Hall & Oates - Private Eyes (1981)

Its been a while since I last posted on here, I've been busy. End of. We all know the recent events that are going to impact the world of blogging, so lets just enjoy what we do for the time being.

Today's post is the awesome 1981 album by the golden touch, liquid smooth vocal rapists Daryl Hall & John Oates, otherwise known as Hall & Oates.
Private Eyes features their best selection of songs in my opinion. Every track is sure fire gold, assimilating R&B, soul, jazz and rock into simple, radio friendly bursts of pop. "Head Above Water" is the best unused pump-up/montage track as well.

Hall & Oates - Private Eyes

In other news I have recently took up posting over at the might Illogical Contraption. If you dig death metal, conspiracy theories, awesome stuff and futuristic shit then its well worth a read.

Sho'nuff Grooves Vol.2

I recently put together another mixtape for the night me and my good friend Macky are responsible for. Its basically us playing all the stuff we like while drinking cocktails and showing a whole host of awesome cinematic treats on a big screen. People get drunk, play air bass and dance in front of images of women being hacked up and dudes being dudes. Its pretty fun.

Sho'nuff Grooves Vol.2

The mix features a pretty good cross section of everything we touch upon, Kiss, Oingo Boingo, The Time, Joe Tex, Stevie Wonder, NWA and loads more. There is also a Sho'nuff Grooves Vol.1 available here.

Siege - Drop Dead (1984)

Another RIP post. Sad news when it reached me. Kevin Mahony passed on recently. Kevin, along with his band mates in Siege basically defined the parameters and direction of hardcore punk back in the 80's.

If it wasn't for Kevin and Siege I wouldn't be doing what I do now. Here is the only release they ever managed. Drop Dead compromises the 6 track demo recorded back in '84 and 3 more tracks that came to light on Pushead's Cleanse The Bacteria compilation in 1985.
Basically the foundations of any band, musically and lyrically, that parades under the banner of fastcore/grindcore/power violence/hardcore whether your aware of it or not.

Siege - Drop Dead

Some pretty awesome, public TV footage as well.

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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!

Smoke And Smoke - Love Suffers Long (2004)

You like Godheadsilo and Enemymine? You like The Murder City Devils? Now, a combination of those worlds would be a pretty good thing to listen to wouldn't it? Well your in luck, such a thing does exist. Created by these three salty dudes below, the awesome, bass heavy, fuzzed out, misanthropy rife rock out that goes by the name Smoke And Smoke and an album called "Love Suffers Long".

Combining the unstoppable rhythm section of Mike Kunka and Dan Haugh and the acidic croon of Spencer Moody, Smoke And Smoke differs from Godheadsilo/Enemymine/Dead Low Tide in its stripped down structures and more to the point force. The bass is monstrous on here. Kunka always knew a thing or two about creating a wall of sound with one instrument but the levels of distortion and range of sounds he whips up from one fretboard and some pedals is pretty mind boggling. You don't really hear it as a bass, more as this wall of distortion/synth devastation washing over everything.
The vocal side is some of Spencer Moody's best work I do believe, far more unhinged than his work in The Murder City Devils. His lyrics seem to switch from finger pointing aggro to stream of consciousness absurdity and nihilistic abandon from line to line.
Now, that's either going to sound like the biggest load of rubbish or the best thing ever, but as they claim on here.... " You're gravely mistaken if you think for a second that Smoke and Smoke give a fuck-fuck-fuck!" Awesome band.

Smoke And Smoke - Love Suffers Long

Funkadelic - Maggot Brain (1971)

No explaining necessary. You should listen to this album. Look at those guys above! They know.

Funkadelic - Maggot Brain

Breach - It's Me God (1997)

Solid gold, bulletproof classic. The dark, Swedish hardcore machine known as Breach have never really set a foot wrong. This album is my favourite and one of my biggest influences. I couldn't ever really describe how good this is, just get it listened to.

Breach - It's Me God

They ended the final show by smashing up all the instruments and then the guitarist did this little interview......

