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Another week, another pick! I have been out of commission the past couple of newsletters because I was sick, but I am back and ready to go! Who would have thought that a medication you take for one thing can make you even more sick? Being a pharmacy technician in my past life, I should have known this, but I guess it didn’t click in the cold medicine haze I found myself in. One good thing about being home sick: I was able to check out some new music and just live in my collection for a week. This week’s pick is a Finnish synth pop duo called Modem and their new album Megalomania.

I have a thing for danceable synth pop. As a kid, I remember going to Holland to visit my Mom’s side of the family and one of the first groups they showed us was Ace of Base and right after that, Eiffel 65. After that I was hooked on pop synth dance music. After getting older, I have found myself loving not just synth pop but a lot of subgenres such as dark wave and synth driven post punk—bands like Soft Cell, Depeche Mode and New Order.

Megalomania fits into that 80s pop phenomenon that folks craved in that time period. Very bass heavy tones and lead guitar riffs galore. When you hear this record, you would have no idea that it actually came out in 2024. On the track Goodbye Horses 2004, they sample the beginning guitar solo in Prince’s song “When Doves Cry.” This album will have you dancing or at the very least tapping your feet. From start to finish it’s a synth pop dream. At times, the vocals can feel very dark and this shifts with the music as well. It can go very basic thick bass synth that was well known in the 80s to a slowed down very goth type of feel.

Pick this record up and throw it on the turntable, put on a leather jacket, sunglasses and beret and dance the night away.

What’s up Sorry State readers? I hope everyone has had a nice week. This week, I’m writing about another RSD release I picked up a couple weeks ago, 300% Dynamite, a compilation of Ska, Soul, Funk & Dub from Jamaica put out by Soul Jazz Records. I’m pretty sure I’ve stated this many times before, but any time Dom recommends a comp to me, I always pick it up. This one is perfect for spring and rapidly approaching summertime. I’ve got my record player set up in my room that connects to my back porch so I can hang out outside while making the whole neighborhood listen to whatever I’m listening to, but I don’t think anyone would have a problem with this. I honestly don’t have much to say about this other than every song on here is a banger. If I had to pick one track that’s stuck out as my favorite at the moment, it would probably be Coconut Woman by The Freddie Munnings Orchestra. An absolute ear worm, so many of the lyrics on this song are so quotable. Other favorites would be Uptown Top Ranking (Althea and Donna), Step Softly (Bobby Ellis), Jungle Lion (Lee Perry and The Upsetters) and Let’s Dub It Up (Dee Sharp) but honestly I could make a case to just list every song on here. Definitely check this one out if you haven’t already.

Hi Sorry State fam! Hope everyone had a good weekend, and that all mothers and mother figures felt the love from their families. Well, maybe not all mothers. Some moms straight up suck. But I’m a mom and I think I’m pretty good, and my family made sure I had a really nice day with cards and gifts and dinner. Anyway, let’s get on with it.

So my staff pick this week relates to an artist who is I respect very much, who has been a big part of my music life for well over half my life, and who unfortunately passed away last week: Steve Albini. I gotta say I’m not that affected when many “famous people” die. But this one hurt. The last one was probably Robin Williams.

I’m gonna cut straight to the music because otherwise we would be here for a while. So this past week I have been listening to several albums produced by Steve Albini. I never realized how many I had in my collection. He had such a distinct style and produced so many incredible sounding albums. The ones that really stand out from a production perspective include the Pixies’ Surfer Rosa, Breeders’ Pod, PJ Harvey’s Rid of Me, and Nirvana’s In Utero. Holy drums. No one recorded drums like Albini. That damn PJ Harvey record may just be the finest in the bunch. So raw and powerful. Like the band is right there in the room with you.

I’ve also been listening to a lot of Shellac. Which brings me to my staff pick this week! At Action Park by Shellac. Self-described as a minimalist trio, and described by others as noise rock or math rock. I still don’t know what the hell math rock means. But to me they are quite possibly the best and most interesting noise rock band ever. Dark, punishing, arty, noisy, experimental, yet minimalist. Minimalist yet with great storytelling and dark humor. Minimalist yet still very colorful. Especially in the way the lead guitar is utilized. As if they threw away the directions to the instrument before ever seeing a guitar before. It wasn’t about the riffs but about the texture the lead guitar added to the music.

Something interesting about Shellac is how melody takes a backseat to the rhythm section’s more brutal, cyclical, grooves. Kind of repetitive but never boring. The tempo shifts are extreme and sudden. And the vocals are distant but abrasive and magnetic. Even a little creepy. Song of the Minerals embodies these adjectives the best. Definitely my favorite song on the album. Albini had a fascination with the darker parts of humanity, which you hear in his prior works as well as Shellac. But the way these themes are expressed and how they substantiate the music is more creatively mature and interesting than Big Black (in my opinion). While Big Black is hard to top in the Abini discography, I think Shellac does it with this album. And they definitely do it with 1000 Hurts (2000). Shellac’s sound is not as much a departure as it is a progression or expansion of Big Black. Their sound is more unhinged and less domesticated than other post-hardcore/post-rock bands like the Jesus Lizard, but if you like the Jesus Lizard or Slint and you missed out on Shellac, definitely give them a listen. Personally, the Jesus Lizard and I never really clicked, and not for lack of trying.

