Polyester Catacomb
Rambling About Jams From Long Ago & Other Things
Cold & Numb
Now bear with me a minute - I’ve been feeling my age in both good ways and bad lately so this short and sweet bit of word vomit is gonna be a bit sentimental. I just started playing music last night with some fellow geriatric punk rockers where I, at 50 years old, am the baby in the band. In the face of agile youth hell bent on early graves, its a lot of fun to be playing music with people who’ve been around, seen some things, been through some shit, and come out on the other side. I’ve bitched and moaned before here about how punk is about creating space and is for all ages. The youth love to yammer about youth culture this and how old people are clueless that and while there is some truth in that, it is really edifying hanging out with people who understand the reality of making punk a threat (or is it a treat?) in the face of growing older and taking on more of what life is and can be.
Maybe I think too much on this - my therapist would say that the problem isn’t thinking about it too much but more what you do in the face of the paradox of growing older while holding on to the things that you value from your youth.
Punk Is Verzet.
Enough rambling - here’s what I’ve been listening to and thinking about while trying to write for this project aka your Thursday playlist:
The first SF hardcore band? Probably? Maybe? Mobile Home is the fucking jam and paints such an effective picture of being down and out in Reagan’s America. “Now do you see just a little bit of a paradox? Lving or dead - You’re stuck in a box! Your life goes on - it′s your last resort. On a dead end road, in a trailer court”
I saw Ignition at a house show in like 1988 (or was it 1989?) and it was both life changing and affirming. Alec Mackaye remains the coolest motherfucker on the planet.
While some prefer the more straight forward How We Feel I enjoy the more refined anger and riffing on this bit of Norwegian punk. The only way to live is against the grain.
Do you even know what riffs are if you don’t like this record? Absolutely rampaging hardcore punk with killer guitar work.
Maybe one of the most underrated of the class of UK82 - its somber, angry, and absolutely powerful.
This band went on to be a sorta meh pop punk band on Hopeless Records but this LP is just insanely ripping - blazing thrash that doesn’t lose its sense of melody. It’s like Hüsker Dü if they had leaned more into the Discharge side of their Discharge meets The Byrds formula.
Like the Underdogs, totally underrated stuff from the misery of Thatcher’s England. You can just feel the utter state of horror being inflicted on the poor by the Iron Lady’s Right Wing bulldozer - something that is sadly relatable to our current world.
The predecessor to So Much Hate - you can hear the hints of what is to come in Børre Løvik’s guitar work later on. One of those foundational bands for what is to come in later on and so crucial to the 80s notion of an international hardcore punk network of friends.
I mean, duh. Most people prefer Mush but for me, this is the perfect LP - a bit rawer and aggro but still soaked in mountains of melody steeped in whiskey and cigarettes. Peasant in Paradise is a perfect song, maybe the most perfect song.
While I prefer the earlier albums musically, I think this record is really important - written much later in their career when most bands tend to shy away from an explicit and pointed political approach, they dive in with both feet while retaining a sense of aggression musically.
Can't argue, solid list!