GLW/DRK

iconAclass - For The Ones

2011-10-01T12:30:00.009+02:00

Sometimes it's incredibly hard to write about a record, for numerous reasons. Just one example: what the fuck should I write about Black Flag or Fugazi or Rites of Spring that hasn't been said before? Or what could I write about your band's crappy demo without hurting your baby boy feelings? Writing about iconAclass has been just as hard. I have been a dälek fanboy for years and years, and Will Brooks is my brother from different mothers. But fuck being objective, especially when it comes to music and words.

iconAclass is the new solo effort from one of the dopest and illest contemporary MCs: dälek. So yes, you got it right: the group is called dälek, and the solo project is called iconAclass. I was confused, too. I think it's safe to say that dälek has changed my ways of listening to music - and not only HipHop, any genre basically. I always loved the fact how much they alienated your average HipHop listener. No, wait... I didn't love it. I just thought it was funny. It was just like Slayer being shrugged off by metal dudes for being "too extreme". Now that dälek (the group) is on hiatus, the Oktopus does MRC Riddims and dälek (the MC) does iconAclass.

Both For The Ones (the album) and I Got It (the EP) are masterpieces. And I could stop the review here, because you either get it or you don't. But let me delve in: the beats are simply incredible. No fancy gimmicks, no big ass production, no stolen samples - just solid kick ass beats as the groundwork for some of the most creative wordplay I have heard in HipHop for a long, long time. dälek is fucking angry ("I ain't mad, muthafuka / I'm rabid!") about the state of the world. And very obviously, things are going wrong: "95% of my crew go to stores to cash checks. 99% leave vexed." - but there are some things in life that make it all go good, things that help you through the struggle: "4 out 9 love the New York Mets. 2 my nigga get ill on them Technics decks."

It's a sad thing, but a proven fact: hard times help spawn great music: just remember Reagan era hardcore! "The wealthy done built their pearly gates. Out here evil takes so many shapes. We tend to meet early fates. Trust too many fakes. Idolize those who imitate. Bastardize all who create." For The Ones (and I Got It, too) are records that are on fire with passion and anger, not unlike the rage that Chuck D spat on vinyl with PE. dälek is a poet, no doubt about that. But the true poets have always yelled fire. (And, speaking of poetry and art in general: when was the last time you have heard an MC namedrop Geoffrey Chaucer, Lars von Trier, Pablo Picasso, and the Coen brothers?)

But what really counts at the end of the day is the music. There are crazy bangers on that album, slower jams like "Heat Down" on the EP, dirty Boom Bap jammers, you name it. DJ Motiv adds a few cuts and there, but they are never overdone and just add to the whole flavour. So well, I told you... this might be one the lamest reviews I have ever written. I just can't help it. These two records mean so much to me on a personal level that it's close to impossible to write something that makes sense to anyone who is not in my head. Thank you, Will Brooks! It means the world to me to be a part of this.

"Wack crews out flanked by the Massive. Last thing you say 'bout Deadverse is we passive."

www.deadverse.com
www.drugfrontrecords.com

Pygmy Lush - Old Friends / Des Ark - Don't Rock The Boat, Sink The Fucker

2011-06-12T15:40:00.013+02:00

Cynical minds have been speaking about "trends" and "hypes" in punk rock, about an abundance of quieter and introspective music. I beg to differ. While it's certainly true, that a plaided shirt, a beard, and an acoustic guitar is quite the safe route to take for the past few years, there is an entirely alternate scene-within-a-scene out there, one that does not rely exclusively on songs about booze and heartbreak... at least not all the time.

Admittedly, it's easy and lazy to be throwing these two records in the same bin, just because they are quiet and came out on the same label at the same time, but fuck it. It makes for some good name dropping. Aimée Argote, the lady behind Des Ark had J Mascis produce one of her records, and members of Pygmy Lush used to be in bands such as Pg. 99, City of Caterpillar, and Majority Rule - all cornerstones in my record collection, and still: it doesn't mean anything at all at the end of the day. Just look at the ex-members tag from a different angle: J Mascis was in fucking Deep Wound of all bands. Shelby Cinca did the design for the Pygmy Lush album, and it's a far cry from Frodus. Dave Grohl was in Scream. Dave Mustaine was in Metallica. Told ya, fucking useless info!

The lowest common denominator for both records is the atmosphere: they both feel haunted. Haunted in the sense of an 8 track recorder on the floor boards of an old abandoned house in the middle of the night, with the sounds of the wind outside as an integral part of the music instead of a mistake. Haunted in the sense of carrying around the burden of sorrow and guilt, of love gone wrong and bad decisions, of lost lovers and lost friends. It's hard to put my finger on it, but beneath all the calm beauty in both records, there is something dark. I am no stranger to this.

Please let me make a statement: Des Ark sounds nothing like Pygmy Lush. These albums are not interchangeable, it's just that they have the same atmosphere - the same kind of atmosphere I can get out of Tom Waits' Closing Time or from The Jesus and Mary Chain's Darklands, to stretch the analogy even further. It's all a gloom of despair and alienation, but alive with pleasure and love and lust. This is the sound of the need to rest, to re-think, reminiscence and adjust, of the need for introspection and the screaming urge for expression at the same time.

99% of aging punks are nostalgic idiots full of shit. Pygmy Lush and Des Ark are the exception to the rule.

www.lovitt.com

Terrible Feelings - Impending Doom 7"

2011-06-12T14:11:00.007+02:00

There are some bands with horrible names: Sex Pistols. Dayglo Abortions. Social Distortion. And the list goes on and on and on... but then again, for every single one of these verbal atrocities, there's a band name that just fucking nails it and gives you an idea about the sound: Nuclear Assault. Sick Of It All. Cro-Mags. Enter Terrible Feelings, a punk band from Sweden - the birthplace of melodramatic death metal and cheap ass furniture.

If you ask me (and even if you don't), they couldn't have picked a more apt name... their two songs on these seven inches of vinyl are spooky, angst ridden, sinister, melancholic - and, above all, PRETTY FUCKING CATCHY! There's hints of Agent Orange, Wire, and Redd Kross, and the vocals sound like a mix between Joan Jett (if she was doing power pop) and that woman from Life...But How To Live It? (is she was doing power pop).

I don't have a lot to say about these 6 minutes of power-pop-punk, except one thing: this is punk rock done right. Yes, it's possible. Even in 2011.

You can download the entire record for free (and many other kick ass releases from the boss punx at Sabotage and Taken By Surprise) here - but you should buy it.

BIG BANG BIG BOOM - the new wall-painted animation by BLU

2011-06-06T11:55:00.001+02:00

BIG BANG BIG BOOM - the new wall-painted animation by BLU from blu on Vimeo.

Vrgns - Manimals / Deep Sleep - Turn Me Off

2011-03-27T16:51:00.010+02:00

I had a conversation with somebody recently, and a question popped up: "So what exactly is hardcore?" - And me, Mister Bigmouth Punk Rock Knowitall, I was dumbfounded. "Well, you know... it's kinda hard to explain. It's a subgenre of punk rock. It's loud. I fucking love it." - "But what IS IT?"

How the fuck should I explain hardcore? How do you explain why you love a girl even though she takes all your money, has an ugly personality and goes out with other boys? This pretty much sums my relationship with this bitch called hardcore. I love her and I hate her. But every once in a while, she puts on those clothes that make me feel all horny and then she gives me a 13 minute quickie. She calls herself Deep Sleep then, and recites her badly written poetry that made me fall for her in the first place: "I want to fuck. I want to scream. I want to destroy everything. I want to kill. I want to burn. Won't cry now, cause I never learned. I want to do everything. I want to make my heart explode. I want to do everything. I want it now and again and again and again and again." - I love you, babe. Even though you steal your riffs from other babes.

Enter her prettier twin sister who isn't a Virgin anymore (she also went out with other hardcore boys), but a Vrgn. Miss Vrgn offers a nice threesome, and when when get you right down to it, she offers oozin' aah choruses. I'm all hers.

So, well... THIS is hardcore. This lady uses curse words and screams, she sweats and spits and hates everything, she smiles through broken teeth, but she always keeps her head up high. She's not like those plastic boobed girls in porn movies, she's REAL. And no, I can't explain why I'm still a sucker for hardcore. But I am. Thanks for reminding me once again...

www.myspace.com/virginsofflorida
www.myspace.com/deepsleepmusic
www.kissofdeathrecords.com
www.gravemistakerecords.com
www.takenbysurprise.net

Indoctrinate - Down-and-out (Demo 2010)

2011-03-19T18:20:00.007+01:00

Shit, I can't even remember the last time when a band sent me their demo... I think it was around 1912 or something. On a shellac. But there's still punk bands, and to my surprise punk bands still make demos... anachronism rules. Big time. Well, at least in my punk world. (Fuck you.)

So let's see past the "packaging" (which is basically just a CD-R in an unprinted paper sleeve, which - to make things worse - looks like Papa Roach...) and let's see past the horrible band name as well... this could be anything. Skapunk maybe. Or metalcore. But let's pop the fucker in and... aha... interesting sample... holy shit! This is good! These kids thrash! Like fast and ugly! Speaking of ugly, the sound quality sucks, like 8 out of 10 on my personal suck-o-meter. But wait a minute... I stand corrected, because I actually like the sound. The sheer ugliness reminds me of one the few records from way back when that actually stood the test time. There's a little bit of D-beat here, some (how original!) Tragedy guitar wanking, death growls, you name it. The vocals are somewhere between Pushead and that Colohan dude you love to hate, the lyrics deal with all the things you'd expect and then some, but this is how it's supposed to be. Let someone else have the whiny bullshit. I am not going apeshit over this band (yet?), but I guess I will see them in a dirty stinking basement soon enough.

www.myspace.com/indoctrinateofficial

The Arrivals - Volatile Molotov

2011-02-22T20:00:00.006+01:00

This band fucking rules. This album fucking rules. No, really. I am literally kicking my ass for sleeping on their first four (!) records. What the fuck has been wrong with me all these years?

A gentleman from Dillinger Four plays in this band. They are from Chicago and sound sometimes like that one band you have never heard of. No, the other band. But that's too obvious, isn't it? Phew. Fuck you. I knew it. All right, some more coffee, and then let me try to explain...

Any halfway decent rock and roll album needs an opener that kicks in with a bang (check). It needs melodies (check), punches (check), amazingly witty lyrics (check) that could be short stories (check) instead of classic rock blurbs about girls and cars. (Only one man can pull this shit of, and you all know that I am not talking about Mike Ness.) British pop influence (check) is always a plus, awesome vocals (check) can't hurt either.

So it's all there... a great fucking ass kicking rock and roll album with the potential to corrupt the morals of the youth in a fucking positive way, an album that's your best drinking companion, your co-pilot on night drives, awww... fuck it. Just rock and fucking roll, no bullshit. If you buy this record, you're probably going to hell. But you'll go to hell knowing that you made this world a better place and your life less miserable.

www.recessrecords.com

American Psychos

2011-02-05T13:21:00.005+01:00

The most retarded band in the history of punk... and it even gets more retarded by the minute. They wrote some of the catchiest songs ever, but why the fuck do they still walk among us?

This is old school...

2011-01-24T09:48:00.001+01:00

"Here, my dear" - Photos by Thomas Reitmayer

2011-01-09T14:21:00.006+01:00

Yeah, that's right... this is my first real solo art show.

This is what (some of) my loved ones have to say:

"Nichts ist an dem Mann symmetrisch, nichts im Gleichgewicht, alles ist ver-rückt. Höhen und Tiefen wechseln sich ab, manchmal im Minutentakt, selten gibt es eine Mitte, selten auch ein Mittelmaß - so auch seine Fotos: bizarr, erschreckend, trostlos, euphorisch, voller Liebe oder Hass. Leid und Leidenschaft. Er fesselt, verwirrt und lässt die Bandbreite der Emotionen in jeglicher Hinsicht expandieren, bis hin zur Explosion, ob man nun will oder nicht." - Daniela Rotheneder-Stari

"Dein ganzes Leben wird geprägt von Menschen, die du im Laufe der Zeit kennenlernst, egal ob du es willst oder nicht. Die einen sind schnell wieder vergessen, aber die anderen begleiten dich ein Leben lang - Thomas ist einer davon. Er ist schwierig, kompliziert, so oft mit allem überfordert und auch wenn wir uns (gerade) nicht verstehen, teilen wir trotzdem die Leidenschaft zur Photographie. Was nützt einem das beste Equipment, wenn man DEN einen Moment, der eingefangen werden möchte nicht erkennt? Seine Photos schwanken zwischen wow, gut, geht gar nicht bis grottenschlecht und trotzdem oder gerade deswegen haben sie Herz, Seele und Tiefgang." - Uschi Amminger

"Thomas Reitmayer. A man with a plan. What plan is that? I have no fucking clue. I bet he doesn't either, but that's fine. The plan at hand and the ends to achieve are unimportant. The thing to pay attention to is the means. You see, I know for a fact that Thomas is a big fan of Ed Templeton, of the Dischord and SST labels and artists, and, (in an exercise of lazy journalistic comparison considering this is a brief blurb for a photo exhibit), of Glen E Friedman. Like them, his work ethic is one based on effort and love. Giving 1000% just because you love what you're doing. Rewards and end results are unimportant. You do your shit. And everything else is just filler. Gray area. Bubble wrap around a new shiny toy. This becomes much too evident looking at the images before you. In an age where easily accessible technology makes a 'photographer' out of anybody with too much time and money on their hands, Reitmayer's pictures show an obvious link and a veiled homage to those who made history locked up in a dark room inhaling toxic chemicals. They are alive, plain and simple. Vibrant in their black and white, inanimate objects and anonymous landscape shots seem to have a strange, creepy energy to them. They live. And in this day and age that's pretty much all you can ask of anything that gets pushed your way." - Elías Martínez

"I clearly remember the first time I met Thomas Reitmayer. It was a January sunday night in Vienna, actually my first time there, playing with Obstacles at one of the small venues in the Arena area. After being introduced to him, we quickly found out that we shared common ground with our views on punk rock and aesthetics.

Thomas has always been a loyal supporter of Obstacles, but also one of our most vicious and honest critics - instantly spewing out his opinions, pros & cons with no filter whatsoever. As a friend and an artist, this honesty really means a lot. He always shows a "middle-finger-attitude" towards the world we live in, but when you get to know the person showing this middle finger, you meet a very heartfelt and generous person. Every time we play in Vienna, we know that Thomas will be there, taking pictures of us, sharing what is going on in his life, letting us crash on his floor and giving us lessons on the importance of Bruce Springsteen while we're all, in our drunken state, giving eachother stick 'n poke tattoos until the sun shows its rather unwelcome face in the morning.

Thomas Reitmayer has been a prolific personality in a wide palette of activities concerning the realm of punk rock and skateboarding culture in Europe for longer than most of us can even remember: running a record and skateboard store, releasing records, doing graphic art and posters for bands, documenting all of this with words and pictures along with his companions in the highly regarded GLW/DRK Magazine, and now having his debut exhibition of his photographic works entitled "Here, My Dear".

Until now, I was only familiar with Thomas' live-music photography through his modest, but beautiful spiral-bound book "Listen to Your Heart" - a documentation of various punk rock shows and, even more important, the faces behind the music. While asking me to write a few words about him, Thomas introduced me to his other work for the first time. First of all, I must admit that I, despite my slight interest in art and aesthetics, don't know a lot about this. So, these are not the words from some sort of art critic, but rather words from a person who has no idea about what he's talking about besides what he feels... Folks, isn't that what's the most important thing when it comes to art after all?

