Best Albums of 2013

Bill Orcutt - A History of Everyone
I wasn't sure where exactly to put this album on my list, so I decided to just shove it on the end where it wouldn't interfere with the top fifteen proper. It's a really great record - I posted a review of it yesterday, so I won;t go into too much detail here, but seriously - give it a spin. It's awesome

And now for the top fifteen:

15: Locust of the Dead Earth - Mithridate
This was the first album I ever reviewed on this blog, and I definitely got things off to a good start. It's a dense, delicate, swirling melange of ambient textures and drones, nihilism and beatitude, Neitszche and Brian Eno. I still don;t know how to pronounce that name, but I love this record.

14: The National - Trouble Will Find Me
I'd never listened to The National until tonight, and I'd always written them off as a hipster band, but holy fuck is this thing beautiful. It's kind of like a more organic-sounding Radiohead - the semi-ambient soundscapes, the subtle yet perfectly judged melodies, the oblique lyrics, every aspect of this album adds up to make a truly amazing piece of work.

13: Kanye West - Yeezus
A lot of people hate Kanye West, largely because he's a wanker. But what they forget is that he's a damn good musician. He may be a self-absorbed, arrogant dickhole, but he's also really good at taking the piss out of self-absorbed, arrogant dickholes. That comedic ability, along with West's talent as a producer, is what marks this album out as something special. He's also a damn fine rapper, far better than his overhyped, mediocre contemporary Jay Z.

12: Sting - The Last Ship
Sting is a much-underrated songwriter. People always slag him off because of the Police, and to be fair, they were a bit dull. But his solo work is fantastic, and this album is no exception. A concept album, based around the shipyards of Newcastle, The Last Ship runs the gamut of emotions, from raucous drinking songs to tear-sodden laments, often in the same song. Have no doubt, this is well worth buying.

11: Facebreaker - Dedicated to the Flesh
This is another album I hadn't listened to until today, and it was a hell of a find. Facebreaker are a Swedish death metal band, which probably tells you all you need to know about them. I don;t really listen to a lot of death metal, but Dedicated to the Flesh kicks all kinds of arse. It has everything you'd want in a death metal album and more. Buy this record. See this band.

10: Dead in the Dirt - The Blind Hole
Dead in the Dirt are a vegan straight edge band from the US, and their new album is a harsh, discordant affair. Feedback bleeds through pummeling hardcore like blood from a fist full of broken glass. There's something in the bleakness of this album that seems to come from black metal, rather than grindcore, and the album really benefits from that. The sheer coldness of The Blind Hole marks it out.

9: Islam85 - S/T
Islam85 sadly broke up this year, but this self-titled release was a truly outstanding final bow. It's the quintessential powerviolence record - low-down, bass-heavy chug, brutal fast sections, cheap and nasty production and pure, unadulterated rage. They blew my mind, and hopefully they'll blow yours, too.

8: Blister Unit - The Dengar Demo
I was hesitant to put this on the list, because (SPOILER ALERT) I didn't want to have two albums by the same band. But Blister Unit definitely merit the double placing. This is drum and bass powerviolence at its finest, enough to - dare I say it? - give Man Is The Bastard a run for their money. Blister Unit are an incredible band, and they deserve to be far better known than they are.

7: Sick/Tired - King of Dirt
King of Dirt kind of passed me by when it came out, but when I finally heard it, it knocked me for six. The sheer feral energy of this band is beyond compare - there are few bands who can ever hope to replicate the abrasive, ferocious assault on the ears that is King of Dirt.

6: Cloud Rat - Moksha
I've been a fan of Cloud Rat for quite some time, and they just get better and better. There's no one thing that makes Moksha a great album. Everything - the unorthodox melodicism, the focus on texture and atmosphere rather than mindless aggression, the imaginative guitar playing, the way the singer sounds like she's on the verge of jumping through the speakers and ripping your throat out - it all combines to make this arecord that is far greater than the sum of its parts. I would recommend this to any grindcore fan.

5: Laura Marling - Once I Was An Eagle
Ok, now we're into the big guns, the top five, and there's a slight change of pace with this one. Laura Marling has given the world some amazing music, and Once I Was An Eagle is no exception. It's jazzier than her previous efforts, tougher too, and generally more worldly. Marling sounds like she's been around the block once or twice, and has the scars to show for it. This is a wonderful record.

4: Blister Unit - Christ Ape
I've written about this album quite a bit, and it deserves every word of praise I've given it. It's a simple, fast blitzkreig of the senses, a collection of songs that seem to be physically shaking you and screaming in your face. You can practically feel the singer's breath. The guitar solos are a real high point - never wanky, never boring, just sheer aggression. One of the best grindcore bands around, full stop.

3: Fuck Buttons - Slow Focus
I knew Slow Focus would be on this list as soon as I heard it. It's a soaring, uplifting noise album, full of sound and fury, signifying - well quite a bit actually. Some hardcore noise fans have slagged it off for being too upbeat, too "accessible," but such complaints smack of hipsterism. And the less said about the fucktards who hate it because it's discordant, the better. If you like noise, electronica, or music in general, then I'd recommend this.

2: Merzbow and Nordvagr - Partikel III
Well, this is something. I never would have thought that anything could come along to knock Merzbow off the top spot, but it's happened. Still, nothing can take away the fact that this is one of the greatest Noise albums ever made. It's not as harsh as some Merzbow fans might expect, nor is it as soft as the Guardian readers would want, but it is what it is and what it is is something very, very special. It's difficult to describe Partikel III without slipping into hyperbole, but what I will say is that Merzbow and Nordvagr deserve a spot alongside Lou Reed and Throbbing Gristle in the Noise pantheon. Listen to this while high and you might just acheive nirvana.

1: Bill Callahan - Dream River
Well, this is it, folks - number 1. The king of the hill. The best album (imo) of the year. And I can think of few years when Dream River would not have deserved that title. Bill Callahan is a master songwriter - one of maybe two or three who deserve to be compared to Bob Dylan. There is not one single thing wrong with this album - the vocals are perfect, the lyrics are perfect, the music is perfect. If you've lost faith in modern music; if you think that all the great songs have already been written; if you don;t own any records made after 1975; then this is the album to change your mind. There is nothing hyperbolic about anything I've said here. Bill Callahan is a genius, and that is not a word I use lightly.

Review - Bill Orcutt

Bill Orcutt
A Hisory of Every One

Ok, it's been a while since I posted, due to various factors, but now I'm back with what is definitely the strangest (and hardest to classify) album that I've heard all year. Bear in mind, I am quite considerably drunk at the moment, so that may affect my judgement.