Gone - Lets Get Gone Real Gone For A Change (1986)

From the dope addled mind of Black Flag and SST head honcho, Greg Ginn, came Gone back in '86. A vehicle for his complete wig out, free-jazz obsessed, hippy rock dreams. This is early 70's stadium jams transposed to 1980's van tours and shitty basements. Its awesome. I have always been a fan of Flag's "The Process Of Weeding Out" and after watching the Reality 86'd documentary I was reminded of how much fun this record is. So I dug it out, spun it in the car to work a few times this week and am sharing it here now. Bonus note, until recently I had no idea it was the almighty rhythm section of Andrew Weiss and Sim Cain. YES!

Gone - Lets Get Gone Real Gone For A Change

This is not punk rock!

Unsane - The Peel Sessions (1994)

The awesome, pummeling sound of Unsane is one that has been much copied but never bettered. If you don't know who Unsane are then you really should not be reading this blog. Along with The Kittens album I posted a while back, I don't trust anyone who doesn't like either. I remember there being a point when I was a kid, my friend had a compilation he got from somewhere. On it where a selection of bands that would dictate our musical paths. My three friends followed the mundane sounds of The Wildhearts and Honeycrack while I was introduced to Unsane with the the song Scrape. Never looked back since.
This is a compilation of two separate sessions they recorded for John Peel ( a total of three where recorded over the years but the third has never been made available) back in May and November 1991. The live medley and "Bath" feature original drummer Charlie Ondras as well. Download this and bathe yourself in that crushing tone.

Unsane - Peel Sessions

* Listen out for the string drop as Chris Spencer tunes down for Exterminator on the live medley.

Albums that influenced Oliver #3 : Cryptopsy - None So Vile (1996)

Hands down, the finest example of technical, brutal death metal going. Not only was it unbelievably fast but so precise with its song writing. I was sat in my friend Solon's house as was the custom at least 5 nights a week, when he put this on. Straight away, that sample from Exorcist III and then the berserk opening blast of Crown Of Horns ( which is still one of the best intros on any death metal album) smashed out of the speakers with Lord Worm's howl over the top.
That is reason enough in my mind, but then the album continues as it starts. More blasting, more crazy riffs, tons more guttural rumbling and high pitched screaming and then the bass. That is what still stays with me on this album, and the next two they followed this up with, the bass work of Eric Langlois. That is a huge influence on my own style and as far as finger style playing in extreme music goes, no one beats Langlois. Of course there is the piano and bass lead into Phobophile that everyone remembers and there is no denying the power when that blast rips in but Langlois brings quite a few of his own tricks to the table. Subtle little string pops and twangs. Tiny little dynamic shifts that benefit the album fully. This was the first album he played on and you can see the huge difference his style brought to the table. Listen to Blasphemy Made Flesh then this. No contest. They did follow this up with Whisper Supremacy and ...And Then You'll Beg which are both pretty solid albums and even more technical. They lost Lord Worm, had a few other vocalists, Lord Worm returned then left again, they recruited new members, changed direction as bit ( pretty shonkily if you asked me, they invented this style) and continue to tour and record. I sorta lost interest after ...And Then You'll Beg. I still blast this out all the time tho. The ultimate in technical death metal without sacrificing brutality and speed for technique. Something a lot of so called tech bands could do with taking note these days.

Cryptopsy - None So Vile

Here they are in there rehearsal space in 1996.............

Sam & Dave - Hold On, I'm Comin (1966)

Gritty, classic soul/R&B masterpiece. Allegedly the title track was written after being rushed to finish up having a whizz, song writer David Porter responded with "Hold on, I'm comin". One of the finest vocal double acts ever. Without Sam & Dave we wouldn't have no Blues Brothers. And where would we be then?

Sam & Dave - Hold On, I'm Comin

Kittens - Bazooka And The Hustler (1997)

 
You only have to look around the Internet to find out how much love and respect there is for this band. For this noisy, angular bunch of Canadian kids from an isolated town. It sits comfortably between Am-Rep noise and Fugazi/DC sleight of hand while belonging to neither. They released 10 albums between 1992 - 98. After they split they went onto be involved with KENmode, Hide Your Daughters and Projektor. Cursed covered them on the Blackout At Sunrise 7". That should be a good enough recommendation for you. I do not trust anyone who doesn't like this album.

Kittens - Bazooka And The Hustler

I was going to upload this myself but computer problems and the fact that the awesome folk over at [Shiny Grey Monotone] have beaten me to it not once, but twice in the past. This is there link. Show em some love while your at it as well.

