A Year of Music

The first time I ever ran across Swarm of the Lotus, I thought they had a really stupid name.

The first time I actually heard Swarm of the Lotus’s When White Becomes Black, I thought it was tune-free noise.

Now I think it’s one of the heaviest, loudest hardcore records I own, with all kinds of tricky riffs buried in the mix and a brutally tight rhythm section. It’s like they took the excruciating crux of Neurosis’s “Locust Star” (probably Neurosis’s most oppressive song) and turned it into an entire album, only noisier, faster and meaner. For sheer raw aggression and out-of-control sonic violence, it gives Converge’s Jane Doe a run for its money. It’s also extremely catchy, but you have to approach it on its own terms, because it takes no prisoners and isn’t really big on providing an easy way in, and the songs are a lot more complex than they seem at first. If you like loud, mean, fast music, though, the time spent with it is well-rewarded. I think of this record as a lost classic.

They did have a really dumb name, though.

Like I promised, I tracked down those two Ganglion records. It wasn’t that tough; I just had to find their MySpace page and then follow that to their Interpunk page. Interpunk’s price schedule for shipping is kind of jacked for small orders, so I hunted around and ended up picking up a few other things (including a Drowningman album I didn’t have, with its requisitely smartassed song titles – one of which, in turn, provided the title for this post). They included a free label sampler, as is their way, but I’m not very hopeful that anything other than the No Trigger song will be any good.

While I was at it, I bought this album I discovered through Mutant Sounds, because I was really enjoying it and the MP3s linked from Mutant Sounds sound like crap. And I grabbed two more Dan Deacon releases, which I may end up regretting (song titles like “Shit Slowly Applied On Cock Parts” do not prefigure happy fun-time easy listening), but I love Spiderman of the Rings, and maybe naming things just isn’t his strong suit: another song is named “ksjfhgljkhertykjlehgskjhkjvhda”. (I bought these three using Amazon’s MP3 store, which is scarily easy to use, in case anyone’s curious.)

Finally, I grabbed these crappily encoded MP3s of Steve Albini recording demos for Fugazi because Cosmo’s description was interesting.

So here’s the newest grist for the mill:

• Dan Deacon: Meetle Mice (Carpark)
• Dan Deacon: Silly Hat vs Egale (sic) Hat (Carpark)
• Fugazi: In on the Kill Taker [Steve Albini demos] (bootleg)
• Ganglion: Of the Deep (self-released)
• Ganglion: As Steel Takes to Flesh (self-released)
• Drowningman: Don’t Push Us When We’re Hot (Thorp)
• Last Perfection: Drawing Conclusions (United Edge)
• Shizzo Flamingos: Years Passed By 83-85 (Fuego)
• Supermachiner: θριαμβος της μεγαλης μηχανης (Undecided)
• v/a: New School Records: Summer Sampler 2007 (New School)

Dear Jacob,

Thank you very much for your work with the most awesome hardcore band in existence. The damage you have done to your throat (and my ears) over the years is very much appreciated, and I certainly hope you feel better now than you did when you were writing the songs on Jane Doe and You Fail Me, because to be honest you sounded sort of depressed. Although I guess you’re still not feeling so chipper, because your new solo record sounds like it’s going to be pretty emo. That’s OK, though. I miss Swans too.

Also, thank you for being such an awesome artist and designer. Every time I wear my “PLAGUE QUEEN DEATH KING” T-shirt, it makes me smile, and the covers to Jane Doe and No Heroes are among my favorite in heavy music. Elegant and forceful in their economy, very dirty and very punk.

I do have one question for you, though. Well, not really a question, more an observation. A tiny criticism, even. That would probably have been a lot more useful before Supermachiner put out Rise of the Great Machine. Sorry. I was busy then. But anyway, here it is:

Writing the title out as «ρισε οφ τηε γρεατ μαχηινε» is some incredibly dorky design wankery. Wouldn’t «θριαμβος της μεγαλης μηχανης» have made more sense? I mean, if you had to use Greek? Why not stick to blackletter? That always looks pretty hardcore. Or maybe Gaelic would have been nice.

Aside from that, I look forward to your upcoming projects and hope this letter finds you well. Best of luck with your solo project and Irons!

χαιρετισμους,
Forrest

“Let’s Free Your Head From Your Ass And Worry About Tibet Later” is a near-perfect name for a song, especially when the band playing it sounds suspiciously like early Nirvana.

