Something I Learned Today

After several years of trying I finally tracked down a copy of the 6 song 12″ by DC band Rain. La Vache Qui Rit was recorded in 1987 and posthumously released in 1990 on Guy Picciotto’s Peterbilt label. “Worlds at War” was included on the State of the Union comp. Bert Queiroz provided a brief overview:

Jon Kirshten (Chris Bald’s younger brother) played guitar & sang, Eli Janney played drums, Bert Queiroz played bass (& cover photo), Scott McCloud also played guitar & sang. Amy Pickering, Ian MacKaye & Jeff Turner did backing vocals, Ian & Jeff did production, Don Zientara engineered, & Kurt Sayenga did the design. Glad someone still cares & likes the record.

The music here is firmly in the vein of the post-Revolution Summer sound, call it emo, post-hardcore, whatever. Embrace and One Last Wish are the two bands that immediately come to mind.

Rain - That Time of the Year.mp3
Rain - End of my Mind.mp3
Rain - Snakeout.mp3
Rain - Worlds at War.mp3
Rain - Around the Axis.mp3
Rain - Rivers.mp3

Notes:
>> for those interested, Eli Janney and Bert Queiroz both maintain websites.
>> For another great Peterbilt release checkout Deadline

** It appears that both the Rain and Deadline EP’s will be re-issued by Dischord in the next month (way overdue). I will be removing these tracks shortly given this information **

One of the nice things to find in my mailbox upon my return from vacation was a promo copy of Alternative Tentacles reissue of the collected works of Miami’s The Eat. It’s Not The Eat, It’s The Humidity collects 30 studio tracks and 29 live cuts on 2 CD’s. And you know, it’s about time. The Eat are KBD legends, with their first two singles commanding ridiculous prices. It’s Not the Eat… collects these two gems, the Scattered Wahoo Action cassette from 1982, and the full mid-90’s sessions that spawned the Hialeah 7″. In the late 90’s the band themselves was distributing most of this material on a CDR called Slowly I Turn. All in all, this is enjoyable melodic, garage punk with a biting satirical edge. As the AT bio labels ‘em:

top-floor melodic punk ‘n’ roll - sort of a sped-up Real Kids with rock-bottom Angry Samoans-style lyrics

The second disc is live, and I can do without most live releases. This is no exception. (note that the double vinyl edition skips the live material). I’ll stick with the studio material. The Eat never topped “Communist Radio”, but they come close on a couple of these. Some of my favorites:

The Eat - Communist Radio.mp3
The Eat - Nut Cop.mp3
The Eat - Party Line.mp3
The Eat - Hialeah.mp3

You can buy It’s Not The Eat, It’s The Humidity directly from Alternative Tentacles
(Or, you can try and win one from Peter over at Killed By Death Records)

Shit, there ain’t much I can say about either of these legendary bands that you don’t already know. This split was released by Yesterday and Today records in 1990, featuring one track apiece from each band. The Bad Brains track was recorded in 1979 and was released on the Best of Limp comp. The Black Market Baby song was recorded in 1981, and released on the Connected compilation (same version?).

I picked this up as I my Bad Brains fanaticism was waning, killed mostly due to the glut of live bullshit spewed forth in the late 80’s. Hearing “Don’t Bother Me” was a shot in the arm, a jolt of spastic Bad Brains. Even cooler, “World at War” was my first introduction to Black Market Baby - and christ almighty, it was a fucking revelation. At the time though nothing from Black Market Baby was in print, which was torture, though a year or so later Bitzcore released the Baby Takes and Baby on Board LP’s. Luckily, you can easily track down “World at War” and a ton of other BMB’s greatest cuts on 2006’s retrospective Coulda…Shoulda…Woulda

Bad Brains - Don’t Bother Me.mp3
Black Market Baby - World at War.mp3

notes:
sleeve pic and info from the BMB website. Also cool, :30 Under DC

A couple of comments back someone asked me to repost my Chronic Sick tracks. Well, I never actually posted any Chronic Sick material, so it must be out there on some other blog. I could do some searching and throw out a link, but fuck it, I’m too lazy to track it down. Seeing as I have the tracks from an old CD-R from a couple of years back I might as well share.

