Reviews September 2007

REVIEWS - SEPTEMBER 2007

‘BIG FUN

Passing theTime 7”

Firstrelease from cool Brooklyn recordstore, Passout Records. And this is having astrange effect on me. Extremely catchy and hooky, and extremely garagey pop..orsumthin’.. Fucking awesome hooks and. Four girls with a great feel for popsongand it’s just lofi and garagey enough to make my ears love it.

(Thomas)

Put on Records

BLACK LIPS

Cold Handsb/w My Struggle 7”

Cold Handsb/w Hippie Hippie Hoorah 7”

It’s not aProblem b/w Dirty Hands 7”

Guess it’sfairly regular practice by bigger labels to just release tons versions ofsingles and when it’s the Black Lips that get the treatment I’m notcomplaining. But putting a bunch of livesongs on a 7” is kinda boring so justsuffice to say that the “Not a Problem” 7” is pretty redundant. The Cold Hands7” though it pretty damn sweet, except for more livestuff in the form of“Hippie Hippie Hoorah” so skip that one too. “Cold Hands” is taken from theirnew and upcoming LP and sounds great. A bit cleaner and softer but it’s a damngreat song. Can’t wait to hear it live. I fucking love it! “My Struggle” is anon-LP song and makes this single a definite must-have. A winner.

(Thomas)

Vice

BLACKS

Shattered:the complete singles collection LP

Thecomplete output by in my mind Sweden’s best band ever. Yeah, ever! Heavilyinfluenced by bands like the Gories and Oblivians and they do it great. I mightbe very biased but heck, listening to this almost ten years after they stoppedplaying, well eight years at least anyway, and it still is great shit.Remastered and great sounding.

(Thomas)

Gonna Puke

BUNKER HILL

Hide &Go Seek 7”

Whoa! Oneof the singles I’ve been most wanting to hear for the last ten years or so.Ever since ITR issued that damn cool double Blacktop single that had covers of“Hide & Go Seek” parts one and two. And damn if it ain’t up to my highexpectations. This is a goddamn must for everyone into r’n’b.

(Thomas)

Norton Records

CHEATERSLICKS

Walk Into the Sea LP

Yeah, abrand spanking new Cheater Slicks LP right in time for their 20thanniversary. Yeah, it’s been that long, but the Slicks haven’t slowed down,well maybe a bit but their music is as aggressive and introspective as always.Filled with hate and anguish. And they do it so damn well. I don’t like all thesongs but mostly 90% is just amazing noisy rock’n’roll with a lot of roots in60’s garage and blues. “Walk Into the Sea” shouldn’t let anyone who’ve likedthem before down and it’s a good a starting point as any to discover one of thebest bands out there, and one of the best bands for the last twenty years.

(Thomas)

Dead Canary Records

CHROMECRANKS

DiabolicalBoogie Dbl-CD

Real coolcomp of singles, demos, live and unreleased of this cool NYC band from way backwhen (90’s). Their dark brooding, yet really rockin’ swampy sound made up ofbits and pieces of Blues Explosion, Scientists, Gun Club, Cramps etc is waycool. If you haven’t heard them before this might not be the place to start,pick up the Crypt LP instead but for the Cranks fan that has everything – thisis a real winner. Loads of cool shit is packed on this baby.

(Thomas)

Atavistic

THEE FINELINES

Heavilyinfluenced by Billy Childish down to the very Thee in their name. But hey – noone does it in the States and there’s no one coming even close to being this good.I don’t mind, this is pretty rocking stuff. Not as good as Billy’s best bandsbut pretty decent.

(Thomas)

Licorice Tree Records

GAYE BLADES

I’d BraveEverything For You 7”

This issuch a cute little garagey punksingle from Bobby Ubangi (Lids) and JaredSwilley (Black Lips). Cute songs, hooky tunes and a damn great lo-fi sound. Ifyou’re a fan of either of the above mentioned bands or say maybe the Fe Fi FoFums then by all means get this. It’s just too cute to not love!

(Thomas)

Rob’sHouse/Die Slaughterhaus

INTELLIGENCE

Message ofLove 7”

Two coversfrom the cool Intelligence. I like their experimental robotic stuff cause theyalways keep it trashy and rockin’ enough. It’s always cool and hardsounding.But keeping a danceable beat to it. Cool Stuff. Here they cover the Pretendersand Bob Dylan. I really like how “Message of Love” sounds but I don’t care thatmuch for “Leopard Skin Pill Box Hat” so this is a 50-50 situation..

(Thomas)

Disordered/Lo-Fi

JAY REATARD

I Know a Place b/w Don’t Let Him Come Back 7”

Kind of adeparture as this is kinda acoustic but still in the same style as his latestsolostuff. Pretty cool though. Great songs, and the production is cool. I thinkthis might have been even cooler recorded “real” but it’s kinda cool the stuff he’strying out these days. I can easily see him sliding over to some kinda JeffreyEvans blues thing or back into punkmode or whatever. And it’s pretty darn coolthat everything this guy touches is so great.

(Thomas)

Goner Records

KING KHAN& THE SHRINES

What Is?! CD

The world’s#1 soulband is back. This record has really been growing on me, at first Ithought it was way too garagey and psychedlic but now I’m starting to thinkit’s their best one. A few more real hits would have made it a real killer. Butthere’s enough great songs here to make this a winner. A couple of real turdsin the forms of some sorta free jazz experiment that really bums me out butthat’s what CDs are great for, skipping songs. So without the turds, this isthe shit.

