Punk – Page 12 – 7th Level Music

Review: New Bomb Turks – Nightmare Scenario: Diamond Edition (2020 reissue)

As the story goes, Columbus, Ohio punk legends New Bomb Turks were musing over how to celebrate the 20th anniversary of their Nightmare Scenario album, and wondered if the album’s original engineer, Jim Diamond, still had the master tapes from the four-day recording session in Detroit. It turns out that he did, and NBT discovered they were as raw and rowdy as they’d hoped. The result is the “Diamond Edition” of the album, and it’s a welcome birthday gift for all of us.

Opener “Point A to Point Blank” grabs you by the collar and tosses you into the mosh pit with its furious drumming by Sam Brown and Jim Weber‘s guitar is the sound of a nitro-burning funny car launching off the line. “Automatic Teller” has Eric Davidson singing about his girl “always come runnin’ every payday” to turn him into an ATM while the rest of the band goes bonkers with tight punk riffs. Matt Reber‘s bass line on it is a thing of wonder.

“End of the Great Credibility Race” has, apart from a great title, slick back and forth vocals between Davidson and his bandmates in-between all the powerful riffs. Davidson encourages Brown to “go as fast as you fuckin’ wanna go” on “Too Much,” which packs more punk pedal-to-the-metal punch into a minute and three seconds than most songs three times that length.

“Killer’s Kiss” throws down a sweet groove and is a good display of NBT’s diversity. They can unleash blazing punk licks and garage rock grooves with equal talent. It’s one of their best traits. “Continental Cats” is another fine example of how NBT love to find and lock into a groove now and then, but without letting off the gas and fuzz pedals. “Spanish Fly by Night” displays another NBT talent – wordplay. They have some of the wittiest and sharpest lyrics of any punk rock band you’ll find.

“The Roof” is a solid song about being stuck in a dead end town and wishing for greener pastures elsewhere. The “rough mix” of “Your Beaten Heart” is a neat addition. It’s cool to hear the early, raw version of this. “Turning Tricks” has a wild, swaggering flair to it – as you’d want from a song with that title – and I love how Reber’s bass shoves its way to the front now and then on the track.

There’s no way NBT could’ve predicted in 2000 that “Wine & Depression” could be a theme song for 2020, but here we are and here it is in all its punch-drunk, bottle-smashing punk glory. “Quarter to Four” combines NBT’s punk chops with their groove power to create a solid closer that leaves you sweaty and nearly out of breath as they sing about existential dread: “Close my eyes, I don’t wanna see. Sun’s comin’ up on my history.” Good grief, that’s some gut punch stuff right there. The Diamond Edition ends with “Theme from Nightmare Scenario” – an instrumental garage rock track that would make The Stooges proud.

By the way, all proceeds from the sale of Nightmare Scenario: Diamond Edition go to the Black Queer and Intersectional Collective and Columbus Freedom Fund – two great causes – so it’s a win-win for you and them. Don’t hesitate to snag this.

Keep your mind open.

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Special Interest announce remix of “The Passion of…” album due next month.

Following the release of their album ‘The Passion Of…‘ earlier this year, New Orleans-based punk band Special Interest have announced a new 12″ release ‘Street Pulse Beat‘, which features remixes from Boy Harsher, Ruth Mascelli and DJ Haram. The record is set for release on Jan 8th via Nude Club Records and is available for pre-order and today the “Street Pulse Beat (Boy Harsher Remix)” is streaming online.

As well as the ‘Street Pulse Beat’ Maxi 12″, Special Interest will also digitally release ‘The Passion Of: Remixed‘ on Jan 8th, which is made up of 11 tracks, including the remixes on the 12″ & various other reworks by artists such as Hide & w00dy. People who purchase the Maxi 12” on Bandcamp, will receive a free download of ‘The Passion Of Remixed’ too.

All proceeds will go to House of Tulip (https://houseoftulip.org), which was co-founded and is currently co-led by 2 Black transgender women. House of Tulip provides trans and gender-nonconforming communities in New Orleans, Louisiana with economic stability and safety through zero barrier permanent housing and pathways to education, healthcare, employment, and homeownership.