Alright, then, Bill Orcutt. I wasn't sure what to expect from this record - on the one hand, Orcutt was in Harry Pussy, and I fucking hate Harry Pussy. On the other, he plays a guitar with only two strings on at least one of these songs, and as someone who regularly plays with less than the recommended number of strings, I thought I should give it a look/listen. So I gave it a look/listen, and I'm glad that I did. Orcutt's new record is made up entirely of covers of old American standards, but there's nothing standard about the way he plays them. In his hands, songs like "When You Wish Upon A Star" and "White Christmas" become strange, distorted (de)compositions. He takes some of the most familiar songs in the western world and deconstructs them until they bear almost no relation to their original forms. His guitar spits out strange, jumbled fragments, semi-bluesy note clusters, dissonant skeletons somewhere in between John Fahey's acoustic work and John Fahey's electric work. Sometimes a few notes will come together to form something beautiful and melodious, as in "Spanish is the Loving Tongue," but more often he sounds like Blind Willie Johnson having a stroke - in a really, really good way. Occasionally, Orcutt's voice intrudes, adding eerie whoops and hollers to the jangling guitar.

The comparisons are obvious - Marc Ribot, Jandek, John Zorn - but Orcutt is his own musician, and he plays like noone else could. I won;t give this album a rating, partly because I'm currently too pissed to trust my own judgement, but also because I really don;t think I can reduce this music to a simple score out of ten. One thing's for sure, though - this will be one of my albums of the year.

Review - Bill Callahan

Bill Callahan
Dream River

I got into Bill Callahan quite recently - only a few months ago - and I've got to say, I can't believe I'd never heard of him before. He's a stunning songwriter, kind of like a male Joanna Newsom. His songs have the same sort of ever-shifting structure and complex lyrics as hers, and like her, he's one of the greatest lyricists around right now. It normally pisses me off to a disproportionate level when people say that a songwriter is "really a poet," because it carries with it the assumption that poetry is inherently better than song lyrics - someone can't just be a great lyricist, they have to be a "poet," even though they clearly aren't. A poet is someone who writes poetry. A songwriter is someone who writes songs. Bill Callahan is not a poet - he's a songwriter. But he could be a poet if he wanted to, and I'm pretty sure he knows that. His lyrics actually work like poetry, and the music he writes could easily work without vocals. Other than Newsom, I can't think of another songwriter of whom this can be said. Dream River, his new album, is another addition to an astonishing body of work. The music is intricately crafted, complex but never wanky, the lyrics are some of the best ever written (and I do not say that likely) and, to top it all off, there's the voice. That deep, rich voice, that Callahan weilds like a precision tool - his every syllable is perfectly weighted, given exactly the correct emphasis. His singing style is amost like speech, or like a poet performing his work. He kind of reminds me of a cross between Scott Walker and Lou Reed. Together, the lyrics, music and vocals make up what will almost certainly be the best album released this year. Listen to the album via the link above.

Rating: 10/10

Review - Death Grips

Death Grips
Government Plates

Well, it's finally here - the new Death Grips album.  If you haven't heard of Death Grips, then you've really been missing out. The are peraps the greatest hip-hop group around now, and one of the best that have ever been around. The deal in oblique lyrics set against a harsh, noisy background of brilliantly selected samples and brutal electronics. If you are new to them, though, this album is a pretty good place to start. It starts off with "You Might Think He Loves You For Your Money But I Know What He Really Loves You For It's Your Brand New Leopard-Skin Pillbox Hat" - that's right, this is Death Grips referencing Dylan (though it's hardly surprising - they've sampled Link Wray and Arthur Brown before, so they clearly have a pretty wide-ranging taste in music). Like the rest of the album, it's heavy, it's dark, and while you'd need an interpreter to tell you what the lyrics actually mean, it's pretty clear it's nothing pleasant. The album is pretty much the same as their last three records, but that's not a bad thing - Death Grips know what they're good at and they do it well. And Government Plates isn't exactly the same as their previous output, in any case. There are more atmospheric passages here, and a greater emphasis on building a subtly threatening vibe than bludgeoning the audience into submission - closing track "Whatever I Want (Fuck Who's Watching)" is a case in point. It's not nearly as abrasive as the rest of the album, but that doesn't mean that it's soft, or poppy - it's just that it's more like the long, nerve-wracking part of a horror film where the monster is about to appear, rather than the bloody few seconds when it actually does. All in all, this is a quality album, and a worthy addition to Death Grips' discography.

Rating: 8/10

Will Be Betrayed 3rd Birthday Bash review

Hello there. I've just got back from Sheffield and one of the best gigs I've been to. Here's a review.

Unfortunately, I didn't manage to get to the venue until four, so I missed Cycle Riot, and the beginning of Tosserlad's set, but what I did see of the latter was good, solid punk. Nothing special, but a fine way to start things off. Chewed Up's frontman seemed a little reserved to begin with, but he got into the swing of things pretty quickly and the band gave a quality set. Their ska-influenced sound was an interesting approach and marked them out from the rest of the bands. Ephemeral Foetus, in addition to having perhaps the best band name I've ever heard, played a fantastic set of metallic hardcore, with the singer giving it everything he had, and the crowd loved them. Total Bloody Chaos, who followed, were slightly less exciting but still enjoyable, proving that there's nothing wrong with good old fashioned, by-the-book punk. Gets Worse, of course, were fantastic - they really are one of the best bands of their generation, and if you haven't heard them, you definitely should. They gave probably the heaviest performance of the night, and even among so many other great bands, they stood out. Noone sounds quite like them. Holiday were an interesting change of pace. I'm not usually a fan of pop-punk, or any punk with clean vocals, but they made it work (maybe it had something to do with the vocals being low enough in the mix that I couldn't actually hear the lyrics). Their songs did kind of blend into one another though - the lack of variety put a bit of a damper on the whole thing. Hey, I recognise those three chords - it's all of Dogsflesh's songs! They may be a hugely influential band, but tonight they sounded boring. Their sound may have been original and exciting back in the '80s, but last night they gave very lifeless performance. The same can't be said, though, of Barb Wire Dolls. I'd never heard of them before, but after seeing them life, I'll definitely be checking them out. Their frontwoman was a natural performer - she knew exactly how to get the crowd going. I never thought I'd see crowd-surfing in a moshpit of ten people, but I have now. Which brings us to the big guns, the band I came to see, the unfuckwithable Discharge. They really blew the roof off the place with a blistering set, which included my personal favourite A Hell On Earth. The crowd loved them, I loved them, they were awesome. I would have enjoyed them even more if I hadn't been so drunk/exhausted.

A special shout-out is due also to Vegan Approach, who provided excellent vegan food.

Grindcore for Beginners Part 8 - WTF is that!?

