Deformities-Sometimes I Wish for my Own Death EP (2013)

What do you get when you throw Bodymore's finest together? The best throwaway EP of the year (anyone who thinks that a record consisting of 2 songs that don't exceed two minutes can't be the year's best EP shouldn't be reading this blog). Drew from Sick Thoughts and Nick from Kent State team up for epic, and epically brief, scuzzfuckery on this one.

The eponymous opening track mixes the hilarity and relentless monotony of Sick Thoughts' best with the (slightly) better production and (slightly) more complex guitar work of Kent State. A goblin may have invaded the studio while they were cutting "Still Separated II," to take over signing duties. The guitar slices in and out, and Drew's arrhythmic patter makes it sound like to drummers were dueling while the tape was rolling.
There's not much else to say: you either love sloprock noise or hate it. The latter type can fuck off, the former can revel in Deformities' idiot majesty.

Chief Thundercloud/Walrus split CS (2013)

Just in time for creeping fall blues, Halifax drops two offerings in one on ya. Walrus is a tried and true DrugPunk fave, while Chief Thundercloud slipssome downer blooz your way that forms a nice contrast with the former's sedate neopsych.

It's a dicey proposition, jacking riffs from Daniel Johnston: mere competence at evoking DJ's sound don't cut it. There's two ways you can go about aping the great D.J. The first is to act as "quirky"* as Johnston is on early favorites like "I eat cigarettes." This is the tack favored by dipshits such as Devendra Banheart, who mostly just come off sounding like shitbirds whose parents bought them a recording studio and a bag of mushrooms as a present for graduating from RISD. OR, you can go out on a limb and try to convince us that you're just as sad as Daniel Johnston. To succeed at the latter, you either have to be such a good actor, you might as well be on Broadway, or in fact be seriously deranged//depressed and walk around every day feeling like I do after polishing off a 6-pack and Tuscan red after getting in a screaming match with an ex.

Either way, Chief Thundercloud manages to pull it off. Of course, some of this is due to the clever use of hushed production. But he hits just the right note for when you're feeling sad but not exactly despondent, if y'knowhatImean. "Nothing's Gonna Stop" has some of the best dumb-straightforward lyrics I've heard this year. Here's the chorus: "I need you in my life [full stop] More than any other time [full stop]." Sneer all you want, can you do any better? The rest of CT's side is more of the same: wistful, forlorn, and subdued strings of autumn anomie.

Walrus, true to form, continues down the road carved on previous splits and brief EPs. "Brian" is a jaunty bit of airpop: almost-bouncy drumming, truncated singing, and minimal guitar. "Little City People" might be my favorite Walrus tune yet, gliding by under the radar sounding like  Jefferson Airplane outtake with a majestically surprising finish. Listen to it instead of reading my description of it.

Taken together this is a dynamic split-which is more of an achievement than it sounds, given that most splits I've ever heard might as well be a full album by a single band, given how similar the two sides are. Play the Chief Thundercloud side when yr broken up over yr ex but already have a new one in the works, play Walrus the morning after you've hooked up with said new rose for the first time.

Walrus lives here, while Chief Thundercloud skulks over here.

*"quirky": a nice, pleasant euphemism that lame cunts use to paper over the fact that Johnston is a schizophrenic who, as far as I can tell, has lived his life in immense pain; mental illness isn't cute, it's sad and shouldn't be glorified by anyone, present drug punk included. 

Not dead...

....just busy pretending to be an adult (Har. Har. Har.), and also homeless at the moment. I'll be back soon, kiddies, once I find a place in the godforsaken Old Country with a steady internet connection. Stay tuned.

Alone & Forsaken XVIII: Razors in the Night

Yes, kiddies, I'm alive, narcotorpors and booze binges aside. I'm in the process of moving (back) to the Old Country so posts will continue to be intermittent for the next two weeks or so, but then I'll get back to the ever-present pile of shit (er, new releases) clogging the innards of my Gshit account.

In the meantime, have a gander with some classics of the "loud, young, dumb and violent" variety. Some of these tunes appeared on previous installments of the A&F series, but they're classics and zippyshare deleted those long ago anyways.

SHOW YOU NO MERCY AT ALL!

1. 86 Mentality-Intro/LifeTrap
2. Blitz-Razors in the Night
3. X-Nausea
4. the Germs-Communist Eyes
5. Social Unrest-Making Room for Youth
6. Youth Brigade (LA)-Violence
7. Ultimo Resorte-Cementerio Caliente
8. The Mau-Maus-Society's Rejects
9. Uproar-Rebel Youth
10. Negative Approach-Ready to Fight
11. The Fix-'Cause the Elite
12. SSD-Boiling Point
13. Born/Dead-No One (Necros cover)
14. Cro-Mags-Show You No Mercy (demo version)
15. Government Issue-Self-Destruct
16. Iron Cross-Wolfpack
17. Criminal Damage-No Solution

Nnevtelga-s/t CS (2013)

Apparently weirdos do indeed live in a city overflowing with technocrats and bankers. Brussells' Nnevtelga (say that five times fast!) warps and woofs layers of sonic brutality around your austerity-weary mind on their debut. These Flemings traffick in a nasty brew falling somewhere between ambient drone and noisecore, with a dash of the Swans thrown in for good measure.

Monotony is an essential part of much noise, but Nnevteiga's controlled use of rhythm & guitar breaks up the glacial slide of synthshittery. The first five tracks are straightfoward beat-noise-beat-noise nastiness, but "Soko Inede" shows how dynamic the band is. It's nothing but a propulsive beat and a repeated vocal line, but damn is it catchy, in an abrasive sort of way: throwing this on at a shitty '80s dance party would totally clear the floor, allowing you to dance alone while huffing up the blow left behind by irate revelers.

