Is This Culture?
Brief musings on recent zines and hearing destruction...
For all the shit
For all the dear departed
For all the war
We’ve still got beer
-Hard Skin
I want to start out this week talking about a couple zines that have shown up in my inbox - if you know anything about me, you know I have a basic mantra of ‘only print is real,’ and yes I get the irony of typing this out to be served up on the information super highway. The thing is, this is temporary. The promise of the internet was that we would have easy access to information at the touch of our fingers and fundamentally forever but, we all know that isn’t true. From albums you purchased to stream via Amazon, to film studios just outright deleting and denying the ability to access certain movies, to digital publications shutting down and deleting years worth of writing and documentation - well, the story goes on and on. In many ways, the ease of the internet has helped connect and grow the punk world globally but it remains up to us to continue to document and preserve it in manner which doesn’t allow for its erasure at the whim of some detached exec making budgetary choices.
But enough of my rambling and proselytizing let’s talk about what matters - first up, I am so stoked to see there is a new issue of AT HOME - this Drew has absolutely outdone themselves. Twenty-four tabloid sized pages with beautiful reproductions of images to accompany interviews with absolutely legendary punk photographers Cynthia Connolly, Justine Demetrick, Brian Maryansky, and the founder of Closer Skateboarding Magazine, photographer Jaime Owens. As a photographer the depth of detail around process, decisions you make as an artist and general philosophy Drew goes into with the respective image makers is outstanding. This is all rounded out by excellent personal writing around Bruce Springsteen and the joys/pains of being on tour. I’m just in awe of this project - its inspiring and just a beautiful creation. One to track down for sure.
I’ve also been luck to acquire a few recent issues of Possessed - self described as a fanzine for slackers & haters, obviously something I can relate to. Each issue is jam packed with opinions, funny cartoons, well done interviews, record reviews and chaotic mayhem all crammed into too few pages of a half sized publication. Seriously one of the best to do it these days and a must read for anyone remotely interested in punk, hardcore, and all points in between.
AMUSEMENT - Walk Out To Sink b/w You Will Never Hear This 45
Somehow I missed this last week - companion debut release for this Portland band taking heavy cues from that late 80s ‘college rock’ sound (MOVING TARGETS, LEMONHEADS, Homestead Records, etc). Melodic, driving, and anthemic punk that’s like a missing chapter from that book Our Band Could Be Your Life. Great stuff.
BLEAKNESS - Words b/w Greed 45
Moody French punk that less goth and more 80s SoCal punk with some garage rock overtones - think RIKK AGNEW’s solo record or Living In Darkness AGENT ORANGE. The A-side is a killer track for sure.
Heavy as shit metallic crust from Texas - snarling vocals over a massive sounding wall of guitars and drums. It’s got dive bombs, heavy mosh parts and double bass. You’ll probably wanna smash your coffee table to this.
CARRIE DAIRY - Carrie Dairy n' The Carrie Dairies CS
Trashy, garage punk from Missouri. Fuzzed out, hyper lo-fi in that REATARDS meets OBLIVIONS sorta way without the full homage to Memphis rocknroll history. They’ve got songs like “Hot Dog Husband” and “My Girlfriend Hates The Beach Boys” so you know this rules.
Iron City punx taking a crusty d-beat romp fused with heavy metal flourishes - this feels like a cider and butt flap fueled party live.
DEATHKNELL - Taste The Bitter End Of A Once Brilliant Dream LP
Pummeling crust from Calgary - eight relentless tracks of steady, jack hammering hardcore with a lot of City Weapons-era INEPSY style flare. You can almost see the swirling mass of black clad and studded maniacs losing their shit to this.
DIAMOND DOGS - World Serpent LP
Hammering Oi from Holland that tricks you at first into thinking you’re about to delve into a heaping bowl of anarcho pie and right before you walk out the door to free the henge it switches to this more straight froward, stomping skinhead rocknroll attack. A little plodding at times but that can be typical for the genre - this is well executed and perfect gift for your Fredy Perry clad friend at Christmas.
