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Dial Club, a new cassette label out of Japan, brings us this Buenos Aires duo’s first two demos combined into a single release. RUDIX plays bratty, frantic garage punk in the vein of LOLI AND THE CHONES, and the eight tracks on this cassette are loud, fast, tinny as hell, and over nearly as soon as they start—just as god (or at least Greg Lowery) intended! Real good shit!
Denver, Colorado is killing it with hardcore at the moment, and SMEAR CAMPAIGN is no exception. This is some gnarly, vicious, fast solo hardcore with super blasted, blown-out “production.” Asa, the person behind SMEAR CAMPAIGN, is clearly a big fan of URBAN BLIGHT, ‘cus this sounds a lot like they did. If you’re into URBAN BLIGHT and the ferocious Boston HC sound and such, this scorcher will be right up your alley. And clocking in at a blink-and-you’ll-miss-it running time of just over three minutes, you’ll be sticking this rager on repeat over and over. You know what they say; the best music only leaves you wanting more.
Second slammer from Cleveland’s Delayed Gratification to pass through my ears this month, and like the opening track pleads: “I just need more.” Three doses of ripping USHC from Akron’s S.M.I.L.E.—nothing fancy but very special indeed. A logical extension of the BIB, S.H.I.T., HOAX-style hardcore that (justifiably) dominated the mid-’10s, there’s just a touch of groove here and fukk, it just slams so damn hard. More indeed, please.
Maybe it’s just my own personal obsession, but I sensed VELVET UNDERGROUND worship in this and I’m not mad about it. I’m sure there’s other earmarked influences in this, but my ear is catching Matrix Tapes-era but with Bob Quine’s tape recorder, except it was recorded in a living room in 2022 and the four-track is broken (at their own admission). It’s audible especially in the final track as you hear it reel its last, but the crackle of analog death adds a certain charm of imperfection to the whole thing. It’s an additional layer to the double-time guitar, thumpy dead string bass, and drums that sound like those kid’s kits with the paper heads. Each song is maxed out at 1:30, so you’ll be in and out with it in less than ten minutes. It’s econo, it’s budget; they call it “dunce,” but it’s certainly not dim. “Piss Grave” and its bouncy bassline is a standout from the bunch.
Well, I’m a big dumb idiot. I sat on this record for nearly a month before giving it a spin because I was dreading reviewing it. I’d never heard of the band, their name seemed annoyingly generic, and I could easily imagine this cover being slapped on a record I hated. Plus it’s a whole damn LP! That means that I’m going to have to endure eleven songs and 30-plus minutes of music that probably sucks over the course of multiple listens. Except, it doesn’t suck. Not even a little bit. Turns out VISION 3D, a trio out of Toulouse, France, has cobbled together one of the best guitar rock records I’ve heard in a long time, by combining nearly everything I’ve loved about garage punk over the past twenty years. Throughout the record you’ll get snatches of the COUNTRY TEASERS’ detuned cowpoke post-punk, THEE OH SEES’ trebly reverbed-to-hell garage-psych freakouts, the early BLACK LIPS’ “I’ve Got a Knife” attitude, and, for good measure, MAN OR ASTRO-MANS?’s outer space raygun surf. Then that’s all topped with some great multi-tracked vocals that would fit in somewhere among a KLEENEX-ish yelp, the too-cool-for-school contemporary post-punk vocals of the WORLD, and the avant-garage-pop chanson of STEREOLAB or the LIMIÑANAS. Just an absolutely fantastic record put out by a band with an actually fitting name that, in retrospect, has a perfect cover. I wish I’d had an additional month with it.
My first time hearing Peruvian hardcore, and it sounds good. It came to my attention that ATROPELLO!! is made up of some Peruvian veterans of the hardcore punk scene. Equal parts Scandinavian punk and Italian hardcore, these Peruvian aggressors play a raw and spastic brand of hardcore. There is always this underlying chaotic quality that seems to be the glue to what they do. Putting Peru on the punk map.
The second EP from the Washington, DC band BRAIN TOURNIQUET is a bouquet of pain and fury. The band, formed by members of PURE DISGUST and TRUTH CULT, knows how to give their own twist to a genre (powerviolence/fastcore or whatever you want to call it) that we know has a limited creative spectrum. And they do it with songs whose foundation is anger, and from that base they build small monuments to bad vibes with a brutal musicianship and very imaginative arrangements. A very pleasant surprise.
