...Because Sometimes You Just Want Other People To Hear Your Favorite Album Ever.

Alright...no joking around, and maybe it's just my proximity to this band's stomping grounds, but this is maybe my favorite record in the whole entire universe.  Dead Things were an Asheville band comprised of folks from such incredible bands as Astrid Oto and Pink Collar Jobs, and ...Because Sometimes You Just Want To Ride Your Bike To The Show was their full-length album.  It is a Southern punk rock masterpiece.  It is a desert island record for me.  It is every good rock band all in one, from the Ramones to Thin Lizzy to Bruce Springsteen to Judas Priest to Black Flag to Motorhead to Blatz and Filth all at once.  It is Asheville to me, the shitty winters, the amazing summers, the disappointment, the hope, the dirt, the grime....all of it.  From hangovers to hikes in the mountains, Dead Things have been there with me every step of the way.  Lynn, Mike, Mike and Jason...from the bottom of my heart, thank you for these songs...they mean more to me than you could know.

Dead Things

Raccoon Party

Speaking of!  This was my punk band with my friends in high school.  We were called Raccoon Party and we had a blast.  We were all obsessed with bands like Orchid, Saetia, Pg.99 and Welcome the Plague Year and I think it shows...except we weren't talented enough to pull off shit like those bands, but I think we created our own sound, anyways... At one point, we had 6 members, including 2 stand alone vocalists, and we recorded this six track demo.  It's still to this day one of the weirder sounding punk recordings I've ever heard....for some reason we the guitars were recorded clean, and then distortion was added afterwards, including on top of the vocals and drums?  I really don't understand why that happened.  We all recorded vocals, only a couple of us had any words written down, and one song we hadn't even written the music for...we basically just improvised and it ended up working out (it's the long jammy song).  Raccoon Party was my first foray into DIY punk, and somehow we got to play with a bunch of big metal bands like Baroness, Skeleton Witch and KyIesa. I really loved being in this band and I'm still proud of the music we made.

My Youth!

I couldn't find the artwork, but here's a video of us playing at the old Asheville showspace, El Nuevo. I'm the long haired fool playing guitar closest to the camera.

Pray For Death

Holy shit, ya'll.  I just dusted off the old hard drive and I'm diving back into the past a little a bit.  It's been a long time since i listened to Pray For Death, but damn is this shit still good to me.  Crusty lo-fi screamo metal punk from New Orleans (at the time).  My old high school band Raccoon Party was supposed to play a show with these folks at my (at the time) future employment place of Gourmet Perks, Asheville NC with my (at the time) future best friend Jasmine's band Until It's Dead.  For some reason or another the show was cancelled and we were all super bummed, but at least I still have the B. Menace flyer for that notshow....and then Pray For Death broke up and the members formed countless other bands that broke up and formed countless other bands and so on. You know how it goes.  This CD was special to me, though.

All Our Heroes Have Been Killed By White Men

Godless

SIN DIOS was a seethingly political band, first and foremost. They formed the same summer I did, the summer of 1988, in Madrid, Spain (I was formed in Raleigh, NC).  Their anarchist ideologies were worn blatantly on their sleeves, and their songs were vessels for the feelings exploding out of their hearts and minds.  I believe this file is the first two records, Ruido Anticapitalista and Alerta Antifascista, from '91 and '93 respectively.  Few bands I've heard in my time have reached such politically intense heights as Sin Dios do...Crudos and Antischism are a couple others that come to mind....but you probably already love those bands as much as I do.  Sin Dios also let their influences flow through their songwriting...so many different points of reference could be made, but just listen and let them take you through their supercharged blend of punk, hardcore, ska, metal, folk and more (emphasis is definitely on the first 3).  This was an important band, and one of those special bands that backed up their hardcore anarchist messages with excellent hardcore music.

