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This was a long week for me, with a busy workweek leading into a grueling weekend spent helping at the store during the day and catching shows at Hopscotch in the evenings. I’m not sure how many people outside Raleigh know about Hopscotch, but I enjoy going every year. It’s a corporate music festival, but one with a reputation for booking more interesting indie and underground bands. Hopscotch takes over every venue in downtown Raleigh, and I’m pretty sure hundreds of bands play over the course of the weekend. This year I saw a lot of different stuff, including Pavement, the spiritual jazz ensemble Irreversible Entanglements, and the classic New York dance-punk group ESG. There was a stand-up comedy show this year, and Sarah Sherman’s set had me doubled over. And, in something of a Hopscotch tradition, there was a punk show at the tiny dive bar Slim’s, this year featuring scorching sets from locals DE()T and Paranoid Maniac alongside headliners Cro-Mags. The Cro-Mags set was crazy, but they only played like 4 songs from Age of Quarrel. It was a fun weekend, but it wore me out.

None of that has anything to do with my staff pick this week, which is a formative record from my youth just reissued on Vinyl Conflict Records.

4 Walls Falling: Culture Shock 12” (Vinyl Conflict Records)

I grew up in Virginia, and 4 Walls Falling was one of the first local hardcore bands I heard about. I think my high school girlfriend’s older sister had dated someone who played bass for the band… whether or not that was true, said girlfriend had a CD of Food for Worms that she played to death. I’m not sure how I felt about Food for Worms at the time, but when I started going to shows in 1995, 4 Walls t-shirts were everywhere, probably the second most common shirt at any show after Avail, whose shirts were ubiquitous. I understood they were an important band, which led me to pick up Culture Shock. I remember I was at the Outer Banks on vacation with my family, and I looked in the yellow pages for record stores. I found one and went there, and surprisingly they had a great selection of punk. Browsing the CDs, I came across Culture Shock, having no idea it existed until I saw it in front of me. I remember playing the CD on the tiny boom box I had brought to the beach, and I know immediately this record was the reason people were still wearing 4 Walls shirts several years after the band had broken up.

I played Culture Shock to death over the next few years, and even now I can sing along with all of Taylor Steele’s rapid-fire lyrics. I responded right away to 4 Walls’ brisk tempos, big riffs, and sometimes quirky, always interesting rhythmic changes. While 4 Walls were often viewed as part of the youth crew scene, their music didn’t fit that template comfortably. Unlike the comparatively primitive Revelation bands, 4 Walls’ music sounded progressive, even adventurous. I had little point of reference for their style at the time, but listening to it now, I wonder if Bad Brains’ I Against I was a big influence, particularly its groovy metallic rhythms. 4 Walls also differed from the youth crew world in their lyrical approach, which had more in common with bands like Crucifix and Subhumans. Lyrics often came from a personal perspective, like “Filled” and “Price of Silence,” whose subject of struggling with how to respond to racism had particular resonance for this southern teenager. But more often, Steele wrote about a bigger picture where powerful institutions control and exploit the public and the environment, as in “Culture Shock” and “Greed.” I soaked up Taylor’s message like a sponge, and it helped to prime me for the anarcho-punk I was discovering at the same time. 30-something years later, the lyrics on Culture Shock still sound on point to me.

Familiarizing myself with the rest of 4 Walls Falling’s discography in the pre-Discogs / YouTube age was a slow process. When I was still in high school, a friend put the Burn It b/w Happy Face single on a mix tape and I loved those tracks. Even today, I think this single might be 4 Walls’ shining moment, sounding a little more intense and punk rock than Culture Shock’s more staid production, and with songs that hint at the progressive character of their later work, but keeping, even topping, the intensity of their earlier recordings. Once I got online in 1997 and discovered eBay shortly after that, “4 Walls Falling” was one of my first saved searches. Their shirts turned up way more than their recordings, and at one time I had a pretty gnarly collection of original 4 Walls Falling t-shirts. Eventually I picked up the two EPs that came between Culture Shock and Food for Worms. I remember being blown away when I bought a copy of the Burn It / Happy Face CD single for completion’s sake and it had an extra track! I even reassessed Food for Worms every once in a while. I don’t think I got a copy of their first EP until the late 2000s, and while I think some people consider that their best record, after being weaned on the later stuff, it didn’t do much for me. That record sounds to me like they’re still trying to figure it out.

Another highlight of my 4 Walls fandom was when they played a reunion show in Washington, DC in June 2000. I had missed the band’s original era by a couple of years, so I was super excited to see them live. I thought they played a great set. The show was also a stacked bill with Rain on the Parade, a very early Strike Anywhere, No Justice, and a demo-era American Nightmare.

Vinyl Conflict’s new issue of Culture Shock was a great opportunity for me to revisit this record, and I enjoyed the improved mastering job and the additional inserts, which offer archival material alongside testimonials about the band’s impact. It always intrigued me that Culture Shock was the first release on Jade Tree Records, and there’s an essay from Darren Walters that fleshes out that story. I’m curious to see if younger people respond to 4 Walls Falling’s music. I feel very close to it, and while it evokes a particular time and place for me, it’s also oblivious to the musical trends of its time in a way that makes it kind of timeless, and hence ripe for rediscovery. Check it out and, if it moves you, we have you covered on your very own copy.

Savageheads: Summer Demo MMXXIII cassette (Active-8)
The Massacred: A Look into the Bowels of Hell cassette (Active-8)

I didn’t buy a single record on the Scarecrow / Vidro tour. I used to come back from any tour I did—even a short one—with boxes of records, but not this time. Mainly, this was because we didn’t really go to any record stores. Besides a short trip to a stereotypically grungy Cleveland beach (there was literally a dead rat on the shore), we didn’t do much of anything aside from hang on the tour. Not that I’m complaining! The good thing about two bands touring together is that it’s way more fun… maybe it’s because if the two bands don’t know each other super well everyone is kind of on their best behavior. Maybe it’s that you’re in that exciting period of getting to know one another when you’re digging past surface-level interactions but comparatively blind to things that might, in the long-term, coagulate into annoyances. Who knows, really? One thing I can tell you about large touring parties, is that they’re a fucking logistical nightmare. Getting from one place to another always takes ages. Someone has always wandered away, the driver has gotten lost in conversation with a local, someone is hungover and puking… actually, I don’t think anyone puked on this tour. But yeah, with such a large touring party, it was a struggle just to keep everyone fed and make it to the gigs on time.

While I didn’t buy any records, I did buy a handful of tapes. I don’t particularly love tapes, but there are things I love about them. A lot of them sound really good. A lot of them sound really bad. You can’t really tell until you pop it in the deck, and that’s part of the fun I guess. It’s really fun to see a band live as your first impression, then pick up the tape at the gig and see how the musicians translated their ideas to recordings. I used to experience that all the time, but it rarely happens these days, when most bands try to get some kind of music online before they play any gigs. It’s a shame, because I think for most young bands their live set is going to be way stronger than anything they record.

Enough pontificating about tapes… let’s get to these two releases I want to write about this week. Both of them are on Active 8, and I picked up both directly from Mark of Active 8 at Scarecrow and Vidro’s Boston show. It’s cool that both of these releases are from established bands who have already put out vinyl, but are teasing or working out newer material. I’m not sure if the goal is to get some of the tracks out there and see what people think, or just to have something to sell at gigs while their new releases percolate (Boston bands always seem to take forever!), but I’m happy to hear both of them.

