THE CAVEMEN

 I got Sex Bomb Baby as a promo when I was in high school and I simply didn't get it - I thought "Ha Ha Ha" was a funny novelty song, but I didn't....get it. I saw FLIPPER in Norman, Oklahoma sometime around 1991 and still didn't get it (even though I knew it was important and I was supposed to get it). The next time I saw FLIPPER was at El Rio in San Francisco sometime in the early 2010s, I lasted a few songs but got to see a former coworker (a 60+ year old SF punk OG) throw a beer at them and tell them they should go back to shooting heroin (said former coworker was 'formerly alive' a few months later). 

ANYWAY......

I only talk about my weird irrelevant and inconsequential relationship with FLIPPER because "Ca Ca (My Wall)" kinda hits me they way that the aforementioned encounters did. THE CAVEMEN are different though - it's FLIPPER for sure, but with THEE OH SEES and a splash of Albini (see: "Ritual") and THE SPITS for good measure, all presented on a tape that was duplicated on a pile of turds and eventually sinks into the depths of murk. It's okay to observe, young punks. It's okay to be curious and still not understand. Real freaks will remain distant - even from other freaks. 

BAND IN B.C.

HEAVY TEMPLE

 

It's hard for me to describe which (and how many) nerves this one struck a nerve when I listened the first time, but I can assure you that that nerve count has only increased with subsequent blasts. IDES OF GEMENI, MOTÖRHEAD, LOST GOAT, PENTAGRAM, SLEEP - it's all here...and there's more. But the "more" is HEAVY TEMPLE. Which is to say that this band deserves to be classified and categorized with those aforementioned references because.....I don't know man, I'm just a middle aged dude with an opinion. And in my opinin, this HEAVY TEMPLE is really fukkn good and the rest of their shit is really good too.  

CHASSIT

TERRITORY

 

This dude who works with me brought me this tape and a vegan BLT hoagie sandwich from Philadelphia a couple of weeks ago. Yeah, he brought the sandwich from the east coast, and it was (still) delicious. Also this TERRITORY tape is a blown to shit DBeat beast....so I won twice. You only win once - you're just gonna have to trust me about the sandwich.

WAR FOR...?

DIALER

 

Someone feel like telling me how a present-era band manages to effortlessly conjure '80s Albini and early '00s indie alt in the same apocalyptic punk track? Twenty seconds into "Palpitation" and I swear they move from BIG BLACK to BLOC PARTY and I just have so many questions. "War Reality" just offers more confusion - a chaotic, jerky proto-industrial track presented as North American basement punk that just makes me wonder where DIALER has been all my life. Or where I have been for the last few years of mine while they were creating these sounds. On the subject of sounds, the final cut is an eleven minute War Of The Worlds caliber thriller that will stop you dead....it seemed so unreal until it didn't. Doesn't. 

PALPITATION // WAR REALITY

SQUELCH CHAMBER

 

As much as I liked the Everything Turns To Shit release from Wet Cassettes, this recording from Philadelphia's SQUELCH CHAMBER is absolutely feral. All consuming grind tracks devour themselves as the band descends into sludge and noise portals to create an indescribably terrifying assemblage of sounds that nods to Fair Warning-era VAN HALEN and MUERAN HUMANS of back-to-back tracks. Not only is it that varied, but Much Drugs is simply that fucking good. Listening to this tape is a white knuckle experience from start to finish, and I am truly in awe. 

MUCH DRUGS

PURLING HISS

 

This is some of the most glorious damage I've ever come across - timeless freaked out Kraut-esque mostly instrumental jams with a funky monotony that's impossible to describe. There's a moment in "Crocodile Tears" where I start to wonder if Philadelphia's PURLING HISS are doing a little too much until they cross an intention threshold and make it clear that they are going all in.....and then clearly I'm right there with them. You know the music that you put on and think you kinda forget about and then you notice that it hasn't been in the background at all? You notice that you are a part of it? That's the power of Meandering Noodle, and it's formidable. 

MEANDERING NOODLE

GRUMBLE

 

Fuck me, man - Region Rock as a descriptor is such a motherfukkr. The shit is easy to hate on...if you're an asshole (or me). But if you actually listen? Shit, tell me something I want from punk that's not here and I'll tell you it's something from punk that I don't need. Except relentless DBeat - I do need that shit. And GRUMBLE does not offer that, so I can still listen to other records and tapes (which is good, variety is important). But I'll be fukkd if I can't listen to this shit and feel like everything is right...and that's especially weird (and perfect) because 35 years ago I was listening to people 10 years older than me make me feel like I wasn't alone - now it's people 20 years younger than me doing the same fucking thing. I know that's a lot of numbers and math is a real piece of shit, but my point is....right now, this GRUMBLE tape is doing everything right.

MILLION DOLLARS

...help me realize every day ain't so great...

