putrid diamonds

Blah.

2011-06-21T13:43:00.001-07:00

Last year a local newspaper had this writing and illustration contest for teams of two. They gave you a genre to write in and a author whose writing style you had to imitate. For illustrators, they just gave you an artist to imitate. Anyway, I had to write a horror story in the style of James Joyce. I came up with this cheesy little thing but had fun writing it. Illustration by Mercedes JG, who had to rip off Van Gogh or something.

Indeed, you sometimes find yourself in an odd placement in life so to speak, dabbling in this and that here and there and thereafter, you sometimes, as mother would say, end up wandering by mistake into whatever trouble lies past some grimy street corner or alley like the one time I was surreptitiously roughed up by some ruffians while walking home from school, my beloved Doc Martens stolen, I had to walk barefoot all the way home, whereupon I was greeted by mother's worst possible humor for the loss of the footwear that father had worked so hard at the mill to earn the money for, or like the one time a friendly officer decided to crack down on the head of the protester I was assumed to be while simply making my way down the block to buy some coffee and Spanish onions, and that's really how it usually goes on: you go ahead and mind your own and suddenly realize you're caught up in a veritable whirlpool of trouble, distress, and, generally, pain of the physical and moral kind, with no end in sight and the certainty that, as they shay, 'it ain't over 'till the fat lady sings', with the fat lady being a clever metaphor -of the kind I favor, being as I am an educated gent- for the sirens of the police cars and ambulances liable to appear at any such event like that one time some crowd started gathering outside of the school and it a brawl of considerate dimensions broke out for reasons still unbeknownst to anyone and..
Anyway.
The predicament I found myself now was, even with my penchant for mischief and what I’ve come to term 'vital irregularity', peculiarly different from the usual, being that I was locked up for the night in the house up on the hill on the outskirts of town which, I shouldn't need to add but will do anyway, was abandoned and supposedly haunted by ghosts and ghouls and creepy crawling creatures of all kinds known to man's fantasies and perhaps even some unknown, why you might even run into Chtulu himself if you were to believe what the local lore had been saying since any of us had any recollection of such things, and even despite the fact that no one had ever seen or heard anything coming from there besides the odd rat crawling out of the bushes out by the front yard, it was said, however, that the house was inhabited by the ghosts of Sir Henry Wagford and his life-long wife Wilhelmina, beloved early settlers of our town which did so back in the good old days of 1893, with all that it entailed, no running water, no electricity, tuberculosis running rampant on a seasonal basis, yet it seems that the Wagfords were wonderful people of culture, prone, like many other cultured souls of the time, to the infatuation with the occult, and are rumored to have hosted in their home the visit of none other than Aleister Crowley during an American tour by Mister Great Beast himself and I can certainly imagine Henry and Wilhelmina just sitting there enjoying their tea, minding their business and Oh dear, Crowley telegraphed, he's coming over for dinner tomorrow, I hope it's perfectly fine, and old Wilma would answer But Henry baby, the servants did a full spring cleaning just yesterday, I suppose and truly hope that Great Beast business has nothing to do with him being rude and dirty and unkempt and inconsiderate, and Henry would comfort Wilma and make her feel all better about having Crowley in for the day and how He (for, in the eyes of these occult aficionados, Aleister was a man of divine importance) would most surely be helpful in their reoccurring yet unsuccessful attempts at summoning the creatures from the other side of reality, the dark, brooding, mysterious multiverse where the shoggoths and the demons and the succubus and incubus and whatnot coexisted with the ghosts and spirits of persons past, something which particularly obsessed the Wagfords who seemed to have a peculiar fantasy of flooding their house with friendly spirits to keep them company to compensate for their horrible estranged relationship with pretty much every other living soul in town who actually suspected that Wilma was in fact a man and referred to the couple as 'those satanic sodomites' and also thought that they actually had managed to fill their house up with whatever beings and lived all together in some kind of non-stop satanic sodomite escapade.
But I digress.
One in the morning and my iPod battery runs out leaving me alone with the discomforting sounds of the house, these being the constant tiptaptiptaptiptaptiptap of a innumerable number of leaky ceilings, incessant scratching coupled with what seems to be small household items tumbling down and around above me which I attribute to rats in the cellar which is certainly not a comforting thought and screeeeeeeyyeeeach goes the fence door outside, to and fro to the rhythm of the wind while I'm sitting here hating my guts for being asinine enough to let myself get talked into this and oh darn, I could so very well be sitting at home right now instead of wasting time and risking getting bit by a rat and catching god-knows-what in the process and what the hell was that, I saw something move out there in the corner oh well probably some curtain or something that the wind moved and did some funny effect with the streetlights outside except there's no windows in that corner of the room and this is starting to get rather odd I must say and there's still a few hours left until morning and OH MY GOD I certainly have seen something there and it was a woman and she was blonde and was wearing something that looked blood-stained and WHAT WAS THAT NOW? I swear I saw something out by the kitchen door and OK, OK now, it's all right it's certainly normal to be led to believe you have seen a woman in a house you believe to be haunted but this is getting out of hand I swear I have just seen a second figure and this time it's a man I'm sure, so I better get on and make a dash for the door and to hell with this stupid bet as much as I need the money and hey....when exactly was this door locked?

Stupid fucking records and shit.

2011-04-18T11:21:00.001-07:00

More stuff. I haven't updated in forever because:
1) I couldn't be arsed (I am in no way British, nor do I intend to be, as I do not play in a 'street punk' band, but I always wanted to use that word).
2) I really did not have much to say. I understand if you operate in the punk scene where the kids ALWAYS have something meaningful and deep to say (even if its the intellectual equivalent of a spoonful of stale oatmeal spilled on a wheat field) about the state of the world, people they'd like to put in their place, or whatnot, this may come as a surprise, but I swear: some of us are dumb like that. I wish there were more of us actually, I'm sick of illiterate fucks making would-be (in kindergarden class, maybe) profound speeches about this or that everytime I try to go see some bands and get stupid. Read a book before you claim allegiance to whatever trendy progressive train of thought, dipshits.

So, anyway, here are a few reviews of new stuff I've acquired recently. Go.

BIG CRUX "Is a big funk" 7" - Anyone who knows anything about Big Crux knows they're constantly being compared to the Big Boys and the Minutemen. And anyone who knows anything about me knows I worship the former and am almost there with the latter. With this in mind, my relationship with this record could be a love story or a trainwreck. Hey look! it even has artwork by Tim Kerr, dammit!
It might be due to the fact that this is an avenue of punk rock that has not been taken by hundreds of bands yet (like say, d-beat or youth crew), but this is derivativeness at it best!: songs are energetic and fun, lyrics are engaging in style and content, and as much as it wears its influences on its sleeve (no pun intended), you never get the feeling these guys are trying too hard. As can be expected of Iron Lung Records, the record sounds, looks, and feels great, silkscreened covers included. I really hope they record more stuff, maybe a full length, I can see their songwriting growing like that. Oh yeah, some of them played in some other band or something, can't remember.

CSC "Amour et sourires" 12" - Valencia is a city in southeastern Spain, well known for being a haven for nazis and their RAC bands, some kind of drug party wonderland, and smelling weird. I would lie if I said I don't like the town. It's also the home of CSC, who are probably Spain's best-kept secret (due in no small part to the disastrous distribution this 12" has been subject to). The band features some Muerte A La Muerte alumni, but operate on a totally different level: snotty, manic KBD-styled riffage, where you can totally hear their garage/punk rock background shine through, including some dips into the unknown with weirdo movie samples played over trippy instrumental breaks and creepy solos that really bring to mind East Bay Ray's work, and while I can't quite put my finger on it, there's something (other than the obvious pre-HC82 influence on some of the riffage) that really brings to mind the early DC bands, but on a very bad acid trip and with song titles like 'Nazi pedophile'. Welcome to Valencia.

GOOD FELLAZ "4 Jams from western Africa" demo - In the summer of 2004 Marinus Van Beek left his hometown of Langedijk, Holland, to go on a pilgrimage through South Africa and look for a missing branch of his family tree. At some point during the flight, the plane went through what is known as the Uafulukua Plain, a not very well known spot of paranormal activity in the center of Congo, not unlike the Bermuda Triangle (except dryer and differently shaped), and was psychichally derailed towards the Canary Islands by virtue of an unexplained episode of mind control that took over the crew. The rest is history: we all know the story of KLM flight 762 crashing into a holiday resort in Tenerife and its resulting 'Little Twin Towers' episode. 356 dead, 1200 injured, infinite property damage. An entire island's tourist industry destroyed for years.
What is not so well known and in fact, has been kept from us by the media is that local authorities were unable to control the episodes of looting and scavenging that took over the disaster area. Impoverished locals scavenged the resort's ruins and the remains of the plane, debris and corpses were kicked aside to obtain big screen TV's, hotel safes and pairs of Nike Air Max. Among the ruins was Marinus Van Beek's corpse, trapped in a jam between two airplane seats, his iPod sticking out of his left shirt pocket. At the time, Marinus was a well known and very active member of the European hardcore scene, and his musical selection was (as is usually the case with trendy central europeans) a reflection of then current trends: groovy, big riffed, late 80s NYHC and the resulting revival evidenced by labels such as Lockin Out or Complete Control. Marinus' corpse returned to his family and was given a proper burial, but his iPod stayed in Tenerife, salvaged by some young street rat or other. And that is how Good Fellaz came to be.
This is much better than their previous demos and 7". Closing track is the handywork of Fácil-E from Muerte A La Muerte, bringin' the ruckus on this Akai MPC. Out on Super Soldier Tapes or you can listen to it online.

2011-02-21T10:52:00.000-08:00

Fosdyk Well - "slumber and stark lots" CD

Got this one for review, and, well, as much as it sucks having to review shit you don't care much about (if at all), it's pretty cool getting to do so with stuff you actually like. "Slumber and stark lots", huh?...pretty apt title for this baby, having a bit of both driving the songs. The 'slumber' bit does not imply at all that it's a boring record, and it's presented not in a dreamy, shoegazer-ish way, but in the hazy, confused way you feel when you finally get some sleep after three sleepless days on a speed binge and somebody wakes you up halfway through the night: confusedly stumbling, disoriented in your own room, somehow scared to death for the first 15 seconds. There's a definite ambient/cinematic feel brought forward by creepy background soundscapes which contrast perfectly with the crisp, stark (there you have it) guitars and slightly declamatory vocals that build the actual songs.
Yes, the promo sheets are right and there's echoes of Rivulets or Current 93 at their least epic on here, but at the end of the day, Fosdyk Well avoid the cliché stylings of 'neo folk' or whatever and simply deliver a solid set of moody songs stretching a bit over twenty minutes (perfect length for a record for those of us chastised by low attention spans after years of 10-song 7"s), wrapped in a nice, elegant layout, which would probably rule if it was on a 12" cover instead of a CD. But then again, if the only bone you have to pick with a record is its format, then you can't really complain.

Fosdyk Well on Bandcamp
Black City Records.

Records, records, records.

2011-01-25T11:47:00.000-08:00

So I got a few new records in the mail. And you know records are not meant to be listened to, they're meant to be blogged about and then mayyyybe flipped on eBay. So here we go. As always, no download links. I'm not your goddamn internet maid. I would also like to add some of these were PROMOS, that's right folks, I'm getting shit sent my way for free. You can do it.

Artic Flowers 7" - This band is obviously trying to capture the sounds of the old UK Anarchopunk bands that latched onto a more postpunk/goth kinda sound, and with people bringing up similarities to the Ruts, Gang Of Four, or the Au Pairs, I was really looking forward to it. I'm happy to say they have avoided the main problem that plagued these old limey bands, and most of their offspring: they were very succesful at throwing down a lot of flanging and effects and creating 'atmospheres' but totally inept at decent songwriting. Unfortunately for me, well written and all, "Neon Tombs" immediately reminded me of Spitboy and, even worse, Signal Lost, and totally ruined the rest of the record for me.

Insurgents "Fad Cash" 7" - Well, what can I say? This record (down to the cover artwork) is disgusting and filthy, the living, walking, talking image of small town boredom enhanced/subdued (sometimes it's all the same) by cheap drugs and shitty equipment. It's a sound that a trillion bands have tried to capture in recent times, but then again, most of them are not from Australia, a country known for producing bands in whichever style imaginable but constantly marked by what I can only define as an aggro weirdo vibe. Which is perfect, really. It really sounds like no particular band, but if you groove or have grooved in the past to the sounds of fine purveryors of musical garbage such as YDI, Void or The Mob (NY), you should get this.

Leather "Anchorite" 7" - Well, the last couple of years have seen a lot of bands move away from cookiecutter hardcore stylings (handbook youth crew/d-beat/80s retro/whatever exercises) and try to capture the disjointed, fucked up, hardcore sleaze of later period 'Flag, Saccharine Trust, Scratch Acid and all the usual suspects. I guess if you are like me, and were jaded on hardcore by age 19 and your enthusiasm for the genre got a new lease on life via buying a copy of 'Fucked Up & Photocopied' and discovering a lot of old, weird, and ugly hardcore bands, this is good news. As much as I can see right through a lot of these bands, and most of them reek of guys who were sucking mayor youth crew cock 18 months ago and are simply trying to latch on to a new set of clichés and style guidelines, as defined by the messageboard-born 'Mysterious Guy Hardcore' subgenre in an effort to live out their fantasies of being either a late-80s Henry Rollins or a current, better dressed Bruce Loose, which totally kills it in every which way possible, most of these bands shroud themselves in mystery (which in this day and age means having your internet presence reduced to an un-updated blog, no biggie) and if you live in third world Europe (as I do) there is very little way of finding out about them through the grapevine, so they got that shit covered by forcing you to give them the benefit of the doubt. Leather go for a nice sound like early SST channeled through late 80's Touch And Go, with all the crazy, lunge-at-your throat riffing, snaky guitar licks, and vocals that actually don't succumb to god-awful screechy screaming or pathetic attempts to sound like the guy from Pissed Jeans, but actually stay firmly rooted in slurry punk howling and yelping, I don't know, it kinda reminds me of Chris Thompson (Fury/Monorchid/etc..) at times, and that's a good thing. I'd like to see these guys record with a (slightly) cleaner, trebly sound, not Billy Anderson-clean, but Spot-clean, crunchy and warm and comfy. I like.

