HICKEY - "Live on KCXI. Last Show" - Tape - 1998

   Even if you're a casual reader of this blog, I'm sure I don't need to explain the importance or impact that HICKEY made on this world. I've had this tape for years and was sure that it was already uploaded. I realized that I hadn't because it was already widely available, but now most of those download links are dead, so here it is again. HICKEY broke up way back in the 90's after playing some bad bar show in Tucson, but then got back together the next day to play this one last live radio performance. It's a great send off because the band sounds pretty happy; like they're still having fun and ending things when it was time. For a little more info and the track listing, check Cosmic Hearse.

DOWNLOAD

Other links:

Rare and Unreleased Hickey

Hickey and 50 Million

Hickey Live on Valentine's Day 1997

More Hickey Recordings

San Francisco Needle Exchange

Thanks to Mike Wilson for pointing this one out.

PETER STUBB - "Blueberry Masturbator" - Tape - 1992

 
   Peter Stubb has gone by many names in his life: Gary League, Dewayne King, Cannibalistic Retard, Gary Lee Austin, Gary Spit and many more. Peter Stubb, for whatever reason, is the one that has stuck around the longest. He began home recording his own songs on cassette sometime in the late 80's, just banging on things and making guitar noises with his mouth. The lyrics could be funny, disturbing and demented. Other times, they were crushingly depressing, especially when he delved into the topics of the reality of his everyday landscape, which included the mental wards and psychological education centers of North Georgia.
   I had heard stories of Peter Stubb throughout the south for a while and got a chance to play a show with him in Chattanooga in late 1995. To put it lightly, it was life changing. Throughout the show, the punks had been flying all over the room, singing defiantly and going nuts. As Peter started to set up to play, most of the people in the room politely sat on the floor in front of him and a hush grew through the building as if something important was about to happen. Peter sat in front of the assembled audience, struggling with some papers and a music stand, his face painted in fucked up, dripping corpse paint and his shoulders flanked by football pads. His battered acoustic guitar was covered in fading stickers and his arms were completely covered in scars from self-inflicted knife wounds. He appeared to be nervous and too anxious to be in front of all these people. All I could think as he was about to strike the first chords was "What the fuck is going on?!" He belted out a quick 40 second song devoted to the love of cunnilingus and the crowd howled. Seconds after finishing that one, he completely changed gears and destroyed the audience with one of the most honestly depressing songs I had ever heard. The punk kid next to me who earlier looked so tough and bulletproof was sobbing like a baby.

    Soon after, I was visiting Chattanooga again and I asked my friend Eric Nelson if he could copy any of Stubb's music for me. He obliged with this tape, "Blueberry Masturbator". He joked around about the less serious songs on the tape but he added, almost gravely, that Peter Stubb is the most honest songwriter that he has ever heard in his life. On the drive back to Alabama, I put it on and got a chance to really immerse myself in it. It starts off almost abruptly with "Social Phobia", which feels as if you just stumbled into an internal monologue that had been occurring long before you arrived. Stubb palm-mutes like crazy in a way that recalls the best RAMONES songs and introduces you to his world of anxious paranoia. The next couple of songs are a complete 180, telling stories of pot heads and objectifying women. While stuff like the latter may offend the ears of my more radical thinking readers (like say, me), I think this is part of the Stubb experience. His songs are uncomfortable, untamed and dark. To only listen to the ones that line up with your political outlook is cheating. "Bodies in the Tub" is about stacking up the dead bodies of his oppressors in his bathtub. "I Don't Care If You Go" is about Stubb's mom. "Crashed and Died" is about a motorcycle wreck in which Peter crashes and dies "like a motherfucker". Towards the end, Stubb launches into some odd speech that is part possessed/part childlike that permeates some of his other songs, but this is it's only appearance on this tape. Just when you thought he wasn't gonna get too serious again, he comes back with "Committed", a crushingly sad song that details his early experiences with the north Georgia mental health system, which I can only imagine is less than stellar. In the song, he sings...

    "One teacher asked me, what would I like to be. I said 'A werewolf...a demon inside of me.' She kinda flipped out. She said I needed help. She said 'How long have you felt this way?'. I said 'I don't know. I'm like this everyday.' She said 'We'l get you help..you can count on it.' Next thing I knew, I was committed."

   Later, he says that they won't let him out until the sanity is back in him, In the next song "Bu-Doing-Schwing", you're finally convinced that Stubb has lost it in this song about hyper-sexualized lust....and his dick. He makes weird sounds with his voice, which recall many of his earlier tapes and the whole thing is just kinda bizarre. Abruptly, Stubb launches into the last two songs, which take you into the lowest depression of the whole tape. "Just One More Time" is about feeling bad about the things that have happened in your life and wishing you could change them. The final song, "They Took It Away" is epic, destructive and possibly the single most depressing song I have ever heard in my life because it is 100% real and nothing but honest. I can't even do it justice by talking about it. You just have to listen to it alone and let his words pull you into the darkness. 

   Long before this release, Peter Stubb had been releasing his own self-recorded tapes and he still continues to this day. Many of his early tapes were one of a kind...he would record a couple of songs, make a cover and just give it to a friend. Others were released in a edition of ten or less and you might find a copy of it that Stubb left in the bathroom at a Dalton, GA Wal-Mart. There are countless tapes of his music all over the place. You never knew what you would find on these tapes, but it was/is always interesting. He's still releasing a few tapes a year and if you send him $4-6 cash in the mail, he will send you a new one. You can find Peter here on his FB page and he'll send you his address to order tapes. 

   I'm putting this up on this site to archive it and for all of his old friends and fans, but mostly I am sharing it in the hopes that someone in a small town in the middle of nowhere will find this and have it change their life in the way it changed mine (as well as many of the people I love).

Thanks to Eric Nelson for everything.

Thanks to Josh Mayfield for being such a dutiful archivist of Stubb's music for so many years. 

Thanks to Peter Stubb for making all of this music and for giving me permission to put this tape online. 

Download "Blueberry Masturbator"

...and here is a link to the short film "I'm Like This Everyday", made by Mitchell Powers in 2008.

WHITE TRASH SUPERMAN - Tape - 1994

   For long time readers (or those of you paying attention), this one will be familiar because I've already posted this tape. The reason I am reposting it is because this is one of the first tapes I ever posted on this blog and I had no clue what I was doing. The mp3's in that file sounded awful, but I posted them anyway because I thought absolutely no one was paying attention to anything on this blog. I was wrong. I've been meaning to replace the files for a long time now, but never got around to it. Ever since Mediafire suspended my account, it has been pretty easy to decide which files to re-upload. This one was at the top of the list. If you downloaded this in the past, please delete those files and download this one instead. You will be much happier with the results.
  I only saw WHITE TRASH SUPERMAN once, at a pizza place in a mall in Huntsville, Alabama. It was 1994 and I had no idea that these hair farmers were going to write my favorite song of all time. I also didn't know that in 3 short years, I would be playing in a band with one of them. No...they were just these 4 guys playing these energetic pop songs that are maybe just too wacko or adrenaline-filled to be simply classified as "Indie-rock". They probably spent more time in the air than on the ground. They were jumping around the whole time in this excited way, like they were thinking "Holy fuck, I can't believe 20 people showed up to see us!" You can't really tell from this tape, but their live shows were kind of insane. At their last show ever, the audience was throwing cans of Spam everywhere and a lot of stuff got broken, including the bass players leg after a guitar got hurled into it.
    In a perfect world, these guys would get written up in the indie-rock history books alongside SUPERCHUNK (who are great) and whatever other garbage those people like. Alas, this is our world and WTS wrote my anthems. Songs like "Clock", "Rocket" and "Thumb" have been hopelessly stuck in my head for years. They also wrote "Couldn't If I Tried", which is, in my humble opinion, the best song ever written. This is golden stuff here, my friends. If you head over to the WTS entry on Terminal Escape, you will have everything this band recorded in their short time on Earth. It's all great.
    Marsh went on to play in THE COMAS and now plays in THE OVERNIGHT LOWS with his wife of 14 years, Daphne. I never really knew Steve or Jamie from WTS, so I can't tell you they went on to do. I can tell you that Jayson went on to form THE GRUMPIES a couple of years later. These days, he is making amazing art (as he has always done) and playing music with WACO DEAD and MING DONKEY ONE MAN BAND. He also didn't ever get any credit for writing the guitar hook for that famous BLIND MELON song or for getting baked with Slash from G'N'R (all true).