What’s striking me when I look at Thomas' work is the subtleties of his imagery. All the photographs are black & white, analog, raw, yet clear, and to some extent very fragile. They seem to have a diary-ish value, as they document sporadic captures of moments that could seem to be very everyday-like, both in their warmth of smiling faces and motives of objects that are fond to the artist, but also in their exploration of random details in the streets that you probably wouldn't notice by the first glance. These explorations, these captures of "common people", tell a bleak yet beautiful story of solitude, but what makes them special is that they never lose a sense of hope! These "common people", static objects, living statues in busy surroundings that are always moving, always on the run, seem peaceful and well aware of their relation to what is going on around them. Maybe they, like the Thomas Reitmayer that I know, show a refusal to be part of this stressful hassle that our world is built upon. I can only guess and speculate about what he wants to tell us. What about you? What do you think? Listen to your heart..." - Jeppe Street Jarlstrøm, Obstacles

There will be a limited and handnumbered fanzine.

January 17th, 2011 through Feburary 19th, 2011
Hours: Mon through Fri 12 - 6 PM, Sat 12 - 5 PM

Yummy
Stumpergasse 31
1060 Wien
Austria

www.yummy.at

The Riot Before - Rebellion

2010-11-28T18:43:00.012+01:00

Depending on which dictionary you use, growth is, among many other things "development from a simpler to a more complex stage", or "something that has grown or developed by or as if by a natural process".

Yes, people still use books to look up things. You know, those funny things with words on paper. Some people even still read books, even punks. And now get this: some punks even read books and put quotes from books in the liner notes of their albums. Ain't that weird? Duh!

Every once in a while, you come across a record that knocks off your feet, for whatever reason. Rebellion is one of these records for me, and yes, I will say it gladly: it's in my top ten of 2010. The title of this record is a fuck you in itself: you look at the cover artwork, you either catch yourself thinking "Ow, so these dudes have grown up, and they are angry about whatever", or, more likely: "Shit, they want to cash in on ths success of Anti-Flag". But my friend, you couldn't be further from the truth... let me explain:

Yes, in some ways this is about rebellion itself, because the music here is much harsher and angrier than on their previous record, but that's where the story ends. You are only scratching the surface here, which is cool, but you are missing out. Big time. So take the record title, and juxtapoze it against the Dostoyevsky quote in the insert:

"One can hardly live in rebellion, and I want to live."

The fists were buried in pockets, now they are clenched. Not swinging blindly, though - this is not a record about scene politics or punk rock gossip, this is a record about personal growth, and trying to find your place in a world you don't necessarily like - because "you need to leave from the edge of uncharted lands. / The dark spots on maps where no person has ever been before." This is a record about hope. Not sitting over beers, sighing, but getting the fuck up, doing what has to be done, getting out of whatever shithole you are in, literally or figuratively: a town, a relationship, a bad situation.

And the music? Oh wow. The first song on the record alone is a far cry from previous The Riot Before songs, more Jawbox than Ann Beretta, and probably not due to the fact that Mr J Robbins has been producing this. From a personal experience, I think it's safe to say that these gentlemen are men of taste (not always when it comes to footwear and belt buckles, though). And these gentlemen know how to write a good song. It is essentially pop punk, yes, but this is a not a four letter word. And fuck it, I just decided I'll not drop any reference points here.

Rebellion is a record that grows on you. It's a record that will love in six months, and a record that you will fully come to appreciate and understand in a year. (If you are me, at least.) Until then, it will be a good travel companion through the trials and tribulations of life. Oh, and the good times as well.

Up the book punx!

www.gunnerrecords.com
www.paperandplastick.com

Dirty Tactics - It Is What It Is

2010-11-19T12:08:00.008+01:00

Don't you love it when you discover new bands and immediately come up with associations, whether you want it or not? Well, I know I do.

The title of this album reminds me of one of my all time favorite skateboard videos, and the band is from Philadelphia, so how could I not think of the Boss? (And no, I have never seen that movie, and I don't intend to. The idea of Tom Hanks as a gay lawyer sounds as appealing to me as a porn version of Forrest Gump. Thanks, but no thanks. No homophobia intended, but Tom Hanks?! I mean... come on!)

I don't know anything about Dirty Tactics' sexual orientations, but I can feel that they are no lawyers. They're punks. And they seem to be very fucking proud of it. Their music is fast, catchy, and melodic. Nothing that you haven't heard before, but that's the nature of punk rock. (And I am glad it is!) I am not particularly stoked about this record, it's not something I would recommend to everyone, but it makes me happy to know that it simply exists. It's a good record. It's fun to listen to. (LOUD!!!) I hear some One Man Army in a few of the songs, especially when it comes to the vocals, some Pinhead Gunpowder, some Crimpshrine. And even though it will never be an all time fave, it takes me back to a time and a place when things were simpler. It makes me dig out long forgotten seven inches. It makes me happy for the better part of an hour. So, once again in the words of the Boss: "Tell me, friend, can you ask for anything more?"

www.say-10.com

The best record of the year, hands down!

2010-11-10T10:23:00.007+01:00

The story behind this album can be found everywhere, so I won't even bother. It's THE BOSS, so you know it's perfect from the get go. But check out this packaging. It gets 7 out of 5 stars according to my own private graphic nerd rating system.

(Oh, and here is a very interesting story about the cover photo. Nerd alert, again.)

"If younger heads quote this, then it ain't all hopeless..."

2010-10-08T15:05:00.009+02:00

I know it has been said before, but I will gladly repeat myself... Dälek are the future of HipHop, if there is one. I am not saying this because they are my friends (they are), and not saying this because this video brings up the fondest of memories about Thee Oktopus discussing the glory of Badolato's pizza crust (as compared to New Jersey pizza crust) for about 15 minutes (and more), but because... well, it's the truth.

Let's talk in 10 years, when you're gonna finally catch up and when you start to look beyond the fence that goes around your HipHop mindset. (But then again, who am I to talk shit? When I first listened to London Calling 20 or so years ago, I thought it wasn't punk at all...)

Happy birthday, Bruce Frederick Joseph Springsteen!

2010-09-23T09:05:00.001+02:00

Jeff Rowe - Barstool Conversations

2010-09-11T15:06:00.013+02:00

Dear Jeff -

I'll have to admit that it took me some while to get into your record. I will be honest with you: I think the design is god awful, but maybe that's the design nerd in me talking. The cover art is really good, the drawing of the empty bottle is something I would frame and put on my wall, but the typesetting of the lyrics... ouch. So well, that was something that put me off initially - that, and my own thoughts about another punk with another acoustic guitar. You know what I'm talking about.

Personally, I would have picked another opener instead of "Passenger". Don't get me wrong, it's a good song, a great song even, but it just doesn't set the mood. "Chasing Ghosts" or "An Island's Point Of View", however, are songs that do. So yes, you had me after the fifth song, and I went from "Shit, I'm sure this dude has some ugly tattoos and a beard" to "Oh, this is a man I would love to drink with". I kept this CD in my player. I listened to it when I got up in the morning and had my first coffee. I listened to it when I was working. I listened to it to fall asleep to - which might sound lame, I know, but it isn't. Now let me explain...

I think a common misconception about records you can fall asleep to is that they are boring. That's bullshit. I can fall asleep to Cannibal Corpse or Pig Destroyer, because blast beat after blast beat is like a mantra, a brainless one, but a mantra that helps me switch off my thoughts. But this only one side of the coin. The other side are records like yours, and I will gladly put Vic Bondi's Ghost Dances on the list as well, or Bob Mould's Workbook, you name it. They're all intense records, they're all punk records essentially, but they speak a different language: they don't scream at you. They comfort you. They are, for lack of a better analogy, the arms that hug you when you're alone in your bed. Barstool Conversations is one of these records.

It's the kind of record you have to have to learn to appreciate, you have to literally get to know it, like you get to know a stranger in a bar sitting next to you, in these small hours when you're drunk and when the borders between good luck and bad luck, between happiness and sadness start to blur, when you fucking feel like telling your most intimate secrets to complete strangers. And in turn, these strangers sometimes speak words of wisdom, of pure poetry, and you want to write them down on a beer soaked napkin, but you don't. In the morning, it's all forgotten, and all that's left is a feeling. Your songs, however, are still there in the morning.

So well, Jeff, I would like to thank you for this record. I would like to thank you that it made me take a trip to the middle of fucking nowhere, just to see you play. Thanks for that. Thank you for drinking with me, thank you for talking about books and music and life and love and struggles and hardship, thank you for that Descendents cover, thank you for singing that Propagandhi song with me, thank you for the t-shirt, but above all... thank you for that record. And now I know that is supposed to be a review, something that should tell people about how it sounds like, how good or how bad it is, why they should or should not buy it, but I say fuck it. I just can't do that.

And you know what? You were right. It's fucking lame to compare it to let's say Tim Barry or Chuck Ragan. Just because they're punks, and just because they play a similar kind of music doesn't mean shit. They might be your peers, true, your music is at home at The Fest and the Revival Tour, but it also makes sense in the backroom of a bar in the middle of nowhere, it makes sense that you are playing and touring with the fucking Landmines, because at the end of the day, it's about two things that you have put to words a lot better than I ever could:

"I've got a love that makes me weak. I've got friends that are more than are more than blood."

Jeff, thank you for making a difference in at least one person's life. And that's the glory of punk, regardless of style or genre or scene, even in 2010...

Your friend,
Thomas

www.jeffrowemusic.com
www.gunnerrecords.com

"Where I was born and where I grew up, being an artist was like being totally insane." - An interview with Irmie Vesselsky

2010-09-06T13:33:00.008+02:00

I usually don't like Austrian music. Because, let's face it: 99% SUCKS. OK, 99% of all music sucks, that's true, but there's something about Austria that makes the suckyness even suckier. I am not going to drop names - just turn on that Austrian "alternative" radio station and be prepared to empty your stomach. There are a few exceptions to the rule, of course. One of these exceptions is Irmie Vesselsky. A lady, her voice, her piano, and that's that. She is a master of a long forgotten craft called SONGWRITING. Her album Parentheses of Antitheses is a hidden treasure, and here's a few things she has to say...

What made you start playing music in the first place?

Music itself - and everybody who told me to never ever do it. Music was always there. But in fact, I really tried to ignore it... my parents and my surroundings, "friends" told me to do so. They all gave me the feeling that there was something wrong with me, spending all my pocket money on CDs or instruments and rather "talking to my piano" than to men. Where I was born and where I grew up, being an artist was like being totally insane. So I was a good daughter and functioned, and tried to be what they wanted me to be, and music was my way to escape. Finally a breakdown/burnout back in 2008 made me follow my inner voice, and made me go back to where I was and what I had. I remembered myself as a kid sitting at the piano for hours on end, trying to escape this world, and create my own. It was wonderful. When you're a total mess and have nothig left, anyone or anything to trust or to rely on, and nothing is left but a piano in the corner of your room - what else could you do but talk to her? She was always so almighty, so tempting.... so I couldn't do anything but follow her and let it all out.

What made you realize "I can be an artist, and I can perform live and it's good"?

Have I really realized that? Am I...? This reminds me of what Katherine Hepburn once said: "I think most of the people involved in any art always secretly wonder whether they are really there because they're good or there because they're lucky." I mean, when I started writing songs, I never intended to play them live, to perform them or have them recorded. No one but my cat was allowed to listen. (And she always preferred Bach to my own songs.) When I first played "Unheard" - my first song ever - to her, she ran out of the room, shrieking...

It's quite a long way from writing your own songs to performing them in front of an audience... how did this happen? Who encouraged you? What was your first time like?

It was a long process, and it all happened by sheer chance. Who encouraged me? Well, there was a small bar in the countryside where I used to live. The bartender once came up to me saying "You are going to be a star. I can see it in your eyes.... play for me!" I thought this man was totally crazy and avoided his bar for some time. He then showed up at my place wanting me to sing for him and persuaded me to do a showcase in his bar. It took me quite some time until I agreed. Then, my first time... I really can't remember. I mean, I remember being sick, being nervous days before the performance already. I was very insecure and shy, couldn't stand those people staring at me, and couldn't understand why they were here to hear me play at all. But when I started to play, I forgot everything around me. I was in my own universe, there was just the piano and me dancing together. The applause was like an alarm clock waking you from a sweet dream. That's all I remember. I didn't really know what I was doing back then. I think, I was a mess, but quite a good one, ha!

So, after that “good mess”, it seems like you are playing constantly now, at every chance that pops up. Does it ever get boring? Are you still nervous before a show?

First of all, I do not play everything - it has to feel right for me and for the promoter as well. Playing concerts never gets boring: there's always a different venue, a different audience. Also, the way I play shows might differ. So it's still exciting for me. Things that in fact do get boring are the time between soundcheck and stage time, and moving all the equipment, especially if there's no piano. That's a thing I wish I wouldn't have to do anymore. And yes, I still get nervous! But you know what? Sometimes if I don't, I really get squirrelly, because I think there's something wrong with me. And honestly, I never ever want to "get used" to stage fright or gigging at all.

For some reason I just can't get past the idea of taking your lyrics as something deeply personal. It might be fiction, it might be just words to a song, but... you know. Dare to elaborate?

I wish I could write about something I haven't felt, I haven't experienced in my life, but I really can’t. Sometimes I do start with a fictional thought, but end up somewhere I've been before, sometimes I start with an experience and end up somewhere else my mind is dragging me to. So maybe it's a bit of both, fiction and reality. I could tell you a thousand of stories to each song, and they would all be true somehow - but isn't it ultimately more interesting which stories the listeners themselves create in their heads? It would be less fun if I told them what they should see or hear in this or that song, wouldn't it? Feel it!

www.irmievesselsky.com

Austin Lucas

2010-08-19T21:58:00.002+02:00

2010-08-17T18:51:00.004+02:00

"BORN TO RUN" IS THE BEST SONG EVER IN THE HISTORY OF RECORDED MUSIC. PERIOD.

Take this job and shove it!

2010-08-10T17:37:00.001+02:00

Auxes - Ichkannnichtmehr

2010-08-06T10:44:00.012+02:00

I tend to put people on a pedestal sometimes. Musicians, artists, writers, people in my life, people I love. I just can't help it. This is part of who I am. When I interviewed Chuck D, I felt like a little kid. (OK, actually I was looking down on Flavor when I bumped into him, but this was more a height thing...) But then again, punk rock has taught me that hero worship is a bunch of shit. If you look up to someone, you make yourself smaller. That's idiotic. One of the best thing about punk rock is that there are people you admire, people that inspire your thoughts and actions, and ultimately your life, but you can see eye to eye. You are peers.

Dave Laney is one of the people that have inspired me, even though we have never talked. He played in Milemarker, he played in Challenger, he published Media Reader, and probably did half a dozen more things that I don't know shit about. I loved the pink Milemarker record to death, and Media Reader made me look at music reviews from a whole new angle:

"We believe that the complete package is essential for a proper review of an "artist", and, even more importantly, of the specific "work of the artist" that you are sending us. We see no separation between art and music (in fact, music is art) and thus review not only the music but also the design and contents of the record."

So, well... Mr Laney is an American gentleman. This album has a German title. He lives in Hamburg now. Does that say anything about the music? Nope. I just thought I'd drop some random info here. And now, in the spirit of Media Reader, let's have at the artwork... awesome! It's extremely simple: just white and pink handwriting on black backgrounds, but it works. In fact, it works much better than an all computerized and clean design work would in this case. The music is dirty, the lyrics are personal, and the artwork reflects just that. Extra bonus points for the tasteful of magenta without letting it even remotely look like some teenie metal "emo" band!