Máximo Volumen "Inyecciones por el bul" LP - This is the vinyl pressing of a 1987 spanish hardcore demo which I reviewed in an early entry of this blog. And that's pretty much all I can say about it. It's a nicely done reissue, with lyrics and some graphics pulled out of old zines (not an easy feat, let me tell you). It's raw, it's ugly, and it's pure nonsense at times, but if you like your hardcore raw and exotic, it's a must have. Limited to 300 copies, get in touch with Terminal Picnic Records before it's all gone.

Merchandise "Strange songs in the dark" LP - Murky production that works, decent album length, I could really see myself getting into this, and seeing how some people I trust were enthusiastic about it, I really tried but..I don't know, there's something missing here...you know 'that extra push over the cliff' that Nigel Tufnel talked about? Well that's it. They stuck to the most boring elements of shoegaze (aimless wandering amongst songs) and post punk (being bored and affected and distant as an excuse for being boring), and, I don't want to be that guy, but really, this record needs some guts, some blood, something other than jaded slackery. Pretty tepid response from yours truly. I guess I could get into this if I was depressed because the new dorm I moved to was a few blocks further away from American Apparel than the last one. Or if I was a girl.

2010 collected in lumps of spinning plastic.

2010-12-30T08:57:00.000-08:00

Yeah, yeah, yeah, no updates ever, but I feel like my expansive fan base is used to that by now, so anybody with a problem with it can do a triple backflip and suck my throbbing gristle. I'm lazy when it comes to new records, but I managed to scrape a few selections and put together the mandatory years-end list. Here you go. No download links because I still believe in buying records.

- The Young "voyagers of legend" LP . - I reviewed this a couple of posts back, and I doubt I can top that one. So there you have it. The one thing that sucks about this record is how expensive it is, as much as it's worth every damn penny.

- Glam 7". - MRR gave this a great, wordy review. I'm a couple of steps below that intelectually, so let's just say it's just good, solid hardcore, with no gimmicks or cliché style allegiances. A turbulent mass of swirling vocals drenched in delay, fast thumping beats, and beefy guitar and bass. There's a sort of in-joke comparing Glam with dutch band Vogue, down to the (I guess, I hope) tongue-in-cheeky names. True that. But really, they are much better. And oh yeah, comparisons to Invasión are just as lazy as they are clueless.

- Deskonocidos "en la oscuridad" LP. - 'Death rock' sucks as a label, and is usually synonimous with boring sub-Christian Death crap played by dudes in vinyl suits. 'Death punk' while cooler-sounding, has been ruined forever by those norwegian bufoons that I won't name. Hence, I find myself at a strange situation where I'll actually have to describe what these guys sound like without easy/lazy tags. Basically, they've set the perfect example for how a punk lp should work: expanding the style presented on previous 7"s to suit an all-around longer record. Songs are big, catchy, well crafted, arrangement wise Vampis has reached into his bag of tricks and pulled out a grip of well-flanged delicacies to layer upon the slithery bass lines, interesting drum patterns and uh, lyrics about various forms of death and related issues, which I fully back. I know this reads like a review of the latest Panda Bear or El Guincho or whatever, but Deskonocidos keep it real with blaring spazzy vocals, and the ocassional outburst of legitmate punkness like "Alemania". It's a great punk lp to listen to again and again. The only sour point could be the Paralisis Permanente cover, but I have to say that I've been listening to that poser punk band since age 12, grown to hate them, and find this cover pretty damn listenable. It's actually pretty good.

- Muerte A La Muerte demo .- See I have a problem with Spanish hardcore. On the one hand you got the shitty bands. Shitty, shitty, shitty bands that make a shitty mess with pieces of shit they've tried to pick up from their favorite bands and got lost in translation. On the other hand, you got a raging epidemic of Napoleon complex that usually makes me want to stay away (proximity, you see). That's why MALM rule: they suck, they know, and they don't care. They'll never pose, they'll never give out tailor-made interviews full of hard talk they'll never back in the real world, they'll never make 8 shirt designs after playing one show to a dozen of their friends, and they'll probably never even learn how to play their instruments. "And I luv it". Yeah, I just quoted Young Jeezy.

- Men's Interest "More war" 7" .- This is the way the world ends: not with a bang but with a creep and a crawl and a knife to the throat.

- Costa "Morfina"/Carmona "Actitud salvaje" .- I'm reviewing these two records together because it makes sense. Not only are they buddies and both feature on each others records, but both platters share production jobs by the one and only Sendy, who manages to spit out a bunch of his trademark beats, as flashy as they are grimey and as heavy as they are arranged and subtle. Seriously, great job. I could probably listen to these as instrumental versions, but luckily, we have two monsters on the mike, telling their tales of crime, money, sex, drugs and Madridian street life with mid paced, somewhat clunky, classic sounding flows and feature a bunch of their friends on their records (Ivan Nieto, Romo, Darmo, Kunta K), providing clever verbal wordplay, punch lines and metaphores that will probably fly over a bunch of people's heads, and enrage many others. This kind of shit is somewhat new to Spanish rap and people seem to have a problem with it. Me? I just happen to like good shit.

-Swans "My father will guide me up a rope to the sky" LP .- I'm afraid of not doing this record justice and making Michael Gira want to kill me. Or even just making him want to come up and talk to me. I admit I was expecting some kind of retarded cash-in comeback or simply an Angels Of Light affair under a different name but no sir, this is a bonafide Swans record, basically expounding on all of their sonic trademarks without actually falling into the trap of being a carbon copy of their old selves and it works perfect. It crawls, it lurches, it lunges at you and aims for the throat. Gira is as imposing as ever vocally and lyrically, and the whole thing is just so massive I couldn't have thought of a better cover image. I have dreams in which this LP takes the Best Coast record and fucks it up the ass.

-Integrity "We are the end" 7" .- As much as I tried, I could never get into post-Melnick Integrity. As a matter of fact, I refused to refer to them as 'Integrity', prefering instead 'Dwid and his mariachis'. It wasn't only the line-up change, it was also the fact that those records always seemed like crappy has-been attempts at past glory for hardcore dipshits to spout half baked Process shit over while typing in messageboards. However, maybe due to a good, hearty breakfast on recording day, they got it right this time, and whatever it is Dwid sings about this time, he does so over a d-beat and blazing solos that are so over the top they're ridiculous. Stop bitching about one sided 7"s and get on this shit. Oh yeah, d/l code didn't work.

- Cult Of Youth "Filthy plumage in an open sea" 12" .- The thing about these 'neo-folk' (or whatever) outfits is that you have to admit that you somehow take seriously all the occult/mysterious/sketchy hoopla they surround themselves with. The fact that they usually spend more time working on said hoopla and their fashion choices than on music usually makes it very complicated to actually find some worthwile stuff to listen to amidst the piles upon piles of GARBAGE that make up the genre. COY seem to have their shit right on and actually make good songs (an intriguing concept in current music if there ever was one, I know). Yeah, all the imagery, the spooky voices which can be either terrifying or comical, depending on your mood, the nazi summer campfire acoustic guitars, the runes and the sigils, but there's also songwriting skills and an attencion to detail on the production and arrangements that pays off. Another thing would be the fact that, gloom notwithstanding, they have a fiery, passionate energy to their writing and playing that totally makes it. 'Eiwhaz' (oh heck, runes!) has this totally cool drum beat and snarling electric guitar that somewhat reminds us all that these types come from the same cesspool of a town that birthed Sonic Youth and Teenage Jesus & The Jerks.

Anhelo Escalante (II)

2010-10-11T03:04:00.000-07:00

PD: I love your artwork, do you remember when you started to actually work on it? Did you look to any other artists for inspiration?

Anhelo: Well I attended the Nuevo Leon School of Visual Arts. Just for a couple of years in 2000. My family was more interested in me studying music, but I thought it was pretty stupid because I didn't want to end up playing in a shitty orchestra making 80 pesos a week, which seems pretty stupid now, since I don't even make 50 a week nowadays playing in a small indie band. There's a lot of artists, painters, musicians, and poets in my family; it's a big family, my mom has twelve siblings and my dad has eight, so I grew up in a crowd of about twenty children of all ages for whom fun meant lying down in the cold floor of my grandma's patio to draw. But back to your question, I was never good at drawing, unlike the rest of my family, I seemed to be less able, and not even college made me better, in fact it made me hate it. It wasn't until almost four years ago, I went through a very depressive state during which I locked myself up at home and drew for no reason at all other than killing time. Coffee all day and a joint, that's what made me have some confidence in art. I haven't stopped since, I love drawing and all the different methods to create images.

PD: Is it easy making a living in Mexico with a "creative" profession?

Anhelo: funny that you mention it, most of the illustrators I know were really planning on working as something else: painters, graphic or industrial designers. They work as illustrators to make a little more money. I don't know a single person who works exclusively as an illustrator, it's usually only an alternative to make a few extra bucks, and all of it being overworked. You have to work for differente employers, but I think that's pretty common anywhere.
Usually in Mexico people have two jobs: the one that feeds them, and the one that makes them happy. Most employers want somebody that can do three jobs in one, but gets paid for half of one. But I also think it's a question of attitude, if money is what you want, you just sell yourself and do it. Mexico is a country where if you want money you can just "buy it" and if you want passion you starve to death.

PD: What about the States?

Anhelo: I think that in the states if somebody wants money he can just go to school and pay attention, and if he wants passion he'll do ok. But in Mexico, a college education is either a luxury or a reward for your constant determination and effort.

PD: You just finished a book that probably no one reading this blog will ever see, want to plug it?

Anhelo: Yeah, sure. There's a small press in Mexico called Samsara, it's a small independent publisher that makes books pretty much as a labor of love; they have division called Habitación 69 where they intend to publish any kin of erotica: photography, poetry, illustration, etc.. You're right, maybe no one will see it because it will be a very limited pressing of 100, but it's not bad considering it's my first book an artist and illustrator.

The Young - Voyagers Of Legend.

2010-10-10T15:38:00.001-07:00

I'm not really too active when it comes to seeking out current bands. Actually, I'll come across a lot of them due to friends recommending them to me, but I'll usually tire of them after 10 minutes. There's nothing wrong with the bands, it's just me. I'm old, I'm jaded. After more than ten years I have not grown tired of Black Flag or Negative Approach or Poison Idea, I can still listen to 'Age Of Quarrel' 'Forever changes' and 'Enter the Wu Tang' on a daily basis for three months straight. I guess I'm comfortable with what I like so I don't really feel the need to listen to current replays of records I love. Even bands that pipe themselves as 'creative' and 'innovative' are usually a mish-mash of a lot of good stuff that ends up sounding like shit when put together. The Young's LP 'Voyagers Of Legend' is an example of none of that, and to celebrate, I'll do the thing I hate and write a record review.

Like a lot of other current bands (that shall remain nameless), The Young build their sound on the foundations of 60s sounds sparked with a backbone of garage-y punk grunge (not Grunge). Unlike those bands, however, The Young don't seem to have any kind of retro-dress-up or 'look at me I'm weird' vibe. They just rock. And ooze. Kinda like an 18 wheeler full of lava lamps that just crashed into a south western desert rock (not Rock) formation.

I'm no musician, but writing an LP seems like tricky business.You need to balance the musical weight just right if you want it to seem like a cohesive piece of work, and not just a bunch of songs put together. In that sense, 'Voyagers of legend', just like 'Space ritual', 'Easter everywhere', or 'Youth Of America' (all pretty valid reference points if you ask me), flows perfectly from start to finish. So much, in fact, when it's over you just want to listen to it again, and again, and again, until a huge blur of desert landscapes complete with abandoned towns take over the room. Some time around then, you'll start feeling like you're stuck in a gravel pit with a quart of bourbon on your right hand, the most potent weed rolled up in your left, and no intention of leaving. Ever.

Just perfect.

The Young - 'Voyagers Of Legend' (Mexican Summer Records, 2010).

2010-10-07T16:05:00.000-07:00

I try to explain to my girlfriend how it's not that I don't like her friend, it's just that I think that he's totaly clueless about the hardcore scene he spouts about. You know the type: he'll be one of dozens of people who flock to the "bigger" shows (Limp Wrist, Tragedy, yaddayaddayadda), but who'll never even consider going to see Total Abuse, Crimen De Estado or Deskonocidos. Messageboard and last.fm scene kids, who stumbled into a lot of information and merch throught the deaf and dumb internet, but have no connection to the real deal. It's not an attack on "posers", at least in the past posers would still go to shows and let the scene leech off them, and maybe even learn something in the process. This crowd worship Fucked Up yet do not understand where they came from and have created a parallel subworld full of know-it-all-ness while being as clueless as I am regarding, say, dubstep, or hungarian ska.

She argues that information should be freely available to anyone, and that in the end it's better to have 300 clueless kids go to a show and support a band than having 20 know it all veterans of tape trading and basement shows discussing the greatness of the Cheetah Chrome Motherfuckers (she didn't actually mention CCM, but I felt like adding some cool band names to this mess). I agree, but still feel akward and retarded trying to explain why I still like my punk business small and intimate, and carried out by people who live and breathe and know it like the back of their hand. The further something reaches, the more diluted its essence gets, at least in minimalistic mechanics like those of punk rock, and after half a lifetime spent (wasted?) in it, it's just as hard trying to explain why it frustrates me to see it taken over by a lot of average joes happy to be part of the student-party crowd and having hardcore as their 'cult-weirdo' card to impress the ladies and each other, as it is frustrating. And no, it's not that I dont like her friend. It's just that, like that band that I like said "everybody hates a tourist, specially one that thinks that he's always such a laugh". Graffiti kids are merciless with what they call 'toys'. If only we could...

