CRUTCH

I wish that this tape could actually capture the fire that this trio started one afternoon back in March when I saw them lay waste to a glorified storage unit in Oklahoma City, but for the geographically challenged....this tape will have to suffice. Volume helps. CRUTCH capture the late '90s hc/blast/pv vibe perfectly - face melting hardcore tunes with brutally simplistic mid paced stomps trading off with grinding blurs and the things Max would always call "jerk off riffs" when WHN? were writing songs (you know, the hand just goes up and down the the neck...back and forth...sorry kids, I know this is a family friendly music blog - except for all the talk about drugs and stuff - but seriously....that is the motion, and that's what the riffs are called, and actually I'm not sorry at all). These dudes absolutely slayed in the flesh, and I was almost hesitant to press PLAY when I got home because sometimes it's just not as good, you know? But this collection rrrrrips right out of the gate, and CRUTCH have fully mastered that CROSSED OUT style 'hardcore into blast into slow DBeat back into blast' thing (and if you know what I mean then you totally fukkn know exactly what I mean) so perfectly that you feel like you know what's coming before they even do the damn thing but then they still manage to surprise you ("Exempt Employee" is a perfect example). I confess that I am not always (or even often) in the mood to listen to this brand of destruction (though I am always down to see it live), but when I am.....? This is the fukkn shit I want. 23 tracks (in just under 22 minutes) culled from comps and demos and shit, and every one of them is a banger. 

YEAR ONE

DIFFERENCE

One of the early installments from the Building label was this sub-five minute explosion from DIFFERENCE. Filthy and raw California hc/pv with desperate vocals in league with (gasp) deliver songs structured more like forms of punishment than anything approaching music. "Again" is a magical piece of devastation, as close to perfect as you could ever expect to find. I would ask you to enjoy this tape, but enjoyment is not the point. 

DEMO #1

PUBLIC SUICIDE

This 2013 demo is the most glorious collision of early '00s fastcore, ugly '90s SoCal powerviolence and boys making dogpiles all over other boys in the spirit of East Coast hardcore. PUBLIC SUICIDE hit all of the buttons, they flip every switch. And they turn all of those switches to the "ON" position. Five tracks, 4 minutes and 14 seconds - and 64 of those seconds are the instrumental intro. It's so simple, there's no reason it should be this good.....and yet it is totally this good. 

PUBLIC SUICIDE

KALI

Fierce and emotive (note the difference between this and emotional) grinding hardcore from Alberta. Pulls no punches, takes no prisoners, gives lots of fucks, leaves nothing on the table. Pure power.

KALI

IRON LUNG

For the discerning random cassette connoisseur, I present you with n accidental cacophony. Recorded at Mission Records sometime in the early 2000s, presumably over what seems to have been a pretty cool mix tape, this IRON LUNG set is preceded and interrupted by several layers occasionally recognizable sound - a few DANIELLE DAX tracks, some oldies, and tortured electro pop bangers from distant lands. The beauty of this organic manipulation is that it is still incredibly listenable, and when the sound gives way to the final few IRON LUNG tracks unhindered they sound extra deadly. It's a complete accident, to be sure, but a compelling one to say the least.  Been sitting on this one for a while...and today seemed like the day. Don't snooze.

IRON LUNG *plus

FORCE FED DRUGS

Totally off the rails crust/PV from somewhere between Poughkeepsie and Troy, New York. Maybe living on the Hudson River makes people play really disgusting music? Half the time these kids barely manage to hold it together, which is kinda the charm...and I feel obliged to tell you that the vocals are either going to win you over or keep you away forever. FORCE FED DRUGS sound real and not at all contrived, and sometimes that plus a sick bass tone is all I need.

FORCE FED DRUGS - "I"

LIMBS BIN // SIDETRACKED

One two minute burst of power electronics from perennial favorites LIMBS BIN on one side, and a really compelling idea from SIDETRACKED on the other. The former melts your brain, while the latter takes powerviolence to a new place. I know you don't like to take chances, but four minutes is the total length of this cassette, so your risk is minimal...but the reward is splendid.

LIMBS BIN // SIDETRACKED

GORILLAXMONSOON // VEXED

GORILLAXMONSOON spend the first 90 seconds of this split with a one riff intro that creates a mountain of tension that you just know is going to come crumbling down on you, and even when it does you aren't quite prepared. After an intro that features a gutsy five second silence and a fist clenching yeeoowl, they launch into five tracks of killer 'crew incarnated as devastating heavy hardcore. The breakdowns, the backups, the chugs, the determined falter in the vocals...it's all there, but GORILLAXMONSOON are none of the posi hardcore that those elements might imply. Pissed, desperate and brutally honest, these five tracks are real. And then GORILLAXMONSOON hand the torch to their neighbors in VEXED and the reality gets dark in a hurry. That desperation fades into depression, and the grey area comes out in the music as much as the vocals - which is saying a lot, because the vocals give me chills. Five minutes of crushing, blasting hardcore/pv sandwiched in between four minutes of painfully slow riffing, the VEXED side of this tape is a really dark counterpart to the already dark flip...none of these kids are fucking around, and I would love to hear more from both. And for those keeping track of the places where all the good bands come from, GORILLAXMONSOON are from Chico, California, and VEXED are from up the road in Redding. 

