PINECONE PEOPLE - Tape - 2001

   Sometimes, the tape is just there and you have no information. You listen to the tape over and over and over, but still wonder if the people listed on the cover actually made the music presented on the  cassette that you hold in your hands. I still don't know. When you're a teenager, music comes around pretty often that blows your mind wide open. As you get older, it still happens but not as often. I sat on a beach once, well into my thirties, and watched people involved with this project play music that truly melted my mind in a way that I hadn't felt in ages. This tape isn't in that realm, but it hints at the possibilities contained within the players presented here....if it's really them.

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Members of ROTTEN LIVING, COUNTY Z and MOTHER OF FIRE.

HEX - Demo - Tape - 2007

Today's post is brought to you by Erik Ruin, who previously contributed a top ten list to the blog a few years ago. I think this tape is incredible, but wanted a different perspective on it, so I asked Erik for his take. Many, many thanks to the members of HEX for sending over the digital files when my machinery was having issues. 

   Heavy music on non-traditional instruments has a seriously mixed track record. It can tend toward simple novelty- (think APOCALYPTICA or even worse) but it can also lay bare nuanced dynamics and complex compositional structures that are often obscured to those- like me- who have trouble looking beyond the standard genre tropes (wailing guitars,machismo, long hair, etc.). It’s into this latter camp I’d put viola/tuba/drums trio HEX, alongside luminaries like Portland’s DISEMBALLERINA and Providence’s BELLOWS.

  According to violist Jackie Beckey- “Andie, Aaron and I were all hanging out around this time and interested in creating heavy music on nontraditional instruments. I'd been experimenting with this for awhile and was hoping to start a project with someone who shared this vision. Aaron--a fellow classically trained orchy dork punk on tuba--was the obvious choice for a bandmate. We were both interested in creating heavy music influenced by non-western music, such as African drumming. Aaron and I were also into geeking out about poly-rhythms, exploring tonality by amplifying acoustic instruments and using instruments with incredible amounts of sustain to play heavy music.”

   The first and last songs of this tape begin with lengthy tuba drones rich in texture and atmosphere. From there it gets more rocking, with Jackie alternating between heavily reverbed pizzicato plucking (kind of a trademark of hers) and sawing riffs. At times, it reminds me of stoner rock transcendalists like SLEEP or even 70’s Swedes PARSON SOUND (a direction Jackie and Andie would take further with their project MYRRH) but it also breaks out into galloping sections that are not too dissimilar to their Minneapolis contemporaries COUNTY Z (ed. note: there is so much CZ on this blog and you should definitely seek it out) and ROTTEN LIVING. The cover sports paper-cut artwork by “Dragon-face” Dan Nelson, virtually de rigeurin the scene at the time (see also DOGS, THIEVES, DANGER BOY & THE ROAD VULTURES, etcetcetc….)

   HEX was relatively short-lived, beginning and ending in 2007. As far as I know, this is their only recording. They did go on a two-month tour, which Jackie remembers as “the best tour I've ever been on. Luke Holden toured with us the entire way and performed at every show as the hilarious "Body McFartin" human fart machine opening act. Because we kind of didn't fit into any specific musical genre, we played a lot of weird shows--opened up for a D-beat band in Dallas, performed with the art-punk band TEENAGE WAISTBAND in Providence, and performing during an intermission for a psychedelic play in Kansas City.”

    They so impressed my friend Dan Schleifer at their Providence show that he formed his own tuba-drone metal band, the aforementioned BELLOWS (who also ruled and are also sadly broken up)

    All the members of HEX have gone on to do a bunch of stuff– Jackie formed the more melodic yet still driving BRUTE HEART and is now mainly focused on soundtrack work. Tuba player Aaron moved to Pittsburgh where he’s playing in two great bands- tuba with brassy LUNGS FACE FEET  and bass with heavy weirdos COME HOLY SPIRIT(alongside Gina Favano of the much-missed JOHN DENVER'S AIRPLANE). Andie went on to play drums in the brilliant MOTHER OF FIRE, then in a variety of scrappy punk bands and is a brilliant painter.

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COUNTY Z//SHEP AND ME - Split - Tape - 2003?

   If you're familiar with this blog, you're probably familiar with COUNTY Z, because I've given you plenty of opportunities to check them out. SHEP AND ME is also no stranger to this page. As I've said before, COUNTY Z is one of my top 5 all-time favorite bands in the history of music and these two songs don't appear on other things they released. I don't know anything about it, but it's so good to my ears.
  SHEP AND ME is Matthew Himes playing outsider sounds and otherworldly folk that comes out of a world that is his own creation. Everything I've ever heard by him has been nothing short of brilliant. I'm not exactly sure if SHEP AND ME is still an active project, but Matt has been tirelessly releasing analog (and some digital) documents of the outsider world through his label, Lighten Up Sounds. Pick up anything he has available and you're guaranteed to be intrigued.
   This tape was released by Snob House, but I don't have a cover for it. Apparently, there was a surly dog drawn on it, so you can just imagine that for yourself. COUNTY Z broke up and then 2/3's of the band started playing with Matt as ROTTEN LIVING. Then, they broke up and MOTHER OF FIRE started. Then they broke up and the world is a black hole of despair.