Either the snobbiest of all punk record releases or an elaborate and well-executed joke on behalf of the band, this is a limited edition lathe-cut 7” of a single track recorded live at the Curtarock Festival in Italy, limited to just 25 copies pressed. Perhaps even funnier, this “piece of history” was not yet sold out at the time of this writing. Musically, it’s pretty cool. “Commotion” is a kind of nihilistic post-punk/no wave jam that reminds me a bit of Richmond’s stellar BLACK BUTTON. Get yours while supplies last.
Where did this come from—somehow this sweaty outfit has been active just a few hours south of here for almost twenty years and I hear about them now?! To be fair, this is likely more a reflection on me than CHAR-MAN, but damn, do I have some catching up to do. “Shake Your Hips” is laid-back STOOGES monotony with undeniable modern swagger, while “Shitwrecked” is a demonstration of the beauty in pure simplicity. Garage punk rock’n’roll at its finest —what an absolutely stellar two-song banger!
Titan riffs coming through from Belgium’s DAYS OF DESOLATION. DAYS OF DESOLATION play hyper-blast grinding crust as a three-piece, with morose chords beneath the fury. Cacophonous synth subtleties are dispersed within the tracks and sound squeamishly off-putting with ominous dread. This is quite technical with all the grit of classic crust. Thinking NASUM, GADGET, SNIFTER, early INSISION, or more recently, SAYYADINA, D.E.R., P.L.F., or GRUELING SENTENCE. A fine mix of prog ambiance and pulverizing grindcore with nodes of death metal and crust. DAYS OF DESOLATION tether between exhausting blasts and well-composed passages that grab you by the throat. I admit I sort of lost touch with this style of crust-grind, but DAYS OF DESOLATION have my eyes bulging out with attention. With songs titles such as “King of Pikes,” “Autumn,” “Your Prerogative,” and “Hypersleep,” I feel like I will grow to give this one a much deeper connective listen over the coming months. A definite for manic grind blasters that like their crust extra heavy and their death extra fast. I also have learned DAYS OF DESOLATION are on the CAPITALIST CASUALTIES tribute album, so that rules. Circles is their first LP after an EP, and it slays.
Fourth LP from father/daughter team Kenny and Inez McClain, the EXBATS take flight from the deserts of southern Arizona. At first glance, I hear the song writing sensibilities of ’60s girl groups (the BANGLES, with drummer/vocalist Debbi Peterson, to boot) on songs like “Best Kiss,” but with heavier influences from the punk genre, and similar to early ’00s the LIKE in this convergence. But EXBATS don’t pigeonhole themselves. Themes of country twang appear in “Practice On Me,” and “Hey New Zealand” describes eco-disasters, atypical of jangly garage pop.
Well good goddamn, would you look at that. Seven years after the release of their last record, Leeds’ own superstars the FLEX are back with a brand new album. As they say; if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it, and the Burley Boys understand this mantra all too well. The sound on Chewing Gum For the Ears is nothing short of classic FLEX—fast, old school Boston-style hardcore with plenty of mosh parts included (of course). This new LP includes some of their most blistering compositions yet, including “War Boy,” “Voight-Kampff,” and the mind-blowing closing title track (my favourite song on the album). It’s been a while, but the lads still have it down to a T. This has been possibly my most anticipated release of the past four years and it truly delivered on all fronts, and, at the end of the day, was well worth the wait. The New Wave of British Hardcore may be dead, but the FLEX lives on—ten years strong and hopefully many more to come. Cannot recommend this slab enough.
The latest single from GENTLEMEN ROGUES picks right back up from where their last 7” left off. Great, catchy, sugary sweet power pop that wouldn’t be out of place next to your SUPERDRAG and BOB MOULD/SUGAR records. Highly recommended to anyone who digs the aforementioned bands, or cruising with the windows down on a late spring day. Fingers crossed that there’s a full-length in the works.
I AM THE FLY is a synth punk duo out of Essen, Germany. The players here identify as “Musca domestica ♂” and “Musca domestica ♀,” so that should give you a pretty good idea of what we’re dealing with. The music is pretty by-the-book for this kind of stuff—skittery drum machine beats, post-punky bass lines, and kitschy sci-fi synths. The vocal delivery falls somewhere between a sing-songy chat and like a dry physics lecture. It’s clearly a choice—one that might even work were the lyrics less awkward! Instead we’re getting clunkers like “The least enjoyable part of my existence / Is your existence.” I’m sure I would have been kinder to the record had the lyrics been in German, but I still don’t think there’s enough going on here to say that I would have enjoyed these songs—an assessment I feel pretty shitty about making seeing as how I only speak one language and cannot, for the life of me, write music. So, if you’re less likely to be annoyed by lyrics and just love downer-y robotic synth punk, give this a go.