At Action Park is just what 1994 needed, and it was met with high praise. It feels like it could be the soundtrack to doomsday when only a handful of people are left and they are all really cool. Picture it. The song Pull the Cup feels like a perfect doomsday track. It’s the type of song where you kind of wait in anticipation. Will it brighten up? Stay the course? Go darker? No. But there is a curious intensity to it. The first few times I heard it, it made me feel a little anxious. I think that’s a good thing.

I’ve always loved the packaging of this record. It’s a folded hand pressed sleeve and what’s known as a uni-pak style album jacket. On one side of the sleeve is a fictional map of Action Park and on the other side the medical text, Resuscitation from apparent death by electric shock. I guess the text came from one of their old electronics textbooks. “Smoking is as natural as breathing. They’ve been doing it since before I was born... ... which is a shame, because I could have invented it. - Todd Stanford Trainer 1994” is etched on both sides of the vinyl. Perfectly fucking weird. Just like Shellac.

I don’t think Shellac is recognized and credited as much as they should be. I’m so glad they recorded a new album before Albini passed. Their first album in ten years, To All Trains, comes out Friday. And I cannot wait to hear it! Thanks as always for reading. Until next time..

-Angela

Hello and thanks for reading. I think the week before last I mentioned a handful of bootlegs we had just got in stock. It appears the 7"s are sold out now, but we still have a few copies of the East Punks compilation. It seems like the same person had made all three boots, but I don’t really know that for sure and I probably shouldn’t try too hard to figure it out, haha. I haven’t written about a boot in a while, and I don’t buy them often. Usually, I don’t think much of them cos more times than not an official reissue follows. I think the last boot I wrote about was the BLACK UNIFORMS Faces of Death 12". It was nicely done. It seemed just like the original. But if it’s unofficial and looks seemingly identical to the OG, I think that is a bit whack. I felt super inclined to pick up a copy of each of these Japanese boots cos I had never heard of a single band except GASMASK. This 7" split with GASMASK and BARRICADE seems like total fan club shit, haha. The idea of creating your own split for a bootleg, I mean. I will talk more about that split in a minute, as it is my actual staff pick this week. But first, the PISS 7" I know nothing about. At first, I wondered if it was this same PISS from this compilation. I had never heard of this compilation either, but it’s pretty sick. It’s also sick that all the bands are comprised of only women! Luckily, a friend informed me the PISS on the boot are from Kyushu, the same city as CONFUSE, and this recording is somewhere between 1982 and 1985. Cos of the GASMASK split 7", I thought the East Punks 12" was also a fanclub kinda layout cos I could find nothing about an original release online. I managed to find a demo of one of these bands on YouTube, ZAMZA, and it fuckin rips. But luckily again, the same friend informed me that this compilation was originally released on cassette, and it features bands from Shizuoka. The sound quality ain’t amazing, but I think it still sounds good for what it is. Who knows how good it even sounded originally. And obviously whoever made the boot sourced it from their original mega-hyper-rare cassette. The A side starts off strong as hell with this raw ass-beater shit called WILD BONVERS. The sound quality is probably best for them and ZAMZA. Regardless of the sound kinda being all over the place, it’s safe to say each band fucking rips.

Getting into the GASMASK split with BARRICADE, the GASMASK tracks were unreleased until now—what the fuck?! How did they do that? Fuck. Maybe these recordings have been passed around in some tight Japanese nerd circles, and some are not impressed. But for someone like me, I find this incredible! Haha oh shit, but now I am thinking about how Crust War previously reissued GASMASK, so maybe permission could have been granted. I think this is where I say something like ‘but I digress.’ The GASMASK tracks on this split are so damn good. I’ve just been listening on repeat. It sounds pretty much nothing like their one and only EP. Ah shit that’s a lie. On that GASMASK/COWARD split reissue Crust War did, they featured a good amount of bonus songs. One of them is an unreleased GASMASK track from 1987. That must be from the same session as the tracks on this boot 7". The sound and the style are the same. They play much faster on the material after their EP. They still have their noisy characteristics, but it comes out in a different, more chaotic fashion. Their catchy aspects evolved more into a metallic, anthemic sound. I absolutely love the evolution. I don’t think there is any relation to BARRICADE with GASMASK. I don’t think they share members, and I am pretty positive they weren’t from the same city. The BARRICADE stuff on this split is from 1983 as well. See what I mean when I said this is some total fanclub shit? Haha. Two bands from different cities, and a handful of years apart. Maybe I am just not knowledgeable enough to recognize the relation. I learned the BARRICADE stuff had been previously released on a super obscure compilation called Rock’n Roll Boogie ‘83 Now Hits. It seems they stand out unbelievably by being the only band on the LP playing hardcore punk. It’s interesting they are the only band who’s got more than one song on there too. If you hadn’t heard this shit like me, you can check a song here. Alright, I should get going actually. Thanks for reading and thanks for your support. Cheers!

E.T.A.: We Are the Attack 7” (2002, Deranged Records)

This 2002 7” from Sweden’s E.T.A. (aka Epileptic Terror Attack) holds a special place in my heart. I picked it up when the band played Richmond in the summer of 2002. I’m not sure I recognized it at the time, but it was a significant moment. I had been gobbling up everything referred to at the time as “Y2K thrash” (Tear It Up’s Nothing to Nothing was probably my favorite record of that year), but there was something even cooler just over the horizon. I had seen Total Fury play the summer before. Brandon Ferrell had joined Municipal Waste on drums and they were covering early Poison Idea. Amdi Petersen’s Armé played Richmond, but I missed the gig (one of my biggest show-related regrets ever), but thankfully I made it out when E.T.A. played at the Hardcore Holocaust warehouse. Within two or three years, it felt like there was a whole scene of retro 80s US-style hardcore bands wearing combat boots, tight jeans, and denim vests, but as these early moments were happening, they felt like glimpses into another world, one I desperately wanted to immerse myself in.