Savageheads’ tape is three new songs and an Insane cover; the insert says “this tape includes demo versions of some new songs for an upcoming record.” To me, the three new tracks sound a little more pulled back than their recent LP, which moves the focus from the charging rhythms to the strength of the songwriting. That relentless, Partisans-esque rhythm is still there, but the drums aren’t quite so pounding (maybe because these are just demo versions). The songs also seem to have a little more to them… it’s hard to put my finger on exactly why, but they sound a little more “musical” to me, particularly the mid-paced track “They Follow,” which might be Savageheads’ slowest song, but is so fucking anthemic and catchy.

The Massacred’s tape is much longer, with eight tracks: four demo tracks for an upcoming LP, two tracks from their upcoming second EP, and two songs recorded live at a gig in Boston. While the Massacred’s 7” was pretty lean and mean, there’s a lot of variation in tempos and riffing styles on these eight tracks. The seething mid-tempo songs, which remind me of Exploited songs like “War,” are an immediate highlight, but there isn’t a dud here in my opinion. It’s clear the Massacred has a lot of gas in the tank, creatively speaking.

It’s really cool how Active 8 has managed to carve out a non-internet space for these tapes. Part of that might be a supply bottleneck… Mark told me he dubs each copy one by one on a home stereo (they sound great to me, by the way). However, the label and bands have done a great job of not leaking digital versions of the recordings online. There are a few bits and bobs on the Active 8 YouTube channel, but if you really want to experience these releases, you’ll probably have to buy them in person at a gig. I think that’s fucking punk. One advantage of the lack of online distribution for these tracks is that it forces you to engage with it on a much deeper level. Rather than my first experience of these tracks getting half my attention (at best) while I was driving or working, I didn’t listen to these tapes until I could sit down with them in my living room, listen to them on my main stereo, and look at the inserts while I played them. First impressions matter! Speaking of which, both tapes also look great. While the packaging is simple, it has that classic feel of Active 8’s vinyl releases, with a lot of attention to detail in making everything look just so. These straight up look like tapes from the 80s, which is very cool.

So yeah, pick these up if you can make it out to a gig in New England.

Kinetic Oribtal Strike photo by Razorblades & Aspirin

While the newsletter has been quiet over the past couple of months, it’s been a very busy summer for me. I’ve logged several thousand highway miles traveling up and down the east coast playing and attending shows. In fact, it’s only in the past day or two that things have calmed down for me. After the Scarecrow / Vidro tour ended on August 12 I stayed out on the road to catch a few dates of Appendix’s US tour, then I had two nights in my bed before Scarecrow was once again on the road playing a gig with Tozcos and Violencia in Charlotte. Then after that I hit the Sheer Mag gig in Durham this past Monday and drove up to Richmond for the Enzyme gig on Tuesday. When I woke up on Wednesday, my body was screaming “STOP!” Thankfully September looks quieter on the gig front. I’m looking forward to spending lots of time with the turntable spinning and my dog Patti sitting on my lap.

Since my mind is still in gig mode rather than record mode, I thought I’d use this staff pick to tell you about a few of my favorite bands I saw this summer. I saw a lot of incredible sets this summer, so if I don’t mention your / your favorite band, that doesn’t mean I didn’t enjoy it… in fact, I’d say I’ve enjoyed every set I saw this summer. However, here are the ones I hold in particularly high regard:

Phantom I didn’t have time to give Phantom’s demo tape a close listen before I embarked on my crazy summer of gigging, but we had packed up so many copies in your orders that I knew I should pay attention. They were the first band on the after-show on night 1 of Something to Talk About, which is a great time slot… the crowd was warmed up, but not yet exhausted. Phantom slayed that night, an explosion of unhinged energy with insane drumming. They were the first band of the day at Another Lost Weekend and while they sounded great, the crowd didn’t quite match their energy. However, when I they played at Cousin Danny’s with Scarecrow and Vidro, they were once again blazing. Phantom is right up my alley, musically dense and adventurous hardcore punk with inhuman tempos.

Kinetic Orbital Strike I knew going in that KOS was going to be great, but I wasn’t prepared for how thoroughly they leveled everything the two times I saw them. We know from their demo and their newly released 7” that KOS’s songs are lethal, but they clearly put a great deal of thought into their live show’s sound and presentation. In DC, Chris played out of a full stack that could peel the paint off the walls, and I’m pretty sure he played out of three speaker cabinets in Richmond the other night. Trish’s bass tone is also godly, so loud and full and furious. Other bands might try to sound like Disclose and Framtid, but experiencing KOS live feels like Disclose and Framtid have colonized your brain and taken it over from the inside. The one-two punch of Destruct and KOS in Richmond the other night was one of the most explosive pairings I have witnessed in my 20+ years going to gigs.

Appendix I went into Appendix with zero expectations… we all know things can go either way with bands from 80s. However, when they hit their first note at the Richmond gig, I was sold. These old guys scored zero points for style, wearing shorts and New York City t-shirts from Chinatown while they guzzled beer, ripped cigs, and laid down note-perfect renditions of the early catalog. I love this band, and the two sets I saw left huge smiles on my face.

Tozcos This was my first time seeing Tozcos, and they did not disappoint! It’s been five long years since their last record, Sueños Deceptivos, but the band’s m.o. sounds the same as ever… blistering hardcore punk that is as catchy as it is intense, drawing as much from classic punk as it does ripping hardcore. I love all the big guitar hooks, the walking bass lines, the explosive drumming, and the singer’s commanding vocals and stage presence. They mentioned they have a new album coming out in September, and I can’t wait to hear it.

Vidro I gotta give a HUGE shout-out to Scarecrow’s tour buddies in Vidro, whom we got to see annihilate every night. We were all blown away when we played with Vidro in Hamburg last summer, and in the flurry of activity leading up to tour I didn’t have time to build anticipation for seeing them again. However, as soon as they hit the first note at our first gig in Philly I was just like, “oh yeah… this band fucking brings it.” Vidro is an explosive ball of energy, and the members’ constant pogoing makes it seem like they’re riding the waves of pummeling sound emanating from their instruments. It seems like not too many people had heard them before they played, but every night there was a huge line at the merch table full of freshly blown away new fans.

Cicada The Richmond stop on the Scarecrow / Vidro tour featured Invertebrates and Cicada in the opening slots… if there was an award for the gig with the highest average Beats Per Minute this summer, this would have gotten it. Cicada’s sound was loose and explosive, with an unhinged energy that made me think of Koro, Deep Wound, or the most furious early 80s Italian hardcore. I am eagerly anticipating the 3-song tape they said is coming soon. And I’ll also give a quick shout-out to Hominid, who played our DC show share a guitarist with Cicada. Their vibe was similarly gnarly… they played about 5 minutes of explosive hardcore that reminded me of Siege and ended with a Negative Approach cover.