The Locust
Plague Soundscapes

I couldn't think of a title for this section of Grindcore for Beginners, so I just went with my first reaction to the frenetic grindfuckery of The Locust. Like Captain Beefheart jamming with Agoraphobic Nosebleed, or The Dillinger Escape Plan before they got boring, this California-based four-peice has included two former members of Cattle Decapitation. They're well-known for wearing strange costumes, only playing all-ages shows and being completely batshit insane. Their brand of noisy, conspicuously technical Dadaist grind, replete with neck-snapping tempo changes and oblique lyrics, has made them more enemies than fans - odd, seeing as their detractors are often the same people who will be tripping over themselves to lap up every pretentious note that Melt Banana shit out. Their music is unbelievably complex, but never wanky, and probably about as weird as it gets.

The Locust exemplify the fun-loving insanity of punk and grindcore - an aspect people often forget. Remember, Napalm Death used to fall about laughing in their early rehearsals, and for every Dropdead there's a Cogs and Sprockets.

What's also interesting is how they exemplify the tendency towards high levels of technicality in grindcore. This tendency may be down to the influence of metal on the genre, or it may simply be due to the fact that it takes considerable chops to play grind - punk and hardcore prided themselves on their simplicity, but the sheer speed of grindcore means that even the simplest riff will take a lot of practice. Whatever the cause, there have always been grind bands whose technical wizradry is a vital part of their music, and most of them tend to be pretty dull. The Locust, however, are the exception. They may fit more riffs into one song than most bands have on an entire album, but they never forget that the technique must serve the song, not the other way around.

Anyway - have a listen.

A slightly late halloween post

Ok, I know Halloween was yesterday, but I'm doing this post today because shut up, that's why. This is the time of year when we like to be frightened, where we watch scary films and read ghost stories. But there's something missing there - where's the scary music? It often seems to me that, while people will happily watch a scary film or read a scary book, they tend to run a mile if you play them a scary peice of music. Why is that? I don;t know. There seems to be a tendency to think of music as something that should be tuneful, cheery, something to dance to and little else. When people hear anything discordant or dark, they tend to start bitching about how it's "depressing" or "not proper music". In the interests of redressing that balance, then, here are five of my favourite frightening songs.

Of course, I had to put this one in. "Frankie Teardrops" tops every list of scary songs, and for good reason. The subject matter's dark enough - murder, suicide, damnation - but it's the music that really makes this terrifying. The spare, pulsing electronics and the gibbering vocals are bound to send shivers up your spine. For maximum terror, listen to it alone, in the dark, on headphones.

"Birds / Birds / This is not a cornhusk doll / Dipped in blood in the moonlight / Like what happened in America" Possibly the scariest opening line of all time? You can always count on Scott Walker to provide some creepy shit, and this is one of his best tracks. A song about Mussolini's mistress, Clara Petacci, who was hanged alongside him, this song makes the perfect soundtrack to a night spent cowering in a corner in a pool of your own terror sweat.

Bob Dylan is the greatest folk singer of all time. When you listen to him, it's like listening to the voice of folk music itself, all the blod and gore and darkness and beauty of the old songs made manifest. And this is one of scariest folk songs of all - a story of a woman who is tricked into taking a ride with someone who might be the Devil, or the ghost of her dead husband. As you might predict, it doesn't end well for her. Dylan wrings every ounce of fear from this song, and it's genuinely chilling. You can hear my take on the song here.

I couldn't pick one song off this album, so I've just gone ahead and posted the whole thing. Still, at just over ten minutes, it's hsorter than two of the songs on here. Grindcore is a genre where words like "brutal," "harsh," etc have become cliches, but this is a band who genuinely deserve to be described in such terms. Even among this most extreme of music genres, they stand out as one of the most challenging and, yes, scary groups out there.

This is folk music at its finest - it's nasty, it's scary, it's bloodthirsty. Billy Bragg gives a standout performance on this spine-chilling meditation on the Falklands conflict.

Bonus track:

In honour of the late, great Lou Reed, who died on Sunday, here's an appropriate track from his album The Blue Mask:

Lou Reed

Lou Reed is dead.

Lou Reed died yesterday morning in New York. He was 71 years old, and one of the all-time greats of music. He didn't just play rock 'n' roll, he was rock 'n' roll. Sexy, threatening, pathologically cool, always experimenting, never content to repeat himself or settle for less than the absolute best he could do. He was a key member of one of the greatest and most influential rock 'n' roll bands of all time; he made the best noise album of all time at a time when noise music barely existed; he was a punk before anyone knew what punk was; he managed to make Metallica sound half decent; and he was possibly the coolest motherfucker on the planet. His family and freinds have lost someone they loved; the world has lost a legend. So to remember him, I've picked out five quintessential Reed tracks:

It's hard to choose one Velvet Underground song, but this has always been my favourite.  There are a lot of things that add up to make this track great - Mo Tucker's drumming, John Cale's droning viola - but the key ingredients are all Reed. His lyrics, his voice and his guitar - those are the core of this song.

Of all of Lou Reed's solo albums, New York is the one that most perfectly captures his cool, his wry wit and that indefinable quality that links him inextricably with the eponymous city. And of all the tracks on that album, "Beginning of a Great Adventure" has always been my favourite. Apart from anything else, the lyrics just sound perfect paired with Reeds dry, acerbic voice and his deadpan delivery. You could read this out as a poem and it would still be brilliant, and there are few songs where that's the case.

If Hubert Selby Jr had been a songwriter, he would have written this. It's utterly heartbreaking - there's nothing much else I can say, really. If you only listen to one song today, make it this one.

This album came out in 1975. Bear in mind, in 1975 Throbbing Gristle had only just formed, punk was still an obscure New York phenomenon and people's attitude to Noise music was...well, basically what it is today. This album nearly destroyed Reed's career - even today, it's almost universally reviled, or at best regarded as a joke. But, contrary to popular belief, this album does not sound "bad" on purpose - it sounds great on purpose. Reed spent a lot of time and effort making sure that Metal Machine Music sounded exactly how he wanted, and the result is a stunning, hour-long composition that is among the most beautiful, ugliest, most brutal, most lyrical, most un-musical music ever made.

It's kind of fitting that Lulu, the album that this track comes from, was Lou Reed's last record. At a time when most '60s legends were content to plow the same old furrow, making music that - regardless of quality - was basically the same as what they'd done in their youth, Reed made an album with fucking Metallica. This is not a man who was in the business of fuck-giving.

Lou Reed is dead. And the world is a sadder, quieter place.

Review - Sons of Rogues Gallery Pt. 2

Various Artists
Sons of Rogues Gallery

Ok, second part of the review. Here goes.

After Iggy Pop's hilarious "Asshole Rules the Navy" comes "Off to Sea Once More" by Macy Grey. Yep - Macy Grey still exists. News to me. Anyway, the song is a well-put together reggae take on a traditional sailor's song, and Grey's raspy, whispery voice is right at home. It's not fantastic, but it's pretty good. After that was over, it took me about half of Ed Harcourt's song to realise that his style-over-substance contribution to this album was supposed to be bluesy. Seriously, today's musicians are in desperate need of some testosterone.