DIE IN VAIN - Savage New Times EP
Turkish in origin but musically this sounds straight out the UK82/Riot City playbook - hammering drums, chanted vocals in that sorta staccato football riot manner eviscerating the current shit state of things, and just cooking along in this mid pace pogorific manner. Fat Bob from HARD SKIN likes it, so just get stuck in you cowards.
DOUBLE ME / FUCK ON THE BEACH split EP
Two absolute ripping ragers tearing through eight tracks in total of high octane thrash - DOUBLE ME contribute six tracks, taking a bass and drum approach that reminds me a bit of GODSTOMPER. On the flip, the legends, FUCK ON THE BEACH, only contribute two blasts, one being a take on CHAOS UK’s “No Security” which absolutely rules. Is this power violence? Is this my beautiful home? My god, what have we done?
EXCITED TO DIE - This Is A Life? CS
Twenty tracks in about as minutes but this ain’t no thrash-o-rama, rather some jangly, old fashion USHC. Devoid of distortion and blast beats, it takes its cues more from bands like the FREEZE or current bands like MILK. Members of MUTATED VOID, BOOJI BOYS, and THE HOLD, for those keeping score. This rules.
GRISAILLE - Entre Deux Averses... EP
New project from members of SYNDROME 81 and MENTALITÉ 81. Obviously this rules, like you know its gonna rule but you don’t know how much its gonna rule and then you listen to it and you are like fuck me this ruuuuuules. It’s more of the same from these folx - melodic, slightly new wave vibes, jangly guitars but fuck a duck can they write melodies, hooks, chorus, bridges - just everything. Like, it’s unreal how good they are at this - absolutely brilliant.
Irreverent, spiteful, and delightfully pissed off hardcore punk from Vancouver (me thinks). Imagine the snotty, filthy rage of the CRUCIFUCKS’ Doc Dart but with a less annoying vocal approach - like he made sweet love with Henry Rollins and produced this piss and vinegar soaked baby. Super duper killer.
Short, fast and loud rules, ok! Toronto punks taking in the full embrace of primitive, slashing, spirit of 1980 USHC - that sweet era when punk rock deviance and snot danced arm in arm with head shorn Neanderthals. Lyrics in both Tagalog and English. Really cool.
MURO - Imperio Es Ascenso Flexi
Its such an exciting and wonderful thing to see a new release from Colombia’s MURO. Seeing them in Toronto a few years back was both life changing and affirming - on this new release we find two quick blasts of rabid hardcore punk - its catchy while being off kilter and totally raging. Obvies you need this.
Raw-as-fuck, primitive as shit, DISCHARGE meets DISCLOSE style hardcore - more noise for punx, etc. No metal bullshit. No funk. No pop bullshit. Just pure d-beat destruction.
Catchy as shit street punk from Richmond - big choruses, big guitars, and heavy beat. When you factor in this is people from VIRUS and MINDSET, it makes sense in how it has a predominant UK82 street punk with the feral energy of USHC feel but there are moments here that echo back to that more Chiswick Records/Pub Rock thing. The track “Bread & Roses” is outstanding.
PARANOIAS - Chemical Sustain LP
Totally rip and slash, thrashing surf guitar style punk - snotty and obnoxious in the best way vocals, echo soaked riffs, steady drums and just this overall all crash the beach party, steal all their drugs and pet their dogs vibe. I love this record.
PUTRID FUTURE - Nightmare Reality CS
Brutal crust that feels like a missing Profane Existence band from 1994. Snarly, guttural vocals, grinding guitar tone, mad blasts of speed alternating with stomping sludge - just the right tinge of metal and gloom to get a room of dreadlock crusties worked up into quite the sweat and beer soaked lather.