Nowadays, I don’t hear too many people mention E.T.A., but when they do, it’s usually in the context of Regulations, which featured 3 of E.T.A.’s 4 members. It’s easy to read E.T.A.’s discography as the members groping toward the sound they eventually locked in with Regulations. I haven’t spent too much time with E.T.A.’s first few releases on the Swedish label Putrid Filth Conspiracy, but they’re more aggro than the later material, and while Otto’s vocals are pretty much there, the band hasn’t adopted that punky west coast style they’d perfect later. I’ve seen people describe E.T.A.’s early stuff as having a more traditional Swedish hardcore sound, but it’s not d-beat… more like fast scissor-beat hardcore… closer to Filthy Christians than Anti-Cimex or Mob 47.

By the time E.T.A. released their split 12” with Tear It Up and their No Faith LP in 2001, their music was showing more influence from early 80s US hardcore, particularly the more melodic west coast variety. Many songs referenced skateboarding in the lyrics. The guitar riffs were brighter, swingier, and more prominent in the mix rather than taking a back seat to the cacophonous drumming. And while the drummer still relied on scissor beats on the fast parts, they’re a notch slower, giving the songs a steadier, more confident groove, and there are more mid-paced parts that rely on classic surf-punk rhythms. Like the guitars, the vocals occupy more space in the mix, shouted in a youthful hardcore style and with memorable melodies, even serving up some hooky “whoas” on tracks like “Fucked for Life.” And in case you couldn’t tell which way the wind was blowing, No Faith closed with a cover of the Circle Jerks’ “Beverly Hills,” just to drive the point home.

Which brings us to 2002’s We Are the Attack. You might expect E.T.A.’s final record to sound the most like Regulations, and in some ways it does. Certainly they’ve honed those west coast punk parts, as you hear on the mid-paced parts of “Looking for a Spot” and on their cover of “Dicks Hate the Police” (re-titled “Otto Hates the Police”), which makes that song sound like something from the Beach Boulevard compilation. E.T.A. is also confident in their delivery of big hooks, like on the singalong “I’m a Bore.” But on the other hand, We Are the Attack is more aggro than No Faith. Maybe that’s because it’s an 8-song 7” in the early Dischord / Touch and Go format, but the recording is rougher and the band sounds meaner too, with lots of fast scissor beat parts like on their earlier material. At their best, E.T.A. infuses this more hardcore material with their growing propensity for memorable hooks, like on the standout track “Lose My Mind,” a chaotic hardcore song in the Victim in Pain mold. As with early AF, though, E.T.A. weaves a memorable call-and-response vocal and dynamic rhythmic change-ups into the melee.

By the time Regulations released their first 7” one year later in 2003, they’d excised the gnarlier elements from their sound, fully embracing their early SoCal influences with a thinner, more vintage-y guitar sound and bigger punk hooks. I don’t think many people would argue that E.T.A. was a better band than Regulations, but in order to become Regulations, they had to leave behind parts of E.T.A.’s sound. In the context of these musicians’ development, We Are the Attack captures a unique moment where much of what made Regulations so great was coming together, but the musical possibilities remained more open and less dictated by their influences. And it also articulates this brief but exciting moment when the scene was right on the bubble between the Y2K thrash era and “the No Way years.”

What’s up Sorry State readers? I hope everyone is having a nice week. Last week was my birthday, and I got to spend the weekend hanging out and relaxing at the beach with my friends, which was really nice. We even got to go to an old school skating rink, which also was a bunch of fun. My wonderful girlfriend knocked it out of the park with her gift and got me this live Doc and Merle Watson record that I’ve wanted for a while now. I never buy records online honestly cause it feels silly when I work in a record store. Coincidentally, this record was recorded on May 2nd, 1974, exactly fifty years from this past Thursday. Like the Live Johnny Cash record I wrote about months ago, this show was recorded by Owsley “Bear” Stanley, in his own unique way to make it sound like you’ve travelled back in time and are sitting right there in the crowd. They get things started with Wabash Cannonball, cause every show needs a train song to kick things off. Another song I really enjoyed on the first side was A Rovin’ On a Winter’s Night, which I had just heard for the first time a few weeks ago when I saw Billy Strings in Nashville and instantly fell in love with it. As I’ve said with every other live bluegrass album I’ve written about, I always love the banter and jokes in between songs. It really breathes life into the recording and makes it feel more personal. Other favorites of mine on here include Tennessee Stud, Peach Pickin’ Time in Georgia, Walk on Boy and Brown’s Ferry Blues. I’m so thankful Owsley Stanley took it upon himself to record such amazing and intimate performances so that we can enjoy them half a century later. Thank a taper today. Hopefully in fifty years I’ll be listening to a live record of a show I attended and think back fondly of the memory and remember all the small little details that happen in between songs.

