I was going through my ipod, and thought I’d share this. It’s Nuzzle’s demo tape. Nuzzle’s “Anchors Astreigh” 7” is the first record I posted on my music blog! And this demo contains a couple songs from that 7” (it’s very cool to hear these other versions). This tape was transferred to mp3 last year by Ryan (from Honeywell, Los Cincos, Volume 11). He sent it to me, and noted that after sending it to Nuzzle’s singer, he responded with “this is the first demo we made when I switched to vocals, barring that first track of course.”

I think this tape and the Anchors Astreigh 7” are their best material. I’m not so into their other records (with other vocals, and a more persistently laid-back sound). This came out around 1993 – and they were from Rosemead, California. If you’re into slightly melodic and also frenzied and harsh lo-fi hardcore, then you’ll like this!. You can definitely hear them channeling Indian Summer at times, with the powerful, energetic parts filled with dual-screams. And also Reach Out during the harsher moments? And also Unwound (Fake Train era)..??

Download it here.

When I was in college I’d spend a few hours each Saturday working for the Santa Barbara Food Not Bombs. A bunch of us would meet up at a friend’s house, then we’d designate tasks – like going to the farmer’s market to ask farmers to donate veggies and stuff, food prep, cooking, etc – and spend a couple hours preparing a bunch of grub. I wasn’t an experienced cook, and I learned a lot during those sessions by staring at a mish-mash of different foods and trying to decide how exactly to cook them together to make a decent meal. It was also fun to hang out with friends, with a goal. Once the food was all prepared, we’d bring it downtown and then set up in a grassy area next to the public library. Many homeless and needy folks would stop by and eat. We weren’t their only resource, of course, and I doubt anyone would have starved to death without the one meal per week that we provided. But it was still nice to group together like that, with zero budget, and help out as we could.

It was crazy to think how all that work went into just one meal, and that other organizations were in the habit of providing homeless and needy people with three meals per day.

I don’t have any experience with other city’s Food Not Bombs programs. But I can imagine that some provided more than just one meal a week, and in places that were more desperate for assistance than Santa Barbara. So, it’s no surprise that some people put out benefit records in order to expand their resources.

Here are two Food Not Bombs Benefit compilations. One’s from 1994, on Inchworm Records, and the other’s from 1996/7, on Anima Records. Both feature really similar styles of hardcore. They are international in scope, with both male and female-fronted bands, and the styles range from emo-ish, to powerviolence, to metal, and such. Both are great comps, and they do a good job of covering these great times for hardcore punk.

Most recent one first:

Line-up:

Anomie Palatka Kathode Inso Grey Holocron Sixpence Swallowing Shit Constatine Sankathi Drift

Brief thoughts about some stuff:

Many of the bands have multiple songs – I like that!

Three more Palatka songs! They are sooo good.

Holocron does their best Orchid impression here. What’s that? This is a couple years before Orchid? Oh, my mistake.

Swallowing Shit destroy it as usual.

Inso Grey, nice female-fronted hardcore.

Constatine Sankathi is basically my favorite hardcore band. So… their song is great, like usual.

I don’t think I’ve heard much Drift before… but it’s members of One Eyed God Prophecy, or something? They certainly sound like OEGP (except not as good). And they got “big,” as far as hardcore bands like this go? Interesting.

This record came with a big booklet. It includes many pages of writing about Food Not Bombs, plus one page per band. I’ve scanned it and included it in the zip!

-download Food Not Bombs Benefit Record (1997)–

Next:

Line-up:

Ten Boy Summer Swing Kids Campaign Indian Summer Starkweather Franklin Fingerprint Braille Half Man Premonition Railhed Current

This covers a time when half of the hardcore bands’ singers sounded like the singer of Struggle. I joke! But yeah, like four of the bands on here are like that.

My vinyl is not in as good of condition as the first comp in this post. Plus I don’t have the insert!! CRAP. Doesn’t anyone have it scanned?

Thoughts:

One song each per band. In general, longer songs than the last comp.