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TRACEY TRANCE - "101" - Tape - 2013

Today's post is brought to you by Jacob Khepler 

 It's common for a band to make a "tour release"- a limited object you can only get direct from them at shows on tour. Oftentimes it is hastily put together, by bands that don't have a new-enough record to sell at the gigs. As a consequence the tour release is more prone to have goofy shit, live stuff, weird covers, noise parts, and collaborations that would never make the cut on the official release. And as a result of this, a tour release can have a behind-the-scenes feeling, that really makes you think of the band members as human beings. The full release is like a band's thesis. The tour tape shows you what the band is like at home- who they're jamming with and what they're riffing on.

   Anyway, this tape isn't a tour tape, it's like the reverse of a tour tape. It sounds recorded on the road, about being on the road, named after the road, with sounds of the actual road, for the benefit of the friends at home. "Our car broke down in the following 8 places, and each place had a nice new friend, a sunny ditch, a kooky animal, and a romantic feeling". It's very sweet!!!!

    This tape contains Tracey's high wavering falsetto singing a nice little ditty about experiences on the 101 highway (i think), and another song about friends, intercut with road sounds, alternate takes, the same songs fed through effects, and brief verses and bits of other songs that come and go in a nice natural way. It's basically an EP of filler material, but as I said before, that can be very nice. The songs have an easy fun melody and a simple rhyme scheme that really makes them seem like they were initally written while driving, maybe even freestyled, for the amusement of the passenger or passengers. Many parts feature a keyboard, Tracey's main instrument, played in a loping circular manner as fingers slip and slide across the plastic. The whole thing seems to be recorded on a handheld walkman recorder- in quieter moments the compression on the tiny built-in condenser mic swells and you hear the background rush in. Lots of nice highway sounds too- trucks, trains, bridges, bells. Very nice.

    If you are not already a Tracey Trance fan, this tape may be your "101" (qua "introductory class")- these sounds are all present to varying degrees and yes, the music is basically this high all the time (at least). If you like it definitely seek out other releases (especially "Pyber Kub"). If you don't like it, that's totally valid. Do not seek out other releases.

    I have no idea if this title is in reference to the Depeche Mode live album / documentary of the same name. It easily could be, and I don't think it's hurting anyone to pretend it is. I would love it if Tracey did a full-on Depeche Mode cover tape- Tracey if you're reading this, think about it.

 In conclusion, I like Tracey Trance, and I like this tape.

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FERAL CHILDREN - Tape - 2006

   This tape showed up in a box of stuff sent from the east coast a few months ago and it sat in that box until today. Last week, I was in the home town of FERAL CHILDREN, saw this tape for sale in a record store and thought "Oh yeah, I should dig that tape out when I get home."
   This tape was written, performed and recorded by my friend, Mikey in a house named Little Pancakes. Once, I was there and ate some homemade pizzas after painting a bunch of blue shit on my face. These days, I'm pretty sure some freak-o's still live there. I've walked by and thought I should just knock on the door and hang out, but I never have.
  FERAL CHILDREN sounds rudimentary and wonky...on the verge of collapse and decay. Industrial at times, but never machine-like. Some conventional song structures at times, but like, alternate-reality conventional. Truthfully, I don't know what the fuck I'm talking about right now..I went outside for a while and wanted to kill every motherfucker on the street, so I came home, closed my door, listened to this and it made me feel better,,,like there's other people in the world who just can't take it sometimes and sit in their house and make weird music because it keeps them from randomly punching strangers. Or maybe I'm just projecting.

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S.B.S.M. - "Bitter Ends" - Tape - 2014

   There's this thing that happens when you live in town long enough where everyone just assumes that you know everyone. This isn't true. I started hearing about S.B.S.M. around town. When I asked some friends about the band, they would just say "Oh, you know them...it's (these people) and they played that show at (venue I've never heard of) with (that one band everyone cares about but somehow I've never heard of them)" Well, it turns out that I work with a member of S.B.S.M. Oops.
   When I finally tracked down S.B.S.M., they were playing in a tiny basement in West Oakland. Their loud, cacophonous mess of sound was almost overwhelming in a way I haven't felt locally in a long time. The thing that really drew me to them, besides the fact that I was into their music, is that even though it's completely obvious that the three people in this band are very serious about what they do, they don't let that stop them from laughing it off when their broken equipment shorts out mid-song. One of them will use that as an opportunity to explain the song or tell you about an upcoming protest or talk about why they're playing that particular benefit show while the other members change out cables, tear apart wires and try to figure out what the fuck went wrong. And this is all so refreshing for me because I feel like we have entered a stage of punk (and this is just my perspective) where so many bands are trying to be perfect recreations of bygone eras or they're afraid to go out on limbs or they're trying to pose just right for that Instagram photo or whatever the fuck it is that people do. Many bands don't discuss their politics anymore or don't have any politics to speak of whatsoever, but when the whole fucking world is falling apart and there are rape apologists (and rapists) in your audience and cops are killing all the brown people they can possibly get away with and you feel like you're just gonna explode because you can't fucking take it anymore...just fucking talk about it!! Or just take your place in line (or the barstool) next to all the other soulless hardcore bands.