Days later, after one of those shows the last.fm crowd doesn't even hear about (and not for the lack of promotion, mind you), a talk on one of my favorite subjects (Texas punk, early 80s) turns into sharing admiration for Funkadelic. As odd as it may seem for those unfamiliar with them, Funkadelic shared many interesting traits with punk rock, namely an overload of countercultural pre-millennial tension (albeit of the 'feel-good' variety, much like, yes, the Big Boys, see, it all comes full circle). However, with all its grandiosity and apocalypse grooving, the Funkadelic vibe was about inclusion instead of exclusion, not about remarking how what they did was secret but about one nation getting down and all that jazz. As always, playing Funkadelic at home, leads to playing 'the Chronic' and me humming singy-songy rhymes about rolling in 6-4's and such. Girlfriend remarks how I'm as much of an alien to that shit as her friend is to hardcore. I try to explain how it's not the same according to the 'exclusiveness/inclusiveness' axis and how I never even try to pretend I do. I end up realizing I've spouted a couple of dumb slogans like 'hardcore for the hardcore' and such and decide that I'm coming across as an inarticulate asshole and I should just shut up. But damn it, I KNOW I'm right.

Endnotes:

-Part II of the Anhelo Escalante interview will be up as soon as I get some images and translate a few more lines. It's been a while, I know, we're both busy in the real world.

-Deskonocidos and Vaaska played Barcelona to a small crowd, with a few super enthusiastic individuals. While some of them were pogoing a friend remarked: 'Man look at all those patches, I wonder how many hours they spend sewing so they can look like Formula 1 cars". About an hour later, someone said "the minute I heard Really Red I thought 'fuck this is what the Minutemen should have sounded like all along'". The night was rife with genius, as you can see.

-I had something written about the 9/29 riots in Barcelona, how there's nothing more beautiful than a flaming cop car, and how I was locked up in at my job during the whole afternoon shift (of the riots), but I'm still undecided wether it's done or it needs editing so it doesn't read like one of those epic poems of revolutionary punk lore that Profane Existence fanboys would eat up.

-I've given up (for real this time) on vinyl accumulation, but I'm still looking for the first Meat Puppets 12" and old Texan punk and UK anarcho stuff

Oh yeah,

Anhelo Escalante (I)

2010-09-08T01:37:00.000-07:00

Anhelo Escalante has a name that reads like pure poetry, play(ed)s in XYX, one of my favorite bands of the past 500 years (being as they are similar to a good acid trip through the set of Alucarda with the Butthole Surfers and The Pop Group as travel companions) and she also draws and writes just the way I like it. So, I had to interview her.

This is the first part of the interview. If anybody can hook me up with the XYX records, I'll be eternally grateful. And I'll pay for them.

***

PD: Ok, what's going on with XYX?

Anhelo: I'll give you the whole truth. XYX is comprised of two persons now living in separate cities. Mou, the drummer, and I have committed ourselves to so many different projects -musical and otherwise- that it's super hard for us to organize and keep working togeterh. We don't live so far apart from each other, so distance is a little more than an excuse. Mou is part of another band, kinda psych-prog pop, who have just signed to a big record label in Mexico D.F., so he's pretty busy. As for myself, I married the owner of a small record store from Texas, I started a band (still a pretty rough deal) with King Coffey, and kept making solo music here at home.
XYX recorded all through the winter back in Mexico, a total of twelve disastrous pieces, some of them pretty epic. However, when we got down to work on them, we realized we would have to cut them up for technical reasons, and we're still trapped in that process.

PD: A friend from Mexico told me that "The girl from Ratas Del Vaticano and the one from XYX are the wackiest and craziest in all of Mexico"

Anhelo: Well, Violeta and I have been friends and played in bands together since 2004 more or less. We're very different people and do things for different reasons. Truth is, I don't think we're really nuts, I just think we're very resilient. We like to go off about subjects that others won't really dare get into, and we've never really wanted to be in a band to be 'interesting', we've just felt prey to musicians that have accepted and supported us for what we are, instead of telling us how to dress. Let me tell you, she has a lot more formal musical schooling, and that we've both gone to college for things you wouldn't imagine like economics, sociology, psychology...Truth is, I've met lots of chicks way worse than us, we're just different I guess.

PD: What was the state of mind or whatever, if there even was one, when starting XYX? What kind of musical community did you form in?

Anhelo: The state of mind was the influence of LSD. We wanted to do something that sounded like our egos, drum beats and electrical currents channelled through the thick strings of an electric bass. The 'community' back then consisted in a bunch of misfits, angry at the fact that we were being ignored and not payed for our hard musical work, which doesn't seem to be worth shit for many, but that's besides the point. A few of us started to get organized, we built our own studio, some opened a venue, and that's how we collectively made it possible for the Monterrey underground music scene to break into a million possibilities and reach other countries.

PD: Both XYX and Ratas Del Vaticano have become kind of hip bands to listen to amongst the cool elite of American and European punkdom...do you notice much of a difference between how they assimilite/understand/live your music in the States?

Anhelo: As far as american punkdom is concerned, anything that sounds desperately different is considered cool. Pretty much everything is assimilated differently in the States, they have a different background as far as music history goes, but they also have the terrible habit of looking for ten bands that sound exactly the same as one they like a lot. It's kind of like when you try a new pizza and and you start looking for all the restaurantes where they serve it, trying to feel cool about eating it everywhere. Whatever.
In Mexico, people think they're cool for listening to records and tapes from the North American underground, and Americans feel the same about foreign music. I don't want to be misunderstood, in Mexico we don't have as many means to stand out, so if somebody wants to make himself heard, he does, and ends up being the Mexican rarity for foreigners; however, in the States, people keep listening to bands that have ten albums and three year tours playing every damn city in the country, the same music that never evolves, and they still like it, always on the same level. People only turn their heads when something really new comes in. Maybe I'm very strict, or maybe I'm just tired of going to shows and having everybody want to sound the same.

Scott Helland.

2010-07-27T05:53:00.000-07:00

If I have to introduce Scott Helland...well, then you shouldn't be reading this to begin with. This interview is almost two years old and was done for what was supposed to be #2 of We Are Robots zine. Oh well..

-How did you get into punk rock? was there any particular band/record/event that made you think "this is it!"? what were your musical tastes pre-punk?

Scott- What got me into punk music was hearing the Ramones on college radio when I was about 12, then it was bands like Black Flag and Minor Threat and it snowballed from there. Motorhead was a big influence too. The first record I bought was Rocket to Russia (Ramones), and as soon as I heard it I wanted to be a musician... there was no looking back. Before getting into punk all I was exposed to was my parents Jazz record collection and what was on regular commercial radio at the time, Deep Purple, Tom Petty, Beatles, Queen that kind of stuff.

-Please tell us about the start of both Deep Wound and the Outpatients..did you prefer one band over the other in any way, or better put, did you see both bands as inherently different in the way you approached playing in them?

Scott-Deep Wound was my first band, Lou and I met in high school, he was the only other kid there that liked hardcore. We put up flyers looking for a drummer who could play super fast beats and J Mascis (from another town) answered the ad, and Deep Wound was born. I think we actually tried to play as fast as possible...especially at shows, it was just insane. Six months or so later I started Outpatients with my older brother Vis and drummer Mike Kingsbury, we jammed a few times and we clicked right away, I played in both bands until DW split up. Playing in both bands was definitely a different experience, it seemed like Outpatients was a bit more serious, we practiced more, wrote more songs and played more shows. Deep Wound was kind of the opposite. There was also a certain chaotic-ness to the existence of DW, sometimes it seemed like we were just of bunch of crazy kids. But I listen back to some of the stuff we played and it's pretty cool, I'm proud of it...both bands put out some good stuff.

Outpatients live in Argentina, 1992.

I know the Outpatients actually toured out of the US, but did Deep Wound play a lot of shows? what was the climate like at shows in your area during that time?

Scott-Deep Wound pretty much played in Massachusetts, the western MA and Boston scenes. The shows back then were great. There were fairly small turnouts at shows, 30 to 50 kids sometimes more in Boston. Lots of slammin', but for the most part everybody was cool, friendly and respectful.

Despite being from Western Mass, Deep Wound often get lumped in with the Boston scene of the time, what were your relations with these bands like at the time? other than the mighty Siege, i can't think of any other band from around West. MA from the time, any particular band that time forgot and you think was great?

Scott-The Western Ma bands didn't really hang out with the Boston bands, it was 2 hours away and it was just 2 different scenes. Outpatients played a lot of shows in Boston though, with bands like SSD, FU's, the Freeze, Jerry Kid's etc. Deep Wound played with some of ..em as well. Seige wasn't around early on but I think they were from Eastern MA anyway. Some cool western Ma bands back then were Da Stupids, All White Jury, B.I.U.

Possibly the greatest record cover ever.

The DW 7" cover is a fucking classic, and one of my favorite covers ever, please tell us a bit about it, as i know for a fact other people are curious about it.

Scott-The cover was Lou and my idea I guess, being the odd little blokes that we were, we got an ice cream cone and wandered behind a hospital in Westfield MA, we saw a pile of slugs and grabbed a few and put ..em in the cone, I held it up to the sky and Lou took the photo. It just seemed to fit, plus it looked hilarious.

What about that demo with Gerard Cosloy on vocals that's been reportedly lost forever? were there any unreleased songs?

Scott-Hmmm I don't remember playing or recording anything with Gerard Cosloy, maybe it's been buried deep in my head?

Let's go for a bit of dumb/geeky trivia: i've heard the solos on the DW songs were played by J because Lou could not pull them off..true?

Scott-No, not true, J just wanted to play leads on some of the tunes, I think Lou was just like yeah, go for it. Lou wasn't a lead guitar guy anyway, and J wasn't really yet either! ha ha

The Outpatients kept on playing until 1995, afterwards you played in School of Violence with your brother Vis and Darkside NYC, before your current Gipsy Nomads venture...any special memory from those years? what are your feelings about your your ex-bandmates current bands/musical projects? i somehow think a collaboration between the Gypsys and your brother's industrial/noise stuff or Witch could be pretty suitable..

Scott-Playing with SOV was pretty cool, we had tons of gear so we were extremely loud, it was like a train a bulldozer and a truck barreling down the road. The drummer Mark is dead now, so there are the usual bittersweet memories of a fallen band mate, no need to tell any stories there. As far as Darkside, they were a great bunch of guys, I did have a bit of an altercation with the singer Rich onstage once. He liked to swing his arms around and I liked to move around, and we smacked into each other onstage and were pretty pissed off for a bit, but we laughed about it after. I get along with everybody I've ever played in a band with except I haven't talked to my brother Vis in years. But you know, sometimes things have to be that way for a while and then hatchets are buried, just hopefully not in anyones head. Now a days playing with The Gypsy Nomads, it's not much different from the punk days, it's still very diy and independent, very punk rock in attitude it's just a completely different style of music.

As far as a collaboration with some of those bands and The Gypsy Nomads, sure, sounds good to me, when's rehearsal.

When Damaged Goods reissued the Deep Wound discography i was hoping you'd make at least a limited amount of DW knit sweaters. will you ever? i need one.

Scott-I don't think there will ever be any sweaters made, J's mom made it like 20 something years ago, but you know if we ever do, you'll be on the list for gettin' one.

The Gypsy Nomads

Are you still even remotely interested in current hc/punk stuff?

Scott- Every once in a while people will play some new stuff for me that's pretty cool or a new band will request us on myspace and they sound really good, but I'm just in a different scene now, so it's a natural process to lose track of music that your not involved with. I guess I get bored so I change and explore different music. Though, punk and hardcore is a part of who I am as a musician today, it always will be and I'm proud of that.

How does it feel to see something so small and "unlikely to succeed" that you were a part of get to be so big and influential to current pop music in general?

Scott- Back then I would never have thought it would have so much influence, and the fact that people still like Deep Wound and Outpatients and seek it out is pretty cool, if by chance someone along the way was inspired us, that's great too.

Any closing comments, plugs, whatever?

Thanks very much. Check out our myspace pages, myspace. com/outpatientswmass, myspace. com/deepwound, http://www.myspace.com/thegypsynomads

Q: Criaturas? A: CRIATURAS.

2010-07-14T08:35:00.000-07:00

Punk rock of the d-beat crusty variety can (and often will) get very boring. Criaturas are a whole different story: crazy flanged guitars, screeching female vocals with paranoid and bleak lyrics in broken spanish straight outta Austin. Like a head-first collision between Ultimo Resorte and a Cormac McCarthy-meets-Hunter S. Thompson re-write of "Class of 1984". They've just put out a demo and it's one of my favorites for 2010. I would like to add that I've been doing fanzine interviews for the better part of the last 13 years and this one has the best closing statement I've ever had the pleasure of getting.

Criaturas: how and why?

Eddie- Me and Mike started Criaturas in the summer of 2009. I really wanted to play bass in a band, so I started writing songs. We would only practice around 2 times a month since I was so busy with Deskonocidos and Vaaska. We also just wanted to make this a recording project, but then Matt(Deskonocidos/Vaaska) moved to Los Angeles. With this, I got a lot of free time and we started to take the band more serious.

Dru- They had about 4 songs before they asked Vampis and I think it was more of a dare than an actual invitation for me. We tried a couple of other drummer's before we finally succeeded in talking Cp into drumming.

We brainstormed for months, then a couple of days before the flier for our first show had to be made it just came to Vampis... Q: "Criaturas?" A: "Criaturas."

Eddie- We had around 20 names for the band, but nothing fit till Vampiro said, Criaturas.

The demo has a very interesting sound, you could probably pick at it from different angles, but I like the fact that it's not a one dimensional rip-off band and has hints of very different influences in it..what were the particular bands/records, if any, you were looking up to while writing? Pegamoides meets Discharge?

Eddie- I write the basic song structures then everyone gives me their input and adds their own ideas. I never listen to anything when I'm writing songs. I try to go into it fresh and with a clear head. Don't get me wrong...Discharge and Motorhead are always on my mind.

Mike- I pretty much listen to Neil Young, Death in June, Big Black, later period Wipers records, and this band from Hungary called Nagy Fero and the Bikini and all sorts of other random stuff. I wasn’t really looking up to any one band or trying to sound like another. I think by default these groups approaches to music have seeped into my brain. Victor and I are both guitar dorks and have a lot of equipment gathered through the years to tinker with.