Massive guitar/drums duo from Minneapolis, streamlined and ready to get stuck in your head. Classic high-energy garage sounds, simultaneously dumbed down and beefed up at so every song is full, powerful, and addictive.
Split 7” from two synth-addled punk collectives. X-ACTO layers lo-fi insect synths over garage hardcore with goofy lyrics. “Smell Like Beef” sounds like a malfunctioning Speak & Spell holding its own with the punks. The chorus is “What’s that smell? I smell like beef.” Kinda gross. During the bridge on “Blastbeats,” the buzzing electronics and drums evoke the LOCUST, but not quite as heavy. For fans of RESEARCH REACTOR CORPORATION. PARANOISE’s side is, and I don’t particularly like this word, wackier. One of the first records I ever bought was a MAN OR ASTRO-MAN? 7”, and when I got it home, I played it at the wrong speed and sat there like, “What the fuck is this? It sounds like cartoons.” PARANOISE gives me the same feeling, like everything is sped up and just a little off. What I do like is the chromatic riffing they do and the relentless downbeat drumming on “Sixth Kind.” Try as hard as they might to be eggy dorks, it’s a hardcore ripper. Recommended if you thought the CONEHEADS played it a little too seriously.
“The REAL DISTRACTIONS love rock’n’roll,” and from this Olympia quartet’s prestigious pedigree and the songs on this quarantine EP, I believe that love has got to be real. The guitar rings out with power pop build-ups and a tingle of bubblegum glam raunch on the edges. The electric piano has that reedy Wurlitzer garage rock rattle, a texture I just absolutely adore. On all four songs, the dual vocals meet up in the middle like a secret handshake but also have their own moments at the mic. The bass and drums keep it punchy and tight, shifting into the sometimes snakey time changes but exploding with big dynamic fills, all while still staying in the driver’s seat, keeping the van going all night. While the band has studied their well-flipped 45s and the songs are classically catchy, they’re still lyrically modern, with connections to the real world in real time and not just rock’n’roll revivalist tropes. The REAL DISTRACTIONS have such high-quality ingredients as a band, and the combination of them compliments each other perfectly—like tomatoes, mozzarella, olive oil, and basil come together on a warming slice of Old School pizza. And like a good slice, it leaves me wanting more, so here’s hoping for a West Coast tour, or else I’ll have to make my way to Olympia and catch them on their home turf.
Boy howdy is the reissue industrial complex ever fucking exhausting, but even a stopped clock is right twice a day. Sydney, Australia’s SEEMS TWICE crammed twelve blasts of completely devolved art-punk (the longest of which maxed out at 43 seconds) onto a one-and-done 1980 EP, blitzing through each track with an economical severity befitting Pink Flag-era WIRE, if Pink Flag had been generously splattered with the collapsing primitivism of the URINALS. The original Non-Plussed 7” fetches around half a grand on the current market (that’s about $100 per minute of total runtime) and the prospects of a reissue seemed exceedingly remote as time marched on, until this 12” version appeared out of nowhere last month, an unanticipated answer to years of prayer-like thoughts. Antipodean no wave rhythms scatter in all directions on half-minute burners “Real Arafat” and “Look At It,” like cockroaches after a lightswitch flip—rumbling, almost MINUTEMEN-ish bass grooves collide into flailing spin-cycle drums and frantic guitar scratch, with shouted lyrics spilling out in breathless rushes approximating a cracked verse/chorus structure in the barest minimum of lines (and seconds). Totally fast and fucked-up enough to win points with the hardcore crowd allergic to all things “art,” but these are some legit freak sounds. Utterly unassailable OZ DIY brilliance!
Disorienting guitar opens the tape, then the rest of the band drops like a bomb to start “Sum Body” and I’m at attention. Mid-paced, deliberately erratic hardcore, with a damage that can only come from millennial-era punks. Dark and serious, down and dirty, Ohio’s SOUR hits like a fukkn wrecking ball and while you’re turning up the volume, they’re turning up the intensity. Howling vocals, entire songs built on indescribable breakdowns—while this is in the speakers, for those nine powerful minutes, I don’t want to hear anything else in the fucking world.
