GLUERASH

Hardcore. Fast and nasty. No frills, just attack. Ten songs in nine minutes. Boom.

 GLUERASH

Find GLUERASH here.

ALTERNATIVE

One of the more under the radar UK anarcho acts of the early '80s, ALTERNATIVE cranked out consistently interesting releases. Whistful (almost COCTEAU TWINS-esque) guitars and lilting vocals fronting a forceful Scottish outfit, hearing these tracks (many for the first time in my personal earholes), a decidedly more mellow take on the out front weirdness of many previous releases, is excellent. I'll still take If They Treat You Like Shit of course...but old punk demos are fukkn cool, and this reinterpretation of "Fuck Off Thatcher" is a total killer. Not entirely sure about where this demo fits in their discography, but a few of the tracks appear on the Get Away From It All In The Army and How Dare You cassettes towards the end of their run. 

JULY 1986 DEMO

INANGER

Cassette version of the Reality Blind EP on Tribal War (please read the interview with Neil/Tribal War in the recent MRR, excellent stuff) and an excellent rehearsal recording. 15 tracks in all, driving political punk from Scotland...exactly what you need.

WITHIN THIS CORRUPTION

4 MINUTES

Mid tempo and catchy melodic Scottish punk from 1982. This is a rehearsal tape from one of the hundreds of bands that sprouted up in the second wave of UK punk and then faded away just as quickly as they appeared. No information available, no track listing available, but a companion post on Escape Is Terminal of a live set from the same year is this is what tickles your pickle.

4 MINUTES

LAST RITES

All hail home taping! I found this gem on the backside of the tape from which I culled the POST MORTEM shit last week - these tracks from Scottish punks LAST RITES come from 1984's Fascism Means War EP (check out THE BLOOD style guitars on "The Dreams Of Many," subtle but brilliant) with the A side "We Don't Care" from their debut single thrown in (B-side gets cut off before the first chorus). The first single is notably less impressive ('80s Britpunk at its unimaginative worst. This band plods forward uneventfully, spitting out hackneyed lyrical clichés along the way. It sounds like they don't care, so why should anyone else? - Tim Yo, MRR #7), but the next record is a quintessential UK82 scorcher. Cheers to someone in the past for putting this wax on tape - enjoy.

FASCISM MEANS WAR

BARBED WIRE

WHOA!!! I don't know how this one slipped under the radar for so many years, but this 5 song slab from BARBED WIRE is a scorcher! Ferocious UK82 styled hardcore punk with a little touch of DISCHARGE (especially on "TV Drug"), and they deliver a killer cover of THE REZILLOS classic, a nod to their fellow Scots that sounds more like a hardcore tune than I ever knew it could. This is the final installment from the three band tape that also brought us THE DEAD and INTERNAL DIMENZIONS...if only there were more gems on the B side!

BARBED WIRE

NORTH ATLANTIC NOISE ATTACK, vol. 1 - UK

Just like the title says: a compilation of punk and hardcore from the UK. This Lethal Dose tape (catalog #LD10 for those keeping track) features OI POLLOI (three tracks off the first demo), POLITICAL ASYLUM (who are criminally under appreciated, probably because they released primarily - if not exclusively - cassettes, making them unappealing collector fodder) with tracks from the Walls Have Ears tape, SUBHUMANS, THE STUPIDS (who I sometimes forget were fucking incredible...after I ripped this tape I blasted the Van Stupid LP and it was so damn good), CIVILISED SOCIETY with two killers from their 6 track demo, CHAOS UK ("4 Minute Warning" still gives me chills), GENERIC, LUNATIC FRINGE, and the unfortunately named but really good FRANKFURTER. This thing fucking smokes, and I think it's probably the perfect compilation for you to listen to today.

NORTH ATLANTIC NOISE vol. 1

6 MORE YEARS OF SHEER BLOODY HELL

This comp was released as a benefit for Martin Foran who was wrongfully convicted for robbing a pub in 1984. I wonder how much money the sale of this raised for his legal defense, but I'm glad they put this stuff together for me to enjoy in (what was then) the future. There are some usual suspects on the TDK D90, like THE INSTIGATORS (reasonable quality live tracks), CULTURE SHOCK, SHRAPNEL, THE APOSTLES, A.O.A., and  OI POLLOI, but the fun shit here is lesser known bands like GODORRHOEA, INCEST BROTHERS and LIFE CYCLE. 30 tracks from 13 bands in total, and consider yourself warned: the tape opens with some horrific live drum machine driven tunes from THE NEXT WORLD, but once you get past those, you can rock out to the freedom of Mr. Foran!

6 MORE YEARS OF SHEER BLOODY HELL?

AOA

Raging Scottish hardcore that will have you peeling your speakers off the wall after you blast this all morning.  After the Who Are They Trying To Con? 12" came this demo in 1986, and then AOA delivered a split with OI POLLOI and a proper LP (five of those LP tracks appear on this demo). The only respite here is the spoken word bit before "Material Profit," and even that is just a teaser because it's about The Man, and right after you hear somebody talking about The Man and Society, you fucking KNOW that punk rock is coming next.  This one is all about the guitars man, from the manic whirling charge of "Is This Life?" to the AXEGRINDER/AMEBIX crunch in "Bastard Satan Fuckers From Hell," there's an intensity here that is rarely matched...Play fucking loud and enjoy.

AOA 1986

OI POLLOI

I figure OI POLLOI kinda goes in the "needs no introduction" category, but I completely skipped over this band for years.  Perhaps I saw one too many idiot wearing their shirts, or maybe I was simply too concerned with the bands playing live in my area to bother checking out some old codgers from Scotland. But OI POLLOI are fukkn bad ass, and this is their first "proper" recording (the first demo is a way rougher home job, but still killer) from 1984.  If anyone else has not bothered getting into them, then might I suggest that this is the perfect place to start - any demo that begins with "Punx 'n' Skinz" is probably going to be a winner. And in case you aren't sold, how many bands have anti nuclear power songs and pro-skinhead songs on the same release? Not many.