Hi Sorry State fam! What’s up? Happy Cinco de Mayo on this rainy Sunday (as I write this)! At least in Raleigh, the weather is pretty wet and humid. There’s a nice celebration going on at a park near me, but it just started raining harder, so I may not get to partake in any delicious Mexican cuisine. It’s kinda gross to eat in the rain, anyway. Let’s see what else have I been up to? Oh! I got to see Sunny Day Real Estate a few days ago here in Raleigh at a sold out show. It was the 30th (yikes!) anniversary of their album Diary, so they played it in its entirety! I’ve only been to one other show like that where a band plays one of their old albums, and it was Less Than Jake last summer. Those shows are so fun because you are guaranteed to hear many of your favorite songs. I got to see SDRE last year at Hopscotch, but festival set lists are a lot different. They are usually pared down and don’t typically feature any deep cuts. So after this last show, I am feeling satiated. It’s crazy how many old bands have come out of the woodwork post-pandemic to reunite and tour again, but I am not complaining.

So my staff pick is sort of bittersweet. I don’t know why I dropped the ball on this one when we first received it (AND in a specially Sorry State exclusive color!). I’m ashamed of myself because this album should’ve been drilling my ear holes the minute we got it in. I didn’t mean to make a pun. The record is by the band Drill and it’s called Permanent. Which is pretty ironic, as I learned that this is a posthumous release, and there’s nothing permanent about the band, as they’ve already broken up. But it’s still a permanently fantastic album, and one of the most uniquely likable and exciting LP’s I’ve heard in a long time. The second I popped it on I knew it was for me.

The Philly trio is comprised of drums, bass, and synth. It’s a blend of arty, synthy, noisy, cheeky, risk-taking, impact-making, melodic post-punk. I haven’t heard something quite like this record. It’s very bass-driven, and the bass anchors this layered and frantic whirlwind of sound perfectly. The vocals are cheeky and aggressive, and sometimes desperate and frustrated. The vocal style changes add so much flavor to the music. The title track, Within Reason, is by far the best song on the album. I have that one on repeat. Within seconds, I was hooked. It was like I stumbled across a buried treasure that I wasn’t even looking for. A song that checks all of my boxes, as though it was written for the sole purpose of satisfying me. A pure banger.

The music has a 90s indie rock foundation akin to the Breeders, in that’s it experimental, atmospheric, and noisy, but in a much more brazen way. They don’t sound like the Breeders, but I could see how a band like this may use their style as a blueprint and then make it their own. The song Eggs for Now makes me think of the Breeders’ beautifully warped masterpiece, Pod. The Breeders ruffled the feathers of their indie sound by pulling in weird sounds, but it was more like background noise to add dimension, whereas Drill puts their weirdo sounds right out in front. The vocals shift from soft and doll-like to manic and screechy, but more abrasive and with much less commercial appeal. That is certainly not a bad thing. Most of the tracks are catchy and interesting, but I will admit I’m not a huge fan of the last song called Rocks. I don’t like extended periods of noise. I like songs that are more structured, and I don’t want to search for the beat. But this is just a minor gripe.

Overall, the album is just so eclectic and jam-packed full of sound and creativity that you just have to experience for yourself. But if you like the hyper-bizarre sound of Spread Joy, the melodic pop of Divorcer, the incredibly infectious synth punk of Cherry Cheeks, and the hardcore style (and similar vocals) of Judy and the Jerks, this one’s for you!

Thank you so much for reading! Until we meet again, friends.

-Angela

Hello and thanks for reading. I haven’t been listening to a ton of records lately, just a few here and there. I have found myself playing my partner’s Nintendo Switch basically any time I have free time. This is like a handheld video game for those who don’t know, like a Gameboy but way more advanced. I have even been making time between work and rehearsal to squeeze in some video games, haha. We will see how long this lasts though, as I am not a big fan of video games or television. Usually, I would rather spend my time with something on the turntable rather than something on the television. So let us get to the records then, and I wanted to start with Hardcore Knockouts.

To be honest, the results shocked me, cos in my mind BLACK UNIFORMS is a much ‘cooler’ band. (For the record, I voted for ASTA KASK.) These two bands are extremely different and a bit strange to match up, but maybe a lot of people got my joke. This is a ‘special edition’ of Hardcore Knockouts, cos it’s about beef. I’m not really sure if ASTA KASK really had any direct beef with BLACK UNIFORMS, but BLACK UNIFORMS certainly had something to say about ASTA KASK in their song F.O.A.D. I was a huge ASTA KASK fan for many years before BLACK UNIFORMS, so when I heard this song that started with an ASTA KASK intro, I lost my mind laughing. ASTA KASK is like basically pop-punk by today’s standards (and I hate pop-punk), but the way it’s executed is absolutely perfect if you ask me. They sound a bit meaner and rougher than a pop-punk band would, but they are certainly melodic as fuck. I love how catchy the choruses are, and the gang vocals really hit the spot for me. I wrote about ASTA KASK a handful of years ago when their EPs were reissued on cassette. Going back just now to read, it was actually pretty informative. My memory sucks… But I went back there cos I wanted to point out that while ASTA KASK was on the poppy side of things, they played an important role in hardcore punk from Sweden at the time. The band was started by Micke Blomqvist, who operated his own recording studio through the 80s called Kloakens Alternativa Antistudio. At his studio, legendary bands like ANTI CIMEX, AVSKUM, ASOCIAL, SVART PARAD, CRUDE SS, NYX NEGATIVE, and RÖVSVETT all recorded. You can read a bit more in the link I dropped above, and I am pretty sure I have copies of the tape I mentioned still. If you need one, you know where to find me.

