Good bad Music for bad, bad Times!

MAJOR CONFLICT were formed by two former URBAN WASTE members shortly after the dismiss of the maybe greatest Hardcore band ever (at least the band with the best HC 7″).
No question: This is pretty far from URBAN WASTE. Some might say it has a strong Metal influence, which of course is not the case, it only sounds “metallic”. The “mosh parts” are definitely ahead of the time. The wimpy vocals unfortunately almost ruin the songs, especially on “Outgroup”. Sounds like the singer just had his puberty vocal change, haha. The B-side, “Not just a Song” is a wild and weird mixture of different genres (the oriental guitar bits totally shred and the echoing voice kills!). A great, athmospheric song and pretty unique, I’d say. All in all, I totally love the sound of this 7″. It’s so massive, crunchy yet garagey. Wonderful!
500 were made, but only a part of the edition was ever sold. I’m not sure if I read this somewhere or if I’m just making it up now, but not everybody in the band was happy with how this 7″ came out in the end, so a part of the pressing vanished. Also, I’m pretty convinced that the band members manually added the loud crackling noises onto the vinyl. Check out how the crackling perfectly adds to the boyscout-ness of the first 2 songs: Here it sounds like a camping fire! On the spooky B-side song, it sounds more like a chimney fire. Crazy!
Anyway, it’s a rare find, but luckily prices have come down a bit.

How do ya feel.mp3
Outgroup.mp3
Not just a Song.mp3

Post Scrotum: I wasn’t aware of the official CD reissue available from Mad at the World Records. Get it here!

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How can such a fantastic compilation LP be forgotten? Producer Tom Dark (who was also in THE DARK) mentioned in an interview that he feels sorry for the countless regional bands that somehow disappear in the shadows of more popular bands. But somebody, he said, will dig out the forgotten bands. Judging by the many great videos of these bands available on Youtube, somebody’s been digging before – great job!

On THE NEW HOPE, there’s plenty to dig out. 11 bands delivering 30 songs, not one to be missed, if you ask me. THE GUNS two tracks sound like an unreleased pre-Rollins Black Flag demo tape which, as you can guess, is not exactly a bad thing. POSITIVE VIOLENCE follow with three mainly faster tracks, “T.V. Blues” being the best here. Next we have SPIKE IN VAIN. “The Funeral” kicks me right in the face. Next up is the comps highlight maybe – AGITATED play very agitated Hardcore with a great drummer. Imagine they had recorded a few songs more and released them on a 7″ in limited edition – myspace fansites would jump up all over the place, so on the other hand, it’s not that bad maybe they get dragged out onto the light so late. NO PAROLE is one of the few female fronted Hardcore bands of the early 80s. I guess nobody outside the Cleveland scene knew about them until now. “Disposition: Hellion” is a great simple song and the singer sounds a bit like Donna from No Thanks. THE DARK, producer Tommy Dark’s own band, have three more fast and furious HC tracks, including the short “Sacrifice”. The flip starts off with “Drop the A-Bomb on me” (remember the PEACE WAR double LP on Rradical? Yeah, there you go!) and three equally great smashers by ZERO DEFEX. OUTERWEAR have two slightly more dissonant, FLIPPER-ish songs, another band that just doesn’t deserve to be without a tombstone in this little blog. OFFBEATS play “humor-laden Hardcore”, fast and funny. Another winner. PPG (in the booklet, they give plenty of options of what the three letters mean, “Penis Pump Gun” being one of them) are more on the darker side again, kinda gloomy Hardcore Punk with a weird edge. And finally, we have STARVATION ARMY with four more fast and furious thrashers. The final song, “Fun” is cut into the outleading groove on the actual vinyl. Love such details.

Please note that although I had bought the LP still sealed, the B-side has some pressing defects that will result in occassional crackling unfortunately.

And finally, here’s a trailer of a Cleveland documentary I’d love to see, “Cleveland’s screaming”. I’d be happy to review this, dear producers.

It would of course be great if some of the old scenesters would stop by and give more info on this. And I think it’s about time such a great record will be re-released one day.
THE GUNS: Locked inside.mp3
AGITATED: Death warmed over.mp3
ZERO DEFEX: By the Day.mp3
OUTERWEAR: Knife Lust.mp3

Get the complete NEW HOPE compilation in 320 kb/s quality, carefully edited and uploaded with love here. (100.5 MB)

Phew, that was a lot of work. Now I need some rest.

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Couldn’t believe my eyes this morning when I saw that I really posted some Irish Folk LP last night. The wine was delicious and rather heavy, hahaha.