Snarling Dogs Snarling Dogs played our Pittsburgh show, and when I saw the band included Tom and Scud from innumerable great Pittsburgh bands of the past decade or two, I knew they would be good. I was not wrong. All their projects have a different vibe, and Snarling Dogs brings a little rock and roll into the mix, fast and furious but with catchy, pub rock-inspired guitar flourishes. Speaking of which…

Puffer Montreal’s Puffer blew me away at Something To Talk About. I had heard their recordings, but seeing them live was something different altogether. They write great songs, which comes across on record (“Sister Marie,” from their latest 7” on Roach Leg, is one of my favorite songs of 2023), but the wildness of the guitarist’s style gets muted by their lo-fi recordings. My eyes were fixated on his playing for their entire set. I wish I could rewind my brain and watch it again right now.

Alienator Alienator was one of the bands I was most looking forward to seeing this summer, and they delivered both times I caught them. The members’ physical presence is intimidating. I’m pretty sure the non-drumming members are all well over six feet tall, all of them with shaved heads, big muscles, and tons of tattoos… it’s like someone beamed in 4 copies of Al Barile circa 1982 and made them start a band together. The sound is just as burly as the visuals too, and watching them felt like being crushed by a bulldozer.

Personal Damage Personal Damage is one of my favorite bands of the past several years, and I finally got to see them live at Another Lost Weekend. It’s tough for a 3-piece hardcore band to bring the same energy as groups with an untethered frontperson, but Personal Damage leveled the place. Live, they were even faster and meaner than on their records, blasting through their short but catchy songs one right after the other, nailing the manic vocal trade-offs that are such a big part of their sound. This was Personal Damage’s first appearance on the east coast and I think many people didn’t know about them, but after their set everyone was buzzing about how great they were.

Public Acid I’ve seen many Public Acid sets over the years—including a few this summer—but I can’t go without mentioning their set with Appendix in Richmond last week. Heavy on new material from their upcoming 12”, the band sounded as vital and explosive as ever, and the new tracks’ metallic edge felt fresh and exciting. I hope I get to see more sets that lean on this new material in the coming months.

Damn, this is already long as hell, but there are still so many great bands I didn’t mention… Chainsaw, Laughing Corpse, Self Checkout… and of course impressive sets from veterans like Electric Chair and Warthog. If you didn’t see some of these great bands this summer, you fucked up!

No Allegiance: Mad 12” (Destiny Records, 1986)

One of my favorite moments of 2023 so far is when Scarecrow played with Lasso in Norfolk, Virginia a few months ago. The bands all stayed at the newly opened Not for the Weak Records, and after the gig everyone hung out at the shop late into the night, sipping beers and listening to music. Eventually things degenerated (as they tend to do) into drunken OpIvy and Specials singalongs (with Greenough displaying an impressively deep command of even the densest OpIvy verses), but for most of the night Chris from Bato was spinning hardcore deep cuts from his collection. There were jams galore, including a handful of things I didn’t know… how had I never checked out the Special Forces LP? My want list definitely grew by a few items that night.

Another band Chris played for us that night that I didn’t know was Germany’s No Allegiance. Actually, after some subsequent research I realized I did know No Allegiance, at least kind of. The band’s original name was Porno Patrol, whose underrated 1984 7” I was familiar with. However, Porno Patrol (wisely?) changed their name to No Allegiance in 1985 and released two LPs, Mad and No Cash Value, on the singer’s label Destiny Records. Destiny Records has a long history, including at least a few cool records like the Porno Patrol 7”, the Combat Not Conform LP, Cheetah Chrome Motherfuckers’ Live in SO.36 LP (which I still need a copy of!), and Squandered Message’s Getting Blunt LP. It appears the label’s tour booking arm also helped to bring a bunch of American bands to Europe in the 80s… I’m guessing the label’s releases from US bands like Capitol Punishment, R.K.L., M.D.C., and Verbal Abuse coincided with those bands’ tours. I bet there are a lot of stories to be told about all that.

Back to No Allegiance. I was in New York for Another Lost Weekend, and of course I hit a bunch of record stores while I was there. I hadn’t been to Generation Records in probably 15 years. The last time I went, I’m pretty sure the store sucked… if I remember correctly, the upstairs was all CDs and merch and all the vinyl was downstairs, but I don’t remember buying a single thing. This time around, it was a different story. There were lots of crazy records on the wall (for crazy prices, of course), and while I didn’t buy any of that stuff, I found a lot of cool, more reasonably priced records in the used LP bins. (Side note: every record store I went to in New York just calls their entire used section “new arrivals,” which is probably a good way to get people to look through everything.) There were a bunch of 80s German hardcore LPs, which I have to assume came from the same collection. One of them was No Allegiance’s first album, Mad, which I eagerly nabbed.

Sometimes when you hear a band at a party after a few beers, add it to your wantlist, and track down a copy weeks, months, or years later, it doesn’t hold up as well as you remember. While Chris had played No Cash Value, No Allegiance’s second album, Mad was no disappointment. In fact, I think it’s pretty killer. It reminds me of better-produced US hardcore records from the mid-80s, when bands started getting stronger recordings… I’m thinking of records like the FU’s Do We Really Want to Hurt You and DRI’s Dealing With It… bigger-budget records from bands that still played loud and fast. RKL might be another good comparison. Basically, if you like the bands that were still riding for hardcore in the mid-80s without going melodic or metal, you’re probably going to dig this.

It looks like both of No Allegiance’s records fly so far under the radar that they barely sell for anything on Discogs. (I paid the New York City premium price for my copy, but I’m OK with it.) So, if you can track down these records, they shouldn’t cost you much at all. And if you ask me, they punch way above their weight.

Cluster: Grosses Wasser LP (1979, Sky Records)

It’s been a week of ups and downs for me. On Monday, Scarecrow played with Subhumans, which was awesome. It was my third time seeing Subhumans (the first was way back in 1998), and they were great as always. They’ve always been a huge band for me as their music is so powerful and unique, and it’s really special that they still do such great gigs and they bring them around to all corners of the world. Very cool. Unfortunately, though, it was a rough night for me physically. I’ve mentioned my recent skateboarding injury in the newsletter; I was grinding a parking block two weeks ago and fell hard right onto the block, taking it directly to my ribcage. I felt like it was getting better, but Monday was a long day with a full day’s work, playing a set, standing around a lot at the gig, and moving more equipment than I should have (though Jeff and Usman kindly handled all the speaker cabinets). By the end, I was in a lot of pain, so on Tuesday I broke down and went to the doctor. I’d avoided that because I read they couldn’t do much about a rib injury, but I got x-rays confirming I didn’t fracture any ribs, and they prescribed me some kind of medication. I’m not sure what the medication was, but two days later I’m feeling way, way better. Maybe it’s a coincidence or a placebo effect, or maybe I should have just gone to the doctor two weeks ago. Either way, it’s nice to feel like there’s some positive movement.

Between the gig, doctor’s appointments, and driving around my wife, whose car broke down on the way back from the Subhumans gig, I have had little time for listening to records. I got in a good listening session Tuesday night, when I spun the Die Letzten Ecken LP (this week’s Record of the Week!) a few more times and got to soak in the new Fairytale LP, which is phenomenal. I’ll write about those for other sections of the newsletter, so what to write about for my staff pick? I scanned my pile of recent acquisitions and landed on this 1979 album from Germany’s Cluster, which I took home a month or so ago. I was at the store one day and it was sitting at the front of a bin, unclaimed after a few weeks in the stacks. I commented that I hadn’t heard it and was interested, and Jeff was like, “you should just take it.” So I did!