In the alternate world where thudding European techno is (still) being dropped on heaving, roiling dancefloors in American Legion halls in small towns across the Midwest and every major city has a Technodrome right next to the basketball coliseum expelling crowds of sweat-soaked, euphoric clubbers every Sunday morning, Clark’s “Volcan Veins” (released today on his new album, Turning Dragon, on Warp) is entering the charts at #1, where it will tenaciously hang for the next six weeks. Good gravy, I didn’t think anyone was still making music like this. Sounding like nothing so much as an exceedingly messy yet propulsive blend of Jackson at his nastiest and Speedy J’s from-out-of-nowhere heavy techno flawed-masterpiece Loudboxer, “Veins” also reminds me of Neil Landstrumm’s “Gigolos Trapped in Retro Hell”, Kiki’s “Gas126” and some of User’s more alarming Moroder-on-bathtub-speed disco loops. Which is to say that it’s a grainy, oversaturated chunk of High NRG disco-loop fury, and is exactly the sort of thing that makes me regret having hung up my slipmats. This is some seriously whacked-out dancefloor business and it ends the only way it could – by collapsing into a murky black hole of distortion and echoes.

Don’t believe me? Listen to the second track in this album sampler. I already tried to buy the whole album through Bleep (the samples make it sound fucking fantastic, but I sort of expect that from Clark at this point – his last album, Body Riddle, was a nearly flawless slab of loud bedroom techno), but they sent me a ZIP file containing only the liner notes. Thanks, guys.

Thanks to Nick, I now know that Fucked Up and Xiu Xiu (two bands who should never be mentioned in the same sentence) are suing Camel, Rolling Stone, and (potentially; see the sidebar) Rhapsody for, well, being asshats (more summary here):

Indie rock bands Xiu Xiu and Fucked Up today filed a class action lawsuit against R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Company (the parent company of Camel cigarettes) and Wenner Media (the publisher of Rolling Stone) alleging the unauthorized use of artists’ names, unauthorized use of artist names for commercial advantage (right of publicity), and unfair business practices, all in regards to the ‘Indie Rock Universe’ multipage advertising section that appeared in the 40th Anniversary issue of the magazine published on November 15. The class action, which was instigated by Xiu Xiu and Fucked Up but filed on behalf of 186 bands and artists featured in the pull out spread, accuses both the cigarette company and the magazine of engaging in “despicable conduct” that was “illegal under settled, unambiguous California statutory and common law.” The lawsuit demands Rolling Stone publish an admission that the artists’ names were used without consent in a spread equal in size to the original ad, as well as seeking actual and punitive financial damages. (Under California law, this could conceptually amount to $750 per issue of Rolling Stone, per band, or a whopping $195.3 billion.

Everybody’s favorite bit of that story is this line:

The 18-page complaint filed today reads partially like a Pitchfork review written by a music-nerd attorney.

but they actually back it up with

Xiu Xiu’s work is described as “often thematically dark, marked by non-narrative, evocative lyrics delivered in small fragments, and is varied in instrumentation, which can include koto, digital sound samples, and whistles, as well as bass, keyboards, percussion and guitar – or some combination of some or all or more.” Fucked Up’s work is described as “direct, sonically violent at times, and often characterized as hardcore punk, with the sometimes acknowledged influence of Spanish Civil War-variety anarchism, Viennese Actionism and the Situationist International.”

The attorney on the case, Christopher J. Hunt, is either really good at reading band bios, has a remarkable ear, has a well-developed sense of humor, or some combination of all of the above. Those are as accurate descriptions of either band’s sound as I’ve ever heard.

I’ve been trying to tell everyone how great Fucked Up are for a while now; I strongly feel that Hidden World is an outstanding achievement: fierce, loud, lyrically sophisticated, politically and metaphysically engaged, and immaculately recorded. Also, they have a totally hilarious name (check out the hoops Kelefa Sanneh has to jump through to get his review of their live show into the New York Times), and the members’ pseudonyms (10,000 Marbles, Pink Eyes, Mustard Gas, Concentration Camp, Guinea Beat) are overblown and dorky-offensive in the best punk rock tradition. I’d say they’re the best punk rock band from Toronto, but there’s actually an awful lot of really great punk and hardcore bands from Toronto.

I won’t rehash the details of the case, because there’s more than enough links up above, but I will say that I think the bands have a pretty good shot at a settlement. I find the type of advertorial shenanigans Rolling Stone and Camel engaged in distasteful (“advertorial” is, of course, a portmanteau word combining “advertising”, “total horseshit” and “editorial”). Somebody there should have known this was going over the line. I’d be pissed if I were either Fucked Up or Xiu Xiu too: Rolling Stone has as much to do with real independent music in 2007 as Rupert Murdoch does with decency or truth, and the cheesy “Indie Rock Universe” spread Rolling Stone published makes the bands mentioned look uncool just by association. I find the idea of Rolling Stone being forced to run a 4-page pullout saying “WE FUCKED OVER FUCKED UP” in gigantic type quite satisfying.

