Reviews For The Week Of July 25th
By admin on Jul. 25, 2011.
Mind Eraser at some Scion sponsored gig. I giggled at how DFJ bums out the bouncers.
Blessed Offal
Self Titled Tape
Death metal coming highly recommended by friends who dig this stuff. While a few songs go on forever, Blessed Offal keeps them interesting with enough changes of pace to not lose me. This is pretty good.
United Youth
Demo
Decent 88 style hardcore that goes by in the blink of an eye. I see a lot of potential for an ep. Keep going.
Vaccine
Crimes In Blood 5″
Painkiller Records
I am glad this is a 5″ because there is about three minutes of music here. I don’t think a single song goes over 30 seconds. Vaccine fit somewhere in between Infest and No Comment, playing blazing fast hardcore with some changes within those brief songs. This is excellent.
Black Flag
Live At The On Broadway CD
Huh, this is totally weird. I’ve had pieces of both of these sets (the debut of the “My War Demos” lineup) for about 13 years, but only parts put together to make one set. Even weirder: It was labeled “Los Angeles 1983,” not even the right city/year. This obvious bootleg (hello, poser alert, on the wrong song titles) puts out very nice soundboards of two Flag shows from 1982 at the On Broadway in San Francisco. My Rules and I’ve Got To Run are brand new songs, and some of the My War songs are played as well. Obviously, this is essential material from Black Flag, but I’m not sure if you want to support the bootleggers.
Bl’asting Concept
Self Titled LP
It’s Alive Records
Our old friend Fred Hammer put this one out on his long dormant It’s Alive label. Not surprisingly, because of their name, this band must be big fans of Bl’ast!, Fu Manchu, and Annihilation Time. Heading more towards the rockier sound of the latter two bands, I lost a bit of interest when listening to this one. I think there is a big audience for a band like this right now, so I’m sure you will check it out for yourself.
War Hungry
Self Titled LP
Six Feet Under Records
Somewhere between Iron Age and…Life Of Agony (? Seriously? People like that crap?) comes the new record from PA’s War Hungry. This is pretty metal and would have fit in with all the Roadrunner Records bands the kids in my high school who were into “hawd” bands dug. I’m glad I stuck to Floorpunch and Voorhees. This is definitely not for me.
Mauser
End Of The Line 7″
Vinyl Rites Records
Burly Discharge/Anti Cimex inspired hardcore from the cess pool of Florida. This is a genre filled with lots of garbage, but this stands out as an essential modern piece of d-beat hardcore.
Whirl
Distressor Tape
Bridgetown Records
As if D-Beat and youth crew hardcore being genres filled with garbage was annoying enough, shoegazer is another genre where the good is heavily outweighed by the bad and vastly overrated. A friend told me Whirl were very much in the vein of Slowdive, so I checked this out. “Sounds like Slowdive” indeed! This is beautiful, dream like, shoegazer ala Slowdive. After a soundbite from Kubrick’s Eyes Wide Shut, Whirl slam into some fantastic music. Seven songs is a perfect length for this, leaving the tape at its ending before any hint of boredom, a big problem with this genre, ensues.
The Rival Mob
Raw Life 12″
Lockin’ Out Records
The Rival Mob are one of the best bands out there today. Somewhere between Madball, youth crew hardcore, and Ringworm, they sound fresh and interesting without anything silly or outside the realm of hardcore. Great stuff.
Reviews For The Week of July 18th
By admin on Jul. 18, 2011.
Talk Is Poison…one of the best bands of the past 15 years…
State of Alert
No Policy Bootleg LP
This is a pretty complete bootleg LP with all of State of Alert’s recorded material. The No Policy 7” on Dischord, the tracks from Flex Your Head, two demos, and a live set. I’ve heard all of this before, but completeists will dig having all of this in one place. Why hasn’t Dischord done a discography for them already?
