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For what It’s worth, here’s some of the MRR 
reviewers’ current Top 10 (or so) things we’ve 
reviewed this month. 


TOP 10 


SSR-Orwellian Future-EP 
RUMANIA-Fiesta Democratica-EP 
CHIN CHIN-We Don’t Want to Be Prisoners-EP 
RATAS DEL VATICANO-Chido-EP 
HEIL HIDIOT-side of split EP 

mmrnmrnmmm 

V/A-I’d Buy That For A Dollar Volumes 1 and 2-EP 
BAD BRAINS-171A 1981 Sessions-EP 
ROLLER BALL-Savage Eyes/Lay You.Down-45 
MADMEN-LP 

DEAF AIDS-Do It Again-EP 

mum 

NORTHERN TOWNS-Good As Gold-10” 
EXTORTION-Loose Screws-10” 

INFAME-II-LP 

HEADACHE CITY-We Can’t Have Anything Nice-LP 
SPIDER-Back to the Wall/Down and Out-45 


LOS PLANTANOS / VENEREANS-split EP 
MUJERES-Black Dog Inside My Soul-EP 
HATRED SURGE-Deconstruct-LP 
SHADOW OF THE TORTURER-Marching IntoChaos-LP | 
NONCENS-6 Laters-EP / NU SENSAE-live 

NEO BOYS-Give Me The Message-EP 
SCREAMERS-Pat Garrett Demos-LP 
MICKEY-She’s So Crazy/I’m Your Trash-45 
TOXIN lll-l Rock I Ran (Again)-LP 
SPIDER-Back to the Wall/Down and Out-45 

GHETTO WAYS-1 Always Wanted You-LP 
WE LIVE IN TRENCHES-Modern Hex-LP 
SYNDROME-Total Disarmament-EP 
VEM BRYR SIG-Va Fan E Re Nu R&7-EP 
ROLLER BALL-Savage Eyes/Lay You Down-45 



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COVER: Art by Kevin McCarthy, photo of the 
Spits by Canderson 

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Please send all records, zines, 
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MAXIMUMROCKNROLL 
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Phone (415) 923-9814 


www.maximumrocknroll.com 

mrr@maximumrocknroll.com 


KNEE SURGERY MEANS LOTS OF SOCKEYE ON THE STEREO BUT NO TOP TEN 


INDIAN WARS-lf You Want Me-EP 
BEAT BEAT-LP 

THE ART MUSEUMS-Rough Frame-CD 
BABY TEARS-CD 

HEADACHE CITY-We Can’t Have Anything Nice-LP 

NEO BOYS-Give Me The Message-EP 
RATAS DEL VATICANO-Chido-EP 
CHIN CHIN-We Don’t Want to Be Prisoners-EP 
REACTIONARIES-1979-LP 
SCREAMERS-Pat Garrett Demos-12” 

CARDIAC KIDZ-Get Out!-LP 
DAGGERS-Ponte a Patinar-EP 
NEO BOYS-Rich Man’s Dream-EP 
VEM BRYR SIG?-Va Fan E Re Nu R&-EP 
SPIDER-Back to the Wall/Down and Out-45 

:«;i:n:«iun 

MICKEY-She’s So Crazy/I’m Your Trash-45 
MAKEOUTS-ln a Strange Land-LP 
V/A-Denton, Denton USA-LP 
MARVELOUS DARUNGS-The Only Ones For Miles-45 
THE HUSSY/ZYGOTEENS-split EP 


REGULATIONS-To Be Me-LP 

THE JAM-At the BBC-LP 

GHETTO WAYS-1 Always Wanted You-LP 

SPIDER-Back To the Wall/Down And Out-45 

NOTHING PEOPLE-Enemy with an Invitation-45 

VENEREANS-Future Primitive-LP 
MYELIN SHEATHS-Both EPs / NONCENS-EP 
LOS LAXANTES-EP / VEM BRYR SIG-EP 
HEIL HIDIOT-side of split EP / MUJERES-EP 
WETDOG-Lower Leg-EP / NU SENSAE-live 

RF7-Acts of Defiance-EP 
UNFUN-Pain Prescription-EP 
POWERCHORDS-More Than Me/Chemical Girl-45 | 
REGULATIONS-To Be Me-LP 
SCREAMERS-Pat Garrett Demos-12” 

CHIN CHIN-We Don’t Want.to Be Prisoners-EP 
MODERN ACTION-Radioactive Boy/Problem-45 
READIES-Mink Dagger/Medicine Cabinet-45 
CROCODILES-Neon Jesus/Neon Autobahn-45 
BARRERACUDAS-Dog Food/Diet Coke-45 












MAXIMUM ROCKNROLL IS A MONTHLY PUBLICATION. ALL WORK IS DONATED AND NO ONE RECEIVES ANY SALARY. ALL PROCEEDS ARE EITHER INVESTED IN TECHNOLOGICAL 
IMPROVEMENTS OR GO TO OTHER SIMILARLY NOT-FOR-PROFIT PROJECTS. ANYONE IS WELCOME TO REPRINT ANYTHING FROM MRR, BUT ONLY IF IT’S NOT-FOR-PROFIT. 


TOP 10 


Please send two copies of vinyl, CD-only, or demo 
releases to the address on the previous page 



RATAS DEL VATICANO-Chido-EP 

MICKEY-She’s So Crazy/I’m Your Trash-45 

NERVE CITY-LP + EP 

V/A-I’d Buy That For A Dollar Volumes 1 and 2-EP 

NATIVE CATS-Cats Paw/Lemon Juice-45 

MYELIN SHEATHS-Both EPs 

V/A-Our Boy Roy-LP 

CHIN CHIN-We Don’t Want to Be Prisoners-EP 

ROLLERBALL-45 / SPIDER-45 

BARRERACUDAS-45 / RAY MILLAND-CD 


THE 99ERS-And The There Was Surf-CD 

ART MUSEUMS-Rough Frame-CD 

NOTHING PEOPLE-Enemy with an Invitation-45 

CHIN CHIN-We Don’t Want to Be Prisoners-EP 

MYELIN SHEATHS-Mental Twist-EP 

POWERCHORDS-MoreThan Me/Chemical Girl-45 

MY MIND-EP / MARVELOUS DARLINGS-45 

NORTON-CD / LAST COMMUNION-LP 

HEADACHE CITY-We Can’t Have Anything Nice-LP 

BUZZCOCKS-LIVE / THE DAMNED-LIVE 

Mil I 

DRUID PERFUME-Don’t Eat ’Em They’re Poison-45 

SCREAMERS-Pat Garrett Demos-LP 

READIES-Mink Dagger/Medicine Cabinet-45 

RATAS DEL VATICANO-Chido-EP 

BARRERACUDAS-Dog Food/Diet Coke-45 

LOS LAXANTES-No No too No-EP 

ROLLER BALL-Savage Eyes/Lay You Down-45 

SPIDER-Back to the Wall/Down and Out-45 

V/A-I’d Buy That For A Dollar Volumes 1 and 2-EP 

CHIN CHIN-We Don’t Want to Be Prisoners-EP 

1 III 1 ■ 1 1 1 1 1 ——1^— 

BOILING OVER-Trash City-EP 

SOTATILA-Vituiks Meni-EP 

SYNDROME-Total Disarmament-EP 

CHUCK DAMAGE-LP 

FOR THE WORSE/WEDNESDAY NIGHT HEROES-EP 

SSR-Orwellian Future-EP 

HAMMERLOCK-Live on public TV 

MADMEN-LP 

ANTIMOB/BURIAL-split EP 

EXTORTION-Loose Screws-10” 


CONFLICT RESOLUTION-American Internment-EP 

HATRED SURGE-Deconstruct-LP 

SOTATILA-Vituiks Meni-EP 

REACTIONARIES-1979-LP 

RUMANIA-Fiesta Democratica-EP 

EXTORTION-Ldose Screws-10” 

MADMEN-LP 

LOS LAXANTES-No No No No-EP 

SYNDROME-Total Disarmament-EP 

GEP0PEL-EP / FY FAN-CD 

FRED SCHRUNK 

SCREAMERS-Pat Garrett Demos-LP 

GOD EQUALS GENOCIDE-lt Wasn’t Made For Us-EP 

UNFUN-Pain Prescription-EP 

THE HUSSY/ZYGOTEENS-split EP 

HEIL HIDOT/WEEKEND WARRIOR-split EP 

LOS PLANTANOS / VENEREANS-split EP 
HEADACHE CITY-We Can’t Have Anything Nice-LP 

REGULATIONS-To Be Me-LP 

CHIN CHIN-We Don’t Want to Be Prisoners-EP 

REACTIONARIES-1979-LP 

i 1! IT 1 ;1 ;lil 1 111 U It 

INFAME-II-LP 

RATAS DEL VATICANO-Chido-EP 

LOS LAXANTES-No No No No-EP 

SSR-Orwellian Future-EP 

LOS PLANTANOS / VENEREANS-split EP 

DEJANGRADOS / AMARGO-EP 

SYNDROME-Total Disarmament-EP 

RUMANIA-Fiesta Democratica-EP 

SOTATILA-Vituiks Meni-EP 

REACTIONARIES-1979-LP 


Nuts! #3 + #4 

Burn Collector #14 

Self-defense for Radicals 

Wet Cement #2 

Mycoffinhands #2 

Kid Cutbank #3 

Chilena Comando #6 

Screaming at a Wall #3 

Classy People #2 

The Second Skin of Cities 


MRR SHITWORKERS 

Sam Alvarado Peter Avery 


Judy Balmin 
Heidi Marshall Booth 
Tim Brooks 
Eric Butterworth 
Krista Ciminera 
Robert Collins 
Sarah Crews 
Craigums 
Helen Degenerate 
Alex Dorfman 
Sean Dougan 
Robert Eggplant 
Lowell Fletcher 
Travis Fristoe 
Hector Garcia 
Zane Grant 
Jason Halal 
Ben Howell 
Chris Hubbard 
Sarah Janet 
Ramsey Kanaan 
Jon Kortland 
Brad Lambert 
Vinnie La Russa 
Mike Longshot 
Ray Lujan 
Hal MacLean 
Jeff Mason 
Andrew Murphy 
Paco Mus 
Jon Off A Building 
Chris Pratt 
George Rager 
Rotten Ron Ready 
Ken Sanderson 
Fred Schrunk 
Dionne Stevens 
Tress 

Andrew Underwood 
Thera Webb 
Max Wickham 

CONTRIBUTORS 

Osa Atoe 
Chuck Barrels 
Mykel Board 
Chris Cony 
John Fahy 
Fly 

Dan Goetz 
George Impulse 
Mattilda 
Mark Murrmann 
Brontez Purnell 
Ted Rail 
Steve Spinali 
Logan Worrell 
Helge Schreiber 
Marissa Magic 
Jason Gellis 
Jess Scott 
David Ensminger 
Nicholas Jones 
Canderson 


Michelle Barnhardt 
Julia Booze 
Dan Butler 
John Chainsaw 
Karoline Collins 
Rob Coons 
Arwen Curry 
Andy Darling 
Mark Dober 
Brian Dooley 
John Downing 
xCarlos El Pasox 
Jonathan Floyd 
Steve Funyon 
Bob Goldie 
Vernon Hadley 
Michelle Hill 
Mike Howes 
Jill Hubley 
Clara Jeffers 
Kenny Kaos 
Daiki Kusuhara 
Andy Larsen 
Pat Libby 
Michael Lucas 
Jesse Luscious 
Marissa Magic 
Kevin McCarthy 
Ryan Murphy 
Golnar Nikpour 
Isaac Pirie 
Chris Pugmire 
Randy Ransone 
Casey Ress 
Steve Scanner 
Martin Sorrondeguy 
Maxwell Tremblay 
Trash 

Kate Wad kins 
Ned Wells 
XYosefX 


Ariel Awesome 
Brace Belden 
Graham Booth 
DX 

Bill Florio 
Juls Generic 
Felix Havoc 
Carolyn Keddy 
Allan McNaughton 
Chris Pugmire 
Al Quint 
Bruce Roehrs 
George Tabb 
Bryony Beynon 
Dan Butler 
Max 

Greg Dick 
Pedrag Delibasich 
Kenji Yamaji 
Kevin McCarthy 


DISTRIBUTION COORDINATOR 

Diane Anastasio 


WEB COORDINATOR 

Paul Curran 

ZINE COORDINATORS 

Mariam Bastani Layla Gibbon 










A WHOLE CRAPLOAD OF MRR BACK ISSUES... 


0179/April “98. Boy Sets Fire, Tres Kids, Idyls, 
Spat & The Guttersnipes. The Posers, Explosive 
Kate. Douche Flag. 

#180/May ‘98. Reinforce. Discontent. TV Killers. 
Slack Action, Eyeliners. Mademoiselle. MK 
Ultraviolence. Haulin’ Ass. 97a. Infiltrators. Jack 
Saints. Stray Bullets. 

0 181/June ‘98. Grapefruit. Druggies, DDI. 
Bonecrusher. Normals, All Bets Off. Stiletto Boys. 
Summerjack. Cell Block 5. 

0184/Sept ‘98. Absentees. Devoid of Faith, UXA. 
Umlaut. Four Letter Word. Streetwalkin'Cheetahs. 
Ricanstruction. Libertine, Indecision, Snarkout 
Boys. 

0186/Nov ‘98. Registrators. August Spies. 
Marilyn's Vitamins. Chinese Love Beads. 
0187/T)ec ‘98. Real Kids. Sawn Off. Cretins. 
Spider Cunts, Heroines, 3rd Party, No Class. 
0188/Jan ‘99. Stitches. Neighbors. Mansfields. 
Real Swinger, Marauders. Mark Bruback. Mars 
Moles. IX)A. 

# 189/Feb ‘99. Monster X, Peter & the Test Tube 
Babies, Steam Pig. Maurauders. Yakuza, Dead 
Beat, Halfways. Hot Rod Honeys. DcRita Sisters. 

0190/Mar ‘99. John Holstrom. Powerhouse, 
Brezhnev. Slappy. Black Pumpkin, Smartbomb ca. 
Wanda Chrome. Long Gones. Smogtown. 
Halfways, Tilt. 

0191/April *99. Murder Suicide Pact. Kil Kare. 
Dudman. Super Hi-Fives, Better Than Elvis DJs. 
Pet Peeves. Loose Ends. Slingshot Episode. 
0192/May ‘99. Los Crudos. Burning Kitchen. 
Henry Fiat’s Open Sore, Polythene, Kangaroo 
Rees. 

0194/July ‘99. Deathreat. Last Match. God Hates 
Computers, Fokkewolf, Flesh Eating Creeps. 
Aside. Hoppin' Mad. Kid Dynamite. Thee 
Outcasts. 

0195/Aug ‘99. Moral Crux. RC5. Have Nots. Ill 
Tempered. Dysentery. Greg Higgins. Revlons. 
Larry & the Gonowheres. 

#196/Sept ‘99. Hopscotch. Catharsis. Orchid. The 
Pricks. Grissle. Product X, Reaching Forward. 
Emerge. Third Degree,‘‘Epicenter Zone *90-'99". 
0197/Oct ‘99. Reducers SF. Lower Class Brats. 
Reactor 7, TheGodsHateKansas, Futuro Incierto. 
Showcase Showdown. Waiflc. Flat Earth Rees. 
0208/Sept ‘00. Le Shok. tlie Commies, the Chemo 
Kids, Day of Mourning. Affront. Diaspora, 
Whippersnapper, Hopeless/Sub City. Prank, 
Countdown to Oblivion 

0209/Oct “00. Loose Lips. Godstompcr. Peace of 
Mind. FYP. I Farm. Annalise, Cattle Decapitation. 
Riot/Clone. 

0214/Mar *01. Crispus Attucks, Fetish. Lifes Halt. 
Mr. Roboto. Dream Dates. Satan McNugget, 
Havoc. Briefs. 

0215/April ‘01. No Means No, Vitamin X. 
Injections, Y. Dils. Last In Line, Don Austin. 
Deranged Records 

0218/Julv ‘‘01. Guyana Punchline. Les 
Sexareenos. The Devil Is Electric. Red Monkey. 
White Collar Crime. Forca Macabra, The Ataris. 
Suicide, The Mob 

0221/Oct “01. The G8 Summit. Reflections. 
Soophie Nun Squad. Totalitiir. True North. 
Wontons. Sin Dios, Bottles & Skulls. Scarred For 
Life. Flowers in the Dustbin. Remains of the Day. 
Ritchie Whites. B'67. 

0222/Nov *01. Dios Hastio. Tragedy. Four Letter 
Word. Salad Days author Charles Romalotti, Very 
Metal. Maurice's Little Bastards, the Rotters, MDC 
Brazilian tour diary, the Cravats. JR Ewing. Dutch 
scene, extended news section. "Globalization 
Rhetoric & Reality." 

0223/Dec ‘01. "US Policy in the Middle East." 
"Revisiting 1948." Manifesto Jukebox. Good 
Riddance. Pokers. Viimenen Kolonna. Bluebloods. 
Vitamin X tour diary. Flakes. Pg. 99. the Mob. 7 
Days of Samsara. 

0225/Feb ‘02. Lengua Armada. Breaker Breaker. 3 
Yrs. Down. Scrotum Grinder. Turun TautL Flux Of 
Pink Indians. Holding On. Pauki. 86’d, See You In 
Hell, Red Light Sting. Nazis From Mars, Scare 
Tactic. 


0227/Apr ‘02. Bcllrays, Rhinos. Wasted. Kristofcr 
Pasanen, Business. Assert. DS 13 tour report. Life 
Set Struggle, lowaska. Zounds. 

0229/June ‘02. Countdown To Putsch. The 
Awakening, Dave Hill Distribution, Holier Than 
Thou. Kill Devil Hills. Sound Of Failure. E.T.A.. 
Nubs. Les Baton Rouge, New Disorder Records. 
Career Suicide. Swellbellys. The Sinyx. 


0230/July *02. Bitchin'. Redencion 911. Phantom 
Limbs. Secretions. Holy Molar. Sharp Knife. 
Mighty John Waynes. A Global Threat. Groovic 
Ghoulies. Reproach, Annie Anxiety. 


0231/Aug ‘02. Epoxies. Puppy Vs. Dyslexia. 


Koro, Blocko. Amdi Petersen's Anne. Piss & 
Vinegar Zine. Schizophrenic Records, Toys That 
Kill. Give Us Barabbas, Dirt. 


S3 EACH IN THE USA 
$5 MEXICO/CANADA 
$10 INTERNATIONAL FROM 


0233/Oct ‘02. "All Ages" article. Scholastic Dcth. 
Runnamucks. Sinners & Saints. Panic, Gasolheads. 
Jewws. Futures, Michael Landon’s Commandos. 
Storm the Tower, Against Me!. Balance of Terror. 
Class Assassins. Spazm 151. 

0234/Nov *02. Snobs. What Happens Next? 
Brazilian tour, The Oath. Radio 4. Feeder/. Charm 
City Suicides. Selfish. Riot 99, End On End. 
Peawees. Bom/Dead. 

0235/Dec *02. Anti-war Special Issue. Articles: 
"Reading for Democracy." "War on Iraq?". 
“Unfinished American Revolution." Resource 
Guide. "US Involvement in lraq.""Axis of 
Empire*" Long Island DIY Scene, What Happens 
Next? Brazilian tour part 2. Smalltown, Kylesa. 
Crash & Bum. 

0236/Jan ‘03. Mr. California & State Police. Iron 
Lung. Riff Randells. Chainsaw, Artcore , 
Latterman.Travis Cut. Phenomenauts, Pretty Little 
Flower. X-Cretas. 

0238/Mar *03. World Bums To Death. Chronics. 
Vilently 111. Dystopia. Pilger. Exotic Fever, 
Brezhnev. R.A.M.B.O.. Blown To Bits. Put To 
Shame. Dcconditioned. This Bike Is A Pipe Bomb. 
Monsters. 

0239/Apr “03. Romanian D : bcat. Meconium 
Records. Amazombies. Abandoned Hearts Club. 
Mike V. & the Rats. Nicki Sicki. Bigamists, Bolivia 
article. Negatives. Kuolema. Defiance. 

0240/May *03.1 Quit. Apers. Headless Horsemen. 
Lesser of Two. Barse, Nightmare, Music Zine 
Roundtable. Exploding. Hearts. Flesh Packs, 
Blacklist Brigade. 

0241/Junc ‘03. Tyrades. Lumbergh. The Stand By 
Me, New Mexican Disaster Squad. Cut the Shit. 
Libertinagem. 17th Class, the Ends. He Who 
Corrupts. Deathbag. Cria Cuervos. 

0242/July ‘03. Pensacola & San Francisco punk 
protest reports. John Wilkes Booze. Anfo, Bob 
Suren. Migra Violenta. Jackson 8. Snakepit zine . 
Krigshot. the Rites, Deadfall. 

0243/Aug ‘03. "Media Allia'nce and the FCC." 
Striking Distance. Malcontents. Invisible City. 
Books Lie, Charm City Art Space, Hopeless 
Dregs of Humanity. I Shot Cyrus. Sunday 
Morning Einsteins, What the Kids Want. Onion 
Flavored Rings. 

0244/Sept “03. None More Black. Deadline. Rai 
Ko Ris. Boxed In. Exploding Hearts. Raving 
Mojos. Blackout Terror. Morticia's Lovers. Thee 
Fine Lines. Trust zine. 

0245/Oef ‘03. No Time. Left. Riistetyt. Intense 
Youth, The Gimmies, Ass End Offend. Artimus 
Pyle. La Fraction, Kung Fu Rick. The Honor. 
0246/Nov ‘03. Punk & Resistance in Israel, Letters 
from Palestine. No Choice. FM Knives. Bury the 
Living. Marked Men. The Dirty Burds. Provoked. 
0247/Dec ‘03. DSB. The Boils. Popular Shapes. 
Phoenix Foundation. Bathtub Shitter. Meet the 
Vims. Cropknox. "Punk Babies on Tour" Article. 
0248/Jan ‘04. Discharge. Superhelicoptcr. Jed 
Whitey. Black Friday ‘29. Find Him And Kill Him. 
The Lids. Impratical Cockpit, Face Up To It. 
Histdty Of Maximum Rocknroll Radio. 

0249/Feh ‘04. From Ashes Rise. Hagar the Womb. 
This Is My Fist. Skip Jensen, Gride. Katy 
Otto/Mike Taylor Dialogue. John Yates. Pointing 
Finger. 

0250/Mar *04. Best Records of 2003, Miami 
FTAA protests, Clorox Girls, FIYA. "La Villita: 
Chicago Pilsen Scene." Terminus Victor. Restarts. 
Damage Done. Knights of New Crusade. 
0251/April ‘04. The Fuse!. Vakivaitaa. Modem 
Machines. Microcosm, Migra Violenta Euro tour 
diary. Allegiance. Neurotic Swingers. Xavier 
Lcpaigc Photos. Le Scrawl,Vrah. 

0253/June ‘04. Sweet J.A.P.. Gorilla Angreb. 
Voetsek. Minority Blues Band, Scmvy Dogs. 
Molotov Cocktail. Kidnappers, Schifosi. King Ly 
Chee. YD1. 

0254/July ‘04. No Hope For The Kids. Dropdead. 
Diskords. Breakfast. Asschapel. I Excuse, Strung 
Up.To Hell & Back. Four Eyes. Lamant, Gammits 
MW, scene reports from Portland. Boston and 
Germany. 

0255/Aug *04. "Punk's Not Dead. Reagan Is" 
Special Issue. Leatherface, Get It Away. The 
Hatepinks. Keen Monkey Work. New York City. 
South Dakota. Czech Republic. Philippines. Russia. 
0256/Sep ‘04. Observers, Witchhunt. Annihilation 
Time. Zann. Eskapo. FxPxO. Haymarkct Riot. 
Fourth Rotor. Les Georges Lenigrad. Texas scene. 
Newfoundland, Indiana. England. 

0257/Oct “04 The Election Issue. Jesse Townlcy. 
Matt Gonzalez, Rattus, Fighting Dogs. Hero 
Dishonest. Kickz. Boss Martians. Reactionary 3. 
Slovakia, Australia. South Wales. South East Asia. 
0258/Nov ‘04. Career Suicide. Cathy Wilkerson of 
the Weather Underground. No Fucker. The Repos. 
Dominatrix. Ashtray. Deadstop. Midnight Creeps. 
Michale Graves. The Diffs. Shemps. Abi Yo Yo's. 


0259/Dec ‘04. Bad Business. Penelope Houston. 
Rambo. AI, Ass. I Attack,The Krunchies, A-Lines, 
Insurgence Records. The Hates. Accidents, 
Massgrav. The Critics. Merciless Game, SF Hotel 
Workers Strike, photos from Japan. SoCal & the 
Bay Area. 

0260/Jan ‘05. Technocracy. The Total End. Only 
Crime, True North. Partisans. For The Worst, Dick 
Spikic. Straight to Hell. Black Cross. Action. Ergs. 
Rusty Nails. Queer Activism in London. Greg 
Shaw tribute. John Peel tribute. Andrew "Stig" 
Sewell tribute. Beijing punk photos. 

0261/Feb ‘05. Year End Top Tens. Riistetyt. Lost 
Cherrccs, Complete Control. Cheap Sex. Gasoline 
Please. Becrzone.,Grey.skull. MOTO. Water Into 
Beer Fanzine. Swe-Punk scumpit. Japan punk pho¬ 
tos, Bay Area punk photos. Texas. Russia, and 
Malaysia scene reports. 

0262/March “05. Kamvapen Attack. Neo Boys. 
Catholic Boys. Dead Moon. Wreckage. Frantix. 
Armitage Shanks, Wendy Kroys. To What End?. 
Cell Block 5. Bent Outta Shape, Ah-Nah Tron, 
Slovakia. Indonesia, and Illinois scenes. 

0263/April “05. All Crushes Spending Loud Night 
2(X)4. Bombenalarm. Battleship. APA. The Black 
Lips. Words That Bum. Flamingo 50. The Low 
Budgets. Mellakka. 1 Object. Antisect. Bay Area 
scene report. South Coast UK scene report. 
#264/May ‘05. Crime. Love Songs. Bruce Banner. 
Intent. The Holy Mountain. Have Heart. The Bill 
Bondsmen. The Real Losers, archive photos. Bay 
Area scene photos. Taiwan and Rochester scene 
reports. 

0265/June ‘05. Endless Nightmare. Hard Skin. 
Kolokol, Amebix. Transistor Transistor, The Safes. 
The Detonators, Finl^id scene report. France scene 
report. SoCal scene report. 

0266/July ‘05. The Carbonas. MDC. Destrux. 
Urikind. Hiretsukan. Giant Haystacks, Ohuzaru, 
Teenage Harlets. Michigan scene report. San Diego 
scene report. Eugene. OR scene report, photos. 
0267/August *05. Knugen Fallen Sleeper Cell. 
Motoruma, Gulcher Records history. Army of 
Jesus. The Slicks. Thee Merry Widows. Rotten 
Sound.The Faction (UK), Czech and New Zealand 
scene reports. 

0268/September‘O5. Signal Lost. Gulcher 
Records history part tw'o. Teenage Bottlerocket. 
Mattilda (aka Matt Bernstein Sycamore). The 
Spectacle. Bang Sugar Bang. Chumbawamba. 
Reason of Insanity, Forward To Death, Flyer art. 
Florida Scene Report. Bay Area scene report, pho¬ 
tos. 

0269/October ‘05. Hammer. Desastre. Human 
Eye. Les Bellas. Gasmask Terror, Randy "Biscuit" 
Turner tribute. Stalag 17 (UK). Stepbrothers. 
Retching Red, Weaving the Deathbag. Gather. 
Chicago and SoCal scene reports. 

0270/Novcmbcr ‘05. Clorox Girls European Tour. 
Czolgosz. Regulations. Time Flys. Taxi. No More 
Lies. Oil!. Paddy Costello of the Dillinger Four. 
Smartpils, Revenge of Mongoloid, Pisschrist. 
Scene reports: Puerto Rico. UK, Russia. 
0271/December ‘05. Besthdven, Abductee SD. 
Tractor Sex Fatality. George Harrison. Deathtoll. 
Photos by icki. Ice & The Iced, the Ulcers. Chimps 
Eat Bananas. Deranged / Criminal IQ / 
Kick‘n‘Punch Records. Scene reports: Iowa. 
Maine. Illinois. 

0272/January ‘06. Conga Fury. Let's Grow. 
Frustration. Bastardass. Icons of Filth. Burial, 
Hrydjuverk. Cranked Up!. Urrke T & the Midlife 
Crisis. Tropezio. Baboon of Sickness zine. Scene 
reports: Austin. France. Michigan. Larry Wolfley 
photos. 

0273/Fcbruary ‘06. Fuses. Endstand. Out Cold. 
Pedestrians, Acts of Sedition. BadEatingHabits. 
Western Addiction. Jesus Fucking Christ. Toxic 
Waste. Punk photo spread. St. Louis. USA & 
Brighton. UK scene reports. 

0274/March ‘06. Best of 2005. Formaldehyde 
Junkies. Brutal Knights. Kansan Uutiset. Hatred 
Surge. A-Heads, Manikin. Upinatem. Hips. Boston 
scene report. Punk photo spread. 

0275/April ‘06. History of ABC No Rio (Part One). 
Ringers, Missbrukama. "90s garage punk scumpit. 
Anatomi-71. After the Bombs. Rubella Ballet, RIP 
Pig Champion. Ricky Adam interview and photo¬ 
graphs. Sean McGhee. Hard Skin US tour diary. 
0276/May *06. "Is Business Killing Punk Rock?" 
business survey (Part One). History of ABC No 
Rio (Part Two), Vitamin X Asian Pacific tour diary. 
Soviet Valves Suburban Death Machine. 
Frustrations. George Hurchalla. Scene reports: 
Czech Republic and Greece. 

0277/June *06. "Is Business Killing Punk Rock?" 
business survey (Part Two). Imperial Leather. 
Boom Boom Kid. Vitamin X Asian Pacific Tour 
(part two). "How to Make It Big!" by the Phantom 
Surfers. Magrudergrind. Poland. 

0278/July ‘06. Billy Childish. Death Token. The 
First Step. Ramsey Kanaan of AK Press. Headache 
City. Dcconditioned. Under Pressure. Insuicicty. 
Instigators. Malaysia Scene. Bay Area Scene Pics. 


0279/August *06. Mika Miko, The Fall, Cardiac 
Arrest, Digger & the Pussycats. Massmord. Insect 
Warfare, The Astronauts. Canary Islands Photo 
Spread, Four Slicks. The Fallout. PAWNS, 
Tajikistan. Uzbekistan. & Umea. Sweden scenes. 
0280/September “06. Hjerte Stop, Grupo Sub-1. 
Desperate Bicycles, Bill Daniel interview and 
photo spread. APF Brigade. Disconvenience. 
Southkore Fest photo spread. Rosenbombs, Up the 
Voltage. Euro photo spread. Svartenbrandt, 
Asheville, NC & world wide punk scene reports. 
0281/October *06. Out With a Bang. Redd Kross. 
Derek Lyn Plastic, We March. Alan Milman, Rat 
Traps. Blood Robots.The Scarred, Gilbert Switzer. 
Japan & US photo spreads. Sweden & UK scene 
reports. 

0282/November ‘06. The Feelers. PESD. Toxic 
Ephcx, Auktion, Bruise Violet, Trust fanzine. The 
Homosexuals. The Effigies. Rat City Riot. New 
York City & North Carolina scene reports. 
0283/December *06. Jay Reatard interview & pho¬ 
tos. Crimes Against Humanity Records. A Touch of 
Hysteria. Doris Fanzine, Kvoteringen, ‘90s Punk 
Scumpit Part II, Black Chrome, The Dirty Water 
Club, photos. Tokyo scene report. 

0284/January *07. Margaret Thrasher. 924 
Gilman at 20 Years. Order of the White Rose. 
Regress. Subhumans (UK) Part One. Blank Its, 
Condcnada. Genetic Control, photos, Syracuse & 
San Diego scene reports. 

0285/February ‘07. Randy "Biscuit" Turner of the 
Big Boys & the early Texas punk scene. Lemuria, 
Ruin. Subhumans (UK) Part Two, The Blinds, 
Trunzistors, ANS. Riot This, La Piovra. Bay Area 
scene pics. Barcelona. Spain scene report. 

0286/March ‘07. Best of 2006. Smartut Kahol 
Lavan. Electric Kisses. Holy Shit!. Lost Chenrees 
Pt I. Go!. Kraljcvo. Serbia, and Bakersfield. CA 
scene reports. 

0287/April *07. Alicja Trout. Keith Rosson (Avon- 
zine). Crap Corps. The Vicious. Scum System Kill. 
Lost Cherrees Pt 2. Restless Youth. SB V. Australia. 
Kyiv. Ukraine, and Pittsburgh. PA scene reports. 
0288/May ‘07. Clockcleaner. Pisschrist. The Rats 
(Sweden). Conflict (US). The Viletones. Violent 
Tumor, Czech Republic and East Texas scene 
reports. 

0289/June ‘07. Ultimo Rcsortc. Kursk. 

Masstrauma. Social Circkle. Final Approach. Post 
Punk Kitchen, Southern Death Cult. Portland 
Drummers, Timisoara. Copenhagen, and 
Pampanga scene reports. 

0290/July ‘07. Stortncrow. Merkit. Solid Decline. 
Monster Squad. Sex Vid. Vivisick, Warkrime, Top 
Ten, We're Gonna Fight zine. White Cross. Berlin 
scene report. 

0291/August ‘07. MRR 25th Anniversary Issue. 
Martin Sprouse, Tim Yohannon. No Slogan, 
Ruidosa lnmundicia, Chinese Telephones, Vaseline 
Children. Anti-System. Dave Roche, 6-page retro¬ 
spective photo-spread. Kawakami/ Disclose obitu¬ 
ary, Brazil Scene report. 

0292/Scptcniber *07. New Bloods. Chronic 
Seizure. Outraged. Geriatric Unit. Active 
Distribution, Gruk. The Mods. No Defences. The 
Fakes. Trashies Tour Report. Mexico scene report. 
0293/October '07. Punk and Immigration Theme 
issue w/ interviews, articles, and stories. Anti-You. 
Loser Life. Political Asylum. Olympia scene report. 
0294/November ’07. The Hipshakes. Neverending 
Party, Punk & Immigration article. Finally Punk, 
La Lucha Para La Justicia en Guatemala, Leftover 
Crack. AO A. 

0295/Decembcr ’07. Surrender. What If Gods 
Lie?. The Crawlers. 2:20. The Joneses. Libertario 
Magazine. Bad Samaritans. Shrapnel. Untermensch. 
0296/January ’08. Hellshock. Mario Panciera. 
Anathema,The System. Eddy Current Suppression 
Ring. The Voids, Cinecyde. Kyklooppien 
Sukupuutto. Punch In The Face. BSA. 

0297/February ’08. Marie Kangcr-Born. 
Thriilhouse Records. Contaminators. Oi Polloi. 
Obstruction. 1 Walk the Line. Utopia 
0298/March '08. Best of 2007. Autistic Youth. 
White Lung. Karma Sutra.. Clusterfuck. Sharon 
Cheslow. Slaughter of the Innocent. 

0299/April ’08. Government Warning. Age. Off 
With Their Heads. Guided Cradle. Go It Alone. Fy 
Fan. Daily Void. Hungarian Scene history. 
0300/May '08. NorCal Punk Special: Fix My 
Head, Black Rainbow. Tank Crimes. Young 
Offenders. Church Police. Traditional Fools. Six 
Weeks/Short Fast & Loud. Ecoli. 

0301/June *08. Underground Railroad to 
Candyland, Straightjackct Nation. Red Dons. 
Spectres. Dean Dirg. Kola. Los Violadores. the 
Sears. Tentacles of Destruction. Antibodies. Head 
on Collision. 

0302/July '08. Giuda. Wasted Time. Reality. Sin 
Orden. Teenage Head. Antidote. La Urss. Canadian 
Rifle. Seasick. Israel & Japan scenes. 


HWHUWKMMLL * P0 m U0760 • fft^<IX0, </\ ^h-OlhO 
oft oftMfft ok -fT wm^xirntw^wuLm! 


0303/August '08. Double Negative. Burnt Cross, 
Masapunk; Chicago Clitfest. Intifada. Nuclear 
Death Terror, Raw Power. Unlovables. Waste. 
Chaos In Tejas photospread, Houston and Grand 
Rapids scene reports. 

0304/September ’08. Raymond Pettibon, John 
Stabb of Government Issue, Cola Freaks. Measure 
[sa]. The Press. XYX. Simply Saucer. 
Kulturkampf. Andy T. FPO. and Columbia scene 
report. 

0305/October '08. Pierced Arrows. Bum Kon. 
Deep Sleep. Dicntc Perro. IRA, Legion of 
Parasites. Reality Control. Riot City Records. 
Stations, Test Patterns. 

0306/November '08. Brain Handle. Assassins, 
Diodes (pt. I), 97 Shiki. Black Dove. No Bunny. 
Shellshag. Sista Sekunden. Vivian Girls. Animals 
And Men. 

0307/December ’08. SOLD OUT!!! Sony... 
0308/January '09. Punks & Film Special- with 
Target Video. Whatever Happened To Susan Jane. 
Cleveland's Screaming. Mondo Vision. After the 
Salad Days. You Weren't There, Botinada. 
Taqwhcores.and more. 

0309/February ‘09. Ooga BoogasMind Eraser. 
Cococoma. Extortion. Boyracer. Nixe. Mr. 
California. Deathcage, Squalora. Maniax. Null and 
Void. Think Fast. 

0310/March ‘09. 2008 Year-end Top Tens. Health 
Issue Special-Interviews with Mikey Mind. Chris 
Colohan and Craig Lewis, plus tons of articles. 
0311/April “09. Print Media special with Erick 
Lyle (Scam zine). Shit-Fi, Z-Gun. Terminal 
Boredom. Tales Of Blarg. John Holmstrom (Punk 
magazine). History of skate zines. Punk flyer art. 
and a dozen one-page fanzines. 

0312/May '09. Criminal Damage. Never Healed. 
Masonics. Screaming Females, Germ Attak. 
Petticoats. Condominium. Passion Killers. Pioggia 
Nera. & the second part of the health issue. 
0313/June ’09. Cult Ritual. Acid Reflux. NN. 
Herds, Hunx and His Punx. Grass Widow. Project 
Hopeless, Defect Defect. Tom's Midnight 
Garden. Existers and scene reports from Sydney 
and Boston. 

0314/July ’09. Libyans. Coke Bust. Strange 
Boys. Turboslut. Vogue, Smart Cops. Zyanosc. 
Dennis Dread, a History of Squatting in Italy. 
Tornonto Scene Report. 

0315/August ’09. Zero Boys. Skin Like Iron. 
Punch. The Black and Whites. Insomnio, Resist. 
Blank Dogs. Etacarinae. Come On. London and 
Brest scene reports. 

0316/September ’09. Amebix. Bom/Dcad. 
Divisions. Meatlocker. Something Fierce. 
Mutating Meltdown.Altercado. Anal Wamead. 
Nick Toczec, Cowley Club, Albany Scene Report. 
0317/October ’09. Queer issue, with Nastyfacts, 
Gary Floyd, Limp Wrist, Jos Scein’ Red. GB 
Jones. Younger Lovers. Vaginal Davis. Josh 
Plocg. Teu Pai Ja Sabc?. Schwarzer Kanal. 
Bromance. Extra Tongue, and more. 
0318/November ’09. Destino Final, Ratas Del 
Vaticano. Hex Dispensers. John Joseph/Cro- 
Mags, Explode Into Colors, Ratos De Porao. 
Stupids. Antidotum/Czosnek Tour Diary. Disco 
Assault. Fucra De Linea 

0319/December "09. The Fix. Slices. Nodzzz. 
Brilliant Colors, Positive Noise. Gun Outfit. Pink 
Reason. Scrotum Poles. Gandftis Cookbook. 
Goner Fest Phqtospread, Punk On Kuollut. 
Eliikbon Hardcore: A Personal History of Finnish 
Hardcore 

0320/January ’10. MRR Top Ten of the Decade. 
D-Clone. Broken Water. Complications. Control. 
Ian Glaspcr (The Day the Country Died/Burning 
Britain) 

0321/February ’10. Photo issue. SOLD OUT!!! 
Sorry... 

0322/March ’10. MRR Review Staff’s 2009 Top 
Tens. Japanese artist Sugi. Death, Dry-Roy. Druid 
Pcrfhme. Kim Phuc. Dcfensa Absoluta 


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Brirr^“BnaxirouBnrocknroll.cow. No response guaranteed. 



I've been an on again, off again, on 
again reader since 1986. Still love the magazine. I 
just finished reading the letter section in the March 
2010 issue and felt a moral obligation as both a 
punk and a convict to write this letter. 

I am currently serving a five to seven year sen¬ 
tence in Massachusetts state prison for two counts 
of assault and battery by means of a dangerous 
weapon. You see, I haven’t been a very good per¬ 
son by my current standards or society’s. I have 
been a drug abuser, I’ve committed act of vio¬ 
lence, and I’ve stolen from people. I almost killed 
a person over something as trivial as cash. Hell, 
back in 1989-19901 put an ad in the classified sec¬ 
tion of MRR for a Bad Religion “Live in Albany” 
bootleg cassette and kept countless five dollar bills 
and spent the summer I was sixteen getting high 
on other punks dime. I can’t change what I’ve 
done, but I can work on becoming a better person. 
With all this said, I am certainly no position to 
judge anyone. So here’s why I am writing: 

I would like, at thirty-six, to have punk be as 
safe as possible for all the kiddies who don’t know 
any better. You see, another inmate from Mass 
wrote a letter last month asking for pen pals (Issue 
#322). The address listed is for the Massachusetts 
Treatment Center. The only inmates held there are 
the states most devious and sexual offenders. Feel 
free to check for yourself. 

Through all the shit I’ve been through, the only 
thing that I could count on was punk. I grew up lis¬ 
tening to far too many speeches'at Bom Against, 
Fugazi and 411 shows to not take a stand against 
any type of rape or sex crime. Please check into an 
inmate before writing them. Many of us are not 
very good people. Much like my Jewish brother 
Brace Belden says. Ha Ha. 

Keep up the good work. 

-Jerry Colvin #W89041 
PO Box 146 
Norfolk, MA 02056 


Jerry— 

Thank you for your letter. I confirmed the infor¬ 
mation that you sent us and I am glad that you felt 
compelled to write. While we can't predict the 
motives of any of the inmates writing to MRR in 
search of pen pals, I agree that any reader consid¬ 
ering correspondence should check out where the 
person is sewing their sentence. It seems that in 
this case, an address gives substantial information 
in making a decision. With that being said, I would 
never discourage anyone from writing a y fellow 
punk doing time. People really do make mistakes. 


but as you said, checking out the origin of your 
potential pen pal is necessary\ In this issue, MRR 
will be providing an online resource regarding the 
correctional institution from which the letter orig¬ 
inates—not to pass judgment, but to protect the 
interests of the readers and the inmates. If any one 
on the inside or the outside has strong feelings 
regarding this practice, please let us know 
because we are considering making this a perma¬ 
nent change. . 

Thanks again. 

—Mariam 

Commonwealth of Massachusetts/Pondville 
Correctional Center: www.mass.gov/doc. 

j ma ji ec j [ n a demo to you last week 
from Massachusetts! LIMBS BIN!, in an envelope 
with a single black and white lyrics sheet! I forgot 
to add the price of the demo—$2-4—and my con¬ 
tact information at this e-mail address 
(jel08@hampshire.edu) and 

www.myspace.com/limbsbin! I hope I haven't 
gotten this in too late. I really enjoyed the photo 
issue and the decade-capping issue. I was happy to 
see many of the formative punk records of my 
introduction to hardcore mentioned, from No 
Hope for the Kids to Fucked Up’s early output. 
I'm thrilled that in 2010, when I see bands like 
Brain Killer and Nomos live. I’m excited for the 
future of hardcore. I’m going to give “best show of 
the decade” to a particularly ridiculous 
Inmates/Darvocets show in Albany back in 2007; 
that was outta control. I look forwards to getting 
some zines of my own into your mailbox soon, 
and as a long time reader. I’m always thrilled at 
how easy it is to get in touch and share and such. 
Be well! 

-JOSH 


Dear MRR, 

The photo issue was a good issue. 
Don’t forget Naomi Petersen, who photographed 
early ’80s bands (Black Flag, Meat Puppets, 
etc,). She is deceased now. 

— Ross 


Hey Ross— 

The only photographers from that era featured in 
the photo issue were those closely associated with 
MRR: basically, Murray Bowles who did the MRR 
photobook, If Life Is A Bowl Of Cherries... and 
Helge Schreiber who did Welcome To Cruise 
Country. We tried to focus mostly on current pho¬ 


tographers and bands and scenes. BUT, we are 
planning on running a series of interviews with 
classic punk photographers throughout the year... 
Naomi Peterson was a great photographer, and a 
true inspiration. RIP. 


I’m a few issues behind in my com¬ 
ments, but the letters page seems to be pretty 
empty lately, so I may as well spout off. 

I know you guys depend on readers for contri¬ 
butions, but that interview with JJ from the Cro- 
Mags was a real waste of space. There was no 
background given at all. JJ was giving his side of 
controversies that happened 20 years ago with no 
back story. On top of that, the article could have 
been half the length if you cut out his useless NY 
tough guy posturing. Though it was funny how he 
repeatedly let us know that he could beat up any¬ 
body he wanted to if he wasn’t a man of peace. 
Secondly, I’d just like to say FUCK AMEBIX and 
any other band that retires for 5, 10, or 20 years 
then comes back to tour on their back catalog, 
claiming that they earned the right. If you want to 
earn something get the fuck out of punk. Amebix’s 
last release was the terrible Monolith LP, then they 
went off to make axes for 20 years. I’d say the 
Renaissance Fair owes them more than the punk 
scene. Low door prices just means they’re smart 
enough not to alienate the people who are paying 
for their tour or buying their next release. Re¬ 
forming Amebix, Christ on Parade, Accused, etc. 
is so much easier than doing something new, hav¬ 
ing to book your own tours or put out your own 
records. And you get to travel the world for free 
(or very cheaply at least). It’s embarrassing that so 
many punx buy into the nostalgia game. 

Thanks, 

-Phil 


Hey Phil, 

...Thanks for writing, it's true that in th t e world of 
message boards and faceless e-sniping, the world 
of letters is going to the dogs. The interview we did 
with John Joesph was exactly that, an interview 
with John Joesph. As with all interviews in this 
rag, it was an uncensored interview without edito¬ 
rial interjection. I believe that JJ is an important 
character in the tapestry of punk the same way 
that Henry? Rollins, HR or Ian Mackaye is. In his 
case, his history will forever be linked to the sim¬ 
mering melting pot that was and is New York 
Hardcore ... both good and bad. This was not a 
historical article on the Cro-Mags or NYHC, so 
any assertions he makes are his own. It would be 







LsrrsRS 


awesome to get the other side of the stoiy, any tak¬ 
ers??? 

— Tim Brooks 

Greetings from North Kern State 
Prison nestled in the bustling heart of beautiful 
Delano, California — the jewel of California’s 
central valley! My name is Joshua Livingroom and 
I am currently serving out a sixteen-month sen¬ 
tence for taking heroin and stealing electronics 
from Target. Oops. Anyway, my cousin Leslie 
rules at life and she blessed me with a subscription 
to your publication. Needless to say, I*m FUCK¬ 
ING STOKED about it. I’ve been reading MRR 
since I was 18. Now 32, having Maximum 
Rocknroll in here is like having my favorite t-shirt 
or an old pair of converse; comfort food for my 
mind or something. 

I know that I’m hardly the first punk to write 
you from prison, so by now, you know that prison 
is a vast cultural wasteland populated by fascists, 
boneheads and people who listen to Disturbed (on 
purpose). Needless to say, I am starved for con¬ 
versation. I saw this dude the other day with a 
sweet ‘crimson ghost’ Misfits tattoo on his side. I 
was going to walk up and get his opinion on “Plan 
9” vs. “Walk Among Us,” (“Plan 9.” Duh.) then I 
saw the giant Swastika tattooed on his chest and I 
changed my mind. I briefly considered taking a 
belt sander to my obligatory Misfits tat, but then I 
caught sight of his Social D tattoo and somehow 
felt way better about myself (I wonder if that 
retard is hip to Mr. Danzigs ethnic background. 
Fuck it, I ain’t tellin' him). Then there was this kid 


who claimed he was a “gutter.” He complained a 
lot about how the emos were taking over, which 
was kinda funny, but then he tells me about his 
hummer and the time he saw Black Flag play a 
garage in Pamona. Since he was three when Black 
Flag broke up, he was either confused, a patholog¬ 
ical liar or the world most punk rock toddler. I told 
him about the time I had fish tacos with Jello 
Biafra and he asked me who Jello Biafra is (I 
couldn’t decide if that made him more cool or less 
cool. You be the judge...). The moral of the story 
is this, kids, I NEED PEN PALS! I plan to do a lot 
of traveling upon my release in July and I’d love 
to meet anyone with resources and/or tips on 
places to stay/visit/squat in between Reno, San 
Francisco and Mexico. You’ve got a captive audi¬ 
ence here and all letters are guaranteed a response. 
Feel free to vent about your lame-ass roommates / 
significant others. I’ll feign sympathy. Or, if you 
prefer, I can simply regale you with stories of 
prison life, or school you on how to get caught 
shoplifting at Target (it’s easier than you think). 
Oh yeah, I like Jawbreaker, Descendents, 
Screeching Weasel, No Means No; Against Me!, 
Crossed Out, Melvins, Leftover Crack, Dillinger 
Four, Pinhead Gunpowder, Billy Childish, Soda 
Pop Kids,Tav Falco, etc, etc! Punk / Death / Grind 
/ Powerviolence as well as some sissy la la hipster 
stuff. So chew me up and spit me out. 

Thanks for everything. Keep up the good work, 
and if you’ll allow me to dust off an old Chestnut: 
Up the Fucking Punks! 

—Livemois # G49451 
NKSP-C2B- 1494 
PO Box 5004 


Delano, CA 93216-5004 

North Kern State Prison: www.cdcs.ca.gov/VISI- 
TORS/Facilities/NKSP.html 

Dear MRR, 

Your movie reviewer sauntered into 
Whip It (the movie), I would have thought punks 
were more discerning in regards to mass market¬ 
ing huha and I don’t expect people to be perfect. 
But I then kindly request that you support a move 
to convince punks, not to support anything forth¬ 
rightly! Being promoted under Fox Media’s name. 
Their “news,” movies and TV programs breed 
idiot people through their lack of info and flashing 
lights, ie: voting for Bush twice! Making the world 
go to war! They use marketing techniques that 
would make Goebbels blush with endearment and 
world religion thank you for all their money. The 
big difference is, if you don’t support them along 
with others then that can be a big market share that 
other companies cannot and will not financially 
support and give more breathing space for other 
media organizations and opinions to exist and be 
heard, rather than just the right winger status 
■‘Rupert” quo. I also personally take it as an affront 
to the English translation, as it were, of the word 
journalism. Not only do they support the weapon 
industry, but their art is crap by buying the rights 
to classic stories, etc, and twisting the message, no 
matter how good the trailer is. Might as well start 
wearing a swastika t-shirt and call the zine: 
Britney says LOL. 

Thanks, 

-Blair, NZ 


ONE PAY AT GUANTANAMO 


l WAS A TAX/ 
PRiVER ! I'M 
INNOCENT! 

I NEV/EP DID/II 


^YEAH, YEAH...^ 

TAKE "THIS P O.S. 
unperson 

TERRORIST OUT 
BACK AND SHOOT 



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I am sick of all the little goons that cut their hair and 
think they’re punk. A haircut don't mean shit. Just cause 
they have records and just wimp around ail the time don't 
mean shit Every time l see one I kick ass. Nobody 
should try and be somebody they ain't Personally i love 
hardcore, it’s the only way vo take out your aggressions. 
Slamdancing la great. Everything else la too slow. New 
hardcore bands should keep coming out to keep punk alive. 
And X don’t know who die hell ail the aasholes are that are 
trying to shut punk out Authority sucks! I'm sick of it. 
They only understand their ways. Hardly any new bands 
are getting half a chance because they can’t get.placea to 
play cause punks are too rowdy. I am trying to get a band 
together and it's hard. I just want to play for fun to say 
what I have to say about my problems and this fucked up 
society, I just want to make enough money for food, rant 
and gas. Sat that's net why I want to play. I want to keep 
punk alive and to make some kids get out there and 
thrash in the pit and have some fun. That’s why you 
should give the young punka a chance- so they will carry 
out (he attitude jn the years to come. 













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SHOTGUN 

SEAMSTRESS 


BY OSA ATOE 



Holidays make me grumpy. All that pressure 
to be in a good mood on a certain day automati¬ 
cally puts me in a bad mood. At the same time, 
something in me changed before I moved to New 
Orleans that made me want to be in a place 
where people celebrate absolutely everything. 
People either associate New Orleans with cele¬ 
bration or tragedy. After living in Portland, 
Oregon for six years, a place you could describe 
as pleasantly monotonous, I was ready for some 
highs and lows. 

I actually watched the Super Bowl on Sunday, 
or at least parts of it. Being in a town with an 
actual personality changes the way you live. 1 
look at the scene I was involved in Portland 
before I moved. It was pretty ideal, being a queer 
woman who plays music, because there are so 
many others, and then after a while, more and 
more people of color started to move to Portland. 
So by the time I left, in' the fall of 2008,1 was leav¬ 
ing behind the scene of my dreams, in a way. But 
everyone who's ever lived in Portland always 
compares it to a bubble. My whole life revolved 
around this group of mainly punk inspired, 
queer, mostly female musicians who were trans¬ 
plants from other states, and all in their 20s. I was 
a nanny so it's not like I even knew people from 
work. My whole world was my housemates, my 
bandmates, other people in bands, people I saw 
at shows and then peripherally the folks at the 
feminist bookstore, or the community organiza¬ 
tion I volunteered with for a little while. 

In New Orleans, there's more of a feeling of 
being a part of something larger than your par¬ 
ticular group of friends. You're a part of a city 
with a strong historical identity and distinctive 
culture and you'd have to be the most jaded per¬ 
son in the world to not want to learn more about 
it and participate on some level, which is why I 
actually watched some football last Sunday. I just 
wanted to be around all of the excitement, you 
know? Of course, it's half ecstatic and half 
annoying, like the exhilaration of zipping 
through standstill traffic in the French Quarter 


with everyone honking their horns to celebrate 
our victory, but then almost getting smacked in 
the face by people on foot and in cars who think 
it's a good idea to try to high five a biker. It's not 
just events or holidays, it's the actual culture 
itself that's so appealing. I've been able to see a 
few marching bands in second line parades that 
happen randomly throughout the year, and I also 
went to see a couple punk brass bands who are 
inspired by the traditional brass bands of New 
Orleans. I'm actually thinking about putting 
Chin Up (aka Slow Danger) Brass Band on a No 
More Fiction show with a touring band cuz they 
might as well get a taste of what's unique about 
this place if they're only gonna be in town for one 
night. 

I was just telling Brontez today how queer of 
a town New Orleans is. It's the secret queer capi¬ 
tal of the South. I mean, I gtiess it's no secret to 
people who are actually from the South, but you 
know how a place like San Francisco, for exam¬ 
ple, has a national reputation for being queer? 
Well, New Orleans doesn't have that, but it is. If 
you think about it, where else are all the freaks 
from Texas, Mississippi and Alabama gonna go? 
And I'm not talking queer as in mini version of 
the Castro, although that does exist here. There 
are also tons of black, poor and working class 
queers, too, who have created their own culture 
all to themselves. There's this hip-hop subgenre 
native to New Orleans called bounce and queer 
bounce rappers created a sub-subgenre called 
sissy bounce, which is starting to gain national 
attention. And I see black MTF trannies on a reg¬ 
ular basis walking around my neighborhood and 
the Quarter like it's no big deal. Part of me thinks 
a black transwoman would have a harder time 
surviving in Portland, Oregon—a seemingly 
more "liberal" place—than here. Obviously, I 
wouldn't know for sure. 

Honestly, I'm still taking it all in. There are so 
many layers to this city; it's humbling. I feel like 
when I talk to people who travel a lot or move a 
lot, they often try to characterize a city in such a 
quick and simple way, as if you can really know 
a place after only being there for a few days, 
weeks or months. New Orleans is the type of 
place that defies easy categorization. It's south¬ 
ern, but it's got Caribbean influences; it's pro¬ 
gressive and traditional at the same time. It's 
African, Spanish, French and Native American. 
It's beautiful and still cheap to live in relative to 
other major cities. I'm so down with living here. 
I hate where I grew up. My parents are immi¬ 
grants so it's not like I have deep roots anywhere 
in the US, and I knew Portland wasn't gonna be 
my home forever, but here I am for the first time 


feeling a lot of pride about where I live. Like 
meeting someone you have instant chemistry 
with, I want to give this city more time and get to 
really know it. I don't have any plans to move on. 



Season one wrap-up: 


Well this is my twelfth "Basement Screams," 
so even if they cancel me now I can say, "I did it 
for a year" which is cool kinda. A year is a good 
mile marker. I mean, I'm nt> George. It's cool 
when people say they actually want to hear 
about my stupid misadventures sloppily 
attempting to copy the perfection and craft of 
Martin Birch, and I never can quite believe it. So 
thanks for that... Seriously. The fact remains 
though, until someone else with, ahem, actual 
credentials steps up, I'm hoping they won't can¬ 
cel me, because I think this is something you 
punks out there should be thinking about and 
experimenting with. Anyone who wants to can 
learn to do this themselves. If you care about 
your band, and the way it sounds, it's a great 
way to have more control over that. Anyone who 
can afford to play in a punk band (e.g. you're of 
relative privilege on planet earth) can afford to 
take up home recording. Even compared to ten 
years ago, there are an incredible number of inex¬ 
pensive options on how to do it. You could get 
the things you need to start with a few weeks pay 
saved from even a fairly unremarkable job at the 
mall or the local coffee hut. Home recording isn't 
a career path anymore than running your own 
punk record label is or ought to be. But as every¬ 
one reading should know the personal touch of 
doing it yourself is often what makes something 
special. So... hopefully catch you in "Basement 
Screams" #13 next month, and until then, here's 
a few things I learned in the past year. 

What I learned in a year of basement screams: 

1. Don Zientra's go to chorus pedal is the yel¬ 
low boxed MXR Stereo Chorus. 

Maybe not for you, but for me, this was the 
answer to a long burning question I'd had. What 
was that chorus effect you hear on almost every 
DCHC recording from the '80s? Don was nice 
enough to do an interview with me in an install- 


r 
















r 


cnnjMNs 



merit of "Basement Screams" and his memory 
proved thankfully detailed when it came to this 
minutia. Usually Zientra used this as a way to 
thicken the single guitar attack of some of the 
projects he worked on, in fact maybe the only 
one§ I can think of that don't have that distinct 
Chorusy shimmer, are the first MINOR THREAT 
7", and maybe the SO A "No Policy" EP 

2. The Ampeg V4 conquers all. 

Listen, I'm just saying if you have the time to 
keep one of these things in working order, it basi¬ 
cally can do no wrong. Bass or guitar, clean or 
dirty, it always sounds smooth and full, and 
makes even the most modest of guitars sound 
like a well-built precision machine. It's weird I'm 
not one of those "gear-king" guys, but I get asked 
a lot "what kind of amp should I get?" which is 
kinda stupid because that's like asking, "what 
should I eat?" V4's are notoriously difficult to 
keep in working order. I was on tour for three 
weeks once with two of them and we came back 
with both busted. I mean no disrespect to 
Marshall or Sunn, which serve me in a much 
more reliable manner, but this is just my favorite 
amp to record. 

3. Don't rely on "fixing it in the mix." 

Dumb as it might sound, it really helps to 

remember this one. I think one of the bigger con¬ 
cerns when I'm recording folks is the "vibe" and 
the momentum of the session. No one wants to 
get bogged down on one little detail for two 
hours and so it becomes kind of easy to brush 
over something that may not sound right with 
the intention of cleaning it up later, so as not to 
take the wind out of everyone's sails. Generally 
you'll later come to regret this. Generally the less 
you need to do in the department of EQ, com¬ 
pression, effects—the better. Of course, this stuff 
is there to improve the sound of a recording, and 
often times it does, but when you rely on it as a 
crutch, I guarantee you'll run into trouble. I cer¬ 
tainly have. While I was reading through an arti¬ 
cle on the making of Autopsy's Mental Funeral LP 
this summer, I was struck by their admission that 
nothing on the record got any additional EQ dur¬ 
ing the mixing of the record, what you hear is 
more or less "as-is." While I don't think I'd ever 
roll quite like that, I think it's something to shoot 
for. Keep it as pure as you can, get the guitar 
sound you want when you're playing the guitar, 
instead of trying to fix the guitar sound you don't 
want later. Before anyone bums out, just remem¬ 
ber Autopsy were punks at heart, and they're 
even from San Francisco. Perfectly worth anoth¬ 
er mention in Basement Screams—and it proba¬ 
bly won't be the last. 

4. Expensive mics. don't fix shitty sounding 
instruments and gear, but decent sounding 
instruments and gear sounds pretty good with 
cheap mics. 

Seriously plenty of accomplished audio 
recordists the world over still use a simple Shure 
SM-57 to capture the sound of an electric guitar. 
A mic you can buy new for $100, and used for 
nothing. A great guitar will still sound pretty 
great with even a middle of the road cheap mic 
like this, but all the Pro-Tools magic and high end 
microphones aren't going to fix a weak sounding 
guitar or a busted ass snare drum. It's amazing 


how far you can get just changing the drum 
heads (and tuning them) and guitar strings, mak¬ 
ing sure your amp is working properly, and it's 
amazing how much further you can get if the 
stuff you're doing this on isn't total junk. I'm not 
saying it needs to be special, just functional, and 
maybe not falling apart. I realize some bands 
thrive on the unique sounds their broke-ass shit 
makes, and I can respect (and often enjoy) that, 
but for those not working on that alternate para¬ 
digm, even the cheap fixes help, and a lot of 
times they help just as much as the expensive 
ones. If you're going to spend an entire day of 
your weekend recording a demo, even if it's just 
on a four track, spend the $80 on the new drum 
heads. You'll be happier later. 

5. Make a backup copy whenever possible 

I miss my computer, but I'm happy to say 
nothing was lost, other than my faith in Steve 
Jobs when it died. It sucks, but it could suck a lot 
more. 



(It finally happened. They're firing/have fired 
me. By the time you read this, my box will be 
cleaned out and the iron-fisted despots that lead 
the present Junta here at MRR will be cackling in 
their doghouses, forked tongues flitting out of 
their evil mouths only to lick the blood off their 
hooves. The twin stenches of sulfur and hate per¬ 
meate this former Holy House, that once printed 
the so-called Punk Bible, now simply producing 
mimeographed terror and stiff-backed, jack- 
booted guidelines for record buying and inter¬ 
views with Hergozevinian posi-crust rock 
groups. I may be the first up against the wall, but 
I'll be damned if I'm the last.) 

Think of MRR as a bird—what once was a 
spit-drenched wren, now has evolved and taken 
higher, further flight as the Great Dove we knew 
it would always become. And yet even with its 
new shimmering ivory plume, it must shed 
feathers, for what is re-birth without the death 
that precedes it? 

They asked for my resignation; I could not 
provide one (Oh! Pride! You mighty, senseless 
beast!). They requested that I simply stop doing 
my column, suggesting perhaps I could cite med¬ 
ical issues (mono of the fingers, cancer of the ego) 
as reason for quit. You know, to avoid controver¬ 
sy. I refused. They wished this cover-up because 
they feared backlash from certain thuggish (re: 
wigger) segments of the punk population that 
hold me in high esteem. In an uncharacteristic act 
of grace, they agreed to let me write this one last 
message, this final transmission, this last gasp 
from my chapped lips before I close them forev¬ 
er. So here we are, if only for a few more fleeting 
lines, and then there we'll be. 


It's April. April. Speak the word, pucker it out 
of your mouth and push it into the air. My col¬ 
umn isn't the only thing to have died a tragic 
death in this short, lonely month. I speak of 
course of Christ, of his torture and eventual 
death at the hands of the Romans and Jews. Like 
Christ, I am stricken; Like Christ, I shall rise. For 
him it was three days before he rose from that 
cave and once again walked the Earth, spreading 
Joy and Love and Goodness. I, too, shall rise 
again, ready to kiss the heads of tiny children and 
drink freely the milk that shalt flow from the 
bosom of Punk Magazines. 

When the Lord closes a door, he always opens 
a window, and the window he opened for me is 
in Los Angeles, California, in a small, unassum¬ 
ing building housing a magazine called 
Razorcake. I've long admired Razorcake ; from their 
tireless coverage of bands that I love, like 
Dillinger 4, the Ergs, and Young Offenders, to the 
alliteration of their editor-in-chiefs name, I am on 
board with them 100 percent. Maximum may no 
longer have room for those such as I; so be it. 
Razorcake does and always will. Goodbye, MRR. 
Goodbye for good. See you in the dole queue, au 
revoire, tanx. 



Chicks can't rock. 

Well, most of them, anyway. 

But you tell that to anything that's got a vagi¬ 
na, and is human; it will most likely call you 
"sexist." Or beat you up, as has been my experi¬ 
ence. 

But no matter. The truth is the truth. Women 
do not belong in rock. 

It's very nice to think that they do, as well as 
politically correct. And it can sure get you "sensi¬ 
tive guy" points if you say that some girl you saw 
play was really good. But, alas, it's bullshit. 

Chicks in bands belong in rock 'n' roll about 
as much as salt belongs on an open wound. 

Womefi should stay on the side-lines taking 
pictures, or better yet, giving blow-jobs. Isn't that 
what it's all about, anyway? 

Okay. 

So maybe some girls can rock. But the odds of 
one doing so are about the same as getting hit by 
a bus. Maybe one in 10,000. 

For the most part, women do not belong 
behind guitars, or, god-forbid, a drum set. And 
while there are many reasons why this is true, the 
main one is they simply do not possess a penis. 

And you must have a penis to rock. 

Rock hard. 

Let's start from the beginning. 

Of human life, that is. 

We are all born with either a penis or vagina. 
Or, in some rare cases, both. 























But for reasons of this argument, let's just 
stick with the nuts and bolts, and not those 
metallic twisty puzzles my friend Allyson likes to 
play with so much. 

Once we are bom, our parents begin to raise 
us according to our sex. Boys learn to play with 
guns while girls learn to play with dolls. 

Unless, of course, the child is unlucky enough 
to be born in Northern California, where he and 
she both get the dolls. 

Anyway, while this may seem like an over 
simplification, it is, for the most part, true. Males 
around the world play more violently with one 
another from early on, while females, on the 
other hand, learn to get along, having tea parties, 
and playing dress-up. 

The reasons for this are mostly genetic. It is 
inherent in the male of the human species to be 
wild and savage, while females have always 
been more civilized. 

Which explains why women should be the 
political heads of the world, and not men. But 
that's another story. 

Anyhow, civility and rock do not mix well. 
Just look at the English. They act proper, have tea 
and biscuits, dress in nice suits, but play dress up 
with girlie underwear in secret. No wonder The 
Beatles and Rolling Stones moved' here. Who 
wants to live in a pussy country, especially one 
that has major dental problems. 

On the other hand, Australia, which is mostly 
outback, has crocodiles, guys with spears and 
lips pierced with plates, and five foot high 
rodents hopping around. This makes for some 
real kick-ass rock n' roll. Like AC/DC and the 
Hard-Ons, because of it's lack of civilization. It 
seems the more wild the country, and in this case, 
the continent, the more rock can grow and pros¬ 
per. 

But I'm getting way ahead of myself. 

Let's go back to the penis. 

All men are born with one. And all men learn 
to play with it at a very early age. By the time we 
are one or two years old, we have learned that 
holding it is more comforting than anything our 
parents could ever do for us. 

By the time we are five or six, we've learned 
that playing with it can makes it hard, and by 
fourteen or fifteen, that it can perform some pret¬ 
ty cool tricks. Well, in my case, I was seventeen, 
but it would have been earlier if my dad had only 
explained to me that when you "rub yourself", 
you do it up and down, and not side to side as I 
believed. 

Playing with your penis is very important, 
and even more so for future rockers. See, the man 
gets used to having a hard stiff thing in his hands 
from an early age. The harder, and stiffer, the bet¬ 
ter. He also learns how to grip this tool, and, 
eventually, how to use it to pleasure himself, as 
well as perhaps other members of his boy-scout 
troop. 

Eventually, when the male finally does pick 
up a guitar, it's pretty damn familiar. Sure there 
are strings on the damn thing, but the principle is 
the same. Slide your palm and fingers up and 
down really quickly, and you feel good. 

On the other hand, what do females do? They 
learn that if they make dainty little circles with 


their pointer or middle finger, they feel good. 
There's a big difference between tiny little circles 
and big long strokes. 

This, of course, brings us to the small penis 
principle. Simply stated, the smaller the prick, 
the weaker the lick. Which, makes sense. If a guy 
is used to wanking on his tiny little pecker, of 
course he's not going to be able to adjust to a BIG, 
hard guitar neck. Duh. 

But getting back to females, they don't know 
how to wank at all. They don't know long and 
spastic wrist and arm movements. Instead, they 
know sweet little tickles that make them feel "oh- 
so-good". No wonder they are so good at sewing, 
and other fine crafts. 

Then there's the whole orgasm thing. Men, 
unlike women, really know how to blow their 
load. 

Let's take an AC/DC song for example. Like 
"Let There Be Rock" or "Whole Lotta Rosie". 
Angus, the guitarist, certainly knows his rhythm. 
The songs have a steady beat you can wank to, 
and they both build up with crazy guitar leads to 
one hell of a climax. 

One. 

Not two. 

Not three. 

And not zero. 

One. 

Women, for the most part, don't understand 
this. They are used to the whole multiple orgasm 
thing, or none at all, therefore their songs are all 
over the place and are usually unintelligible. 
They don't know that blowing one big one is 
much better than having lots of mini-ones. 

And yes, I've heard all about that tantric crap 
where men can have many orgasms, or ones that 
last for minutes, even hours. You know what I 
say? Who cares. Do I want more sex after I blow 
my big one? Fuck no. I want a beer and drugs. As 
does any self-respecting guitarist who just fin¬ 
ished a great song. 

Another reason chicks can't rock is because of 
their hands. They are naturally smaller than most 
men's, and have difficulty reaching around the 
entire neck. That's why, girls usually play 3/4 
scale guitars, and have to use both hands when 
giving a blow-job. 

But what's probably most telling about 
females, and rock, is their sound. When a woman 
is in a band with other men, she is most likely 
going to sound better than a woman who is in a 
band with all other women. 

Why is this? Let's examine it. 

We'll start with the all chick bands, which, 
99.5% of the time, suck. The reason for this is that 
beside? not being able to handle the stiff neck of 
a.guitar, women make horrible choices in amps, 
and the sounds they choose to get from them. 
Most women go for Fender Amps, or some other 
brand that's not Marshall. Why? The fuck if I 
know. Maybe an amp that's too big and black 
scares them? I dunno. But what I do know is that 
most of the time their guitars sound weak, jang- 
ly, hollow, and too high pitched, like their voices. 
They also wouldn't know how to use a distortion 
box if it was a tampon. And their choices in gui¬ 
tars, oy.... 

Men, real ones that is, on the other hand, 


know that big and black is the way to go, and a 
heavy guitar like a Les Paul or Explorer, or even 
a Peavey, rocks. And distortion is king. But just 
the right amount. Enough so that your balls 
shake, rattle and roll, but not so much to make all 
the guitar notes begin to sound the same. Much 
like a female rattling on and on about how her 
day was. * 

Drums. Chicks can't rock on those either. For 
the most part, the reasons are the same as the gui¬ 
tar. They don't know how to grip the sticks, beat 
them hard, keep a wanking rhythm, or how to 
get a good sound. Plus, their breasts get in the 
way. 

But another reason chicks can't drum is 
because they have too many brain cells. 
Drummers, for the most part, are morons. And 
that's what makes them so great. The dumber , 
they are, the harder they hit those skins. The 
more a drummer drools and smells like an ani¬ 
mal, the more likely he is to be a savage behind 
that kit. Women just aren't like that. They smell 
nice, hardly drool, and still know how to think. 
Now, are drummers dumb because their brains 
get rattled around from all that banging? Or are 
they born that way? Or is it both? Someone 
should do a study. But there is one thing that is 
certain, smart drummers suck. 

Vocals. There is not much to discuss here 
because, alas, this is an area where a large num¬ 
ber of chicks can rock. Maybe even five percent. 
You don't need a penis to have a good voice and 
be able to scream, you just need the right amount 
of drugs, booze, and anger. 

And that anger is very important. Rock'n'roll 
is all about rage, baby. Sure it can make you feel 
all warm and fuzzy, like my friend M. Doughty 
in Soul Coughing likes to Brink. Then again, he 
plays through a Fender. 

But it's the rage that makes rock rock. That 
feeling of wanting to break everything insight, 
then fuck the hell out of whoever you are with. 
But not before doing all those drugs and drinking 
all that booze. And women simply do not have 
this rage. Probably because it is testosterone driv¬ 
en, and they, well, do not have balls. 

All this said, there are some exceptions to the 
rules. Usually, women who are dykes, can rock. 
They may not have a penis, but they sure wish 
they had one. And that, makes them grip that 
guitar all the more harder, and makes their fin¬ 
gers play with agility and speed and an actual 
sort of envy. 

Then there are the "loose" girls. The ones who 
love to fuck. They too can, for the most part, rock. 
It may be due to the fact that they know how to 
let loose, but I bet it's got something to do with 
their expert ability through experience to handle 
a penis. But, alas, they are few and far between. 

And then there are the Qthers. That rare dia¬ 
mond in the rough. The needle in the haystack. 

These women rock for reasons unknown to 
both myself and mankind. They are true natural 
wonders, and should be cherished and admired, 
and put upon a pedestal. For these women truly 
are gifted. Born without the proper tools, these 
ladies have learned to overcome their handicap, 
and play with the best of them. 

And for those rare women who can and do 


















-1 


0X1M1S 



rock, I salute you. 

Take My Life, Please. 
Endnotes: 

Happy April, everyone! 



The big news around these parts is that for the 
first time ever, fucking X (the Australian X) is com¬ 
ing to the USA!!! This May, Steve Lucas and kids 
are coming to do a West Coast tour with the A 
FRAMES. From Seattle to Austin for Chaos In 
Tejas, and back to the West Coast. Big thanks to 
Timmy Hefner for making it happen. It's a dream 
come true. Corny, but true. Another band I never 
thought I'd get to see.. .go see 'em if you can, and 
say hi, as I'll be out on the road with them. 

Also getting me excited are the two new sin¬ 
gles from Detroit's DRUID PERFUME. By now 
they should be able shed the ex-PIRANHAS 
label, but hey, if it helps lure in the uninitiated. I'll 
keep using it. One single ( Other Worlds) is on 
M'Lady Records, the other (Don't Eat 'Em There 
Poison) on X! Can't get enough of these weird 
punk monsters. Word is they have a new album 
in the can. 

In the reissue department, 1977 Records out of 
Japan is set to unleash a new batch of repo sin¬ 
gles, all must-haves, all will save you oodles from 
not having to get the originals...at long last the 
TITS ("Daddy Is My Pusher / We're So Glad 
Elvis is Dead"), and from the Netherlands, 
FILTH's elusive single both get the treatment! I 
see on the 1977 site that they've also got legit reis¬ 
sues of both VICTIMS (Australia) in the works, 
as well as a CRACKED ACTOR CD (they reis¬ 
sued the Nazi School 7" a few months ago). And 
last, but not least, the FANS You Used to Be and 
LAST STAND'S Just a Number join the ranks of 
the reissued. TORA! TORA! TORA! 

By the time you read this, the other rare sin¬ 
gles label, Sing Sing Records will also have three 
new ones ready for your hungry ears: SPIDER 
(UK), ROLLER BALL'S "Savage Eyes," and the 
DEAF AIDS. Roller Balls feature two members of 
ELTON MOTELLO, prior to joining that band. 
All three hard-to-find and great singles. And, I 
gotta say, all three pick up the pace after the 
slight let down of the previous batch (JEFF HILL 
BAND, etc). Check the Sing Sing blog for updates 
on their releases and other cool early power pop 
discoveries: singsingrecords.blogspot.com. 

Rave Up has a new batch as well. 
Philadelphia's WARM JETS, the CARDIAC 
KIDZ, the ACTION (by way of Canada, you 
know, the "TV's On the Blink" band), SF Art 
Punks the SPECTACLES (recorded in 1980, never 
before released) and most recently, the DIODES 
(a live recording from 1978). Like pretty much 
every Rave Up release, the copies of these I've 
heard are 1/3 — 1/2 good, and the rest is mostly 


filler of demos, live material, alt takes and other¬ 
wise unreleased miscellany of varying quality. 

Man, that SCREAMERS Pat Garrett Demos 
bootleg sure kicked up a lil' duststorm on the 
internet. A steep price ($30) for a one-sided 12". 
The packaging is gorgeous (silkscreened, clear 
vinyl and silkscreened cover), the sound quality 
pretty much tops all other versions of these leg¬ 
endary recordings. It was rumored to be a legit 
release; band members deny any knowledge of 
it. Limited to 300. If you didn't already grab one, 
check eBay and be prepared to dig deep into 
your wallet. 

If I was more in tune with the times (or both¬ 
ered keeping tabs on all the messageboards, 
blogs and other internet chatter) I would have 
long ago known about Avi Spivak's killlller zine. 
Humanbeing Lawnmower. I stumbled across a 
mention of the zine on Crushed Butler's 
MySpace page...and finally picked up a copy at 
Needles and Pens here in SF. 

Seriously, if you are reading this column, you 
owe it to yourself to pick up a copy of HBL. Not 
only is it chock-a-block with important articles 
("Thug Rock Top 50") and interviews that read 
like a who's who of the bands who spend the 
most time on my turntable: FLAMIN 
GROOVIES, JESSE HECTOR (CRUSHED BUT¬ 
LER, HAMMERSMITH GORILLAS, all around 
top dude), the DICTATORS, EDDIE AND THE 
HOT RODS, MC5...all that, plus the thing looks 
fucking cool. It's an all around top-notch zine. I 
can't tell you how long it's been since I've read a 
zine, got schooled on shit I had never heard (but 
was right up my alley), taken notes on what I 
need to hear. Just like the old days! The writing is 
pretty simple, but has enough enthusiasm to 
make it fun to read. And Avi's illustrations are 
great too. Well worth the $6 it'll set you back. 
Email Avi to get a copy: thehumanbeinglawn,- 
mower@gmail. Hopefully he has a new one in 
the works. 

As you may or may not know (or care), I spent 
some formative years in Bloomington, Indiana 
and still have a soft spot for the place. A month or 
so ago I got to hear Bloomington's HORRIBLY 
WRONG'S swansong LP. Those in the know 
might be asking yourself, "Huh? I thought those 
guys broke up years ago?" Well, they did. But, 
lucky for you and I, Shit In Can and Eradicator 
Records are stupid enough to release an album 
by a long broken up band that - let's be honest - 
didn't get much attention outside of Monroe 
County. I gotta say, it's a great fucking record. No 
bullshit, no gimmicks, just pure gut-rot garage 
punk as only semi-isolated young guns from the 
Midwest can make happen. Well worth tracking 
down. 100 on red vinyl, 400 on black, all with 
silkscreened covers. 

Living very much in the present, but still so 
much in the past, APACHE DROPOUT just 
dropped their debut 7". If you've happened to 
see them, you know to expect a blitzed out mind- 
jam of fuzzy, swirling psych. Sorta WOODEN 
SHIJPS-ish...same realm of music anyway. 
(www.myspace.com/apachedropout) It trans¬ 
lates well to vinyl, but seeing a band like this is 
always best. 

The rumors are true! WILD THING have two 


new records in the works. Are you ready??? 

Aussie boy toys EDDY CURRENT SUPPRES¬ 
SION RING have a new album out, Rush to Relax. 
Sure you've heard by now. Goner's doing the 
deal again this time around. You probably didn't 
hear that Mexican Summer did a now-you-see-it- 
now-you-don't single called "Wet Cement" with 
Eddy Current. I didn't even know it existed until 
Mitch Cardwell sent a frantic email looking for a 
copy. If you have an extra, I know a few people 
who are looking. Or maybe it's not even out yet. 
The record collectors are sweating! 

Speaking of Eddy Current, they'll be in the 
States this summer! 