The total output from New Jersey’s Chronic Sick included 1982’s 6 song 12″ EP Cutest Band in Hardcore and the 1983 3 track 7″ often referred to as Reagan Bands, both on the Mutha label. All you really need to know is that, despite the meathead lyrical sentiments, this is some choice ‘Shore Core’. That translates as surprisingly melodic punkish hardcore. The opening tracks “There Goes The Neighborhood” and “Dress Code” are 1-2 punch in the chops. Take a listen:

from 1982’s Cutest Band in Hardcore 12″
Chronic Sick - There Goes The Neighborhood.mp3
Chronic Sick - Dress Code.mp3
Chronic Sick - Public Suicide.mp3
Chronic Sick - Man Rape Blues.mp3
Chronic Sick - Mucho Macho.mp3
Chronic Sick - Pain for Profit.mp3

from 1983’s self-titled 7″
Chronic Sick - Reagan Bands.mp3
Chronic Sick - Crotch Rot.mp3
Chronic Sick - Blood Type X.mp3

Notes:
** Check out Chronic Sick @ Myspace
** Also, lot’s of info on Mutha Records here

One of the most frequent email, etc. requests I get is for the reactivation of the tracks associated with the Husker Du rarities post from July 2005. So, with nothing pressing at the moment and the stack of “to-be-blogged” material rapidly dwindling to nil I give you about an hour and 20 minutes of little heard Husker material. A couple of tracks (”Erase Today” and “It’s Not Fair”) were officially released on comps (Blasting Concept Volume 2 and Kitten), but most of the material here is from the Savage Young Du and Up in the Air boots and live tapes/CD-R’s. Best bet is the great sounding ‘80/’81 live material, but the Metal Circus and New Day Rising outtakes are pretty good as well. Broken down chronologically, with a huge debt of gratitude to Paul Hilcoff’s Husker Du discography (flyer courtesy of Minnesota Historical Society)

studio 1979 & 1980
Husker Du - Sore Eyes.mp3
Husker Du - All I’ve Got To Lose is You.mp3
Husker Du - Writer’s Cramp.mp3

live May 1980
Husker Du - Pictures of You.mp3
Husker Du - What Went Wrong.mp3
Husker Du - You’re Too Obtuse/Put Your Past Away.mp3
Husker Du - Sexual Economics.mp3
Husker Du - Industrial Grocery Store.mp3
Husker Du - Instrumental.mp3
Husker Du - Uncle Ron.mp3

live July 1981
Husker Du - Private Hell.mp3
Husker Du - Travel in the Opposite Car.mp3
Husker Du - Call on Me.mp3
Husker Du - Won’t Say a Word.mp3
Husker Du - Don’t Try It.mp3
Husker Du - Termination.mp3

studio 1982 (Metal Circus outtakes)
Husker Du - Today’s The Day.mp3
Husker Du - You Think I’m Scared.mp3
Husker Du - Won’t Change.mp3

live 1982 (included on Kitten compilation)
Husker Du - It’s Not Fair.mp3

studio 1983 (Zen Arcade outtakes)
Husker Du - Some Kind of Fun.mp3
Husker Du - Dozen Beats Eleven.mp3

live 1983
Husker Du - Drug Party.mp3

studio 1984 (New Day Rising outtakes)
Husker Du - Erase Today.mp3
Husker Du - Listen.mp3

studio 1986 (Candy Apple Grey outtakes, all instrumental)
Husker Du - All Work and No Play.mp3
Husker Du - Misty Modern Days.mp3
Husker Du - Just Be.mp3

live 1987
Husker Du - Never Talking To You Again.mp3
Husker Du - Get Along With Me.mp3

When I first wrote about The Left in 2004 I didn’t have jack on them. That all changed in 2006 when Jesus Loves The Left was released, containing this Hagertown, MD band’s Hell, It’s The World and Last Train To Hagerstown 12″s, a comp cut, and a couple of unreleased tracks from the early 90’s. Get ahold of this as soon as possible. The best material here is a potent mix of 60’s garage, melodic hardcore, and Stoogified guitar riffs. Powerful vocals too boot. This shit should have been huge (to paraphrase flex) Luckily, Scott reminded me of this release in the comments a couple of posts back.

The Left - Hell.mp3
The Left - Fuck It.mp3
The Left - The Viet Cong Live Next Door.mp3
The Left - Teenage Suicide.mp3

Notes:
>> Buy Jesus Loves the Left @ CD Baby
>> Requisite MySpace page
>> More info on The Left

Thought about posting about The Gears a couple of months back only to find the excellent Last Days of Man on Earth had just posted The Gears 7″. Six months later and I’ve looped back around, ready to dish out a couple of tracks from the CD reissue of the band’s 1980 LP Rockin’ At Ground Zero on Dionysus. The press release sums it up:

“Rockin’ at Ground Zero” is by far the most rockin’ album to come out of the final days of the original Los Angeles punk rock explosion of 1977-1980. Here’s a band that wanted to have FUN; get drunk, do drugs, get laid and make some damned good music! They were ahead of the curve and made a super-musical concoction by mixing together styles that were a direct or indirect influence on the original punk scene, surf and rockabilly groups and even The Ramones

So there you go. While there are a couple of duds on this, the majority is melodic punk with a greaser rock undercurrent. Bonus points for tacking on the band’s 1979 7″.