   The other reason I like them is that when they play the last part of ":Godzilla" live, it sounds like 30 bombs going off in a haunted castle nestled in a nightmare world.

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They're recording a new tape soon. 

RUSSIAN TSARLAG - "Decrepit Gas Station" - Tape - 2013

Today's entry is written by my good friend, E.R. Conner.

   I've seen Carlos (of RUSSIAN TSARLAG) play a bunch in other bands and I've even seen Russian Tsarlag play too. Once, he and my friend Dorey played a show where they recited this story/play thing and then passed out soup to everyone. The soup was cold and I was very afraid to eat it. In the end I ate the soup and it was pretty alright.
    Carlos does a thing where he seems really disconnected when he performs...like maybe he's a quiet guy already. I mean, once I saw him pretty much naked fighting on some train tracks in an alley and that was music too. I think that time there was also some kinda food but instead of getting passed around to eat, it was getting thrown/rolled around in??? Or maybe it was shaving cream? My mind does not remember these kinds of details. So maybe it's just different every time.
   I have some other RUSIAN TSARLAG recordings. They sound different from this. ​This tape about The Gas Station sounds like shoegaze music but maybe a little more fucked up. I mean, on purpose the way that people do when they make art things or music things. Not like it was an accident which is what sometimes people mean when they say "fucked up". I'm trying to say, I think this dissonance you hear in the recording or this kind of collapsing of sound, I think this guy thinks that sounds cool. He's right!
   My favorite song on this tape is called "ON THE STREET". I like it because I like sentimental songs. Like, it seems cool to have an interaction with someone where you want to write a song about how you "wanna see them sometimes on the street". But maybe that's all you wanna do! Just see them around? I like that. Even though in real life my biggest pain is running into people I know on the street because maybe I was just having a conversation with myself inside my head and other people are distracting. Most of the other words are hard to make out, so it could be like that Sting song everyone thinks is like *really sweet* and *super cute* but really it's about a stalker and then it got REALLY awkward when they turned it into a song about BIGGIE'S GHOST WATCHING EVERYTHING YOU DO.
    I wouldn't say that this is darker than other RUSSIAN TSARLAG tapes or more in line with conventional pop song writing but there is a way that it's that stuff in a different way than older tapes. Like maybe this guy found a COCTEAU TWINS tape or broke his little heart up or something. Or maybe he found out about some other more delicate part of life and that made shit more mysterious. I don't know what happened to this guy. His music sounds different now. You could call this maturing. Ok, let's call it maturing. He's mature now.

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To keep up with RUSSIAN TSARLAG, try this.

TREMARCHE//MOTEL MATTRESS - Tour Split - Tape - 2013

   TREMARCHE and MOTEL MATTRESS are two bands from the great state of Massachusetts. The former is from Worcester and the latter is from Boston. TREMARCHE lives in my favorite house in Worcester: Distant Castle. That's about the point where my familiarity with these bands end. I've never seen either band and had never heard either one until receiving this tape, although I briefly met one of the dudes in TREMARCHE and he was super friendly. I was out of my mind while wearing a dress and bird mask. 

  MOTEL MATTRESS plays one, long seven minute, proggy, vocal-less super jam that dissolves into tape loops at the end. There's some hints of USAISAMONSTER or KING CRIMSON in there somewhere or maybe I'm way off the mark. Maybe they're just a jazz fusion band. Either way, if you had given me a tape by them ten years ago, I might have smashed it into bits with a hammer and let monster trucks run over it in the street, but now I'm really into it. Now, I want a 21 minute loop of it, which just means I'll let it play three times in a row and be happy as hell. 

  On the flip, TREMARCHE throws out three hardcore blasts in less time than it took MM to play their one song. "Hardcore" might be too simple of a term for this band. There's a lot more going on. There's some noodly bits. There's some parts that sound like they might have been really into FUGAZI when they were 16 or 17, but actually haven't put on "Repeater" since they turned 19. There's some parts that show that they live in a heavily creative environment and it would just be too easy to write a simple verse//chorus song. Basically, I don't know how to easily tell you what they're playing, but I can tell you that I like it. 

   

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Also, I was surprised when I looked up these two bands online and saw the "official" cover of their split. Even though both bands live about 990 miles from my old home of Chattanooga, TN, the cover features a nice photo of Parkway Towers, which is an abandoned building on the south side of downtown Chattanooga. I once tried to squat that building with two friends of mine. We spent a couple of nights there, but the building was too fucked up to safely and comfortably spend a winter. That was in 1998. The building is still abandoned, as far as I know. 

More from TREMARCHE

More from MOTEL MATTRESS

SCRAPEGROPE - Demo - Tape - 2007

   Today's entry is brought to you by my good friend, E Conner, who will tell you all about her old band, SCRAPEGROPE.....

