Antique Pony-Museum of Blood EP (2012)

After spinning these Glaswegians' [sic?] debut EP, I can safely say that they are fans of mathrock. Their email winging the EP my way described them as a noise band, but their sound isn't as guttural as most groups I associate with that genre.

Instead, these nine tracks exhibit a pretty solid grasp of postrock songwriting. The production is a bit too mannered for my tastes, but it sounds like an aesthetic choice, not happenstance. Most of the tracks sound like the makings of jazz musicians who got fed up with playing in fancypeople bars and got into Scratch Acid. The drummer totally stole the opening roll for "novella written by retired mortician" (gee, these guys had their thesaurus at hand when naming these songs, eh?) from Joy Division, but eh, who isn't ripping off Morris & co. these days?

Anyways, you'll dig this if you like sustained, guitar-centered post-rock instrumentals. This is a lazy review, I know, but I'm on my way out of the house to get blackout drunk and try to make conversation with the anarchists of Florence, so buzz off.

Check out Antique Pony HERE.

No Trend-Teen Love 7" (1983)

I'm often accused of being a misanthrope. That's probably true, BUT!: compared to No Trend (or at least the version of No Trend presented on this and their first LP, 1984's "Too Many Humans"), I'm a hippy.

NT was infamous in the mid-80s US punk scene for their obnoxious performances (including the use of blinding runway lights to separate themselves from the audience) and unpredictable, consistently contrarian albums.

This is by far my favorite: three tracks of trudging, grinding noise that gives you a good sense of why Lydia Lunch later collaborated with the band. "Teen Love" is a touching tale of teen stupidity in Reagan's America: the first two tracks, "Mass Sterilization (Caused by Venereal Disease" and "Cancer," sound like they read: vicious, gleefully nihilistic noise.

Throw this slab of puerile misanthropy on if your week has been as bad as mine. Enjoy!

There's an interesting oral history of the band up on the NY Press website; the interview that Ratcharge did with an ex-bassist is also worth reading.

Bands and musicians who have sent me stuff recently: Have patience, your stuff will be reviewed eventually.

MEDIAFIRE AND LEMAIRE CAN SUCK IT

I just realized that Mediafire has suspended my account. Those motherfuckers didn't even send me a fucking email. Thanks a lot, you bastards. I can't explain how angry I am about this.

This means that all of the posts from 2011 now have dead links, as well as quite a few from this year.  I don't have the time or patience to re-up everything. If you want a given file or mix, send me an email or leave a comment on the relevant entry and I'll reup it elsewhere. Or, if any of you wanna be sweethearts, try posting current links for dead files.

The "Alone and Forsaken" takedowns especially piss me off, since they're semi-autobiographical in a lot of ways. Also, A&F XIII included a track by a good friend that I was hoping would get more attention.

I'd like to reiterate my charge that the people who run Mediafire are, collectively, a bunch of cowards and assholes. Of course, I expect this sort of behavior from a corporation, but Mediafire is notable for their open complicity with fraudulent copyright owners, namely, LinkID and Lemaire.
 Their one-way process of kowtowing to any shitbird who sounds like a lawyer is craven and despicable, and in any case will not save them if SOPA passes. There is no future in Mediafire's dreaming.

The way Mediafire responds to complaints, based on what I, Zen Arcade, Iamtheleastmachiavellian, and various other blogs have experienced, is to unquestioningly believe anyone who emails them with a complaint., even if the email is clearly written by a spambot or dummy corporation.

I'm using Zippyshare for all future reviews when there isn't a bandcamp link. I'm sure, however, that the purge of music blogs will eventually zero in on Zippyshare. If anyone has suggestions for more permanent solutions to this issue, now's the time to start talking.

I'm going to continue Drug Punk to the best of my ability and as time allows. The contrarian in me actually is energized by what these shitbirds are doing to the community of weirdos, loners, and music nerds that I've always aimed my writing and posts at. If all else fails, we can just go back to trading cassettes anyways.

If you run a blog or any sort of website that hosts files, you're probably going to be targeted soon, if you haven't already, by someone calling himself Lemaire, running the company LinkID. Here's the contact info:
LeakID
13, rue Greneta
75003 PARIS
Tel: +33950084207
Mobile: +33620867619
Mail: contact@leakid.com

Strike a Match-demo (2012)

True story: one of my friends saw Fugazi (or was it Bikini Kill? Sorta the same band in a lot of ways-those of you who disagree, read some other blog) at Chicago's Aragon Ballroom back in the early '90s. Pearl Jam had just broken big, and Eddie Vedder was shouting the good name of Ian MacKaye et. al./Kathleen Hanna et. al. from the rooftops. So a bunch of fratboys were there, catcalling the riot grrrls. Of course, they had picked the wrong bunch of women to fuck with, and a fight ensued. Problem was, the riot grrls thought that my friend-a Marxist and noise musician-was one of the frat boys, and they beat the living shit out of him instead of the shitbird frat guys.