In the meantime, Fucked Up have put out a bunch of singles over the last year, all of them great (and some of them not at all what you’d expect from a Black Flag-style hardcore band), and have a pretty crowded slate of new releases coming out this year. And their latest blog post linked to a pretty good disco-house single from Hercules & Love Affair, featuring the vocals of the amazing Antony Hegarty (of Antony & the Johnsons), which shows they’re nice guys – I mean, they’re looking out for my interests and all.

Ladies and gentlemen, The Telefones (from Hyped 2 Death #3):

Don’t come around knocking at my door,
I don’t love you any more,
you won’t go bowling!

And don’t you call me on the telephone,
you know I won’t be home,
I probably will be bowling.

bowling, I like bowling (4x)

You ain’t nothing but an alley cat,
and worse than that:
you won’t go bowling!

You ain’t nothing but a gutter ball,
I think that says it all,
why won’t you go bowling?

bowling, I like bowling (4x)

(guitar solo)

YES!

(saxophone solo)

You ain’t nothing but an alley cat,
and worse than that:
you won’t go bowling!

You ain’t nothing but a gutter ball,
I think that says it all,
why won’t you go bowling?

bowling, I like bowling (4x)

YES!

(guitar solo)
(dual saxophone solo)

From The Slog, the blog of The Stranger, “Seattle’s only newspaper”:

[Stranger staffer] Eric Grandy thinks Canadian hardcore band Fucked Up will make it all the way to the Super Bowl, compeletely disregarding the fact that Canadians know absolutely nothing about football.

I hope that never happens, because then I’d have to pay for Superbowl tickets. I’d put $50 on Fucked Up, no problem.

People seem surprised when they hear Mudhoney are still around. They are. Mark Arm’s still a funny asshole. They’re still loud and loose. They still hate The Man. And the Bushes. And you, probably.

They got a horn section, though. That’s new.

Likewise, Guy Picciotto has had a long and varied career with the DC hardcore scene and is also well-represented on Twenty Years of Dischord Records. There are tracks from Rites of Spring, One Last Wish and Happy Go Licky (and, of course, Fugazi, the reason anyone under the age of 25 knows who Guy Picciotto is). Happy Go Licky were interesting. They put out one single, and De Soto Records released a compilation of live and demo material long after they broke up. There’s lots of pointless experimental wankery with the 4-track, but there’s also “Twist and Shout”, which is spooky, tense and restrained. It’s more like a lost Factory b-side than anything from the DC punk scene. I could listen to it all night.

Of course, Twenty Years also features “Blueprint”, which is still probably my favorite Fugazi song, along with being one of the three or four I can play when I feel like screwing around with one of my guitars.

Man, this compilation is just packed full of goodies. And I haven’t even gotten to Slant 6 or Autoclave yet.

I’m listening to Twenty Years of Dischord Records, and since it’s, like, the DiY label Ian Mackaye started to release his own music, there’s a lot of his stuff all over it. Dude was in a lot of bands (Teen Idles, Minor Threat, Skewbald, Egg Hunt, Embrace, Fugazi, etc.), and his evolution was pretty linear, but there’s stuff like The Snakes’ “Snake Rap” popping out of the mix with a very high WTF?! factor. Hearing Mackaye and his friends rapping about snakes is, of course, extremely silly. The backing track is still some pretty convincing funk, though.

I used to have a very strong belief that every American child should be handed a copy of Minor Threat’s Complete Discography upon reaching 15 or 16 years of age. 20 years later, I see no reason to change that belief. “Screaming at a Wall” still slices through bullshit with ease. The only punk tracks that come close to it in clarity and righteousness are Bad Brains’ “PMA” and Flux of Pink Indians’ “They Lie We Die”.

Oh, and the rest of Minor Threat’s catalog.

Q: How the fuck did I end up with five Akimbo records? How does "Dungeon Bastard" manage to live up to its monumentally ridiculous title? How can I take a hardcore band seriously if it's going to stick a 3-minute drum solo into the middle of the album? How can I not? How many loose, loud and loaded albums are these guys going to release before I get tired of them?

A: Dunno. By being super fucking catchy and loud. Because. I guess I can't. All of them.