The music... well... it KICKS FUCKING ASS! Maybe I have been listening to too much Black Flag in my life (if that's even possible at all!), but some of the song structures remind me of Black Flag. In fact, the chorus of the first song sounds exactly like "Rise Above" (if you make your own phonetic version of the lyrics, like I do all the time...). The second song, "Bad Luck, Motherfucker", is my favorite song on the whole album, it rocks so hard it's almost ridiculous. And more than that, it makes me feel alive.

So, from one old punk to another: thank you, Dave Laney! Your music is on fire with passion. I can hear it. I can fucking feel it. I can relate to a lot of the lyrics. That was a pretty bad review of a pretty good record, I know. I just feel that I really can't do it any justice by just describing it. Just listen to it, and you'll know what I mean. This is punk rock 2010. There is hope.

www.auxes.com
www.gunnerrecords.com

All my friends are into liquid trends

2010-08-04T11:28:00.001+02:00

We're not that hopeless, we're not as fucked as you think...

2010-08-03T20:20:00.005+02:00

"In short lived moments, we can do anything..."

Dear Landlord, München 2010

Water Pistol Man, full of ammunition...

2010-08-02T21:13:00.002+02:00

I never sleep, 'cause sleep is the cousin of death.

2010-08-01T20:51:00.002+02:00

I am patient boy. I wait, I wait, I wait.

2010-08-01T08:11:00.002+02:00

Nothing feels good

2010-07-31T21:30:00.001+02:00

"Everybody's got a hungry heart..."

2010-07-30T09:43:00.001+02:00

"But maybe everything that dies some day comes back."

2010-07-29T09:01:00.002+02:00

"Everything dies, baby, that's a fact..."

2010-07-28T11:11:00.001+02:00

Young Livers

2010-07-27T21:41:00.003+02:00

"Words were unforgettable. Actions are unforgivable."

"I had covered most of the house with paint and ink" - An interview with Adrian Landon Brooks

2010-07-27T11:03:00.008+02:00

I discovered Adrian Landon Brooks' art by sheer accident. Must have been on Myspace or something, which is ("this is sooo 2007!") pretty an old school thing by now. Myspace has become a zombie of bits and bytes in the meantime, Adrian's profile does not exist anymore, but somehow I have always been following his art... because this is the nature of art: it touches you, whether you see it in a gallery, on the streets, in a book, or even on the fucking internet.

What made you realize "wow, I can be an artist and be taken seriously"?
I started off painting graffiti all through out my teenage years, and got a job installing work at a gallery in Houston,TX. The owner of the gallery encouraged me to broaden my horizons, and that led to me exploring ink drawings. As the drawings progressed, I had a few key people in my life at the time that kept encouraging me to push my limits. When I had a body of rough work, I was offered a spot in a group show at a local warehouse gallery named "one ten". The experience of watching people interact with my work really opened my eyes and gave me some confidence that I had otherwise been lacking.

"Silver Jew" - water color on wood panel, 11" x 6 1/2 "

Who were these "key people"and what did they do?
When I was 19 or so, I was living in a dilapidated rental house with two of my close friends in Houston. We had a dining room and a huge garage that nobody was using, so I kinda took over both with all my scrawling ink drawings, and the beginning of some actual paintings. My roommates would give me constant feedback and comment on the mess I was creating daily. By the end of the lease, I had covered most of the house with paint and ink. That year shaped my work a lot. I also began a romantic relationship that same year and subsequently made portraits of her for the next few years. I owe those times and people a lot.

"The experience of watching people interact with my work really opened my eyes" - give an example!
I specifically remember selling a small drawing for 20 bucks at the first group show I was a part of, and being blown away with how happy this guy was to take it home. It really meant a lot to know my work could have such a positive effect on someone, even though it was pretty dark material at the time.

Speaking of happiness, what keeps you sane?
I would say my mother and art binges. I usually make a group of work all at once over the course of a few weeks. I seem to enjoy the purging process a lot more than making little things every day. When you work on a piece for 12 hours straight, you definitely experience a type of euphoria I haven't been able to find from any drug.

What inspires you to create art on a daily basis?
Pretty much anything you can think of really. I get inspired by music pretty often, or just a specific line from a song that hits me hard one day. Some of the one liners in my work are borrowed from some of my favorite songs. I think if a piece of music is capable of moving me, I should pay homage to it with my own creation.

Music... you have a Jawbreaker tattoo. What else rocks your world?
Haha, I got that tattoo when I was 17. I can safely say that Jawbreaker shaped a good part of my youth. 24 Hour Revenge Therapy will never get old. I have been listening to Timber Timbre and Phosphorescent a lot lately. I usually gravitate towards sad bastard music.

How, well... "fitting" - your art is not particularly lighthearted or happy per se... where does that come from?
I think I find the most inspiration or motivation from the darker side of things. It's not that I am an unhappy person, but I think sorrowful content is a little more interesting. I try to break up the melodrama with words - it's a way of bringing my issues to light, and realizing that I don't have it so bad. I think it's good to be able to poke fun at yourself.

More art can be found here: www.adrianlandonbrooks.com ... support!

I want your skull, I need your skull

2010-07-21T14:28:00.002+02:00

"As I have practiced it, photography produces pleasure by simplicity. I see something special and show it to the camera. A picture is produced. The moment is held until someone sees it. Then it is theirs." - Sam Abell

If you have nothing to say, post photos...

2010-07-18T11:04:00.004+02:00

Steve Ebner, 360 flip to fakie

"There is only you and your camera. The limitations in your photography are in yourself, for what we see is what we are." - Ernst Haas

"It's not just us three, anyone that has this kind of feeling or yearning of an unfulfilled life, can be basically be Client."

2010-07-17T12:28:00.014+02:00

This is an old interview. I did this in 2007, and it was originally intended to be in GLW/DRK #5. Client play - for lack of a better term - "electro pop". Electro pop that could be the soundtrack to one thousand sexual fantasies.

When the band was starting, they were a two piece. And I guess they found it easy: you could get one hotel room, two flights. A band like that is very cheap to do. But then again, you're doing small stages, and you're having a limited sound. By the third album, the sounds matured, and the stage shows developed, the influences had gotten bigger. Two people can't run it anymore, because there isn't a manger, there isn't anyone telling us what to do. And it was good for me to come in at the time, because I have a similar love for the music and the art and the lifestyle that goes with what the band is about. I guess I just brought in some ideas and helped develop the stage sound with more bass, rhythm section, haircuts, lights. You know, all the things that really matter [laughter]. It's just an added kind of dimension. If I got a new boyfriend, I'd always watch all their films, and listen to their music. It's the same kind of thing. Just bringing in some kind of new thing, it just keeps it fresh.

I completely agree, because from what I saw tonight, your kind of bass playing is not just like a rhythm instrument. You're playing your bass pretty much like one would play guitar.
Yeah, I was a guitar player, but I was really lazy. I didn't like to play lead. I just liked rhythms and stuff, so what I would is do harmonies and rhythm. Because all the bass lines are already there on the keyboard, and you can't really add anything to this, so I'd just pick out bits of the lower bass or add a different dimension. Give it more drive. Just take that song, "Where's the rock and roll gone", there is no bass. It's just the keyboard line, so I would go all out and do metal riffs, which is really fun.But other songs like "Pornography", they've got bass. It's still kind of keyboard riff, but I play it exactly the same, because it works. If you go through all the songs, you can pull out different elements before its being programmed up by Kate. She wrote most of the melodies before I joined. And they had done two albums already. I had to work with what was there. Its kind of like sitting in and then making the live sound.

So you are Client C then?
No, Client C is in Hamburg. Her name is Corinna. She isn't with us today, but she was for a few days. She helps with t-shirt designs, the album artwork, graphics, layouts, web design. Or, if you have an idea and you're sitting let's say somewhere in the middle of the world, and you don't have your computer and no internet access, you'll still just know there is another person who can do it. She is the glue that keeps everything together. She is the backbone. She updates Myspace, I run the Client Club Nights, and do the emailing for that. Kate does all the booking and coordination, and talking to distributors and record people. So during the day, she always gets phone calls Germany, Italy, Greece, Scandinavia. And then when she is in bed, she gets phone calls from people from USA, Mexico, South America, China. So she doesn't sleep. I'm Client E. My name is Emily. It just seemed natural. Client F for Andy Fletcher. Client X for Scott, who was the guitarist before we had Günther. Günther is from Vienna actually.

Really? I didn't know that. How did you hook up with anyway?
We were on Mute, and so were Fad Gadget. They'd got together again to go on tour with Depeche Mode. Not a lot of people know this, but Depeche Mode were actually influenced by Fad Gadget back in the day, but Depeche Mode took the more commercial route, and Frank Tovey kept his avantgardde performace art route and never made it to stadiums - pretty much what happens to people that stick to their independent principles. So when he died, his family got a DVD together with a lot of music videos, interview footage, live sets. Günther was playing guitar with him on the last ever tour that he did, supporting Depeche Mode. We met him at the showing of the film, and we were kinda taken by him, and that he supported and continued the Mute tradition of the experimental electronic dark wave kinda thing. It was good to keep it in the family, and he appreciated the music that we do. We appreciate his style of playing, because he knows what we are about, so it's perfect.
Speaking about record labels, how come you have these t-shirts with "Go DIY, lose EMI"? What happened?
What happened is that the music industry, from what I gather, is in a huge state of...

Being a whore?
Well, no... no one seems to be buying records anymore. The tradition of buying records is endangered, because nobody knows how to sell music anymore. A couple of years ago, when a band had an album out and people liked the band, they would buy it. But with the new media formats of the internet, like filesharing and download platforms, people are not buying hard physical copies, which is a shame I think. The concept would be so simple... people understood going to a record store: CD? Vinyl? Catch! So when things completely change for the consumers, we as artists and producers have to change the way we think about distributing music, even making music. People haven't got a clue anymore what to do, because theyre not in control anymore. Bands can take control by letting people listen to their music, or in some cases download it for free. This is the way to get noticed: let people know what your music sounds like.

It's pretty much the same thing as going to a record store ten or fifteen years ago and listening to a stack of brandnew records.
Yes, only now you don't have to leave the house. But MP3s are so compressed that the quality isn't all that good, compared to say CDs or vinyl. So I guess it's kind of gone backwards in a way. The whole issue of artwork, packaging, the beauty of vinyl, it's being lost. With our "Zerox Machine" fortyfive... it's white vinyl, we made sure that all the packaging had the whole handmade look, we paid special attention to what we did, and kept it really simple. All the record companies are losing their income, because they are not moving with the times. They are marketing everything as something you have to have, so they are losing lots and lots and lots of money on all these different hyped people and bands - but the interest isn't there. People are not buying into their marketing anymore. They are not paying attention to record comapnies that spend millions of pounds on marketing telling people to listen to this, so [the record companies] are not getting it back in the sales, and the artists get completely dropped. Record companies invest too much money in the first album, so artists dont have development time, they can't build a fanbase, and they don't have any longevity. EMI bought Mute, and they kept Depeche Mode because they make them money. Being on Mute means that you are technically on EMI,. and all they are is a major. I have heard "fuck the majors" from so many people, and for good reason actually: because majors are not interested in their artists, they are interested in making money. They are not into music, they just look at figures. And sure, it's the music BUSINESS, but it's also creative enterprise, and you can't just look at the business side in a non creative way. You've got to think of profit to be able to support yourself. No matter how romantic it may sound, a lot people when they are younger are like, "I want to be an artists, I want to be a singer, a musician." You can suffer for your art, or you try to take control yourself. We are just three girls, and they don't get the music. We don't run around in tight short skirts.

But you do.
It's not in a way the majors can understand.

For whatever reason, I have the impression that you try to stay under the public radar.
Well, I would say it's longevity as well. Music comes with a very short shelf life. The turnover is just ridiculous, especially with the British press - it's all fashion to them. Everybody can be the next big. You can blow up, and then next week you wouldn't even be able to get a gig or play shows. People have their opinion on you: "Oh, Client? Aren't they such and such and such?" I think it's more clever to let people find out about you through word of mouth. DIY! We're not, "Like us, we play catchy pop songs and we dress sharp." The music that I was drawn to, it felt like you were part of something, or as you said under the radar. I loved the Manic Street Preachers, I loved Placebo. I think the word now is "emo", but back then it was mod gothic electronic stuff.

Is there any certain band that you can recall that made you pick up an instrument?
Don't laugh, but it might have been Green Day. There are worse artists, though. I loved Pearl Jam, that track "Sometimes" is so beautiful. It makes me cry still. Jeff Buckley... uhm, things escape me. Pink Floyd was a huge influence... I was big hippie, you know. [laughter] I just like really emotional soulful music, but from any genre. You can find it in jazz, you can find it rock'n'roll, blues, soul, even hip hop. I don't listen to a lot of hip hop, but it's playing in the studio I work in. Some of the lyrics are absolutely phenomenally genius, and so is the production! I literally dissect it in the studio, because some of the beats and the rhythms are ridiculously good. Electronic music was born out of r'n'b in way, like the beats and the grooves were taken by Afrika Bambataa who added more beats and grooves. I found electronic music in london to a lot more of a black influence, like M.I.A. or this small local band Shy Child - they have this rhythm and it's really filthy, and can they play an indie club, rock club, r'n'b club. I am always really excited about hearing new things that grow naturally. But electro, you can press a button a synthesizer and you are god.

Speaking of which, Client as a band or collective have evolved from an anonymous unit to like real people...
It started anonymous, so that people would just listen to the music. It was putting the music first; the style of anonymity. You have the style and the substance going hand in hand. Even though you weren't flaunting it, you still had an image.

When you joined Client, did you ever find it hard to live up to image?
Well, we are Client. See, I would like to put it like this: when you are working and when you are behind your computer, you can have all these sexual fantasies, or think of something else, or just think about what you'd rather be doing. So you have all these thoughts in your head, and when you're going home, you change into another outfit, and you become this whole different person. We, as Client, are faceless. We wear uniforms. We could be anyone. We wear office skirts, a shirt, and tie. This is an office outfit, because it's like going to an office, going to work. It's not just us three, anyone that has this kind of feeling or yearning of an unfulfilled life, can be basically be Client. Personally, I never wanted to be just another kid in school. All the other school had certain ideals and their whole lives plotted out in front of them, and I just felt I didn't belong there at all. To me, that's why the album is called Heartland, because it's all about this certain longing to be accepted in life. Everybody has that, whether or not they admit it.

Is that a Sisters of Mercy reference, by the way?
Yes! I think the whole album was very much influenced by the Sisters of Mercy. It's the kind of emotion that I felt myself as a teenage girl sitting in my bedroom. It sounds kind of stupid now, because I have met so many teenage girls who have said the very same thing about Client to me. Especially Sarah has gone through a lot between the second and third album, and she's used to pour out a lot of angst - so to all of us, it's quite a release to go on stage and just yell out, and this is what makes our music so emotional in my eyes.

o, sitting here with you as the "new member" of the band, there is no spokesperson for Client, right?
Sometimes Kate doesn't like talking, because if she talks to much, her throat hurts. After she has been singing, she can't talk anyway. [laughter]

Client still rock my pants wet. They run their own record label, Loser Friendly Records. www.client-online.eu is their internet home.

Spanish Gamble - It's All Coming Down

2010-07-02T13:36:00.014+02:00

Maybe it's the summer heat, or maybe it's just my bad humor, but this record offers a lot of things to joke about. So let's crank the volume all the way up and let's get right into it...

One, this is a punk band that's orginally from New Mexico, and eventually they moved to Gainesville. That's not a joke, not even by my low standards, but it should not give you No Idea about the sound. And no, there is no pun that I don't like. Two, the name of one of their guitar players is Randy. That alone is as funny as it is awesome, because every Randy is a good Randy. Another bonus point for Spanish Gamble!

Speaking of which, what does that band name mean? It gives me weird thoughts.

