Thanks to Aesop / Cosmic Hearse for exposing SLOUGH FEG. What a mind blowing piece of (traditional) Metal perfectionism! Almost a bit too good, if you know what I mean.
Recommended Movie:
«All the President's Men", the movie about the Watergate scandals that brought down Richard Nixon. Totally singular movie like there's no second around. And on a side note: Yes, I'd vote Obama too if I could.
Reading:
«Franz Kafka - Die Jahre der Erkenntnis» by Reiner Stach picks things off where he left them with the previous volume of this monstrous Kafka biography. Totally overthrowing all clichés about the writer's life and work, these books leave me cluesless. Since I admire everything done with a certain degree of obsession, I like Stach's biography quite a bit. On the other hand, he's constantly overvoicing Kafka, dissecting and reassembling him mercilessly, often forgetting that it's the writer who creates his objects by writing about them. Still, few biographies had kept me so still on my seat. Find out yourself and see how "the man who had problems with everything" becomes "the man who is everybody's problem".
The MAIDS one and only release has been posted here and there before, but that just can’t hold me back from running my own feature. The two songs on this 7″ were first introduced to me by a fellow tape and record trader from Germany, very late, just before the internet changed everything. I had never heard of them before; it was one of these little treasures that were easy to oversee in the before-KBD / internet times (they came almost parallel, did you ever notice?). A local band, a small press 7″, a weird band name. I was fortunate enough however to having seen a copy of this in a local record store just days earlier, so once I caught the bug (in a matter of seconds), I just could go there and buy this 7″ for a couple fränklis. The incredible sound of the actual vinyl alone made me hold my breath: Popping fresh, raw and with very present guitars on both “Back to Bataan” and “I do I do”. Fantastic how the band stays somehow vague about what’s going in these few minutes here: Were they serious about their music, were they being ironic? Is there a subtle message, something like a key that would allow you to understand what the fuck is going here? You guessed it - there ain’t and if there ever was, it got lost in time and during the shift of the music to another continent. To me, this is pure, youthful joy, a powerful kinky slap in the face of powerpop and beat revivalists or the emerging wave of grim Hardcore taking over the Californian Punk scene at the time. Name of the guitarist: John Ritalin - how great is that?! The song writing is basic and I don’t think these two songs are really innovative in terms of composition – yet whatever it is; it WORKS. And how it works. The break on “I do I do”, with the bass strings sounding like atomic elastic bands or the incredibly riffing in “Bataan” and the sweet vocals on top of everything: It’s pure energy, joy and a good dose of aggression of the non-aggressive sort. One of the most defining moments in in the as of yet unwritten history of the music of underground Punk worldwide! If you don’t understand this, you have no brains and if it doesn’t make you happy, you have no heart.
Read the extensive and funny L.A. Weekly story on MAIDS and the KBD-hype around them here. A must read, although the article is 8 years old (fuck, time flies!).
Hi-quality transfer from vinyl and scans of the very rare insert (only 100 copies had this, apparently).
When CHAOS Z is german transcendental punk, then SEIZURE is american utiilitarian hardcore. Simple, primitive, umpa-umpa-umpa and effective at that til head explosion. There’s a good bit of Motorcycle Punk thrown in too and probably other styles too. After this came out (I think I had it ordered from Charlie Infection’s mailorder), “Pain is Pain is Pain” was featured on every comp tape I made and the song still affects me in ways too unprosaic to describe. SEIZURE came from Connecticut and were featured on “Make it work” and “Connecticut Fun” comps too. They also had a 12″ with a paper sleeve and some pink color on it after this. I used to have it, but sold it. So it could have been really bad or maybe it was really good, but I wasn’t ready for it. We’ll probably never know.
I love the photo of the cool cat of a singer Karl with his sunglasses and that the guitarist Sex Bomb is a man of larger proportions. On the photo, he looks a bit like Pig Champion in a Popeye the Sailor dress. Killer! Oh yes - and I’ve never met anybody who liked this 7″. That makes it even better!
Back with a brand new 750 GB internal hard disk drive (the old one had serious physical damage after only 2 years) and a brand new stereophonic pick up head (which considerably improves the sound on my hifi).
THE FUTURE LOOKS BRIGHT is plain and simple one of the greatest compilations you will ever hear. Originally released as a cassette tape, 500 copies were pressed onto black gold shortly after and these were sent out to radio stations, zines and promoters only. With some tracks altered, it was officially released as “The Future looks brighter” a bit later, but as always, the first version is the one to have.
There’s not one song to be missed here. If you’re unfamiliar with the early west coast sound or if you just want to give yourself a serious kick in the butt with a comp that goes off like a rocket, then this is quintessential, featuring some of the best of SST, Posh Boy and New Alliance bands.