Vampis-I feel that on my part i tried to pull things out of the air... and just kind of let it ride, but i did look to the cure and bauhaus for guitar sounds. Hence all the effects on the guitar which is something i'd been messing with for a while in deskonocidos prior to this recording. However, I was listening to alot of Neil Young and alot of MF DOOM at the time also. Not exactly sure how that might have influenced the record. I do love alaska y los pegamoides though.

Dru- I've listened to Alaska y los Pegamoides almost daily for years so I think it's funny and flattering that you say Pegamoides meets Discharge. I can't really say I looked to any band before coming into this, I was listening to the Supremes and Sisters of Mercy alot around that time.

CP- UNCURBED/ULTIMO RESORTE

The past few years we've seen a lot of latinos in the US forming bands that are heavily influenced by classic spanish/basque punk bands, I guess Criaturas sort of falls into that..how did you discover Eskorbuto, Ultimo Resorte and such? do you think there's some sort of common thread/theme running through all those bands (Peligro Social, Deskonocidos, Rayos X, Ultratumbados)?

Eddie- I got a later era Eskorbuto tape when I was in the 10th grade, but I though it was just mediocre. I didn't really get into Spanish punk till like 5 years ago. I love Spanish punk, but don't really listen to it as much as people may think. I personally don't think that Criaturas has anything really related with Spanish punk, other than it's sung in Spanish.

Mike- I came into Spanish punk first through some comps like I think Welcome to 1984 when I was younger and then later after Eddie and I became friends. I still don’t have a full grasp of it besides the obvious ones like Paralisis Permanente, Eskorbuto or RIP.

Vampis- Yes and no.. I'm sure every band would admit to having heavy classic spanish punk influence. Though I think each band does what they can to put a new fresh touch to that simple format. I think that's why there's such an array of different types of latino punk bands. Not to mention even wider musical tastes that influence subtly and sometimes not so subtly.

Dru- A friend gave us a burnt copy of the Eskorbuto Eskizofrenia album about 6 years ago and my love for spanish punk grew from there.

I think the common thread is that we're all proud to be latino/chicano/hispanic. Who knows how long this will last or if it will have any effect on the scene but it's great seeing all these bands pop up all across America.

CP- Spanish punk has always been popular aqui en Tejass!

Austin has a rich and amazing punk history, going all the way back to the 13th Floor Elevators, Red Krayola and such...where do you think Criaturas fits into all this? fave TX band/record ever?

Eddie- The Latino punk scene in Austin is growing and more people and bands are popping out. I don't know where we fit in in all of this, but were just a punk band. Playing music for the same reason everyone else does, boredom and self expression. Will anyone care what we did in 20 years, who knows? Yet, it doesn't change what were doing today.

Mike- I see us as just another band continuing to dance on top of the corpse of Rock like everyone else. Or in a more positive light I see us as adding to the rich history of Texas punk. Both seem pretty realistic in my eyes. Roky Erickson and the Aliens, Vomit Pigs or Bobby Soxx/Teenage Queers/ Stick Men with Rayguns are tied in battle for favorite Texas group. Based on story alone The Skuds win hands down though.

CP- D-beat Psychedelic punk rock weirdos, we like it all! TX best? Big Boys/Dicks/Really Red/Offenders/Roky/Deadhorse/Spazm 151 for me!!

Two of you are the head honchos of TODO DESTRUIDO, please, tell us about the label's current and future endeavors. What was the DIAS DE DESTRUCCION FEST exactly? will it happen again?

Eddie- We started the label because we had a lot of free time at the moment. I'm now playing in 4 bands and I think the label will be slowing down a lot. After 2011 we just plan to do 1-2 records a year and mostly of our own bands, friends bands, and people we have already worked with. We got a Deskonocidos Lp, Ilegal 7", and Los Monjo Lp in the works now. After that, who knows?

The fest was mainly friends bands and a few other Latino punk bands from the USA and Mexico. We will not be having it this year, because I will be on tour. Don't get me wrong, if someone wants to help organize it when I'm gone...I'm all for it.

Dru- Does anyone want to help me? haha

Not really many more questions here, so if there's anything you think you should say and I haven't thought of asking..go!

Vampis- I think Criaturas sounds like a tie-dyed discharge shirt.

Problemas, problemas.

2010-05-05T10:12:00.000-07:00

My friend Eddie asked me to write a review of his band Deskonocido's 7"s (one of which I'm very proud to say I did the cover art for!), after much procrastinating I sat down during a sleepless night, armed with said 7"s and a lot of coffee, and this is what poured out. Lo siento Eddie.

I really don't know how i didn't see it coming.
I mean, I HAD to go to Texas. I had spent too large a part of my teens feeding off classic Texan punk rock, Pushead's work for Zorlac skateboards, wondering why my shitty northwestern Spain hometown had no decent burrito stands and constant rain, watching old western films and reading about the Texan Nationalists. I had even made some kind of psychic bond in my head about how the FBI ended their siege on Waco on the day of my tenth birthday. Fuck, I HAD to be there. I knew there was some kind of life-changing esoteric psychic experience awaiting me. Thus, I did the very un-esoteric thing of booking a flight to Dallas, where a friend of the family could host me for free, and from there on, I planned on moving around the area, looking for adventure and spiritual clairvoyance. Preferably aided and abetted by psychedelic mexican food. The plan was perfect, yet, as could be expected, disaster ensued.
I got off the plane at DFW Airport, and made my way to my host's house. They were dead. Yes, it seems the next door neighbor had some kind of issue with the main gas pipe and had blown the whole block away. Any people I knew were on either coasts and didn't know anybody in the area. I walked around for a few hours, wondered where JR would be, booked a cheap hostel, called home to break the news, ate what seemed like 45 burritos. Thought. I wasn't going back now. Adventure was not around the corner, it was right here right now, plus my return ticket was not effective for the next month, so I had 30 days to wander around, try not to die and learn the coolest accent ever. I sat in a small 24h diner, drinking cheap coffee, doodling in my notebook and, for maximum Aaron Cometbus effect, playing some Jawbreaker on my ipod. I somehow struck up a conversation with a truck driver who said he could drive me down to Austin, which seemed like a better perspective. I remembered that 80s indie film (the name still escapes me) that took place in Austin, it looked like a nice place to walk around, so off we went. Eric, the trucker, was a nice enough guy. We drank some coffee, chatted a bit, and he made me listen to David Allan Coe which, much to my surprised dismay, I found quite enjoyable. About 80 miles in, we stopped for gas and coffee, and I made some small talk in Spanish with the Mexican employee. That's when Eric flipped his wig. Apparently he didn't want no Mexicans in his truck, and apparently, he believed Spain to be a part of Mexico, a very common urban legend about Americans which I had never given much credit. Well, fuck. There went my ride. Seeing as it was almost dawn I thanked Luis for the free coffee and donuts and started walking, hoping to hitch a ride soon, and who knows what would happen then.

***

By the evening of the next day, I had finally reached Austin. In the process, I had been fined for loitering by a cop who was nonplused by my story and left me to rot in the desert after giving me my ticket, nearly run over by a bunch of cars, shot at by the passengers of one of said cars, realized i had left my food in Eric's truck, and fell into a fit of hysteria, no doubt caused by the realization that having been unable to hunt, kill, and eat a single armadillo, I was at the bottom of the food chain. I cried like a pussy on the side of the road (narrowly avoiding a rattlesnake bite in the process) until I was picked up by a very nice but very scary bunch of cholos with face tattoos who I guess were initially going to jump me, until they realized that a) as much as I looked like a misplaced tourist from Connecticut by way of Port-au-Prince, I spoke Spanish better than any of them, and b) I probably had nothing worth stealing anyway, so they proceeded to show some of that 'kindness of strangers' so common among burnouts of all kinds worldwide, offered me a ride and got me so stoned I almost forgot my name (I never smoke pot, don't ask what strain it was). I do remember all the crazy free style mixtapes I had to sit through though while hearing about meth labs, mamis, and a lot of stuff in slang that totally escapes me (thankfully, I might add).
Once in Austin, I remembered the golden rule of traveling 'light' I had been instructed in years ago by a Hungarian crustie that hung around my city for a while: always rep the punk rock. It should be noted that said crustie failed at his attempts of convincing me to feed and house him, yet his advice worked: if not for my (unbelievably dirty, and partially destroyed by armadillo claws) Void shirt, I would have never been invited to a house party,where, upon telling my tale, I was fed, drugged, and pampered like the proverbial shipwreck victim, which is pretty much how I felt, covered in dust and dirt and blood, still stoned, weak in the knees, like some thrift store version of a Cormac McCarthy character.
While all i wanted to do was crawl into some kind of sleeping arrangement and die, I made an effort to be polite to my hosts, and made my way to see the band, which I had been told (in that accent, Jesus H. Christ, that accent! how the fuck can they get anything done when all of them speak like that?) I would like. Deskonocidos. I don't know, they were, in a way, like the kind of freaks that the jocks want to beat up in high school but don't because they're somehow kind of scared of them, they looked like outcasts in their own stage, totally out of place, yet somehow totally in control at the same time. All in all, they were a mess, I could smell the booze and whatever else was in them from the other side of the room, and they sounded like the punk rock I had grown up on, which means they had a serious case of Eskorbuto damage approached with the sort of carefree, reckless attitude which only being an outcast in an absolutely inhuman country like the mighty US of A could breed. Problemas, problemas.
That's when it hit me. Maybe it was the junk food, lack of sleep, THC, dehydration, booze and God knows what else coming together in my system, but I felt like I had finally found IT. I felt connected, I felt redeemed. The 'here-and-now' was home. At last. I was never leaving this city, fuck, I would never leave this show if possible. First thing the next day (or when i could walk properly again, anyway), I was going to get a collarbone script tattoo with my favorite Eskorbuto lyric, drop out from my previous life and stay here, perpetually listening to Roky Erickson and the Geto Boys, drinking Lone Star, and participating in all the cheesy Texan clichés that I, as a migrated euro white boy could come up with.

No more nostalgia was necessary. I had finally found a time/space location where life had so very little purpose or meaning, it actually mattered. Problemas, problemas.

Deskonocidos.

Adam Nathanson.

2010-02-16T02:21:00.001-08:00

Back in the glory days when i was 15, I would listen to Killing Time and Mob 47 and Merel and Submission Hold back to back like it was no thing. Older friends with extensive music collections made sure I could blow my allowance on blank tapes full of esoteric punk records I was anxious to discover, during otherwise pretty bleak high school days. It always rained back home, and being able to listen to now-forgotten 90s crap like Zorn, Revolución X, or Health Hazard made it all a bit more bearable. At one point, I would buy a full case of 10 tapes each week, but my favorite in the midst of all this sound overkill was a certain tape made in dark green plastic which contained Poison Idea's immortal epic 'feel the darkness' on one side and Born Against's 'nine patriotic hymns for children' on the flipside. I would listen to that little fucker at least daily, often more. I was soon consumed by Born Against (Poison Idea too, but that's another story), I loved their smart-assedness approach to preachy HC politics, their tough-yet-somewhat-brainy sound, the artwork and layout on their records...I somehow got a hold of their related bands and became a fan...(Young) Pioneers made me dig deep into the Minutemen and Bob Dylan, Life's Blood sparked my interest in searching out rare late 80s NYHC, and Men's Recovery Project ended up being a key part in my later obssession with noise/experimental/electronic crap. I was a teen obssessed. Many years (yes, more than 9) and vital mishaps later, I still find myself grooving hard to the rebel sound of shit and failure.

The interview could have been longer and better, but Adam is a busy guy and so am I. Do your own.

1) let's start in the pre-Life's Blood days, what was Albany like? scene-wise it's always seemed heavily NYHC influenced, so what were the popular local/regional bands that shaped the scene? I'm thinking stuff before NY Wolfpack and the likes..Mental Abuse?
Well I’m from New Jersey unfortunately, but as a teenager I felt strongly that my music and social world was in New York City.

2) tell me about Life's Blood...how did the band come about? was there any preconceived notion about what the band should sound like/stand for/deal with? Was there any pre-L'sB band?
No pre-Life’s Blood bands released any records, but when I was in 12th grade, I did a band with Sergio from Quicksand, John from Nausea and Dan of Smash Apathy fanzine called Trauma. It was kind of like Crucifix and Discharge, but not super noteworthy. Simultaneously I was the guitar player in Mr. Softee (the name of an ice cream truck company) with Anthony from Raw Deal and John Wrecking Machine. Anthony had a song called 'Summer of Fun 1981' about skateboarding with Johnny Feedback from Kraut. The music later became 'Never Make a Change' by Life’s Blood. The idea according to Wrecking Machine was that we’d be the hardest band in NYC so there would irony to the ‘soft’ name. The true irony was that I was arrested by the transit police for hopping the PATH train into NY to see Straight Ahead and the Mob one Sunday and my father subsequently grounded me as punishment. I was respectful enough of my parents not to break their rules, so I had to quit both bands since I couldn’t go to the city to practice anymore.

Life's Blood @ Nightingale's 1987. Pic donated by Freddy Alva, according to whom: 'The skinhead w/the Skrewdriver shirt was later jumped outside of the club by Minus of the Sunset Skins, beaten up & got his boots taken, true story.'

3) Life's Blood seems to have been a pretty confrontational band from the get-go, from song lyrics like "never make a change" to the "FUCK/NY" labels on the 7". Also, the zines you were doing at the time were also very controversial and outspoken...Did you catch a lot of flack or even engage in actual beef with NY scene moguls because of these things? In general, how would you say L'sB was received within NYHC? this is probably one of the (still) most folk-lored and legend-plagued music scenes ever..any interesting anecdotes like your 'tattoo run-in' with John Joseph?
Life’s Blood had beefs with straight-edge bands, but it was mostly due to my unfocused, irrational acting out. Those silly bands weren’t the real evil in the world or anything close to it, they were just normal jocks invading the scene, which upset me as an 18 year old maladjusted Jersey kid who thought that hardcore was “the way, the truth, the life.” The real rotten things going on back then were the gentrification of the Lower East Side, corruption between housing developers and city council people, and the police state after the Tompkins Square riots; and that’s just what was right under our noses, not to mention the U.S war in Latin America, and the spread of crack cocaine, all of which were related on a macro level.

