SAND CIRCLES

Not since FWY!'s San Gabriel have I been so instantly struck by a piece of lo-fi synthesized sound. 2012's Motor City hits everything  - it sounds old, but not "old" like an artist trying to recreate another time, instead it sounds like it is from another time altogether. It sounds advanced, careful, creative...like what someone in the past thought minimal synth and electronic ambiance was going to sound like in the future, and not the other way around. There's a lot more to investigate with SAND CIRCLES and its creator Martin Herterich, but I'll leave that to another time. Perhaps (unfortunately) another life, but thankfully this one is in the current one. 

SAND CIRCLES

PLANET ON A CHAIN

If you were even casually tuned into the USDIYHC Internet in 2020, then you heard about PLANET ON A CHAIN. Back in early Covid times, the folks from MUTILATED TONGUE recorded ten songs and shipped them off to Texas to get the treatment from Dave Ackerman (TEAR IT UP, OBEDIENCE, animal control, etc). Dave gave it the treatment, and the result was twelve of the best minutes in USHC for all of 2020...then Blind Rage slapped that tape on wax and it became twelve of the best minutes in USHC in 2021, too. I can't really shower any more praise on this recording than the USDIYHC Internet already has, but it's all warranted. Shit, if this were a one song tape and the song was "Counterattack," then I would still probably drool all over this motherfucker like I just did.

 THIS WON'T GET ANY FUCKING BETTER

Lots of links in that post - this one is still for sale virtually and physically from the band and the label. 

You know how this shit works. 

BUGHOUSE i

 

Not Normal is straight up one of the best punk labels in North America. Understated and too often under the radar, with a roster that's just stacked beyond belief, folks just keep cranking out bangers (most recently from MISTER, so I guess I'm back on Milwaukee trip...kinda) and they never seem to disappoint.  And since we're on the subject of "not disappointing," this Bughouse i jammer from 2015 is pretty much unstoppable. Almost forthy cuts from AMERICAN HATE ("Forever In Debt" might just steal the whole comp, so listen for that shit), LEECH, YOUTH SUCKS, OTHERIZED, THE FLOOR ABOVE, MYSTIC INANE, BOOTS, ORDEN MUNDIAL...not to mention BUGG , THE BUG and SLUGBUGS. There's more, of course: TENEMENT, BAGHEAD, NEGATIVE SCANNER, FOGG's "Childryn" is probably the biggest "wtf?" moment and I'm sure I'm missing something but the shit is all killer. I repeat - Not Normal rules. 

BUGHOUSE i

MUTATED VOID

 

Well, I guess we're gonna go back to talking about Canada's Atlantic Provinces. Again. This motherfucker is just unreal - seven pieces of perfectly executed North American Hard Core of the highest quality and appropriately moderate fidelity. You hear "Darkness Over Light" and it hits so hard because it sounds like something that should have kicked your ass the year you got into hardcore - when you and your buddies were frantically taping records and demos for each other and passing them back and forth trying to simultaneously discover and share the best bands you had never heard. MUTATED VOID sound like the best band that you discovered that year...but let's be honest: probably better. 

POWERSLIDE YOUR POWER // EAT THE CONCRETE FLOWER

SKATE-A-RAMA

 

Really, I should be posting this on Escape Is Terminal because it's a live recording. But y'all don't look at that shit so I'm gonna put it on The Main Stage. The title says it all, pretty much: on a November evening in 1986, there was a pretty stunning gig at Skate-A-Rama in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma and it was captured by someone in the audience. The recording is thin, and pretty rough in places, but it's all there...and it rules. Only three tracks from the FACE FIRST set (including "Little Man" from their near perfect self titled EP) who were on fire at that show. Four blasts of high energy CRYPTIC SLAUGHTER-esque thrash from R.I.P., possibly the only recording of this band that survived the decade. But of course you're still reading this because of the headliner. Tulsa's N.O.T.A. are easily Oklahoma's most notable hardcore export, and they are so fucking fast here that it hurts. Recorded just before they split up (the first time) with a lineup that featured Dave Scum (who had been associated with or friends with the band for years) on vocals while Jeff played guitar. Original guitarist Russel had left the band by this point and they had a replacement bassist as well, so it's a maybe a bit of a scab version of N.O.T.A., but holy shit this set is fast. Scum's vocals give tracks like "Police Front" a kick in the ass, and some of the shit is so fast it's barely recognizable....a studio recording with this lineup would have been a welcome gift to late '80s hardcore. Six cuts, interrupted by a fight. Because of course. 

LIVE AT SKATE-A-RAMA

CHISTIAN SCIENCE MINOTAUR

 

Throughout the late '00s, the Peasant Magik label released a steady stream of (at least) interesting) and (often) excellent experimental and/or dark ambient tapes. There's not really a through line with the sounds or the artists, though there are several releases tied to PILLARS OF HEAVEN, but virtually everything I've come across is worth picking up...like CHRISTIAN SCIENCE MINOTAUR's Map 3 (of 9), the third (obviously) release in a four tape (not quite as obviously) series. The drones are sometimes anxious and awkward, sometimes ominous, and "Tashtego (A)/(B)" spans the two sides of the tape sneaking subtle programmed beats and manipulated instrumentation underneath the surface before "Queenqueg" closes the tape like you're just out of range of a radio station broadcasting (important) messages from other worlds. Though it runs just 25 minutes, Map 3 settles in so effectively that I feel an absence that I can't quite define when it runs its course...as if the sounds are just supposed to be there. And then they aren't. 

MAP 3 (OF 9)

B-WARD

 

Santa Rosa gets left out of conversations about "Bay Area" punk way too often. It's a solid hour away from SF (without traffic), but it's definitely a part of the same general metropolitan area...even though it's a different world in many ways. First time I played there was in '95 with SCHLONG, and we felt like we were in some backwoods town in Tennessee when we rolled up, but it also felt like the Bay Area. These observations are all just excuses to share B-WARD's 2017 tape, of course, because no matter how you want to classify the place geographically, the town has produced some good ass bands, like B-WARD. Three cuts here - no bullshit, hard hitting dark punk. Two burners and a howling misty stomp called "Silent Scream." Also, I work with a guy who refers to Santa Rosa as "god's country," which I just think is kinda weird.

B-WARD