  I met Jail in the Indianapolis bus station when Erin and I picked up her and Vanessa to drive down to Ida for Idapalooza... oh shit.... like 8 years ago. Fuck that's a long time ago. The trip was weird and mostly remembered for overhearing a lot of sex, people not being that nice, and Jail and I dicking around a tent drinking whiskey during a tornado. A few months later she moved into my house in Bloomington (The Well Well Well) and we started this band. I played drums and she played a circuit bent Casio. We practiced in the weird basement hole in the ground and sometimes in the living room of The Well Well Well. This tape was recorded in the living room of The Well Well Well by Brad on his computer. It was originally put out by Upper Dave and was released as a split with EVIL WIKKID WARRIOR, which was (is?) John Benson's band that he started with his daughter. We only played a couple of shows, mostly in the living room of The Well Well Well and mostly no one went. We played one show in Chicago and it was a very weird trip...marked by digging change out of a fountain in a mall so that we could buy a beer before getting on the Megabus and playing with David Diarrhea and Lee Revas' (of RIND) old opera fern project. Jail and I also collaborated on a short play called "You Too Sylvia" which was also performed in the living room of The Well Well Well. (there's a theme here) Bennie, Chloe, and Claire (off stage vocals) were also in the play. Jail does a solo glitchy jabber operatic noise dance project called FORCED INTO FEMININITY. Once she did drunken book reviews for an old issue of my fanzine and she is one of the smartest coolest people I've ever known and I love her.

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BLOODWALL - "I Have Seen The Loc Ness Monster In A Hole Where Two White Walls Collide" - CD-R - 2010

   I posted a tape by BLOODWALL back on Christmas when I was in a really, really bad mood. I feel better now and BLOODWALL still sounds good. I've been working on more and more art stuff in my room lately and I find this it helps if I listen to music that is either fucked up and noisy or just doesn't have any words (or all of that).  BLOODWALL satiates that need for the latter. This release is a little more complicated than the last one I posted, incorporating cello, guitar, drums, bass and more...all played by Graham, who is the one man behind this musical project. I like it a lot. That's all.

DOWWNNNNLOOOADD

Find more by Graham on his Soundcloud page

Get him to produce your own mono lathe-cut record right here.

VARIOUS ARTISTS - "Field Recordings From The Edge Of Existence. Vol 2" - Tape - 2013

   When I'm at my job, I rarely let down my guard to reveal details of my personal life to my co-workers because I feel like there's too many facets of it that are confusing or difficult to explain (I want to say that I also work with a lot of wonderful people who "get" me 100%. I have a lot of co-workers). For example, a nurse told me that she routinely spots me all over the city, riding my bike at all hours of the day. She explained, "I feel like I've seen you over 50 times in every corner of San Francisco, but you've never noticed that I'm in the vicinity." As I was coming to the end of a 12 hour overnight shift, I barely looked up from my paperwork and casually said, "I have to put on psychic blinders in this world to block out the constant barrage of bullshit so that I can continue to fool myself into believing that this city can be a beautiful and magical place." As those last words fell from my lips, I started to catch myself and glanced up to see the nurse looking both horrified and confused. I stammered "I'm...I'm sorry I didn't see you. Sometimes my best friends have to grab me to get my attention as I pass them on the sidewalk." It was too late. I revealed a little too much and that nurse gave me a look that simply said "Let's just not talk while I'm here, okay?"
   Sometimes, the blinders are on too much and I even miss the things that I should be looking out for. My friend Vanessa gave me a copy of her zine Asswipe (issue 5), which consisted mostly of interviews with Oakland bands that I had never heard of, even though I go to punk shows in Oakland regularly. I read through the interviews and felt all kinds of emotions. I was intrigued, annoyed, confused, enthralled and enlightened. Never bored. For the first time since living in the Bay Area, I felt completely and utterly out of touch with what was going on in a facet of the Bay Area punk scene. It was awesome. I think some people would take that as a sign to drop out or move on, but I found it to be exciting...like, there's still interesting and productive scenes thriving on the fringes. When I feel like I should take the blinders off, I think that maybe I should keep them on and venture further underground.
   I was handed this tape by Yacob in the backyard of an Oakland punk house and it showcases some of the bands talked about in Asswipe (p.s., one of the better Bay Area zines), as well as some non-local heavy-hitters. Almost everything on the tape was recorded live on a handheld tape recorder by Yacob in the Bay Area, so the sound quality is lo-fi (as hell) but still engaging in a totally fucked way. PATH OF RUIN start off the tape with a wild, noisy, violent stab of no wave and their recording trainwrecks into a live set by the BILL ORCUTT and JACOB HEALE DUO. Orcutt should be no stranger to any fan of noise and outsider sounds. The tape continues on with more harsh, (possibly) challenging recordings by KAREN, EXIT BAG, ETTRICK and more.
   Side 2 begins with a live recording of last year's phenomenal SF performance of SUN RA'S ARKESTRA led by Marshall Allen (I feel embarrassed now that I didn't include this on my year end top ten because it was one of the best, most transcendent musical performances I saw last year, by far) at the Victoria Theater in the Mission District. It's followed up by a free jazz performance by SF SOUND GROUP, who also played the ARKESTRA show. I liked the recording of them on this tape, but, honestly, I was unimpressed by their live presentation and spent their set drinking cheap beer on the corner of 16th and Mission while people-watching. I wish that this tape included the opening performance by HANS GRUSEL'S KRANKENKABINET, but this world is not perfect. The tape closes with the no-wavey improv (?) blanket of BAT MAGICK. Overall, this tape is challenging, interesting and does a phenomenal job of documenting the underside of the Bay Area's noise scene. Blinders on. Head down.