4) how do you look back on the band, considering it wasn't very long lived or prolific, yet remains intensely influential 20 years after the fact?
The biggest honor bestowed upon Life’s Blood for me was when Steve from Heresy stayed at my house in Jersey City in 1993 and told me that when Heresy recorded the 'Whose Generation' 7”, they were listening to Life’s Blood. Fresh.

5) Was Born Against seen as a continuation of L'sB or some kind of fresh, new, start? It sometimes seems like your initial intention was to piss off as many people and stir up as much shit as possible? how about your leftist leanings, how did they fit in the scene at the time? i've read an interview in which the drummer of Citizen's Arrest bashes the band for "introducing socialism in the NY scene" or something to that effect...
I only wish we had been able to impose my own benevolent dictatorship style socialism on the scene. The revolutionary cadre turned on me at the last minute.

Adam in the BA days, photo by Chuck Miller.

6) you're probably gonna hate this, but this scene trivia and gossip is what the kids want, I've read and heard many stories about crazy beef BA got caught up in, a few of them involving narrowly avoiding crucial beatdowns at the hands of NYHC heavyweights, like you saving McPheeter's ass from the Killing Time dudes...care to elaborate?
There’s a recording floating around of Born Against and Charles from Rorschach “debating” Sick of it All on WNYU’s Crucial Chaos radio show in 1990. It was a circus of stupidity that only Born Against could have created.

7) BA did a Euro-tour, how did you find the audiences? did you ever encounter a room full of people expecting a full-on standard NYHC act and being severely disappointed? any particular euro bands from the time that stand out in your memory?
The problem was multi-faceted: We were ungrateful, dysfunctional misanthropes AND the Europeans consumed our band the same as Kentucky Fried Chicken and Chicago Bulls jerseys. When we’d mention Negazione, BGK, Porno Patrol, Raw Power, Pandemonium, Cheetah Chrome Motherfuckers, The Wretched, Declino or any other great Euro band, we just got blank stares. We also saw that we had been busting our asses touring in the U.S and Canada and releasing our own records for years before we went to Europe, paying our dues at home. But there were so many American bands over there being treated like royalty that never bothered to play 30 miles outside NYC or even release a record in some cases! Yet in Europe we were indistinguishable from the American slackers. We were enraged and no one cared; which made us more enraged. Very teenage, even though we weren’t teenagers anymore.

8) I really don't know shit about music, so this is probably gonna sound like a terrible explanation, but I've always found your guitar style in BA to be way personal..there's definitely a classic, basic hardcorepunk sound, but there's also a lot of very "creepy" almost melodic guitar picking going on at times,and an almost folky melodic influence on the chord progression to some of the songs, particularly the later ones ('i am an idiot'), or things like the intro to 'shroud'...so what were your influences when learning to play?
'Shroud' was supposed to be like something off of Amebix 'Arise' or 'Monolith'. Learning to play punk, I listened a lot to the 'Blasting Concept' SST sampler, and 'The Big Apple: Rotten to the Core' volume 1 compilation.

9) The early 90's HC scene, particularly the one centered around ABC NO RIO was a peculiar blossoming of creativity, with kids coming from the increasingly violent NYHC scene in search of something different, something i guess a bit more thoughtful and positive, and some of the bands were incredible in the sense of yrical content and emotional depth..which were your personal faves at the time, and the one(s) you felt that BA as a band had the most kinship with?
I can still listen to Rorschach, Chisel and Citizen’s Arrest. Jawbreaker transcends, but they weren’t from NY.

10) I was always curious about the Screeching Weasel split..it seems like such an odd pairing...
We were friends so the pairing made sense to us. What I didn’t like from the get go was the meant-to-be-witty lyrical reversal and horrifying layout of that record. Yikes!

11) How did the move to Richmond and following break up come about? what was sharing a house with Mcpheeters and Neil Burke like?
Richmond is and was an easier place to live than New York or New Jersey. I came down here with $500 I borrowed from my brother. Since then I have been able to contribute to the community through Food Not Bombs, have children, buy a house, finish college, and pursue graduate studies in Adult Literacy. I was however, unprepared for the terrible level of gun violence down here; it seems to be part of the culture.

12) This was also the beginning of the (Young) Pioneers , a fantastic and unique band in which you seemed to pick up on a Woody Guthrie/Bob Dylan/Springsteen bent..a friend of mine once said "it's what Billy Bragg should be if he wasn't such a pussy"...how did this come about? how do you feel about being extremely influential on the current 'folk punk' bands, or having a band that sings your praises in one of their songs (Against Me!) being on MTV?
I am flattered that bands on MTV like (Young) Pioneers. Let me know if you can think of anyone else who’s moderately famous who likes (Young) Pioneers so I can brag about it to my friends and family. I always thought the best reviews of the band were the negative ones. In Panic Button fanzine in 1994, Ben Weasel said that on the first EP I sound “like Arlo Guthrie with his nuts in a vice.” Truer words have not been spoken. I was shooting for a Palace Brothers/Silver Jews angle, but that’s not how it came out. Another later Pioneers review said we sounded like ‘a sore-throated Springsteen shouting Marxist slogans over a poorly recorded garage band.’ I could not come up with a better description myself.

13) (Y)P was, to my knowledge, not a very heavy touring band, but decently prolific..which would you say was your favorite release by the band?
Actually, check it out: (Y)P’s touring included the following- December ‘95/January ’96 U.S. tour (West Coast w/Clikitat Ikatowi & Cars Get Crushed) October/November ’96 U.S. tour (Northeast with Avail) September/October ’97 U.S tour (mostly w/Karp, Peechees) May/June ’98 Southern U.S. (Virginia to Texas w/Avail) February ‘99 West Coast tour (San Diego to Seattle w/the Locust) Plus we played several times a month in places like Chicago, Philadelphia, Raleigh, Detroit, Cleveland, New York and Boston during the same time period, including lots of those ever present 1990s DIY festivals. My favorite releases would be the 'On Trial' and 'Crimewave' EPs by far, recorded by Andy Ward (once of Antioch Arrow) in San Diego at Matt Anderson’s Gravity studio.

14)You're currently (?) involved in Teargas Rock, I don't really know much about this band, so if you could please introduce us?
Teargas Rock was Martin Violence of Y(P), Corporal Randolph Davis of the Great Unravelling, and I. We recorded a 12” EP that never came out but can be found in its entirety at myspace.com/teargasrock, along with more detail about its genesis. Last year I recorded one additional song 'John Brown’s Raid' in my basement, as well as another called 'City in Freefall' with my friend Jonathan Fuller from Sleepytime Trio.

15) I know Latin American history and politics have always been a big interest of yours, what's your take on Chavez and the current situation in Honduras? Do you see Chavez as a viable leader, or a charismatic but inept goon?
I am disappointed in Chavez’s authoritarian anti-democratic tendencies as of late, but clearly my country needs to back off and stop creating such strong justifications for his harsh measures. It’s like a slightly milder version of the Cuban conundrum. Subcomandante Marcos said Latin America doesn’t need anymore Caudillos, and I agree. I am torn on Cuba, Honduras and Venezuela because I see the world through such a strong anti-capitalist inter-communalist framework. I do NOT believe at all however, in Mao’s precept that “the enemy of my enemy is my friend.”

16) What's your day to day like? how do you make a living nowadays? Also, the interview ends here, what piece of sagacious old man advice would you like to share with the readers?
I have two beautiful daughters, Reina and Bella. My wife Alyssa was one of the singers in the grind/crust band Disrupt, and she started Food Not Bombs when we moved down here. We will celebrate our 10th anniversary on Friday. I make a living teaching Adult Literacy, including English as a Second Language. My advice for readers is Joe Strummer’s advice from one of the documentaries released about him: Don’t always look to the past, do something new. Somewhere out there young people have started an urgent political or social movement or music scene that we can’t even conceive of. Make it your business to find out about it before it’s already past.

on seeing Sex Vid live in Barcelona

2009-11-28T17:32:00.000-08:00

Sex Vid are, i guess, on the verge of not being cool anymore, as they're popular with 'hipsters' (the great phantom menace of the punks) and liked by more than ten persons, but it's still one of the two bands in recent memory that make my skin crawl whenever I hear them. The sheer amount of unbelievably real bad vibes present in their songs and layouts -which somehow reek (to me, at least) of Throbbing Gristle's nightmarish soundtracks to doing cheap drugs in grey tower blocks, or the early SST Records camp's explorations of the dark side of '60s counterculture- are something I just can't help but develop a certain affinity to and identify with, whereas even the best of the rest of the bands of today are nothing but (in some -rare- cases GREAT) entertainment. And no, this has nothing to do with the retarded "modern day Black Flag" tag that's thrown around every three months to describe every other band, and no, Sex Vid don't seem to be better than they actually are because of the shitty general state of hardcore punk music of today. Sex Vid embody hardcore the way it once was, a state of mind for misfits and outcasts totally devoid of uniforms, rules or style guides, the ugly sound of mental illness way out as once executed by United Mutation, Void or Cheetah Chrome Motherfuckers. Blessed be.

The show itself was pretty much a blur of crushing noise, yet executed with tightness and precision, much like being caught inside an early Die Kreuzen rehearsal tape from the day when Dan Kubinski had a sore throat, or the feeling you get when you first listen to early Darkthrone on a shitty C60. The band played for about 15 minutes, beers were flung, drunken mosh antics ensued, authentic crusties hated their hipster asses, and we all went home drunk and with ringing ears, happy in having reveled for just a little bit in a feast of somewhat friendly psychic warfare.

2009-09-21T19:01:00.000-07:00

i'm not dead, i'm just busy preparing an art show.

i'll be back soon, with some good stuff, meanwhile, you can go here:

putrid diamonds!

2009-08-22T08:10:00.000-07:00

I'm pretty sure you could probably write a full book based on Jam song titles alone, but 'Days of speed and slow times mondays' is such a brilliant line, except Paul the asshole forgot about the word 'terrifying' in his glamorized recollection of being a teenage upper lover. For example, he forgot when you look at yourself in the mirror after a full weekend awake and you realize the usual pasty plaque brought in by dehydration has started to dry up for good and darken and turn different hues of green and brown in just a few hours and your teeth look like something out of a Rudimentary Peni record, just two rows of perfectly aligned (well, maybe..) putrid diamonds just waiting for some strange fetus-esque goblin to pop out of your throat and take you on tour with Disrupt or something. Scary, scary, scary. That's when you brush your teeth with so much energy you might as well pull them out and proceed to freak the fuck out for a few minutes until you realize they're actually ok, they just had some dirt and dust from the squat you were in last night stuck to them.

Go kiss your mom in the mouth.

------------------------------------------------

also, remember kids: DFTS / DFTS

Mateus Mondini

2009-08-12T17:16:00.000-07:00

Mateus Mondini, a.k.a 'Maradona' is the best thing to happen to band photography since Glenn E. Friedman, and the best current documentalist of the DIY hardcore punk scene. This interview was done for Vice Magazine, but it was not to their liking and thus rejected, and I didn't really feel like letting it rot forever. Granted, I could have gone back and added a few less stupid questions to it, but I really did not feel like taking up more of Mateus' precious time. No I did not ask him about Sarcófago or Regina Do Santos, but hey, you can't always win.

Brazil seems to be a very dangerous country..aren't you scared of carrying all your equipment around to dirty punk shows in sketchy places? or do you have a private escort like some people do out there?

I would love to have a body guard if he is a chimpanzee or a gorilla, but we are not that wild, even living in São Paulo I never had a lot of problem with thieves but of course I’m scared walking everywhere with my only equipament in the backpack, so I did a insurance of it all and now I can walk with the camera everywhere without fear.

My friend Pablo asks if you've ever been beat up for being in the pit taking up space and getting in everybody's way while they're trying to have some fun..

Beat up never, but spits, bubblegum sometimes, I used to have a lot of problens with cider in London, but it use to happening in big shows where im working in the front of the fans crushed in the grill, im punk shows I already had problens with broken equipament, flash, lenses, glasses, camera, well, everything, but it’s the result of someone stage dive, pogo or even my fault, I don’t think someone broke my stuff for evil, always it happened I think was one accident, in a punk show I..m there to have fun too, so I do the pogo, singing, Im just one more in the crowd, It's a little more boring to be with the camera but…

Please tell us about 'Fodido E Xerocado', the book you and your partner in crime Daigo have produced..

It’s a fanzine with just photos of punk(or related) bands that was taken by me and my friend Diago, inside a silk screened envelop, its free and its used to be 100-200 each edition that goes out every 2 or 3 months, we are working in number 11 now and we start it because our photos was just in internet and we wanted something that you can hold and carry to toilet. Two years ago our friend Thiago released one better looking volume with some colour photos but it still not a book, maybe one day.
Daigo is nice, one of my best friends and one of the best journalist photographers of today, very talented, dedicated, organized and can fucked up any amazing band with a bad taste tattoo in his arm as one "Everything went Black" with a baby hand, or a Embrace word game

In my country, Brazil is famous for producing excellent shemales, myth or truth? are there or have there ever been trannies in the Brazilian hcpunk scene?

Yeah transvestites are one of the biggest brazilian exports, I don’t know any punk travesti today but have some historys about a punk gang from the early 80s called Punk Dolls, the old punks always refer to they as “punks travestis” but I don’t know if they were more to New York Dolls or to Wayne County, anyway they were always involved in fights had one show that someone put fire in their hair and the venue was taken by the smell of burnt hair.

You've travelled all over Europe photographing tons of bands and scene celebrities, i'm sure this has produced embarassing stories you can now tell to millions of readers...right? is it true that Invasión/Destino Final have an art director that coreographs their poses and sprays the room with hairspray every three minutes?

