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.
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