“This remix of ‘Street Pulse Beat’ came from the depths of springtime lockdown. In a bleak and uncertain world, Special Interest was keeping our creative spirit alive. This remix was made entirely with the OB-6, SH-101, and the JV-1080. Trading in distorted guitars for plucky bent synths, Boy Harsher’s remix offers their signature melancholy sound. Ali Logout’ confidently controls the energy, reminding us that synthwave can still have a backbone and can hang with the punks.” – Boy Harsher

Adding to this, Special Interest vocalist Alli Logout said the track is “A ballad for lovers delusions of grandeur in the depth of the terror that is codependency.”

Listen to “Street Pulse Beat (Boy Harsher Remix)” here: https://youtu.be/WtwwtZHcxFw

Pre-order here: https://specialinterestno.bandcamp.com/album/the-passion-of-remixed

Keep your mind open.

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[Thanks to Frankie at Stereo Sanctity.]

Wolfmanhattan Project declare it will be “Summer Forever.”

An anti-supergroup like no other! Wolfmanhattan Project, featuring Mick Collins (The Gories, The Dirtbombs), Kid Congo Powers (Gun Club, The Cramps, Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds) and Bob Bert (Sonic Youth, Pussy Galore, Lydia Lunch) bring you a healthy dose of dark swampy voodoo with a uniqueness and immediacy that only a combination of this magnitude could deliver.

The new video for ‘Summer Forever’, taken from their forthcoming second album Summer Forever And Ever (coming in 2021) on In The Red Records was filmed in isolation and edited and directed by filmmaker Dylan Mars Greenberg, who, among her many films and music videos, won Best Animated Film at this year’s LA Punk Film Festival for the short film, ‘The Bathtub‘, (starring Bob Bert).

Keep your mind open.

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[Thanks to Jo Murray!]

Review: Oh Sees – Levitation Sessions

Recorded live in the parking lot of the famous Pappy and Harriet’s music venue in Pioneertown, California, Levitation Sessions by OSees is another great live set put together by the Reverb Appreciation Society and the folks behind the Levitation Music Festival. It’s also another great live album from Osees / Oh Sees / Thee Oh Sees / OCS (By the way, John Dwyer, if you’re reading this – I recommend “Eau Seas” for the next spelling, possibly calling the album under that moniker Water Weird.) that brings out some old tracks the band hadn’t played in years.

The album / show starts with the crowd favorite “Carrion Crawler,” getting things off to a deceptively quiet opening before unleashing rock fury. Mr. Dwyer (lead singer / guitarist) and his crew (Tim Hellman – bass, David Rincon – drums, Paul Quattrone – drums, Tomas Dolas – keyboards) give you a four-count to catch your breath before launching “I Come from the Mountain” at you like a rocket. “Static God” is the re-entry burn of that same rocket, and by now you’re holding on for dear life. Hellman’s bass is the harness keeping you in the rocket’s seat while Rincon and Quattrone are the sounds of the heat shield nearing critical failure. Dolas’ keys rise as Dwyer screams, “It doesn’t matter at all – your fucking institutions!” Impermanence is the only real thing.

The post / garage punk of “Sewer Fire” is outstanding and might cause you to pogo in your living room or office. Just try not to do it in your car while driving. “Chem Farmer / Nite Expo” blends keyboard-heavy prog-jazz with mammoth-heavy riffs and cymbal crashes. It ends with Dwyer yelling, “We have fun!” “Dreary Nonsense” is both fiery and goofy, which means it’s great. “The Fizz” is one of those older tracks they haven’t played in a while, and it has a great call-and-response chorus and fun keyboard dexterity from Dolas.

“Corrupt Coffin” and “Together Tomorrow,” both each under two minutes, blend together like a punk cocktail made out of Red Bull, sweat, vodka, and highly caffeinated Earl Grey tea. “Night Crawler” is pure psychedelic fuzz to lull you into a smoky headspace. You take a breath, and then “Terminal Jape” comes around the corner to mug you and then shove you into oncoming traffic. “The system has been broken down!” Dwyer grunts as the whole band turns into a tsunami. “Rainbow” slows things down a bit, but it’s almost a feint because “Heart Worm” is a straight-up punk boot to the head. “The world’s so fucked up!” Dwyer sings. It’s hard to argue with him if you watch the news.