Download WHITE TRASH SUPERMAN

The abrupt cut off at the end of "Lb" is how my tape ends. It wasn't a mistake on my part.
Also, this is the 300th post on this blog. Thanks for reading this far.

HICKEY - "The Ultra Heliocentric Underworld Of The Most Evil Terrifying and Naked Cult Of Hickey. Rare and Unreleased, Unstoppable Rock!!" - 1998 - Tape

   If you're at all familiar with this blog and many of the artists that I've shared on it, I don't need to tell you why HICKEY is important. I discovered punk through THE MINUTEMEN and THE RAMONES. It was because of HICKEY (along with BLACK FORK, BIKINI KILL and 50 MILLION) that I became fiercely attracted to the DIY aspect of punk that keeps me going today and their influence still informs just about every musical decision I make. It's kinda ridiculous.
   I copied this tape off of my friend Ivy way back in the late 90's. Initially, I was not that into it and preferred the band's piles of 7" EP's and their unfuckwithable LP. As time marched on, the songs on here kept creeping into my life and many of them became some of my favorites by the band. HICKEY was known for having a remarkable live show. Sometimes, they played all of the "hits" back to back. One time, I saw them and they just kinda jammed for a long time. It wasn't bad. The 3 members became an intuitive, unstoppable unit that was not afraid of experimentation and going out on a limb...even when it failed. I think some of that comes across on this tape.

  The tape starts off with a couple of unreleased (?) songs and then delves into the band's epic cover of MANOWAR's "Kingdom Come". That song originally appeared on the Probe Records compilation "Death To False Metal", but this is the original six-and-a-half minute version with an extended jam (p.s. it rules). Next up is a weird version of "Last Nite on the Planet" with Shell (I think..it sounds like him. Edit: It's Aesop) making pro-wrestler comments throughout. The next few songs are by HICKEY MILLION, who you can read about if you follow that link (and yes, you can download the file on that page when you get to it). The rest of the side is filled with jams, cover songs (SQUEEZE, DAVID BOWIE, GUNS N ROSES, STOOGES), alternate takes and interviews with teenagers at a live HICKEY show. Side 2 (or for you, song #21) kicks off with a radio promo and goes straight into a live set on KDVS in Davis, CA. There's more jams, a really cool duet with Matty and Allison Wonderslam, more cover songs (AVENGERS and SABBATH) and that damned trumpet they stole from VOODOO GLOW SKULLS all those years ago.
  I'm still constantly impressed by the amount of stuff that this little band recorded in their brief lifetime...and how much of it is really great! I mean, there's still more, although the further you dig, the sadder it gets. Drug addiction is not pretty, folks, so let's just stop here and enjoy this great band and all the years of inspiration they have injected into our lives.

Download HICKEY Oddities

(Just to warn you, this is a large file. 230mb)

Thanks to Ivy Jeanne for the source tape (mine is thrashed).

Thanks to Aesop for giving the green light and drumming on these recordings.
Thanks to MRR for digitization help.

Thanks to Chubby, Rizzler, Wade and Shell for making it out alive.

Thanks to Matty Luv for everything. R.I.P.

...and since Valentine's Day is right around the corner, why not check out this live HICKEY set from V-Day 1997?

THE GRUMPIES - "Barn Demos" - Tape - 1998

 
   In the first part of 1998, I spent a lot of time driving between Birmingham, AL and Starkville, MS, sleeping on floors, working in a bookstore, playing shows in little dives and coffeeshops and living really cheaply. I played drums in THE GRUMPIES and we were trying to get our shit together to record an LP for Recess Records. Whether or not we got our shit together is totally debatable, but we did actually drive out to Los Angeles and record an entire LP (plus some) in a little shitbox of a room while some hack with a goatee (I think he said he recorded FACE TO FACE also) turned knobs. That's a story for another day though....
    When this tape was recorded, we hadn't even thought about crossing the Mississippi yet. We practiced in an old-ass barn in Louisville (that's "Lewis-ville"), MS behind Bubba's house. Bubba was Jayson's (guitar/vocals) 95 year old grandmother who made the best cornbread and was quite possibly one of the sweetest grandmas you could hope to meet. She would always make us stop practicing when it got too late (around 7 or 8, I think). Anyhow, this little demo was recorded just for us on the four track in the barn. We were working on new songs for the LP and beyond. Some of these appeared on the LP and some of them never showed up anywhere else. For reasons beyond our control (because we could barely even control ourselves at the time), Amy (bass/vocals) was not with us at the barn that day, so Jayson and I just recorded these songs without her and Jayson overdubbed the bass himself. I always liked how this turned out because I think it was closer to what we were turning into, rather than the hyper-manic, Chipmunk-style pop-punk we were pummeling people with at our live shows. The songs are a bit slower and darker, at times. When we played some of these songs live, you could see the pop-punk kids eyes just kinda glaze over as they waited for us to speed it up.
    The first six songs are Jayson and I in the barn. Songs 7 through 10 are just Jayson playing everything himself in the barn. I will make no excuses for tape hiss and deterioration. This thing has been sitting in a box, rotting, since 1998.

DOWNLOAD

If you want the original GRUMPIES demo tape from 1996, you can find it right here. I just re-uploaded the files so that you can download it again.