Albums that influenced Oliver #2 : Bloodlet - Entheogen/The Seraphim Fall (1996/98)

It was a hard choice to make as I have always, ALWAYS, insisted on The Seraphim Fall as the most important Bloodlet album to myself. But then after several months reacquainting my ears with Entheogen I realised that they both had pretty important reasons for being on here and finally after wussing out I decided to post both.

Bloodlet became known to me through those Victory Records sampler CD's, number 3 to be exact ( same place I discovered Integrity, Snapcase, Earth Crisis and Deadguy ). It was "Dogman With Horns" of Seraphim... that I first heard. I didn't understand it at all. The production was so lo-fi and murky, the vocals didn't seem to suit the music, it had this weird allover the place groove that I just couldn't get my head around. It didn't make much of an impression on me. Then on a trip to Vinyl Exchange in Manchester I picked up the album they did prior, Entheogen, out of interest wondering if it was going to be any different. That's when it clicked.

Bloodlet - Entheogen

I loved everything about this album. The vocals had this nasty, twisted atmosphere to them that at first seemed odd but perfectly suited the way these songs lumbered out the speakers. Still heavily indebted to the whole metal/hardcore chug that Victory was renowned for in those days (before it went) but spiced up with twisted pinch notes and odd timings and a whole load of dissonance. But the single most important thing about this record for me was the fretless bass playing of Art Legere. That is what sealed it in the hall of fame for me. The bass just seemed to snake under the chugging and harmonies, the intro to "Eucharist" still gets me these days.
It was about a year later that I managed to get hold of The Seraphim Fall. After listening to the track of the sampler on repeat for what seemed like weeks I thought I was ready to face this album. Having spent so long with Entheogen I felt I had a good enough understanding of Bloodlet to give it a second chance.

Bloodlet - The Seraphim Fall

It was the production that hit me at first, it was so murky and lo-fi. Almost sounding like it had never been mastered properly. Being the geeky and stubborn minded fan I was, I stuck with it for weeks before one morning when due to a delayed train I had time to listen from start to finish with no interruptions.
All of a sudden the production made sense. It snared you in with the quietly mixed acoustic parts before the almost, subliminal heaviness of the guitars came crashing down and all the while that translucent bass tone was scaling up and down the fretboard like crazy. All the odd chords, strange lyrics, dissonance and weird interludes just made it so much more important to me than anything else I was listening to at the time. I knew no one who was into this. It was my find. I absorbed as much as I could from that album. Hunted for any more information on Bloodlet that I could find. I wanted to know everything about it. Still a very under rated album and certainly one the band never managed to better in my opinion. There are links to both above. Two very important and influential albums to me.

 ( These where the fashions of the time. Blond dreads and shelltoes.)

Albums that influenced Oliver #1 : Mr Bungle - S/T (1991)

The 15 albums post got me thinking. I can't possibly settle with those 15. There are so many albums that have influenced me through life that it would be pretty pointless trying to list them. So taking a leaf from the old blog and my friend Paul's series of similar posts over at Because I Said So, I have decided to revive the infamous "Albums that influenced Oliver" series like Jason Voorhess in Friday 13th Part IV when he gets that huge spike through his chest and gets struck by lightning.
I was going to waffle lyrical about how awesome and influential this album was to my impressionable young ears. If you can be bothered hunting out the old  piece of shit blog then you can read about it all there. Suffice to say there was a time when I could nearly play all the bass on this album track by track, back to back ( sadly I no longer have the discipline or stamina to do that these days). Other than that I can't really say anything about this album other than it is truly one of those lifetime albums that stays with you. It has stayed with me.

Mr Bungle - Mr Bungle

This is going to be a continuing series. More than likely not very regular, just dropped among my other posts like dirt out of a trouser leg.

James Brown - Revolution Of The Mind : Live At The Apollo Vol.3 (1972)

The Hardest Working Man In Showbiz! Mr Dynamite! Mr Please Please Please Please Her! Minister Of The New New Super Heavy Funk! Soul Brother Number One, are just a few of the names he goes by.

James Brown - Revolution Of The Mind : Live At The Apollo Vol.3

One of the best live albums ever! Fact! But don't just take it from me.....