You might like Strike a Match if you like Fugazi. Although they sound like they have a better sense of humor than Ian et. al. ever did (that's a compliment, fellas). They're from Oslo. I apologize to them, as this thing washed up in my inbox back in February and they've since broken up.

Check it out here.

Sulla spiaggia

I'm on vacation for the next few days, so I probably won't update Drug Punk until next Wednesday or so. Deal with it, peeps.

Kitchen's Floor-Orbit/Regrets 7" (2010)

I haven't showered in days and I can't recall what kind of or which drugs I've been doing for the last four days, so it seems like it's appropriate to feature Kitchen's Floor, finally, on Drug Punk.

KF is one of my favorite recent bands, combining an ear for harmonies with an offhandedly snarling, apathetic aesthetic. This, their debut EP, is ramshackle even by Matt Kennedy standards: three tracks of dirtbag, ultra-lo fi garage misery. The drummer sounds like Mo Tucker on percosets, Kennedy howls, hollers, and shouts over the guitar squall, and yr misery has its new favorite company.
"Still Night" is the surprise here: a slightly psychedelic, plodding concoction much slower than most KF songs, it really sticks in yr head. HERE.

Turn this on, drug out, and remember that loneliness is a dirty matress. This EP is long out of print, but you can still pick up copies of their two LPs at Siltbreeze Records.

Harry Cloud-Indian Pussy EP (2012)

This is a good recording, despite having what is unquestionably one of the dumbest titles I've come across since I got this blog started (I mean, stoopid is cool, but stupid is just stupid, yeh?).

Harry Cloud lurches, crawls, and drags his audience, willing or not, through seven tracks of alternatingly atmospheric and suffocatingly direct stoner jams here, and you can bet that there's plenty of pitfalls, booby traps, and side/soundeffects that sound like the voices in yr head.
I see this appealing mostly to those of you whose youths were spent in intense, focused study of the Southern Lord back catalogue, chilling out from this study by indulging in goofy K Records-style coyness. That's a shitty description, I know, but stoner rock guitar does manful combat throughout with a heavy dose of weirded out, kinda-pretentious-kinda-fun experimentation just beneath the surface.

Light up, zone out, stone out and freak out, freaks. HERE.

Violent End-demo CS (2012)

The cover says it all: violent music with nothing but malice lurking beneath frenetic drumming and ugly, mutilated guitar riffs.

Violent End is the current darling of the Chicago punk scene: current or ex-members of Raw Nerve, Manipulation, Chronic Seizure, Vile Gash, et. al. If you know anything about those bands you can expect a similar dose of barebones, no-frills hardcore. Angry Andy from Vile Gash delivers his trademark snarl, barking out words of hate (I can't make 'em out but I'm sure the words are as violent as the music).

I don't need to say any more; if you like raw American hardcore, you'll like this.

The songs aren't separated, so it's just one big file. Deal. Check it out here. You can still buy a physical copy from Sorry State Records. Do it, now!

Violent End is playing with Hoax, Kontaminat, and NEGATIVE APPROACH on September 9th at Chicago's Cobra Lounge. It'll probably be the show of the year, so go if yr gonna be in my hometown. For more info, read this.

Tiny Swimmers-Spurtin' Spirit EP (2012)

The email sending this my way concluded with this cryptic epigram:

"1 shot grain alcohol + 1 shot nyquil (red) + 1/2 bottle 5 hour energy = THE BRAIN DRAIN

drink it out of an empty shampoo bottle and you have yourself a CHACHI PITTMAN"

Er, yes. Minneapolis' Tiny Swimmers toss together psychedelic guitar riffs, bursts of distortion, and the odd synthesizer beat on their debut EP. The result is an often-confusing confection that works on some fucked up level I still can't figure out.

"Hey You Guys" makes you think they're doing some sort of videogame-core electronica mess, as it's followed by "Jimmy Stewart's Elephant Room," which is just noisy guitar and an insistent electric beat that for some reason makes me think of some Big Boys tune, maybe ""We Got Your Money" minus the mob choruses. "Hot Ass Bedroom" manages the difficult feat of combining harmonica with glitch beats. With mixed success.

Altogether it sounds like Tiny Swimmers is reaching for a sound that hasn't quite yet crystallized. Parts of this work, parts of it don't. It's worth a spin, so do it here.