That's it this time around. It's been a brutal 
year so far. Send all hits, tips and shits to me at: 
4209 Shatter Ave/ Oakland, CA 94609 / markmur- 
rmann@gmail. com 



Music is something that separates man from 
the animals and the difference between music 
and say, making noises to communicate with one 
another, is that music is an almost purely emo¬ 
tional medium. Some folks believe that man used 
music before verbal speech, like the how tribes in 
Africa communicated with drums for eons. It's 
interesting, because where the hell did it come 
from? No animals actually make music like we 
do, and no animals dance. And lots of animals 
eat their own poop and their children. What's the 
connection here? Is music what makes our socie¬ 
ty work and we've never even noticed it? What 
would human life be without it and would 
human life even be possible with out it? 

Of course we experience music on different 
levels, I know that "I Wanna Be Your Boyfriencl" 
is E A B a few times then C# A when it gets to 
"Do you love me babe." I actually didn't know 
any of that, I didn't even know the line was "Do 
you love me babe." I never bothered to try and 
decipher it exactly, but I could play that song 
without practicing it and probably without mess¬ 
ing it up too badly. The thing is, there is that emo¬ 
tional part of my brain that has the ability to play 
the song without thinking about it, or to sing the 
song without needing to remember the next line, 
and then there is my logical part that sometimes 
gets in the way and says, "Hey isn't that part 
coming up soon? Have you counted to sixteen 
yet or are we at twelve?" Anyway, if you let the 
math part of your brain get in the way, you fuck 
the song up, or at least play it badly. It seems 
with enough practice one can jump that gap 
between singing the song along with the karaoke 
machine and just singing the song without hav¬ 
ing to think about it. 

So, that makes me wonder, are people who get 



















COLUMNS 


stuck not being able to play on an emotional level 
more prone to not letting emotions get in the way 
of everything else? Are people who are good at 
tuning into their music and singing or playing 
guitar or drums without needing to know what 
part comes next more prone to letting emotions 
mess with their logic, if someone dumps them do 
they quit their job and become homeless? I don't 
know the answer to these questions. I do know 
that you can be a complete imbecile and write a 
great song. MRR would be a place where lyrics 
are tom apart for being racist or sexist or ridicu¬ 
lously violent, but in truth, those are emotional 
sorts of things. Just because a song is, say, racist, 

I think if it's expressing raw emotion it has poten¬ 
tial to be a better song than someone who comes 
up with some sort of chant at a protest to, say, 
stop varnishing children's furniture. Then again, 
I walk around singing commercial jingles from 
when I was five, and I have no emotional attach¬ 
ment to say Dynamo or Juicy Fruit gum. So there 
are two sides here. The side of the white power 
song that's catchy, because you really hate your 
Russian Jewish landlord and emotionally con¬ 
nect with hateful lyrics, and then there is the 
emotional power of music which forces me to 
sing about the New York lottery in the shower 
and then get the urge to drop $5 on it when I 
leave the house. People go to church because 
their parents force them to, but there's a whole 
lot of singing going on in church now isn't there? 

So, we're all playing with and being played 
with here on some level. Music is a very power¬ 
ful force and you really can't fight it or embrace 
it with any logic. There is no formula for a good 
song versus a horrible song. There are a million 
songs with the same chord progressions, the 
same beat, the same sort of singing, and some of 
them we all love and some of them no one loves, 
and then music we really got into ten years ago 
seems really lame to us now. I don't have these 
same sorts of feelings for books or movies or 
even food. Sure, I'll get into something for a little 
while with a little more intensity from time to 
time, like when I decided to watch every 
Kurosawa film in a row over the course of three 
weeks, but I'd watch them again and not like or 
dislike them anymore other than I'll probably 
remember how a few of them end. Music, I'll lis¬ 
ten to over and over again. It's not like when I ate 
Pop Tarts twice a day for a month. I'm not going 
to feel sick when that second Ergs record comes 
on my headphones, because I've listened to it too 
much. I'm actually going to associate all the 
experiences I connect with the Ergs when I listen 
to their record. Then again, if they say, ran over 
my foot with their cargo van, I may have trouble 
listening to them again. 

That's another thing, you see a great band live 
and sometimes listen to really bad recordings of 
them. Well, it seems a lot of music has to do with 
using your imagination anyway, sure you may 
not be able to hear the bass fills because the live 
recording you have has the guys drunk brother 
filling in and he didn't play the fills, but a lot of 
times you think you can hear them even when 
they're not there. It's like the music is playing in 
your head anyway and the record is just singing 
along with you. That's somewhat magical and 


freaking probably more powerful th^n anything 
any of us can create and we succumb to this 
power on a daily basis. 

Now imagine if we could make music a 
weapon. I'm not talking about cheesy nincom¬ 
poops who would say, "Let's use music as a 
weapon! A weapon against oppression. NYU 
medical center kills monkeys and you know it!" 
I'm thinking about someone figuring out how 
music works and what affects the greatest per¬ 
centage of the population. Someone came up 
with something so invasive that it gets stuck in 
your head immediately. Fuck, maybe Barry 
Manilow already achieved this? Imagine if some 
song was like that Juicy Fruit commercial and got 
stuck in your head every time you had a quiet 
moment or took a shower. Now imagine that not 
only did it get stuck in your head, but it bummed 
the fuck out of you at the same time. Suicide rates 
soar, suicides create more suicides by the sheer 
psychological nature of trends, markets collapse, 
people commit more suicide because of fear of 
the unknown. All we have left are folks with 
autism. Felix Flavoc runs for president and wins. 

Eh, I'm sure whatever the counter attack 
would be will be the best song ever. 
bill@candids.com 



TIME THAT I GOT PAID 

"iWe been tryiri harder every day I And I think it's 
time that we got paid'l-ZERO BOYS, "iTryin' 
Harder"! 

That song's from the ZERO BOYS' Vicious 
Circle album. It's not really the strongest song on 
that album, but I still think that any hardcore 
record collection missing a copy is incomplete. I 
remember having a discussion with someone 
about that song at a show sometime in the '80s. 
He was actually offended with the sentiment— 
"i'Time that we got paid?' Come on!"i the guy said. 
In his eyes, he viewed their aspirations to get 
paid for their work equaling selling out. At the 
time, it made me wonder if there was a grain of 
truth in that statement. Still, when I saw the 
ZERO BOYS last summer at the No Way Fest 
after nearly three decades of fandom, I didn't 
bring it up when making chit-chat with them. 
Instead, I told them of my regrets that I missed a 
Boston show they played at the end of '80 or 
early '81, over a year before Vicious Circle's 
release. They didn't seem all that interested in 
what I had to say but I'll leave that alone. 

Still, that line popped into my head a few 
months ago. You'll have to read the whole col¬ 
umn to find out why, though. I've been doing 
this writing thing for a long time. I've actually 
been writing- since I was a kid, doing small 
newsletters about items both real and imaginary. 


I did a few record reviews for my high school 
paper, writing about TED NUGENT's Free For 
All album and the DEAD BOYS' Young Loud and 
Snotty. In fact, the latter found its way into a 
publication of writings for one of my English 
classes. There's a little story behind that—there's 
always a story with me, ain't there? Our teacher, 
Mrs. Wilma Lunder (and, no, I never once bel¬ 
lowed Fred Flintstone's infamous 
WILMAAAAAAA!) once had the idea for us to 
bring records that we liked to class. My selection 
was Young Loud and Snotty. The needle hits the 
disc, the opening chords of "iSonic Reducer"! fill 
the room and there are immediately horrified 
looks on many of the kids' faces. This was the 
fall of '77, mere weeks after my Punk Rock 
Epiphany, the moment where I heard the SEX 
PISTOLS' "iGod Save The Queen"! for the first 
time. 

Anyway, one of the projects in Mrs. Lunder's 
class that fall was a newspaper called Wasted 
Times, a collection of jokes, puzzles, fake news 
and classified ads and more silliness from the 
minds of us eleventh graders. And, yes, I saved 
it. My contributions were a report or! a New 
England Patriots loss, 24-14, to the Buffalo Bills 
and that aforementioned review. There was 
another review of the same record that took a 
contrary opinion, courtesy of Georgine Baker. 
She opined, "iThe music is different to say the least. 
It gave me a terrible headache and made me hate 
music for a little while... 1 can't understand how they 
can call themselves musicians. Just because you hit 
drums, pluck at instrumental strings and scream, it 
doesn't make you a musician, "i Georgine concludes 
the review by stating, "tin my opinion, the group 
Dead Boys should be dead!"i Man, that's harshl And 
I hope Georgine's words didn't place a hex on 
them because, as well know, poor Stiv Bators 
died after being hit by a car in 1990. Georgine 
lives in Florida now and we've exchanged a few 
emails. I brought up the review but I don't think 
she remembered much about it. And I didn't 
mention the possibility of any curse. 

I suspended my budding writing career until 
after graduating from college in 1982 and the 
story of Suburban Punk / Suburban Voice has been 
told and re-told so there's no need to do that 
here. What people might not know is, besides 
doing my zine and contributing to MRR practi¬ 
cally since the beginning. I've done some other 
music writing as well, for more commercial-type 
enterprises. While I was working in record 
stores, we'd get these industry magazines like 
Billboard, HITS, CM] and the like. Some of these 
rags and various marketing companies would 
call to get sales lists, see how their releases were 
doing, etc. I occasionally contributed a short 
report to HITS, about my indy picks. 

Speaking of those marketing companies, 
many of them weren't above asking me to fudge 
the sales figures a bit, to make their particular 
releases look like stronger sellers than they were. 
Some would offer various swag to influence 
those reports and, sometimes, I'd work it to my 
advantage. There was some kind of sales contest 
from BMG to see which local independent store 
sold the most of a certain release and the winner 
would receive a five-CD changer. I fudged it 






3 


OQDMJS 



well enough that I won—but I wanted to kind of 
keep it quiet, since I had no intention of giving 
that disc player to the store. So when the local 
rep showed up, I went out to the parking lot 
with him to switch the player from his car to 
mine, all the time looking over my shoulder. 
Incidentally, this player was a piece of crap and 
broke down within two years. Most of those 
multi-CD changers are crap and I've only used 
single bay players since. I suppose I got what I 
paid for! But it was a dirty business and I didn't 
think twice about working it to my advantage, 
on occasion. 

I eventually managed to combine my writing 
and retail work into some cash. A rather odd 
gentleman by the name of Wayne Green started 
publishing a monthly (and then bi-weekly) 
newspaper. Music Retailing. The managing edi¬ 
tor, Mark Lo, was a music scene acquaintance of 
mine and he got me a column that I dubbed 
Spirit of Independents (clever, eh?). Since this was 
1991-92, I wrote quite a bit about bands on Sub 
Pop, Amphetamine Reptile, etc. I lauded such 
bands as BIG CHIEF, TAR, LOVE BATTERY, 
SKIN YARD, MONSTER MAGNET and FUDGE 
TUNNEL. I cringe when reading my words 
about some of the bands I praised back then, but 
I can still rock most of Jackson by TAR and the 
hypnotic song "iBetween The Eyes"! by LOVE 
BATTERY. I got paid $50 an article. The paper 
didn't last very long, but Suburban Voice was my 
main outlet, anyway, and I was actually making 
a few bucks putting it out. 'Tis true! 

Which brings us up to the present. I did do 
columns for Hit List (started by former MRR 
mainstay Jeff Bale) and AMP, which his co¬ 
founder Brett Mathews started after the former 
folded. I didn't have much choice in the matter 
since he put my name on the masthead before 
asking me if I'd like to write for them. I figured 
that if he went to all that trouble... so I dutifully 
submitted a column for a number of years, as 
well as one for their Loud Fast Joules offshoot. 
AMP was always the kind of magazine that 
"iplayed the game"i with the labels and, man, 
some of the bands that were getting prominent 
ink were wretched beyond belief. I wondered if 
I wanted to be associated with a magazine that 
had the likes of HAWTHORNE HEIGHTS, FALL 
OUT BOY, PARAMORE and THURSDAY on the 
cover. Over the past few years, it's become more 
of a lifestyle magazine, with plenty of ads and 
articles about clothing companies, tattoo artists 
and the like. They even started taking ads from 
Wal-Mart. 

That was the breaking point for me. One of 
the Wal-Mart ads was for a "iSummerTour 
Survival Guide"! that includes a fourteen-song 
CD plus a publication that includes interviews 
and "iposters, prizes, games and much more!"!- 
all for a mere $3.88 and Wal-Mart was the only 
place you could get it. My column for the Fall '08 
issue was about that kind of marketing from 
Wal-Mart. I'm not sure if it was an oversight or 
intentional phasing out but I didn't get notices 
about column deadlines after that. I wasn't told 
I was .fired and I never officially quit, but just 
decided to concentrate on this column and never 
did follow up with what happened there. I 


should say that I'm very fond of Brett and not all 
the bands they cover suck but I was starting to 
feel dirty being associated with that kind of 
magazine. 

Or so I thought... because things are changing 
in my life. I just turned 50 and have been taking 
stock, a bit. I just had a long conversation with 
my sister Sue, complaining about our new 
health insurance, which we get through Ellen's 
work—how expensive it is for the premiums, co¬ 
pays and the like, plus there's a deductible. Sue 
is a para-professional, working with autistic chil¬ 
dren in the Peabody school system (the city 
where we both live) and her work pays for most 
of her insurance. She suggested I might want to 
look into teaching, that I could make decent 
money and benefits and wouldn't have our 
insurance eat up so much of Ellen's paycheck. 
This came out of the blue and I plan on ponder¬ 
ing it a bit. I really can't picture myself doing it, 
to be honest. But it might not be necessary— 
there might be a way for me to make money by 
doing something I love. 

There's an old friend of mine who works for 
a publicity company in NYC. One of his co¬ 
workers recently became an associate editor for 
Billboard, which, if you're not familiar with it, is 
essentially the bible of the music and entertain¬ 
ment business. I was telling him about our ever¬ 
growing expenses and how we could use more 
money and he suggested I contact this lady. 
Apparently, they're looking for new writers, dif¬ 
ferent ideas, preferably from people with ties to 
the "iunderground,"i whatever that means these 
days. So I contacted her and told her about my 
nearly 30 years of writing experience and what I 
could bring to Billboard. I mentioned that, given 
the "iresurgence"i of vinyl in the past few years, 
perhaps she'd like someone to review stuff a bit 
more off the "ibeaten path."! And since I still 
love classic rock and metal, she wondered if I'd 
be interested in covering that "ibeat"i as well. 
She made me an offer to do this writing and, to 
be blunt, it pays damned well. One of the perks 
would include occasional travel to large-scale 
concert events, on their dime. 

I haven't given her an answer yet. It's a lot to 
chew on. There was a time when I did want a job 
in the music biz but eventually decided it wasn't 
for me. Sometime in the '90s, I realized it was 
DIY punk and hardcore that meant the most to 
me. I didn't want to go to as many large concerts 
or even club gigs anymore. I ventured into more 
basements than in my younger years. It was DIY 
or die! But this is a pretty sweet opportunity to 
do something I'm good at and get paid well. 
And I'll have the chance to provide wider pub- 
' licity to bands that could otherwise fly under the 
radar. If FUCKED UP and PISSED JEANS are 
starting to get some mainstream coverage, why 
not great bands like DESTINO FINAL and 
AMERICAN CHEESEBURGER or Boston bands 
such as LIBYANS, BRAIN KILLER and WASTE 
MANAGEMENT? 

It's attempting to balance ethics with making 
a living, with paying the bills. I wonder if I'd be 
leading a double life by continuing to contribute 
to this 'zine while also doing work for a publica¬ 
tion that pretty much epitomizes the corporate 


machinations of the musical/industrial com¬ 
plex. I have a feeling if I take the job with 
Billboard, there's a pretty good chance you won't 
be seeing my work in this space anymore. So if 
there's no column by yours truly in the next 
issue, you'll know why Maybe you'll want to 
keep up with my work in Billboard. It's quite 
expensive, though—it's $299 per year or about 
$6 per issue. Quite a few public libraries do carry 
it, though, so if you need your Quint fix and 
don't want to shell out that kind of money, 
there's another option. 

In the meantime, I'm keeping my PO box 
open and will probably keep doing the Suburban 
Voice blog, as well as my radio show, so keep 
those packages coming. 

See you next month? 

A1 Quint, PO Box 43, Peabody, MA 01960, subur- 
banvoice@earthlink.net 


WITH CHUCK BARRELS 


Much like you, I was also sort of surprised 
Andre Dawson got selected for enshrinement in 
the Baseball Hall of Fame. Surprised in a good 
way though, as he's one of those borderline play¬ 
ers who I figured would eternally get the shaft 
much like Dave Parker has. But die selection 
committee grabbed their balls and gave The 
Hawk the nod. I remember witnessing Dawson 
throw some slug out at first base on a one-hop 
line drive to right field as a kid. It blew my ado¬ 
lescent mind. He threw a guy out at first from the 
outfield! I didn't even think was possible at the 
time. I'm still not so sure it is. The guy had a fuck¬ 
ing cannon, that's for sure. So, congrats to you 
Andre Dawson! Tim Raines, who? 

So, I know you want me to discuss the fact 
that Turk Wendell was totally left off the ballot, 
and how that fruit Todd Zeile got the nod (with 
0.0% of the vote, thank you very much), but I 
need to talk about some music here. Look for that 
rant and an extended overview of Fred McGriff's 
career in the next issue of Baseball Digest. In the 
meantime, we need to discuss this new FEELING 
OF LOVE long player, cryptically titled Ok Judge 
Revival. No idea what that means, but Guillaume 
is operating on another level than the rest of us 
anyway. FoL released a shit-ton of wax back in 
2008, which they backed up with a US tour, and 
then they took a break for a spell. Which was a 
good move, because by the time their first LP 
was released, I was sort of burnt out on them. But 
the G-Man is back with a back with a vengeance 
in Tha Dime, with a 12", a couple singles, and 
this here LP, which I'm going to call the best 
thing they've ever done. They use the garage- 
rock template as their launching pad, but power 
their assault with hefty doses of PUSSY GALORE 
and other vintage "pigfuck" sounds and Jonny- 
boy Spencer outfits and relations. This is not 
Frenchmen emulating the sounds of America, 


CONT 

ENT 

MENT 












which is sadly what many European rock bands 
have left us to expect. This is some weirdo 
Frenchies taking our schtick and making it into 
something altogether new. Weird-punque par 
excellence, imbued with the sort of perversity 
and sticky creepiness that only a French mind 
could create. If you've heard any of their records 
from the prior recordings, this "new" direction is 
somewhat less savage, less garage-reverent and 
far more layered and visionary. They riff on the 
VU quite a bit here, especially on "God Willing," 
which might be the song of the year (or at least 
the winter), if you believe what my dope-smok¬ 
ing cohort The Gaffer has to say. It's real sweaty. 
Best French band on the planet says me, right 
now. I really think Guillaume might be turning 
into some sort of Gallic Ben Wallers. Fantastique! 
(www.killshaman.com) 

If you know me, and I know you don't, you 
know I hate to flog the records of artists from my 
locale, the wilds of Western New York, but there 
are a couple hot new slabs from the WNYHC 
scene I feel the need to fondle in print just a little 
bit here. Firstly, there's the new PLATES 7", 
provocatively titled The Boner Beach EP, and it's a 
real punch in the sternum. Perhaps the ultimate 
Buffalo band, managing to sum up all of the post¬ 
industrial wasteland vibes we feel here every 
day, surrounded by long-closed steel plants and 
empty grain mills, unfulfilled promises and gray 
winters. The band is currently on hiatus while 
everyman lead singer T. Laser is in Korea study¬ 
ing martial arts, but come fall they're going to be 
back with a bong and this EP is just part of the 
build-up to that triumphant return. They some¬ 
how combine the feel-bad sliminess of FANG 
with the Midwestem-core of CRUCIFUCKS and 
could (and will) run in the same pack that outfits 
like PISSED JEANS, DRUNKDRIVER and other 
nasty bands have formed. This one is a four-song 
45-rpm banger, total wall-of-destruction record¬ 
ing quality, and limited to a scant 300 copies. Get 
one now or pay horror prices on eBay once these 
behemoths take the country by storm in late 
2010. (www.bigneckrecords.com) 

The second Buffalo crew I'm going to plug 
here are the mighty BROWN SUGAR, a band 
who are a bit younger and skinnier than the he- 
men of PLATES (although they do share a bass 
player), but who are no less savage. Their debut 
7" went out of print with a quickness,, gamering 
them kvlt status in exotic locales like Sydney, 
Adelaide and Cleveland, but leaving much of 
middle America without a chance to grip a copy. 
Well, they've corrected that wrong with their 
debut LP, simple called An Encounter, which 
should be readily available to blow minds across 
the States and the rest of the free world. A steam¬ 
ing cup of irreverent rust belt hardcore, filled to 
the rim with sugary (!) hot lixx and creamy riffs, 
this thing is going to make the right people pay 
attention, bringing classic hardcore shitstormers 
like YDI, REAGAN YOUTH and MECHT MEN- 
SCH to mind, but with a shit-headedly modem 
sense of humorous desperation. They know 
we're living in end times, and unlike many of 
today's jaded and worthless youth, they have the 
courage to look 2012 in the face and laugh and 
while making mean-spirited jokes about your 


mother. I do have to say, I'm fucking sick of their 
goddamn James Joyce references though, it 
makes them sound like a bunch of intellectual 
masturbators. Yeah, we get it, you're smart and 
shif. Now play the fucking songs and peel some 
fucking paint off these fucking walls instead of 
tickling the balls of that hack of a scrivening 
mick. At least Kafka had a pair, (www.fer- 
alkidrecords.com) 

Here's an open challenge to all you record col¬ 
lectors: go try and buy a copy of the new VEGE¬ 
TATIVE STATE LP Feeding Tubes. It's like trying 
to find a fucking copy of the FREESTONE 7". 
Released in the fall of 2009 by some shitheel 
Columbus label that essentially pressed the 
record and then put the copies in storage, it has 
seen little to no press or attention because only 
about twenty people on the face of the earth have 
a god damn copy. A cryin' fucking shame, it is. 
It's an excellent punk rock record that could 
almost be called hardcore if it were a little more 
homoerotic. Speaking of which, even I had to do 
unspeakable tilings to strike a deal with a partic¬ 
ularly poncey English bloke just to get a copy of 
this. Really snotty and ball-busting, much their 
mates THE FEELERS, it has an energetically dark 
edge and primitive weirdness to it, with 
moments of sheer speed juxtaposed against some 
go-no where nihilist thud. And then there are 
some purely goofy segments that just make me 
want to slap them in the face, but for their own 
good. Overall, just a great and raw record that I 
wouldn't have any qualms and telling people is 
*what I think punk should sound like in this day 
and age. A scant 300 copies were pressed (of 
which about 275 are probably still available!), 
with almost a dozen cuts packed on the A-Side 
and an etched B-Side. I'm not even going to men¬ 
tion the name of the label who released it, but the 
spectacled footie fan over at Criminal IQ seems 
to have possibly thrown the band a lifesaver and 
has scored some copies for distro. Cheers mate! 
(www.criminaliq.com) 

Horizontal Action magazine was once the 
finest print zine in the world, treating us to the 
finest in rock'n'roll and pornography a few times 
a year, and I hold those back issues near and dear 
along with my musty back issues of Forced 
Exposure , Bomp and Highlights. After the print 
department closed its doors, these intrepid entre¬ 
preneurs stepped into the record label game with 
the HoZac imprint, releasing fantastic records by 
punk bands like CATATONIC YOUTH and SPI¬ 
DER and giving collectors and eBay scoundrels 
fits with their Gold Editions and limited sleeve 
variants. Their latest long-playing release is 
something I never thought the name brand 
responsible for puttings nut sack on the cover of 
a widely released magazine would have any 
interest in (but hey, they also released a terrible 
DUM DUM GIRLS record too), but I'm glad 
they've diversified their portfolio and pressed up 
the debut LP by MEDICATION. This Town is the 
title, and as much I hate to deal with the inner 
struggle I feel whenever I like something that 
could be branded as a "folk" record, this is one of 
those instances. Actually, the folk tag in unfair, as 
this really only fits that bill in that it is one lone¬ 
ly fella strumming a guitar and baring his soul. 


It's not some hippie happy flowers-n-beads trip 
though, it's a dark and melancholy journey 
through the psyche of a young man, dealing with 
loss/death, love (and lack of) and the difficult 
emotions life throws our way. Sincere and some¬ 
times harrowing, it's a cathartic listen, especially 
when you're out of weed and on to the whiskey. 
Like any sad story, it's the brief glimpses of sun¬ 
shine in the margins that make it all the more 
compelling, and for as dim as the lights some¬ 
times get for Mikey on this record, he always 
seems to give us that brief glimmer of hope in the 
end. Even though you lost the girl, at least you 
had the chance to love; that sort of thing. 
Wonderful /lo-fi recording job here, you can 
almost smell the dry dust of the attic I imagine 
him setting up hi£ tape deck in, emotive 
acoustic/electric strum, minimal percussion and 
his voice is strong enough to tell the tales. A nice 
departure when you need to wind down and 
think about all the things you've done. Not 
punk? Neither are you. (www.hozacrecords.com) 
And speaking of heavy metal, remember THE 
HOOKERS? I sure as fuck do, and they're back 
with a brand friggin' new single and it's an hon¬ 
est to goodness return to their punk days, before 
they got a little too deep into the cheesy metal 
sound. A two-song double-fister, the A-side is 
"Horror Rises From The Tombs" and it's as good 
as anything from their prime, a la the Satan's 
Highway LP and their early singles. Trash-riffs 
and Stoney Tombs shreddage and vox delivered 
by the Rock'n'Roll Outlaw himself. The flip is a 
cover of the NWOBHM classic (and my all-time 
fave single of the genre aside from the 
ARAGORN 7") "The Mugger" originally done 
by SHOCK TREATMENT! This one even looks 
like one of the old HOOKERS 7"s with black- 
and-white grim reaper imagery and sounds good 
and dirtily lo-fi. Limited to 500, with 100 on 
white! (Red Tornado Records) 

IN THE RED RECORD DEPT: Good old Larry 
just keeps plugging away. Aside from announc¬ 
ing the ITR Archives reissues imprint (promising 
HOMOSEXUALS and CONSUMERS LPs this 
year) and an extensive BLACK LIPS and 
CHEATER SLICKS repress campaign, he's also 
just pressed up the supposedly long-lost third 
CLONE DEFECTS LP titled Warlords of Mars , 
which should be ready for sale by the time this 
issue sees print. Bridging the gap between Shapes 
of Venus and the first FlUMAN EYE LP, the 
unearthing of this release adds more legitimacy 
to the claim that Larry has some kind of pact with 
Satan for supreme dominance of the garage- 
punk landscape. Much like you. I'm actually 
scared at how good this record could possibly be. 
(www.intheredrecords.com) 

COOL SINGLE DEPT: I'm going to have to go 
local again with this one, and give the press to 
Rotchester's very own BAD TASTE and their I 
Was A Teenage Jack the Ripper 7". The growing 
Rotcore scene is going to make some punk things 
happen this year, with ready-to-be-discovered 
acts like BRAIN CAR, THE NARCS and LOVE 
PORK set to light stereos ablaze. BAD TASTE is 
the flagship act of this snot-nosed armada, and 
this EP is a delightful and bratty blend of KBD- 
style nut-kicking, hard-nosed actual garag e-p-u- 








J 


CDDMIS 



;t-/c and no-holes-barred 'core, all executed with a 
deceptive intelligence and vision and plenty of 
middle fingers flying. This one's gonna leave 
some marks, (www.feralkidrecords.com) 

COOL TAPE DEPT.: America's Greatest 
Rock'n'Roll Band are back again with another 
cassette tape to add to their already perfect 
discography. Yes, HOMOSTUPIDS have done it 
again, this time with a second odds-n-sods col¬ 
lection cleverly named Taping the Worm that fea¬ 
tures outtakes from The Load recording sessions, 
various FACTORYMEN-esque synth versions of 
cuts from The Intern and some half-speed takes of 
other favorites, including a secret ELECTRIC 
EELS cover. And that's just side A! The flip of this 
30-minute monster is a live set from last year's 
Horriblefest, which was*surely one the best 
shows I've seen them play. And I've seen them 
play a few. Limited to 100 copies, good grief! 
(www.fashionableidiots.com) 

COOL RESISSUE DEPT: With bespectacled 
collector-scum going googly-eyed trying to score 
a copy of the recent SCREAMERS and CHRON¬ 
IC SICK boots, everyone has overlooked a silent¬ 
ly released yet super-deadly entry into the Killed 
By Death-style compilation saga. Riding the coat¬ 
tails of the last two comps in this style (No One 
Left To Blame and Staring Down the Barrel) and 
perhaps perpetrated by the same lunatics, the LP 
is called No Reason and features what may be the 
last dozen gems to be unearthed from the '77-'82 
time frame. The centerpieces of this are two 
tracks from an acetate-only HAMMER DAM¬ 
AGE 7" that never saw release in '81 which has 
been recently discovered, an amazing demo cut 
from THE NOTHING via a cassette unearthed at 
the Bomp warehouse , yet another lost JIMI 
LALUMIA cut (and this one's actually good!), 
and the recordings from THE PLUGZ work on 
the New Wave Hookers soundtrack taken from 
the master tape which was recently rumored to 
have been saved from a San Fernando Valley 
lockbox. Plus, another half-dozen regional obscu¬ 
rities that will have everyone scrambling to mod¬ 
ify their saved eBay searches. Look to discerning 
distros for copies, as this one is straight from 
Hell, Norway. 

That's all folks. We'll see you next time, I gotta 
go walk the dog... if you know what I'm saying. 



Tumbling 

The strange thing was that Garrett and I actu¬ 
ally ended up becoming close, we would sit in 
each other's rooms and talk about flashbacks and 
desire and our fathers and the masculinity we 
were horrified by; we talked about consent, and 


whether it was really possible. Garrett couldn't 
believe I rarely got fucked, and I couldn't believe 
he thought getting fucked was the only radical 
choice for faggots like us. We got arrested writing 
anti-police graffiti on a bus shelter—the ad 
showed a stick-figure drawing with a gun, shoot¬ 
ing at other stick figures, black lines on a white 
background: "Children Draw What They See, 
and What They See Is a Crime"—we made a sim¬ 
ple alteration, labeling the stick figure with a gun 
as a cop and the victims as unarmed people of 
color, and then we went to a nearby cafe. It 
turned out that some store owner called the cops, 
and since Garrett and I both had bright-colored 
hair we were easily identifiable, they took us to 
jail, overnight, first to a holding cell by ourselves, 
once they decided we had sugar in our pants, 
that's how they put it. I was grateful for that 
sugar, once I took a look in the other holding cell, 
everyone arranged on top of one another, there 
was a fight and someone started screaming and 
the cops ignored it. After a night in a blank room 
with those crazy-making pale green walls, we 
ended up in the queen tank, where everyone 
assumed we'd gotten arrested for prostitution—I 
stayed awake while Garrett dozed; some guy 
was screaming on the phone to his lawyer, he 
was the only one with a lawyer. Eventually the 
cops took Garrett and me to separate interviews 
where they tried to get each of us to say that the 
other one was the problem but neither of us 
did—we ended up with time served and 40 
hours of community service. 

Maybe that's when we really bonded. 
decided to practice French together, even though 
we thought French was snotty we also thought 
we shouldn't forget the language we had spent 
so much time learning, with all of our high 
school dreams of expatriotism. Garrett made 
those stickers that we loved, his favorite was 
"trash" because that's what people had always 
told him he was, white trash but this was when 
people in the Mission were always having white 
trash parties, even though none of these people 
had actually grown up white trash—these were 
the people who had grown up kind of like me 
and so I avoided them, not just because of their 
white trash parties but because I thought they 
would never know anything I wanted to learn. 
At the kitchen table, we would talk angrily about 
those parties, not just the upper-middle-class 
fetishism but the emphasis on whiteness. Garrett 
thought the two of us should have sex, but I was 
never interested—I still noticed how he was try¬ 
ing to be me, at least when he was with me, and 
I was trying to encourage him to emphasize his 
differences; sex wouldn't work between us, I 
said, even though at this point we used the word 
love to describe one another I just wasn't attract¬ 
ed to him sexually. 

I remember those nighttime walks through 
the Mission and underneath the highway, cross¬ 
ing into South of Market to go to Junk once it 
moved to the Stud and we all agreed it was over, 
but it wasn't totally over because we still went 
there. Now there were straight tourists looking 
for three-ways, since the club got written up in 
one of the papers. The first time I went to Junk 
once I got back to San Francisco I was so worried 


about running into Zee and how would I feel and 
then he wasn't there and I could breathe until he 
was there and I tried to talk to people and act like 
it was OK, I mean like I was OK but behind their 
heads I was looking out until I was dancing and 
then it didn't matter no it still mattered but it 
made my gestures mean even more. 

I remember those conspiratorial walks on the 
way there, down dark streets and past ware¬ 
houses and how we would always have these 
elaborate conversations—we were trying to pre¬ 
pare for the drama and if you looked up at the 
sky it would frame us, that's what I'm thinking 
now. Sometimes we looked, and sometimes we 
didn't. I can picture Laurie first and then Garrett 
and Andee, since he had moved down to San 
Francisco while I was in Seattle, we had met at 
Bauhaus but we really met in my kitchen, once I 
got back. There were others too and then there 
was JoAnne. 

And Melissa, she was the one who liked 
house *music too so sometimes we would go to 
Your Sister's House instead of Junk, just the two 
of us and then there wasn't any drama just danc¬ 
ing, Melissa would wonder if any of these 
women were dykes but if they were then we 
never found out. I met Melissa at ACT UP and 
we were the token queers in the activist group 
that got me to stop doing direct action for a 
while, there were other queers but they were tok- 
enized for other reasons. That was the group 
where we held a sleep-out at the mayor's house 
and at meetings everyone started screaming at 
me because I thought we should operate by con¬ 
sensus. Or not everyone, but the two people with 
the most power. Melissa was one of the people 
who agreed with me but she didn't say anything 
in the meetings; neither did the other people who 
wanted consensus. Melissa was kind of like some 
of my childhood friends, someone so awkward 
that most people couldn't see her, but her analy¬ 
sis was more skillful than anyone else who I'd 
met. Like when she met Zee, back when he want¬ 
ed to be friends with all my friends and so the 
two of them went out for tea and I got kind of 
scared that they would become friends and leave 
me, I knew this was irrational so I didn't say any¬ 
thing. That's how I dealt with whatever I thought 
was irrational, like when I got jealous sometimes 
of the people Zee would sleep with, but I knew I 
shouldn't be jealous and so I didn't talk about it. 

After Melissa met with Zee, she said: you 
know, he totally objectifies you. And I hadn't 
thought about it that way before, but she was 
right. Melissa was stuck at her parents' house 
after dropping out of school—she went to Yale 
and it traumatized her in some of the same ways 
that Brown traumatized me, but she stayed 
longer and it got worse and she tried to kill her¬ 
self. After she got out of the hospital, she stayed 
in New Haven because she liked it there, just not 
Yale, but now she was back at her parents' house, 
scared of her father in the hallway and some¬ 
times she would stay at my house, especially 
after Junk. We would share my bed and I would 
try to encourage her to get away, away from her 
parents but there was something that meant she 
couldn't, she would look away when she was 
trying to say it, voice shaking and I knew. 














Once Jo Anne moved in, we were a whole 
house of queer vegan incest survivors. I would 
go JoAnne's room when I was scared of my 
father's eyes and then Jo Anne started talking* 
about the dirty old man she needed to picture in 
order to get off, there was no other way—she 
needed that dirty old man. Finally she realized it 
was her father and we would hold each other in 
that way that meant it was okay if nothing was 
possible and it was okay if everything was possi¬ 
ble and then it was just okay. We would sob 
together, really sob—Zee had held me in this way 
but then it would all fall apart. With Jo Anne the 
connection was a constant—she had felt it right 
when we met in DC and that's what made Seattle 
so possible, and all that space. 

But back to our storied San Francisco kitchen, 
did JoAnne really move in right after Laurie 
moved out, or was there someone in between? 
JoAnne and I would paint each other's nails and 
soak our hands in ice water, we would help each 
other with our hair dye, the hard to reach places 
in the back, and then we would get ready to go 
out. Or get ready not to go out. Sometimes we 
would combine weird drugs that didn't quite feel 
like drugs—black beauties that JoAnne brought 
down from Canada that \yere supposed to be 
speed but they were so calm to us that we decid¬ 
ed they were caffeine, or ephedrine and Xanax, I 
still had a lot of Xanax that I'd gotten from my 
father's medicine cabinet, samples from the com¬ 
pany arranged in a big box. We snorted every¬ 
thing on a shard of an old mirror because that's 
the way we liked it best, we were avoiding the 
drugs that squeezed us too hard but still we 
wanted that burn. Then we'd go to La Rondalla 
for margaritas and the photo booth, was there a 
photo booth at La Rondalla? There was so much 
laughter as we would tumble around. 

The writing in this column is an excerpt from some 
crazy memoirish thing I'm working on called The 
End of San Francisco. My most recent hook is a 
novel, So Many Ways to Sleep Badly. I'm also turn¬ 
ing lostmissing, my public art project, into some kind 
of book-type thing, yay for more books! And I recently 
finished a new anthology called Why Are Faggots So 
Afraid of Faggots? 1 know you're wondering the 
same thing. You can communicate with me via 
www.mattildabernsteinsycamore.com, which includes 
past MRR columns. Or you can write to me at 537 
]ones Street, It3152, San Francisco, CA 94102. 


ROCKET TO NOWHERE 



This month I'm talking about obscure press¬ 
ing variants. The subject is on my mind because 
I recently picked up a variation of a well known 
US hardcore 45 that nobody seems to know 
about. We record collectors are often pretty 
cagey with details like this, especially until we, 


can snag a copy of the variant for the collection. 

I was surprised to land a spare copy a few weeks 
ago pretty cheaply, on eBay no less, in a listing 
that seemed to give all the right info. Apparently 
nobody knew enough to pay attention. 

I am talking about New York City's THE 
MOB. I'm sure most of you are familiar with 
their well-known pressing variant. The Upset the 
System 7" EP, released in 1982 on their own Mob 
Style Records label, came with a Black/White PS 
and a Red/White PS. It is. said that the 
Black/White PS came first, and it seems to turn 
up less often than the Red PS. As far as early 
NYHC EPs go, this is easily one of the best. They 
were also one of the earliest bands, and show 
their punk roots a lot more than most of their 
NYHC peers who didn't get records out until 
'83. 

But I'm not talking about that MOB EP. I'm 
talking about their second 7" EP, Step Forward. 
Everybody knows it because it's the NYHC EP 
on colored vinyl... red vinyl. I guess if you want 
to nitpick, the NO THANKS 7" EP also came on 
both red wax and black wax, although, while 
NO THANKS is a personal fave with furious 
hardcore female vocals, it wasn't really recog¬ 
nized in the canon of NYHC until a few years 
ago. THE MOB is one of the big six that hardcore 
collectors have fiended for since the '80s: THE 
MOB / URBAN WASTE / THE ABUSED / 
ANTIDOTE / AGNOSTIC FRONT / CAUSE 
FOR ALARM. 

So what's so special about my MOB Step 
Forward EP? It is on black vinyl. Who has ever 
even talked about a black vinyl Step Forward EP? 
I have not heard about it. It is totally possible 
that there are a bunch of copies floating around, 
but nobody has ever advertised it. Maybe it's 
because black vinyl is perceived to be less desir¬ 
able? Go look at your popsike and collectors- 
frenzy, every copy up there is on red wax (except 
maybe the copy I just bought). Based on my rel¬ 
atively casual research, this seems to be a very 
rare variation. 

I do know one other collector who was aware 
of it. He already has a copy, so I think he will for¬ 
give me for spilling the beans. Being in the 
Northeast, he has had some contact with the 
band/label and it sounds like this version was 
pressed at the same time Mob Style Records was 
getting additional Upset the System EPs and 
URBAN WASTE EPs pressed. You may be famil¬ 
iar with the incredibly difficult white border 
URBAN WASTE sleeve? This one-time repress¬ 
ing was apparently the source of both the white 
border URBAN WASTE sleeve and the black 
vinyl Step Forward EP, both estimated in quanti¬ 
ties of 300.1 tend to believe it, as neither of these 
variants show up with any regularity, maybe 
once a year, if that. 

So what does all this thumb twiddling mean? 
Well, to most people, probably nothing at all. But 
to a NYHC collector, this is a kind of crazy reve¬ 
lation (pun intended?) to be having circa 2010. 
An obvious NYHC record variant finally noticed 
25 plus years later? I dread what other hardcore 
pressing variations may be lurking this late in 
the game. 

I should also probably describe what the Step 


Forward EP is all about, since it's actually still out 
of print. THE MOB's Upset the System EP and We 
Come To Crush LP were compiled onto a CD reis¬ 
sue a few years back, but somehow the three 
songs from the second EP got left off. Some peo¬ 
ple prefer the second EP to the first EP. I will not 
go that far, but I'm a fan of the second EP, which 
has an amped up, punked out hardcore thrash 
sound, plus a tad of song complexity which is 
bringing to mind midwestern counterparts DIE 
KREUZEN. A real grower that lacks that blast of 
immediacy of the first EP, but gets stuck deep in 
the recesses your brain with repeat spins. On 
second thought, maybe I do prefer it! 

If pressing variations are your thing, I defi¬ 
nitely recommend checking out the It Never Ends 
’section on the www.BreakMyFace.com website. 
G-d knows all of you have already seen it, but it 
lays out all the minutia in painstaking detail, 
and many of the variations explained were bare¬ 
ly even known until the site let the cat out of the 
bag. I'm still trying to track down "a" REAC¬ 
TORS LA Sleaze 7" EP, let alone all three sleeve 
variations. You can find out which pressings you 
have of each component (vinyl, sleeve, insert) of 
the GERMS Forming 7". No need to detail any 
more of it here other than to mention the difficult 
process of cutting loose my "uncensored" 
ARYAN DISGRACE 7" I had a few months back. 
Who knows if I will ever see one again! 

I think I've detailed some of the teeth gnash- 
ingly aggravating colored vinyl LP variants out 
there in a previous column (DIE KREUZEN's 
maroon wax debut LP and those pesky colored 
CODE OF HONOR / SICK PLEASURE LPs both 
come to mind). I found a weird MISFITS Die Die 
My Darling 12" EP a couple weeks back with a 
cool cover defect that looks like a smeared 
watercolor paint job. I'm hoping the same guys 
who bid $200 for a copy with obliterated off-cen¬ 
ter labels that run in the grooves will decide it is 
some in demand collectible. 

I don't have much more to share regarding 
pressing variations this month, so I will leave 
you with what comes to mind as the most puz¬ 
zling and unnecessarily complicated sagas out 
there. That would be '80s Swedish partners in 
crime ANTI-CIMEX and THE SKITSLICKERS, 
particularly their respective Raped Ass and 
Cracked Cop Skulls 7" EPs. Distinguished MRR 
contributor Stuart Schrader has done a great job 
of documenting any and every bit of minutia he 
comes across on his ANTI-CIMEX ARCHIVE 
over at www.shit-fi.com. Ever the internal strug¬ 
gle, as both EPs are easy top ten hardcore EPs for 
me, I still just own that original first "Hard PS" 
@ Records version of Raped Ass and the standard 
Swedish "GBG 1982" Sprackta Snutskallar PS I 
claimed back in the early '90s. It's hard to hold 
back bidding on the icofiic ANTI-CIMEX UK 
Tour Photo Sleeve (on clear wax no less!), or the 
ultra crude ransom note style Really Fast Raped 
Ass sleeve. Meanwhile SHIT LICKERS have 
their variety of colored paper Export sleeves and 
the crushing ultimate Swedish HC skull sleeve, 
Skit-Slickers Uber Allesl Thankfully for you com- 
pletists out there, my priorities have been geared 
towards spending my hard earned dollars on 45s 
I don't already own on vinyl. Maybe someday... 

















OODMJS 



until then, at least I can look. 



The UCLA campus is everything you'd imag¬ 
ine a southern California university to be. It's sun 
drenched and informal, full of tanned, bounding 
young people, with books in their arms and their 
eyes on each other. But it houses an archive you 
would not imagine it to. One that is dark, vast 
and smells of binding glue and aging paper. The 
Southern Regional Library Facility, is a storage 
facility for all the archives, of any media, the UC 
libraries have amassed that are not in wide circu¬ 
lation because either no one asks for them any 
more, or they are too old or too fragile or too spe¬ 
cial to be handled by the average library-goer. It 
is a massive four stories, with two of those 
underground, and it houses more than five mil¬ 
lion items. 

"It makes me feel kind of small to be in a room 
with nearly every word in the history of the 
English language. The only thing missing is 
probably some new shitty new one like webinar " 

"That's probably here too actually, we get the 
tech journals after they've made the rounds at the 
regular UC libraries," says Dave, my friend who 
works here as one of the custodians of the library. 

It's dark in here, and cold. The lights only 
flicker on when you trigger the motion sensors. 
The movement of another librarian, carting out 
requested items, lights the far end of the stacks, 
his light is so far away it dies out into darkness 
before it reaches us. I can just make out a distant 
wall of illuminated books. I wonder if he would 
hear me if I shouted. 

Dave pulls a random box from the shelves, 
and inside are the original cells from the woody 
the woodpecker cartoons, and a few rows further 
down on our walk he points out an archive of 
zines donated by Darby Romeo, creator of Ben Is 
Dead , one of the few classic zines recommended 
to me that I've never bothered to read. 

The grey file boxes are each labeled "The 
Darby Romeo Collection of Zines (1987-)" inside 
are alphabetized copies of a smattering of late 
'80s and '90s zines, the first of which is an old 
copy of Book Your Own Fucking Life. I stare at the 
"Maximumrocknroll" printed on the cover. 
Flipping through, there are addresses for 
Grimple, Neurosis, for old punk houses and 
clubs I remember that don't exist any more, and 
lots of things that were before my time. Now 
BYOFL is online, and though I'm on it. I've only 
ever been sent mass spam emails by shitty pro¬ 
moters. No real connections. It's more convenient 
to use that the old printed zine since you can't 
lose it, and it's constantly updated, but it brief 
web based convenience was totally over shad¬ 
owed by the rise of social networking sites. 
MySpace made it practically obsolete. Though I 
do still keep a listing on there, it's probably more 


for nostalgia's sake than anything. Looking at 
this old copy of BYOFL , I feel like I'm peeldng 
back into a time I barely remember, when most 
correspondence required a stamp and an enve¬ 
lope, and you found people through ads, and 
directories, or just being friends of friends. I don't 
miss that time, per say, I just have to marvel at 
how different things have become. Just as I have 
to marvel at the fact that this punk artifact is here 
in this archive that houses a copies of old ency¬ 
clopedias in German, and math theory from last 
century. We have our own entry in the archives 
that live unread. It is probably funny to feel so 
surprised by this, it's like discovering you are a 
part of the world: Of course you are. 

I'm glad to see an archive like this. It gives me 
hope that long after this magazine is swallowed 
up by time the words will be held together some¬ 
where, for somebody to read. That our common 
culture of punk will still have an audience some¬ 
day in the future, if there is a future. 

Is that silly or stupid or self indulgent? To 
hope that a part of what I love will last some¬ 
how? Maybe it is. I know that faced with imper¬ 
manence lots of people build themselves silly 
monuments, name children after themselves, 
cryogenically freeze their heads, or inscribe their 
names or faces on mountains. Is it the same silly 
self-importance that makes me happy to see 
punk here in this bunker of knowledge? 

If they do last, these zines and records and 
things we make, how will they last? We could 
have digital book and zine archives, and MP3 
databases to hear any and every punk record 
made. I think that would be totally amazing. But 
I also think there are some irreproducible quali¬ 
ties of an original object too. Its size, its smell, its 
texture—these are things excluded or distorted 
by a digital copy. It's not clear to me how these 
dimensions contribute to my understanding, but 
I'm sure they do. 

The other problem of reliance on a solely dig¬ 
ital archive, or even or* collective blog based 
sharing is that, in general, only the things people 
like or remember or care about are scanned and 
shared, and I think it may be just as important to 
preserve the uninteresting, the banal, the 
garbage, and the over looked. We don't know 
where the future will take us and what records of 
the present or past will prove illuminating, or 
will turn out to be the long lost awesome finds of 
the future. The MRR record collection has a lot of 
such records, ones that are so bad I cannot 
believe they take up space on the shelves, but I 
also could not put on my own shoulders the 
responsibility of deciding what was not only not 
important, but would never be important...who 
can know that? Tim tried. He purged the unpunk 
from the MRR collection, and we suffered for it. 
We lost the Television Personalities, the 
Minutemen, and other possible gems unknown 
(along with a lot of actual terrible crap. I'm 
assured). Things I would consider classic, core to 
the punk experience. Records that are now being 
replaced. 

I don't think maintaining an archive of your 
culture, of books, records, art and knowledge is 
an exercise of ego, or evading mortality, I think 
it's as nice a gift to the future as you can give. A 


gift of things they may want or need, maybe 
things that can help them understand the world 
that has passed away. But we have to realize that 
♦these are things that cannot be guessed at or pre¬ 
determined. We should just mass it all together, 
and they can make from it what they will. 

Please send all correspondence jocular or vehement 
to MRR with a donation large or small to assist in the 
upkeep of the amazing record collection it maintains. 
Perhaps you will be rewarded for this generosity in the 
future with access to this archive at www.maximum- 
rocknroll.com 



Real existing socialism. 

This phrase, popular in the 1970s and '80s, 
was a bit of a misnomer. It was employed pri¬ 
marily by Marxist-Leninists and their fellow 
travelers to refer to those regimes that called 
themselves "people's republics" or "people's 
democracies," two more horrible misnomers. 
For these true believers in, sycophants of, and 
apologists for what was once called the 
Communist Bloc, the term "real existing social¬ 
ism" was a sly, propagandistic way of simulta¬ 
neously asserting that this collection of totalitar¬ 
ian, state socialist countries was truly socialist 
while defending them from the often scathing 
criticisms of traditional socialists, ultraleftists 
and idealistic progressives. 

"Our critics on the Left can argue endlessly 
about what socialism should be like; this is real, 
actual socialism in practice." 

The patent absurdity of this argument was 
illustrated well by the many conflicts within 
"real existing socialism" as to who was really, 
truly socialist—ranging from Yugoslavian 
Titoism versus Soviet-style socialism to Soviet 
revision opposing Chinese radicalism. This 
game of more-socialist-than-thou peaked when 
Enver Hoxha denounced the rest of the 
Communist world as revisionist and declared 
Albania's Marxism-Leninism-Hoxhaism to be 
the only true, authentic form of socialism. A long 
list of incidents in which one type of socialism 
militarily suppressed another type of socialism 
in the name of "true socialism" also comes to 
mind. It begins with Lenin and Trotsky crushing 
Ukrainian anarchism and the Kronstadt sailors, 
and culminates with Soviet tanks smashing 
Hungarian workers councils and 
Czechoslovakia's "socialism with a human 
face." The Chinese PLA's demolition of the 
Shanghai Commune is the bloody postscript. 















And need I point out that the number of real 
existing socialist regimes of this type has drasti¬ 
cally declined since 1989? 

Instead of arguing that Marxist-Leninist sys¬ 
tems aren't really truly socialist however, let's 
see what happens when we try to be more inclu¬ 
sive. What happens when we consider staunch 
social democratic countries like Sweden to be 
authentically socialist? What happens when 
even the sometimes extensive networks of pro¬ 
ducer and service collectives and cooperatives 
within capitalist societies are classified as valid 
forms of real existing socialism (from here on out 
referred to as RES)? 

This expanded definition of RES does not 
cover all form^ of socialist organization, and 
leaves out most political groups and parties, 
social/cultural associations, and militant 
unions. The somewhat fuzzy boundary crops up 
where union workers actually run their enter¬ 
prises, political organizations provide services 
such as workers schools, and social/cultural 
groups delve into things like mutual aid soci¬ 
eties. Still, this more inclusive notion of RES 
does have one particularly important ramifica¬ 
tion. 

Marxism-Leninism, social democracy, and 
utopian socialism are all well represented in this 
larger RES. The representation of anarchism and 
left communism is practically nil. Of course, 
there is the occasional workers cooperative, col¬ 
lective or commune based explicitly on anti- 
state, anti-capitalist and anti-authoritarian poli¬ 
tics, but as viable movements and social orders, 
anarchism and left communism are non-existent 
within RES. 

As a former anarchist who retains some iden¬ 
tification with left communism, I wish this 
weren't so. But it is. Anarchism and left com¬ 
munism both champion a number pf historically 
brief revolutionary moments (Russia 1905 & 
1917, Germany 1918-21, Spain 1936-39, Hungary 
1956, France 1968, etc.) that, while exemplary, 
were fleeting, and failed to produce lasting, lib¬ 
ertarian socialist societies. For anarchists and left 
communists, RES is not true socialism when 
compared to these ephemeral revolutionary 
examples. Yet no.anti-state, anti-capitalist, anti- 
authoritarian RES exists as an alternative. 

The reasons why anarchism and left commu¬ 
nism have failed to produce lasting revolution¬ 
ary options are myriad, and vary from the his¬ 
torically specific to rather universal problems. 
The important fact here is that, without excep¬ 
tion, they have failed. At this point, we have 
three choices available to deal with this fact. We 
can go along with a seemingly eternal anti¬ 
authoritarian optimism to proclaim that, despite 
this dismal record, the next revolutionary upris¬ 
ing will somehow overcome all odds and be vic¬ 
torious. Second, we can argue that, with a little 
tinkering and some key changes, we can increase 
anarchism and left communism's probabilities 
for future success. Or finally, we can declare 
anarchists and left communists perennial "beau¬ 
tiful losers" and pronounce their politics bank¬ 
rupt. 

The first is not so much an option as it is h 
description of insanity, of doing the same 


damned thing over and over while expecting 
radically different results. The second choice 
appears to be more tempered and realistic. Yet it 
is largely ineffectual due to what I call the 
Baskin-Robbins syndrome. Hang on, this is 
going to require an extended frozen desserts 
metaphor. 

After the second World War, when geopoli¬ 
tics polarized between East and West, between 
the Communist Bloc and the Free World, there 
were several attempts to create a neo-anar- 
chist/left communist politics that could function 
as a tertium quid. Paris in the 1960s produced a 
French ice cream called Situationism that 
became all the rage for decades to come. With its 
mixture of left Marxist analysis and anarchist 
spirit, along with a heavy dollop of subjectivism, 
Situationism was more than just one of thirty- 
one flavors, more like a basic, ubiquitous vanil¬ 
la. To boldly mix my metaphors> a friend once 
described the Situationists as a motley theatre 
troupe that managed one mediocre performance 
in Paris 1968, and hasn't done much since. They 
were no Cirque du Soleil, to be sure. 

Returning to ice cream as politics, tastes 
changed and by the mid-to-late 1970s, Italian 
autonomist gelato became popular, followed in 
the late 1980s/early 1990s by the spumoni of 
Italian anarchism and "action without media¬ 
tion." Various flavors of anti-globalization dom¬ 
inated the late 1990s/early 2000s, and most 
recently we've seen a revival of French creme 
glacee. The Invisible Committee's blend of insur¬ 
rectionary anarchism and anti-state communism 
in "The Call" and "The Coming Insurrection" is 
covered with nihilist hot fudge, and topped with 
Theorie Communiste sprinkles, Michel Foucault 
jimmies and Giorgio Agamben crumbles. Study 
groups of youthful radicals. can't seem to get 
enough of this riotous confection. 

[The post-left, anti-politics, anarchy crowd is 
all over this like flies on shit. Hell, even 
Diamond Dave Whitaker is doing a TCI study 
group. Talk about April fools! What more do you 
need to know that this stuff is doomed?!] 

Invariably, these neo-anarchist/left commu¬ 
nist concoctions are tried and found wanting. 
But that's not why I predict that the current 
French melange will soon fall out of favor. 
There's a fickle Baskin-Robbins "flavor of the 
month" attitude to all of this that belies serious 
politics. Young revolutionaries flit from one fad¬ 
dish political fashion to another as they might 
flick between MP3s on their iPods. Needless to 
say, this is no way to make revolution. Further, 
it's a guarantee that anarchism and left commu¬ 
nism will find no place in RES. 

At the risk of coming off as a naive American 
pragmatist, I insist that a central criterion of any 
politics must be that they work. It does little 
good that insurrectionary anarchism and anti- 
state communism are now trendy, if they do 
nothing to advance successful revolution. It 
means even less if those who advocate such pol¬ 
itics are willing to change them at the drop of a 
hat, just to be au courant, whether or not those 
politics can overthrow state and capital, let alone 
create and sustain a socialist society. 

Which leaves us with our third choice, the 


bankruptcy of anti-authoritarian politics. I'm 
loath to consider this option, even as reality 
backs me into this corner. Maurice Merleau- 
Ponty contended, in Humanism and Terror, that 
all of Stalin's crimes—his terror and purges> his 
forced collectivization and calculated famines, 
his show trials and gulags—could be forgiven if 
only the Soviet Union had achieved a truly liber¬ 
ated, humanistic socialism. Flipping this, can the 
emancipatory ideas of anarchism and left com¬ 
munism be countenanced in light of their shod¬ 
dy, lackluster performance in the real world? I 
doubt it, given the paucity of a real existing anti¬ 
authoritarian socialism. 

What we are left with are beautiful dreams 
that fail to become anything more than reverie, 
and dreamers who continually romanticize their 
own failures. That's not enough. 

PERSONAL PROPAGANDA... To find out my 
real name purchase my book, End Time, from AK 
Press (POB 40682, SF, CA 94140-0682) for $10. 
The book is called Tim in Portuguese and can be 
ordered from Conrad Editora (R. Maracaf, 185, 
Aclimagao, 01534-030, Sao Paulo-SP, Brasil) for 
R$ 24,90. I can be contacted at hooligentsia@ 
mac.com. 

ALL 

FOREIGN 

JUNK 

DANISH CASSETTE 

The tape I'm excited about this month comes 
from the high hills of Denmark by a band called 
DE HOJE HAELE. The tape is called Franskbrod. 
This tape was released in France. 

Allow me once again to take a trip into the k- 
town k-hole and be lulled with the memories of 
the AMDI PETERSENS ARME debut 7", a band 
that sounded reared in '70s punk but with the 
bloated titty of DC hardcore dribbling a little 
milk on the chin. We all know what MINOR 
THREAT covering WIRE sounded like; imagine 
if WIRE had a stab at "Out Of Step," and you've 
got it. What a sound that would be! The ferocity 
and annihilation of hardcore, with the jerky art- 
punk feel. Hard to do right, a few bands tried it 
in the '90s but their ambitions were to be recog¬ 
nized as artistically innovative or cultural sub¬ 
versives. APA are hardcore, from the cut off 
sleeves to the lyrics about skateboarding. 
Stalwarts. 

The legacy of this band, their offshoots and 
side projects, would have an enormous impact 
on their home city. The young pups from DE 
HOJE HAELE were probably barely beginning to 
erase the moral lessons from Hans Christian 
Andersoiy when that enormous burst of energy 
that carried APA, GORILLA ANGREB, NO 
HOPE FOR THE KIDS and YOUNG WASTEN- 
ERS (etc.) out into every corner of the world 
began to falter and slow up pace. They definitely 
have listened to the first APA single, sure, and 















OQDMJS 



probably a few pebbles of '60s proto punk. With 
a sound that draws from the hook laden punk 
pop of KBD compilations than hardcore, they 
still have a slight WIRE / SWELL MAPS / UK 
weirdness to them that really carries the songs. 

The band gets in behind the drummer: he 
holds a fairly consistent pound, bass lines it up, 
and guitar stabs in and out with a very flat pro¬ 
duction. Over this, the vocalist has a real flair for 
that lazy, bored tone that can sound like a dude 
reading a grocery list to appease a cantankerous 
filial drama, with the occasional burst of feeling 
that is usually harmonized by the band. This guy 
is reserved and doesn't want to show his cards. I 
appreciate this style of singing a lot. 

Once again, let's call up WIRE as a reference 
point. Their matter-of-fact vocal styles were 
informed by art school: they were making pop 
music without the usual depth of emotion for 
very specific reasons, but when they really want¬ 
ed to stick it into your heart (think about that 
opening chord sequence in "Fragile!") they just 
had a drop a few notes and soften the tone. This 
guy from DE HOJE HAELE gets how to make 
this work: I think he's spent a lotta time listening 
to how the vocalists in early American punk 
exaggerated emotion and early UK punk sati¬ 
rized / crucified it, and chose the easy path in 
neglecting it. But he does it well, these songs 
would sound awful with an impassioned politi¬ 
cal pleading and they'd sound forced with a 
scornful scummy sneer. Like this, with the vocals 
so uncertain and lost in the mix, the sound has an 
awkward .character, like that MINOR THREAT 
song "Stumped" that wonders around the studio 
kicking dust balls and concludes with Ian mum¬ 
bling non-commitally, "was that good enough? I 
think so." But that song sucked, and these songs 
don't. There, my friends, is progress. 

If the impression they're trying to deliver is 
one of repressed teen sexual ambition ala '60s 
garage with the cold paranoia of '80s punk hard¬ 
core, they've succeeded creating something 
that's bleak and energetic, that sometimes struts 
and sometimes falters. This is a great cassette 
(Dead Kids Records are responsible), particularly 
recommended to fans of the old Texan punk 
band called THE NEXT who I feel had a similar 
idea of dark, tuneful punk. 

AUSTRALIAN VINYL 

Melbourne band USELESS CHILDREN have 
been slogging it out hard the last couple of years, 
playing most every week, and developing their 
sound past the hyperactive thrash of their demo 
into something very deranged and very heavy. 
They are about to tour the US, and have a new 7" 
to christen the American soil with before they 
touch. Their LP, released at the end of 2009, has 
the sound but not the songs, but from the sounds 
of this 7" (released on Criminal IQ) since that 
recording this band have been sharpening their 
knives and eating a lot of protein. Informed by 
that moment at the end of the '80s where Ginn 
and company's persistence was beginning to 
make a mark and suburban garages once again 
rattled with amplifier blast, I can still hear the Jap 
hardcore that their early material most resembled 
(especially COMES) buried under the suffocating 
weight of endless, nameless guitar tracks, and 


this is a great thing. 

UK FANZINE 

More Noize from London is the topic of the 
day. I have two issues: #2, a split with Croatian 
zine Vapaus and #3, a half size but twice as fat 
solo project. Editor Tony is a hyperactive, busy 
guy: his punksishippies website uploads obscure 
old fanzines from all over the planet on regular 
schedule, and he's spit out a couple issues of this 
in a short period of time. The subject matter is 
noisecore, primarily by the Japanese. His enthu¬ 
siasm and knowledge of the subject carry the 
zine where his writing can't, which is a refresh¬ 
ing alternative to the legion of modern fanzines 
steeped in cynicism and muscle flexing, but this 
does mean that a lot of the zine is easy to flip 
through. There's a section of #3 devoted entirely 
to the machinations of the noise core scene and 
Tony's impression of its hostility to MySpace is 
that it is uber-elitist* His defense of MySpace is a 
little odd, and I certainly don't share his point of 
view, seeming to boil down to the argument that 
without it, so many bands would go unnoticed 
and neglected. His response to this was to start a 
fake band, which would only exist on MySpace 
called STATE ADULTS, and he details the story 
and reactions from insiders to the joke and those 
who had no idea. It's certainly a step above peo¬ 
ple reporting on their masturbation habits or 
menstruation cycle. 

OK, I'm being a little excessively critical, 
because for the most part I really appreciate the 
sentiment and delivery of More Noise. It's impas¬ 
sioned and excited and devoted to spreading the 
good word about ear damage, and few fanzines 
in the world devote themselves so exclusively to 
worship of GAI, CONFUSE, et al. I've learned a 
couple band names worth tracking down. This 
fanzine is kind of a print out of a blog, and it 
reads like one too. I like fanzines that ignore dig¬ 
ital reality, or exist to spite it. 

If you play punk, hardcore, garage noise or 
any music with a bit of grit and rawness to it, or 
if you write a fanzine that loosely covers the 
same sonic territory, and you don't live in the US, 
Japan or Sweden, please get in touch. My address 
is: Daniel Stewart / PO Box 239 / North Carlton 
Victoria 3054 / Australia. 



Austin is like a ghost town tonight. All the 
streets are empty. There are no people walking 
their dogs, no one's waiting for the bus, nothing. 
It's like fucking Christmas or the grocery store 
on a Sunday night at 3 am. All the businesses 
closed early, from Whataburger to Cherrywood 
coffeehouse. Only thing open is the liquor store. 
It's the Super Bowl, baby, and if you ain't from 
the south, then you might not understand what 


the big hoopla is all about. I mean, hey, you 
might like the shit, but you I don't think you 
really understand it. And that's cool. I can dig it. 

* Football in Texas is a huge fucking deal. Kids 
grow up imitating their favorite Dallas Cowboys 
players in their respective front yards with other 
neighborhood kids; their Dads dream of being 
able to watch their sons play in the big game 
against the rival school. Shit is just like Friday 
Night Lights or Varsity Blues or what have you. 
Young girls get all dolled up and head down to 
the game just to support their team. Everyone 
loves the shit. Nights in high school were filled 
with jocks and squares inside watching the game 
and us scumbags in the parking lot sniffing glue. 
It was very much a part of our day-to-day lives 
to hear about football. As we get older, no mat¬ 
ter where we are in life, we can always rely on 
the comforting fact that sometime in February 
people get together and BBQ some shit or fry 
some shit and watch grown, rich people beat the 
shit outta each other for mere sport. Just to enter¬ 
tain us. What a fucking world we live in. 

So here I sit, all alone in the house usually 
filled with loud assholes and fucked up dogs. I 
had no idea the game was on, but I got stoked, 
because this meant I could jack off on the couch 
for a change (one of my favorite Sunday activi¬ 
ties). For about a second, I thought about maybe 
going to a Super Bowl party just to meet up with 
a few people, ya know, just for shits, and then I 
remember that football is the dumbest fucking 
thing on the planet. I don't even wanna tell you 
what clever little quip my dad says about foot¬ 
ball. I don't know about you assholes, but I spent 
the better part of my formative years getting the 
shit beat out of me by guys that play fooootball. 
Now, why would I wanna support these piece of 
shit jock motherfuckers? Why would I ever want 
to think about all wedgies, swirlies, or constant 
name-calling ever again? I thought my name 
was fag until I was seventeen. 

There was this kid I went to high school with. 
His name is Justin Blalock. He's built like a brick 
shit house, and from what I remember, always 
has been. He's had a pretty amazing career, it 
seems. I don't really keep up with it, but every 
once in a while I'll see his name in the paper. 
Started playing varsity ball when we were fresh¬ 
man; he did the whole college ball thang and 
now plays in the NFL for whom, I have no idea. 

I do know that he's made a literal shit ton of 
fucking money. He's also the asshole who gave 
me this huge scar under my chin, leaving me 
with this roach beard on my face for life. I 
remember it like it was yesterday. We were in the 
hall and one of his limp dick, date rape buddies 
dared him to see if he could choke me uncon¬ 
scious. When I finally stopped kicking and 
screaming, he just dropped me like a rock, 
straight on my face. Blood was everywhere and 
when I finally came to, all I saw were his size 
nineteen Jordans walking about in the abyss of 
the hallway, high-fiving Skip and Kiel (pro¬ 
nounced Kyle) all along the way. Fuck that guy. 

I wonder what the statute of limitations of suing 
somebody for assault is. Surely, I have just cause. 
It's because of him I hate football so much, mak¬ 
ing me a social outcast in my own home. Texas, 

















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COLUMNS 


that is. 

Did people forget that football is for jocks? 
Has football turned into the new fixed gear bicy¬ 
cle? Just because Tragedy likes the Seahawks 
don't make it all right. What's next? Mixed mar¬ 
tial arts between sets at Chaos in Tejas? Bruce 
Roehrs cage match with Layla? So many good 
jams about sports. Void did it. Gorilla Biscuits 
did it and those fuckers were basically jocks. 
First Christians, now jocks. Jesus Christ. Payton 
Manning? 

What's the appeal? I just don't get it. I'm ask¬ 
ing seriously. Someone please write me and let 
me know. I'm not even fucking with you. Tell me 
why you like football. Tell me why you like to 
see to rich men beat the shit outta each other. If 
you just wanna see people fight, come down to 
Austin, I'll take you to the homeless shelter 
downtown and you can watch hobos beat the 
shit outta each other for as long as you want. It's 
better than pay per view and you can drink 
Thunderbird while you watch. Are people into 
this shit to live vicariously through these yup¬ 
pies? Check out the big game, then go to sleep 
fantasizing about scoring the winning point and 
getting to fuck the cheerleader? Just because 
they have a sick tribal sleeve, doesn't make them 
cool. People I work with who hate football were 
telling me they watch the big game just for the 
commercials. That's even worse! The fucking 
commercials?! It's like the devil is shitting on my 
face right now. I can't take this shit. I'm not 
gonna lie, if I was a billionaire I would totally 
spend a million fucking dollars to shoot a com¬ 
mercial of Timmy taking a shit, so all the 
douchebags watching FOX have to see it. That's 
something I could get behind. 

Come to think of it, why the fuck am I talking 
shit on how people spend their free time? Just 
last night I found myself at some weird kinda 
clown rave with a bunch of free loving gypsy, hip¬ 
pie type dickheads complete with girls wearing 
pasties hanging from hula hoops suspended 
from the ceiling. I should probably kill myself or 
at the very least turn on the TV for the post game 
show. 

Send bullshit to: ldworrell@gmail.com 



The Shame And Humiliation Of American 
Bands Touring Europe: Part Two 

Where 1 left off last: Day one. Merkit arrives in 
Europe, plays squatted former Italian Communist 
Youth HQ outside Pisa. Day two. Outdoor fest in 
Bergamo, Italy; much drinking, many people, shit on 
hand, dancing, collapsed table, twelve-hour sleep. 

I awoke in France, smelling like total shit. My 
sleep had been completely rehabilitative, so I did 
not feel like shit, regardless of my immense stu¬ 


pidity and absurd behavior the previous night. 
As I began stirring in the solo-passenger back¬ 
seat, one of the dudes from the other band we 
were touring with, turns to tell me I'd said some¬ 
thing offensive to him the night before, "but it's 
alright." I still do not know if this is true. I realize 
my bandmate, Nevin has had to drive the entire 
twelve-hour trip that I'd just slept through, and I 
feel pretty bad and irresponsible. I'd been awake 
maybe twenty minutes when Nevin hit a parked 
car in the narrow-ass streets of Bordeaux. The 
damage isn't serious and we're close to the 
venue, so we just go on as if nothing happened. 

Tibeault (tih-bowl) is the name of the dude 
that has booked our Bordeaux show. It's located 
in a very, very old building, the basement of a 
pub. We're starving, and this happens to be the 
one show that has made us meat. We bypass it 
and head straight for tlje rice, tomatoes and 
bread. Such simple food never tasted so good. 
Nevin, driven weary and insane without sleep, 
attempts a nap while we set up in the basement. 
When we finally play, the almost-ancient stone in 
the basement makes everything sound killer. I 
get to talk to our Euro-tour host, Iacopo a good 
bit during this show, and he seems more and 
more awesome. He gives me some Italian phras¬ 
es to say when we reunite with his friends in 
Magdalene (also Italians) at an upcoming show 
in Austria. He teaches me, "God is a dog ( Dio 
Cane [CAR-NAY])", and "God is a pig ( Porco 
Dio)." Italian atheists seem to be the most fervent 
haters of Christianity, perhaps not surprisingly. 
Iacopo also explains to me that his friends in 
Magdalene also have a term for the kind of 
ridiculous behavior I'd exhibited the night 
before, which translates in English to, "monster- 
ing around." Tibeault lets us stay in his tiny 
apartment for the night and we take off for 
Germany the next morning. 

On the way out, we pass Paris and vaguely 
see the Eiffel Tower in the distance, as well as 
signs for the Maginot Line. Unfortunately, we 
don't have time to get really silly with tourist 
shit. We are heading for the German city of Trier, 
located on the border of France and Germany. We 
pass two of Trier's most impressive offerings on 
the way to the show, both of which have sur¬ 
vived from the times of the Roman Empire: the 
gate to the city itself, and a gladiator arena. We 
are late, so as soon as our hosts in Trier greet us, 
they usher us upstairs to eat quickly before the 
show. Our hosts are from Danse Macabre, and 
they are going to be playing with us tonight. 
They have cooked us an incredible meal, a kind 
of faux-chicken and vegetable stew with deli¬ 
cious bread. As soon as we've scooped the last 
bite, we're taken to the show, which goes off well 
at Danse's practice space. 

As incredible as the short tour had been so far, 
our next stop outside Frankfurt would complete¬ 
ly blow us away. We drove up along side a mas¬ 
sive stone fence and Andy from Her Breath On 
Glass (who were on the tour with us and had pre¬ 
viously played the venue) said, "This is it on the 
right." Nevin, looking at the massive stone man¬ 
sion and not understanding said, "Where?!" To 
which Andy replied, "This, all of this." 

The building was a four-story, massive man¬ 


sion set on property the size of a substantial park. 
We were to find out that the building had once 
been the home of a wealthy, elite family who at 
some point in time ran into trouble and had their 
assets seized by the state. It had now been zoned 
for public events, recreational and cultural activ¬ 
ities. 

Outside there were gargoyle statues typical of 
what you'd imagine would adorn the home of an 
upper-crust family of the Nazi era. We entered 
through two massive wood doors. Marble floors 
led us to a living room with fireplace that at least 
four of us could have fit into. The ceilings in this 
room were two stories high and an enormous 
wooden staircase led us past large stain-glassed 
windows to the upstairs kitchen and pantry. 
There, we went up and found many stacks of 
beer and soft drinks. Sabine was our host for the 
evening; friendly, redheaded, freckled and 
impossible not to crush on. She showed us out to 
the stone balcony, which itself was the size of a 
small cafe. About a dozen people sat on the low 
stonewalls and at tables in the sunshine, drinking 
and eating. The resident caretaker of this castle 
was grilling marinated seitan steaks on a bar- 
beque. Nevin and I walked to the edge of the bal¬ 
cony, which overlooked the trees on the ground. 
He turned to me and said, "This is fucking 
incredible." 

In the time before the show started, we tried 
to find out as much as we could about the man¬ 
sion. We were told the story of the family and 
what its uses had been turned to. The surround¬ 
ing anarchist and anti-fascist flags were 
explained when we were told that the castle was 
used as a meeting place for anti-fascist groups 
that would congregate before traveling to inter¬ 
cept neo-Nazi marches and rallies. The top 
floor—which we would never see, unfortunate^ 
ly—housed as many as four families at a time. 
These were refugee families whose status in 
Germany was uncertain, but whose resident sta¬ 
tuses were being fought for by leftist groups. On 
top of all of this, all kinds of music was per¬ 
formed there. 

The room we play has a stage, and apparent¬ 
ly was originally designed for rich people to be 
entertained here. I wonder what they would 
have thought of us. The sets that night are record¬ 
ed and we are given copies. Afterward, we go 
into a room off of the "theater" room and hang 
out on couches and get into the seemingly end¬ 
less supply of beer. Sabine tells me about 
Frankfurt and we joke around and talk for a long 
time. Nevin has now taken his turn to get silly 
with alcohol and once it's become obvious that 
he's in the bag, Iacopo says in his Italian accent, 
"Nevin—now you are monstering around!" 
We'd made it. 

Nevin and I, still in disbelief, spend the rest of 
the night exploring the mansion. 

To Be Continued... 

ENDNOTES: 

1. Consult the Cult Maternal folk for copies of 
the Ant Parade/Body Rot split 7", it is excellent. 
www.cultmaternal.blogspot.com 

2. Get at my friend Joe for copies of the 
Waking Up Hurts tape: www.flwebwizzard 
.com/ wtfhttrecords 











4 



oceuhs 

3. Send me packages, demos, mixtapes. 
Please, fahy_john@hotmail.com / John Fahy, 
15011 Lakeside View Dr., Apt. 2402, Fort Myers, 
FL 33919. 



Don't know what l want hut 1 know how to get it. 

—Johnny Rotten 

Know what I want , but I don't know how to get it. 

—Mykel Board 

Out my window, rain streams in torrents 
against the glass, bouncing drop-by-drop on the 
gray Manhattan streets. Rainwater soaks the legs 
of my pants... a walk to the bank... and back. 
Why did I walk to the bank in the rain? Someone 
has used my debit card number to buy $1,000 
worth of disco DJ equipment from Radio Shack 
in New Jersey. 

The appropriately named Chase Fraud 
Department said that all I had to do was fill out 
an electronic form. The money would be back in 
my account "the next business day." Yeah right. 

It's been a week. Imagine a thousand bucks 
missing from your bank account for a week. 
There go the credit card bills, the rent, beer. I'm 
gonna have to mug a wino to survive. But that's 
only the end of week 3 of the beginning of the 
worst decade of my life. 

Back up: I shudda been happier than a femi¬ 
nist at a castration. New Year's 2010. The start of 
my seventh decade. Seventy years, Jesus fuckin' 
Christ. 

God said, "Let there be light." 

I turn on the switch. That's how old I am. 

This is the first month of my seventieth year. 
New Year's Eve was good. The Bear, my best 
Japanese friend was there with Gilberto, my best 
Mexican friend, and Marilyn, my best New York 
friend. We got pleasantly soused at The Peculier 
Pub, my favorite locale in The City. 

Part of why I've lasted this long is that I have 
reasons to live. I knew I could never die before 
going to Mongolia. So I went to Mongolia. OK, I 
will live through writing a book. I wrote a book. 
Two books. Okay, now, I want a party where a 
girl comes out of a cake. 

Everybody has seen a girl —usually a blonde 
with tits out to here— come out of a cake... in 
The Movies,. It's a mainstay. I guess it also hap¬ 
pens on Broadway and in advertising. 

But who's seen it in real life? Anybody you 
know? I didn't think so. But I want to. I want to 
really have a party where a girl comes out of a 
cake. Where, she dips her hands in the frosting 
and tickles my nose with it. I lick it off her 


breasts. Mmmm lemon. Can't die without doing 
that, can I? 

AND, I found the girl and I found someone to 
make the cake. My best pal, Marilyn (right name 
for a girl to come out of a cake... but she's mak¬ 
ing it) and Lola (right name for a girl to come out 
of a cake... and she's coming out of it.), Marilyn's 
making me a great surprise birthday party at the 
end of the month. 

She forks over $1,000 reserving Bar One-Oh- 
Eight, where we drink every Monday night. 
We're pals with the bartender and should score a 
bunch of extras... as well as tolerance for er... 
unusual activities. 

Marilyn paid for three hours of free booze, an 
open bar, and food... Dozens of my friends 
(whose number always increases when there is 
free booze and food) will be there. Marilyn is a 
goddess! 

As for the rest of the month, I was going to go 
through a narrative. Go to each item, just when 
nothing else can go wrong, something worse 
happens. January may be the worst month of my 
life where no one dies. (I'm so not sure about 
that either. I still have six more days for someone 
to keel over.) 

I was gonna tell you about the crashed com¬ 
puter... the $1000 replacement, the pictures, data, 
writing, lost... me, leaving my apartment the 
next day... locking the door... the key spins... 
nothing happens... it's 8:30 AM... I can't lock my 
apartment and I have to be at work in 20 min¬ 
utes. The door stays open all day. 

Next day... I replace the lock... and lose the 
new key... a wart develops on my eyelid, $50 at 
the dermatologist's. 

"Maybe it won't come back," says the doctor 
as I leave with a patch. 

At work, I throw a hissy fit because the office 
manager complains-about me wasting money 
making copies... I throw three quarters (25 cent 
pieces) at her...There! That'll pay for your fuck¬ 
ing copies!!! Now she hates me... won't talk to 
me... Workplace harassment or something. 

Then, there's the four-hundred dollars' worth 
of dental work to replace a gold inlay lost in 
Italy... the twelve hundred dollars' worth of 
Radio Shack goods I already told you about... 
charged falsely on my debit card. (No I still 
haven't gotten the money back)... There's more. 
My doctor says I've got Macular Degeneration. 
I'll probably go blind in two years. I figure it's 
from the "generic Viagra" I got in Trinidad all 
those months ago... I used it three times and only 
scored once. Want more? 

Fuck it. There's too much for the 2000+ words 
I'm allowed here. The headaches and skin erup¬ 
tions. The food spilled on my only clean clothes. 
The toilet backed up and overflowing all night. 
What gets me through it all is THE GIRL, THE 
CAKE. Things are so bad I consider sticking my 
head in the oven... the microwave... but I've got 
a birthday party coming. A girl coming out of a 
cake. 

Do you think this portends? Does it sound 
like a set-up? Like a joke where this guy walks 
into a bar and asks if he can have a girl come out 
of a cake? You bet! The joke's on me. 

Marilyn walks past the bar today. On her way 


to work. The place is closed. Papered up. Gone. 
Skedaddled. Outta here. Nothing. Bar, One Oh 
Eight is Bar, Zero Zero Zero. Not only has this 
decades' luck set me back several thousand dol¬ 
lars, it's set my best friend back a grand. 