During a show in sweden after the singer of Clorox Girls was doing a lot of sieg heiling while naked and also wearing a pink cowboy hat, he commanded for everyone else to be naked, after it he was almost arrested for lighting cigaretttes and placing them in everyone's mouths (still while naked) since smoking indoors is illegal in Sweden. With Press Gang was normal some members jerk off in the van while watching 80s porno movies.
In a festival, I entered in our room and see a couple of completely drunk crusties going out of my bed, I'm not sure what happened there but I prefered sleep in the sleeping bag that day.
Not so embarassing but uncomfortable was 4 days travelling across Austria, with 9 people in the van that just had seat for 3 people in the front and no seats or windows in the back, so were 4 days of long drives lying in the dark with 5 other people, more all the bags and gear, pissing in water bottles and trying to sleep the most possible.
haha, i don't think Invasion need it, they are a amazing band and very easy to photograph, Guille is the Gisele Bundchen of punk rock, any click and you have a good photo.

I recently saw the 'Botinada' documentary about the history of punk in Brazil, and there's this dude that lost his arm throwing a molotov cocktail at a rival gang and now has a fucking hook!!! i'm sure there are millions of amazing stories related to this living legend right??

well, nothing compared with the molotov and hook story, he isn't a guy that you see everyday but he appears in some shows, I remember a show that his band played, it was he singing and much younger guys playing, but he got very drunk before the show, so just the young guys played and he stayed drunk behind the stage, in other show, while a vegan straight edge band played he took the mic and start scream things like "fuck the cows, we have to eat the cows..." but nobody gave a lot of attention, in end 90s he directed one "Opera Punk" about the fights between punk gangs from São Paulo and ABC, and its all that i know.

Photos: Concentration Summer Camps, Gorilla Angreb, Masshysteri, Invasión.
http://www.flickr.com/mateuspatche

the number eleven.

2009-08-06T02:35:00.000-07:00

Chop it off? nah, not really on my list. I mean, if i got through high school with an extra pinkie I might as well let it stay. After all, I'm already used to it, and it's not like it's a huge deformity or nothing. Clever guys always ask if it's hard to get gloves, but it's not like you need them with this weather, right? It's always in the mid 60s at least around here, barely any rain.
Besides, it's not like surgical amputation is a walk in the park, specially not on your left hand. Hands are complicated, man. They're a very complex structure of bones, muscle tissue, cartilage, they're all tensed up, perfectly engineered. So, if you chop off a finger, it's not like you can just bandage it up and wait for it to heal, you know? It's like taking the corner stone out of a cathedral wall, all those cute arches will just go to hell then. You have to cut up some extra tissue, tuck it in, sew it up, and then you still have to wait for it to readjust, for all the different parts to fit into each other, and that's a good four months or so of physical therapy, things shifting places, bones and muscles and veins crawling under your skin and fitting into each other. You even get bruises all over your hand because of all the moving and shaking down there. And then, even if your surgeon is very good at it, there's the chance of ending up with a small stump. See, in order to avoid ending up with one on the side of your hand, you need a surgeon who can actually sculpt the flesh and bones where the finger was, and even still, once everything is settled, some bones might have been displaced so you can still end up with a little poker on the side of your hand, and I'm pretty fucking sure that looks even more fucked up under a gnarly scar than a sixth finger.

MAXIMO VOLUMEN: inyecciones por el bul.

2009-07-27T13:26:00.000-07:00

If you're from Spain, you'll listen to Eskorbuto and La Polla Records around the age of 12 or so, even if that's all the contact you'll ever make with punk rock, they're kind of an institution here, even my mom throws the name 'Eskorbuto' around when she wants a cliché band name to describe the shit her son is into.
It's also pretty usual that you eventually end up neglecting those bands when you get into American hardcore. So all the interest that classic Spanish punk has been getting in the past few years from the scenester elite is pretty baffling to say the least. The funny part is seeing people jock stuff like Cocadictos or Morticia Y Los Decrepitos which was never that good to begin with and would never warrant any interest if it wasn't for their 'classic third world rare punk status', the actually FUN part is seeing that classic style being picked up by bands like Peligro Social or Deskonocidos and done very very well.
Anyway, it's pretty amazing that with all the interest in the genre, when even the super rare (and RAW!!) Delirium Tremens demo has been repressed, the hordes of MRR-worshipping youngsters STILL don't name drop the MAXIMO VOLUMEN demo like it's going out of style. Very little is known about this band, and their only recorded output seems to be this mysterious 1987 demo (there's rumours about an unreleased 7", but nothing is confirmed), which showcases their crazy, over the top manic energy, totally under the influence of then contemporary American (esp. early C.O.C., Septic Death and the Venice Beach scene) and Italian hardcore, specially when it comes to singer Riski's ripping vocals, which definitely bring to mind Negazione. According to my sources, the band was formed by ex-members of other bands from Girona like Exterminio, Diskordia, Vomitos Clandestinos, Kritenio or ADR/Atake De Ruido, and later morphed into Hugger Mugger when Riski quit the band.

Even though the crude recording adds a layer of sloppyness to the whole tape, the band is a lot tighter than earlier Spanish hardcore bands (i.e. Antidogmatikss, L'Odi Social..), and even manage to construct songs that go a bit beyond the verse-chorus-verse,and seem to have a thing for slower intros, constant tempo shifts, and lengthy songs (all but one of the 11 songs are over 2 minutes long).

Lyrically, they are pretty much what you'd expect from a mid 80's hardcore band: blatant socio-political statements, often viewed from a deeply dark and twisted philosophical perspective (another aspect shared with Italian hc), bloating everyday situations into grandiose horror stories. This reaches it's maximum expression in "El mas pequeño" a traumatic childhood experience narrated in over 5 minutes of slow, dark, brooding hardcore. which could very well be the Spanish equivalent of Jerry's Kids 'raise the curtain'. It's not, however the top hit of the tape, this being "Transportes públicos" a raging, vicious attack on the local transport authorities, which extorts the listener to avoid fare whenever possible, making it seem like the most epic of ordeals:

Don't pay, they're ours.
They're ours, they're a public service.
If no one payed, the train conductor wouldn't dare step in,
and then, we would have won the final battle,
our battle.

I hate it when people spoil movies for me, so I won't give you a song-by-song rundown of this, since I don't want to ruin the discovery of the wonderful world of love and rage contained within, but I feel I must quote one of the songs' ('Discordia') lyrics to give you a little tidbit that will help you understand better what to expect from this demo and, what the hell, from life itself:

Fuck the system, fuck it good,
it's a goddamn discordance.

Besides the band itself, singer Risky later fronted the band Youth Spirit, which apparently played instrumental Slapshot covers (?) and also ran Anaconda Records, a small extreme music label/distro, which gave birth to countless rumours and anecdotes throughout the 1990's about his legendary persona (including him cooking Youth Of Today some paella) and the insane reviews in his mailorder catalogs, and then disappeared from the scene. A few years ago, I was working at a record shop and while processing a credit card payment I noticed the name...yes, it was Risky himself. I had been brought up in the scene hearing about this man, and now there he was, in front of me, wearing a Judge longsleeve and looking after his baby daughter. I shivered, introduced myself and mentioned how much me and my friends worshipped his band. He smiled shyly, as if he was embarrassed of having been involved in this piece of history, and said that "that was too long ago, I barely remember myself", but still thanked me for the praise. I told him he should reissue the demo, and he laughed while waving goodbye.

Maximo Volumen - demo 1987

Also, 90s hc nerds will remember E150 covered Maximo Volumen's "Locura de guerra" on their 1996 split with Ivich.

Believe the hype.

Note: this post would have never been the same without the wealth of information and images passed on to me by Edu from One Chord. Thanks!!

insomnia breeds nonsense.

2009-07-26T07:04:00.000-07:00

People think I must be illiterate, some kind of stooge. Granted being a sailor for 25 years ain't really academia personified but whatever. I've read enough. What the fuck you think I did all those dead lonely nights? Just me, my flashlight and my books, lying in bed being waltzed up and down by the tide. See, thoughts flow better when we move. Remaining stationary should never be a real option. And, unfortunately, it's what most people do, y'know? We go through life like drugged out mental patients at a disco party, like deer constantly put in front of a car's headlights in the middle of the night. Stumbling around, scared, not sure where to turn and even if we were, we would be so paralyzed by fear and drugs we would never be able to do it, hehehe. Not that there's anything particularly wrong with drugs, hehehe, i often fool around with the idea of getting into that particular line of work myself y'know? Naaah I'm just kidding, hehehe.
Joking to yourself, now there's a depressing personality trait. Some people do it constantly, they walk down the street looking out into nowhere with a smile on their face. I used to know this guy who was in such a state constantly. He was part of the crew back when I was still in the business. Good kid, even if he had a thing for pulling practical jokes on people. I wonder...oh fuck, yeah yeah, i remember, we left him stranded back in Bangkok one night he was particularly annoying. Yeah, we just waited till the drunk asshole passed out, and left him there. What can I say? You gotta keep peace on the ship no matter what, boy. That's the single most important thing when you're in the business. A restless crew is unproductive. Besides, he had it coming, and I'm sure he's been able to take care of himself. Hey don't look at me like that, gotta do what you gotta do, unpopular as it may seem. Just ask Carrie Nation or Fidel Castro.

_____________

Remember the story about the crazy militant hoodlum from a few posts back? Well, my homie Pablo Tregebov hooked it up with a picture of said real life hero...

Summer fun, Hawkwind, Supertouch, job hunting, it's all good.

Freddy Alva.

2009-07-20T14:03:00.000-07:00

Cliché as it sounds, I really don't know how to introduce Freddy Alva to you. So I'll leave it at saying he's been behind so much cool shit it's not even funny. I'll have to add some of that particular shit has been nothing sort of life-changing for me, so this interview has been a total fan-boy experience. Now go and play your CXA and Rorschach records again, a revival of the 90's ABC No Rio scene is the big HC trend for 2010.

Queensbridge, 1984.

Ok, first off, i want to know about your origins and upbringing, what part of NYC did you grow up? where are you/your family originally from?

Ok, I guess I’ll start from the beginning; I was born in Peru, on the Amazonian border with Brazil. My parents divorced at an early age & my mother decided to start a new life by immigrating to the states. We moved to NYC in ’79, settling in Jackson Heights, Queens. At that time, the ‘Heights’ still had some remains of the old Italian/Irish neighborhood it used to be. By the ‘80’s, a huge influx of South & Central American immigrants alongside dozens of other nationalities had made it into a polyglot’s wet dream. I remember reading a statistic; according to the U.S. census bureau, Jackson Heights is the most diverse county in America, with over 170 countries represented. It was an amazing place to grow up in, I’m still friends with some of those kids I met in the summer of ’79 & even though I’ve traveled/lived in different places, I still subscribe to a Queens based point of (world)view.

I'm really interested in your pre-hardcore graffiti days, what was it like bombing back then? how long were you into it? are you still getting up/in touch with people from back in the days who do/interested in current graff? the 80s NYHC scene was pretty graff-friendly, who had the coolest tag and styles?

Well, this is the first time someone’s asked me about my Graffiti days, I started tagging when I was 12, everyone I knew “wrote” to a certain degree. I was never good enough to do full out multi-colored wild style pieces. I was more of a “bomber”, just writing tags & doing “throw-ups” (simple bubble-based letters) around the neighborhood were my forte. It wasn’t ‘til I started High School that I met with kids/crews from all over the city that I started hitting the trains. NYC in the early 80’s, as far as the train system goes, was exactly like the movie “The Warriors”: A decayed, out-of control, urban nightmare that felt like a playground to us hoodlums! My involvement in Graff lasted about 4 years, from ’81-’85, I stopped mostly due to breaking my mother’s heart every time I came home all filthy at odd hours of the morning & also because I had gotten into something that began to consume most of my time: Hardcore.
I don’t currently follow the Graff scene, but have gotten in touch with some old bombing partners like DEEN X-MEN, he’s still writing & he’s even sponsored by a spray can company now, Ha! I met a lot of writers once I got into HC & started going to shows at CBGB’s in ’85. I remember there was a band called FRONTLINE that was made up of Graff writers, including Mackie from the CRO-MAGS. He had been bombing since the ‘70’s & to see a “B-boy” looking guy hanging out with the Skins & Punks was something I could relate to. I meet a lot kids hanging out at CBGB’s that came from the same background I did: a Hip-Hop/HC hybrid. Some of the best writers were: HUSH, EXPO, SHOE, VERS. A lot of those guys later played in bands, so it’s interesting to see how the 2 most important youth cultures at that time intersected. I later (around ’86) went on to do a fanzine that mixed Graffiti-style letters with interviews of local bands.

You were into hip hop in the early 80s when it was still underground and in its early stages, whereas since then it has grown into one of the most important aspects of pop culture...was there any suspicion it was ever going to blow up like it did from the block parties and small clubs? what were your favorite jams from back then? how about now?

Growing up with Hip-Hop was incredibly exhilarating: it seemed like everyone I knew was either into Breakdancing, Djing, Graffiti, listening to mixtapes. My first live musical experience is of going to a local skating rink in ’82 & seeing Afrika Bambaata & the Soul Sonic Force perform “Planet Rock”. Man, that was mind blowing! I got to see a lot of the greats like Whodini, UTFO, RUN-DMC when it seemed like rap was a “secret language” that only we understood. There were only 2 radio stations that played rap & at designated times. There’s absolutely no way I could have even imagined today’s Hip-Hop global reach. It’s always fascinated me that something that come from such a poor, disenfranchised segment of society; managed to change/influence popular culture to such a degree.
As far as the actual music, I’m partial to the pioneers that sound dated these days, guys like: Cold Crush Brothers. Spoonie Gee, Kurtis Blow etc… My all-time favorite jam is Jimmy Castor’s “Just Begun”, while it’s not strictly rap per se, it’s the one track that once it came over the speakers; people would into a breaking/poppin frenzy. Current Rap doesn’t really do it for me, it all sounds too slick & polished to fit in with whatever’s in vogue. I have heard some cool indie-rap & also groups from different countries such as Brazil, Israel. I wouldn’t consider myself a Hip-Hop head these days, but I appreciate & remember all the stuff I grew up on.