Next up, it's Shilpa Ray, Nick Cave and Warren Ellis, delivering "Pirate Jenny" like something out of a particularly gruesome musical. It reminds me of Tom Waits' collaborations with Robert Wilson in its creaky bloodthirst. Patti Smith and Johnny Depp follow, with "The Mermaid," a song that would probably be interesting under the right circumstances. These are not those. Chuck E Weiss, an old freind of Tom Waits, follows. His voice has the same drunken soul as Waits, but it's higher and altogether more country. The Waits comparisons continue - "Anthem for Old Souls" could easily be a Waits composition from more or less any part of his career, and the production/arrangement is very reminiscent of Swordfishtrombones. It's a decent song, and Weiss sings it pretty well.

A Beefheart song up next, performed a cappella by Ed Pastorini. Not quite sure what I think of that one. Check it out. There follows an unremarkable "alt-country" song, and then a wonderfully seasick version of "Ye Mariners All," performed by Robin Holcomb and Jessica Kenny.

I think the main problem with this album is that - with a few exceptions - every musician on it has gone at their song from the same angle. It's not real folk - it doesn't have the rawness or the simplicity to be that - but a sort of Radio 2-freindly, "accessible" version of it. Fake folk for Mumford & Sons fans.

There are exceptions, of course, as I said. Case in point - Disc 2 kicks off with a Mothers of Invention track. Unfortunately, it's a pretty dull instrumental with none of Zappa's usual flair. Fortunately, Michael Stipe follows with a fantastic version of "Rio Grande," proving that not even Courtney Love's lacklustre vocal performance can stop Stipe from being epic. Marc Almond warbles his way through "Ship In Distress" like he's, well, Marc Almond. Good thing Dr. John comes along afterwards to wash the bad taste out of your ears with an eerie spoken track, and just to put the icing on the cake, Todd Rundgren busts out a version of "Rolling Down to Old Maui" that I can only describe as inexplicably awesome. By the time Dan Zanes comes along, it's clear that this disc is where the real gold is. There are too many fine tracks to go into detail, but the quality stays very high until Michael Gira delivers a thoroughly dull version of "Whisky Johnny" that manages the rather impressive feat of making Bellowhead look interesting.

Well, that's enough for one post - the third and final part of this review will be coming up soon. Now, I'm off to listen to that Todd Rundgren track again...

Male Cirumcision: Why Tanya Gold Is An Idiot

This is a response to a recent article in the Guardian, in which journalist Tanya Gold argues that a ban on male circumcision would be anti-Semitic. You can see the original article here:

http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2013/oct/11/ban-male-circumcision-antisemitic

Firstly, circumcision is not specific to Judaism. It is also an important part of Islam, and many people do it for non-religious reasons.

Secondly, noone is talking about banning Jews from getting circumcised. There are many people, however, (myself included) who think that circumcising babies should be illegal. A baby may be ethnically Jewish, but in religious terms, a baby is not a Jew for the same reason that he is not a Catholic, a Hindu, or a communist. Judaism is a religion – that is, it is a philosophy, a set of beliefs and a guide to living one’s life. A baby cannot be religious because he does not have the intellect to understand ideas about morality, the meaning of life and magic men in the sky. A baby wouldn’t know what Judaism was if you hit it on the head with a Menorah.

            When said baby grows older and begins to learn about Judaism and other religions, he may decide to follow the religion of Judaism. At that point, if he wants to get circumcised, of course he should be allowed to. If I were to wake up one morning with a sudden urge to have my foreskin removed, I would consider it a bit of a dick move for the law to stop me doing that. I am, after all, an adult, and can make my own decisions about what to do with my body.

But a baby is not an adult, and it cannot consent to having a part of it cut off. Performing unnecessary surgery on anyone without their consent is assault, and to do it to a child is child abuse, regardless of which book told you to do it.

The main argument that Tanya Gold makes in her article is that circumcision is a central part of Judaism. (Well, actually, her central argument is “I’m Jewish, so you can’t criticise me or you’re a Nazi,” but that really doesn’t need a counterargument). My counterargument to this is twofold.

1. Fuck your religion. Wrong is wrong, and a bad thing is still bad even if a book of fairytales tells you it’s ok.
2. Religions evolve. You don’t see Christians burning witches – they realised that that was not a thing that civilised people do, so they stopped doing it. Judaism has produced some of the greatest artists, scientists and thinkers in human history. To reduce all that culture, philosophy, art and profound spirituality to a bit of skin on the end of your cock is to sell your religion, and its long and proud history, short.

So, to sum up, banning circumcision would not be anti-Semitic. It would be anti-cutting bits off babies.

Review - Tom Waits, Beth Orton, Todd Rundgren and more Pt. 1

Various Artists
Sons of Rogues Gallery: Pirate Ballads, Sea Songs and Chanteys

Well, this is a find. Shane MacGowan, Keith Richards and Iggy Pop on the same album, all singing folk songs! The results are - let's say mixed. There's a lot of music to review here, so I'll do this post in multiple parts. Shane MacGowan kicks things off, sounding (if possible) more fucked-up than ever before on a version of "The Leaving of Liverpool" that is either awesome or terrible - I'm not sure which. Then it's over to Robyn Hitchcock for a bloodless and supremely irritating version of "Sam's Gone Away." Beth Orton is apparently well-known, and her style is described by the good people on the interwebs as "folktronica." Read that word again. Do you want to cut off your own ears to spare them the horror of what's to come? Don't do that, or you'll miss an exquisite version of a hauntingly beautiful song. Sean Lennon continues the famous-name theme, although in his case only half his name is actually famous. Still, he manages to give a version of "Row Bullies Row" that isn't at all limp-wristed, lazy, or boring. Wait, no - it's all of those things. And shit. Did I mention shit? It's really, really shit.

Tom Waits takes his typical stylised, experessionistic approach to "Shenandoah," giving it the atmosphere of a ship sailing out to sea as the sailors sing of the land they're leaving. I still prefer Springsteen's version, though. Ivan Neville sounds like a cross between Randy Newman and someone much less talented than Randy Newman, and his plinky-plonky music-hall take on "Mr Stormalong" is perfect if you're looking for a guide on how to rob a song of any emotional resonance that it might have. 

Iggy Pop, of course, needs no introduction, but just in case you're one of those poor deprived human beings who aren't familiar with his work, he was the singer in one of the greatest punk bands of all time, did a very interesting solo album with David Bowie, and the most interesting thing he's done since then is an interview on the Henry Rollins Show. Still, "Asshole Rules the Navy" is a pretty funny song.

End of Part One.

