Doorway To Freedom

Scored this 7" as a bonus from the very nice folks at Not Very Nice Records, a wicked old-school throwback to the crossover days of the late 80's. The record opens like a fucking Spinal Tap song - imagine "Stonehenge" or something equally as epic. After a few minutes though the songs devolve into some absolutely killer moshage of which I haven't heard since the last M.O.D. show at L'Amour in '88. Of course this a ton more palatable since it only lasts a total of 13 minutes but I love hearing old school proto-Metallica/C.O.C.-esque speed metal that reminds me of the good times slumming local NJ clubs listening to one nameless thrash band after another. I cannot imagine you will be disappointed with that state of mind. Enjoy.

自由の扉

Super Wet Cheese

An absolutely astounding compilation from the sadly defunt and clinically insane Tokyo jazz grinders - this epic 45-track retrospect spans a multitude of obscure 7-inches, unreleased rehearsals and long sold-out compilation LPs. Released on Obliteration Records (conveniently owned by C.S.S.O. vocalist Narutoshi Sekine) the CD focuses on the band's material through the mid-to-late 90's. Amazing stuff, some of the songs sound straight out of Meat Shits school while others are ridiculously competent avant-garde grindcore bordering on the complexity of the math metal genre that would surface years later. Somewhat unfairly compared to such goregrind bands as Regurgitate and fellow countrymen Catasexual Urge Motivation, C.S.S.O. easily outshines the competition with their musical skills and absolutely original approach to grind metal. Of course, my favorite material by the band will always be their "Diversion Of Former Customary Trite Composition" EP (which I've already posted on this blog) - an amazing eleven minutes of madness in their coolest surf-music-esque style (very similar to the stuff on their split 7" w/ Dead Infection as well).  As far as C.S.S.O.'s dozens of other releases, I fully recommend their two legitimate LPs - Nagrö Läuxes VIII and Are You Excrements? Both absolutely worth the money you'll shell out for 'em on Ebay.

Shake It Up Bokan

Clotted Symmetrical... uh

The band's finest release, this epic two song 7" showcases this seminal Japanese nutball grind band at their very best. Don't write these crazy fucks off as some token noise cacophony, they are absolutely channeling 50's beach rock/spanish flamenco into weird grindcore hybrid 5-minute rock operas. While the opener "Shake It Up Bokan" is killer (especially the ridiculous ending - perfect for the last scene of El Mariachi), it's the 4-part(!) "Diversion Of Former Customary Trite Composition" whic really shows how talented the band is. I don't even know how to describe what your ears are in for - what starts as a very Tokyo-sounding rock song degrades into a strange grindcore miasma which is simply stunning for the fact that it sounds like it was all done in one take. Bravo gentlemen. C.S.S.O. would continue on until 2004 when they split for greener pastures...

Hey, Tonny!

Scarver's Calling

Better-than-average serial-killer hatecore from Akron, Ohio. But who are we kidding here, the only reason anyone's ever heard of Scarver's Calling is the fact they made it onto a 1999 split 7" with Japanese sludge gods Corrupted. Take the two guitarists and bassist from obscure Cleveland grinders Apartment 213, add a few vocalists and the drummer from Sloth and there ya go: new band. Surprisingly the songs were actually written during the Apartment 213 time period and "Mangler" actually appears on a 213 split 7". The music is pretty solid although the crusty Macabre-ish high/low vocal pairing can get a bit grating. The deep vocalist sounds exactly like the guy from Fornicator and the high one sounds like the dude from Macabre's "Embalmer" (off their Gloom album). The songs have a particularly mean fucking vibe - especially the "Missing Child" one - it just goes on forever. Perfect for all you brooding sociopaths out there. I also included the Corrupted track, a nice change of pace in the fact that it only runs 5 minutes (although I expect the original recording went on a lot longer - there's a weird out-of-place fade at the end); typical pounding sludge from seasoned verterans of the genre.

Driven To Download

Japanesludge

Amazing eponymous 2004 EP from these curiously underrated Nipponese doomlords. At one time dot(.) was an active side project for Coffins bandmates Uchino (guitar/vocals) and You (drums); though they permanently left the group almost immediately after this record was rleased. Dot(.) forged on with new members (including an extremely attractive female guitarist) but kept their sparse recorded output limited to splits, compilations and 7-inchers. As far as the status of dot(.) today, their website hasn't been updated in almost a decade but there was an '09 split with SU19B so hopefully the band is still at it. Enjoy.

Period

ボリス

To be honest, once I got over my fleeting fascination with experimental drone and noise a few years ago, there wasn't a lot in Boris' extensive discography that kept me interested. Nothing particularly against their style, just very little of theirs that I would ever consider giving repeated listens to. When I eventually came across 2002's Heavy Rocks and found it their best work, excellent lo-fi hardcore/stoner/sludge in the vein of Men Of Porn or Church Of Misery. "Dyna-Sour" is my favorite - a fuzz-laden rocker with shades of Budgie's "Breadfan". Yeah there's some ambient-ish instrumental stuff sprinkled in between but it isn't overpowering and fits rather well. And the epic "鐘" really makes me wish I fucking knew how to speak Japanese. Enjoy.