Grosses Wasser is the seventh album by Cluster… well, the seventh if you don’t count the two albums they recorded as Kluster before Conrad Schnitzler left the group and they changed the “K” to a “C,” but you do count the two collaborative albums the group did with Brian Eno, 1977’s Cluster & Eno and 1978’s After the Heat. That sentence alone hints at how deeply embedded Cluster’s two official members, Dieter Moebius and Hans-Joachim Roedelius, were in the 70s German progressive music scene, so I won’t go too deeply into that here. Trust me, these two guys are super important. Grosses Wasser, though, I don’t think is seen as a crucial part of their discography… which is weird because many bands’ seventh albums are their most popular, right?

Besides coming rather late in their discography, perhaps Grosses Wasser lacks the sense of discovery of Cluster’s classic periods. Their first two albums are out there on the fringes ambient music, while 1974’s Zuckerziet and 1976’s Sowiesoso found them condensing their compositions into compact instrumental nuggets that had all the impact and melody of the best pop and classical music. The two Eno collaborations came next, which were front page news for weird music heads. Grosses Wasser, though, has weak branding. Peter Baumann’s production is a new wrinkle, giving the group a polished, crystalline sound that’s less organic, but very cool and modern (much like the cover artwork). Grosses Wasser splits the difference between the two early eras of Cluster’s work, with a bunch of compact tracks on the a-side and a more progressive, multi-movement piece taking up the entire second side.

I didn’t know any of this when I first dropped the needle on Grosses Wasser. All I knew was that it was a Cluster album I hadn’t heard, and it just delighted me. Each shorter piece has a different musical character, but they’re all beautiful, combining rich textures with a strong sense of composition and structure that many synth and progressive artists lack. The long piece is also interesting. It’s not droney like the longer pieces in Cluster’s early catalog, more like a short symphony with discrete sections that link together. As a whole, the album is like an anthology of tight, readable short stories with a longer story at the end, and it works well.

I’m not sure if Grosses Wasser is the place I’d start with Cluster, but if you enjoy their first six albums, there’s no reason to stop here. Cluster made one more album, 1981’s Curiosa, before disbanding for the first time that year. I’ll have to keep an eye out for that one and see if it maintains the same level of quality as this.

Honor Role: Rictus LP (Homestead Records, 1989)

My nephew Brody just spent a few weeks staying with my wife Jet and I. The original plan was to hang out for a bit in Raleigh and then go on a mini-vacation on Ocracoke Island, North Carolina for Memorial Day weekend, but a big storm came in, the ferries weren’t running to the island, and we had to cancel our trip. That was a bummer, but it was fun to hang out with Brody for an extended amount of time. He’s 19, a student at Ohio State, and he’s super into music and skateboarding, so we get along like a house on fire. It was nice to have a buddy to skate with, and while he was here we spent most evenings playing music for one another.

Something I realized about myself during these listening sessions with Brody is that I have a strong bias against music from the 90s. Brody played a lot of stuff from the 90s, and it made me realize I almost never listen to music from that entire decade, no matter the style. There’s probably a deep psychological reason for that… like I see the 70s and 80s as some sort of unspoiled golden age, but the 90s make me think of real life, being in high school and feeling like I didn’t belong, being stuck in a rural Virginia backwater while the interesting stuff happened somewhere else. Most recordings from the 90s have a distinctive sound, and while a lot of things about that sound are pretty good—it was an era known for big-sounding, polished recordings, even for underground bands—the sound doesn’t take me to a place I want to go. Even when Brody brought up punk and hardcore bands, I realized I hardly ever listened to them. He told me he’s been into Orchid’s Chaos Is Me, and I told him about how I bought that record when it came out and how Orchid’s guitarist, Will Killingsworth, masters like 50% of the music we sell at Sorry State (including several releases on our label), but I realized I haven’t listened to Orchid in 20 years. He also texted me the other day to tell me he’d been listening to His Hero Is Gone’s Monuments to Thieves. Again, a record I loved when it came out, but I haven’t listened to it in many, many years. So many of our conversations went like this, Brody bringing up something from the 90s and me driving the conversation back into the 80s and earlier or forward into the present millennium.

Having this realization about myself, I was particularly excited when a copy of Honor Role’s second and final album, Rictus, came through the shop. Brody, like most young people it seems, has broad tastes, but I think his favorite style of music is the post-hardcore math rock of the early 90s… he loves Slint, US Maple, Don Caballero, and stuff like that. So I was excited to bring home this Honor Role record because I know they were a big influence on that sound. I think he liked Rictus, but the first thing he said was “this sounds like Tweez,” Slint’s first album, which actually came out in 1989, the same year as Rictus.

I feel weird writing about Honor Role because I’ve heard so much about them from older people in NC, all of whom insist they were one of the best bands they ever saw, way better than their studio recordings. Honor Role played Raleigh a lot… people tell me they came down from Richmond so often they were pretty much considered a local band. Since they broke up in 1989, though, I never got to see them play, and for years I never even checked out the records because of how vocal everyone was about how they didn’t live up to the live experience. However, at some point their 1985 single “Judgement Day” came into the shop, and noticing it was on the legendary Raleigh label No Core Records, I checked it out. I listened to that 7” so much… I even ripped mp3s of my copy so I could put it on my phone… I was so addicted to it I needed the ability to hear it any time I wanted. Contrary to my expectations, “Judgement Day” has a great, powerful recording, raw in the manner of low-budget 80s recordings, but clear with good separation between the instruments and a big drum sound. And the songs, “Judgement Day” in particular, are just so good. They’re a long way from pop, but still so memorable. “Look around me, all I see, waves and waves of… MEDIOCRITY!” Classic.

Converted, I started picking up Honor Role’s records when I saw them. Rictus, though, proved elusive, sitting on my want list for years before this copy came in. It was worth the wait, though! When I first popped it on I was digging it so hard… it had everything I loved about the “Judgement Day” single, namely the catchy vocals and dense, poetic lyrics and the powerful, punk-informed rhythm section, but so much more than that too. Honor Role is lauded for their ability to play in odd time signatures and the relentless riffage of guitarist Pen Rollings, and both are in full effect on Rictus. Some timings on these tracks are just wild. And beyond just being quirky, they’re executed with so much fluidity. I love complex, proggy rhythms, but often bands who play like that can feel overly tight, like the music is laid out on a grid and everyone is playing to the grid rather than with one another. But Honor Role sounds like a band who has abandoned the grid, locking into rhythms that are more organic and human than any math equation. And the riffs… fuck! A lot of them sound like they’re grounded in the big classic rock riffs of bands like AC/DC and Thin Lizzy, but skewed and bent into something subtler and more interesting. Like Greg Ginn, Pen Rollings’ style is instantly identifiable and I could listen to him shred forever.