Side A – You can’t go wrong with Indian Summer, Campaign, and Swing Kids. You CAN go wrong with Starkweather. Ugh… I’m not into that slow blackish metal stuff. Hey, but at least the song is only… 8 minutes long?? When metal bands play faster, their songs are over quicker; when they’re slower, then they take longer. Science. I dig the Ten Boy Summer track – nice and muddy, a la Allure and Indian Summer.

Side B – I don’t remember this Current song being on their discography. Hmm…

–download A Food Not Bombs Benefit LP (1994)-

Two great comps, for a good cause! Hope you like them. (I know they’ve probably been shared on other sites in the past – but the one from 1997 is harder to find online… plus it has the insert!.) These are both fresh rips. I’m currently battling with my record player – the output wires are acting up. I have to position them just right, or the audio cuts out. It’s lame. I’m going to see if I can get them replaced/fixed. I hope these sound good.

Yes, you probably have this already! But I was informed by a friend that the rips of this record that he was finding to download were ccrraappppyy. So I ripped it anew. Plus I scanned all the inserts.

Their music is frantic and frenzied, with multiple vocalists caught within a barrage of sound. Following the lyrics is crucial to appreciating this record. Like many bands from Gainesville, Florida in the late ’90s, their lyrics/messages focus a lot on being sincere and engaged and not materialistic and on NOT being like those other hardcore punks who are laming out the scene. Seriously! Those other people are ruining everything – so this is how we “take it back.”

It’s just a one-sided lp. No Idea put it out in 1999.

They remind me somewhat of Tem Eyos Ki.

Click here to listen to a track. (uh, sorry, I usually embed a player in the posts, but I had already uploaded this to a different folder… anyway.)

–download Palatka – The End of Irony–

Finally! I found the Summertime compilation online. The Snack Attack blog posted it. Thanks! That took way too many years, internet.

I owned this comp, but (as my comment on the blog I linked to says) I lent it to a friend’s bf, and he never gave it back. He also snagged my Ruhaeda CD and Party of Helicopters CD. Luckily I still had the vinyl for those two! But the Summertime comp was only released on CD. I still have the booklet.

This came out in 2000. If you’re looking for late ’90s / early ’00s screamy hardcore, this is a good comp for it. Personally, I think of it as the successor to the Israfel comp. Some notes: The Numbers Are Neutral and Off Minor songs are off their demos, and are great. (I’m not spotting much Numbers Are Neutral songs on the internet right now, and I have this demo, so I may try to transfer it at some point.) The Assistant‘s song is probably my favorite one off of their CD – the drumming is just freaking insane all the way through. Doesn’t Pg. 99’s singer always sound like he’s underwater? He does to me. Usurp Synapse blows minds, like usual. I like The Cable Car Theory’s track. I like those less-screamy vocals mixed with fast, shredding drums. I’ll try to check out more of their stuff. Did their members come from other bands I should know?

I downloaded (148mb) it from Snack Attack, and saw that it doesn’t have the scan of the booklet. So, I scanned it! And this is basically why I’m making this post – though I do think more people should check out this comp, as it may have slipped by you. Download the insert here (4.5mb PDF). Many of the bands have lyrics/info pages. And there’s some writing from the guy who put it out.

SEO yall:

Ache Five Stars For Failure Joshua Fit For Battle Knives & Greenwater Landed Lycosa Neil Perry Numbers Are Neutral Off Minor Pg. 99 Racebannon The Assistant The Awakened The Cable Car Theory The Keyboard Masters The Scarlet Letter The Vida Blue Thursday To Dream Of Autumn Usurp Synapse

In our quest to compile everything by Three Studies for a Crucifixion, it came to our attention that they have three songs on the 49th Parallel compilation (as listed on discogs.com). But we only had that first song in the unofficial discography zip (includes the demo, and a live set). And the rip of that comp that’s cruising around only has 13 tracks…

Where were those other two songs? On the record, perhaps! So I borrowed the record from a friend. And lo, it turns out that the listing on discogs.com is wrong (it’s also wrong about the Inept track list). The other two Three Studies songs are just bolded text in the lyric sheet. They aren’t actually different songs. So the discog is complete.

