Good bad Music for bad, bad Times!

Today, I’ve heard first hand complaints about this blog. “Stop posting so much Metal, more Mongo Punk please!”, said my young friend David when I took a good walk with him. This ain’t so much Mongo, but it sue is Punk and it will be unknown to most and thus not be getting a lot of comments, but what can you do.
SOZZ released this, their first 7″, in 1979, but the band got together in 1978. SOZ came from Büren, near Berne, pretty far off (not in miles - this is Switzerland!) from the Punk capitol of Zurich. It was recorded in the Sunrise Studios near Zurich though and like all these records, you’ll find the mark of “R.So” in the run out grooves. Rico Sonderegger was a man born ca. in the 1920s, who had built up on his own and from scratch on his own mastering machine, where you cut the laqueur disks that were later used to further make the pressing molds with. when I had my own record label, I always attended in person the mastering job. It was an incredibly experience: You walked in his tiny office in St. Gallen. his wife was the secretary. They were both old and grey but you better not fuck around with them! Rico pretty much was an 1.65 m EAR. I tell you, this guy knew everything about music! When we cut really bad ass shit such as INFEST, MORBID ANGEL or FEAR OF GOD there, he wouldn’t even move one muscle in his face. He just played the master through and then said: I guess this must sound so and so, let’s add a little more of this, take out that, turn on these knobs and then it should sound like you want it to sound on vinyl, cause what most studio engineers don’t know, you always should give it a bit more of this knob right here when you’re cutting the master, cause this will irreversibly and ultimately define the final sound, the sound you’ll hear when you hold the vinyl in your hands”. His office was full of gold records and letters and stuff, top notch number one artists would be there in person in the old upstairs office without the slightest bit of comfort when Rico cut the laqueur, and all these shitty little Punk and Hardcore bands went through the same process and were taken care of with full respect. I’m sure the man is not among the living anymore. Hats off to Rico Sonderegger!

When you flip through the pages of old punk fanzines, like those of “No Fun” (first swiss Punk zine), you’ll notice that SOZZ were quite popular (they were often refered to as the “best looking Punk band”). I don’t know nothing of these times when it comes to Punk. My “Punk” was Abba, AC/DC, Judas Priest and Motörhead, Queen, Matchbox and Blondie, Elvis, Led Zeppelin or Kiss, I went to school and the first Punks I ever met were just a bunch of pretentious wankers from the better parts of the village. I sometimes wonder what would have been if I had met somebody who would have shown me Punk music at this time. Would I have gotten into it? I doubt so. And especially a band like SOZZ would have done nothing for me. But I’ve sung this gospel before: It’s great music now. I put these records on and I immediately “understand” them. I guess there must have been a certain code inscribed in late 70s bands that you just “get”, whatever the music sounds like, when you’ve grown up in this time. Same here: I don’t have the slightest idea what they could have meant with those lyrics. A lot seems to come from a regional scene posse, but what the heck. “Lurch Gang” is the hit here, “Patrol Car” is a bit weaker. Too bad they had these annoying background choruses though.
This is a pretty rare record. Unfortunatly, I can’t reproduce the entire nice foldout sleeve here. Enjoy!

Patrol Car.mp3
Lurch Gang.mp3

Peter had a feature of the 2nd CLA, oops sorry, SOZZ 7″ a while back. Check it out here.