If you want the GRUMPIES LP, you might have to scour the internet. You can buy it on iTunes, but I have no idea where that money goes. I would upload it  here, but I don't feel like getting another file-hosting account shut down just yet. You can still buy the CD from Recess Records. I had to steal my copy of it off of TOYS THAT KILL's merch table because Recess wouldn't give me one single copy. Take that how you want.
(negative views are mine: not representative of the whole band)

"Help Me, I'm Trapped in a Ford Festiva" - Compilation - Tape - 1997

    I grew up in a tiny town in the middle of Alabama and discovered punk when I was in 6th grade through a tape of the MINUTEMEN's "Double Nickels on the Dime." Over the years, I tried to start bands with people who either really didn't want to be in a punk band or just had drastically different ideas of what a punk band was. The day after I graduated high school, I moved 108 miles away to a different small town called Huntsville. I lived in my car for those first couple of months and came to discover a whole new world of punk where people were actually playing the loud, fucked up, vibrant music that I wanted to be playing at that time in my life. It was perfect for me. I met people who put out their own records and set up their own shows in houses, parking lots and thrift stores. It was inspiring, to say the least. Within just a few months, I was playing in my own band and going on tour all over the southeast, making friends that I still have to this day. At the time, I wanted to make a compilation tape to show what was going on in my town (and where it had come from) so that other people would know how awesome it was, but honestly, I don't know if this tape ever reached people outside of Alabama.
   The comp starts off with RICE HARVESTER and THE CACA WOMEN FROM URANUS. I've already written about them, so you can click those links above if you're curious. Next up is THE REFILLS, who were a short lived band from the area that consisted of Neil (from JOEY TAMPON AND THE TOXIC SHOCKS and 565 BURNOUTS), Ben (from RICE HARVESTER, SUCKERPUNCH and now in PINE HILL HAINTS) and Bill Conflict (who did and still plays in RANDOM CONFLICT). They played fucking tough, straight ahead punk that was informed by THE FREEZE and D.O.A. I loved them when they were around and their song "Bleed" on this tape still holds up today.

RICE HARVESTER on the 4th of July, 1998. San Pedro, CA.

   Next on the tape is AOA, which was originally a home recording project by my friends Blair and Ramesh. They would get together and record hours of MEN'S RECOVERY PROJECT (and FAT DAY) inspired noise and weirdness at their houses. After a while, they would come over and kind of force me to play anything in their band, like a drum on a bed or some cans. They had tapes and tapes of this stuff (one of which got stuck in my car stereo for months so that it was the only thing I could ever listen to. When I finally removed it, it destroyed the tape and the stereo...a week or so later, the brakes failed at 3 am and I almost totaled a cop car, but that's a different story altogether.) On this recording, we sorta became a kinda normal punk band for a second. I think I played drums, but I also think I played guitar sometimes. Ramesh played bass and sang. Blair sang and played the keyboard maybe. I think a guy named Pube switched up instruments with me. It was a weird time, but I still like "Black Flag is Boring" and the theme song.

AOA in my room. 1996.

   SHITHEAD JONES is a fukkin punk band and you can read all about their saga here. After that is THE GRUMPIES, who weren't technically an Alabama band, but they played there so often that  one might think that they lived there. All of their songs on here (minus one) were later re-recorded for their LP on Recess Records. These early versions are pretty great and it also includes a ripping cover of "Kiss Me Deadly" by Lita Ford.  You can find their demo and other stuff here.

THE GRUMPIES playing in a storefront in Florence, AL.

  GARY COLEMAN BAND were just Blair and Ramesh from AOA playing really minimal stuff. This song was recorded in a porn shop in N Huntsville and is honestly one of my favorite things ever put on tape. The side ends with THE SMEGMAGICIANS, which is my high school punk band that I restarted just to finish out this side of the tape. It sucks. The first song is an AOA cover. I played guitar and sang while my friend Harry played drums. I wouldn't let him hear the song or practice it before recording. The second song is just me playing guitar and drums...and actually it's not too bad.
  Side 2 kicks off with a live set from SHITBOY FROM OUTERSPACE, a band I have already covered here (it's the same set too). They are followed up by the always great 565 BURNOUTS, who have their own entry right here.

A later incarnation of 565 BURNOUTS playing at American Beat Records in Birmingham, AL.

   JOEY TAMPON AND THE TOXIC SHOCKS are up next, playing three songs that I'm pretty sure never appeared on other recordings. Well, two of the songs were definitely on a record, but not these recordings. The first song was never released on anything and it's not that good (but I'm biased...I was in the band). I have no clue where or why we recorded these songs. It could have been recorded in my bedroom or in a "real" studio. No idea. You can find more by the band here.

JOEY TAMPON AND THE TOXIC SHOCKS playing an 8 year old's birthday party in St Mary's, GA. Note that Neil is smoking.

   Joey and Neil from the TOXIC SHOCKS were also in CHEESE ASS CHRIST. They weren't from Alabama. They were from Georgia. You can find possibly everything you ever wanted to know about them here. 

   One of Alabama's first hardcore bands (possibly the very first) was THE KNOCKABOUTS, who come up next on this tape. Their songs on here come from their demo tape-turned -EP from 1982. (well, the demo is from '82. The EP is from '95). You can find more info about them here. The only thing I want to add is that I talked to Ken (owner of Prank Records who released their EP) about them and he said that he might release an LP collection in the future. I guess there's a lot more songs laying around. He's obviously not in a big hurry, but I would be excited if that project ever saw the light of day, Fun fact: The title of this comp ("Help Me, I'm Trapped in a Ford Festiva") comes from THE KNOCKABOUTS. My band (JT and the TOXIC SHOCKS) used to go on tour in my Ford Festiva (with all of our equipment, yes), which is one of the tiniest cars you could possibly own in the 90's. We listened to THE KNOCKABOUTS a lot. When we would listen to their song "Fast Pulse" (included here), we would sing that line instead of the KNOCKABOUTS-penned line of "Help me, I'm trapped in a human body!!"

   MENACE (not really sure if they ever realized there was a classic punk band called MENACE) was a band of teenage punk kids from the burbs who could barely hold it together, but held it together just enough to belt out this rough recording on a boom box. I think I only saw them once and that was only because I drove out to one of their mom's houses in south Huntsville for a band practice. I could be wrong though because I think I have a flyer for them somewhere. One weird thing about this band is that my friend Ramesh sang for them and did not play an instrument, which is ridiculous because he was already becoming a good bass player at that point. Still, you can listen to their song "AUO994" and realize why they got him to sing. 

   THE MACK was somewhat the black sheep of the Huntsville punk family. I believe 50% of that was self-imposed and the other 50 was just punk kids not wanting to admit that they liked pop-punk at some point in their lives. Either way, THE MACK played undeniably tuneful and upbeat pop-punk that was not very popular among the local scene, but I'll bet that they would have been a hit if they had ever managed to go on a tour or two in the mid-90's. Now, you can download this and relive your secret (or not-so-secret) pop-punk past. I will admit now that these songs are good. (Fun facts: THE MACK was the only local band of this era to have an online presence at the time. They are also the only band I've ever "auditioned" for as a drummer...for which I was denied for not being good enough.)

  I'm not talking about the next band. Fuck it. They were from Florida. I was the only one who knew who they were. The first song made me want to learn to play drums. The second song sucks ass.
   15E was an insane sounding punk band that worked as a precursor to THE SLACKERS, SHITBOY FROM OUTERSPACE and most of the crop of 90's punk from Huntsville. The members were Jason (SHITBOY and later XPIA), Joey (JOEY TAMPON, THE SLACKERS, RADIOACTIVES, 3D's, many more and later a born again Baptist preacher), and Mike (SEWER PUNKS and others that flew off my radar). They named the band after the apartment number of the place they shared. This recording comes from a live set at the Tip Top in north Huntsville where the band constantly harangues the audience for being shitty people. Punk. This is all I know about them. They were before my time in that town. If anyone has their demo tape, I will gladly take it.
   The tape ends with local greats THE SLACKERS and THE JAWAS. Everything you might ever want to know about both of those bands can be found here and here. The closing sample is possibly one of the best samples ever committed to tape, in my opinion.

DOWNLOAD
Re-uploaded 2013

P.S. There's 65 tracks total in this download.
This one's for Ramesh, who was always a fan and supporter of Alabama punk bands.