The Gears - Baby Runaround.mp3
The Gears - Don’t Be Afraid To Pogo.mp3
The Gears - The Last Chord.mp3
The Gears - Heartbeat Baby.mp3

I prefer the version of “Hard Rock” from Bloodstains Across California to the remixed version on the CD
The Gears - Hard Rock.mp3

Notes:
>> The Gears on MySpace
>> Buy Rockin’ At Ground Zero

When it comes to punk compilations a post on the first Rat Music For Rat People compilation may seem ordinary given all of the rarities now available via blogs, p2p, and usenet. Nothing obscure here by any stretch - all of the bands are legendary and all tracks are live versions of songs that also appear on the official releases of each band (with the exception of the Dils, I believe). So why post it then? Two main reasons:

Not to mention that it’s out of print and the CD version (with only 27 of the 42 cuts from all three volumes) is selling for the ridiculous price of $126 on GEMM. WTF? BY comparison an original press of this LP on Go! can be found for the bargain basement price of $15 on Ebay. Go figure. Below are my favorite tracks from the comp, all recorded live in San Francisco from 1977 through 1982. You can download the whole thing as .rar archive right here.

DOA - America The Beautiful.mp3
Flipper - Life.mp3
Circle Jerks - Live Fast, Die Young.mp3
Bad Brains - You.mp3
Crucifix - Steel Cage Enclosure.mp3
Dead Kennedys - Forward To Death.mp3
Black Flag - Scream.mp3
TSOL - Sounds of Laughter.mp3
Avengers - Cheap Tragedies.mp3
Dils - Blow Up.mp3

In 1980 or thereabouts the three members of primitive LA punk trio the Urinals upped and changed their name to 100 Flowers, for no other reason than their increasing musical ability and songwriting skills dictated a move away from the fuckitall minimalism the band’s previous name conjured. Where the Urinals celebrated their rudimentary talents, 100 Flowers featured more dynamic songs and sounds that can lazily be tagged as “art-punk”. In addition to some compilation appearances (Hell Comes To Your House, Keats Rides A Harley, and Life is Ugly, So Why Not Kill Yourself? amongst others) 100 Flowers would record would release a 3 song 7″ in 1982 and record enough material for a full LP and 12″ EP on Happy Squid. Both 1983’s self-titled album and 1984’s Draw Fire 12″ were released after the band had called it quits. In 1990 the vast majority of this material was released as 100 Years of Pulchritude. I happened across this one sitting in a used bin for $2 and speculated. 10 years later I’m still happy I didn’t pass it over. Highlights:

100 Flowers - Reject Yourself.mp3
100 Flowers - Our Fallout.mp3
100 Flowers - Poltergeists At Home.mp3
100 Flowers - California’s Falling Into the Ocean.mp3
100 Flowers - Triage.mp3
100 Flowers - Contributions.mp3

Notes:
>>Check out Happy Squid records and the Urinals here.
>>100 Years of Pulchritude is out of print. I’m hoping that with the recent reissue of Keats Rides A Harley, the Urinals old material, and new Urinals album that this once again sees the light of day.
>>You can find the Urinals second 7″ @ 7InchPunk. Good Music for Bad, Bad Times has the 3rd Urinals single. Somebody probably has the first one posted somewhere, but I’m too lazy to search for it.

Thanks everyone for the post suggestions. Thanks also to Evil Do’er who saved me the trouble of ripping The Offenders singles. You can check out my original Offenders post from Feb 2005 if you’re looking for something wordy, I aint gonna give it too much here tonight beyond the basics. The first Offenders single (”Lost Causes” b/w “Rockin’ The Town”) was released in 1981 and was much less intense (i.e. “hardcore”) sounding than their later material. In 1989 Bitzcore reissued the single with 3 additional tracks from the same sessions as Fight Back. Here it is:

Offenders - Lost Causes.mp3
Offenders - Poor House Energy.mp3
Offenders - I Hate Myself.mp3
Offenders - Rockin’ The Town.mp3
Offenders - One Fine Morning.mp3

In addition, here’s the Offenders 1984 I Hate Myself 7″
Offenders - I Hate Myself.mp3
Offenders - Bad Times.mp3

For more great Offenders tracks try tracking down the Died In Custody CD. It’s a must have if only for the opportunity to hear the band’s amazing 11 track demo from 1983.