There are countless myths and stories about NYHC in the 80s, if i'm not mistaken you started going to shows in 1985, what was it really like back then? I guess the fact that neither punk rock nor the city itself were as safe, accessible and clean as now made a huge difference right? which were your favorite bands of the time?

It’s a little clichéd talking about what a different city NY used to be. Whole books & movies have been done trying to portray the dangerous & out of control place it used to be. It wasn’t until I got older, that I discovered the various economic & political-related causes for NY’s plight. I didn’t consider it abnormal at the time, I just thought everyone lived like that & went about my daily life. The concept of individual youth tribes was much more ingrained back then. At my high school, you were either a B-Boy (the majority) or into Metal or Hardcore with a small strata of people into Dance/House music. I had always been into harder rock stuff like AC/DC, due to a friend’s older brother who was into that stuff. I met and started hanging with a small HC skinhead group from my school. A friend took me to my first show at CB’s in ’85, Raw Power & Dayglo Abortions played and I was immediately floored by the musical impact. I do remember being a little bit anxious of hanging out on the Bowery, where the club was located. Besides the assorted punks & skins attending the show, there were bums & derelicts from the nearby homeless shelters, drug dealers, hookers about to start their shift & assorted shifty-looking characters. In short, a microcosm of NY in the 70’s/early ‘80’s!
My favorite bands back then were: KRAUT (1st. HC record I ever bought), URGENT FURY, AF, CRO-MAGS, BAD BRAINS. Queens had a happening scene, with bands like LEEWAY, MURPHY’S LAW, MAJOR CONFLICT, all being local heroes. A big influence was TOKEN ENTRY, the original singer, Anthony Communale, lived 10 blocks from me. He turned me on to older punk bands for which I am eternally grateful. He later went on to sing for RAW DEAL/KILLING TIME, a band that had a couple of songs on a compilation tape, that I put out in ’89, called New Breed, which I’ll talk about later.

In the 'American Hardcore' documentary Sean Taggart mentions something about the NY kids back in the day having a certain inferiority complex compared to the rest of the country's scenes, do you share this impression?

I think that the opposite is truer: most of the kids I knew had a sort of tunnel vision when it came to NY bands: we thought our scene was the best. Local bands with only a demo, would headline over national touring acts with records out. The NYHC sound was pretty unique; some metal-riffs, plus Hip Hop-influenced mosh parts plus a tough street life-based lyrical content that made lots of out of town bands uncomfortable. The scene was incredibly violent in the mid-80’s, so much that CBGB’s stopped having HC shows.
I think that Taggart’s view comes from the theory, posted by American HC, that NY was somehow late in developing a noticeable scene, as supposed to DC, Boston. I think that’s due partly to the fact there never was no early ‘80’s single unifying document like DC’s “Flex your Head “ & also because a lot of the classic circa ’82 bands like ANTIDOTE, URBAN WASTE, CAUSE FOR ALARM never really toured & only put out EP’s as opposed to the Boston/LA/Midwest groups that managed to put out full-length lp’s. The exceptions being AGNOSTIC FRONT: who did tour a lot & put out Lp’s, but got branded as a right-wing skinhead band. BAD BRAINS: not really considered a band from NY originally & the CRO-MAGS, who are mentioned in the movie as not putting out their LP ‘til ’86, when HC was supposedly over.

While we're at it, what's your impression on the sometimes controversial American HC movie and/or book? I felt it was terribly wrong dismissing everything after 1986, considering it was an amazingly rich period for hardcore punk culture....

As you can imagine, from the previous answer, I don’t agree with some of the conclusions of the book/movie. I did enjoy all the classic live footage & some of the commentary from Vic Bondi/John Joseph is pretty right on. I think that the overall “HC was over by ‘86” tone comes from the fact that a lot of the originators of the sound had by that time either broken up (Black Flag/Negative Approach/SSD) or moved on to toning down the harsher aspects of the music (i.e., the “Revolution Summer” bands in DC). The infiltration of Crossover influences, especially in NYC, with bands like the CRUMBSUCKERS/ S.O.D./ LEEWAY led some of the pioneers to conclude that the original straight-forward HC sound had been polluted with the creeping metal influences. I am biased of course, since I was heavily involved in the scene from about ’85 on, but yes I agree; the following years (’86-’92) were incredibly creative & fertile for HC. There were an infinite number of bands that could match any of the “class of ‘82” for power & originality. Judging from me & my friends experience, that period left a lasting influence way beyond outward trappings such as the fashion or purely musical aspects of HC. Our lives were significantly altered in regards to political/social views, diet, career goals etc…
In short, HC might have been over for some people by ’86, but for the rest of us; everything had really just begun.

You mention the band Frontline, the Beastie Boys re-did one of their songs in their "check your head" record using Sly And The Family Stone lyrics ('time for livin'), did the band ever record anything? because the Beasties themselves aren't too sure about that in their liner notes..

Had no idea that “Time for living” was a Frontline song, that song always sounded very Bad Brains influenced to me. Frontline didn’t put anything out, never even heard of a demo. I only remember hearing a live set back then, there might be some live stuff online. They were a band that I knew mainly to the Graff/Mackie connection. I think it’s cool that the Beasties used Sly’s lyrics, Fresh is my favorite Sly Stone album.

Back to you, i'd like you to tell us a bit about you went from an audience member to an active part of the scene, and specifically how the New Breed Compilation came about...other than you wanting to do something with Absolution, was there any specific criteria in choosing the bands?

Well, I talked a bit about this on the New Breed website. Ever since I could remember, I never had any musical skills or the patience/aptitude to learn them; the one time I tried to learn how to play guitar was pretty much a disaster. I figured that the easiest way for me to get involved in the scene, apart from being a spectator, was to do a fanzine. There was a great fanzines-only store called SEE HEAR (which I later worked at) that carried national ‘zines like MRR, Suburban Voice, XXX & great local ones like: Guillotine, Jersey Beat, Smash Apathy. These & others inspired me, in the summer of ’86 I did one issue of “F.T.W.” with an older punk guy that lived in the heights. FTW was more punk oriented, we interviewed FALSE PROPHETS/SLOPPY SECONDS &… YOUTH OF TODAY, weird combo!
I wanted to do a more NYHC-based ‘zine, so in ’87 I got together with a couple of friends: Chris Wynne (later did IN EFFECT ‘zine) & Paul A. (bassist for FIT OF ANGER) & we did the first issue of New Breed, the name coming from an IRON CROSS song. Another friend from Queens, Chaka Malik, did artwork for that issue & the style we were going for was a HC coming from Hip Hop vibe that reflected the backgrounds of the kids we hung out with. This was a marked difference from the first wave of HC in NY that disdained anything to do with rhythm-based music. I came up with the idea of including a comp. tape with the 2nd. issue, Chaka got heavily involved with putting this together & we decided to make a full -size lyric booklet to accompany it. I guess that the main rule was that the bands had to be fairly new, with only demo’s out & reside in one of NY’s 5 boroughs. The main point of reference for all the bands on the comp., was the thriving scene centered around SOME records, a HC/Punk only record store located a few blocks from CBGB’s.

What do you remember people's reactions being like when it came out? how many copies did you sell? i guess you had no idea it would end up being so influential there would be kids on the other end of the world rocking Life's Blood shirts twenty years later...

We were blown away by the reaction to the comp, the last big NY comp had come out in ’87 (Revelation’s “The Way it is”) & we beat Blackout Records “Where the wild things are” comp. by 6 months. So, there was a huge interest to hear (at that time) the new bands that were on the scene. Having Absolution open up the comp really captured people’s attention, but the other classic tracks by Life’s Blood /Beyond/Collapse etc., increased the demand for it, we kept selling them as fast as we could make them. I think a fair estimate of how many we made is about 700-800 copies, you have to remember that these were all duplicated one at a time on a double cassette deck. I always had good memories of doing the comp & throughout the following 10-15 years, somebody would always mention how much they were influenced by it. There were a number of bootlegs done with varying degrees of quality, it wasn’t until a couple of years ago that somebody got in touch with me in regards to doing an interview about the comp. Said interview never came out, but it sparked an interest in me, on doing some kind of tribute due to ’09 being the 20th anniversary of its release. I got together w/Daryl Kahan (who sang for one of the bands on the comp.) & we did a website for it & so far the tape’s been downloaded about 12,000 times! I wasn’t aware of its far-reaching influence, especially with (much) younger kids, but I’m really proud to have been involved with it. It’s really cool to see a new generation getting into it & God bless those kids on the other side of the world rocking those Life’s Blood shirts, I wish I still had mine!

More or less about this time CBGB's banned hardcore due to the ongoing violence at shows, i've heard stories of stabbings, i've heard an interview with McPheeters in which he talks about a kid being permanently blinded at a show, gangs showing up mainly to cause trouble and rob kids, it seems like it was a fucking war out there..

NY had always had a pretty violent scene, as far back as I can remember, the pit was always intense with fights breaking out left & right all the time. This was all a precursor to levels unseen by the summer of ’88. There are various reasons for these, one being that the “leaders” of the scene were busy touring across the country (MURPHY’S LAW, WARZONE, AF, YOT) & they would have normally kept the aggression in check, but I think that the real reason is that a bunch of well, thugs for a lack of a better word, had found in CBGB’s , a ripe target. I knew a lot of these guys & was “down” with them, so I never had problems. I wish could say the same for the countless kids who were savagely beaten up. Since I knew the perpetrators, I will list a rogue’s gallery if you will, of the main culprits. I am not embellishing anything, these people really existed & caused incredible amounts of damage. I’ll start with:

- The Twins: 2 identical Puerto Rican skins from Brooklyn who ran around with the Sunset Park Skins, a crew that would go to shows just to beat up kids for their boots/jackets, making them run barefoot back to the train station.

- Scott E. Banks- A founding member of the DMS gang, he’s currently serving a 25 to life sentence for the murder of 1 punk that had the misfortune of being at the wrong place.

- Minus- Another Sunset Park character, he was notorious for going into the pit with chains wrapped around his hands & just wailing at people. I once saw him swing a sock filled with cue balls at a long haired Metal guy just for fun, totally breaking the guy’s nose.

- Ali “The Hammer”- The nickname came from, you guessed it, walking around with a ball-peen hammer & hitting unsuspecting kids at any given time.

- Esat “00” Bici - Another DMS member that was involved in a widely publicized murder of a gay man (Not at CBGB’s). I heard he got stabbed in Mexico, in the late 90’s.

I could go on but I’m afraid that it’s starting to sound like the plot of a bad “Urban” TV cop show. This is what HC had become: a battlezone, CBGB’s was right in cancelling shows by late ’89. I’ve always detested violence & to be honest, if the early ABC NO RIO scene hadn’t started up, I’m sure I would have slowly but inevitably dropped out of Hardcore altogether.

ABC No Rio all stars

When the ABC No Rio collective started creating an alternative to CB's, was there any animosity/conflict with the 'tough guy' (for lack of a better term) part of NYHC? how about the crusty/peace punk 'Squat Or Rot' types? were you into those bands? i always found weird how Nausea and YDL were on the same compilation lp, right?

The early ABC NO RIO shows started due to the void left by the shutdown at CB’s. Mike Bullshit along with Bugout Society, found this dingy space on the lower east side & almost overnight, new bands formed and started playing there. It was just the right timing for people that were sick of what NYHC was heading & luckily enough, the thug element stayed away. This was due largely to, that at the beginning; we had some important scene “protectors”. Guys like Gavin (BURN/ABSOLUTION), Brendan SFA & Chaka all worked security at the first shows & they scared off any violent elements. Another reason was that none of the CB’s-related bands ever played there: guys like SICK OF IT ALL, KILLING TIME, SHEER TERROR etc.. We started doing really silly stuff on purpose, like having Conga lines at the shows, playing Twister on stage. The “tougher” HC dudes found this a little too much & they avoided the place at all costs. The parallel Squat or Rot/Crusty scene was also avoided by those guys. I liked a lot of the bands like NAUSEA/INSURGENCE/RADICTS & once Mike B.S. left for a cross-country bike trip, leaving me in charge of booking. I started to book a lot of the crustier groups alongside the ABC regulars. I remember catching a lot of flak for that, since it brought this whole contingent of “Drunk Punks” into the club, but that’s another story.
The inclusion of YDL & Nausea on the same record always struck people as odd, but to me it was a pretty accurate representation of the scene at the time. I actually enjoyed YDL’s music (I’m a bit of an OI! Fan) & yes they were very right wing /conservative, involved with that whole “Rock Against Communism” nonsense. But, to the best of my knowledge, they weren’t the White Power group that MRR made them out to be. There were a lot of confused kids at that time, I knew White Power Black & Latino Skinheads, which is a an obvious contradiction when you think about it, but to this day I bump into YDL’s singer (English Nick) & he’s still exactly the way he was: A traditional working-class skinhead with right of center political views, not a neo-nazi , but you can say the same of a good chunk of the USA. I also remember Crazy Jay from Warzone playing guitar with them & he’s jewish. There was also a black skin named Brian that played with them briefly. Not the most politically correct bunch of guys, but to be on the same comp as the very left-wing NAUSEA, has always seemed to me a more real version of events in that era.

I asked a friend of mine if he had any questions he wanted to ask you and he just told me to ask for 'anything related to YDL and Sheer Terror'...any tales to share with the kids? i recently heard this old story about Paul Bearer and Brendan from SFA standing up for Mike Bullshit when he started getting shit for being 'out'...