Now, here's some flyers from that era.

I think this is one of the first punk flyers I ever made, with help from Jason Shitboy. We used to have illegal shows at the Jaycee's Fairgrounds, which was just a gazebo in a parking lot. Sometimes, we paid $100 to use the space. Other times, we just went in and had the show without permission. I think this was one of the illegal times. THE DUMBSHITZ was my old band from Birmingham that I had quit by this point. They didn't show up for this show. Here's a video of them playing in Birmingham after I quit.

This was my birthday show, also at the fairgrounds. PROPERTY was a mainstay of the Huntsville punk scene and I'm confused as to why they're not on the tape. THEE AUTOBOTS was a later band spearheaded by Jack THE MACK that incorporated sax into the pop-punk world.

Great show for $3. Gorin's was an ice cream shop downtown that was dumb enough to let us have punk shows. 

All local bands at Gorin's Flyer by Blair Menace. BLOODY HOLLY was mostly improv-violence. Blair, Jay Kaos and I wore bloody dress shirts and glasses while assaulting people, sonically. I can't even begin to explain the CATATONICS to you. If I can ever dig up their tape (doubtful), it will have its own thing on here.

Another local show at Gorin's. THE SHIZNICS never recorded and I don't remember much about them. THE PANIC BUTTONS should have been on the comp but never got any music to me. They will be featured on the blog one day. Those guys went on to play in THOMAS FUNCTION.

RICE HARVESTER's 1st show. One of the TOXIC SHOCKS' last. PINK COLLAR JOBS were one of the best bands from the southeast in the 90's.

Local times, minus THE GRUMPIES, who might as well have been local. Art by Marsh. Flyer by me.

THE GRUMPIES - Aborted Demo - Tape - 1996

   Longtime readers of this blog may ask "Haven't you already uploaded this demo?" The answer would be "Yes...sort of". I have a confession to make. I lied to all of you. The GRUMPIES Demo that I posted back in June of 2011 was not the actual tape I got in the mail from my friend, Angie in 1996. That post was the second or third thing I ever did on this blog and I was pretty sure no one would ever read or pay attention to anything I ever said on here. Now, I realize that there are quite a few people who read this thing and my need for truth and accountability has become weirdly overwhelming. The tape that Angie sent me was the one that is now contained in this download.
   Back in early 1996, THE GRUMPIES formed in Starkville, MS out of the ashes of the legendary (to me and a few others, anyway) WHITE TRASH SUPERMAN to play some hyperfast, manic pop-punk that went beyond that simple genre description and attempted to define their own way of being. Maybe it was growing up in Mississippi. Maybe it was massive doses of early FLAMING LIPS records and seeing hair metal bands in barns. Maybe it was drugs. I don't know. What I do know is that THE GRUMPIES were doing something that was different and all their own. They managed to wear their influences firmly on their sleeves without sounding like any of them. I love them and when their drummer quit, I jumped at the chance of being in the band...partly because of this tape.

   THE GRUMPIES playing at the gazebo in Huntsville,AL 1996.

    So, the tape...They recorded this demo at their house in Starkville on a four track and then played a couple of shows in Mississippi and Birmingham (where my friend Angie picked it up). After those shows, they decided that they could probably do a better job, re-recorded every song on the demo (same house and same four track as far as I know), added some samples and voila, that is the demo that is more well known and widely available. This one is a lot more rough and rudimentary, but I always liked it a lot too, especially this slower version of "Weather Girl" and Vince's back-up vocals on "In My Past".  If you've never heard this band before, I suggest you follow the link above for the "official" demo and try that one. If you're already a fan, this will be interesting for you.

 Download THE GRUMPIES

SHOTWELL - "Geneva Avenue Fallout" - Tape - 1999

   SHOTWELL started back in 1994 (as SHOTWELL COHO) and they continue to (sort-of) exist as a band to this day. To me, and many others, they are as synonymous to the Mission District as burritos, norteños y sureños, street-sold churros and the Mission theater sign. Their rough, tuneful songs have mirrored the class struggles, police repression and the pure fucking joy of living in San Francisco for the past 17 or 18 years. The band has been a revolving door of drummers, bass players, and second guitarists with Jimmy Broustis manning the vocal / guitar duties since day one. On record, Shotwell is flawlessly flawed, shambolic and raw. Most of their albums and singles have been on constant rotation anywhere I've lived for the past 15 years and many of their songs have helped to inspire a constant, snarling disdain for authority. SHOTWELL yearns to live in a world that is free of cops, drinking in public laws and the upper class. A live SHOTWELL show can go in a few different directions: On one hand, it can be the best thing ever - dancing punks, a tight band, Jimmy's long, rambling diatribes that end up making such a concise point that you'll think about it for the next two days. On the other, they can be a terrifying, depressing affair where the band sounds like harsh noise, Jimmy is trying everything he can to make the songs fall apart and someone gets punched. I've still managed to have fun at those shows though...somehow. Alcohol is usually involved.

    This tape is one of my favorite things that SHOTWELL has ever recorded. It shows the band at a really tight, ragged point and the songs are all top-notch. Jimmy asks a few timeless, musical questions, such as "Where the fuck is Eppli?" (sources are still unsure) and "Do we have what it takes? We've got 5 years....fuck no.." (it's now been well over 5 years and sources are still confused as to what we had 5 years to accomplish). Jimmy's voice does that beautiful thing that it does where it goes from a half-laugh to a snarl that lets you know that he's not fucking around. All the while, he is backed up by the breakneck, steady drumming of Iggy Scam and the solid bass-work of Greg Snyder....and then Carl Rice...How many bands do you know of that change band members so quickly that they can't even keep the same people throughout one album? Most of these songs later appeared on their fabulous split LP with MIAMI (which came with a 30 page zine that chronicled the efforts of the Mission punks to start having punk shows on the streets of SF after all of the all-ages warehouses got shut down), except for their excellent cover of the AVENGER'S "Cheap Tragedies", which can only be found on this tape.
     I think my favorite line from this tape is "...tell me to get a fuckin' job! Fuck you Nazi, I'm throwing rocks!"
    If you want to keep up with SHOTWELL's website, which has not been updated or relevant since 2001, you can find it HERE..

Download Geneva Avenue Fallout

This is for the people who are still in the streets in Oakland today, fighting for economic justice and against police brutality.

Photo of SHOTWELL playing an illegal show at 16th and Mission BART in 2001 by lil' Sarah T.

 And now, to the best of my abilities, I'm going to try and name every person who has ever played in SHOTWELL. Please chime in if I missed anyone.