I Want To Go To Madrid

STRESS

Huge thanks to Robert of Terminal Escape and Aesop of Cosmic Hearse for sharing this record with me.  Jesus, I've listened to it so many times, it's one of my favorite records to listen to cookin the line at work, and some person always comes up to the counter and asks what's playing....This is STRESS!  Brazil's "first(?)" heavy metal band.  Their self-titled debut came out in 1982 and it is a raucous, loose, all over the place, fun as all hell, old school heavy metal record.  Their sound is wild, maybe a little too wild, maybe a little drunken even?  Regardless of how fucked up they were when they made these recordings, you can tell they put their all into it, and it is a powerful experience on the other end.  Don't think SLAYER, think SABBATH, BLUE CHEER, URIAH HEEP and all the heavy bands that take you to slightly psychedelic heights, but with an aggressive, almost speed-metal approach.  I REALLY LOVE THIS ALBUM and if you like metal at all, I don't know why you wouldn't as well.

Brazil, 1982

Served In Silence

Permaculture is a newer recording project from Ryan (Social Circkle), and Jen (Nuclear Family).  The music on this ep, Swallow What You're Given, harkens back to the starkness of early UK anarcho punk, but you realize within the first 10 seconds of this record that this band is no nostalgia trip and they really know what the hell they're doing.  The lyrics are visioned, emotional, commanding, passionate and delivered with zero irony.  The socio-political messages creep into you and you find yourself believing.  The instruments are all played by Ryan and his arrangements are masterful in their complexity and beauty.  These 4 songs are beyond impressive, and I hope they find themselves firmly lodged in the canons of punk rock for decades to come.  Jen and Ryan, please make more Permaculture.

GROW

God I Smell Magnificent

At this point, I'd like to apologize for having 10 posts already and failing you.  I have failed you because it took me this long to upload this album.  You've been clicking and listening and these songs haven't been coming out of your speakers.  I'm so sorry.  Give Into Sounds Maniacal, Govern Interior Sickly Mindstates, Grow Illegal Substances Man.  Do I have to spell it out for you?  Gee Eye Ess Em. It doesn't get much better than this.  This their first record, Detestation.

BYE BYE

Vaarallinen

Alright, I love Finnish punk!  Here we have Vaarallinen, a Finnish-named band who sing Finnish lyrics, and who live in....Singapore?  Okay...any concerns I might have immediately vanish when the first song kicks in.  This demo is abusively aggressive, 10 tracks of hardcore, thrashing punk that never slip below the "totally-in-your-face" level of intensity.  The vocals are drenched in reverb, melding in with the music and the result is a pretty oppressive assault on your poor ears.  I like this.

Lion City Punx!

AKKA

I really hate when I fall in love with a newer band, only to find they've just recently broken up.  Sighhh..AKKA was an all-female crusty hardcore band from Shikoku Island, Japan.  I guess they were mainly active during the 2000s? Their particular style of punk on their sole 7", 5 Songs, is just so unreservedly brutal and dark...the song structures are heavy, melodic, and are pushed as hard as they can be pushed and the desperation in the music and vocals is authentic and powerful.  Thanks AKKA, I know I'll be listening to this record many many times over.

5 SONGS

Peter Stubb

Peter Stubb (not his actual name) is a man of many demons and many talents.  His lo-fi songs are so many different things all at once, and he's been writing them for at least 20 years now, home-dubbing cassette tapes and selling them in person or through the mail for the change in your pocket.  This is one of his more well-known tapes, Blueberry Masturbator, and the title alone should warn you that this isn't exactly a politically correct collection of songs.  Like I said, the man has a lot going on in his head, and it's great for us listeners that his outlet is writing weird, fucked up, heartwrenching, absolutely beautiful (and at times, horrifically disturbing) songs.  I have the inclination to say that this music isn't for everyone, but my heart is telling me that there is something so inherently human about Peter Stubb's music that everyone should listen to it and heed the perspective of this self-confessed madman...maybe he can remind us of the parts of ourselves that are constantly suffering, conflicted simply by the state of being stuck on this strange, fucked up plane.  Thanks to Greg/Remote Outposts for this album.