Film Review - World War Z

I read the novel World War Z, by Max Brooks, this summer, and it blew me away. If you haven't read it, you should - it's a genuinely original, well-thought-out take on the standard zombie apocalypse theme. It would also make a pretty awesome film - the problem is, that film does not exist. What we have instead is a film that's called World War Z, and has zombies, and is connected to the book only by those two things. Seriously, if it weren't for the name, it would be impossible to tell that this film is an adaptation of the book. Basically, the book World War Z is an account of how the world fell to the undead, and how humanity eventually recovered. It takes the form of a series of interviews with characters from various countries, and is written like a real history - Brooks is clearly very knowledgeable when it comes to international politics and world history (though he clearly knows fuck all about Clement Attlee) and he tells a thoroughly plausible story. If the world ever were to be taken over by zombies, I'm sure it would go down a lot like it does in World War Z.

The film World War Z is about Brad Pitt running away from zombies. He has a family, and for some reason we're supposed to care about them, though they're on screen for about ten minutes and the scenes that do focus on them contain about half as much character development as an advert for dog food. the sad thing is, Pitt's wife and daughters (I think they might have names, but I honestly can't remember) are the most well-developed characters in the film. There is also an Israeli soldier who gets bitten on the hand (making this the only zombie film where I was momentarily rooting for the undead) but it's ok, because Brad Pitt cuts off her hand and thus stops the infection. That's how the audience finds out that amputating a bitten limb can stop someone becoming infected, and the only purpose of that character seems to be to demonstrate that. Which would be fine, if the audience didn't already know that because it's been in every fucking zombie film ever made. The plot consists of Brad Pitt being saved from the zombies by various people, and eventually finding way to beat the zombies. I won;t tell you what it is, because I wouldn't want to ruin the surprise of just how mind-bogglingly idiotic is is. M Night Shyamalan could come up with a better plot twist than this. If he was in a coma. And could only speak in pronouns.

There are some good things about this film. Firstly, the zombies are very impressive - firstly because they're fast (monsters are scarier when you can't escape them by powerwalking) and secondly because they're very well acted. That may sound weird, but the way that the zombies move in this film is great. They look properly inhuman, like some kind of predator rather than just some walking corpses. Secondly, there is one very impressive shot where Brad Pitt etc. are in Israel, and the Israelis have built a wall to keep the zombies out. The camera pans to show a tower of zombies clambering over one another to get over the wall, and that is a very nice peice of staging. Watch that one shot. Then turn the film off, and spare yourself the ninety minutes of tedium that surround it.

This film reminds me of the scene in Trainspotting where Renton dives into a toilet full of shit to retreive some opium suppositories. There are some good things buried in there, but you;ve really got to ask yourself whether it's work digging through all that crap to get at them.

Rating: 3/10

Review - Elvis Costello and the Roots

Elvis Costello and the Roots
Wise Up Ghost

I've never listened to the Roots before, and I've only heard a few songs by Elvis Costello, but after hearing this collaboration between the two, I'll definitely be checking out both. Costello's snotty rasp sounds fantastic spitting out the lyrics to "Walk Us Uptown," and "Stick Out Your Tongue" proves that age hasn't mellowed him as he rages against "the fag-ends of the aristocracy". The Roots play fantastically throughout - they're the ones that really make the album, providing a cool, jazzy background for Costello's bile. They give the record its swing, its swagger, that cool, low sound that comes all the way down the line from Lighting Hopkins and the other old masters. On the album's tenderer moments, such as "If I Could Believe", Costello proves he can do more than just rant. His voice is heartfelt, pained, dripping with emotion but never melodramatic or forced. This is a fantastic album.

Rating: 8/10

Review - Bring Me The Horizon

Bring Me the Horizon
Sempiternal

I'm kind of ambivalent about BMTH. Sure, most of their output is a sea of rancid cockdrippings, but their last album was actually kind of ok, and I quite like the singer's voice. Plus, my sister keeps telling me that their new album is pretty good, so I decided to give it a listen. Here's a detailed explanation of why it's terrible.

1. The lyrics. Apparently, Oli Sykes is "surrounded by vicious circles". What does that even mean? Are they concentric circles? Or is he surrounded by a circle that is itself made up of circles? What kind of geometrical nightmare is this? That's pretty representative of the lyrics on this album. Adolescent, whiny shite.

Still, though, all metal bands have shit lyrics - that's practically a requirement. It's only a problem if you can hear them. Which brings us to reason number two.

2. The vocals. Thanks to Sykes' perfect enunciation, every godawful, emo, sixth-form word is as clear as a bell, if that bell was made of shit and talentlessness and the broken dreams of orphaned puppies.

3. The song. The one song. That they play over and over again, with different lyrics and titles, for fifty-seven minutes. Seriously - by the fourth or fifth song, I could predict exactly where the slow part with the gang-shouted vocals would be, exactly where the half-arsed electronics would come in...fuck this record. Fuck it in the arse with a cactus until it promises to stop existing.

Choice lyrics:


 "Can you feel my heart?"

No. No I can't. Your heart is inside you.

 "Should I sink or swim, or simply disappear?"

The third one.

 "Go to Hell for Heaven's sake"

Ha! Do you see what he did there? Do you see? Get it? DO YOU? DO YOU SEE WHAT HE DID THERE? HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHkill me now

Review - Carcass

Carcass
Surgical Steel

A few minutes ago, I saw a picture of a sloth in pyjamas and utterly lost my shit. I was once almost paralysed with happy when I was in the same room as David Ian Rabey. I get excited easily, is the point I'm trying to make. But even by my standards, this ranks pretty high - a new album from Carcass. One of the greatest metal bands of all time. Co-inventors of grindcore. The kings of gore. Honestly, I wasn't sure what to expect - this is a band renowned for being constantly in motion, changing with every record.

Actually, it's pretty much the same variety of melodic death metal that they played on Heartwork. Whether that's good or bad depends on your opinion of that album - personally, I love Heartwork, which is strange, because I normally run a mile when I hear a metal band described as "melodic".
       Opening track "1985" does not get the record off to a promising start. It might be a pretty good intro, where it not for that shrill, paper-thin, irritating-as-fuck guitar tone that ruins so much metal. Fortunately, that song is only there to lull you into a false sense of boredom before Thresher's abattoir smacks you upside the head with a hammer made of riffs and drums. Oh yeah - the drums. The drumming on this album is fantastic - some of the best on any Carcass album.
       Third track Cadaver Pouch Conveyor System suffers from some all-too-intelligible vocals. If you're the type of person who enjoys hearing metal lyrics, then this won;t be a problem. But then, if you're the type of person who enjoys hearing metal lyrics, then I suggest you seek medical help. The same problem ruins A Congealed Clot of Blood, or would if the drumming weren't so epic. Then that awful lead guitar tone turns up and kills it properly. It's a shame, because it would be a good guitar solo otherwise.
       The vocals are a recurrent problem with this album - they're heavy, sure, but too easy too understand. That wouldn't be a problem if the band wrote good lyrics, but this is Carcass we're talking about. So the clear, precise phrasing really brings down what could otherwise have been a damn good album. That, and the guitar tone. That fucking guitar tone. Whenever a good, hefty riff kicks in (and this is Carcass, so that happens a lot) up pops that lead guitar, like an annoying younger brother, ruining everything with its inane yammering. That and the vocals together gradually suck the life out of this album, until after twenty minutes I'm wishing it was over.
       The riffs, though, are fantastic. Thanks to them, this album is at least listenable. In fact, if you listen to them individually, the songs on Surgical Steel are almost all pretty good. In fact, they're very good. But if you listen to the album as a whole, it's just too long. The songs all follow pretty much the same pattern, and there's only so much up-tempo melodic death metal that I can take. Final track Mount of Execution is a welcome relief, even if the guitar tone does rob it of much-needed heaviness - I can see that slow, chunky riff causing havoc in a moshpit.