Jimmy Broustis                    Buzz Lee

Tony Rojas                          Iggy Scam / Erick Lyle

Mason                                Paul Curran

Aaron Cometbus                 Ivy Jeanne
Phil                                    Pete Simonelli
Chris Myers                       Antonio Ramon

Ben                                    Colin Atrophy

Greg Harvester                   Ken Williams

Carl Rice                            Greg Snyder

Steve Moriarity                  Matt Birdflu

Buddha                              Morgan Stickrod

Ryan Maddox                    Joey Alone

Paul Barger                        Abe
Garritt Heater                     Wade Driver
Cinque Adams                    E.r. Conner
Ernst                                  Alan Disaster
Shellhead                           Matt Powell
Todd Siemens                    Brontez Purnell
Caroline Paquita                Mike Wilson

TECHNICAL DIFFICULTIES FROM DAY ONE - Tape - 1997

   Iggy Scam put out this tape in 1997 and it brought to life a ton of bands that I had only read about (mostly in SCAM, the zine) or heard about by word of mouth. It was a revelation to hear real, live songs by bands with names like DARVIS BROWN AND THE SMOKE ASSES, VANBUILDERASS, LES TURDZ, and KREAMY LECTRIC SANTA. It was more than that. It was fucking exciting and it changed my life. It helped to open up my life to a whole world of complete and utter badasses who mostly have remained that way through the years. This is where I first heard "Revolution Sound" by THE STUN GUNS, where I first heard THE DRILLER KILLERS (who inspired me to make my own shirt with a Sharpie), where I was introduced to the genius of "Can't Take It Away" by THE MORONS and so, so much more. "Stupid Fresh" by KLS still sends chills down my spine every time I hear it. This is also where I first heard THE FUNYONS, a band powered mostly by one man named Steve who plays his simple-yet-insanely-catchy songs only on the streets, which I've always respected immensely. You may also know Steve as the principal songwriter behind ONION FLAVORED RINGS, who have been also churning out quality pop-punk for 10 years, even though they have slowed down in recent years. The cool thing is that Steve still plays FUNYONS songs unannounced on the streets of San Francisco all the time.
   This tape proclaimed "30 bands! 51 songs from The Region!" and that term (the region) has stuck around for all these years and has evolved into "region rock". But what the fuck is "region rock" and why should you care? I can't answer the latter, but I can tell you that the term "The Region" was coined by Cinque Adams. It  is loosely defined as an area in the southeastern US that is shaped like a triangle with points in Dogtown, AR, Tom Foote;s house in Chattanooga, TN and the ruins of an old hotel called "The Mutiny" in Coconut Grove in Miami. Bands from The Region mostly shared (and continue to share) ideologies, band members and much more. I don't want to define it too much because it's not mine to define. It's ever-shifting and belongs to the punks of the southeast. Don't think about it too much. Just close your mind.
   The songs were compiled by Iggy using (I'm sure) the cheapest of equipment and the barest of essentials. The same could be said for many of the bands recording their songs. The music was dubbed onto tapes stolen from chain stores and distributed through the US by touring bands, traveling kids, punk post, and a couple of small distributors. I remember getting 10 of these in the mail from Iggy and they were all snatched up by the punks in my town within a couple of hours. I don't even have a copy of this anymore.

   I did a sequel to this comp three years later, which you can find right here. This comp was originally posted on Region Rock and More, (so you can ask him why all the songs are weirdly numbered and out of order) but is no longer available there since Megaupload was shut down by the feds. I wanted to keep it around and easy to access, in case people want to hear it. It's an important document in the history of southeastern punk rock. This is for Forrest Haye, Andrew Ross Powell, Chris Cottie, Brian Turd, Victor Wiley, Mike O'Brien and any other winners we've lost along the way.

DOWNLOAD///Updated July 2013

 





JACKWACKER - "Things From Inside Your Body" - LP - 2006

   In 2005 or 2006, I hitched a ride to Louisville, KY to go see IMPRACTICAL COCKPIT play at a little neighborhood bar. They were the only band on the bill and they played a great, sprawling hour-long set that literally cleared the room of every paying patron in the building. They had opened up the doors to the bar and the torrential downpour outside was blowing into the building. We thought that the burly biker-looking bartenders and door-guy were gonna be pissed off that the band had driven away their customers and left them with a weirdo band, their friend (me, who wasn't buying anything), the guy who set it up (Kris) and the one other spectator (hi Christina!). After playing the last note of the set, the dudes at the bar, who had been staring sternly the whole time with their arms crossed, asked "So, are you guys into SUN RA and BEEFHEART?" It turns out that the guys at the bar were stoked to hear improvisational noise and skronky sounds. They didn't give a fuck that we ran everyone off and they gave us a lot of free drinks. We went back to Kris' house afterwards to see his insanely huge record collection and talk nerdy about FRED LANE and DAVEY WILLIAMS until the wee hours. He said that he helped with a collective called Black Velvet Fuckre that had just put out a triple LP by his group VALLEY OF ASHES that had already sold out before it even got pressed. I knew that this guy must be up to something good if he can manage that.
    After getting back home to Bloomington, I found this LP by a band called JACKWACKER and bought it for these two reasons: They were a local band from the early 90's and Black Velvet Fuckre had put it out. When I got home, I was not prepared for the weird, mega-distorted, totally fucked onslaught that greeted my ears. At first, I couldn't really tell what the hell was going on, but I knew that I liked it. The band consisted of only two guys, but it sounded like three or four. The guitarist was playing a guitar that had 3 bass strings and 3 guitar strings on it. The drummer was playing...well, a drum set. There was some intermittent howls and yelps, but most of the vocals were minimal. Some hacks in the music journalism field keep comparing them to LIGHTNING BOLT, but I don't really think it's an apt description. For one, they predated LIGHTNING BOLT by years and they were far more minimal, more jazzy and way more drone-y at times. A lot less freak-out and a lot more straight-up improv.
  I had a really hard time finding out any info about them when I got this record. From what I could tell, they lived in Bloomington, Indiana in the early 90's and recorded a lot of these songs live in basements around town. Then, they moved to Madison, WI and recorded the rest before breaking up. I asked people around town if they knew anything about the band and no one really did. I asked old-timers and lifelong residents, but no one I asked had ever even heard of them.
   I played 3rd guitar (!!) in a doomy sludge band called GOURMET SCUM and we were invited to play with a lot of other folks on a local radio show where each band was asked to do one original song and one cover by a local of any era. We chose to "interpret" a JACKWACKER song ("Hashslinger") live and in front of an audience at a downtown auditorium. After our ramshackle barrage of drop-D sludge, a guy walked up to me, said he appreciated the JACKWACKER cover and he didn't think anyone remembered them. I asked if he ever saw them and it turned out that he was the drummer, Rob. He said that they played a lot around Bloomington, but no one ever seemed to "get" them or appreciate what they were doing. After moving to Madison, they broke up after a year or so and life led Rob back to Bloomington, where he stopped playing punk/noise and got more into free-form jazz and improv. I didn't ask him much more about it because he seemed wholly uninterested...and there was a noise nerd around town who kept completely fucking hounding him for info...so I backed off (also, after this show, the noise nerd assumed we were a JACKWACKER cover band and was trying to get us to play shows as JACKWACKER, which we never did or acknowledged...because we were our own band.)
   This record came from out of nowhere for me and I am really glad to see that this kind of noise was going on in the Midwest in the early 90's. It's destructive, cathartic, and insane. I love it.

