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Before I get into my staff pick for this week, an addendum to my pick from last week, when I wrote about the Hungarian punk band Nagy Feró És A Bikini. A couple of actual Hungarian punks wrote in and shared some interesting info with me. First, I have to correct an error they both pointed out. I linked to a Bikini 7” and said it was the one Jonah held up on What Are You Listening To?, but it turns out I linked to the wrong record. The record Jonah actually held up was this single, which features two album tracks from the record I wrote about last week. I know this because one of the Hungarian punks who wrote in, Dini, is the person who gave Jonah the record! Small world. The record I linked to by mistake is a very rare 7” featuring two Bikini songs with alternate vocal tracks where the lyrics are in English. This 7” is very rare… no one knows how many exist, but it is certainly very few. Viktor who wrote in called it “a Hungarian punk holy grail,” so don’t hold your breath waiting for a copy.
Both Dini and Viktor recommended several Hungarian bands for me to check out, but Dini also told me about his appearance on the long-running Canadian punk radio show Equalizing Distort in 2015. I was really intrigued when I saw his setlist for the show, but when I started playing it I was surprised to hear that, in addition to the songs, there’s also a lengthy interview with Dini about punk in Hungary. I had planned to let the radio show play in the background while I worked, but the interview was so interesting that I had to stop it and save the rest for a time when I can listen with full attention. If you didn’t already know, every episode of Equalizing Distort is preserved for posterity on the Internet Archive. Links to larger files on the Internet Archive can be finicky, and I couldn’t get the embedded player at the link above to work. However, if you go to the file’s page on the archive, click the link on the right side that says “VBR MP3,” and wait a good long while, you will (hopefully) be rewarded. Enjoy!
Now for today’s staff pick, which is another record I picked up while I was in Greece this summer:
Deus Ex Macina: Motorpsycho LP (Hitch-Hyke Records, 1991)
This is one of several records I bought on the suggestion of the owner of Art Rat Records. I’m thankful for the recommendation, because I’m not sure Motorpsycho would have stood out to me otherwise. Not that it doesn’t look cool, but the 1991 date, the longer song lengths (only one track under three minutes) and all the biker imagery (the back cover features the slogan “Body is the Motor / Rider is the Soul”) aren’t typically signals that something is going to be in my wheelhouse.
So, I was somewhat skeptical when I eventually threw this on the turntable, but it knocked me out immediately. First of all, it doesn’t sound at all like what I would have expected. Not that I knew what to expect from early 90s Greek biker punk, but I wouldn’t have expected this. The record starts with a tough-sounding mid-paced groove and a total skate rock riff. As the song develops I get a surfy vibe, particularly when the guitars ring out and the bass and drums keep charging forward at that head-nodding tempo. The vocals take a loooong time to kick in, and when they do they’re pretty minimal. After a couple of songs, I realized what it reminded me of: Agent Orange’s Living in Darkness. Not as surfy, not as California-sounding, but there’s something very similar there. As the record keeps spinning it just gets more and more exciting, particularly when they do that thing I love where the guitarist repeats a short rhythmic figure while the bass player does something more stretched-out and melodic underneath it.
I didn’t know anything about the band or the record and I had no idea what I was going to say in my staff pick, but when I did a little research on Deus Ex Macina, some things clicked together. As it turns out, Deus Ex Macina was started by two members of the band Αδιέξοδο (Adiexodo), whose album I also picked up while I was in Athens. I wrote about the Adiexodo album in a staff pick back in July. The Deus Ex Macina record is very different from the Adiexodo album, which is roughly recorded, rather primitively played, and has a tough, even thuggish, vibe. But there are some similarities too. When I wrote about Adiexodo, I pointed out how the guitarist is very rhythmically oriented, while the bass player is busier and more melodic, which is exactly what struck me about Deus Ex Macina. It’s very cool that a band like Adiexodo, who had a very primitive charm, found a way to develop that allowed to lean into their strengths without feeling watered down.
Looking at Discogs, Deus Ex Macina has a substantial discography with releases all the way up to mid-2010s. I haven’t yet explored, but if I pick up anything else maybe I’ll cover it in a future staff pick.