Skip to content
Feederz: Jesus 7” (Placebo Records, 1983)
I don’t know how many times I’ve listened to this Feederz 7” since I picked it up a month or two ago. I’ve been a fan of the Feederz for many years, yet I watched several copies of this 7” (as well as one copy of the very rare first pressing with the original sleeve) come through Sorry State without ever taking one home for myself. This is one of the records I added to my want list last year when I started putting new polybags on my entire collection (I still haven’t finished) and noticed how many gaps there were, records I felt like I “should” have but didn’t. Realizing these 1983 Placebo pressings of Jesus weren’t getting any cheaper, I decided to get one while I could. It took a few months for an attractively priced copy to come my way, and I’ve been totally obsessed with it since I got it in my hands.
Originally released in 1980, the Feederz’ first 7” is pretty early on hardcore’s timeline, and it sounds like it. Big, distorted guitar sounds and monochromatic rhythms hadn’t yet become de rigueur; a few years later, the Feederz would have had a template to follow, but on Jesus they sound like a new wave band possessed by the spirit of hardcore. The surfy main riff on the title track makes me think of the B-52’s, while “Stop You’re Killing Me” sounds like its riff and tom-heavy drumbeat were more or less swiped from “The Attack of the Giant Ants” off Blondie’s first album. Even that crushing riff in “Terrorist” has something about it that reminds me of early Talking Heads. But the attitude of the Feederz’ music is so different. There is none of the flirtation with accessibility that defined new wave; the Feederz sound like a band whose entire existence is about channeling negative feelings and refining them to knife’s-edge sharpness.
The most infamously negative (and infamous in general, really) song is the first one on this record, which also appeared on Alternative Tentacles’ Let Them Eat Jellybeans compilation and on the Feederz’ first album, Ever Feel Like Killing Your Boss? (the latter of which is, thankfully, still sporadically in print). Weirdly, the track is called “Jesus” here, while it’s “Jesus Entering from the Rear” on Let Them Eat Jellybeans and “Entering from the Rear” on Ever Feel Like Killing Your Boss?. Whatever you call it, listening to it in the year 2024 is a weird experience. I’m pretty sure they meant this song as a good old-fashioned piece of blasphemy, and it’s a good one at that. I love the way the chorus focuses on the moment of penetration; the temporal and physical precision of it feels so sacrilegious when referring to a being that is supposed to transcend time and space. In 2024, though, most people probably couldn’t give a shit about the blasphemy, but many people might be offended by the prominent use of a homophobic slur in the chorus. The word hangs heavy over the song, and to be honest it’s hard to listen past it. I don’t want to get into the weeds assessing whether or to what degree the Feederz are guilty of homophobia, but I find it interesting that a song whose entire purpose is to offend ended up being offensive for completely different reasons than what the band intended.
Back to the music, though. For me, this single has absolutely perfect punk production, with the kind of dry, unadorned recording that is always the best move for a band that can really play. As I mentioned above, the guitars have essentially no distortion, achieving their aggressive, slashing sound just by hitting the strings really fucking hard. The guitar sound is so nasty and percussive that it makes the songs sound even more intense, though the locked-in rhythm section (which works with a variety of different, often off-kilter rhythms) does a pretty good job of maximizing intensity on their own. The sound is perhaps a little fuzzy (I wonder if they recorded on used tape?), but every instrument lives in its own distinct frequency range. Aside from just getting great, dry tones, the only “production” touches are a little double-tracking of the guitars and the occasional backing vocals, with the ahhhhhs on “Jesus” sounding so much like the Adolescents that it makes you wonder if there’s a direct connection.
So yeah, what a great EP. I could talk more about how much I love that all four songs are so different from one another or how Frank Discussion is my favorite punk nom de plume of all time, but I’ll leave it there. If the slur I mentioned above sounds like it might offend you, then abide by the trigger warning. But if you’re willing and able to put that very of-its-time transgression to the side, I think Jesus is a truly great American punk record.