Download JACKWACKER

THE SLACKERS - Discography - 1993-1995

   I bought a drum set from my cousin for $100 in 1988 when I was 12 years old. I didn't know how to play it, but I banged on it every day and tried to come up with something that remotely resembled anything that I had ever heard in my life. Most of the time, it was fruitless and sounded like a 12 year old banging on some trash. I had read articles in magazines about how when THE RAMONES came along, punks around the world were inspired to pick up guitars and start their own bands because all you needed was 3 chords and a steady beat. The articles would talk about how laughably simple their songs were. When I listened to THE RAMONES, I heard untouchable genius that could not be replicated. Sure, I could sorta play "Bltzkrieg Bop" on guitar (I even taught my dad when I was 13. He had never touched a guitar in his life), but that fucking machine-like beat that Tommy Ramone was playing was impossible for me. I would play the drums for hours and not even come close to sounding anything like it. I constantly felt like a failure at music, but soldiered on, playing in teenage punk bands that never amounted to much. I had this idea that your band had to sound perfect and you had to be on a record label to ever put anything out. My bands would make tapes in editions of 3-25 because we didn't know what else to do.
    As time moved on, I heard bands like BEAT HAPPENING, RAOOUL and SKINNED TEEN, who helped me to realize that you don't have to be a pro musician to play music and put out records. But the biggest influence to me at that time, who helped illuminate a path to a greater understanding of DIY, was THE SLACKERS. They lived two hours north of me in Huntsville, AL and they were punk as fuck. The punks in my town had some cool bands (like HEAVENLY BANGING CANNON, WAFFLE HOUSE RIOTERS, and THE SPASTARDS), but THE SLACKERS were actually putting out records, touring, setting up shows and living their punk lives 24 hours a day. When I heard their first 7", "Where Were You in 92?", I laughed because it was so ramshackle and amateur, but also catchy and punk. Even I could play drums as good as their drummer (I found out later that even though Matt set up a bass drum in front of him, he didn't use it). I knew that I had to see these guys live.

   One of the first times I saw THE SLACKERS play was at a thrift store in Huntsville (next door to the northside Bandito Burrito, for any locals reading) with HEAVENLY BANGING CANNON and THE FUN GIRLS FROM MT PILOT. I remember that during their set, everything just kept breaking and falling apart, but they just kept playing. I think I remember their bass player, Joey getting naked and yelling a bunch. It probably sounded like crap, but they were way more fun than almost any band I had ever seen. It was really fun and inspiring to see this band and they changed everything for me. When I got back home, I immediately got my band to cover "Scram", off of their second 7" and no one in the band was excited about it because they really wanted to sound like PROPAGANDHI. It was disheartening and I gravitated more and more towards the scrappy punk that was rumbling from the Huntsville scene until I moved there the day after I graduated. I lived in my car for my first summer in Huntsville, usually parked right down the street from the van that the SLACKERS singer, Heiko lived in.

SLACKERS live at Lucy's Record Shop, Nashville, TN. 1994

   Joey (formerly of SHITBOY FROM OUTERSPACE and CHEESE ASS CHRIST) played the bass and his whiny, squeaky voice was a drastic contrast from Heiko's gravel-throated roar. Together, they sometimes did a call and response that sometimes worked, sometimes didn't, but was always entertaining. Their guitarist, Robert wrote the more poppy songs and provided a raw, fucked guitar sound that could only be made with the cheapest of equipment. Their drummer, Matt was barely hanging onto the beat in the beginning, but like I said, it meant a lot to this dumb teenager from the sticks. Their first songs like "I Wanna Destroy Music" and "Fatto The Cop" were anthems to me, helping to instill an early hatred of cops and a complete disdain for top 40 radio music. They followed their first 7" with "Circle A Your Day" in 1994, which showed them playing a little tighter, but not by much. The songs "$70 Rock Star" and "You Can't Do Just What You Want To Do" show a little more effort than their first 7", but retains all of the anger they've reserved for sellouts, posers, rich assholes and society at large. Their last recorded effort was a split 7" with the aforementioned FUN GIRLS and shows the band at their tightest. It always felt good as a teenager in Huntsville to sing along to "Society". "Fuck you and your racism! Fuck you and your sexism! Fuck you and your capitalism!" In "I Was A Teenage Anarchy", they sing about sniffing glue, making your own clothes, and being a punk. It fucking ruled and the complete and utter DEAD KENNEDYS rip-off part still kinda makes me laugh.

   In addition to their other tours, THE SLACKERS went on a one show tour out to California where they played at Gilman and ended up jumping onto a show at Epicenter. When they returned to Alabama, they left Heiko in Oakland (where he remains to this day) and broke up. They played one last show at the Tip-Top Cafe in Huntsville where punks came up to do their own impression of Heiko's singing for the band, since Heiko was stranded 3000 miles away. At the end of their set, Joey announced, "I'm starting a new band tomorrow called JOEY TAMPON AND THE TOXIC SHOCKS. If you want to be in it, talk to me about it." Even though I didn't really know Joey, I told him I wanted to be in his band since THE SLACKERS meant so much to me. Without knowing if I even played drums or not, Joey invited me to be in the band and true to his word, we had our first practice the next day. We were a band for the next 3 years and that dumb, talent-less 12 year old drummer inside of me was stoked beyond belief to actually be doing something that I never thought was even possible at one point in my life: playing in a punk band that put out records.

   THE SLACKERS also appeared on the "Play At Your Own Risk" compilation on Recess Records (now resisting the urge to toss out an aside about how Recess was once fun and punk, but has negated their credibility and relevance by putting out the newest SCREECHING WEASEL 12") and posthumously offered up 2 unreleased songs that appeared on the "Fuck The East Bay, This is N.O.K." comp. They are both in this download and they rule. I guess this isn't a complete discography because there is also a tape floating around of some more unreleased songs. If you have that, please send it to me, digitally or otherwise (emphasis on the otherwise).  Now concludes this lengthy essay on a band that you may not care about.

Download it
Link updated on 4/6/15. RIP Heiko)

UPDATE: THAT TAPE IS RIGHT HERE.

If you want to read EVEN MORE about the band, check out my old buddy, Seth's blog right here.

50 MILLION - Live at Mission Records - Tape - 1999

   Previously, I have rattled on and on and ON about 50 MILLION being the best band in the world, so I will keep my ramblings short this time. I'll leave this post mostly up to Erick Lyle, who played drums on this recording and loaned this tape to ye olde Outpost.

   "1999 was a rough year in the Mission - all under ages spaces were closed by cops in the gentrifying dot-com boom. Yuppies everywhere. All the great bands like HICKEY broken up. Most of the scene spiraling into drug-filled wreckage. 50 MILLION did not give up, however! I was asked to join on drums and Wade moved to lead guitar. We practiced 5 hours a day, pushing our amps in shopping carts to rehearse at Starcleaners (ed. note: a former art/show space off of Mission Street near 18th where Jen from Shellshag lived along with many other freaks over time) and I did what I could to help Wade realize his vision for a new double LP, "The Song Remains Insane." We played as many shows as possible to work on this new material (I think we played Kimo's a bunch when it was still a queer bar and you had to wear drag to play there. I cherish great memories of going to steal lipstick and eyeliner at Walgreen's on Polk St with Shell). The thing is, no one cared. It was just a dark time. The scene was in ruins, but we tried. That record even got recorded but never came out. This show is from Mission Records with THE NEED from Olympia. We refused to play any of "the hits", just all new shit. So at the end, Bochay, Pablo and Jason sang "Baltimore" to us. Very sweet. "

   The lineup on this one was Wade and Shell on guitars and vocals, Capt Norlon on bass and vocals and Iggy Scam (Erick) on drums. I have a few random songs on a tape from that double LP and they are really good. If anyone wants to put out that beast (if the source tapes still even exist), get in touch with me and I will get you in touch with them. Enjoy this crazy sounding live set from 1999.

