Satanic Threat - In To Hell (2008)

We all have a love for the head banging fury that masters like Nunslaughter and the mighty Midnight obviously rule at. Now take members of both those mentioned acts and let them loose on some 80's hardcore records and you have this EP by Satanic Threat. Solid, US, 80's hardcore. Think Uniform Choice, Minor Threat, SSD and Youth of Today if they wrote songs about hating Christ and blaspheming. Solid, evil stuff.

Satanic Threat - In To Hell

Claw Hammer - Q:Are We Not Men? A:We Are Not Devo (1991)

We all should like Devo. Its a basic fact. In California, there was a noise rock band called Claw Hammer who really did love Devo.

These guys love.......

...these guys. Lots.

 They loved them so much they recorded Devo's 1978 debut album Are We Not Men? We Are Devo in its entirety, in track order and released it under the title Q: Are We Not men? A: We Are Not Devo in 1991.
In a very similar vein to Pussy Galore and the Exile On Main Street cassette back in '86, what you get is those well known new wave jams being smashed through by some noisy punk rock kids who would go onto be Wayne Kramer's backing band.

Claw Hammer - Q:Are We Not Men? A:We Are Not Devo

Maybe I could wax on about this some more but its very simple. You like Devo, you like noise rock and punk, you will like this.

Busta Rhymes - When Disaster Strikes..... (1997)

So while I was left reeling by the announcement that Busta Rhymes wouldn't be playing Shonuff in the upcoming remake of Berry Gordy's, 1985, cinematic milestone The Last Dragon ( the part is taken by Samuel L Jackson! Why? Of all people?), I got listening to his albums for the first time in years as a way to console myself over this blow. Busta always had a different angle to most of the other turkeys in the mainstream rap game. Up until the early 2000's you could always rely on him for something odd and slightly left of the game. The album below, When Disaster Strikes.... and its follow up Extinction Level Event were the soundtrack to a full year of my misspent college adventures when I was younger. The version below is the repress that removes the slightly lumpen Survival Hungry track and replaces it with the Knightrider sampling, floor filler Fire It Up. In turn, a reworking of the album track Turn It Up.

Busta Rhymes - When Disaster Strikes.....

Cult Ritual - S/T LP (2009)

 

Despite the meagre number of followers on here, I can pretty much garuantee that most of you have a pretty good knowledge of music and know something good when you hear it. Of those I pesonally know, sorry, I can pretty much wager that you are going to like this post.
I missed this album first time round, not suprising really, part of the Youth Attack Records stable, limited vinyl release, talked up across the boards and copies fetching upto 200 sheets on Ebay ( Christ!). Despite all this, its done the rounds online and across the blog networks and reached quite a few more people than anyone (including the band) probably intended.
To cut a long story short, Cult Ritual have pretty much found the perfect middle ground between AmRep noise rock, Sub Pop whistle and screech and good old hardcore punk and fashioned an immensly noisy and enthralling album that doesn't hold back in its screaming feedback and broken glass guitar sound while never compromising dynamics or forward thinking. Essental doesn't really do this justice but its far more venomous and angry than a million identikit chugging hardcore bands and posseses more energy and chaos than any number of so called punk rock clones. Cult Ritual are a pretty good definition of genuine hardcore thinking.

Cult Ritual - S/T LP

Dial - S/T EP (2010)

Noise rock.  As much as I hate genre classification and pigeon holing ( despite my some what convoluted way of describing some of the bands featured on this blog), the term noise rock does a wonderful job I think, of describing to people aware of this awesome area of music just what to expect.

New Zealand's Dial are what I would call noise rock. Big, dirty, distorted guitar noise, wild screaming and huge pounding drums. I didn't realise its all just one guitar making this racket. This is a demo they put out themselves ( or they didn't) and the quality control board at Robotic Empire decided it was more than worth banging out on a CD. So go there to buy an actual copy, if I had Paypal myself I would.

Dial - S/T EP

Just listen to this song below while it downloads. You won't regret it.

Graham Central Station - Mirror (1976)

Larry Graham has got a fair few decent things going for him. He was a key member of Sly & The Family Stone, he is often credited with pioneering the slap technique applied to electric bass and he also worked with Betty Davis, Tower of Power's horn section and The Pointer Sisters. Amongst all this, he found time to form Graham Central Station back in 1973 with various musicians picked out of Jefferson Airplane, Santana and Hot Tuna. Mirror show cases this collectives combined playing skills on many levels. Some of the tightest and most energetic playing you are likely to hear.

Graham Central Station - Mirror

FUCK!!!! Some tight ass playing right here!

Onyx - Bacdafucup (1993) & All We Got Iz Us (1995)

The angry, foul mouthed, Biohazard collaborating, Spike Lee acting group known as Onyx made a pretty big impression back in the 90's. Here are the first two albums they did, Bacdafucup and All We Got Iz Us both classics zipped up together.