It’s a shame I never got to see Honor Role play live, because if they were exponentially better than these records, they must have been something truly great, which everyone insists they were. There are a couple of gigs on YouTube, and these sets from CBGB in 1987, DC in 1988, and Chapel Hill in 1989 (the band’s final show) are indeed powerful. I’m not much for watching video footage of bands playing live, but all three hold my attention. If you want to check out Honor Role’s studio recordings, Merge Records collected everything from their post-punk era (I can’t believe I didn’t even mention the band’s hardcore years above… oh well) on a CD called Album, which is available on streaming services. That CD starts with Rictus and then proceeds in reverse chronological order through the rest of the band’s catalog, ending with the “Judgement Day” single. While it’s a lot of this very dense music to absorb in one sitting, at least it’s out there and accessible. If you want to follow my path into their discography, keep an eye out for used copies of the “Judgement Day” single and Rictus in your local used bins… it might take a while for them to turn up, but they shouldn’t cost you much when they do.

Egg: The Polite Force LP (1971, Deram)

I have now succumbed to one of the ultimate record collector cliches: I’m into Canterbury. This has been brewing for a while—I chose Caravan’s album In the Land of Grey and Pink as my staff pick way back in July 2020 and I had been checking out Gong and Steve Hillage before that, but the world of Canterbury has sucked me in over the past few months as I’ve spent more time with Canterbury mainstays like Soft Machine, Hatfield and the North, and Quiet Sun. I’d been exploring this scene on my own time, but the process got sped up thanks to a couple of folks who sold records to Sorry State. One guy was so attached to his Canterbury records that he kept all those, but sold us several thousand others, and on my house calls I spent a lot of time talking with him about his favorite records. Then, coincidentally, another prog aficionado sold us his record collection. This guy was willing to part with his Canterbury gems, so I scored original copies of several of the records the first guy was raving about. Synchronicity!

For those of you who are unfamiliar, Canterbury refers to the city in Kent, England (famous as the setting of Chaucer’s The Canterbury Tales), and Canterbury music refers to the explosion of music that happened there in the late 60s and early 70s. For me, what’s interesting about Canterbury music is its unique set of influences. The musicians in that scene were interested in the then-current psychedelic and progressive rock movements happening in the UK, but they were also engaged with jazz (including the contemporary jazz-rock fusion movement Miles Davis was pioneering), avant-garde and experimental classical music by composers like Stockhausen and Edgard Varèse, and early modern English folk music. These aren’t influences that lend themselves to a natural fusion, and a lot of Canterbury albums can feel eclectic, with jarring shifts in tone and style from one track from the next, or sometimes even within a single track.

I’m not sure when I happened upon Egg’s second album, The Polite Force—it may have just been in reading about the Canterbury scene—but when I first listened to it, the monstrous organ riff that opens the record knocked me on my ass. While Egg didn’t employ a guitarist, organist Dave Stewart lays down a riff as dense and sludgy as anything Black Sabbath or Deep Purple did in their heyday. While nothing else on The Polite Force is like that, it’s a great introduction because it demands your full attention, which Egg subsequently tests over the course of the album. In researching the critical reaction to The Polite Force, I found many people were put off by the album’s experimental elements. The Polite Force certainly leans more toward that end of the Canterbury spectrum, with much of its runtime given over to Stockhausen-influenced tape manipulation and freewheeling jazz experimentation. I guess I can see how it’s too much for some people, but for me Egg keeps the ideas coming fast and furious, and even if I like some moments more than others, wondering what they’re going to do next keeps me engaged throughout the record.

Last night, as I was playing The Polite Force, I was pondering why Canterbury music appeals to such a particular breed of nerdy record collector. Can you appreciate this music if you have less than two thousand albums in your collection? Perhaps you can, but having a voracious appetite for music seems to help. Maybe that’s because the Canterbury scene is so embedded in its context that you need some knowledge of the influences they were working with to appreciate what they were doing. Or maybe it’s because the way these bands combined the different elements of their respective sounds was often surprising, even jarring. Maybe it’s perfect for an old head who craves that sense of discovery, but has kind of heard it all before.

Another way the Canterbury scene whets the collector nerd’s appetite is how interconnected everything is. As I was reading about Egg last night, for instance, I learned that guitarist Steve Hillage had played in a group called Uriel, which was basically Egg plus Steve Hillage. While Uriel never released anything, the group reformed in 1969 and released a self-titled album as Arzachel, which streaming service recommendation algorithms really think I’ll like, but I’ve never checked out. Even more enticing is Khan’s album Space Shanty, which came out in 1972. Khan featured most of the personnel from Uriel / Arzachel, and the songs on their LP were intended for the follow-up to Steve Hillage’s solo album Fish Rising, another ye olde staffe picke para moi. The vibe on that one is supposed to be more space rock than prog, and I can’t wait to dive in and learn more.

Claire Dederer: Monsters: A Fan’s Dilemma (2023, Knopf)

One of my least favorite duties at Sorry State is managing our “banned list,” the list of albums and artists we refuse to carry. This is not a task I am well equipped for. While I think of myself as a morally upstanding person, I don’t have a strong sense of justice. I tend to look at the world more analytically, examining situations from multiple perspectives, and as someone who loves music and art, my curiosity and love for art is apt to outweigh my sense of right and wrong. So, I rely on my colleagues for guidance here, and when they’re offended by something we carry, I trust that it’s the right decision to remove it from the racks. It’s often a difficult decision, though. Some things, such as music that explicltly promotes hateful ideologies, are beyond the pale. However, what about work by artists with stains on their legacy? When I was younger, many people thought it was OK to listen to the first few Skrewdriver records, which they made before they became an explicitly racist and nationalist band. Nowadays, all the band’s releases are taboo, and they’re all banned from sale on mainstream sites like eBay and Discogs. But what about the country singer David Allan Coe, who made at least one album full of slurs and other reprehensible ideas, which he seems to have intended as a joke. Do we remove all his records from the shelves? What about people who have done bad things which don’t show up in in their work? We didn’t have to decide to stop carrying Bill Cosby’s records because people just stopped buying them. But what about Michael Jackson? Morrissey? Miles Davis? Our customers are still eager to buy those artists’ records. Where is the line, and how do you determine what side of it things are on? That is the question Claire Dederer addresses in this book.

Once I started reading reviews of Monsters: A Fan’s Dilemma this spring I was eager to read it, because I realized this is an issue I think about all the time, and I desperately wanted to read an analysis that’s smart, or even (fingers crossed) wise. The problem is that most sane writers don’t want to touch this topic with a ten-foot pole (in fact, I find myself nervous to write this staff pick), because the stakes are high and the dangers of missteps are real. Sympathizing with a monster can get you branded an apologist, putting your own politics and ethics in question. Thus, the discourse around this topic is dominated by people with the most extreme views. Shouts of “burn the witch” play well on social media—I click on them despite my better judgment—and the only people who stand up against the zealots tend to be reactionary dummies. If someone uses the terms “cancel culture” or “woke,” that’s an immediate red flag for me, a signal that they’re an asshole, someone who thinks it’s acceptable to trample on other people’s feelings to protect the “freedoms” enjoyed by the privileged. As someone who cares about art and culture, it often seems impossible to find the middle path that respects the feelings of victims, marginalized groups, and other stakeholders while reserving space for artists to do what artists do… what we love them for doing.