So what am I going to do? How can I face it? 
It's unrelenting. Every day there's something 
else. Today, my statement comes from Chase. 
The $1000 from Radio Shack is still listed. 
There's also an Albanian restaurant claiming I 
owe more than $100 for a meal I ate two months 
ago! I'm so depressed I ignore it. Don't give a 
rat's ass. Can't pick up the phone to complain. 

I'm rarely depressed. My life's been pretty 
good. But now, I want to kill.... passers-by... that 
nice bum on the corner who I give a quarter to 
every day... Anybody. None of the usual shit 
works any more. Find something worse?.. 
Someone in shittier shape than me? Haiti? Of 
course their lives are worse than mine... well, 
maybe not. They're dead. Afghanistan? They've 
got a cause. Me? A girl and a cake are not 
enough. I feel like my head's gonna explode. I've 
hung up on a dozen people so far today. Tech 
support! Chase! Amex! FUCK YOU! (click) 
FUCK YOU! (click) FUCK YOU! (click) My skin 
burns, like it's been sanded or scraped by a 
sharp knife... 

I want to destroy. Break something. Knock 
someone's teeth out. Sounds like punkrock, 
doesn't it? Maybe it's time to start a band again. 
In the meantime. I'm gonna stay 69. Refuse to 
have a birthday. If God wants to fuck with me. 
I'll show her. Come on! Think you can take me? 
Try it! 

* 

ENDNOTES: [email subscribers (god@mykel- 
board.com) or website viewers (www.mykel- 
board.com) will get live links and a chance to 
post comments on the column] 


—>Kyle Nonneman is back in jail dept: That 
doesn't surprise me. once they get you, they 
want to keep you. What does surprise me... but 
shouldn't... is the reason stated in the "report to 
the judge" 

I quote: 

Samples of Nonneman's work under the 
name "Nothingistrue" include the following: 


—>Thank heaven for little boys dept: In 
Chattanooga Tennessee a 4-year old boy was 
found roaming around at night. He was drink¬ 
ing beer and wearing a little girl's dress, taken 
from a neighbor's house. The reason? 

It's not clear, but the boy's mother said he 
wanted to be with his father, who was in jail. 1 

—>Small victories dept: Thanks to a lawsuit 
filed by Americans United for Separation of 
Church and State, a federal judge has ruled that 
a South Carolina license plate, sporting a cross 
and the words "I Believe," is unconstitutional. 

It's not clear whether it would be constitutional 
if you had a choice between a cross, a Star of 
David, a Crescent, or a Pentagram. But only a 
cross, for some reason, violates the establish¬ 
ment of religion clause of the constitution. I can't 
imagine why. 
















COLUMNS 


The Passion of Misanthropy 

Cunt Envy 

Right to Kill 

Dead Little Girls 

Once You've Killed Someone Life's Shit 
(That last one sounds like a plea NOT to kill!) 

Worse than that, the parole-ending guy 
writes in his report: it appears he (Kyle) sub¬ 
scribes to a Nihilist philosophy.... Typically 
Nihilists reject social, legal, moral and religious 
norms. His thoughts and beliefs are clearly 
spelled out in his writing, music and posts on his 
MySpace page. 

Can you believe the cops/courts using music, 
thoughts, beliefs, and MySpace to jail someone? 
Uh... yes, you can believe it. This is America, 
after all. 

Write to Kyle at: Kyle Nonneman, #691768, 
1120 SW 3rd St, Portland OR 97204 

—>1 wonder if she called them "old farts" dept: 
One of my new heroines is Teanne Harris of 
DesPlaines IL. Six days before her scheduled 
wedding, her fiance... er... pulled out. Instead of 
trying to get whatever refund she could, she just 
gave the whole celebration (food, DJ, drink, kit 
and caboodle) to the local old folks' home..This 
turning a tragedy on its head is just great. 

It's even better than the original plan. Marriage 
is a sucky slave-related government institution. 
Old people are cool. Ten punk points Teanne. 

—>Polling the 'digitally active' dept: PC Tools 
recently commissioned a survey investigating 
online habits. 

Here are the results: 57% of people surveyed 
would give up alcohol before giving up the 
Internet. Eleven percent would give up their job 
and 8.6% would go without sex to stay connect¬ 
ed! 

Why is it so hard to give it up? 

Social media ranked first with 68% of partici¬ 
pants responding that socializing with others 
would be the hardest Internet activity to give up. 
30% indicated that one of the hardest online 
activities to sacrifice would be porn! 

I don't think PC Tools gets it. People don't 
give up sex for porn. Porn is sex. You just don't 
have to make breakfast for it in the next morn¬ 
ing- 

As you probably know, Mykel is due to 
spend the next twenty years at a medium securi¬ 
ty facility in Tuscaloosa. MRR will handle his 
correspondence. You can write to him c/o us. 
Thanks. 



I don't think I would have stayed in 
Newfoundland if it weren't for Dan and Melissa. 


A few weeks after I showed up here, they called 
me up and asked if I was interested in starting a 
band with them. They'd both been fired from 
their exploitative homecare jobs and had been 
sitting around their house, smoking joints and 
writing blazing riffs. Could I do vocals and 
could my partner play drums? Yes! So we start¬ 
ed This whirlwind double-date band called 
Rumours and they would tell me these crazy sto¬ 
ries about living up in the Canadian territory 
called Nunavut. Melissa had been working in a 
mental health facility and one of the residents 
had been put on an ice floe to drift off into cold, 
cold death by her family. Also, they would serve 
"country food," which was a lot of raw, frozen 
fish and meat that was buried, then dug up, then 
eaten. Anyway, they now live up there perma¬ 
nently in the capital city, Iqaluit, population 
6000, which sucks for me. 

Juls: I have this theory that you guys are the 
most northern punks in Canada. At first, I was 
thinking the entire western hemisphere, but 
probably there are some punks in Alaska. I think 
where you live is weirder, though. Can you tell 
me about it? 

Melissa: Currently, Iqaluit is cold as fuck and 
dark for 70% out of the day. It can be a really 
peaceful place and life there is generally really 
easy (minus the isolation). There are however a 
lot of social problems because of the history 
that's involved. 

Dan: Basically, the Canadian government is 
attempting to compensate for the cultural geno¬ 
cide created by residential schooling, which 
essentially forced Inuit to abandon their lan¬ 
guage and traditional ways of life. This obvious¬ 
ly created a fuck load of hostility and resent¬ 
ment, which is still felt today. 

Melissa: This may sound blunt and negative, but 
it's the truth, at least from our perspectives (so 
far, at least). It's a totally different place if you 
travel here as a tourist versus if you live here 
permanently. If you asked a random tourist their 
opinion would most likely differ greatly. Aside 
from the shit, I like living here and culturally, 
there is a lot to offer. 

Dan: And the physical landscape is beautiful 
and unlike any other place in Canada. 

Juls: What do you mean by "the government is 
attempting to compensate." How? 

Dan: Recently, Steven Harper made a public 
apology on behalf of the Canadian government 
regarding the forced allocation of Inuit children 
into residential schooling. As well, the Canadian 
government paid settlements to those who were 
made to attend said schools. There are other 
measures taken in order to assuage the situa¬ 
tion—priority hiring given to land claims benefi¬ 
ciaries as well as housing allowance, free post¬ 
secondary education, and entitlement to grant 
money (education, arts, etc.). 

Honestly these issues are beyond my imme¬ 
diate experience, but living here, you get a first¬ 
hand perspective as to how these measures 
affect the Nunavimmiut (this term is inclusive 
for both land claims beneficiaries and other¬ 
wise). 

Juls: Why did you move there? 

Melissa: We lived there for a bit in 2008 and 


decided to go back after finishing school. My sis¬ 
ter was living there too, but she moved away 
before we even arrived. I was able to get my old 
job back, which was a big motivation. 

Juls: So what do you guys do up there? 

Melissa: I work at a live-in mental health treat¬ 
ment center. 

Dan: I work at a children's group home. 

Melissa: Aside from work, we cook a fuck ton, 
party a bit, listen to music, and hang out with 
our dogs. 

Dan: Yeah, we got two dogs and they occupy 
most of our time. The rest of our time is divided 
among the aforementioned activities as well as 
getting tattooed by our roommate Nate, who is 
learning how to tattoo and using our bodies as 
practice skin. 

Melissa: We also play old Nintendo games on 
the Wii. 

Juls: Melissa, you're from the middle of nowhere 
anyways, right? Grandfalls, which is in central 
Newfoundland? Basically. Without an immedi¬ 
ate, geographic punk community, do you still 
feel a part of the overall punk community? How 
are you guys staying punk?! 

Melissa: At times it feels so separate from what I 
was used to; it bums me out. I miss going to 
shows and playing shows and being involved in 
a local punk community. At the same time, I feel 
like location doesn't define who you are or what 
you believe in. I stay connected whatever way I 
can and look forward to eventually moving 
somewhere and meeting up with people who 
share similar ideals and interests as me. 

Dan: We're punk wherever we go, Juls, you 
should know that. 

Juls: What is the culture, like amongst the white 
people who have moved up there to work? Are 
most people sympathetic to the history of 
fucked-up-ness the people there have endured 
or are people generally assholes? 

Melissa: There is a strange mix of people living 
in the arctic. It seems like people are there to help 
mostly, but obviously I can't answer for all. 
There is a serious push to have the government 
infrastructure Inuit-run, however that may take 
some time. 

Juls: What surprised you most about moving 
there? 

Dan: We were really well prepared for a big 
change. Not to say that nothing was surprising, 
but we sort of knew what to expect. The cold is 
a bit of a shock. Thinking about negative 60 
degrees is different than experiencing it. 

Juls: Is that how cold it gets? 

Dan: On an average day, it's between negative 20 
to negative 30. But during some blizzards it's 
been like negative 65 or something. We don't 
even leave the house. 

Melissa: Because our eyes will freeze. 

Juls: Soundtrack for staying stoked on the tun¬ 
dra? 

Melissa: Punch, White Lung, Brilliant Colors, 
Masshysteri, Pissed Jeans. 

Dan: Marked Men, Slices, Bongripper, 

Condominium, Finally Punk, Mayyors. 

Melissa: If anyone ever moves to Iqaluit, look us 
up: melissamurr@hotmail.com and dan.gal- 
way@gmail.com. 











r 


OOCMIS 




A few months ago I wrote about the rising 
cost of records. I pointed out that the transition 
from mail order and record stores to online e- 
commerce as a means of record distribution 
meant that added fees were like a "tax" on the 
cost of records bought on line. Furthermore, this 
money goes directly to large corporations, rather 
than to say, bands or labels. 

As a means of illustration, my outfit. Havoc 
Records and Distribution, last year paid $2426 in 
credit card and Paypal fees, $490 in eBay fees, 
and $1243 dollars for web hosting, DSL, site 
maintenance etc. That's $4159 a year in expenses 
that didn't exist for a label in the golden days of 
DIY hardcore. Back then the big expense was 
advertising, in the form of zine ads, and free 
copies of records to radio shows and fanzines. 
This could add up to a lot of postage and time, 
but the money and records mostly stayed inside 
the scene. There was once a vast proliferation of 
punk fanzines, good and bad, supported by 
record label ads. Now my advertising expense is 
under $1000 a year. In fact it's primarily ads in 
this magazine. I quit mailing out review and 
radiQ promo copies and placing magazine ads a 
few years ago because it no longer seemed to 
have any impact. Furthermore, the number of 
decent zines covering music I liked has shrunk to 
a small handful. So instead the beneficiaries of 
my record labels non-postage and pressing relat¬ 
ed costs are corporations like Visa, American 
Express, and Paypal/eBay. At least most of my 
web expenses go to local independent compa¬ 
nies. While this is probably not a big surprise to 
most people under 30, it's a big change from the 
way punk record distribution was done in the 
past, and most importantly, in the period when 
most of the punk ethics and ideals were forged. 
That Crass or Dischorii put "pay no more than... 
or why pay more" on the covers of their records 
seems quixotic and quaint in our time, but was 
once taken quite seriously as punk bafids sought 
to control the price of their records and who was 
able to profit from their work. 

As most readers know, I have long been a 
champion of Swedish and Finnish Hardcore on 
these shores. The Finnish scene of the early '80s 
remains one of most powerful, intense and pro¬ 
lific scenes of the hardcore movement. Given that 
Finland has a population of but five million 
(about the same as my home state of Minnesota) 
its contribution to hardcore punk has been excep¬ 
tional. During the '90s I was waving the flag for 
Finnish hardcore, distributing releases by that 
country's current bands, and dubbing tapes of 
the out of print classics. The reissue mania of the 


past few years has meant that most all of the 
essential classics of Finnish punk and hardcore 
have been re-pressed on vinyl, with many more 
on CD and uploaded to MP3 blogs and file shar¬ 
ing sites. There was a time in the '90s that I 
thought many of these bands would be all but 
forgotten except by a small cult of record collec¬ 
tors. Now Kaaos, Riistetyt, Bastards, Appendix, 
Terveet Kadet, Rattus et al are front-page news 
again with records and CDs in bins and MP3s in 
rotation. This has led labels and fans to dig a lit¬ 
tle deeper into the Finnish scene and release 
some of the bands that only made it to compila¬ 
tions and demo tape. Notably Polliisivaltio, 
Klimax, and the Bastards 1982 Kasset LP —all cas¬ 
sette releases now on vinyl. Just when it seemed 
that the vaults had been scraped bare a few new 
entries turn up. 

Abortti 13 are best known from their split EP 
with Pyhakoulu. Apparently the band had writ¬ 
ten some fourteen songs and only recorded a few 
of them for the split back in 1983. Fast-forward to 
2009 and two of the ex members put a new ver¬ 
sion of the band together and recorded those 
fourteen songs. I know this idea sounds some¬ 
what preposterous, but the resultant Viimeinen 
Verildyly EP is one of the best records I've heard 
in some time. Great raw thrashing Finnish hard¬ 
core the way it was done in 1983, but recorded 
last year. It must have been a blast for these 40- 
something punx to bash out the tunes from their 
'83 demo. Unlike a lot of old bands that reform, 
the sound is still raw and punk. Most old hard¬ 
core bands play a metallized version of how they 
thought they sounded back in the day,, played 
through better amps with professional production. 
What those bands thought were technical limita¬ 
tions back in the day, such as primitive recording 
technology and shoddy gear, are essential ele¬ 
ments of the sound and vibe of real hardcore. A 
sound it is very hard for today's scene to capture. 
Back to the music, if you love Finnish hardcore, 
check out Abortti 13's new 7" on Killer Records. 

Next up, and most exciting is the Fight 
Records pressing of a long lost demo by 
Jarjestyshairio. This band was not known to me 
until this 7" dropped. The bands name means 
"disturbing the peace" and they recorded a demo 
in 1982. Apparently their singer was in an early 
line up of Kaaos, (which did not record), but was 
replaced on vocals by the late Jakke who 
switched from guitar. Fight records has done the 
world a great service by bringing us these ten 
blasts of pure 1980s Finnish hardcore power. The 
sound is raw and abrasive like Discharge or 
Varukers sped up and delivered with more 
anger. The primitive recording sounds perfect 
and the songs have all the hooks and verve that 
so much hardcore today lacks. I love the raspy 
vocals, the hard tone of the Finnish language 
probably makes it the best language for hardcore 
vocals. The guitar solos have that "recorded in a 
tin can and beamed in from Mars" sound that 
rings so true for all '80s hardcore. It's hard to put 
into print how pumped I get about this kind of 
hardcore, but at least I have this space in MRR to 
expound my zeal for this style and encourage 
others to check it out. 

Not to overemphasize the early '80s, there 


have been some great current bands out of 
Finland. Kykloopien Sukuupuuto will be playing 
Chaos in Tejas this summer, their two 7"s, split 7" 
and LP are all worth checking out. Riistetyt have 
just released a new LP and will be touring the 
USA this spring as well. Kieltolaki is reported to 
be working on a new LP and Kylma Sotaa possi¬ 
bly have some new record coming out? 

Some other 7" s you might have missed from 
Finland in the last year or so include: 

Omaisuusvahinko's second EP Sotaa Maailma 
Vastaan: Good fast paced hardcore punk, feels 
tighter and more focused than their first 7", but 
that one is good too. 

Pahaa Verta six song 7": There's been a long 
running cultural exchange between the Finnish 
and Brazillian hardcore scenes. I don't know if 
this band is directly influenced by '80s Brazilian 
hardcore, but their sound reminds me of a caus¬ 
tic mix of early '80s Brazilian and Finnish hard¬ 
core. Good raw (almost Oi punk) vocals over mid 
paced hardcore punk. 

Yteiskunnan Ustavat's Porojen Maa EP: This 
band has been around for some years, but I did¬ 
n't pay too much attention to them until recently. 
In fact I seem to remember thinking they were 
more of a grindcore or metal type band. Either I 
was wrong or they stepped it up, this is pure 
hardcore punk in the Finnish style. 

Ydinaseeton Pohola s/t EP: This one is better 
to my ears than the split mentioned below. The 
songs are quick mid paced ragers and the vocals 
are harsh and desperate. I like the song structures 
and gritty guitar tone. 

Kerripukki / Pahaa Verta split 7": Both bands 
play shredding fast hardcore. Kerripukki's vocals 
are sometimes a little too screeching for me, but 
the music is raging. 

Ydinaseeton Pohjola/Kerikpukki split 7": I 
like the Kerripukki material on this EP much 
more. Driving raw hardcore that reminds me of 
early Wretched as interpreted by the Finns, 
Ydinaseeton Pohjola is more mid tempo on this 
release, and one song tastefully includes a key¬ 
board. Their vocals are kind of unique, a sound 
that has turned some people off to the band. I 
however, back this band and their approach. 

I find it perplexing, though perhaps refresh¬ 
ing, that these bands are probably only selling a 
few dozen of each of these EPs in the USA. With 
so many bands and fans caught up in hype and 
commercialism, it's good to see real hardcore 
being recorded for the sake of just releasing good 
hardcore and not so much importance placed on 
making it out side the home countries scene. That 
said, it's a shame to keep good hardcore under 
wraps. You have the chance to discover this 
music today instead of waiting 20 years for a reis¬ 
sue. 

Kieltolaki probably have better chance of 
being known by US listeners with two 7"s on an 
American label. Both are excellent, and not too 
hard to find. They were recently interviewed in 
these pages as well. 

Sotatila is another band that might be better 
known with some fairly well distributed 7"s and 
demo, in fact I will be doing the US press of this 
bands new 7" on my label. 

Most of the bands mentioned above (as well 



















as some other bands which are now inactive) are 
featured on an excellent compilation LP 
Propaganda Is Hippies , which came out a few years 
ago and shouldn't be too hard to find. 

Lastly, there's been a lot of discussion around 
Razorcake's two-part expose of the Lumberjack 
Mordam Music Group debacle. I was critical of 
this deal when it went down, and I don't know 
what those labels were thinking who stayed on 
after Lumberjack bought Mordam, and it's even 
more of a head scratcher that they stayed after 
they found out how deeply involved Warner 
Entertainment was in the buyout. In the past I'd 
been critical of Mordam but mostly on aesthetic 
grounds. Although this distributor was a product 
of the DIY hardcore scene, their roster of labels 
was full of pop, ska, indie, emo and garage rock 
with some hardcore punk thrown in. Those 
bands labels might be nice people and have some 
integrity, but it's hard to take a lot of that stuff 
seriously coming from non-punks playing com¬ 
mercial sounding music, most of whom move to 
bigger labels and distributors as soon as they get 
the chance. Musical tastes aside, if you have 
spent any time in hardcore punk, you should 
have some kind«of bullshit detector running in 
the back of your head. When one of the worlds 
largest media companies buys up an independ¬ 
ent distributor, they can't have the best interests 
of your small underground label at heart. In fact, 
WEA probably bought Mordam just to put it out 
of business and absorb its most commercial 
labels into its own distribution network. Reading 
the interviews I didn't recognize most of the 
labels or bands mentioned. But I have to ask, you 
signed up with a subsidiary of WEA, what the 
fuck were you thinking? Did these labels actual¬ 
ly believe that raking in chain stores and major 
label distribution was going to make their bands 
into the next Offspring or Nirvana? That worked 
out really well didn't it? I feel sorry for the peo¬ 
ple who got burned, but really you should have 
known better. 



THEY DIVIDE 

Fuck yes! Hardware Records from Germany 
has unleashed one of the toughest, hard-as-nails 
split EPs in recent memory! The split features 
two of the most ferocious hardcore bands on 
planet Earth! On side A you have BURIAL from 
Germany howling and punching their way 
through "Run." This song is fucking unbeliev¬ 
able! BURIAL attacks you with full battering- 
ram force. You get gruff vocals, searing metallic 
guitar leads and heavy as lead drum and bass. In 
"Run," BURIAL sings: "Run for your fucking life 


/ Run until your feet bleed / Hope for the next 
day to come / Run with your herd and stick to it 
/ Run! / But when the curtain falls, you will 
pray for your death / Pray!" Fuck!! This song 
destroys everything in your world! On side B 
you get ANTIMOB from Greece playing two 
killer songs that will continue the beating you 
received on side A! ANTIMOB is well qualified 
to occupy a split with the esteemed BURIAL. 
Both bands have come to shatter the thin sensi¬ 
bilities of all the safe little punks. This monstrous 
pair of hardcore dynamos will punish you fucks! 
BURIAL and ANTIMOB have taken on new 
strength as they ascend to the elite company of 
the gods of war! Get the split! Contact Hardware 
Records at www.hardwarerecords.com 

Fuck! A blistering slab of hardcore appeared 
at MRR the other day! This fucking record dev¬ 
astates everything in its path! BOILING OVER 
from Illinois is responsible for this swath of 
destruction! The debut 7" by these hardcore hel¬ 
lions is called Trash City. BOILING OVER is 
fucking angry! The first cut is "Humanity -is 
Fucked": "There is a growing contempt / A hate 
I can't control / All of you are dragging me 
down / You step all over me / Your greed is 
driving you." Very good! The music is raging 
hardcore—very fast at first, with a break that 
builds to a strong finish! The singing is fucking 
possessed by hatred and disgust! Read part of 
"American Dream:" "I have been raised in a 
place that has taught me how to live in a con¬ 
stant state of discontent... Here's to my fucking 
freedom / Here is to the land of opportunity / I 
am going to inherit a wasteland." Those are 
bleak observations by BOILING OVER. Song 
three is "I Live in Sin," and it goes like this: "You 
hide behind your golden crosses / You're plac¬ 
ing your values on our world / We live by your 
rules / I have wasted nine years of my life to this 
shit / A man behind a pedestal shouldn't dictate 
how I act..." Fuck yes! There is palpable bitter¬ 
ness here! Side one finishes with "Anxiety 
Attack:" "I can't fight—I can't control it / 
Pressure is building up—Another day I'll be 
dead." Those are anxious words for you punks! 
Side two smashes you in the face with the title 
song "Trash City." This seething bucket of bile 
has powerful singing with superior guitar work. 
Some of the words are: "I'm stuck / I've been 
thrown in a ditch / lam choking / lam filled 
with waste and drowning in a sea of shit." These 
lyrics reflect a very desperate situation!! Song 
two on side two is "These Colors Don't Crust:" 
"This needs to change—we're on a path to 
destruction." This is a good song! Song three 
might be the most urgent song on the EP, "A War 
For Every Cause." The chugging guitar riff is 
fucking hypnotic! The words go: "Drug society 
and drug culture fixated on feeling a fix / Get 
me out of this culture, of this hell!! / The addic¬ 
tion won't stop / We're dragging our youth into 
this mess!" BOILING OVER writes intelligent 
songs about the ills we are facing in this society! 
Side two ends with "Cross It Off:" "We are 
destroying our history day by day / Tear it 
down—cross it off / Our past won't be remem¬ 
bered at all!" That is another fine hardcore mes¬ 
sage, delivered with authority with excellent 


drumming, guitar playing, bass and vocals!! Get 
this record! You will be impressed! Contact: Rev 
Distribution, PO Box 5232, Huntington Beach, 
CA 92615, www.revdistribution.com 

Yes! SYNDROME from Richmond, Virginia 
has a snarling new EP for you fucks this month! 
This kick-ass release on Desolate Legacy Records 
is heavy-as-fuck! With Wolfboy on vocals, Alan 
on guitar, London on bass and the illustrious Mr. 
Brandon Ferrell on drums. This shit has deep, 
gruff vocals with scorching guitars and bombas¬ 
tic bass and drums. Side A starts with "Total 
Disarmament" and some of the lyrics are: "Years 
ago in darker times / Across the map they drew 
the lines / Nation versus nation went to war / 
Told us a flag's worth fighting for / Paid for with 
your blood and tears / Forcing us to live in fear." 
This is a thorough indictment of the masters of 
war that manipulate our children! Song two is 
"Walking Ghost" and it goes something like this: 
"Dying agony, burning flesh, fallout breeze, 
stench of death... / Crying screaming, going 
mad / Inferno fever from the rads." As you can 
tell from the first two tunes, this is not happy 
stuff. SYNDROME comes up with a rather pes¬ 
simistic assessment of society today. Song three 
is called "God Junkie" with some scathing com,- 
mentary: "Your god won't set me free / Got no 
time for this shit / God addicts on the street 
playing games with people's lives." SYN¬ 
DROME is strongly opposed to organized reli¬ 
gion! Side B of the SYNDROME EP is equally 
inspired. Rough vocals fleece out the stomping 
guitar, bass and drum combination. Side B 
begins with 'information Control." This song 
goes like this: "G-man spooks and databases / 
Black vans already waiting / No one safe from 
their eyes." Unfortunately this is not just punks 
being paranoid—it's true fact! SYNDROME fin¬ 
ishes off the EP with "The Aftermath". This song 
has very dark lyrics that are most depressing— 
and valid: "Greed of nations / Mass starvation / 
Marching death / The reaper's breath." Fuck! 
There you have it! This record has disturbing 
lyrics and razor-sharp hardcore music jto drive 
the point home! You need to hear this excellent 
H/C punk record! Contact SYNDROME c/o 
Desolate Legacy Records, PO Box 1681, 
Richmond, VA 23218. 

The second screaming EP this month from 
Desolate Legacy Records is Orwellian Future by 
SSR. SEDITION SUB ROSA comes out with a full 
head of steam on the title track "Orwellian 
Future." This fucking song pins you to the front 
of the stage as the crowd surges forward for 
more! Some of the lyrics are: "World domination. 
/ State sponsored mind control / Coward fuck¬ 
ing sheep that do exactly as they're told to / 
Billions ruled by a handful of elite that gives 
their orders from their thrones." George Orwell 
predicted this situation accurately! Song two is 
"Dark Days." The spot-on singing and the con¬ 
stant attack of the buzz-saw guitars render you 
helpless! "Dark Days" goes like this: "Nothing 
seems to go my way / Thoughts of joy now a 
. total haze / It'll take more than time to escape 
this place / I can see no end to these dark days." 
Fuck! A song like "Dark Days" is the perfect 
soundtrack to slit your wrists by! Song three har- 










oacjffls 



nesses a twisted type of optimism: "Night just 
begun, my mind is a mess / Life is in shambles, 
brain is a wreck / No future / No hope / This is 
my lot / I live for these insane nights." Shit—at 
least you've got "Insane Night" to look forward 
to! Side B has two more songs that hit you like 
the cold kiss of a wet fist. SEDITION SUB ROSA 
begins with "Programming Centers." Read these 
lyrics: "Total brainwash right from the start / 
Conditioned thought, conditioned minds / 
Ensuring this generation stays just as blind / 
Uniform thought, uniform state." 
"Programming Centers" ties in nicely with the 
"Orwellian Future" title cut that SSR led off 
with. The last song on the EP is a distinct change 
of pace. The song "They Divide" ends the EP 
with the most powerful blow yet! This slow and 
menacing number makes your skin crawl! The 
anguished vocals call out the lament: "Poor 
white man is helpless / A poor black man's the 
same / Convinced their plight is from the other, 
they've fallen for their games / Only two divi¬ 
sions, those that have and those that don't / 
They make us hate each other, then run to them 
for help / We beg for scraps from their fucking 
feast, while they create our hell." Fuck yes! That 
is an amazing punk rock anthem! 

Fuck! SOTATILA from Austria and Finland 
have a shockingly great eight song EP available 
for you punks and skins! For the uninitiated, 
SOTATILA has been delivering raw punk since 
2005. SOTATILA sings in Finnish with explosive 
D-beat songs that draw on influences from early 
bands such as KAAOS, TERVEET KADET and 
TAMPERE SS. The new EP is called Vituiks Meni 
on Kamaset Levyt Records / Flavoc Records / 
Plague Bearer Records. This music is played bru¬ 
tally fast. You don't get a chance to catch your 
breath between songs—this band slams you 
again and again!! SOTATILA is comprised of 
Jukkeli (vocals), Caro (guitar), Mundi (bass) and 
Yrjo (drufns). This crew plays D-beat punk as if 
their lives depended on it!! Contact the band at: 
sotatila@gmx.et or www.punkinfinland.net/ 
bands/sotatila 

Holy crap! EXTORTION from the city of 
Perth in Western Australia has fired another 
fusillade in your direction! These crazed hard¬ 
core enthusiasts are carrying on in the tradition 
of SLAYER, NEGATIVE FX, POISON IDEA, 
NAPALM DEATH and NEGATIVE 
APPROACH. EXTORTION play furious thrash 
that connects them to the Australian Hardcore 
mania perpetrated by RUPTURE, TOE TO TOE 
and NAILED DOWN. EXTORTION is: Rohan on 
vocals, Brendan on guitar, Luke on bass and 
Stooks on drums. EXTORTION starts off this 
strong ten-inch slab with "Regrets." Behind the 
wound-up vocals are good lyrics: "I've told lies 
and I've told the truth / I've wasted time and 
wasted youth / All the things that I've done 
wrong now fill me with regret / I have trusted 
when I shouldn't have / I've cut off the helping 
hand / So much to give but I'm no use / Fucked 
up, stupid and confused / All the things that I've 
done wrong, I just can't forget." Yes sir—those 
are powerful lyrics that touch on the experiences 
that many people have lived through. In 
"Reality," EXTORTION sings about a shallow. 


self-serving individual: "Your judgments to me 
seem poor / You think that you can see it all / 
When filth you're buried underneath / You are 
so blind you can't see / Don't tell me what is real 
/ It's all based on procedure / Act as if you're 
above it all / Wallowing in muck as you make 
that call / Get fucked." Yes! Those are some 
harsh words for that man! We storm right into 
"The Pessimist" with lyrics that illustrate how 
negativity breeds failure. Read this: "Wait for the 
end / Expect the worst / The pessimist has seen 
this all before / Seeing all the mistakes made 
and not making anymore / Pull apart what took 
so long to mend." Yes—those are not very happy 
thoughts! We blast through "Maze" and arrive at 
"Stare At The Sun:" "The answers have been 
staring back for so long under searing fact / 
Eyes burned black / Won't look away / Won't 
yield to fear / Living life with a mind burned 
clean." Those are great lyrics! This record has 
brutal fast parts that segue into slower, danger¬ 
ous interludes. Side B yields more hardcore 
mayhem. We start with "Kill The Lights" with 
introspective lyrics such as "Kill the lights / I 
don't wanna see people chewed up by machine 
/ Heads not made for being schooled / Never 
safe, not fitting in / Crushed inside of the 
machine / Chewed up, spat out / Body man¬ 
gled, buried under / The casualties of an emo¬ 
tionless machine." Holy fuck! Those are dis¬ 
heartening lyrics. We plow through an energetic 
"Cheated" and come to a slower introduction on 
a tune called "Faulty Wiring". Then you get 
bludgeoned! Next is a ripper called "Degrade"— 
if you do not maintain the system, it will fail. 
This is delivered with deep garbled vocals, guar¬ 
anteed to make you uncomfortable. EXTOR¬ 
TION play "Grind To A Halt" with a chugging 
slower groove to ensnare their victims and finish 
the record with rock and roll aplomb. This is 
good hardcore for you cretins!! Get your copy 
through Deep Six Records at: PO Box 6911, 
Burbank, CA 91510, www.deepsixrecords.com 
or from Resist Records at: PO Box 372, Newtown 
NSW, Australia 2042, www.resistrecords.com 
Fuck yes! AGNOSTIC FRONT came to the 
Bay Area for a three-night stand in January! On 
Friday night, Mr. Miret, Mr. Stigma and compa¬ 
ny destroyed Thee Parkside club in San 
Francisco! After an introduction of some newer 
songs, AGNOSTIC FRONT proceeded to play 
the entire Victim In Pain record! This amazing 
hardcore opus has stood the test of time. Victim 
In Pain remains the best hardcore record ever 
made!! The punks and skins went absolutely 
crazy! After hearing this music for twenty-five 
years, this shit is as powerful as ever!! The crowd 
was also treated to songs from the United Blood 
EP. It was an incredible show! Read this set list: 
"Eliminator," "Dead To Me," "For My Family," 
"Friend Or Foe," "United Blood," "Discriminate 
Me," "Victim In Pain," "Remind Them," "Blind 
Justice," "Last Warning," "United and Strong," 
"Power," "Hiding Inside," "Fascist Attitudes," 
"Society Sucker," "Your Mistake," "With Time," 
"Gotta Go," "Take Me Back" and "Addiction." 
Fuck! That is as good as it gets for American 
Hardcore! You lucky fucks can purchase a hand¬ 
some repackaged version of Victim In Pain and 


United Blood from Bridge Nine Hardcore 
Records. These new copies have a sturdy 
leatherette outer sleeve with the pictures from 
the original sleeves inside. Very nice! Get your 
copy from www.bridge9records.com 

Yes sir! ACES & EIGHTS from Boise, Idaho 
have an excellent CD prepared for you! The new 
material is entitled A Different Animal and this 
shit rocks with a capital "R!" ACES & EIGHTS 
began playing back in 2002 with inspiration 
from early punk and Oi! like ROSE TATTOO, 
COCKSPARRER and MOTORHEAD. The 
Different Animal CD bristles with the rock and 
roll excitement similar to those legendary bands. 
We start off with "It Takes An Army." Read this: 
"It takes an army, it takes a million desperate 
souls to find one hundred warriors / It takes a 
lifetime to ask yourself the questions that you 
know you should really ask." This is great skin¬ 
head rock and roll in the tradition of die mighty 
ROSE TATTOO! The vocals are very strong with 
excellent guitar work! The bass playing and 
drumming help push the street-rock over the 
top! In "Poison Child," ACES & EIGHTS sing 
about drugs: "So when I say to you, it's the truth 
/ Keep it there, over there / Don't want that 
bullshit in my life!" ACES & EIGHTS make their 
feeling about drugs quite clear! The songs are 
consistently strong. "Knives Come Out" is a par¬ 
ticularly great number with a solid COCKSPAR¬ 
RER sound to it. Excellent! Read some of the 
words to "Knives Come Out:" "Your house of 
cards is falling / Corrupted through and 
through / Hey you sheep of the land / Look up 
to the wolves you worship / Licking their chops 
at you / Don't say one word you bastards / It's 
not a laughing matter." Excellent! The next song 
is "Death Before Dishonor:" "You think I'm 
gonna buy this shit? / It was an accident and his 
life just slipped away / Here lays a man who lost 
it all / In the end he couldn't bear to be alone / 
He chose death before dishonor." That is a good 
song! ACES & EIGHTS finish you off with 
"Daniel," "Tomb Of The Eagles" and "I Hit The 
Road (And The Road Hit Back)." This is a good 
CD with a lot of street smarts and strong rock 
and roll to back it up. Contact ACES & EIGHTS 
through Downtown Academy Records, 
www. downtown academy.com or 
www.myspace.com/aceseights 

NOI!SE is a new four-piece street-punk band 
from Tacoma, Washington. Their recent demo 
includes "Blame," "Pushing On," "Reasons 
Why," "Walk Beside Us," "What Happened To 
The Kids?" and "War." This is melodic punk- 
rock with good sing-along choruses and tight 
harmonies. The tasteful guitar riffs and polished 
singing reminds one of older BAD RELIGION, 
not unlike the Hoio Could Hell Be Any Worse era. 
Keep your eye on this band with an upcoming 
7" EP to be released soon by Longshot Music 
and Contra Records! Two more bands from the 
Northwest that you need to be aware of are 
BRUTE SQUAD from Portland, Oregon and 
SHOT FOR SHOT from Seattle, Washington. If 
our luck holds, ACES & EIGHTS, NOI!SE, 
BRUTE SQUAD and SHOT FOR SHOT will 
share a four-way split in the not so distant 
future. 


















Until next month... See you fucks at the bar! 



mUEBT COLUMN 


1. British winters are a peculiar breed. The 
problem is usually their interminable average¬ 
ness. No deep freeze or breathtaking wind, just a 
slow procession of drizzle and grey-blue total 
cloud cover that today has the effect of making 
the high-rises across the road seem to blend into 
the sky. This year has been slightly more dra¬ 
matic, yes, we've had a few inches of snow here 
and there, yes (of course) this was reported as a 
national "event," which would make most more 
snow-acclimatised countries laugh the tennis 
racquets off their feet. This being Britain, the 
"freak" weather came complete with, a few days 
into the "crisis," much tabloid-newspaper con¬ 
sternation that the distribution of grit for the 
roads and pavements was an income dependent 
post-code lottery. Of course they weren't inciting 
class war really, just having a futile moan, and as 
usual the sentiment melted faster than the icy 
stuff itself, leaving them to get back on^with lam¬ 
basting the usual cause of "Broken Britain"— 
Polish lesbian Black immigrants (possibly 
Jewish) that are hell bent on establishing Sharia 
Law and anally penetrating your kids. OK, that 
may have been a bit of a skim read, and yes, 
while I'm more than lucky to not share a country 
with Limbaugh et al, here we are in the compa¬ 
ny of cancerous journo-turds like Daily Mail 
columnist Richard Littlejohn, whose not-so- 
latent fascism still gets bought into way too 
much for my liking. 

2. "So Tough! So Cute!" Right on rampage, no 
apologies. 

Why does a band described thus make me so 
angry? It's not even for a gig, or a punk night, 
it's another of these increasingly derivative and 
weird fetishizations of the symbolism and refer¬ 
ents of Riot Grrl for the purposes of a "themed" 
night at some aberration "oh-but -everyone's- 
going" deadbeat bar in East London. So when 
girl bands, supposedly taking queues from 
Messthetics and Delta 5 are sandwiched between 
DJs, and described happily as "So Tough! So 
Cute!" I can't help but make everything all awk¬ 
ward (damn me) and at least raise the question. 
Am I only heightening the awful otherness by 
wondering where the politics and self-criticism 
went? Doesn't it matter anymore? There are 
more and more girls in bands in London and it's 
more than exciting in a way, but seems every¬ 
one's got peculiar ambitions and certainly no 
one appears to want to challenge how they're 
represented and mediated as women, or as a 
band, no one is being ballsy or worried about 
what it means when, as I saw the other week, ten 
helpful boys rush the stage at the sound of a coy. 


"Oh gosh, how do you work this amp!? Tee hee!" 
Also, that familiar sort of ironic sing-song vocal 
delivery of that kind of bored-style talky disaf¬ 
fected stripped down lady punk was so power¬ 
ful to me when I first heard it, precisely because 
of what they were saying, hidden in that seem¬ 
ingly dispassionate tone. The next step seems to 
have been Jto sing in a way that sure sounds like 
that, but make lyrics so happily content/context- 
void so as to neuter the whole shebang. 
Someone swapped a manifesto for guest list 
spots, now the most minor of all threats, made 
frilly enough to warrant a predatory "give us a 
twirl" from the soundman. Fuck. 

Back in the summer we played a few gigs 
with Finally Punk. At one in particular moment 
I felt really weird and I couldn't put my finger 
on it apart from the one-way desire, from audi¬ 
ence to stage, as the band, who seemed at one 
with each other in a really awesome psychic 
way, stripped off to just t-shirts and knickers and 
frolicked about. They are all classically beautiful, 
toned and American, a deadly trio for English 
boys natch, and it was warm, and the band clear¬ 
ly didn't give a fuck, of course, but the hope that 
they, well, that they might, if you catch my drift. 
Well it felt palpable in that sweaty room, in a 
way that unnerved me, and I'm not a prude by 
any stretch. I read this quote: "The idea of 
women empowering themselves by becoming 
sexual objects is backward. It seemed brilliant at 
one point, but it had really bad ramifications. 
Things lose their context so quickly." OK, it's 
Kim Gordon and there's a whole other kettle of 
fish right there, but my worry is just that bar 
room sexism finds its comfiest home when 
everyone, or even just a few people, think the job 
is somehow done because there's girls on stage. 
Still, thank god, for every wah-wah-lalala-con- 
tent-bankrupt band like Pens, there is a band like 
CHAPS from Bristol. (I wish the ratio was actu¬ 
ally that way, but you get my meaning— 
www.myspace.com/ chapsforever) 

A few months ago, we went to a gig (it always 
starts the same way).. Some power pop bands 
played, some great ones, some not so great, 
some that made me question if this was really all 
that punk whilst having me tapping my toes so 
frenetically I forgot the question. After the set of 
one of the touring, female-fronted supports from 
the US, I found myself in conversation with 
some boy-friends, one ventured, still in a dream¬ 
like state, and the other quickly backed up, that 
there is just something "so damn hot" about a 
girl being in a band. After calling them creepy 
weirdos, I began to wonder about where this 
strange "hot" came from, if it was something to 
do with the woman being so precisely in the 
proverbial spotlight that the usually kind of 
covert sexualized gaze is given automatic space 
for the duration of the set at least, and that's 
maybe boner^enducing? At the same show, talk¬ 
ing about this with a girl-friend of mine, she crit¬ 
icized the singer of said band for "playing right 
into their hands" by being sugary and "too inof¬ 
fensive"—even just for being blonde! Now I peg 
that as kind of unhelpful. Personal politics 
shouldn't have to come into every musical 
expression, girl or boy. But then that made me 


think maybe the weird "hot" thing could be 
equally due to the fact that being in a band and 
making music is radical and super fun and that 
a person that does that and looks like she or he's 
having fun is attractive—aka maybe I should 
chill the fuck out. 

There's surely no accounting for taste, but 
I've been trying to prove to some silly people 
that you can, in fact, sing in octaves and notes- 
that-must-be-hit and still be really fucking angry 
and maybe a bit politically articulate. Like, uh, 
haven't they heard the Shangri Las? X? Pfft. 
Trouble is, composure's one thing in theory, but 
the self-actualizing agency of simply holding a 
microphone is all too often mitigated by the all- 
too-real fear that you can see my arse crack, or 
that I probably am too big for this t-shirt and 
these lights aren't flattering or that I look a stu¬ 
pid heifer. (Sure, I talk of manifestos> yet this shit 
doesn't stop mattering, somehow.) So recently 
when we played (with a one-off reunited 
Zounds, ferchrissakes) the other day, I was so 
pumped for it, and then a legion of unbelievably 
moronic street punk types were being grope-y 
bad bastards the whole way through our set, 
making shit comments, trying to grab my boobs, 
getting their dicks out even. I wanted to make a 
point, be funny to diffuse how horrible I felt, 
some polemic, some kind of neat rebuttal to the 
butt display, because, well, no one else was 
responding, but instead I just kept mumbling, 
"Fucking punks don't get it" and huffing. 
Eventually I did slap one of them who made 
more of move to my boobs than I was prepared 
to accept, which was weird because I've never 
done that before, and I don't know if ineffectual 
violence towards a cider-faced teenage stage 
penis who was literally almost unconscious- 
wasted really did much to advance the cause, 
but needs must. Of course they goofed about 
during the other bands sets, but in very different 
ways. I kind of wish they'd gone for the singer of 
Violent Arrest, because that dude would have 
definitely done better than my pissy slap. 

Ultimately, every stage is a fucking minefield 
and, apart from in cases like that, it's not always 
anyone in this room's fault. Still, while we con¬ 
tinue to stand in this proverbial room, it's got to 
be our responsibility to at least recognize, if not 
engage with all this stuff in some way, no? Am I 
going mental? Wah. Clearly I'm working 
through these ideas as they slap me about the 
face, not with much in the way of any deeper 
tools than my own experiences, and maybe it 
shows, so, ugh, sorry. 

3. Threeearworms. 

My friend Lenny took me to the Hunterian 
Museum at the Royal College of Surgeons today, 
which is a massive collection of so many differ¬ 
ent biological oddities—both human and ani¬ 
mal. Pickled walrus tumor, distended sheep's 
gut, gigantism sufferer's skeletons, otter and 
lizard-face biopsies and more pickled fetuses 
than you could shake one of their massively bru¬ 
tal seventeenth century forceps at. There was 
almost definitely some kind of pickled, ear-eat¬ 
ing worm type monster, too. What I'm saying is, 
I forgot to have lunch before hand and very 
nearly brought back my coffee on coming across 













- 1 


ctbsjms 



a frog preserved at the moment of tadpole dis¬ 
patch from weird little chambers in its stomach. 
Rank. I work as a visitor host at the British 
Museum, which is a more general (and deeply 
problematic in too many ways to go into here) 
"treasures of colonialism" type affair, I just look 
at mummified stuff all day, and am now eternal¬ 
ly glad that there's little chance of me coming 
across anything quite as gruesome as the hairpin 
in the spleen I saw today Egads. Anyway, ear- 
worms, the other meaning. 

This month has featured a more than usual 
repeated bashing of "Securicor" by Crass just for 
the best use of dog breed names in punk, and 
because it reminds me of Ralph Simmond's two 
high-concept "name-only" bands, a queercore 
darkwave two piece called Penetrating Gaze (ho 
ho) and primitive d beat noise in the form of ... 
Pissed Alsatian. If anyone can think of anymore 
dog songs beyond that Shellac record called 
Excellent Italian Greyhound, then email me—I'd 
like to make a tape. I'm also obsessed with "Beer 
Can Beach" by Surf Punks, completely ridicu¬ 
lous sparse bass-led, like a jokier more-beach- 
based Devo dealing mostly with Californian 
beach turf wars it seems? I'm no expert, but the 
area of South Wales I grew up in had a similar 
thing, except everyone just pretended to be a 
Surfie and never went near the sea because it's 
fucking freezing. My Beach is great as a novelty 
LP, but bro has definitely got sand in his bloody 
mouth organ. Uncalled for. Either way, I cannot 
wait for summer to blast this on one side of a 
tape and Simpletones*on the other. Thirdly, 
Italian band. Chain Reaction for the song 
"Bloody Ways." The vocals sound like he's being 
flayed and kind of somehow liking it in a dirty 
way, it's hyper-speed fast, easy on the produc¬ 
tion values and heavy on the accent, so great, 
tuneful and ballsy. Also, Hi—totally not metal, 
unlike everyone else in 1985. The rest of the EP 
(Gabiie on Belfagor Records) has songs titled 
stuff like "Your Bloody War" and "Personal 
Autodistruzione" so make an informed choice 
there. I'm listening to this and reading Paulo 
Virno, and it works, ho ho. If yod can get me a 
copy of this, the email is there for a reason. 

4. We finally, after what, six releases, started 
maintaining a proper internet presence, so peo¬ 
ple can actually buy our records should they 
choose to, and whatever guff we've traded for. I 
nearly tore my own hands off trying to make it 
look not shit and then gave up but nevertheless. 
Dire Records has embraced the future. Where's 
my jetpack? (If you want to look or maybe get a 
Sceptres record—fuck off, I know—then god 
willing it should still be there—www.direre- 
cords.com) 

5. Garbled, but eh. So. Deleted from the inter¬ 
net...kind of. Something about planning actions 
not results and taking advice from semi¬ 
strangers. That email-only seems like puritanical 
cold turkey is weird, but probably good. 
Regaining some semblance of inner life and try¬ 
ing to undo this constant partial attention we've 
had bred into us. I've swapped it for reading 
Walter Benjamin under the duvet (the night 
before the seminar, of course) and that phrase "I 
contain multitudes" loops on my frozen cycle 


ride as a hopeful kind of metronome. It's only 
nine miles across the city, but it feels like an 
adventure. I wait in library until its dark—four 
p.m.—mainly just for the way the high rises look 
across the river, impotent as every other finan¬ 
cial capital now, but London still floors me when 
least expected. Home and wheezing. Dusty as 
hell and the glue has dried up to nothing, but I 
found the first LP ever bought. Played each side 
five times. Maybe back to the start or maybe 
reborn, today it's impossible to tell, but for an 
accidental stuck groove mantra—You can't be 
what you were, so you better start living the life 
that you're talking about. 
bryonybeynon@gmail.com 
www.direrecords.com 



■ 

■ 


mmmrn;: 

Mi wm 


Thee olde toppe tenne! Cut in hal£ bargain bin stylee. 

1- The mysterious NZ comp 12" that Graham 
Booth tantalized my ears and brains with, it 
came out sometime in 1980/1981, featured most¬ 
ly girl punk bands, had weird blue, kind of psy¬ 
chedelic cover that sort of resembled a '70s cur¬ 
tain more than a black light painting if ya know 
what I'm saying. At any rate I didn't bother to 
write anything down—band names, who needs 
em. I had an idea of the comp title and record 
label, and assumed I could use the power of the 
computer search tools available in modem life to 
find out more. How wrong I was! There is noth¬ 
in' anywhere about this artifact, the search led 
me to the absolutely insane and amazingcore 
Y2K Axemen blog. The maniac New Zealand 
band have provided a most excellent resource 
and time suck rabbit hole of doom, theaxe- 
men.wordpress.com, into which I suggest you 
throw yourself if you are interested in down¬ 
loading tapes of pre-Shoes This High bands, 
looking at eye damaging art and finding out 
which over the counter medicines have psyche¬ 
delic properties. In short if you need to know 
about New Zealand punk weirdos and the 
things they conceived of during the '80s through 
'til now, that place is a good starting point. I am 
being purposely vague here, but if anyone 
knows what I am talking about in regards to this 
record and can tape it for me, we would be 
friends for life. No lie. 

2- "Peer Pressure was a Santa Cruz band (1980- 
1981) involving Kathy McVey, Rosemary Gilman 
and Patricia Gleseke. Kathy and Rosemary had 
sat in on some Waybacks shows and then decid¬ 
ed to start their own band. They were "driving 
along and there was this girl standing there at 
the stoplight with drumsticks in her pocket, and 
we go 'Hey, you wanna be in a band?'" The girl 
was Patricia. John Peel played their song "I'm 
Adult" so often on his radio show that they 
received fan mail from England." It sounds like 


a less rock Bush Tetras, it's much more shambol¬ 
ic (and thus punker), but with that similar band 
idea. At any rate of course I couldn't find much 
more info about them, beyond an aging Santa 
Cruz punk Facebook page. I like the idea of the 
band forming out of some version of the punk 
nod, one adapted for punk girls... 

3- 1 was going to go see Chain and the Gang, Ian 
Svenonius' new band, which I have yet to hear, 
but alas the excursion was not possible. I have 
been listening to a lot of tapes recently, as I have 
a Walkman rather than an iPod, (due ,to bank 
balance deficiencies rather than luddite tenden¬ 
cies) and I've been listening to these Nation of 
Ulysses tapes I got in the dollar bin at Amoeba. I 
was obsessed with NOU as a kid, and only did¬ 
n't go see them play because I was grounded 
when they played London. The Cupid Car Club 
7" is pretty perfect too, but not so much his later 
stuff. Walking to work listening to NOU makes 
me want to form a band, a secret society. I have 
been attempting to get rid of some of the 
ephemera I carry around with me, the epic piles 
of fanzines and fliers and magazines that clutter 
my room and become the bane of my life when I 
have to move... The gas station jacket, probably 
last worn in '95, complete with mottled Heroin 
patch? Do I need this artifact? Sassiest Boy in 
America? Nostalgia will sink us all. 

4- The Plugz-"Mindless Contentment." The 
punk song that gets stuck in my head the most is 
GG Allin's "1980s RocknRoll." This is not the 
best thing that has ever happened to me. I also 
get these classic numbers rattling around my 
thoughts on a way too frequent basis: "You're so 
Stark / Raving normal" and also, "No hope for 
you / No hope for anyone / No hope for the 
wretched." If you don't know the words to these 
things and they do not reverberate around your 
skull like an endless woeful infomercial, consid¬ 
er yourself blessed. This month however I have 
had the Plugz in my brains, which is quite pleas¬ 
ant. Mindless Contentment! 

5- Nu Sensae live. Holy shit. People mentioned 
Godheadsilo, which also happened when XYX 
played. Bass and drums? Reasonably heavy? 
Pigeon holed! The singer/bassist was sort of 
reminiscent of Linda Manz in Out of the Blue. The 
drummer's style is transformative, and made me 
think of listening t&Is This My World? It's not 
sludge, it's not no wave, it's not AmRep, nor 
KRS, but just heavy interesting music played 
well with an incredible female vocalist. 


whatwewantisfree.blogspot.com 

layla@maximumrocknroll.com 



So last month we ran an interview with a 
member of a Christian band, which prompted 
many intense conversations around here regard¬ 
ing Christianity, punk, and the combination of 












religion and punk, and, really, 'no one got any¬ 
where. There are two stereotypical responses in 
the punk world that I have seen in regards to reli¬ 
gion. Religion sucks, religion is evil, it's man 
made, it shows some sort of weakness, it oppress¬ 
es people, Jesus is the same as the Easter Bunny, 
etc. The other response: Who cares? That shit is 
beneath me—let's get fucked up. I can't say that I 
agree with either side completely, but I do under¬ 
stand the reluctance to engage in the subject any 
more that that, because beginning to examine any 
type of religious tradition, opens up a Pandora's 
Box; it's a lot more complicated than it seems. It's 
my opinion that punks generally oversimplify 
religious traditions (like some of the columnists in 
this magazine have illustrated all too well). I think 
most punks in the US forget that as adults, we 
have a choice and that for many, religion is some¬ 
thing that is intertwined with our upbringing, our 
politics and our culture, all in varying degrees and 
all within different levels of intersectionality. 

It seems that a number of punks have had 
extremely negative experiences in their upbring¬ 
ing regarding religion causing an understandable 
aversion to engaging with any dialogue about it. 

If there is any sort of discussion, most of it is anec¬ 
dotal with very little factual knowledge. Religion 
and spirituality are very personal, without the 
negative or positive experiences attached, there * 
would be fewer disputes, but I am a firm believer 
in knowing what it is you are standing against. 
Punks that are huge combatants of religion should 
probably know what they are talking about. That 
is not to say that none of us do, but if we are so 
strong in our beliefs, what are we afraid of? Is 
knowledge about religious traditions a drug? Are 
you afraid of becoming a believer? 

We have all had experiences with religion in 
both negative and positive ways. I know the pos¬ 
itive experiences are arguable within punk sub¬ 
culture depending on your point of view and 
where you come from. Punks are willing to listen 
to the negative stories because it serves their pur¬ 
pose much more, but any success stories that a 
person may have are dismissed as being delusion¬ 
al or ignorant. How can you argue with someone 
that is happy and doing no real harm? Even help¬ 
ing their community? I guess that is an opinion 
that I formed in the distinction between big "R" 
religion and little "r" religion. 

Institutional religions have a pretty bad track 
record, but the way they are lived out on the street 
is for the most part very different, and tends to 
help the person involved. This might sound nuts, 
but just think about it (Check out: Women as Ritual 
Experts by Sered, and Women in Ochre Robes by 
Khandelwal). Also, that type of attitude can easily 
lend itself to racism and the ethnocentrism that 
has been a justification in "helping"* the "natives" 
for hundreds of years. 

For me, punk is about rejection of what society 
is telling you is right or wrong. We hate religion, 
right? Religion is evil? We are the good guys fight¬ 
ing against the oppression of religion, right? Not 
that I am an Ayn Rand quoting subjectivist 
(gross), but it's pretty funny to think that this anti 
religious stance is mimicking what is being fought 
against. This dichotomous relationship with reli¬ 
gion and punk mimics the dichotomous relation¬ 


ship between good and evil. The way I see it, if 
you are going to reject "Religion" then you should 
be actively trying to abandon the residual sexism, 
classism, racism that goes along with it, but we all 
know that this is not the case. I have heard punks 
that hate religion and disdain God, punks that 
write scathing songs protesting the bloodshed of 
religious wars, who will in the same breath call 
people faggots, try to convince me that 
Skrewdriver is cool, or talk down to women. Then 
they'll tell me that it's "Just the way we talk, 
where I come from," Gimmie a fucking break. 
Grow up... 

Another thing to consider is that sometimes 
religion is so intertwined with a culture that it s 
inextricable to our experiences. Like I said before, 
there is a distinction between "R"eligion and 
"r"eligion, meaning that what we see and hear on 
the news, is not always what's happening on the 
ground. In countries where punk is thriving, like 
Mexico, punks see direct impact from the pres¬ 
ence of a religious tradition that affects their 
everyday lives in an invasive way, (like over¬ 
turned pro-choice fertility legislation in Mexico 
City due to the threat of ex-communication from 
the Catholic church. I suspect the recent legaliza¬ 
tion of gay marriage in Mexico City will fall vic¬ 
tim to this as well). Lots of these punks still go 
through the religious rites of passage that have 
more meaning than their obvious religious over¬ 
tones. To put it plainly, religion is the source of 
many conflicts, but also the source of many events 
that promote community in smaller levels of 
expression. To paraphrase Holy Terrors: Thinking 
About Religion after September 11 by Bruce Lincoln, 
most of the countries in the world are "maximal¬ 
ist." This means that religion, whether you like it 
or not, is the. central domain of the culture, involv¬ 
ing ethical and physical practice. It is the stabilis¬ 
er of culture; religious leaders are the ones who 
maintain the ongoing order and "minimalist" 
countries are seen as intrusive and power hungry. 

Here in the US, we are in the minority in that 
we -are a culture that promotes the choice to 
engage in religious activity or not—we are a reli¬ 
giously "minimalist" country. Our economy 
drives our society and religious/metaphysical 
concerns are restricted to the private sphere. The 
market dictates our cultural preferences, we view 
societies with religious ties as either archaic yet 
quaint, or a threat that is justifiably subject to 
attack. Sound familiar? So what does this mean 
for punks from different places? From the nature 
of the level of unavoidable interaction with reli¬ 
gion within their societies, maybe we could learn 
something from the way they deal with it. With all 
that said, whether you like it or not, Religion is 
part of our culture. It is. Expressions of religious 
tradition in this country are mostly "minimalist," 
but their influence is ever present and seems to be 
harnessing the power of capitalism in its quest to 
be "maximalist." 

What does that mean for us as punks? It means 
Christian "punk." While I consider myself a toler¬ 
ant person, I in no way support Christian punk in 
any way shape or form. Christian "punk" is not 
punk. I know that is a pretty strong claim and 
there will be arguments about the music (if it 
looks like a duck and walks like a duck...), but 


that shit is not punk by the very nature of its 
being. Don't be fooled; the New Testament (pick a 
gospel, any gospel!) distinctly makes proselytiz¬ 
ing part of the Christian mission. In the culture of 
most dominant Protestant sects, embracing tech¬ 
nology and language is encouraged in their quest 
to "save souls." 

The art and lyrics of the aforementioned band 
remind me of George W. Bush speeches in which 
New Testament allusions are made, but are under¬ 
stood differently among Christians and non- 
Christians (check out JP McDaniel PhD. Figures of 
Evil: A Triad of Rhetorical Strategies for Theo-Politics 
and Smith and Hopson PhD. Changing Fortunes). I 
know, I know... this sounds awfully conspiracy 
theorist of me, but I think Christian bands are 
playing their secular punk fans for chumps. They 
are banking on your ignorance of their religion. I 
am not using the band's name to illustrate a point. 
You may not be Christian, but let me tell you that 
numbers count and the more people they have at 
their shows, the more powerful they look and feel. 
Visibility and exposure in areas that are not neces¬ 
sarily their domain over time normalizes particu¬ 
lar behavior and ideas; you are tacitly supporting 
their mission. A big point of contention in conver¬ 
sations about the interview with the singer of this 
Christian band was that he seemed to have some 
good, well thought out ideas. Never underesti¬ 
mate the intelligence of a religious person—these 
ideas have been developing over thousands of 
years, evolving and responding to the world 
around them. No one does this more effectively 
than Protestants. Many people belonging to a reli¬ 
gious tradition study their texts, and know where 
to refer to in order to answer difficult questions 
posed to them by secular people. 
Underestimating this is an example of a failure of 
your intelligence, not theirs. The aforementioned 
interview subject asserts that the bible does not 
say that homosexuality is wrong (which is true), 
and that he is prochoice, so it was argued that he 
must be somewhat open minded. If you kept 
reading, his correlation between crack and abor¬ 
tion is comical and intrinsically racist (yes, it can 
be both). Basing a persons "open mindedness" on 
answers that you find correct and ignoring weird 
correlations or ambiguities is, again, a failure of 
any discerning intelligence. 

My intention here is not to sound like an all¬ 
knowing pretentious asshole, but to point out that 
there is an ulterior motive here. There have been 
some embarrassing liaisons between punk and 
religion, like the Krishna punk movement that 
folded in on itself, but there have also been some 
great examples of punks questioning the role of 
traditions within their culture by way of music, 
like the Taqwacore kids. Ultimately, punk is about 
having no limitations to your means of question- 
' ing. If you choose to adhere to a worldview that 
intrinsically limits you, then it's not punk. From 
the first letter from this guy on his work station¬ 
ary, asserting his intelligence to the seemingly 
well-rounded answers in the interview, pointing 
out his "outsider" status and his smug style of 
confrontation, there is a motive here and I would 
bet that it is not in your best interest, but his. 
mariam@maximumrocknroll.com 










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MRR NEWS COMPILED BY LAYLA GIBBON AND MARIAM BASTANI 


BLACKWATER'S GUNRUNNERS 


By Daniel Schulman from Mother Jones 
Blackwater improperly obtained hundreds of 
weapons intended for use by Afghanistan’s 
already underequipped police force—and 
then falsely claimed to a Senate committee 
that the firearms had been returned when 
many remained unaccounted for. 

According to a months-long investigation 
by the Senate Armed Services Committee that 
unearthed a range of misconduct by the com¬ 
pany’s personnel, contractors working for a 
Blackwater subsidiary named Paravant oper¬ 
ated recklessly and routinely violated military 
regulations. The inquiry also identified a series 
of major vetting lapses by the company, which 
employed at least one contractor it had previ¬ 
ously fired for improper behavior in Iraq and 
others who abused alcohol and drugs, includ¬ 
ing steroids. The investigation paints a grim 
picture of the state of contracting oversight in 
Afghanistan, where, according to committee 
staffers, military officials missed multiple red 
flags calling Paravant’s conduct into ques¬ 
tion—and were even confused about who was 
ultimately responsible for overseeing the com¬ 
pany’s work in the first place. 

On Wednesday the committee will hold a 
hearing on Paravant, which, in the fall of 2008 
inked a subcontract with Raytheon to train 
Afghan National Army troops. The work, worth 
about $20 million over two years, was carried 
out under a 10-year, $11.2 billion contract 
known as Warfighter FOCUS. Paravant, one of 
numerous subsidiaries incorporated by 
Blackwater founder Erik Prince, was created 
solely for the purposes of this subcontract. 
According to Brian McCracken, a former 
Paravant vice president who now works for 
Raytheon, Blackwater and Paravant were 
“one and the same.” He said the subsidiary 
was created to avoid the “baggage” of 
Blackwater’s scandal-tainted brand. 

The committee, chaired by Sen. Carl Levin 
(D-Mich.), first began investigating Paravant 
last summer, following an episode on May 5 
when off-duty Paravant trainers opened fire 
on an on.coming car, killing two Afghan civil¬ 
ians and wounding a third. Similar to fallout 
after Blackwater operators gunned down civil¬ 
ians in Baghdad’s Nisour Square, the episode 
outraged Afghans and, according to the 
Justice Department, “caused diplomatic diffi¬ 


culties” for State Department officials in 
Afghanistan. 

In January, two of the contractors, Justin 
Cannon and Christopher Drotleff, were indict¬ 
ed on second-degree murder and firearms 
violations. (They maintain that they fired in 
self-defense.) Blackwater moved quickly to 
fire the pair, saying they had violated the com¬ 
pany’s policy prohibiting the consumption of 
alcohol. But Daniel Callahan, who initially rep¬ 
resented the contractors, contends that the 
men were scapegoated. He claims Blackwater 
concocted the drinking charge as a pretext to 
fire them. What Blackwater wanted to cover 
up,' he says, was that Cannon, Drotleff, and 
their Paravant colleagues were issued 
weapons they were unauthorized to carry. (A 
spokeswoman for Xe, as Blackwater is how 
known, did not respond to a request for com¬ 
ment.) 

The information obtained by the commit¬ 
tee, which combed through thousands of doc¬ 
uments and conducted dozens of interviews, 
confirms widespread use of unauthorized 
weapons by Blackwater and Paravant person¬ 
nel. And, say committee staffers, the shooting 
episode involving Cannon and Drotleff was 
not the first to involve Paravant contractors. 

Five months earlier, in December 2008, a 
Paravant training team got the “wild idea” to 
take target practice from a speeding vehicle, 
according to the firm’s former program man¬ 
ager, Johnnie Walker. The team’s leader, 
Russell Cannon, mounted the car carrying an 
AK-47 and decided to “ride it like a stage¬ 
coach,” Walker told the committee. When the 
vehicle hit a bump, Cannon’s weapon dis¬ 
charged, striking a colleague in the head and 
seriously wounding him. 

“The reckless disregard for weapons safe¬ 
ty is particularly striking given that he and his 
team were hired for the specific purpose of 
teaching the Afghan National Army how to 
safely use their weapons,” said Levin in a pre¬ 
pared statement. 

The shooting was reported by Raytheon to 
the Army’s Program Executive Office for 
Simulation, Training, and Instrumentation 
(PEO STRI), the military division overseeing 
the training contract. Yet, committee staffers 
say, PEO STRI officials took no steps to inves¬ 
tigate the incident—and were unaware they 


had even received the report until Levin’s 
investigators confronted them with it in 
October. “If the shooting had been investigat¬ 
ed, PEO STRI would have seen that Paravant 
personnel were using weapons improperly 
and unsafely, with inadequate supervision, 
and that they were carrying weapons they 
were not supposed to have,” said Levin. “If 
corrective action had been taken in 
December, the May 2009 shooting could have 
been avoided.” 

This was just one of a series of oversight 
lapses by military officials, who also told the 
committee of routinely seeing Paravant con¬ 
tractors in possession of weapons but never 
checking to see if they had the requisite 
approval to carry them. Meanwhile, 
Blackwater and Paravant personnel were 
apparently well aware they were violating reg¬ 
ulations. In November 2008, for instance, 
Blackwater’s country manager for 
Afghanistan, Ricky Chambers, requested 
Paravant personnel return the weapons they’d 
been issued. The reason? According to docu¬ 
ments reviewed by the committee, the com¬ 
pany was “expecting an investigation into 
Blackwater accountability in Iraq resulting 
from a lawsuit, and fear[ed] it will impact 
Blackwater accountability procedures in 
Afghanistan.” Chambers later recommended 
against approaching the colonel in charge of 
training the Afghan security forces to receive 
formal approval to use weapons authorized 
under a separate contract. The official, 
Chambers said, “may ask too many ques¬ 
tions.” 

Chambers, who declined to be interviewed 
by the committee, citing his 5th Amendment 
right against self-incrimination, eventually 
suggested Paravant contractors obtain 
weapons at a US-operated weapons depot 
outside of Kabul. Known as Bunker 22, the 
facility houses weapons and ammunition for 
the exclusive use of the Afghan National 
Police. According to the committee, 
Blackwater had previously acquired more 
than 500 AK-47s and other weapons from the 
facility, using them to arm contractors working 
for a variety of Blackwater-connected firms. 
The company was able to acquire the 
weapons via an inside connection with an offi¬ 
cial, Chief Warrant Officer Greg Sailer, who 









worked at the facility. Sailer was a one-time 
Navy colleague of Blackwater’s then-armorer, 
JD Stratton. On multiple occasions, Sailer 
facilitated the handover of hundreds of 
weapons to Stratton and other Blackwater 
contractors—in at least two cases, without any 
paper trail documenting the transfer. In anoth¬ 
er case, when Sailer conveyed more than 200 
AK-47s to Blackwater, the contractor who took 
custody of them signed them out under the 
name “Eric Cartman” or “Carjman”—an appar¬ 
ent reference to the South Park character. (A 
Blackwater lawyer told the committee that the 
company had never employed an individual by 
either name.) 

Since June, Blackwater has claimed at least 
twice that the weapons had been returned to 
Bunker 22. As recently as February 20, 
Blackwater told the committee that the com¬ 
pany had “returnfed] all Bunker 22 firearms 
that had been issued to Paravant personnel.” 

But, said Levin, “records obtained by the 
Committee prove the company’s statements to 
be false.” He added, “these are weapons that 
belonged to the Afghan National Police—not 
Blackwater. And it is only on the eve of this 
hearing that the company is giving the majori¬ 
ty of them back to the Afghan government.” 
(This is not the first time Blackwater has been 
accused of possessing weapons it wasn’t sup¬ 
posed to have. In the past, the company has 
come under investigation [7] for illegally smug¬ 


gling assault weapons and silencers into Iraq.) 

It’s bad enough that Blackwater improperly 
obtained hundreds of weapons intended for 
the Afghan police, committee staffers say. 
Worse still, Paravant distributed them to a 
crew of poorly vetted contractors who should 
never have been carrying them at all. Records 
released in connection with the prosecution of 
Cannon and Drotleff indicate that both had 
records of misconduct and violent behavior. 
And the backgrounds of other Paravant 
recruits were equally checkered. 

Take Sebastian Kucharski, an assistant 
team leader for Paravant who had previously 
been fired by Blackwater in Iraq following an 
alcohol-fueled altercation. Kucharski’s name, 
say committee staffers, even appeared on 
Blackwater’s internal “Do Not Hire” list. Yet 
Blackwater brought him back on—only to fire 
him again last May after he got into another 
fight, this time with military personnel. Then 
there’s Karl Newman, a Paravant team leader, 
who was booted from the contract by the army 
after he attempted to “pull rank on a US Army 
Lieutenant.” Paravant’s ex-project manager, 
the aptly named Johnnie Walker, was let go 
after repeatedly violating the company’s no¬ 
drinking policy. The committee’s investigators 
found that other Paravant personnel were ter¬ 
minated for alcohol and drug use, including 
one contractor who was found in possession 
of steroids and hypodermic needles. 


Committee staffers say Blackwater also 
took a cavalier approach to the supervision of 
its contractors. Following the shooting last 
May, Raytheon sent a written warning to 
Paravant for failing to exercise “sufficient com¬ 
mand, control and oversight of its personnel.” 
Paravant responded: “If [Raytheon] believes 
that Paravant needs to supervise all sucon- 
tractor personnel at all times... Paravant will 
need to submit a request for equitable adjust¬ 
ment for the additional personnel, security, and 
other costs of providing such ‘24-7’ supervi¬ 
sion throughout Afghanistan.” In effect, say 
committee staff, Blackwater was seeking addi¬ 
tional compensation for a duty it was already 
contractually obligated to perform—and in the 
process shirking responsibility for the actions 
of its personnel. 

Oversight lapses in Afghanistan and Iraq 
have been well documented. And, according 
to a recent report by the Congressional 
Research Service, the actions of contractors— 
and those of Blackwater personnel in particu¬ 
lar—have potentially undermined US foreign 
policy goals in both theaters. As Levin pointed 
out, “Even one irresponsible act by contractor 
personnel can hurt the mission and put our 
troops in harm’s way.” 

Source URL: http://motherjones.com/poli- 
tics/2010/02/blackwater-paravant-unautho- 
rized-weapons-afghanistan-levin 



On February 9, 2010 Derrick Ponce, Chicago musician, artist 
and a great friend succumbed to cancer. He was born on June 10, 

1969, the son of legendary 
jazz musician, Tommy Ponce, 
and jazz vocalist, Linda 
(Holmes, Ponce) Dellorto. 

Always humble, Rick was not 
Q M| only one of the most kind¬ 
le hearted, generous, laid back, 

and funny punks in Chicago, 
b he was also an amazing gui- 

P tarist. I know that is often said 

about many people, but ask 
anyone, literally anyone, who 
has witnessed him play and 
™ they will tell you that he was a 

illfp shredder with finesse, style 

Y and a l° ve tor playing that can 

' be matched by no other, which 

near the end, is what he 

/ Jm missed most. He was in tons 

> j v» of punk bands over the span 
■f k of his life (Disrobe, Rat 

M , Bastards, Fleabag, Uncle 

Hf * Brown Eye, Subjugated, 

Jflr District 13, Mob Action, 

« ^ Jp Generation Excrement, Ufgc, 

o Bottles Flyin’, Snoopeez 

Tapeworm, to name a few) as 
well as several metal bands 

* 0 J&bm and a few J azz and b,ues 

Ik Mmrnm groups. 


Rick was also a great artist, winning awards for some of his art¬ 
work and created countless illustrations for record covers, shirts 
and band merch. He was a pretty quiet guy, but could expound on 
the history of classic martial arts, horror and sci-fi movies, or dork 
on for hours about music with out any hint of pretension. With 
intelligence and his great sense of humor, Rick had no problem 
expressing his extreme left views while still having a beer, a 
smoke, and a kind word for anyone he met. With the help of his 
family, Rick fought hard against the disease, went through all the 
treatments, and changed what ever he could to battle his illness. 
Chicago lost a great friend, a legendary punk and when he said 
“I’m all about the HARDCORE-PUNK scene and the DIY ethics, 
and will be for life,” he meant it and showed it everyday. We are 
all sad that he is gone, but happy that he is no longer in pain. I 
guess this is one of the few times that I really hope that there is a 
place that we go after we die because, as stated by Useless 
Wooden Toys in their farewell to Rick, “Wherever mad thrashers 
go, it’s gotta be that much radder!” We love you Rick and we miss 
you. 









IN UTAH MISCARRIAGE=CRIMINAL HOMOCIDE 


By Rachel Larris From RH Reality Check 
A bill passed by the Utah House and Senate 
this week, and waiting for the governor’s signa¬ 
ture, will make it a crime for a woman to have a 
miscarriage, and make induced abortion a 
crime in some instances. According Lynn M. 
Paltrow, executive director of National 
Advocates for Pregnant Women, what makes 
Utah’s proposed law unique is that it is specifi¬ 
cally designed to be punitive toward pregnant 
women, not those who might assist or cause an 
illegal abortion or unintended miscarriage. 

The bill passed by legislators amends Utah’s 
criminal statute to allow the state to charge a 
woman with criminal homicide for inducing a 
miscarriage or obtaining an illegal abortion. The 
basis for the law was a recent case in which a 
17-year-old girl, who was seven months preg¬ 
nant, paid a man $150 to beat her in an attempt 
to cause a miscarriage. Although the girl gave 
birth to a baby later given up for adoption, she 
was initially charged with attempted murder. 
However the charges were dropped because, 
at the time, under Utah state law a woman 
could not be prosecuted for attempting to 
arrange an abortion, lawful or unlawful. 

The bill passed by the Utah legislature would 
change that. While the bill does not affect legal¬ 
ly obtained abortions, it criminalizes any 
actions taken by women to induce a miscar¬ 
riage or abortion outside of a doctor’s care, 
with penalties including up to life in prison. 
“What is really radical and different about this 
statute is that all of the other states’ feticide 
laws are directed to third party attackers,” 
Paltrow explained. “[Other states’ feticide laws] 
were passed in response to a pregnant woman 
who has been beaten up by a husband or 
boyfriend. Utah’s law is directed to the woman 
herself and that’s what makes it different and 
dangerous.” 

In addition to criminalizing an intentional 
attempt to induce a miscarriage or abortion, the 
bill also creates a standard that could make 
women legally responsible for miscarriages 
caused by “reckless” behavior. Using the legal 
standard of “reckless behavior” all a district 
attorney needs to show is that a woman 
behaved in a manner that is thought to cause 
miscarriage, even if she didn’t intend to lose 
the pregnancy. Drink too much alcohol and 
have a miscarriage? Under the new law such 
actions could be cause for prosecution. “This 

BELARUSIAN PUNK BAND 
PARTICIPATING IN 

by Szarapow 

Belarusian-language sources report that 
around 40 members of the Sayuz Palyakaw 
(which represents the country’s ethnic Polish 
minority and is not recognized by the authori¬ 
ties) were arrested on February 15 for partici¬ 
pation in an illegal rally in Hrodna on February 
10, 2010 which protested the treatment of the 
Polish minority and commemorated the 70th 
anniversary of deportation of the Polish 
inhabitants of Western Belarus to Siberia after 
it was occupied by the Soviet Army at the 
start of WWII. Apparently the activists were on 
their way to the town of Valozhin where a 


creates a law that makes any pregnant woman 
who has a miscarriage potentially criminally 
liable for murder,” says Missy Bird, executive 
director of Planned Parenthood Action Fund of 
Utah. Bird says there are no exemptions in the 
bill for victims of domestic violence or for those 
who are substance abusers. The standard is so 
broad, Bird says, “there nothing in the bill to 
exempt a woman for not wearing her seatbelt 
who got into a car accident.” 

Such a standard could even make falling 
down stairs a prosecutable event, such as the 
recent case in Iowa where a pregnant woman 
who fell down the stairs at her home was 
arrested under the suspicion she was trying to 
terminate her pregnancy. “This statute and the 
standards chosen leave a large number of 
pregnant women vulnerable to arrest even 
though they have no intention of ending a preg¬ 
nancy,” Paltrow said. “Whether or not the legis¬ 
lature intended this bill to become a tool for 
policing and punishing all pregnant women, if 
enacted this law would permit prosecution of a 
pregnant woman who stayed with her abusive 
husband because she was unable to leave. Not 
leaving would, under the ‘reckless’ standard, 
constitute conduct that consciously disregard¬ 
ed a substantial risk,” Paltrow explained. 

While many states have fetal homicide laws 
most apply only in the third trimester. Utah’s bill 
would apply throughout the entirety of a 
woman’s pregnancy. Even first trimester mis¬ 
carriages could become the basis for a murder 
trial. Bird said she is also concerned that the 
law will drive pregnant women with substance 
abuse problems “underground;” afraid to seek 
treatment lest they have a miscarriage and be 
charged for murder. She said it directly revers¬ 
es the attempts made, though a bill passed in 
2008, to encourage pregnant women to seek 
treatment for addiction. Paltrow added that the 
commonly thought belief that pregnant women 
who use drugs are engaging in behavior that is 
likely to cause a stillbirth or a miscarriage is 
wrong. “Science now makes clear that drug use 
by pregnant women does not create unique 
risks for pregnant women, although it is likely 
that among those targeted for prosecutions by 
this statute will be women who go to term 
under drug usage,” she said. 

The bill does exempt from prosecution fetal 
deaths due to failure to follow medical advice, 
accept treatment or refuse a cesarean section. 

MEMBERS ARRESTED FOR 
AN ILLEGAL RALLY 

court case related to the grievances of the 
local Polish community was to be heard 
today. 

Those arrested include the organization’s 
Head Council chairman Andrei Pachobut and 
its press secretary lhar Bantsar who were 
both sentenced to five days in jail for their 
part in the action. Right after being sentenced 
Bantsar declared a hunger strike demanding 
to be released. 

Pachobut used to be a bass player in the 
anarchist punk band DEVIATION which his 
brother Stas fronts. Bantsar is a singer with 
the Hrodna streetpunk band MISTER X. 


Bird said this exemption was likely because of 
a 2004 case where a woman who was pregnant 
with twins was later charged with criminal 
homicide after one of the babies was stillborn, 
which, the state deemed due to her refusal to 
have a cesarean section. Planned Parenthood 
and the ACLU of Utah worked together to 
“amend the hell out of the bill,” Bird said. One 
of their few accomplishments was at least 
dropping the legal standard of “negligence” 
from the bill, a much lower standard than “reck¬ 
lessness.” 

Bird was shaken with emotion after the 
Senate vote. “I broke down and cried,” she 
admitted. “I normally never let these kind of 
[legislative] battles get to me.” “What really 
sucks is that we had three supposed allies in 
the Senate, three [Democratic] women, who 
voted fQr the bill,” Bird said, adding she didn’t 
yet know why the three senators switched 
votes. Marina Lowe is legislative and policy 
counsel for the ACLU of Utah. She worked in 
tandem with Bird on trying to derail or at least 
mitigate the worst aspects of the bill. Lowe 
says at this point she doesn’t know if there is a 
potential constitutional challenge to the law 
once it is signed by the governor. But she 
points to cases like the one in Iowa as exactly 
the kind of situation that might arise once this 
law is put into place. 