DESTROI THE SYSTEM!

PUNK...THE ACQUIRED TASTE!

Are these Friday compilation tapes getting old?  I was kinda wondering if that was the case, until I popped this one into the Magic Terminal Escape Digital Sound Converter Machine and heard how awesome it is.  Just like the cover proclaims: "22 Punky Tracks!!" and this shit smokes from start to finish.  Everything here is from the UK except for the excellent addition of Italy's S.I.B. (Swelling Itching Brain) and the post S.I.B. "skunk" band DIOXINA (that's 'skin" and 'punk' shoved together in the same genre, and these dudes made it up in 1983)...the S.I.B. tracks are two of my favorites, while the DIOXINA stuff falls a little flat compared to other shit they did in later years...but that's as close as this comp comes to a dud, and nearly everything else fucking shines.  The two EXIT-STANCE tracks make my hair stand on end, especially the epic A-side closer "Witchtrial,"  and XPOZEZ here are as good as I've ever heard them.  SCREAMING DEAD offer appropriately gothy tracks; DISTORTED live their name to the fullest (why have there not been more bands called DISTORTED? It just makes sense...); live female fronted shit from HAGAR THE WOMB; demo tracks of two SUBHUMANS classics; killer songs from BUTCHER; and the always worthy Scots POLITICAL ASYLUM round out the roll call on this C60 comp.  If POLITICAL ASYLUM's "Trust In Me" sounds a bit familiar, then please follow my little story:  The singer has lived in the SF area for many years now, and when I heard the opening bass line to this track I gave him a ring (actually, it's the only bass line in the song).  "Did you know that the bass in this tune is lifted from BLACK FLAG?" I asked.  "Sure, it's '6 Pack'" came the reply.  Shameless, and kinda brilliant.  This tape came to us in 1983(?) courtesy of Rentaracket Recordings, which was an offshoot of Odsunsods fanzine, and came complete with a mini-zine featuring band info, contacts and shitloads of punk graphics...yeah man, punk compilation tapes rule.  Enjoy your Friday.

PUNK...THE ACQUIRED TASTE!! (side A)

PUNK...THE ACQUIRED TASTE!! (side B)

SOCIETY'S VICTIMS

Killer UK82 shits from Scotland's SOCIETY'S VICTIMS,  who apparently laid down these tracks and then called it a day.  Guitar leads are the highlight for me, especially the echo drenched wanks on "Army." After that first scorching track, things mellow out a bit, and the result is pretty standard UK anarcho fare, but that lead guitar is more than engaging enough to hold my interest.  Punk rules.

CHAINED TO YOUR BELIEFS

DISTEMPER

Blazing four song demo from Scotland's DISTEMPER that someone asked for last week.  Were it not for the white hot guitar sound I might consider this Oi! but the guitar is so gloriously blown to hell it practically places these tunes in a genre all their own. This 1984 tape and one track on a Scotland compilation EP the following year are all that DISTEMPER graced us with, but if you're going to leave a legacy, it might as well be punk as fuck.

UP AGAINST A WALL

SOCIAL ABUSE

SOCIAL ABUSE came from Falkirk, which is somewhere northish of Edinburgh, and they are punk as fucking shit.  They rely almost exclusively on the plodding floor tom heavy mid tempo UK punk beat, which is completely fine by me, but it's the vocals that make this six song demo totally indispensable... strained and insistent in the way that only a teenager can really be.  The songs are rudimentary and rather monotonous (this is a good thing) but well played, and fueled by the vocals there are some incredibly catchy bits on this tape.  "Society's Prisoner" gets my vote for punkest tune of the lot, with it's long winded howl "Did you have a nice day at the office deeeaaaarr?" while the band lumbers through the two notes that make up the entire song.  Yeah, it's brilliant.  This is from 82 or 83 (I think), and I don't believe they released anything other than this tape, so dig in.

FIRST OFFENCE

MAXIMUM SECURITY

Early 80s hardcore punk from Glasgow, Scotland.  Extremely basic and rudimentary in their approach, MAXIMUM SECURITY took about three songs to warm up to me, but by the time "UK Utopia" entered my aural canals for the the first time, I was completely hooked, and the fact that the guitarist can barely make notes through the generous twisting of the distortion know became an asset, not a drawback.  The bassist seems like the musician of the band, with walking and meandering bass lines in most of these seven tracks, and perhaps that's what gives this demo it's real charm and sets it apart from heaps of 80s releases by bands yearning to be the next Riot City act.  Political, as you can see here:

and forceful punk that might have been hardcore had it been born a few years later.  Seven songs, seventeen minutes, gruff awkward vocals, blown out pencil thin guitar and frustrated drum beats...what more could you possibly want from your punk?

FROM INNOCENCE TO IGNORANCE

BRAIN DAMAGE

A raging 1983 demo from yet another mystery band.  Absolutely ripping UK hardcore, with a few rather typical tracks (the vocals on "Nothing Left" are textbook sing-song punk, and "Survive" is a superb, though by-the-books number), but a couple of these songs are total standouts (especially "Believe In Me," which is a complete scorcher but features a posi-core chorus that would make 7 SECONDS proud, not exactly what the UK was churning out in '83). BRAIN DAMAGE hailed from Scotland, graced us with this seven track ripper, and then two of these songs appeared on a 1986 BCT compilation...that's all folks.

DEATH TO TIMMY POP