Hit after hit! SHATTERED FAITH shatter & restore faith, TSOL rip shit up, SOCIAL DISTORTION distort, CH 3 sing about concentration camps for american japanese, MINUTEMEN make me dance around naked, DESCENDENTS were never better, SACCHARINE TRUST as always basically destroy every other band with their cynicism from their mandatory 12er, BLACK FLAG shine in pre-Rollins glory and the STAINS somehow managed to steal Gregg Ginns guitar for recording the bands one and only LP, from which the final track is lifted. Some versions of the songs on FUTURE LOOKS BRIGHT seem unreleased elsewhere (Black Flag?), but I’m too lazy to compare right now.
Oh yeah - the labels are plain b&w, not yellowish like on the shots above. So don’t sweat, there’s only press of this ’round. Never in ps, this came in a plain white die-cut sleeve.
Switzerland’s premiere Punk band NASAL BOYS released this much acclaimed 7″ only and that’s a shame. Some of the wildest and fastest Punk around in 1977! “Hot Love” is the instant hit. Driving, memorable and like some old hippie once said when he heard early 7 SECONDS in a squat: “This sounds a bit like Nasal Boys on 78 rpm”. The b-side is weird. Punk again, aggressive and short, but with some weird 60s feeling thrown in. Can you hear the MONKS? I can.
In a TV interview from 1977, the band was asked why they didn’t dress punky. “We’re against clichés”, the singer responded, and: “Our main inspiration is U.S. Punk, not U.K. Punk.” Guess one can hear that. Still, the band got famous for opening up for CLASH when they played in Zurich in 1977. Some years ago, a great quality 1/4 reel tape surfaced, containing both the CLASH’s and NASAL BOYS’ set, but unfortunately, I wasn’t able to get a copy. The guy who had it, didn’t want to share; not everybody is as generous as me, the musical knight in shiny armor …. You can see a reprodcution of the gig poster and a short live review from Switzerland’s first Punk Fanzine NO FUN below (from issue number 1, click to enlarge). After the short article, the reviewer asks: “Where have the Metalrockers been? Forget them. The future of Rock has begun!” And I thought, Punk was about no future and stuff:
Shortly after, the band tried to make it big and changed name to EXPO. They released an LP on a big label (and some 7″, if memory serves) which is ‘kay but nowhere near the glory of this single. Former members went on to form BUCKS, a highly influential Punk band for Zürich. From issue 3 of NO FUN, released in January 1978, comes this nice NASAL BOYS interview you can see here:
I have a complete set of NO FUN (issues number 1 to 18) for sale. Immaculate condition, issue 4 contains an original piece of art by Fischli / Weiss, done for NO FUN exclusively. The fanzines span the time from Oct. 1977 to June 1980 (until the breakout of the riots) and are as fascinating a document as impossible to find, especially in this condition. If interested, get in touch. Proceeds will be used to buy a professional tape deck in order to start digitizing more of my collection of tapes.
Recently found this absolutely amazing video footage on youtube and thought I had to share. SAINT VITUS opened up for BLACK FLAG in London, Ontario in Canada. Whereas BLACK FLAG had a Henry Rollins who got more and more obsessed with his image (check the videos on youtube) that night, SAINT VITUS play a perfectly tight show with the original singer Scott Reagers. I’ve had this as a bad quality live tape for some time, but the youtube footage has way better sound.
Damn, this makes the other VITUS footage I had recently featured look and sound a bit pale in comparison. Go to this youtube page here and find the complete show chopped up into several pieces (and more goodies!).
The MAIDS one and only release has been posted here and there before, but that just can’t hold me back from running my own feature. The two songs on this 7″ were first introduced to me by a fellow tape and record trader from Germany, very late, just before the internet changed everything. I had never heard of them before; it was one of these little treasures that were easy to oversee in the before-KBD / internet times (they came almost parallel, did you ever notice?). A local band, a small press 7″, a weird band name. I was fortunate enough however to having seen a copy of this in a local record store just days earlier, so once I caught the bug (in a matter of seconds), I just could go there and buy this 7″ for a couple fränklis. The incredible sound of the actual vinyl alone made me hold my breath: Popping fresh, raw and with very present guitars on both “Back to Bataan” and “I do I do”. Fantastic how the band stays somehow vague about what’s going in these few minutes here: Were they serious about their music, were they being ironic? Is there a subtle message, something like a key that would allow you to understand what the fuck is going here? You guessed it - there ain’t and if there ever was, it got lost in time and during the shift of the music to another continent. To me, this is pure, youthful joy, a powerful kinky slap in the face of powerpop and beat revivalists or the emerging wave of grim Hardcore taking over the Californian Punk scene at the time. Name of the guitarist: John Ritalin - how great is that?! The song writing is basic and I don’t think these two songs are really innovative in terms of composition – yet whatever it is; it WORKS. And how it works. The break on “I do I do”, with the bass strings sounding like atomic elastic bands or the incredibly riffing in “Bataan” and the sweet vocals on top of everything: It’s pure energy, joy and a good dose of aggression of the non-aggressive sort. One of the most defining moments in in the as of yet unwritten history of the music of underground Punk worldwide! If you don’t understand this, you have no brains and if it doesn’t make you happy, you have no heart.