Moving on, one of the best records of 2023 is now back in print on Sorry State, and that is the G.U.N. LP. I remember the first time I heard this. It was when I was listening to a test press while making covers for them. I didn’t know what to expect at all and I could not believe how good it was. I mean obviously right, or I would have been playing the masters like mad before we even got the tests, haha. I think everyone I know thinks this the LP is killer, hence it selling out pretty fast and us being asked about it repeatedly since. Well, it’s back in print now with a pretty small pressing of 300 copies. They are all on yellow vinyl and they all come with a cool color poster. Alongside this LP, Sorry State is also dropping a ‘new’ PERSONAL DAMAGE 7" and I think it is absolutely amazing!! One thing that really gets me with this band is how damn good the recordings sound. At times, it legit sounds like you’re listening to an 80s record. They don’t hide behind some lo-fi aspects with a blown-out recording or something to emulate an old recording. The recording is pretty clean, and the drums sound especially good. Oh, I said new in quotations, cos this 7" was actually a tape not too long ago if you missed that one. Well, it’s excellent, so good thing Daniel decided to put it out on a more permanent format. Dropping these two hot ass slabs together is quite a release day if you ask me. I can listen to both of these records non-stop, and they never get old. Both records end with such catchy songs that stay stuck in my head for hours or even days after listening.

So it’s been a while since I last wrote, and last time I did I mentioned KRIEGSHÖG. We had just stocked the fresh repress of their debut (and masterpiece) LP. Well, that shit sold out fast as hell, but I am sure we will restock it. Since then, we have gotten in copies of their brand-new LP entitled Love & Revenge. I’ve listened to this LP pretty heavily. I was lucky enough to land a test press, and that got some serious rotation on my turntable. I was not sure what to expect with such a large gap between releases, and yet another line-up change. I think it’s safe to say this LP is a certified banger. The sound is extremely different from that of their debut, so don’t go into it ready to compare or you’re going to be let down. I will probably write more on this LP later, as I have a lot of thoughts on it. I also want to do some nerding out on the line-up changes over the years.

Alright, now it’s time for my actual staff pick. My pick this week doesn’t have anything to do with a new release, and it really has (almost) nothing to do with hardcore. I don’t know if I have ever mentioned THE SPECIALS here before, but this stuff is integral listening if you ask me. When I got into punk as a teenager, I also learned about ska and reggae around the same time. It’s always interesting when I meet punks who don’t fuck with ska. I understand third-wave ska and beyond was really bad, but that’s not the shit I am talking about. Traditional ska and rocksteady from Jamaica are what I mean. If you don’t know the history of ska and skinhead, then maybe you don’t quite understand what I mean when I say I find it interesting when punks don’t fuck with ska. Just like punk and hardcore, I find ska and punk inseparable. I don’t know enough about the history of ska to confidently explain the evolution and relationship of ska, skinhead, and punk, but I know Dominic can school us all on this stuff. If I remember right, Dominic attended some of those 2 Tone gigs that originally happened back in England. I was introduced to 2 Tone via THE SPECIALS, a handful of years after my introduction to ska. THE SPECIALS actually were the band to coin this term ‘2 Tone’ and they (namely Jerry Dammers) also started the label called 2 Tone Records. If I remember right, it is named as such to reference the unity of whites and blacks in their subculture, as well as the fusion of punk and ska in their music. It was an important movement, as racial tensions in England were getting out of hand, including at these gigs. While I find the ska-punk of today to be pretty hilariously bad, THE SPECIALS were the first band that I know about who incorporated elements of ska and punk together. If you ask me, it’s a beautiful fusion. I can never get enough SPECIALS. It is 100% feel-good music that makes me want to dance no matter what.

After many years as a SPECIALS fanatic, one day I came across this bootleg LP at a record shop. I didn’t know what it was exactly, but it said “THE SPECIALS” across the front so I bought it without question. I went home and discovered it is a very early version of THE SPECIALS. At this point, they were not known as THE SPECIALS, but THE AUTOMATICS. I am 99% certain this stuff was recorded for John Peel (no surprise there). The sound is not quite the 2 tone style I knew them for, as it seems that evolution hadn’t quite hit yet. It seems the line-up is almost identical to THE SPECIALS, however legend John Bradbury (R.I.P.) had not joined the band on drums yet. I think his drumming seriously elevated THE SPECIALS, but man, hearing these significantly different versions of songs I knew like the back of my hand was SO COOL. I can’t stress that enough. I have a lot of friends who get down with THE SPECIALS, and not one has ever known about this stuff before I played it for them. Well, surprise, Dominic was the exception to that, haha. I wanted to mention this here today, cos maybe there are some friends of mine who are reading, or SPECIALS fanatics, who haven’t yet heard this stuff! They recorded almost all the songs again on their debut LP, but there are a few that never appear again. And one of them is one of my all-time favorite SPECIALS tracks, Look But Don’t Touch. While I said earlier that THE SPECIALS are 100% feel-good, this song is an exception for me. Look But Don’t Touch hits me layers deep and brings out a bit of sadness. It’s good to feel sad at times. I haven’t given THE SPECIALS a real listen since Terry Hall passed away. Earlier this week I found myself listening to a later SPECIALS song after talking to a friend... This later era of the band did not have Terry Hall, as he had formed Fun Boy Three alongside another former SPECIALS member, Neville Staple. After watching this music video, I went onto the music video of their first hit track Ghost Town. And down the pipeline I went. You can hear the full LP I’m holding in my hand here. Also, nice timing, my partner coincidentally just sent me this YouTube video. It focuses on Ghost Town in a way, but it also gives a brief breakdown of the culture and influences at that time.