But all GLW/DRKisms aside... shit! How good is this? There's everything a punk record needs in 2010, and then some. Seriously. The songs are catchy as hell, there's even handclaps and bro choruses en masse, booze fuelled vocals, and... guitars. Oh, those guitars. I wouldn't be too surprised if there was a secret lab somewhere in a back alley in Gainesvile, Florida, where beer drinking punks in stained white coats create genetically manipulated punk kids, who, some day, will grow up to play THAT sound. Or like Frankie Stubbs said, "It's all about the sound of a guitar going RRRRRRRRRAAAAAAAAAAAAA."

To sum it all up and to make you rush out and buy this record (*), It's All Coming Down is one hell of a summer record with perfectly crafted songs, and lyrics that might be worth a new tattoo or two:

"I just can't hit erase every time I fuck up. / It's all coming down. / These walls, this room, this whole fucking house. / And I can't take one more step into I'll regret."

(*) Yes, right, I said it. If you consider yourself punk (and even if you DON'T!), buy a record. Don't download it. You can't download vinyl. You can't download a cover and hold it in your hands while you drink beer by the open window and sing along. And that's just a few reasons...

www.paperandplastick.com

The worst record covers of all times, part two

2010-06-27T12:03:00.013+02:00

Well, I have to admit that it isn't the best idea I have ever had to make the 12 or so readers of this blog go blind. But then again, what should I do? I own this record. And I just can't bear this pain on my own. Please help me.

This record and this cover are so awesome on so many levels. One, it's not a "single", it's an EP. Four songs. That was unheard of back then! Two, it's not only four songs, it's four DRINKING SONGS. For better or worse. I am still a bit in doubt whether or not these are songs you should listen to while you are drinking (to enhance the liquid experience), or songs you just can't stand listening to while you're sober. I'll leave this up to you, dear reader. Judge for yourself.

But this is about the cover, not the music. This dude is the textbook definition of awesome: part Red Dawn, part King Diamond. Oh, hold on a second... must... gasp... for... breath...

Two things about this cover will poke your eye immediately: the teeth and the Spar logo. Now I don't really know what the fuck is up with that logo, but it definitely is an interesting thought that this piece of "music" was a giveaway by the world's largest food retailer. But where the fuck did they display this? In the wine section? Special offer: buy two bottles of vodka, get a vinyl seven inch for free? We'll never know.

Anyway, I would love to get a free seven inch when I go shopping for groceries. It would make a song I love come to life again.

The worst record covers of all times, part one

2010-06-24T20:21:00.012+02:00

Now I know that are quite some websites dedicated to the art of the album cover, like this or that, but as far as I know, no one has ever posted this visual atrocity. Sit back, open the image in a new browser window, and gasp for breath. Yes, this is serious!

It's only half as "funny" if you don't understand German, because the song titles make it even better. And no, I'm sorry, I just CAN'T translate it. The second song, "Wüst oder wüst ned" is a overlooked and long forgotten gem of Austropop. Even if you don't get the lyrics, it's worth a mouseclick... because... because... it's a fucking Sirtaki song, and I AM NOT MAKING THIS UP!

It's a song about drinking with a girl, supposedly giving her the time to make up her mind (about whatever, the author is being unclear about this), and looking for the toilet in the meantime. And while the story itself is scary and weird enough, please take another look at the cover. The person who sings this song is the one on the left, some kind of Austrian semi-celebrity. So, uhm well. But who the fuck is the one on the right? Shit, that dude's scary! And by "scary", I mean BIG TIME SCARY.

So, dear blog reader, whoever you are - enjoy this post like you would enjoy driving past a car accident on the highway. You can thank me later. Me, I will go and see Kim Wilde and Billy Idol tonight. For free. It's gonna be fun, in an Accüsed kinda way...

"It's not just about chords and beats." - An interview with Obstacles

2010-06-24T10:01:00.011+02:00

"Obstacles grew out of the D.I.Y. culture and finds its inspiration and energy in the principles of integrity and immediacy derived from this movement. The band is driven by an urge to create relevant music, to transcend the triviality of our times uniform culture and to protest its monolithic aesthetics. Obstacles is the creative partnership between friends."

There. They said it themselves. I just can't think of any better introduction for this great band. They are "math rock" (for lack of a better term), they are "post rock", they are an instrumental band (one that does not bore me, yay!), and they kick ass. They have released an album called Decomposition of Movement, a 7", and a split with Auxes. I love them.

This is an interview that was never finished. But the points that were made were just too valid to disappear on a hard drive forever.

(This is my friend Emil. He is not in the band anymore.)

Obstacles? Why? And which ones? Which decomposition of what movement?

Thomas: The title Decompostion Of Movement has two sides to it; a concrete and an abstract one. First of all it's the name of a brain lesion, which means that your gestures are broken up into individual segments instead of being executed smoothly. Second, it refers to the idea that music is not about linear movement, but movement in a mass of directions. To say it briefly, it's songwriting - anti songwriting. Mathrock, as I see it, is a matter of decomposition in general, a break down of the framework of "classical songwriting". Leaving more room for playing around and turning things upside down, therefore making it more interesting, more creative and less predictable. We're not really interested in trying to write or reinvent the perfect rock song. To me, that seems so unambitious and boring. I'm not saying that what we do is super original and never-been-done-before like, but more that what we're doing is simply putting together small pieces of noise and music in formations that seem challenging, new and exciting to us. It's a collage: everything's already been done, now it just needs to be messed up!

Niels-Peder: Obstacles, as in the things we encounter in the process of writing songs, but also in a more general term. The things that are all around us, other people, trains, buses, our computers, all the obstacles that meet us everywhere we go. For me the thing is that we tend to see these obstacles as things to be passed, getting over things, getting well, the way we tend to ignore the obstacles at hand. I think we need to be more aware of all these obstacles, investigate them and then decide what is going on with them. There I think, we can truly find out what we hate and what we love. Obstacles are there to be studied, to be seen as the things that - in a strange way - make up our very life.

Obstacles does not have a vocalist. Was that a conscious decision? What are the pros/cons about this? Do you sometimes find yourself having a hard time getting your message across only with instruments?

Thomas: Can't really say it was a conscious decision. In the beginning we tried several vocalists out, but it never really worked out. It was fun and all, but we never got that 'yes' feeling. So after while we trashed the idea. I guess we wanted to do something new and different from what we had done before, and the vocalists we tried out didn't really contribute to that.

One of the things I love about being an instrumental band is the way it leaves space for the instruments (or maybe it's just an ego thing!). When we write music, we often go, "Oh, this part sort of needs a lead figure", because there are no vocals. And then it's always really interesting to try and figure out what exactly it is that's needed, what instrument, and how to play it. So in some ways I think the creative process is a bit more challenging when writing instrumental music. For us "the message thing" is just as much a matter of how we choose to be a band and be in a band as it is about writing, let's say, political songs. We play music that's relevant and means something to us. Music that moves us, be it protest songs or love songs.

To tie right into that, what sets obstacles apart from your run of the mill "postrock"-band in my book is that you are very DIY and very political - by choice, and not by necessity. Want to eloborate?

Thomas: The way I see it, there's a huge difference between being an indie band that is really independent right until a major label shows a bit of interest, and a band who wants to run it themselves, because they believe in doing it that way. Of course a band is a business in some ways, or at least it becomes one when you release a record or go on tour. But for us it's important to bear in mind that, when we got involved in music - touring and releasing records. We were only able to do so because people were ready to help us get started, you know, booking tours, doing shows, releasing our music and so on. And it's still like that. We did a tour in Russia some months ago, a really great tour. And again, we could only do that because people over there worked their asses off to bring us there, without getting anything but the experience in return. To me, that's really something. It's not just about chords and beats, but about deliberately choosing alternative ways of organization. A subversive approach to the whole promotion thing is, as I see it, the core element in being a "political" band.

Niels-Peder: Being political is in essence, as I see it, not about saying the right things or having a radical attitude. To me, the political side to the project is, as Thomas puts it, about deliberately choosing another way. The meeting between people and the exchange of ideas and experiences this brings.

Obstacles will play at the Rhiz in Vienna on August 16, together with Alarma Man.

www.obstacles.dk

Average & Huckey - Ganz schön hässlich

2010-06-20T14:31:00.017+02:00

This record is a tricky beast to write about, for a number reasons... one, I really, really like it. A lot. And when I find myself liking a record, it gets hard to write about. Bad reviews easy, good reviews hard. Two, it's kinda old. Not "old" as in 1980s old school old, but it has been out for quite some time now. But then again, GLW/DRK has never been about being up to date, and that's that. And finally, three, it is an Austrian hip hop relase. In Austria, we speak German, or at least a version of German. And since this album (or is it an EP?) has German lyrics, I really wasn't sure whether or not I should write this review in English. It's a hard knock life, I'm tellin' ya. But here it is, in English, because I truly feel that this album can be enjoyed even if you don't understand the language. I know that at least I can like French hip hop, or Turkish hip hop, or Japanese "post-core" without being able to understand a single word.

I have mixed feelings about Austrian hip hop. There are many (new) acts, there are many good acts, but a lot of the output these days is just tee-rash. I don't know, maybe it has to do something with the nature of German language, but, in the words of Markante Handlungen, "muas I eana schau wieda mit da Peitschn deiten, wei's die Deitschen biten!". Average and Huckey don't do that. They do their very, very own thing, and it's easy to admit I am stoked.

Ganz schön hässlich is some kind of a concept album, very loosely based on the 19th century children's book "Der Struwwelpeter" by Heinrich Hoffmann. (There is an awesome adaption by Bob Staake available from Fantagraphics, and there was an anti-fascist version during WW2, called "Struwwelhitler".) There are six tracks about the stories in the book, and then there are 5 more remixes. Average is a young (dope!) MC, and Huckey is an old (dope!) MC, so it's pretty much like this, only with words and rhymes. It would be wrong that say that me and Huckey are friends, but we have known each for quite a while now, and that relationship goes back to the days of his old bands, Target of Demand and Seven Sioux, so I am more than stoked to see that he still kicks ass. (He actually never stopped kicking ass, and this is the evidence.)

So what has to be said about this record are three things:

1. The beats are amazing. The choice of samples is great. The cuts are right on. Seriously, this is up there with the best of the best.
2. The words and rhymes and the flow are top of the game, and they are one of a kind. There has been no Austrian release like this before, drawing influence from a classic piece of literature, turning into something unique and original, and above all, pushing limits and staying "true to the game".
3. Kamp makes an appearance, and so does Flip from Texta, and the features and the remixers don't ruin it, in fact they add a little extra something.

Ganz schön hässlich is a hip hop record for the heads and for people who don't even like the music. It's everything that made hip hop so amazing in the first place, it's deep and fresh, and it works in the club just as well as it does on your headphones. Big up!

www.tontraeger-records.com

Young Livers - Of Misery And Toil

2010-06-07T14:44:00.012+02:00

Something about this record screams "No Idea", and I can't quite put my finger on it. Sure enough, they're from Florida (well, at least 3/4 of them), they rock hard, scream, and - dare I say it - well, yes, they are standing on the shoulders of giants, who, for what it's worth, never ever could pull off an album like Of Misery And Toil anymore. But still, there is something underneath all the noise and melody and gruffness that makes Young Livers stand out.

Maybe it's the fact that this record came into my life at the right time. Maybe it's got something to do with a desperate need for someone to tell me that everything will be OK, no matter how hard it seems sometimes. Lines like "We face up to look down. We breathe out just to hear something else." just ring a bell. There is hope. Repeat: there is hope.

Music is just sound, and books are nothing but words, but they serve a deeper purpose. They help us humans to understand the universe. They explain things. They make you feel less alone, and less miserable. And sometimes, music and words touch your soul.

The feeling I get from this record, way beyond the screaming and beyond the realization of "Hey, wait, they didn't have all these hard rock guitar melodies on the first album", is this: there are times when we, as humans, feel completely lost and lonely and desperate, and we think that no one can relate to the pain we feel. It becomes something universal, bigger than life itself, and we become so absorbed with it that we just can't see the light at the end of the tunnel. It is the task of the poet that make us feel less alone, to touch our hearts and minds, to explain things, to make us understand. And fuck yes, drunk punk rockers from Florida can be the true poet that touches your heart and soul every now and then. Young Livers did that to me.

Behind this wall of noise, there is a soothing beauty. Behind all the screaming, you can find stories of desperation and fucking up, of falling down - and, more important than anything else! - of getting the fuck back up again, brushing off the dirt and tears, and asking the universe: "Is that all you have to fucking offer?"

There is hope in failure. There is hope in pain. There is always a light at the end of the tunnel. Always. We only need a little reminder now and then. My own personal reminder sounds fucking amazing and is called Of Misery And Toil.

"It's veiled now in our patience. It's kindled in remorse. Failed, as we have become what we loathe."

www.noidearecords.com

The only thing an iCrap is good for...

2010-05-09T11:21:00.001+02:00

Unveiling the wicked (like the title of that Exciter record)

2010-03-26T09:43:00.013+01:00

A few days ago, the Side One Dummy website read that the artwork for the new Gaslight Anthem album had been "unveiled", and I was already skeptical. Unveiled?! What the fuck? A long lost Van Gogh painting? Or even a new Banksy piece? Either way, I figured, it must be special...

And yes, it is special indeed. "Special" in a Special Olympics way.

All right, I am the first to admit that the artwork for The '59 Sound was one giant step forward from the visual atrocity known as Sink Or Swim. And let's not forget that Señor and the Queen looks fucking awesome... (That said, please check out www.giantsquidletterpress.com for a lot of really amazing letterpress artwork!) So well, yes, this band had developed a really strong visual identity over the years, one that even I could enjoy.

But let's be honest, the new cover... ouch! I actually like the idea, but that's where it ends. Maybe the only good thing I can say about it is that it was quite smart to use the same typeface as on '59 again. What totally ruins it is that white border around everything... it looks like some World of Warcraft playing douchebag from the Gaslight Anthem's bible group came up with the concept of making the record look "used" and "old", but one Photoshop lesson after sunday school just wasn't enough to pull it off. Seriously, it's looking putting this picture on top of that cover. Why not poop on it?

(Please excuse me for a moment... must... empty... stomach...)

On with the sweetness, baby! The album title in that black box on the bottom corner... what's that? Did you forget to add it in your 72 DPI preview file? I am not even mentioning the arrangement of the photos here. It wouldn't take any amputee who has to click the mouse with his toes longer than let's say ten minutes to crop them properly!

But the cream of the crap (oops, crop, I mean...) is the knuckle duster right under the label logo. I am not even blaming the graphic "designer" here, maybe it was just a smart business move. "Dude, well, you know, dude, we need to expand our target audience... let's not forget our old fans. You know, dude, that chick in Poophole, Ohio, was all over me... I want her to buy the record at Hot Topic!" NO! NO! NO! What's next then? Girlie shirts in XS that are flexible enough to fit a whale if stretched properly?

Dear whoever-did-this-cover, I would love to meet you and shake your hand. You must be a fucking genius. Not when it comes to graphic design, sorry, but I'm sure you got a big bag full of money to commit offense to all my sensiblities, and that makes you one hell of a business man. Oh, and by the way, you owe me a meal. The one I had today wouldn't remain in my belly.

Help the police? Well... naaaah.

2010-03-15T23:04:00.000+01:00

A random photo and a not quite all that random quote...

2010-03-05T17:54:00.003+01:00

While going through my negatives recently, I discovered the photo above. Is it just me, or does it really look like this?

Anyway, it made me think of something Henry Rollins once said:

"When I was 18, I wanted to fuck on the floor and break shit. When I was 25, I wanted to fuck on the floor and break shit. When I was 35, I wanted to fuck on the floor and break shit. Now I'm 40 and I wanna fuck on the floor and break shit."