So, pros: great riffs, epic drumming.
Cons: Shite guitar tone, audible lyrics, lack of variety.
Rating: 6/10

Review - Blister Unit (Part 2) and some free music by me

Blister Unit
Dengar Demo
Split w/ Bruxism

This is the second part of my attempt to catch up on all the awesome Blister Unit music I missed over the last few months.

Firstly, the Dengar demo, which the band's Bandcamp page says is their second demo - recorded in 2010 but not released on Bandcamp until June this year - and it's a very different beast from their first. While A Storm Of Corpses And Fire was standard, competently-executed grindcore, the Dengar demo is much, much bassier, more powerviolence-y, and that is a very good thing. The songs are considerably shorter - not one over one minute forty - and they all foreground the bass, to the point where the guitar is relegated to the background. That focus on the bass gives the songs a low-end heaviness and brutality that was slightly lacking on the previous demo, and it also provides that same adrenaline rush that would later make Christ Ape such an engaging record. I can't find a download button anywhere, but you should definitely listen to this one.

Rating: 9/10

Finally, there are four tracks available from the band's split with Bruxism, whose name apparently refers to an excessive grinding of the teeth (excesive grinding - geddit?). Once again, the tracks are short, the longest being one minute and forty two seconds, but in contrast to the Dengar demo the band stick more to the treble end of things; the guitars cut like razors and the vocals sound slightly higher-pitched, while the bass sits in the background, providing a solid, er, base for the songs. This is a damn good set of songs - they hit fast and hard, and quit before you have time to acclimatise. I still prefer the Dengar demo, but these tracks are well worth the five minutes it will take to listen to them.

Rating: 7/10

Free music

Lastly, here's a new track from yours truly - it's off my upcoming album Fireworks.

https://georgejones1.bandcamp.com/

Grindcore for Beginners Part 7 - From the Sublime to the Ridiculous

Anal Cunt

The 88-Song EP

Anal Cunt. Now there’s a name. If ever there was a band whose name was their mission statement, it’s these guys. They set out with the intention of being the most hilariously, parodically offensive band in the world, and they managed it. With album titles like 20 More Reasons To Hate Us and Everyone Should Be Killed, and songs like “You Only Converted To Judaism So A Guy Would Touch Your Dick”, AxCx (as they have to be known on album sleeves) took the in-you-face, look-how-confrontational-I-can-be attitude of many grindcore and death metal bands and parodied it mercilessly. Their lyrics – when they had them – were (to begin with) concise, to-the-point and utterly hilarious. The music was stupid in the extreme – apparently largely improvised, it sounded like what it was: a couple of blokes trying to make the noisiest racket they could. I’m not sure if the late great John Peel ever heard Anal Cunt, but they sound like the band of his dreams. The 88-Song EP was their second release, and it captures the band in that brief moment when they were still funny, before frontman Seth Putnam started to buy into his own shtick and the band crossed the line between hilarious bad taste and boring, childish shock tactics.

There are an awful lot of comedy bands in grindcore: there are also a lot of awful comedy bands in grindcore. Basically, Anal Cunt is the one band that rises above the level of Tenacious D. Grindcore has always had a certain stupidity at its heart, like all punk – grand opuses and incisive social comment are all very well, but sometimes it’s fun to just listen to something so brilliantly idiotic that it’s fun. So give it a listen, if only to remind yourself that music doesn't have to be smart to be good.

Review - Blister Unit (part 1)

Blister Unit
Split w/ Cybearg
A Storm of Corpses and Fire demo

Blister Unit are a band I first came across back in March, when I found their second album, Christ Ape, on Bandcamp. They blew me away, and the album ended up in my top 5 albums of the year so far. After that, though, I kind of forgot about them, until yesterday evening, when I gave their Bandcamp page another look and found that they've a veritable smorgasbord of new material available. So, in the first part of a two-part post, I'm attempting to catch up on what I've missed.

Firstly, three tracks from an upcoming split with a one-man band called Cybearg, which apparently will be coming out soon. I've got to be honest - I found these three tracks a little lacklustre. There's nothing especially wrong with them, but there's nothing especially right with them either (apart from the growls which are fantastic). It's just the same, garden-variety grindcore that hundreds of other bands play just as well.I'm sure all three of these songs would absolutely slay live, but on record they just don;t have that immediacy, that sudden rush of adrenaline that Christ Ape does. Where Christ Ape grabbed you by the scruff of the neck and dragged you along in its wake, these three songs seem content to ask you politely if you;d come with them.

Rating: 4/10

Fortunately, A Storm of Corpses and Fire is a different story. It starts off just as uninspiringly as the split, but halfway through first track The Alchemist, something clicks, and they become recognisable as the band who made Christ Ape. It's not a perfect record - it's clear that this is a first demo - but it's a good one. It's fast, relentless and heavy as balls, particularly on standout track Endor Apocalypse. My one criticism would be that the samples really don;t need to be there.

Rating: 7/10

New track from Death Grips

Ok, this is very exciting indeed - a new song from the mighty Death Grips, an experimental hip-hop group from America who've been making quite a name for themselves. Over the course of three albums (Exmilitary in 2011, The Money Store and No Love Deep Web in 2012) these guys have created some of the most intense, original and consistently excellent hip-hop of recent times and now, they have a new song out called Birds.

To be honest with you, I'm not sure what I think of this one. It's got that low-down, bluesy groove that is a key part of the Death Grips sound, it's got some very atmospheric electronics and the production is excellent, but lyrically it just sounds like a bunch of random words that sort-of rhyme. I love Death Grips, but I'm kind of disappointed with this song.

Anyway, check it out via the link above and form your own opinion.

Review - Nine Inch Nails

Nine Inch Nails
Hesitation Marks

It's finally here - Trent Reznor, the grand old man of industrial rock, has released a new album as Nine Inch Nails. I've been looking forward to this - my acquaintance with NIN basically consists of the classic singles, plus some of the more recent ambient stuff, but what I've heard so far, I've liked. So I was interested to see what the new, drug-free, happy Reznor would produce.

