Military School: School Is War 7"

"Are you ready to get weird? Philadelphia’s Military School are here with their take on the superior art form for tastemakers worldwide, the hardcore punk-seven-inch. “School is War” is their offering, with five songs seething with absolute vitriol that only can be provided by someone that has definitely never been in the military. Bad Brains meets Cleveland style insanity with a tinge of midwest punk ala Dirty Work/Nuke Cult (but they were mostly listening to Christ on Parade). Dirty and fucked up just the way we like it, that only a group of fucked up individuals or people devotedly pretending could ever produce." Run of 300

Our take: 11PM Records and Broken Skull Records team up to bring us this debut 7” from Philadelphia’s Military School. The first thing you’ll notice when you drop the needle on School Is War is that this bad boy is raw… Brendan from Cicada and Hologram did the recording, and it’s full of tape warble, hiss, and analog clipping. It’s a choice, but not necessarily a bad one; the recording might lose some subtlety in the drums and guitar, but when everyone in the band is playing full-tilt and all the little red lights on the four-track are lighting up, it sounds like a sonic bulldozer plowing through everything in its path. As you might expect from an 11PM release, Military School’s primary mode is fast-and-loud in the early 80s tradition, but the songs have peaks and valleys, mixing up tempos and using instrumental breaks to let you catch your breath for just a second before Military School slams the pedal back to the floor. The playing is loose and ugly, particularly the vocals, which are a Darby Crash-esque snarl that treats the song’s beat as a suggestion rather than a dictum for how the vocal pattern should flow. Some people will say this is too raw and noisy (they’re wrong), but if you (correctly) think it’s all about the energy, maaaaan, School Is War will go down like a cocktail of rubbing alcohol and Mad Dog.

• Format Type: 7"
• Genre: hardcore