And here’s the 49th Parallel compilation!

This is an lp, put out on Old Glory Records in 1997. It was also put out on CD by Disillusion records. 21 tracks. Here are the bands:

Swallowing Shit Still Life Karenza Tho Ko Losi Acrid MK-Ultra The Eliot Rosewater Three Studies for a Crucifixion Submission Hold Inept Gates of Dawn Resin

Many of these bands are from Ohio or Canada. This is a rad compilation. Many play pretty brutal and fast powerviolency stuff. Still Life has three tracks on side a (10 minutes of it, or so). It’s a departure from their usual sound. Here, they channel Kilowatthours (Travels in Constants, vol. 17) and Bugskull, producing three lo-fi, droney tracks. Tho Ko Losi sound like Monster X on their first song.

More songs by Inept can be found here on the Fugitive Equilibrium blog.

–download the 49th Parallel– like 70mb, insert included. It’s a pretty long comp (about 24 minutes each side)

Please tell me if I made any mistakes on this rip. I was sort of tired when cutting it into tracks.

Here is the An American Tragedy compilation 7″.

It features:

Dead Silence Three Studies for a Crucifixion Still Life Watercolour

It was put out by Diffusion Records (Bloomington, Indiana) in 1996.

Dead Silence covers a song by a band called Dissent. I’m guessing it’s originally from the ’80s. It starts with, “Sometimes I get angry, but not in a selfish way.” And sometimes you play pretty catchy ’80s punk rock (which is also not a selfish thing)!

Then Three Studies for a Crucifixion arrives from planet Jupiter, but explodes mid-entry, and this is what we’re left with. And it rules. This song is also on the split 7″ with Harriet the Spy. Except this is a different recording of it. A better one! I recently posted this song on my tumblr. I love it! So then I figured I should post the rest of the record. Which is what I’m doing now. This comp had previously (about 3 years ago), been posted on another music blog. But they didn’t have the balls to keep the links alive. Which maybe means that this record is already common on the hip young music-sharing message boards you blokes “surf.” BUT! It wasn’t included in a zip that supposedly contained their comp tracks.

On that (side) note: here’s everything by Three Studies for a Crucifixion! It’s only their songs (not the other sides of the splits), and includes their stuff from: the split with harriet the spy, split with coleman, split with melt banana, four songs from comps, demo, live set. (Look, I used mediafire… they keep links up for a long time, right?) Thanks to Leo for for helping find these! And I got the demo from Killing Technology.

Edit: this discog is three tracks short! It’s missing three songs from the 49th Parallel compilation. My friend has that record, and I’ll be borrowing it soon, to complete the discog!

If you want the other sides of those splits, here’s: split with Coleman split with Harriet the Spy split with Melt Banana

Okay, back to this record. Side B has Still Life doing their best and slowest William Martyr 17 impression. har har, just kidding. But those bands do remind me of one another at times. Watercolour is good – melodic and decently-fast (similar to cap’n jazz or something).

This compilation is a benefit for the (now departed) political activist, Judi Bari. Her car was hit with a pipe bomb… and by whom? Insert included.

-download An American Tragedy–

Here’s the first Boys Life 7″. This was put out on Synergy Records, in 1993. It’s the first thing Synergy put out. I found this at a local record shop a couple weeks ago for $2! And it’s in untouched condition. It’s also, according to the insert (included in the d/l), one of the first 150 put out (because the label owners glued the song names on each side).

I was surprised to find that I couldn’t find a d/l of this record posted online. So here it is. And here’s a post on Chug Life with a bunch of their other records. Also, read that post for some more info about the band.