OK, I’ve said quite a bit about not a whole lot that’s relevant to Sorry State, so I should stop now. We recently got these bootlegs of some Japanese shit in stock. Two of these releases I have absolutely no idea about, but I think the GASMASK is unreleased material! I am out of town so I haven’t checked them out yet, but you can expect a review from me sooner than later! Alright everyone, thanks for reading and thanks for your support. Cheers!

What’s up Sorry Staters? Today, as I write, it’s May 4th, so, May The Fourth Be With You. As a Star Wars fan, I thought it appropriate to make my staff pick thematic with the day. So, let’s discover Patrick Gleeson’s Star Wars on Mercury Records from 1977.

First off, this is not a hard to find or pricey record by any means. I found mine cheap in a bargain bin, but as with many similar records it punches above its weight. The current Discogs median is just $5, to give you an idea. But don’t ever let that put you off being curious about a record’s worth. I’ll throw up many $1 records as examples of music that is far superior to a lot of junk that gets passed as music these days and has the nerve to charge punters $50 plus for the pleasure of owning it. But the price of new records is a discussion for another time and place.

Back to Star Wars. I went to the opening weekend screening of the film back in 1977 as an eight-year-old kid and went back several times over the course of that summer. Over the years, I watched the original trio of films many times over, in all their versions. I’ll admit to not being a huge fan of the prequels when they first came out, but have warmed to them over time. I’d say the same about the sequel trilogy, although I have only seen each of those just the once. Not being a Disney subscriber, I still have not seen the Mandalorian series or any of the other animated Star Wars universe films and shows. Whilst living in New York, I had the opportunity to go to the premiere for one of the prequel films, which was more memorable for me standing in line with the nerds because that was when Triumph the Insult Comic Dog filmed a great segment having fun with some of the folks there. None of my party were dressed in costume, so were spared the potential ridicule, but we were thrilled to see Triumph and his handler Robert Smigel doing their thing as we were big fans. Around about that time Smigel had his TV Funhouse show on Comedy Central, which only ran for a season, but was comedy gold in my opinion. Seek it out if you can. Anyway, all this to say that I like Star Wars and honestly any sci-fi TV series or film set in space. Star Trek, Battlestar Galactica, Dr. Who, you name it and I’m probably into it. A big part of the enjoyment for any of these has always been the music and, as I have mentioned many times in these pages, I am a big soundtrack fan and collector. Hence me naturally being drawn to this version of the Star Wars music.

So, the first thing to say about this record is that it is not a simple note-for-note rerecording of the original John Williams score by someone trying to make a quick cash in. There were a few of them in the wake of the film’s success and sci-fi in general. My record collection has several such examples. A lot aren’t that bad. Most people know the one by the artist known as Meco and his Star Wars and Other Galactic Funk. That’s a good one and again easy and cheap to find if you’re into this type of stuff. The Patrick Gleeson version was recorded in July and released in August 1977, just two months after the release of the movie. Gleeson wasn’t responding to the movie like the average movie goer and fan; he had anticipated the release ever since George Lucas began discussing its production back in 1975. In fact, Gleeson, confident in his ability and knowledge of synthesized music, put himself forward to be the one who would score this new movie for Lucas. Obviously, that task fell to John Williams and the LSO after Williams was recommended to Lucas by his directing pal Steven Spielberg. But the idea of Gleeson being the one to produce the music wasn’t just wishful thinking on his part. Over the previous eight or so years, he had made a name for himself within the music industry for his pioneering use of synths and electronic music. Gleeson was an English professor at San Francisco State who had been dabbling in early electronic music during the mid 1960s. In 1968, partly in support and sympathy of protesting students, he gave up his position to become a full-time musician. After hearing Wendy Carlos’s pioneering record, Switched On Bach, he took some money his dad lent him and bought a Moog synthesizer. Soon after, he founded the Different Fur Recording Studio, which initially provided a space for him to record music for independent film and low budget television. Within a short time, his reputation brought him to work for a lot of musicians, particularly in the jazz field, who were experimenting in future sounds for their music. The biggest name being that of Herbie Hancock, who hired Gleeson to set up synth pads for him to use. On meeting Gleeson and seeing him at work, Hancock asked him to play on the recordings rather than teach him how to play the synths. Gleeson ended up joining Hancock and his band for the recording of Crossings and then Sextant, and would appear at some live gigs playing the synth patterns live, something that was very new back then. Through his work and success with Herbie Hancock, Gleeson would make connections with lots of similar minded musicians, including Charles Earland and Eddie Henderson, who utilized his synth work on their albums.

In 1976, Gleeson released an album called Beyond The Sun, which was an electronic take on Holst’s The Planets. The album, with liner notes by Wendy Carlos, was nominated for a Grammy. So, with all this behind him, Gleeson released his most commercial album the following year with the Star Wars record. On the album, the songs are based on the John Williams originals but given a much different treatment. In places, the themes are recognizable, but in others not so much. Also, although much of the music was created using synths, humans are utilized throughout. Particularly drummers, and some damn fine ones, too. Billy Cobham and Harvey Mason are two names that any 70s jazz fusion head should be familiar with. There are also vocals provided by a singer named Sarah Baker (who I couldn’t find much about) and the early use of a Lyricon (a synthesized wind instrument) played by Lenny Pickett, who would later lead the Saturday Night Live Band.