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Don't Judge A 7" By Its Cover...

As a recovering graphic designer it drives me crazy when I stumble upon shit like this. Awful cover, awful logo, awful fonts, awful album name, awful song titles, awful band name. How could artwork like this appeal to anyone flipping through a record bin? Who was their target audience? This 7" arrived as a bonus with some long forgotten order decades ago (I truly thought it was included as a joke) and sat for nearly as long before I blew off the dust and grudgingly threw it on a turntable. Surprise! What I expected to be some generic Kraut prog synth-pop was actually some dirty grindcore out of Japan recorded by none other than Genocide fave Bill T. Miller. Okay, maybe it's not as offensive as some of the grind I tend to side with but Quest For The Clearness has a nice angry punch and reminds me of some (very) lo-fi Brutal Truth. Solid hooks and nice grooves break up the blast beats; side A's "Sunshine" is easily the better of the two, side B's "Non Fiction" gets a little Metallica-ish at times. Multiplex evidently lasted through 1997 with a couple of singles and a full length, I'm actually interested to start tracking down some of their other stuff but for chrissakes, fire the fucking art department guys!

グラインド！

 
Currently watching: Blow Up
Currently listening to: Havohej Kembatinan Premaster

Noisecore Nonsense

Sheesh! No sooner did I drop the Boredoms side project Z-Rock Hawaii then I was awash in another piece of Japanese noisecore phlegm - Osaka A.C. rip-offs Cunt Decide. Actually my introduction to the band was lead singer/screamer Manabu sending me the demo tape for his then-blurcore band, Senseless Apocalypse. I don't know if he thought I was a record label or fanzine or what, he sent the cassette completely unsolicited - side 1 was S.A., side 2 was a previous blur band of his called Cunt Decide. Kind of a Senseless Apocalypse 1.0 (less produced and more noisy), Cunt Decide blast through a hundred or so twenty-second tunes in 35 minutes. A few grooves here and there (á la Anal Cunt) but mostly a sheer wall of blastbeats and howling. I went ahead and sent him $5 for the demo - two bands spewing 500 songs in 90 minutes is worth a fin in my book. Senseless Apocalypse has since gone on to become a more typical (but definitely more listenable and talented) grindcore band and Manabu's still running the iconic Blurred Records so give 'em a listen!

579116952348

 
Currently watching: Married With Children (Season 9)
Currently listening to: No Fraud Love And Massmurder

Bbbrrrblababrbrbrbrbleeeeeeyaaaaaaaa!!!

Back in their Pure Guava days, the brothers Boognish, still new to their "big label" contract with Elektra, were still openly jamming (and recording) with whomever they could find (Frente!, Kostars, Green Lipped Mussels, Chris Harford, etc.) with styles that weren't necessarily what Ween's record label endorsed. Among those bands were Japan's institutional Boredoms, four abrasive noise-core gods with whom Gene and Dean recorded eleven strange, quasi-listenable "songs" that start like a typical Ween track and morph into a screaming, blathering cacaphony of noise and babble. I love Ween, but do I love Z-Rock Hawaii? Well, yes and no. It's fun hearing Dean do his best George Thorogood impression while eYe is screaming bloody murder in the background, but to be honest it gets old really fast. It's just too fucking annoying. Sweetly delicate tracks like "I Get A Little Taste Of You" (which thankfully became a sans-screaming staple of Ween's shows in the mid-90's) get lost in the screeching and feedback. I'm sure the whole project was a big joke by two bands who happened to meet in the studio one afternoon and my annoyance is the punchline they're all laughing at but whatever. Boredoms are fine, for like two minutes. So listen to Z-Rock Hawaii one track at a time, it's a lot more digestible.

Chocolate And Cheese Synthesizer

 
Currently watching: Colors
Currently listening to: Cunt Sludge Jane Doe

C.U.M.

Definite fathers of today's waaaaay-to-oversaturated goregrind genre, Catasexual Urge Motivation was formed in late 1992 by brothers Yuzin "Sadochist Spermata" Kanai (lyrics/concept) and Tomoaki "Sadochist Ejaculata" Kanai (guitar/composition), with Cyber E.M.F. as drum programmer. The Encyclopedia Of Serial Murders was the band's first (and only) legit full-length, released in 1996. Blasting drum beats, gurgling vocals and thundering, sludgy, black fuzz guitar make this a real classic. Or, as an original flyer for the CD puts it: "22 trax in 63 minutes of extremely brutal ultra sick grinding death gore metal with murder in philosophical view. A must!!!"

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