Download 50 MILLION Live
(link updated 8/12/16)

STUN GUNS - Live on WNYU - Tape - 1995

STUN GUNS live at Churchill's in Miami. Photo by ??

   This very recording right here, which is legendary and almost mythical in my mind, is one of the reasons I started this blog in the first place. When I was typing the words to the first or second post ever, I thought "I have to get a hold of that live STUN GUNS tape and make a good digital copy of it one day." My good friend, Erick Lyle was kind enough to mail it across the country, along with 30-40 other tapes that are on loan to me for a bit. If you're as happy as I am about this, be sure to buy the man a coffee the next time you see him. Enough about that....let's get the stories rolling. Here is what George Kelley, the bass player of the STUN GUNS had to say about this time in the band's history.

  "This would have been in August, 1995 towards the end of a nine week tour with the almighty SHAFFERS from Chattanooga. Considering that it was eight people traveling together for over two months and doing all sorts of destructive things to themselves, I don't think there's one person in either band who wouldn't have called it an amazing experience. I sure would.

   We had our fair share of fucked up shows on that tour (it wouldn't have been the STUN GUNS otherwise) but we nailed it a lot too. A day or two after the WNYU show, we had a gig in Manhattan - I think it was called the Gnat Club - that I still think was our best performance ever. We were just super tight at that point, at least when we could stand up.

   So, this would be a little slice of that time. Probably equal parts sloppy and inspired with a little Paul (Enema) Lecours cursing on-air to drive the staff nuts, too. But we genuinely loved what we were doing and loved each other, too. And not a day goes by that I don't miss Andrew Ross Powell and wish that he was still here."

STUN GUNS in Alabama in 1996. Photo by me.

   Erick Lyle has always been a big supporter, friend and archivist of the STUN GUNS since day one. It is because of his tape comp "Technical Difficulties From Day One" that I ever heard the amazing live version of "Revolution Sound" from this recording (the same goes for many, many other people). This is his take on this era of the STUN GUNS and the southern punk of the mid-90's...

    "This is the closest thing to a foundational moment as survives today for what is now popularly called "The Region". Sure, Eric Nelson's band, AUDACITY came to Miami from Dalton, GA to play with CHICKENHEAD in 1992. Sure, Andrew Powell (STUN GUNS drummer) actually went to live in Dalton and went on tour with THE SHAFFERS in 1993. But the real unity began in summer 1995 when Miami's STUN GUNS and Dalton's SHAFFERS embarked on an ill-advised, over-ambitious, yet now legendary 3 month tour of the United States. With almost no shows and no money, this rolling blackout was quickly joined by THE HOOKERS - a proto-SPAWN SACS of Michigan / Miami wildness. The three bands simply showed up and lived for days in punk houses across the country from Lansing, MI to Portland, OR to the roof of NYC's ABC No Rio, closing countless minds as well as their own, forever, along the way. THE SHAFFERS attempted to record in Lansing, but Eric's voice was blown and they never liked the recordings. This trip to WNYU with Region ally and Yonkers legend Joey I, is the best surviving recording of the band (SHAFFERS) and includes some of the best STUN GUNS material too. Accidentally amazing, transcendent, hilarious and simply the best!"

   For those of you in the dark, the STUN GUNS were a Miami punk band that were around for a good chunk of the 90's who delivered catchy punk that was equally inspired by melodic punk, Goodfellas, and the hard living of Miami. Paul Enema would sling out off-the-cuff one liners as quickly as he spit out his rapid-fire lyrics that were both bitingly cynical and tragically astute. George Kelley was always a super nice guy who seemed to be able to discuss anything with anyone and held everything together with his solid bass lines. Their guitarist, Buddha was and still is one of the best guitarists I have ever heard in my life. Andrew Ross Powell is still one of the most inspirational drummers (and people) I've ever seen or heard. Just being in the same room with him felt electric and exciting sometimes. His absence from this world is palpable and uncomfortable at times. Along with hundreds of other people around the world, I will always feel a strange vacancy in this punk scene without Andrew in it. I hope he's resting in peace somehow...or at least putting lotion in his foot-long devil-lock, writing a 43 chord song on the guitar and playing the drums like a man possessed in an alternate reality. RIP forever and always.

One of the many reasons Andrew was such an inspiration to me is because he put everything he had into his every performance. Here he is seen playing bass for KLS at a show where he broke 3 strings on the bass within 2-3 songs. Photo by Josie.

Download STUN GUNS

Updated 2013

...and if you're wondering, "soooo...where's the SHAFFERS stuff?", it will be posted tomorrow.

Thanks to Maximum Rock N Roll for letting me use their superior digitizing equipment for this tape so I could get the best quality possible and for all the hard work they've been doing with their magazine since 1977....and for bailing me out of jail in 2002.

OH!!  I ALMOST FORGOT...You can still order the outstanding STUN GUNS LP from Do Ya Hear We!!

PUNKY ROCKIT - 2 7"s - 1994

   I think it was my friend, Angie who first stumbled across this 7" at American Beat Records in Birmingham, AL back in 1994. I probably listened to it in her room or she put it on a tape for me. The details are all fuzzy. What I do know is that we both became kinda obsessed with this Portland band and their record was on constant rotation either in her room or blasting out of the factory speakers of my Ford Festiva. She also ordered their 2nd 7" straight from the band and it showed up broken in half (it's okay, they sent another one). It was just as good as the first one and we learned that the band had already broken up. Our hopes of ever seeing them were dashed on the rocks.
    PUNKY ROCKIT (yes, I even thought the name was pretty bad when I was 17) were a punk band from Portland who were flagrant supporters of animal rights, feminism and DIY. Some of them lived in the Powerhouse, a punk house in the northeast part of town that did house shows. I'm pretty sure that the band barely ever played outside of the northwest US since they were only a band for the year of 1994. Their sound is kind-of hopelessly mired in the mid-90's to me. It just sounds like 1994. Songs like "Smoke", "Running Out" and "In the Chair" are super catchy and jump-around-the-room basement punk. That is really all the information I have about this band, since I didn't really know them.
    My old band, RICE HARVESTER used to cover "Running Out" at every show and no one besides a handful of our friends knew or cared what it was. We played it at a show with a member of PUNKY ROCKIT's new band (SHARKS KILL) and all of the Portland people on that tour were completely dumbfounded that some pop-punk band in Alabama had ever even heard that song. RICE HARVESTER reunited a few years ago to play one show and we threw that song in to the set unannounced. It seemed useless to even tell anyone what it was since no one ever knew it in the first place. After we played, our friend (Goddamnit) Pat said "Whoa, I can't believe you guys covered a PUNKY ROCKIT song." Finally, after all these years, one person that wasn't already close to the band knew that song.

   One last thing about the band. They were adamant about talking about their politics in their record inserts in a way that I found engaging and enlightening as a teenager. It seems like if you openly discuss your politics as a band (or even just a regular old human) these days, a lot of people are quick to jump back at you and tell you why you're fucked up for doing so. (This happened in the 90's too. It's just more prevalent now due to faceless messageboards and the security of not having to actually look someone in the eyes while saying completely horrendous bullshit.) I think it's important to tell people why you're a feminist, why you're an anarchist (even with all the negative connotations that the media dishes out about them) and to discuss the problems of homelessness. Folks are quick to put others down as being "P.C.", but really, what the fuck is wrong with actually giving a shit about other humans and animals? I don't understand why anyone finds it threatening to their way of life, but lots of people do. Don't be afraid to discuss your politics. Do it even if you don't think anyone is listening. There's a chance that there is a teenage boy in Alabama who is looking for something more out there, who is completely uncomfortable with the status quo of male privilege, who doesn't know if there are other people in the world who feel the same way that he does and there's a chance that he will find your record and realize that he's not alone.

