Fuckshitupism deluxe.
GENERICS- Societal Hemhorrage 7″EP (selfproduced, Canada, 1985)
Thought it was about time for a repost of this criminally undererstimated little pearl. This could widely be considered a classic and I will never understand why it isn’t. Even if you did first time around – give this another listen. All freshly re-ripped with love. First published Aug 3 2006.
Recorded in 1983 but due to the tragic death of the singer Marc Sahrmann not released until early 1985, this is one of the records that are just too great for words. Apparently very much on the anarcho-side of things as far as lyrics and graphics go, the music is a very unique mixture of saxophone-driven punk with out-in-space guitars and the vehemence of Hardcore. I really have never heard anything like this before! Totally underrated, obscured, forgotten – hopefully this may help in changing that.
Collectors notice: the original press was either 400 or 500 copies (that’s what my sources say). In the mid 90′s, some very nice chap from Germany made a 300 copies bootleg of this and that was a true labour of love, complete with heavy stock cover (the original has a very thin paper foldout) and all. I wish I hadn’t sold my copy of it!
Due to the greatness and rarity of this gem, I’m making it fully accessible. Put your feet up and get ready for some serious mind-bogglin’ and emotional overflow:
Someday.mp3
Freedom Six Feet Down.mp3
Outcasts Of Society.mp3
There Are No Virgins Anymore.mp3
Postscriptum: Oh yes, the crackling. Well, this is what happens if you have a professional jazz fan with his professional superduper record cleaning machine taking care of your worthless punk shit. It cost me 3 $.
Anonymous wrote:
Was looking for this for years and years. Used to see them live every now and then it was a killer band! Thanks so much!
[Reply]
Posted on 03-Aug-06 at 8:06 am | Permalink
Mike Woodford wrote:
There’s a pretty informative bio of Generics to be found here if anyone is interested…
Generics
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Posted on 03-Aug-06 at 9:14 am | Permalink
E. wrote:
Thanks a lot, Mike. I didn’t know of this site – it’s a great biography of this extraordinary band!
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Posted on 03-Aug-06 at 9:30 am | Permalink
Mike Woodford wrote:
My pleasure.
If you look at the rest of the London Scarchives you’ll see alot of great bands from Southwestern Ontario from the same era. There should be a link somewhere on the site to the CHRW archives where you’ll find full recordings of the records as well. Unfortunately they were ripped at a low bitrate but beggers can’t be chosers I suppose.
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Posted on 04-Aug-06 at 1:22 am | Permalink
Peter - KBDRecords wrote:
Ops! Missed this one the first time around. What can I say?? Killer stuff? Yeah that sounds intelligent enough.
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Posted on 10-Aug-06 at 8:17 am | Permalink
Anonymous wrote:
Hey thanks for the kudos. I’m glad someone appreciates it, ‘cos after spending millions for studio time, hiring the top producer in the industry, the London Philharmonic Orchestra, and all those guest musicians like Rick Wakeman and Jimmy Page, it’s nice to get some positive feedback.
Great site by the way. So much I’ve never even heard before, a lot of it I didn’t even know existed!
Cheers
Chris (Generics rock & roll guitar superhero)
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Posted on 03-Jan-07 at 11:09 am | Permalink
Erich wrote:
Thanks for stopping by, Chris. Please drop me a line if you got some more GENERICS material you’d like to spread.
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Posted on 03-Jan-07 at 12:18 pm | Permalink
Anonymous wrote:
Oh, by the way. If anyone’s interested, there’s an “official” 21st century digital alternateen-friendly Generics myspace site here:
http://www.myspace.com/generics80
All comments, hate mail, death threats, etc. are welcome.
Chris
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Posted on 03-Jan-07 at 12:21 pm | Permalink
Tim wrote:
Could you re-up these possibly?
When I click the links it downloads very small files that don’t play.
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Posted on 09-Mar-08 at 2:07 am | Permalink
filthy chris wrote:
this is amazing. total ripper. the vocals are righteous. i read that they replaced the singer early on. is there any other material out there featuring this rob reiss dude?
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Posted on 14-Apr-09 at 2:41 pm | Permalink
::beatMe:: wrote:
must have missed these the first time. very very good!! “six feet under” is a monster of a song!!!
