SUBTERFUGE

UK punk from 1983...there's a reason why people worship and ape this shit 35 years later, because when "Soldiers Of Fortune" drops it feels like all is right with the world. I stand by my words in the initial post - start with the tracks from Woolshag's Last Round demo, as they are straight screamers and it makes you appreciate the band's humble ramshackle beginnings a little more (there are only four months between the two recordings, but still). I am enjoying revisiting these old posts....there's a lot to dig into.

1983: GOOD BEER GUIDE // WOOLSHAG'S LAST RIDE // Live @ Brannigan's

CONTINGENT

When young punks draw liberally from the sounds of decades past, foregoing anything resembling originality in favor of trying to recreate an artifact, when young punks spend their time doing the new millennium equivalent of the kids in my high school jamming "Stairway To Heaven" ripoffs, when it seems like maybe there really is, in fact, nothing new....then I want it to fukkn sound like CONTINGENT. When the tracks are this good I don't give even half a shit if it's a rehash, and these young punks sound like they got plopped straight out of 1982. Three pogo friendly burners with perfectly gruff vocals, just enough flange on the bass, and "In The Wild" is the most gloriously ignorant track I've heard in ages. Well done, young punks, I take back everything I said about you.

CONTINGENT

CITY INDIANS

I originally posted this one in the early days of The Escape, and recently dug the tape out again to repair the dead link. But after blasting it a few times, I figured Spoilsport warrants proper re-posting instead of a fresh download buried beneath four years of posts. Either ripping metallic UK82 or rudimentary proto anarcho/metal/punk depending on their intent, these tracks are searing and fiercely (shamelessly) political in a way that bands just don't seem to be anymore. 

SPOILSPORT

For the curious, here's the blurb that accompanied the original post:

CITY INDIANS hailed from Derby, and this is the Spoilsport demo from 1986. Relatively basic, but super in your face UK82 punk, with a very serious animal rights angle. (It is sometimes astounding to me just how fucking political a large part of the DIY punk scene was in the UK, and equally bewildering how much a large part of the scene in the US today is just simply not.) Killer four song demo, that probably came 4 years too late for anyone to get really excited about it at the time. But now? This guy is excited.

PRIMITIVE PACT

This burner is all about the guitar. Rarely have I heard a guitar recorded that so perfectly suits the style. Hollow and piercing, it bites through the rest of the band with pure ferocity and I confess it was near the end of the demo before I stopped focusing on that one instrument and actually realized how searing the band is. UK82 energy harnessed and ramped up several notches - these New Yorkers are clearly on a fukkn mission, and they are succeeding.

END OF THE WORLD

AD NAUSEAM

Decades before the current wave of kids cranking out meticulously distorted and deliberately fukkd sounds there were waves of kids bashing out their own brand of desperate sounds. These blown out aural explosions laid the foundation for years of careful imitators, many of whom would make sounds far more memorable than the accidental originators. There are exceptions of course...enter AD NAUSEAM. Plodding and painful UK anarcho punk from 1982 delivered amidst complete chaos and a whir of analog distortion. The guitar alone could be a blueprint for countless hangers on, but these songs have so much more to offer than unintentional mastery of an EQ knob. Songs like "What A State" are worthy of DISORDER level accolades, and "Daddy Daddy" is a legit UK82 burner, but it's all hiding under a wall of fuzz (this is either a deal breaker or deal maker depending on how noisy you like your noise punk). Included are the 10 song demo and a 30+ minute live set from Winchester Art College - and you just thought the demo was chaotic. The political punk construct blown to oblivion, think THE DECAY and CHROME trying to bash their way through a set of primitive first wave hardcore...this shit is raw.

AD NAUSEAM

TWENTY YEARS ON - THE SUMMER OF LOVE?