This is the second album by these members of the D4MT Labs family tree, and STRAW MAN ARMY’s branch has grown in considerable length and fruit since their 2020 LP. This is one of the first albums I’ve heard or reviewed recently that feels truly “post-pandemic.” Not in the sense of it being over (an obviously foolish way to think), but more so that it feels of its time, as a reflection and distillation of the feelings and varied collective traumas experienced since March 2020. The anxiety, isolation, unrest, grief, depression, and the front row center seat we’ve had for late capitalism’s corrosive and violent nature on local, national, and international levels. The songs on the record are surgically performed and spartanly recorded—there is nary a wild or unhinged moment, everything is carefully considered. The guitar, bass, drums, and vocals together sound like a tightly executed line drawing. Where the depth, dimension, and color of the album is revealed is in its details, especially the ambient moments that lead you between sides: the meditative synth washes, vibraphone sounds, and bird songs. They give a moment of breath and clarity, a palate cleanser between the grim realism of the songs. These moments and the pacing of the album creates an emotional build-up that follows anger, grief, despondency, and trying to stay empathetic and aware in a world that wants you to become callous and shut off. The songs embrace a mounting tension from the Escher staircase riffs of “Human Kind,” and the accelerating, decelerating train track rhythms of “State of the Art,” a criticism of modern progress and the myth of endless growth, sounding like a stock market bar graph as it rises and eventually falls. “Millenarian Man” is a brilliant merging of the the band and the musique concrète elements into a a truly NY state of mind, the vertigo of skyscrapers, the claustrophobia of crowds, the terror of police sirens. Then once all the confusion and anger of the world in the song becomes too much, they conclude the album with “Beware,” which begins melodic and vulnerable, but ends bitter and seething. STRAW MAN ARMY has created explicitly political music that isn’t phoned-in anti-everything anthems or simplistic catalogs of atrocities, but is a hard, analytical but deeply thoughtful and meditative look at this torrential time frame. SOS is an album that is about staring the nightmare in the mouth and realizing that we can’t just wake up from it or simply go back to sleep.
Inflammatory tape by this hardcore punk band from Los Angeles, California. Five tracks of fierce and pernicious attacks of loud and distorted praises to thrashing around and flipping the finger to this horrible world. I need more TRÄUMER!
Attitude is one of the most, if not the most, important qualities that make up a punk band. Otherwise, it’s just rock’n’roll! VIDRO is all about the angst: the fury that pours through the way the songs play out, and the way the singer spills aggression with every scream. Members from all around the world and a drummer that played in HUVUDTVÄTT, a classic Scandi punk band. Glöd is a great modern banger, a fresh-sounding “fuck you” and then some. This might be your new favourite band, so don’t sleep on it!
Cataclysmic darkwave/post-punk/hardcore sound from Brooklyn’s YOUNG RUINS. The opener “Rabbits” has a tremulous guitar riff like JOY DIVISION’s “New Dawn Fades,” which simply repeats “I could be the god / You could be the lamb / Take you by throat.” Even in our news-cycle culture that has forgotten last month, let alone last year’s news, this recording from 2016, finally released in 2021, is still very current. “Actual Women” and “Law Enforcement” speak for themselves, while “On Hold” encapsulates YOUNG RUINS stream of conscience theme. Songs wonder lyrically, brooding on the mundane, mixed with social conflict, as in “So alive culturally, little house on the BQE / We all still lock our doors at night / Expensive, local, everything” from the closer “Game Over.” The instrumentation is jabby and loud, but with earned breaks from chaos; and mostly the songs move in a single direction: rising crescendo to end right there at the top, ignoring typical verse/chorus patterns. I would highly recommend this cassette.
So, this is an anthology of a decade’s worth of songs from this Las Vegas band. The problem with this is that there have apparently been multiple lineups of this band, and it’s a noticeable difference. On one hand, you have a band that sounds fun and vibrant and very much a punk band, on the other you have a band that is more akin to late ’90s/early ’00s alternative rock. The difference between the differing lineups is almost night and day, and perhaps the “punker” lineup and the “alterna-rock” lineup should have been separated by A-side and B-side so that the listener could literally choose a side.
A versatile mix of fast hardcore, crushing death metal, punishing slow sludge, and weird-ass tempo changes. Not quite powerviolence, not quite fastcore, but they seem to have their shit together and aim for pure aggressive music. The clashing of the genres works very well and the curveballs they throw at you hit like a truck. Formed in 2008, and now on their third album after a truckload of splits and EPs, they seem to be a busy bunch. If you are a fan of NAILS and don’t quite enjoy their newer material, or even if you miss HATRED SURGE, here is a good one for you.