ENAMEL

 

Another dose of mid-teens USHC that slipped by me in the moment...amazing what you miss out on when you're focused on not falling the fuck apart. Philadelphia 2016, nice and squirmy the way the kids liked it back then, but it's the way that ENAMEL surge forward that really grabs me. It's as if they settle into a tempo and then...the drummer holds them back just enough to feel them try to catch up when he kicks it back up. The bands are completely different, but it's the same way I sometimes feel about Markley's drumming in ECONOCHRIST - a rock steady four on the floor with a looseness around the pace instead of within it. Most of you are going to notice the vocals, and that's okay because they are in your face and full of fire. Some of you are going to pay attention to the guitars instead and that's okay too because they are a swarming duo of no bullshit North American hardcore riffs and they are exactly what I need today. But I'm still gonna hone in on that rhythm section because they're giving me pause, they're making me think and they're making me listen. I guess I should have paid more attention in those twenty teens.

ENAMEL

FUCK SS

 

When the kids say that something is "fire" it confuses me, because fire is a noun, not an adjective. You can use "fiery" as a descriptor, but....well, it's a generational thing, but I simply don't get it. Or at least I didn't get it, until I popped this FUCK SS demo in the deck. This shit? This shit is straight fire. 

DEMO SS

WORSHIPER

 

Can I tell you the thing that instantly sucked me in? I mean...of course I can. It's my blog thing and I've been telling you things for 5000+ posts now, but I still like to think that you're all eager and willing visitors and consumers. The opening track on WORSHIPER's Pleasure Of The Flesh (titled "Pleasure Of The Flesh" of course) simultaneously reminds me of a song that FUCKFACE would have written at the very end of the run when we were all very very high and a song that a band from Norman, Oklahoma would have written when I lived there in the early 1990s. Something akin to "White Vans In The Mission" by way of FOR LOVE NOT LISA in a time machine but with (very) heavy JESUS LIZARD energy...and that's the shit that's gonna hold my attention securely, you know? So I listened intently, and there's no doubt WORSHIPER are their own animal - while channeling the dark and heavy UNSANE, BLESSING THE HOGS dirges that permeated a segment of the '90s scenes. It's not just good, it's exceptional. And it's not just a rehash, it's a rebirth for a dissonant band who had a short and complicated run in the late 2010s that was cut short by addiction and struggle. Unearthed and remixed a couple of years ago after the passing frontperson Mike Parry, the fine folks at Strange Mono and the band's two surviving members have done the rest of us a service by re-releasing this recording. I was sucked in anyway, the sound/s hold me tight and the ugliness is familiar and strangely comforting, but the context makes this release extra. You can feel the ugliness and the desperation, and you understand WORSHIPER even more in the process.

PLEASURE OF THE FLESH

BILLY & THE BAD PEACH

 

What a fucking mess this is. What a disgusting and dreary mess. Think about KILSLUG and KILLDOZER. Think about CRAMPS and GALLON DRUNK and think about BRAINBOMBS. Think about sonic damage. Think about going for a ride with the bad kids and deciding you don't ever want them to bring you home...even though you told your mom you were just going to the movies with your friend Steve. Your mom calls Steve and finds out you lied...but you're already gone. Think about that. 

BILLY & THE BAD PEACH

GAZ

 

Absolute ramshackle scorcher coming at you from the late teens and kicking your fukkn ass. These kids are (were) complete savages...the guitars are from another planet - same guitarist as IN SCHOOL but the riffs and riffing are more unhinged and more honed, which makes no sense, but it's part of what makes this thing such a monster. Listen to Golnar yell "How Do We Remember...?" and know that GAZ is not ahead of you...they're just playing an entirely different game. 

GAZ

SOLARIZED

Expect forty minutes of dark, tense hardcore with understated nods to JESUS LIZARD and BL'AST (though there's nothing understated about the band). The sound is advanced, developed, intentional...and powerful. To listen to "Work Without Weapons" is to listen to the result of the process without having to think about the process itself. Whether it's an official designation or not, I'm filing SOLARIZED under 'adult hardcore' until someone invents a better descriptor. Descriptors tamp expectations though, so perhaps you should just use the volume knob* and reach your own conclusions? 

A GHOST ACROSS HELL FROM ME

 * I realize that most modern devices utilize either volume buttons or finger swipes on touch screens, but neither hits the same in the context of thew written word...so you get a knob.

MOVE

I'm not going to present myself as an expert or a historian, and the (living) legacy of MOVE perhaps lives at the uncomfortable intersections of revolution, oppression, activism and violence. But I remember being a twelve year old kid seeing the news coverage after pigs in Philadelphia dropped bombs on a residential neighborhood in West Philly and let a couple of city blocks burn. I remember the things that were said about the eleven people the system killed, some reportedly shot by cops as they were trying to leave their houses that were on fire. I remember not understanding, and I know that this is the shit that sticks with you. This talk from 1994 is long. It's powerful. We still do this - we've always done this. 