The second half of the LP finds the band walking this same delicate line between "fuck-you-listener" and "nah we're really just a noise band": just when you want them to settle down into sadism they drop another disturbingly punchy bit in. It's really quite catchy in its own perverse way, especially "tshlobl:" imagine a zombie on Xanax singing for the Vyllies.

Check out this piece of Flemish fuckery here. Then, go buy a cassette copy from Tendresse Records!

Dungeon Kids-Oh How it Hurts EP (2013)

 Dungeon Kids' upbeat, off-kilter garage thrumming doesn't really fit with what you expect from Baltimore, s a city best known for Edgar Allen Poe, The Wire, and grinding poverty.* I guess it's just further evidence that the internet has completely decentered physical space and its influence from how musicians work?

Getting off my pseudo-insightful high horse, Dungeon Kids offers thee five tracks that fall somewhere between garage rock and Fugazi-style postpunk. It's a strange mix that I've never really understood, but these kids is good at it. The lead song, "Is there Light?," perfectly encapsulates their sound. It opens with fullforce guitar fuzz and a mushy rhythm section that propels the band forward. Then, around 20 seconds, the song jerks into a midtempo verse that sounds like the chorus. It comes complete with the noodling guitar leads that never break through into catharsis. This is the third band in the last year that reminds me of the Unicorns without really sounding like them at all. Anyway Dungeon Kids are more interesting if only because it sounds like they in fact give a shit about the music they're playing. Same goes for Celestial Shore & Shopping Spree, the other two bands.

The "sounds like____" formula is escaping me right now, but this is the sort of album that my friends in Olympia would blast when it's noon, we're stoned and unemployed, and the sun hasn't come out for about a week. That sorta stuff.

Get stoopid then get a job with Dungeon Kids, over here!

*Oh, and this band!

Death Evocation-s/t 7" EP (2011)

This one's a bit of a throwaway post, but that's not to disparage Death Evocation. Personally I can't stand most metal-between the Nazi undertones of a large part of contemporary Black Metal and the overall macho wankery of the genre as a whole, there ain't much goin' on with metal power.

Death Evocation, however, delivers the goods. Those goods consist of colossal, wailing, [fill in the blank hyperbolic adjective ehre] guitar blitzkrieg,a  pummeling rhythm section, and a singer who just barely manages to stay within range of the rest of the band.

These three tracks are suitable for doing activities that make you angry, feel powerful, and/or outraged at [fill in the blank injustice here: war, the NSA, Obama, Asad, whateverthefuckthisismetalwhogivesashitreally].

YOU CAN'T COPE. Death Evocation seems to be one of those "mysterious" bands with no internet presence, so I can only recommend that, if you're interested in buying this record, go find the nearest junky crustpunk nodding out in a gutter, and offer him $10 and/or a bag of heroin in exhange for his/her copy.

Crazy Pills-Restless LP (2013)

Behind all the gloop 'n'glop,  many of us-even at this late date of the beshitted year of our Lord 2013-still prefer bare bones, moronically straightforward rock 'n roll over contrived, overly-complicated gimmicks and/or too-kool-for-skool-retreads. Of course, doing your best to sound like Jerry Lee Lewis' band fronted by a woman is fundamentally reactionary. But the last couple of years' worth of subcultural (anti-)cultural slop have largely focused on rehashing the 1990s. So takin' it back to the '50s seems downright revolutionary-by-way-of-reactionary at this point.

Whatever, in Crazy Pills, Brookyln belches out yet another sweet rock 'n'roll group that strips away all pretense and just dishes out snazzy tunes to dance to. This sort of rock is exactly opposed to longwinded disquisitions on why it's good; it just is.

So crack a beer, comb some pomade through your hair, and go down to the local sleazy rocker bar. Pop a quarter in the jukebox, then get irate with the bartender when Crazy Pills doesn't show up. Then insis, at top volume, that he look this band up HERE, and FUCKING ROCK OUT DOOD. Yeah. I totally impressed a girl enough with this sort of gimmick for her to make out with me last weekend, Scout's honor.

Multiple Man-s/t CS (Major Crimes Records, 2013)

Yeah, I'm as surprised as you are that I crawled out of an alcoholic slumber to start posting rad new shit but there ya go....

....and the "there," as is often the case these days, is Brisbane, Australia. Multiple Man is twins Sean & Chris Campion and they deliver the goods with five tracks of weirdo, minimal synth fuckery. "Built Wrong" is a slow-burning bit of persistent, almost-menacing goof-goth with percussion that sounds like someone kicking a piece of aluminum siding with steel-toed Docs. Things get nastier with "Photo Arrays," which shortens the beat to autistic levels while ramping up the distortion. It sounds like how you feel after a night of drinking 15 light beers and wrecking your bike while out on the town. That good.
"Typecast" is the best track here, and could easily have crawled out of some Viennese synth-geek's lair circa 1984. Clean, crisp, automated ambiance washes over a hysterical rhythm and mindless, monotone vocal tracks. It creates the illusion that the Iron Curtain is still just across the Danube and it's always raining so fuck it gimme another beer and turn up that bootleg of live Joy Div you just smuggled in from France. 

The next two tracks are just as good but I don't wanna ruin the fun for you fuckers (clue: settle in with downers and whiskey for "Whipping Boy"). Those of you who enjoy the benefits of the European welfare state are just getting back from summer holidays. This is the perfect piece of cold, fuzz-fucked minimalism to usher in fall and yet "another year with nuthin' to do," as Iggy Stooge said so majestically in 1969.

Listen to Multiple Man HERE or HERE. Major Crimes is sold out of the cassettes, but email Matt over at Eternal Soundcheck Distro and he might still have copies kicking around.