I am 36 years old now. You do the math.

Ninja Gun - Restless Rubes

2010-03-01T16:15:00.014+01:00

Sometimes it's a good thing if I don't write a review right away. Some things need time. Some things only make sense when the time is right. When I first listened to Restless Rubes, I was like "uhm, well, ok". Today is March 1st. Today is the first real warm and sunny day of the year, and all of a sudden it all clicked, and it all made sense.

I guess Ninja Gun are punk kids at heart. They did split EPs with Fake Problems and the mighty Whiskey & Co., and their lyrics clearly show where they come from - but still, Restless Rubes is a pop record. And no, that's not a contradiction. I mean, come on... fucking London Calling is the prime example of a pop record made by punks. So there.

First of all, the production is superb. "Superb" in a major label, big budget kind of way, but without sounding too slick and polished. There is a certain depth and warmth to the sound that makes a whole lot of dirt shine through. And if you know me, you know how much I love dirt - or, in the words of Jason Jessee: "I like to fall on my face. I like to hurt myself. I like everything!"

So what we have here is a pop album that might appeal to three old boys and aging ex-punks at the same time, and this is something that doesn't happen every day. When I still had a regular 9 to 5 day job, I would play Samiam and Sense Field all the time, because I fucking loved these bands (still do!) and nobody felt annoyed. Ninja Gun should be filed in the same category. Sure enough, this isn't a record to piss off frat boys and cops and co-workers, but what the fuck... this is 2010, and a Born Again$t t-shirt is not going to change the world.

Restless Rubes might not make it into any top 10 lists this year, it might not become anybody's favorite record, but if you seriously give it two or three chances, it's a rock solid album that you will find yourself coming back to. You might even dig it so much that you will save three copies from a sales CD bin as birthday presents. In the meantime, I will keep my fingers crossed that it actually does not end up in sales bins. It's simply too good for that.

www.ninjagun.com
www.gunnerrecords.com

Fist A Ferret / Slaves To The Grind - Split 7"

2010-02-18T13:22:00.015+01:00

Oh well... I admit it: guilty as charged. I have put off reviewing this little fucker for quite some time. Not because I don't like it, but because I wasn't quite sure what to make of it... I'm still not sure. But anyway, these are my thoughts:

1. It looks like shit. Seriously. The brown cover looks like a print job gone horribly wrong. Intentional? I have no clue. All I know is that even if I was a dedicated fan, I would never in my life pick this up in a record store, EVER.

2. Fist A Ferret must be one of the worst band names of all times. I'm sure that there is half way funny inside joke behind the name, but that doesn't make it any better. But then again, Hüsker Dü was a band name so incredibly bad... and who am I to complain?!

2a. Fist A Ferret even the score by calling their "label" (or whatever it is) Simmering Noise Productions. And if you know me, you'll know that two out of these three words mean a lot to me. I love noise. I would defend my 'hood to my last breath. Simmering rules, 1110 for life. There, I said it.

3. Whoah, nice sample! If you're not from Austria, you probably have no clue who Dagmar Koller is... but if you are, you will fucking appreciate this timeless and immortal quote!

4. I do like the music actually. Fast, fast, fast, no bullshit, violent hardcore. Dual vocals. Makes me think of Infest at times, a little bit of Spazz, some random 625 and Slap-A-Ham stuff, early Napalm Death and Unseen Terror, and damn, there's even some From Ashes Rise guitar lines thrown in the mix. On hyper speed, of course.

5. Slaves To The Grind is another REALLY BAD band name.

5a. Fuck them! Their name sounds like a Skid Row record (plus one letter), and they don't even sound like Skid Row.

5b. No, wait a second... I'll take that back. They made me wanna listen to cock rock again, so no "fuck them". Cool? Cool.

6. Do yourself a favor... never EVER look at their band photos. Their drummer is a fucking hippie, in a crust punk way. And like the lyrics to Saint Vitus' "Clear Windowpane", he's probably got "things living in his hair". Yikes.

7. Slaves To The Grind only know two speeds: fast and faster. Even though "playing a solid groove at 190 bpm can not be considered fast in 2009, BOLLOCK!" ... well, you know... sorry to say that, but I've heard it all before.

8. Now don't get me wrong - this is not a bad record. And these bands are probably the bomb at 3 AM in a squat basement... it's just that I don't go to 3 AM shows in squat basements anymore.

9. From a purely economic point of view, 12 songs on 7 inches are a pretty good deal... if the Bleeaauurrggh compilations never happened!

10. Oh, fuck it. Buy this record! If you're a young punk, it might just change your life. If you're old jaded like me, it might remind you of your glory days when Terrorizer was all the rage.

www.fistaferret.tk
www.slavestothegrind.se

Kodiak / Nadja - Split

2010-02-15T10:32:00.004+01:00

All the way back in 1992, I bought a record. That record sucked so bad it was hard to believe. Eighteen years later, I can listen to it on an occassional basis without the urge to pierce my eardrums. I was a young snotty punk in 1992. In 2010, I am an old man. Old men sometimes sit on their couches with coffee and listen to boring records. This is how we do. But old men also get records in the mail, and don't buy a lot of stuff anymore - at least not because someone told them that there's this "masterpiece" out there. I have heard it all before. And here's a promise: I will never ever buy another Melvins record. I bought "Lysol" in 1992 because fucking Kurt Cobain said they were his favorite band, and that this record sounded like side B of "My War", and what I got for my hard earned cash was a shit sandwich on vinyl, and the deep conviction that the fucking Melvins are one of the most overrated bands of all times, right after the Beatles.

Eighteen years later, I find a record in my mail box that makes "Lysol" seem to be the masterpiece I was told it'd be.

Kodiak are from Germany. And shit, their "song" is just like the German Autobahn: long and boring. It takes them a good ten minutes to even find their drums in the studio, while someone puts a poor excuse for a piano sample over it, trying to be Varg Vikernes. Listen, Kai-Uwe, you can put your pedal to the metal on the Autobahn, and speed up things, race past the other BMWs. Why the fuck would you stay in the first lane, and drive your Volkswagen at the speed of a turtle? But oh, behold! Things just got even worse...

Nadja isn't even a band name. It's the name of an Eastern European prostitute. But damn, Polish hookers are probably a lot more fun than this band. Is it even a band? Or just one socially handicapped dude? Call me ignorant, but this is garbage. It's just white noise. Nothing ever happens here at all. And to put things like "recorded / composed / performed live in the studio blahblah" on your cover doesn't make it art, it just makes you look even more like the arrogant asshole that you are.

I never thought that I would say this in public, but records like this one make me want to listen to bullshit like the Locust. Or even the entire Bob Dylan discography. And that, my friends, is a form of torture that's probably outlawed in most civilized countries. Except Germany.

www.denovali.com
www.denovali.com/kodiak
www.nadjaluv.ca

Agnostic Front vs Mozart (according to Walter Schreifels)

2010-01-13T13:16:00.006+01:00

"Victim In Pain by Agnostic Front is one of my favorite records of all time, it's classical music. If you don't know this album I highly recommend that you get familiar with it. Don't be scared away by the misleading artwork, although that's part of the album's "Power" (title of a song on VIP) AF's music fights against fascism and the attitudes of fascists ("Fascist Attitudes")

I think cavemen would have liked Victim In Pain better than anything Mozart ever came up with, or the Beatles. If you had to get psyched up to kill a Wooly Mammoth, would you listen to The Beatles with Sgt. Pepper on french horn or Victim In Pain with Vinny Stigma on lead? I can almost hear the cave men screaming (if they had developed language) STIGMA!!!

It's timeless music, post apocalypse Mad Max people will be rocking to it in a thousand years. Do you think anyone is gonna give a shit about The Shins when you could be raped, lit on fire, dragged by a motorcycle and killed for a liter of gas (which kind of defeats the purpose)? Shit, Apes from Planet Of The Apes would love AF, though the Chimps and Orangutans maybe not as much.

Anyhoo, it's not a music competition, I like The Shins and there is a place for them too but I think that Victim In Pain is more important and unique in the evolution of music, art, mankind, that it goes beyond indie rock and steps into Smithsonian Institute territory.

For that reason I covered AF's "Society Suckers" from Victim In Pain. My version doesn't approach the aggressive power of the original but I had fun interpreting it, an homage. I think of it as classic folk song like "This Land Is Your Land", I wish Woody Guthrie would do a version in the time/space continuum."

The Takers - Taker Easy

2009-11-23T14:46:00.007+01:00

Well, I think it's safe to say that your attention span is probably that of an amoeba if you are browsing tEh intOrwebz for bands and music reviews, so I'll keep it short for you: this is country music played by punks. From Gainesville, Florida. Two people from Whiskey & Co. also play in The Takers. And it's a great fucking record. Now go out and buy this. Thank you. You can now close your browser window.

(End transmission.)

But if you like to read more, be my guest. I was stoked when this album arrived here. Country music, punks, Florida, drinking songs, how could I go wrong? The answer is easy: if you like traditional music, this should be on your shopping list. The early 1970s saw the rise of a movement called "outlaw country", taken from a Waylon Jennings song. In retrospect it's kind of funny to think about Waylon Jennings or even Willie Nelson as outlaws, when there's people like Hank Williams III or even David Allen Coe taking things much, much further in every aspect. But hey, then again... the Sex Pistols were once called "punk", and look at them now. So there.

So in that sense, yes, The Takers are outlaws: the nice kind of outlaws, with "one hand on the bottle, one foot in the grave." They are punks. Their brand of country is PUNK without a doubt, even though it doesn't sound like it. Your dad might like it. What makes it punk is that they take a genre of music that's traditionally reactionary and conversative, even unabashedly racist and nationalist at times, and put it back where it belongs: in the hands of the people. There is no ambition for stardom, for radio play, for money and groupies, it's just about putting feelings in a song. It's about fucking up and losing, being honest about it, and still flipping the bird to the man and the bosses. In my book, this is much more punk than clean cut white middle class straight edge kids talking about a "crew" or whatever. This is real music by real people. This is a great record.

www.suburbanhomerecords.com

Hail the King!

2009-11-03T18:47:00.001+01:00

This is so awesome on so many levels...

Switchblade - Switchblade (2009)

2009-10-22T15:49:00.008+02:00

"Be loud, be slow, as the march of celestial time."

This is a hard record to write about. Damn, it even is a hard record to listen to. But then again, what do you expect from a band that releases five self-titled records in ten years, and doesn't even have song titles? A fucking top ten radio hit?!

I am not too fond of the new wave of "drone" or "funeral doom", because let's face it: most the time it's nothing but completely talentless hippies who can't play good enough to keep beat releasing overpriced limited edition bullshit. Fortunately, Switchblade don't seem to be hippies. They're ex-punks. They didn't mellow out with age, they didn't try to come up with any "artistic statements", they did not "experiment with new frequencies", they just created record after record and got better and better. And totally unlike most of their peers in the world of slow music, Switchblade don't fuck around with bombastic arrangements. Everything about this record is so pure and simple it almost hurts.

Their fellow Swedes Abruptum have often been hailed as "the audial essence of pure black evil", and every second fat Black Metal chick believed it and bought their incredibly awful records to shock their parents just because some douchebag told them to. I can only imagine what Switchblade would do to them... just a notch above Sunn O))) when it comes to "beats", this band demands a lot from the listener. What might seem scary at first (or, as Jawbreaker said, "funny like a funeral") is in fact breathtakingly beautiful. Because... well, true beauty lies in darkness. Pain is not bad per se. All things must end. A black t-shirt is cooler than a white one. And so on and so fucking further, ad infinitum and ad nauseam. It's a useless task tyring to describe this music, or trying to convince you to buy this record - because it's either you do, or you don't. If you're straight edge, you probably won't like Bukwoski. If you think that Cradle of Filth is evil black metal, you can go get fucked. And that, my friends, is the point I am trying to make.

This album is one of the best and most intense records of the year. The album cover is aboslutely stellar. They're only a trio, but they make a shitload of noise. Turn off the lights, motherfucker.

www.switchblade.se
www.trustnoonerecordings.com

The Spits - The Spits IV

2009-10-16T19:31:00.009+02:00

Fuck you. I hate this record.

Seriously, what the fuck is wrong with you? The temperature has dropped, it gets dark way too soon, it's cold like my beer should be, and I'd usually listen to Darkthrone at this time of the year. Or Winter. Or Bathory. But oh no, the fucking Spits have nothing better to do than release a new record. Fuck you. I want to be miserable, hate the world, and not leave the apartment. I certainly don't want to sit on my couch with a big grin and tap my feet because this album is SO AMAZING. I hate the Spits for recording this, and I hate Recess for putting this out.

That said, it's a textbook example of a punk rock record. Ten songs in less than 16 minutes, dumb as shit and smart at the same time, and it even sounds like shit. If I'd go to a record store and the person behind the counter would tell me that it's some long lost proto punk band from let's say 1979, I'd believe them, buy the record, and tell all my friends about it to make me seem cooler than I actually am. (Of course, I would bust my ass trying to look up their early EPs on the internet, and not find anything, but this is how us music nerds usually spend our evenings.)

While I was typing these three paragraphs, I have listened to this record twice. It's only 16 minutes. And since it sounds even cooler if you pitch it up a notch, it might have been only 12 minutes. Faster is better.

www.thespits.com
www.recessrecords.com

"Are we not NYHC anymore? I'd say we still are, and I think we always will be." - An interview with Mike Bullshit

2009-06-17T19:24:00.008+02:00

GO! just has to be the textbook definition of a hardcore band name. Unbroken, Poison Idea, Urban Waste, or Sick Of It All ain't too bad either when it comes to band names, but GO! always have had a very special place in my punk rock heart: fucking shit up, but always remaining a firecracker of positivity, sarcasm, and smartness. They recently got back together, released two new 7"s, and eventually Mike Bullshit and me ended up exchanging a few e-mails...

GO! has only been a band for 3 years originally, then you broke up, got back together 15 years later, and broke up again. What happened in the meantime? And does this mean you will play reunion shows in 2023 again?
Oh, it's been even weirder than that. We were actually only together like a year and a half, then did the US tour in 1990, came back, recorded Why Suffer?, played our second "last show" (the first was in January 1990), and then I went to go hitchhike around the country, settling in Texas, while Aaron went to university. We then did the Euro tour in 1991, came back and recorded There Is No Man, and then I think broke up again.Then we did some shows in mid 1992, then again in mid 1994. We were then totally out of touch until late 2005, when I contacted Aaron and we decided to make music again. We did some shows in mid 2006 and recorded Re-active, and the some shows in California in 2007 and recorded What We Build Together. And then we broke up again in January 2008, but... you never know. To be more specific, in 2006 and 2007 we were together for a total of 9 days, played 8 shows and recorded 2 EPs.