DA UNDERGROUND 3-16-94

BLUEPRINT

Philly's BLUEPRINT had moved on before they moved into my orbit, which gave me the opportunity to soak up the entire catalog at once. I recommend starting with "Dissonance," from their first release The Asterisk Era - burly, furious, intent and tragically on point USHC that is immediately followed by a squirm inducing bass intro that starts "In My Head" and you want to just slither everything to pieces. Vocals are painful and gnarled and the band just sounds so full and massive all the way through...execution is absolutely key here, and the execution is flawless. Good news for you (as it was for me) as you dig into the rest of their output? BLUEPRINT just got better until they (digitally) dropped Sophisticated Ignorance a couple of months ago...and then that was it - I guess the hottest ones burn fast and bright. 

THE ASTERISK ERA

 

CONGENITAL DEATH

Totaly fucking fire from Philly's CONGENITAL DEATH, who filled up the middle of the last decade with slab after slab of start/stop hardcore punctuated by furious blasts and more riffs than any band should be allowed to come up with on their own. A touch more subdued (accessible?) than bands like PARLAMENTARISK SODOMI, but we're talking about the same kind of erratic fury....but with mandatory moshers like "Disapproval" thrown in the mix. This 2013 tape has the entire Heavy Hands EP plus two untitled bonus bangers on the flip. 

HEAVY HANDS +2 

THE STYLISTICS

The smooth croons of THE STYLISTICS will indeed make you feel brand new when the harp accent sends you into the second half of the verse in "Tu Me Haces Sentrime Nuevo," and this Spanish pressing just keeps on giving after that. You know the moments; cruising slow on a warm night, necking under a tree (I never did that as a kid, but it is a thing that happened for - and to - a lot of adolescents). Like East Side Story but for the East Coast set - the '70s trying desperately to hold onto the sonic '60s with subtle funk guitars, falsettos and sweeping studio presentations. The appeal of so-called "oldies" is obvious, understandable, and wholly logical. I still want to grind, and I don't want to live in a world without DBeat, neanderthal stomps and harsh electronic manipulations, but then "Terminar Para Empezar" comes on and Russell Thompson, Jr. croons "break up to make up, that's all we do...first you love me then you hate me, that's a game for fools" and it all just kinda breaks down for a minute.

LO MEJOR DE THE STYLISTICS 

Your lips and my lips - what more is there to say?

KNOW YOUR ROLE

Thick necked, ham fisted, late 200s East Coast hardcore. Listen to them lurch into fastcore on the eponymous opener and you fukkn know you're about to get into the mix. Look at the rest of the lineup and see "Spin Kicks For Christ," "Noodle Ass Dude," and "I Don't Like You" and take up a deep breath. It's everything you think it's going to be.

 

CASHIN' CHECKS AND SNAPPIN' NECKS 

SOUNDS OF LIBERATION

 

Are you ready to fall in love? Are you ready to know the feeling of power and control as it seeps into your pores. That's what this 1972 recording is.....power. And the players here are in complete control throughout (hear "We'll Tell You Later," but know that you cannot unhear things like this). Once again, I feel compelled to write at length about a recording that has already been discussed and dissected by those far more knowledgable than me, so.....so I express gratitude to the people who made the sounds and I encourage you to do the same. This is an incredible (and incredibly legendary) recording, transferred onto tape by the folks from Loathed Sound after a welcome reissue that was priced almost immediately out of reach. Sounds Of Liberation deserves to be devoured, 

SOUNDS OF LIBERATION

DECONTROL

A collection of smashers from the lost late 1980s (even a casual observer will eventually admit that, especially in retrospect, it was the late '80s that truly languished in schlock and mediocrity while the much maligned '90s were actually a starting point for exploration and discovery within the confines of punk music and DIY community). DECONTROL were from Philly, and this relic from magnetic postal audio trading has the Born To Be Wild EP from 1986 - yes it's that "Born To Be Wild," and yes it's unnecessary, but "Joe Blow" is a nice chilled out (hair)metalpunk ripper - a live radio set from '85 and the self titled full length from '87. The full length is where they really figure it all out and seemingly realize their truest vision...which includes the dueling guitar MOLLY HATCHET-esque boogie of "Baby I'm Not Dead" and a cover of "Blue Skies" that will have you dreaming of that STEPPENWOLF cover from the single. There are moments on the LP, but this one is mostly about that radio set; total Do We Really Want To Hurt You? energy dancing on that wire between butt metal and ripping crossover hardcore. It's raw, it's loose, and there's a rough knuckle dragging undercurrent that takes me back to the time LIME CELL dedicated "You're Not Punk, You're Dirty" to me and my bandmates.

DECONTROL

Three tracks from a 1985 Kennel Club show tacked onto the end because tape traders rule. 

Also - LIME CELL weren't trying to make us feel welcome with the shout out, they were trying to intimidate us. Pretty sure it worked.