The BLACK GLOVES have been around for a few years now, their first two-song demo dating back to 2017. Here we have a five-song cassette of killer, driving, catchy garage punk from Denver, Colorado. Stripped-down, simplistic, no-frills, and nothing to be desired from this reviewer. A four-year gap between releases may seem like a long time, but with the output being this solid, I will gladly await the third release, which based on what we know, should be out somewhere around November 2025.
Debut album from Milwaukee’s CONVERT, with elements of darkwave and goth in its mood and temper, but faster and closer to post-punk with belabored screams. The ever-present horror movie synth lands a little cheesy for me at times, and I could certainly do without the voice- modulation intros, but I understand the place for both. “Watch It Burn” hits the heaviest, while “Night Bursts” is the most wondering and haunting of the album. Check it out if your teenage angst is bubbling up again.
Third snotty garage slammer in a row, and this one sounds dead ready for a cider-fueled piss-up. Short, snotty punk with a loud ’n clean guitar in your face and a firm tongue in their cheek. I hate the general pub(l)ic too, mate.
This release comprises the DESTRUCTOS demo and some fun remixes in a new package. The band mixes classic rock’n’roll with no wave danger and dancefloor action. Imagine the B-52’S fronted by Lydia Lunch, and you have the sound of the first few songs. “The Sight” has the line, “We got your baby / We ain’t giving it back!” It’s catchy and a little scary. The last two songs before the remixes begin are a little more mellow—the intro to “She’s Got the Master Plan” sounds like a BEDHEAD/SLEATER-KINNEY mashup before garage rock 1-2-1-2 drums back the call-and-response vocals and strummed indie rock progressions. It’s all good, but I prefer the dynamics of these later songs. The remixes are fun reworkings that emphasize the hip-shaking catchiness of the originals. The “Gabber Mix” of “The Sight” goes full-bore ALEC EMPIRE digital hardcore with relentless 808 bass drum mayhem. The “Mr. Policeman Mix” of “Neutron” could have been released on Grand Royal in the ’90s; all crackling vinyl, dubby bass and vocals, and big beat choruses. “She’s Got the Master Plan (Flanafi Mix)” bubbles with rattling techno drums and a hyper-pop approach to the vocals. It accentuates the beauty of the original while becoming something entirely new sounding. Punk remixes are pretty rare, but this tape is a perfectly realized great idea. Rockers on the A-side, party mix on the B-side. Why not?
An eerie intro creeps up on you just before EX(tincion de)-DOM(inio) tears your eardrums apart. This Bremen-based foursome has a couple of known faces and they know what they are doing. Sung in both Spanish and German, it creates a new dimension of aggression in the seven songs that make up this raging demo. Pogo-inducing, DISCHARGE-styled hardcore that sounds fresh and old school at the same time, so it will please newcomers as much as old punks. Watch out for their new releases as well. Highly recommended!
The music here is really driven by the roaring guitar. It sets the pace for the rhythm section rather than vice versa. It’s big, static-y, and yes, “fuzzy.” The band injected a few trad rock’n’roll elements: notes running down the scale and the occasional tamborine. The medieval imagery on this release (and all their others) adds a fun, out of left-field vibe to the music.
We have DEVO-tees and Su Tissue sympathists, but where are the disciples of GEZA X? While his production credits on the first wave of West Coast punk singles are lengthy and legendary (GERMS, BAGS, the oft-bootlegged SCREAMERS demos), aside from his brief time in the DEADBEATS and their crucial Dangerhouse single, GEZA X (with or without his MOMMYMEN) was a musical outlier in the early L.A. punk scene, creating his own art-damaged, cartoony wormhole, not far from DEVO or the SUBURBAN LAWNS but with none of the new wave pop refinements that probably helped bolster those bands’ popularity. GEZA is more uncomfortable, needling and experimental, with sideways time signatures, sax skronks, and rollicking marimba runs, that I would probably file closer between CHROME and the RESIDENTS. He probably would’ve been a great fit on a Ralph Records comp! This 7″ by No Matrix is the first of his solo efforts, demo recordings of “Practicing Mice” (which would reappear on the wacky, wonderful, wildly underrated You Goddam Kids! LP) and “Me No Wanna Be.” Both have his trademark squelchy raygun guitar sound and vocals dripping from his nasal cavity. The lack of a live band is made up by stuttering rhythm machines and haywire synths. As I write, this 7″ is long sold out and No Matrix’s newest archival GEZA release (”Hot Rod / Sex Melt”) is quickly heading that way as well, so act fast before the eventual GEZA-core wave crests in your local scene.
