Heavy, intense, and instantly engaging UK hardcore. The guitars dominate this release—heavy mosh metal chugs interrupted by melodic leads that manage to land organically between Euro-crust and mid-’80s Mould. GRAND COLLAPSE is fast, sometimes even sounding like they finished writing a song and consciously decided “that’s cool…faster would be even cooler” (they were right). Empty Plinths is an injection, hard to not feel fucking amped after listening.
Seventeen songs here, with the longest clocking in at 1:29. Short, fast, hardcore songs that strangely don’t use distortion on the guitars. I don’t particularly know how I feel about this. The songs are good, but the lack of distortion is off-putting to say the least. I wanna like this, and I think I do, but the sound of the guitar is fucking with my brain. Like it’s seriously giving me a borderline panic attack. Hahaha.
Split release between Orange County’s CORRUPT VISION and France’s JODIE FASTER. CORRUPT VISION plays thrashing, in-your-face fastcore with some ska breakdowns; not necessarily resorting to the crack rocksteady model, but heavier on the fastcore end. JODIE FASTER plays fastcore with clean guitars reminiscent of ’80s Italian band PEGGIO PUNX. Personal preferences aside, this is a great split release where both bands sound different enough while still having a similar quality that doesn’t resort to dark noisiness or heavy sounds. Raging anti-authoritarian speedcore intensity.
Copenhagen’s NEXØ plays an obnoxious arrangement of post-punk skate rock with interludes of twisted cold/no wave, similar to if DEPECHE MODE collaborated with PROPAGANDHI and added even more thrash elements. The trudging riffs of SKITKIDZ and the optimistic speed of NO HOPE FOR THE KIDS. Overall, this is quite unique, and I give it great acclaim for that. Super well-produced and masterfully played punk rock. The minimal vocals are excellent—when they are on, they are intense. NEXØ makes a racket that is perfect to zone out in for measures longer than usually edited for this style of music. So NEXØ brings forth the unexpected and they do it well. There is a lunacy to their music, but it is very precisely rehearsed. I don’t know where to categorize this outside of art-core proto-punk. There are some elements of industrial and carnival madness. The LP listen only gets faster, like a ride you can’t get off, interspersed with melodic soundscapes throughout. Sheer escapist punk with a lot of heart.
I’m certainly intrigued when the first track is called “Jazz Wasps.” Holy shit, I haven’t heard anything with horns in a while. And to hear it working in a punk record is wild and surprising. This is like if the poetic rhythm of INSTIGATORS played as hard as SPITE UK or POLICE BASTARD but with saxophones! The bold venture alone is worth acknowledgement, but damn, I’m really moved by this. Fire solos, steady D-beat with slightly snotty, slightly robotic vocals. Chaos ensues! Some tracks are as fast and outrageous as GAUZE, others as heavy and classically-driven as DOOM. As a saxophone player in my youth, I kind of always wanted to trill over hardcore punk or even ambient black metal, and I find PI$$ER hugely inspiring. The horns are complementary to both guitar and bass—not to be ignored, but in no way steer the intention away from punk. This seriously fucking works! And I’m going nowhere near the “S-word.” More like JOHN ZORN playing DISCHARGE, SORE THROAT, or PLEASANT VALLEY CHILDREN. War-siren, dismal alto octave dissidence as fuck. Lyrics about living and learning and gaining those experiences. “Life = Art / Art = Life!,” as it says in the liner notes. Agreed. I’m not going to get into the amazing band connections this group has, that is not the point. This is totally new. A rad project you’ve done here, PI$$ER.
The DOMESTICS put a brand stamp on their specific style of hardcore with this release, like putting the best elements of old and new school hardcore in a blender: fast, raw, and brutal. Guitar solos are often stripped to just a quick pick slide before the vocal attack returns. “Purchases” and “Falling Apart” are both killer songs with interesting structures and tidy musicianship. If you like hardcore, then I guarantee you’ll like this.
As we witness the decay of the physical parts of punk, like the disappearance of the printed word and the records we used to hold in our hands, one of the earliest casualties was always going to be the compilation LP. These motherfuckers are hard to make good, you know? It’s like going to those goddamn ten band bill shows, where five people watch the band they came to see, and everyone goes outside to smoke during the rest of the night. So when I hear a comp LP in 2019 of bands I’ve never heard of and find it to be completely listenable and varied, I get pretty fucking stoked. Slobbery two-finger metal, tolerable Fat stuff, pop punk, dark synthy post-punk, drooling robo punk, cleaned-up crust, and even some fucking ska metal. I gotta hand it to these fine folks, as this is all over the place and still not fucking terrible. There’s a shit ton of sneer and bile in almost all the vocals, like every singer went to the same laryngitis-inducing singing school. Seventeen tracks, and financed by seven different record labels, which is kinda goofy, but hey, that’s the price you gotta pay to put out records in a time when nobody is buying. Definitely worth checking out.
Brighton’s ÄTTESTOR made me feel anxious from the start—self-described ADHD-beat punks deliver straight-for-the-throat hardcore punk with a decidedly erratic bent that will make you clench your fists unconsciously. On the flip, ZERO AGAIN from Bristol goes heavier, goes darker, and paints a bleak sonic picture over their two tracks. The chorus riff in “Damaged Goods” is a should-be classic, and the entire song seems to set the tone for the unleashing of fury that fills the final 30 seconds. Not only is there no filler on this split, there’s barely time to take a fukkn breath.