The band pauses a moment before “Transparent World Jam” melts your mind and perhaps your body into lava lamp ooze. As Oh Sees like to do, they end with a mostly instrumental jam. This one is the nearly twelve-minute-long “Block of Ice” – a track that reminds you of Zappa, Allman Brothers, 13th Floor Elevators, and My Bloody Valentine all at once.

Few things can top the energy of a live Oh Sees show, and capturing that energy in a recording is a colossal feat. Levitation Sessions sounds great and the record’s mastering by J.J. Golden cannot be understated. This is a nice appetizer for, hopefully, many more live shows to come.

Keep your mind open.

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Adulkt Life releases two more fiery singles from upcoming record.

Adulkt Life, made of Huggy Bear’s Chris Rowley, Male Bonding’s John Arthur Webb and Kevin Hendrick, and drummer Sonny Barrett, announce their debut album, Book Of Curses, out November 6th on What’s Your Rupture? Today, they offer two new singles, “Stevie K” and “Taking Hits,” which follows the previously-released song “County Pride.”

Huggy Bear led the UK’s answer to riot grrrl, inspired by the “seismic shock” of witnessing a Nation of Ulysses performance together and galvanized by Bikini Kill drummer Tobi Vail’s germinal riot grrrl zine “Jigsaw.” In the 25 years since Chris Rowley played with iconic Huggy Bear, starting a new band hasn’t felt right. But after John Arthur Webb (Male Bonding), who Rowley met while picking up records at a Rough Trade shop, asked if he wanted to play music together it “suddenly it felt super exciting.” Within a year, Webb and Rowley befriended drummer Sonny Barrett, who worked at a different Rough Trade location and later offered to drum in Adulkt life. The Adulkt Life lineup was finalized when Webb enlisted his best friend and longtime collaborator, Kevin Hendrick (Middex) on bass.

For Rowley, Adulkt Life “felt like it could carry the weight of all the things I would want to culturally load into a band without having to compromise any of it.” That meant these songs—ecstatic buzzsaw guitars, blown-out poetry, the improvisatory energy of torrential art-punk drumming that reveals Sonny’s free-jazz interest—should reflect the conditions of his life as an older person. In 2020, Rowley is a 55-year-old father and longtime employee of a children’s charity. “You have to create a question and interrogate yourself,” he says, and so he poses inexhaustible ones: What is it to parent in a crumbling world? What does it mean to stay political as Earth burns, to keep loving music? How best to communicate the excitement and charge of possibility from “a whole different set of paradigms?” Adulkt Life inquires but offers no easy answers, instead instigating punk’s eternal invitation to see: “Wow, I should do something—make something, start a political party, just do something rather than not do something.”

The cut-and-paste word collages Rowley once shouted in Huggy Bear are as cool and thrilling as ever on Book Of Curses—with chiseled noise hooks expertly mixed by Webb and mastered by Total Control’s Mikey Young, fitting the “cold war bubblegum” aesthetic called out in the lyrics—but charged by the high-stakes of adulthood. “Taking Hits” is a rallying cry for those unable to cry. The explosive “Stevie K” is a “mythic hero/ine song” inspired by Nation of Ulysses guitarist Steve Kroner. In the 1990s, after Rowley and the other members of Huggy Bear saw Nation of Ulysses, “You couldn’t be a band and want to be anything less than the impact that had on us […] We wanted to shake everybody up.” Adulkt Life honors these impulses. Rowley expands on “Taking Hits” and “Stevie K”:

“‘Taking Hits’…I wanted to forge a battle hymn that would corral our beat down and
punch drunk living situations into something transcendent, stronger of knees and
able to stare out the haters.

It’s a synesthesia yarn synthesizing smelling salts, rubbing oils, cheerleading disgust, sugar and vitriol, like if the grifters got up early and went track training in the rain/confused east coast hard-core with all the floodlights on/jaws clamped like Dan Fante.

