GOD HARVEST

These Florida crushers paid us a visit almost six years ago, and they have certainly not mellowed with age. Heavier than last time, with more churning blasts and leads that hint to metal roots lurking under the stench that dominates the recording. Relentless punishment in eleven doses. 

INSULATED

TRAITOR CRUCIFIX

This one is something else, punk. Eleven minutes of Florida brutality...searing and relentless. Even when they "slow" things to a dull pummel on "Proclamation," these kids are a swarm of devastation. And that's when they scale it back a bit. You see where I'm going with this? Pure power..and those vocals. Ooooof. The shit is nasty in all of the right ways. Get it. 

TRAITOR CRUCIFIX

BAD ORGASM

Filthy Florida grind from 2007. Twelve songs in fourteen minutes, and I'm probably glad they didn't include lyrics. Enjoy your holiday, Americans, summer's over...the rest of you mutants just have a good Monday.

GENITAL LEPROSY DEMOS

FALSE PUNK

These fools have that filthy, nihilistic mid paced swerve/stomp down hard. So hard that it makes you forget that you've been saying that you wish bands would stop drawing from the same damn well. Fukk it, punk, if the water is cold and you are thirsty.....drink. The riffs are so primal, and the attack is so deliberate, and aside from one little discordant bit in "Adjustment Bureau" the whole thing is just one monotonous beating. Track of the day is "NSNP," because you like things that are ugly.

FALSE PUNK

GROSS

With a resounding "OOOOFFFF" this Florida outfit will drop you to your knees. Hollow, thundering hardcore power with riffs upon riffs upon riffs and a ferocious pace that doesn't let you catch your breath until 13 minutes into the demo (that's when the sound is finished, natch). Sometimes they switch to weird disjointed parts that are hard to rage to, but they start blasting before confusion really sets in...and then they slow down to a painful, fist clenching slog...and I'm only talking about the 90 seconds of "Close Circle" here, the other songs are just as nuts. Raise your glass and show respect, this is the shit.

GROSS

HOLD ON TO YOUR BUTTS

Anyone who has ever met me knows that I'm going to jump at a band called HOLD ON TO YOUR BUTTS without hesitation. I confess that the intro almost made me regret that decision, but thankfully that disintegrated into "Must Go Faster" and then it was off to the races. Heavy on the tongue in cheek everything (especially dinosaurs), they thrash relentlessly and almost certainly drink with equal fervor. Get ready.

WHEN YA GOTTA GO

NO FRAUD

I don't really need to wax on about this one, but I will say that if you aren't familiar with Florida's NO FRAUD then you need to be. If I asked someone to describe their idea of "perfect 1980s US hardcore" and they simply handed me a copy of this 1985 demo, then I don't think I could make an argument to the contrary.

NO FRAUD

BASTARD DECEIVER

Blackened Florida metalcrust that is every bit as powerful as those three words imply. Tampa's BASTARD DECEIVER are ugly and dark, and when they descend into those deliberate mid tempo plods ("Sick Nature" specifically) they go from pure power to shameless brutality. I feel like when bands try really hard to do something new, to push an envelops, to be different for the sake of being different...just listen to "The Void" and you'll see that it's more than enough to just do something right. This shit churns and grinds and it will turn your stomach - pure filth and pure power.

BASTARD DECEIVER

ROYAL ANGUISH

Painful garage thrash/death from Florida, circa 1990. With that blurb and the ridiculous logo, you should be downloading already, right? I suggest reading the lyrics included in the download, definitely worth a hearty laugh.  Now...somebody wanna put on their detective shoes and tell me how many of these hessians still love Jesus?

SCREAM BLOODY MURDER

Holy Shit - 45 seconds of internetting and it turns out that ROYAL ANGUISH are still active!!!

Dig in, kids...

FUCKBOYZ

Listening to this 1989 demo, you just have to shake your head at how advanced these Florida teens really were. Whether it's the infectious garage punk song craft of "Hallucinating," the opener with hooks that could fall in line with the best Reatard-esque bangers, or the SAMHAIN worship that is "Full Of Sin," or even the DRAMARAMA styled "alt-rock love songs played by ex punkers vibe" of the tape's final track "Think Of Me" (no way this one should have been conceived of or delivered by people this early in their journey down the rock 'n roll highway), FUCKBOYZ were way better at doing whatever they wanted than they had any right to be. The mountain of musical contributions that the core of this band would bestow upon us in the years that followed is well documented (YOGURT, HICKEY, LUDICRA, MIAMI, WORM OUROBOROS), and perhaps this recording lacks a little bit of focus but while you dissect and get overly critical, I'm gonna jam the shit out of these tracks today. Repeatedly.

