Finally.....

who's stoked? Me that's who.

In Tongues demo

In Tongues are from Glasgow, Scotland. A tough city that produces rough sounds. My prevailing memory of this city is of playing there with Age Of Kali, Raise The White Flag and Out Of Hand some years ago. We parked our van on the pavement outside the venue and whilst we were loading out a bunch of local toerags climbed into our van through the side door and began helping themselves to our posessions. When asked “what the fuck you playing at mate?” our caledonian friends informed us they were “jus gittin’ ma baaaag pal”. No you aint mate. Props to Sketch for manning up on that occasion.

Anyhow, In Tongues sound kinda like if Mike Cheese was fronting Green Rage or some similar clunky mid-nineties metallic hardcore act. The recording is practice room standard which adds some grit to the whole affair but I want to hear the guitars crunch and the drums thunder ya kna'? Obviously this is a band in it’s infancy, so there’s a real mix of elements, influences and ideas herte, sometimes the songs sound a little confused because of it. There’s shades of early 90’s clevo, some nice crusty fast parts and an early Abnegation feel here and there that kinda works but the Strife’esque back ups don’t do much for me and sound a tad corny. Lyrically i'm bang into it, rallying against materialism and the modern world, right on. I would say that once they figure out what direction they want to focus their energies upon, these guys are gonna produce something a bit fucking nasty. I look forward to seeing what they churn out next.

Download The Demo HERE

New shit.

So i thought i'd have a crack at micro-blogging. I don't really know what that means but I've set up a tumblr account as a visual accompaniment to this blog. It's mostly just old pictures and stuff that I found in my nans loft, but some of it may be of interest to you?

The Siege Perilous Tumblr

Return Of The Black Dog

I roadied for these guys many times back in the day. Lots of laughs and many, many fond memories. The shocking discovery of a dildo caked in menstrual blood, however, is not one of them. Grim buisness.

I've learnt from observing how you play the game, that you and I are not the same...

Total War demo

This nasty piece of work arrived courtesy of Drainlands Jamie Grimes. If you are a fan of filthy, sludgey belligerent noise and you’ve not checked out the mighty Drainland, go HERE post haste and do the right thing. You’ll not be disappointed i assure you.

Anyway, Total War is the sound of a Dublin curmudgeon, foaming at the mouth, gnawing on his own tongue and thrashing around inside his cage as the clean cut youth of modern hardcore peer in with morbid fascination from the safe side of the bars. Four songs of foul, blown out and distorted to all fuck, hardcore.

Want a comparison?...Siege would be a good starting point, Deep Wound too maybe? Dublin 2012 has a wicked Greg Ginn style riff throughout, whilst the homeless drunk vocals gibber and rant over the whole racket. It’s not a comfortable listen by any stretch but i fucking love it, and if you’re a miserable old twat who hates the youth and thinks hardcore should sound like it was recorded in an abandoned, piss drenched bomb shelter, you will too. Lyrically, it's all righteous spite, malice and frustration. All these songs were written,recorded and played by just the man himself but Total War has since become a full band with members of Drainland and the ugly beast that is Crowd Control filling out the vacant spots. This is what we need. Thank fuck.

Total War demo

Death Threats

Control demo

After what feels like weeks of being pestered by Controls vocalist for a review, here it is.

Control are a new band from the Durham/Middlesborough area, made up of both veterans and new blood alike. This is their second stab at recording a demo, the first quite frankly was a piece of shit, (though that was down to the recording not the songs.)

Much like Wardogs, Control are peddling straight forward and gimmick free traditional hardcore. Yeah they wear their influences on their sleeve, The Knockdown 7”, Floorpunch 7” and Youth Of Todays back catalogue have all been ruthlessly plundered and“Addicted” is pretty much a direct rip off of Floorpunch’s Not For Me, but still. If being unoriginal was a crime, I think we’d all be doing a long stretch in the pokey right? And at least this recording doesn’t sound fucking modern, it’s rough and ready and thats what i want to hear. I hate it when bands lay claim to the same influences as Control but make it sound all polished and squeaky clean and palatable, fucking soft scoop shite. It’s still punk rock for fucks sake not Poison or whatever people listen to now. When i hear a band like Control i want to see straight edge skinheads running across heads and sneaking digs on people they hate whilst caught in the mosh. Not, as my man in Dublin describes it “Get Along Gang bullshit”. Thankfully Control don’t fall into that category. Iains voice is gruff but not so gnarly that you can’t hear what the twat is chuntering on about and his lungs are far better suited to this type of stuff then when he was fannying about with Sarin. The musics full on and agressive, short and punchy with no pretensions or dodgy metal efforts. It is what it is. If you like old Youngblood Records stuff, or Stop & Think is your jam, give this lot a try. Just don’t be too enthusiastic or else they will pester you for shows and stuff all the time.

Control

Next couple of shows....