Something I Learned Today

Fulfilling a request for the Caveman, who has patiently emailed me several times about some tracks without ever copping an attitude when my replies have been “tardy”. All he wanted was to hear the last God Bullies 7″, 1995’s Millenium. I’m happy to oblige. My response to these guys back in their heyday was always lukewarm, but I’ve grown to appreciate most of their AmRep material. I never heard the band’s Alternative Tentacles work, but if it’s similar to the tracks here I’ll have to investigate. I love the creepy heavy A-side on this one, and the flip, though tamer, ain’t bad either.

God Bullies - Millenium.mp3
God Bullies - I Forgot Where I Live.mp3

Notes:
Strange Reaction has the band’s double 7″ Join Satan’s Army

Not much to be found on the The Next out there in the internets. All I can gather is that they were from Austin, Texas and released two singles. Their debut 7″, 1979’s Make It Quick, is an overlooked gem of a record. All three tracks have that catchy, rough sound that makes so many lost Texas punk records still sound essential. “Cheap Rewards” was included on Bloodstains Across Texas, “Monotony” on Killed By Death #6. These tracks are culled from the godsend compilation Deep in the Throat of Texas - Six Small Wonders of Texas Punk. If you can find that one, don’t hesitate to pick it up.

The Next - Mr. Wonderful.mp3
The Next - Monotony.mp3
The Next - Cheap Rewards.mp3

For those interested, Last Days of Man on Earth has The Next tracks from 1980’s Live at Raul’s LP. Head over, take a listen, and poke around - there is some quality music to be had.

If the H-100’s post from a couple weeks back was pushing the envelope of what gets posted in these parts, then this 7″ by Infest definitely is off the reservation. I never got hooked by the whole grindcore/power violence scene, but this 10-song debut by L.A.’s Infest still kicks me in the teeth with it’s brutal instrumentation and bilious vocals. Even without a vocal the closing instrumental “Fetch The Pliers” is especially ominous sounding. Their later releases were mostly good (especially the Slave 12″, which includes all 10 tracks from this record plus 8 others) but never matched the chaos of the first 7″. I’m pretty sure this is currently out of print, but I struggle to keep up on what gets reissued and when. For more band info check out the Infest Wikipedia entry.

Infest - Machismo.mp3
Infest - Where’s The Unity.mp3
Infest - The Game.mp3
Infest - Mindless.mp3
Infest - Which Side?.mp3
Infest - Headfirst.mp3
Infest - Break The Chain.mp3
Infest - Slave.mp3
Infest - Sick & Tired.mp3
Infest - Fetch The Pliers.mp3

Washington, DC’s Deadline provided a couple of my favorite tracks from the landmark 1982 hardcore compilation Flex Your Head. But just like so many of those early flash in time DC bands (Untouchables, Red C, Artificial Peace) they disappeared without much of any vinyl legacy beyond FYH. Featuring future drummer Brendan Canty (later Rites of Spring and Fugazi), Deadline recorded a demo in August of 1982 just before splitting up. In 1989 Guy Picciotto’s Peterbilt label resurrected Deadline’s 1982 demo tape as a limited edition 1-sided 12″. 11 tracks in all, featuring a more typical hardcore sound than the tracks recorded earlier for Flex Your Head. My favorite cuts are below, but you can grab the whole thing right here

Deadline - I.C.A..mp3
Deadline - Nothing For Me.mp3
Deadline - Closed Door.mp3
Deadline - Anti-Christ & Deep Sixed.mp3
Deadline - Authority Figures.mp3

Notes:
Interview with Guy Picciotto at KillRockStars, talking about Peterbilt records.

Boulder, Colorado’s Dead Silence were your standard American anarcho peace punk band, sporting songs about the usual topics - war, animal rights, capitalism, sellouts, etc. Given that it should be no surprise my first exposure to Dead Silence came in the form of their track “Hope” on the Maximum Rock ‘n’ Roll compilation They Don’t Get Laid, They Don’t Get Paid, But Boy Do They Work Hard. I was impressed enough to back track and capture most of the band’s pre 1990 catalog, including their 1985 Stress 12″ and 1986’s Beginning of the End LP. 20 years later the music itself sounds clunky, a combination of poor production and limited musicianship. What’s wrong with the material is offset by what is right - some solid lyrical content and deranged vocal delivery courtesy of singer Kevin Vulture. In 1994 Vinyl Communications released Unlearning, a CD compiling the band’s work from 1985-1989. Though the band would continue to release 7″s into the mid-90’s, all of the best material is collected on the now out of print Unlearning collection.

from 1985’s Stress 12″
Dead Silence - Mad Scientist’s Ball.mp3

from 1986’s Beginning of The End LP
Dead Silence - Fucked In the Head Part II.mp3
Dead Silence - Energy Wasted.mp3
Dead Silence - We Turn Away.mp3
Dead Silsnce - Beginning of the End.mp3

from the MRR compilation They Don’t Get Laid, They Don’t Get Paid…
Dead Silence - Hope.mp3

originally from Metal Gives Us A Headache EP
Dead Silence - Sally.mp3

Not to brag or anything, but the most famous graduate of my high school (Gates-Chili, Rochester NY) is one half of the Hillside Strangler murderers, Kenneth Bianchi. Bianchi’s and Angelo Buono’s 1977-78 rampage in the LA area was fodder for the punk subculture, producing two quality tributes - one by the  infamous Child Molesters, the other by the Hollywood Squares. The two tracks here are from the Squares lone 1978 single. “Hillside Strangler” is most definitely a classic, but the b-side is cool pop-edged cut that also bears repeated listens. Not surprisingly, both songs have been comped and booted many times over. A reissue of the single, studio tracks, and a live show is due sometime in 2006 on Rave Up.