Well, the only YDL-related story I can think of is that the Guitarist of Citizens Arrest sister used to date the drummer for YDL (Rishi), came from some sort of a muslim/middle eastern background & took great pains to hide that. I guess that he was embarrassed that when they played behind the gigantic American flag that they hung at their shows, somebody would say: “Rishi! What kind of a name is that?” That was hilarious to me at the time. Sheer Terror’s Paul Bearer was/is a really interesting guy, very smart & literate. They had a huge skinhead following for some reason, he would love to say all these sarcastic comments regarding their political/fashion stances & it would just go right over their heads. I remember when Mike B.S. came out & most people didn’t really have a problem with it, it wasn’t until he wrote an essay in his fanzine (Bullshit Monthly) about The Bad Brain’s homophobic lyrics on the song “Don’t Blow Bubbles” that a lot of people were upset & they wanted to beat him up because of it. Once again, guys like Gavin & Brendan SFA, got involved to protect him. I could write a book on how many people those guys saved from serious bodily harm.

Wardance Records...being short lived and not too prolific, is often overlooked, but i find it pretty much established a very important aspect of 90s hardcore with its first releases (C.A., Rorschach) and also pointed the direction things were going in with 1.6 Band and Hell No...In hindsight, which was your favorite release on the label? Where you into limited covers/color vinyl or any other collector scum bait like that? Is there any record from the era you would like to have released yourself?

Doing Wardance was an incredible experience for me, I’m still in awe of the records I got to put out. The overall answer is that I love all of the bands, each one came out exactly the way I envisioned it, but I will say that my 1st. release is my favorite: The Citizen’s Arrest 7” was/is such a powerhouse. Daryl Kahan gives one of the all-time best HC vocals as far as I’m concerned. It’s a shame that they broke just as their Lp came out. We printed an extra 100 copies of the 7” on red vinyl & they were not for sale, just to be given out to friends that had helped out the band, pretty everybody from the early ABC scene. That was the only time I did limited edition colors & apart from HELL NO doing about 25 copies of an alternate cover of their debut 7”, I never did any other collector-type pressings. I think you’re right in pointing out 1.6 BAND & HELL NO’s ahead of their time sound, a lot people didn’t “get” them back them. The odd-time signatures & lack of straight-forward HC sound was at odds with the rest of the scene. I can definitely hear their influence on later bands to this day. The one record I wish I could have put out is the BORN AGAINST 7”. They were such an influence on an individual & collective level. I always considered the 3 most important bands from ABC to be: RORSCHACH/CXA & BORN AGAINST, so to have put out 2 of those 3 is really gratifying.

I've always wondered what is the significance behind the Wardance logo and also the label name? a Killing Joke reference?

The name is a tribute to the song Wardance, off one of my favorite records, the first KILLING JOKE Lp. I like the lyric: “Music for pleasure it’s not music no more”, I took it to mean that music as a whole should be more that just a pleasurable hobby & they (KJ) really believed in what they sang about: they were so sure of an oncoming apocalypse that they temporarily relocated to Iceland in hopes of a better chance of survival. I was always struck by that anecdote. The logo is a warrior figure from the Chimu culture in northern Peru. It wasn’t done with some sort of ethnic pride in mind, I just thought it looked really cool; the little guy’s finger is pointing at upper left hand corner, right were the release’s info would be.

Late 80s/early 90s hardcore was, as you say, very concerned with making a change within one's daily life/habits, i guess you're still friends/in touch with/aware of the current situation of people from that era..when looking at all of you, how do you feel you have all been affected?

Being involved at ABC from about ’90 to ’92 was a real eye opener for me. I got to meet so many people from different backgrounds, ABC was ground zero for a thriving grassroots activist scene that juxtaposed with the DIY mentality of HC. Bands & people really practiced what they preached, as far as offering an alternative to the (even in HC) mainstream. I guess the biggest change was on an individual level, speaking for myself: it influenced me to adapt a vegetarian diet, maintain a healthy sense of skepticism & seek a meaningful career/job as opposed to something that just pays the bills.
To this day, I’m still in touch with a good chunk of the early ABC people , some have become jaded of course, but & I can say that for the most part; the persons they became today, can be directly linked to those times we spent at that dingy spot on the Lower East Side.

New Breed Tape Compilation.

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And just for good measure:

GIVE NOTICE OF NIGHTMARE

2009-07-12T19:08:00.000-07:00

I think i was like 13 the first time i was exposed to a Suehiro Maruo comic. It was a short story in a theme issue about dreams that a major comic magazine had published. I don't have the issue at hand, and i can't remember what the fuck his story was about (something pretty usual when dealing with Maruo), but i do remember being totally freaked out and disturbed by it, even though, as i recall it, it wasn't heavily loaded with twisted sex and violence as usual, it was just scary, in a 'burn-out-acid-freak-spewing-mindless-drivel' way. Back then I only owned one Black Flag record, 'Loose nut', and I found the Pettibon images quite matching to Maruo's ugly nightmarish vibes.
With time, i grew up to know and develop a love/hate relationship with his work, I mean, yeah, I'm aware his stories are supossed to be "the artistic vision of a nightmare", which basically means he's not really supposed to have a decent storyline that makes sense, just some kind of stream of conciousness graphic rant for him to go crazy and/or get all poetic on us. And it's better off that way. When he tries to actually tell a story, he usually sucks at narrating, or else his storylines are bland and predictably cliché-manga in the worst way possible. Yeah, they are entertaining sometimes, but it's best to not pay too much attention to them.

His latest offering, The Strange Tale Of Panorama Island is pretty much the perfect example of this. Graphically, Maruo is unhinged in it, the story lends itself to it: it tells the tale of a millionaire who decides to build a small utopian world in a island, so you know what you're getting: huge landscapes, a fantasy world inhabited by wild life, outdoor orgies, crazy architecture, circus life, diverse character studies, are all given the special treatment. The storyline, however, is a different story as it has suffered greatly from Maruo's lack of ability as a narrator when it came to adapting it from the original novel (published in 1926) and thus comes across as somewhat dull and unspirited. Apparently, Maruo has been working and delaying this project for over ten years, and i really can't imagine why during all that time he the thought of quiting the project and sticking to his usual stab-your-heart-then-lick-your-eyeball/bad acid trip on a group sex session routine didn't cross his mind.

Yes, that was pretty pointless as a review. Fuck you.

Also, I'm curious about Maruo's alleged ties to the early Japanese punk scene, if anybody has any info, please drop a line.

--------------
Listening:
Brain Handle 'smiling/smiling again'
Destino Final 'atrapados'
Danzig 'II'
Roky Erikson 'the evil one'

... in all this blood and thunder.

2009-07-01T08:39:00.000-07:00

Fully immersed in that dangerous position that stands in between tedium and being simply pissed off, listening to GZA, having my brain cells scorched to death by the fucking sun, walking from one end of Barcelona to the other, my thoughts suddenly shifted from wondering which one of my friends would be the first to die to asking myself wether or not what i was feeling was a slight case of wallowing in guilt for it or just the atrocious amount of Mexican food i had eaten a little earlier, and trying to remember which of these streets exactly was the one where i found out the guy that had filled the city with hand written flyers against the government was living in his garbage filled car. Then i saw him. Not that guy, but a different, even cooler local lunatic.

You see, while i lived in town, i would see him every now and then, and even after leaving it a couple of years back, i would still have a knack for running into him while visiting. He hadn't changed a bit since the first time: old man clothes, a demented look on his face (like he's about to kill everyone in sight, invade Poland, shoot the president, or all three at once), age somewhere between 45 and 60, physical features somewhere between Rorschach and Alfredo Landa and, most strikingly, very heavy political messages written in ball-point pen in the back of his jacket (he always wears one, fuck the summer) that made me define him as some kind of far right anarchist. It would be a different one each time i saw him, including some amazing hits like:

WHAT A MESS THE GOVERNMENT MADE IN ATOCHA
ETA KILL THE GOVERNMENT MOTHERFUCKING THIEVES
or the classic:
LONG LIVE THE ETA, ETA KILL THEM ALL BEFORE ITS TOO LATE

I should add that some heavy duty spelling and grammar mistakes where lost in translation. And yeah, they do sound like japanese hardcore song titles.

My excitement grew as i approached him, thankfully i was wearing sunglasses, so it wasn't too obvious i was staring and hence he wouldn't try to kill me (at least not for that reason), As our paths crossed, i nervously turned around to look at his pale beige 'members only' jacket.He didn't disappoint:

FRANCO HAD MORE BALLS THAN THE ENTIRE GOVERNMENT COMBINED

It was written in his trademark scratchy block letters. As usual, my mind filled with questions: who is this guy? where does he live? and how? does he have similarly politically-minded activist friends? what music does he like?
Meanwhile, back in my ipod:

I'm lively, my dome piece, is like buildin stones in Greece my poems are deep from ancient thrones I speak I'm overwhelmed, as my mind, roams the realm

I really, really, love life sometimes.

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GZA 'liquid swords'
Sonic Youth 'sister'
Men's Interest demo

Firmeza 10, Crimen De Estado, and why hardcore still matters...

2009-06-24T20:07:00.001-07:00

"This is not music, this is shit", so claims the silk-screened cover of Firmeza 10's (named after a series of repressive measures against anarchist activism announced by the Spanish government) debut 12" 'Hardcore Radikal', and, indeed, it is. I'm not going to play the extreme music lover and hide the fact that this is a hard record to listen to: 16 songs of ultra distorted fucked up bass-less noise punk, with raging and crude female vocals, along the lines of Wretched, Shitlickers, Disorder, or the obvious Discharge, but noisier, rawer, and perhaps, angrier than any of those bands. As easy as it would be to simply dismiss them as another d-beat band, i'm glad to say F10 avoid the pigeonholing of clichés...unlike 90% of today's 'd-beat' hardcore subgenre, they do not sing by-the-numbers lyrics about war atrocities, dead bodies among the ruins, and the usual crusty fun and games, theirs is a song of personal anguish, of the barely repressed urge to scream in a claustrophobic urban setting, of being trapped within the confines of four walls built inside one's own head. It is, indeed, the fitting soundtrack to the everyday struggle that results from a modern day urban life-style, and as such is an emotionally crushing record, yet immensely rewarding.

Crimen De Estado, which features members of F10 and Destino Final as well, is a vastly different affair. Indeed, it shares an affinity for DIY, lo-fi aesthetics: silkscreened cover (amazing artwork too..), photocopied insert, and a wonderfuly raw, primitive recording, but where Firmeza 10 is the sound of inner turmoil, Crimen De Estado is the soundtrack to throwing bricks at cops and burning ATM's, ridiculously epic as it may sound, that's the feel that this little 7" evokes, pure fucking raw hardcore, influenced by all the classic Italian, Finnish, and Spanish bands you can think of, with to-the-point-lyrics. The description might sound generic and like something you have heard a million times before. And you have. Just not this good. It's hard to describe what makes a raw hardcore punk record great, but whatever it is, this has massive amounts of it, blood boiling, fist pumping, raw hardcore, the kind you'll never tire of hearing. At least i hope so.

Neither band has a myspace, book your own fucking life.

SLICES

2009-06-24T18:18:00.001-07:00

So we've been into the p-rock thing for a while, got jaded, went into rampant hipsterism and started clubbing and taking drugs, and fucking girls with horn-rimmed glasses....what the fuck makes us crawl back into a sexually deprived hell hole of basement shows, vinyl records that take up far too much space, retarded arguments and t-shirts that fade in the first wash? For me, its bands like Slices that do the trick.
I admit it, i'm a sucker for this kind of sound, ugly, noisy, furious hardcore punk, that takes later period Black Flag as a blueprint to go wherever the fuck they feel like going. In a way, it's similar to what Born Against or End Of The Line did 20 years ago, but it's not an imitation in sound or attitude, reviews have tagged it as 'Crossed Out playing 'My War' side B' and while i'm not really 100% into that, i'll admit it's a pretty good working description. I'm reviewing both their 7"s on Home Invasion and 160h records (i need a copy of this, be nice, i'm broke), being as they are from the same recording session, and all i can say is they are on constant rotation on my ipod and turntable.
Music that can be hard, ugly, fast, noisy, dirgey, slow, with lyrics that don't insult my intelligence, a recording that is powerful and crunchy without being overproduced and an awesome attention to detail when it comes to the record layout/packaging, which is what makes it worthwhile to actually buy a record in the end, this brings to mind the same feel as all those early 90s records: Heroin, Born Against, Crossed Out, End Of The Line, Rorschach, Cop Out...just pure gut-level hardcore punk without retro posing, scene style guides to follow, pretentious and badly played out 'slickness', or ridiculous attempts and being 'professional'...all i need really.

Buy their records from Home Invasion and 16Oh or check out the band's blog.

KIM PHUC

2009-06-24T17:54:00.001-07:00

Now, when i heard there was a new band with ex-members of Aus Rotten (aka the most boring band EVER to grace the pages of Profane Existence, and that's saying a lot), i pretty much didn't give a shit, however, i'm glad to have finally given them a chance due to a friends insistence.
There's a lot of talk about Kim Phuc, and not on the strength of their name alone, they've drawn comparisons to early 80s NYC noise rock such as Live Skull, or early Swans (not seeing this, really), a grimier version of British post punk, early American hardcore, or even some weird brand of mid-to-late 80s fucked up American post-punk ala AmRep/Touch & Go. Fact of the matter, this is all true, but not quite.
Their debut 7" (which i need a copy of) offers up four tracks of dirty, fucked up, thuggish sounding punk rock, like an early 80s USHC band trying to work their infatuations with The Stooges and Wire into the mix, lyrics dealing with human misery, lust for money, self medication and all that good stuff we've come to expect from a punk rock band. It is however on their second 7", 'Wormwood star b/w Freak out the squares' where i believe the band really comes into their own. First song is a somber, yet energetic, sorta anthemic even, twin guitar attack on a mid tempo beat that simply won't give up for a good 4 minutes, with interesting noisy guitar arrangements to boot. The flip side is the winner for me, kicking things off with a building crescendo that simply snaps into a barrage of buzzsaw strumming and mean spirited, venomous punk rock. 'Are you ready to die for art?'. Absolutely.
I believe these guys have already managed to figure out their own sound and spirit, one that is grimy and mean, without falling into the trappings of 'street punk' or 'scum rock', and which can attain a certain level of sophistication without being downright 'arty'.

You can find out about Kim Phuc and where to get their records through their myspace.