DILS were one of the first american Punk bands and one of the few explicitly political ones at that too. The two Kinman brothers who were the main force behind this short lived act, were also known for a couple of funny stories like the one Peter reported when he posted the 2nd DILS 7″ on his blog.

I remember hearing this in a local record shop in 1980. Prior to this, I’ve had heard the Sex Pistols, Clash, Buttocks, Nina Hagen (haha) and other assorted Punk, but I always thought that compared to Motörhead or the raw power of AC/DC’s “Let there be Rock”, Punk was a bit lame. Well, the DILS blew me away and that was also how I heard the term “Hardcore” the first time, cause that’s what the shop owner said it was – Hardcore. He was not too wrong, I think.
The opening chords in “I hate the Rich” to me pretty much epitomize great music per se. Fan-fuck-en-tas-tic.

I hate the Rich.mp3
You’re not blank.mp3

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This obscure anthology of (nationalist) rebel songs from Northern Ireland gets everybody I know off the chair and on the feet. Isn’t it kinda weird to see that of the thousands of records you have at home, only one would put a smile on everybody’s face? That’s exactly the case with this compilation and I’m pretty sure it will be just the other way round when I’m posting it here.
Although in my younger days I used to call myself part of the radical left, I’ve never been an anti-imperialist or sympathized with “national liberation”. That type always seemed like the worst to me. A bunch of militant esoteric and racist hippies, the worst of the worst. I don’t know whether my rather sympathetic feelings for the struggle of the “Irish” for “independence” (= being ruled by assholes that have the same passport like you) had something to do with anti-imperialism or whether it was the proletarian stance the uprising seemed to have, at least from the countless movies that I had sucked in. Coming from a very proletarian family myself, I seemed to understand so much of the struggle, but looking back now, I’m pretty sure at least a part of this is pure projection. Anyway, all reasoning put aside – I just LOVE this record. Found it on a flea market years and years ago.
Fantastic music to get wasted to and although I probably never played this LP soberly, I’m pretty sure it’s enjoyable in that very pitiful condition too. Impossible for me to pick one favorite track – all the songs are absolutely great, mostly due to the fact they’re all crude and simple.

Here’s two examples, both coming from the singer BLACKTHORN (no, it’s not Black Metal):
Blackthorn: The Lid of me Granny’s Bin.mp3
Blackthorn: The Man from the Daily Mail.mp3

You can download the entire LP here.

Cheers

The Man From The Daily Mail
(Unknown)
Now Ireland’s a very funny place, sir It’s a strange and a troubled land And the Irish are a very funny race, sir Every girl’s in the Cumann na mBan Every doggie wears a tri-coloured ribbon Tied firmly to its tail And it wouldn’t be surprising If there’d be another rising Said the man from the Daily Mail Every bird upon my word Is singing treble – I’m a rebel Every hen it’s said is laying hand grenades Over there sir, I declare Sir And every cock in the farmyard Stock crows in triumph for the Gael And it wouldn’t be surprising If there’d be another rising Said the man from the Daily Mail Now the other day I travelled down to Clare, sir I spied in an old boreen A bunch of busy gooses there, sir Dressed in orange, white and green They marched to the German goose step As they whistled Grann na bheal and I’m shakin’ in me shoes As I’m sending out the news Said the man from the Daily Mail Every bird upon my word Is singing treble – I’m a rebel Every hen it’s said is laying hand grenades Over there sir, I declare Sir And every cock in the farmyard Stock crows in triumph for the Gael And it wouldn’t be surprising If there’d be another rising Said the man from the Daily Mail Now the whole place is seething with sedition It’s Sinn Fein through and through All the peelers they are joining local units And the password’s Sinn Fein too Every doggie wears a tri-coloured ribbon Tied firmly to its tail And it wouldn’t be surprising If there’d be another rising Said the man from the Daily Mail Every bird upon my word Is singing treble – I’m a rebel Every hen it’s said is laying hand grenades Over there sir, I declare Sir And every cock in the farmyard Stock crows in triumph for the Gael And it wouldn’t be surprising If there’d be another rising Said the man from the Daily Mail.”

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All of a sudden, when I was riding my metrosexual bike today, I had “Don’t forget me Tommy” in my head. What a great simple melancholic song. THE FREEZE’s debut sounds like it was recorded with the cheapest equipment and not mixed at all. But I’ll be damned if this is not a fantastic record! As always, Cliff’s vocals are outstanding.

I’ve seen both red and yellow sleeve variations of this. Mine had no insert – does yours have one?

I hate Tourists.mp3
Don’t forget me Tommy.mp3

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The debate is on!