GORILLAXMONSOON // VEXED

UNKNOWN

This comes up from time to time, and is perhaps only of interest to the more adventurous of you, but your curiosity will be justly rewarded. Five different tapes that made it into my life with little or no identifying marks. And to all the nerds (which is hopefully most of you), you see the challenge before you, the only question is whether or not you are up to it. So....are you?

1. Twelve tracks of chaotic industrial noise. Greatness is approached, embraced, and then cast aside over the course of one half hour. Cassette marked only as "ETC......."
HERE

2. Ten minutes of crucial grind/powerviolence. The completely unmarked tape was in a box full of master tapes and live recordings from '90s Bay Area bands, so I'm inclined to think this is from the same time/scene...but I cannot identify it. The recording is absolutely ruthless.
HERE

3. I feel like I may have shared this one before, and simply unearthed a double? Dual vocal fastcore/thrash that I think is from South America. The recording varies quite a bit from track to track, but the vocals are pretty consistent so I think this is all the same band...but I might be incorrect.
HERE

4. From the flipside of the DEAD FISH tape I posted a while back. The collection of Brasilian demos I picked up from Allan had many tapes with records dubbed onto the blank B side (like the WIDE AWAKE demo on the back of the DIASPORA tape). Someone with a better mental encyclopedia than me can surely pick this one out.
HERE

5. Live (at least mostly?) outsider shit-fi punk. Four tracks, all essentially inept, possibly from England, and endearing (if only for a few minutes).
HERE

Get to work, kids....

ORGAN

It takes a lot to make something that I can't really talk about. I talk a lot. But I don't know what the fukk these kids are thinking and this short (short!) demo confuses me. Two short and super intriguing keyboard (organ?) driven soundscapes and two brutal and excellent lo-fi bass/drum powerviolence eruptions. Three minutes of magic on a 60 minute blank tape...that's all I know. 

ORGAN!!

NO CHRIST FOR THE POOR

I got a bunch of shit that came from who knows where. Maybe it's one of the tapes Craig gave me? Maybe it's from the box Dan gave me in Milwaukee last summer and I just integrated into the "to be ripped" shelf gushing over the DYSTOPIA and DEVASTATION demos? I don't know how NO CHRIST FOR THE POOR came into my life, but those with a similar penchant for guttural, tense and shamelessly brutal powerviolence will be glad that it did. Massachusetts, and the samples date the recording as much as the sound (early '90s I'm guessing), these dudes lash out in sub-60 second bursts with a weirdness that would have had them right in line with the West Bay's finest (the 7+ minute hip hop track that closes the tape solidifies that impression) with erratic and utterly hateful downtuned dirges that erupt into fidelity-free blasts and pained distorted screams. This music is fukkn ugly. Oh yeah, and there is a 7+ minute power electronics piece before the hip hop, so...yeah, sometimes life is a harsh toke.

SEPTIC REFLECTIONS OF DRUG ABUSE AND DEATH

GAS CHAMBER

I've been sitting on this one for far too long. Started to post it more than once, but the words never seemed right so I opted for something easier. GAS CHAMBER is not easy, not simple. GAS CHAMBER is deep, visceral, and intense beyond words. This year's Hemorrhaging Light LP on Iron Lung defies description, it is a revolutionary collection of sound that transcends mere hardcore music. So it should not be surprising that this cassette collection that was released before the LP, a series of interludes, compositions (and one banging single), is a total stunner. The two pieces that make up "Prone" set the stage for the remainder of Kairos Will Erase, prolonged ambience exploding into massive bursts of advanced hardcore. Goosebump inducing vocals and bass flanged to oblivion, driving the recording (indeed the whole band) through treacherous twists that would have most outfits stumbling over their own fingers. For me, this tape is all about the noise... "IX" and "X" take up over 25 minutes, and it's that sparse, anxious intermission that makes this presentation of the Corpse With Levity EP (presented here in the same form as the vinyl release) seem wholly different than the first time I listened to it cold. The list of bands that can make so many different sounds and styles all feel like they belong is very short, and this band is at the top. Trying to describe the music is hard enough...but describing the power is impossible. Without question, GAS CHAMBER are among the most intense live bands I have ever seen, but this tape will hold you over until you become one of the The Fortunate Ones.