Despite being from NY and playing hardcore, GO! never seemed to be down with the NYHC scene... no, scratch this. I would say GO! was more punk than the bands that played CBGBs matinees, right? In retrospect, I guess it was more ABC-No-Rio and Born Against than let's say Agnostic Front, would that be a good analogy?
Well, we never were a tough guy band, but lots of bands weren't - y'know, Bad Trip, Life's Blood, SFA (which I was in earlier), Underdog, Gorilla Biscuits, Krakdown - good bands, not macho assholes. And then yeah, Born Against and Citizens Arrest and Rorschach came along and we were happily in that ABC thing. But I always thought of us as 100% hardcore. Punk and hardcore were very seperate things in NYC back then. Lots of "drunk punks" and "squatter punks", and we weren't quite in that scene. But we never played CBGBs either, and the Anthrax in CT never wanted us for some reason. But we played with Krakdown, SOIA, Uppercut, and Burn, [and] our first show was with Absolution and some others, an animal rights benefit at the Pyramid - thankfully the only show where I played bass and sang. Absolution were astounding to watch. But then again, I went to just about every hardcore matinee at CBGB's in 1985 and 1986, give or take, and on and off through 1989. I loved CB's! And I saw Agnostic Front, Cro-Mags, Murphy's Law and such, easily 8-10 times each. They were awesome shows. But I was [just] this little 16 year old geek doing my fanzine, Bullshit Monthly.
From an outsider's perspective, I always thought that not only the New York hardcore and punk scenes were quite separated, but also the CB/ABC scenes. GO! always had a very strong anti-violence stance, anti-racist, pro-gay, all things that were not, well... "popular" among the likes of Cro-Mags or Warzone. Was it widely known that you are gay? How and when did you come out?
I actually came out very publicly: on the inside cover of Bullshit Monthly #21 it said, "Proud to be gay-owned and operated." So, it was out there really quickly, maybe towards the end of '89. I remem-ber at the first GO! show mentioned above dedicating [the song] 'Section 28' to "my gay friends." Ouch. But that's where I was at that point in time. I guess maybe at this point it was both CB's and ABC happening, plus the Reconstruction Records store. Maybe the big SxE shows at the Pyramid weren't really going on anymore. I had actually missed that whole part of the scene, although I loved Straight Ahead and some others. There's a Straight Ahead video from 1988 on YouTube and you can see me - I come in maybe half-way. I've got my beard, which is unfortunate. Anyway, by 1989, I had been in the scene on and off for like 5 years and everyone knew me through the fanzine, so it really wasn't much of a problem. If people didn't talk to me or whatever, it didn't really bother me. And no one ever kicked my ass or anything. In that way I was probably the best person to come out, since I wasn't as much at risk. GO! never played at CB's, and I wasn't out when I played there with SFA - but at some point after I had been gone from SFA and came back, there was a show scheduled with the Bad Brains and I think we all decided better that I didn't do it and leave the band, which really was for the best. We probably didn't play too many shows with absolute bonehead bands. And I certainly wasn't out in 1985-86 in the pit at Cro-Mags and AF shows. I was just this skinny dweeb.

How and why and did GO! break up? I only know you released an (ego.) 7" afterwards, but I always had the impression it was pretty much under the radar, and all of a sudden you seemed to have disappeared from "the scene", only to turn up again in some hippie community, with Bullshit Monthly one sheeters full of Abba and La Bouche reviews...
GO! broke up so many times some people can boast at having been at 3 or 4 GO! "last shows." But we pretty much broke up as a steady band (for the fourth time, I think) in late 1991, after the European tour and recording There is No Man. Why? We had always planned to. The thought was to play great music before we moved on with our lives, yet split before we started making lousy music, like so many other bands had done. Then I did (ego.) and we did some shows in the summer of 1994, released the Existence compilation in 1995 (which Aaron compiled with Don Fury, and Frank from Epistrophy in Germany put out), but then we were totally out of communication until 2005. At that point I found Aaron's phone number and just gave him a call. We got together for a weekend with our spouses and at some point I suggested writing and performing again. And there we were. Believe it or not, I had no idea that every other band was reuniting as well. That was a complete surprise. (ego.) was kind of a side project that released two 7" EPs, but also played maybe 7 or 8 shows in the NYC and surrounding area, and even did a limited US tour in 1994 with Sticks & Stones. Our car broke down in California somewhere so we stopped. At some point [the] Stick & Stones van caught on fire, so maybe it’s better that we split off from them. And yeah, I lived at East Wind Community in Missouri for almost 3 years. It was great. I loved it, and part of me definitely misses it. I learned so much about people, about life, about business, and computers, also having the opportunity to work in the ranch or on the farm for like an hour a week (or however much I wanted) was very special. How often do you get that chance? I met some very special people (and some real assholes), learned a whole lot about nature and the natural pace of life, and grew up. I went from being a complete vegetarian to eating meat every so often. But only really stupid animals, like cows, sheep, chickens. Never anything intelligent, like pigs. Fuck, what an incredible time in my life. Now with work, the mortgage, my husband, our two dogs and such, I of course couldn't go back to that. But maybe for a visit at some point. And yeah, I did CB for a number of years: Current Bullshit, starting when I lived in Germany and continuing into Missouri and later when I moved to California. It was based more on personal observations of the world around me, less so on music. It made me open my eyes, look around, pay attention to things. What a great mental exercise. And it kept me in touch with many people.

How old are you now? I am asking this because I am 35 myself, and whether or not we like to admit it, hardcore is a youth movement. So how does it feel to be a part of this in 2008? What do your friends, family, peers think about it? Also, since you mentioned your husband, here's something I've been thinking about... when I interviewed Martin Sorrendeguy of Los Crudos and Limp Wrist, he said that the "gay part" of him always felt more attracted to disco and hip hop, and that he found himself struggling to balance the hardcore vs the non-hardcore side of him. I don't think that this has to do anything with sexual pre-ferences, because I share similar experiences...
When all is said and done, what it comes down to for me is music and energy and community - and for that age doesn't matter. There were always at least some people of all ages at shows in the 80's and early 90's, and they were as much a part of the scene as anyone else. I am turning 40 this year, but I still live my life in a way I feel is positive, still love hardcore music, still want to play it and record more. I don't really go to shows much, but that's often a time factor and the fact that I don't know that many people. And there are so many people I'm in communication with now who I knew back in 1990. Labels, distros, fans, zine editors, promoters. They're still around, I'm still around, and then there's always a new crop of kids coming into the scene. It's a good mix. I definitely felt it at ABC-No-Rio when we played there in 2006.

The hardcore and gay thing I can totally relate to. It is the straddling of two very different worlds... I guess another analogy for me is being gay and Jewish. I turned away from Judaism at a very young age because I couldn't reconcile the two (well, and yeah, being an athiest didn't help matters). But when I moved to the Bay Area, I found a synagogue which was about 90% gay and realized I didn't need to choose. Life isn't black or white, one way or the other. People are fluid. Things don't always have to be the same. They can be different. Now a lot of times I'll just say to non-hardcore friends "I'm in a band", and every so often I'll give them the URL to our website or MySpace page and they'll check it out. But I preface it with something like "I know it's probably music you won't like, and that's ok." There's no right or wrong. My parents have every record and every interview and every issue of Bullshit Monthly. They're very supportive. They probably feel better that we're not rehearsing in the basement anymore. They'd be on the second floor and the mirrors would be shaking. Sigh, "back in the day." But again, it's not your age - it's your life, the decisions you make every day.

What are the lyrics for "That rare 7" EP" that were not printed?
It's just a list of names of bands who have produced rare records: Poison Idea, SSD, Germs, Straight Ahead, Youth of Today, and so on. Loved doing that song! It was a lot of fun. So much of that record I would've done a little differently: this a little faster, and that a little slower, and this with background vocals, and that with louder vocals and on and on. Doing Reactive after so many years apart, it has it's strong points and its weak points.

Did anyone notice that the logo still says NYHC, but that the contact address is in San Jose?
Yeah, I do get the occasional question about that. Originally, this all came up because there was another band named GO! who wanted to use the name, but we were first. I said ok, like a complete idiot, since this was a couple of years before we even conceived of getting back together. And I said if we did ever release or rerelease anything we would called ourselves GO! NYHC... And then when we got back together it made sense anyway, even though I think that other band isn't around anymore. Because really, half of us still live in NY, and even so, we're the same band. We're playing the same songs. We have the same attitude, and the same connection to all our friends there. Are we not NYHC anymore? I'd say we still are, and I think we always will be.

100% backed. GO! = NYHC, period. Their two latest records What We Build Together and Reactive (plus other random stuff) are still available from www.designbymike.com/go. The latest news is that GO! will be playing yet another reunion show on October 10th at ABC-No-Rio in NYC with Huasipungo and some other bands.

Air Re-THRASH-ening

2009-05-22T13:09:00.002+02:00

This is one of the coolest flyers I have seen all year, and it looks like a pretty rad show. Update your calendars.

Hitch - Clair Obscur

2009-04-11T15:10:00.003+02:00

Hitch is one of the most underrated bands in Europe ever. They have been around for 15 years now, and that's a a lot longer than your crappy band will ever be playing - that, and Hitch have the dedication necessary for pulling it all off. But let me give you an example: let's say three kids start a band. 99% of them just can not rock tight enough with even the most sophisticated studio tricks and five million guitar tracks. They want instant gratification instead. They want a record, they want a tour, they want to be all the rage on every "cool" messageboard. That's boring. Because even the most "punk" bands are conservative beyond belief. Instant crowd pleaser: Negative Approach cover song. Secret recipe for five minutes of fame: super limited colored vinyl. Style maybe, substance no.

And this is exactly what makes Hitch more punk than most punk bands, regardless of the musical style. They just play whatever feels natural. And it sounds great! Of course this kind of greatness isn't everybody's definition of "great", but sure enough it rocks my boat. Clair Obscur combines the sexyness of Girls Against Boys, the post rock tightness of Quicksand, a little bit of Steve Albini worship, the rock urgency of Drive Like Jehu, and of course it sounds like Fugazi every now and then. And seriously, I don't care whether or not you will dig this. Because Hitch have been around when you were still swimming in daddy's nutsack, and Hitch will still be a force to be reckoned with when you finally get what's up and start looking for their records on Ebay. In the meantime, I will blast Clair Obscur at full volume - because it's one hell of an album. Because it makes me happy. Because it fucking rocks. Thanks, Hitch.

www.hitch.be
www.vlasvegas.be

There is no place for irony in heavy metal, part one

2009-02-04T21:06:00.021+01:00

In a time when every Vice Magazine reading asshole thinks it's hip and cool to wear cock rock band t-shirts for the sake of some misunderstood irony, it's time to raise the flag of hate again. Metal always was, still is, and will forever be the greatest fucking musical genre on earth ever. Period. I mean it.

So, dear fellow headbangers, put on your sleeveless denim jackets, ride your battle horse into glory, turn the fucking volume all the way up and have a look at some of the greatest moments in art history with GLW/DRK...

W.A.S.P. - Animal 12"
All right, everybody - never ever disrespect W.A.S.P.! I mean it. You might shrug it off as just my opinion, but trying to argue with me that W.A.S.P. is not one of the greatest bands of all time might result in a massacre. What's not to love about them? Blackie Lawless even replaced Johnny Thunders in the fucking New York Dolls (for a few days only, but still...) This is way cooler than your lame hardcore band will ever be, no doubt. And any band that has a debut single like Animal just flat out rules. Period.

But let's take a look at the cover, shall we? One thing that immediately catches your attention is the lettering that was used for the title. It's exactly the same font as on the cover of NWA's Straight Outta Compton, and if you ask me, this is cooler than Vanilla Ice and MC Hammer together. I also love the fact that the title says "F**k Like A Beast". That's like flipping the bird to the moral majority. "You're not gonna let us print the word fuck on our own cover, you posers? Well, we're gonna use the picture of a man in tights instead, and we're gonna put a bloody sawblade on his private parts. That's how heavy we are, Tipper Gore!" The band logo is a wonderful example of heavy metal typography: it looks like four pieces of metal with screws. And fuck it, who cares about tracking and letter spacing? This piece of modern art was created years before desktop publishing software became widely available, so the sawblade between two letters and painfully varying spaces are a-ok.

(On a side note, does it really say "mum" on his belly, written in blood? How metal would that be?)

Exciter - Heavy Metal Maniac
What we have here is one of the most underrated albums ever. It's basically their demo pressed on vinyl, and that was when bands still did demos with 9 songs and spread them all over the world on tape, instead of recording one lame track and putting it on MySpace. Exciter was a speed metal trio from Canada, with a drummer who also handled the vocal duties - a concept that was later utilized by Snuff and Satanic Surfers, but none of these bands were even remotely metal (despite the word "satanic" in one name).

The cover sums up the title perfectly. Just look at the man's arm! He's got a heart tattoo with a banner around it that actually reads "metal". You just have to be a true heavy metal maniac to get some sweet ink like this. Talk about being down for life! Even though my initial assumption was that the person in the picture is someone who auditioned for the Village People, the credits on the back cover tell us that this is the arm of someone called the "East Side Slasher". No matter how you look at it, it's awesome. I would kill to hang around with someone called East Side Slasher. "Hey East Side Slasher, want another beer?" But maybe the East Side Slasher really did audition for the Village People. It would explain a lot: (a) his semi-gay leather biker bar outfit, and (b) the act of violence he commits to the Marshall amp. After all, he cuts a pussy into that amp. An act of retaliation maybe? The Village People were never known to be as heterosexual as let's say the 2 Live Crew, so who knows...

Pokolgép - Pokoli Színjáték
Ladies and gentlemen, fellow metalheads, and now... the most amazing metal cover of all time. Ever.

Even though I don't know shit about Pokolgép (which means "hell machine", or more loosely translated just some random piece of explosive device), I just had to pick this up at the flea market. It was super cheap, I had seen Pokolgép tapes all over the place when I was on holidays in Hungary as a kid, and nothing screams m-e-t-a-l! like the cover artwork. Come on, just look at the logo! Chains and metal, just what a true headbanger at heart needs... and don't forget the reflections. This was done in 1987 with Eastern European crayons, and Adobe has not been able to come up with a Photoshop filter like this until now. Pure genius.

But let's check out the little details that add to the overall greatness of this masterpiece...

1. The monster-robot (or whatever the fuck this is supposed to be) is apparently holding a baseball bat, which is way ahead of it's time. It's almost prophetic: bands like Biohazard or Madball were doing this years later.

2. The rings! Four of 'em! Two skulls, one happy devil with a Rolling Stones tongue (pop-cultural cross references, anyone?), and a sad devil. That's like Yin and Yang in a heavy metal kind of way. To make the whole imagery even more metal, one skull has not two but three rows of teeth, and the sad devil even has four. Really, count them. Can you get any heavier? Maybe this is some kind of social criticism that I don't get, but please keep in mind that Hungary offers some of the best and cheapest dental services on the face of this earth.

3. I love the robot's helmet. It has (a) two horns (to make it look more diabolical), (b) it says 666 (even more evil!), (c) it looks a bit like the Motörhead war pig logo (another reference), and (d) the helmet is either cracked and shattered from battling other demons, or the artist was going for a bio-mechanic look, trying to add veins. I don't know what's cooler.

4. I can't stop to sing the praise of this amazing artist. His name is Giorgio Soós. Does he have any books of his artwork available? When's his next solo exhibition? Seriously, this guy was a true visionary. Everybody rips of Shepard Fairey these days, or Pushed, or even me - but let me enlighten you. I am sure you haven't noticed until now. Take a close look at the robot's face. See? It's fucking MF Doom's metal mask! More than a decade ago! (And Sido ripped off that shit even later.)

Flotsam and Jetsam - Doomsday For The Deceiver
Holy fuck, now this is an all-time classic, both musically and visually. In case you didn't know (which would make you a wimp and a poser), Jason Newsted played bass on this album, before he was chosen to replace Cliff Burton in the band that should have broken up after ...And Justice For All. But historical details aside, what rules about this album (apart from the über-metal riff-o-rama, of course!) is the wonderful front cover artwork.

It's one hell of a epic battle scene: Scuzzlebutt from South Park versus the funny little devil from Maiden's Number Of The Beast cover! This is heavier than Rocky versus Mr T, or Luke Skywalker versus Darth Vader, and perhaps even Jack Bauer versus everyone. I have a few minor complaints about the cover, though. Scuzzlebut (a) is green instead of brown, (b) doesn't have Patrick Duffy for a leg, and (c) there's no piece of celery for his right hand. But I can see past the last mistake, because random vegetables are just not as evil as reptile claws. And could you rip out somebody's eye with celery? Probably not, unless you are Jack Bauer. Or maybe these two cuties are just playing, and Scuzzlebutt played a little bit too rough? We'll never know. Maybe the devil just didn't like the wicker baskets Scuzzlebutt was weaving, which would make him the deceiver. About time his doomsday is here! Boo! As an extra added bonus, I'm sure it hasn't slipped past your experienced art critic eye that this battle of epic proportions takes place on the corner of Flotsam and Jetsam Street or Avenue or something or other.

