Sorry again for not getting a newsletter out last week. Running Sorry State is always a balancing act, and last week it felt like all the plates came crashing to the ground. I needed a few days to recover, but now I’m back to pushing the rock uphill. It’s bound to happen from time to time, and I appreciate everyone’s patience when it does.
Last week I went out to Local 506 in Chapel Hill to check out Sacred Bones artist Anika play. I don’t think I’ve talked it in the newsletter at all (aside from maybe a brief mention in the new arrivals section), but Anika’s new album, Abyss, has been one of my most played records of the year so far. I spend so much time listening to contemporary hardcore punk that not much non-punk new music penetrates my orbit. Anika was on my radar, though, because Rich from ISS and Paranoid Maniac recommended her old band, Exploded View, to me at some point. I picked up one of Exploded View’s records in the clearance bin at Chaz’s Records in Durham a few years ago and spun it a lot, and when I read the description of Abyss and realized Anika was the singer, I gave it a spin. I liked Abyss right away and have kept returning to it all summer. Anika’s rich, deep vocals and evocative lyrics carry over from Exploded View, but there’s a kind of 90s alt-rock heaviness to the record that really does it for me. It’s like Nico singing for Dinosaur Jr or something. I urge you to check out Abyss if that sounds at all like it might be interesting to you.
The show was an interesting experience. Before the gig, I hit Mediterranean Deli, one of my favorite restaurants in Chapel Hill, which had been closed for several years after a fire destroyed their space. Med Deli is located right near the beloved (and sadly now-defunct) Chapel Hill venue the Nightlight, and I always used to joke that it was responsible for many a sluggish set from Raleigh punk bands who ate a big, nap-inducing meal there before the gig. The meal was everything I remembered and more, and I walked up the street to Local 506 in a great mood. I knew absolutely no one at the gig, which was kind of nice. I arrived just as the opening band was finishing, and rather than make a new friend, I passed the time between sets planning SSR’s staff meeting on my phone.
Anika’s set was excellent, though not entirely what I expected. She is based in the UK (I think), but the rest of her band wasn’t along for the trip. The ensemble for tonight was Anika on vocals, a guitarist whose name I didn’t catch playing all those reverb-drenched shoegaze-y parts, and one of Anika’s bandmates from Exploded View on drums. The bass and other effects came from a backing track, which had its pluses and minuses. On the plus side, the sound was absolutely incredible, and almost indistinguishable from the record… it felt like blasting Abyss on the best sound system in the world. But I got the impression that playing along to backing tracks kept the members’ performances on a tight leash… even subtle things about Anika’s performance, like the inflection of the words and the way she would periodically overload the mic, sounded eerily like the record. There were a few moments of spontaneity, though, like how Anika jumped into the crowd for the punky “Out of the Shadows,” and a couple of stripped-down tunes (including a Yoko Ono cover) without the backing track at the end of the set. Since I didn’t know anyone, I kind of bolted at the end of the set. Anika was posted up at the merch table chatting with people, and while I wanted to know why she speaks with an English accent but sings with a German accent, I was too shy to ask.
Anika’s set was the kickoff for a busy couple of weeks of shows in this area. I always say it’s feast or famine for shows in Raleigh, and we’re feasting right now. Sadly, I had to miss the Catharsis show at Kings on Friday, but it looked like it ruled. This Friday, Will from To Live a Lie Records is putting on Dry Socket and a bunch of other bands at RUMAH, then Rigorous Institution plays on Sunday at a new venue called Cannonball Music Hall, and then Golpe returns on Monday, which will also be my debut as the bassist for Starving Bomb. And then after that, maybe I’ll rest a bit.
Oh yeah, I’m supposed to choose a record as my staff pick, right? Let’s go with this 1980 compilation from New Zealand, which I’ve been listening to a lot lately. Its title is a bit confusing… I’ve seen it referred to as Four Stars, ****, and various combinations of the two. It originally came out on a label called Sausage Records, and it features a few tracks each from four bands: Life in the Fridge Exists, Wallsockets, Naked Spots Dance, and Beat Rhythm Fashion. For the first two bands, Four Stars was the only material they released; Naked Spots Dance managed an album in 1983, while Beat Rhythm Fashion released 3 singles before breaking up in 1982. All four bands sound like they could have been on the early Rough Trade roster, playing scrappy renditions of punk that had only recently acquired the “post-” prefix. That’s one of my favorite eras of music, and these groups have a similar vibe to the Raincoats, Swell Maps, the Slits, etc… arty weirdos who walked through punk’s door found more than just power chords and tired rock cliches.
One clear highlight is the opening track, “Have You Checked the Children,” by Life in the Fridge Exists. Full of angry young woman energy, the song rises above your typical DIY clatter with a particularly impassioned delivery and some clever wordplay. I love the line, “your sons and your daughters / are working in saunas,” which is exactly the kind of clever half-rhyme that makes me smile. Maybe saunas are stigmatized in New Zealand, but in my 21st-century American brain there doesn’t appear to be anything so bad about working at a sauna. The image, for me, pushes the song into the realm of the surreal, the singer getting all worked up about something that doesn’t seem like a big deal at all. I’m struggling to explain where the language’s power comes from, but it’s there for me.
My copy of Four Stars is a bootleg that came out in 2020. The original is impossibly rare… only 250 copies pressed, and the Discogs median currently stands at $340 USD (one copy is currently for sale for $450). I could be wrong, but it appears the bootleg copy I have may come from the same source as two other semi-recent bootleg compilations: The Buntington Long Playing Record and Scaling Triangles (the latter of which we carried at Sorry State). All three titles have similar packaging and a similar MO, bringing a very obscure regional compilation back into print at a budget price. Everyone has an opinion on bootlegs, but I say god bless the folks responsible for these. Compilations are a logistical nightmare in the first place, and I can’t imagine what it would take to officially reissue a small regional compilation from 40 years ago… just contacting the bands would be a challenge, not to mention getting them all signed on for a reissue. A bootleg is a quick and dirty option, and since I don’t think there’s much money to be made in this enterprise, all can be forgiven in the name of spreading around some great art. I can’t help but wonder, though… if these three compilations are all part of the same series, are there others I’ve missed? Please let me know if there are!
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