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Tape is not split into tracks...just side A and B, since everything runs together.

File is large. 203 mb.

I think this tape was released in an edition of 25, so it's probably gone. 

If you want to hear more from people involved in these projects, check out Albacore Records

MARISSA MAGIC - "The Fall" - Tape - 2014

    A little over a month ago, I was stepping onto a plane in Alabama, a little tipsy and on pills, not really sure if I'd ever see my dad alive again. About a week later, I realized that I was right. As I was trying to get comfortable inside of that soon-to-be-airborne metal tube full of normal humans, I scanned my mp3 player for anything that might make me feel sane...or sound at least as fucked up as I felt at that moment. When I reached the "M's", I already knew where I would be stopping. I put on "Infinity Bums" by MARISSA MAGIC and felt like I was listening to something that was made for that exact moment in time. Maybe the drugs kicked in. Maybe the tape helped sooth my frazzled mind. Whatever happened, I kept that release going through my brain on repeat for most of the plane trip back to San Francisco. 

   A few short weeks later, I was sitting on a couch at an Oakland punk house when Marissa plopped down next to me and handed me her new tape. At first glance, I thought she was handing me a homemade tape of THE FALL, but soon realized that I was wrong. This tape, to me, is nothing like the last one and I'm totally okay with that. When I first put it on and heard one of my favorite songs, I thought that she gave me a bunk tape, but then heard that it was really her. I'm not even gonna try to explain this one too much because I'm not sure if I can. Marissa doesn't use any traditional instruments (as far as I can tell) on this tape and mostly sticks to tape loops and layers upon layers of her voice. The deterioration and static lends to a deconstruction (or destruction?) of the typical noise tape. Or maybe I'm wrong. Maybe she was just listening to the radio and shit got fucked. Either way, it leads me into a world that I know little about but am constantly intrigued by. I find it to be uncomfortable, challenging, entrancing and soothing. 

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I don't know how to get this tape other than having Marissa pull it out of her pocket at a show and handing it to you. 

Marissa plays guitar in STILLSUIT, who put out an awesome LP in 2013. It quickly grew on me and I think it's one of the more interesting and intriguing LP's that have come out in the past year. 

NO STATIK - "Earhammer Soundsystem" - Tape - 2013

   I decided to take a break from the barrage of top ten lists today and just share a completely badass tape with you. If you're even a casual reader of this blog, my thoughts on NO STATIK are probably no secret to you. In short, I think they are one of the best contemporary hardcore bands that you could possibly have the pleasure of experiencing. I'm aware than many readers don't visit this corner of the internet to get their hardcore fix, but please do yourself a favor today and push the download button at the bottom.
    This tape is the band's 2012 LP "Everywhere You Aren't Looking" remixed and completely fucked with by the band and their engineer, Greg Wilkinson. It starts off innocently enough with the band ripping through their song "Regrettably" , but you quickly know something is different as the guitars start to change tone or just drop out of the mix altogether. From there on out, it just gets weirder and more fucked up to the point where some of the songs don't even resemble their former selves. They incorporate elements of techno, noise and loop effects to tear their songs apart and put them back together anew. I'm still on the fence, but this might be my favorite NO STATIK release to date.
    The download doesn't split up the songs at all because, as you'll see, it's pointless to try. Track one is side A. Side B of the tape is 20 minutes of mostly blank space with a hidden track placed ten minutes in. I was confused if I should leave it as is or edit it down. Luckily for you, I decided to crop it down so that track 2 is just the nutso song featuring mouth drums on side B...no blank space.

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Is this tape still available? Fuck if I know. Iron Lung Records had some for about 5-6 seconds, but they're gone now. Go ahead and write to the band. If you ask nicely and send them some cash, they might be able to help you out. 

nostatikhc@gmail.com

BLOODWALL - "Guitar Tape" - 2011

   I had a pretty light-hearted, fun tape lined up for today, but then I thought "fuck it". Fuck your stupid holiday. You see, I haven't celebrated this weird holiday in earnest since I was a teenager and even then I was only in it purely for the gifts. I mean, I just don't understand it. I don't believe in God (or Satan even). Santa is a really weird person that was made up so that you can learn to lose faith in your parents and believe that they're just gonna lie to you about everything for the rest of your life. And how many people got trampled in a Wal-Mart this season? Whatever. Maybe I'm just in a bad mood because this time of year always puts me in a bad mood and my dad is 3000 miles away and currently hooked up to a ventilator as he slowly fades away from this mortal coil. So, I'm gonna be spending the holiday drinking iced coffee (because I live in a godless city that doesn't completely shut down) and hanging out with incredibly depressed senior citizens,because that's what I get paid to do. Hooray.
   I will also be listening to BLOODWALL, which is just my friend Graham playing layers of guitar on this hour long tape. The first side is all acoustic and reminds me a little bit of John Fahey at times if he lived in a cold house in south Minneapolis with a dirt yard. The second side is electric and is both plaintive and meditative. You'll like it or you won't. I truly don't care if you do, but I love it. Live, BLOODWALL sometimes plays behind a wall of amps to the accompaniment of noise, radios tuned between stations and other odds and ends. The results can be truly hypnotic.