Things start off with a decent, atmospheric introduction, which leads into opening track Copy of A. It's musically solid - a great, driving beat, and an infectious synth hook - but lyrically a bit too whiny for my taste. That's a problem throughout the album, actually - though Came Back Haunted has a brilliant melody, it's undercut by the kind of lyrics self-pitying teenagers scribble in exercise books. Find My Way is Reznor's failed attempt at writing another Hurt - it's fantastically produced, but then so is everything he does. That doesn't excuse poor lyric-writing. Conversely, I Would For You has decent lyrics, but musically is somewhat lacking.

Sonically, though, this album is very good - All Time Low is downright funky, Disappointed's electronic blippery bubbles along nicely, and there are hooks aplenty. Then again, there are exceptions to that rule - Everything sounds like a (very) slightly ballsier version of countless pissweak indie bands and Sattellite sounds like Justin Timberlake. Overall, this is a decent record, but it lets itself down by slipping all too often into emo territory. I would reccommend it to those who can look past the self-indulgent lyrics, but I'm not one of them.

Rating: 6/10

New music from thedowngoing, free music from Blister Unit

First, thedowngoing. If you haven't heard of them, then you're a bad person and should be ashamed. Only joking - they're a two-man grindcore outfit from Australia who redefine the word "brutality", and now they've put a new song on their Bandcamp page. It's from an upcoming split with Detroit, and it's certainly something. It may be hard to believe if this is the first you've heard of them, but they're actually reigning in the aggression here, although it's still heavier than 99% of grindcore bands. More importantly, though, this is a great song - definitely the best 34 seconds of music I've heard today.

Blister Unit play a more traditional version of grindcore, and they play it well. Their last album, Christ Ape, was number 5 in my top 5 albums of the year so far, and now they're making their first album, Nodes, available for free here. If you like crust, grind, hardcore, or more or less any other kind of loud, fast music, check it out.

Review - Tartupaluk

Tartupaluk
S/T

Ok, for my next review I've chosen a doom band from the Czech Republic. Tartupaluk play an atmospheric, lo-fi brand of doom that at times is reminiscent of grunge, particularly Soundgarden, but with raw, barked vocals that sound like an angry bear.

Vychova Strachem, the first track on their three-song self-titled album, starts off with a snaking, Black Sabbath-lite riff that sounds like the work of amateur metal bands the world over. That might sounds like an insult, but actually it's not - Tartupaluk manage to use hoary tritonic conventions in such a way that it sounds, not like a boring rehash of better work, but like a comforting, familiar blanket. It quickly slips into a crushing riff and the aforementioned pissed-off rottweiler vocals. Again, it's nothing spectacularly original, but when it sounds this good, who cares? The band change the tempo enough to keep the song interesting, and it's got a nice, attainable sound to it - it sounds like anyone could do this, but few could do it as well as Tartupaluk. This is almost punk metal.

Pevnost kicks off with another atmospheric riff, this one sounding more like Led Zeppelin circa Kashmir. I can't help but notice the similarity to the previous song - even the vocal pattern sounds the same. Even comfort food needs a little variation now and then, guys. In fairness, if I hadn't heard the first track, I'd like this one. There's also a fast part in this that gives it a little extra something.In fact, if the song had started with that part, it'd be pretty good. Basically, skip to the five minute mark when listening to this one.

The third and final song sounds a little less like the first one, and a little more powerviolence-y - I can imagine a band like Islam85 playing this, only they'd do it with more mind-crushing heaviness. Don;t get me wrong, this is a damn heavy track - and a damn good one - and heavier than a lot of metal bands, but it's not going to bludgeon you into submission if you;re used to the more extreme ends of the musical spectrum.

Basically, this album is pretty good - nothing special, not a masterpeice, but a solid, entertaining record. Also, it'as available for free on Bandcamp, so there's no reason not to get it.

Rating: 6/10

Grindcore for Beginners Part 6 - Intelligent Aggression

Cephalic Carnage
Conforming to Abnormality
US; 1998

The debate over whether grindcore is more metal or punk has been going on since the genre was invented, and will still be going as long as it exists. As the ‘90s wore on, however, it was clear that the balance was shifting to the metal side. Napalm Death – hitherto the exemplars of grind’s punk roots – released their controversial, death-inflected album Harmony Corruption, Carcass went full-on death metal with Heartwork, and bands like Cattle Decapitation headed a new wave of grinders who wore their metal influences on their sleeves. This new influx of musically and lyrically complex bands breathed new life into the genre with their unusual time signatures and lyrics that were considerably more nuanced than the standard political sloganeering. No band better exemplifies this intelligent aggression than Cephalic Carnage.

            CC, along with fellow grinders Brutal Truth, threw out the stale punk clichés that threatened to choke the life out of the genre, and replaced them with jazzy experimentation and a new, metallic edge brought in by larger production values. Thanks to them, grindcore did not stagnate; instead, it branched out into new realms, and began to become a genre in its own right, rather than just another branch on the punk family tree.

Review - Unattended Funeral

Unattended Funeral
S/T

It says something that I was listening to the new Gets Worse seven-inch right before this, and yet these Slovakian grinders still sound heavy as fuck. They've got that low-end, MitB-style rumble that really adds something extra to their sound, and the production really pushes the bass to the foreground, with the guitar relegated to the back, providing texture for the groovy, intense bass playing. The drumming is another reason to like this band. While too many grind bands rely on relentless blastbeats, Unattended Funeral mix things up a little; there are moments of absolute fury, but the drummer has some subtlety - a word rarely heard in grind circles - and manages to vary the mood and style without easing up on the audio violence. The songs deal with the standard themes of misanthropy, anti-capitalism, etc. but that's no bad thing - they're constant themes these days. All in all, I would absolutely recommend you download this track - or even go for the extra-fancy tape release.

Rating: 7/10

Review - Primitive Man

Primitive Man
Scorn

So. Six tracks, nearly forty minutes - this album is kind of the opposite of what I've been reviewing lately. Primitive Man deal in long, punishing deluges of sludge. The title track goes on for nearly twelve minutes, and while that's the longest song on the album by a considerable margin, none of these songs are particularly short (with the exception of Black Smoke). These tracks are long and slow, built around enormous, crushing riffs that sound like some huge machine. Even when the band speed up, as on Stretched Thin, they ever rise above a standard rock tempo. In fact, it's those brief moments of speed that let this album down for me. Primitive Man sound best when they're playing a big, lumbering monster of a song - I get that they're trying to introduce variety to their music, but it just doesn't work for me. Another criticism is the length; this album just goes on for far too long. Almost all the songs could be cut back by a minute or more, and the unnecessary and annoying interlude Black Smoke should have been scrapped altogether. Primitive Man are clearly a very talented band, and I hope they do well in the future, but this is a deeply flawed album. It's still definitely good enough to be worth a listen, though - click on the lick above to hear it and judge for yourself.