‘Stevie K’ was recorded in starvation conditions / prison yard style under the working title ‘Nation of Ulysses ruined my life’ as in ‘where do you take that logic to a limit?’ It’s a mod / art ballad for a catcher in the rye / no friends shake up steve k mythically emerging from field recordings, in love with the ruts staring at the rude boys a scream for hope / deliverance.”

LISTEN TO “STEVIE K” AND “TAKING HITS”
Other songs, ablaze, explore lawlessness, authenticity, love, redemption, like fables of radicals across time and space: us versus them, defeat and resurrection, sax squall, noise blasts, visceral empathy for the vulnerable and disenfranchised. Rowley’s apocalyptic visions just happen to appear alongside bedtime stories. On Book Of Curses, punk means never surrendering your creativity or your curiosity.
LISTEN TO “COUNTY PRIDE”

PRE-ORDER BOOK OF CURSES

BOOK OF CURSES TRACKLIST
1.County Pride
2. JNR Showtime
3. Whistle Country
4. Taking Hits
5. Flipper
6. Stevie K
7. Room Context
8. Move
9. Clean (But Itchy)
10. New Curfew

Keep your mind open.

[Thanks to Jacob at Pitch Perfect PR.]

Rewind Review: Screaming Females – Castle Talk (2010)

Screaming Females’ (Mike Abbatte – bass, Jarrett Dougherty – drums, Marissa Paternoster – guitar and vocals) fourth album, Castle Talk, features a drawing (by Paternoster) of a horse on its cover. The horse’s tail seems to be made of fire. It’s a fitting image for an album that often charges straight at you like those horses from Krull that move so fast they leave behind trails of fire.

Opening track “Laura + Marty” opens with doom metal chords before it abruptly switches into almost power-pop riffs and post-punk bass grooves. “I Don’t Mind It” could and should be a big radio hit as Paternoster sings a peppy song about heartbreak. Dougherty’s “not as easy as they sound” beats are a highlight of “Boss.” His switches between hard rock beats and jazz timing are sharp.

The raucous energy of “Normal” gets your whole body shaking. “A New Kid” has this cool warped sound to it that I love (especially in Abbatte’s drunken circus clown bass), and, good heavens, Paternoster’s riffs on it blow you out of your boots. Her vocals on “Fall Asleep” are layered with fuzz, almost taking a back seat to her shredding – which is somehow smooth and buzzsaw-like at the same time.

“Wild” has soaring solos that contrast with Paternoster’s soft vocals about missing a lover. “I wanna be your late night crisis line. I wanna give you all a piece of my mind,” Paternoster sings on the snappy and snarky “Nothing at All.” “Sheep,” (a solid rocker about infidelity – “You’ll count sheep with anyone, and anyone will do.”) is a great example of what makes Screaming Females so good – their ability to make effortless turns from soft tones to face-melting riffs. “Deluxe” starts out with a left-in blooper before it drifts into a slightly psychedelic, echoed, acoustic track that lets you catch your breath for a moment. Castle Talk ends with “Ghost Solo” – a song that builds behind Dougherty’s rumbling floor toms and Abbatte’s almost-disco bass to Paternoster’s defiant vocals (“This is it, it’s the last time you set me up.”) and guitar riffs that sound like a delighted bird of prey.

It’s a good send-off to the record and a good addition to any fan’s collection of the band’s material. Few bands can make love songs that are both heart-tugging and head-exploding at the same time. Castle Talk is full of such tracks.

Keep your mind open.

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Rewind Review: Zeke – Hellbender (2018)

I don’t know why Seattle punk legends Zeke took fourteen years off between albums, but their last album, Hellbender, shows that they didn’t slow down during that time. If anything, they came back faster (the longest song on the album lasts one minute and fifty-one seconds), louder, and rowdier than when they took a break.

The opener, “All the Way,” has drums that pop like the SKS rifle on the album’s cover, snapping you awake no matter where you are. “Two Lane Blacktop” covers one of Zeke’s favorite topics – racing – and will make you stomp your gas pedal to the floor, even if you’re sitting at a desk, with it’s sizzling guitar solo and pursuit driving beats. “On the Road” (the aforementioned “long” song) covers similar ground and could be the score to a 1970’s car chase scene in which competing muscle cars plow through an empty brewery.