KAIROS WILL ERASE

Physical copies from Peterwalkee Records

NO LESS

NO LESS should need no introduction to most. West Bay Coalition powerviolence devastation with a penchant for manic grind and song construction that was on an entirely different plane. Sure, plenty bands used samples and blatant nods to hip hop sounds and culture, but NO LESS were just advanced. The ability to play whatever weirdness popped into their heads, and an affinity for substances that kept those minds on the fringe at all times. Two demos included in one download, 1994's pro-dubbed Lesson II and a handwritten collection of self described "New Shit" from 1993. Choice tracks include "Buffalo's (sic) Stampeding," "Gin and Tonic" and the epic "Inner Lude - Just Kook Out All Over The Place." Absolute next level status.

LESSON II: ELECTRIC JUNGLE VIOLENCE

NEW SHIT

PEUR PANIQUE

Perks of the trade, my friends: sometimes shit like this just shows up on my doorstep. Well, I don't really have a doorstep, but the mailperson puts it in my mailslot. But sometimes it doesn't fit and they just leave me a note and I bike to the post office annex on Bryant street on my lunch break to pick it up. But the point is that sometimes those trips are really worthwhile because those packages too big for my mailslot have tapes like this one inside. Ugly, menacing French hardcore/pv inside. A filthy, distorted, fist clenching killer with screaming and shouting and breakdowns and blastbeats - you know, exactly what you want (if you know what's good for you). The 20 second "Populace" is that jammer, though the breakdown in the following track ("Veine Cave") is about twelve steps beyond complete crush. Eight songs in just over six minutes - and one of those minutes is the fukkn intro (the last 50 seconds in the outro). Complete crush, total kill.

PEUR PANIQUE

DEEP CREEPS

Crushing mutant hardcore from Boise. A half hour of downtuned discordant devastation that nods at '90s powerviolence without ignoring the nuances that have come since. While touches of KARP (by way of grunge) and basement emo guitar work keep DEEP CREEPS firmly rooted in the past, this demo is more modern and aurally topical than any by-the-numbers hardcore act cranking out the rehashed flavor of the month - this shit is weird. Intent(ional) listening is not required, but the full effect cannot be realized without it.

CROWN GALL

LIFEWRECK

OK, so I don't really like the bass tone at the start of the first song - that is the beginning and the end of my list of complaints about this ten song kick in the face. Raw, forceful fastcore/PV with brief excursions into epic crust, the echo and effects are on the backing vocals (and it makes them sound massive) while the leads are just distorted by pure power and remind me of AKEPHAL even though the band doesn't (so really, that is a rather stupid "comparison," eh?). The whole thing lasts twelve minutes, but these Greek warriors cram an awful lot of power into those minutes, and I look forward to hearing more.

DEMO '13

VILE INTENT

These dudes just get meaner sounding. Cavernous powerviolence with lurching blasts, rumbling low end a level of discomfort that permeates the entire recording, but is especially evident when VILE INTENT slow down. Seven songs in as many minutes, this third cassette (the plastic shell version of the EP by the same name) came my way ages ago, and I have been remiss in not sharing it before now...

SKIN IN THE GAME

UNDER

This tape is absolutely disgusting. Bombastic dirges lurch with such force that UNDER start to seem almost peaceful...but it is a short lived peace that is destroyed by searing vocals and the overwhelming weight of life itself. The sound is massive, everything pushed to the very limits and then just a little bit further. Distorted by volume and intensity more than by aural manipulation, these five minutes will absolutely crush you.

UNDER 

NECKLACING

NECKLACING make some of the most menacing hardcore/power violence I've come across in recent memory. Seven songs in seven minutes - the last track alone takes up three of those minutes and, as is so often the case with recordings like this, levels the whole fukkn place. These sounds are mean and desperate.

NECKLACING

NECKLACING make hypnotic and harsh white noise. These two 15+ minute tracks will draw you in, and you will be punished for your weakness.

NECKLACING

Necklacing is also one of the most brutal acts of humanity I've ever had described to me. And however uncomfortable it may be to read about it, imagine listening to a first hand and matter of fact description from someone responsible presenting it as what seemed, at the time, to be a necessary evil. Heavy shit.

BAG OF CHISELS

Sometimes you have a really long day and you just want to do nothing when it's over. Today is one of those days, so I am just listening to these ten songs over and over, and each time I do it is the best three minutes and forty something seconds of my day. Do the math, this is frustration put to sound...and I need to go back to Hawaii. Members of MAUA VALLEY BLAST TEST are partially responsible for this beast - and I assure you that is indeed a fukkn beast.

10 SONG DEMO

get me out of here before I snap // wall closing in on me // why won't my hands stop shaking

bagofchisels(at)ymail(com)