Onyx - Bacdafucup/All We Got Iz Us

 

Sigh - Ghastly Funeral Theatre (1997)

Need to get back on the blog trail. A catalogue of life fails and problems have persisted recently. The bonus is I have managed to stock pile some good stuff for future posting.
The first will be this '97 offering from Japan's Sigh, the avant garde black metal group that have been confusing and alienating thicky metallers for over a decade. From the early black/thrash output on  Deathlike Silence ( you know ran that don't you?) right up to today's genre spanning amalgamation, they have always seemed to follow what ever the hell they fancied doing. I do remember the rumour that 2005's Gallows Gallery album used sonic warfare equipment perfected by the Japanese military in WWII to harm the listener. Sadly that was just a daft rumour to disguise the crap production job.
Ghastly Funeral Theatre marked a definitive change in the bands evolution. The Celtic Frost like guitar worship is still here but tempered and with an equal amount of keyboard and piano tinkling. Huge orchestral swathes of them open and close the album while the track Imiuta separates the more metal elements with a further piano interlude. Throw in a ton of folk and odd, almost classic rock moments and you have Ghastly Funeral Theatre. You might be thinking you have heard keyboard driven black metal far to much before and in all fairness I wrote this off first time around. I remember the album Hail Horror Hail in the same year, more for its striking cover art, receiving quite a bit of press. This EP and that album are where Sigh began to get interesting for me.

Sigh - Ghastly Funeral Theatre

80 Blocks From Tiffany's (1979)

Too good not to share. Really interesting documentary about street gangs in the 80's. Primarily around the Bronx area. Everyone knows gangs are cool. Especially with names like Nomads and Savage Skulls. Back in the days when everyone wore denim and leather. The Warriors got nothing on these dudes........

Altered Beast - Toshio Kai - OST (1988)

How many of us got this free with the original UK Megadrive bundle? Yep, and how many actually completed this? Thought as much. You took the easier option of Sonic or Golden Axe didn't you? Well, I really don't blame you. Altered Beast was one of those games that people do remember. But its usually for everything other than the game play. It was a combination of the frustrating lack of extra credits, the wacky attack patterns, the assumption that you must be able to mind read the enemies movements and the fact if you missed all 3 blue power up balls you where fucked when it came to the boss. Think about it!

Despite all those bad points, Altered Beast was still pretty bitchin'. Come on, you could change into a beast that flew around the screen and fired lightning! That was pretty sweet. Plus you can't ignore the intended-ominous-but-shitty-soundboard-issues-caused-it-to-be-distorted legend "Wise fwom youw gwave".
I always remember the soundtrack. Toshio Kai, the man responsible for the Pac-Man theme, managed to compose a pretty memorable score, in fact its my most solid memory of this classic. So here we go, Toshio Kai's soundtrack to Sega's gateway classic Altered Beast.............

 

Toshio Kai - Altered Beast OST

The Jesus Lizard - Peel Sessions (1991/92)

Its The Jesus Lizard. I shouldn't have to say anymore really. This is a mix of two separate sessions they did for John Peel (god rest his soul) back in 1991/92. A nice bass heavy mix. They don't have the Albini clarity to them but I love how you can hear Sims bass thundering away behind Denison's guitar screeching. Don't think these ever got officially released other than being passed around the Internet. The Peel sessions where good.

The Jesus Lizard - Peel Sessions

Busey week.

Yes, the living legend himself, Gary Busey. This week involves re watching most of the Busey in my collection and reacquainting myself with his deranged genius. In the firing line are.......

Act Of Piracy

Bulletproof

Plato's Run

Hider In The House

Olivers favourite......

Christopher Walken moments :

At Close Range - Awesome, true life story of a small time crime boss. Sean and Chris Penn are both pretty good in this but its Walken who towers above everything.


King Of New York - Great film, great cast. Walken wins with his dancing, sudden bursts of controlled violence and his "love of money".


Suicidal Tendencies albums : 

Classic skate/thrash/crossover/punk/metal from opposite ends of the ST discography. Both albums in one link

Suicidal Tendencies - Join The Army / The Art Of...

Favourite film snack : 

Jonnys Bacon Tasties.....

(Wipes the floor with Frazzles every time.)

This is what tonight is all about I reckon. These 3 things ( 5 actually). Be as cool as me. But don't like them as much as me.

The Bellrays - Meet The Bellrays ( 2002 )

Final post for this weekend. The super greasy, sleazy and sexy tones of LA's The Bellrays.
This came out at a time when there was a huge interest in that garage rock sound. The White Stripes and The Hives where in the big leagues and lots of labels where looking for bands to latch onto that success, or who at least had "the" before there name. The record shop I used to work at stocked this album. My friend Jason was big time into this Detroit sounding garage rock revival and ordered in lots of albums that had a buzz about them. One of those was "Meet The Bellrays". Of course once the drums-falling-down-a-flight-of-stairs and feedback intro crashed out of the shops speakers we got busted by management and told to turn it off. So we kept listening to it when we could and we realised that they where a million miles away from those other bands. The Bellrays had balls. Big, angry, loud balls that listened to The Stooges, MC5 and old soul and Motown. They had this huge voiced black woman called Lisa Kekaula ( who according to Jason was terrifying when he saw them live ) who sounds like she is channeling Tina Turner and Iggy at the same time.
Better than most bands that mine this vein of music. The Bellrays kick ass.

The Bellrays - Meet The Bellrays

Didn't Your Parents Give You A Name?

This is the inspiration.....



Superb song and lyrics from a superb album.