“If this is Metal, Deep Purple is Punk!” (Lao Tse, «Tao te king»)

How we rock Intro.mp3 / How we rock.mp3
Words that kill.mp3
The Choice.mp3
On the Road.mp3
What it takes.mp3 [<-- one of the Admin's fave tracks EVER!]
What if I.mp3

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Classic video from the old days. A band from Liverpool (fastest band back then) covering ANAL CUNT.

Greetings to Seth.

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There’s nothing I could write about the BAD BRAINS that you didn’t already know. Everything (and I mean everything) the band laid hand on before “I against I” turned into solid gold. All the controversy the band stirred, the boring records, the idiotic statements that followed the bands course couldn’t even scratch the surface of the phenomenal “ROIR Tape”, the “Rock for Light” album or the unearthly “Black Dots” session.
“Pay to cum” might be one of the few Punk songs that appeals to almost anybody. I think it’s because of the power and drive so overwhelming. This is the best version of the song, although I haven’t heard the obscure alternate take that originally appeared on a laquer-disk only version of this 7″. “Stay to close to me” is a catchy song, especially the middle part, which breaks out of the Reggae/Dub scheme a bit and adds that special flavor.

This comes from the 1989 japanese counterfeit bootleg version. I once held the original first press with cover in my hands in a small record store in San Francisco’s Polk St. in ’86. It cost something like 20$. I thought it was too much cause I already had “Pay to cum” on the “New York T(h)rash” cassette. Yeah, don’t tell me …. these days, I’d cum to pay …..

Pay to cum.mp3
Stay close to me.mp3

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Tough Punk from Holland, leaning towards the Hardcore side. ZMIV also had three tracks on the mandatory second “Als je haar maar goed Zit” comp. LP, but these songs were really really weak. It’s like the guitar wanking, which fits perfectly on this EP and is still very moderate, got totally out of hand.
But on this very hard to find EP, you’ll get the full dose, including really dumb lyrics: You’ll be able to make out most of “Lay down” yourself. “Wir haben es nicht gewusst” (“We didn’t know it” – one of the most heard phrases coming from Germans after World War 2, in face of the horrors of the concentration camps) compares the death of one rioter in Germany (got rolled over by a cop car) to the 6 millions in the camps – only Punks can get so fucking dumb. I guess you have to be dumb to make really great, wild, primitive music.

Don’t feel like writing more at the moment, but since there seems to be a decrease in the readers commenting, I guess it’s just fair. Yeah, Peter from KBD Records had posted a few songs of this before and there’s an official repress with a dramatically ugly cover. You should however order it, I think, because I like the idea of people doing things I told them to do.
The original track list is a bit messy: I corrected it, putting the songs in actual order in which they’re listed on the labels, I think that is how they were intended to be arranged.

Lay down.mp3
Alive.mp3
Why.mp3
Wir haben es nicht gewusst.mp3
Fame.mp3
Beware.mp3
G.B.C.mp3

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Every decent blog has got to have his share of POISON IDEA and although I had mine already (here and here), here’s some more. I have absolutely no idea whether this has been re-released or not and candidly spoken: I don’t care, cuz this is a smasher of a (double) 7″!
POISON IDEA who never liked the idea of other people putting out their music (sorry ’bout this, guys!) had a strict policy concerning bootlegs: They responded immediately to them by officially re-releasing the material in demand. First practiced here with: When some german fellow decided to put the band’s rare cassette-only “Plastic Bomb” demo onto vinyl, POISON IDEA were quick to release this double 7″ with additional material and in superior sound quality.

So first, we have “Plastic Bomb” in the demo version. You’ll notice the different lead part in the ouverture (the final version on “Feel the Darkness” had straightened this out), but apart from that, this version totally kills, especially the twin guitar part in the solo which makes one think of Judas Priest a bit, doesn’t it? On the flip, the cover round starts, they rip through the prevously released (on the SubPop 7″) “We got the Beat”. The Go-Go’s original is a neat song, but POISON IDEA totally destroy it with this monster. One of the band’s high-lights, no doubt! Then (and I couldn’t believe my eyes when I first saw this), the band who had brought you “I hate Reggae” in 1983, delivers Jimmy Cliff’s “The harder they come”. And I shall be damned if this is not a great version! “Lawdy Miss Clawdy” was a song originally written by Lloyd Price in the early 50s, but made famous by Elvis. I think that the POISON IDEA version does the song no justice at all (it’s got a lot of atmosphere and tension in both Price’s and Elvis’ versions). POSION IDEA’s cover versions did not always work, another example would be the band’s attempt to catch the vibe of G.I.S.M. in which they miserably failed too. So be it.

Plastic Bomb.mp3
We got the Beat.mp3
Harder they come.mp3
Lawdy, Miss Clawdy.mp3

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