Dederer’s book starts by examining the reputations of Roman Polanski and Woody Allen. These filmmakers make excellent test cases. Both made art that, at least at some point, was acknowledged as great, and both men have done bad things (though, as becomes apparent, there’s much more to be said than that). Dederer analyzes both cases at length, examining the work for evidence of the darkness we see in the bad things the artists did and tracking the discourse around these artists and their work, from the people who think they should be resigned to the dustbin of history to the people who think we should “separate the art from the artist,” and everyone in between. Consistency and easy answers are in short supply. The metaphor Dederer lands on to describe the situation is that of a stain. I find this metaphor apt because it’s so flexible. Stains can be larger or smaller, darker or lighter. Some people can live with stains and keep wearing clothes even after their stained, while others find themselves unable to unsee the stain, or rather to see past it. Whatever your attitude toward the stain, it’s still there.

Along the way, Dederer pulls a bunch of threads related to this central line of inquiry. There’s a fascinating chapter about women monsters, who are rare, but they exist. Unsurprisingly, what constitutes an unforgivable transgression is very different for a woman than it is for a man, as are our attitudes about the women who cross those boundaries. There’s also a great chapter about alcoholics and addicts, who present a more complicated case because the monsters aren’t just monsters; they’re also victims. And what of the addict in recovery? What happens to the stain when the artist commits to mending their ways? Is there any hope of redemption? Dederer also a fascinating reading of Lolita, a book I’ve never read because I am frightened of it. But I am always interested in what people have to say about it, and Dederer’s chapter on Nabokov and Lolita is gripping, a masterpiece of literary criticism. For Dederer, Nabokov is the anti-monster… unlike the bad men who made great art, Nabokov is (by all accounts) a decent person who made a monstrous piece of art, which both illustrates and complicates our feelings about the relationship between art and monstrosity.

If you’re looking for Dederer to provide a list of which artists are and are not beyond the pale, or even a stable rubric you can apply on your own, then you’re going to be disappointed. However, the book still has some substantial takeaways. A big one for me is that capitalism is a big part of the problem. Under capitalism, art is a commodity and the consumption of art-as-commodity is inherently politicized. Viewing art as a commodity complicates the picture in all kinds of ways, in no small part because of the system of celebrity that has built up around the culture industry. Appreciating a Woody Allen film—even if you don’t pay money for it—feels like an endorsement of Woody Allen, one that Allen and the people and businesses who associate with him profit from, if only indirectly. Try as we might, though, we can’t opt out of capitalism, and these problems are likely to remain with us for the foreseeable future. And even if Dederer doesn’t offer a solution to the fan’s dilemma, her book brings the issue into much clearer focus and does a great deal of work to carve out critical space for those of who value art’s ability to question, antagonize, and even offend.

Punk rules.

This m̶o̶r̶n̶i̶n̶g̶ afternoon I’m riding high after an excellent gig last night. It was the first night of Lasso’s US tour. Not only did I get to see the band but also they’ve been staying at my house and hanging around at Sorry State for the past two days, so we’ve had some time to get to know one another. Then last night we got to introduce them to our NC punk friends and have an epic show and hang. And better yet, we get to do it again in Norfolk tomorrow, where we’ll add all our Norfolk homies to the mix. It’s going to be epic.

Sorry State has put out 3 of Lasso’s 7”s now. Their most recent EP, Ordem Imaginada, arrived at Sorry State HQ a few days ago, just in time for them to bring copies along on their tour. Lasso is one of a handful of bands whose records I put out based on an unsolicited email. As you might expect, we get lots of messages from bands asking Sorry State to release their music. Much of it we don’t even consider… I think sometimes people just google something like “North Carolina record label” and email every search result, not even taking the time to realize we only release punk rock. It’s easy to ignore those messages, but it’s tougher when a band submits something and there’s a connection there, whether it’s that they’re fans of Sorry State, we know the members, or their music is just good. A band being “good enough” isn’t the only factor in deciding whether we want to release something, though. That’s one thing I learned being on this side of running a record label, and it sunk in even more when we started hiring employees at Sorry State and I had to conduct job interviews and decide between competing candidates. Those decisions are less about being “good enough,” because plenty of people are “good enough,” and often way more than that. It’s more about whether the timing is right and the fit works in other respects. I know rejection can sting, though, and whenever I can, I try to write polite rejection letters that explain all this.

Back to Lasso, though. When I first clicked the link to listen to their music, it blew me away. As I do when I hear something I like, the first thing I did was show it to Jeff and Usman, who confirmed that my response wasn’t idiosyncratic… this band is really good. I can’t remember what other factors I was weighing, but I knew right away I wanted to put out their record. I felt even better about the decision when I saw their friend Carlos Casotti’s illustrations, which they’ve used for the artwork on all their records so far. Lasso had the total package… great music, great performances, great sound, and great artwork. And across their second and third EPs they’ve only gotten better.

Seeing Lasso live, though, gave me an even deeper appreciation for their music. Not having met the members before they arrived at my house on Tuesday afternoon, I didn’t know what to expect from them. I don’t think I’ve even hosted a band from Brazil before, so I didn’t know what to expect from them as people. I could tell right away, though, that they take their music seriously. Raleigh was the first stop on their tour and they had all their gear shipped to Sorry State ahead of time, so the first thing they did when they arrived was check everything to make sure it was in good shape. I could tell by the way they plucked the snare drum’s head or checked the intonation on their guitars that they are meticulous. They confirmed that impression when they rehearsed at the Sorry State warehouse later that evening. I was working in my office down the hall while they played, but it sounded more like someone was playing their records than a band playing live, which is impressive given they’d just endured two and a half days of exhausting travel and were using unfamiliar gear.

The sound I heard carrying down the hall at the warehouse, though, paled compared to what I saw and heard at the gig last night. The vibe last night was great. I love going to shows at the Fruit… even though it’s in Durham, the next city over from Raleigh, the club feels like home. It was my wife Jet’s birthday, so there was a lot of love in the air. Overgrown Throne got the night off to a great start, playing the best set I’ve seen them play and setting the crowd off. Then it was time for Lasso, and it was transcendent. That spark I felt when I first heard their music returned in force as I experienced the band’s power live in front of me. Just like at their rehearsal the day before, their performances were totally locked in. Lasso’s songs are mazes of subtle rhythmic shifts and accents, and the band seemed to execute them with one body, each note as precise and visceral as a hammer hitting a nail right on the head. They moved like a massive bird of prey, their grace difficult to reconcile with their heaviness and power. They were fucking great.

Scarecrow wrapped up the show, then the two bands and some of our friends went out for late-night burritos, hanging out until 2AM on the patio at Cosmic Cantina, our go-to spot for a late night meal after gigs at the Fruit. The vibes were great, everyone having taken a deep swig from punk’s goblet, and even though it was super late and I knew I had a newsletter to write today, I was reluctant to leave.

How amazing is punk, that we have this community where we can all share in this incredible music, and that the music creates a bond that can transcend differences in language, culture, education, class, and every other way humans can differ from one another? When we stand together in front of roaring amps and pounding drums, we taste something profound and elemental. Perhaps not every time, but often enough to keep me coming to every gig I can. I can’t wait to do it again tomorrow night. Viva Lasso! Viva punk!