Paltrow says this bill puts a lie to the idea 
that the pro-life movement cares about women. 
“For all these years the anti-choice movement 
has said ‘we want to outlaw abortion, not put 
women in jail, but what this law says is ‘no, we 
really want to put women in jail.’“ 


FAIR USE STATEMENT: 

This Magazine contains copyrighted mate¬ 
rial the use of which has not always been 
specifically authorized by the copyright 
owner. We are making such material avail¬ 
able in our efforts to advance understand¬ 
ing of environmental, political, economic 
and social justice issues, etc. We believe 
this constitutes a ‘fair use’ of any such 
copyrighted material as provided for in 
section 107 of the US Copyright Law. In 
accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 
107, the material is distributed without any 
profit to those who have expressed prior 
interest in recieving the included informa¬ 
tion for research and educational purpos¬ 
es. 








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mrr asks you: 


WHAt ’ slTHElSCOOP 


This month’s question: What’s the best punk band or genre to fuck to? 
(asked over valentine’s Day weekend, duh.) 





Maggie, 25, San Francisco 

Metal, specfically the band Sleep. Plus 
their name is fitting. Wait, people still read 
Maximum RocknrolFl 



Reece, 23, Lahaina HI 

The Offspring are fun to fuck to. 



Sean, 23, Oakland 

The Descendents song “Pervert.” 


Amelia, 25, Oakland 

That’s easy. American Splits. 


Jen, 23, Oakland 

You say that you’re my friend. But I know 
that you’re one of them. Or smooth listening. 




Sean, 22, Oakland 

The first Damned record. 


Moses, 33, San Francisco 

The Modem Lovers. 


Lee, 43, nowhere 

The Damned or Discharge. So I’m show¬ 
ing my age. 


Greg, 23, San Francisco 

Neu! All their songs are ten minutes long, 
so you got plenty of time. 





















I’m sitting in the secret clubhouse/compound of the Spits. In the middle of ail the taxidermy and lava lamps 
is the band, wearing mirrored cop shades and passing a huge, smelly joint between them. Erin Wood (bass/ 
vocals) and Lance Phelps (drums) are playing a heated game of table hockey and Sean Wood (guitar, 
vocals) is engrossed in what looks like a losing battle with Tekken 3. There is a Mexican girl who is very, 
pretty, except for her lazy eye, who sits and smiles nervously at me. I’m told her name is Angel, that she 
doesn’t speak very good English, and that she is the newest Spits keyboardist. 

Interview by Max / Photos by Canderson. 

MRR: You guys wanna do this interview? 

Erin: You wanna hit this? 

MRR: Pm good, man thanks. 

Erin: Don’t be a little puss. 

Sean: You wanna do this interview, you gotta hit the ganj spliff. 
Lance: Or we could just sick the dog on ya. 

MRR: Yeah, what the hell. OK, let’s get baked. 

.Erin: Ok, now we can talk. 

MRR: So congratulations on your new album. It rules. It’s 
great to hear new material from you guys. 

Erin: Neat. 

Lance: Sweet. 

Sean: Total. 

Lance: We’re working on another one right now. It’s probably 
gonna be pretty good. We’re thinking of calling it The Spits. 

Sean:.or maybe Rip Hella Phat. 

Erin: or we might call it Why Did the Cyborg Cross the Road? 

MRR: You guys have a lot of songs about robots. What’s 
up? 

Lance: In our world, robots represent absolute evil and anti¬ 
fun. We totally rage against the machines. 

Erin: Wow, there’s another album title! 

MRR: So you guys are all from the same small town of 
Allegan, Ml. How did you end up starting the band? 

Lance: We were at a party out in a trailer in the Allegan forest, 
where we met this old Indian dude. We ended up taking acid 
with this dude and he told us it was our destiny to go west 
and start a punk rock revolution. Which we did by moving to 
Seattle and playing open mic nights until we were eventually 
discovered by Glen Danzig. The rest, as they say, is history. 









MRR: Wow, that sounds like total bullshit. 

Erin: That’s cuz it is. What happened was, we were visited from 
the future by a mah who claimed to be Sean’s son. He came 
back to warn us about Skynet, and how we were the only ones 
who could save... 

MRR: Dude, that’s the Terminator! 

Erin: That’s right! The terminators are robots encased in living 
flesh, who were sent back to stop the band from forming, and.. 

MRR: Ok, never mind. Ummm, so, Angel, how is it being 
like #15 in a long line of keyboardists? How did you get this 
gig? Do you ever fear for your life? Do you think you will be 
able to break the keyboard curse? 

Angel: Uhhh.... I love the Spits! 

MRR. Ok...let’s just make this easy. If you could be any 
famous person from history, who would you be? 

Sean: Eddie Van Halen. 

Erin: A sleestak from Land of the Lost. 

Lance: Either Long Dong Silver, or Abraham Lincoln. 

Erin: Oh, wait, I wanna be Nikola Tesla! 

Sean: I’m sticking with Eddie. 

Lance: Then Erin should be Alex and I could be David Lee Roth, 
and Angel could be Michael Anthony. 

Angel: ^QUE? 

MRR: So besides the new full-length album, you also 
released a four-song single on Slovenly. Any comments on 
that. 

Erin: We recorded the cover song “PAIN” (from the TV show 
CHIPS, the punk episode) in a barn in France with Lo Spider who 
records a lot of our European friends bands like the Magnetix. 
The single is basically just a bunch of songs that didn’t make it 
on the album. 

MRR: You have been seen touring around in an RV lately. 
Can you share any highlights from the recent Mutant tour? 

Lance: There were a lot. Doing blow in the basement of the 
biker party in Milwaukee, Erin getting pissed at the crowd in 
Madison and calling them all pussies after every song, foraging 
for firewood all night at a campground in Montana. 

Erin: The New York show at the Cakeshop, where the crowd 
almost killed all of us, and themselves. 

Lance: Yeah, there was blood and pieces of skin stuck to my 
bass drum at the end of that one. 

Erin: Playing Kalamazoo is always a highlight. 

Sean: How about low points? Like when we stayed at the 
photographer from Spin’s loft in Brooklyn and Lance got wasted 
and ended up pissing in the dude’s Craftsmen toolbox in the 
middle of the night? 







Lance: Or when Sean got all pissed and pulled over in that park in 

Cleveland so he could sleep, and everyone went to opposite ends MRR: Wow. So is there a message behind the Spits? 

of the park to get away from each other, and the keyboard player Sean: Have fun. DUH! 

(not Angel) was sitting at a picnic table crying. Erin: The message is: “Come to our shows, buy our records, 

Erin: Sleeping in Walmart parking lots and having to climb on top shirts, and toys. Give us drugs.” 
of the RV to put a tarp over the leaky roof. 

Sean: Getting AIDS. MRR: So what are the Spits plans for 2010? 

Erin: Stop Skynet! 

MRR: It all sounds very exciting. Is it still fun to be in a band Sean: Rip up the Streets! 

after all this time? You guys have been around for a long Lance: Get Osama bin Laden to design the new album cover, 
time. 

Sean: It keeps getting more and more fun. We have more friends MRR: Alright guys, I guess I should probably get going, 
and fans all over now. People take care of us wherever we go. Lance: Be careful, there are strange things ‘round here in these 

Erin: We are like famous bullfighters. Women throw flowers down woods at night. 

at us from their windows when we drive into town. Erin: Don’t you wanna check out our skate ramp? 

Lance: I wasjusttalking aboutthis with Governor Schwarttznegger, Sean: Yeah, dude. Get the fuck outta here, 
and he said “I can’t believe how big you guys are getting.” We had 
a good laugh about it. He really is a lovely man. 









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Just read; 


MRR: Who is Face the Rail? 

Max: I play arums. 

; Jake: Uh, guitar. 

Andrew: Singing. 

Randy: On da bass. 

MRR; You guys have new LP out on Tank 
Crimes/City Records, talk about it. 

Max: We recorded it about a year ago and . 

• it just came out a month ago. Willy from ' 
Wo Options was originally going to put it 
out but ended up moving to Germany, which 
meant I had to finance it myself. Wo hard 
feelings, but it was a huge delay. I was at 
a Hazmat show talking to Scotty from Tank 
Grimes about helping me screen the record 
sleeves at I-lonolith and he offered to split 
release the records with me. So that’s what 

; happened. ^ 

MRR; Where was it recorded? 

Max: It was recorded by Greg Wilkinson at 

• Earhammer. studios in Oakland. 

' Jake: Yeah Greg does some pretty awesome 
stuff. 

Randy: Yeah! Greg’s the shit. 

Jake: Yeah. 

Max: He has the touch; I recommend every 
band recording with him. 

MRR; I’ve listened to the record and seen - 
you guys many times, and you definitely 
jump around within music genres, from 
surf guitar to wanky guitar solos, 
but you come back to a real early ’ 80 s 
California sound. Is there a specific 
sound you guys are going for? 

Jake: I think we made it like a surf/punk 
- band and then we kind of developed that and 
included a DC influence, like the Revolution 
. Summer era. It’s definitely going in that 
direction, I feel. 


So the Bay Area is full of wacky 
crazy hands* Some good, some not 
so good, some hest left forgotten* 
Then there's Face the Rail, a 
quartet of twenty somethings, 
aren't they all, that have been 
rocking out and skating pools 
for the past three years* They 
have a new record out that 
has nothing really to do with 
skateboarding hut that's okay* 
r You can skate to it or pursue 
pther leisurely activities, such 
as drinking at your favorite 
pool with your bros or hitting up 
the local skate park on Sunday* 
Just kidding* No, I'm not* There 
is some really progressive and 
emotional work on, this piece o 
vinyl* What? Yeah I kind of wrote 
that correctly* Obviously there's 
more than meets the eye to these 
young lads* Take a gander at yonder 
interview for the full story* Oh, for 
some reason they want me to mention 
that they were in lots of other bands like 
Second Opinion, Shanghai Surprise, EcolU 
No. Dice, what the fuckt you don't care* Those 
bands aren't even around anymore and Face the Rail 
is all about the future, or some progressive hippy shit like that* 
punk* 

interview.'by. Jason Gellis 


i\„ •J/’ £ -* ] . J 


C v-:\; .. ‘' 


MRR; Revolution Summer like the Faith 
or more like Rites of Spring? 

Jake: Like Rites of Spring, kind of. 

Max: With cool guitar solos. Which I like. 
Jake: It’s getting emotional, more 

emotional. 

Max: You grow up. 

MRR: Really? Is Face the Rail growing 
up? You guys are all in your 
early twenties. 

Max: It just morphed that way because when 
we started we were mainly listening to 
those early Posh Loy EPs, you know? And I 
think Jake was already there on guitar but 
the rest of us had to progress to catch up. 
The rest of us were not where we wanted to 
be musically. 

Randy: Right. 

Max: So we definitely started emulating 
early hardcore but really started expanding 
into some slower more melodic stuff. 

Jake: Yeah, at first we wanted to be more 
like a skate rock band and we kind of still 
are but we haven’t been writing songs about 
skateboarding lately. 

Max: We’re definitely keeping away from 
skate references. Obviously the name Face 
the Rail is about skateboarding. Mo more 
skate songs for now. 

MRR: There’s a lot of different genres 
creeping into your music and punk in 
general. Do you think now it’s more 
acceptable to include a wide range 
of genres in punk? I mean, first you 
guys say skate punk, then surf, then 
DC hardcore, which includes several 
varied styles. 


'Jake: I think that the different genres that 
started creeping in the ’80s, now it’s easier 
to look at them with outside eyes, you know? 
There’s room to experiment and bring those 
in without having to worry about what 
. specific genre or subculture they belong 
to. 

• Randy: We’re trying to develop bur own 
. sound and write our own songs. I like lots 

of music but I’m not specifically trying to 
copy someone, just do my own thing with the 
music I like listening to. 

Jake: Totally. Ly being more open to 
different styles, we can move in way more 
directions 

Max: I think that now, as opposed to 30 
years ago, it’s more accepted to meld a lot 
. of different styles in music, which is a way 
: to move forward. 

MRR: If it sounds cool, you go with it. 

Everyone: Yes. 

MRR: Listening to the record, there 
are some huge jumps in songwriting and . 
playing styles, some very drastic. But 
this creates a strange soundscape that 
seems to really work for you guys. 

Max: I like to think that the record works 
as a whole. 

Jake: In the end it really melds together 
but you can easily tell when our influences 
pop up. 

MRR: How has the Bay Area responded to 
you guys? 

Jake: It all depends on what shows we end 
up on. 

Max: Sometimes we have a great crowd; other 

• times no one shows up. Hit or miss. 

Randy: We’ve played some great shows. 












Max: We played at Balazo and half the 
people were into it and the other half made 
fun of us. 

Jake: A lot of people hear us and are not open 
to something that sounds different than 
straight forward hardcore. They probably 
think we’re really wussy and emotional, but 
we do come from a background in hardcore. 
For people that know us, they’re more open. 
Max: We loaded out once and some dude 
was like, "you guys suck." Whatever, he’s 
probably lame anyways. 

MRR: How was the record release? 

Jake: We played with Deadfall, who were one 
of the scene leaders along with other bands 
in the early ’GGs, so it was great. 

Max: Awesome show! I remember seeing them 
when I was fifteen and they were amazing 
and here they are playing with us now and 
are still great guys that are down for us. 
Randy: It’s good to see a lot *of those bands 
are still chill dudes and don’t have rock 
star attitudes even though they’ve made a 
name for themselves. 

Jake: I mean, ocotty put out the record. 

MRR: The Bay Area has a great scene with 
a diverse set of bands. There’s hardcore, 
crust, metal, ’77 punk, garage, etc. The 
shows seem to really reflect that with 
a good line up of different bands, yet 
here you guys are playing a little of it 
all. 

Max: It was a natural progression, bands 
can get along while exemplifying different 
styles. 

Randy: I get sick .of going to shows where 
everyone is playing in the same style of 
music. 

Max: Over and over again. It gets boring. 

MRR: Your lyrics stay away from politics 
and deal more with skating and girl 
problems. Bush is out and Obama is in. 
Are politics no longer important to you 
guys? 

Andrew: Me personally? 

MRR: You write the lyrics. 

Andrew: I didn’t care about bush and I 
don’t care too much about politics. What am 
I going to say that’s new? I’d rather write 
about things that are directly affecting 
my everyday life, being frustrated, being 
stuck in a lame situation. Girls breaking 
my heart. Mot the government fucking me 
over. 1 know they suck. We all know they’re 
not on* our side. Yes it’s real, but I’ve got 
other shit to worry about. 

Max: Politics and punk go hand in hand, but 
after awhile I want to forget about things 
I can’t change. I can’t change politician’s 
minds and I’m not going to grab a gun and 
start shooting people. 

Andrew: bush was to the past eight years of 
hardcore what Reagan was to the ’BCs. 

Jake: That led to the resurgence of hardcore 
with a new generation playing, but I think 
looking for inspiration elsewhere is good 
too. 

MRR: You think Obama will make for 
another good four years of music? 

Jake: Yeah, I think everyone thought he 
would change the world. He’s been presented 
as this transformative politician, but 
hasn’t done anything. 

Max: Game as bush, same as Clinton, they’re 
all business minded. 

Andrew: Yeah, they’re just trying to make 
money. 



MRR: Thirty years on, does punk mean 
anything? I mean, you’re not supposed to 
listen to anyone over 30, so why listen? 
Should you listen to punk? 

Jake: Mo. 

Max: I don’t know, what does it mean to be 
punk? What does it mean not to be? It was so 
much easier to define at the beginning, but 
it’s been mixed and melded so much. It’s a 
label that needs to be done away with. There 
are still parts that I identify with, but - 
sometimes I feel like I don’t identify. 

MRR: At the beginning you work for the 
punk ideal but in the end it works for 
you. I guess you take what you want from 
it. 

Max: Punk had a huge positive influence on 
me but at the same time it can box you in. 
Andrew: It can easily lead to a tribal 
mentality. 

Randy: A lot of punks think everyone else 
is assholes, but they can be just as bad. 

Max: It’s like any other group of people. 
There are bigots and racists and assholes 
in punk. 

Randy: Punk’s cool when you’re thirteen. 
Andrew: There is no punk. 

MRR: Veil if there is no punk, then who 
is Face the Rail? 

Max: Four weird dudes playing music in a 
basement. 

MRR: Good answer. So upcoming releases. ■. 
I know you just recorded a new 7 M but 
pretend I don’t know that. 

Jake: Face the Rail has one new record . 
recorded. A one sided 12". 

Max: I hate 10"s. 

Jake: Maybe two sided. * 

MRR: Tours? 

Jake: Uh, we need shows. I don’t know about ■ 
tour but summer is right around the corner 

so... 

MRR: Summer is like ten months away. 

Jake: I think ahead. 

Max: We have plans. 

MRR: What are they? 

Max: Uh, I don’t know but we want to go to . 
Portland in the spring. They have skate \ 
parks and we like to skate. ; 


Andrew: We get boners for skate parks. 

Max: Let’s shut up about skating before we 
look stupid. 

Jake: Too late. 

Randy: Umm 
Andrew: Mext. 

MRR: So I’ve asked you a little about the 
past 30 years of punk. What about the 
next 30? What about the future? 

Max: The future. 

Randy: Oh fuck! 

Max: The future is now. 

MRR: Vhat does that mean? 

Max: What? 

Randy: I wish I hated technology but I 
don’t. 

Max: It makes everything easier. 

Randy: Listening to DRI on my iPod instead 
of talking to cute girls. 

Jake: I like that. 

Andrew:' What, listening to DRI on your 
iPod? 

Jake: Mo, listening to Devo on my iPod. 

MRR: I actually meant punk music. Can 
punk last another 30 years? Or even 
rock and roll? 

Jake: It's hard to say. The only real 
constant music is classical. Rock is only 
the past 50 years. I guess traditional rock 
guitar structures will last. It's music for 
the people. 

MRR: There is a lack of pretension at the 
heart of rock. Grab a guitar and start a 
band. You don’t need to study violin for 
ten years. 

Max: There will always be some pissed off 
kid in the suburbs. Whether its punk or 
rock or anything, it seems that electronic 
music offers the last options for doing 
something new. 

Jake: We should get a Theremin. 

Randy: OOooGGOOoooo 0000 Goooo GOG 
Jake: I want to play an electromagnetic 
field. 

Max: The future! 

MRR: Any last words? 

Max: Keep on keepin’ on. Don’t let yourself 
get boxed in. 

Randy: Are those really your last words? 
Max: I guess I should think of something 
better. 

Jake: I’ve got nothing. 

Andrew: Give up. 









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MOB RULES 


Britain is like small pan full of rocks and stones, and when shaken, 
Leeds’ Mob Rules come to the top. Having acquired the status of The 
Best Hardcore Group In The Country™, they’ve gone relatively quiet of 
late whilst they Work on new material. Their two awesome 7”s — The 
Donor and their split with Crowd Control — are brutal outbursts that 
sound like From Enslavement to Obliteration-era Napalm Death with 
Unsane’s rhythm section. Their newer songs bring a feel in the vein of 
Flag’s “Swinging Man” to the table. Where there was previously little 
action higher up on the fret board, there’s now a wealth of sprawling 
post-free-jazz guitar noise. 

At one point in the interview, bassist Paul Steere asks if I think the kind 
of music a group listens to has anything to do with the kind of music they 
make. There are a number of different answers to that question which 
would all be correct. But the fact that Mob Rules’ personnel have highly 


omnivorous musical tastes, and are most knowledgeable about the wider 
world of sonic disharmony, is undoubtedly one reason why they manage 
to channel so much more on an enormous feeling of intensity than most 
other hardcore groups that are out there. I doubt many of the groups on 
Dead & Gone have any Ramleh or Peter Brotzmann in their collections. 

I feel some further descriptive text is necessary to try and conjure up 
a more specific sense of what they’re like, for the benefit of Maximum 
Rocknroll readers whose grasp of the many possible variations on punk 
rock makes the Inuit culture’s breakdown of what different types of snow 
there are seem like a relatively narrow codification system... Nah, just 
“negative” will do. 

Foreword and interview by Nicholas Jones/Post Scriptum by Conor 

Rickford / Photos by Matt WBPS 







Campbell, Thomas (vocals): How have you 
been since our last interview? 

MRR: Do you know what the first question 
is? It’s been eighteen months since we 
last had a chat. How’s the career trajectory 
panning out? 

Paul Steere (bass): Well, you’ll notice that we’re 
in a much nicer van than when you last spoke to 
us, which we also own, so that’s indicative of at 
least some level of success. 

MRR: So, you’ve earned enough from 
playing to have bought a van. Excellent. 
Paul: We no longer rent panel vans. We own our 
own luxurious one. That’s a level of success. 
Conor: Other than that, I’d say our star is on the 
wane a little bit. We haven’t been able to play 
shows in certain towns now for a while. Like 
Nottingham. 

MRR: Why? 

Conor: We must have blotted our copybook at 
some point. I don’t know, we haven’t played 
there that much and we haven’t played as many 
shows really. 

Paul: In Wales. 

Conor: Wales we can’t get booked in. 

Campbell: What happened in Nottingham, do 
you think? 

Conor: I don’t'know. 

Campbell: Is t because of the guy from Jesus 
of Spazzareth ? 

Conor: It may have been. 

Paul: Yeah. 

MRR: Are you sure it isn’t just that no one’s 
had an available night when you’ve been 
around? 

Paul: That’s most likely. 

Conor: It’s possible we’ve read too much into 
that. Not that we need any more shows than 
we’ve got. 

Campbell: I don’t really like leaving my bedroom. 

I find it hard enough to go to the kitchen, so I’d 
find it quite hard to go to Cardiff or Newport. 
Conor: Or aijy other third world region. 
Campbell: Afiywhere which is more than a five- 
minute walk (from my kitchen I don’t really like. 
MRR: You’vje been playing new material that 
sounds quile different recently. It could be 
the difference between Damaged and My 
War for yo4 

Conor: Well; you’ve got to have a Damaged 
first, haven’t you? 

Campbell: And we didn’t have that. 

Paul: You’ve got to be exceptionally popular 
first for that to really work, otherwise you just 
go from being a moderately popular band to a 
band that no one likes. 

Campbell: Yeah, I don’t think we’ve ever‘sold in 
excess of 100,000 records. If we did, I wouldn’t 
be wearing this jacket. I would be wearing a 
gold jacket. 

MRR: How many records have you sold? 

Campbell: 30,000. 

Conor: Just under 30,000. Actually, 300 of the 
*7", that comp’s almost sold out. It’s not a polite 
question. 

Campbell: It’s like asking your mother how old 
she is. If she’s got a problem with telling you, 
it’s obviously very old — and you should leave 
it at that. 

Conor: We’ve sold 700 records, and my mum’s 
about 58. 

MRR: I never realized you were so precious. 

Campbell: A question for Nick — how old’s your 


mum? 

MRR: You’ll have to ask her that. How old’s 
yours? 

Campbell: I don’t know. 

Ben Hirst (guitar): Mine’s 49. 

Conor: She was but a child when she had you. 
Ben: She was 26. Fuck you. 

Conor: Would you say it’s indicative of something 
happening at Maximum Rocknroll—a decline 
in standards possibly—that they have to get 
interviews from bands that have only sold 700 
records? 

MRR: Well, on the subject of gender and 
age — 

Paul: Which is what we’re always doing. 

MRR: — what demographic do you envision 
Mob Rules’ music being ideally suited to? 

Paul: I think disinterest knows no gender. So, 

I think we appeal to disinterested people of all 
genders. 

Campbell: Women. Women should be our main 
audience, but they’re not. 

Conor: I don’t think we’ve got a real audience 
anymgre. It’s mainly just people who are waiting 
for something else to happen, but sometimes 
we’re the last thing that happens. 

Paul: I don’t think bands tend to attract 
“audiences” any more, I think we’re on the 
wrong scale to be thinking about audiences. 
Campbell: And also, the main reason we get to 
play gigs is we’re the only band in the UK who 
has a complete backline. 

Paul: As far as we understand, it isn’t possible for 
a show south of Birmingham to happen without 
us playing because there’s no equipment south 
of Birmingham. So, here we are in Brighton 
— about as far away as we can get from our 
hometown and stay in the British Isles. And 
we’ve got ail the equipment for the show. 

MRR: Have you ever played with anyone 
who has a substantial backline? 

Conor: American touring bands. 

Paul: Yes, American touring bands — the bands 
that people moan about. 

MRR: And do they let you use their 
backlines? 

Paul: Yes. 

Conor: If we ask. 

MRR: The drummer from Sic Alps put 
Stroidy straight about the English cultural 
standard of always having the touring band 
supply the drum kit. 

Conor: Well, I’ve got sympathy for them, but 
at the same time... There are shit bands that 
wouldn’t get any shows if they didn’t bring a 
drum kit with them. I think they’d get a lot less 
shows. And that’s what’s more important — 
their drum kit — rather than their music. 
Campbell: Because there’s an absence of 
equipment in the UK. 

MRR: What’s your least favorite region of 
the UK to play? 

Campbell: Well, unfortunately, we haven’t 
played all of the UK. So we can only comment 
on places we have played. We haven’t played 
Cornwall or Devon. Or anywhere in Scotland. I, 
personally, didn’t have a particularly good time 
in Cardiff. 

Paul: I think it’s convenient for the Welsh to 
think that we don’t like them. 

MRR: Conor, you’re suspiciously quiet. 
What’s your take on Wales? 

Conor: Wales. Well, I’ve heard it described 


by people who live in Wales as, well — that, 
basically, everything that happens in the UK 
tends to happen in Wales about five years after 
the rest of the country. So, for instance, now 
they’re going through this big revival of bands 
that kind of sound like — uh, who is it? —Right 
Brigade. So, we had that in the rest of the UK 
about five years ago, so why now? 

Paul: In My Eyes hoodies at shows. 

Conor: Yeah. I mean, that’s not on, is it? And 
I think the biggest problem is that they love 
each other’s bands to this degree where they 
don’t even know what their bands sound like 
anymore. It’s more just like “Holy shit, it’s a 
band from Wales! I wonder what they sound 
like. Actually, that doesn’t matter — they’re 
Welsh, so they must be good.” So, Wales has a 
lot of bad things. 

Campbell: Nick Griffin. 

Conor: Nick Griffin lives in Wales. 

Campbell: I just thought I’d point out an actual 
bad thing. 

Conor: And even he doesn’t wear an In My 
Eyes hoodie at a gig. 

Paul: But he has got really strange e yes. 

Conor: So in his eyes if you’ve got wob : eyes, 
then Wales is good. But for the record, I think 
we’ll give it a miss. Like, we don’t ever need to 
go back there for any circumstances, so... 

MRR: Campbell’s on the verge of saying 
something... 

Campbell: I don’t think I am. I’m just thinking 
about... We’re playing this gig this evening in 
Brighton and there’s this really out-of-date kind 
of punk kitsch. In Brighton it’s just gross. They 
play loads of crap. 

Paul: Well, they’re exclusively playing Le Tigre 
from what I can hear. 

Campbell: And No Doubt. 

Conor: So, it’s a bit like — for anyone who’s 
lived in Leeds — Pussywhipped. 

MRR: That means attendance tonight is 
going to be poor. 

Campbell: It’s like Pussywhipped except with 
more decorative Barbie dolls. 

MRR: Within moments of being inside, I was 

speaking to a man with Iona b rown h ai r, and - - 

breasts. Pussywhipped also has a man with 
long brown hair and breasts on the team, 
and I’ve not met any others. 

Paul: I’m sure we’ll go down fabulously. 

Conor: Well, you were asking us about our 2 

target audience. And I don’t know what it is, but 
I know it’s not them*. And they’re going to know 
it’s not them as well. 

Campbell: All I’m going to say is, we seem to a 

be a band who polarize people. But mainly, in 
a sense, the people don’t like us. And we quite 
like our own material. So, in that sense, we 
polarize people. I hear it and think “Wow, this 
music these guys are playing is brilliant. I love 
it.” But, I don’t think everyone else really likes 
us. And that’s fine. 

Conor: Our currency is depleting a little bit, isn’t 
it. Because I think as you try and do something 
slightly more outside of the box, or outside of 
what you’ve done before, no longer will people 
be able to say things like “That was really fast” 
as a positive appraisal of a band. 

Paul: A lot of people come up to me after shows 
and go “That was great. It was really fast.” And 
then over the last few months people have been 
coming up to be and going “That was really 


























great. I really liked those bits when you were 
fast.” As we slow down, it seems to be having 
an adverse effect on our popularity. 

MRR: That’s why I deployed the My War 
analogy. 

Paul: I suppose so, but \ mean — 

Campbell: It would be conceited of .us to - 
Paul: — to put us on that level. But that is a 
standard cultural touchstone, I suppose. But we 
don’t place ourselves on that level. 

MRR: Well, iwe’ve got that straight. You 
don’t place yourself on the level of Black 
Flag. Although people might have thought 
you did considering how fast you were. But 
actually not. Say you were going to go on a 
tour of the west coast of the US. Are there 
any punk pilgrimages you would like to 
make, Campbell? 

Campbell: Yeah, yeah. If we were going to say 
not the west coast, but just the north of America, 
the United States of America, then currently, I’d 
want to go to Cleveland, Ohio. I would want to 
go to that bar^called Now, That’s Class. I’d like 
to go there. 

MRR: Why? 

Campbell: Bepause that’s the only place that’s 
had consisterftly good bands for the last fifteen 
years outside? of Japan. Punk. So, I’d want to 
go there. 

MRR: Who are the bands? 

Campbell: I don’t know. Well, I’m just going to 
namedrop really obvious bands. 

Conor: Well, like...? 

Campbell: Yeah, like Cider, Integrity, Puncture 
Wound, HIOOs... 

Paul: Real household names. 

Campbell: To be honest I wouldn’t want to 
make that many pilgrimages, I’d just go record 
shopping. And eat burritos. Actually, I’d just go 
to loads of supermarkets. I’d go to the Whole 
Foods salad bar and do what I did when I lived 
in Chicago and not realize that, unlike in the UK 
where salad?bars are measured by the size of 
the box, in America they’re measured by weight. 
So I spent 13*9.00 at the Whole Foods salad 
bar. So I wafs like “Wow, these chicken wings, 
wow, I’m goihg to get 25.” But, you know, it was 
a bad idea, /fnd obviously I couldn’t put the food 
back. So I’d probably just do that if we went to 
America. I’d spend more time doing what I did 
the last time I was in America and explaining to 
people that I’m not Irish. Which I had to do a lot 
when I was in Chicago. 

MRR: Do you have Irish heritage? 

Campbell: Arguably. 

Paul: What would Nick Griffin say? 

Campbell: Yeah. 

Paul: I went to a Catholic.school, so I’ve been 
on enough actual pilgrimages to not need to go 
on any more. 

MRR: Conor, people have been commenting 
that you’ve gotten pretty buff recently. Do 
you think that as you get tougher, Mob 
* Rules’ music will get weaker? 

Conor: As I spend less time practising 
drumming? I’ve put on a lot of...weight recently. 
That’s one thing that’s changed in the last 
eighteen months. I weigh two stone more now 
than I did then. So, I dread to think what might 
happen in another eighteen months. But I lost 
all my gains, all my weight gains, when I went to 
Vietnam. It’s hard to eat all the time in a world 
where you can’t understand anything that’s 
around you, and you’ve got a very finite diet. 


Paul: But you can buy crows in a Coke can. 
Conor: Crows in a Coke can, yeah. 

Campbell: Bears in jars. Baby bears drowned in 
jars of alcohol. 

Conor: Like all Russian bears. I don’t think I’ve 
gotten to a stage where you could ever call me 
“buff’ by any description. But, I think, has the 
music got weaker? Yeah, I think. I feel a bit 
weaker. I feel weaker in myself, but maybe it’s 
because I’m not exerting myself as much any 
more, so maybe I just don’t feel like I’m getting 
it done, but I actually am. Although saying that, 
I’ve broken mote cymbals in the last eighteen 
months than I’ve broken in my whole career 
of playkig drums to date. So that’s a financial 
burden, and also a pick-me-up when I think, 
“Ooh, maybe I am stronger than I thought.” So 
there you go: breaking things that cost me loads 
of money. 

MRR: An awesome way to get your self¬ 
esteem up. 

Paul: That’s what being in a band is all about. 
Conor: Do you feel heavier, or were you heavier 
then? 

MRR: Heavier then. I’ve started swimming 
since then. 

Campbell: You see, that’s the worst. That’s 
not the sort of exercise you should be doing. I 
think swimming’s fine. But you want to get into 
anything else. 

Conor: Is this because you can’t swim? 

[Cue a load of faux-jeering from all, and a lot of 
non-faux protesting from Campbell] 

Campbell: Of course I can swim. This is Great 
Britain, not Pathetic Britain. I can swim every 
stroke apart from butterfly. Which is the best 
stroke. 

Conor: That’s two strokes isn’t it, then? 

Campbell: Why? 

Conor: Oh, no, three. Breaststroke, front-crawl 
and back... flip? 

MRR: When was the last time you went 
swimming? 

Campbell: ...About a month ago. * 

MRR: Why did you go swimming? 

Campbell: Because I do like going swimming, 
but more for recreation than for exercise. Unless^ 
you’re really good at it. 

Conor: It’s more like chess. 

Campbell: I consider it to be a pub sport. 

MRR: I don’t get in the casual swim area and 
lie there floating on my back. 

Campbell: It annoys me when I go swimming 
because there’s always some people in either 
the slow or medium lanes who walk. Rather 
than swim. 

MRR: Maybe they’re disabled. 

Campbell: No, they’re not. They’re old people 
and obese people. And basically, they should 
be in the slow lane and not the middle lane. 
Because if I’m trying to warm up before I get in 
the fast lane, it’s not on, is it? 

MRR: There is a politics to it. 

Campbell: There’s no politics, there’s just- 
Conor: A hierarchy of needs. 

Campbell: No, there’s a level of over¬ 
assessment of one’s abilities which takes place 
in swim baths. 

MRR: I hear you’ve gotten quite into 
wresting. 

Campbell: No. 

Conor: Yes, you have. 

MRR: I heard you were training a - 

Campbell: No. No, no, no, no, no, no — 


MRR: I heard that you were mentoring a 
wrestler? 

Campbell: No, this is a rumor. This is a malicious 
rumor. It’s not true. I think that Ultimate Wresting 
is reasonably interesting. But then again, I get 
interested in most things, too. 

Conor: Ultimate Fighting is kind of like the 
wresting of the new generation, isn’t it? Every 
one of us probably watched Tatanka or Mr. 
Perfect in the WWF. Whereas I don’t know much 
about Ultimate Fighting, other than it looks like 
something you can see on any British street on 
any given night, really. I’m not sure what my 
feelings are about it. 

Campbell: But, no. If I had the necessary skills 
myself, I would be interested in training a 
wrestler. Budding wrestlers, do not contact me. 
Conor: Not yet. 

MRR: Conor, you’ve got a question for 
yourself. 

Conor: Yes. My question is not just for the female 
readers of Maximum Rocknroll or the readers 
who’ll be more orientated towards males. But, 
when does a craggy-faced man cease to be 
just an ugly thing and become an attractive 
thing? For instance, Gordon Ramsey —I don’t 
know if they’ve heard of him in America—Lou 
Reed, Viggo Mortensen. I mean, what is wrong 
with these men? Where do these faces appear 
from? 

Paul: It’s elemental. It’s all to do with power. 
They look like they’re carved out of—they look 
like they’re natural. They look like they’re a 
force of nature. 

Conor: That’s three different trajectories though, 
isn’t it? Because Gordon Ramsey... 

MRR: Gordon Brown and Gordon Ramsey 
look pretty similar, actually. 

Campbell: Apart from one of them is great and 
one of them is pathetic. 

Conor: I’m wondering about the different 
trajectories of someone like Gordon Ramsey 
and Lou Reed, who has'obviously had a slightly 
different upbringing. How do they end up being 
roughly the same, in terms of how craggy their 
face is? 

MRR: I f you could nmk& JLd^ 

and say, if you were the most charismatic, 
successful man — but you’ve got to have a 
craggy face — Conor, would you do it? 

Conor: Well, that’s a win-win there, because it’s 
charisma that means the craggy face isn’t ugly, 

I think. 

MRR: Well, that’s the answer to your 
question. 

Conor: Yeah, that is the answer. 

Paul: Did we pass the test? 

Conor: But, when will my face become craggy, if 
ever? How do I gain this? 

MRR: I think this is a very self-aware line of 
questioning — you’ve got a face that doesn’t 
show any sign of cragginess. 

Conor: Not yet. 

Campbell: Nick, who’s got the craggiest face in 
Mob Rules? 

MRR: Do you really want me to answer that 
question? Turn the lights on, then... No, 
none of you have craggy faces on the scale 
that we’re talking about. 

Conor: But, if you ask us in another eighteen 
months... that’s why we’re not as popular 
anymore. Because people were hoping for us 
to develop craggy faces. 

Campbell: But, maybe you could make the 











point that maybe Conor’s increased weight has 
decreased our popularity. Because now we’re 
too heavy a band physically, and it detracts 
from our heaviness musically. And these things 
are best when they’re mutually distinct. 

Conor: I like to see small men being heavy. I 
don’t like to see heavy men being small. 

MRR: It’s like the big guy in Instrument 
talking about why he likes Fugazi — because 
of the controlled energy. 

Campbell: He can’t control his energy. 

Conor: He can’t control his estrogen. 

MRR: What were you listening to in the van 
on the way down here? 

Campbell: It will look like we’re namedropping. 
Awesome music. 

MRR: Okay. 

Conor: We were listening to stuff off my iPod, 
which has a little radio transmitter. And Paul had 
to hold it at a very certain angle so he looked 
like a T-Rex. 

Campbell: I can probably remember, in order. 
We listened to the Antidote 7”, we listened to 
the first Saint Vitus 12”, we listened to, then... 

MRR: Vinyl, in a car? 

Campbell: Uh, no. Digitalized versions of the 
aforementioned.records. 

ra n d p“ un £ 

Railroad, Captain Beyond, Melvins’ Bullhead, 
Moss Icon... 

Conor: Sonic Youth. It’s been a very long ride. 
Campbell: Hold That Tiger , the best Sonic Youth 
record. I think we can agree on that. 

Ben: A short blast of Metallica. 

Campbell: .. .And Justice For All, by the way. 
Conor: Honky Chateau by Elton John. 
Campbell: It’s very annoying. 

Conor: Something from The Big Pink by — 

[At this point, a group of around 35 people 
dressed in black jumpsuits, carrying batons and 
rather flimsy looking riot shields jog past the 
van] 

Campbell: There’s some sort of anti-fascist 
march happening around us. 

Paul: If they fuck with us, I’ll give them a taste 
of anarchy. 

Campbell: We saw a black bloc warm-up just 
before we got into the van and it looked like a 
cross between the Scouts and what our North 
American readers might know as cross-fit. I was 
quite impressed. In English, it’s an anaerobic 
class. It was paradigm busting. 

Paul: Do you think that what a band listens to 
really has anything to do with the kind of music 
they play? 

MRR: Are you asking me that? 

Paul: I’m just thinking out loud. 

Campbell: I think accessibility to music of a high 
quality, no matter what it’s level of obscurity 
hitherto, is now so high that I don’t think it has 
as much impact as it would have done. 

Paul: It seems that exposure to good music 
does not engender good taste. These days. 
Campbell: I also think that this decade has been 
significantly better than the ’90s for hardcore. 
And I think that is mainly down to increased 
accessibility to the classic records of the ’80s. 
Which, when I was a young teenager were nigh 
on impossible to find in the UK. 

Paul: I think it’s safe to say that in the ’90s you 
had hardcore as a formula going out as far 
as it can go. So now you’ve essentially got it 
collapsing back in onto itself, collapsing back 
into the good stuff. In ten years time it’ll be 


largely non-existent, I would imagine. 

Conor: By 2020... 

Paul: By 2020, you’ll have to just implant a chip 
behind your eye and it’ll just be like listening to 
every band in the world. 

Campbell: ...at the same time. 

Paul: Did you see that thing on BBC4, A Vision 

Of The Future ? . 

Campbell: You should watch it on iPlayer. 

Paul: I recommend watching it on iPlayer. I 
can’t tell if it’s a joke or not, or if it’s serious. But 
it’s this Japanese guy telling us about what’s 
going to happen in the future. Specifically in 
2020. 2020 seems to be his standard date. 
He says stuff in it like “In 2020, people aren’t 
going to know what the word ‘traffic jam’ means 
because cars will be automated by microchips 
and so therefore there’ll no longer be any traffic 
jams.” But 2020 is eleven years away. So, 
that’s like saying “When I’m 38 I won’t know 
what the word ‘traffic jam’ means”. It’s entirely 
implausible, that’s ludicrous. And he’s got a real 
boner for talking about putting microchips in 
things. Literally anything. In two separate points 
he says “You’ll have a microchip in your clothes 
which will be like having a doctor inside your 
clothes.” 

Campbell: And he says “So that if you have a 
heart attack, it will know that you’re having a 
heart attack before you know. And will have 
rung an ambulance.” 

Paul: It’ll upload it to an ambulance where it’ll 
wait in a queue, like everything else in the world. 
And the other thing he says is that aspirins will 
have microchips in them. And it will be like 
swallowing an entire medical laboratory. Why 
would that be beneficial? 

MRR: I’m guessing there’s a reason this 
guy was granted a programme, and it’s 
probably not because of the accuracy of his 
predictions. 

Campbell: I think it’s because the year 2020 has 
amazing symmetry. Which gives it - 
Paul: It sounds deeply futuristic in the Way that 
the year 2001 once sounded deeply futuristic, 
but we’ve rocketed past that. 

Campbell: And it may also have numerological 
significance. 

Paul: 2012. 

MRR: The Olympics. 

Paul: The end of the world. 

Campbell: I want to say about the Olympics... 
MRR: No swimming? 

Campbell: No, of course I like swimming as a 
sport, really. I retract all earlier criticisms. It’s 
one of the most fantastic physical pursuits, or 
forms of male or female expression. 

MRR: Unlike hardcore. 

Paul: On that subject we’ve had a complete 
duality tonight. That’s the Mob Rules 
experience. 

Conor: When it starts off, we sound very 
antagonistic. But by the end we just want to 
cater to every - 
Paul: We’re extremely pliable. 

MRR: On that note, I want to eat this burrito I 
have on my lap, and I don’t want this to take 
forever to transcribe. 

Campbell: Can I ask you Nick, what year in the 
1980s do you think is the best year for music? 

MRR: I’m not going to say because it wouldn’t 
be a meaningful answer. I wouldn’t mean it. 
Well, let’s see... Meat Puppets II came out 
in 1983 and that’s probably my desert island 


disc, so I’ll say that. 

Conor: I thought you liked Up On The Sun 
better? 

MRR: No, I think — 

Conor: I’ve been getting really into the later 
stuff, like Huevos and Mirage. 

MRR: It’s not as good. Flatly. 

Conor: But it is still good. 

MRR: It’s good in it’s way. If we start talking 
about The Fall, we could be here all day but 
This Nation’s Saving Grace is a really good 
one. Have you heard that one? 

Paul: I have. 

MRR: It’s a slow-burner and a total banger. 
And that’s ’86. And what year did Perfect 
Prescription come out? 

Campbell: Well you see, ’86, ’86... Age of 
Quarrel, Master of Puppets and Reign in Blood. 
It’s the most brutal year in the history of music. 

MRR: Does the fact that it has a six in it and 
you just mentioned three records have any 
significance? 

Campbell: 2020. 

MRR: I would say that every passing year 
that there are still records coming out that I 
like, I’m surprised. Because of the music I’ve 
liked that’s come out this decad|, it’s barely 
likely that any of it couldn’t havejcome out in 
a previous decade. I think we’r^ in terminal 
rehash. 

Campbell: There’s loads of good} records still 
coming out, you’ve just got to be happy to 
search further a field. Like the Paihtbox albums 
that have come out this decade are as good 
as... 

MRR: Are they the group with the woman 
who dances like this [does impression]? 
Paul: Haha, no. 

MRR: The one in that grunge documentary. 

Paul: Oh, Hammerbox you’re thinking of. 

MRR: Candlebox? 

Paul: You got any more questions for us, Nick? 

MRR: Campbell, have any of your students 
seen you play and commented? 

Campbell: To juy knowledge, none of my 
students have seen me play. 

Post Scriptum by Conor Rickford 

i. As it happens, mere days after the above took 
place, we were asked to play in the fair city of 
Nottingham but the above has been preserved 
for reasons of verity. 

ii. It is also important to note that we have a long¬ 
standing, mutual respect for our interviewer, 
Nicholas Jones. Although many are often wont 
to blur the interviewer/inquisitor boundary, 
Nicholas employs nothing but tact and charm to 
sluice away the layers of bullshit and conceit that 
“artists” bury themselves within. His publication, 
“Niche Homo”, is, in my opinion, the yardstick 
by which all micro-culture publications must be 
judged against. 

iii. Having subsequently spoken with Thomas 
Campbell regarding hiscommentson swimming, 
he has retracted many of the derogatory 
statements. For those of you who enjoy what he 
calls the “unclad sport”, he respects your Choice 
and wishes you all the best with your pursuit. 

iv. Ben Hirst is a reserved man. Our words 
are mere house-bricks when set against his 
cyclopean presence. 














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not just entertai 

the legacy of 




ss 

The members oj the band have been very generous, providing me vivid ephemera, which I made available to the nubhc at- 
Intro and interviezi' by David Ensminger 


who were part of the early scene of Montrose are important because 
that is where it all started for me. Montrose was the Greenwich Village 
of Texas. The beatnik, jazz, pot smoking, LSD movement was alive and 
well. 

Kelly and Ronnie lived in Bellaire during those years and Kelly went 
to University of Houston. Kelly was part of the Chenevert Street Gang 
and worked at “Freaky Foods” (aka Richwood Food Market.) where my 
brothers, sisters, and I would get our 2 a.m. munching food; Everyone 
went to Love Street Light Circus and downtown in the warehouse 
district and hung out at Market Square. 

The MC5 actually played at a club named Of Our Own on University 
and Kirby Drive in the heart of West University. We hung out with 
them after the show. They were pretty wild and crazy guys and what a 
band. It was the only time I’ve ever seen two guitar players throw their 
guitars to each other mid-song without missing a beat. 

We saw the 13th Floor Elevators, New York Dolls at Liberty Hall, the 
Kinks, Springsteen, the Who, the Stones, Genesis with Peter Gabriel. 
1 was at the Dallas Pop Festival in 1969, which was nuts. I think my 
greatest influence was the Kinks. Eve always loved songs that tell 
a story, and Ray Davies was a master at that. I also liked the Kinks 
because Ray and Dave Davies used to fight a lot and stayed together. 
There was a great band in Montrose called the Montrose Marching 
Band that was so good at covering Kinks songs that they got to play 


MRR: John Paul, tell me about your roots in the Texas 
punk scene. 

John Paul: We start with me being kicked out of Boys Harbor in 
LaPorte, Texas in 1969 for sneaking off and refusing to be disciplined. 

I had been on the boxing team and told the director that I would hit 
him back if he thought he would give me “pops.” The director was 
an ex-heavyweight boxer from Germany, and he could’ve have really 
kicked my butt. The form of discipline was to lean over his desk, and 
he would hit you as hard as he could with a paddle made of wood. 
Y ’know, a custom job that had holes in it so it would make a wooshing 
sound before it hit your butt. It was not unusual to draw blood during 
disciplinary sessions there. I had spent most of my youth incarcerated 
but not because I was a juvenile delinquent. My family lived all over 
the world, including Iran, and my father walked away from eight kids. 

I was sent to Mount Sacred Heart Military Academy in San Antonio 
in 1960.1 thought, “What the heck did I do to deserve this?” I was also 
sent to St. Mary’s Orphanage in Galveston, Texas in 1961, the year of 
Hurricane Carla, and through Boy’s Harbor in La Porte, Texas until I 
was 17.1 used to go to Christmas for a few days with a family l never 
met. I used to get socks and pajamas at Christmas. I slopped hogs 
every morning for nearly five years. After all of that, and the stoiy 
could be much longer, I ended up in a one room garage apartment in 
Montrose with my very eccentric brother Tinker where I was exposed 
to all things nefarious and cool. The backgrounds of the individuals 









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^ in front of Ray Davies at their hotel, 
r Our band was a little like that. The 

.-/r^ musical influences of the day were a big part of our 
■ * effort. The first incarnation of Really Red was a band 
named A Fine Madness. We were a bunch of young 
kids figuring out how to play and did some jamming 
and started learning some songs. I think we played a 
gig or two and cut our teeth back in those days. We then 
became China. I don’t know how that happened, but it 
was probably Ronnie who thought that up. He has always 
been somewhat of a Marxist, and I went along with a lot 
of that stuff because I really didn’t care. I guess I thought it 
was cool at the time. 


MRR: I understand that you, Ronnie, and 
Kelly lived in a series of old houses in the 
heart of Montrose. I know even Gary Floyd 
was experiencing some seedy moments in the 
neighborhood during the early 1970s. 


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Sss Ewry Thrilling S*c8«i?:’ 


Ronnie, his girlfriend Bonnie, and 
were at the Houston Music Hall performance 
of Bob Marley. We were some of the only 
white people there, but it was a fantastic 
show with everyone dancing at the end. Back 
then codeine was in. Robitussin. There were 
Robitussin bottles all over the place after that 
show. It was a cultural thing, and I wasn’t used 
to that way of getting high. Montrose was where 
the action was. 





Up- 


John Paul: Montrose was my home. We had fabulous and 
Is crazy times at our houses known as Crocker Street, Yupon 

*v V. House, and West Main. I walked those streets every day and 

* night. I’d walk to Birraporetti’s and write lyrics while drinking 

.: Irish whiskeys and get free happy hour pizza. Montrose was 

my stomping grounds. My brothers and sisters went to 
school there, and I went to Lamar for one year. I was 
living in the middle of the whole thing—staying up all 
night, walking to Richwood food Market also known as Freaky Foods 
(Kelly worked there) on the corner of Richmond and Dunlavy. Ronnie 
and my brother Tinker were pretty tight and both very radical in their 
political views. I remember Tinker and Ronnie both to be people who 
hated the establishment and were more inclined to be like the Weather 
Underground and into Che Guevera and Socialist/Marxist ideologies. 
Ronnie has been like that as long as I’ve known him. 1 had been raised 
in a very conservative and disciplined style, which meant getting up 
at 5:30, slopping hogs, being bussed to public school, coming back to 
the Harbor, doing farm chores, homework, go to bed, get up, and do it 
over again day after day, year after year. I guess 1 grew up much more 
conservative. I guess I actually lived the gulag life, and I was a farmboy 
thrust into a hippie world. 



i 


When I began my journey in music, it was with an old bass with gut 
strings. I never took a lesson. I put on records and learned how to 
tune and figure out chords. I actually wanted to be a lead guitar player, 
but everyone seemed to want to play guitar, and the egos were so big. 
I decided to become a bass player. My mentors were John Entwistle 
and Chris Squire because their styles were flamboyant. It was when 
Bob Marley happened on the scene that my bass tone and attitude 
changed. Where I thought I would be a lead guitar player on bass, I 
then decided I’d rather alter people’s heartbeat with my bass tones, 
like the Wailers did with me. I still liked playing fast but more in the 
lower register from then on. 


ID #i® 


The greatest punk bee 
in America! S.F/s 


QEA 0 


KENNEDVS 

■I 


s of 



REALLY RED —— 
M.D.C.[Stains| and FREE MONEY 


SUNDAY AUGUSTS 


t/ 



As friends, we would hang out in Montrose and downtown at Love 
Street. You had everything from Liberty Hall, the Banditos, Urban 
Animals, parties, and craziness. It was the post free love Hippie thing. 
SDS (Students for a Democratic Society), the Chicago 7, Abbie Hoffman, 
and all those radicals were running around trying to tear down the 
government. It’s funny that people like Bill Ayers and Jeff Jones of the 
Weather Underground are buddies of Obama. A lot of the socialist, 
Maoist, Marxist characters of the time are actually czars in the Obama 
administration. Van Jones and Jeff Jones of the Weather Underground 
are getting millions of our tax dollars by their association with Obama. 
Jeff Jones, who heads the Apollo Project, actually wrote the stimulus 
bill, according to Harry Reid. It looks like we’re headed down the road 
to socialism, especially when you count Mao as one of your mentors. 
He only killed 72 million people in peacetime. 



~r-'< 


Anyhow, Ronnie, Kelly, and I started off living together on West 
Main and Mandell where we started our band. We all had jobs. I 
started marking steel at the docks with Ronnie. I ended up working 
for that company for nearly seven years, clearing shipments through 
US Customs with hair down my back. I ended up cutting my hair when 
I got arrested for driving my Triumph 650 motorcycle with my license 



























suspended and spent fourteen hours in the 
Houston Police Department drunk tank. The 
♦ judge (Billy Reagan) told me the next day I 
t would go to jail for three days unless I cut my 

* ' hair. I saw a guy get beat unconscious right in 

front of me. I thought he was going to die. It 
■ ^ was a scary moment in my life, and I realized 
at that time that jail was not going to be a place 
'4 I would visit again and I haven’t (thank God). 
3? Prison isn’t my style. I’d already spent most of 
my life incarcerated, so that angle was not a 
^ ^ good idea. I still suggest you angry young people 

* realize that what you are angry about might just 
be your own reluctance to be self-responsible. 

You want to be part of some real change? Root 
out corruption and fraud and quit thinking the 
government will take care of you. They only want 
power over you and your money. Be a stand-up 
person and develop strong ideals. Stop whining that 
the world won’t take care of you. It’s just the way it 
is. Under a socialist system, you’ll never know true 
prosperity unless you are one of the “chosen few.” 


MRR: Tell us about China, the ^ 4 

cover band that included most of Really 
Red and featured songs by Dave Clark Five 
and Roxy Music? This ended up being a link 
to meeting Bob, the drummer? 

John Paul: China was an experiment in doing songs we 
liked. We were varied in our approach with Roxy Music 
but also King Crimson, Kinks, and other copy songs. We 
might have done Petula Clark’s “Downtown,” which (I 
think) was on our first record and might have been popular 
for its hardcore treatment—the way we did it [ed: the song 
was released posthumously on a single]. I think we got tired 
of not doing our own material. We jammed a lot and started 
coming up with riffs. Yes, we had different drummers, but 
for some reason they were all not very reliable or had really 
great ideas about their own self worth. Bob walked in very 
different than the others. He had great technical ability, and 
we simply miked him to make his sound bigger. 


1115^ 


V MRR: By the time the Ramones ventured 
■ through at Liberty Hall, did you feel like this 
' t was a national kind of musical movement, or 
did it seem just like another rock ’n’ roll band 
; * with a twist? 

John Paul: The Ramones were the first punk band. The great 
thing I liked about the Ramones is that they were uniquely 
American, New York, cool, and a very tight four piece band. They 
had the same setup with bass drums and guitar as Really Red. 
I actually think we were a Texas version of the Ramones except 
that Ronnie’s lyrical style was more like Johnny Rotten and anti¬ 
establishment ranting, but that was his style and his contribution to 
the band. He always had a lot to say. Anyone who know Ronnie knows 
that he can talk for hours, and you’ll sit there and listen. Regarding 
the music of our time, Ronnie was one of the most knowledgeable 
people in the country. How he is now? I wouldn’t know as we don’t 
communicate anymore. That’s another story. We went in different 
directions, and I’m very happy with the direction I went in. I still play 
guitar and occasionally sit in with some friends. I tell people that I 
am a professional doodler. I can play along with any band and an 
Ipod. 

. Houston's 


MRR: Ronnie once told me, “We learned a lot 
from Legionnaire’s Disease’s (local notorious 
punk band) attitude and approach to self- i 

promotion.” Do you feel this way as well? • J: & 

John Paul: Sure, I thought they broke new ground when . * 

it came to outrageous behavior on stage and they deserve 
their place in Houston’s music history. I was not into the fact that 
they were into hard drugs and needles though. I wasn’t as much into 
their out of control stuff, but I was probably in the minority on that. 
Jerry Anomie was a nice guy, and I liked him, but was not that into 
the band as much as Ronnie. But they were an important part of the 
scene. The Butthole Surfers were just kids at that time and used to 
open for us at different gigs. 

We definitely learned about self-promotion. Really Red was 
probably one of the early bands that realized that we could promote 
our own records by sending out 45s to college radio stations. We 
would get play lists back and design our tours around those schools 
that played our records. In today’s digital world it is very easy to cut 
your own CD’s. Back then it was a studio. We went from 8 tracks to 16 
tracks to 32 tracks etc. We had a great time—we were all friends for 
many years, and some of us stay in contact once in a while. 


MRR: Bob explained that the band played to the edge of 
its musical limits, which gave the band a unique sound. 
Who were the members pushing the sound into new 
areas? 




















hW* 


4T. John Paul: Actually, a good question. 

Ronnie brought attitude, lots of opinion, 
-, and lyrics. Since we were a three -piece musically, we 

jammed until we came up with riffs. Either Kelly or I 
would come up with a line, and we would play with it 
for hours. It was typical for us to be finished with a song 
prior to lyrics being added, so there was plenty of ti me 
to mess around. Kelly was an extremely good guitar 
player, reminiscent of Pete Townsend’s style. Bob was a 
very accurate drummer. He and I would concentrate on 
our beats so we had a tight mix. Bass and drums laid out 
the rhythm, and Kelly would come in on top and make it 
musical. Nobody better for my money. 1 wish we had video 
of some of our better shows. 


Bottom line is I relished all of it: the good, the 
bad, and the ugly. Nobody in Really Red was 
in charge. We all played hard, had our share 
of arguments, but when it came time to be on 
stage we were in agreement: do it the best you 
can, and take it all the way. We were a band that 
typically played for over an hour non-stop, and 
people liked that. 1 never really thought of us 
as punk. We were rockers, and we liked to play 
loud and fast. Eveiyone else called us punk. I 
think the most appropriate term for our style 
was cow punk. 


Because Really Red was all four of us, the band V- **' * * A; - 
could not exist without all four of us. The band V _ 

died in 1984. Maybe that’s fitting now that the real ‘ . 

Big Brother is watching over all of us. It turns out that - 

the Marxists and Communists (aka Progressives of 
both parties) in our own government are destroying f 
the American way of life. I was told once by a judge ^ • ***** 

that 1 would go to jail for not cutting my hair by the 9 ^ 
time he left his chambers. I went ahead and cut that ‘ 
hair but swore that I would never let “the establishment” xft. 

control my life. At that time it was the police and the % v t * 

_ ^ ... - corporations that were coming down on me, but the 

* . *. • , ™j||p / greed and thirst for power of this government is truly >*; 

- - : ^ jH|J r massive. The present thirst for power among “elitists” 

if. v* jJjP. from music to politics crosses all boundaries. The leftists ! v .." - 

’ ; ^ \ in power right now were probably supported by the ***. 4 ; 

> j “punks” out of their hatred for Bush, but in return they are 

' ^jjpr ' 1 f having their rights and freedoms taken away by Obama. 

I jV The days of big government and victim entitlement are upon 

v us, and those jealous of successful people are choking the life out 

j * pC of this country because they think they ‘deserve” what other people 

have. The plan of redistribution will make us a Third World country. I 
I think we had diverse tastes, but we also came together on a lot of stand up against that. Government should leave me alone to make it 

musical styles. We would listen to George Jones, Merle Haggard, Waylon or break it. I don’t want what you have, and I want you to stay out of my 

& Willie, David Alan Coe, and others. We also listened to the Ramones, way. Quit taxing the hell out of me and get off my back. 

Clash (I was never a Mick Jones fan though), Sex Pistols, and many 
other hardcore bands. We listened to English bands too numerous to 
mention. We listened to reggae. I always liked Van Morrison, Stevie 
Ray, Boz Scaggs, old stuff like Tony Bennett, Sinatra and many, many 
others. Ronnie would make some fantastic compilation tapes (yes 
tapes, remember those?) for our tours, so we had a great DJ in him. 

We all made them, but Ronnie probably had the greatest dufc to his 
record store collection and the hours he spent within the music record 
business. 


MRR: For me, one of the great themes of the band was 
puncturing the myth of rock, epitomized in tunes like 
“Entertainment” and “Prostitution.” But did you agree 
with the band not opening for the Clash, or was that, in 
hindsight, a lost opportunity? 


John Paul: We did stand up for our ideals. However, it would have 
been awesome playing Hoffheinz Pavillion in Houston with the Clash. 
We were given a great opportunity for exposure and, in hindsight, I 
should’ve argued that we should play the gig for our own benefit and 
screw the Clash’s ego. We were also offered a pittance to play, but 
y’know, it would’ve been historic now that people are still asking about 
Really Red and what we did. Was it our own egos that got in the way? 
Maybe we should have kicked some ass just for the fun of it and taken 
names later. 


MRR: The early tours seem quite a blur, I suppose, but 
I know the band played a store in Portland and the 
weird basement Tool and Die in Frisco, and might have 
been kicked off a bill by Black Flag. Did you relish such 
moments, in the very DIY/anything goes style of punk 
I suppose, or were you ever disappointed with such an 
odd assortment of places and egos of the underground 
world? 


John Paul: For my part, 1 never concerned myself with being noticed 
by the “establishment” of the hardcore world. Ronnie was probably the 
closest to that group of punker business people. None of them ever 
mattered to what I did, nor did they ever show that in return. It was 
great meeting people and sharing certain bonds, but eveiyone did 
their own thing. 1 liked DOA the best out of all the bands we played 
with. DOA were great musicians and non-pretentious in my view. I 
don’t remember why we were kicked off a bill with Black Flag. If we 
did, it was more their problem than ours. 


MRR: Now that Alternative Tentacles may re-issue the 
back catalog, what do you recall about your gigs with the 
DKs, and how “Prostitution” ended up on the cornerstone 
Let Them Eat Jellybeans comp, quickly selling over 10,000 
copies? 


John Paul: I have no idea how “Prostitution” ended up being on that 
record but I would’ve picked a different song; something a lot faster 
like “Suburban Disease.” Our gigs with the DK’s were always awesome 
because we measured up well with them. In Houston, at least, we were 
a force to be reckoned with. I think the song was picked more for the 
lyrics than being representative of our overall sound. 


We played a lot of odd places and with different bands from Nick 
Lowe to SPK. We played bars in Louisiana. We played the Midwest, 
we played the American Legion Hall in Reno, and UC Davis after being 
up all night drinking at the casinos in Reno. We also had great gigs 
and held our own very well with the Dead Kennedys, DOA, and others. 













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Obscu: 


Tin Huey: 1974-1979 recordings 
Pistol Whip: CD/DVD 1977 and 1978 recordings 
Face Value: CB/DVB from the golden age of Clew HC 
Easter Monfreys: GD/BVD original 1984 IP and 1982 live 

JZ^-ECORDSm, 


THE RUMOR: 

In pre-punk 1974, there was a 
legendary proto-punk band from 
Cleveland, Ohio called 

Rocket From The Tombs. Only 
lasting a year and issuing no 

THE REALITY: 

Some tapes existed and Smog 
Veil Records issued the best of 
them in 2002—27 years later- 


recordings, they spawned the 
members of what would become 
Pere Ubu and the Dead Boys. 
Imagine what kind of band 
you'd have if you combined the 
two into one—That was RFTT! 

as "The Day The Earth Met 
The Rocket From The Tombs," 

Not in 1974, not in 2002, did 
ANYTHING sound like THIS. 



TUE DE ElulEDf*EMrE 

I ilE IIE^EPlElfUElivE 


• Now Rocket From 
The Tombs are back, 
with a newly-recorded 
vinyl single, featuring 
founding members of 
Pere Ubu, Dead Boys 
and Television. And 
today, still, NOTHING 
sounds like Rocket 
From The Tombs. 



At worthy record stores., and from 

www.smogveil.com 





























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‘nerviercould USea \° WS are Ml 

I interview bvMari K onsta 

k Ph °tosbyU^ nSSaM Mc 

I - ^ Anna Drown 


J]Uestio ns s 
90s mis sti 
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Alan: So when I was home I talked to a couple people that said they heard the record, I was life 
cool what did you think? And they were like... yeah, I didn’t like it it’s what everybody 
Danielle: But that’s good if people hate it. 

Eva:' The Chronicle said that they couldn't print our band name because of their ohseemt 
policy; she said she would talk to the editor again but that it probably wouldn't happen, Sh 
asked for an explanation and 1 gave her one and then said, but if we’re gonna have to spend Um 
explaining ourselves... then fuck you. 

Danielle: You said that? < 

Eva: Yeah, 

Danielle: You should have told her about Alan’s parents wearing the shirts that said Dadfeg t 
church...in Georgia. 

Alan: They wore it under stuff. v • 

Eva: Marissa, you should check out Zummzumm &JA 4 Sst 5 1 

if you haven't heard them. * J | f | ^ 


MRR: Who are they? 

Eva: They’re like this noise punk band ff< 
Athens and they’re better than 2 

anything that exists now. £jjm 


MRR: I guess we shoi 
start now, who : 

Who are you? .^g|t 


Danielle: I’m Danielle. 1 play guitar and 


MRR: So where’d the name come from, Dadfag? 

Eva: When I learned how to play guitar it was in open tuning which is 
like dadbag or something, then I thought of dadfag, which 1 thought 
was funny because my dad was a fag for a while... 


MRR: Well I think it was funny that you were doing a Northwest 
tour and I heard all this talk from Olympia saying, “What’s 
with the name?” 

Eva: I got a call in Portland from whatever his name from Sex 
Vid was. 


MRR: Judd 


Eva: Yeah Judd, he said, “I’ve got 
this weird question for you, 
are you gay or is 
anyone in 


3and gay?” And^ S ^^^^^ 
I said, “Yeah just tell them 
■ I’m a big old faggot, I mean yeah sure if 
they need that.” But yeah we thought it was funny. 


MRR: But now you can’t be in the Chronicle because of your name' 

Alan: I’d think that in a progressive city like this it wouldn’t be a problem. 














Eva: The issue is exactly because of that. 
Alan: It’s just a weird thing, I’d assume if 
you’re gay or lesbian you’d want it to mean 
nothing. 

Eva: Like Limpwrist, what if their name 
was Limpfag or something? They’d still 
be a really great awesome band, they’re 
a hardcore fag band and proud of it, it just 
seems like the most progressive of the fags 
are back Into the idea of taking the word and 
erasing its meaning. 

Danielle: By using it, yeah. 

Eva: Once it enters into the vernacular it 
doesn’t have the weight that it would as 
an insult, it’s like the same way you get 
desensitized to the word fuck or shit. 

MRR: It’s pretty dependent on context. 

Eva: Like anything deemed derogatory, like 
dyke or pansy can’t be used 

MRR: You mean in the Chronicled They 
can’t use pansy? 

Eva: Yeah! 

Danielle: What if you’re having a flower 
show? 

Eva: But-1 mean I’m not trying to use it 
in a derogatory way. I’m not trying to be 
offensive... I’m trying to offend the squares! 

MRR: So you’re all from the South? 

Band: Yeah. • 

Eva: Alan and I grew up in Georgia; Danielle 
grew up in LA and Alabama and went to 
school in Georgia where we all met. 

MRR: How did you end up coming out 
here then? 

Eva: The eight of us from Athens came out 
here, Danielle came first, then I moved out 
here, Alan had gone on tour with Long Legged 
Woman out here, and then Justin joked that 
Alan could play drums for us and I was like 


Alan, do you wanna play drums? 

Alan: I moved out here with no intention to play 
music, I had already been in a bunch of bands and I 
was kind of done, I don’t know why I said yes. 
Danielle: I couldn’t stand and you had to take your 
shoes off. 

MRR: Wait, wait wait what? 

Eva: For the first practice so none of us would be 
nervous, Danielle and I had been playing together 
for a while but neither one of us had played guitar 
in a band before so we were like nervous to show 
anyone, so we took all tftese painkillers. 

Danielle: I had fucked up my wrist at work and my 
manager was like take these drugs! And I was like 
okay, and then 1 went to practice and was like hey 
guys take these drugs— 

Eva: I was like “Fuck yeah!” But then my shoes 
were hurting me but I took them off and walked all 
around the Mission. 

Danielle: I had to hold my belly button to keep 
I • myself standing. 

Alan: I remember it being a good practice, it wasn’t 
really awkward, like most times with a first practice 
it’s like oh, uh... that sounds like you can keep 
time... 

Eva: It sounds like you know how to drum. 

Alan: But I didn’t know what to expect with these 
two, I didn’t even really know what I was getting 
into. 

Danielle: And then we trapped you. 

MRR: So you guys knew each other in the South 
and then came here? 

Alan: No. 

Eva: We didn’t really know each other at all until 
we moved out here. I kindjof moved out here on a 
* whim being like “I hope Danielle is cool!” 

Danielle: And then you slept on my air mattress for 
multiple months. 

Eva: It was one month. 


MRR: 

So you didn’t know each other? 

Danielle: No we had both been dating best friends, so 
we knew each other, but we never really hung out. 

Eva: Definitely not independently and even when we 
were in the same room we didn’t really talk. 

Alan: Eva and I weren’t friends. 

Eva: Alan was scared of me. 

Alan: You scared the shit out of me, we never spoke 
a word to each other, I figured if I said anything she 
would tear me apart, like I would say “Oh. what’s your 
name?” and you would just rip my face off...I think 
that really helped craft the dynamic of our band. 

Eva: I’m just hitting him with my guitar like “Faster!” 
Alan: Usually they tell me to go slower. 

Eva: It’s because you’re always playing blast beats. I’ll 
be hitting you with my guitar being like “You’re fired 
asshole!’ 

Alan: my parents kicked me out of a band once. 

MRR: Your parents? 

Alan: I was in a band with my parents, and they kicked 
me out because I was in four other bands and I wasn’t 
spending enough time on their band. 

MRR: Did that make things awkward? 

Alan: Yeah, I didn’t show up to dinner for a while after 
that. 

MRR: No dinner? 

Alan: I stopped letting them cook for me, it was kind of 
a weird blow... I actually got kicked out of two bands 
then... 

MRR: Okay, so Allen you’ve been in bands before, 
I know this is Danielle’s first band, how about you 
Eva? 

Eva: I’ve been in a couple bands. 1 was in an emo band 
when I was in high school, and my dad played music, 
and I was in a band with some friends in Athens. Then 
I learned how to play guitar because my friend Parker 
needed a baritone guitar player in his band, I was like 





















sing it at them, 1 do that a lot, like right straight 
at them. 


MRR: Yeah I think there is a tendency to turn 
vocals up; I like them when they’re kind of on the 
same level, 

Eva: Yeah, because vocals are fucking stupid no one 
ever has anything to say. Unless it’s like a personal 
song but then it’s something that could be sung to 
yourself or something. 


“Let’s figure this out.” We lived together at the 
time, it was fun, and I wasn’t any good at it. I can 
do it now, but at the time... 


MRR: What are you trying to do? 

Eva: Fucking get paid man... have you heard of 
this 7”? The Whines? 


MRR: How are your guitars tuned? Because 
they sound really crazy. 

Danielle: I’m regular. 

Eva: Hers is standard and mine is just drop D... 
well it’s DADFsharpAA, but I hardly use the 
higher strings, so it sounds like just drop D pretty 
much. 

Danielle: We just play guitar really really weirdly, 
especially together. 


MRR: Insane Okay ? 

Eva: Yeah. 


MRR: But with your lyrics I’ve noticed a lot of the 
time that they’re pronounced in this way where they 
could mean five different things. Like at the end of 
that Huggy Bear song where he’s singing “does it 
make you more a pig if you wanna off a kid/does it 
make you more a kid if you wanna off a pig” and 
after awhile you can’t tell if he’s saying kid or pig? 
Eva: In writing I really appreciate things that have 
more than one meaning, like double entendres or 
insinuations that lead to depth in the meaning, you 
know especially when you’re trying to write lyrics and 
poetry and shit. Because everything has been said, and 
you have to make it beautiful and as deep as possible in 
order to really do anything worthwhile. 

Danielle: I also think it’s really fun to—it’s kind of like 
a puzzle, you write something and then you’re trying 
to fit it in to the music you have, and you really have to 
knock things out, and it kind of changes the meaning 
and then you can also fuck around with the intonation 
of your singing, and that too, that changes everything 
too. 

Eva: Because people are going to take from it what 
they want, when you’re making art for the public 
people are going to interpret it in many different ways, 
people are going to like it or not, 1 kind of feel like fm 
covering my bases so no one comes out of left field and 
is like “Why’d you say that?” and then it’s just “1 didn’t 
think about that at all!” I like to know all the possible 
meanings so I know what I’m saying. 

Danielle: It’s also funny to write something about 
someone and then they come to your show and you can 


MRR: That one is so good! 

Eva: They have a record done and they’re coming 
here in March. 

Danielle: 1 know when we started the band we 
were really angry, and that was really the only 
thing that made it better. 

Eva: It’s just a thing for me, like we haven’t 
practiced in a while and 1 feel fucking nuts. 
Danielle: It’s just a physical and mental and like 
everything way to emote. 

Eva: It’s a really good outlet. 

Danielle: And also you can meet all these people 
that are doing the same thing. 

Alan: 1 feel.it’s the first band ever. It’s really 
comfortable and it’s not a weird... we don’t have 
an agenda really, we’re just having fun. 

Danielle: We have so much fun. 

Eva: We just never care if we piss someone off 
and we’re always on the same page and shit, we 
just wanna have fun. 

Alan: It’s like I expected nothing of the band, 
and by far this is the most successful thing I’ve 
been a part of, it’s really great. I don’t have to put 
anything into it. 

Eva: You get to ride on the coattails of some 
beautiful women. 

Alan: It’s one of the most fantastic things ever. 
Danielle: All you need is someone sucking your 
dick. 


MRR: It sounds really dissonant a lot of the 
time. 

Danielle: Yeah. 

Eva: It’s because we think it sounds good. 


MRR: I was thinking about the review I did 
for the record and how it sounds fucked up but 
that’s the way I like music? Like all my reviews 
always say—this is off time and out of tune and 
it’s perfect! 

Eva: Alan and I just showed up at the same record 
store at the same time, and I was like “What are 
you doing here?” And he was just like, “Oh I 
gotta check out Maximum our record is reviewed 
in it.” 

Danielle: I thought it was incredibly accurate. 


MRR: 1 was worried because I dissed the 
recording. 

Eva: Well the vocals were way too low in the first 
mix, so we turned them up and then 1 think that 
when they mastered it they boosted them even 
more. They were where I wanted them but I guess 
people who think they know about these sorts of 
things turned it up. 























MRR: While you’re playing. 

Eva: There are vegans who won’t have sex with non¬ 
vegans. 

MRR: Are they afraid of the meat juice? 

Danielle: Most people are sticking their dicks in pieces 
of meat. 

Eva: I definitely stick my dick in pieces of meat. 

Danielle: What else should we talk about? 

Eva: We could talk about how Nazi-feministic we are. 
Alan: What’s the angle for this interview, anyways? 

MRR: That’s actually really funny because the other 
day I was at the Jump off a Building show at Thrillhouse 
and Layla was telling me about overhearing a group 
of dudes reading the interview I did with Broken 
Water—“What’s with all this feminist shit?” 1 felt like 
I had won a prize or something. 

Eva: That rules. 

MRR: Well, Alan was talking about it just being fun 
and not really about anything, but is it political? 

Eva: Well we have our personal politics that come through, 
just how people interact with us, like we don’t put up with 
any shit. 

MRR: But lyrics wise? 

Eva: Not political in the sense of world or national politics, 

I definitely think Western civilization is completely fucked, 
humanity has gone to shit and everything is beyond... 
beyond. But 1 feel like that’s so obvious it’s not even 
worth talking about anymore. Everywhere I’ve ever been, 
whether it’s like the South, where things like this might be 
more thought of as normally occurring, every major city 
I’ve been to, every place I’ve been to I get fucking yelled 
at. I get called a faggot, get called a bitch and get people 
coming up to me asking me, “How much?” every fucking 
day three times a day at least. Sometimes it’s so disturbing 
it’s made me cry because it’s too fucking much and just 
because I look weird. The less weird I look the more 1 get 
called a woman...in a derogatory sense...the more weird I 
look I get called a fag. 

MRR: Yeah, like even when I’m having an amazing 
day, someone will...one time 1 had a guy be like “Ah 
mama, you make my dick so hard.” 

Danielle: And it was like the middle of the day. 

MRR: Yeah! And it just informs your entire worldview 
sometimes. 

Danielle: 1 was walking down the street the other day, 
right by my house, wearing pants and a fucking t-shirt 
in the middle of the afternoon, and there were these guys 
walking behind me. like seriously right fucking behind me 
talking about my body, and I turned around and was like 
“Fuck you guys” and then they immediately started talking 
trash about my body, like “Well we thought your ass was 
fat anyways.” 

Eva: Like, a) that’s gonna matter to me that you’re— 
Danielle: Yeah that they were like “Oh, you so fine” and 
then suddenly like fuck you. 

Eva: Men always get really really really offended. 
Danielle: Yeah, all the sudden it’s like “What the fuck 
crazy bitch!?” 

Eva: You know the fact that I am anything more than an 
object, the fact that I am forcing them to interact with me 
means that I’m a crazy bitch because I’m a woman... to 
the point that deep in the punk scene it’s like what the fuck 
is this shit and nobody even talks about it and riot grrl is 
starting to get sold off.. 

MRR: There was this thing in some magazine that 
was like “How to do your makeup like a riot grrl” 
Everything gets commodified at some point. 

Eva: That’s definitely true...but I mean gay rights are still 


openly discussed, but women’s rights...like making Perrier shower. 

equal pay in the workplace? Fuck the workplace... that’s Danielle: We played this show and this really 

not the measure of equality. awesome dude thought we were interesting 

Danielle: All the stuff that I write about, all my personal enough to put the record out. 
experiences, pissed offness or happiness, when you Eva: I don’t know why, we played this weird art 
play a show. Ll’ve finally gotten to this point where I show, and the person who put it on worked at 
can look or scream or feel or say whatever I want, not Rainbow and the Broken Rekids guy also worked at 
even thinking about who’s watching us. Rainbow and he was like “I wanna put your record 

Eva: Like that self-consciousness is gone. out” and we were like “We just so happen to have 

Danielle: Yeah, like I could never have gotten that this record.” 
way five years ago, but now I’m feeling something 

in front of an audience and then one girl will come MRR: So you recorded and then met the guy. I 

up and say “That was so fucking awesome, to see Alan: We didn’t even really know who he was. 
you guys doing that.” Danielle: He had to write us like three times. 

Eva: Not sucking someone’s dick or something. Alan: We didn’t even respond for a while. 

Eva: We had some friends in Portland who were going I 
MRR: Not playing a tambourine. to do it. but it became more and more apparent that it 

Danielle: Being exactly what you feel and are, was going to take a long time, but 1 don’t think we’re 
it makes you want to play music and that means ever going to get anyone else to record us except our 
something to me that is like a change and an really good friends, I don’t like the studio sound. 



exchange between two people. 

Eva: Dropping the necessity of language. 
Danielle: That it’s okay to be whoever you want 
to be, you could be sexy or ugly you could be 
whatever and you could be a fucking asshole 
and you could be really nice and you are all 
of these things. 

Eva: It’s helped for me really to not take 
the way that the world reacts to me as the 
basis of my actions in and of itself, I feel 
like this band has helped me grow up a lot, 
realizing that I am always separate from the 
people around me and they can’t affect the 
way that 1 do anything, they can’t affect 
the way I play guitar they can’t affect my 
moods, shit like that—because I don’t 
care what 99% of people think of me. 

Danielle: When we first started playing 
and I would be so nervous about whether 
or not people would come, now I think 
it’s awesome when people come and 
are into it, but it’s for me now. 


MRR: Yeah, I don’t really care if 
people like my band. 

Eva: I hope they dislike us, because I 
don't want them to get us, like if this 
crowd likes us...hold on listen to 
this song (she puts on Pink Reason’s 
“Borrowed Time”) It’s like the song 
the Stooges forgot to write. 


MRR: Let’s talk about your 
record. 

Eva: What about it? 


MRR: It’s out. 

Eva: BUY IT! Mama needs a 
new pair of heels... 
and a 







Alan: Yeah. 

Eva: Nothing is present everything 
sounds far away. 

Alan: We just did some new recordings. 
Eva: They sound like how we’re supposed 
to sound, more like the way it sounds in 
my head. It involves all that graininess 
and distortion...you know? 

Danielle: When we listened to it. 

Eva: We were kind of at a low point. 
Danielle: And it was just like “This makes 
me so excited about my fucking band!” 
Eva: It was a moment of we’re not really 
sure why we’re doing this and then we 
listened to the recording and it was like 
“Oh yeah this fucking rules.” 


haven’t done a full US tour yet. 

Danielle: Fuck America. 

Alan: I just imagine a lot of people wouldn’t like us—people in the 
middle... in the South. 

Danielle: Just me as a person by itself. 

Eva: Doesn't do too well in Middle America. 

Danielle: I mean, I think it would be really awesome to do that...and 
we will at some point. 