(Reading the lyrics to the title track, I actually found out that it's not Scuzzlebutt, but another fine gentleman called Flotzilla. He even had his own EP after this album. Wow, cool.)

Virgins - Miscarriage

2009-01-14T12:49:00.006+01:00

"Next year things won't be so bad / I know you're sick of being sad / I'm skipping my own funeral."

Dear Virgins, thank you for a kick ass record! Thank you for restoring my faith in punk rock, which definitely is not the simplest of things to do in 2009. I don't know you as people, but if the ten songs on Miscarriage say anything about you, then I'd like to shake your hands and share a drink. Or seven.

But anyway, this is supposed to be a record review, and not a letter of fandom - even though I pretty much became a fan boy the moment I popped in this CD. The roaring guitars in the first 15 seconds of "Another's Gun" were enough to get me hooked and keep my glued to the stereo, in all their as-if-Frankie-Stubbs-was-playing-Rites-Of-Spring- songs glory. (Note to self: Should I ever finish my magnum opus, the Comprehensive Guide to Punk Rock for Complete Dummies, I will make sure to include a lengthy chapter about what will referred to as the "fuck yeah factor" by future generations.)

So yes, the Virgins rule. Their band name in connection with the album title is probably more punk than your entire lame record collection. And it's so fucking easy to see why: these dudes are angry. Like, super pissed off for a reason. And this, dear message board hero, is because they have a reason for all that rage. This world is a shit hole, and once mom and dad stop putting money in your pocket, this shit will really hit the fan like fucking napalm. There is a giant difference between their anger and your anger. Let me explain.

It's cool if you're 20 and feel alienated. Everybody does. But what the fuck are you angry about? What do you rebel against? The price of soy milk if you're vegan? Your parents? The bombardment of Gaza (pro or con), if you're book smart enough because of your political science college classes? Yeah, right. But this is exactly why your crappy band sucks so much... you have nothing to scream about, apart from being stabbed in the back by another PC punk douchebag maybe. But this is just the cartoon version of being angry, pretty much like Donald Duck squeaking his head off. In other words: it gets boring pretty soon when you're older than three.

The Virgins, on the other hand, boy... they do what every great punk band does: they are mad at the world, they write songs about it, but - and this is the main difference - they do something about it, even if it's just writing songs to make their own miserable lives a little bit better. These songs have substance, they breathe, they are alive with emotion. They are about what the thousands of songs that saved thousands of lives are about: the human experience. And if punk is not about that, it's about nothing at all.

Dear Virgins, thank you!

www.kissofdeathrecords.com

Balance - In Like A Lion 7"

2009-01-06T14:53:00.011+01:00

Owww, I gotta be careful here. These dudes might not even sport pubic hair, but they seem kinda mean.

"You little rat stabbed us in the back / You're walking around talking shit / Did you think you'd get away with it? / You can never come back here you scum / So stay the fuck out!"

I double checked the insert more than once, but it really seems as if this record came out in 2009. That's 24 years after Ray Cappo first complained about his lack of sleep or something on the record Can't Close My Eyes. Twenty-fucking-four years! (Looking at the photos of the band members, their parents were probably having intercourse around that time.)

So, well... I guess this is supposed to be hardcore. It just leaves me wondering whether this version of "hardcore" refers to the subgenre of punk, or some kind of pornography. I see very little (if any) punk content here, and considering the graphic nature of the artwork and the record title, well... your guess is good as mine.

"Say it to my fucking face instead of talking shit about me and my friends / Say it to my fucking face instead if you dare."

I'm absolutely amazed by these lyrical gems, especially how beautiful the words "face" and "fuck" go together. Let's have a closer look at the cover: the gorilla on the left side is pounding his chest while getting a tittie man hug by the gentleman behind him. The singer (on the right side) is handing him some archaic phallic symbol (almost shaped like a banana, so even the gorilla can get the point) and teaches him how to open his mouth for fellatio. To make an already wonderful picture even more perfect, the back of the gorilla's t-shirt says Mouthpiece. One can only wonder what this refers to. Maybe it's got something to do with the words "face" and "fuck", I'm not sure.

"Say it to my fucking face if you dare / I'll be waiting for you right here."

Now hold on second... "right here" is not a very exact geographical description, and to be honest, I'm not really into that kind of smut. I like to have a beer or seven every now and then, which is something you don't seem to like, and your music is very fucking awful. No, thanks.

www.njwrecords.com

Monikers - Wake Up

2009-01-03T19:38:00.004+01:00

Hey kid, I know it's hard to believe, but there actually was a time when pop punk meant something entirely different than today. If you have no clue what I am talking about, please leave this blog immediately, because you really need to do your homework. I don't expect you to even move your white middle class ass to a record store (which is a shame it itself!), but please at least check out gems like Chrimpshrine, Pegboy, Screeching Weasel, Sleeper (later known as Serpico), Fifteen, and The Queers on the internet - and this list if far from being complete. They were all punk bands, but they played what they thought were pop songs; not the other way around.

(Now let me get one thing out of the way: I noticed that this blog seems to be full of references to old music. "Old" in a punk rock sense; because a record that was released 15 years ago is "old" in the context of a music genre that's only roughly as old as I am. I don't mean to brag and boast about being "old school", because I know I'm not. In fact, I was probably toilet trained when the first Clash album came out. So there.)

Monikers is a pop punk band in the truest sense of the word. They're punks. Their music is poppy. And this record seems to be a leftover from a time long gone. Maybe this is why it's so much fun to listen to.

Wake Up is the kind of record that could have come out in 1992, which was a good year for music: Jawbreaker released Bivouac, Samiam released Billy, Leatherface released Mush - can it get any better? And hey, I didn't even mention A Blaze In The Northern Sky! All these records were sloppy and catchy at the same time, which is something I really miss in 2008. Most music these days is just too perfect, too polished, and too predictable - which reminds of the fact that I am supposed to be DJing in a good week from now, and they were asking for "indie rock". What the fuck do I know about indie rock?! And why should I care? Maybe I am hopelessly stuck in the past, who knows. But my idea of indie rock is all about the bands I mentioned, and I don't mind dissing radio rock I haven't even heard of yet. But what was I trying to say again? And what was the name of that one SNFU song? Oh yeah, "Grunt, groan, rant and rave". There we go.

To make it short, the Monikers remind me a lot of Jawbreaker in the pre-major label phase. They remind me of the Lemonheads circa Hate Your Friends. And I am very much aware that this will probably only appeal to a very small group of people, but the musical taste of the majority can be filed under "shit" anyway.

(Oh, one dude from Discount plays in Monikers. I am still looking for a vinyl copy of their Crash Diagnostic album... anyone? The world was definitely a better place before Alison Mosshart became "VV".

www.kissofdeathrecords.com

The Serious Geniuses - You Can Steal The Riffs, But You Can't Steal The Talent

2009-01-02T11:41:00.010+01:00

It's only the second day of the new year, my --th birthday is still weeks away, and I feel like a jaded old man. I spent the better part of this morning cleaning up my office space, throwing out a ton of shit, and flipping through stacks of old yellowed fanzines. Oh, the memories. HeartattaCk actually meant something at some point, there were still kick ass compilation albums with unreleased songs and lengthy booklets, kids made mixtapes and not online MP3-blogs, and everything seemed much more honest and simple. All the time, the Serious Geniuses were blasting in the background over and over again, and I couldn't help but think how awesome they are.

Stolen riffs, yes. Talent, yes. New all time favorite record, probably no. But this is the nature of this disc: it doesn't get you all pumped up to go out and skate, it doesn't depress you, and it sure as hell doesn't scream in your face - it's just there. You Can Steal The Riffs is like your best friends: you don't have to call them once a week to know they'll always be there for you. Sure, it's sometimes boring having them around, sometimes they even annoy you, sometime you don't want to see them for months, but you always find yourself coming back to the half forgotten inside jokes and the nostalgia.

If You Can Steal The Riffs had been released 15 years ago on let's say Crank! or Jade Tree, (a) reviewers would have compared it to Jawbreaker, Braid, or even Lifetime (when they were still boring and out of tune), (b) it'd be out of print by now and being sold on Ebay for half a fortune, (c) a song or two would have ended up on the soundtrack for TV shows like My So-Called Life, and (d) you would still shake your fist of the younger kids for not remembering the classics.

But hey, it's 2009 already, and I can only recommend getting your wrinkled hands on this record, playing it to death for a week, and then coming back half a year later. Fuck nostalgia. The good old times are right here and right now.

www.seriousgeniuses.com
www.kissofdeathrecords.com

"Two turntables and a microphone is bringing it back to the fundamentals of what inspired us both" - An interview with X:144 & SPS

2008-12-23T11:29:00.008+01:00

X:144 and SPS are one MC and one DJ, walking in the footsteps of greats such as Guru and DJ Premier, Eric B and Rakim, KRS One and Scott LaRock, or even not-so-greats like Dendemann and Rabauke. Despite being long time veterans in their hometown Hip Hop scene of Orlando, Flordia, they are still under the public radar. Best kept secret? Next big thing? Oh yeah. Expect very, very big things. Which music / scenes did you grow up with? What made you decide to play music yourselves?
X:144: Well, my family came here directly from Egypt, Africa, so I'm first generation "American". Hip Hop has always been a fascination with my family, and has been my passion since I could remember - being that we were Africans straight "off the boat". Being born in New York, my first influences were a lot of music from my home country, where the bands backing up the singers were orchestras, like Abdel Halim Hafez (known to this generation by Timbaland's contribution in his sampling for "Big Pimpin'"), or Oum Kalthoum. Hip Hop took place in my life through b-boying, and of course the music: Run DMC, LL Cool J, X-Clan, Public Enemy, Boogie Down Productions, The Native Tongue Family, etc. Then grafitti art became something I pursued, and after this I wanted to be a deejay. Then low and behold, I heard DJ Jazzy Jeff and The Fresh Prince, and for some reason something inside me clicked. I looked at my mother and said, "This is what I want to do when I get older", and I did.

SPS: I grew up around all kinds of music while growing up. I am a military brat, born in Honolulu, Hawaii, and lived all over the place, so it was inevitable to cross all types of music. My biggest influences in music come from all genres. Most of my listening years happened when I lived in Berlin, Germany. I was surrounded by alot of electronic music, Hip Hop, techno, and classical music, so it all was welcoming to me. Hip Hop was more my speed, because it was so raw and to the point. After going to a Hip Hop concert in Germany and witnessing a deejay do a 15 minute scratch solo, I was sold and knew that's what I wanted to do.

How and when did you meet and start making music together?
X:144: I have been a part of the Orlando Hip Hop scene for about 15 years now. I've watched the scene grow, and its community change from one extreme to the next. People swearing that they wouldn't sell out I've seen sell out. This created a small tight knit community of "true school" Hip Hop practitioners. I myself was in a group named after my production company, TDP, which stands for Transparent Dark Productions. My rhyme partner at that time was telling me that we needed recruite SPS as our deejay - only to find out he had already started something with a crew called Andromeda. Years later, after all groups and crews disbanded, Nonsense Records was building up their roster, SPS and I included. We were both solo at the time, until conversations arose between myself and Kelly Shockley (CEO of Nonsense) of wanting to up my game. I then heard SPS' track on the Nonsense compilation, Community Service Vol. #1, and got extremely excited. I knew that this is what I wanted in a DJ. Kelly then suggested that we hook up. Unknowingly, he had already mentioned this to SPS - and bloaw! - X:144 and SPS were born.

What do your (almost sci-fi like) names stand for?
SPS: Mine's easy...

X:144: SPS is rather simple and to the point: "Second Place Sucks" - named appropriately for his turntablist battles. X:144, well in short: everything is based on numbers and mathematics. The English alphabet is coded in multiples of six, A=6, B=12, C=18, etc... X=144 - 'X' represents the Xth Generation, '144' is the 144,000 recognized by the Ancient Egyptians, Mayans, and "Christians" as sacred number - hence implying that we, the Xth Generation, are the 144,000th here to create a beneficial change in this world. We just so happen to do it through Hip Hop.

Why did you decide to go for the classic one emcee / one deejay formula instead of having your huge ass "crew", like everyone and their neighbors seem to do these days?
X:144: Well, I believe the formula of a larger crew was tried by the both of us and by many around us. Two turntables and a microphone is bringing it back to the fundamentals of what inspired us both to be what we are today. It pays respect to the pioneers of Hip Hop music, and maintains the integrity of what we believe is lost. Our intentions is to bring forth an elevated status of the relationship between the deejay and the emcee, so that Hip Hop does and feels a progress and re-evolution in itself. What we do now can only pave the way for the future.

SPS: In addition to that, deejays, in Hip Hop music today, are often slept on when it comes to performances. Keeping the liveliness on the turntables with live cutting and scratching is the core essence of this music. Much of this is lost now, and needs to be preserved. Less can be more, and effective when it comes to the formula we have. The typical entourage of dudes on stage can sometimes lose or bore a crowd.

Tying in to what you just said about the relationship between the emcee and the deejay, I remember a quote from an interview where you said that this was not being utilized to the fullest - and I agree. Still, with the continuous advancement of technical possibilities, I find it hard to say whether or not the one emcee / one deejay - thing is, can, or even should be what "true" or "real" Hip Hop is all about. Any comments?
X:144: There is no absolution to anything that grows. The emcee and deejay relationship was the core of Hip Hop music. What we're doing is paying respect to our ancestors and pioneers, while maintaining our 'Bushido' or what have you. Hip Hop has been mis-translated so much so that the culture is in a deficit, a "negative debt". So in order to balance our 'history books' or bring us back to a "positive balance", we have to give "credit" due to what once was. It's simple accounting in a sense... Ultimately we're continuing where I believe the fundamental values left off. So if an absolution is implied of what "true" or "real" Hip Hop is, it's not because of our formula, it's because of who we know ourselves to be.

SPS: This music was practically started in the DJ's hands... everything about Hip Hop stems from that. Change is not bad, but knowing the past is important. Knowing about breaks and digging for those loops and drums is another standard slept on in Hip Hop. Props to the DJ, it's long overdue. Respect the architect.

Let's talk about the "business" side of things for a bit. For most artists, music is something they love to do, but on the other hand, many of them are kind of hesitant to "sacrifice" everything else for their vision. That said, how "serious" are you about what you do? How real is the possibility for you to do nothing but create music, without having to work day jobs, etc?
X:144: Well, we both work for ourselves now. SPS is still doing his DJ gigs, and I am still maintaining my studio work, but it's a diligent process. We just came off a 40 city U.S. tour called the "Quit Your Dead End Job Tour"... haha! I know we are living examples of our dreams. It isn't impossible to do what you love. All that's required is belief in yourself and your plan. Belief in the people who you would bring that very talent or idea to. If you don't have belief in people to believe in you, then your work is sabotaged before it's conception. I think that's pretty damn serious if you ask me, and you did. [laughter]

SPS: There's no turning back! We love what we do. This is who we are, and for so long, this is what we've strived and worked for.