The HAZMATS are a new project featuring members of CHUBBY & THE GANG, GAME, and BIG CHEESE. But instead of being inspired by classic Oi! and hardcore, the two songs here sound as if they were plucked directly from that late ’80s-early ’90s period of UK indie pop. “Empty Rooms” is evocative of the STONE ROSES or TEENAGE FANCLUB, all lush, shimmering guitars and sweet melodies, while “Today” could be easily be a secret C86 compilation track, existing somewhere between the SOUP DRAGONS (in their earlier, scruffier incarnation) and the WEDDING PRESENT. Derivative, maybe, but I love this shit, and these are good songs. More punx should indulge their wimpy pop instincts.
Super solid demo from this Richmond, VA, band. Four songs of UK82-inspired hardcore with raw production, fast, catchy songs, and shouted DISCHARGE-style vocals. “Red Lake Earth” starts with a great three-note lead that burrows in your brain as it turns into a three-chord blast. “Shit Pit” has some classic, single bent note hooks and a dissonant solo that push all the classic HC buttons in the right order. Loud, fast, and raging punk for fans of the FIX and UNRULY BOYS.
Tokyo, Japan’s KLONNS come out swinging with this blistering new EP. The influence from classic Japanese hardcore bands like LIP CREAM and DEATH SIDE is very apparent, but do not mistake KLONNS for being a worship band. The sound on the Crow EP is super ferocious and raw. The instrumentation makes this record sound like it’s coming apart at the seams, and the vocalist sounds so hoarse that his throat could be bleeding. This is a violent, vicious listen. Pure hardcore punk.
An absolute monster box set (pun intended). Smash hit after smash hit of the legendary Peruvian band. The thing covers their whole career so you can appreciate the richness of their sound: the caveman vocals, the reverb-rich riffs, the wild BO DIDDLEY-esque beats. I’m not so fond of the whole exercise of historical revisionism the band has suffered and benefited from but, I think they may well be the only band worthy of that sort of intellectual procedure. They truly are a great band and they did anticipate sounds and motifs from the punk era. This is teenage angst as a form of art. Enjoy the marvelous sounds of LOS SAICOS.
Sometimes when I start writing a review, the record’s description ends up coming out as something I would never want to listen to even if I am enjoying what I am hearing. Sounds like the RAMONES (boring!). Songs about unrequited love (yawn!). A song called “Facebook Fighting” (who cares?). Goofy band name (eh). An odd selection of covers (OK, that’s fun). It is best to let go of all musical knowledge and preconceptions with this one and simply enjoy the tunes. The songs are peppy and straightforward poppy punk, but not in that annoying pop punk way. MONTY VEGA’s vocal style is bratty, but more Dee Dee than Joey. The best song on the cassette, “Gravity Man,” has the band moving into the garage rock lane. As for the covers, “Ghost Rider” is slowed down with spoken-style vocals making it sound really cool, and “Hungry Heart,” a song BRUCE SPRINGTEEN originally wrote for the RAMONES, is better than expected. I like this no matter what I say.
A strong release from the Potsdam, Germany punk scene. The band is led by a scathing female vocal attack from singer Claudi. Her delivery compliments the tight rhythm section and angular guitars. Her delivery and the band’s range have some of the pop of Cinder Block of early TILT, Mia Zapata’s attitude and aggression with the GITS, and Penelope Houston’s politics with AVENGERS.
Bits and Pieces is the first LP from this Moses Brown (INSTITUTE, GLUE) solo project, whose only other release was a limited-run cassette EP of fuzzed-out, lo-fi glam that came out back in 2020. The sound’s been cleaned up a bit for this here official debut, but it’s still a lower-fi affair that weds the grooves of T. REX’s Electric Warrior, the looseness of the VELVET UNDERGROUND’s Loaded, and the oddball lilt of JIMMY JUKEBOX’s “Motorboat”. Apparently, it’s also pulling a lot from Zamrock, a Zambian take on late ’60s guitar rock that evolved alongside glam (it’s a genre I was wholly unfamiliar with that I’m now keen to dig into). So, throughout the ten tracks on this record you get lite touches of psychedelia, dub (mostly in its exploration of studio space), and even Krautrock. Perhaps the most distinct element of the album—and the one most likely to rankle listeners—is Moses’ vocal performance. It’s certainly pulling from all the above influences, but at the same time it’s this bizarre sing-songy croak—like straight vocal fry—often delivered as though it’s being issued from the bottom of a k-hole. It really ups the records overall woozy vibe and helps this feel like a unique take on a familiar genre. My guess is that this isn’t going to be for everyone, but I love it.