(Thomas)

Hazelwood

LOVER!

S/t LP

Rich Crookfresh from such great bands as the Lost Sounds and the Knaughty Knights goessolo, kind of and produces a full album of great popsongs kinda continuing hisstyle from his previous bands. Great shit! I love all the songs and theproduction sounds great. It’s kinda high energy rock’n’roll but pop songs.Sounds awesome.

(Thomas)

P TrashRecords

THE MEENIES

Kill, Baby, Kill CD

Rawk fromLondon. Supposedly inspired by Russ Meyer, New Bomb Turks and the Devil Dogsand while I kinda hear the influences this sounds nothing like the two greatbands above. This has that sorta Social Distortion sound that’s pretty muchunbearable. They also quoute say this sounds like “the Misfits getting drunkwith Elvis listening to Social Distortion”. Ugh…

(Thomas)

Selfreleased

MOCKINGBIRDS

Always Late and Not Even Close CD

Ugh, thisis horrible.. streetpunk made up to sound like rock’n’roll. Fuck this ishorrible!!!

(Thomas)

Heptown Records

SEXUALSLURS

S/t 7”

Ryan Wongand Steve Sleaze team up for some real lo-fi dirty punkrock in the Rip Offvein. Six songs, and two pretty great ones and four more medium memorable.Sounds like different recordings a bit too much also. Kind of a shame, soundslike this could have been a great single, lose two songs and some masteringmaybe.. Well, what do I know… Pretty cool punkrock anyway. Reatards meets RipOff Records.

(Thomas)

Solid Sex Lovie Doll Records

SONICNEGROES Honky Bastard Blues CD

These guysfrom Stockholm are still rummaging in the mid-90’s Hellacopters pool ofactionrock. Taking cues from bands like the Stooges etc. Nothing new, fairlycompetent.. Not my cup of tea at all..

(Thomas)

It’s Not About Music Records

THE SONICS

BusyBody!!! Live in Tacoma 1964 LP

Anothercool discovery from the Norton folks. Two long lost live recordings of theSonics from 1964. I mean yeah, live records aren’t the shit but this is a damncool testament of time. A part of rock’n’roll history. The Sonics, probably theepitome of 60’s garagerock, caught live in their early days. You get two liveshows and classics like “Have Love, Will Travel”, “Busy Body”, “The Witch” and“Night Train” plus more and come cool introductions and radio spots concerningthe two shows. All in all a cool package, raw sounding but with pretty goodfidelity anyway courtesy of Tim Warren and the Crypt Studios.

(Thomas)

Norton Records

SWEET ROT

DrugFiend… 7”

Cool asfuck punk ‘77-style. And it’s not overly retrosounding or anything like that.This is just a great fucking punkrock single. Three damn cool tunes that soonhave me hollering along! Hope they can keep it up.. Cause I want this shit tokeep on coming.

(Thomas)

Square WaveRecords

TRACTOR SEXFATALITY

Braces 7”

Heavy andtrashy, and the best I’ve heard so far from TSF. Usually it’s too noisy andhard sounding for me to like but this time it’s kinda sloppy and dirty andlo-fi which gives the noise a much garagier sound. For fans of nosiy stuff likeHuman Eye and the Blowtops.

(Thomas)

KillSounds/Unscene

TWISTIN’RUMBLE 1-4 LP

Four newfantastic comps of insane dancenumbers. How awesome is that?! Yeah, enough tobreak out the A-word. It’s fucking awesome! And these comps are just plainfantastic. Not one of these songs will let you down. It’s a great package allthe way down from the insanely great artwork to each individual song. Rangingfrom soul to r’n’b to exotica to garage to slop.. Some are justuncategorizable. There’s some stuff you’ve probably heard before but thesoundquality is awesome. Put these on at any party and you’ll soon have abonafide dancingparty going on all night!

(Thomas)

No label

VIKINGS

I Need YourLovin’ 7”

Coolreissue of apparently ultrarare 45 from ’65. Cool shit anyways. B-side is a bittoo soft for my ears though. A softvoiced ballad. But the fact that there’s somuch fucking awesome stuff that haven’t been reissued the right way yet is justamazing, and who can complain when great shit like this just continues showingup on great sounding singles from Norton. Just get this if you’re a fan of 60’sgarage. You won’t be disappointed.

(Thomas)

NortonRecords

ANGRYANGLES / DIGITAL LEATHER split 7”

Pretty coolsplit. Angry Angles’ got a really cool sound which I guess you know by now.Rumor has it their ITR fullength is still coming out. Digital Leather isn’t mything to a hundred percent. It’s a bit too electronic. But as far as ‘electro’,these guys are by far the best I’ve heard.

(Thomas)

Shattered Records

BLACK LIPS/ DEMON’S CLAWS Split 7”

Anotherinstallment in the Rolling Stones cover 7” series from Norton. All of these arepretty redundant but there’s some really cool bands here and there and this isthe best of the bunch so far. Demon’s Claws do a very stripped down “FactoryGirl”. Sounds more like a demo recording, but fairly okay I guess. The Blips do“What To Do” and in a very Black Lips-y way. At the end of the song you’ll bethinking it’s a Black Lips song. They can do no wrong right now. Great tune!

(Thomas)

Norton Records