It’s a 45, with one song on each side. I didn’t listen to this band much back in the day. It wasn’t until some recently that I started running into their records at shops. But, the first hardcore show I ever went to was a Boys Life show! This was 1995, and it was at Food Not Bombs in Goleta, CA (later called The Living Room). I barely remember their set, though. I think we didn’t see all of it. I remember getting vibed by some guys from our high school – established scenester guy named Dan. Another band (that sounded really good) was playing inside while we were heading in, and Dan, in a mocking fashion, dropped some knowledge bombs on us. “Since you probably don’t know, that’s not Boys Life playing right now,” he said. Yeah, no shit man. ANYWAY

Some other site mentioned that Boys Life kinds of sounds like Drives Like Jehu or Fugazi. But… I’m not too familiar with either of those bands, so I think of them as somewhat similar to Car Vs. Driver (and maybe even Clikatat Ikatowi?!). It’s got really active drumming, and slow/fast transitions that eventually build up to rocking, crashing moments before tempering back down. The vocals are somewhat subdued behind the guitars, and are easy to get along with (aka they don’t scream).

–download Boys Life–

Ricardo requested this. Here’s the 9 song End of the Line lp, released in 1993 on Ebullition. I’m fairly certain this is still available from Ebullition, and so the best way to obtain it is probably to ask your local record store to order it. I’m also really certain that Kent would be super stoked to be rid of them.

End of the Line has three members from Heroin, and one (the singer) from John Henry West / Han Shan. The drummer, Aaron, is currently in the Portland band, Dangerous Boys Club (he drummed in Heroin and sang in Antioch Arrow… so check out his current band). So… this lp should already be familiar?

Here’s the last song on side a.

When I was first learning to drum, I emulated this style. I basically learned by listening to Heroin and this lp on my headphones while I practiced. It took me a while to get this fast beat down – two high hat hits, two snare hits, four bass hits, one cymbal: REPEAT. I hadn’t heard it before Heroin. But then Mohinder, Antioch Arrow, and a few others repeated it exactly. I gathered that this was the way to play fast. And it’s much more interesting than straight blast beats or speed metal beats. Still, when I played in this machine kills I didn’t really have it correct – I didn’t get it straight until the band after that (but, no recordings exist!)

This lp is all they recorded. They had a version of Burning Down on the Give Me Back compilation (1991).

One thing amuses me: to think about how the big mainstream fad at this time was “grunge” music. To think about how Nirvana and Soundgarden – at the time even – appealed to my parents, but how bands like this one really took punk and said, “I’m speeding it up, I’m making it heavier and crazier and fuck sitting around in a studio polishing our cymbals, here’s some loud, fast, spazzy shit!” And they didn’t need to dress the part, either.

–End of the Line–

Here’s the Thumbnail 7″ – The Sound of Thumbnail. File Thirteen Records, 1994.

I like Thumbnail a lot. I see them as like a mix between Car Vs Driver and (early) Unwound and Iconoclast and…Shotmaker. Is that crazy? I dunno. They’re steady, linear, not too fast, guided by bass and drums. I like their drummer – pretty snare-driven style, which is fun to drum along to.

All I’ve found online is their s/t album (which is great… and I just uploaded it! click here to d/l. 50mb), and a couple other miscellaneous songs. So I thought I’d share this one. 4 songs. I had this on tape for years, recorded from a friend’s record. But then I found my own copy of the record a couple days ago! Nice find – only took me 15 years…

I also added an extra song to this zip – their track, Sore Throat, from the We’ve Lost Beauty compilation. It’s a good song, so why not?

Here’s a track from this seven inch, to get you started.

–download The Sound of Thumbnail– 20mb

Here’s the split 7″ with Pankration and The Red Scare. I borrowed this from my friend Nate. And it’s a fresh rec, so check it out.

This was put out by Donut Friends in 1996. One song each. And the Pankration (pronounced pan-krat-tee-on, from what I’ve heard) is under 2 minutes long. Both bands remind me a bit of Puritan and Ettil Vrye. Harsh vocals, snappy snares.

–download Pankration / Red Scare– 7.2mb