Eva: I definitely want to do it but— 

Danielle: Europe first man, somebody else can drive us around. 

Eva: So we can be super wasted, and me and Alan have never been 
anywhere. 

Danielle: They don’t even have fucking passports. 

Eva: We’re trying to get this driver that our friends used there and he was 
saying, “Yeah they have everything like amps and keyboard stands.” 
Danielle: We could start using keyboard stands. 


MRR: So those recordings will be a MRR: That could be like your gimmick. 

7”? Alan: We could play our guitars like slide guitars. 

Eva: Yeah we recorded six songs, three 

of them came out really good, and I don’t MRR: So what is it like? Being from the South? 
know who will put it out, maybe a couple Eva: Alan went home for Christmas and every single person that he 
Portland labels. went to high school with is married with children, no one even ventured 

Danielle: Maybe Jesse? outside of that paradigm. 

v Alan: A lot of people, this one guy was freaking out to me about how 

MRR: Any tours? he needs to get married by twenty five and start having kids because the 

Eva: We’re going to tour this kids you have by the time you’re twenty five are supposed to have an 
summer in Europe; added life expectancy of twelve extra years. 

w e Eva: If your mother is younger you live longer? 



Alan: Yeah by twelve years, but this is coming from like, people 
who— 

Eva: The human race doesn’t need to be perpetuated anymore, they 
don’t need to survive. 

Danielle: Eva hates babies. 


MRR: I hate babies too... 

Eva: In the South I’m used to living on like three 
hundred dollars a month. Living here on 
what I make, I can travel. 

Alan: Bigger paycheck 

Mk here. i 

A 


Danielle: 

‘ You’re not 

working for like 
$5 an hour here. 

Eva: It feels weird. I like 
it here, it took two years but 
I like it. 

Alan: The coolest thing about now and 
being here is the fact that most of the 
records I listen to are amazing records. 
Eva. Our friends. 

Alan: It’s like a very personal secretive 
sort of secret club. 

Eva: There are all these people along 
the coast and we play with each other 
and go to each other’s towns, like I 
don’t really feel the need to go beyond 
this. There are bigger bands that I 
admire that it would be cool to 
play with. 

Danielle: But it’s 

nice to feel like 
such a part of 
something. 


Eva: And makes it easier to kind of filter people 
out. like people who do things and go to shows. 

MRR: Yeah, like no matter where I go, I know I 
can just go to a couple of shows and find people 
that 1 will definitely have something in common 
with, or even people I somehow already know. 

Danielle: That’s where my friends or potential 
friends are going to be. 

Eva: People who do interesting things with their 
lives. 

MRR: When 1 meet people who I’ve never seen 
at a show I kind of don’t trust them. 

Eva: Otherwise it’s like “What do you do? Do you 
run a boardroom or something?” 

Danielle: Watch TV! 

Eva: Something. 

Danielle: I feel like 1 was into music when I was 
like fourteen and then I stopped being into it and 
then the last two and a half years I’ve gotten back 
into it. But there was this huge chunk of time— 
Eva: That’s why we never knew each other. 
Danielle: 1 never went to shows in Athens. I went 
to two during the three years I was there. 

Alan: Didn’t you go to my pyrotechnics show? 
Danielle: Yeah! That was one of the two shows. 
Alan: It was such a weird, it was me, Justin. Alex 
and Jeff from Long Legged Woman 
Eva: That was one of the best shows ever. 

Alan: The weird thing was everyone the next day 
was going to talk about the Bruce Springsteen 
cover band, like that was the big deal of the night, 
but then we actually stole the show. So we did this 
weird pop thing for awhile and then this crazy 
noise jam and fucking we brought out all these 
crazy fireworks. 

Eva: Inside. 

Danielle: In a living room. 

Eva: In a living room like the size of this room. 
Alan: Jeff melted part of his guitar, and Justin 
put his drums on the side and was just beating 
the bass drum, I was doing auxiliary percussion 
and everything was like, things were melting 
and all these fire works were going off, Alex was 
throwing M-80’s at everyone around, then Jeff 
jumped on me. 

Danielle: I went there by myself and I was just 
like “Oh my god, I have to go home, I don’t even 
understand what’s happening.” But when you play 
a show there is like this community of people and 
it’s awesome, and then you’re part of this secret 
society like Alan was saying, and then you meet 
other people through that, and then you travel and 
go to different cities and meet new friends through 
your other friends. It’s huge but it’s small because 
everyone fucking knows everyone, I was at show 
last night, and all these people who 1 didn’t realize 
play music and they didn’t know I did and it was 
just like “What you’re playing that show too?” 
Eva: Marissa, do you know American 
Cheeseburger? 

MRR: I’ve heard some stuff but I’m not too 
familiar. 

Eva: FUCK! I’ve listened to this 7” so much it’s 
kind of fucked sounding (she puts on American 
Cheeseburger) this is the best band... BEING IN 
A BAND RULES EVERYONE SHOULD DROP 
OUT OF COLLEGE! 

Dadfag “Scenic Abuse” is out now on Broken 
Rekids www.brokenrekids.com 








his whole life into one day. To a young teenager, like myself then, 

that was the only and whole 

truth. 

A couple of months later I finally got the chance to hear B side 
of that single—again on the radio—this time in a car on our way 
to Greece. It wasn’t as fast as “Hiljadu Godina,” but the energy 
was there. Also, my father was irritated by the lyrics. We survived 
Orwellian 1984 (after all it was better than expected), and 


any. It is perfect. I mean, if I gave my top ten list of LPs this one 
would be in it, right there with the Velvets, MC5, the Stooges 
and Ramones—it is that good. Front cover, back cover, lettering, 
lyrics, music, arrangements, playing, production, their clothes and 
shoes—everything is ten out of ten. 

The cover is a shot of the band in action— cliche, but it works 
in some cases, and in this one in particular. I’m sure if you’re a 


It was late July/early 

August 1984. My brother and I were working at my grandparents 
place, shifting the gravel to earn some pocket money we would 
spend for ice cream and lemonade later on. The day was bloody 
hot. I didn’t like the idea of breaking my back, but couldn’t help it. 
The pile of gravel was waiting for us, shovels were lying around, 
the work had to be done. Our small AM radio was turned to the 
local station that played some, more or less, middle of the road 
stuff. My mouth was sore and dry and I was on a brink of collapse 
when the announcer introduced the new band from Belgrade— 
Partibrejkers—and their debut single Hiljadu Godina (“One 
Thousand Years”). It was something I haven’t heard before—fast, 
loud and dangerous for sure. I couldn’t give such a description 
then, but it sounded like The New York Dolls on speed playing 
some prime Pretty Things tune. The drummer seemed untamed, 
guitars (no bass) fought against each other and singer desperately 
yelled how even if he could live one thousand years he would fit 


new wave were dead and well, most of the excitement was gone. ! 
That same year Partibrejkers released their debut self-titled LP— 
the best punk’n’roll record released that year. 

But, let’s reveal some history first: apparently they formed 
in 1981. Don’t know about the rest of the band, but the singer 
Cane was in an excellent punk band Radnicka Kontrola, which, 
unfortunately, ended up releasing only two songs on a compilation 
LP. The first Partibrejkers song that saw the light of day was “Radio 
Utopia,” which opened Vol. 1 of the series of compilation albums 
with some unsigned (“demo”) Yugo bands. The song was good, but 
it didn’t present the power they’d give us a year or two later. 

Anyway, Partibrejkers (which means “Partybreakers,” and is 
actually spelled as it is pronounced in Serbian) had their debut 
out in 1985. As with nearly every new band in Yugoslavia at that 
moment, they got some radio and TV airplay. At first it seemed as 
if they were going to make it, but I’ll talk about that later. 

Partibrejkers is the best album ever released in Yugoslavia, 
even though I hate to give such qualifications. There are several 
Yugo records that come very close to this one, but each and every 
one of them has some weak moment, while this one hasn’t got 























drummer looks like a runaway prisoner, 
singer like a skinhead who forgot to shave his 
head for a few weeks, the guitar player as if 
he was undecided (but still comfortable) and 
another one (very garagey looking) levitating 
in the air. Back cover contains lyrics written 
in a strange, square spiral (if you get me), 
way and credits done in a punk manner, ie, 
“nickname-instrument”. 

The first thing you could hear when the 
stylus strikes the opening “Ako Si” (“If You 
Are”) are the guitars, and the only thing you 
can feel is the force, which won’t leave you 
throughout all eleven songs from this album. 
It is possible that they just came up with the 
wordplay on the Heartbreakers. One thing 
that’s for sure is that Partibrejkers were 
influenced by that Johnny Thunders’ outfit, 
as well as by New York Dolls, Stooges, MC5, 
Dictators and the like. Also, it’s obvious they 
were hooked on r’n’b. 

None of the songs exceeds the limit of 
four chords (maybe a chord or two extra for a 
chorus), and the thing that makes it all more 
exciting is the absence of the bass guitar- 
only two guitars, both lead and rhythm, 
depends on perception. Now, you tell me, how 
many years before the Gories, Cheater Slicks 
and Oblivians was that? 

Producer was Koja, once in a seminal 
punk band Sarlo Akrobata, then in the nearly 
as good Disciplina Kicme (now based in 
London, playing rave shit—at least that’s what 
I’ve been told—how dull!). No matter how 
great the Partibrejkers were then, he made 
them sound even better on record—loud 
guitars, thumping drums and sharp vocals. 
Think about My Machine by the Humpers 
and anything by Teengenerate and you’ll get 
a pretty close picture of the sound on this 
album. Even the break between the songs is 
so short, which makes it all even more fast- 
paced and dynamic. 

Lyrics are desperate urban stories of love, 
hate, alienation, fear, lust, hope, and even 
child abuse (with a chorus: “Tajna Tatina 
Devojka”—“Secret Daddy’s Girl”). These songs 
helped me through my turbulent puberty 
better than any friend, girl, psychologist, drug 
or alcohol ever could. I can’t imagine what 
the author of the lyrics must’ve been through 
before writing it, for there’s no way they were 
phoney. 

I don’t know much about the background 
of the guys in band, but the rumors are that 
one of the guitarists checked in a hospital 
quite a few times for drugs rehab and the 
singer was seen performing some extremely 
hard labor jobs. As said earlier, it seemed 
they would make it with their debut—their 
videos had a fair bit of airplay and they hit 
the charts, but nothing major happened. 
Knowing the circumstances back home then, 
I would say they sold up to 10,000 copies of 
the album, which was considered to be kind 
of a disaster for a new band on one of the 
two biggest labels in the country, and would 
usually end with dropping the band off. I can’t 


say for sure if that happened in this case, but 
the band broke up soon after releasing their 
first LP. 

Apparently, their early shows were great. 
The only live performance (in the line-up 
that played on the album) I’ve seen was 
the TV broadcast of Yugoslavian Band Aid 
(if you thought Band Aid and USA For Africa 
were bad wait to hear this one). Promoters 
managed to put up the gig on the biggest 
soccer stadium in Yugoslavia and lined up 
the crappiest pop/rock bands of the moment. 
Don’t ask me who decided to let Partibrejkers 
play, but I’m sure the person who’s done it 
got fired immediately. There they were— 
Partibrejkers were playing live right there in 
my home! I could’ve just stretched my arm 
and touch them. It was excellent, though only 
three songs, but they were cranking it up and 
the singer ran amok on stage. My father got 
annoyed again. 

Too good to last, as they said. The band 
ceased to exist. Anton, a guitarist, shortly after 
played in another cool band called Placenici 
(Hitmen - now, that’s not coincidence any 
more!). The singer also joined some band, but 
they didn’t last long. The other guitar player 
seemed to be very quiet for the next several 
years, while the drummer, Manzanera, 
disappeared (virtually, I think). 

Maybe the Partibrejkers weren’t around 
anymore, but they left a huge testimony to 
the kids out there. They didn’t sell too many 
records, but all the people who bought their 
album “went on to form their own bands.” 
Soon after their demise lots of guys all over 
Yugoslavia realized that they could do it too, 
so they did. Overnight the city clubs became 
occupied by new punkish r’n’r bands to the 
delight of all the people (me included) who 
thought the r’n’r died with Partibrejkers. 
Unfortunately, major labels didn’t want to 
have anything to do with these bunch of 
degenerates, so all that’s left from that 
period are several cassette-only releases. 
Still, at the same time, independent record 
labels started forming up day by day, but 
that’s another story. 

Around early 1986 Partibrejkers reformed 
with a new line-up. Only the singer and 
guitarist were still in the band, with the new 
drummer, and bassist instead of second 
guitarist. I checked one of their first gigs 
and it was great, but not as good as before. 
Next year they put out second LP, titled 
Partibrejkers again. Their third album is self- 
titled as well, which causes a lot of confusion. 
From that point on I realized they were lost. I 
did check 'em out every time they played in 
the radius of 100 km around my area, but the 
energy from their debut was all gone. They 
sounded more like the Godfathers than the 
New York Dolls. 1992 saw release of semi¬ 
good live album, and in ’94 they put their 
last(?) album so far—Kiselo I Slatko (“Sour 
and Sweet”)—definitely their worst one ever! 
These days I don’t know what’s happening 
with them. The last I heard was that they 


played some big stadium gigs. Enough said. 

There was a moment in 1992 when I 
thought they could still cut it - Partibrejkers 
played a gig in the city where I lived the night 
before our wedding. We went to the show just 
to have a few beers and kill the nervousness, 
and didn’t have any expectations at all. The 
band got up on stage and stormed into “Biti 
Moja” (“You Must Be Mine”) from their 
first LP—the song I saw them playing last time 
some five years before. The whole gig was 
furious and powerful, that we forgot about 
what was scheduled for the next day. Well, 
nearly. 

As I am coming to an end of a story, or a 
saga, as you may say, I have to admit I never 
wrote review as long as this one ever. The fact 
is that I haven’t heard Partibrejkers' first LP 
for at least five years, (I don’t even have it on 
a tape at the time of writing this). Still, I know 
it by numbers. I know every detail on the 
cover, all the lyrics and riffs; I know every note 
by heart. Maybe Partibrejkers isn’t the best 
album ever, but it is the one that affected my 
life as no record before or after. 

And a bit of a trivia for all of you who think 
I went too seriously about everything: in early 
1992 during FEST (the annual international 
film festival in Belgrade) Partibrejkers were 
joined live on stage by Johnny Depp on guitar 
and Jim Jarmush on back-up vocals. I saw 
the whole event on telly and am still trying 
to obtain the video of it. Also, Partibrejkers- 
haven’t only influenced the Yugo bands— 
Antiseen have blatantly ripped of “Tajna 
Tatina Devojka” and re-titled it “Wife Beater” 
while L7’s “Shit List” is nearly a note-by-note 
copy of “Ulicni Hodac” (“Street Walker”) 


Partibrejkers Discography: 

Partibrejkers I LP (1985) 

Partibrejkers II LP (1988) 

Partibrejkers III LP (1989) 

Zabava Jos Traje /live LP (1992) 

Kiselo I Slatko LP (1994) 

Najbolje Od Najgoreg Compilation LP (1996) 
Ledeno Doba LP (1997) 

San I Java compilation LP (1999) 

Gramzivost I Pohlepa LP (2002) 

Sloboda lli Nista LP (2007) 


The Partibrejkers 

Zoran Kostic Cane- Vocals (On all LP's) 
Nebojsa Antonijevic Anton- Guitar (On all 
LP’s) 

Ljubisa Konstadinovic- Guitar (On I LP) 

Goran Bulatovic Manza- Drums (On I LP) 
Branislav Petrovic- Harmonica (On I LP) 

B. Trivic- Saxophone (On I LP) 

Vlada Funtek- Drums (On II LP) 

Dima Todorov Mune- Bass (On II LP) 

Igor Borojevic- Drums (On III LP 
Pera Joe- Harmonica (On III LP 
Darko Utvar- Drums (On Sloboda...LP) 
Vladislav Rac- Bass (On Sloboda... LP) 





Scatha formed from the ashes of Sedition and Disaffect in the ’90s the time that influenced us most, since that’s what we set out to play 

with the aim of playing much slower, heavier material that they did to from the beginning. 

great effect. Combining crunching riffs, manic drumming and crazed 

vocals with intelligent lyrics and cool artwork; they were easily one of MRR: Is there any specific singer that influenced you? 
my favourite Scottish bands of the era. I was lucky enough to see them Angus: No; no one in particular. I liked a lot of Italian HC bands at 

many times, having been in a band that toured with them a couple of the time we did Sedition. There were a few other bands around with 

times and had plenty of laughs (like breaking into Stonehenge) but I’ll screaming vocals, but most bands at that time had deep, growling 
leave the talking to Angus. vocals. With Sedition, I wanted to do something different from that, 

This interview was conducted by Kenji Yamaji for Doll magazine with whereas with Scatha, I just wanted it to be completely different from 

Angus Quinn, vocalist of Scatha. Unfortunately, the magazine folded Sedition. I think I probably thought I was being really clever at the time! 

and the interview wasn’t published. However, last year I started work 

on a zine about Scottish punk throughout the years and was offered MRR: What was the intention in using Pictish patterns on Sedition 

this piece but unfortunately, my zine didn’t see the light of day either, so and Scatha artwork? Was that to show the bands roots? 

we thought sending it off to the good folks at MRR would be the best Angus: Basically, yes. I wanted to use the artwork from our own cultural 
option. background to show our identity and affinity with that culture as a band 

Intro by Mark Nelson based in Scotland, but in a modern context; to use bold symbols from 

Photos by Angus and Brunta the past as logos and graphics like most other punk/hardcore bands 

used modern symbols and images as logos in their art and graphics. 
MRR: Angus, we all know that you are originally a member of Some of the early 1980s anarcho-punk bands used amazing modern 

Sedition. Can you tell me why Sedition broke up? and sometimes old symbols in their logos and graphics. Bold and 

Angus: From the beginning of Sedition, Brycey (bass) and myself had striking. You only need to see the image alone to immediately think of 

always shared flats and houses, which made it easy as we were writing the band associated with it. That’s the idea I was trying to create, 
most of the songs for the band. By the time the split happened, we were 

both living at opposite sides of the country, so we were no longer able MRR: It looks like the sword and snake image is the symbol 

to write stuff together as easily and freely as before. It became more of Scatha. Who did this artwork? What is the meaning of this 

and more difficult to get together regularly enough to work on any new symbolic image? 

material and this inevitably led to a great deal of frustration. There was Angus: This is based on a very rare version of a very famous Pictish 

a break down* in communication and in our relationship, which finally symbol, which is found carved into stones all over Scotland: Its more 

ended in the band splitting. famous version has a “Z” shaped rod instead of the single rod of the 

rare version. When I first drew the symbol for Scatha, I deliberately 
MRR: So how was Scatha formed? I’ve heard that it was formed by stylized it to fit more with the band name, changed the shape of the 

ex-members of Sedition and Disaffect. Can you tell me the behind snake to form the “S” and stylized the rod to make the whole symbol 

story back then? more bold and simple. In a lot of ancient cultures, it is believed that the 

Angus: After Sedition split in 1993 and Disaffect split in 1994, Andy and snake or serpent was a symbol of the power within the earth, and the 

I.B. from Disaffect, started writing some new slower and heavier-songs. rod, or sword/lance, was a way of harnessing or channeling that power. 

I had already written some lyrics, which I intended for a slow, heavy 

band, and I already had the name Scatha in mind when they asked me MRR: Please explain the meanings of each title: “Respect, Protect, 

if I’d be interested in doing vocals. Billy (ex-Sedition and Disaffect) was Reconnect,” “Fuck the System,” and “Birth, Life and Death.” They 

asked to play second guitar, and Jason (ex-Stretchheads) was asked are seemingly simple, but I assume there must be hidden, deeper 

to drum. Thus, Scatha was born. messages under the words. Can you tell me some thoughts and 

feelings for each of them? 

MRR: Can you name some bands (of any style, not just punk / Angus: “Respect, Protect, Reconnect” was a title I had for a while, 

hardcore bands) that influenced you back in the early ’90s? before Scatha. I just liked the way it sounded. Here, it directly refers 

Angus: We all listened to different music. I remember Billy liking to our relationship with the earth and how we take it for granted these 

Brazilian hardcore bands, Andy liked a lot of slow, heavy bands and days. We ignore its importance to our own existence, but you could 

also some d-beat bands (especially from Japan). I.B. liked a lot of US apply it to anything in life I suppose; “family”, for instance, another thing 

hardcore bands. Jason came from an indie-noise background, with the I think we take for granted nowadays. “Fuck the System” was a joke title 

Stretchheads, which I reckon led him to get into a lot of blast-beat noise we had for a song that became “Fuck the System.” Before we had any 

bands. I was also listening to some slow and heavy bands, and a lot lyrics for it, it was called “the Fuck . 

of traditional Celtic, folk, and tribal music at the time. I suppose it was the System song” because it was f\ 

the slow, heavy fast and furious compared to 
bands we were other Scatha songs; the / 

^ * . v ", \ listening to at name fit and the song was A WjL 





sample was great and we just had to use it for that song. It fit so 
well and it’s still my favorite sample that we used. 


MRR: Can you describe the situation of the scene in the ■ respect and your place within the ^5 w IliKP 

SSS late ’90s, when Scatha started? J| surrounding environment. There is 

?SS£Si Angus: The UK scene in the ’90s was still very DIY. still quite K nothing distinctly attractive about Vjbt,^ 

strong, still a lot of bands playing in the DIY scene, and still a lot W the Celtic culture that doesn’t r*Rj|f> . ^ 

^<^5 of people putting on DIY gigs. So, things were still very active exist in a lot of other ancient or Km * I JB 

when we started Scatha. A lot of international bands were A modern tribal based cultures. JSjfc 
1| Wjjjj coming to the UK whilst touring in Europe, so there were plenty ■ lj Being Scottish, it was just an easy 

of opportunities to see and play with loads of bands old and 1 * starting point for me in exploring 1 ^ SkK 

new. We were able to tour around Scotland and England twice, P my own self-awareness, but it has 
WHS as wel * as two tours ma ‘ n,ancl Europe in the first couple of Ml *also lead me to learning about and appreciating other indigenous or tribal m 

vj Of years of being together. So, yeah, I’d say the scene was still IV cultures from all around the world and what they can also teach me. 

aillF quite excjtin 9 then< * 1 if 

0 i MRR: Not every Japanese person knows the difference between the B 

MRR: Which bands had you guys done gigs with at that (jp countries in Great Britain. Do you have a special feeling or opinions I 
iril time? about England’s politics or music? 

r5i?l Angus: There were a lot, far too many^to remember them all, ^ Angus: The main differences between the countries that make up Britain H 
so, apologies to anyone we’ve missed out. I’m impressed that 5^ are purely political—a false sense of nationalist pride that is usually fed by g| 

t jfe we managed to remember this many, but here’s a few Andy ^ politicians and the mainstream media or at certain sporting events. There is R 

J0*' and myself could remember...Quarantine, Doom, Cress, no real cultural difference from place to place within Britain anymore. The * 
ABC Diablo, Defiance, Drop Dead, Dezerter, La Fraction, || Anglo-American influence in most of the west means cultural differences from 2 
(PjS Y, Los Grudos, Lost Cherrees, Anomie, Disfear, Gurkha. l| country to country are becoming blurred and less important as time goes I 
Muckspreader, Unhinged, Hiatus, Sawn Off, Post Regiment, *** on. Consumerism is today’s culture of choice in most of these countries and 5 
mjp Headache, Bloodshot, Extinction Of Mankind, Svart Sno, kg capitalism ensures we keep on consuming. The saddest part is that most poor y. 

# Counterblast, Catastrophobia and the Dagda. /JJJ countries, usually rich in their own cultural heritage, still covet this culture of jj 

* * ^ consumerism we have already embraced and most of the wealthier countries | 

i||p MRR: The way you dressed in the Scatha era was jjjj are more than happy to bring it to them, but at what cost? 

11^8 more tribal than leather-and-studs or crusty. Were you PI | 

JfM 1 intentionally dressing in that way? ■ MRR: How was the discography project with MCR company started? 

Py§jtt Angus: I think Andy would be most upset to hear you say that, H What drew you guys to do it? I appreciate the project because all the 
he’s always liked his leather’n’studs. But, no, we never had W original Scatha releases are getting hard to find these days. 

> jpB a band image, as such. Everyone dressed as they dressed Angus: Andy, who played guitar in Scatha, also played in Ruin. Ruin was ™ 
mmM from day to day; what we wore when not playing in the band iSj releasing stuff for MCR already and l think Andy mentioned to Yumikes from Pj 
was the same as we wore when playing in the band, nothing I MCR that we were looking for someone to release the Scatha discography, 

was contrived. I suppose with Sedition, it was more contrived I Yumikes said he’d do it. It was good for us because usually when MCR release 

m m 1 because we usually wore kilts when playing, but again we also the CD version, Agipunk (Italy) release it on vinyl too. As you say, the vinyl is * 
™ H wore kilts when not playing then too, so l don’t remember ever hard to find now, so it’s a bonus for all. J* 

* thinking about a band image or dress code, as such. It was I 

H just the way we looked at the time. However unfashionable or ™ MRR: Now you are doing T.R.I.B.E as your main activity after Scatha. ;, 

5 stupid that was. Can you tell me the reason for Scatha breaking up? 

mmm ^ Angus: Scatha broke up because we were finding it too difficult to get together IJj 

Wjk i • regularly enough for rehearsals and to write new material. We were all busy .ij 

i JM—f ff with jobs, family, and also other bands. It was more and more difficult ■ 

v ? t° arrange when everyone could get together at the same time, so we & 

MV decided amicably between us that it was time to quit. R 


jfe MRR: Please tell me the plans and projects of T.R.I.B.E., as far as the 
^ schedule goes. 

\ Angus: First, around the autumn 2009, we will contribute a brand new song 
to a benefit CD for Leonard Peltier, which will be released by the French 
organization AISIA/Kan ar Bleiz. This will be the first song of new material 
> that we have been working on for some time now, we hope to have all the 
songs ready for recording before the end of 2009, and we hope to be ready 
A to play the new material live as soon after that as possible. 


% MRR: Please give a message to Japanese punks to end this interview. 

ft'* Angus: Thanks to Kenji (Doll) for these questions and his patience in 
^ waiting for the answers, thanks to everyone who has, and still does, 
gf J support what we have done and still do!!! R.E.S.P.E.C.T!!! 
















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rr ° m NTt -* the two c «n of Battletorn have been 
hammering out their raw blend of proto-grind and HC for 5 

years now. Sounding like a cross between bands like Terrorizei 
(sans blasts), Negative FX.and Onslaught, Battletorn have 
a .stinctive sound, with pounding drums and a haunting 
Hellhammer guitar tone”. As a band they thrive on simplicity- 
two members, short songs, simple song structure and lyrics 

tn,rh Th" Ca T 3n band ” ° mid SayS ' But this is onl X a half-' 

truth.The reality, as always, is more dynamic. Not only was 
here once a cavewoman” in the band, but the paths taken anc 
lyrical reflections by the band aren’t obviously so simple Like 
Iw mascot Tungar, Battletorn are on a „„ J that appears tl 
deeper than the simplicity of their music may suggest The 
ques t th U s far hasn’t led to the band’s demise in *e form of 
dened cynicism (i.e. being dead alive), as the ideals of the 
aand seemed to have remained a strong guiding force through 
ill the complications that came to pass. Friendship and the idea 

, mUS ‘ C as a release have S u 'ded the band through 5 years of 
>laymg, more outside the spotlight than in, and more on the 
nargms of punk/metal/HC production lines than not.This is a 
onversation with Omid, singer and guitarist of the band He is ; 
own to earth guy who seems to have a simple agenda, both in 
ie band and in his life: to make the most of it. 







MRR: Mega Blade, the label that did the first release.This 
was a Troubleman offshoot? How’d that happen? 

Omid: I guess that came about because I had met Mike who runs 
Troubleman somewhere along the line and we became friends. 
Then when we started Battletorn, he booked us a couple times at 
shows he was setting up, and eventually one night at one of our 
shows he asked if wed want to do a single on his '‘offshoot' 1 label 
he was starting with this guy Dennis called Mega Blade.The name 
of the label was great (half of it from Megaforce and half Metalbfad 
two classic metal labels), and we liked those guys so we said yeah 


MRR: So for MRR readers maybe a brief history of the 
band. I think it began in a porn shop? 

Omid: Yeah, well it does all kind of start in the basement of a Times 
Square porn shop.... it was probably about 1998 or 1999 and I was 
up there looking around because this particular shop also had a 
large selection of non-adult cult horror flicks and stuff. I asked this 
guy at the counter if they had a copy of this movie Stunt Rock 
which is a 70s movie that has this killer hard rock band Sorcery 
in it and the dude tried to tell me he could get me a copy. But he 
literally meant a bootleg dubbed copy, not a real copy! Anyways, 

{ ended up declining the offer and went back later to give him a 
cassette of the soundtrack and we started talking about music. 
Turned out he was in a grind band called How We Lost the War, 
and I told him I had been in Enemy Soil and we became friends. 

It was many years later that we actually started to play music 
together though, but that was the origins! 

MRR: Okay, so how did you guys eventually hook up? And 
how was Beverly introduced to the picture? 

Omid: Well, so over the years I went to see William’s band 
HWLTW at some grind shows like the Loud As Fuck festivals 
Raphy from Disassociate used to do at CBGB every year, and he 
used to come out to metal shows that I would book in Brooklyn. 

So William and I were friends, and then I met Beverly because 
she worked at this shop my friends run and we went to see King 
Diamond and Entombed together at L’Amour in Brooklyn around 
the end 2003 or so. When she was at my house getting ready to 
go to the show she was looking at my CD collection and pointing 
out bands like Assuck and stuff and l asked her why she wasn’t in 
a band and I had been thinking about getting into playing music 
again—I hadn’t played since 1 was in Enemy Soil in 1997 so anyways, 
I called William and asked him if he wanted to start a band, then 
we jammed and then Beverly came in and sang, and we became 
Battletorn. 


Omid:Yeah, it definitely did. ! think we weren’t taken seriously by 
the kind of people who would appreciate us musically because we 
weren’t on a label that would typically put out that kind of shit. We 
didn t give a fuck at the time, we were never about trying to sell 
records or reach our “target audience,” but looking back Lean say 
that it did have some effect for sure. But I would like to say that we 
appreciate Troubleman giving us our start. We had also been asked 
for a demo by the head of Matador Records within a few months 
of becoming a band. Guess there was a buzz on the NYC streets 
about us and they wanted some of it We never sent them a demo. 

I refused to be on a label with people as tender as Jon Spencer. So 
they got Early Man instead! But yeah, we were never a band who 
recorded or even circulated a demo. We just started, played shows 
everywhere we could like it was our job, and then people offered 
to put out records for us and that was that. As I said above it all 
happened pretty fluidly and organically. 

MRR: Aside from the fact that Mega Blade is a great name, 
In going with the label reflects a kind of 
open-mindedness that people in the HC/metal scenes may 
not like* Would you agree? Does the over-attachment to 
image and seeming closed-mindedness of the Mc/metal 
scenes ever bother ypu? 








MRR: After Mega Blade you guys did end up on a more 
established HC label, Mad at the World. By this time 
Beverly was no longer in the band. 



4 ,t 
#, 


Om,d:Th e r e , S definitely a lot of that “image" stuff that is tied into 
both HC and metal for sure. I would agree with that. I mean, if you are 
a certain type of band you are expected to dress a certain way. end 

a U ce°r n tal C r in d ° a " those thin ? s ** « guaranteed 

a certain degree of success I guess. So yeah, we pretty much went 

against that and we are long-haired kinda hippy metalhead freaks 

playing fast hardcore who ended up on a hipster NYC label, so it was 

_° f , a m '^ dle f ' n S er to that wh °le way of doing things! But as I will 
probably end up repeating over and over, a lot of Battletorn is about 
friendship and family type things, and those were our friends at the 

r;:r r nted “ * °" their labeL 1 mean ' Mike from Tableman 

came to my house and he brought over his copies of the first Fix 
and Necros singles to show me, I was floored that he owned those' 
don t know anyone else who does. I even put a photo of them on ' 
the collage of the Evil Chains album! So yeah, we went on their label 
because they were our friends and wanted to support our band, we 
1 n t wait around for a label that releases crust or HC to discover us 

and put us out. Fuck it. 

MRR: I noticed while living in NY that you guys wouldn’t just 
play with HC bands or metal bands. It truly seemed like you 
just wanted to play. 7 

OmidYeah, that's totally true we wanted to be like the old 70s and 
80s rock/metal bands and just play. It was a blitz and we took any 
stage or shit hole that would let us on it with any bands at all, we 
didnt care! We were having fun playing. We had originally only planned 
on being a band for one year and seeing how much we could do 
in that time, so there was a sense of time restrictions too! But we 
ended up stretching it to five years now! 

MRR: One of your early shows was with Riistetyt.What are 
some more memorable shows from the Beverly era? 

Omid:Yeah we did get to play with Riistetyt That was awesome! In 
the year and a half Beverly was in the band we played a bunch of great 
shows, that was a really fun time. We even had nights where we would 
play two shows in a night! We were hungry.'Almost all the shows we 

, that era 'f re a blast - u n«l *e end.Then it started getting weird 
and the three of us were barely talking and were going in different 
directions, which made them not as fun.We weren’t really friends any 
more, and that as I said is the core of Battletorn ... friendship. So whin 
that was getting strained things had to change. 


Omid: Right. Well at some point we had gotten an email from Mad 
at the World saying they had seen us live and wanted to talk to us 
about maybe doing a single or something. I mentioned it at practice 
because I was excited they liked us.They were a NYC label that 
mainly seemed to be doing reissues of great old NYHC bands like 
Nihilistics, Urban Waste, Major Conflict, and bands like that so we’d 
be in great company! But for some reason the idea was met with 
lukewarm response by other members, mainly Beverly I think who 
thought we should stick with Mega Blade. Which was fine with me, 

I didn’t really care that much at the time, Mega Blade had offered to 
do a full length for us so we just stuck with them and put out our 
first LP Evil Chains in fall of 2005. We had done a full US tour in 
summer of 2005, which was hard. We were as I said above starting 
to lose our friendship and that was making it hard to function 
as a band. Mainly Beverly and I were not getting along, so things 
got tough because I loved her and what she brought to the table 
musically for the band, but personality wise we just couldn’t do it. 

So pretty much right after Evil Chains came out we decided to split 
from her and carry on without her. 

We had been asked by this band Kamikaze to go to the UK to do 
a tour and Beverly was acting like she didn’t want to go, so that 
was the breaking point really. I just wanted to go do shit and she 
seemed to second-guess things, so that was that. It wasn’t easy. But 
William and I agreed to basically never play any of the songs she 
had written lyrics for but continue on as Battletorn. 

MRR: How was this transition into a two-piece? Did you 
think about adding other members? 

Omid: OK, back to after Beverly left. For a minute there we thought 
about getting a new singer, but there was a time crunch because 
we wanted to get out a new record of the “Mach II” Battletorn and 
it seemed like it was best to just keep it a two piece with William 
and l,and I would sing. Mad at the World Records had stepped up 
and told us they wanted to work with us, so everything fell into 
place quick. We wrote and recorded the Burn Fast single in the first 
couple months of 2005, got it pressed and were in the UK touring 
as a two piece in April 2005! It was kind of a bitch getting used 
to singing and playing guitar—I had done it long long ago when I 
was seventeen years old playing in my drunk rock bands like Pork 
Trimmer doing KISS covers to get free beer at keg parties! But we 
figured it out and got it done. It was sink or swim so we had to. 

As I said after she left we were basically a band with one song (Evil 
Chains was one I’d written all of so we kept that), a name, and a 
tour of the UK, so we just hunkered down and did what we had to. 

MRR: My questions are a bit focused on the facts, which 
you document so well yourself? You’ve written pretty 
lengthy tour reports and band bios. What’s the motivation 
behind that? Anything other than just wanting to document the 
goings on of the band? 

Omid: Honestly it’s almost more for myself than anyone. I have 
noticed, as I get older I am forgetting a lot more of what happens 
in my life. Part of that might be due to all the substances I put 
ih my body to try and forget stuff for so many years, and some 
of it might just be getting older and how the older you get each 
year and things that happen to you becomes a smaller part of a 
bigger picture. So it gets hard to remember it all! Plus I am an avid 
music fan and love reading stuff about bands I like, so I like to put 
that stuff out there for people who like our band. And for us too, 








because I think 1 speak for all that have been in this band and 1 hope 
this doesn’t sound conceited but we are fans of-town band ^ 

I hate that people feel they can’t like their own band, or wear tnei 
own bands shi, ts, or whatever. If you don’t like your own fucking 
band why even bother doing it? 

That response was to your question about documenting the bands 
activities And as an addition to that. I would say that I am working 
A - n<s a Battletorn book to document ail the activities, stories, 

^ots f £££. will probably only make .00 orso copies, 
but it seems like a more fun way to document the last five years 
than on a web site! If the Plasmatics could write a book about 
themselves then I think it's OK for us too! 

MRR- It seems like Battletorn is more a vehicle for 
experience (of friendship and the high of playing shows) 
than just a band trying to reach its target audience The 
same artist has done all of your artwork (including the 
logoT). but it seems like there's less emphasis placed 
on image in a way and more on the experience of 
playing music and having fun.These are kind of (from 
my perspective) more punk principles, more * »I™* 
approach to playing music, but you grew up P'^ngjnhard 
rock bands called Pork Trimmer Do you think there * 
closer relationship between punk, meta . rock, whatever 
than scene purists would like to believe? 

OmidWasn’t it you who described our show as "a violent spirit 
of togetherness!” I think I used that on our bio! We are definite y 
, j l always loved that you said that and I felt it 

has his lsical roots firmly in one thing: rock and roK And the rest 
of these kinds of music are all just off shoots of that basic root of 
rock Maybe you can trace it back further than that to the bh.es 
butliustgrewup on rock. I grew up listening to bands like GUESS 
WHO and FLEETWOOD MAC. bands who wrote catchy songs 
with verses, choruses, and melodies, and you can hear a«iof that 
in Battletorn too. So from a musical perspecove that 
rooted and as far as the mentality behind the band—you hit the 
nail on the head. We were in it to hang out with friends, pla*^some 
music we due and have a good time doing it I think the punk p 
comesTroniour attitude and way of doing it ourselves and our way 
without participating in the “music industry machine " * 

any particular audience. And from my eyes there is a P“ nk nduslry 
machine” in play that’s not so different from the ma t or label 
™cbin,s Z tVm out produn bpnd, (o, 

But whatever, it’s wasn’t worth worrying or thinking about w 
just got out there and did our thing. Some people have gotten t 
*. are h W ** wb.s w.Ve doe. » M. •» <b« 

matters in the end. 

MRR:You would think it’s obvious that friendship ^ 

and fun are more important than getting b g. 
was mentioned, it seems so many bands, evenwnf.m 
“underground” scenes, are still focused on getting big. 
Whfdo 8 ^ continue to choose friendship andJun over 
opportunities that you may have had to ^ 

you may have gotten more exposure on Mega Blade fo 

instance.... 

Omid: Because to me in the end friends and family are the most 
important thing. And I don’t mean family in the sense of bio 
relatives as much as some of the friends and people I am closest 
with in this world who are my family. I look back on Batt etor 
Tave so many great memories of the people I have met and shared 
time with through this band, and that’s been the mosumportai ^ 
part to me.William and I have been together m this band for o 


' izszz 

friendships and experiences are what have meant the most to m . 

Hove William like a brother and appreciate all that we have done 

With, and label folks like Dan and Asim from Mad at the Wo . 
great people, 

It’S like Lynyrd Skynyrd says in that song Am I Losin which is about 

losing friends “Cause your friend Lord is the most important 

thing” I love Lynyrd Skynyrd. For me Ronnie’s lyrics are a gospel o 
som.Some people read the bible.l’d rather read h,s lyncs. 

MRR: Do you think he read the bible? 

Omid-1 know he read the bible. He was raised a southern religious 
family so I wou'd bet he did there’s a lot of spirituality an go 
references in his lyrics. Maybe I should read it sometime too. 
it’s a good novel! 

MRR: Does spirituality enter into your lyrics? 

Omid Yeah it does.That was a huge sticking point with Beverly too 
“wrote the song Evil Chains and wanted to name the first LP 
after that song It is a song about being strung out and losing hop , 
S h ^ J W„g » »o spiritual or AA or ,om«h.ng 

It wasiV^oi'eairt to be either, it was just about m, experience, which 
was ona of many that lead to me getting sober and Imng a dean 
S more .pintil Me for over eleven ym nowTh.r, are . 0 0 , 

„ that I’ve written since we became a two-piece tha 
S te!mt spiritual experiences and beliefs.AII of it comes from my life, 
there's very little fantasy lyric writing since we became a two-piece. 
And by spiritual experiences I mean both good and bad I jk 
ronsider near death experiences even if at my own hand spiritu 

experiences,butnotvery positive onesthatl 

anvone try The message and spiritual experience I want to convey 
mTethananyother is one of survival and hope. Unfortunately . 
always comes out sounding pretty angry and raw. so ^/be peop e 
miss that! My name means “hope” in Fars, so I ve always tried to 
hold onto it even in the darkest times. For me music has provi e 
a lit of support in some of those hard times, and maybe our music 
c '“do that for people too, be a release for things they need to 
process and let go of.And maybe just have fun and bang their hea 

while doing i# 

MRR- So we left off talking about Ronnie’s lyrics and the 
topic of spirituality in lyrics.lt reminded me 
you’d mentioned about a disagreement a difference 
between your and Beverly’s respect, vestyiesofwntmg 

lyrics. Wasn’t it initially over the song Evil Cha.ns. 

Omid-1 think there were some minor disagreements about lyrics 
S„b. E.,, Chains sbing. Basely bo. b-*““ 
pretty much given Beverly free reign to write about what she 
w3 but at a certain point we started reading the lyncs and 
reSng she was using words that we didn’t even know v^tti^ 
meant and we asked that she please not use words that we (the 
other two band members) would have to get out a dictionary to 

understand. 









MRR: What were some of the words out of curiosity? You 
remember? 

Omid:And though we welcomed her input musically, she wasn’t 
interested in letting us contribute or be a part of writing lyrics.The 
word, and it was really this one word that it came down to was 
“hegemony”. It did end up being in a song on Evil Chains in the end. 

MRR: “Cut It,” That’s the word I was gonna guess! 

Omid:That s right, that’s the song. She wanted to call it “New 
Hegemony” and we settled on a different song title but leaving the 
big college word in there. 


So anyways, around this time I had the song Evil Chains come into 
my head—music, lyrics, and all—on a subway train ride and brought 
it to the table. She was not pleased. It was almost the end of the 
trio right there before we’d even recorded our first LP. 


MRR: So for Beverly though, just the fact that there’s a 
religious association bothered her. Right? 


Omid: Well, I think it was the religious/recovery connection. 

MRR: Battletorn lyrics are all seem pretty general and 
abstract. Evil Chains just sounds like a song about struggle. 

Omid: Yes, I would agree that the lyrics that I have written are 
definitely more abstract and vague. I could tell you what every song 
was about but I don’t say everything totally literally.And yes. Evil 
Chains is about struggle and survival. 

MRR: So the lyrics are really important to you even though 
you want to keep them simple. 

Omid: Lyrics are very important, but yeah, I like to keep them 
simple. And I like them to rhyme when possible like the old rock 
songs I grew up on ha ha.Verse, chorus, verse, chorus! 


MRR: So what we’re her reservations about Evil Chains? 

Omid:Well, I remember so clearly going into Beacons Closet and 
having this drag out fight with her where she started saying that 
she (and evidently some of her friends she had asked) thought that 
Evil Chains sounded like some kind of AA slogan and that the song 
sounded preachy and recovery oriented. I told her it was about 
my own experience and that was it. She said she didn’t want to 
sing those words, so I said I’d sing them... back forth back forth. 
Then I told her I thought we should name the album after that 
track because it was the catchiest title and the shit hit the fen. I got 
the title for that song from a book about a religious commune, a 


Omid:Tbtally! Hooks, choruses 
4$ second song! 


you can remember even if its only a 


MRR: Recovery is a pretty deep process for a caveman, no? 

Omid:Yes, a recovering Caveman! That’s a good way of putting it ha. 

MRR:What’s it like to be in recovery and in the HC/metal 
scene for you? 


Omid: It’s a long tedious process! A lifelong process! But I’m trying 
Dan! So far it’s worked for eleven years!!! That’s a good question.To 
be honest, I don’t think about it too much, in regards to the metal/ 
HC scene, I just think about it in life in general. 

Being sober is fucking hard sometimes. A lot of times. But it’s worth 
it, and I wouldn’t trade it for anything. 

I did it all; I have nothing left to try except living life without 
crutches. jS» 





MRR: When did you get sober? Were you playing music? 
Was it during or post Enemy Soil? Eleven years is post... 
right? 

Omid: It was post Enemy Soil. It was in fall 1998 when I was 24.1 
had just moved to NYC and no I wasn’t playing music at the time. 

MRR: Was there a time when you felt self-conscious 
specifically about being sober around a bunch of drunk 
punks or metalheads? 

Omid: Actually I would have to say never. By the time I got sober 
the whole straight edge bubble had burst and most people in the 
HC scene were raging partiers, so in a way I was living the new 
counter culture by being sober! haha... 

MRR:Ahhh,a contrarian! I can relate! 

Omid: Metalheads were always ragers, so it was interesting being 
around some of them sober but they never made me feel weird. 
Especially those who knew me when I was using/drinking- they 
were glad to not have to deal with me like that, ha ha. 

Yes, contrarian! Wait, what does that word mean? Did you go to 
college or something Dan? I have my masters but don’t know that 
one. 



I meant to say that at the time of starting the band I wasn’t 
conscious of it being a vehicle for those feelings. As time has gone 
on I have definitely become aware of it and even consciously used it 
to work through some of those hard times while writing some sick 
thrash! And it has helped me. Survival man, survival! 


I assume it means being contradictory or something! 

MRR: Like always going contrary to other people.You 
said it was the new counter culture. When you started 
Battletorn did it seem like people expected you to be 
grind because of the Enemy Soil connection? Would you 
say there’s a grind influence? 

Omid.Yeah, I guess some folks might have expected some grind but 
then again I was only in Enemy Soil for about a year so it wasn’t my 
life’s blood or anything. But being in Enemy Soil did teach me how 
to play fast, that’s for sure! Richard Johnson has the patience of a 
saint to have been about to deal with me while I was in Enemy Soil, 
I was a longhaired mess. I meant to say to have been able to deal 
with me. 

MRR: How do you feel about maybe not meeting peoples 
expectations who want you to be this kind of band or that 
kind of band? 

Omid: Not a dumb question but I hadn’t thought of it. But I guess 
I’d say fuck em! We didn’t set out to play for any certain crowd or 
people. I think we did catch people off guard, we were probably 
expected to play metal since I was a long hair and such a metalhead, 
but I also loved HC and punk so Batttletorn became a hybrid of 
all of it. And as I think we discussed before this has both helped 
and hindered us. We are too punk for metalheads, too metal for 
punks, too noisy for some HC purists... so we just end up in some 
uncharted lands, which is fine. We just do pur own thing and if 
people get it cool, if not thats cool too! I have had fun doing it. We 
have had fun doing it! We!!!! Not me! This is a band!! Ha ha. 

MRR: So when you started playing music again did you 
feel like it was kind of a vehicle for your recovery? Not 
necessarily in the lyrics but just in the experience of 
playing being a release or whatever... 

Omid: Hmmmmm... that is a good question! 

MRR:Thank you... 

Omid: I don’t think I was conscious of it at the time, but I would 
say that in hindsight Battletorn has been a musical reflection of a 
lot of the struggle and hardships I have experienced in my life, both 
before and after getting sober. Life after getting sober has had just 
as many if not more frustrating and painful times as when I was 
using. But I am definitely better equipped tp deal with them. 


MRR:You mentioned the importance of friendship in the 
band. Do you feel like the friendship and collaboration 
is part of what makes the creation of music a healing 
experience. Would you consider it healing? Even though it’s 
reopening old wounds sometimes 

Omid.Yes to all of that. It is a healing experience, even when 
reopening old wounds. I would elaborate on that if you want but I 
think you hit the nail on the head! 

MRR: So Reflect the Filth is the last Battletorn record. Do 
you think it’s an appropriate end point? Why? 

Omid.Absolutely an appropriate end point, no question. We have 
been going for five years, and have put out three LPs, a few singles, 
a couple splits and other miscellaneous releases. It’s a body of 
work we are proud of and wanted to bookend.We didn’t want to 
become one of those bands that put out records just because we 
could and tarnished our name.There are very few bands that just 
keep putting out good records forever, so we just made a decision 
to quit while we felt we were ahead.The Reflect the Filth album 
is a pinnacle musically, emotionally, and in all areas. We were riding 
the subway home after finishing the recording and just said to each 
other “man... that’s a good place to stop.” 

MRR;What wounds are being healed or reopened on 
Reflect the Filth? 1 

Omid: Hmmmm.... Well, it’s mostly about the sickness and suffering 
that has permeated our lives and relationships. It’s been a hard road 
in that area. And then the usual topics, death, violence, that sort of 
thing! Hie title track is one of the best Battletorn songs we have 
ever written in my opinion. 

MRR: No Chance, No Loss what’s that lyric about? 

Omid: It captures everything that is and ever was Battletorn. Well, 

I hate to say it but that is about many of my relationships. Many 
of them had no chance, so in a way I see them as no loss... kind of 
a hard thing to admit but it’s true. Maybe that makes it easier to 
accept the loss. I don’t know. Don’t make me cry. 








March 26 - Calgary, AB @ The Safehouse 
March 27 - Edmonton, AB @ TBA 
March 28 - Vancouver, BC @ Biltmore 
March 29 - Seattle, WA @ The Morgue 
March 30 - Portland, OR @ Plan B 
March 31 - TBA 

April 1 - San Francisco, CA @ TBA 
April 2 - Oakland, CA @ TBA 
April 3 - Los Angeles, CA @ TBA 

(WITH Poison Idea) 

April 4 - Los Angeles, CA @ The Boulevard 

(with Poison Idea) 

April 5 - Tijuana, MX @ TBA 

April 6 - Pheonix, AZ @ The Slurp 

April 7 - Albuquerque, NM @ TBA 

April 8 - Denver, CO @ TBA 

April 9 - Lincoln, NB @ The Ghost House 

April 10 - Winnipeg, MB @ War On Music 

April 11 - Regina, SK @ The Fainting Goat 



DFA ‘2000-2004 Discography’ CD 
(Both LPs, Splits + unreleased tracks) 


IARANTUJA ‘Do Not Resuscitate’ CD/LP 

(Canada’s killer new thrash-terpiece!) 

CHECK FOR TOUR UPDATES: 

www.myspace.com/ dfathrash 
www.myspace.com/tarantuja 




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r- 



to’s Horseshoe Tavern with the Last 

The first wave of Toronto punk came to a bands. The Hors ^ oe ^JuTtheyglvlme Garys and 


Interview by Greg Dick 


MRR: So you’re a Toronto boy? 

Colin Brunton: Yep. I started off in The Beaches, 
then I spent a couple of years in Scarborough, 
then the West End. When I was thirteen, I went 
out to the East End where I remained. 

MRR: Did you go to high school out in the 
East End? 

Colin Brunton: Yep. East York Collegiate. 

MRR: What kind of bands were you getting 
into in high school? 

Colin Brunton: This would have been the 
early 70s, so I still loved Led Zeppelin. I hate 
to admit it, but I was into Edgar Winter. I also 
liked bands like Humble Pie, but my real secret 
shame is Jethro Tull. Loved Alice Cooper. The 
bands that I really liked I got into when I was 
twelve or thirteen. Those were Alice Cooper 
and the Yardbirds. It started off with the British 
Invasion, and opened up to the Animals and 
the Kinks and all that stuff, and when I got into 
high school I’was getting into Led Zep. The 
musical thing for me in high school was scoring 
this gig at The Original 99 Cent Roxy. Gary 
Topp hired me to work there. That’s when I got 
really turned on to tons of awesome music, 
film, culture, and art and stuff. The best one 
was finding out about Roxy Music. 

MRR: What was your first exposure to punk 
rock? A lot of us saw pictures first before 
we saw bands. 

Colin Brunton: It depends on how far you want 
to go back. 

MRR: I’m talking spiky hair, safety pins... 

Colin Brunton: I don’t think the spiky hair started 
until 79 or ‘80, but my first thing I guess- 
discounting an Iggy or Velvet Underground gig, 
would’ve been the Ramones when they came 
in September of 76. Obviously, months before 
that we were all getting a taste of it. Gary used 
to show this movie called Blank Generation at 
midnight shows at The New Yorker. It is a film 
by Amos Poe, a documentary on the New York 
punk scene, so you got a little taste of the Dead 
Boys, Ramones, Talking Heads, Television...all 
that, and you’d have to ask Gary himself this 
question, but I think that’s what got him keenly 
interested; the first couple of shows he brought 
were the Ramones and John Cale, and then 
everything just kind of changed. 

MRR: I started seeing pictures of a lot of the 
New York bands in Rockscene before they 
had records out. I know the movie Blank 
Generation was kind of interesting because 
the audio is not in sync with the footage, 
but it was the only way to see these bands 


at the time unless you lived in New York, 
which we didn’t. 

Colin Brunton: And if you were at The New 
Yorker at midnight watching Blank Generation 
and smoking weed, or being on some other 
thing, it didn’t matter if it was in sync. 

MRR: How did you meet The Garys? 

Colin Brunton: I was a high school kid. The 99 
Cent Roxy was the cool theatre to go to. Not 
just for awesome movies. There were double 
bills, different movies every night, and it 
was a fun place to go to. Gary Topp’s 
presentation was unparalleled. As soon 
as you walked in the door, the show 
started. When you got into the theatre 
itself, it was the music he played, playing 
movie trailers without the sound but with 
rock music over it. It was a buzz. So, 

I hung out there, and what happened 
was that it started getting really busy 
when Gary brought Reefer Madness. 

He offered to pay me and a pal twenty 
bucks a night to watch the doors and 
make sure people weren’t sneaking in, 
and it just kind of evolved from there. I 
continued to work with Gary there, then 
The New Yorker Theatre, and then at the 
Horseshoe. To work at the Roxy Theatre 
in high school was considered 
pretty awesome. It was the only 
movie theatre in Toronto where 
you could openly smoke dope. 

We experimented with marijuana 
there quite often. 

MRR: You were hanging 
out with the Garys making 
sure everything was running 
smoothly? 

Colin Brunton: Gary Cormier 
wasn’t in the picture at the Roxy 
so it was just Gary Topp and a 
couple of other partners who 
didn’t stick around that long. Then 
this guy named Jeff Silverman 
from Brooklyn came in and 
helped Gary run it. My job was 
great. I was taking tickets, and 
then as soon as I took the tickets I 
could go in and watch the movie, 
and just make sure I was out for 
the break. And occasionally throw 
people out of the theatre. We 
didn’t tolerate people who drank 
or dealt drugs, so they could 
smoke all the dope they wanted 
to, but if we heard the clink of a 
bottle we would be down there 

Right: Colin with Joey Ramone 
Photo by Tim Sebert 


figuring out who it was, and casually ask them 
to leave the theatre. We’d have to talk down 
people that were having bad acid trips. Our 
failsafe was the guys that hung out at the 
pool hall across the street, so if we ever got 
in big trouble they were there for the rescue. I 
remember once I had to throw this guy out that 
was on PCP or something. I had to sit on his 
chest, and he looked at me and he just started 
Rising up, and I thought, “Fuck, I’m going to get 
killed here.” Then Ducky, and Spike, and the 
boys from the pool hall came across and saved 
me. 


















MRR: The crowd that you were seeing at 
the theatre, would you say that they might 
have been the foundation of the future punk 
scene? 

Colin Brunton: A lot of the regulars ended up 
going to The New Yorker and the Horseshoe, 
and it wasn’t so much a clique. It was a 
fantastic place to get this really wide taste 
of culture. It wasn’t necessarily punk. Gary 
would show Roger Corman movies one night, 
and the next night a Bunuel double bill, and 
always new music. He’d just hear about bands 
before anyone else did. The kind of creativity 
it encouraged may have planted a seed in 
certain people’s minds that continued on and 
contributed to the idea of punk. You can’t 
measure how much influence Gary Topp has 
had on the counter culture in Toronto. 

MRR: Gary went on to spearhead the 
Toronto punk scene, and I always found 
there were parallels between cinema, 
literature, and the first generation punk 
scene. I noticed in Hamilton the people at 
The Delta would pop up at Club David’s 
and the Crash ‘n’ Burn. They’re curious 
and they were looking for something a little 
cutting-edge, which I think is what a lot of 
those rep theatre type places were. Were 
there ever any gigs at The Roxy? 

Colin Brunton: Probably one of the best shows 
I have ever seen was the first gig I ever saw 
at The Roxy by an awesome band called 
Breathless, which featured a very young—he 
must have been maybe seventeen-years-old— 
Nash The Slash, playing his electric viola. Later 
on, I remember a ten minute concert by Nash 
• where he sat down—I think it was his premier 
gig as the masked Nash The Slash, and he 
did a live soundtrack to Dali and Buhuel’s Un 
Chien Andalou. And you have to know that 
when people went to any weekend show at 
The Roxy they were ripped out of their minds. I 
remember sitting watching Nash and watching 
the audience, and everyone was leaning 
forward in their seats watching the movie, their 
jaws were just dropped. They couldn’t believe 
this. It was unreal. He had a candelabra set up, 
and did trickery with his tape machines, which 
was so ahead of it’s time. It was fantastic. 

MRR: Why did the theatre close? 

Colin Brunton: I think it was the rent. They 
didn’t own the building. From what I can recall 


as a little stoned seventeen-year- 
old kid, I think it was a matter of 
however successful Gary was there, 
the landlords would up the rent, and 
I don’t think they ever got a piece 
of the snack bar. That’s how you 
make money at a movie theatre. The tickets 
were 99 cents and the thing would sell out 
every weekend. After a while they just couldn’t 
make any money, so they moved on to The 
New Yorker and leased the place off of a guy 
called Bennet Fode. It was kind of the same 
deal as The Roxy: Different movies every night, 
midnight shows, stuff like that. 

Nash The Slash was the first manager, and 
I was his assistant for about the first year. We 
would take turns going to the basement, having 
a puff of weed, and then taking off to Funland 
to play pinball. (Sorry Gary!) I remember one 
day Gary and Jeff needed to get the snack bar 
fixed and they called in this carpenter. This 
long-haired, bearded guy came in and did an 
excellent job, and he and Gary just hit it off. That 
was Gary Cormier. He had some experience 
managing Rough Trade, but had gotten out of 
the business, and I think meeting Gary Topp... 
they were kindred spirits. They both got excited 
about doing this stuff and the next thing you 
know they built a stage and started bringing in 
all these bands. They became known as the 
Garys. It was very exciting. That’s where it 
happened. I am pretty certain the first one was 
the Ramones although it could have been Ali 
Akbar Khan, a sitar player. It was one of those 
two and then John Cale was probably the 
second or third person. 

It was all just mind- blowing. The thing about 
The New Yorker that was awesome was that it 
was a small theatre with 500 seats, so any seat 
was a great seat. What made it more intimate 
was the fact that there was no back stage, 
and so the bands would have to walk from the 
basement through the lobby and down the 
aisle. You would just hear this buzz starting 
because everyone in the back would say, 
“Hey, here comes John Cale!” or whatever, 
and the applause would build and go to the 
front like a wave, and then they would leave 
the same way—off the stage, walk up the 
aisle, through the lobby, and down into the 
furnace room. 

MRR: The first time the Ramones played 
was with Johnny Lovesin. Tell us about 
that show. 

Colin Brunton: It was great. I don’t know if you 
can get a show much more exciting than the 
first Ramones show. It was Johnny Lovesin 


and His Invisible 
Band, which means 
that it was Johnny 
Lovesin solo. And he 
was great! What balls 
to go and open for this 
band that everybody 
was so excited about. 

MRR: I didn’t see the 
first Ramones show. 
I went the second 
time when they had 
the Dead Boys open 
for them. 

Colin Brunton: We 
were excited. They 
didn’t let us down. 
Three shows man. 

Five bucks a ticket. 
The Garys probably never made a nickel off 
of it. They couldn’t sell out the three shows. 

I think they did a total of 1,300 tickets. Peter 
Gabriel walked out after the first ten minutes of 
the show muttering, “This is bullshit.” We were 
thinking, “This is un-fucking-be//evab/e!” It was 
such an assault, and it was so different and 
faster and crazier than anything you’d heard up 
until that point. 

MRR: The second time they came the Dead 
Boys played with them. Were there more 
people the second time around? 

Colin Brunton: I am pretty certain that one was 
sold out. That was the Dead Boys, the Poles, 
and the Ramones. The nasty Dead Boys... They 
came quite a few times. I interviewed Cheetah 
a couple of summers ago at a cemetery for this 
project that I’ve been working on for a couple 
of years. When we were at The New Yorker, 
Gary and Jeff got me to clean up what would 
be the dressing room. I would take this muriatic 
acid and splash it on the wall, and then hide my 
nose away from it, then scrub it with this brush 
and try and clean this whole brick wall. We tried 
to make this crappy basement into a dressing 
room and we got it looking okay, and then the 
Dead Boys came and trashed it in, like, an 
hour! When I interviewed Cheetah, I called him 
on it, and it was funny because he was just so 
apologetic. “I’m so sorry. Did we really destroy 
it?” “Yes. Yes you did.” “I’m so sorry man”. The 
Dead Boys were bad boys. 

MRR: During the time that The New Yorker 
was happening, what other clubs or 
hangouts were there back then? 

Colin Brunton: It is hard to track it all. In 76 
or 77 I think the first one that popped up was 
the Colonial Underground, and there was the 
Turning Point, David’s, and I believe that the 
Crash ‘n’ Burn didn’t start until the following 
summer. Then it seemed like a new club would 























THE 


ROM DETROIT, USA 

ROMANICS 

— . 


SEPTEMBER 

7 


ITEENAGEI HEAD*? , 
PUGLySJa NDFODS 


HE GOV ERNMENT 
I SHAMBLES IBH 


THE 


HIM 

OF FOUR 


and now live 

from Toronto 


SUICIDE 


FROM DETROIT 
WITH EX-STOOGE 
RON ASHETON 
AND EX-MC5 
MICHAEL DAVIS/1 


THE SCENICS 




the Last Pogo 


AiX. 5tA.ii> K^LriVtU . I iv>!vKJiw\ 

RECORDS ON WHEELS * ROUND RECORDS 
RECORD ROCKET 



















































pop up over night. You’d hear, “Go to so-and- 
so address on Yonge Street,” and there would 
be a band in a flat above a store, and you 
brought your own beer or bought it there like 
a speakeasy. They’d last for maybe a weekend 
and then they’d disappear. 

MRR: Who was the first Toronto punk band 
you ever saw? 

Colin Brunton: I remember it was with Gary and 
Gary after a shift at The New Yorker. “Come on, 
let’s close it up and check out Steven Leckie’s 
new band at the Colonial Underground.” 

MRR: What was Steve’s band called? 

Colin Brunton: The Viletones. Not the 
Dialtones. The Viletones. It was something to 
behold. It was like nothing we had ever seen 
before. 

MRR: Would it be safe to say that they were 
the first Toronto punk band? 

Colin Brunton: I can’t really think of anyone 
else who came before them. The Ramones 
were September 24 th , 1976, and it seemed like 
a week or two later this whole thing started. 
All of a sudden you started' seeing handbills 
on telephone poles in the city, which you had 
never seen before. All of a sudden there was 
this thing happening. Steve Leckie was the 
first. It was an awesome show. It was one of my 
favorite shows of my life. It was just so anarchic 
and chaotic. 

MRR: When did the idea hit you that you 
could become a filmmaker? 

Colin Brunton: I think about one second before 
I said, “Hey Gary, I want to make a film about 
this Last Pogo show you’re doing.” 

MRR: So that was a little later on from the 
time that we are talking about? 


and now live from Toronto 


THE 

IUGLY 


on BOMB RECORDS and TAPES 
the Last Pogo 


BOMB 7029 


and now 


from Toronto 



DRASTIC MEASURES 

on BOMB RECORDS and TAPES 

the Last Pogo BOMB 7029 


Colin Brunton: I was fumbling around trying 
to figure out what I wanted to do, and I 
wasn’t super ambitious or anything. I took 
a filmmaker’s weekend course at this place 
called the Toronto Filmmaker’s Co-op, and 
made a little movie with Elizabeth Aikenhead 
called Bollocks. It was a little five minute thing 
where we went to Club David’s and shot the 
Viletones, and then we just shot some goofy 
stuff. We re-created the front cover of the first 
Stranglers album with a rat, and I made one 
of those giant safety pins that you could wear 
like an arrow-through-the-head kind of gag, 
and that kind of gave me a taste for it. I started 
driving a cab and one night I pulled up in front 
of the Horseshoe to pop in and say hi to Gary, 
and I heard Andrew Paterson talking to the 
Garys saying, “Hey this Last Pogo sounds like 
a great idea.” 

MRR: And Andrew Paterson was a member 
of the Government? 

Colin Brunton: Yeah. I just heard him muttering 
in his way, and I was pretty certain that I may 
have been experimenting with marijuana in my 
cab that night, and I grandly announced without 
really thinking about it, “Hey that sounds like a 
really cool thing to make a film about.” I left it 
at that. I finished my shift and the next morning 
I got up and it still sounded like a good idea. I 
pulled it together somehow. 

MRR: Did you work at the Horseshoe? 

Colin Brunton: Gary was the most awesome 
guy to work for. When I started working for him 
I was seventeen, and it was just such a big 
influence on me. To this day, the way I treat my 
crews on film and TV shows is much the way 
Gary treated me. Do your job and relax, and get 
it done. It was very loose. By the time we got to 
the Horseshoe he asked me if I wanted to work 
here and I said, “For sure. So what do I do?” 
He was like, “I don’t know, whatever.” 
“Uh...do you want me to take tickets?” 
“Oh, no. We’ll have people for that”. “Do 
you want me to bus tables?” “No there’re 
people for that, too.” “So what do I do?” 
“I don’t know. Just hang out.” So I just 
kind of hung out. Then I started making 
the handbills. I made all the posters, and 
then I went and stapled them up around 
town. Sometimes it would cost more to 
make the poster...back in those days 
when you made a handbill you had to cut 
with scissors and paste with glue. If I had 
white letraset I would scratch it to make 
it look distressed, and then if I wanted to 
make it bigger or if I wanted to make it 
black instead, I’d get on my bike and go 
to this place called Midtown Reproduction 
in Yorkville. I’d drop it off, tell them what I 
wanted, come back either three hours or a 
day later, get the new artwork, spend ten 
bucks on that, and occasionally realize I 
made a really stupid typo. It would take 
forever. I think they paid me 50 bucks a 
handbill, which back in those days was 
really generous. But sometimes I would 
end up paying more to make the handbill. 

MRR: What were some of your favorite 
gigs at the Horseshoe? 

Colin Brunton: One of my favorites was 
Edie the Egg Lady. Edie was famous for 
being in John Waters’ Pink Flamingoes. 
She was the obese elderly woman who 
sat in the crib waiting for the egg man 
to come by. She came to town and she 
had some poetry, and it was one of those 



ink Rock 1978 


spontaneous catch-lightning-in-a-bottle things. 
The Garys arranged for the Viletones to back 
her up, so it was Chris Hate, Motor Mike, and 
Freddie Pompeii. They met Edie that afternoon 
and she told them what she wanted to do, 
and it was awesome. She did her big hit, “Hey 
Punks Get off the Grass.” Another show I really 
loved was Suicide. 

MRR: Was that the night with Destroy All 
Monsters and Teenage Head? The triple bill 
that went three nights? 

Colin Brunton: The Suicide show that stands 
out to me is the one that they may have done 
by themselves. There were very few people 
at the Horseshoe; there were maybe a dozen 
people. Alan Vega is pretty intense, and we 
were standing there, and we had grins ear to 
ear watching him because the guy was just so 
entertaining and so different. Every so often you 
would get these stragglers that would wander 
in. I remember there was this table of what 
you might perceive as university jocks sitting 
at this table having a few beers and yapping 
off to Alan Vega. At one point Vega jumped off 
the stage and marched up to the table and put 
his face about one inch away from the loudest 
jock’s face, and keeping totally in time with 
Martin Rev’s, synthesizer screamed “I wanna 
fucking kill you!” The guy never said another 
word. The Contortions were awesome. The 
Cramps were great. The Stranglers. Richard 
Hell. The Dead Boys always. The thing is, you 
look at the handbills from those days, and it 
was nine months, seven nights a week. It’s 
hard to believe. 

MRR: Were there any bands wanting to play 
The Last Pogo that were turned down? 

Colin Brunton: The one I remember of course 
was Mickey de Sadist from the Forgotten 
Rebels... 

MRR: ...who does a cameo in the film? 

Colin Brunton: Yeah, well we finished the 
shooting of the thing and we thought we should 
get a few interviews with people. We went 
down to New Rose which was the punk record/ 
clothing store run by Freddie Pompeii and 
Margarita Passion. We interviewed the both of 
them. Mickey was there and he was jokingly 
bitching about the fact that the Forgotten 
Rebels didn’t get to play The Last Pogo. We 


j 
























decided to interview him and he was great. He 
held up his Forgotten Rebels album and told us 
that The Last Pogo was “one big farce,” that it 
was stupid, and he did a Mods impersonation. 
We thought, “We have to keep this guy in for 
sure now.” He was just too funny. 

MRR: That night the Viletones pirated the 
stage and weren’t expected to play. They 
took Teenage Head’s gear. I know Sam was 
playing Steve Mahon’s bass upside down, 
which Sam had some trouble with, but they 
still pulled off a fantastic set. 

Colin Brunton: Plus, it’s always good when you 
play a bass guitar to, y’know, plug it in. I don’t 
remember very much of that evening at all. I 
was trying to make this film with a few camera 
people, and I was a little shell-shocked. I 
remember getting pushed outside. I remember 
talking my way past the fire chief, or the cop, 
or whoever it was that told us we had to leave. 
Apart from that, I’m drawing a blank on the 
whole evening. I’m glad I made the film so that 
I can remember it. Or at least 26 minutes of it. 

MRR: The place was way oversold. Did you 
expect that kind of a turn out? 

Colin Brunton: I think everyone in the scene 
was pretty excited about the gig. We thought 
it was probably going to sell out, we just didn’t 
expect that there were going to be an extra 
300 people that would make their way through 
the doors. It ended up being pretty chaotic, 
but again, I don’t even remember where I was 
standing that night, or what I was doing. I think 
I was behind the sound board and occasionally 
walking up to a camera person. The only thing 
I really remember is being out on the sidewalk 
and hearing the riot and thinking, “I can’t 
believe I’m stuck out here on the sidewalk.” And 
then I was thinking, “Where’s the sound guy?" 
Someone said he was still inside recording, so 
at least we captured the noise of the riot, and 
shot the aftermath. 

MRR: Did the scene change much from last 
Ramones gigs at The New Yorker to the 
Last Pogo? There’s a time span of almost 
two years. 

Colin Brunton: The Ramones came in 76 and 
I remember when the show was over me and 
a couple of buddies that worked there were 
thinking, “Wow they had black jeans." You 
couldn’t buy black jeans in Toronto. There 
was a big concern about it. “Man, we can’t be 
hippies. We can’t wear blue jeans. We gotta get 
black jeans from somewhere.” So one of the 
differences by the time the Pogo came around 
is that people were getting a bit more into the 


whole fashion thing. For the first 
couple of years Toronto wasn’t as 
fashion conscious as New York or 
London were, and I think after that 
it changed a bit more. 

MRR: Who do you think had the 
strongest performances at The 
Last Pogo? 

Colin Brunton: The first night, as 
much as I loved certain bands 
there, I think the best performance 
was from the Secrets. They were 
playing down the street at the 
Beverley. They literally ran from 
a gig at the Beverley down to the 
Horseshoe, and just ran up on 
stage and did their show. And you 
can tell they were pumped with 
adrenalin when they did their bit. It 
was a bit odd because they did some a capella, 
and it was more like an edgy rhythm and blues 
band. The Viletones were always exciting no 
matter what. You never knew what Steven was 
going to do. Cardboard Brains, the Mods and 
the UGLY were good. I Jike the Scenics, but 
they had the opening gig, and they didn’t have 
a huge following. And it’s pretty hard to beat 
a band coming on during a riot—there were 
people standing on tables and playing with the 
lights when Teenage Head hit the stage. 

MRR: That was just incredible, those last 
twenty minutes in the Horseshoe. I’ll never 
forget it. Walking through there with my 
buddy looking at piles of wood from these 
chairs that would have taken ten chainsaws 
to break apart, but somehow all these 
skinny little kids just destroyed everything. 
It was just amazing. In the movie why is the 
sound for Teenage Head so muddy? 

Colin Brunton: What happened was that back 
in those days Teenage Head were managed 
by a guy who was very protective of his band 
and wouldn’t allow Comfort Sound to record 
them. All we had to go off of for that moment 
was our tape recorder with our sound guy, so 
we just couldn’t get good sound. And in fact, at 


that point we couldn’t get much footage of them 
either because we couldn’t get to the stage, so 
we had to do our best to cut and paste together 
what we had. 

MRR: Tell me about the interviews in The 
Last Pogo. You already touched on the one 
with Mickey de Sadist. One of my favorites 
was the one you did with the Viletones, with 
the famous quote from Tony Torcher, the 
drummer. 

Colin Brunton: I knew Leckie and I thought, 
“How am I going to get a rise out of Steven 
Leckie? What is the stupidest question I could 
ask?” So I said, “Are the people that come to 
the Viletones shows laid back?” That just set 
him off, and he said, “No they are not laid 
back,” and Tony came up with the line “People 
change. It’s like a hit of heroin.” 

MRR: I think he said “The Viletones are like 
a hit of junk.” I loved that, but I think they 
were more like a hit of speed. Tell me about 
the Teenage Head interview. They finish off 
the movie. 

Colin Brunton: I asked them an honest 
question. I said “Do you guys think you’ll be 
doing this five years from now?” They cracked 
a joke, and it’s kind of funny because they went 
on to do it for another 30 years, which is pretty 
amazing. 

MRR: The Last Pogo was billed as the last 
punk show ever. Was it? 

Colin Brunton: It was the last punk show at 
the Horseshoe Tavern when it was run by 
the Garys. I really think that you can’t peg a 
day that the punk scene started in Toronto. 
You can’t peg a day when it ended. For my 
purposes, for the new project I’m doing, I’m \ 
saying that the punk scene started when the 
Ramones came in 76, and I think the first real 
wave of the punk scene ended the night of the 
Last Pogo, December 1, 1978. 

MRR: I fully agree with that. Do you feel 
that the Toronto scene was overlooked 
internationally? 


Above: Horseshoe Tavern Photo by Michael Korican 






















Colin Brunton: Absolutely. There weren’t 
enough clever people in the record industry. 
The press was kind of amused by it. Look at 
some of the CBC archival stuff of interviewing 
The Viletones. I mean it was much the same 
attitude as the American media when they got 
onto Elvis, and the rock‘n’roll thing started in 
the States. They just thought it was a passing 
fancy. The thing about London and New York is 
they got a lot more attention because there’re 
a lot more people. There’s a lot more press, 
and maybe they had smarter people. Toronto 
back then was still so provincial and small-town 
that we just didn’t have the coverage. Luckily 
for me and this new thing that I’m doing, there 
were also a lot of really talented and creative 
people in the audience that night. I have so 
many fantastic photographs by people like 
Edie Steiner, Don Pyle, Ross Taylor, and a few 
others. There was a fantastic scene and no one 
paid attention to it. 

MRR: I think that’s changing now. The one 
thing I enjoy seeing with the Toronto scene 
is not just the enthusiasm within our own 
city, but I think the people around the world 
are starting to pay attention. The release of 
the movie is certainly going to help that. 
What did the promoters the Garys do after 
the Horseshoe? 

Colin Brunton: They started The Edge. They 
took over an old pub. I think it was an old 
Ryerson student pub called Edgerton’s. They 
renamed it The Edge and it was a much 
smaller room, and they continued on bringing 
in their favorite bands. 

MRR: Did you work there? 

Colin Brunton: No I didn’t. I did the handbills. I 
was driving a cab. I had this vague notion that I 
was going to keep making films somehow. 

MRR: That was another incredible place. 
You could see the Only Ones on Sunday 
and Ultravox with the Mods on Monday. 
Seven nights a week. It was just incredible. 
The public debut of The Last Pogo was at 
the Danforth Music Hall a long time ago 
with the Toronto debut of the Buzzcocks, 
Gang of Four, and The Viletones’ debut as a 
rockabilly band. How did that go? 

Colin Brunton: It went great. Gary put a screen 
in front of the stage so when one band ended 
the movie started, and you could kind of 
vaguely see the band behind the screen getting 
set. I was so nervous. In 26 minutes I smoked 
five cigarettes. I just wanted to get the thing 
over with. I was in the projection room sweating 
up a storm, puffing away. It went over great. 
To the Toronto audience it wasn’t that much of 
a big deal. These were their bands they saw 
all the time, so the film got no attention when 
I finished it. 

MRR: How were the reviews for the film? 
Were there any? 

Colin Brunton: The only review I managed to 
get was—and this was after a couple of letters 
that I wrote to Peter Goddard— and finally he 
came through and wrote quite a nice article 
about the film in the Toronto Star. But I couldn’t 
sell it. No one wanted to show it. The New 
Music wanted it for nothing. When they couldn’t 
get it for nothing they picked up some British 
punk special instead. I just thought, “Fuck you.” 
They did relent a year later and showed it three 
times. 

MRR: Typical Toronto back then. It has 


changed a little now. Ignoring their own 
scene. 

Colin Brunton: It hasn’t changed that much. 
Let’s face it. 

MRR: Did the film get any international 
exposure? 

Colin Brunton: Funnily enough it got picked up 
by New Line Cinema. One of my trips down to 
New York I decided to pop in unannounced and 
ask them how the film was doing. Gary Topp 
had a friend in California who was an assistant 
camera guy who I admired because he had 
actually gotten into the business, which was 
very romantic to me. He told Gary that he saw a 
film of this Last Pogo at a midnight show in San 
Francisco. So, I went to New York and I walked 
into New Line’s office and I said, “I want to see 
the books on my film.” I looked at the books 
and I said, “What about the San Francisco 
gig?”, and they hemmed and hawed, and I sat 
in the lobby for about an hour and a half, and 
then I left that day with all my film prints. 
They tore up the contract. It was over. I 
think I made $36. 

MRR: It has had rave reviews 
irj Maximum Rocknroll and the 
alternative press. I think that the way 
things are with the internet these days 
I have a feeling that the thing will get 
exposure. You had started filming 
the bonus footage for the DVD that’s 
coming out, but it turned into a whole 
other project. You just started meeting 
all these people that were involved in 
the scene back in the day, and you 
found out that there was just so much 
and they were so interesting. Tell me 
about that. 

Colin Brunton: It’s kind of endless. The 
reason why I thought...well, the rights 
for The Last Pogo were tied up for ten 
years, and when I got them back I took 
a look at the film and thought, “Wow, this 
really holds up.” At the same time I had 
this awesome camera that I’d managed 
to get, my son Ollie was thirteen, and I 
thought, “Maybe I should just take the 
summer off and we can go out with the 
camera and start tracking down some 
of the people from The Last Pogo and 
find out what they are up to,” and it 
evolved from there. Now I have created 
a monster! I have to end this soon. I have 
to admit that I’m getting kind of tired of 
it because I have a family, and I have to 
work, so I kind of sneak time in. But it’s 
still fun. 

MRR: This is just a side project for 
you. You are working on Little Mosque 
on the Prairie and so maTiy other 
things so... 

Colin Brunton: Yeah, so it has kind of 
turned into this monstrous hobby and it’s 
fun, but I just want to get it done. I think 
I have about two to three hundred hours 
of footage and there’re still a couple of 
dozen people I feel like I really have 
to get that represent that period that I 
love—1976 to 78 in Toronto. That’s what 
the new film is. We’re going to use the 
original Last Pogo as the spine, and we 
will re-meet people that you saw in The 
Last Pogo and find out what they’re doing 
now. 

MRR: What is it going to be called? 


Colin Brunton : The Last Pogo Jumps Again. 

MRR: Are the Garys going to be involved in 
this upcoming Last Pogo show? 

Colin Brunton: I don’t think they’re officially 
involved, but I know for sure that Gary Topp is 
going to be there. I haven’t talk to Cormier, but 
the Garys have to come for sure or it’s almost 
ludicrous. 

MRR: Will it be filmed or recorded? 