The album comes with a two-sided insert with notes from Gleeson explaining the technical details of the recordings along with his thoughts on the project. He says himself that he thought he was the one who should have scored the film, although he doesn’t knock the work of John Williams and understood why Lucas went the direction he did. Gleeson would eventually fulfill his ambition to score music for a Star Wars project when, in the 80s, he contributed to the Ewoks TV show. His resume is full of notable work, be it for soundtracks or contributing to other artist’s albums. If you start to look, you’ll see his name popping up in the credits of a lot of records. If Herbie Hancock thought he was cool and smart, then you know he must have been.

Okay, gotta catch the deadline. Go check this one out whether you’re a Star Wars fan or just a lover of interesting electronic music. Or both. Here’s a link.

Cheers - Dom

What’s up Sorry Staters?

I know I had plenty of extra time on my hands over this past weekend, so why am I always scrambling? Just an indication of my true lunatic-like tendencies. In just a couple days, I’m hopping on a train and hitting the road and the skies with Public Acid. We’re playing a couple shows in NYC and then meeting up with our friends in KOS in Seattle. We’ll be touring down the west coast and ending at Lie Detector Fest in LA. It’s gonna be sick. Hope to see some west coast friends I haven’t seen in a long time on this trip. It’s gonna be a blast, but I always get the pre-travel anxiety jitters a few days before. Feelin’ a little crazy.

Anyway, let’s talk about records. Recently, Sorry State did a big distro order from Nada Nada Discos. It’s so rad to me that the label has expanded beyond solely doing punk reissues. Under the flipped around version of the label, when they use “Discos Nada” instead, they’re doing mostly all Brazilian music but in genres of all kinds—whether it’s jazz, avant-garde, electronic… you name it. And yet, for the purposes of my staff pick, we’re still gonna talk about a punk record. Big surprise.

Inocentes is one of those bands where I’ve definitely heard the name, but I don’t really think I’ve taken the time to sit down and fully digest an entire record by them. I debated writing about this Cólera record, too. I was already familiar with Cólera because of their appearance on the classic SUB compilation. Cólera definitely plays at hardcore-speed tempos, but with anthemic, melodic vocals that maybe even hint at Oi! influence from time to time. With that in mind, I wasn’t really sure what to expect with Inocentes.

This LP we just stocked from Nada Nada Discos is a reissue of Inocentes’ first 12” release, entitled Pânico Em S.P. Originally released in 1986, Pânico Em S.P. is really a 12” EP with only 6 songs on it. This Nada Nada reissue puts the whole studio session on Side A, and then Side B has a 1986 live performance which actually sounds pretty good. Firstly, though, the studio side sounds amazing. Kicking right in with the first track “Rotina”, I already knew this LP was gonna be right up my alley. Inocentes play at a mostly upbeat mid-tempo pace with songs that sound pretty melodic and catchy. That said, rather than the kind of anthemic, Oi!-gang beer-sloggin’ folk melodies that I mentioned with Cólera, I would say Inocentes has way more in common with early punk from Southern California. I hear a huge surf influence. Pounding tom grooves that launch into lightning speed ride cymbal Bill Stevenson-esque double-snare-hit beats. Most notably, when I hear the washy, reverby, but mostly clean swells of guitar and the spidery walking bass lines, these elements lead me to believe the dudes in Inocentes probably had Living In Darkness on heavy rotation. On a track like “Salvem El Salvador,” the singer is barking what I can only assume are intense, politically driven chants over top of a riff that sounds like a blend of the riff from “Abolish Government” by TSOL and a single-note riff lifted from the nastiest sounding Ventures instrumental.

While this other band is from Uruguay, this Inocentes record is scratching a similar itch as that Los Invasores record I loved from several months back. What I think is so cool about records like this Inocentes 12” is that you can hear a clear blend of influences, whether it’s SoCal surf-infused punk, new wave, goth… Still, the result comes out sounding totally unique with the Latino punk influence and maybe some other things in their sound I couldn’t even pinpoint. Man, I even hear a little bit of that signature familiar chord change in a song “Ele Disse Não,” which I directly associate with my young over-indulgence of bands on Epitaph before discovering hardcore. All this is to basically get across the idea that I hear things about Inocentes that grab my ear because they are comfortable and I’m sucker for it, but their take on this sound is so different and well-done that it feels totally fresh and exciting. Nada Nada did a great job with the packaging as well. Super thick, high-quality laminated gatefold sleeve (oh baby, I Iove a laminated sleeve). It also comes with a printed inner sleeve, a poster, and 3 additional leaflet inserts. And it’s on clear vinyl!

Anyway, Inocentes rule. Now I gotta check out some of the band’s other records in greater detail. I know at least early in the day on the day this newsletter comes out, Sorry State still had a few copies of Pânico Em S.P. in stock. If my write-up got your attention at all, definitely try and snag a copy if you’re new to Inocentes like me. Highly recommend.

Anyway, that’s all I’ve got this week. As always, thanks for reading.

‘Til next week,

-Jeff

Tomorrow’s Uproar AI Compilation (MA Glory, 2024)

I’ve spent plenty of time listening to music over the past week, but the sounds that have dominated my brain space are the ones on this AI-generated hardcore compilation my friend Adam sent me. Adam sent me the link to Tomorrow’s Uproar after reading my discussion with Woodstock 99 in a previous Sorry State newsletter, in which the band explained how they used AI on their new album, 99 Ta Life. While Brandon from WS99 warned us that AI was coming for our beloved punk subgenres, I didn’t think I’d hear something like this mere weeks later.