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Graham also plays in VISITOR and can put any noise you want on a mono lathe-cut record over at 2208 Records.

If you truly enjoy the holidays or think that making your kid believe in Santa is worthwhile, don't let me ruin your parade. It takes all kinds to make this world interesting.

YOGURT - Collected Songs - Tape - 1993 - 2002?

  I want to start this off by saying that I'm not sure if I can tell you much more about YOGURT that hasn't already been said more eloquently here or here.
   For the uninitiated, YOGURT is the home recorded output and brainchild of HICKEY guitarist/vocalist, Matty Luv. Also thrown into the mix was his longtime collaborator/best friend Aesop Dekker, various housemates, random bandmates, answering machines, found tapes and whoever happened to walk by when he was recording. YOGURT was often unfairly held up to the same standards of HICKEY, who's recorded output was completely unfuckwithable, but YOGURT was a different beast altogether. It's fairly standard practice for the general public to hold an artist up to their past accomplishments and scrutinize their current projects in this fashion. I was told by a few different people that YOGURT was "kind of like HICKEY without teeth", but I think this is wrong. YOGURT, while made by the same people, was experimenting into different realms and allowing themselves to be silly when they felt like it. As awesome as HICKEY was, it seemed like the band became a job to those involved where they had to take on a role as some sort of gutter-punk superhero at all times. I imagine that it must have been free-ing to let their guard down and branch out with a lot of this home recorded material. I dubbed a bunch of these songs off of my friend Sarah T when I stayed in her room in Georgia for a week. Over the years, many of these songs have become indispensable to me. From the noisy, sample laden experimentation to the beautiful guitar layered instrumentals to the short pop songs
  For a short time, YOGURT was a live band, featuring the original HICKEY lineup of Matty, Aesop and Chubby. I was visiting San Francisco in the late 90's and I found out that they were playing a bike messenger bar in the SOMA neighborhood. No less than three people tried to talk me out of going, explaining that YOGURT was boring and nothing like their former glory. I didn't care. I was some young southern punk visiting from Alabama and I wanted to see these guys that I looked up to. After dodging a fist fight in the alley, I made my way inside and, no, they were nothing like HICKEY because they weren't trying to be like that. It was still rad and I'm glad I didn't follow the advice of any of my friends. I feel lucky that I got to see them at all.
    This download is taken from the (now dead) link from the Cosmic Hearse blog and contains a ton of songs from different tapes. There's even more YOGURT songs out there. I once sifted through a small cardboard box full of random tapes from Matty's room, all of them teeming with home recorded songs and hazy band practices. The sheer amount of music that he recorded is dizzying to think about. Please enjoy this small bit of some of the best stuff he put out there.

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EVERYTHING WENT PINK - Compilation - Tape - 2000

   "Everything Went Pink" is a tape that was released by Dan B back in 2000 that specifically covered the DIY punk scene in Asheville, NC, which was mostly centered around a giant punk house called the Pink House (located at/near 201 Broadway...it's now either a parking lot or condos.) It was kind of a magical time in the history of that town. A whole bunch of freaks happened to converge on the town all at once, from Minneapolis, New Orleans, California, Montreal and even the suburbs of Buncombe County. Some lived in cold-ass houses in Woodfin. Other lived in makeshift shacks out by the freeway (like everyone in MARGARET MOTHER OF THIEVES). Many others, including myself, lived in the Pink House, right in the middle of all the chaos. The house itself was kind of a freak magnet since it was a giant two-story pink place, the door was almost always unlocked, it housed a teeming library and it welcomed just about anyone who walked through the door. The landlord was a member of CRASH WORSHIP and he could often be found smoking weed by the toxic creek in our back yard. I'm pretty sure that, at one point, 17 people were living in the house.
    There was a time when there was almost nowhere for DIY punk bands to play in town, so a bunch of folks from the house decided to clear out piles of the landlord's bikes and crap in the basement to make their own show space. There was a big problem though. Raw sewage and toxic creek water leaked straight into the basement, right into the area where bands would play. No problem...a group of punks (namely Joseph, Big Mike and Ed....possibly Luke too) built a retaining wall / ditch all the way through the basement and bored a hole though the back wall so that water could drain out though ANOTHER drainage ditch into the toxic creek! Thus, the punk club, Oh My! was born. Every time a band played there, the audience ran the risk of falling into the shitty toxic trough and the band ran the risk of getting a huge electrical shock! Still, it was the best place for shows and it's where I saw many life-changing events.