FUCKBOYZ

LOST COLONY

More time/place comp action, this time from Pensacola, Florida. Grind, hardcore, raucous garage punk, noise punk from a band called ZEROX '82 that will melt yr fukkn mind, catchy Oi! and the obligatory "our bro has a sampler thing and he made this song and he lives here so can he be on the comp?" track from BALDER. Personally, I'll take the ALTERED STATE tracks over anything else on here (though the BAD ORGASM jams are superb), but the whole thing is tops. Good job, and enjoy.

LOST COLONY: PENSACOLA PUNK 2006-2012

NO PLEASURE IN LIFE

Sometimes it's nice when the source is a total mystery. I think I was directed to this project by someone personally involved, but that was months ago and my memory is shit. So here are two horrifically bleak black metal missives: "The Coils Of Depression" and the title track "Happiness Is Not An Option." See above description: horribly bleak. Kinda like life, but you take the good things out of it and you revel in them. And while it might be ironic to file NO PLEASURE IN LIFE with the aforementioned (but rare) "good things." sometimes you have to take what you can get. Even when what you can get is rather grim.

HAPPINESS IS NOT AN OPTION

WORLDS

Low end burly grind from (of course) Florida. This is a bulldozer that lacks any nuance whatsoever, the first track goes right for the throat and WORLDS never lets up. Fukkn insane.

UNFORESEEN PATHS

IVES

The 1:15 mark of "Lost In The Pleasures Of Moonlight" is a gloriously brilliant example of how punks can sometimes make better metal than hessians, a terrifying assault that only last a few seconds but knocks you on your heels...but doesn't prepare you for the xylophone solo that follows. And the xylophone solo totally makes sense, which is even weirder. IVES reminds me of those (almost punk sounding) early Norwegian black metal bands I heard in Aesop's room in 1995, which I think is their point. Not that IVES know who I am or that I lived in Aesop's room, but that they would like to sound like those seminal bands...except for the first few seconds of the title track where they would like to sound like MITB (super weird, but compared to a xylophone solo, not really that shocking).

ABANDON

ECTOPLASM

Blown out punk as fukk madness from the Gainesville MAUSER tree. You know what you're getting here, and you are about to get a motherfukkn facefull - searing guitars, a beyond bombastic rhythm section and vocals shouting out a constant struggle to be heard through the white hissssssss. Your ears can only take so much when digested at proper volume, and ECTOPLASM has cut their initial offering mercifully short at four songs. You're welcome.

EAST COAST TOUR 2013

CULT RITUAL

These Florida kids kinda took a bunch of shit by storm in the late '00s. It might have been the tunes - '80s US hardcore kicked in the ass with a healthy dose of '90s DIY (I'm thinking FLAG reinterpreted by BORN AGAINST here), lots of youth and a sick heavy psych/grunge guitar, it might have been the fact that their shit always looked super cool or seemed to be hard to track down...personally I think it was The Internet. Right or wrong, I associate these meddlers with Mysterious Guy Hardcore - not like they invented it, but more like they were enveloped by it (if you aren't familiar with MGH, then please, do not delve any deeper, it is a stupid moniker that seemed to only exist on message boards and amongst people who tend to get wrapped up in things that don't really matter). After CULT RITUAL, these people formed some other bands. A couple of them I have liked, a couple of them I have not liked at all. This is the first CULT RITUAL demo.

DEMO I

JUD JUD

This had to show up eventually, right? JUD JUD are the perfect example of what happens when an inside joke achieves full actualization. Even if you don't (think you) want to listen, you should download the link just to follow along with the lyrics sheet...every jud and jud is accounted for. "Dive Bomb Song" is still my favorite track by this duo, and the joke is still funny.

XAFIX

And after years of confusion, I was told that the title 'XAFIX' has nothing whatsoever to do with the band AFI. It was meant to be a play on a crucifix, but a straight edge crucifix, as in some kind of "nailed to the X" kind of thing. 

VERMIN

Thundering raw DBeat coming at your from the furthest recesses of cavernous life. No frills in the songs themselves, but the guitars rely on flange and manipulation instead of pure distortion and the vocals are hollow shouts - it's the inevitable result of noiz punk maniacs starting to devour (and recreate) '80s goth and post punk...of course, the result is simply that it's even more reminiscent of the past. They crushed it when we played with them in Gainesville.

VERMIN

FLORIDIAN WINTER

Ultra primitive plodding black metal/raw punk hybrid from Tampa. Guitar/drums and sneered distorted vocals. It took me a while, and maybe it's something about the echo in the guitar (though the awkward adolescent moaning in "She Likes Many Things" didn't hurt), but I consider myself a convert.

MORALS COME LAST

TESTÖKRA

I don't want to complain about tour. Tour is great. Cruising around with people you (hopefully) like and playing punk...shit rules, that's all there is to it.  Sometimes things go wrong - van trouble, your stupid bandmate is being an idiot (again!), shitty show, etc. But just about the only complaint I have from the NO STATIK east coast tour in December/January is that I didn't get to see TESTÖKRA. The members were at our show, just not playing music....I would have loved to have seen "Witch" live. Maybe next time.

SHAKING NERVES