You have released stuff on Nonsense Records for quite some time now, and it seems to me as if both the label and you have grown together, and very organically so. How do you feel about being on an independent label, as opposed to some major contract? Also, if someone came knocking with a "better" aka more lucrative deal, what would it take to convince you to leave Nonsense? Solillaquists Of Sound are now on Epitaph, hence the question.
X:144: I'd run with the money! [laughter] Seriously though, what we and Nonsense Records are trying to create is a movement. Now I know that sounds cliché, because all labels start this way, and most fall short of their goal to "sell out" for lack of a better term, but it's true. It's common sense, think about it: if we went with a bigger label with a more lucrative advance - not deal, but advance - where would that leave us? In greater debt, making a smaller percentage, lack of control, lack of ownership of our music. With a label such as Nonsense, we both started at the same level, share the same ideals, and like you said have grown together. So as we grow, the label grows. Solillaquists were in a position where moving on to Epitaph was appropriate for their plan, and their longevity. As for us, we are eye to eye in size and growth with our label, so the bigger we get, the bigger they get. All in all, the plan is to create an in-house working icon that can revolutionize how this industry works and how community is defined.

M.E., the debut album from X:144 & SPS, is available from Nonsense Records. SPS only recently was the 2008 USA DMC Supremacy champion, and X:144 has a new website here.

Interview by Thomas Reitmayer • Photography by Mike Begonia

Wimps and posers leave the hall...

2008-12-21T13:05:00.007+01:00

"Heavy Metal is the law that keeps us all united free / A law that shatters earth and hell / Heavy Metal can't be beaten by any dynasty / We're all wizards fightin' with our spell."

This is the best video on YouTube. Ever.

In case you don't know these lyrics or didn't recognise the Bröderna Hårdrock, you're pretty much a poser. Go and listen to Poison or Mr. Big or any of that girl crap, and let the rest of us bang our heads.

Joey Cape - Bridge

2008-12-20T12:17:00.005+01:00

I never liked Lagwagon. In fact, I hated them with a passion that's reserved for Refused these days. Or certain "hardcore" bands from my city. Or your band. And no, I can never forgive Lagwagon for shaping that 90s "melody-core" sound. Not only did it spawn approximately nine gazillion faceless clone bands, nope... do you remember the fashion crimes back in the day? Baggy shorts with chain wallets, XL t-shirts, and backpacks. Ugh. Back in 1981, when he still went by the name of Henry Garfield, Rollins already said "I hate the kids". Where can I sign?

So now, in 2008, when no one even gives half a shit about his crappy band anymore, Joey Cape does what every other aging punk rocker does: release a solo record. Yawn. Admittedly, there's a handful of people who can pull that off, but there's a whole lot more who just suck. Mister Cape is somewhere in between, with strong tendencies towards the latter category. Bridge is not quite as vomit inducing as I expected it to be, but it's still boring and stale like three day old beer. Seriously, some hippies with acoustic guitars playing "Rocking In The Free World" or even "Like a Rolling Stone" in the city center put more passion into their music than he does. If it wasn't for his Lagwagon, he'd be flipping burgers. Thanks, but no thanks.

www.suburbanhomerecords.com

The best shows I have seen in 2008, Part Two

2008-12-19T15:06:00.003+01:00

ADOLESCENTS + WHITE FLAG
Shows like this are the reason why I prefer old farts a hundred times over any hawdcoah flavor of the month. I don't want to listen to any of your youth crew poo poo on colored vinyl, when I can go and see the Adolescents. There has to be a reason why everybody still knows all their lyrics by heart and sings along, and the reason is oh so very simple: they kick ass. They kick so much more ass than your run-of-the-mill kindergarten band ever will. Try to write just one song like "Amoeba" or "Kids of the Black Hole" in your lifetime, and then we'll talk again.

OFF WITH THEIR HEADS
Hands down the best punk (and related) show I have seen all year, and nothing else came even close. Off With Their Heads got it all right, both on record and on stage. From the moment they hit the first notes, I couldn't help but stand there with a big idiotic grin on my face. The entire Off With Their fucking Heads discography is hit after hit after hit, and they know how to deliver the goods live. If you don't agree, you've pretty been ruining everybody's lives and eating all our steak, just like Uncle Rico.

JAZZMATAZZ
I was kinda skeptical about seeing Jazzmatazz in 2008, because let's be honest - Gang Starr was one of the best hip hop acts to walk the face of the earth e-v-e-r, Guru's solo records are still pretty good, but Jazzmatazz? Ok, their first album is brilliant, but everything that came after that... well, your mom would listen to it, 'nah mean? But I bow my head in shame and take back every word, because Guru still is the coolest motherfucker. This man is so bad ass, he didn't even sweat! I'm not kidding you, he either got his sweat glands surgically removed or he is as cool as ice. (On a sidenote, the trombone player looked a bit like Fabio, but I can see past that.)

SCOOTER
Ok, no matter what you say: Scooter is the shit. Just like seeing a crust punk band from Poland, you know exactly what to expect, and you get it. And just like said crust band, Scooter are fast and dumb. For fuck's sake, they even had mighty Mantas on guitars in 2007 or something! I can't remember a show in the past five years or so with an audience this happy. A laser show and half naked go-go dancers, this is the kind of shit hardcore would need more of.

DÄLEK + RIVER FOR SALE
I have seen Dälek at least ten times by now, and it's pretty safe to say that they never disappoint, but never before have I seen them play a better or heavier show than this, do encores, or Oktopus go off as if he was in a moshpit. They almost played only entirely new songs off their upcoming album Gutter Tactics, and if they sound anything like the noise they created that night, it's gonna be Dälek's Reign In Blood. The band that played right before them, River For Sale, might just be the best existing Czech band right now - so much better than the overhyped and overrated Lvmen.

Honorable mentions:
The Rabbit Theory
Off Minor
Young Livers
Hanson Brothers

(And I haven't even mentioned the best show of 2008 yet... watch this space.)

The best shows I have seen in 2008, Part One

2008-12-18T16:11:00.007+01:00

DER TANTE RENATE + SAALSCHUTZ
I don't know how many times I've seen Der Tante Renate so far, but this dude cracks me up every time, no matter how bad I feel. Still, I can't get over the fact that he was in Loxiran - but maybe this is scientific evidence that your music gets so much better once you start drinking. I mean, just think of Poison Idea being a straight edge band... pheeew. I have picked this show as a particular outstanding one, because it was the first time I have seen Renate play his incredible cover of Slayer's "Raining Blood". Plus, Saalschutz also performed that night, added to the fun, and things went wild. Nice bonus.

OBSTACLES
One of the two times that I've seen Obstacles this year, and one of the reasons why I started to develop a love affair with this wonderful band. Miss Cowcow and me travelled to the show for the sole reason that my friend Emil would fill in on bass for them on this tour. If you know Emil, you know how incredibly awesome he is. If you don't know Emil, at least make sure to check out the wonderful record label he runs. So, well... here I am at a show in a foreign country, not knowing what to expect at all, Obstacles get on the stage, hit the first few chords, and I am hooked. In a time when brain damaged art students decide to play instrumental post rock just because an Explosions In The Sky-reference gets you laid, Obstacles is a breath of fresh air. They r-o-c-k. Watch this space for an interview, dude.

Bleubird

BLEUBIRD + AUDIO88
Oh, praise the glory of independent hip hop! And no, you idiot, I am not talking about Anticon... if this is all you know, you just have not been digging deep enough. Monsieur Bleubird has a free download EP available here, do yourself a favour and check it out. So, well... me and Mieze Medusa spent the day with these two distinguished gentlemen over coffee, and then witnessed a show later that night which left us both speechless. Audio88 dropped a lot of words that didn't even rhyme (Literature anyone? Do you still know what that is, in times of teh intOrwebz?) over beats that would have made El-P proud, and the 'bird just went crazy. And when I say "crazy", I mean ker-razy in an HR kind of way, including backflips and everything else that hurts backs and muscles. That night, a handful of people with a clue saw two of the best contemporary hip hop acts, while you were probably sitting at home and downloading G-Unit and Kool Savas tracks.

JACK TERRICLOTH
This man can do no wrong. I mean it. From the criminally underrated Sticks & Stones all the way to The World/Inferno Friendship Society, Jack Terricloth is the man. He can wrestle with words in a way that's both punk and literature at the same time, he is one hell of an entertainer, and... oh, the voice! (And by the way, while you're at it, check out his book The Collected Cloth. One of the best reads in a long, long time). So, anyway - the reason I picked this show in particular over the W/IFS show a few months later was because (a) it was at a squat, (b) intimate and charming like a candlelight dinner, and (c) J.T. played "Theme Song For Nothing", which is one of my all time fave songs.

Liquid Limbs - Orquid

2008-12-18T12:28:00.004+01:00

I never quite got all the buzz that surrounded the "noise rock" genre. There was never enough noise for me, and I'd rather have my rock straight forward instead of relying on technical proficiency and art school drop outs wanking on guitars. And fuck yes, both the Melvins and Sonic Youth might be the most overrated bands out there, ever. Now that we've got this out of the way, let's have a closer look at this record.

Liquid Limbs are a - for lack of a better term - noise rock duo from Gainesville, FL. Here's another thing that bugs me: what's it with all these two piece bands? Ok, Vaz are (were?) fucking incredible, and so are Dead Prez - but seriously, what's the point? Are they all lacking in the social skills department, like a Rainman for the indie scene? Don't they have enough friends to form a real band? And who the fuck cares?

Like every other noise rock band, Liquid Limbs have a horrible band name and godawful cover art - but, whoah... do they rawk! The guitars are wonderfully distorted and downtuned in that sludgy post-Sabbath way, the drums get beaten like Ivan Drago and Clubber Lang got beaten by Rocky Balboa, and the vocals are even in tune. I'm sure these two gentlemen have both done time in a couple of bands whose records I own, but what really matters at the end of the day is that Orquid is a damn fine record that stands on it's own. The fun thing about it all is that you can easily spend a whole afternoon listening to these tunes, trying to come up with all kinds of influences and cross references. My first pick would be Floor (or rather Torche, since the Liquid Limbs have a far more poppy approach) high on crack, trying to cover Cave In songs circa Jupiter after having spent all day listening to the more feedback-driven Velvet Underground tunes.

www.liquidlimbs.com
www.soundstudyrecordings.com

Git Some - Cosmic Rock

2008-12-17T20:48:00.010+01:00

Does anyone remember the band Planes Mistaken For Stars? I loved them to death, in a way that was almost bordering on obsession. But (with a capital B), for whatever reason, they were quite often referred to as "emo", for the fact alone that their first EP was on Deep Elm. That's like calling Anthrax hip hop just because they released the I'm The Man EP and played "Bring The Noise" together with Public Enemy, or calling David Schwimmer a good actor. I mean, how emo schmeemo are record titles such as Fuck With Fire, We Ride To Fight, Up In Them Guts, or (my personal favourite) Fucking Fight? Yeah, right.

(Having mentioned Fucking Fight, this record was their finest moment. Short, sharp, to the point. You drop the needle on the vinyl, the songs explode in your face, and - blam! - before you even know what the fuck is going on, it's all over. Steve Aoki released this EP on his Dim Mak label at a time when he still put Black Panther references in his records, long before he became "Kid Millionaire", started to suck the cock of Vice Magazine, and even before his ugly bitch sister thought she was an actress.)

But what the fuck does my rambling have to do with Git Some? The two gentlemen that handled the bass and guitar duties in Planes Mistaken continue to bring the rock in Git Some, that's what. You can still easily hear that, just like you'll always hear Frankie Stubbs in whatever it is he puts his hands on. But oh well, I have ambivalent feelings about Git Some. Cosmic Rock is pretty good for what it is: a loud, heavy, ugly, distorted rock album. It's just that I have the feeling they could do so much better than this. Just one example: the vocals are just there, it's just something. Sure, they're ugly, and they add to the whole fucked up-ness of the record, but at the same time they make me nervous and annoy the shit out of me.

So, well... Black Flag were a fucking amazing band before Greg Ginn took way many drugs and went all free jazz. If this is Git Some's Process of Weeding Out, I just hope they will release a Damaged record sooner or later. Ain't nothing wrong with a little regression when it comes to rock music...

www.gitsome.org
www.1234gorecords.com

So I published a photo book...

2008-12-17T17:26:00.017+01:00

If you are looking for xmas presents, look no further. I recently published my first photo book, and it would make one hell of a gift for all your friends and enemies, lovers and haters, parents and kids.

The book is called Listen To Your Heart, because this is what it's all about at the end of the day. It's a hand-numbered limited edition (200 copies only!) spiral-bound 50 page photo book printed on high quality 300 gram paper stock, showcasing independent artists (in alphabetical order) like:

The 101, Against Me!, A Painted Mayor, Baroness, Bleubird, Brutal Knights, Burial Year, Champion, Chang Ffos, Client, Converge, Cursed, Dälek, The Deep Eynde, Die Unsichtbaren, Dimitrij, Division of Laura Lee, Dominic, Doomriders, The Feelers, GodSentUs, Hanin Elias, Hezekiah, I Walk The Line, Modern Life Is War, Mr. Lif, Nikad, Obstacles, Overmars, Paint It Black, R'N'R, Sage Francis, Song of Zarathustra, Strike Anywhere, Suma, Ted Leo, Texta, Tiger Lou, Tragedy, Transistor Transistor, Unsane, The World/Inferno Friendship Society, Worlds Between Us, Yaphet Kotto, and The Yellow Press.

Nate Newton and Jeff Caudill wrote intro texts for the book (or rather outro, because it's in the back). They create some truly amazing music and have been supportive beyond the call of duty. Thanks bros!

The book is 12 Euro from hand to hand, it's 13.25 Euro postpaid in Austria, 15.70 Euro postpaid in Europe, and 17.45 Euro postpaid in the US of A. If you like convenient online shopping, this is your best guess.

(Top: GodSentUs, bottom: Modern Life Is War)

The Riot Before - Fists Buried In Pockets

2008-12-17T15:18:00.018+01:00

"All we loved we cannot hold for long / The waves that collide they double in size / Are perceived from the pier by four adjusted eyes / That had widened in time in the darkness of night / But the energy augmented soon must subside / It was gone in that moment we tried to hold tight."

All right, everybody knows that I am a sucker for catchy punk rock with a folk/country twist. Enter The Riot Before, and I'm a happy camper. Fists Buried In Pockets isn't the kind of record that sets new standards when it comes to originality and innovation, but if I was looking for these things in the music I listen to, I'd have dropped out of punk rock long ago. Even though the band name, the album title, and even the cover image would suggest something angry, The Riot Before are more about making it through another day in a miserable life than throwing rocks through bank windows and instigating revolution - which, if you ask me, is at least as valid a topic to write about.

The Riot Before are from Richmond, VA. That would have been my second guess right after Gainesville, FL. Does that give you an idea about how they sound? Yeah right, pretty much like the early Against Me! material with hints of the other big A's like Avail, Ann Beretta, and American Steel. If this doesn't sound like a fucking wet dream, you should go read Pitchfork Media and jerk off to your Japanther records.

"So I'm sorry mom, I'm sorry dad, I really want you to be proud / Don't want to disappoint you all, don't want to let you down."

Dear people in The Riot Before, Fists Buried In Pockets is an album you can be very fucking proud of.

www.say-10.com

"Street by street, blog by blog, taking it all back"

2008-12-17T14:59:00.002+01:00

Punk Planet is no more. Boardstein has ceased to exist. Slap is no longer a print magazine. GLW/DRK, well... GLW/DRK is on holidays. Or something.

When the Slap staff decided to go all online, Lance Dawes said, "...our favorite thing was trying something new, experimenting, failing miserably and sometimes doing something cool that no one else had done yet."

Well, GLW/DRK was never about innovation or doing particularly new things, but since we haven't published a new issue in well over a year, it's about time to put on our shitkickers and kick some shit again. Blogging, oh how very modern. Stay tuned, motherfuckers.