  Most of the songs on this tape were recorded live on a handheld tape recorder at Oh My! Others were recorded at clubs in town, other houses and shacks. Most of the sound quality could be described as "assy", but I respect that the bands worked with what they had, which was almost nothing. Lots of bands on this tape don't have any other recordings. Many do. You can try and differentiate that distinction for yourself. Bands include WAR TORN BABIES, CRAP FACTORY, ASTRID OTO, RAT ATTACK, CHRIST FILTHY DOGS (which I've been wanting to re-use as a band name for years), DEAD THINGS, TRASH NIGHT and more. There's 43 songs in all. Enjoy or don't.

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Did I upload this just to have digital copies of SLATTER HAGS and the final song on the tape? Possibly, but don't tell anybody. 

Tape hiss abounds. Terrible sound quality. Totally beautiful. 

THE GOOD GOOD - "Giver" - CD-R - 2004

   Like many bands on this blog, I don't know where to start with THE GOOD GOOD. I think I first heard them when I was sitting around all day in my lonely bedroom in Mississippi, trying to find new music through my roommate's record collections. I knew that my band would be playing with them soon, so I figured I would check them out. I liked it but I wasn't sold. We played with them a few days later. The second that their singer Natalja put down her guitar and played an entire song with just a megaphone, I was in. These were my people. (That song was "Hello Friends", included in this download).
   I was also drawn to the rock solid bass playing and the wild, completely unpredictable-yet-still-somehow-solid drumming that sometimes drove the songs into dancey rhythms and sometimes drove it into dark dirges. I don't know how to explain this band and that doesn't even matter....I just know that I loved them when they were around and I miss them so fucking much now that they're gone.
   This four song CD_R gives small hints of what was to follow on their later full length LP. If you don't own their full-length LP, which contains insanely awesome art and even better music, then I feel bad for you....but you can order one here, maybe. If you just want to download it, I guess you can go here.

DOWNLOAD "GIVER"

Members of BLOODHUFF, CHA CHA CHA, MUGWORT, BOOMFANCY, COBRA KAI and QUERENT. 

HUMAN HAIR HAT - "3H Fair Dairy Champion" - Tape - 2002

   Sometimes, thinking about the amount of weird shit that Trd Wrd Records has put out is just mind-boggling. When I was traveling to (or living in) New Orleans in the early 00's, it seemed like they had a new tape, record or project appearing every month. Many of their early releases appeared in very limited numbers, with analog equipment and super-DIY layouts being the norm (once I discovered the members of IMPRACTICAL COCKPIT screen-printing their record covers with some house paint that was sitting around because they couldn't find a place to buy the proper ink). Some releases were almost unlistenable to my ears, but I always seemed to "get it" about a year later. No matter what I thought of it, their releases were (still are) always interesting and helped me to open my mind up to the more experimental and noise-minded side of independent music.
    HUMAN HAIR HAT really went "out there." Members of IMPRACTICAL COCKPIT, GROUP B, HARRY FROM HAWAII and (maybe) COUNTY Z all got together and put out this noisy brain-fuck of analog knob turning and fucked up beats. Every song on here is called "Weed Milk" and I'm sure there's a good reason for that. If you don't know what weed milk is, I salute you and hope that you'll keep on that path in life. If you're familiar with weed milk, download this tape and meet your new best friends.

DOWNLOAD SOME WEED MILK

NO STATIK - Tape - 2013

   I've said it before and I'll say it again: NO STATIK is my favorite current live band in the Bay Area. There is a palpable energy in the air every time I've seen them that is rarely matched by other bands. Every time I've seen NO STATIK, it's been better than the last time I saw them. Their singer, Ruby is usually stalking the stage before the drums are set up. When the band starts, they don't just ease into it; they explode. They're usually feeling it harder than anyone else in the room and going more nuts than their past experiences should allow (meaning the members have played shows with broken ribs, a broken foot and post-knee surgeries.) I'm not the only person who has stood at the side of the stage, cringing and waiting for the moment one of us has to call the paramedics....again.

   Besides their live sets, I am also a huge fan of everything the band has recorded so far. Not only are they quite possibly a perfect hardcore band, but I love that they consistently take pains to offer something more than a recreation of their live songs and energy throughout their recorded output. Most of their records have included ambient soundscapes, noisy remixes and fucked up experimentation, which I have listened to just as much as their "normal" songs. On this tape, two of their songs, "Unclarified" and "We All Die in the End" are remixed by IVENS and DJ EONS ONE respectively. The results are both entirely different from one another and also exciting additions to the NO STATIK collection. I've probably listened to this 10 times today already. It almost made living in this fucked up world more bearable.

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Tape is sold out. It will be out on vinyl soon.

Fuck the cops.

Fuck the courts.