45 minutes of varied material from one side of this compilation cassette (the flip side was destroyed well beyond listenability).  An acoustic number from POLITICAL ASYLUM that serves as a preamble to their vocalist's current tenure in FOLK THIS, several live tracks from CHUMBAWUMBA's BANBERET NOBACON, one chilled out jam from CULTURE SHOCK, a noisy live fukkr from TOXIC EPHEX and the whole thing is interspersed with speeches from political festivals and rallies. But the real reason you should listen to this is for the 3:01 track from ATAVISTIC. Taken fro 1987's Life During Wartime EP, "A Question Of Priorities" is simply one of the most chaotic and intense blasts of sound I've ever heard. Totally relentless. One spastic electronic noise piece from STREAM OV ABUSE wraps up the side, and that's what you get. Party.

TWENY YEARS ON - THE SUMMER OF LOVE?

BLOODKROW BUTCHER

Few bands have pulled off Riot City/UK82/Dis worship as well as these maniacs. Bare bones, blistering sounds with a modern throaty vocalist versed in (and a part of) the current wave of noise punk kids taking over the world. The guitar alone is enough to win your heart, but the whole package here is damn near flawless. Quite pleased that this eight track banger is ever bit as ripping as their live set was last month. Sick.

BLOODKROW BUTCHER

ANTI-STATE CONTROL

Brilliant 1983 demo from these under appreciated UK punks. I posted a 1982 rehearsal tape in the early days of The Escape, but it's great hearing this primitive UK punk given the proper treatment. "Sniffing Glue Blues," "Muse," "Nobody Cares About Us" and other songs from that practice tape all sound beyond stellar on this searing demo, with nine more rehearsal tunes as a bonus. Chalk this up as a brilliant second wave band lost in the shuffle, and one who sadly never made it to wax. Fukkn great tunes, with ADAM ANT and DISCHARGE covers for those keeping track.

DEMO//PRACTICE TAPE 1983

HEALTH HAZZARD

I suggest listening to the admittedly rough rehearsal tracks first, so you can get a handle on what HEALTH HAZZARD are  going for before you treat yourself to their crucial (if criminally short) two song demo. Once the edges were smoothed down and they decided that they deserved a proper studio session, these kids cranked out an under the radar two song banger well worth your time. Nearly three decades old, these are still the sounds that kick me in the ass - vocals barked with youthful insistence and razor sharp guitars cutting through the mix. The plodding pace of "Picture Show" suits the bleak lyrics perfectly...classic simple UK punk. Members went on to form REFUGEES, and the live bit from today's tape can be found over at Escape Is Terminal.

BITS OF '82

WE DON'T WANT YOUR FUCKING LAW! // WE DON'T WANT YOUR FUCKING WAR!

Terminal Escape turns 900 today. 900 cassettes lovingly converted into a soulless barrage of 00s and 01s just so you can enjoy the music on the tapes that fill the stairs, shelves, nooks and floors of my tiny flat and drive my wife batshit crazy. Seems appropriate to return to the UK punk that kicked my ass into starting this thing in the first place, and I happen to be sitting on a package mailed to me by a F.O.T.E. a while back containing two essential Mortarhate comps, 1983's We Don't Want Your Fucking War! and We Don't Want Your Fucking Law! released two years later. No introductions required, and yeah, I know the UPRIGHT CITIZENS song is missing...we can only work with the tools we are given, you know?

WE DON'T WANT YOUR FUCKING WAR!

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

END RESULT

Killer UK82 influenced shits from Australia, but injected with thrash energy and CRASS ingenuity. Be careful, these songs will sink in before you even know what hit you. Happy new year.

END RESULT

With any luck, I will finish playing this show and go to a place where someone will be playing this tape at maximum volume. Pittsburgh, I look forward to spending an evening with you.

THE WASTE

Kinda tough to track down much info on these UK82 circa 1985 Exeter punks, but their two demos made their way onto this band-made cassette and I am grateful that it would up in my hands. THE WASTE cruise through 13 songs with discordant guitars and vocals shouted with an honest urgency. They probably fall in line with a heap of other bands who got lost in the shuffle of the mid '80s - playing classic UK punk while the scenes were moving towards thrash and metal. Easy to imagine "Britain in '85" as a stone cold classic, but I'm afraid that is going to have to happen in an alternate universe while the rest of us raise our fists (and pints) to "Mindless Violence" and "Well Hard." Up the Punx.