Rating: 5/10

Review - Methmouth

Methmouth
Demo

First off, I've just heard this and's vile new single "Compelled to Hate," and I have to say I wouldn't recommend buying their music. Don;t give these hateful, compassion-deficient cunts any money. Having said that, you should definitely check out their most recent demo on Youtube. It's a proper, no-fi, punk-as-fuck recording that proves that the rumours of punk's death (that seem to have started sometime around 1978) are greatly exaggerated. It's a shame that their new single shows a complete lack of understanding, compassion or basic human decency, because this is a band that, judging by their lyrics, is actually capable of understanding nuance and excercising pity - at least, where they themselves are concerned. Pity for others is apparently not in their vocabulary. While this attitude may not make this band the kind of guys you'd want to have a pint with (especially as I'd bet my student loan they're Straight Edge) but it does make for some fucking awesome music.

Oh yeah, music that's what this blog is supposed to be about, right? Sorry, I've just spent far too much time raning and I've only just realised I haven't said a word about what these guys sound like. Let me try to rectify that. They're brutal, but not in the bassy, growly way of a band like Napalm Death - this is a hardcore abrasiveness, much more focused on treble-end distortion than earth-shaking roars. And they manage that in spades. The entire record is gloriously amateurish - from the distorted shouts (no death growls for these punks!) to the distortion that sounds less like a deliberate effect and more like the product of an album that was recorded in the red, this band have gone the true, DIY punk route and for that I applaud them. The songs are fantastic - tightly written, simple without being simplistic and angry without ever whining. Great demo. Fuck that new single though.

Rating: 8/10

Review - Islam85

Islam 85
S/T

Well now, this is something. This band comes at you like a sumo wrestler, low and heavy, with moments of brutality that border on incoherence. At times, the music hangs on to its structure by the tiniest of threads, but - and this is important - it always hangs on. That's what puts Islam85 above so many other extreme bands - there's heavy music, and then there's music so heavy that it threatens to collapse under the weight of its own intensity. It's like watching someone throw a punch so hard that it actually rips their arm off. If this review is a bit disjointed, that's because my brain is still trying to process the violence it just experienced. Buy this EP.

Rating: 8/10

Review - Monolithian

Monolithian
Split 7" w/Let It Die

You might remember Monolithian from their split with punk band Ed Wood, which I reviewed a few months back. This time around, I'm taking a look at two songs* from their split with Let It Die, entitled Because the world is perfidious, I am going into mourning. The first track, Emaciate, is a slow, groovey, sludgey rocker reminiscent of the Melvins. It's a very effective song and I can imagine the crowd going wild to it at a gig. The second track, the cheerfully named Euthanise, is a much faster, punkier song - a high-speed rant against...something. Not quite sure what, as there are no lyrics on the Bandcamp page, but I'm pretty sure these guys are pissed off at something or someone.

While these songs don't break any new ground, they're a lively addition to the punk universe; fans of Discharge, Amebix, or Void will find little to surprise them here, but plenty to enjoy.

Rating: 6/10



*I think it's two songs, though for some reason they're listed as one track on Bandcamp. It could be one song with two very different parts.*

** Turns out it's only one song

Review - Bad Religion

Bad Religion
True North

The phrase "pop punk" conjures up images of teenagers with stupid hair playing sonically and lyrically vapid music, while convinced that they're "edgy" and "punk". It's easy to forget that there's nothing inherently bad about pop music - the Ramones were a pop-punk band, in essence. So when I use the term to describe the new Bad Religion album, I mean it in a positive sense. I spend so much time reviewing heavy, angry, dark bands that sometimes I have to remind myself that upbeat music can be good too. And upbeat certainly describes True North - there's anger there, certainly, and protest too, but these are victory songs; this could be the soundtrack to the party after the struggle is over. There's a palpable sense of optimism about this album - BR can clearly see the light at the end of the tunnel.

I often have a problem when punk bands employ clean singing, where you can actually hear the lyrics, largely because the majority of punk lyrics are - not to put too fine a point on it - fucking awful. But Bad Religion manage to (mostly) get away with the dodgy lyrics by singing quickly enough that unless you;re really listening you only catch the odd phrase here and there, and where you can hear the lyrics, they aren't too bad (again, mostly). There are occasions where the band fall into the standard trap of preaching at the expense of poetry, but that doesn't happen enough to ruin the album.

The melodies are irrepressibly happy - there's nothing defeatist about this band. The hooks are good, the choruses are catchy, and the whole record is just altogether fun. Some people might find that gets a bit boring over the course of 35 minutes, and the album does drag in places, but overall it's a thoroughly enjoyable listen. My one criticism is that the songs are very, very similar - at times I found myself thinking, Dude, has this song been going on for ten minutes? Still, it's good fun so long as you don't expect too much from it. This album is unlikely to change your life, but almost certain to brighten your day.

Rating: 6/10

Grindcore for beginners Part 5 - Choosing Death

Cattle Decapitation
Humanure
US; 2004

I'm listening to this album at the moment, and I've had to pause it to write this because I keot getting destracted by its awesomeness. While not my favourite Cattle Decapitation record (Human Jerky takes that prize hands down), this is an amazing record, and perfect for the next chapter of Grindcore for Beginners.

Oddly enough, it could also have worked in the previous chapter. Cattle Decapitation began life as a damn good gore band before moving into deathgrind, and they have retained the fascination with blood, guts and the mortification of the flesh. Unlike other gore bands (except, rather aptly, Carcass) Cattle Decapitation are devoid of the childish shok tactics and rather worrying misogyny that characterises so many others in the subgenre. This, you see, is gore with a conscience. Cattle Decapitation are militant animal rights enthusiasts, and their songs point out the horrors of factory farming, hunting, etc. usually by putting humans in the position of the animals involved. Sample lyric:

Unwanted humans food for carnivorous gimp
Rotted remnants and leftovers
Victim now a bloated flesh blimp
Blackened and purple from decay
Fetishistic sex acts with the dead
Dying from shock and being chained to the rot
Kicking and screaming and slipping in slop
Humanity is the stench that fills your nostrils
Release the gimp

That's from their fantastically titled song "Release the Gimp". But, as I said, they're not a gore band any more - this album is pure deathgrind.

Deathgrind is a subgenre that takes grindcore and adds the conspicuous technicality and higher production values of death metal. It's still brutal as fuck, but it doesn't have the lo-fi muddiness that you'll find on so many grindcore records. It's also more accessible, so if you know a death metal fan who's struggling to get into grind, this could be the perfect gateway album.

The misanthropy that permeates Cattle Decapitation's lyrics is quite common in grind. The general mindset of grindcore as a genre seems to be quite negative - I'm pretty sure it's a combination of the political/social awareness that characterises a lot of grind, and the fact that loud, noisy music is great for when you;re pissed off.

For more awesomeness from Cattle Decapitation, check out their earlier, more gore-focused album Human Jerky or last year's Monolith of Inhumanity.