It is always hard to write about classic hardcore bands releasing new material without jumping back and comparing it something they did twenty, thirty, forty years prior… I mean RATTUS formed in 1978!! It’s like no shit they don’t sound the same as they did back then - I mean WC Räjähtää sounds nothing like Khomeini-Rock and they’re only a couple years apart! I try to listen to things in the context of, if this was a new band would I like it and I can soundly say that I would - it sounds modern and fresh with plenty of aggression, hooks, complicated song writing and not at all dated. My first impression was that this doesn’t really sound ‘Finnish’ in the traditional manic and intense sort of way - its more free flowing and just breathes without losing the sense of angst. Like to be honest, it feels like they’ve been listening to a lot of Eastern European bands like DEZERTER or INNOXIA CORPORA in how they play with time signatures, speed, stops and starts and the like. Totally solid release.
Indonesian skinhead band that mirrors that sorta thinly produced, jangly guitar 80s French Oi meets early TEMPLARS thing. I’m a sucker for this sorta stuff.
RICHMOND VAMPIRE - I’ve Done My Time In The Sun CS
Thrashing hardcore from here in Richmond with plenty of face stomping breakdowns. Energy soaked and utterly ferocious matching their live sets.
Icy cold, metallic hardcore from this Swedish supergroup - epic, thrashing, and utterly crushing. Think INTEGRITY meets a more primitive CANDY. Former and current members of TOTALT JÄVLA MÖRKER, DS13, and CULT OF LUNA for those keeping score and looking for a frame of reference, this is their third release and probably my favorite.
Six blasts of downtuned, kinda sludgy, crust brutality in way that remind me of PHOBIA meets SKAVEN - though maybe its more of the feeling of that LA/Long Beach scene from twenty years back. Its thick like molasses and while it maintains a lot speed it just kinda oozes and snarls its way around the songs.
SCÄRETACTIC - A Plea For End Demo
Thrashy, downtuned, crusty hardcore from Asheville, NC. A dirty, raw and full throated political onslaught on all the bastards that tend to make life shit. I welcome more of this for sure!
SHRINKWRAP KILLERS Feed the Clones, Pt. 1 LP
I’m so excited for this record - perfect new wave inspired, paranoia inducing punk in the manner of the THE SPITS from the musical wizard known as Greg Wilkinson (AUTOPSY, DEATHGRAVE, BRAINOIL, etc). I was lucky to be able to include a limited lathe cut EP with an early issue of Razorblades & Aspirin so it almost goes without saying how much I love this continuing project. Lyrics about clones, reptillians, big brother and the special relationship between parents and the FBI involving ‘sperm socks.’ Fucking brilliant.
1-2-1-2, pookapooka punk that just pulsates and throbs at this relentless place - almost garage like in its production and snot but definitely more punk and pissed off than what is typical for that garage punk land. And pissed off is certainly what this little platter is…
Social Assassin - Your Shadow EP
Given all the piss and vinegar on these two EPs, I have to wonder if the name comes from that episode of Curb Your Enthusiasm where Jeff declares that is what Larry is - those familiar with the show know how Larry David is a person so done with the bullshit of the world and so eager to point it out how fucked it is that he is a sometimes ruiner of relationships, a social assassin. Anyway, like their other release we find six tracks of fuzz-o-rama distortion, steady drumming and pissed as shit vocals.
STUPIDS - Slow On The Uptake LP
Wow! Just wow! I had to check but yes this is the same UK hardcore band from the 80s who played ripplingly fast but melodic punk that owes more to SoCal hardcore like DOGGY STYLE & RKL than the dour crust and metal of the UK age they came up in. Beyond the production being better theres not much different to be found here than what was one their initial release in 1984. Its goofy yet catchy as hell - I’m so excited to have turned this up! Fucking great.
More filthy and rabid hardcore from the city of brotherly love - eight tracks of absolutely ripping hardcore gluing together and modernizing the brutality of YDI and UNITED MUTATION and fermenting it in a vat of molten GBH hooks, and JERRYS KIDS velocity. Brilliant.
WREATHE- The Land Is Not An Idle God LP
London based WREATHE play a dark, brooding and moody take on hardcore that echoes back to later years of HIS HERO IS GONE and the early era of TRAGEDY. Longer more expansive songs with tinges of melody and a mournful tinge. The lyrics take a ecological bent with need to fight back against mankind’s destructive war against nature. It’s an epic, brutal and really great record.