Various Artists
Brutal Supremacy Compilation Double 7″
Painkiller Records
The long awaited debut compilation from Painkiller Records does not let down. Mind Eraser and Scapegoat continue to plow through their always excellent careers with a nice handful of unreleased versions of songs from each band. Hatred Surge seem to have had some lineup changes, but I am still reminded of His Hero Is Gone when listening to them. Iron Lung are a band I had heard about for awhile, but never really heard before. They remind me of some late eighties Touch & Go bands like Shellac, Butthole Surfers, etc and some of the nineties Gravity Records emo bands. Pretty decent stuff. All bands are worth your time.
No Hope For The Kids
Angels of Destruction b/w Cold Touch of Death 7”
Backwards Masking Records
This is definitely my favorite NHFTK record. The A side is a heavy, melodic song that reminds me of the Adolescents a lot. The B side is a faster song with some riffs pretty reminiscent of The Misfits. A two song single is about all I can handle from this band. I did not like their LP.
Christian Mistress
Mother of Mercy b/w The Hereafter 7″
Nasjonal Records
Fantastic Venom soaked metal from this Portland band. Great riffs and changes without become boring or tedious, which a lot of metal gets for me very quickly. A lot of people think the vocals sound like the singer of The Gits, and I can definitely see that.
Free Spirit
Free Yourself 7″
Triple B Records
One of the few impressive youth crew records of the past…oh, let’s say, 15 years or so, combine “second tier” bands like Confront and Hard Stance with a bit of Token Entry to put out a great seven inch. I think there is a lot of potential here, unlike most of the junk coming out of this genre.
The Rival Mob
Hardcore 4 Hardcore 7″
Six Feet Under Records
Members of bands like No Tolerance and Mind Eraser (including one of the illest dudes I know, DFJ…his tweets during the Royal Wedding should be taught in schools) playing hardcore somewhere between good Madball and good Ringworm. I love how noisy Doug’s bass is on this record. This sounds modern without all the stupid chugga chugga or tough guy poses.
Supertouch
WNYU LP
Horror Hotel Records
What more can you say about this? The Supertouch NYU set is, by far, the definitive recording of the band. You probably already have this from the tape trading circuit (my rip was the one frequently passed around for years it seemed), so this LP isn’t super essential. It’s a nice idea to get definitive copies of NYU sets. I’d love to see a label do a series of them.
Soul Swallower
Devour LP
Painkiller Records
Back after a multiple year hiatus, Soul Swallower follow up on their debut seven inch with more ugly hardcore in the vein of Citizens Arrest, Napalm Death, and Rorschach. There is a sense of progression here towards a more noisy, ugly, sound. Some of these songs had been on demos recorded around 2006 (one recorded with a member of DropDead), but there are new ones here too. A candidate for record of the year.
California Love
Reaping The Whirlwind LP
Members of Look Back & Laugh playing power violence in the style of No Comment, Neanderthal, and other California bands. This is pretty good, but I rarely listen to it. If you’re a big fan of this style, I would still check it out because I bet you’d like it.
Reveal The Truth
Courage 7”
Pretty generic thrashy youth crew style hardcore from this Florida band. This reminds me a lot of many of the bands on the old Voice of 1000′s compilation. If you can’t get enough of this style, you’re love this band.
School Jerks
Control 7″
Cowabunga Records
Serious early Black Flag worship from this Toronto band. Think Jealous Again era Flag. This band has been progressing quite nicely as each release goes by. I would highly recommend checking this band out.
Maggot Minded
Tape Compilation
A tape compilation with primarily west coast bands. Most bands play decent modern hardcore with the highlight being HIV (ex-members of the excellent band Cold Sweat).
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Floorpunch-New Jersey
By admin on Sep. 8, 2010.
Floorpunch
New Jersey LP
Six Feet Under Records
I mean, what more do you want me to say about Floorpunch? Everything is here, the demo, the seven inch, all three compilation tracks, the LP, and the famed, unreleased, possibly thought lost, Straight Ahead cover. The only thing missing from this is the unreleased instrumental on the demo tape of the LP. There was talk of that tape (which is a magnificent, gnarly, recording of the LP which is probably the best recording of Floorpunch) being issued on LP, but, apparently, the master tape is currently MIA. I ripped a nice copy of it online years ago, so I am sure you can find it. BUST!
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