Extinction Burst continues their righteous journey, giving new relevant bands a platform and unjustifiably unheralded relics the credit they deserve. If you’ve never heard of the Q FACTOR, you are forgiven—they existed in a brief (but amazing) space and if you weren’t there then…well, why would you care? The nucleus of the band went on to form FORMER MEMBERS OF ALFONSIN (only slightly more visible in the rearview mirror), but not before dropping a killer (and poignant) EP and a slew of comp tracks, all compiled here. Heartfelt, intense, honest, no-bullshit ’90s DIY hardcore punk that is totally their own (even and especially with hindsight), with brilliant nods to SXE ‘core and melodic ’80s SoCal. There are only nine songs on this discography LP, so perhaps they had said all that they needed to say…I just hope someone is listening.
Four years after their debut LP, Parisian quartet ROSE MERCIE returns with their latest conjugation ¿Kieres Agua?, drifting through the winding paths of their own self-created world as illuminated by the faint glow of the RAINCOATS’ tangled rhythms, ELECTRELANE’s warm keyboard drones, and GRASS WIDOW’s spectral harmonies. From an era where the dominant form of post-punk expression has been one of paranoia and detachment (generally amplified by the effects of technology), ROSE MERCIE’s sparse, haunting slow burn seems to exist out of (or outside of?) time, a flickering flame as opposed to a blinking cursor. In the midst of the tranced-out, tom-driven hypnotic tumble of “Dinosaur,” multiple intertwining voices chant the line “let no man steal your thyme” (lifted from a traditional British Isles folk ballad warning young women of the dangers of taking false lovers), a thoroughly unmodern reference that suits them just as well as the TABLE SUGAR-y off-kilter pop lilt and sharp art-punk angles of “Chais Pas” and “Des Pierres.” The four members of the band are cast as witches circling a ritualistic pyre on the LP’s cover (one of the oldest and strongest archetypes of sisterhood), and it’s echoed over the motorik, polyrhythmic percussive clatter of closing track “Witching,” with a Spanish incantation that roughly translates to “Loving us / Looking for us / Taking care of us / Between good and evil”—a testament in sound to the bonds of female friendship; a document of four women making music with each other, but more importantly, for each other.
SKID CITY’s debut LP brings us some wonderfully ugly pub grooves from Melbourne. This band plays a straightforward type of ’70s-style punk rock that’s slathered in attitude and perfectly fucked in all kinds of ways. There’s layers that remind me of motor-garage punkers of the late ’90s like B-MOVIE RATS and the SNAKE CHARMERS, there are parts that echo the grizzled graveyard blues of the excellent first GOLDEN PELICANS LP, and by the time we get to “Dumb,” they’ve gone full DEAD BOYS on us. The straight pub rock comes out on the album’s briefest track, “Alright With Me,” but it fits. Everything is laced with stand-out insidious guitars and raspy disaffected growls, and delivered with a jaded angst probably best expressed in recent decades by the amazing CARBONAS and the adjacent EX-HUMANS. Hitting a perfect ratio of grime and swagger, this is one of the brightest highlights of the year thus far, and the singer’s ragged jeers sound like he couldn’t care less.
In the late ’80s/early ’90s, there was this syndicated cartoon programming block called The Funtastic World of Hanna-Barbera. It featured classic Hanna-Barbera cartoons alongside crude, low-budget shows seemingly cooked up in an ’80s fever dream (see: Fantastic Max or The Further Adventures of Super Ted), and it was hosted by the Down and Dirty Dinosaurs—a trio of dudes in dinosaur costumes dressed in punk/hip hop garb. It was really something. Anyway, I bring this up because the contemporary Aussie punk scene—particularly the stuff coming from the rock mutants of Sydney—really reminds me of that show. And this latest 7” on Computer Human, a label run by the head scientist at RESEARCH REACTOR CORP, is no exception. STERÖID, the brainchild of ex-GEE TEE member Gordo Blackers, is a Hobart-based recording project that plays “eggy metal.” The five tracks on this EP (four originals and one OVERDRIVE cover) sound like the music that the heroes of Galtar and the Golden Lance might play if there was ever an episode that involved a battle of the bands for some reason. Just imagine mid-’80s montage music with chipmunk vocals written by a guy whose record collection was full of, like, RAMONES, THIN LIZZY, and NWOBHM records. It rules.