Hollywood Squares - Hillside Strangler.mp3

Hollywood Squares - Hollywood Square.mp3

New location, new software, same old bullshit. The move to Wordpress would have gone smoother if I wasn’t such a fucking idiot that forgot to back things up. Either way, here it is. Things may looked jacked up for a bit, but it will get straightened out. Same for the links - I’m working to get everything fixed up.

Have fun.

And now for something completely different - a short blast of manic ’90’s hardcore from Cleveland’s H-100’s. There isn’t much info on them, other than this blurb from Havoc Records:

Cleveland Ohio’s h-100’s blast out crucial early 80’s style raw thrash. The singer was a teenage kid with a really snotty voice. The rest of the band were thirty-year-old record collector dudes who were there when hardcore ruled and didn’t forget. Although the h-100’s claim 80’s Japanese thrash as their main influence this record reminds me more of early Die Kreuzen, Poison Idea, Toxic Reasons or many other Midwestern thrash bands of the 80’s…H-100’s were notorious for their outrageous live shows which usually featured fireworks, wrestling moves and throwing everything that wasn’t nailed down.

The H-100s released 3 singles - Texas Death Match, Dismantle, and Distort Cleveland before - splitting in early 1996. 3/4 of the band would become 9 Shocks Terror, with Tony Erba & Wedge eventually forming Gordon Solie Motherfuckers. There was reportedly a CD of all three 7″s, but I’ve never seen it. 1995’s Distort Cleveland EP is my favorite of the three records. Take a listen:

H-100s - Brown Sugar.mp3
H-100s - Destroy Cleveland.mp3
H-100s - Shit We Live In Today.mp3
H-100s - Don’t Ask Me How I Am.mp3
H-100s - Free.mp3

And for good measure here are two more - “Agitate” is from Dismantle, “Picked On” is from Texas Death Match
H-100s - Agitate.mp3
H-100s - Picked On.mp3

To be honest, I don’t feel like I have a keen enough intellect to adequately analyze and expound on Pere Ubu. While I like the band and their music on a high level, I feel like I’m missing something critical that everyone else is getting - kinda how I feel whenever I listen to Jazz. Kinda how I felt when I failed advanced calculus, or tried to read Dostoevsky. Just plain dumb. So I’ll leave it at that, but suggest you head over to Vinyl Mine to check out Jim’s take on Pere Ubu’s first album The Modern Dance.

Deconstruction aside, I’ve grown comfortable with the majority of material Pere Ubu released in their “Historical” period (1975-1982). The band produced 3 fine albums (Modern Dance, Dub Housing, and New Picnic Time) in little over a two year span, in addition to a couple of fantastic singles. If you can put aside David Thomas’ off-key yelping/mewing and the band’s more artsy-fartsy avant weirdness there’s much to enjoy. The tracks here come from the band’s 5-song 1978 12″ Datapanik in the Year Zero, originally released in the UK on Radar Records. The EP collects cuts from the band’s early releases on their own Hearthan label, including the first single from 1975, the b-side to their second single (”Cloud 149″), a demo version of “The Modern Dance” (marked as “untitled”), and the b-side to The Modern Dance single (”Heaven”). A nice sample of the band’s early output, though the exclusion of “Final Solution” is puzzling:

from 1978 EP Datapanik in the Year Zero

Pere Ubu - Heart of Darkness.mp3

Pere Ubu - 30 Seconds Over Tokyo.mp3

Pere Ubu - Cloud 149.mp3

Pere Ubu - Untitled.mp3

Pere Ubu - Heaven.mp3

Notes:

> Photo from official Pere Ubu website: Ubuprojex > Rocket From The Tombs tracks are still available from an earlier post. I prefer the RFTT early version of “30 Seconds Over Tokyo”

> The entire Datapanik EP is included in the Terminal Tower singles, etc compilation and the Datapanik in the Year Zero boxset.

With the recent Joy Division post and my new found enthusiasm for blogging British bands (woohoo, 2 out nearly 350 posts), it seemed like an ideal time to dish up a little Ikara Colt. Playing that noisy, seemingly familiar blend of arty postpunk, Ikara Colt graced the world with two albums and a couple of singles during their 1999 to 2004 run. Pitchfork had the following take on their 2002 debut Chat and Business

It’s as if Ikara Colt ran down a checklist from the back of the NME on how
to be a British punk band: They met at art school, they dress sharp, and they
sound glum. They crib from the best post-punk and noise-rock, and every track on their debut gets a perfect score for pop songform and speedy hook delivery…
The music also falls in line, between Sonic Youth and The Fall, but at least they do it well…. Chat and Business won’t bring you down, nor will it kick your ass. It’s the kind of album that’s never better than its last single, but my complaints will sound like stodgy nit-picking if you go nuts for the guitars 

2004’s Modern Apprentice is more of the same, if ultimately less engaging. No Ripcord sums it up fairly well:

It’s unfortunate that the familiar sound of some of these tracks, the nagging suspicion that you heard this once before, is always hiding in the background, because there’s worthy enough material here. The previously mentioned raw energy is evident in bucketloads, and there are tons of spiky guitar slashes and fuzz-heavy bass riffs. 

Modern Apprentice was never given official release in the US, for reasons unknown to me (perhaps their split). Regardless of the slings and arrows levied at the band I enjoyed both of these albums, with being one of my favorites of the early 21st century. Take a listen:

from Chat & Business
Ikara Colt - Sink Venice.mp3
Ikara Colt - At The Lodge.mp3

 from Modern Apprentice
Ikara Colt - Wake in the City.mp3
Ikara Colt - How’s The World Gonna Take You Now.mp3

Notes:
>Photo from an Ikara Colt fansite