online zine
Editor
Jon Twitch
You can send us
feedback online.
|
CD Reviews
|
|
MR27 MR27 was mostly overlooked when they were active, but this CD hopefully canonises them as a great Korean punk band. While Korean rockers were playing balls-less retro Archies-esque rock and roll, Burke, Sidney, and Kim Ganji were savaging listeners with a cutting blend of garage, psychobilly, rockabilly, surf, and punk, backed in a couple songs by the brass section of Kingston Rudieska and a group of foreigners providing howls. My favourite number is the new version of "Graves of Fire and Ice," which means I must surrender my journalist objectivity and admit I am part of the chorus. The songs are recorded great, and if you listen to this album next time you see MR27 the songs will have much more meaning to you. Of course the only drawback is the CD cover, which is as cheap as the ancient MR27 website. The booklet is filled with great artwork, however.
Join the Circle The top hardcore band out of Korea is the Geeks, no question. Hot on their heels are Things We Say. Following up in third is Join the Circle, but before you accuse them of riding the coattails of those other two bands, give this album a listen. With seven songs averaging just over a minute in length, this CD whips by quickly. Yongdre¡¯s vocals don¡¯t have quite the range of Kiseok¡¯s in the Geeks recordings, and throughout all the songs he maintains the same pitch and intensity. This puts the emphasis on the instrumental performance. The songs are all in English, and despite the occasional grammatical error the lyrics are well crafted, falling closer to poetry than your standard Engrish punk lyrics. Maybe their bassist Sean had something to do with that. This is the kind of band I¡¯d rather listen to live rather than have a CD of, especially considering it only lasts nine songs, but it is a testament to the magnetism of their live shows.
The Moonshiners
The Moonshiners deliver
an authentic tribute to the
roots of rock¡¯n roll on their
debut recording, Uprising.
Not a local spin on rock¡¯n
roll, Uprising, and indeed The
Moonshiners¡¯ stage show itself,
delivers an homage to
the classic sound which destroyed
music and western
civilization as we know it with
its fun-loving, thrill-seeking,
sensualist approach to getting
things done.
Sound quality on the 5-track
recording is superb and the
EP itself is flush with photos,
lyrics and attitude. As the CD
spins you can almost hear the
crisp snap from the freshlypressed
sleeves of sailor suits
over the crystal clear guitar
of the near-legendary Cha
Cha. The four-member band,
Cha Seung Woo (guitar/vox),
Beck Jun Myung (guitar), Choi
Chang U (bass), Son Gyeong
Ho (drum) combine to create
a virtual musical time machine
that were it not for the Korean
language vocals could almost
convince you that hamburgers
are 10 cents again.
Wednesday Night Heroes After ten years and three full-lengths, as well as a few EPs, the Wednesday Night Heroes are as professional as a punk band can get. What I look for in a Heroes recording is how well it reflects their larger-than-life personas. Their first self-titled full-length was written in the heat of anger at being blacklisted, and the second, "Superiority Complex," was done when they were starting to break through and be taken seriously. On this one, where would they go? Now they¡¯re a welltravelled band with impressive contacts, and this album shows. As I listen to the songs I wonder which make the best singalongs, which was always the draw of their live shows. Other than that they¡¯re the same old Heroes, older and wiser and still one of the few bands that can bridge the gap between punk and hardcore. You can tell they still love playing, and their lyrics are still just as hard-hitting and personal as ever. Just like before, nothing will stop the Wednesday Night Heroes.
Galaxy Express Few bands can capture the raw appeal of their live performances in the studio. Many of us who have been following Galaxy Express since their inception have also been privy to their striving to do just that. From their early CD-R (At that side of outer space of dusk), through their EP (To the Galaxy) to their first full-length album (Ramble Around) the band has worked to capture the raw energy of their take on guitar-oriented rock, while simultaneously trying to present the technical mastery which makes their live show so exhilarating and mutable. Ramble Around has the cleanest sound that the band has recorded to date, presenting all the intricacies and layers the music and vocals have to offer. It also sees the band embracing a slightly new direction - not always seeking to plunge into an abyss of musical abandon at breakneck speed. Some of the band¡¯s key tracks, present on all three recordings, seem almost sedate on Ramble Around on first listen. Repeated listens begin to work a subtle alchemy, however, and can raise doubts that the visceral satisfaction of the earlier, faster versions was the best way to present the songs. This album also sees a slight shift in personnel as the band¡¯s drummer (Yoon Hong Gu) was injured during this period and a replacement (Kim Hee Gwon) had to be found. Lee Ju Hyun (bass/vox) and Park Jong Hyun (guitar/vox) remain, and continue to explore this genre of rock with infectious enthusiasm.
SuckStuff Sometimes something happens that is so perfect that those of us unburdened by the curse of optimism realize with perfect prescience that it cannot last. Rough Times Ahead is one of those things. Always a stellar band, SuckStuff has been producing some of the best music in the scene from its inception. With this 11-track "EP" the band hits its stride in a big way and smoothly integrates all its disparate influences into one stirring union. If you don¡¯t have it, get it. It¡¯s really that simple.