Colin Brunton: Yeah, both. When I say “filmed”, 
I’ve toyed with the notion that I can pull some 
16mm together for this, but I’m npt quite as 
stupid as I was when I was 23, when I made 
The Last Pogo. I am not that much smarter, but 
not quite as dumb. I don’t know if I want to jump 
40 grand in debt to film this. 

MRR: When do you anticipate the release of 
The Last Pogo Jumps Again ? 

Colin Brunton: 2010 for sure. 


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ATTENTAT 


* SONOllE 


Attentat Sonore hails from Limoges, France, 
somewhere halfway between Paris and Bordeaux. 
It’s a bit isolated from the bigger cities; if you want 
to see touring bands in Paris, Bordeaux or Dijon you 
need to drive some hundred miles. A couple of years 
ago, I heard a song by Attentat Sonore on a free 
compilation CD by the French magazine Punk Rawk 
and they immediately caught my attention with their 
way cool punk rock style and dual vocals. So we got 
in touch and to my complete surprise, I was able to 
meet some really enthusiastic and very active punks 
in Limoges. Guitarist Raf and his wife Murielle, 
one of the singers of Attentat Sonore, are involved 
in numerous supportive activities in Limoges; 
organizing shows in their hometown (Listen! Bands 
on tour in Europe: if you’re planning to tour Spain 
and you’re coming from up north in Europe, then you 
should definitely get in touch with Raf about playing 
Limoges!), running a record store, doing a fanzine 
and a weekly punk rock radio show. The people in 
Limoges are extremely nice, active and politically/ 
socially aware. They’ve got their punk rock hearts 
in the right place! Along with that, Attentat Sonore 
has been playing since 1988, so it’s about time to 
introduce this band to MRR readers! Allez-allez! 
Interview by Helge Schreiber / Germany 
Photos by Laurent Lagarde and Murielle 


Murielle sings now (her first recording ever was the “Barricades 1905” 7”). Over t 
years we played around, we recorded by ourselves, with our friends. We tried our 
best to show there is an alternative to business-rock. Eh eh! Life on the Bords de 
Vienne is OK... and we want to keep it as it is now, or make it better. 


MRR: We don’t get much information about French scene here in Germany, 
so it would be cool to hear more about what’s going on in France. Could you 
tell us about the French DIY punk rock scene? What is the status on squats 
or autonomous centers? 

Raf: Hell, we sure wish we had more squats, but there are only a few, and most of 
them are short-lived experiences; soon evicted by cops. The best and oldest one 
is Les Tanneries in Dijon where we played a couple of times. It is a huge concert 
venue, with interesting activities besides, like the ones you have in German squats. 
In Paris it is difficult to maintain squats. As far as I know, they only last a couple of 
months. One called La Miroiterie is going to be closed soon. It’s a pity, as they were 
pretty active gig-wise. Towns that formerly had many squats, like in Grenoble or 
Lyon, have had the same difficulties. I guess Fortress Europe has the same rules 
everywhere, now. 


MRR: How would you characterize your band? Is Attentat Sonore more like a 
political band who is based in the DIY scene? 

Raf: I think one could say that. The band shares some points of view with the political 
scene, plays benefits (like for Anarchist Black Cross, arrested demonstrators, 
anti-racist organizations, etc. or the Parisian independent radio FPP) or supports 
different organizations in one way or another. That doesn’t mean we are willing to 
abandon our freedom of thinking, of course. We like the idea to play in different 


MRR: Attentat Sonore is one of the 


v 


40 , 




longest going punk bands in France. 
Would you please introduce yourself, 
give us some band history and tell us 
who’s in the band? How’s life at the 
“Bords de Vienne”? 

Raf: We are Attentat Sonore, I am Raf, 
and I have been playing guitar in the band 
since it started, before the first demo in 
1988. Back then, we were a two-piece band 
with random help from other people and 
playing with a drum machine. It was pretty 
chaotic and unplanned, really. Don’t waste 
your time checking the old recordings. This 
formula changed when I moved to Limoges, 

I started to search for other people; I found 
Loulou (bass) and later Marie (vocals). 
They are still good friends of ours, but 
very busy with their 3 kids! So, we got a 
drummer, then another, then to Stef, who 
still is doing the job after several years. At 
the same time, Ray entered the picture on 
vocals. We later had to replace Loulou on 
bass with Laurent, then with his girlfriend 
Eva. Marie moved on to other projects and 












networks and meet different people who sometimes don’t mix with each other; we 
don’t like ghettos at all. And I am not talking about playing major venues, eheh, just 
mixing the crowds and getting over the labels. Next support gig is the Lemovice 
Antifa Fest 5 for Anarchists against the Wall, in our town. 


Raf: Well, our fifth annual record fair was in early April, 
“Broc’n’Roll,” which is a play on words with brocante, 
which is like a flea market, and rock’n’roll. It was great! 
With people coming from all around, sometimes as far 
as Paris or Bordeaux, it was a success. No big money 
involved in it, only passionate people looking for good 
music, DJ’s all day and a good atmosphere. On the last 
night, there was a gig with D.O.A. and our local mates, 
Sideburns Sweat; it was a cool way to finish the party! 


MRR: What would you say are your musical and lyrical influences? 

Raf: Musically, it is a bit difficult to say, since we like so many bands and different 
styles of music. We’ve been labeled with a lot of names, but we like being 
called simply a punk band then people can form their own opinion when they 
hear our music and lyrics. We have dual vocals and we like bands with female 


vocalists. Let’s just say we are playing punk songs in a 77 style, rougher songs 


MRR: You also run a record label, Guerilla Vinyl. What 
bands have you released so far and do you have any 
ethical guidelines in terms of what you put out or how 
you run a label? 

Raf: Is this a proper label? I don’t know. I just helped 
release a couple of records over the years, Desert 
Culturel / Skinny Boys in 1993, Conflict / Kochise double 
7” in 1996. The same year Panx released our split 7” 
with Scraps, we helped under the name Guerilla Vinyl, 
as an extension of my ‘zine, Guerilla Urbaine. In the end, 
the label survived over the ‘zine! Most releases are our 
bands, but lately, we helped re-release the GO! “Your 
Power Means Nothing” 7”, which I consider a classic of 
the NYHC scene. Also, the Kismet HC / Happy Bastards 
split 7” with limited edition artwork. Ethics: releasing only 
what we find interesting to be released, that’s the way 


somewhere between street punk and early hardcore: simple and straight to the 
point. We covered songs ranging from the Partisans, Poison Idea, 7 Seconds, the 
Oppressed, Kidnap, Rattus, SOIA... Our lyrics have no particular influence from 
any band, really. We like both serious lyrics and more cynical ones; sometimes just 
painful, hateful lyrics! 


MRR: How many shows have you played in the past? Have you been on any 
tours yet? 

Raf: We’ve played cool shows, but we cannot afford to be out of town for too long. 
All five of us have responsibilities here, either family stuff or jobs or others... For a 
couple of years now, we try to play as often as we can afford, and we did a 5 day 
tour in 2007 in France, Switzerland, Germany and Belgium. We are doing another 
one this year in Switzerland, France and Germany. In the meantime, we went to 
play for some unofficial Ladyfests in Brussels, and Barcelona along with our usual 
gigs in France during 2007 and 2008. We opened for bands like Flux Of Pink 
Indians, the U.K. Subs, Operation S, Burning Heads, 

Oi Polloi, Real Me Kenzies, D.O.A., the Hard-Ons, and 3HHHHHHHHI 
more! We are always happy to play with other bands in ■ ■■■■■■ 
other places. *. 


MRR: Attentat Sonore is from Limoges. Could you 
tell us more about the activities in your hometown? 
I’ve heard that you’re booking shows there, how 
long has that been going on? 

Raf: We can’t complain too much about our town, there 
are tons of cool gigs every year and it’s always fun. 
Sometimes the venues are packed, sometimes not, 
but I guess that’s the same everywhere. We’ve been 
booking DIY gigs here since 1994. The most difficult 
part was in the late ’90s/early 2000s when the scene 
was dying everywhere and there were no more cool 
bars. People were not going out anymore, or maybe 
they were busy raising their kids. Anyways, once we 
found a cool bar, we organized a couple of gigs again. 
First, Attila the Stockbroker and Barnstormer, then 
the Lower Class Brats, Bonehouse, the Nitwitz, the 
Varukers... and the wheel started to turn again! A new 
generation of people came, kids started bands again, 
and they had places and gigs to play again. It was great 
to witness these positive things. And it’s not finished 
yet! 




MRR: Since early 2007, there has been a DIY **^^^^* 

record store in Limoges. Could you give us some 
information on the store? 

Raf: Actually, there are other record stores in town, but none had the spirit we like 
to find in a store. None were carrying independent releases, for example. So we 
combined forces with several associations and friends to open and maintain the 
store. It’s called Undersounds and its been 100% volunteer run now for over one 
year. Currently, a friend is working there and there are still people volunteering, of 
course. We opened it in January of 2007. It’s doing ok and we are happy with it. It’s 
what the local scene was lacking. You can find all info about bands and local gigs, 
fanzines, self-released records, and, of course, a large variety of new and used 
records, including lots of vinyl. This way we can expose people to releases from 
local bands and we can help releasing a couple of records. We did a compilation 
CD called “Limoges Punx” with the idea of promoting the local scene. You can find 
rock music, punk, reggae, postpunk, hardcore, some metal, some oldies... Well, 
we like the place, it has built alliances between quite a few people which is great 
to have. 


MRR: Do you collaborate with any other record 
labels? 

Raf: Yes, we always did; particularly with Maloka, who 
helped release the last three vinyl releases. For the brand 
new one, which exists on CD digipak and vinyl, there’s 
an interesting mix of labels involved: there is Maloka 
(releases of Inner Terrestrials, La Fraction, Kochise, 
Conflict, Hard Skin etc ), Mass Productions (Raw Power, 
Varukers, Bonehouse, etc.), FZM (aka Folklore de la 
Zone Mondiale) which is ex-Berurier Noir members’ label 
(Lucrate Milk, Witch Hunt, BxN, and more), and Kawaii, 
another friend from Lyon (French DIY HC label), and 
ourselves. That’s a great mix covering the French scene 
from its ’80s roots to the new emerging DIY HC scene, so 
we are happy to gather these people around us. 


MRR: And how about that record fair in Limoges? 


V 















-3 



MRR: And what about the punk rock 
radio show you’re doing? With whom 
are you doing the show and how wide 
is the reach? 

Raf: The show is done by our singers Ray 
and Murielle, and myself. It is on air every 
Monday (19H-20H) on www.beaubfm.org, 
and you can hear it locally on 89.0 FM. 
Internet broadcasting brings more interest, 

I believe. In the beginning of each show, 
older songs are played and discussed, and 
then we play newer stuff. Sometimes, we 
have guests; you have been one! We had 
Los Fastidios and the Epoxies in the studio, 
too. That’s always fun. We like this media a 
lot. Radio was the medium that had brought 
punk rock to our attention! So we hope that 
some kids will discover some cool bands, 
thanks to this show. Who knows? 



MRR: Earlier this decade you had your 

song “Bords de Vienne” on a compilation CD, which came with the Punk Rawk 
magazine (full color glossy, pro-made punk magazine which was sold nation¬ 
wide at every newspaper stand). It seems like that Attentat Sonore, who was more 
known in the DIY-scene before, got introduced to a wider audience in France. 
Have you gotten more attention since that time? 

Raf: It had helped us a little back then. We realized when playing live that people were 
familiar with this song in particular, which is good, of course. Having a couple of reviews 
helped a little too. Nothing huge of course, but it’s always good to hear from people or 
getting some unexpected support, you know what I mean! I think you do. Actually, Punk 
Rawk doesn’t exist anymore; one of the main editors, Frank, started his own ‘zine called 
Slow Death , it’s very well done...back to the roots. He was responsible for the huge and 
great Violence ‘zine in the early ’90s. Some people were criticizing Punk Rawk for being 
too mainstream. .Well, I guess it was good to have a mag available all around France; 
being a small-town punk in my youth, I was happy to buy anything about music, before 
I had discovered fanzines. 


MRR: Attentat Sonore has played some great festivals. Do you have any special 
memories about certain festivals that stick in your mind? 

_ __ Raf: We like playing with 


to meet several of them at the same time. One 
thing we realized lately is that we shared the stage 
with many bands we loved since our youth, Metal 
Urbain, Wunderbach, Conflict, Oi Polloi, GBH, Flux 
of Pink Indians, MDC, UK Subs, Oberkampf, Raw 
Power, and now Sham, Nabat; that’s incredible 
when you think of it. We were just kids getting crazy 
while listening to these bands. Who would have 
guessed these bands would still be around today 
and that we could play with them? We are damn 
lucky, and we appreciate all the support received 
from many friends over the years. 


bands, whoever they are, 
some became great friends, 
like Rene Biname and Medef 
Inna Babylone. The first big 
fest for us was with these 2 
bands, plus Neophyte, and 
Los Fastidios. It was also 
the first time we played to 
a 500 plus crowd. It was 
exciting of course, but kinda 
frightening too! I have other 
great memories from Dijon, 
where we always have fun 
with all the friends of Maloka 
and the people who come 
to their shows. Brussels 
and Barcelona were great 
too. And, of course, the 
Lemovice Antifa Fest this 
year was awesome with 
lots of bands we really 
like, Nabat, Wunderbach, 
Sham 69, Two Tone Club... 
a great party which lasted 
til Monday around 7a.m., 
eheh. Viva Easter. It is 
always good to meet with 
friends, and playing with 
your band is the best way to 
meet them. I mean visiting 
friends or being visited is 
great, but fests are the way 


MRR: You also do your own fanzine. Could you 
tell us more about your ‘zine? How many issues 
you have done so far and what do you cover in 
the ‘zine? 

Raf: To be honest, my ‘zine Guerilla Urbaine has 
been kinda sleepy for a couple of years. I helped 
a couple of other ‘zines with a few interviews, but 
I don’t have time to publish the ‘zine anymore. It 
was kinda slow, only nine issues published, but it 
had its moment. Two issues were printed and sold 
over 500 copies, the next ones were photocopied 
again, but selling OK. I had the pleasure meeting 
and interviewing bands and activists I was very 
curious about, or that I loved, like Scraps, Verdun, 
New Wave fanzine/label, Panx, Pin Prick, Oncle 
Slam, Flitox, Henry Rollins, 7 Seconds, Murphy’s 
Law, Agnostic Front, Life... But How to Live It?, and 
many more. It was fun and I liked the artwork/layout 
part, but I am too slow and busy now! I published 
“newer” interviews on a website, if you are 
interested: guerillaurbaine.free.fr. The interviews 
include Frank from the Feederz, Violent Society, 
Riot/Clone, CMX, Swellbellys, and, of course, Sado 
Nation, which was a work shared with you. 


MRR: What are the people of Attentat Sonore 
doing besides playing in the band? Your wife 
Murielle, for example, is a great photographer. 
Could she tell us more about her photos and 
where they can be seen? And what about those 
postcard sets? 

Raf: Ray is working as a cook and in markets, 
meaning he often works on weekends, which is 
not easy for playing out of town. Stef was a cook 
too, but for a big hospital. Now he is training and 
studying to become a male nurse. Eva is still 
studying English and music. She is the youngest 
member of the band. Murielle works full time as a 
photographer for a local newspaper now. She takes 













a lot of concert photos as well, and you can see her work on 
her Flickr.com site: www.flickr.com/mumudiy. She really enjoys 
it, and you can find great pics of bands like the Buzzcocks, 
D.O.A., Sham 69, Frustration, and tons more, including the local 
scene, of course. The postcard set was a collective work, nice 
job, maybe to be continued and not only focused on the music. 
Murielle showed her work in a couple of exhibitions, too. 


more in 2010. 


MRR: Any final comments? 

Raf: I talked too much already, I guess. Don’t hesitate to get in touch, say 
hello, trade stuff... we like this. Keep rocking society! 


MRR: You’re working as a teacher. Which classes/courses 
do you teach? Flave you gotten the chance to apply some 
punk ideas or critical thinking in your courses or do you 
have to stick with the guidelines of French curriculum? 

Raf: Well, of course we always try to allow the kids to express 

themselves and have open minds, and often . ^ 'wwm 

have to encourage them in USING their H "Hi 

minds as well, eheh. There is not really a ____ 

big problem with the guidelines, as they are I * 

not that strict. I am a substitute teacher, so # I 

I move from school to school meaning work I 

can be very different depending on where I ' | 

am. Several times a year, I work with kids m* |||*^ 

who have special needs or kids with foreign I 

backgrounds who have no knowledge I 

of the French language; it changes a | 

lot. It is meaningful, but very exhausting | 

too. Working with older kids is different, H 

somehow more challenging as you can take 

on more interesting subjects, but usually I wT , j|f 

work with kids from ten to sixteen. I 


www.AttentatSonore.com 

www.myspace.com/attentatsonore - Ruppert Murdoch still is a prick, but 
we are here anyways. 


MRR: On to a different theme; a 
difficult theme. There is a small town | 

called Oradour-sur-Glane very close ^ 
to Limoges, where the SS slaughtered 
and mass murdered several hundred 
civilians in 1944. Could you describe ^ ^ 

what happened there and how the village 1 

looks today? And what’s your opinion on % 

antifascism nowadays? ^ 

Raf: This small town is known because of % f 

this massacre. On the 10th of June, 1944, \ 

a division of the Waffen SS was moving up 
north to Normandy, stopped by in the town, 
rounded up most of the towns people and 
locked them in the church, women and 
children included. They set the church on fire and then the rest of 
the village. They killed everyone else they saw on the spot. Only 
a few people escaped. More than 600 people died that day. The 
village has been built-up again near the old one, which only has a 
couple of buildings left from the old days before the attack. More 
than 300 houses, workshops, and schools were burnt down by 
the Nazis that day. Nowadays it is possible to visit the site, there 
is a museum, and some good friends of ours work or used to 
work there. Being there is pretty overwhelming, to say the least. 

We believe that antifascism is still needed today. The 
movement needs to take care of the roots of the problem, which 
are political, social and economical, not only a problem of racism. 
As long as society fails, there will be people blaming minorities. 
As we say, “You point at minorities - We blame the bosses!” We 
have to get rid of capitalism or any system based on prejudice 
and injustice if we want to get rid of fascism. 


e-mail : info@attentatsonore.com 

Postal address : Do It Yourself, B.P. 135, 87004 LIMOGES Cedex 1 
France 


Discography 

2009 “Syndrome de Stockholm” 12” / CD 


2007 split CD with FERTIL MISERIA (Sin Piedad Productions, Colombia) 


2006 “Barricades 1905” 7 


2002 “Social Headache” 10’ 


1999 Split 7” with NEGATIVE IQ 


MRR: What are the future plans for Attentat Sonore? 

Raf: For now, we are mixing five new songs and one cover that 
we recorded in January. There are talks of releasing a split 7” 
with MDC, so we are crossing our fingers and we have already 
searched for a couple of labels able to help us release it in a proper 
way. We released our new record “Syndrome de Stockholm” only 
a couple of months ago, so we are still working on the distribution 
and all. We are leaving for our tour with Sideburns Sweat at the 
end of the month. Next big gig will be with Rawside, Heyoka, 
Ratas De Porao, and many more in Britanny. We hope to tour 


1994 Split tape with PRIMITIV BUNKO 


1990 ‘War & Peace’ demo tape. 


1988 Split Tapes with OUTRAGE / REBELLION 




V/- 














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THE 

ASTRONAUTS 


EP 


Interview by Jess Scott. 

MRR: I just read that "Hearts 
in Exile" interview you did for 
I PopMatters . 1 1 really love the sort 
of mini-analogy you gave about 
gays in art and their relationship 
with the mainstream. It was a 
great way of summing up how 
sprawling DIY was—in that it 
I freed up so many people. 

Chuck: You're right about the freeing 
up. Traditionally, punk gets a lot 
| of the credit but the real freedom 
wasn't so much in dressing up and 
indulging in extremes, but rather in 
being able to make music without 
caring what anyone else thought. I 


think one huge, under-rated source 
of that freedom was when people got 
the idea that independently recording 
and releasing their music could be 
cheap—and survivable. The "wow I 
can really do this" impulse—whether 
it was with DIY 45s or cassettes 
(and even before that with private¬ 
pressing LPs in the 70s), or now with 
MySpace music, or YouTube and iPod 
videos—seems to me, now, to be the 
primary "instrument" of freeing up 
the music-making. 

MRR: Right. I think you talked 
about that in the same interview— 
OK, it was cheap, so it was now 
accessible to working class 
kids. But rich kids still dabbled 


and made weird bands at their 
"public" 2 schools. 

Chuck: Let's get to the class and 
income part of this later... But I don't 
think the absolute cheapness was 
ever really the issue—just the sudden, 
pervasive sense of affordability and 
possibility. The counter-example of 
this came during the '80s, when MTV 
became ascendant. Everyone looked 
at their TVs and said, "Shit, there's 
no way I could ever do that myself." 
Contrast that with thousands of kids 
seeing the Rolling Stones tour in '65 
and hearing both chords of "Off the 
Hook," and knowing "I am going to 
start a band this afternoon!" 

MRR: It's interesting because 


Chuck Warner's "Hyped 2 Death" (H2D) reissue label 
serves a thirsty community—and those in search of the 
rarest and best independent music from the US and UK 
between the late-'70s and mid-'80s will find Warner's 
consistently in-print CDs give much more than a track 
or a nugget of knowledge; H2D instead curates a vast 
underground cultural history in the form of DIY music. His 
most famous is the Messethetics series, which specializes 
in DIY from Britain—with 28 volumes to date. Its art punk- 
ish American counterpart is Homework, while Teenline 
brings early power-pop rarities, and Canadian and 
US indie-punk is found on the original Hyped to Death 
volumes. Messethetics has notably dug into hyper-specific 
British regions like the Midlands, West Country, and South 
Wales. It has also veered into specialty areas profiling the 
Manchester Musician's Collective from 1977-82. Or the] 
Greatest Hiss volume, which exhibits UK cassette culture 
from 1979-82, illustrating Warner's creative approach 
Jo cataloging. Each release features a phenomenal 
amount of photos, current contacts, interviews, histories, 

- discographies, and most importantly, context for their 
j-ich contributions to art through sub-cultural exploration. 
Warner's standard description of the series sums it up 
neatly.: "Messethetics' purpose is to. document their 
stories...and celebrate their sounds." 

The following is a conversation with Warner about 
aspects of the larger sketch told by H2D—the motivation 
for thousands of young people in the US and UK to 
take up a band for anything but success. Thatcherism, 
unemployment, art school, experimentation, MTV, and the 
merits _ of thrift are but a few o f the sparks igniting this rise 
in underground music still reverberating today. 


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art schools in the South. What there weren't, however, 
were legions of rough-edged teenage bands releasing 
records and tapes. In the UK there were instruments 
everywhere and not having a drum-kit was no barrier to 
having a band. It was in the US. 

MRR: Do you think people generally subscribing 
to that philosophy therefore "went underground" 
more in the '80s and that's why you see a big gulf 
widening between the underground and mainstream 
music during that time in the US? As opposed to the 
late '70s new wavers who tried to straddle the two 
worlds for a little while at least. 

Chuck: Well, it was different in the US because American 
kids had more money than British. And city kids don't do 
straightedge (hardcore punk, a lot with guitars and the drum-kits—those are all in the 

ali of which were looking backwards, suburbs. ■ ■ 

But, without being too pompous on behalf of the only 
music that matters"—the cheap aesthetic meant the 
ability to remain true to yourself musically. No fears of 
being misinterpreted, mis-categorized, mis-promoted, or 
to aet back to vour first comment—outed. And the whole 


could use common practice spaces, have new band 
nights, etc. 3 A more socialist kind of foundation at 
least, compared to the conservative era in the US. 

Chuck: The music of the '80s largely reflected that MTV 
disconnect. The main scenes were, after 1982 / the rise 
of MTV, garage, roots 
revisited), even twee 
Then grunge came at the end, which for all its energy was 
totally camera-ready—with guitar solos, etc. Things were 
very different in the UK both musically and politically in the 
'80s, I think. Thatcher had far more obvious sociological 
and regional (and musical) repercussions. 

MRR: Right, with out and out psycho National Front, 
anti-immigrant movements, which likely mobilized 
a lot of people that might have snoozed on being 
political. 

Chuck: Musically, too, any parallels in the UK and US in 
77 punk diverged rapidly both at the mainstream level 
(Foreigner vs. Duran Duran) and at the home-made level 
(listen to the later Homeworks next to Messthetics —there 
aren't 5% of the songs that might appear on the other 
series). But the economic life in the UK got absolutely 
sucked out of the north (apart from the North Sea Oil): all 
the money and jobs went south. 

MRR: Is there a reflection of that shifting in 
underground music? Is there a correlation between 
more or less economically fertile areas? 

Chuck: I think there was much less effect on the music 
that I deal with precisely because it was perceived as 
cheap to produce. 

MRR: But the issue of being out of work with time on 
your hands...How do you think the UK infrastructure 
of the art school put a lot of this DIY explosion into 
motion? 

Chuck: The art school thing is only one avenue—it shows 
up in the lyrics, in the packaging, in the age of the 
influences, but it is not at ali organic to indie/post-punk 
as a phenomenon. 

MRR: And that model kind of sprawls itself all over 
A-R-T, period. 

Chuck: I'm working on the South Coast volume right now 
and the weird thing —nm^ MiK; 
is that there's almost 

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MRR: There's an irony there 
because the illusion is that the 
UK is more divisible by class. 
But there is something deeper 
happening, like a cultural value of 
thrift, and an openness to music 
and art that is lacking in the US. 
And maybe therefore DIY was 
pushed to the extreme of going 
further underground in the US 
as a result. Implying that the 
arts and thrift are both UK tenets 
makes punk look really inevitable, 
doesn't it? 

Chuck: But remember that "punk" 
was spectacle first in the UK. And 
the Bromley Contingent all had 
money to burn at Sex, etc. The fact 
that this music could be produced 
on the cheap, with a minimum of 
preparation/practice, meant punk did 
liberate, musically. 

MRR: That's what's so powerful 
about punk—it had the power to 
transgress class, and then later 
regions and cultures. Speaking 
of regions, I see it as being 
really important that your series 
is so location-focused; dividing 
Messthetics/Homework as UK/ 
US, and then within the series you 
have South London versus South 
Wales, etc. Have you ever thought 
about organizing volumes in a 
way different from location? For 
instance, you did the cassette- 
format volume. 

Chuck: Actually, the great thing about 
the cassette scene (reflecting again 
on the number of gay musicians) 
is that it was transacted entirely by 
mail—it didn't matter where anyone 
was from. Thus the musical styles 
seemed completely democratic as 
well (albeit completely British). 

MRR: The cassette format scene 


















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records and 
books!). And 
I'm really 
quite happy 
to have 

something 
stupefyingly 
rare in 

virtual-only 
format—like 
the Demon 
Preacher 45 
on the front of 
#107: that's 



about H2D, 
you deliver 
the story 
above all. 
And the 
story from 
the record/ 
band's 
inception, 
not what 
their story 
might mean 
because it is 

_ rare and you 

have it, etc. 
You really take yourself and your 
label out of the equation and it's 
effectively like a public service, a 




£100 IN 15 MINUTES 
MAKING IT 


massive documentation 
of culture. 

Chuck: Although I will admit 
that I enjoy making it all— 
what?—a bit precious? The 
design, the writing—not at 
all democratic in that way, 

I suppose. Going back to 
the deejay bit—I jam the 
songs right up next to each 
other, and present them (on 
each CD) not by history or 
desirability or really anything 
besides how they sound 
together. Folks find the liner 
notes vexing because you 
can't read about ,the bands 
in the order that you listen 
to them. The whole project 
is put together with—sort 
of analog hyperlinks—the 
interrelated stories and the 
intermingling sounds, the 
span of years. If there were a way to 
Wikipedia the whole ensemble and 
still keep my family in grocery-money 
I'd probably do it in a heartbeat. 

MRR: I've always dug that way 
of organizing because it answers 
questions as you ask them, it's 
much easier than the track one- 
band one approach. Anyway, I 
was realizing that I first got in 
touch with you because I thought 
there ought to be an all-girls UK or 
US H2D volume. What happened 
to this idea? I remember getting 
shut down but I can't remember 
why! Do you think that will ever 
happen or something you would 
have fun with? 

Chuck: I'm actually making some 

progress on Let's Talk About Prams 4 — 
unfortunately it's taken so very 
long that I've lost some of the early 
participants (through no fault of 
theirs). 

It's perpetually "next", however. 

MRR: Let's Talk About Prams is an 
all-girl series? 

Chuck: Yeah—named for this amazing 
song by Vital Disorders. The singer 
talks about all the things she used to 
dream of becoming, then- 
bang (so to speak)—it slips 
into this vicious Norwich horn- 
punk thing as she spits out 
"Let's talk about prams—and 
washing machines / Let's talk 
about the end—of childhood 
dreams!" Among my past 
careers I have some fairly 
deep background in feminist 
liberation theology (er...) and 
the wider movements of the 
'70s with the result that I am 
excruciatingly uncomfortable 


with something as arbitrary (and 
exploitable) as a collection of just 
women's vocals. 

MRR: Right. I want to say 

something like "I feel like I know 
you through your liner notes"— 
but, because you haven't issued 
something obvious like that, I 
felt there must be a good reason. 
It isn't like you exclude girls, or 
miss their contribution and unique 
position in DIY. 

Chuck: I've worked on the concept 
to where I'm a lot more comfortable. 
All-women bands, or bands where 
the sexual dynamics are (weirdly) 
sufficiently stable so that the women 
feel comfortable "being themselves" 
for themselves—rather than for an 
audience of either punters in the 
clubs or reviewers, or even just "for" 
the boys in the band. Expect to see 
several married couples and ex-lovers 
represented as well...and plenty of 
philosophical/existential agonizing. 
MRR: It seems like you'd have to 
get really specific, just like you do 
in a "South Wales" kind of way. 
Chuck: At least I am no longer keeping 
women's bands off of the CDs just 
because I'm holding off until Prams is 
ready. 

MRR: Will you call it Messthetics 
or is Prams going to be a whole 
new series? 

Chuck: It'll be titled Let's Talk About 
Prams but it will have a Messthetics 
100-series number. 

MRR: I can't wait! 

Check out Chuck's whole series 
at Hyped 2 Death's site: www. 
hyped2death. com 
(Endnotes) 

1. PopMatters “Hearts In Exile” Interview: 
www.popmatters.com/pm/feature/663 50- 
hearts-in-exile-an-interview-with-h2d-founder- 

chuck-wamer-l/Pl/ ‘ 

2. In the British school system, the term “public 
school” actually refers to private schools, 
confusingly. 

3. From H2D Messethetics series “Punk and 
DIY in London III.” 

4. A “pram” is British for a stroller. 





























PUNKER 

THAN 


YOU 



by Dave McIntyre 


Punker Than You 
Dave McIntyre 
412 pages • $14.50 
Dave McIntyre 

206-717 Eglinton Avenue West 
Toronto, Ontario M5N 1C9 
Canada * 

It's great to read more and more novels by punks 
that are well written and engaging. This one by 
Canadian writer and former punk band member 
Dave McIntyre is the latest in a string of excellent 
fictionalized memoirs of growing up punk (another 
example is Charles Romalotti’s Salad Days). 

The book's premise is that the narrator, Paul 
"Poker'' Cartwright, becomes ticked off by a short 
article in a Toronto alternative weekly paper about 
a former band-mate of his, Matt "Spike Liberty" 
Miller, and Miller's subsequent move from punk to techno. He starts to write a letter 
to the author, a no-nothing music critic, when the article is printed in December 1994, 
but life, computer problems, apathy, and much more interfere with his plans and the 
letter becomes this 412 page book, finally finished in March 2003 and never sent to 
the critic who inspired it. 

Its structure allows the narrator to be as caustic and informal as he needs to be 
to keep the story progressing. Initially, Poker is writing a snappy, smart-assed letter 
only to the critic. 400 pages of this would get annoying no matter who's writing 
it, so eventually McIntyre allows his narrator to switch moods and go off on many 
tangents. This leads, eventually, to in-depth ruminations about music, growing up, 
love, meeting old friends years later, and much more that will be familiar to anyone 
who's been involved with underground music or art for more than a couple of years. 
How do you balance "real life" with your music and/or art? 

Don't misunderstand. This is not a series of dry letters to MRR about "what is 
punk” or screeds about "ethics and art." The points he makes are usually couched 
among insane stories of violence, music, narcotics, alcohol, puberty, true love, puppy 
love, and survival struggles in the big city (in this case, Toronto). 

Without divulging any spoilers, the story basically follows Poker Cartwright from 
his small town's discovery of punk in 1987 through the town’s glory days of punk 
rockdom and the various permutations of punk (both musically and socially) that he 
and his friends discovered/imitated. The story goes on to follow Poker for the next 
sixteen years as he arid his friends and enemies go in and out of the music scene 
around Toronto. Many real bands (DOA, Dayglo Abortions, Minor Threat, Black Flag, 
Slow) are mentioned, as are a slew of fake bands. There’s even a fake MRR review 
of Poker Carwright s band! It’s clear that a punk, or someone who was at one time 
deeply involved with punk, wrote this book. Many of the narrator's observations will 
ring true to MRR readers. Here's an excerpt from Poker’s time at a punk loft in 1995. 
Sound familiar? 

"People who self-identify as punk —those who claim to be oppressed' by society- 
are really not oppressed enough. It's too damn easy for kids to strap on a spiked 
armband and some Doc Martens and clomp down the main drag expressing their 
opposition to the Man... For some of these kids, punk rock has become a phase: one 
summer you’re blasting Bad Religion CDs and scribbling band logos on your sneakers 
in ballpoint pen, the next year you’re all cleaned up and running on the track team. 
Is there something wrong with people like me, who can't seem to get this whole 
rebellion thing out of our systems even in our mid-twenties? Big business corporate 
^Feedheads still suck, developers still rape the rainforest and ruin farmland with 
their ugly duplicate houses, cops in LA and other big cities still "aim for the black" 
during rifle practice. There is still so much to be angry about these days, and the only 
reasonable reaction is revolt, or a loud guitar and a scream at the absolute least. 

Even so, the people I deal with daily here make me furious. Occasionally they’re 
inspired enough to articulate a political position, but then you ask them when they 
last participated in a demonstration or wrote a letter to the editor and they look 
back at you like a dog watching television... I swear, one more lecture about how 
voting is just a covert scheme the government uses to collect information on its 
citizens, and I'm joining the hippie commune in the warehouse across the street. 


Maybe someone there knows how to cook a real dinner." 

McIntyre slips in some sweet imagery throughout the book. No doubt his time 
writing song lyrics helped him distill things down to an elegant minimum. This section 
comes from Poker and Matt's bands’ US tour: 

Something about being here in the US just gives me the creeps for some reason. 
Like listening to a tape player with the Dolby off. Everything sounds brighter, but you 
also hear the hissing underneath.” 

Poker Cartwright does have some odd views about female punks, and I’m not sure 
if the author shares these views or if they're inserted into the story for purposes, of 
juxtaposition with his straight girlfriend. In early sections of Punker Than You he 
is madly in lust with multiple punk girls, while in later sections he equates punk 
females as having "skin scarred with tattoos." These punk women are, by drinking 
and looking "offensive," giving in to "failure” and degradation. To be fair, he only 
mentions "drunk punks” in these passages, but unlike pretty much every other part 
of the book he doesn't differentiate between the particular women he's talking about 
and all of the other punk women that exist both in his literary world and in the real 
world. It was a jarring enough section that I took note of it and upon re-reading it 
I'm still puzzled about its inclusion. 

That short note aside, Punker Than You is an enjoyable, well-written faux memoir 
of growing up punk and staying punk on one's own terms. It vividly describes the 
collision course between youthful punk idealism and the heavy-handed arrival of 
"real life." Through the narrator’s memories of shows, fights, drugs, sex, poverty, 
and music, the book describes different ways that punks handle this often painful 
and always confusing situation. Dave McIntyre has a gift for fast-paced, detail-laden, 
conversational writing, and the fact that this 400* page book did not feel like it was 
that long is a testament to his skill. 

—Jesse Luscious 

Paper Politics 
Josh MacPhee ed. 

$24.95 * i44 pages 

PM Press * 

www.pmpress.org 

Carrying on the work of artists creating art for 
more than art's sake, instead using social justice 
and global equity-themed art as a vehicle to engage 
community in political conversation, Paper Politics 
started out as an exhibition first hung in Chicago 
in 2004 in the offices of In These Times magazine. 
This book showcases what became a travelling 
exhibit (hosted in n different cities from 2004- 
2009) of politically and socially engaged print art. 

Though traditional printmaking techniques were 
used for all the original work, what's been created 
and collected here is cutting-edge contemporary. 
Though the art was created by artist hands and the exhibitions organized and shows 
hung by collective labors of love with the purpose of building community, mass- 
production printing was indeed used to create the book. 

While the exhibit boasts a cumulative crowd of thousands, the exhibit in book 
form becomes more portable, practical and accessible. This obviously creates a 
contradictory question. Traditionally created printmaking stands out from the digital 
age pack of billboards and bus ads, but can only be printed in small batches by hand. 
Josh MacPhee asks in his introduction, "If the goal of printmaking is communicating 
ideas, and we want those ideas to reach as many people as possible, does it really 
make sense to be printing seventy handmade posters in the age of mass production?" 

Following MacPhee's introduction are two essays and four sections or reproduced 
prints. The first is Repression—imprisonment, eviction, torture, surveillance, media 
control, privatization, apartheid, suppression. Repression is followed by Aggression- 
war, bombing, colonization, invasion, murder, extinction, genocide, rape. Third up 
is Resistance—liberation, solidarity, organizing, occupation, direct action, uprising, 
disobedience, struggle. And last but not least, Existence-identity, awareness, 
movement, communication, creation, transportation, perseverance, joy. Each section 
showcases about 40 reprints; in total, included are nearly 200 artists and artist 













BOOKS 


collectives from over a dozen countries and over seventy-five cities, suburbs and 
small towns. The art here is alive with color, style, unity and diversity - from stencil 
art spray painted on old dumpstered blueprints to precise and fine art intaglios on 
Arches paper. Each section is interspersed with artist commentary explaining why 
they print by hand, what they hope to gain and to whom they hope to speak. 

The first essay is "Political Art and Printmaking: A Brief and Partial History by 
Deborah Caplow. Caplow credits the beginnings of political printmaking to Francisco 
Goya in the beginning of the nineteenth century and reminds us that political art 
has earned many an artist hefty jail terms for having had the audacity to oppose 
injustice, war and corruption. Caplow also explains why the printmaking medium, 
say instead of painting or sculpture, lends itself supremely to messages of political 
opposition: it's reproducible, has low cost and holds great potential for graphic 
expressiveness. The essay suggests that graphic political art has never been more 
popular as the evidence can be found in the form of posters, flyers and stencils on 
the walls, streets, newspapers and magazines all over the world. 

The second essay, "All the Instruments Agree," by Eric Triantaftllou, is an extremely 
thoughtful and well-written piece on the intersection of art and politics. Starting with 
vivid description and sharply deconstructed political analysis of the wheat paste wall 
on Valencia Street in San Francisco, the essay suggests that ultimately, single-issue 
political images have the effect of reducing the larger political context in which 
the image is based down to an oversimplified "us" vs. them or evil vs. good 
message. They confound the broader message that needs to be communicated in 
order for the art as political tool to be successful. Triantaftllou ends with a call to all 
fellow left printmakers to unify their politics into a set of shared goals "based on an 
intransigent desire for total social freedom. 

Paper Politics is for those who recognize that both art and politics are about 
communication and also about community. As much as it is a collection of individual 
artists' prints, the project has proven itself to be a successful exercise in large scale 
organization. Josh MacPhee writes about the project’s intent, ...a community of 
printmakers and a more specific audience for our work than the existing 'anyone that 
happens to see it on the street’.” Proof of that intents success is that a couple dozen 
of the artists involved with the exhibits went on to become members of the Justseeds 
Artists’ Cooperative, an artist-owned and run collective and online gallery. Over the 
years of the traveling exhibit, artists and audiences have met face to face and wound 
up building more long-term relationships than a passing glimpse of a wheat pasted 
poster on the street could ever provide. 

—Jessica Mills 

Direct Action: An Ethnography 
David Graeber 
600 pages • $25.95 
AK Press 

www.akpress.com 

J Every minute detail of anarchist and activist Culture 

has finally been captured in David Graeber’s Direct 
I Action: An Ethnography. Weighing in at just over 
500 pages, Graeber attempts to do the impossible- 
go through this political group with a fine-toothed 
1 comb. 

Graeber’s book begins with a first-hand account 
of the process and protests of the summit of the 
Free Trade Area of the Americas (FTAA) in Quebec 
City, Canada in April of 2001. Graeber worked 
closely with NYC’s Direct Action Network and Ya 
Basta! Collective and detailed the meetings and 
events that helped to organize part of these protests. While this accounts for the 
ethnography in practice, the next sections constitute the theory behind these cultures. 
Graeber describes the ethos of direct action, anarchism, provides a demographic 
make-up of people involved in the scene, discusses problems and inaccuracies within 
the culture, and the process that meetings and action take. 

The length of the book is testament to the fact that Graeber is very thorough on 
a culture that is multi-faceted. However, readers who are completely unaware of this 
culture might have benefited if Graeber gave a better activist description as a form 
of context placement before diving into the nitty gritty of everyday activist life. As 
well, the first 200 pages are dedicated to diary accounts of meetings and action, and 
Graeber does too good of a job of conveying these meetings tb the point where it s 
difficult to get through. It’s important to include some dialogue and choreography of 
meetings to get an impression of the overall functioning of these groups, but much of 
this could have been summarized as to enhance the book s overall fluency. 

Chapter six of the book, "Some Notes on Activist Culture,” is most interesting to 
a person like myself, who had a long history with activism before falling out over 
obvious hypocrisies. In this chapter, Graeber discusses how white privilege and class 
backgrounds affect the message of the culture. This is perhaps where the true worth 
of the book shines, because it is necessary to identify the problems within activism 
and anarchism to rectify them. As much as these cultures like to criticize the methods 
of popular culture, much of that analysis is lost when focused on itself. However, the 




one glaring misstep is the complete absence of the discussion of sexism, which was 
. inevitably the cause of countless of my girlfriend’s departures from activism as well 
as my own. In fact, Graeber uses a notorious sexual assaulter as a small portrait of a 
"hardcore” NYC anarchist within this chapter, calling him "heroic.” It's the lack of any 
in-depth interest into the sexist, patriarchal underpinnings of this culture that makes 
me cringe at the misreporting that is evident here. 

Regardless of its faults, this book is an interesting read as it captures the essence 
of activists and anarchists quite well. It's written in an approachable style so that 
those other than cultural anthropologists can have access to it. Although it is 
intended so that anyone might learn from it, even current activists and anarchists 
could greatly benefit by picking up a copy. 

—Krista Ciminera 

Vegan Freak: Being Vegan in a Non-Vegan World, 
version 2.0 
Bob and Jenna Torres 
222 pages • $14.95 
PM Press 
www.pmpress.org 

Vegans have a lot of baggage. It can't be easy to 
constantly face the general expectation that the 
average person will find them annoying. While Vegan 
I Freak visits this seemingly unnecessary aspect of the 
vegan identity, repeatedly warning vegans not to be 
"preachy," people who consider themselves mostly 
vegan, vegetarian, or omnivorous will probably be 
put off by the fundamentalist theses that make up 
the core of the book. 

At base, Bob and Jenna Torres make the argument 
that people should be ethical vegans. By ethical 
vegans, a term which they interchange with "vegan” without adjectives throughout 
the book, they mean people who stop consuming animal products for the vague 
reason that animals should not be made to suffer for. human use. I say vague, because 
the reasoning is never made formal in some sort of Peter Singer style maxim, but 
instead is laid out through analogies. The first half of the book makes assertions about 
how animals should not be consumed by describing and comparing atrocities. The 
descriptions work to stir moral questioning, but the comparisons are unnecessary 
and offensive. It does not help their argument to compare the trauma of sexual 
assault to harming animals. 

The main function of Vegan Freak is to argue that there is only one right reason to 
go vegan, and it is the ethical one. Statements like "stop applying fuzzy and illogical 
moral lenses" appear frequently in the book. The authors make arguments against 
vegans who are vegan for health or environmental reasons and ethical vegetarians 
for not going far enough. Why people think it is not a moral wrong to harm animals 
receives little attention beyond limited references to acculturation. 

This question of "why” is more pressing for the cause of animal well-being, 
especially if we consider the world beyond non-human animals, a perspective which 
the book never explores. The idea of changing the world through consumption habits 
is appealing to people of monetary privilege, mostly because it means not buying 
something to which they have the means of access. While abstaining from a social 
relationship can be an ethical position, it is difficult to maintain that position without 
looking at the other relationships that perpetuate the cot&ributing systems that 
allow these kinds of consumption and distance from food production. In example, 
dismissing the environmental reasons for going vegan seems tricky if your book is 
going to recommend soy protein as an alternative. An ethical vegan that lived by this 
book would put money into soy markets that make up the new mono-crop system 
in South America, and the oil based food transportation markets that are built into 
economically rationalizing foreign wars. 

The second half of the book is about how to coax other people into being vegan 
without being too annoying instead of relying on the ethical reasoning the book 
proposes as the only right way to be vegan. It is filled with caricatures of non-vegans 
who will give you a hard time and how to deal with them, and some health advice on 
being vegan. If you can't understand why your partner is not vegan and it bothers you 
a great deal, you are probably a really annoying person and you should think about 
why your primary ethical identity is food based. 

While there is some thought provoking information and comedic tales of 
interactions with non-vegans in Vegan Freak, it is at root overly simplistic. From tHe 
perspective of someone who consumes a mostly vegan diet, it did little to change 
the way I think about the world. The book did, however, make me wonder about the 
problems of basing an ethical identity on judgment and how important food is to our 
relationships with other people. 

—Zane Grant 









Hnnn$& 


LJ 


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1 




PICKING WINNERS 

Much has been written on the arcane art of Oscar handicapping. 
Alas, by the time this issue goes to press, the winner of the Academy 
Awards’ best foreign film Oscar will have been awarded, making a 
prediction something of an anti-climax. What s less known to many is 
that this category boasts an especially robust, progressive crop of entries. 
A good part of the time, the Academy selections include a variety of 
films that have earned wide acclaim in international film festivals; even 
the more esoteric films are worthy, but would otherwise have fallen into 
obscurity. 

Among these films, however, several may not have been available 
for previewing—or even promised a commercial release. In nearly all 
cases, they’ve been shown in a few regional festivals, if that. The good 
news, however, is that the top picks can usually be depended upon for a 
combination of top-flight filmmaking skill and (if you’re into it) weighty 
subject matter. 

Not to brag, but Tm fairly certain who the winner will be, if more 
than a few years of successful handicapping is any indication. Of course, 
making a statement like this is bound to get you in trouble down the 
line, but I’m willing to accept the risks. 

To the relief of all, the Motion Picture Academy seems to have 
weaned itself from its weakness for earnest coming-of-age films; bigger- 
budget blockbusters seem to have been expunged from consideration, 
opting instead for serious (and frankly, often grave) dramatic features- 
and if they touch on the issue of the Holocaust, however gingerly, their 
chances for success increase markedly. 

By that standard, one entry in particular comes to the fore. Director 
Michael Haneke emerges as a favorite to nab the best foreign film Oscar, 
thanks to a bounty of international awards—and subject matter likely to 
appeal to Academy voters. But unlike features that would more directly 
address the excesses of the Third Reich, Haneke s film focuses on social 
problems that predate Germany’s fateful joust with history by over thirty 
years. 

Filmed in evocative black and white, the events in The White 
Ribbon transpire in a modest German village that s a clear metaphor for 
community life at the time. Theirs is a pastoral setting that, at least on 
the surface, seems the very image of peace and subdued order. A school 
teacher (Ernst Jacobi) narrates the story, but appears here in the form of 
an idealistic young teacher (played by Christian Friedel). His eyes take 


in a curious set of events which, divorced from the historical context, 
might not otherwise seem terribly suspicious. 

The town’s doctor (Rainer Bock) tumbles to the ground when his 
horse triggers a trip wire set in the trees; his injuries are serious, but 
not mortal. But then, a series of seemingly unrelated events transpire - 
which might mean little by themselves, but build to almost conspiratorial 
levels. A fawn laborer’s wife loses her life when she accidentally breaks 
a barn door. The young, mentally challenged son of a village elder is 
found violently beaten and bound. A child contracts a withering illness 
that portends an uncertain fate they all somehow sense. 

Under normal conditions, the villagers would probably take these 
and other misfortunes' in stride. But the claustrophobic environment, 
poisoned by uncertainty and suspicion, mirrors a world that threatens 
to fall prey to its own weaknesses. 

Director Haneke drafted the screenplay with award-winning 
screenwriter and film veteran Jean-Claude Carriere (whose work 
with Max Mon Amour rates high in my all-time favorites), and the 
combination lends a subtlety and formality to the story. The characters 
aren’t referred to by their names; rather, we meet the cast through 
their roles (the school teacher, farmer, baron, pastor). The implication 
is that the town’s social structure has begun to cast them as objects, 
not individuals—the kind of mind-set that could later be exploited for 
purposes of war. 

Of course, there have been any number of towns in Europe and 
elsewhere that, faced with similar challenges, were able to resist the 
concept of formal conflict. And almost certainly, there were (and 
are) countries with fewer material advantages than the people here. If 
anything, it probably makes more sense to view this pre-war German 
environment to be vulnerable to the temptations and moral confusion 
depicted here. The White Ribbon is designed to give a psychological 
portrait of a people whose future exists in potential. 

The film is for the most part humorless, gray, and uncompromising. 
The pastor (Burghart Klaussner) is the worst offender of all. He 
psychologically brands his children by forcing them to wear a white 
ribbon emblematic of childlike purity; privately, he resorts to other 
strategies to enforce his brand of moral cleanliness. In director Haneke $ 
vision, this world of arbitrary rules and codes deprive the children of any 
sensible moral compass. 

Less convincing as a historical corrective, The White Ribbon works 
best as a parable of sorts. At its best, the film attempts to show the 
German state of mind—a mixture of simplicity and ambition—by showing 
how cultural values betray a state of mind. Full of vivid incidents, and 
underscored by earnestness, it tries its hardest to reveal the future 
through seemingly random moments of the distant past. If it wins, it 
would join The Lives Of Others as another German film attempting to 
make sense of its more recent history. In so far as the year’s Oscar race 
is concerned, The White Ribbon has to be regarded as a front-runner. 

Ajami has a similar sense of gravity, albeit in the guise of a crime 
thriller of sorts-or at least one that’s willing to play with the genre. 
The film weaves five plot strands together, in the same way that the 
somewhat superior Mexican feature Amores Perros did some years 
back; but Ajami uses its narrative structure more honestly, attempting 











MOVIES 


to show a network of religious and family alliances in a region where 
Muslim and Israeli must work and communicate with each other. It’s 
not so much that anyone wants to get along; it’s that they have to. 

Many of the characters here have multiple alliances, regardless of 
their racial backgrounds. To wit, youthful Omar (Shahir Kabaha) has 
business with a Bedouin crime clan, enjoys refuge thanks to his pretty 
girlfriend, and tries to avoid the long arm of the law in the process. In 
each case, ambition and love are kept in place by more powerful societal 
pressures; the winners are few and far between. 

Ajami lias a less than distinguished visual style, and lacks the 
technical prowess needed to make a film in the Amores Perros style, or 
to seamlessly bind together the storylines. Then again, you can’t deny its 
energy, nor its willingness to be evenhanded in its treatment of the theme. 
Part of the credit is due to the filmmakers behind the project, Scandar 
Copti and Yaron Shani—Arab and Jewish, respectively—who constructed 
a genre picture around the unique social realities of the characters. A 
number of the actors are non-professional, giving the drama almost a 
verite feel at times. And while the story is hardly-optimistic, the fact 
that filmmakers from different backgrounds can unite under a single 
viewpoint is exceptionally hopeful. True, the region is not noted for 
its brilliant filmmaking, but if an audience is patient with the material 
and willing to do some research into the subject matter, the narrative is 
really quite rewarding. If anything, it may inspire audiences to reevaluate 
prejudices based on religion or social background. Thay probably 
what the filmmakers hoped to achieve, and they show real energy at 
presenting their diverse points of view. 

Films from Spain have consistently been the focus of special 
attention, thanks to expert production and often-spirited acting. While 
I did not get a chance to preview it, The Secret in their Eyes looks to be 
a very well orchestrated feature. Weighted by “heavy” themes like old age 
and Alzheimer’s, it’s consistent with the serious complexion of the other 
nominees. Unfortunately, the possibility of a commercial release seems 
remote at this point in time. Aside from which, the frank subject matter 
may be a turn-off for some older Academy members. 

The lesson for film fans, however, is to make a special effort to see 
any year’s nominated entries. The Academy’s method of choosing films 
is, frankly, rather flawed—but there’s always a bounty of quality material 
to seek out and enjoy 



BRING ME 
THE HEAD 
OF GENE SISKEL 


„ CAROLYN KEDDY 


It is hard to imagine who the documentary Electric Purgatory: 
The Fate Of The Black Rocker is really aiming to enlighten. If it is an 
obsessive music fan, they don’t get deep enough into it. If it is an average 
person who doesn’t really care about music, the filmmakers would never 
get them watch this. It is a common problem with music documentaries, 
balancing that elusive line between music fans and casual viewers 
without alienating either. There is an important point to get across in 
Electric Purgatory: The Fate Of The Black Rocker. There is a lack of 
respect and audience for a black man or woman playing rock’n’roll. I am 
willing to listen and to explore why this is, but the film never really goes 
beyond the complaints. 

I know rock n roll developed from the blues. I am willing to guess 
that anyone who knows something about music history is aware of it; it 
is well documented. Electric Purgatory: The Fate Of The Black Rocker 


wisely chooses to briefly mention that history. The film concentrates 
on the 80s and 90s bands that have talent and small-time success, yet 
failed to break out. Why? Electric Purgatory: The Fate Of The Black 
Rocker argues that it s because African Americans aren’t seen as rockers 
by music fans or by record labels. 

The band held up as the essential example in Electric Purgatory: 
The Fate Of The Black Rocker is Fishbone. I am actually surprised 
that they weren’t successful, but then one of the band’s members recalls 
meeting with the major label executives before releasing their first album 
and the executives suggest changes to be made to the songs. The band 
makes the changes and the album bombs. The label gives up on the 
band instantly. Unfortunately, this seems to be a common story. Most 
of the bands have similar experiences. A few people mention that the 
bands need to start their own labels and do their own promotion. Makes 
sense to me. 

It all seems to come down to the major labels not doing their job 
promoting these bands. To a punk this is old hat. When have the major 
labels ever done anything right? If a band becomes big, it usually seems 
like an accident. Even then, who knows how long that success will last? 
The music buying audience is a fickle group too. So I am in agreement, 
but what is to be done? (www.electricpurgatory.com) 

No one smiles in Loren Cass. There doesn’t seem to be much to 
smile about. The film tells the story (or lack of story) of a group of young 
people in Florida as their lives progress over a couple of days. They don’t 
ever seem to do anything. In the beginning, a car picks up a shaven¬ 
headed male and they drive to school. While at the same time, a girl 
leaves a boy in her bed and walks out of her parents’ house. She gets into 
a car and goes to school too. Neither interacts with nor acknowledges 
the other. Then they leave school. 

Characters in Loren Cass walk around in a daze. They fight, get 
drunk, and have sex, whatever. Nothing seems to change their mood. 
It is a bleak outlook on life, one that is emphasized by the odd use 
of voice over narration. The narration doesn’t explain what you see 
on screen, just random thoughts that may or may not belong to the 
characters. It enhances the dark mood. The one semblance of optimism 
is the beginning of a potential love story between waitress Nicole and car 
mechanic Cale. The use of a city bus as a symbol for a budding romance 
is a twisted take on love, one that appropriately fits in with the rest of 
this dreariness. 

Loren Cass is by first time filmmaker Chris Fuller. He does an 
amazing job, technically, on what I am sure was a small budget. The film 
looks very professional. The mostly unknown actors really get into their 
characters. They are so believable that you just have to hope they are just 
acting. I wouldn t want anyone to be this morose and depressed, (www. 
lorencass.com) 

The Smell is a music venue in Los Angeles. Live At The Smell is a 
DVD document of performances at the Smell. The DVD starts off with 
a brief introduction to the club. The camera moves through the front 
door, down the hall, past the person collecting money, into the main 
room and right up on stage. It is quick, but you can somewhat get the 
idea of what it might be like walking into the place. 

The remainder of Live At The Smell is one song each from the 
No Age, HEALTH, Gowns, The Mae Shi, Captain Ahab, High 
Places, Abe Vigoda, Foot Village, Ponytail and BARR. The bands are 
diverse, ranging from the drum circle of Foot Village to the computer 
programmed dance music of Captain Ahab to the rock of No Age. If 
this is an accurate cross section of bands, it appears to be the type of 
place where experimentation is encouraged and musical ability is not 
necessary, (www.coldhandsvideo.com) 

I am always looking for films to review. If you made one, send a copy to 
Carolyn Keddy, PO Box 460402, San Francisco, CA 94146-0402. If your 
film is playing in the San Francisco Bay Area, let me know at carolyn@ 
maximumrocknroll.com. I will go see it. www.carolynkeddy.com 









rt C / <leeLre cgC<L $ 




LITERS / p 

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headacherecords.com 



"POLICE HARASSMENT" - S.C.C. 
Crusin’ the streets, Saturday night 
Looking for trouble, picking fights 
Don’t you have anything better to do? 

What the fuck did we do to you? 

We’ve had enough...police harassment 
You think you own this whole goddamn town 
No one is safe when you are around 
Throw a hooker under the bus 
Another violation of the public’s trust 
We’ve had enough...police harassment 
Here’s our solution for the boys in blue 
This time the gun’s pointed at you 
No time left to call your wife 
I pull the trigger and end your fucking life 
We’ve had enough...police harassment 


8-song 7" EP Record 
$3.00 ppd U.S.A. 
$5.00 ppd World 

SLOTTY CHURCH CHIXXX 

myspace.com/noprofitrecords 




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Send two copies of vinyl or CD-only releases (if on both formats, please send the vinyl) to MRR, PO Box 460760, SF, CA 94146 USA 
We will review everything that falls within our area of coverage: punk, garage, hardcore, etc.-no major labels or labels distributed by major-affiliated 
distros. Please include postpaid price and contact information. Let us know where your band is from! No reviews of test pressinqs or promo CDs 
without final artwork. H 


Reviewers: 

(MB) Mariam Bastani 
(BB) Brace Belden 
(JU) Justin Briggs 
(TB) Tim Brooks 
(DB) Dan Butler 
(WN) Robert Collins 
(AD) Andy Darling 


(DD) Dr. Dante 
(HD) Helen Degenerate 
(BD) Brian Dooley 
(SD) Sean Dougan 
(LG) Layla Gibbon 
(DG) Dan Goetz 
(BG) Bob Goldie 
(MH) Mike Howes 


(CS) Chris Hubbard 
(ML) Mike Josephson 
(KK) Kenny Kaos 
(CK) Carolyn Keddy 

(RK) Ramsey Kanaan 
(VL) Vinnie La Russa 
(AL) Andy Larsen 

(RL) Ray Lujan 


(MM) Marissa Magic 
(JM) Jeff Mason 
(AM) Allan McNaughton 
(MU) Andrew Murphy 

(RM) Ryan Murphy 
(IS) Mark Murrmann 
(RR) Randy Ransone 
(BR) Bruce Roehrs 


AA - “Essential Entertainment” EP 

The first song I listened to on this is so perfect. It’s called 
“The Shot” and it’s like “Do the Du” but without any of A CER¬ 
TAIN RATIO’S pop-star dreams. Just a total liberation anthem 
of post-punk dance, a collision between, say, LIQUID LIQUID 
*and um, the FIRE ENGINES?? If you can imagine. For some 
reason I thought they were Danish, but they are actually from 
Belgium—sorry Belgians! I think this was their only record, 
which apparently got to NYC courtesy of Y-PANTS and the 
BUSH TETRAS—a pretty amazing method of punk post, if you 
ask me. The rest of the music is nervous and contained, quite 
distinct from the aforementioned song, making this a clear clas¬ 
sic of the era. The fact that they broke up shortly after forming 
because it was clear that they were becoming too “together” and 
“professional” as a band makes the music even more endearing. 
There are only 500 of these, and the original goes for over $500, 
so pick it up if you see it! (LG) 

(Soft Spot Music) 

ACES & EIGHTS - “A Different Animal” CD 

Imagine, if you will, MOTORHEAD and the current version 
of the BUSINESS playing covers of the KIDS song “This Is 
Rock'n’Roll,” and you'd be right in the ballpark of this Boise 
band’s sound. Even some AC/DC in a coupla songs. A few parts 
Oi/street-punk, a few parts bar rock. At times—and this is kinda 
out of nowhere—the vocals often remind me of Jared from 
KARP/BIG BUSINESS. Now, I know that sounds weird but 
those parts are my fave ones on this disc. Not too shabby for the 
style. (JU) 

(Downtown Academy) 

THE ACTION - “Smashing, White Hot” LP 

Rave-Up Records in the past has brought us some ho-hum 
retrospectives as well as some mandatory ones; this LP falls 
firmly in the second camp. The ACTION is one of my favor¬ 
ite late- 70s punk bands, looking like a bunch of fruitcakes yet 
kicking out some STOOGES-meet-VILETONES jams. It’s got 
a sweet glam edge, but the vocals are totally slurred. Their lone 
12” is one of my collector nerd holy grails. This LP compiles 
that 12” and as the title suggests, shit is white hot. Listen to “Do 
the Strangle”...so punk!!! The unreleased gear is more glam, 
less punk; the live stuff is muddy and throwaway. But the first 
four tracks are more than worth it. Wouldda been nicer to have 
has the 12” reished instead. (TB) 

(Rave-Up) 

AGUIRRE - “Calvaire” LP 

It seems like sludge is becoming really popular with hard¬ 
core/punk kids again—I suppose we have THOU to thank for 


that. Whatever it is, EYEHATEGOD- and GRIEF-worship is 
never a bad thing in my book. While France’s AGUIRRE may 
not live up to their forefathers, they still manage to produce 
some damn fine hardcore-influenced doom metal. This LP 
contains four epic songs that rely heavily on down-tuned gui¬ 
tars and rumbling bass with minimal yet powerful drums and 
screamed/shouted vocals that lean towards the crustier side of 
things. Definitely recommended. (XV) 

(Blind Date / Alerta Antifascista / Exutoire) 

AIDS WOLF / SATANIZED - split EP 

OK, OK, OK, I actually kind of dig this, even though I’ve 
always seen AIDS WOLF as art-shock throwaways, but this is 
pretty heavy. Screamy YOKO ONO vocals, lots of chaos and 
screech. As per usual, all these songs could be like a minute 
shorter—the jam-outs on the end are waaaayyyy to long. SATA¬ 
NIZED sounds basically the same except replace YOKO with a 
boring BIRTHDAY PARTY-era NICK CAVE. Both sides have 
plodding doom and then chaotic, blown-out, math-y free disco 
jazz moments. Kind of liked it better at the wrong speed. (MM) 
(Badmaster) 

AK47 - “AK47” CD 

You want old-school hardcore complete with agitprop dis¬ 
quisition done right? You got it! 24 songs in 22 minutes; anti- 
Gitmo and anti-SKREWDRIVER (“Fuck Racism Fuck Skrew- 
driver and Fuck You Too”) lyrics, delivered at breakneck pace 
(see “24 songs in 22 minutes”). As I said, done right. (DD) 

($7 ppd: Reason) 

AMARGO / DESANGRADOS - split EP 

Two completely raw punk bands that sing in Spanish but 
are from the East Coast of the US. There is a heavy Peruvian 
slant here in theme as well as in sound. The lyric sheet states 
that most of the songs deal with the Peruvian civil war from 
the 1980s to the 1990s. Sonically raw-as-fuck punk with gruff 
vocals—this is pretty amazing shit. If you snooze you will miss 
out on it: only 500 made, so act fast. You will not be disap¬ 
pointed. Great split! (MS) 

(Contraorden / Sin Temores) 

AMBER ALERTS - “Antibodies” EP 

Opening with a slow, sluggish and electro-fied song that’s 
the audio equivalent of trying to make it through the day on a 
belly full of codeine, or maybe what it’d sound like listening, 
to the OH SEES while digesting a mouthful of downers. The 
flipside starts with some dude saying, “Ha ha, nigger! Yeah nig¬ 
ger!” Wow. Two records I get this month with “nigger” on them. 
Ironic? Idiotic. The riff from “Somewhere Under a Shit Cloud” 


(KS) Ken Sanderson 
(FS) Fred Schrunk 
(Cl) Cissie Scurlock 
(MS) Martin Sorrondeguy 
(SS) Steve Spinali 
(AU) Andrew Underwood 
(XV) XYosefX 





























RBTOHDG 


sounds a lot like LIKET LEVER s “Levande Be- 
gravd.” Probably a coincidence. The riff rules and 
thus the B-side of this (“nigger” comment aside) 
wins out. (IS) 

(Sweet Rot) 

ANTIMOB / BURIAL - split EP 

Greece’s ANTIMOB gives us two tracks of sav¬ 
age thrash attack. Until this release, I was only fa¬ 
miliar with heavy, dark and plodding Greek bands, 
but these folks are a fine fit with BURIAL. They are 
a bit heavy, but also totally raging, flying fast, with 
shouted vocals, some guitar leads, and catchy songs. 
Hell yes! The lyrics are in Greek, with explanations 
in English. BURIAL has been putting out rad, fast 
hardcore records for a few years now. This track 
isn’t their best material, but it’s still good enough. 
The guitars are going crazy and the sound is just 
on the edge of blown out. Each stick on the snare 
is like a flog on your bare ass. This particular song 
isn’t quite as catchy or memorable as some other 
shit they’ve written, but that’s to be expected when 
they’ve released so much great material. Accord¬ 
ing to the ANTIMOB site, this EP is already almost 
gone. (JM) 

(Hardware) 

APPALACHIAN TERROR UNIT - “It’s Ear 
from Fucking Over: Discography Pt. I” CD 

This disc compiles the West Virginia unit’s two 
EPs on Profane Existence Records. They play a 
rather metallic, crusty style, which sounds great on 
the first EP, Armageddon Won't Be Brought hy God, 
but the sound is compressed for their second, longer 
EP, Greenwashing. If you’ve heard that first one, 
you've heard their best material. The band is explic¬ 
itly radical and environmentally minded. They use 
the inaudible-spoken-word part a la CONFLICT in 
classic anarcho fashion, though their diatribes are 
intelligible. They’re not afraid to break the three- 
minute mark in their songs, which is fine if you’re 
drunk at the show, but over a whole CD, at home, 
sober, it’s a little much for me. The packaging for 
this release spreads their bile [message] effective¬ 
ly. My advice is to try the Armageddon Won 't Be 
Brought hy God 7” first. (JM) 

(Profane Existence) 

THE ART MUSEUMS - “Rough Frame” CD 

Finally, a CD that won’t go straight to the free¬ 
bee bin. First off this ain’t punk—it’s barely even 
rock’n’roll—but that don’t necessarily make it a bad 
record. Sometimes it even means the opposite, and. 
this, thank the gods, is one of those exceptions. A 
delightful amount of reverb and some digital noo- 
dlings done with a health love of the TELEVSION 
PERSONALITIES and some of that indie cheek of 
the HIDDEN CAMERAS. A nice ’60s psych folk 
feel, not unlike PEARLS BEFORE SWINE and PI¬ 
SCES. The harmonies are beautiful, almost up there 
with FLEET FOXES, and that MARY CHAIN- 
sparked distortion: pure sugar to the ears. If this 
don’t make my end of year top ten, it means I have 
dropped dead or become a nun. (SD) 

(Woodsist) 

ATROCITY SOLUTION - “Tomorrow’s Too 
Late” CD 

This rather excellent seven-tracker bears more 


.than a passing resemblance to the second STAR 
FUCKING HIPSTERS full-length. ATROC¬ 
ITY SOLUTION manages to mix up melodic (yet 
raspily warped) vocals and pop tunes with a dash 
of ska, metallic riffs and driving melodic hardcore 
tuneage...often all in the same song! It’s actually in¬ 
credibly impressive. Lyrics are not half bad, either. 
’Tis a good month for music! (RK) 

(Tent City) 

BABYTEARS- CD 

I know that this band is totally unaware of how 
damn good they are. I will do my very best. This re¬ 
cord plows like a juggernaut, crook full of pounding 
distortion but never once loosing any of its sensibil¬ 
ity for a killer hook, riff and those special catchy 
moments that make a record stick instead of shit. 
Imagine, if you will, KILLING JOKE put through 
the grinder, the BIRTHDAY PARTY cranked up, 
the FALL on steroids and the MEMBRANES with¬ 
out the filler—a big brother to the once-mighty 
HUNCHES. Too many bands force the darkness 
and the menace factor; this band just oozes it for 
fun. BABY TEARS can play my wedding any day. 
Brilliant. 1 (SD) 

(Doomtown) 

BAD BRAINS - “171A 1981 Sessions” EP 

According to the insert, the three songs on side 
A of this 7” (different recordings of ones that also 
appeared on Black Dots ) were originally intended 
for a never-released comp the BAD BRAINS as¬ 
sembled in 1982 featuring East Coast hardcore 
bands. All that’s known about these tracks is they 
were recorded at some point in 1981/’82 at the 171A 
studios in NYC. The recording is raw, but once you 
get used to it, this is a very cool glimpse of the band 
before they completely shed the ’70s punk influence 
and became the hardcore unit we all know and love 
(the third song, “Redbone in the City,” is essential¬ 
ly “Anarchy in the UK” filtered through Xhg BAD 
BRAINS). As a bonus, the labels feature a drawing 
of punk and skinhead skeletons wearing AGNOS¬ 
TIC FRONT and “Punk’s Not Dead” T-shirts. Awe¬ 
some. (JH) 

(bootleg) 

BALACLAVA - “Shame” EP 

This is a crusty/D-beat band from Richmond, 
Virginia that sounds like pretty much every other 
HIS HERO IS GONE spin-off with melodic, gal¬ 
loping guitars and throaty vocals with screamy 
back-ups. Each song on this EP is distinct from the 
others, but sound so much like the songs of other 
bands that it doesn’t excite. The lyrics are political 
and deal with social issues, but are basic and typical. 
The. song “Fences” is a lyrical departure from the 
expected in that it’s a little hopeful. This record isn't 
bad by any means, but it’s nothing groundbreaking. 
There are some really cool moments, like the begin¬ 
ning of the first song on side B and some cool, al¬ 
most stoner-rock breakdowns that interest me. With 
that said, I think that I will be keeping an eye on this 
band to see if they develop their own sound within 
an already saturated genre of punk. The packaging is 
super swank, including a poster and download card, 
and is limited to 500 copies. (MB) 

(Forcefield) 


BARRACUf)AS - “Dog Food/Diet Coke” 

(No, not that BARRACUDAS.) A-side is a won¬ 
derfully heartfelt (and catchy as hell) ode to the joys 
of some of the best cheap eats around. “Diet Coke” 
is a nifty power-pop number. Good times! (DD) 
(Bachelor) 

BEAT BEAT - LP 

Garage meets power-pop done by a bunch of 
fresh-faced pimple-free Austrains. It’s got that retro 
classic feel whilst still maintaining something shin¬ 
ny, new and sparkly. In a strange way that only my 
ample-sized ears can hear, it’s almost like Austra¬ 
lia meets Kent, sort of BILLY CHILDISH getting 
it on with the SCIENTISTS, follow? I’m digging; 
it rocks without being rock, it’s dance without be¬ 
ing PAULA ABDUL, and it’s punk without hint of 
liberty spikes and bondage trousers. In fact, I’ve el¬ 
evated the digging to loving. Perfect garage meets 
perfect power-pop. Monday just got good. (SD) 
(Bachelor) 

BEAT THE RED LIGHT - “Never A Dull Mo¬ 
ment” CD 

5 tracks, 25 minutes, so you can tell something 
is going on this effort. Actually, the results are won¬ 
derfully schizophrenic and eminently appealing. 
Take classic ’80s metal, chugga-chugga death metal 
and upbeat ska in equal measures, add lashings of 
horns, and well, this is what you’re going to end up 
with. The STAR FUCKING HIPSTERS beautifully 
mix metal riffage and a bit of pop-ska on their latest 
record, but not all in the same song! These guys do, 
and do it with aplomb. Quite special, and it'll get 
you skanking, slamming, and headbanging all at the 
same time! (RK) 

(TNS) 

BEAUTY SCHOOL DROPOUT - “Palookaville 
(A Retrospective)” CD 

This CD is a collection of out-of-print and un¬ 
released demo songs plus three new ones from this 
Scottish quartet. It looks like they broke up in the 
early 2000s, but recently regrouped to record some 
new tunes. Musically, this has more of a pop sound 
than a punk sound, with the vocals sounding a bit 
like the SOVIETTES. To my unbiased ears, the new 
songs don't sound much different than the old ones, 
which I guess is a good thing if you’re a fan who’s 
been waiting the last ten years to hear some new 
tunes. (BD) 

(Boss Tuneage) 

BIRDS AND WIRES - 12” EP 

This record starts with the most amazing guitar 
tone—super clean and inviting. The riff it plays car¬ 
ries the song right along with the busy drums trot¬ 
ting into a manic frenzy! The music building and 
building to an intense crescendo that lasts just long 
enough to appreciate it. A great opener to introduce 
an incredible EP by four scene vets from DC. The 
sound of this record is one of the most amazing as¬ 
pects, and the heavy vinyl and superb production 
really paid off as each instrument is immaculately 
represented. For good reason, too—these songs 
are well written and powerful as shit. Some have 
the genteel approach of, say, INDIAN SUMMER 
or SHARKS KEEP MOVING, while others have 
a more assertive sound like AMBER INN or FU- 


















_ 



R5TOHB 


GAZI. From what I understand, there are members of 1905 and 
LOTUS FUCKER in the band. Really solid indie/emo—beauti¬ 
ful packaging, thick vinyl, strong release. (RM) 

(Amor y Lucha) 

BIRTHDAY SUITS - “European Tour 2009” EP 

This Minnesota duo to me sounds like what emo in 2010 
should sound like. That being said, I personally don’t want to 
listen to emo in 2010, but this is good for what it is. It doesn’t 
sound like early-’90s emo nor the Jade Tree BS that was popu¬ 
lar at the start of the millennium, but what modem emo should 
sound like—simple pop hooks played fast and tight with annoy¬ 
ingly forced, whiney vocals. This two-tracker was released for 
their European tour aUhe end of 2009 and has decent artwork, 
though the image doesn’t suit the sound so much. (MU) 

(P. Trash) 

BLACK HOLE OF CALCUTTA / LYCANTHROPY - split 
EP 

LYCANTHROPY, from the Czech Republic, is one of my 
current favorite grindcore bands, so I was psyched to get this. 
I always find it most difficult to review releases I love, and I 
love this. Speedy grindcore with both male and female vocals. 
LYCANTHROPY’S take on the style is new and fre?h sound¬ 
ing—neither rooted in old-school grindcore or in modern, more 
technical grindcore. Fast, pissed, political with brutal female 
vocals. BLACK HOLE OF CALCUTTA is from Chico, CA and 
plays thrashy hardcore that ventures into grindcore. “Graffiti 
Is Art” stood out with its super fast guitar and unique lyrics. 
Reminds me a little of HUMMINGBIRD OF DEATH. Great 
release, and if you haven’t heard LYCANTHROPY: run, don’t 
walk. (MH) 

(Dead Heroes) 

BLACK HOLE OF CALCUTTA / WOJCZECH - split EP 

This is a split EP by two bands that are pretty much house¬ 
hold names on the international grindcore “circuit.” BLACK 
HOLE OF CALCUTTA are from Chico, CA and these songs 
are probably the best I’ve heard from them. The guitar tone 
is dirtier than I recall, much to my liking. WOJCZECH do an 
ABC DIABOLO cover that rivals the original, and the band es¬ 
sentially continues in the same vein as their other releases over 
the past ten-plus years. Strong, half-teutonic, grinding slab o’ 
wax this is. (DB) 

(Fucking Kill) 

BLACK SPIRIL ROSE / UCHAZIM - split CD 

UCHAZIM is up first, and I have no idea what to make of 
this band. Am-Rep style meets AVAIL with melodic male/fe¬ 
male vocals? Sorry, I really can’t get into this at all, but I’ll give 
’em credit for doing their own thing, for sure. BLACK SPIRIL 
ROSE? Fucking terrible. Radio “heaviness” with truly terribly 
sung vocals.. .and then the saxophone came in and made it even 
worse. I bet they place in the Eurovision song contest next year. 
(AU) 

(Papagajuv Hlasatel) 

BOILING OVER - “Trash City” EP 

Give this Chicago-area straight edge crew about ten minutes 
of your time and they will let you know just how fucked they 
think things are in the world. Taking influence from the classic 
schools of ’82 and ’88 USHC, but sounding more akin to later 
approaches towards the style like DEAD NATION or CIVIC 
PROGRESS, these songs pummel you like the bruised fists of a 
thug who wants to take his resentment of life out on you. This is 
the type of straight edge I dig, because no words are wasted on 
silly songs of friendship; most of the tracks here deal with the 
frustration of living in a crumbling society where almost every¬ 
one seems to be complacent due to various forms of stupidity 


and ignorance, such as Christianity and patriotism. I'm down. 
(BG) 

(Lifeline) 

BONUS ARMY - “Negative Outlooks” EP 

Surprisingly rippin’ record. The music here delivers a dark 
ferocity belied by the colorful artwork. Like some other current 
bands I can think of (SACRED SHOCK, BLIND TO FAITH), 
BONUS ARMY has a singer that sounds like Human Furnace 
of RINGWORM. This is a major plus. How do they do it? Such 
a vicious vocal style. The music is pretty basic, heavy hardcore 
that doesn’t break any new ground but remains solid and gener¬ 
ally urgent throughout. With a little more imagination thrown 
into the songwriting process, this record would be more crush¬ 
ing. But all in all, this is a good EP and definitely a progression 
from what I’ve heard of the band’s earlier material. (DB) 
(Arrest) 

BRAJGL- “As Doslouzim, Chci Do Brajglu” CD 

Warped Tour melodic punk that is only saved by the Czech- 
language vocals that give this at least a touch of an edge; oth¬ 
erwise the disc is fifteen songs of goofy, overproduced BLINK 
182, SUM 41 and NOFX dumped in The Great Blender of Me¬ 
diocrity. (WN) 

(Papagajuv Hlasatel) 

BREWTAL THIRST - “The Hard Work EP” CD 

Super boring bar-punk. Lyrics written by a complete knuck¬ 
lehead. Total dude-core. All the songs are about drinking or ref¬ 
erence hanging out at a bar. Zzzzzzzzzz. Wake me up when you 
discover rockabilly and no longer identify as a punk. (FS) 

(Wet Brain) 

THE CARDIAC KIDZ - “Get Out!” LP 

Pretty smokin’ collection of tracks by this early San Diego 
punk band. The CARDIAC KIDZ released two 7”s in the late 
’70s; the first was comped on KBD #12 and is a now a certified 
eBay torpedo bonzer. Like some other Rave-Up retrospectives. 
Get Out! is mostly live stuff but it rages anyway—a total hi-en- 
ergy blast of sped-up rock’n’roll. This is the type of band whose 
members were around a couple years before punk exploded 
(one of the guys has shoulder-length hair, a moustache and a tie 
on the cover), but they caught on fast. And I mean fast —some 
of the tracks rival RAMONES-circa -It's Alive velocities. Speed, 
melody, snottiness—these KIDZ had it all. (CS) 

(Rave-Up) 

CHIN CHIN - “We Don’t Wanna Be Prisoners” EP 

Layla handed this to me and said “It’s the Swiss GO-GO’S” 
and she’s pretty right on. High-pitched multiple girl vocals, bed¬ 
room danceability, scream-along lyrics. They’re less pop and- 
more sparse and jagged with a little bit of psych darkness like 
SIOUXSIE SIOUX. The A-side is the better-known song but 
it’s kind of the boring-er one (though still killer). The B-side is 
a little bit weirder (doomy, desperate) and therefore more excit¬ 
ing. Totally worth it, and watch out for an upcoming LP. (MM) 
(Mississippi) 

CHUCK DAMAGE - LP 

This German band plays energetic and enthusiastic hardcore 
that would likely get a crowd of fans circle pitting, but to me 
it’s just another example of the lowest common denominator of 
modern bands playing self-described early-’80s-style hardcore. 
Ultimately, this is a collection of played-out, yet completely un- 
memorable riffs with none of its own personality whatsoever. 
One part appears to be directly lifted from DIRECT CON¬ 
TROL’S “Public Safety” as well. (DG) 

(Hardware) 































CLIMAX - “Zlocin Bez Trestu” CD 

Simple but passionate HC punk with some crusty 
overtones; what it lacks in complexity or original¬ 
ity it makes up for with enthusiasm and aggression. 
Overall the sound is a bit thin and flat (this would 
probably sound better on vinyl) though the record¬ 
ing is otherwise good and the guitar does have a cool 
buzzsaw attack. Above-average lyrics in Czech with 
English translations included. Plus, the drummer ap¬ 
pears to have a huge photorealistic Charles Bronson 
tattoo (the actor, not the band). If you dig straight¬ 
forward. no-frills political punk bands like the PIST, 
you should check out these guys, who I guess have 
been around for almost ten years. (CS) 

(Papagajuv Hlasatel) 

CONFLICT RESOLUTION - “American In¬ 
ternment” EP 

Four tracks of riveting political hardcore, this 
Phoenix band’s second single is driven completely 
by excellent NO COMMENT-ish vocals that spit 
words in quick lacerations against Disney and 
America’s dystopian future—a kind of immediate, 
direct response to “world events ’ lyrics that, when 
combined with powerful, direct thrashing makes for 
an intense EP. There are back-up choruses, but they 
are weaker than the magnetic draw of the lead sing¬ 
er by himself; plus or minus a solid cover of SUI¬ 
CIDAL TENDENCIES’ “Memories of Tomorrow” 
(great, but I could almost stand to just hear more this 
band’s own songs!) still leaves enough reason to get 
running for this limited to 500 EP. Boss. (KS) 

(Going Apeshit) 

CROCODILES - “Neon Jesus/Neon Autobahn” 

A-side is a slow cooker; shimmery electro-ga¬ 
rage (you heard it here first!), kinda BLANK DOGS 
and less tweaked DIGITAL LEATHER. The flip is 
an instro, which is total snoozeville, but I’m digging 
the A for sure! (TB) 

(Hell Yes) 

CUT THE REINS / EXPENDABLE YOUTH - 
split EP 

CUT THE REINS, alphabetically the first band 
on this split, has a melodic yet heavy hardcore sound 
on their first tune—in a STORM THE TOWER 
way, not a TRAGEDY or FROM ASHES RISE 
way. That’s a good thing, as I think STORM THE 
TOWER is one of the most underrated bands of 
the last five or so years. On the flip, Chicagoland’s 
EXPENDABLE YOUTH is like a mish-mash of 
melodi-crust and a more poppy modem HC sound. 
Kinda hard to imagine but it’s da triif. They have 
their moments, but some jazz-y elements throw it 
off from being wholly concise. (JU) 

(Injustice of Humanity / Me Distro / Rebel Time) 

LOS DAGGERS - “Patinar” EP 

Yes! LOS DAGGERS kick out some debauch-, 
erous hardcore with the same cool obnoxious vibe 
as bands like STREET TRASH, IDOL PUNCH and 
SURF NAZIS MUST DIE, complete with those 
sassy hardcore vocals that few can get away with. 
They play with a clean-ish guitar tone and clearer 
recording than the bands mentioned above, but it 
works in their favor here. The second song sounds 
insanely similar to KILLJOY’S “Rich Plastic Peo¬ 
ple” off of Not So Quiet on the Western Front , but 


I don’t mind because it rages nonetheless. If some 
friends and I were going to crash some hipster party, 
skank around the room and piss in some fashionable 
person’s tallcan. I’d throw this record on the stereo 
to get things started. (DG) 

(Discos Humeantes) 

THE DAMAGE DONE - “Scream AH of Our 
Cliches” CD 

Now this is the kind of record I can get behind. 
And the lugs working overtime. Throw in the best 
parts of CRIMPSHINE, DILLINGER FOUR and 
HUSKER DU, with a modern pop-punk harmonic 
sensibility and just that right level of gravel in the 
vocals, and, well, we have ourselves another winner. 
The lyrical sensibilities seem to be as sharp as the 
backing-vocal woah-ohs, and definitely well worth 
snapping up. (RK) 

(Better Half) 

DEAF AIDS - “Do It Again” EP 

Another lost UK power-pop gem reissued by 
Sing Sing. This time we’re treated to the DEAF 
AIDS’ “Do It Again,” which is easily the best of 
the three songs on this. The B-side features “Peep 
Show,” which is a bit slow and plodding, though the 
DEAF AIDS redeem, themselves on the last song, 
“Aren’t People Strange,” though it includes the 
fucked-up line “I’m not a nigger / Can’t you see I’m 
not brown.” Not at all sure what that’s about. Being 
from Sheffield or not, pretty inexcusable. Originally 
released in 1979 in an edition of 250 copies, it’s sup¬ 
posedly one of the hardest to find of the rare UK 
power-pop singles. While a few of the singles in the 
Sing Sing reissue series have left me a bit flat (ehm, 
JEFF HILL BAND), this is totally upbeat, catchy 
and worth being reissued. (IS) 

(Sing Sing) 

D.F.C./N.E.K.-split EP 

Killer!!! A great split EP with two raw, blast¬ 
ing, flipped-up-baseball-caps, metal-singed thrash 
bands! D.F.C. from Brazil have existed since the 
early ’90s and show no let-up in ferocity here, with 
five tracks of chunky, metal-riffed, scalding-vo- 
called, brutal RATOS DE PORAO-styled hardcore. 
On the flip, Nagoya’s N.E.K. turn the speed, sloppy 
ferocity and rawness up a notch while still working 
within the formula of Brazillian hardcore—acidic 
vocals in Portuguese over rampaging metallic hard¬ 
core that lumbers before speeding into full-tilt may¬ 
hem. N.E.K. features Naito, the Nagoya drumming 
legend from OUT OF TOUCH and C.F.D.L., so 
there’s an edge of the C.F.D.L. total thrash assault 
running behind this. A well balanced, well thought 
out split with comics (!), a Too Circle label newslet¬ 
ter in Japanese and lyrics translated into Portuguese, 
English and Japanese. Both bands’ lyrics have the 
apocalyptic feel of congested cities, clear-cut rain 
forests and oil wars. Cool! (KS) 

(Too Circle) 

DIGGER AND THE PUSSYCATS - “DIY” LP 

Aussies doing ’60s Brit-pop revival with punk 
undertones. I like rock ‘n’roll as much as the next 
guy, but I think the rock’n’roll revival is a bit played 
out theses days. It seems like there are tons of 
bands doing it, but so few who can actually make a 
good impression. I wouldn’t say this is terrible, but 


doesn’t really leave me wanting more. (BD) 

(P. Trash) 

DISPUTA - “Ultimo Reducto Dis” LP 

One-man D-beat (the new thing apparently) 
from Spain. I’m all about this shit right now-it’s 
not going to win any awards for originality but it 
does what it says on the packet. For some reason, 
D-beat in Spanish totally works. The music is pretty 
straightforward VARUKERS style, but the vocals 
are like a Spanish Cal. Epic. (TB) 

(Grita o Muere) 

DISTRUST / OSMANTIKOS - split CD 

DISTRUST from Singapore and OSMAN¬ 
TIKOS from Malaysia both play heavy crust hard¬ 
core. DISTRUST has an older crusty/D-beat sound 
like SIEGE or DISCHARGE—with metal leanings, 
as there are a number of guitar solos. Two of DIS¬ 
TRUST’S tracks are covers: one from BLOOD¬ 
STONE and the other from MINUS. OSMAN¬ 
TIKOS isn’t as heavy or metal, more like EXTINC¬ 
TION OF MANKIND. It’s more of a punk/crust 
sound with multiple vocalists and more melody. 
Both bands might be by-the-numbers but both pull 
it off. The lyrics are harshly political and OSMAN¬ 
TIKOS includes long descriptions of what each 
track is about. The descriptions are longer than the 
lyrics. Need more crust/D-beat? Pick this up. (MH) 
(Epidemic) 

DOTS /VIRUS -split EP 

It took five labels and two bands to release a sin¬ 
gle in an edition of 280 copies—sounds appropriate 
for Italy. These two bands are from Verona and this 
single is amazing—try to find one if you can. VI¬ 
RUS is a duo. The drummer also plays guitar at the 
same time. The other half of the band is the vocal¬ 
ist. It sounds raw and rude in the best possible way, 
reminding me very much of PUSSY GALORE. The 
DOTS sound more like a LA hardcore band circa 
1979, but singing in Italian. They fit in four fast and 
short songs, and VIRUS offers three punches to the 
face. (MU) 

(Depression House) 

DRONE THRONE / TOAD - split LP 

Both bands are from Arizona, but they represent 
pretty disparate styles of music. DRONE THRONE 
plays a pretty standard sludge metal/punk hy¬ 
brid that gets a little too stoner-y at times for my 
taste, paying homage to EYEHATEGOD, SLEEP, 
GRIEF, and the like. I definitely relate to their side 
of the split more. It has some strong riffs and pretty 
Zen moments. To my ears, TOAD fits the category 
of indie-punk, sounding something like MILE- 
MARKER, HOT WATER MUSIC, and 45 GRAVE 
in a blender. Their tunes are catchy but in a way 
that seems facile and unchallenging. It definitely 
seems they could have a wide, mainstream appeal. 
DRONE THRONE wins out on this split. (DB) 
(Boue) 

DRONGOS FOR EUROPE - “Cage the Rage” 
CD 

I guess this original UK82-era band has been 
back together for a while now; no idea if they stick 
to the reunion-act club circuit or play more DIY- 
type shows. The early DRONGOS FOR EUROPE 
















RSDRDS 



singles had a somewhat charming mix of amateur sincerity and 
rudimentary catchiness, whereas their newer stuff is much more 
polished and modern-sounding, both in terms of production and 
songwriting. Either way, it’s cool they’re doing new material 
(rather than, say, releasing a live album of all their old stuff). 
Cage the Rage has new versions of two tracks that appeared on 
their 2007 Dance When Maggie’s Dead EP, plus fifteen more, 
making for nearly an hour of DRONGOS. The songs range 
from fair to good street-punk with sing-along choruses—I was 
reminded of bands like COMPLETE CONTROL, OXYMO¬ 
RON, and even early RANCID. Pretty solid for a reunited band 
that started 30 years ago. (CS) 

(DFE) 

DRUID PERFUME - “Don’t Eat Them They’re Poison/ 
Honk Your Horn” EP 

It’s another release from these Detroit weirdos. This EP 
sounds like ROCKET FROM THE TOMBS crossed with a no¬ 
wave affectation and circus music. The beginning of the A-side 
is a bluegrass girls’ chorus that breaks into carnival-like horns, 
piano, bass and drums with the singer anguishing in yelps over 
the need to taste a morsel of something poisonous. This song 
convincingly tells this story up to succumbing to the irresist¬ 
ible poison. The B-side begins with an infectious bass-line and 
swings into a catchy song with a ton of changes. This stuff isn’t 
for everyone, but within the chaos there is a well-executed, very 
creative structure. I think this is the best DRUID PERFUME 
release yet. (MB) 

(X!) 