Flint, Michigan hardcore thats will certainly inspire an elbow into some stranger’s face. Flanged-out heavy riffs, dirty bass, red-faced yelling, stomper parts and rager parts. Four songs, checks all the boxes, a good hardcore demo.
Hey. I’m sure you already know, but VOID is a truly landmark band in the history of hardcore. The Condensed Flesh demo is one of the best to ever come out of the genre (and there’s been a lot of them) and, 41 years on, it holds up better than ever. Recorded in 1981—prior to the groundbreaking, trippy metallic recordings that would roar into this world on 1982’s stone-cold classic split LP with the FAITH—VOID is a lot more primal and raw on these recordings than the experimental nature of their later works. Including some of VOID’s best-loved ditties like “Organized Sports” and “War Hero,” along with equally awesome deep cuts like “Annoyed” and “Go South,” this demo is even more proof that VOID never produced a single bad note in their three-year lifespan (including Potion For Bad Dreams!). In celebration of VOID’s 40th anniversary, the wonderful folks at Eye 95 Records have reissued this classic demo on 7″ vinyl, so what are you waiting for? Absolutely essential. Obviously.
UK DIY that was, you guessed it, recorded live! Though, this falls more along the lines of weirdo sounds coming from contemporary Deutsch punks (NUNOFYRBEESWAX and PONYS AUF PUMP come to mind), blending tight transitions with oddball cowbell and clap track interludes over an otherwise post-punk landscape. For a good taste, listen to the driving last track, “Hotel Room.”
Nice mix of post-punk and coldwave from this Polish band. The genre hallmarks of bouncy, loping basslines, angular guitar lines, and detached, depressive vocals are all here. But BZDET is not afraid of the dancefloor, like on “Niewola,” which is driven by crispy drum machine handclaps. Similarly, “Nadzieja” builds an ominous atmosphere around a bass-led dance beat and guitar swells. Other standouts are “Sukcesy (Pozory),” which features an oppressive, atonal din interspersed with trebly synth wiggles, minimal electronics, and spoken vocals, and “Okazejszyn,” the closest that the band comes to NEW ORDER-style pop, albeit with slurred/reverbed singing. Moody dance jams covered in sheets of ice for fans of SIEKIERA and LEBANON HANOVER.
Malaysian straight edge. No frills here, just straight-up hardcore. Fast, mosh parts in all the right places, pretty solid outing here. The gang vocals sometimes miss the mark for me here, though. The whole point of having gang vocals is to accentuate a chorus. While there are points where this does happen, more often than not it almost seems as if they’re just kind of randomly inserted here or there. However, that’s a minor set back on what is a great hardcore EP.
Founders of darkwave CLAN OF XYMOX have been reissued on Dark Entries with their 1985 Peel Session recordings. For fans of the genre, it doesn’t get any better than this—but you already knew that. On the intermittent cool and cloudy days of Spring, this will land just right: ambient yet driving synth instrumentation, with vocals that range from melodic and upbeat (“Seventh Time”) to a tortured ode (“Agonised By Love”). “Stranger” opens the album, and could be the soundtrack to a fallen angel’s journey through hell, with anthemic choral vocals backing the whole song; completely chilling. CLAN OF XYMOX (also released as XYMOX) has a catalog of music spanning from 1983 to present recordings. This group has stood the test of time.
Classic punk from the ’77 UK and ’74 Ohio schools, but naturally, it sounds exactly like neither because the real punks keep making the shit sound new and important (because it is important, of course). I can’t even imagine how hard it is to restrain yourself enough to make music like this. Every fukkn song feels like it wants to just let it fly, and I want to listen to HELLNATION when it’s over just so I can hear something fast. But that’s the point, and these New Orleans freaks nail it. Even when they go fast on “So Sorry,” the freakout is so controlled and I love it. Mutant garage punk at the absolute top of their game…and to be fair, they pretty much let it all fly on “Parody,” that one is a full release. Full swagger, full strut, full stomp, total punk.