“Working Man” is so frantic that you imagine the title subject is hopped up on Red Bull and Mini-Thins as he speeds down a country road in his pickup so as not to be late, again, to his job at the mobile home factory. The title track is, somehow, even faster. Zeke excel at blistering pace tracks, and this album is full of them. “Hellbender” and “County Jail” each last under a minute.

The vocals on “Burn” sound like they’re yelled out of a sore throat, and I mean that in the best possible way. The drums on “Goin’ Down” hit so hard that you imagine at least five snare drum heads were broken during the record session. “White Wolf” is, I think, about some ghost wolf or the spirit of rock and roll or some cool art Zeke saw on the side of a customized Chevy van. It shreds, that’s for sure.

Speaking of unknown song meanings, I don’t know if “AR-15” is a salute to the firearm or a punk raging against gun violence. I’m fairly certain, however, that “Cougar Rock,” is about shagging older women. The guitar and drums breakdown on it is outstanding. “Devil’s Night” will get your body moving with its heart attack beats.

The last three songs on the album are more tracks about driving fast cars and blaring your horn so everyone else gets the hell out of the way. “Ride On” is a song perfect for that fire-shooting guitar guy from the last Mad Max movie. “Red Line” moves into the red on your speedometer within seconds of its opening and doesn’t let up for a full minute. “Big Rig” is suitable for smashing everything in sight harder than Kool-Aid Man breaking through a brick wall.

Zeke albums are so fast and wild that reviewing them is difficult. They’re more experiences than albums. You’re not the same once you hear one, and Hellbender will shake you up and leave you in the dust.

Keep your mind open.

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Lamps release wild new single, “Horse Cow Goat Pig Dog,” from upcoming fourth album.

Lamps, LA’s notoriously unprolific noise-merchant trio, are ready to release their spectacular fourth album called People With Faces on In The Red Records and share the first track today.

Recorded and mixed by Ty Segall at Val’s, Lamps’ first recorded output since 2012’s landmark LP Under The Water, Under The Ground finds them breaking adventurous new terrain.

Stalwarts Monty Buckles (guitar, voice, keyboards) and Josh Erkman (drums, voice) double down on Lamps’ trademark cloak of effects-laden guitars and hammering drums, and new(ish) member Denée Segall jumps into the fray with her Poly Styrene wail and monolithic bass, adding depth both sonically and lyrically. Their trademark abrasiveness is still present, but it’s burnished it into something richer, more layered. Don’t worry, it still kicks your head in.

First indication that things have changed comes in the opener, “Confirmed Frenchman.” With its serpentne rhythm and Denée’s muted vocals, it sounds kinda like The Au Pairs, if the Au Pairs listened to a lot of Throbbing Gristle. From that point onwards, People With Faces careens maniacally and majestically between alt-fantasy screamers and boot-bottom dirt-rock scummery.

“Horse Cow Goat Pig Dog” slams like a feminist peak-form Black Sabbath (if only), and “Comedian” is a jaunty, chilling serial killer rave up. “G.N.A.T.S.” updates the Lamps sound into something punishing and darkly humorous, with Erkman screaming that women’s magazines saved his life.

Worth noting is the inclusion of two covers that have been part of Lamps’ live show since Segall joined in 2015. The straightforward and sinister take on Sexual Harassment’s “I Need a Freak” is skin-crawling background music for the worst date ever. And “I Owe It to the Girls,” by Floridian proto-no-wavers Teddy & The Frat Girls, twists the raw desperation of the original into a razor-sharp militant anthem.

Keep your mind open.

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[Thanks to Jo Murray.]

Adulkt Life debuts their first single – “County Pride.”

Huggy Bear’s Chris Rowley, Male Bonding’s John Arthur Webb and Kevin Hendrick, and drummer Sonny Barrett announce their new collaboration, Adulkt Life. In conjunction, they announce their signing to What’s Your Rupture? and present their debut single, “County Pride.”