DRY-ROT - “Philistine” LP 

This is my first time hearing DRY-ROT for more than one or 
two songs. While I’m definitely not the biggest fan of Christian¬ 
ity, other than the “Christ Is Lord” graphic in the insert that they 
probably put there to “fuck with people,” their trinity of imagi¬ 
nary friends in no way meddles with this record. Things tend 
to jump back and forth between styles, and bunches of songs 
seem to listen like chapters that make up a whole. The hardcore 
on this record is generally characterized by a lot of alternat¬ 
ing between drum-fill parts and single-note riffing followed by 
a breakdown or something else—maybe sonically reminiscent 
of the first COLD SWEAT LP. DRY-ROT also has a taste for 
songs comprised of leading bass lines, usually something funky 
and sinister, with guitar improvising notes or noise or whatev¬ 
er over the bass, and the interplay bearing similarities to that 
between the guitar and bass on The Process of Weeding Out , 
though there’s no free jazz here. The B-side starts out like some¬ 
thing you might’ve heard between COLLECTIVE SOUL and 
PEARL JAM on the radio in 1995, but with the vocals sound¬ 
ing like they’re being manipulated manually (think of a record 
being played backwards), which is a cool effect and something 
that’s used on a few other songs as well. It continues in a similar 
fashion to the A-side before ending on a slightly more mellow' 
note. It’s an interesting record that's eclectic in the right way, 
and 100% competent in terms of music and songwriting for be¬ 
ing this ambitious, but there’s something about it that's too sani¬ 
tized for me to want to go out and get my own copy. Even the 
hardcore songs, which definitely have all the right ingredients 
and abrasion, sound too contained in the production to let the 
spite bleed through. I have yet to see them live, so I can’t say if 
it’s something inherent in the band or just some venom that was 
lost in the recording. (DG) 

(Parts Unknown) 

ESKATOL - “Blodorn” CD 

Perhaps this might have a few too many “modern” elements 
for my liking? The drums almost enter tech territory from time 
to time, and the guitars flirt with the bad type of melodic leads 
that modern metal core have killed forever, but fuck man, every¬ 


thing here is just too damn good for me to not love it. The dual 
vocals work perfectly, and when they slow it down, I start to 
hear ENTOMBED...and those guitar leads, half of them sound 
like HIS HERO anyway. Yeah dudes, this Norwegian shit is 
fukkn good. (WN) 

(Kjepp Kjappesens Raske Skiver) 

EXPENDABLE YOUTH - “2016” EP 

Fuck, maybe I'm just getting older, but earnest left politics 
just make me want to vomit. The years have not been kind to 
my youthful idealism. The sad part is that I’m not even quite 30 
yet. As I descend into jaded-old-manhood, the lyrics to records 
like this one can do nothing more than make me roll my eyes 
and sneer a cynical sneer at the hope for meaningful change 
still being held onto by the latest Crimethlnc- or college-edu¬ 
cated would-be revolutionaries. The music here is nothing spec¬ 
tacular, just competently played modern crustcore, blending 
screamo and metallicrust influences into a tasty pablum for the 
dreadlocks-and-backpacks crowd. It isn’t particularly offensive 
to my sensibilities, although I would never actively engage with 
it. But does anyone honestly think that anything is going to be 
accomplished by writing lyrics about how baaaaad capitalism 
and prisons are to the poor, or how the 2016 Olympics need to 
be resisted!!!!! now!!!! really!!!!, or by including lengthy and 
poorly-written song explanations referencing Mikhail Bakunin 
and Angela Y. Davis? This makes me want to put my sixteen- 
year-old past self in a headlock and cut his fucking hair. Just... 
just give up. It’s not worth it. Activism is a fucking graveyard 
for long-held cherished beliefs in social change and the merits 
of progressive politics. (XV) 

(Shaman) 

EXTORTION - “Loose Screws” 10” 

I've heard a bit about this Australian band, but this is my first 
time checking them out. Totally pummeling, ultra-harsh fastcore 
with occasional slow/moshy parts that do a nice job of breaking 
up the speed attack. My only complaint, and I don’t know if it’s 
the recording or the heavy guitar tone or what, is this has a very 
“modern” feel, which I associate with more clean-cut hardcore 
bands (as opposed to, says, HERESY). Other than that, this is 
cool. (JH) 

JAD FAIR / HUMAN ADULT BAND - split EP 

HUMAN ADULT BAND is repetitive blog-rock from New 
Jersey, JAD FAIR is an older man, this record is a piece of shit. 

I have no time for this 3:00 A.M.-Midwest-college-radio dreck. 

I can t imagine anyone listening to this more than once, but I 
suppose anything’s possible. (BB) 

(Third Uncle) 

THE FAKE BOYS - “This Is Where Our Songs Live” CD 

This is really poppy punk/borderline power-pop along the 
ways of YUM YyMS and DESCENDENTS but is lacking 
something. The material just seems a bit flat. When you get this 
pop, you gotta deliver. (RL) 

(Arrest) 

FEELING OF LOVE - “School Yeah” EP 

Over the past two years, some really great and interesting 
new sounds have been coming out of France, and FEELING OF 
LOVE are part of the weirdos over there making things happen. 

I should add that I’m biased against the French, so it takes a 
lot for me to give a nod to the frogs for doing something good. 
This three-song EP is the third release I’ve heard by the band, 
and all three cover different sounds so it’s hard to pigeonhole 
FEELING OF LOVE into one particular style. They describe 
themselves as trying to mix early-’90s JON SPENCER BLUES 
EXPLOSION with SUICIDE and SPACEMEN 3 and I am un¬ 
able to describe it any better than that, but it’s important to note 





































meow s 


v 



that each song has its own feel. The B-side of this 
single takes the lyrics of fellow Frenchman SERGE 
GAINSBOURG over an almost Eastern drone song 
with added feedback and a simple rhythm. (MU) 
(Sweet Rot) 

FIGHTING CHANCE - “A Lifetime of Basic 
Cable” CD 

Not quite sure how this disc slipped past the 
eagle-eared censors at this here mag, but er, de¬ 
spite the fact of me dear mother suggesting that 
“this one sounds like you could dance to it, it s not 
quite up to snuff. Histrionic, overblown pop for the 
40-somethings. And I should know. I’m one of the 
them (40-somethings that is, not overblown and his¬ 
trionic). At its best, it sounds like a bad outtake from 
the POLICE’S “Regatta De Blanc” or the first JOE 
JACKSON disc. Unfortunately, it more often falls 
into HOOTIE AND THE BLOWFISH territory. 
I’m sure they’re real nice blokes, but there s only so 
much one can take... (RK) 

(self-released) 

FOR THE WORSE / WEDNESDAY NIGHT 
HEROES - split EP 

WEDNESDAY NIGHT HEROES from Alber¬ 
ta, Canada play generic, parent-friendly melodic 
punk in the Epitaph/Fat Wreck Chords mold. Their 
MySpace bio, clearly written by some third-rate PR 
goon, claims they’ve “been taking the Canadian 
punk scene by storm since their inception in 1997.” 
Sound like a winner, eh? Shockingly, no. One origi¬ 
nal tune and a ZERO BOYS cover makes me won¬ 
der, what’s the point? I had slightly higher hopes for 
FOR THE WORSE, who I believe have a reputation 
in their home state of Massachusetts as being pretty 
“crazy.” Sort of an oi/hardcore thing with slightly 
high-pitched vocals. Not the worst , but this isn t 
very good either. (JH) 

(Give Praise / Patac) 

FY FAN - “Golden Times 2007-2009” CD 

Full-throttle hardcore from Sweden’s FY FAN, 
with the tracks from the Feral Ward EP, the Adult 
Crash EP and a handful of new tracks all slapped 
together for last year’s Japan tour. For those not 
in the know about thes^ dudes, it’s a raw, pissed, 
insolent attack that draws equally from ’80s US 
hardcore, ’80s Swedish punk and alcohol. Swedish 
lyrics, Japanese translations and the usual top-notch 
packaging and layout that I’ve come to expect from 
Too Circle—great shit all around. (WN) 

(Too Circle) 

GENDERS - “Day of Choices” EP 

In the onesheet that came with this 7”, Jeff of 
Prgnt Records writes “Any input you are able to 
give us would be awesome.” I like this record, but 
first some input since you asked: the record's open¬ 
ing riff sets things up well, but the one it goes into 
kills the momentum with the whirlwind drumming 
instead of something more pounding; the songs 
could be more distinctive as a whole; I can’t read the 
cursive writing; and that emo sing-along is not the 
best way to end the final song. Other than that, this 
seems influenced by a mishmash of different kinds 
of hardcore, mostly on the thrashier and more pissed 
side of things. The songs themselves lack any sort 
of tangible structure and perpetually change tempo 


throughout, including great breakdowns that that 
pop up unexpectedly and make you want to mosh on 
the spot, which is always awesome. It’s cool soni- 
cally, but sort of middle-of-the-road overall, and I 
think I’ll end this with a pat on the head and a “I 
could see the next record being a lot better. (DG) 
(Prgnt) 

GEP0PEL - “No One Can Stop Advance” EP 

This classic Dutch band came out with only a few 
releases, but were intense and distinctive, with a dis¬ 
ordered HC sound not unlike a messy BGK. The six 
tracks here employ basic-as-possible songs, mostly 
founded on repetitious guitar riff§ and a slashing 
instrumental sound. Aside from one curious tune 
with an experimental mix of synth and a swelling 
backdrop of guitars, the remainder of the material is 
uniformly aggressive that improves markedly with 
higher volume. Not quite as arresting as their debut, 
but time hasn’t interfered with the urgency of their 
sound. (SS) 

(Burka for Everybody / Superfluous) 

GET LAID - “Pretty Weathered” 10” 

With the, uh, cost-effective packaging and slight¬ 
ly thin sound, I got the impression this might be this 
band’s first release, but no way is this their first band. 
The songs are raging and tight, mixing it up, staying 
fast but not spending all their time playing straight 
4/4. They're able to write songs that have great flow 
instead of just sounding like different parts grafted 
onto each other. Kids would do spastic dancing to 
this band. They are grounded in hardcore, but get 
wild and fucking bring it. The more I play this re¬ 
cord, the more I’m into it. (JM) 

(self-released) 

GHETTO WAYS - “I Always Wanted You” LP 

Indie-pop meets rock'n'roll with a ’70s-meets- 
'90s feel to it. Unfortunately I like the ’80s better. 
Their slower songs remind me of the MAGNETIC 
FIELDS, otherwise it reminds me of a less weird 
FORESKIN 500. Not hooky or energetic enough to 
warrant any great interest from a “punk perspec¬ 
tive. (AD) 

(P. Trash) 

GOD EQUALS GENOCIDE - “It Wasn’t Made 
for Us” EP 

Another outstanding effort by these thrash/pop- 
punk weirdoes from SoCal. One of the most com¬ 
mendable aspects to GOD EQUALS GENOCIDE 
is that no song they make sounds even Vaguely 
similar to another. It’s truly a smattering of styles, 
like some kind of stupid tie-dyed shirt you made at 
summer camp—and I'm not calling them stupid by 
any means. Actually, they are super rad, and make 
any style they decide to delve into sound amaz¬ 
ing. For example, the record kicks off with a lo-fi 
garage song, but the guitar riff sounds like some¬ 
thing off Slippery Subject-era BANANAS. Then 
song two, they flip out and it’s mosh-pit city. The 
first thing you hear on the B-side is a folk song with 
jangly guitars in the vain of THIS BIKE IS A PIPE 
BOMB-kind of reminiscent of that song “Body 
Count,” where it's folksy, but still kind of intense. 
Anyway, this record bounces all over the place, but 
it’s always going in the right direction. The only 
drawback is that the recording is kind of shitty. It 


has that demo tape/practice recording quality to it, 
which is probably intentional. (FS) 

(Razorcake / Recess) 

GODS OF GAMBLE - “Mind the Pain” CD 

Straight-ahead hard guitar rock. Nothing more, 
nothing less. The singer sounds like DANZIG with¬ 
out the dramatics. Skulls on the cover and a photo of 
the haggard-looking band drinking and smoking on 
the inside. (CK) 

(Stampace) 

GOOFB ALL - “Si” CD 

“Old school hard rock power trio” they say, 
which I guess is close enough: sounds more like 
RUSH meets TSOL Mach II to me. Fairly rever¬ 
ent KING CRIMSON and CREAM covers. Major 
selling point is member Bruno DeSmartass of FLIP¬ 
PER). (DD) 

(self-released, www.goofballsf.com) 

GRANDE COBRA - “Echoes of Rebellion” LP 

When you wear the influences so strongly on 
your sleeve, you’d better supercede them, adapt 
them to your own personal vision... or you just live 
in their shadow. DRIVE LIKE JEHU/ROCKET 
FROM THE CRYPT lite from Australia. Ten tracks 
of the same guitar tone and deconstructed ’77 punk 
attack, but the vocals push their twang to an unlis- 
tenable FLESHEATERS level, and the music over¬ 
all lacks the drive and melodic songwriting knack 
that made those Jon Reis bands work. Recorded in 
2006 at Toe Rag, the cover looks like Yank Crime's 
PETTIBON-style ink work. Limited to 750, this is 
proficient and solid enough to probably work live 
with the vocals subdued a bit under the volume of 
amps, but as it stands...do you really miss RFTC 
enough to accept an imitation sans horn section? 
(KS) 

(Top Five) 

HAMMER BROS. - “The Kids Are Dead” LP 

The first thing that struck me about this record 
was the art, which looks like a second-rate imitation 
of a SABERTOOTH ZOMBIE cover. The second 
thing that struck me was the mix: guitars waaaay up 
front, drums right below, vocals buried somewhere 
beneath and the bass nowhere to be found on most 
tracks. Musically they’re trying for INTEGRITY 
or RINGWORM circa 1995. I’ve definitely heard 
worse attempts at that style, but bands like ROT IN 
HELL do it infinitely better. HAMMER BROS, (just 
what the world needs, more video game references 
in hardcore) are not doing themselves any favors 
by mixing elements of a more modern hardcore 
sound in. Lyrically this is firmly in the vein of CER¬ 
EMONY or their lesser kin TRASH TALK, vaguely 
pissed off but without ever really saying why. This 
isn't as bad as I thought it would be, but it’s not good 
enough for me to buy a copy, either. (XV) 

(Arrest) 

HATRED SURGE - “Deconstruct” LP 

I have no idea who I'm writing this review for— 
everyone I know who would want this (amazing) 
record bought it months ago. But I’ll have to assume 
that someone out there somehow doesn’t know 
about it. HATRED SURGE has, through no fault of 
their own, become the darlings of the hype-based. 




















R5DDHDS 


eBay-high-bidding, forum-shit-talking, collector scum power- 
violence scene. Unlike many of the bands that these pathetic 
losers latch onto to justify their internet existence, HATRED 
SURGE has serious fucking chops and write some damned fine 
songs, if these blasts of adrenaline-fueled anti-musicality can 
properly be called songs. Along with their compatriots in IRON 
LUNG, IN DISGUST, PLF, the ENDLESS BLOCKADE and a 
few others, HATRED SURGE is one of the few bands currently 
described by lazy fucks (such as myself) as “powerviolence” 
that lives up to the legacy that comes with that term. This LP 
represents their best efforts thus far. (XV) 

(Rescued From Life) 

HEADACHE CITY - “We Can’t Have Anything Nice’’ LP 

This is a pretty killer album—garage punk with a healthy 
amount of power-pop, kind of like a modern-day Midwest ver¬ 
sion of the BUZZCOCKS. All the songs are super catchy and 
soft around the edges with melodic and sometimes harmonizing 
back-up vocals. That’s what power-pop is all about, and they 
nail it! All the songs are totally danceable, and half of them you 
can kind of sing along to them the first time you hear ’em. Cover 
art is real cool looking, too. (FS) 

(P. Trash) 

HEIL HIDIOT / WEEKEND WARRIOR - split EP 

It’s always nice to see a split with two good bands, since 
we all hav^ a bunch where only one side gets played, right? 
WEEKEND WARRIOR hails from Costa Mesa and slap down 
some seriously chaotic spastic thrash along the lines of ANTI¬ 
SCHISM and later-period CHARLES BRONSON, with a hint 
of crust thrown in for good measure. The lyrics are nihilistic 
and negative, and one song has a funny line, “we all love Bad 
Brains but we got no PMA!” Classic. HEIL HIDIOT is an Ital¬ 
ian hardcore band I haven’t heard before, but they just might be 
my favorite of the two here—fucking amazing female vocals 
and a furious storm of pure, traditional hardcore to back her up. 
The lyrics touch on sleazy, creepy men; girls who cannot be in¬ 
dependent of their boyfriend; and poser pseudo-intellectualism 
in hardcore. This is a band to watch 6ut for. (BG) 

(Mass Media) 

HELL CITY KINGS — “The Road to Damnation” LP 

Beer-swilling tattoo guys who probably refer to themselves 
as “bastards’’ and hang out in some crummy bar. TURBONE¬ 
GRO rip-off from Texas. This is what ANNIHILATION TIME 
VII would sound like, when the only original member is Chris 
Grande and they don’t even plug his bass in anymore. Maybe this 
is rock’n’roll revival; sounds like a tenth-rate KISS cover band. 
These guys probably all have long-term girlfriends. I think they 
just referred to themselves as scallywags. “Scuuuumbaaaaaggsss 
and scaaaalllyyywwaaaaggggsss”—yeah, they’re saying it like 
that. You know how RANCID and BLINK 182 had that side- 
project where they had a wigger dude rap while they played 
like shit? Imagine if they did like a metal version of that but the 
wigger was replaced by some fuckin' barback. They’ll probably 
take the “funny quotes” from this review and put them in a blog 
on their MySpace sayin’ “WE DON’T GIVE A FUCK!!!!!” and 
like pretending it s cool that they got a bad review, but they 
obviously put at least a modicum of effort into this long-playing 
record and judging by the full-cover back cover (a full-color 
picture of these obviously fun-loving party guys) they’re try¬ 
ing a little bit and failing quite a lot. If these guys come to SF, 
they’re playing at the Parkside, if you know what I mean. I can’t 
stop writing about this record. This is some seriously inspiring 
shit, “y’all.” Real talk though: this thing fuckin’ blows. (BB) 
(Cutthroat) 

HITS - “Living with You Is Killing Me” CD 

Any record that starts off with a “Fuck yeah” after a guitar 


intro makes me involuntarily roll my eyes. Geesh. By the way, 
that song is called “Fuck the Needy.” Hilarious. I can tell right 
off creativity is not going to be a priority on this CD. And it 
doesn’t get much better from there. The singer does his best 
New York junky whine. The music is hard rock. There are some 
ballads. Need I say more? (CK) 

(Merenoise) 

HOOVES NOT HANDS - “Swollen” CD 

I hear an almost industrial sound; not like the electronic/rock 
style, but like the music has a cold, almost sterile sense about it. 
Nothing on this album develops into what I would consider an 
interesting listen. Could be compared to the MELVINS or some 
other dredgy, riff-oriented rock band from fifteen years ago— 
HELMET maybe. This is not hypnotic enough to be enchanting 
and not heavy enough to be much fun. (RM) 

(Amplified Noise) 

THE HUSSY / ZYGOTEENS - “Round ’n’ Round/The 
River No More” split EP 

Wisconsin bands unite! This is super fun pop-punk that's 
lyrically clever and musically talented. The HUSSY is to¬ 
tal rock, complete with sleazy, distorted solo-ing and bizarre, 
chant-like lyrics that are almost provocative, but instead make 
no sense—which rules because it makes it super easy to bounce 
around to it and not be bored. ZYGOTEENS are less cock-rock, 
and way more boppy-poppy-teeny-punk. I can only imagine 
them playing a basement show at 2:00 A.M. after everyone’s 
had, like, 1,000 beers and then we all go apeshit because they 
are such good pop writers. (HD) 

(Big Action) 

IDLE HANDS / MUTAGENS - split 45 

Two bands cover some klassix: the PLUGZ’ “Mindless Con¬ 
tentment and the SHOCK’S “This Generation’s on Vacation.” 
IDLE HANDS take on the former and it reminds me of why 
Cissie always says that bands should never put covers onto vi¬ 
nyl... I have less possessive feelings about the SHOCK’S out¬ 
put, but again this cover seems sort of pointless and throwaway. 

I can t imagine anyone playing this record more than once un¬ 
less they had either never heard the other versions of the songs, 
or were friends with the band. Sorry... (LG) 

(P. Trash) 

IGNORANCE - “World of Waste” CD 

Usually, if a punk band uses the word “ignorance,” it is to 
ridicule the general stupidity of the population that contributes 
to society’s ills, but these guys wear the term as a badge of 
honor. “What the fuck is Darfur?” they ask, “if it’s not in New 
England I don’t give a fuck.” OK. “Apathy is my one virtue,” 
another lyric boasts. OK, if that’s what makes you proud. “I 
wanna fucking hang myself!” Really? Someone in my family 
hung himself; you think it’s fucking romantic? As for the music, 
it’s your typical screaming-angry-guy ’core with lots of power 
chords; it reminds me of early SUB ZERO. Zzzzzzzzzz. (BG) 
(Arrest) 

INDIAN WARS - “If You Want Me” EP 

Four tracks of reverb-soaked, psyched-out garage, a sound 
I love by a band that’s just won over my hard-fought affec¬ 
tions. Its got that slight ’60s folk feel that has been recently 
mastered by the MANTLES, along with that big-velvet-cushion 
gorgeousness of KURT VILE. Throw in some of the dance- 
infectious thud of the OH SEES, and basically what you end up 
with what is possibly my favorite EP of the year. I love Bachelor 
Records, I love Vancouver (even though I’ve never been) and 
most importantly I love INDIAN WARS. (SD) 

(Bachelor) 













































K3CDRDS 



INFAME - “II” LP 

Hailing out of Barcelona, INFAME deliver their 
second full-length. The thick production works just 
fine on this release. Many anthemic tracks here hav¬ 
ing moments of contemporary Japanese hardcore. 
Layers of screaming guitars (slightly metallic) over 
pounding, bass-drenched drums. The songs drive 
and have enough punch to keep your head bobbing. 

In my opinion, the vocal style is what makes the 
record—something about the growl that keeps my 
interest. Nice job. (MS) 

(Packebusch / Kamaset Levyt / Shill / Ravachol 
Prod. / Grita o Muere) 

INTERNAL AUTONOMY - 2xCD 

This two-disc set compiles a hand-picked and 
remastered selection of nearly 40 tracks from the 
various demos, tape comps, and vinyl records IN¬ 
TERNAL AUTONOMY put out throughout the late 
’80s and early ’90s. Bored the typical punk sound 
that dominated at the time, they took the more ex¬ 
perimental approach to anarcho punk (similar to 
the APOSTLES), incorporating elements of folk 
and goth into their sound. Add to that a singer that 
sounded not unlike SOUXSIE SIOUX. There’s a lot 
to plow through on here, but this is the first time on 
CD for all of this stuff. If your tapes are starting to 
decompose in the cupboard, now’s your chance to 
replace them with a pristine digital version. (AM) 
($16 ppd: Front Cover Productions) 

THE JAM - “At the BBC” LP 

The JAM should need absolutely no introduction 
to you, but in case you aren’t familiar with them, 
they are pretty much the ultimate Mod-revival band, 
ever! I know that there are numerous others from 
that era that are also amazing (the CHORDS, PUR¬ 
PLE HEARTS, etc.) but the JAM deservedly are the 
best, not only for all they accomplished in regards to 
their popularity, but the songs themselves stand out 
above all else. On this album you get a compilation 
of tracks taken from four sessions recorded at the 
BBC between 1977 to 1981—three of which were 
with the legendary John Peel! There are sixteen 
tracks in total including the massive hits “The Mod¬ 
ern World,” “All Around the World,” and one of my 
personal all-time favourites “The Eton Rifles.” I 
believe that for the most part these sessions were re¬ 
corded live with minimal studio production, so you 
get a pretty raw version of all these songs, but the 
quality of the BBC studios is legendary so they are 
all excellent and enjoyable to listen to. There is also 
a very informative insert included, so if you’re a fan 
of the JAM, then this is probably necessary for you 
to at least check out... (ML) 

(bootleg) 

LES JOLIS -LP 

From Marseilles, (the dirty part of) France, LES 
JOLIS deliver the goods all for those into slightly 
poppy, slightly art-damaged retro punk (HUBBLE 
BUBBLE, anyone?). At first I thought this was a re¬ 
issue of some genius rarity I’d never heard of. Suc- 
ces! (DD) 

(Scanner) • 

LAST COMMUNION - LP 

This is pretty OK. Gravel-voiced and melodic 
almost-hardcore from Canada. Definitely in line 


with early MANIFESTO JUKEBOX, PHOENIX 
FOUNDATION, LEATHERFACE and the like, but 
faster. Cool wander-y guitar parts with the vocal 
stylings of them thar previously mentioned nutters. 
Rounded out with a cover of the HUSKER’s “Girl 
Who Lives on Heaven Hill.” (JU) 

(P. Trash) 

LOS LAXANTES - “No No No No” EP 

Today in the age of mass globalization and in¬ 
stant access via the internet, punk rock does not 
seem so radical when rebellion is a readily accepted 
and a packaged commodity in every mall throughout 
the First World. So think about an Argentinean punk 
band recording in somebody’s kitchen in 1981 in the 
height of a fascist dictatorship. Most would fall the 
way of the goosestep but LOS LAXANTES raise 
the banner high. Not quite as edgy as their contem¬ 
poraries LOS VIOLADORES, but a pretty ripping 
’77 style punk thing here, not unlike, say, a more 
serious TOY DOLLS or DICKIES. The more I play 
this, the more infectious it becomes and the easier it 
is to see that they are Argentinean legends... (RR) 

(no label, www.myspace.com/loslaxantes) 

LIVERBALL - “Bullet Bullet” CD 

So I guess this is a couple of EPs from the early 
'90s by this Pittsburgh band. It’s a mediocre bar 
band that was the sound of the moment back then. 
Hi-rev MC5/STOOGES lite... Bored the shit out of 
me. (TB) 

(Buck-N-Hour, no info) 

MADMEN-LP 

What you have here is a one-man band play¬ 
ing FUCKED UP freeform, improvisational punk 
rock. Some parts of this record have manic guitar 
riffs with snappy drumming and eccentric shouted 
vocals. The singing and guitars take on a scared rab¬ 
bit feel as you sprint through eight songs of pure 
detached musical experimentation. On the rare oc¬ 
casions that the song slows a mite and gels for a mo¬ 
ment, this could remind you of the DICKS during 
the Kill from the Hearts sessions. The musician(s) 
on this venture are sheer genius—it sounds as if a 
very talented man was fucking around in his home 
studio and someone got a hold of the tapes and boot¬ 
legged them. Play this record several times. It will 
grow on you. This record is disorienting. This re¬ 
cord is very good! (RR) 

(self-released, no info) 

THE MAKEOUTS - “In a Strange Land” LP 

When I see a band named the MAKEOUTS, I’m 
expecting some sort of ’60s-sounding garage punk, 
probably with a healthy dose of pop thrown in. 
From Sweden, these guys deliver the goods, though 
I think there isn’t as much pop as I was expecting. 
That works just fine for me. It’s slick and sloppy 
at the same time. The pace is slow at times, but 
never slows down. Other times, they really pick it 
up. Great LP. All four members sport RayBan sun¬ 
glasses and one has a moustache that looks like it 
belongs to a seventh grader. (KK) 

(Bachelor) * 

MARVELOUS DARLINGS - “The Only Ones 
for Miles/Follow Me Home” 

Despite their great name, I found this to be more 


lackluster rock’n’roll with an indie-pop lean.. .or the 
other way around. It sounds a bit formulaic; not wild 
and crazy enough or just lacking any great energy. I 
think they’re shooting for the REIGNING SOUND 
but fall way short. (AD) 

(P. Trash) 

MEDICATION - “This Town” LP 

I like this record in small doses. If 1 leave it on 
the turntable for an entire side, I just seem to walk 
off into the next room, start reading or do something 
else similarly distracting and distracted. The music 
is slow, quiet and pleasant. The vocals are comfort¬ 
ing in a way that could easily put you to sleep. Put¬ 
ting on one or two songs at a time is the way to do it. 
That way I can pay attention to the pretty melodies 
and pained, engaging, whispered vocals. (CK) 
(HoZac) 

MESS FOLK - “Something I Remember” EP 

OK, so last month I reviewed MESS FOLK’S 
demo and I politely asked for less reverb. Thank 
you! This EP is basically perfect and all three tracks 
are bangin’, keeping with what I liked most about 
the demo: mid-tempo slow-pop-depressed-scrap- 
paper-burning. This recording is so excellent for the 
style of the songwriting, which has a much stronger 
influence from the FALL and other talk-sing psy¬ 
chedelic apathy bands such as PAVEMENT (the re¬ 
ally early years) than I initially thought. With a mod¬ 
erate amount of reverb on the half-asleep vocals and 
the guitars and percussion in the back and scratchy 
bass in the front, this EP is pushing you up the in¬ 
surmountable hill of waking up in the morning. My 
favorite track is the second one, “Give Me a Gun. 
It’s slow, gritty and perversely/comically unhappy. 
MESS FOLK is a very special band and I hope they 
stick around. (HD) 

(HoZac) 

MICKEY - “She’s So Crazy /1 Am Your Trash” 

This is SWEET—glammy with just a tiny bit of 
twang to it. If you are a fan of music that is catchy 
as all hell, this is for you. The A-side is bouncy and 
up-beat and the B-side is a ballad-type number that 
is a little mellower. Both rock in different ways. I 
will look for this one. (KK) 

(HoZac) 

MODERN ACTION - “Modern Action/Bleeding 
Red” 

Apparently this has members of the BODIES 
and the BRIEFS, and that would be a pretty good 
place to start a description of their sound. It has 
the BODIES pace with the smart-arse hooks of the 
BRIEFS. The whole thing has an England 1977-78 
obscure 7” kinda vibe...even the name. Very good. 
(AD) 

(Modem Action) 

MODERN ACTION - “Radioactive Boy/Prob¬ 
lem Child” 

Distorted, rocking lo-fi punk rock from our very 
own back yard, Sonoma. Over in the blink of an 
eye, but still managing to dig those catchy choruses 
straight in to yer noggin. Hooks flying from its ying- 
yang, enough head-bobbing moments to give AC/ 
DC a hard run for its money and even a memorable 
instrumental just to whet that appetite even more. 



















Think the RIP-OFFS, think the MUMMIES and while you’re 
lusting, throw in some GUITAR WOLF. (SD) 

(Modern Action) 

THE MOJOMATICS - “Tears Fall Down/In the Mean¬ 
while” 

Wherein a kick-out-the-blues noisy rootsy combo stretches 
out a bit with good results. “Tears Fall Down” is more polished 
than I remember them, but in a JOE MEEK-esque way, so 
there’s still plenty of weirdness. Nice! “In the Meanwhile” is 
somewhat redolent of late-’60s STONES—and it works! (DD) 
(Hell Yes) 

MUJERES - “Black Dog Inside My Soul” EP 

There was a time when bands like the MUMMIES and the ( 
RIP-OFFS ruled the world. The sound of ’60s garage rock 
through a punk filter kicked everyone up the arse. Now that all 
the garage heads are listening to fuckin’ shoegaze, bands like 
these are going the way of the dinosaur. It’s nice to see the Span¬ 
iards carrying the torch for primitive garage punk’n’roll. This 
band sound like the OBLIVIANS, BLACK LIPS and MUM¬ 
MIES all rolled into one. Three tracks...all raw as fuck and 
pressed loudlll (TB) 

(Discos Humeantes) 

MYELIN SHEATHS - “Do the Mental Twist” EP 

I am surprised the fuzzed-out, drenched-in-distortion 
sound is still a “thing.” Especially for a band like MYELIN 
SHEATHS, who seem to have the potential to be a really cool 
trashy punk band. The A-side of this EP has two songs that are 
catchy, punchy and seem to have funny lyrics (from what I can 
make out). But the whole damn thing is covered in fuzz, giving 
it this ethereal sound that seems out of place. The B-side is a 
longer, slower song that adapts well to the covering, but person¬ 
ally I’d like to see it all cleaned up, too. If you have good songs, 
there is no need to hide them. (CK) 

(HoZac) 

MYELIN SHEATHS - “Do the Mental Twist” EP 

More lo-fi drug music, but I can get behind this because it 
spends its time rocking the fuck out rather than navel gazing. 
Music is blown out and shimmery, like ECHO AND THE BUN- 
NYMEN or a live JESUS AND MARY CHAIN. Coupled with 
awesome layered female vocals, this is the best thing I’ve heard 
on this label. Killer shit, especially the slip “Drugstore/Phar¬ 
macy.” Niiiiice one Canaduh. (TB) 

(HoZac) 

MYELIN SHEATHS - “Stackticon” EP 

Rambunctious garage mess, with spazzed-out trebled guitars 
and the best fuck-you lady vocals, making for a savage attack of 
epic proportions that you would be a fool not to partake in. This 
sounds dangerous and bratty; music for kids that carry knives 
and know all the words to Easter Everywhere and Outta Here. 
Yeah I namedropped my favorite garage record of the ’90s— 
there’s something GORIES about this, the primitive dreaminess 
that many aim for but so few can get a handle on. This makes 
me wanna see this band play so fucking bad... It’s an exciting 
record, my friends. The sort of thing you want to listen to over 
and over ’til your neighbors wanna cut their ears off... (LG) 
(Bachelor) 

MY MIND - “Path Masher” EP 

Is this really an EP? It’s like eleven songs long, but it’s on a 
7”. I thought an EP could be eight songs at the very most. Can 
someone please check up on this for me? Anyhow, back to MY 
MIND. Most of the time, this EP sounds a lot like ’90s Brit-pop 
and indie-pseudo-emotional rock similar to SUPERGRASS, 
SUPERDRAG, BLUR, and (dare I say ?) ONION FLAVORED 


RINGS. The guitars are jangly, the vocals are really clear and 
the unmistakably blues-based pop-song structure is incredibly 
predictable right up until they throw in a strange mathy-jazz 
drums breakdown or a plodding rockabilly chorus. Maybe it’s 
just the intense clarity of the recording, but the change-ups are 
really jarring, like if someone made a mix-tape for you of only 
the very, very best pop songs ever written but stopped every 
song right before the really, really good part happens. I give 
props to the band for the excellent and detailed packaging, 
which includes everything from the lyrics to extraneous (but 
well-madej art. I guess what it all adds up to is that this band is 
trying to do a lot of things. (HD) 

(Suicide Tax / Badmaster) 

THE NASTY - “Graves” CD 

A pretty intense record with a lot of personality and brute 
force. Flying through twelve songs in fourteen minuets, the 
NASTY drop a super charged and maliciously catchy release! 
With throat-shredding screams backed by rad guitars, these 
songs rip and keep it fucking infectious. They rage and fall 
apart, saved by sick drum fills or a lingering bass line. Thrash¬ 
ing breakdowns and ape-shit choruses to put it fucking down! 

I m putting money on their live show being a stage-dive/dogpile 
extravaganza! Really fresh songwriting and sincere intensity to 
boot! Forget coffee in the morning, just throw on this CD before 
work and get amped! (RM) 

(Arrest) 

NATIVE CATS - “Catspaw/Lemon Juice” 

The drum machine hits and my hopes sink... But it’s not 
that bad. Primal, loose post-punk made by some Orstralians, 
just drums and bass and vocals, YOUNG MARBLE GIANTS 
style. If Alison Stratton were a dude. There’s an uneasy under¬ 
tone to these sounds, the discomfort and disconcerting feel that 
early GANG OF FOUR 7”s impart. It feels like private music, 
internal and intrusive all at once. I don’t know, this seems like it 
was right up my street, but it wasn't for whatever reason. I think 
it’s the sort of record that a lot of you will get into though, if you 
like the out-of-body sounds of post-punk disorder. (LG) 

(White Denim) 

NEO BOYS - “Give Me the Message” EP 

I read Joe Carducci’s Enter Naomi a few years back, where 
he makes a point of stating his disappointment with this 7” 
in comparison to their apparent greatness live. I wish I could 
have seen this band play a show that was good enough to blow 
this record outta the water—it is one of my favorite artifacts 
of early-’80s girl punk. This a Euro boot unfortunately—the 
individual(s) that put it out send the band copies via Portland 
radio station KBOO, with the MRR address as the return address 
apparently. Weird. Anyway, I love this record and it has been a 
top want for a long time, so on one hand I am psyched to have 
a decent sounding vinyl copy, on the other hand... The eternal 
question of bootlegs! I think this is one of the most perfect 7”s; 
it’s got this desperate melancholic sound, you can tell it was 
recorded by Greg Sage, and that they are a distinctly Northwest 
punk band. The lyrics to “Rich Man’s Dream” get me every 
time. Kim’s voice is so powerful. There’s a reprint of the NEO 
BOYS interview that Erin Yanke did on KBOO that ran in MRR 
#262... (LG) 

(bootleg) 

NERVE CITY - “Recordings 2007-2008” LP 

There’s a very interesting sound going on here with this band 
from Richmond. VA. I am not very impressed with the cover-it- 
all-with-fuzz style that is still surprisingly overused these days. 
NERVE CITY has that sound, but the way they use it seems to 
emphasize the sojigs more than just simply cover them up. May¬ 
be it’s because these were recorded 2007 and 2008 before that 






























r 


R5H3RDS 



fad got out of control. This LP sounds at times like 
it could be an alternate soundtrack for Repo Man. 
Reverby, surfy Spaghetti Western-style tunes with 
a twisted country-ish singer. There is something un¬ 
comfortable and unbalanced to the whole thing, and 
I like it. (CK) 

(Sweet Rot) 

NERVE CITY - “Red Tops’ EP 

Like a lot that’s been coming out on HoZac late¬ 
ly, Richmond, Virginia’s NERVE CITY mines the 
lo-fi vein pretty deep, burying their songs in echo, 
distortion, reverb and whatever else they can to 
make it sound like they’re playing at the back of a 
cave. It’s a sort of BLACK LIPS effect, taken to the 
next level. While NERVE CITY has a bit more teeth 
than some of the other lo-fi bands around (that is, 
they aren’t quite a sit-down, sing-songy band [yet]), 
the distortion/reverb gets to be a distraction, like it’s 
more about the effects than the songs. A sure hit for 
fans of DUCHESS & THE DUKE. (IS) 

(HoZac) 

NIBIRU - “War Before Extinction” EP 

Old-school grindcore/death metal from Texas. 
Guttural vocals, medium-paced, no frills, raw and 
heavy. Reminds me of early Earache bands like 
TERRORIZER and CARCASS. Dark lyrics dealing 
with politics and war. I think two of the guys were 
early members of INSECT WARFARE. Good stuff. 
(MH) 

(Rescued From Life) 

THE 99ERS - “And Then There Was Surf’ CD 

A charming full-length of indie rock meets ama¬ 
teur punk mostly on the topic of surfing. A mix of gal 
and guy singing that reminds me of the POPGUNS 
and HELEN LOVE. Dare I say “bubblegum”? And 
the fact that they’re from Minnesota, you gotta re¬ 
spect their enthusiasm for waves. Very cool. (RL) 
(Spinout) 

THE 99ERS - “Stand and Surf” CD 

Sugarcoated surf—I think influenced punk, if I 
even dare use this word. Your two-year-old might 
like it; unfortunately for this band I wipe my own 
ass and only wear diapers on a Sunday morning. 
(SD) 

(Spinout) 

NONCENS - “Society” EP 

An exact re-ish of this ’83 Swede classic (well, 
it’s got different labels than the original, but what- 
evs). Not quite as thrashing as some of the others 
from the time and place, e.g. MOB 47, ANTI-CI- 
MEX, S.O.D., etc., but it definitely has its moments, 
like the track “Don’t Give Up,” which is a straight 
ripper. The majority of the other stuff is somewhere 
between that more classic Swede HC stuff I men¬ 
tioned before and bouncier shit like ASTA KASK. 
Until today, I knew nothing about these nubs beside 
what they sounded like and when they were from. A 
good, non-obvious reissue. (JU) 

(Smrt) 

NORTON - “Long Walks on Short Piers” LP 

Very well produced melodic hardcore from Swit¬ 
zerland that is sung in English. It’s kind of emo at 
times, but there are some slightly political moments 


on this album. It’s not totally introspective and their 
sound is along the same lines as the “heavier” stuff 
Fat Wreck Chords puts out. There is nothing that re¬ 
ally grabs attention; no song is really memorable, 
they all kind of blend together by the third or fourth 
track, and the lyrics are not very thought provoking. 
Long Walks on Short Piers is neither good nor bad, 
just kind of...mediocre. The most memorable, last¬ 
ing impression is the cover art that features a wall¬ 
paper of three girls involved in a “three-way kiss,” 
leaving me wondering if the dudes in this band are 
chauvinists or just boneheads. (FS) 

(Rinderherz) 

NORTHERN TOWNS - “Good as Gold” 10” 

I love 10” records! So this release is already 
looking good to me! From the appearance of the 
band and the claims of classic punk and mod in¬ 
fluences, I was a little bit disappointed as I think 
NORTHERN TOWNS falls into more of a post¬ 
punk/hardcore style. Not that it’s bad at all—they’re 
really friggin’ good at what they’re doing! There is 
an overall matured feel to this in the musical compo¬ 
sition and the lyrics, and the combined talent of this 
band is evident from the collective experiences of 
these San Diego punk and hardcore veterans includ¬ 
ing former members of OVER MY DEAD BODY, 
DRUG WARS, SWINDLE and CHEAP SEX. (ML) 
(Swagger City) 

NO SHAME - “Ironing Day” LP 

Cool! I had never heard of this band before, but 
with some quick research I see that they are a Finn¬ 
ish punk band that formed back in 1999 and have 
numerous releases under their belt. Even before 
my little Google search, it was evident that these 
guys weren’t a vapid punk-by-numbers band with 
song titles like “Born in Submission” and “Fuck 
the System” and a gnarly assault rifle on the album 
cover. These guys definitely have something to say 
and there is substance to this album! Included with 
the record is a 20-page booklet including all the 
lyrics—every last incendiary word—almost like a 
manifesto! This reminds me of LEATHERFACE 
or the SUB HUMANS at times both musically and 
style-wise, which in my opinion is a big compli¬ 
ment! (ML) 

(Full Steam / Rookie) 

NOTHING PEOPLE - “Enemy with an Invita¬ 
tion/Reinstall” 

NOTHING PEOPLE, from Nowhere, Califor¬ 
nia, specialize in vacant, cold-wave punk that draws 
from a variety of influences. Side A evokes GARY 
NUMAN jamming with WARSAW, while the track 
on the flipside is more droning and (dare I say) in¬ 
dustrial sounding. It’s a cool little record: it comes 
packaged as an invitation, in a sturdy white sleeve 
with gold embossed lettering. Fairly limited, so get 
in there quick or go straight to eBay. (AM) 
(Permanent) 

NOT SORRY - “Moving On” EP 

Tuff youth crew hardcore from the reputable Se¬ 
attle scene doing what rainy day/pissed edgers do 
best: crush\ Reaping the benefits of extensive study 
of the Revelation Records back catalog, NOT SOR¬ 
RY stays faithful to the style of hardcore that keeps 
us in the pit and singing along. The furious pace is a 


constant through each track, taking short rests only 
to break it down, complete with bass scale or guitar 
lead. A nice blend of traditional sounds and contem¬ 
porary aggression—I’m in. (RM) 

(Lifeline) 

NUMBER 9 HARD - “All Lubed Up and Ready 
to Go” CD f 

NUMBER 9 HARD include a promo sheet to 
help me, the lowly reviewer, learn a little more 
about their band and tell me how they play shows all 
the time at punk venues with punk bands. They tell 
me that they take their infectious brand of punk/ska 
on the road all over the Midwest and that they gig 
in Wisconsin “constantly.” Since I spent the major¬ 
ity of this band’s existence in Milwaukee, I thought 
this was a little strange, ’cause I ain’t never heard 
of ’em until now, but whatever. I hope you dudes 
have fun at the Rave and The Miramar, but might 
I suggest hitting up a few basements, ’cause that’s 
where the punks are in Milwaukee, dudes. NUM¬ 
BER 9 HARD listen to a lot of OPERATION IVY... 
like way too much. (WN) 

(SBS) 

THEE OH SEES - “Quadrospazzed ’09” 12” 

There seems to be a good amount of buzz around 
this band. I haven’t heard anything other than this 
one-sided, one-song EP, but it seems they’re going 
for an experimental/psychedelic rock sound. This is 
a 45 RPM 12” with one long, noisy song, lots of 
reverb and repetitive vocals that sound like they are 
saying, “I am on my way back home?” Maybe it’s 
my short attention span, but this song seems to start 
up and drone on for a while. It has a short break in 
the middle where things quiet down for a bit before 
they get going again, but it never really takes off. 
This is a live recording and I’m guessing they are 
more of a live band than anything else. Oh, and it 
would be a shame if I didn’t mention the beautifully 
intricate etching of faces and patterns that takes up 
this record’s B-side. (BD) 

(Castle Face) 

ONE TRICK COBRA / S.U.S. - split EP 

A split 7” between two bands from Texas. S.U.S. 
plays sloppy, chaotic hardcore. The vocals are 
buried in the blur of the music. Both tracks have 
a good amount of guitar soloing. One minute it 
sounded like straightforward modern HC, then they 
slowed down to more of an emo sound, and then 
for a split second, a blast beat. I like the chaotic 
feel. ONE TRICK COBRA’s two tracks couldn’t 
be farther apart. “Macho Sixth Song” has a speedy, 
in-your-face hardcore/thrash sound, but what’s up 
with “Murder Rock’n’Roll”? A mix of bar rock, 
MOTORHEAD and punk’n’roll with a simple rock 
riff and gang woah-oh vocals. Ugh. (MH) 

(TFC) 

ORCHARD OF THE LIVING - CD 

This is so far out of my purview that I don’t even 
know what kind of music it is. Neo-screamo? Indie 
post-rock? Long, spacey melodic jams with half- 
sung/half-yelled vocals delivering political lyrics 
written like poetry. You might like this, but I really 
have no idea. Not my cup of tea. They probably 
have some songs up on their My Space... (XV) 
(Sickle Moon) 


















R5XDRDG 


OVERNIGHT LOWS - “City of Rotten Eyes” CD 

No-frills Southern garage rock, kinda like a snottier, brat- 
tier REDS or some of the early Rip-Off Records bangers. This 
genre is touch and go; it can either be generic yawnsville or ban¬ 
gin’ as fuck. This falls easily into the latter as the band makes 
sure to sprinkle plenty of hooks throughout this blazing retard- 
punk. The “hit” for me is “Eyesore”: “E-Y-E-S-O-R-E-R-E”... 
yeaaaahhhh. (TB) 

(Goner) 

PARALYZER - “Counting Catastrophe” CD 

Totally ripping modern metal crust that would probably sit 
just as happily on a bill with SKELETON WITCH as they would 
with COLISEUM, and I would guess that the crowd would love 
them at either show. Well written songs that fly by, but still take 
the time to squeeze in a few amazingly short breakdowns and 
(almost distasteful guitar wanking. The vocals make this one, 
though—always at the very edge of collapsing, like the dude is 
sincerely not going to have anything resembling a voice tomor¬ 
row, but that’s cool, 'cause we still had tonight. Solid shit. (WN) 
(Yep) 

PIZZA / TIDELAND - split EP 

PIZZA is one of the worst bands names ever...really, you 
want to call your band “PIZZA”? I don’t really like their BAR¬ 
BARA MANNING lo-fi indie twee thing either. TIDELAND 
is a little more noisy and even have a slight KILLING JOKE 
guitar sound behind ’90s-emo-meets-indie-rock rock. (AD) 
(Cosmic Debris, no address) 

LOS PLATANOS / VENEREANS - split EP 

Two bands from Spain puke up some really cool early-style 
punk tunes. I can’t say I like one more than the other; they are 
both really cool. If you are searching out some snotty ass punk 
’n’ roll, then-check this shit out. Great party punk, so have your 
local punk DJ search this out. (MS) 

(Superfluous) 

POLYMORPHINES - “Transistor Sistor” CD 

Yesterday morning, I listened to this CD while getting ready 
for work and all during the afternoon I had the images and 
sounds of great ’70s proto-punk bands playing relentlessly in 
my head. You know what I’m talking about—the wailing gui¬ 
tars, huge hair, bellbottom jeans and lots of rock'n'roll swagger. 
More than the originals, though, this damn fine album brings to 
mind the MOONEY SUZUKI upon a second listening (in their 
better, early days). And like that band, the POLYMORPHINES 
throw down a perfect blend of classic rock and punk with a 
slight touch of blues while completely maintaining a unique 
flavor and sound. My favorite track here is “Dirty Cop” with 
lyrics like, “You used to be a high school jock / Nothing but a 
right-wing prop.” The harmonica is put to use on this one and if 
you aren’t fucking tapping your foot and digging the music, you 
must be dead inside! Those with a penchant for a dose of rawk 
in their musical mix are strongly encouraged to check this out. 
(BG) 

(Get Bent) 

POWERCHORDS — “More Than Me/Chemical Girl” 

Possibly the most unoriginal name in popular music, but 
at least it’s descriptive. The POWERCHORDS play the kind 
of tuneful, catchy pop-punk that is currently being peddled 
as some kind of power-pop revival. Think UNDERTONES 
or BUZZCOCKS, although the singer has a decidedly RUDI- 
tinged Irish lilt despite being from Chula Vista. “More Than 
Me” is my favorite cut of the two—it sounds more authenti¬ 
cally ’70s in its slightly out-of-tune harmony, not to mention 
the subtle BEATLES rip in the backing vocals near the end. It's 
good stuff, and my rigorous research uncovered the news that 


they have another single and a CD out already. Both are worth 
looking into, no doubt. (AM) 

(Bachelor) 

THE PSYCHO KID - “Hypocrite Land” CD 

A new band in the world of RAMONES-meets-SCREECH- 
ING WEASEL masses. This is just OK considering the com¬ 
petition. From Chicago, this is probably best for the genre’s 
completists and Chicago locals. (RL) 

(self-released) 

PU$$Y COW - “Drinky Birds” CD 

This is really stupid, which is the intention. A healthy dose of 
stupid punk with one one-liner after another. This also includes 
a song called “I Love the Muffs” so I can agree with this band 
on one level. Basic, funny stuff that is amusing if nothing else. 
(RL) 

(Chorizo Bonito) 

PU$$Y COW - “Ride” CD 

Really? I don’t want to even dignify this with a review. I 
can't believe I have to spend the next 30 minutes listening to 
this garbage. Proof that anyone with enough money can put out 
their very own CD. Oh, and there’s a secret track! This bag of 
shit will never end! (FS) 

(Chorizo Bonito) 

RAPEGOAT - “Man Cannot Be Saved” CD 

Questionable name'aside, I would love to give this CD to a 
thirteen-year-old kid growing up in a religious household and 
watch the corruption that would ensue. There’s a bit of a comic 
factor and a somewhat polished recording here, maybe akin to 
the kind of decent punk record some classic early ’80s LA band 
would record today, but it’s still pretty good. The lyrics take 
plenty of shots at organized religion in an irreverent and funny 
fashion, and I suspect they might be,a product of the singer’s 
own religious upbringing. (DG) 

(Mystery School) 

RATAS DEL VATICANO - “Chido” EP 

Fuck, this is kinda amazing and the B-side is even better. I 
was really anticipating this band’s earlier full-length on Silt- 
breeze after the douchebag distributor/label onesheet claimed 
it to be the next KBD band (citing them to rival the SODS, 
MENTALLY ILL, GUILTY RAZORS, TAMPAX, etc.) and I 
was more than let down. After being assigned this record I re¬ 
visited the LP and still am yet to make a declaration, but this 7” 
on the other hand I’m ready to get into fisticuffs with detractors 
and fully back it as they stand their own ground and are amaz¬ 
ing. If this record were a vagina or butthole. I’d fuck or eat the 
shit out of it! (RR) 

(Volar) 

RAYMILLAND - “Recordings ’79-’81” CD 

One of St. Louis, MO’s first new-wave bands. RAYMIL¬ 
LAND played eight shows in their short career, but there were 
some big ones. They opened for MAGAZINE, ULTRAVOX 
and CHELSEA. They were even scheduled to open for JOY DI¬ 
VISION in Chicago. They officially released only three songs: 
two on a 7” that was included with copies of Praxis magazine 
and one song on the Sub-Pop #5 cassette. All of those tracks 
are included here, as are their unreleased demo recordings and 
rehearsal tapes. Twelve songs in all. The music is post-punk 
prog: simplistic guitar, pounding bass, rhythmic drums and 
synthesized noises. It is obvious why they were chosen to play 
with JOY DIVISION. The singer sounds like a cross between 
David Bowie and Peter Murphy. Arty, theatrical and weird, yet 
strangely commercial sounding. (CK) 

(BDR) 










































1 


H5DDRDG 



THE REACTIONARIES - “1979” LP 

This album marks the first official vinyl release 
of ten songs recorded at practice by the band that 
eventually became MINUTEMEN. Well, to be 
completely accurate, one song, “Tony Gets Wasted 
in Pedro,” appeared on MINUTEMEN’s Politics of 
Time album, but you knew that. Mike Watt wrote all 
of the music and most of the lyrics for these songs, 
so you can detect clues to what was to come, but 
it’s definitely a lot more straightforward and “punk” 
sounding. D Boon’s guitar, as always, shines like 
a beacon through fog (sorry); Joe Strummer and 
Mick Jones as filtered through a childhood of CRE¬ 
DENCE CLEARWATER REVIVAL. All of the 
aforementioned happens on side one of the record. 
The flip has various combinations of folks from the 
San Pedro music scene (past, present, and future), 
including Watt, Jack Brewer, Todd Congelliere, 
Joe Baiza and George Hurley, performing versions 
of the REACTIONARIES’ songs. Like the Pedro¬ 
centric zine The Rise and the Fall , this feels very 
much like a really fun CQmmunity-building exercise. 
Let’s face it: although an enjoyable listen, musically 
speaking, the B-side is fairly redundant and unnec¬ 
essary, especially when presented right alongside 
the electric vitality of the originals on the other side. 
It does, however, serve as a kind of aural document 
of the tight-knit and lively scene in Pedro—an audio 
version of The Rise and the Fall , perhaps. Still, as 
a complete package. I’d go so far as to call this es¬ 
sential . (AM) 

(Water Under the Bridge) 

THE READIES - “Mink Dagger/ Medicine Cab¬ 
inet” 

Total NEW YORK DOLL/HEARTBREAK- 
ERS/STONES-like swagger from Mr. Dan Kroha, 
who you may remember from bands like the fuck¬ 
ing GORIES or DEMOLITION DOLL RODS. Un¬ 
like the hundreds of others who’ve tried their hand 
at taking up the JOHNNY THUNDERS torch, the 
READIES keep it simple, clean and lean for maxi¬ 
mum effect. I’m a sucker for this kind of rock’n’roll, 
when done right. And the READIES do it right. (IS) 
(Cass) 

REGULATIONS - “To Be Me” LP/CD 

As someone who has listened to both REGULA¬ 
TIONS LPs (including the two 7”s of course) ex¬ 
tensively over the last several years, and who con¬ 
sidered getting an E.T.A. tattoo in my youth, I have 
to say that this record was generally a letdown. I 
wasn’t a fan of the direction they were going with 
the Different Needs 7”: it felt too contrived, like too 
much of a blatant GERMS rip-off, and with zero of 
the personality that made their other records speak 
to me so much. This record expands on what they 
were doing on that 7”, and ultimately makes me 
think of them playing some well-lit bar with few old 
fans in attendance, sort of reeking of doing-it-for- 
it’s-own-sake. There’s also this sort of forced-ecle’c- 
ticism, especially in a lot of the intros, which doesn’t 
make sense given that they’ve always known how to 
write good songs with natural sounding intricacies 
of their own. All of this said, if you were a fan of the 
Different Needs 7”, chances are you might Jike this 
record more than me. It’s also a little strange that 
Deranged sent an LP copy for the MRR collection 
and a CD as a reviewer copy (even opposed to no 


reviewer copy at all), but I suppose when your label 
is taking out color ads in Vice , you have to cut costs 
somewhere. (DG) 

(Deranged) 

RELICS - “We Owe Ourselves This” LP 

Woah! Three-piece from Massachusetts doing 
heavy, mostly mid-tempo power/complexity stuff. 
These guys mix up intricate instrumental scenarios 
with brutish authority that could either hypnotize 
you or lead you into a headbanging frenzy! They do 
end up straddling the line between ADD brilliance 
and annoying song structure due to the lack of con¬ 
tinuity on some tracks. But overall I found this a 
cool record that doesn’t necessarily incorporate a lot 
of the regional trademarks most people recognize 
from the Mass hardcore/Clean Plate camps. Rather, 
they have a sound that finds its way somewhere be¬ 
tween the sophistication of AMPERE and the chaos 
of PG.99. Simple but hand-assembled covers; only 
300 pressed and they seem to be going fast. (RM) 
(Galambis / Clean Plate) 

RESIST AND EXIST - “Ad Liberty” CD 

The ’90s have always seemed too close for ap¬ 
preciation and not far enough away for nostalgia, 
but as distance grows, what was unique about the 
time period becomes more and more apparent. Half 
a primitive studio recording with thirteen unreleased 
songs and half a live recording, the CD from this 
early ’90s MOB/CRASS-inspired SoCal peace punk 
makes for a “for fans” proposition at the outset—es¬ 
pecially as the liner notes from one of the singers 
flat-out states “RESIST AND EXIST has always 
cared more about the message and less about the 
music”—but between grid-tempo, multi-vocalled, 
rudimentarily inept punk bashing, there’s a spirit in 
these 24 tracks that somehow seems to have been 
lost in the last 20 years. This is most evident in the 
last ten tracks* of live songs from 1992, which are 
simultaneously delightful, crazy, naive, inspired, 
well intentioned and comedic as the band reads 
long diatribes about the patriarchy between songs, 
invites people on stage to burn the flag and an¬ 
nounces that “this song tells everybody how we feel 
about war.” It could be argued that these types of 
(at times cringe-worthy) diatribes caused a reaction 
that killed off a lot of the political orientation of the 
US scene, which I don’t think quite views itself now 
as an agent for social change in the same way as the 
’80s or ’90s—but in capturing that time, it’s endear¬ 
ingly charming as much as inspiring. I wish the time 
had been taken to type out the lyrics to the tracks as 
well, as you never know what will be somebody’s 
first punk record, but I think the intention was to 
make a nice collection and bonus for fans, and it’s a 
mission well accomplished. (KS) 

(Mass Media) 

REY MUERTO - “Rey Muerto” EP 

Totally inept yet somewhat charming punk from 
Spain. It’s got the true eternal sound of punk, like 
it could have been made in ’77 or ’81 or ’93—with 
no sense of any self-conscious intent—it’s not some 
self-conscious, “Let’s form a KBD-style band!” 
This is punk as it will always be. The singer has a 
little bit of a John Lydon yowl, the music sounds 
like it’s just about to happen; I used the word inept 
in my first sentence intentionally. There are parts 


that remind me of an ESKORBUTO practice tape, 
then they throw in some total incongruous guitar 
dirge. The kind of record you put on, instantly hate, 
write off as half-assed shit, then realize it’s great, 
then realize you know nothing about anything, (LG) 
(Regresivos) 

RF7 - “Acts of Defiance” EP 

RF7 have been around forever, or at least since 
around 1979, and have put out some, but not a ton of 
records. This four-song EP looks like it was record¬ 
ed in 1980 and, as far as I can tell, contains songs 
that have not otherwise been released. Most of the 
cuts here are on the slower side and have a sort of 
TALKING HEADS or GANG OF FOUR funkiness 
to them, without actually sounding like either of 
those bands. I imagine it will do more for some of 
you than it does for me. (KK) 

(Puke ’n’ Vomit) 

ROLLERBALL - “Savage Eyes/Lay You Down” 

I love what this label is doing! I haven’t loved 
all the re-issues that they’ve done, but most of them 
have been amazing and if nothing else, they’ve 
managed to unearth some incredibly classic gems 
from the golden era of power-pop/punk/garage/ 
rock’n’roll which is much, much appreciated, and 
this release is a definite hit in my books! ROLL¬ 
ERBALL was a pre-ELTON MOTELLO one-off 
studio project that has a pub-rock feel a la DR. 
FEELGOOD or LITTLE BOB STORY. The B-side 
has even more of a swagger to it reminiscent of 
the NEW YORK DOLLS/JOHNNY THUNDERS. 
Awesome! (ML) 

(Sing Sing) 

RUM ANIA - “Fiesta Democratica” EP 

This is my favorite kind of record: you will either 
absolutely hate it or fall in love with it, but it will 
never be background music'. These four punks are 
from Madrid, Spain and, from what I could gather, 
are ethnically Romanian, but I could be wrong... 
Let me know dudes! This EP delivers some straigh¬ 
tahead Spanish punk/street-punk/Qi. That might 
sound a little boring, but when you add the vocal¬ 
ist, delightfully sloppy moments and some chorus 
vocals that are just a little off, you get a great record. 
Many bands try to pull off this loosely played style 
of punk, which usually ends up sounding just plain 
shitty, but these guys nail it. The singer’s vocal style 
can be compared to Jello Biafra's, seriously, almost 
right on. The sound of this record is distinctly Span¬ 
ish punk in recording quality and style, but aside 
from the great music, their lyrics and attitude make 
them one of my favorites of the awesome punk com¬ 
ing out of Spain today. They are snotty enough to 
be fun and the lyrics are dripping with irony—not 
the kind that makes you want to slap someone’s stu¬ 
pid mustache off their face, but the kind that allows 
you to have a healthy laugh at serious and terrible 
situations without being a callous asshole. Get your 
hands on it! (MB) 

(Ayuntamiento de Madrid) 

RUSSIAN ROULETTES - “R&R” LP 

It’s blown-out, raw, garage-y rock’n’roll from 
these Aussies. Think DIRTBOMBS, RIP-OFFS, 
etc.: well executed, but with much more pedestrian 
songwriting than either of those bands. The A-side 















mm rds 


seems to go on forever, and all the songs just run together. The 
B-side is far more interesting, with a ten-minute jammed-out 
epic, a blistering HENDRIX-style WILLIE DIXON cover (the 
album’s high point, unfortunately), and a full-on Phil Spector 
wall-of-sound pop song, but overall I found this record to be a 
bit of a let-down. With less cod-garage and more of the B-side 
experimentation, they would be onto something. (AM) 

(P. Trash) 

SABERTOOTH SNATCH - “Project Sherm” EP 

When I say this six-track EP is has low production values 
and the music is kinda sloppy, I mean it more as a descriptor 
rather than a criticism. Project Sherm is the product of a weird 
mix of nerdy sci-fi and burnout drug cultures. The music has 
elements of punk, metal, prog and more, while the lyrics and 
art tell the twisted tale of a spaceship that runs on PCP and the 
misadventures of its debaucherous crew. Not really what I’m 
looking for in a record, but maybe you’ll love it? Limited to 500 
copies on frosty-nugz-colored vinyl. (CS) 

(Goin’ Ape Shit) 

SCHIZOPHASIA-EP 

After releasing a stream of short and stunning demos over 
the past couple of years, SCHIZOPHASIA finally makes a vinyl 
debut. I have to say that most people would absolutely hate this, 
but for those diehard few who love their punk noisy, chaotic and 
challenging, this is an absolute must-have. The actual record¬ 
ing is reminiscent of the Z Violence Action flexi —very trebly 
and thin with everything blown out but the bass. The songwrit¬ 
ing is more in the early GAI vein, while a few of the slower 
and creepier moments recalling RUDIMENTARY PENI. The 
more traditional punk sounds are bracketed by and interspersed 
with more atmospheric pure noise, a bit of experimentation that 
works for SCHIZOPHASIA in a way that it rarely does for oth¬ 
ers who attempt the same. I suppose you could call them the 
MAN IS THE BASTARD of the noise-core scene? Great cover 
on this EP with all text in Arabic for some aesthetic reason or 
another. Limited to 500, so start looking now. (AU) 

(SMRT) 

SCREAMERS - “7-7-77: Pat Garret Demos” LP 

Really high-quality bootleg, and when I say quality, I mean 
quality. One-sided with a tasteful screen-print, top-notch sound 
quality and packaging, limited to 300. I'm iffy on bootlegs of 
a band never "properly recorded” but this thing sounds like a 
proper fucking recording to me—I'm smiling and I don’t smile 
often when reviewing records in this fucking dump. Also, in 
case any of you morons were wondering, the SCREAMERS are 
fine with this bootleg being released, and how could they not 
be? Buy this immediately (if you can). (BB) 

(bootleg) 

SHADOW OF THE TORTURER - “Marching into Chaos” 
LP 

Wow, this is not what I was expecting—very metallic doom 
with the heaviness of BURNING WITCH and the pace of more 
“active”-sounding doom bands like CATHEDRAL or YOB. 
While I haven’t listened to a lot of stuff in this genre lately, I 
actually find myself quite enjoying this. The riffs aren’t break¬ 
ing any new ground, but they’re appropriately devastating and 
the low/high vocals are nice and evil (is it just me, or do I de¬ 
tect a bit of Jim Konya SCHNAUZER/ALL THAT IS EVIL/ 
etc. influence in the vox?). There's a nice sort of SAINT VITUS 
tribute part at the end of "Alone at Night” as well. (AU) 

(Blind Date) 

SILENT WAY - “Wound” LP 

Brittle, jangling, and tuneful punk rock that owes more to 
late-’80s/early-’90s college rock than to 1-2-3-4 RAMONES 


riffing. Think flREHOSE, SUPERCHUNK, TRUMAN’S WA¬ 
TER. and DINOSAUR JR, though not necessarily all at the 
same time. I get the impression that everyone in the band con¬ 
tributes to the songwriting, and you definitely hear that there 
are a few disparate styles going on. It means they don't really 
sound like anyone else, and makes for a refreshing listen. More, 
please. (AM) 

(Silent Way) 

SOTATILA - “Vituiks Meni” EP 

Hailing primarily from Finland (with Austrian roots), SO- 
TATILA never fail to deliver the goods—usually close to MEL- 
LAKKA, but taking cues from mid-’80s hardcore. Eight songs 
here, and the standard is uniformly strong, with thundering gui¬ 
tars taking the fore. “Miks Sa Elat” may be the standout, with 
its enraged H£ energy and arresting songwriting. Outstanding, 
as you’d expect. (SS). 