GET OFF

Acceptance

Die Kreuzen are the undisputed kings of Wisconsin hardcore, but have you given Mecht Mensch a listen?  This ep, Acceptance, gives DK's Cows and Beer a real run for its money if you ask me.  Five tracks of some truly vicious Midwestern punk, with demented vocals and that contorted, sickly, post-Black Flag riffin style I've come to love from that flatter, more dairy-ful region of the country. You probably won't be able to find this record anywhere, and the only ones I've seen around sell for STUPID prices, so enjoy this digital version.  Grind it.

GET SOME UGLY

Neon Christ!

For the first US band on this site, you get a real winner.  If you were to pick a year and a place for excellent US hardcore, '83 in Atlanta, Georgia probably wouldn't come to mind.  but here we find ourselves...Atlanta's Neon Christ put out a handful of songs during their original 3 year length of existence and I'll be damned if they aren't some of the best hardcore songs ever written.  Wicked fast and urgent songwriting gets occasionally sidetracked by weird breaks, and hazy moments of introspection...but WAIT!!!  the match of furious hardcore and melodic experimentation makes their stuff unique as hell and gives a timeless feel.  I always listen to this 7" all the way through, it just works as a complete thing to my ears.  This is the first record, the Parental Suppression 7" and you simply need to know it.

YOOF!

scemo is Italian for idiot.

I love Peggio Punx!  they rip so hard, yet sound so crappy!  Hailing from Alessandria, Italy, they were around from 1981 til the early 90's, and these two 7"s here are probably their best records.  The vocals are so inherently Italian...pissed, rapid-fire, wild, wreckless..all at once.  the guitar is trebley and thin as hell, like Ray from the Dead Kennedys, the bass is bouncy and deep and doesn't always play the "right" notes, and the drums, oh the drums...actually I'm not even sure they're drums...could be just a pile of broken metal and wood and cardboard.  Whatever the hell the drummer is playing, he plays the crap out of it and it sounds insane and cool as hell.  This zip is the first two 7"s Disastro Sonoro and La citta e quieta...ombre parlano, from '82 and '83, respectively.  Get ye with it!

No Scemo

one two three four oi!

This is one of the most stupidly fun records I've ever heard.  The Discocks are/were an oi/pogo punk band from Japan during the 90's and it seems their sole motive in making music is to make you jump up and down whilst drinking heavily, sniffin glue, and making other generally poor life decisions.  Discocks will let you know that you are PUNK and that's all you need to be!  We are proud punks!

Join Us!

Gauze - Fuckheads

The incredible GAUZE of Tokyo, Japan!  They've been one of the best punk bands in the world since 1981 and have only gotten better during the last 3 decades, and I'm pretty sure they've done it with the same 4 members the whole time.  This is their first album, from 1984.

GO! GO! GO! 

                             

Narcosis - Primera Dosis

Narcosis was a punk band from Lima, Peru in the unlikely years of 1984-86.  Even more unlikely is how unique and fresh these songs still sound almost 30 years later..I was immediately hooked the first time I heard their song "Excusas" on the No Morir Si! compilation and went on a frantic search to find more stuff.  The CD version of this record, Primera Dosis, is what I found.  It rules.  The music is too rough and tumble to be pop punk, but the songs are midtempo and catchy as all hell.  The real kicker is in the vocals, though..Luis' voice is equally gravelly and soulful, and it will penetrate your skull, make a nice comfy nappin' spot, then refuse to leave for several days.  Apparently they still play every once in a blue moon?

Seguir su destino

the spirit continues...

I'm gonna give this music blog thing a shot.  It seems simple enough: I like music, I put it here, you listen to the music, and either you like it, too, or you don't.  Worst case, you've listened to something new.  Best case?  I'm not sure....

first up, my favorite record from Italy!  NEGAZIONE's "Lo Spirito Continua" from 1986!  This album is hardcore punk rock, fully realized.  10 tracks of aggressive, adventurous, all over the place hardcore and not a damn second of filler, not one uninspired guitar lick, featuring a vocalist that sounds like he's about to lose his freaking head.  There is a reason I chose this one to put up first...

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