Galaxy Express Friday December 7 was the CD release party for the new album by Galaxy Express, Ramble Around. The show itself was great, with a good line-up of openers, and two sets by Galaxy Express. The CD is pretty damn good too, though it does have more than its fair share of tracks already released on their previous CD and EP. There are a few tracks from previous albums, as well as their perennial cover, "Kick out the Jams." It would have been nice to hear their newest cover, "Immigrant Song" by Led Zeppelin, as I¡¯m sure that by now everyone who¡¯s seen the band play more than once is already very familiar with their take on MC5. Having said that, the re-released songs are more polished, as is "Kick out the Jams," they did a great job with them. The boys of Galaxy Express are smart lads. The album opens with one of their most popular songs, "¸Ó³ª¸Õ Ç×Á…", and keeps the pace going from there. There are a couple more old songs before we finally hear a new one, but it¡¯s worth the wait. The first new song on the album, "¶Ç´Ù·Ð ÇÏ·ç", has a seriously kickin¡¯ sound; it¡¯s driving, hard and fast, a solid rocker. Another new song, "ºÒŸ´Â ÇϴþƷ¡" has a great intro leading into a definite rock-out-with-your-cockout song. "Black Mush" has a pretty good sound, though it didn¡¯t get me movin¡¯ like the other tracks did. It¡¯s followed by "Kick out the Jams" which sounds really nicely cleaned up here. But again, get a new cover! There are two hidden tracks on the CD, not so hidden if you upload though. The first one is fantastic, it¡¯s slow and sludgy and heavy and trippy with an awesome solo. There¡¯s a defi- nite Black Sabbath vibe happening here, which can also be heard in their cover of "Immigrant Song." The second hidden track has more of a rockabilly vibe; short, fast, catchy, and fun. This is a song that would definitely get a dance floor moving, and is an excellent closer to the album. Overall, this is a great album, and is well worth picking up. I¡¯m looking forward to a new album with all new material though, instead of half of one. Get this album!
The Pipettes I am a skin and I do not approve of hipsters, nor do I approve of such avant garde fashion and ridiculous behavior... But there is something inside of me that says: "This is an amazing sound that deserves to be heard." I can tell you that their album is really excellent and I have listened to it endlessly. If you like fast paced, oldies style stuff mixed with this... weird new style... The Pipettes will give your heart of music a note to smile at. The Pipettes are quite genius. I enjoy their voices and their music. So far to date, the only redeeming thing to come out of the hipster scene is the Pipettes. I forgive them all for their shaggy hair and for their ridiculous antics merely because the music produced is worthwhile.
The Metal Declared Good & Holy I have turned my ear to metal for a while and I am now ready, as a skin who was fed off of Oi and RAC over the last seven years, to declare the metal bands which are very worth listening to. Behold:
(1) Manowar.
I Would Rather Be
In Jail I saw a fucking awesome Wikipedia quotation: Midtown was an American pop punk and alternative rock band from New Brunswick, New Jersey. Formed in November, 1998 by three Rutgers University students, Midtown soon became a quartet. The band took advantage of the fertile New Jersey punk scene to develop a sound that combined elements of emo and punk rock and began recording shortly after their formation. My anger made a cumshot in the back of my throat. I was once 12 years old and I bought a CD of a man urinating into snow the word ¡®Punk¡¯ and I laughed and it was really hard and fast music and it talked about what it is like to be so Awesome. Midtown sounds like a bunch of motherfuckers who would do a split album with Millencolin in 2001 because they cried the time their dad threw the trash on the floor and told them to pick it up since they didn¡¯t clean their room. Oh my God I would rather be in jail getting fucked in my ass by an overbearing wife beating pedophile uncircumcised Muslim convert than listen to music whose main inspiration is the Vagina they wish their penis turned into during puberty. The words of emo and punk combined into some sort of coherent entry in an encylopedia is like an encyclopedia that has, under the entry for God, "God is Dead." I do not care if there are faggots who think they are punk rock or punk rockers who think they were allowed to turn into faggots after the Misfits broke up (newsflash: it is never allowed to become a bitch in the punk rock scene), this is criminal and it should not be allowed in official entries anywhere. I am a very young person who has had flirtations with loud rock and roll musics, and I daresay that as someone who became into the scene of punk, hardcore and Oi in 1996 that I should, that I should daresay, these guys are fucking cunts and all those guys that transformed the scene from the late nineties to the mid 2000s should probably drop their bars of soap whilst in front of an overbearing wife beating pedophile uncircumcised Muslim convert. If I see these guys play I will be that dude who yells, "You suck !" and throws a bottle onto the stage to be attakced by a mob of people with scene sweeped hair and swollen vaginas confused for penis. I am so angry that I would be able to maintain successive erections just to perform homosexual rape upon these polluters. if I had my way these dudes would be wearing Birkas and walking 15 feet behind me, not talking to anybody and upon confrontation identifying themslves as my wives.
The List Of The Immortals There are certain bands that I just can listen to for decades. Last night I was perusing new music and was so shocked at how bad some of it was... What did I do? Take an album I've been listening to since the early 2000s and rocked out hard. There are a few bands, in my book, that can never do any wrong in the creation of music - even their most mediocre songs seem to be done better than the "good ones" that other bands have done. I think it comes from the mere ingredients they use. You cannot fuck up certain foods because what they put into it is just so good. Some bands can just do anything and it turns out well. I am very excited because I can add a band to the list. Here is the list of the immortals in order of appearance in my life:
- Queen - late 1980s I fully discovered Blockhaus three months ago. Zillertaller Turkenjager just yesterday. It blew my mind a new fucking anus. If you do not like most of the music above... I do not know what to say to you. The primordial soup that went into us was just different and you are a loser. I think that the above mentioned music represents the greatest collection of sounds that people were able to make over the last 40 years that I have been informed |