(Kamaset Levyt / Plague Bearer) 

SPIDER - “Back to the Wall/Down & Out” 

This label is saving us record tweakers a bunch of scratch by 
faithfully reissuing long-lost power-pop/punk bonzers. SPIDER 
was a total no-mark power-pop/NWOBHM band that released 
this one impossible-to-get 7”er, and it’s a stormer. (Later the 
band went "rock” and released some other shit...but the debut 
is the jam!!!) Tight and precise power-pop in less than two min¬ 
utes a pop. Bish bash bosh. Good shit, and the cover has to-be 
seen to be believed...only in the ’70s!!! (TB) 

(Sing Sing) 

SSR - “Orwellian Future” EP 

I totally dig this record. We reviewed their LP Nuclear Na¬ 
tion last month, and I gotta say that I like this EP better (al¬ 
though I am going to have to give that LP another few listens 
now). The SSR (SEDITION SUB ROSA) looks like CCR on 
the cover (CREEDENCE?). It’s pretty much D-beat, but don't 
let my saying that fool you... Yeah, it’s medium (definitely not 
mild) fast, but they definitely play around with tempo enough 
to make it interesting, though not unrecognizable. Their bass 
player: what in the fuck? Let me go on record saying that I have 
only heard maybe two other current bass players (one being A1 
Murton from DISROBE) that can play with this much style. If 
I ever see him, I am buying him a shot. The recording lets you 
hear every note this dude plays, and it's worth it. There is a 
lot of high end to the guitars, and the riffs are all about getting 
the point across and less showing off with a fucking over-the- 
top solo every ten seconds. There are also some wanky parts 
that seem to work in some songs better than others (very few 
that are maybe a little too punched in sounding?), but when 
solos do appear, they are creative and fit the song perfectly. 
The drummer is all power, doesn’t fuck around, but like the 
guitarist, when he indulges with fills, they are a balance of pre¬ 
cision and chaos. The lyrics are all'right, but they have some 
shining moments and are a hell of a lot better than most bands 
in this genre. I like that they include both personal and social 
themes and the shit rhymes! The vocals are echoed, scream-y, 
high-pitched yet throaty and definitely anguished. It all comes 
together to make a great chunk of songs, every one of them— 
the sound of creeping, controlled chaos. The last song on side 
B, "They Divide” is my new jam. Get this record, play it a few 
times and see what it does for you. As for me, I gotta see these 
guys live. (MB) 

(Desolate Legacy) 

LOS STEAKS - “No Moon Album” LP 

This is a lo-fi release from this Spanish band with a definite 
retro sound similar to the FEELIES, NOBUNNY, the BLACK 
LIPS, etc. Personally, this isn’t up my alley as I find that the 
intentionally minimal quality of the recording (at least I think 






ACTS 

or 

DEFIANCE 








































r 


R5TOHD5 



it’s intentional?) detracts from what could be very 
catchy songs... (ML) 

(Discos Humeantes) 

SYNDROME - “Total Disarmament” EP 

This is some classic Clay Records worship from 
Richmond, VA. From the pocket sleeve to the re¬ 
verb on the vocals to the meaty recording, this is as 
close to DISCHARGE/BLITZKREIG/VARUKERS 
as you can get from a 21st century band. This re¬ 
cord is so punk that the vinyl should have studs and 
spikes on it. There are a couple of moments where 
they pick up the pace and the spell is almost broken, 
but the B-side tracks are nearly damn perfect. This 
is one of the better releases in this style since WAR- 
CRY’s Harvest of Death ER (AU) 

(Desolate Legacy) 

TEN PINTS IN - “Raising the Bar” CD 

I’m a pretty open-minded guy when it comes to 
music, but I might have hit a wall with this release. 
TEN PINTS IN from Long Island is an obviously 
talented group of musicians who play tight punk 
rock, but with the overbearing focus on beer and 
drinking, this verges on shtick and comes off as a bit 
of a novelty act. This isn't the first group to write a 
song about Guinness or drinking, or the first band to 
use plenty of imagery in their artwork to celebrate 
the joyous act of getting drunk—however... I don't 
think that there is a song of the twelve on this CD 
(coincidence that there are twelve songs?) that is not 
about drinking, and from the pilfered Guinness post¬ 
er art on the front cover to the CD tray card image 
of numerous empty beer mugs, this is all a bit too 
much... We get it. You guys like to drink! But that 
should have been obvious enough from the band’s 
name, I guess. In keeping with the redundancy of 
the songs and artwork, the music is not much dif¬ 
ferent-even though I would expect this from a cli¬ 
che Oi! band (which these guys don’t appear to be), 
this sounds more like a cross between DROPKICK 
MURPHYS and GREEN DAY to me... (ML) 
(Mother Box) 

THE THINGZ - “Los Cosas Del Norte” EP 

Very reminiscent of SOUTHERN CULTURE 
ON THE SKIDS. “Monkey Song” sounds like a 
boundy JIM KWESKIN JUG BAND number some¬ 
thing like SCOTS might have done it; “CANNED 
BEER” sounds like a rather plodding nod to LINK 
WRAY (I put it on 45 first and it was perfect at that 
speed, but the next song was a vocal number that 
didn’t benefit from the sped-up treatment). (DD) 
(Coffee Addict) 

TOXIN III - “I Rock I Ran (Again)” LP 

If you missed the Hyped 2 Death or Rave-Up re¬ 
issues, here’s your chance to get TOXIN Ill’s early- 
’80s output. The song you know (and probably love) 
is “I Rock I Ran” (which ki^ks off Killed By Death 
#8.5), but unlike a lot of the KB D band reissues that 
get spread out over a whole album, TOXIN Ill’s oth¬ 
er songs more or less hold up, especially if you can 
get down with bands like the SHIT DOGS. None 
of them are nearly as storming as “I Rock I Ran,” 
but even the later tracks that start leaning towards a 
new-wavey sound (think early SUBURBS maybe) 
are good. (IS) 

(Burka for Everybody) 


TRUE - “Still Life” CD 

TRUE (a self-described crust/death metal band 
from Croatia) won instant points with me for the 
intro to this CD that sounded like music GOBLIN 
might have written for one of the better Dario Ar- 
gento films. Indeed, throughout the CD I found the 
more atmospheric moments (many of which feature 
tasteful keyboards and tambura) to be more mem¬ 
orable than the heavier stuff. In their heavier mo¬ 
ments,.! found that they had more in common with 
early black metal a la GEHENNA’S First Spell than 
death metal, perhaps because of the constant trem- 
picking and the trebly influence of the tambura. Not 
bad, though the tunes are a bit long for my taste. The 
shorter tracks, especially “Massacre,” are the real 
standouts. (AU) 

(Geenger) 

TV EYE - “Nice People” CD 

Woah, this album has 31 tracks! Luckily, they 
are all fairly brief. TV EYE mines the RAMONES/ 
SCREECHING WEASEL/QUEERS vein of fast, 
poppy punk with smartly dumb lyrics. All the songs 
follow the same formula, but surprisingly I didn’t 
really start getting bored until track 24. That’s some¬ 
thing of a personal record. (AM) 

(Hoax, no info) 

U.D.I.-LP 

The initials stand for UNIDENTIFIED 
DRUNKEN INJURY, which is appropriate for the 
booze-filled, nihilistic thrash that these dudes throw 
down. There are stylistic nods, not to be mistaken 
as imitations, toward mid-’80s crossover thrash like 
the ACCUSED and SEPTIC DEATH, even F.O.D. 
The lyrics are hate-filled and the venom is pointed 
towards everything dumb in American society. The 
singer has a cool vocal style that flows through the 
wall of the thrash, blasting from one track into an¬ 
other. The first listen of this album had me mentally 
dismissing it as OK, but I ended up spinning it sev¬ 
eral more times and really started digging it. Pretty 
damn good. (BG) 

(Spider Cuddler) 

UNFUN - “Pain Prescription” EP 

This is not at all what I expected, assuming 
this band’s name is a JAWBREAKER reference— 
UNFUN doesn’t really sound anything like JAW¬ 
BREAKER. These six songs have a really beefy 
(but not heavy) sound and that perfectly lo-fi re¬ 
cording quality that I absolutely love. Overall, it’s 
late-’90s Midwest sing-along, sweaty, over-crowd- 
ed-basement pop-punk (longest descriptor ever?) 
that’s bpst taken in whilst imbibing large quantities 
of your favorite cheap beer. This is the kind of-pop 
punk that I’ll never get sick of. (BD) 

(Lost Cat) 

UNITED MUTATION - CD 

You are probably familiar with this DC band 
that was around in the early ’80s; if not, here’s your 
chance to get acquainted with a group that was do¬ 
ing some pretty creative and out-there shit in hard¬ 
core for the time. One half of the CD is their first 
release and highlights their straight-up hardcore 
roots coupled with Mike Brown’s distinct style of 
raspy, guttural vocals that have always sounded to 
me like Cronos of VENOM and the precursor to 


GISM. Yeah, there is a Pee-wee Herman part, but 
hey, at least he is trying shit out. The music sounds 
like a combination of every era of POISON IDEA, 
from Pick Your King to Feel the Darkness, but a lot 
less solid. The second half of this CD is their Rain¬ 
bow Person EP, which gets into some uncharted ter¬ 
ritory, stretching the definitions of hardcore. There 
is a musical quality similar to KILLING JOKE and 
some BAD BRAINS moments—even the vocals 
get a little HR at times. There are definitely times 
where I was asking, “what the hell am I listening 
to?” that shifted to “this is a killer song.” If you are 
into packaging, be warned because it’s pretty crap¬ 
py, but don’t judge, because the music is definitely 
worth a listen. You don't have to like it, but you have 
to appreciate the boundaries they were pushing at 
the time—sometimes very successfully, as some of 
these songs are awesome. (MB) 

(DSI Archives) 

VEM BRYR SIG? - “Va Fan E Re Nu Ra” EP 

VEM BRYR SIG? has a curious name and a sto¬ 
ry to match. They began playing in 1979, but made 
their name with a new lineup a year later before 
calling it quits. But this Stockholm band reasserted 
itself in 2008, gigging with the legendary GRISEN 
STRIKER. Musically, they work best playing mid- 
tempo punk—though their material isn’t wholly 
distinctive, with the sound not unlike ’80-vintage 
EBB A GRON. You have to be thankful, however, 
to discover one of the more obscure outfits from the 
good old days. (SS) 

(The Eye) 

VENEREANS - “Future Primitive” LP 

A funny amalgamation of punk and surf music. 
Surf music isn’t really that complicated of a style, 
but some how these guys manage to dumb it down 
to a real primitive, plodding thud. The vocalist 
seems very serious, though he doesn’t seem to be 
singing about serious topics. Put it all together and 
you get VENEREANS. It is a strange combination, 
but interesting nonetheless. (CK) 

(Tic Tac Totally/Discos Humeantes) 

VENEREANS - “Future Primitive” LP 

Wow—this floored me on first spin. A great mix 
of weird, angular riffs and pounding beats, delivered 
with an almost offhand nonchalance. The rhythm 
section forms a solid base for the guitar player to 
explore some East-Bay-Ray-style leads, while the 
vocalist goes off on songs like “Burka for Every¬ 
body,” “Don’t Step Cockroaches” and the amus¬ 
ingly titled “Maybe Too High.” They finish off with 
an unusual cover of UNITED MUTATION, if that 
gives you any clue to the twisted minds from which 
this Spanish band was conceived. Very cool. (CS) 
(Tic Tac Totally/Discos Humeantes) 

THE WANKYS - “American Wank” CD 

This CD collects five vinyl releases by this Jap- 
anese-noise-punk-imitation act from the UK. For 
fans of bands with zero originality. (CS) 

(Rescued From Life) 

THE WARM JETS - “Wanna Start a War” LP 

OK, here we got a band from Philly circa ’79/’80 
that’s name is the only Pleasure Principle aspect 
of the entire record. The first side contains seven 















R333RD3 


songs—two taken from an acetate, four studio, and one live at 
CBGB’s. The flip side was recorded entirely at Max’s Kansas 
City. The more I listen to it, the more I like this record. Tons of 
attitude and a heavy dose of youthful vigor, panache and snot 
make this one of Rave-Up Records' (with the shitty artwork, 
graphics, no insert, and minimal info) better releases/boots. I 
wanna start a war indeed!!!!!! (RR) 

(Rave-Up) 

WE LIVE IN TRENCHES - “Modern Hex” LP 

The Scandinavian group known as WE LIVE IN TRENCH¬ 
ES has turned out their first full-length album, one they call a 
“fix of reality” and the “soundtrack to your final hours”—which 
is in contrast to what I call “low-grade rehash crap.” From start 
to finish, I found the record fairly bland, and at times eerily 
familiar. I viewed this it as an attempt to “next level” some 
shit, and it failed because of execution and identity. The mu¬ 
sic is post-punk that is (according to them) “ready to explode 
through the plasticity of your life” with heavy nods to crunchy/ 
proggish bands from the past like the JESUS LIZARD or HOT 
SNAKES; they unfortunately end up channeling tired contem¬ 
poraries like FUCKED UP and CLOCKCLEANER. The album 
never grabbed me and I felt like listening to one of the afore¬ 
mentioned bands instead... blah. (RM) 

(P. Trash) 

WETDOG - “ Lower Leg” EP 

Man, I have wanted records by this band since I heard their 
demo probably five or so years ago. Their first record did not 
ship to the US for some reason, and since they are British, it 
costs about the same as buying an eBay bonzer to get it shipped 
here. Anyway, in the tradition of LUNG LEG, WETDOG are an 
all-lady band that has successfully encapsulated the KLEENEX 
7” for the modem age. Primitive punk with barks and shouts 
that bring to mind mostly the previously mentioned genre¬ 
defining ladies of Swiss punk... WETDOG can write songs; 
this isn’t just a collection of yowls and howls, it’s compelling 
and complete and makes me think of the best FALL 45s. That 
propulsive sound that I am unable to scrape off my turntable. 
The savage sound of the MONORCHID with no hardcore past? 
How she wrote elastic man?? This has persuaded me to bite the 
bullet and pay an insane amount for their prior LP. Their new 
records are going to come out on US labels I believe... (LG) 
(Captured Tracks) 

WORD FOR WORD - “Manchester Forever” CD 

A collection of unreleased material and vinyl-only releases 
from this New Hampshire band playing fairly typical NYHC- 
inspired moshcore. All the obvious trademarks are here: chugga 
chugga fast parts, gang vocals, breakdowns, a CRO MAGS 
cover and a song that starts with “Bust it!” Well executed, but 
tired and all too forgettable. Even if this was my thing, I don’t 
think it would stand out from the pack. (JH) 

(Arrest) 

YEAR OF THE PIG-CD 

Six songs of weird, angry, downbeat stuff. Some fast parts 
heie and there, but mostly it s doom and gloom heaviness with 
tribal drumming and growled vocals. The guitarist can shred 
but unfortunately the songs don’t really go anywhere. What¬ 
ever. (JH) 

(Spider Cuddler) 

V/A- “Clone Vol. II: Play Slow, Die Fast” 

A really insane release by Blind Date Records outta Ger¬ 
many, this is the second installment of what I believe will be 
a four-volume compilation, exclusively featuring sludge/metal/ 
doom bands covering classic hardcore and metal songs from 
the days of yore! Standouts include GOLDEN GORILLA doing 


UNBROKEN's “Absentee Debate,” THOU screeching through 
BORN AGAINST’s “Well Fed Fuck” (they do a great job of not 
turning their version into a predictably slow and boring rendi¬ 
tion; rather, they rip through it—relatively speaking—keeping 
the song punk and exciting) and MOLOCH opening the record 
with “Lightning Strikes” by RORSCHACH. The topper has to 
be HEY COLOSSUS pounding through a warped version of 
SUICIDAL TENDENCIES “Institutionalized”! Weird, chaotic 
and vaguely familiar, HEY COLOSSUS puts a whole new silly 
and sick spin on it. Finally, it would be criminal to overlook 
the four-star packaging by Blind Date. A thick slab of vinyl is 
tucked nicely into a heavy, die-cut and embossed sleeve with 
the Clone title. Not for the mildly interested, but if bands like 
LOSS or AGUIRRE are your thing, grab a copy. (RM) 

(Blind Date) 

V/A - “Denton, Denton USA” LP 

It looks like this is what the city of Denton, TX has to offer, 
at least at this point in time. Interesting, and not at all bad. The 
tracks range from pop to odd to punk, back to odd and to in¬ 
die. Highlights include SLAVE/MASTER, the PUMPERS, the 
WAX MUSEUMS, BAD SPORTS, FERGUS AND GERONI- 
MO, FUNGI GIRLS and the TEENAGE BEES. Overall, this is 
really high quality. (KK) 

(Play Pinball) 

V/A - “I’d Buy That for a Dollar Vol. 1” EP 

A compilation of four bands that have a similar new-wavy 
punk sound, yet each is fairly distinct and has a nice quality to it. 
The songs are catchy, quirky and synthetic. BLACK ORPHAN 
starts the EP off and has cool robotic vocals. MENTHOLS are 
next with teetering song and a pained singer. LEGENDARY 
WINGS do an extremely catchy surfy garage pop song. LOS 
STEAKS finish it up with keyboard-driven new waver. Great 
compilation. (CK) 

(UFO Dictator) 

V/A - “I’d Buy That for a Dollar Vol. 2” EP 

Four bands and, I do believe from the title, all for a dol¬ 
lar. First up, CAVE WEDDINGS doing their lo-fi garage spin, 
catchy and to the point, not a trillion miles away from NOBUN¬ 
NY and HUNX AND HIS PUNX. Second to the blocks, USE¬ 
LESS EATERS—anotheV lo-fi exponent with a more darker 
feel, close to the FUNCTIONAL BLACKOUTS and HUMAN 
EYE. I'm liking. Third up, GUT REACTION—more lo-fi but 
with a hint of psych and krautrock and that repetitive drone that 
I'm all over-nice. WANTON LOOKS prop up the basement 
with a nice little lo-fi garage-pop number, sort of like NODZZZ 
meets CHEAP TIME meets a nice wall of distortion. Thumbs 
up and not one filler track. (SD) 

(UFO Dictator) 

V/A - “Our Boy Roy” LP 

The Roy in question here is ROY ORBINSON. Yes, it’s a 
tribute album of ROY ORBISON songs done by “garagey” 
kind of bands, if that’s what you call ’em these days. Features 
plenty of big hits: JACUZZI BOYS (“You Got It”), TY SE- 
GALL (“Pretty Woman”) CHEATER SLICKS (“Crying”), 
RED MASS (“Running Scared”), TEENAGERS (“You're 
My Baby”); and some of the lesser-known hits: HAUNTED 
GEORGE (“Rock House”), BLOODSHOT BILL (“Cause of 
It All”), DEMONS CLAWS (“It’s Over”). All in all, a decent 
comp. Enough variation in bands/styles so it doesn’t become a 
blur of samey covers, but not so totally all over the map that it’s 
disjointed and unlistenable. But it's still a bunch of covers...I'd 
reach for my real ROY ORBISON records over this any dav 
(IS) 

(Telephone Explosion) 



WiMBRyRSlG? 

l 'A f"AW E rE : U RA~ 






























R5XDHDG 


CONTACT INFO • CONTACT INFO • CONTACT INFO • CONTACT INFO • CONTACT INFO • CONTACT INFO • CONTACT INFO 


Alerta Antifascista: c/o Timo Nehmtow, 
Engelbosteler Damm 35,30167 Hannover, 
GERMANY, www.no-pasaran.org 
Amor y Lucha: www.amorylucha.org 
Amplified Noise: amplifiednoiserecordings. 
blogspot.com 

Arrest: PO Box 1102, Manchester, NH 03105, 
www.arrestrecords .bigcartel .com 

Ayuntamiento de Madrid: www.myspace.com/ 
aytodemadrid 

Bachelor: 5421 Adnet 186, AUSTRIA, 
www.bachelorrecords .com 
Badmaster Records: 1208 S. 46th St., 
Philadelphia, PA 19143, www.badmasterrecords. 
bigcartel.com 

BDR: PO Box 19202, St. Louis, MO 63118-9202 
Better Half: www.betterhalfrecords.com 
Big Action: 915 Scheffer Ave, St. Paul, MN 
55105 

Blind Date: PO Box 6302,79039 Freiburg 
GERMANY, www.blinddaterecords.de 
Boss Tuneage: PO Box 74, Sandy, Bedfordshire, 
SG19 2WB, UNITED KINGDOM, 
www.bosstuneage .com 
Boue: www.myspace.com/bouereconds 
Burka for Everybody: burkaforeverybody.com 
Captured Tracks: www.capturedtracks.com 
Cass: www.cassrecords.com 
Castle Face: www.myspace.com/ 
castlefacerecords 

Chorizo Bonito: 224 N. Avenue 55, Los 
Angeles, CA 90042, www.myspace.com/ 

• pussycowtheband 

Clean Plate: PO Box 9461, North Amherst, MA 
01059, www.cleanplate.com 
Coffee Addict: www.thethingz.com 
Contraorden: www.myspace.com/contraorden 
Cutthroat: www.myspace.com/cutthroatrecs 
Dead Heroes: doomsday@centrum.cz 
Deep Six: PO Box 6911, Burbank, CA91510- 
6911, www.deepsixrecords.com 
Depression House: www.myspace.com/ 
depressionhouserecords 
Deranged: 2700 Lower Road, Roberts Creek, 

BC, VON 2W4, CANADA, derangedrecords. 
com 

Desolate Legacy: PO Box 1681, Richmond VA, 
23218 

DFE: www.myspace.com/drongosforeurope 
Discos Humeantes: www.discoshumeantes.com 
Doomtown: PO Box 6172, Omaha, NE 68106, 
www.doomtownrecords .com 
Downtown Academy: PO Box 980274, 

West Sacramento, CA 95798, www. 
thedowntownacademy.com 
DSI Archives: PO Box 346, Dunn Loring, VA 
22027 

Epidemic: epidemic_distro@hotmail.com 
Exutoire: BP 73, 33031 Bordeaux Cedex, 
FRANCE, www.exutoirerecords.com 
The Eye: www.theeyeproduction.com 
Fighting Chance: www.fightingchancemusic.net 
Forcefield: PO Box 26946. Richmond, VA 23261 


Front Cover Productions: Box F, 67 

Tannaghmore Rd., Ballynahinch BT24 8NU, 
NORTHERN IRELAND, back2front_danny@ 
yahoo.co.uk 

Fucking Kill: www.myspace.com/ 
fuckingkillrecords 

Full Steam: wwwTullsteamrecords.com 
Galambis: www.galambisrecords .web.com 
Geenger: Dolci 20,10362 Kasina CROATIA, 
wwww.geengerrecords.com 
Get Bent: www.getbentrecords.com 
Get Laid: getlaidbooking@gmail.com 
Give Praise: www.givepraise.com 
Goin’Ape Shit: 641 E. Broadway Road, Tucson, 
AZ 85719 

Goner: 2152 Young Ave, Memphis, TN 38104, 
www.goner-records .com 
Grita o Muere: www.gritaomuere.com 
Hardware: w^vw.hardware-records.com 
Hell Yes: hellyeshellyeshellyes.blogspot.com 
HoZac: www.hozacrecords.com 
Injustice of Humanity: www.myspace.com/ 
injusticeofhumanity 

Kama set Levyt: c/o Jukka Nakari, Vallikatu 
28 A2, 33240 Tampere, FINLAND, www. 
punkinfinland .net/kamanen 
Kjepp Kjappesens Raske Skiver: www. 

‘ kjeppkjappesen.com 

Lifeline: PO Box 692, Midlothian, IL 60445, 
www.lifelinerecords.net 
Lost Cat: 317 Raymond Ave NE, Saint Cloud, 
MN 56304 

Mass Media: PO Box 2692, Costa Mesa, CA 
92626 

Me Distro: myspace.com/distro-yrecords 
Merenoise: www.merenoise.net 
Mississippi: 4009 North Mississippi Ave., 
Portland, OR 97227 

Modern Action: PO Box 1452, Sonoma, CA 
95476 

Mother Box: myspace.com/motherboxrecords 
Packebusch: www.myspace.com/packebusch 
Papagajuv Hlasatel: c/o Pavel Friml, Mrstikova 
393, Ricany U Brna 66482 CZECH REPUBLIC, 
www.phr.cz 

Parts Unknown: PO Box 4835,Toms River, NJ 
08754, USA, www.partsunknownrecords.com 
Patac: www.patacrecords.com 
Permanent: 1914 W Chicago Ave, Chicago, IL 
60622, w w w .permanentrecordschicago .com 
Plague Bearer: PO Box 604, Copenhagen N, 
DENMARK, www.plaguebearer.com 
Play Pinball: 1102 Thistle Cr., Cedar Park, TX 
78613, playpinballrecords@gmail .com 
Profane Existence: PO Box 18051, Minneapolis, 
MN 55418, www.profaneexistence.org 
Psycho Kid: www.thepsychokid.com 
P. Trash: c/o Peter Eichhorn, AugustastraBe 
4, 33649 Bielefeld, GERMANY, www. 
ptrashrecords .com 

Puke 'n’’ Vomit: PO Box 3435, Fullerton, CA 
92834, www.pukenvomitrecords.com 
Ravachol Prod: futurenoir.propagande.org 


Rave-Up: Via Crispolti, 16-00159 Roma, ITALY, 
www.raveuprecords.com 
Razorcake: PO Box 42129, Los Angeles ,CA 
90042 

Reason: c/o Tony Goluza, PO Box 8829, Victoria, 
BC, V8W-1LO, CANADA, akfortyseven.net 
Rebel Time: www.myspace.com/rebeltimerecords 
Recess: PO Box 1666, San Pedro, CA 90733 
Regresivos: www.discosregresivos.com 
Rescued From Life: PO Box 14821, Haltom 
City, TX 76117 

Resist: PO Box 372, Newton, NSW, 

AUSTRALIA 2042, www.resistrecords.com 
Rinderherz: Postfach 6086 2500 Biel 6 
SWITZERLAND 
Rookie: www.rookierecords.de 
SBS: www.myspace.com/supportlocalmusicsbs 
Shill: www.myspace.com/shillrecords 
Sing Sing: 533 E. 5th Street #15, New York, NY 
10009, www.singsingrecords.com 
Scanner: miguie.zorlha.free.fr/scannerrecords 
Shaman: 3517 W Diversey Ave. 1, Chicago, IL 
60647, my space .com/shamanrecords 
Sickle Moon Recordings: myspace.com/ 
sicklemoonrecordings 

Sin Temores: www.myspace.com/sintemores 
Smrt: www.smrtrecords.com 
Soft Spot Music: www.myspace.com/softspotrecs 
Spider Cuddler: PO Box 887, Warren, MI 
48090, www.spidercuddler.com 
Spinout: www.spinoutmusic.com 
Stampace: www.stampacerecords.com 
Suicide Tax Records: www.myspace.com/ 
suicidetaxrecords 

Superfluous: PO Box D-39002, Magdeburg, 
GERMANY 

Swagger City: www.swaggercityrecords.com 
Sweet Rot: PO Box 78025, Vancouver, BC, V5N 
5 Wl, CANADA 

Tent City: www.tentcityrecords.com 
TFC: 7906 Rosenberry Dr., Austin, TX 78747 
Third Uncle: www.thirdunclerecords.com 
Tic Tac Totally: PO Box 558383, Chicago, IL 
60655-8383, www.tictactotally.com 
TNS: www.tnsrecords.co.uk 
Too Circle: c/o Shingo Maeda, 221-3 Hi-home 
Kodaira 510, Nakamachi Kodaira-city, #187- 
0042 Tokyo, JAPAN, www005.upp.so-net.ne.jp/ 
toocircle 

Top Five: www.myspace.com/topl2345records 
UFO Dictator: PO Box 19083, Kalamazoo, MI 
49019, www.ufodictator.com 
Under the Bridge: waterunderthebridgerecords.com 
Volar: volarrecords.blogspot.com 
Water Silent Way: myspace.com/silentwaynb 
Wet Brain: 3611 NE 50th Street, Seattle, WA 
98105 

White Denim: PO Box 605, Bala Cynwyd, PA 
19004 

Woodsist: 229 Bushwick Ave., Apt. RH, 
Brooklyn, NY 11206 
X!: www.x-recs.com 

Yep: 1640 N. Argyle PL, Cincinnati, OH 45223 















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Send demos and CD-Rs to: MRR attn: Demos, PO Box 460760, San Francisco, CA 94146. Please provide a postpaid price and a mailing address with your 
demo! Reviews by Robert Collins and Dan Goetz 


A FIGHT WITH SLEDGEHAMMERS - Powerful apocalyptic 
crust that meets all of the requirements a band might need to fall into 
that category: pained vocals that are slightly more emotional than angry, 
downtuned crushing riff action; melodic guitar leads tastefully applied 
under the vocals...you get the drill. Black shirts, patches on their tattered 
ballcaps—it might sound like I’m making fun, but I m just trying to 
show you where they are coming from. The recording is blown to shit (or 
it could be my speakers), and that makes them even more awesome. Me 
like. (Robert) (8 song CDr, no lyrics, $3ppd from 3827 West Chestnut 
Ave., Altoona, PA 16601) 

APE! -1 hear that bass and I can’t not think about KARP, so instantly 
my ears perk up and 1 take notice. This is all of the fuzz that I actually 
liked about the early ’90s (AmRep, Sub Pop and the like) but with a 
way heavier modem delivery and the vocalist sounds as much like 
Mark Arm as the bass player sounds like KARP. This shit is awesome, 
and while I’ve dropped old references, it sounds totally fresh. Heavy 
forceful tuneful psychedelic brilliance. If you aren t scared of rock n 
roll, then this is great shit. (Robert) (9 song CDr, no lyrics, myspace. 
com/weareape) 

BLITZKRIEG WITCHCRAFT/DOOMED TO EXTINCTION - 

Two Salt Lake City crust bands teamed up on one disc. BLITZKRIEG 
WITCHCRAFT play ’90s crust a la DYSTOPIA, The second track, I 
Support The Invasion” is a killer funeral dirge and the rest of the shit has 
an appropriately unnerving feel. DOOMED TO EXTINCTION are a blur 
of four track powerviolence fueled death metal. Lo fi as shit. (Robert) (9 
song CDr, some lyrics included, $4ppd from PO Box 521174, Salt Lake 
City, UT 84152) 

BUBBLE GUN - The first of two noisy piles of shit from the good 
folks at Spent Planet this month. Drum machine, acoustic guitar and 
inescapably catchy songs, even the kazoo is endearing. (9 song cassette, 
no lyrics included, “a few bucks” ppd c/o 100 Condor Street #2C, East 
Boston, MA 02128, spentplanet@gmail.com) 

CHEMICAL THREAT - Singsong UK punk rock. Plodding mid 
tempo political stuff with “follow the bouncing ball” style vocals. This 
is pretty standard fare, they call it punk. (Robert) (5 song CDr, lyrics 
included, $8ppd from 82 Ivy Road, St. Denys, Southhampton SO 17 2JD 
UNITED KINGDOM) 

THE CHOKE - Cheesy, overproduced “rock revival” crap with 
a “sexy” female vocalist and songs like “Murder at the Arcade.” This 
demo was recorded at three different studios, including one in the UK. 
These songs are registered with BMI, so I suppose the royalty checks 
will start rolling in soon. (Dan) (11-song CD, lyrics not included, www. 
myspace.com/thechokenyc) 

COLD SNAP - Slow dark and anguished screamo stuff..is there a 
genre called “funeral emo” like “funeral doom?” Cause this would be in 
that genre. But then they speed things up on the third song and COLD 
SNAP sound more like your average modern HC band with nice slick 
guitar leads and vocals that sound more pained than emotional Good 
songs, great guitar tone, makes me feel kinda awkward. (Robert) (4 song 
CDr, no lyrics,-myspace.com/coldsnapct) 

ESCALATOR - A crushing juggernaut of low end frustration 


with extra chaos. This reminds me instantly of HINCKLEY; swells 
and eruptions with burly low end vocals and self conscious delivery. 

A chaotic version of early HIS HERO IS GONE with more emphasis 
on the testosterone. If you like it tough and dirty, then this is your jam. 
(Robert) (4 song cassette, lyrics included, thefuckingdiscoveryzone@ 
riseup.net) 

EVERYTHING WENT BLACK - Four songs of ultra polished 
new school hardcore from St. Louis. Super heavy and completely 
professional (though they are only seeking a “semi-professional" label 
for the release of their upcoming full length, according to their bio). 
Mostly mid tempo with crushingly weighted breakdowns and properly 
anguished but still posi vocals...fans of MODERN LIFE IS WAR and 
RISE AND FALL take note, this is not punk at all, but other than that 
it’s great. (Robert) (4 song CDr, lyrics included, everythingwentblackstl. 
blogspot.com) 

FLAT OUT - After the godawful moshy intro, this demo gets 
slightly better for the next 11 songs. They play a modern hardcore/metal/ 
grind hybrid that screams “well-produced CD-R demo,” and the screams 
themselves alternate between throaty and more yelled hardcore. The 
grind parts are actually decent and competent, and the production works 
fn the favor of these parts alone. (Dan) (12-song CD, lyrics included, 
myspace .com/flatoutflatout, i willdestroy 1015 @ gmail .com) 

GIFT HORSE - Complete ’90s worship (AVAIL, JAWBREAKER, 
PROMISE RING, JAWBOX, and there’s even a TEXAS IS THE 
REASON cover to seal the deal). Any attempt at this vocal style (sung, 
but with extreme emotion while not screamed...you know, like an actual 
artist) needs to be at least this good or the result is very bad...the result 
here is good. Fans of the decade mentioned in the first sentence of this 
review should order this. (Robert) (3 song cassette, lyrics included, 
xgalambisrecordsx@gmail .com) 

GIVE UP - Order this NOW. Albany is a hotbed of killer hardcore, 
and a lot of those bands have roots dating back to this five piece bulldozer 
that was around until 2003 or so. Songs from their 99 demo, both EPs 
(including the unreleased one) and a blazing live set from 2002. Fast 
as fuck burly intelligent hardcore punk with just enough action on the 
guitars to jar your senses and make you go “Holy Fuck! every few 
songs. This is seriously crushing, and they pulled no stops with the 
packaging so act now...I can’t believe no one has properly reissued all 
this shit. GIVE UP rules hard. (43 song CDr, lyrics included, $6 plus 
postage, www.peterwalkeeerecords) 

HOBOCOP - It’s like THE SPITS were getting drunk with 
SOCKEYE and someone found a bunch of acoustic guitars and they 
tried to play blues rock. The vocals are fucking horrible but in that 
• (almost) cute way. All this is great, but unfortunately my fantasy party 
turned into an after bar and someone scored some blow and the whole 
thing went on for almost half an hour and it got less retarded and more 
“good” as it continued. For HOBOCOP, I prefer them when they are 
awful,cause it’s awful in a good way, you know? (Robert) (13 song CDr, 

no lyrics, myspace.com/hobocopmusic) 

HUMILITATE - Blistering metallic thrashcore on a cute little 3” 
CDr. Dual vocals, and one of them has the perfect NYHC “I’m spitting 














U5JBS 


vocals at you in short bursts” delivery which is 
odd for this kind of music, but when juxtaposed 
against the burly scream for the other dude, it 
totally works. This stuff is ultra heavy, and the 
songs fly by with crossover speed, but this still 
sounds Spanish...like if SIN DIOS morphed 
into MUNICIPAL WASTE. Weird, but it 
works. (Robert) (6 song 3” CDr, no lyrics, 
$6ppd myspace.com/humilitate) 

INJUSTICE SYSTEM - Pick a tag for this 
one: call it fastcore, thrashcore, powerviolence, 
hardcore, youth crew? I could care less, 
because the shit FUCKING KILLS. Start/Fast/ 
Stop/Faster...that’s the formula INJUSTICE 
SYSTEM stick to throughout this tape and 
actually, now that I type their name out. Blood , 
Sweat and No Tears and the first SOIA EP 
are a pretty fucking good comparison. This is 
tight...I’m not sure what that means, but the 
cool kids seem to keep saying it. about things 
that are good, and this is really fucking good. 
Well worth your dollars, put 4 em in the mail 
now. (Robert) (4 Song cassette, lyrics included, 
$33 ppd c/o 3202 N. Rome Ave., Tampa, FL 
33607) 

INTERRACIAL LOVE TRIANGLE 

- Guitar/drums duo playing raucous twisted 
country punk. It’s fast, it sounds like it was 
recorded in a toilet and there’s one song on it. 
I’m sold. (Robert) (1 song cassette, no lyrics 
included, no contact info) 

KLOWN - A faux live demo of a KISS 
worshipping bar rock band covering KISS 
songs. They do a pretty good job, and the dude 
has Paul Stanley’s voice nailed. (Robert) (19 
song CDr, no lyrics, but do you really need 
them?, $10ppd www.myspace.com/klown) 
KRANG - Dual vocal metalcrust assault 
from Chicago. Five long, doom (the feeling, not 
the genre) laden, rampaging tracks attacking 
war, animal cruelty and humankind as pathetic 
whole. If you!* tastes lean towards SCATHA, 
MASSKONTROLL, REACT, NAUSEA, then 
might I suggest the new demo from KRANG? 
(Robert) (5 song cassette, lyrics included, 
c/o Adam Blann, 959 S. Yates, Kankakee, IL 
60901, myspace.com/krangcrustards) 

LA VOZ - Fucking awesome hardcore from 
Southern California. I feel like I’m listening to 
LIFE’S HALT for the first time. LA VOZ might 
not be quite as life altering as LH were, but 
these tracks get my blood boiling like fucking 
crazy. There are (at least) two different sessions 
on the demo, and while it’s weird that they put 
the shitty sounding stuff at the beginning, it 
kinda rules...Matt and I put this bad boy on 
after we saw them a few weeks back and just as 
soon as we got used to the ultra raw boombox 
recording, we got our fucking asses blown off 
by the final three studio tracks. Upcoming EP 
on Lengua Armada, get into it. This band rules. 
(10 song CDr, no lyrics included, no contact 
info) 


LIMBS BIN - One man noise project that 
manifests itself as aggressive electronic he/ 
grind. Most of the tracks here are blasts clocking 
in well under 30 seconds. Fans of noise punk 
along the lines of BLOODY MIINDED take 
note, those searching for traditional punk or 
hardcore steer clear. In addition to the demo 
you get a 7 song, 3 minute live “set.” (19 song 
CDr, lyrics included* c/o Josh Landes, PO Box 
0559, Hampshire College, 893 West Street, 
Amherst, MA 01002) 

THE MAINE COONS - Were it not 
for the delivery, this would be a cheap JAY 
REATARD/REIGNING SOUND jerk fest 
with extra 50 MILLION sauce, but this shit 
is more blown out than the early DISCLOSE 
demos, and the result is a glorious trainwreck. 
Awesome freakout nonsense here, not for the 
faint hearted. The first five songs are all about 
male ejaculatory fluid...but in a fun sort of 
way, while the whole B side is live (and yes, 
it is even noisier). (Robert) (11 song cassette, 
no lyrics included, “a few bucks” ppd c/o 100 
Condor Street #2C, East Boston, MA 02128, 
spentplanet@gmail.com) 

MORBID ABORTION - This is like 
the full band version of JUD JUD. There’s a 
dude hitting something to simulate drums, but 
all other instruments come from the mouth, 
including the guitar solos. Fucking funny, 
especially with songs like “Teachers Must Die,” 
“Satan’s Cum,” “Regurgitate Your Date,” and 
my personal favorite, “Poo.” For the record, 
there is no need for 70+ plus minutes of this, I 
stopped while I was still laughing. (Robert) 

(37 song CDr, some lyrics included, $6.66ppd 
from www.morbidabortion.org) 

POPULATION CONTROL - This band 
sounds like a million other chuggy and melodic 
modern hardcore bands with screechy vocals, 
but there’s a passion and aura of discontent 
that has me liking it when I’d be bored by 
similar sounding bands. The recording is also 
punk enough to make things sound better as 
well. (Dan) (6-song CD, no lyrics included, 
www.myspace.com/populationcontrolfuck, 
danking_82@yahoo.com) 

RAD COMPANY - Punk on the vaguely 
melodic/pop side of the spectrum. Think GOB 
(Canada) with ’90s Mike Ness singing playing 
the non-acoustic AGAINST ME stuff. There 
are moments where they start to get “heavy,” or 
at least more aggressive, but these seems more 
like humorous interludes instead of stylistic 
divergences. Sing along opportunities galore 
here, all songs come from previous records 
and demos. (Robert) (18 song cassette, lyrics 
included, c/o 659 Carlisle Ave., Dayton, OH 
45410, barkquackmoo@yahoo.com) 

SCOTIA WIDOWS - Killer, ultra catchy 
mid tempo punk with teeth from Chicago. The 
female vox are the highlight (sweet, pretty, 
more pop than punk, but it works), but the 


guitar starts worming its way into my heart 
after a few tracks...then I realize that the band is 
PEDESTRIANS and DAYLIGHT ROBBERY 
folks...yeah, no wonder it’s awesome. SCOTIA 
WIDOWS are more straight forward rockin’ 
punk, but if the songs are good, you don’t need 
anything else! (Robert) (6 song CDr, no lyrics, 
www.myspace.com/scotiawidows) 

SEXUAL JANITOR - Fun, almost-inept 
teenage punk that sounds like the band is still 
learning to play together, but with ridiculous 
catchy songs. A lot pf them are about sex, 
drugs, or both, and I’m guessing the female 
singer didn’t pen a couple of these songs with 
lines like “she caressed my nuts” or “can’t get 
off without dustoff, it really gets my rocks off.” 
It’s juvenile, but all in good fun. (Dan) (8-song 
cassette, lyrics included, generalinterestpunk@ 
gmail .com) 

THE SICK NEEDS - Basic three chord bar 
punk from Canada. Raw demo recording and 
songs about televangelists and being frustrated 
with life. (Robert) (5 song CDr, lyrics included, 
www.my space .com/thesickneeds) 

SILENT WAY - Jangling guitars and 
vocal melodies are at the forefront, but the 
focus is good times and tuneful punk rock. 
There’s a definite 90s influence, equal parts 
JAWBREAKER and mellow college rock 
stuff. Tracks here from a 2009 EP and an early 
2010 demo; not my thing, but it is nonetheless 
engaging, (Robert) (8 song CDr, no lyrics, 
www.myspace.com/slientwaynb) 

SWEETH TOOTH - Mile a minute skate 
thrash from Shitsville, Illinois just east of St. 
Louis. Equal parts street fueled hyper thrash 
and frustrated grind violence, these dudes 
blast through eight songs before I can even 
remember that I don’t skate. This might be the 
best demo I’ve heard all month, might I suggest 
that you get a copy of your own as soon as 
possible? I would give you mine but...well, I 
won’t, because I want to keep it. (Robert) (8 
song cassette, lyrics included, $2ppd c/o MM, 
1142 Illini Drive, O’Fallon IL 62269) 
TELECOMMANDE - Instantly addictive 
drum machine backed two piece from France. 
The music is a little “pop punk,” but when 
mixed with the primitive sounds from the 
fake rhythm section and the odd blips and 
beeps, it scores a grand slam in the bottom of 
the ninth. Silly, infectious party music, highly 
recommended, and you can download the shit 
for free if you are too cool for cassettes (hint: 
nobody is too cool for cassettes). (Robert) 

(3 song cassette, no lyrics, 6128frustration. 
blogspot.com) 

THATHIANA KHANKHANA - Groove 
laden mid tempo heavy rock from the Basque 
country. The vocals are varied (screamo shreiks, 
crust growls, grunge howls) and the rhythms 
are close to early TODAY IS THE DAY minus 
the faux grind. These dudes can all play their 


i 










I3SM0G 


asses off and the packaging is minimal but 
impressive. (Robert) (7 SONG CDr, no lyrics, 
$5ppd myspace .com/thathianakhankhana) 

TOUCH ME SATAN - Tuneful melodic 
mid tempo punk from Seattle with a singer 
who’s voice is instantly engaging, even though 
I am not as drawn to the discordant music. I 
don’t want to drop a comparison as lofty as 
Mia Zapata, but three songs in and that’s the 
voice I keep coming back to, while the music 
is early 90s era SONIC YOUTH with Riot 
Grrl thrown in for good measure. This is pretty 
good. (Robert) (5 song CDr, no lyrics, www. 
myspace .com/touchmesatan) 

TROOPS OF TOMORROW - “Now I’m 
running with the kids // the ones who shave 
their heads clean // they’re looking for trouble 
// I’m looking for release.’’ Mid paced three 
chord street punk attack from the DC suburbs 
with equal nods to Oi! and hardcore. (Robert) 
(6 song cassette, lyrics included, no contact 
info) 

WILDDOGS - Spanish female fronted 
grind/crust. The vocals are what make this 
stand out, but the more I listen, the songs are 
pretty exceptional, though I could do without 
the bits that lean towards the metal side of 
grind. Add a touch of mid tempo rock 4 n roll on 
the last song, throw in a tasteful bit of melody, 
and you have a killer demo. (Robert) (3 song 
CDr, lyrics included, www.myspace.com/ 


laswilddogs) 

XANTHAR THE MAGNIFICENT & 
MURRAY THE RADD - Ahhh, computers 
Now anyone with a bedroom can make their 
very own “punk rock' demo. Plodding 4 track 
“genius” that goes from SQUIRREL BAIT to 
SUICIDE in two songs flat, and then moves 
on to THE REATARDS covering NEGATIVE 
APPROACH. The flip side (MURRAY 
THE RADD) is just layered guitars and vox 
playing over self-indulgent closet rock. 
(Robert) (12 song cassette, no lyrics included, 
allmyfriendsaredead@live.ca) 

YIKES! A LION! - I blame this band and 
their acoustic guitar entirely on AGAINST ME. 
I would like to blame them on BILLY BRAG 
(I’m sure that they would love that too), but 
this is totally AGAINST ME’s fault. (Robert) 
(6 song CDr, lyrics included, myspace.com. 
yikesalion) 

ZERO PROGRESS - Dirty hardcore punk 
from the Bay Area. This kinda reminds me of 
BROTHER INFERIOR (mostly the singer) but 
musically it’s more full speed ahead charging 
get the pit started and pound yer fukkn beers 
fist in the air punk fukkn RAWK ...pretty good 
shit, and I figure they are only gonna start 
writing even better shit if they keep it up. 
(Robert) (9 song cassette, some lyrics included, 
www.whichsiderecords.com) 


ZERO PROGRESS - Fast and bulbous Bay 
Area hardcore, pretty much the same review as 
the nine song tape, except that this one is rawer 
and, as a result, sexier and more dangerous. 
(Robert) (4 song cassette, no lyrics included, 
Oprogress .blogspot .com) 

v/a - WILD WILD WEST - The “West” 
here is Western Massachusetts, and this 
tape covers the whole fucking spectrum of 
bands from that region. Banjo/violin down 
home duo ZAC JOHNSON starts, then 
comes WHITE PRESSURE who sound like 
FRANX FERDINAND, GIFT HORSE (’90s 
wannabes), downer country from MUDLARK, 
SQRM (painful raw hardcore), DANGUR 
(burly east coast HC), crushing modern HC 
from RELICS, mellow reverb drug sounds 
close out Side 1 in the form of YAK SNOT. 
And Side 2 is just as varied: VACCINE 
and LOW CHARACTER (heavy plodding 
hardcore), GUILT LUST sound kinda like 
FUCKED UP but not as self indulgent, THE 
CRYSTALLINE ROSES sound like their 
name, DARK MASTER are complete black 
noise, more banjo crap from THE OFFAYS, 
modern tech metal new school emocore from 
AMPERE and some crushingly powerful 
emotional sludge from WASTELAND to close 
out the tape. (Robert) (16 song cassette, lyrics 
included, www.galambisrecords .webs.com) 


25 songs recorded in 1983, nearly all previously unreleased - a blazing mix of Black 
Flag and early DEI showcasing a relatively unknown American hardcore band at their peak. 


www.midheaven.com 
mailorder: maximumrocknroll.com 















Send zines for review to: MRR, PO Box 460760, San Francisco, CA 94146. Please include the following info on a separate 
piece of paper with your zine: postpaid price, international price, do you take trades?, size, copied or printed?, number of 
pages, language, mailing address, website address, email address. 


Reviews by: 

(DA) Diane Anastasio 
(JD) Judy Balmin 


(MB) Mariam Bastani 
(JB) Julia Booze 
(LG) Layla Gibbon 


(DG) Dan Goetz 
(BG) Bob Goldie 
(MM) Marissa Magic 


(JM) Jeff Mason 
(CR) Casey Ress 
(Cl) Cissie Scuriock 


(DS) Dionne Stevens 
(VX) XYosefX 


13 YEARS OF GOODLUCK / $1 

7 x 5.5 - printed - 100 pgs 
As one of the most prolific distributers and pub¬ 
lishers, Microcosm has put out a wide-ranging 
collection of zines, art, and other publications 
over the past thirteen years. This compilation of 
work previously published by Microcosm ranges 
from DIY tips, to interviews, history, comics and 
recipes. It's an absolute treasure trove of writing 
and at one freaking dollar there is no reason for 
you and everyone you know to pick up a copy. 
(CR) 

Microcosm Publishing / 222 S. Rogers St. / 
Bloomington, IN 47404-4936 
www.microcosmpublishing.com 

AB #9/ 2$ big print or 1$ tiny 
5 x 8 - copied - 20 pgs 

There is so much useful information in here- from 
how to build a wood-burning stove to DIY den¬ 
tistry, and it's even laced with a bit of conspiracy 
theory to protect and provoke the reader. This 
issue contains some correspondence with other 
sea and homesteaders, and is definitely related 
to lifestyle tactics detailed in Dwelling Portably. 
This is an all-ages manual for freegans every¬ 
where- acting as both a resource for aforemen¬ 
tioned how-tos, as well as an info share repro¬ 
duction and distribution catalog. I will definitely 
be ordering back issues. Note; there is no paper 
wasted on double spaces and tab allowance, so it 
reads a bit maniacally. I like. (DS) 

Lisa Ahne / POB 181 / Alsea, OR 97324 

ACCEPT THE DARKNESS #1 / $2 

5.5 x 8.5 - copied - 26 pages 
A decent first issue of this zine out of New York 
state that covers the D-beat/raw punk side of 
things. Perdition, Nerveskade, and NY natives 
Koward, Syndrome, and Dawn Of Humans are all 
interviewed, with the author asking general ques¬ 
tions and the bands offering detailed answers. He 
also offers up some short histories and discogra¬ 
phies for some of his underrated favorites from 
the '80s: Part 1, Vorkriegsphase, Svard Parad, 
and the Iconoclast, who I think are a bit more 
well known. The layout is pretty derivative but 
still competent in its execution, and everything is 
done with plenty of enthusiasm and excitement. 
(DG) 

c/o Shiva / 61 The Terrace / Katonah, NY 10536 
eggmangel@gmail.com 

ANGRY VIOLIST #1 

4.75 x 8.5 - copied - 15 pages 


This zine sums itself up best at its beginning. 
"This zine is for string players who are angry at 
being forced to play classical music; who yearn 
for something more interesting than the standard 
repertoire; who are tired of being stuck in the old 
Classical srraightjacket; who like to (or want to) 
make ugly and/or non-conventional, experimen¬ 
tal sounds with their beloved violin/viola/cello." 
The author talks a bit about his own classical 
training and getting over the guilt he initially felt 
for making unconventional sounds, offers a 
primer on the bow and different ways it can be 
used (including with guitars, including a note 
equivalent guide!), talks about the role the violin 
and viola played in folk music, as well as other 
string players who came up with their own styles. 
A great read, even for non-violin players. (DG) 
angry.violist@yahoo.com 

BALD CACTUS #27 / 3$ppd or trade 
5 x 8 - copied - 28 pgs 

Bald Cactus is very much the same style as her 
British brother Gadgie, but I prefer Bald Cactus 
because it contains less rambling on about foot¬ 
ball (soccer). There is one article that touches on 
the subject, so I skipped it. In addition to the 
short essays and reviews, there is an interview 
with Burnt Cross. I am currently reading the 
Crass book and sensed a similar defensive stance 
taken by band members. They defend their anti- 
Christian statements and ideas well in both the 
book and here, in the case of Burnt Cross—seem¬ 
ing justified rather than pig-headed, and I have a 
sustained respect for them both. Now back to 
Bald Cactus, it's not totally engrossing but well 
compiled and fun to read. (DS) 

Bald Cactus Distro / c/o 145-149 Cardigan Rd. / 

Leeds LS61LJ UK 

baldcactus@gmail.com 

BARRICATA #20 / $5 

8.5 x 11 - printed - 76 pgs en Francais 
Trois ans de Francais en ecole did me no good 
really, I mean, I can barely read any of this. 
Harkening back to les etudies, je n'ai pas une 
idee que cette magazine has to offer. I can sense 
from the pictures and headlines that it has a 
political bent, and thrillingly a wide cross section 
of underground cultural coverage varying from 
punk to hip-hop to anti-colonial activists in the¬ 
atre, photography, academia, and more. From 
what I can grasp, there is a heavy theme of the 
examination of the Palestinian/Israeli conflict. 
There is an interview with an anarchist photogra¬ 
pher named Keren Mano, who stays I think in Tel- 


Aviv, and documents what happens on the front¬ 
lines in the West Bank. Another interview focus¬ 
es on Michel Warschawski's activism in Israel, 
there is also a conversation with the zine 
Cartouche, a health worker in Gaza, a band called 
Heyoka, plus an apparel company and a rap 
group, and tons of reviews of records and zines. 
Hard to tell precisely but it looks tres magnifique. 
(JB) 

Barricata / 21 ter, rue Voltaire / 75011 Paris / 
FRANCE 

BASIC PAPER AIRPLANE #3 / $3 US, $4 

World, Free to Prisoners, Trades and Stamps 
Welcome 

5.5 x 8.25 - copied - 32 pgs 
This is sorta librarian punk style now... The 
author has a very earnest and direct way of com¬ 
municating; his enthusiasm for his subject matter 
is extremely evident. There's a piece on the his¬ 
tory of the postal service, which ends with the 
fact that his mom is a postal worker and since 
she doesn't live in a city she had to pay for her 
own vehicle, which seems unfair. Did you know 
that the reason the post isn't delivered on 
Sundays is because of pressure earlier this cen¬ 
tury from churches due to declining attendance? 
There's a rumination on cop killings that also 
touches on working at a bookstore, the Kindle 
and fanzine culture. Sort of all over the place... 
Like a conversation. Joshua and his friend, the 
writer of the zine Jesus Chris Superzine go to the 
Utne Reader magazine award ceremony, where 
they have a nomination for zine of the year. He 
captures the inanity and business deal hand¬ 
shakes that go on at any industry meet up. The 
overall theme behind this zine seems to be about 
finding the human connections in everything the 
writer encounters. (LG) 

Use Yr Words / PO BOX 2645 / Olympia WA 
98507 

sleepingsilent@hotmail.com 

BROKEN PENCIL #46 / $5.95 

8.5 x 11 - printed - 64 pages 
This professional-looking magazine out of 
Canada seems to cover "indie arts and culture" in 
a general sense, with an emphasis on zines and 
the literary, but I feel like it's more by and for the 
kinds of college educated, alternative newspaper 
reading gazers that would, say, consider Etsy a 
"DIY cultural phenomenon." The pieces on "Nerd 
Girl Pinups" and "The Indie Store Revival," are 
good examples of this, among other lukewarm 
articles and columns, though Allison Wolfe's arti- 









ZEES 



cle on the Riot Grrl zine archive at San Francisco's 
very own Goteblud zine shop is a worthwhile 
read, and I found the cover story on funding cuts 
to the arts in Canada to be informative, especial¬ 
ly since I had no idea how much federal funding 
the arts received there. There are also some 
excerpts from a few comic zines, and extensive 
book and zine review sections (both divided in 
categories, no less) that I imagine would be the 
most useful aspect of this zine. (DG) 

PO Box 203 / Station P / Toronto, ON M5S 2S7, 
Canada 

www.brokenpencil.com 

BURN COLLECTOR #14 / $6 

4.25 x 6 - printed - 156 pgs 
Well, well, well, here is a fat book of Al Burian's 
musings on public transit (travel), bike culture 
(more travel), street music (leaving one's regular 
space), a house-show scene report as argument 
for expanding both mental and physical explo¬ 
ration (again, traveling), existentialist travails, 
loneliness-urgency—fuckery. I find most dra¬ 
matic were the revelatory exclamations of the 
power of Ned Dirlik's drawings akin to the magni¬ 
tude of the influence of Greg Ginn. Yes, comics 
abound amongst this collection of writing, some¬ 
times directly accompanying it, adding to the 
messages in an illusory manner, sometimes 
thwarting your attention because it exists sepa¬ 
rately from it, fighting over the focus of your 
pupils. Get this: "Where Clowes echoes the fears 
of my parents' generation—that you have to grow 
up sometime, that you have to decide on one 
area of focus and master it in order to succeed— 
Brinkman is a prototype of the new way of the 
idea of expanding instead of contracting your 
interests as a means of survival." Fuck yes. This 
section prevails in my memory as the relevant 
parts sticking out furthest from-page-to-brain. My 
impression of this kind of writing is that it is run¬ 
ning along boundaries of godless nights, sleepy 
days, nerve endings on fire, always pushing, 
always allowing a measure of cynicism to fall 
back on because failure as climax is so imminent 
we pretend we were expecting it all along. (JB) 
Microcosm Publishing / 222 S. Rogers St. / 
Bloomington, IN 47404 

CHILENA COMANDO #6/4 euros 

5.5 x 8.5 - printed - 64 pgs 
This is a Spanish language fanzine from the peo¬ 
ple of the Burka For Everybody label in Spain, 
that is mostly made up of interviews with some 
comics and an ending list of a bunch of random 
books, movies, records, events etc... of which the' 
authors wanted to include. The layouts and art¬ 
work are very esthetically pleasing. The inter¬ 
views are thorough, interesting and informative; 
they make me want to get to know more. To 
name a few Interviewed: Galactic Zoo Dossier, 
Skjit Lars, Billy Bao, The Ex, Chefa Alonso (female 
free-jazz groundbreaker), Jess Franco (awesome 
Spanish horror/sex director), Gepopel and more, 
covering a good mix of film, music, art etc... If 
you like zines that cover stuff other than punk, 
but are interested in artist, musicians, and the 
like, who share the DIY spirit of punk in their own 
realms, this is the zine for you. Warning to 
nationalist shit heads: they even have an article 
about Robert Anton Wilson, so watch out!! It 
came with a CDR of music that is covered in the 
interviews and then some (including a song by 
Montanas called "Calamares gigantes en Luarca" 
that rocks!). Overall, this zine is extremely well 
done and it definitely shows. I went online to try 
to get the previous volumes, but they are sold 


out!! ARGHH It comes out once a year, so if you 
are a Spanish speaker or trying to learn, get it 
now!!!!!! (MB) 

burkaforeverybody.com/chilenacomando.htm 

CLASSY PEOPLE #2 / $3 or trade 

8.5 x 5.5 - copied - 64 pgs 
What if you kept a diary filled with brief descrip¬ 
tions for every show you've attended within a cal¬ 
endar year? Well, that's the deal here, and it's 
quite fun to read along and get a glimpse of a 
Midwestern scene from one person's perspective. 
The excitement of seeing great bands that blow 
one away is balanced by the many letdowns of 
going to shows, such as cancelled headliners or 
terrible opening acts that often shouldn't even be 
playing a punk show in the first place. But worse, 
there are the punk legends who continue on past 
their prime and seeing them becomes depress¬ 
ing. For the writer this occurs when seeing the 
Zero Boys twice results in a new outlook on that 
band—and it ain't good! The same is felt for 
MDC. And for newcomers Deep Sleep, they get 
referred here as "the most mediocre band" seen 
during the year. Ouch! I dig Deep Sleep, but 
maybe now I don't feel so bad about missing the 
Zero Boys reunion show last year. Anyway, read¬ 
ing this thing makes me want to start going to 
more shows. (BG) 

Micah Jenkins / 5502 Sleet Dr. / Indianapolis, IN 
46237 / vomax25@hotmail.com 

EARTH FIRST! Vol. 30, #2 / $ 4.50 
17 x 11 - printed - 32 pgs 
Earth First is a long running journal that serves as 
a sort of central meeting place informing like- 
minded people of current events and issues, as 
well as including some comics and poetry to add 
some nice variety. I'm sure you would agree that 
what these folks accomplish is much more punk 
than wearing your fucking Vans retro sneakers 
and owning a couple of rock and roll records. 
Some punks end up in jail for pissing in an alley 
or stealing beer. That's pathetic. Some environ¬ 
mental activists end up in prison for standing up 
and resisting corporations and industries from 
wantonly obliterating our delicate ecosystem for 
profit. That's conviction. Check out an issue and 
see what's going down. (BG) 

Earth First! / PO Box 3023 / Tucson, AZ 85702 / 
www.earthfirstjournal.org 

ENDLESS DISAPPOINTMENT / $? 

24 x 18 - newsprint - 2 pgs 
You know when you vomit over and over, and you 
can't stop, until you are vomiting what feels like 
your stomach lining, a bitter mucous like sub¬ 
stance. Bile. This is a poster sized zine compiled 
by two people, a girl called Jax and a man called 
Gabby. The writing style is reminiscent of the lit¬ 
erature found in places like the Youth Attack 
internet forum, one of the many avenues avail¬ 
able for kids to vent their fury over subjects such 
as colored vinyl and who said what to whom. 
Endless Disappointment contains a lot of self- 
conscious vitriolic rants in which "homos" and 
"faggots" surround the writers, as they innocent¬ 
ly attempt to eat coconut rice dream and enjoy 
the musical stylings of Devour and Video Disease, 
whilst disdaining the "metrosexual... chick hard¬ 
core" sounds of Sex Vid. The disdain felt for Sex 
Vid is quite maniacal, it sort of veers into con¬ 
spiracy theory talk, like reading someone lose 
their shit over some alien abduction 9/11 Obama 
tea party connection that apparently the rest of 
the world is blind to. The bassist, Sue's appear¬ 
ance is insulted in classic kreepy misogynist style, 


which made the rest of the zine seem like putrid 
garbage. Apparently most of the prose is cour¬ 
tesy of a 35-year old man, who wants to wipe out 
the crust population of the upper west side of 
NYC, and also watch hockey with his bros. I am 
sure there are a million angry old men in sports 
bars across the continent who share his opinions 
of fags and women, and it's always sort of mys¬ 
terious to me why dudes like this get into punk 
when their views are so obviously reflected in 
mainstream culture. (LG) 

64 Oxford St / Toronto, ON M5T 1N8 / CANADA 

FLUKE #8 / $2 

5.5 x 8.5 - copied - 68 pgs 

There are no ads or reviews, but we are treated 
to interviews, aphorisms, a few more "personal" 
style pieces, and a tour diary. If you're bummed 
qn punk being too stagnant, you may be stoked 
to read the discussion with Andrew Jackson 
Jihad, an acoustic two-piece from Arizona. The 
tour diary results from the editor tagging along 
with them throughout Southern California. Also 
interviewed is Christ On Parade, who talk mostly 
about the old days, perhaps understandably, and 
a pair of Little Rock kids. Paige Hearn skates 
tough and manufactures boards, while Alan Short 
is just down with the LR punk/metal scene. One 
poor guy writes about having cancer, and anoth¬ 
er guy writes about his Army buddy quickly 
becoming incarcerated upon- returning to the 
States. The Army guy is quite sympathetic to his 
buddy's rough deal, both while enlisted and after, 
but doesn't mention that maybe the folks whose 
country they invaded got it worse. Overall this 
zine is packed with writing and is pretty well 
done. (JM) 

PO Box 41931 / Tucson, AZ 85717 

FOR FEAR THE HEARTS OF MEN ARE FAIL¬ 
ING / $0.50 or stamp 

8.5 x 14 - copied- 1 pg 

If you sat on a street with a fair amount of foot 
traffic and reported back what each person was 
doing in one short line and then complied them 
all onto one horizontal piece of legal paper and 
left the other side blank you would have made 
the zine For Fear the Hearts of Men are Failing. 
While I thought it was interesting, I would more 
expect to see this wheat pasted on a wall than 
folded into an envelope but hey, why not. (CR) 
3088 King St. / Berkeley, CA 94703 

GREENWOMAN #5 / $5 US, $2 to female pris¬ 
oners, trades OK 

5.5 x 8.5 - printed - 60 pgs 

Another hearty issue has reached us already. 
Much of this one is given over to the editor's job 
diary. For the first time in a while she's perform¬ 
ing paid labor outside of her house, gardening in 
the yards of (who else?) the rich. Her writing is 
engaging enough that I was interested in what 
happens, even though she discusses a number of 
un-punk topics (or are they?). Her business and 
social relationships with other women, which 
plants are the raddest, and which peppers resem¬ 
ble male genetalia are among the topics 
broached. A few contributors contribute material 
also in this vein. This issue doesn't have as much 
hands-on advice as the others I've seen, but is 
still sweet if this is your scene. (JM) 

Sandra Knauf / PO Box 6587 / 

Colorado Springs, CO 80934-6587 
www.sandraknauf.com_a.google.pages.com 

IZU GIROA #15 / 2 euro, trades 

8.5 x 11 - printed - 52 pgs 




















I know that Basque is not the most common lan¬ 
guage where we come from, but I really wish I 
could read it, cuz this zine looks badass. Izu 
Giroa, translated as "Climate of Fear," is a fanzine 
from Basque country, Spain that is jam packed 
with music, music, music! The content is primari- 
' ty band interviews, including Limp Wrist, 
Sulfators, Motocross, Imperial Leather, Yo soy 
Julio Cesar (an old school Basque punk/new 
wave band) and more... There are a whole bunch 
of record reviews, zine reviews and, my favorite, 
show reviews. Its black and white with a simple 
layout and a bunch of live shots and cover scans. 

I got on the phone with a friend of mine who 
understands some Basque and I tried to read, in 
my broke-ass accent, some of this zine. Between 
the two of us, and hours later, we got through a 
small part of the record reviews and a few show 
reviews. I tried! (MB) 

Izu Giroa / PO Box 10216 / 48007 Bilbao Basque 

Country / SPAIN 

•izugiroa@hotmail.com 

KID CUTBANK #3 / $2.50 or trade 
4.25 x 8.5 - copied - 36pgs 
What I am getting out of this zine is a balanced 
view of idealism, energy, and a critical look at 
education, the meaning of life and refusing the 
dismal offerings of survival in a suburban dead 
zone. I love the herb reference checklist, inter¬ 
view with a radical educator who has a brilliant 
analysis of a new approach to teaching kids, the 
pictures, abandoned building exploration, roof¬ 
sitting, etc... dream on, kid, dream! Up thebanx. 
(JB) 

Ben / Hoodrat-militia@riseup.net 

LEARNING GOOD CONSENT / $3.50 

5.5 x 8.5 - printed - 46 pgs 
OK, yeah, I get how verbal consent is important 
but this zine basically builds an idea that the only 
way to have sex is by constantly "checking in". 
Like, this zine spends a lot of time talking about 
ways to ask for consent from a partner but does¬ 
n't really give any tips on how to say no. 
Personally, I think it's way more important to fig¬ 
ure out how to say "I like that" or "I don't like 
that" rather than "is this ok?". The otherhuge 
problem I have with this is it does the whole "the 
attacker needs healing too" thing. There are 
probably a couple people who have sexually 
assaulted someone and they now realize that was 
fucked and that they have some shit to work 
through. Maybe. However, the majority (basically 
all) of rapists are TOTAL FUCKING SCUMBAGS. I 
don't see why a community should take respon¬ 
sibility to "heal" their local sexual predator. FUCK 
THAT. Scumbags should be CHASED THE FUCK 
OU7TA TOWN. (MM) 

Microcosm / 222 S Rogers / Bloomington, IN 
47404 

MYCOFFINHANDS #2 / $12 

5.5 x 8.5 - copied - 24 pgs 
This is a really cool zine of drawings and stuff 
with a nice screen printed cover AND a pull out 
screen printed poster. Most of the drawings are 
pretty doom-y and super detailed. Super-limited, 
like only 25. Try topick it up.(MM) 
mycoffinhands.blogspot.com 

NUTS! #3 & #4 / $2 or trade 
35 x 11.25 - newsprint - 24 pgs 
These are great examples of how a local zine can 
represent a punk community without being mid¬ 
dle of the road or square. Nuts! is based in 


Olympia, and is full of art (including some from 
my fave Oly punk artist, Lauren Likely) and ran¬ 
dom local ephemera, along with interviews with 
local bands, like Milk Music and White Boss, and 
former local band Nodzzz. This is Olympia, so as 
well as the picture of the modern dance troupe 
there's a photo of Sex Vid's last show, and some 
rad stick and poke tattoos... You know, all inclu¬ 
sive—for the feminists and the greasy scumbags, 
and the greasy feminists. I think my favorite 
thing about these zines is the way that there will 
be someone's handwritten list of the best places 
to see shows in Olympia, next to a guide to some 
guitar trick, next to some brutal Void style psy¬ 
chedelic art damage. Judd's reviews of every 
restaurant in town sort of reminded me of classic 
Oly zine Germ of Youth for some reason. Tobi Vail 
writes a great piece about meeting Mike Watt, 
and his impact on her ideas of growing older and 
staying punk and so forth. Anyway, these are full 
of ideas, shitty art (in the best sense of the word) 
and the crummiess and radness that makes 
fanzines compelling... Making the mundane tran¬ 
scendent and the transcendent mundane. (LG) 

PO BOX 7302 / Olympia, WA 98507 

PEARLS BEFORE SWINE FLU / THIS IS 
PLAGUE CITY / $3 US, $2.50 CAN 
4.25 X 5.5 - copied - 28 pgs 
This is a little zine out of Toronto—a split 
between two writers of fictional short stories. 
What these stories have in common is their loose 
theme of plague and disease in the writers' home 
city. I guess I'm not that into random fictional 
stories, so I had a hard time getting into this col¬ 
lection, but I could see why people might find 
some meaning in these stories. There is a palpa¬ 
ble sense of morbidity and unease to the first col¬ 
lection, while the second reeks of sexiness and 
sensuality. These themes seem quite pertinent 
given the mainstream public's obsession with the 
flu and illness. (DA) 

PO Box 1093 Station F / Toronto, ON M4Y 2T7 / 
Canada 

dave@woodenrocketpress.com 

bitsofstring@yahoo.ca 

PLASTIC BOMB / #69 / 35 Euros 
11.75 x 9 - printed - 80 pgs - German 
Plastic Bomb is a long running German punk 
fanzine, probably a little more mainstream than 
the one you are currently reading, in that it's full 
of cheesy adverts of punker girl costumes with 
Betty Page haircuts... This is all in German, which 
I cannot speak or understand beyond some basic 
stuff from my school days, but there are inter¬ 
views with about fifteen different bands, ranging 
from Press Gang to So Much Hate, and there are 
a few articles that seem to have more of an 
activist stance, one on a demonstration and 
another that seems to be about women and 
immigration—though I may be wrong. The cover 
image shows a woman leaning into the camera, 
her stance somewhere between tough and 
provocative, with a black eye and what looks like 
vomit coming out of her mouth. I found that 
somewhat questionable.... (LG) 
www.plastic-bomb.de 

RAT'S EYES / $2 

8.5 x 11 - copied - 14 pgs 
This is such a rad example of inspiration seen 
through to the finish. This dude obviously likes 
the styling of our own sweet mag, MRR and her 
ilk; so, he decided to make his own personalized 
version. The layout makes sense for the hardcore 


punk fanzine- Intro, interviews and reviews. 
Bloodclot Faggots are .featured and Pathetic 
Human. There is a comic at the end. The end 
(DS) 

Richard Costa / 717A High St / Thornbury 3071 
/ Victoria, Australia 
rcosta_700@hotmail.com 

RAZORCAKE #54/$4 

8.5 x 11 - printed - 114 pgs 
This issue of Razorcake provides its loyal readers 
with a glimpse into the minds of beloved Bay- 
Area Brits, Young Offenders, who discuss every¬ 
thing from touring and their eclectic tastes in 
music, to their kids and their personal lives. This 
issue also follows up on the piece in #53 about 
the life and death of the giant underground music 
distributor, Mordam. And for all of you pop-punk 
heads out there, the editors at Razorcake have 
thrown in a hilarious interview with the Dead 
Milkmen, who have not given up on playing 
shows. There is also an interview with So Cal 
hardcore ragers, Death Crisis, plus tons of 
columns and reviews. (DA) 

Razorcake / PO Box 42129 / LA, CA 90042 
www.razorcake.org 

SAVAGE FOREST / no price listed 

4.5 x 5.5 - copied - 88 pgs 
The writing in here is the kind that's difficult for 
me to really get a grip on. While not as dreamy 
or ethereal as Keep Lovingr, Keep Fighting, the 
author here similarly describes situations some¬ 
what obliquely. I'm left feeling like heavier issues 
are kept at a distance while she more-plainly 
describes her immediate environment. Many of 
these pages are devoted to her trip to East 
Africa; Utah and New York City (her home) also 
appear. I'm not particularly sympathetic to privi¬ 
leged folks slummin' it in desperately poor coun¬ 
tries, but for this trip she travels with someone 
who knows people there (including actual 
Africans) and speaks a locaJ language, so many 
times they crash in somebody's house. The 
design of the zine is pretty sweet—the text is 
mixed nicely with illustrations and photographs. 
I'm not super excited about this zine, but I do 
think some kids reading these reviews would be 
(JM) 

Dani Golomb / 517 W. 121st St. #7015 / NY, NY 
10027 / dmg2112@columbia.edu 

SCREAMING AT A WALL #3 

8.5 x 11 - copied - 28 pgs 
It seems like print zines focusing on hardcore 
have been coming back in a big way. I'm all for 
it. We need more pissed-off straight edge zines. 

It probably sounds like I'm kidding, but I'm not. 
"The militant edge is no joke." I have to say that 
I'm surprised that this zine is on its third issue 
and this is the first time I've seen it. This is the 
kind of thing that our kindly taskmasters here in 
the MRR slave labor camp usually slip under my 
cell door in the dead of night with a "review this 
by mid-month or face our wrath" note attached. 

I'm not familiar with several of the bands inter¬ 
viewed here (namely Alert, No Minion and Troops 
of Tomorrow), and I know of Rival Mob but have 
never listened to a note of their music for some 
reason. The editor does interview one band I'm 
familiar with though, namely Waste 
Management, whose 7" on Painkiller is worth 
tracking down. The interviews were mostly on 
the shorter side, unfortunately, especially the one 
with Waste Management, which was less than 
two full pages. The rest of the zine is filled out 



















with the usual reviews and band photos, as well 
as a one-page "Comic Book Corner." It's a nice 
idea, although I personally haven't followed any 
of the X-Men titles for over a decade outside of 
the runs written by Grant Morrison and Joss 
Whedon, so I can't comment on his descriptions 
of the "Messiah War" or "House of M" storylines. 
This is a good effort. There's some definite room 
for improvement, but I'm glad zines like this are 
out there. (VX) 

Bobby Westfall / 1206 D St NE / Washington, DC 
20002 

robertxwestfall@gmail.com 

THE SECOND SKIN OF CITIES: PHO¬ 
TOGRAPHS OF STREET ART IN HOUSTON / 

$5 

5.25 x 3.5 - printed - 24 pgs 
This is a small photozine by David Ensminger of 
Left of the Dial fame. The title is. pretty self- 
explanatory but this is a little compilation of var¬ 
ious street art, ranging from crude tags, box car 
graffiti to political stencil art and flyers. There are 
a few paragraphs inside touching on whether 
these works indicate gentrification, the transfor¬ 
mation of a neighborhood with the paintbrushes 
and rent checks of art students or the opposite, a 
neighborhood in ruins. The last piece in the zine 
is a painting of a couple that sorta resemble a 
Chris Johanson painting, you can't tell if it's naive 
street art or a Beautiful Losers consumed art stu¬ 
dent. (LG) 

2301 Norfolk St #1 / Houston TX 77098 

SELF AWARE #5 / $3 ppd 

8.5 x 11 - copied - 32 pgs 
Interesting. Along with the usual batch of modern 
hardcore-ish bands I couldn't care less about 
(Touche Amore, Hawks, Stymie, Just Die!), this 
issue includes an interview with Outlaw Order. 
For those who might not know, Outlaw Order is 
pretty much the entire line-up of Eyehategod 
with a different drummer, and they play a punker 
form of NOLA sludge. Definitely not something I 
was expecting in these pages. It's a pretty good 
interview too, although at only three pages it was 
shorter than I'd want it to be. Aside from the 
interviews this has a bunch of record and zine 
reviews, a couple pages of band photos and a list 
of someone's ten favorite Carolina bands. I actu¬ 
ally agreed with half of his choices, which was a 
pleasant surprise. As always the zine is laid out 
quite well and looks good, there's obviously some 
effort put into this, which is admirable. If they 
interviewed more bands I like I could really give 
this zine my unreserved support. As it is, I'm sure 
plenty of kids want to read the interviews that I 
don't — how else to explain the contents of MRR 
every month? If we only interviewed bands I like 
circulation would drop drastically. (VX) 

2537-F Woodbrook Ln. / Monroe, NC 28110 
selfawarezine@gmail.com 
selfawarerecords.blogspot.com 

SELF-DEFENSE FOR RADICALS / $4.95 

5.5 x 8.5 - printed - 32 pgs 
When I saw this for review I feared some hippie 
meandering, but this was actually really fucking 
good. Intensely informative, no fucking around, 
and even some theory stuff about how pacifism 
does not and cannot work in every situation. This 
was entertaining to read and included everything 
from detailed instructions on how to give a good 
left hook to rape statistics. Highly recommended. 
(MM) 

PM Press / PO Box 23912 / Oakland, CA 94623 


TOINEN VAIHTOEHTO #223 
5.5 x 8.5 - printed - 30 pages 
This Finnish zine features interviews with 
Armageddon Clock, White Flag, and Jarkko 
Martikainen; some record, show, and zine 
reviews; and some articles I could discuss more 
if I knew the language. In spite of the semi-pro¬ 
fessional look and layout here, this is a fully DIY 
effort with no semi-corporate or otherwise ridicu¬ 
lous ads or content. (DG) 

PL. 1 / 65200 Vaasa / Finland 

THE TROUBLE WITH NORMAL #98 / $2 

5.5 X 8.5 - copied - 40 pgs 
Consistency is something I prize, but not as much 
as The Trouble With Normal editor Boone. The 
ninety-eighth issue of his zine don't look much 
different than the thirtieth or fiftieth. The inter¬ 
views are still pretty marginal. He's still going to 
shows and taking pictures. There's even a punk 
show this time. He talks with Joe Lally and a local 
band, Monte Carlos. His decade-recap focuses on 
federal politics and is a little soft on the current 
President. In the past, his political commentary 
was always a strong part of the zine, so this was 
a bit of a letdown for me. The show to celebrate 
the 100th issue of TTWA/is already booked, so git 
yer ass to Columbia if you're down. (JM) 

PO Box 1444 / Columbia, MO 65205-1444 / 
www.jthetroublewithnormal.tripod.com 

TRUST #139 

11.75 x 8.25 - printed - 64 pgs 
Even though I can't speak German, I agonizingly 
endeavor to "read" much of the content here 
because I absolutely love this zine and I can for¬ 
tunately make out a little of what is being said on 
occasion (a few reviews and even a few lines 
within some interviews are appreciatively written 
in English, which makes my life a bit easier, I 
might add). What would make me go through 
such an undertaking? Well, if you have to ask 
you've never laid eyes on Trust, a fantastic 
German punk fanzine that has been going at it for 
some twenty five years. The layouts are always 
impressive, and the variety of cool band inter¬ 
views, columns, articles, and numerous reviews 
make this publication one of the standard bearers 
for others to emulate. Some of the interviews 
featured this time around are The Last (LA), 
Kriegshog, Burial, and one of my all time 
favorites, the Youth Brigade (LA). Every issue I've 
ever come across is superb. You can check out 
their website for info on ordering some back 
issues. And it's a great way to learn German! 
(BG) 

Trust Fanzine / Postfach 11 07 62 / 28087 
Bremen / Germany / www.trust-zine.de 

TURNING THE TIDE: JOURNAL OF ANTI¬ 
RACIST ACTION, RESEARCH & EDUCATION 

Volume 23 Number 1 
11 x 17 - printed - 8 pgs 
More politics and theory from the LA ARA crowd. 
This issue features a piece on the Black Riders 
Liberation Party, interviews with Bogota, 
Colombia RASH (Red Anarchist Skinheads) and 
the leadership of Los Macheteros, a half-page 
article entitled "Beyond Identity Politics", an 
excerpt from Theses on the Imaginary Party, and 
the usual writings on the pigs, Israel, the 
Panthers and community radio. Reading this is 
like looking into an alternate universe I used to 
inhabit. Revolutionaries, one more step to 
become nihilists! (VX) 4 

Anti-Racist Action Publishers / PO Box 1055 / 
Culver City, CA 90232 


UNEMPLOYMENT / $2 plus postage 

6.5 x 4.75 - printed - 48 pgs 

This is a small (think Chick Comics tract-size, only 
taller by half) collection of personal writings from 
the author/editor of Big Hands zine. As you may 
have guessed, these writings deal with being 
unemployed. Self-doubt, the search for work, - 
American politics and a dream in which the 
author faces judgment by a certain key 
Crimethlnc. figure all play into the seven short 
chapters here. This kept my interest while I read 
it, but I prefer Big Hands. There are worse things 
to spend two bucks on, though. (VX) 

Aaron Lake Smith / 1104 Imperial Rd. / Cary, NC 
27511 

Microcosm Pub. / 222 S Rogers St. / 
Bloomington, IN 47404 

WET CEMENT #2 / $? 

8.5 x 5.5 - copied - 36 pgs 

This sarcastic and humorous zine had me crack¬ 
ing up as I thumbed through the pages, reading 
every word. No band interviews or record reviews 
here, just a collection of punk rock rants and 
mocking anecdotes cut up and pasted within a 
black and white layout that consists mostly of 
classic record illustrations (the rat and the 
garbage can from New York Thrash, the angry 
bald dude on the first III Repute album, etc.). This 
aesthetic effort makes the zine twice as good and 
a more likely contender for the "keeper" catego¬ 
ry. Another thing that makes Wet Cement stand 
out is the few like-minded contributions from 
other writers, which keeps this clear of being just 
some personal zine. My favorite part here was 
the list of things this guy will hate you for if you're 
guilty of just one infraction. I failed his test 
because I sometimes wear sunglasses, but I 
agree with most of his views. Hilarious. You 
should really check this out. (BG) 

Jeff / 56 Franklin St. / Allston, MA 02134 / 
jeff@skitsystem.net 

WHAT'S THE JAM #6 / $?, trade 

5.5 x 8.5 - Copied - 34 pgs 
Be warned, this zine is so relentlessly positive 
that it made me chuckle several times reading it 
and think, "are you fucking with me?" There is no 
swearing, not that its necessary, but the author 
uses "shoot"' and "eff" instead of their obvious, 
filthy counterparts. The cover is hand cut and the 
layouts are all hand drawn/written. There are an 
impressive amount of record reviews, animation 
reviews, zine reviews, and, my favorite, show 
reviews. There are a few theater reviews, movie 
reviews, record store reviews, illustrations, a 
recipe, lists of movie to go to, you tube vids to 
see and a bunch of articles about subjects 
(Micheal Jackson, Jim Henson, Paul Reubens, 
Breakin' 2) that the author loves and just wants 
to show "apreesh" for. The drawings are pretty 
cute and sorta funny, giving it all a comic book 
feel. I can be a pretty crabby asshole, but I 
enjoyed this zine. All its about is someone having 
a great time, checking out a ton of cool shit and 
they wanna share it with you. Although I don't 
know how much posi I can take, I would read 
other issues of What's the Jam because it's a 
great example of someone that is taking advan¬ 
tage of the availability of cool things, staying pos- 
• itive and highlighting the constructive parts of 
punk life. There is a call for trades, penpals, 
reviews, etc... It seems very genuine and defi¬ 
nitely put a smile on my face.. (MB) 

Tuna - What's the Jam / 1626 N. Wilcox Avenue 
919 / Hollywood, CA 90028 
whatsthejam@yahoo.com 













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MAXIMUMROCKNROLL 
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MRR’s classic int’l HC comp, back in print on vinyl for the first time in 20 years! Featuring: 
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