Huggy Bear led the UK’s answer to riot grrrl, inspired by the “seismic shock” of witnessing a Nation of Ulysses performance together and galvanized by Bikini Kill drummer Tobi Vail’s germinal riot grrrl zine “Jigsaw.” In the 25 years since Chris Rowley played with iconic Huggy Bear, starting a new band hasn’t felt right. But after John Arthur Webb (Male Bonding), who Rowley met while picking up records at a Rough Trade shop, asked if he wanted to play music together it “suddenly it felt super exciting.” Years later, Webb and Rowley befriended a then-teenage drummer, Sonny Barrett, now 23, who worked at a different Rough Trade location. After a mysterious letter from Rowley arrived for Sonny at the shop, Sonny finally decided to check out Huggy Bear, promptly offering to drum in Adulkt Life. The Adulkt Life lineup was finalized when Webb enlisted his best friend and longtime collaborator, Kevin Hendrick—who has in recent years turned towards solo industrial noise poetry as Middex—on bass.

Now, working with these musicians and their combined perspectives, Rowley makes a striking return. The need for change that Huggy Bear sought is no less relevant today – Adulkt Life inquires but offers no easy answers, instead instigating punk’s eternal invitation to see: “Wow, I should do something—make something, start a political party, just do something rather than not do something.” Their debut single, “County Pride,” offers a first taste of their frenetic sound. It brings together three generations of punk energy, creating a timeless sense of urgency.

“Early in Adulkt Life songwriting we wanted to make a song like Devo – something herky jerky with a future disco swing for a party crowd – but we were all too angry,” says Rowley. “The song is about the need to escape from hostile small town awfulness and the weird ways you choose to get out. It’s a dark ride with sparky edges through small town/new town bid for blood… Adulkt life haven’t learnt to be flippant yet just flipped out ….Ricochet and rockblast vs racism.”
ADULKT LIFE’S “COUNTY PRIDE” ON YOUTUBE

ADULKT LIFE’S “COUNTY PRIDE” ON BANDCAMP
Those who download “County Pride” from Bandcamp will also receive the first of three fanzines, which the band intend to “try and recapture the feelings not just in rediscovering music but all the other crucial elements that go alongside it, the passion to share and scrutinise and play poetically with brut force and argue.” More info HERE.

ADULKT LIFE ONLINE:
https://adulktlife.bandcamp.com
https://www.instagram.com/adulkt_life/

Keep your mind open.

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[Thanks to Jacob at Pitch Perfect PR.]

Dream Nails release “Vagina Police” ahead of upcoming album.

London punks Dream Nails have been buzzing in the UK for some time and last month announced their signing to Dine Alone for the release of their debut self-titled full length, which will be out August 28th on Dine Alone in North America and UK indie Alcopop! in the rest of World. Today, the band are sharing a new single from the LP entitled “Vagina Police,” along with it accompanying video.

WATCH: Dream Nails’ “Vagina Police” on YouTube

Dream Nails’ drummer Lucy Katz describes the track as “our battle-cry against the persistent and pathetic-yet-insidious obsession of the state to police our bodies at any cost. It’s a song about reproductive rights and (in)justice in all its forms.” Bassist Mimi Jassson elaborates on the ways the establishment tries to police our bodies across the world: “From abortions being illegal, to forced sterilization of trans people. We stand in solidarity with our trans siblings in the face of the UK’s repression of trans rights.”

The track was originally released by London-based indie Everything Sucks Music but the new version, as will feature on Dream Nails’ forthcoming self-titled debut album, produced by Tarek Musa of Spring King, breathes new vigour into its intent. For the next month, 100% of Dream Nails’ Bandcamp proceeds will be split between Abortion Support Network and Mermaids.

Dream Nails self-titled LP is due out August 28th via Dine Alone and Alcopop! Pre-orders for ‘Dream Nails’ are live today and can be found HERE. Physical vinyl bundle includes a 40-page signed zine. In true punk DIY fashion, the zine is handmade by the band, featuring lyrics, articles and background to the songs on the album.

Keep your mind open.

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[Thanks to Tom at Hive Mind PR.]