NEON PISS - "Rarities 1979 - 1987" - CD-R - 2013

   This past Sunday, our band NEON PISS played our last show at 924 Gilman Street as part of "This Is Not A Step - 20 years of More Than Music." In its earliest incarnation (well, as far as this year's fest goes), the fest was supposed to be a benefit for Sarah Kirsch before she passed away from complications with fanconi anemia (I didn't capitalize that because I don't think we should give that kind of dignity to the things that kill us). We agreed to play the fest on the same day that Sarah lost her life.
   The fest ended up being a benefit for Sarah's family, the SF Trans March and The Pacific Center for Human Growth (with the money being allocated specifically for transgender clients). Initially, I had my doubts with how the whole thing was being organized: the fest was dominated by bands populated by cisgender people. I wondered what it must be like as a transgender punk to come to a fest that supposedly has your lifestyle in mind but does not actually include bands with members who are trans. At one point, I told the organizers that our band would happily drop off of the fest if our spot would be given to any band that included trans members. Obviously, that didn't happen. I also talked to people who took issue with the fest being on the same weekend as Pride and people who thought that the workshops were weak. About a month before the fest though, I decided to stop complaining and just go for it. It takes a ton of hard work to set up an event of that size and scope. No matter what you do, you are going to have detractors. I believe that the organizers have their hearts in the right place and did a lot of good work. While I was truly a little embarrassed (no, really) to be on stage when our slot could have been given to voices who aren't straight white guys, I still believe that we all need to be allies to each other if we actually want to be any sort of real fucking change in this floating shit heap that we somehow magically inhabit. Every day, I see the absolute worst examples of human garbage walking this planet that just make me want to die, but this past weekend at the fest, I felt like everything was kind of okay for just a little while. Bands raged. There was an open mic on stage for anyone to utilize to say anything that was on their mind. The mic was mostly utilized by queer and trans people who said some really real shit that straight ears needed to hear. Being open and vulnerable in front of a crowd like that is an incredibly hard thing to do and I wish I had half the strength that some of the people on that stage did.
   I felt the need to say something when our band played, even though the thought of speaking in front of large groups makes me wanna puke. I said something along the lines of...

 "No one in out band was ever a friend of Sarah Kirsch but her life touched all of us immensely. I never even met her. We are in awe of her strength and determination. I admired her full commitment to the power and importance of DIY...to her commitment to punk and hardcore. I feel saddened that she never got the chance to live her life in the identity that she showed to us near the end of her life. I think that one tiny thing that we can learn from her is that we need to treat others with the respect they deserve because we don't really know how much time we have on this earth. I think it's really easy for people like me, straight cis men, to treat transgender people with respect....or to treat anyone who doesn't come from a place of privilege with the respect they deserve....and if I can do that, so can you" blah, blah, we are a band, this is our last show....

   If you picture a nervous guy staring at the ground and insert about 45 "uhhh"'s, you'll get the picture. Anyhow, It was a fun show and I feel very, very lucky to have shared space with such amazing people in such a long-running institution as Gilman. Speaking of lucky, I am also incredibly lucky to have been able to play music and travel with my bandmates Kyle, Barker and Bryan. I'm still amazed that we got to make music that we enjoyed making and people actually took the time to pay attention to us. I know that's probably not a big deal to many of you, but it means a lot to me. 

  We decided to put out this CD-R a day before our last show and only have it available at the show for the cost of 25 cents. There's no insert or even a cover. We thought it would be funny....maybe just to us. Here's what's on it:

 1. The one and only song by The MUNI MEN, our fake Oi band. We wrote and recorded this song in about 5 minutes at our practice space and it shows. Kyle played drums. Barker played guitar, Bryan played bass and I played that hot guitar lick.

 2.  Practice weirdness. Sometimes, people buy weird pedals.

 3. A NEWTOWN NEUROTICS cover that we played (badly) at a squat show in Hamburg, Germany just because our friend Laura came all the way from Berlin to see us and she likes that band a lot. "No man is a cow"

 4. A very early version of "Close The Door" 

 5. Us losing our minds on a 27 hour drive across the top of the country. Sounds best on headphones.

 6. "Burn" on the Grand Manor piano in Chicago.

 7. "Burn" recorded by Kyle at our practice space with different lyrics from the version on our 7".

 8. We had some extra time at the studio when we recorded our 7" so we told Stan to just roll the tape and we shit out this weird song that just sounds like the theme from Roseanne. Stan couldn't believe that we used our time to do this. To be fair, neither could we.

 9. A song that was never fully realized. No lyrics. Recorded at our practice space. 

 10. We were losing our minds (again) as we drove into NYC while listening to Harold Camping. Shit happens. 

 11. Another song that never made it out of the practice space. No lyrics. 

 12. Another stab at the Roseanne theme, but now with a bullhorn. 

 13. "Paranoid" as interpreted by freaks. Just be glad we didn't include our 10 minute version of "Born to Be Wild"

 14. A 28 minute remix of our song "Close The Door" that Kyle and I collaborated on. Best listened to on headphones...in the dark.

Download NEON PISS

  Thanks to people who humored us and bought a CD-R for 25 cents. Thanks to everyone who helped us out in our time as a band. You can download all of our releases on our Bandcamp page for free or by donation. You can buy our records from Vinyl Rites, Cut The Cord That... and Deranged. Stuff can be bought from us on Bigcartel (not much is left). 

  Other bands we are in: Barker plays in WET SPOTS and HUFF STUFF MAGAZINE (their new album is great). Bryan also plays in THE NEW FLESH, who just released an awesome LP and are getting ready to tour both US coasts. Kyle is working on stuff with COLD BEAT and is constantly twisting knobs in his room. I started a hardcore band that doesn't have a name and has only practiced four times, so who knows?