PUNKY ROCKIT download
Link updated Sept 2018

My friend, Angie, who you may remember from the beginning of this post, started experimenting with lino-cuts around the same time as getting these records and this is one of the first ones that she did.

50 MILLION - "This One's Pretty Cool, But I Like the Old Stuff Better" - CD - 1995

   I've already explained who 50 MILLION is and I've told you how much I love them, so I'll tell you about the first time I saw them, which is when I bought this CD.
   To be honest, I wasn't going to go to their show in Huntsville, AL back in 1997. I didn't know who they were and they were playing with some pretty crappy bands, but the flyer proclaimed "50  MILLION from San Francisco, featuring ex-members of J CHURCH". I loved J CHURCH, so I went to the show just to see 50 MILLION. (tangential side note: Wade from 50M played drums in J CHURCH for less than a year or so and recorded with them on "The Procession Of Simulacra - The Map Preceeds the Territory" 10", which coincidentally is the first record I ever heard by them.) I was more than a block away from the show and heard this loud, low booming voice of a guy talking somewhere. As I got closer, I realized that the voice was coming from this long-haired guy in front of the venue and he was talking a million miles per hour to one of my friends and telling her she had beautiful eyes. He turned to me as I walked up, saw the HICKEY patch on my jacket and introduced himself as "Shellhead". I found out that he was good friends with the guys from HICKEY (who had rolled through town a few months earlier) and they had told him to look for me and some of my friends. It was sweet. I met his brother Wade (the drummer on this tour) and their friend, Bloomie (the bass player). Shell continued to hit on my friend (very sweetly and not at all creepy, I might add. My friend was enjoying it and talking to him all night). It turns out that she was the ex of "J", this bruiser/greaser who had a reputation of starting fights with touring bands, young punks that were smaller than him and anyone who said anything slightly negative to him. He was a fucking jerk. I was afraid of him because I was young and scrawny. He had fought HICKEY, the SPAWN SACS and even tried to beat up my friend Ivy when she had a broken foot and was hobbling around on crutches. World class jerk here.

     Anyway, "J" was lurking around in the shadows, glaring at Shell talking to his ex while getting drunker and surlier. It didn't help matters that when 50 MILLION took the stage, they played a HICKEY song and dedicated their sweetest, sappiest songs to the woman. 

   As far as their live show went, I was sold. They played everything from awesome pop-punk to metallish dirges to feedback-laden experimental noise. They were pretty fucking amazing that night. Also, they set up all of their equipment in front of the band's stuff that played before them, thereby trapping it back there so that the douchey, crappy pop-punk band that played before them had to wait until they were done so that they could load out. I remember watching the members of that band stare helplessly and hopelessly as 50 MILLION played a 10 minute version of "She Is a Monster", making it drag slower and slower until Shell was laying on the floor, making his guitar feedback and Wade was playing something like 5 beats per minute. It felt like vindication for having to watch that crappy band's piss-poor excuse for pop-punk for 30 minutes.

   Anyway, at some point during the set, Shell tackled me in a faux wrestling match and we rolled around on the floor in a fake fight. "J" took that as his cue to attack and ran up to kick Shell in the head a couple of times, which he defended as protecting me (totally ridiculous, since that dude threatened me numerous times). After the show was over and 50 MILLION had packed up, Shell was talking to the woman and "J" made his move. He started pushing Shell around and threatened to kick his ass for trying to steal his girlfriend. Wade ran up, jumped between them and threatened to kill the guy, telling him that he would cut his head off. (a little background: Wade had parts of his head shaved off. He's an old Texas bad-ass covered in homemade tattoos and has a nasty disposition, but a heart of gold. On this tour, he looked like a completely deranged, sadistic, escaped mental patient.) "J", for the first time ever, looked genuinely scared of someone. I left with 50 MILLION in their van and found out that Wade had a machete tucked into his pants the whole time. He had fully intended to cut off "J"'s head if he didn't back off. As Wade was driving to my house, he calmly said "I'm glad I didn't have to blow his head off with the shotgun". I turned around and the shotgun was right behind me.

   I bought this CD from them at the show, even though Shell told me that it sounded nothing like their live show. I thought it was weird that a band would put out something that was wholly unrepresentative of their sound but I bought it anyway and it bummed me out when I listened to it for the first time. Over time, it quickly grew to be my most favorite thing that the band has ever put out. It's a collection of home recordings by the two brothers that dates back as far as the mid-70's, but mostly sticks to the early-to-mid-90's. A lot of the songs were started by one brother who recorded his part and then sent the master tape through the mail to the other brother to finish. It includes now-classic songs like "Baltimore", "Burn Away", "Egg in the Face", "Evergreen" (which Matty Luv of HICKEY once called "the saddest song ever written") and 22 more. 50 MILLION were (and are) a brilliant band that encompassed the hopes, dreams and ultimate failures of being broke and hopeless, but found solace and comfort in that and learned to be proud of and celebrate their lives, no matter what. They were also drug-addled, drunk and unapologetic, but who wasn't? I'm so very happy that they made it out of the 90's Mission punk scene alive.

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   ...and here is the reason I didn't use "J"'s real name in the story. You may wonder, "Why would you use an alias for some jerk who beat up all of your friends?" Well, a few years after leaving Huntsville, I went back to visit for a few days. Some friends and I went out to the river to hang out and drink a few beers. On the way, they said they were gonna pick up "J" to go with us. I said "uhhh...what the fuck dudes? I don't wanna hang out with this macho fuckwad" (or something like that). They just said it was cool and picked him up. After a couple of drinks, I said "I need to talk to you" and pulled him aside. After all of these years, I had gained some self-confidence and decided to tell him how I felt. I tore into him about how demeaning it was that he beat the shit out of young punks, how fucked up it was that he threatened women with violence and what my friends across the country thought of him. I told him how angry I was at him for all of those years and how much I wanted someone to just beat the living shit out of him. Then, I braced myself for the beating he was about to give me. He didn't. He stood there and listened to everything that I had to say and then he told me that I was right and that he was sorry. I couldn't believe it. This guy had never shown any remorse in the moment or admitted any signs of weakness or apology. He explained that he grew up fighting as a means of survival and as a way of life. As he got older, he didn't see any other way of living and fighting became his only method of solving problems or disputes. He told me that he wasn't happy during that time and worked a lot on changing his behavior to become a better person. He didn't expect me or anyone else to forgive him for all of the harm he had caused so many people, but he wanted me to tell those people that he's really sorry and he wishes that he could make up for it somehow. So, if you ever lived in Huntsville or came through there in a punk band in the 90's, it's highly possible that you know who I'm talking about...and if he fought you for some stupid reason, he's sorry. The rest of that night hanging out with him was great and memorable. I even hugged that motherfucker at the end of the night. Life is strange.

If you want to order stuff by 50 MILLION and many other great bands, please visit STARCLEANER.