The Fall: Live 1977 LP (2023, Cherry Red Records)

A few years ago, when Castle Face Records released The Fall’s Live at St. Helens Technical College 1981, I wrote about that record and toyed with doing a series of staff picks dedicated to live records by the Fall. You can consider today’s installment the second entry in the series, and maybe one day I’ll get to Live in London / The Legendary Chaos Tape, Fall in a Hole, A Part of America Therein, and then to the scores of releases that have come out in recent years. For now, though, let’s turn our attention to Live 1977, which Cherry Red Records released as a Record Store Day exclusive this year.

These tracks (well, most of them… we’ll get to that later) first appeared on 2022’s 8 CD box set called [1970s]. That box set purported to compile all the band’s 1970s studio recordings along with several live sets. Honestly, that box set seems like a mess. What person who wants to hear eight different early live sets by the Fall, but also still needs copies of Live at the Witch Trials and Dragnet on CD? I can’t imagine it’s many. Mercifully, though, Cherry Red put the entire box up on streaming services. I spent a couple of days with the set playing in the background when it came out last fall, but my friend Rich pointed me toward the May 23, 1977 gig, specifically the songs “Race Hatred” and “Sten Gun Rock” that (unless I’m mistaken) don’t exist on any other recording, live or in the studio. I wouldn’t say either is a lost classic, but it’s cool to hear early songs by the Fall that I’d never heard before.

Live 1977 is basically a vinyl version of the full May 23, 1977 gig that appeared in the [1970s] box. I’m glad to have this as a stand-alone release rather than buried on disc 5 of an 8-disc set, because it’s a brilliant gig and historically significant to boot. The band is on fire here, ripping through great early tracks like “Repetition,” “Industrial Estate,” and “Frightened,” all of which sound remarkably similar to the versions the band recorded in the studio. For a group that had just started, the Fall sounds so confident here. The closeness of the arrangements to the recorded versions shows they were well-rehearsed, and they play with power and confidence. I don’t think it’s in appropriate to say they’re on fire. The fidelity is also pretty good… noisy, but with every instrument present and accounted for. It can get a bit blown out during the loudest parts, but the power comes across even if some of the subtlety gets lost.

While the music on Live 1977 is great, the packaging is a massive disappointment. The front and back covers are pictures of (presumably) the box the tape was stored in, and it is as uninspired as it is aesthetically unpleasing. There is a printed inner sleeve, but it’s all but worthless. One side features a grainy photograph of the building where the gig took place and the other side has two newspaper clippings, one of which doesn’t even mention the Fall and the other of which is so poorly scanned that it is illegible. On the evening of Record Store Day, when I first put the record on, I was grooving out to the music, excited by the strength of the performance and the quality of sound, when I picked up the packaging to learn more about the gig. I quickly grew frustrated that Cherry Red gave us essentially no information about the gig.

Thankfully, though, there is an active community of Fall nerds online, so I could glean a little information from other sources. Live 1977’s credits refer off-handedly to this being the Fall’s first gig, but that isn’t the case. While the Fall’s first gig was at the same venue and also in May 1977, keyboardist Una Baines didn’t play the first gig because she hadn’t yet saved up the money to buy her instrument. This recording has clearly audible keyboards, leading one to the conclusion that it’s the Fall’s second gig and Una’s live debut. At least that’s what guitarist Martin Bramah said on Twitter… it would have been nice if Cherry Red had gotten the details straight so the people who bought this record could understand what they’re listening to.

The other big mystery with Live 1977 is the last track. It’s an instrumental tune that doesn’t appear on the 1970s box set, which means it’s exclusive to this Record Store Day vinyl release. The first time I listened I suspected something was amiss, because it doesn’t sound like the Fall at all and has no vocals, hence no Mark E. Smith. (Perhaps your granny is there on bongos somewhere low in the mix.) Maybe members of the Fall play on this jam (but then again, maybe not), but there’s nothing musically that indicates it’s part of the Fall canon. You can hear the musicians chatting before and after the jam, and folks on the Fall message board note the accents don’t sound Mancunian. Of course, the packaging for the record doesn’t even mention the track, so I’m at a loss what to make of it. Is it something unrelated that happened to be on the same tape? Who knows?

While the above details are still cloudy, it seems to be the case that Live 1977 is the earliest known recording of the Fall. With so many books, articles, and podcasts devoted to the band, you’d think Cherry Red could have found someone to put this recording into its proper context, but I’m glad that at least the music made it into the world.

185 Miles South Podcast

This is probably old news to many people since, as of this writing, the podcast has 204 episodes under its belt, but a couple of months ago I discovered the 185 Miles South podcast, and I’ve come to really look forward to seeing new episodes in my feed. Maybe this is arrogant of me to think because 185 is so well-produced, but when I first listened, I felt like their podcast was doing something very similar to the Sorry State newsletter, engaging with punk rock’s past and present in a thoughtful, enthusiastic way.

The first thing I like about 185 Miles South is its format. While there are frequent special episodes devoted to a single topic, the standard format is magazine-style, with each two hour-ish episode featuring a mix of shorter segments. Taking inspiration from the classic punk zine format, typically there’s at least one band interview and a record review segment where the hosts discuss new music. There are also segments that pop up less frequently, some of which are more light-hearted. My favorite one that I’ve heard is 25 Ta Life lyric trivia, where they play a segment of a 25 Ta Life song and the contestants have to guess what the actual lyrics are. They play the clip and it sounds like Rick is spitting incomprehensible gibberish, and then when they reveal the lyrics it’s like “yeah, I guess that is what he’s singing.” It makes me laugh every time. We’ve been too busy to even think about it for several years now, but we spent a lot of time talking about launching a Sorry State podcast. My idea for how we should do the podcast was essentially what 185 Miles South is doing… I imagined it as an audio version of the newsletter, and hearing 185 confirms that format can work well if it’s done properly. I’m sure it’s a crushing amount of work for Zack and the crew, though.

Aside from its format, 185’s other strength is how smart and thoughtful the hosts are. I’ve listened to a lot of podcasts about music (including just about every one I can find about punk and hardcore), but I’ve found very few of them that are worth my time. A big part of this is that I’m a tough audience. I’ve been obsessed with punk rock since I was a teenager, and I’m almost 44 years old. I’ve heard a lot of records in that time and I’ve read a lot of books, zines, and other ephemera, so I have little time for intro-level stuff. I hate to say anything bad about them because they did a great job, but a good example of what I don’t like is the punk season of the No Dogs in Space podcast. The podcast is well-produced (by the same team that does the popular podcast Last Podcast on the Left), but it rarely told me anything I didn’t already know, and I often found myself yelling at the podcast when they spouted incorrect information or off-base opinions. Maybe I’m just an asshole? While I can forgive someone for not knowing something, I’ll turn a podcast off and never go back if I feel like it’s intellectually lazy. A lot of podcast hosts are just windbags who don’t take the time to understand what they’re talking about and, well, fuck that. At 185 Miles South, though, they know their shit. Not only are they well versed in punk and hardcore history, but even when they’re approaching something they’re not familiar with, they do it with open, honest, and attentive ears. Just based on the handful of episodes I’ve listened to, they’ve built up a lot of credibility with me, and I respect their knowledge and perspectives. And like we are at Sorry State, the crew at 185 Miles South is passionate about the current scene. They’ve already introduced me to a bunch of cool music I wouldn’t have heard otherwise.