DEMO 1+2

VIRUS

All of these songs save one ("Systematic Violence," arguably the best song on the tape) appear in different forms on the You Can't Ignore It Forever demo, also released in 1984, but Dorset's VIRUS are too fukkn good to let a tape slip by just because you have already heard the songs once before. Or twice. There's a MOB styled moodiness to their anarcho brilliance - the vocals have a mournful lilt even when shouting out the determined mantra of a 1980s UK peace punk band. Such a brutal shame that this band only managed to record a handful of songs before calling it a day, VIRUS were fukkn brilliant.

INFECTED?

The liner notes were typed on the back of the cover, not photocopied, and the cassette was done up by hand...both seemed worth including.

SHRAPNEL

Welsh bangers SHRAPNEL left a criminally small output before calling it a day, but with this and the Restricted Existence demo in your stable, I guess it's not really necessary to crank out a bunch of crap to beef up your discography. UK82 styled punk circa 1983 with gloriously amateurish lyrics ("We're just working class // So they can stuff their education right up their ass") that look at the world with the bleak and uncertain frustration of 1980s teenagers. Pogo your asses off.

THEY CONTROL OUR DESTINY FOR WE LIVE IN MISERY

Accompanying this post is a 35+ minute live set from SHRAPNEL, also from 1983, which can be found on ESCAPE IS TERMINAL.

SELF ABUSE

SELF ABUSE has remained on the second tier of '80s UK bands, you only seem to hear about them after delving a little deeper into the world of less appreciated acts, but I think this 1984 demo is one of their highlights. Never mind the whining off key vocals in "On & On" that sound as if there were a producer behind the board trying to convince the boys to go for a chart topper and throw in some new wave crooning, just get into the driving jerky beat of "Another Nightmare" and "Strange Life," two certifiable burners. Moments of SLAUGHTER & THE DOGS and EDDIE & THE HOT RODS creep into the tunes - just enough rock 'n roll to keep the train rolling, and the guitar is straight '77 punk in the best way. The ten song live recording on the flip is predictably rough, but the sound is good enough to let their hooks shine through, and it's clear that SELF ABUSE were a seasoned live act. It always pleases me to hear these live sets...the band is positively killing it, and are greeted to a lackluster smattering of forced applause before going into the next song. Just goes to show that even "back in the day," some of the best bands played gigs in front of paltry apathetic crowds who had no idea what they were witnessing.  The SELF ABUSE discography is lengthy, and many of their other releases are available on many blogs (including this one), so get to clicking.

SELF ABUSE Demo & Live 1984

SOCIETY'S PROBLEMS

Fierce UK punk from the Northest of England, SOCIETY'S PROBLEMS never made it past the demo phase, but they wrote some brilliant tracks in the process. This top notch rehearsal tape features searing guitars and several tracks that never made it onto their 1984 self titled demo. There's another demo/live tape floating around with even more songs...but there are a lot of things floating around that I might not get around to dealing with.

SOCIETY'S PROBLEMS

REFUGEES

The A side of the tape that brought you the LAST RITES and POST MORTEM recordings features a 30 minute rehearsal recording from the dual female fronted REFUGEES. Dual female vocals will draw you in, but the guitar will hook you (pun intended) with mid tempo riffing that bridges a gap between UK anarcho and '80s Midwest hardcore ("Shrink" features a simple lick that is a dead ringer for HÜSKER DÜ's "Target," and is my favorite song on the tape). Ex-HEALTH HAZZARD, for those keeping track. Fukkn great, for those who just want to rock.

REFUGEES Rehearsal 28 February 1984

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

SUBNORMAL

SUBNORMAL unleashed this complete scorcher in 1983 and then seem to have faded away. Excellently crafted UK82 punk played at breakneck speed and with fukkn stellar guitar leads that appear sporadically so the listener still gets excited when they swoop in. This demo features 13 songs, five of which appeared a few months back on the Slaughter Of Innocents blog (clearly these tapes came from the same source material, as they feature the same blips and clicks from duplication). I named the tracks based on the lyrics I could make out, so my apologies to band members if I screwed it up (of course, you could rectify this by dropping me a line and setting the record straight). This one has been on repeat all morning, just killer killer tunes - get yourself some.

SUBNORMAL