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Posted on 09-Jun-09 at 12:05 pm | Permalink
Jay Thurston wrote:
It sounds like they hired Eddie Van Halen to do the guitar work on this one…as well as the first singer for Toxic Reasons(Ed)? Other than that, I do like the snaps, crackles and pops. Thanks Erich
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Posted on 10-Jun-09 at 7:01 pm | Permalink
What's the Truth? wrote:
Thanks! I missed this one the first time around because the links had expired, but I’m glad it was reposted. It’s excellent. There seem to be a few bands, like Neon Hearts, Lilliput, Razzia, and that Braille Party LP I dled from here, that are good with mixing punk/hardcore with the so-called “post-punk,” and I really enjoy when this is done well.
Also, on the topic of anomalous genre-bridging, and since I know Erich is a history man, I just got the recently-released 1974 demo “For the Whole World to See” by the 70s Detroit band Death. It’s fantastic…a great example of Detroit garage rock’s connection to early punk, and then also an example of the unclear boundaries between early punk and its ancestors…this sounds like it was part of the punk, and even proto-hardcore scene, but was created completely in isolation from them. A few songs sound almost EXACTLY like they could be on the early Bad Brains demos, from the chords to the vocals. Here’s a surprisingly accurate mainstream review:
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/03/15/arts/music/15rubi.html
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Posted on 11-Jun-09 at 10:03 pm | Permalink
Admin wrote:
“For the whole world to see” is one scorcher of an album, indeed. The sound of it alone makes me wanna jump around, the tight rhythm section, the vocals and some of the songs have a massive amount of power. A worthy re-release everybody should have heard. Here’s an example on youtube:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LuILbMSrKRQ&feature=related&pos=2
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Posted on 12-Jun-09 at 12:06 am | Permalink
What's the Truth? wrote:
In Foucault’s essay “Nietzsche, Genealogy, History,” there is a line about genealogy tracing not just what forces made something possible, but tracing things that did not happen as well, and how that absence contributed to the turn of events. I think that’s applicable to both this Generics release, and to the Death demo.
Death was a band that was playing something that would almost certainly have been called “punk” had punk found its way to them in the 70s. They could have been progenitors of a scene in Detroit. Maybe they never heard a punk record or met any punks during their time, and so it was shelved. It’s interesting to consider how different things might have turned out, at least in Detroit and for this band, if somehow they had been punk. Hell, maybe they would have integrated into the punk scene, garnered a different set of influences, developed differently, maybe they would have have lost their uniqueness as a result of conforming to those punk influences and that scene. Now, decades later, they have been uncovered by the children of the band members, who themselves were in a hardcore band, and projected “punk” onto the sound they heard in the demos based on their own understanding of “punk’s” musical traits. Now, Death has become “punk,” even a canonical artifact for some record collectors. History is weird stuff…
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Posted on 12-Jun-09 at 8:54 am | Permalink
Federico wrote:
Really great 7″, thanks a lot Erich!
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Posted on 13-Jun-09 at 12:13 am | Permalink
chano wrote:
Grrrreat vokills!!! Great guitar sound too… Very good new wave-ish hardcore-punk!!! Thanx for posting some of best stuff, Erich.
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Posted on 15-Jun-09 at 2:03 am | Permalink
Jay Thurston wrote:
It is definitely time for a new post….
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Posted on 20-Jun-09 at 4:19 pm | Permalink
Levi Johnston wrote:
This is a great record, but not nearly as enjoyable as the synopsis of the Iron Maiden movie.
I was particularly impressed with this observation: “Heavy Metal as a technique of the self.” Yes! Masturbation is indeed a genius metaphor for the “deeply political,” social phenomenon known as Heavy Metal.
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Posted on 20-Jun-09 at 6:42 pm | Permalink
Admin wrote:
That was a very funny remark, Levi, hahaha.
And yes, it’s about highest time for a new post!
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Posted on 20-Jun-09 at 11:16 pm | Permalink
vile76 wrote:
Hi Erich,
I do have this 7″ at home but I do have a more complete session with 6 songs. I did have it by the german guy who released the repress of this 7″.
Unfortunatly, I lost the piece of paper with tracklist.
[Reply]
Posted on 03-Jul-09 at 7:49 am | Permalink
Admin wrote:
That sounds interesting! Sinceyou have your own blog thing going – how about posting these songs? Maybe somebody will be giving us the song titles once they’re floating around.
[Reply]
Posted on 03-Jul-09 at 8:01 am | Permalink