While I love everything about how they produce 185 Miles South, they focus on a different, though overlapping, part of the scene than Sorry State. The hosts come from the more hardcore end of the spectrum; in fact, I think I remember checking out 185 some time ago when they mentioned it on the Revelation Records podcast Where It Went, but when I tuned in, they were going on and on about how great Earth Crisis or something was and I decided it wasn’t for me. While the podcast features plenty of coverage of the 70s and 80s punk I love (the most recent episode has a segment on the No Future Records band Attak, which illustrates how deep they go), the hosts and most of their guests hold straight edge hardcore in high regard. If you look at their Top 100 Records of the 1980s, for instance, you’ll see that Revelation Records released 5 of their top 15 records of the decade. They also find a lot more to like in the 90s punk scene than I do. Honestly, though, I think the problem here is me, not them. I was a teenager in the 90s and the straight edge scene was huge where I grew up in Virginia, so I’m familiar with almost all the music they talk about; in fact, I liked a lot of it in my younger years. However, in the early 2000s, I disavowed straight edge and post-straight edge hardcore and never looked back. For me, that has less to do with the music and more to do with the scene politics in my part of the world. I always found the straight edge scene (and most everything that sprang from it) snobby, cliqueish, and way too clean cut (but also violent and sketchy), whereas the punks more steeped in 80s music tended to be more open and welcoming, just wanting to rage out and party. Like I said, though, that’s just me being an old, closed-minded curmudgeon, and I think most sane people will appreciate 185’s broader focus.

So, yeah, if you’re as much of a fan of the way we talk about music in the Sorry State newsletter as you are of what we cover, I encourage you to give 185 Miles South a listen. I recommend starting with the latest episode, #204, which even features a glowing review of the new Illiterates LP on Sorry State. Enjoy!

The Bonniwell Music Machine: S/T LP (1968, Warner Bros. Records)

My connection with the Music Machine begins with Rocket from the Crypt. I should write at length about my feelings on RFTC at some point. I loved them when I was a teenager, even though they never achieved the level of success many people think they deserved. They were such a great band, but their campy aesthetic and their James Brown-influenced, “hard working entertainers” schtick were just so out of sync with the times, the total opposite of the earnest slacker vibes that dominated the radio in the post-grunge era. RFTC’s songs were so damn great that to check them out was to fall in love with them, and every time I have revisited their music in the two and a half decades since (!!!), their greatness is confirmed. But that’s an argument for another day.

Camp Zama Records in Norfolk, Virginia was the first independent record store I frequented. There are a handful of records I remember seeing there, some of which I bought, and some I didn’t. One of them was a minty first pressing of the Teen Idles EP on the wall for $100. At the time I made $4.15 an hour, so $100 was an inconceivable amount to pay for a record… most new 7”s were about three bucks. But I think seeing that record on the wall planted a seed in me that’s still sprouting today. Other records I remember buying there include the Cap’n Jazz LP, Converge’s Halo in a Haystack, and Redemption 87’s self-titled LP, all of them seeming to my sheltered teenage brain like messages beamed from some kind of youth culture promised land. Another one I remember seeing on the wall was Rocket from the Crypt’s 1996 single featuring two cover songs by the Music Machine. The artwork for that 7” was a straight rip of the cover of the Music Machine album, and I remember being so intrigued by it. I can’t remember if I bought that single or not, but the tracks hit home with me when I (re?) discovered them on the CD version of RFTC’s 1995 10” EP, The State Of Art Is On Fire, which added the two Music Machine songs to the end of the original 10”. The State Of Art Is On Fire is kind of the ultimate RFTC record, catching them right on the bubble between their earlier, rawer records and the more anthemic material they moved toward during their major label period. I played that CD to death, and the two Music Machine covers were a big part of why I loved it, a perfect pop chaser after the heady psychedelia the band dips into on the EP.

(A short aside: RFTC connects to another significant moment in my life as a music lover / record collector. Their third album, 1995’s Hot Charity was only available on vinyl… I think I remember reading that the band promised the record would never appear on CD. Not only was one of one of my favorite bands repping for vinyl by refusing to release their new album on the dominant format of the day, but it also taught me an important lesson… a lot of great music only exists on vinyl.)

So, with the cover of the Music Machine’s album burned into my brain via seeing RFTC’s homage on the wall at Camp Zama, the next stop on my journey with the Music Machine is when I picked up their album for a dollar. Every year at Richmond’s Strawberry Festival, Plan 9 would have a giant outdoor booth filled with LPs, and everything cost a dollar. Every year I would spend $50-$75 and buy a giant armload of LPs, and I got loads of great stuff. My first copy of the Circle Jerks’ Group Sex came from one of these sales, a beater copy with split seams. The original 1966 pressing of Turn on the Music Machine I bought, however, didn’t have any major condition issues. I’m amazed the record ended up at the dollar sale, because Plan 9 was one of the few stores in the area that dealt in collectible records, and they knew their shit. Maybe someone was dropping a golden ticket in the pile of dross. However it ended up there, I was stoked.

Even though I didn’t know much about 60s garage, I played Turn on the Music Machine for years. It just ripped. It turns out that RFTC’s covers of “Trouble” and “Masculine Intuition” were faithful to the originals, and those weren’t the only killer tracks on the record. “Talk Talk” might be the band’s shining moment, and their cover of the Beatles’ “Taxman” is scorching. They hew pretty close to the Beatles’ arrangement, but it makes sense since the song is suited to the Music Machine’s strengths. There’s also a great version of ? and the Mysterians’ “96 Tears,” and as I don’t think I’d heard the original by that point, the Music Machine also pointed the way toward another 60s garage classic.

I think I was dimly aware there was a second Music Machine album under the name the Bonniwell Music Machine, but I’d never taken the time to check it out until I picked up Rhino’s 1984 Music Machine compilation Best Of The Music Machine. I picked up the LP hoping it would gather some cool non-album sides I wasn’t familiar with, and I found myself intrigued by the tracks “Double Yellow Line” and “The Eagle Never Hunts the Fly,” which are the two singles from the Bonniwell Music Machine album. The album went on my want list, but it’s not an easy grip… it sold poorly at the time, so original copies are scarce, and in the intervening decades, the Music Machine has been canonized as a titan of 60s garage, so the supply and demand see-saw slams down right on your wallet. Luckily, though, when I was in LA for the Lie Detector Fest in December 2021, I found an original pressing during my wanderings around LA’s record stores. It wasn’t a cheap copy, but it was reasonably priced and in nice shape.

So yeah, that’s the long story of how I discovered and acquired this record. As for the music… it’s pretty cool. Leaning more toward psychedelic rock than the more ferocious, punkier Turn On, The Bonniwell Music Machine is still full of great songs, though I think the band chose the strongest two as the singles. The production is somewhat baroque, and it reminds me of Love’s Forever Changes… actually, Love’s trajectory as a band resembles the Music Machine's, starting with searing garage rock and moving toward baroque pop. I even played this LP once when my family was visiting, and my dad and my brother-in-law commented on how much they liked the music. I don’t think they’ve EVER done that before or since.