Hard To Swallow - Protected By The Ejaculation Of Serpents (1998)

Long gone but well missed by folk. Hard To Swallow where responsible for so much influence in UKHC. But only to people who knew about them. I came across this back in 1999 when buying some stuff from the Household Name distro. Got this album and the t-shirt because I heard it was some guys from Iron Monkey. Of course it sounded nothing like Iron Monkey and took me a few weeks of tentative listening before it clicked and I realised how awesome this band was. I listened non stop for months. Absorbing all the ideas and every twist and turn. As you do when young and when you discover something that grabs your interest.
Yes, it is hardcore. Its hardcore that veers towards power violence bug time. But never quite becomes it. HTS was this crazy, mangled beast of twisted riffs, dual screaming and some immense, inventive drumming. 
Basically this album became my constant companion on journeys to work and college and years later I ended up in a band with one of them.
Seriously, I urge anyone with a passing interest in hardcore, grind, power violence whatever to give this album a listen. It comprises of all the various 7" splits and comp tracks they put out as well as 11 new tracks written for this release. 25 tracks in total including some hidden live stuff.

Hard To Swallow - Protected By The Ejaculation Of Serpents

Once again its a mighty list of bands that have spawned from the remnants of this band. I really can't list them all so instead head over to HTS vocalist Bloody Kev's blog Keep It In The Family! He has pretty much everything he has ever done available there as well as links to the HTS family tree.

In Cold Blood - Hell On Earth (1997)

We ain't had any Clevo appreciation yet on the blog. So instead of posting my favourite Integrity albums ( which I more than likely will at some point) like everyone else does I thought it more interesting to leave you this one. Integrity off shoot, In Cold Blood.
I came across this originally on a Victory Records comp in a record store in Orange County, CA about 10/11 years ago. They had the song "Lost In Doubt", which kicks in after an acoustic refrain with a shredding guitar solo before the bellowing and doom laden guitars start crushing. It made quite an impression on me. I heard this before I was aware of Integrity ( who where also on that comp) or any of the Clevo sound.
You can read all about the history of this band at other places on the Internet so I won't bother, suffice to say if you dig Integrity then you will like this. Its all part of the same sound really. Maybe ICB have a more old school approach to hardcore than Integrity did but still with plenty of lead heavy, metallic muscle to back it all up.

In Cold Blood - Hell On Earth

Its all over with inside of 25 minutes. Plenty of solos and fierce breakdowns that put to shame most stuff these days and it ends with a nuclear explosion. Holy Terror lives.

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

The National Acrobat - For All Practical Purposes Is Dead (2000)

Any in the know hardcore kid nowadays could easily reel of love for Coliseum. Easily. Maybe some would mention Black Cross, Lords, Breather Resist (very soon) and Christiansen.  But not many could recall or claim to have heard of the very band that spawned all these musicians and laid the foundations for the rulers of the current Louisville, Kentucky indie scene. Criminally under appreciated by most hardcore kids during there far to short life span and still passing under the radar of most folk nowadays. Here we have a very important album for me, For All Practical Purposes Is Dead by The National Acrobat.

I remember hearing the name mentioned in a few magazines years and years ago when there second Ep, Can't Stop Caspar Adams was released. I really liked the description and stuff I was hearing about this band but could not for the life of me get hold of a copy. Obviously this was before the Internet was as wide spread as it is nowadays. None of the mail order distro's stocked it so I consigned myself to putting it on the list of bands I would never get to hear ( that was a mighty big list back then). Then browsing through Manchester's Vinyl Exchange one day a year or so later and to my barely contained surprise this Ep popped up for 6 sheets. That is what started my love for The National Acrobat.

I could waffle on for ages about the intricacy of the guitar work and forward thinking song structures. How its a nearly perfect fusion of DC math rock, snotty mid west punk and burly east coast muscle. How vocalist Caspar Adams voice draws a line across your opinion or even how cohesive while still pulling in every direction each track is. It would be doing a great disservice to them. You just need to hear it.

The National Acrobat - For Practical Purposes Is Dead

Besides the Ep's they released a couple of 7"'s and appeared on a few comps. Initial Records did put out a complete discography some years ago that as far as I know is still available. Its worth the tracking down.

Amplifier Worship

From the recent recording sessions for my band, The Ergon Carousel's album. Pretty excited to get this finished. Feel a lot more pride and accomplishment with this than nearly all my other recording ventures. Mixing coming up then sending it off for mastering. Available from the ace folk at Holy Roar Records later on this year.