There isn’t much info on the Bandcamp page that hosts Tomorrow’s Uproar, just that “The music, vocals, lyrics, song titles, and album art for this record were all generated using AI” and the credit, “Generated using AI by Trevor Vaughan.” A quick Google search didn’t turn up any coverage of or chatter about the album, and I’m left curious about the tools and methods Vaughan used to put together the release. Based on the limited time I’ve spent playing with AI interfaces, we’re not anywhere near the point where you can type “make a hardcore compilation LP” into an AI interface and have it spit out something as on the money as Tomorrow’s Uproar. I find that AI tends to work best when you get a back-and-forth dialogue going with it, refining its responses through multiple iterations, so while the AI gets top billing, I imagine a lot of human thought still went into Tomorrow’s Uproar.

My first impression when I scanned the track listing for Tomorrow’s Uproar was that it reminded me of hardcore parody projects like Grudge and Crucial Youth. Both those projects parodied hardcore’s tendency toward vapidity and embrace of cliche, and how AI cobbles together punk-sounding words into conflagrations like Edge of Resistance, Concrete Annihilation, and Steel Core Rebellion echoes how pastiche divorces form from content, using words as interchangeable puzzle pieces rather than as symbols standing in for more profound thoughts. You hear the same thing in the lyrics, like how “Concrete Annihilation” starts with the line, “I’m haaaaaard / like these concrete streets.” But while that line and titles like “Fists of Defiance” are ham-handed, others like “Stand As One” are more on the money. In fact, “Stand As One” is the title of a Cause for Alarm song, and has served many times as a band name or album title for hardcore bands whose members are all human. Maybe AI isn’t yet smart enough to figure out that “Stand As One” is acceptably cliche while “Fists of Defiance” is dumb, but it’s only a matter of time. I bet your first band was pretty generic, too.

The relationship to its source material seems in flux throughout Tomorrow’s Uproar. Sometimes you can hear exactly what’s it’s trying to do, like how the vocal on “Tomorrow’s Uproar” is clearly modeled on Rollins, or how “Curb of Broken Dreams” starts with a title lifted from Green Day, gets going with a total Blink 182 riff, then the vocals slide into Fat Mike. The lyrics are spot-on Fat Mike too, perfectly imitating his somewhat clumsy rhymes and metaphors. At other points, I can’t tell what the exact inspiration is, and those parts are more interesting, but perhaps it’s just because I’m not familiar with what the AI is cribbing from. It’s like how sometimes I’ll watch a sketch on Saturday Night Live and think it’s a hilarious piece of absurdity, only to find it’s some pop culture tidbit I hadn’t heard about, barely amplified or altered from its original source. Again, so much on Tomorrow’s Uproar reminds me of the work of a young artist who is too in love with their inspirations and whose radar for cliche isn’t yet sophisticated enough.

There’s also the odd moment on Tomorrow’s Uproar when I think to myself, “that actually wasn’t bad.” “Viper’s Betrayal” works perfectly well as a parody of tough-guy hardcore, but when the singer shouts “just another Judas…” and then the gang vocals respond “BETRAYAL IS YOUR ACT,” I have to admit it’s not the worst take on the time-worn hardcore lyrical trope of backstabbing I’ve ever heard. If that line had appeared in a Ten Yard Fight song when I was a teenager, you can bet I would have been singing along. Even 44-year-old me struggles with the last track, “Streets of Discontent,” though. This song’s tuneful skate rock reminds me of Code of Honor, and the line “chains and spikes we stand, we tower tall” sparks a twinge of feeling that I wouldn’t expect to get from computer-generated gobbledygook. This track is the clearest sign that, quite soon, AI might generate something I’d listen to unironically.

I think the biggest thing keeping Tomorrow’s Uproar in the uncanny valley is the songs’ lack of adherence to conventional structures. From what I understand, Large Language Models like ChatGPT work by generating texts word-by-word, calculating the word that is most likely to follow the previous words in the sequence… I think that’s the reason that, when you chat with an LLM, you see its responses appear on your screen gradually in words or chunks of words rather than all at once. The songs on Tomorrow’s Uproar seem to work the same way. Where you’d expect them to return to a previous riff and iterate an idea through another, similarly structured verse, they just keep plowing forward. The way songs seem to build toward a resolution that never arrives gives me a seasick feeling, like I’ve fallen into a bottomless pit. Again, though, that seems like a problem that shouldn’t be too hard to fix… I bet the technology that created these tracks could produce more conventionally structured songs with more or better prompts.

I’m not really sure what I think about Tomorrow’s Uproar overall. I thoroughly enjoyed that first listen when I was howling with laughter, and if you’re reading this, you’ll probably enjoy your first listen just as much. I’m curious to see what comes next, though. This time next year, will we be jamming AI-generated outtakes from Detestation? Could AI give us a version of Black Flag’s 1982 demo that sounds just as good as Damaged? Could it take a band like America’s Hardcore that only released a few scattered comp tracks and use that material to generate a full-length record that’s just as good as the real one would have been? Could it venture into an alternate universe where Discharge fired Cal in 1984 and replaced him with Jonsson from Anti-Cimex and bring us back an entire album from that dream project? I can’t answer any of these questions right now, but it seems safe to assume we’re going to see some wild shit soon.