Read this blog now

While looking for reviews of albums I already own I stumbled across this great album review blog written by an ex-music critic with a passion for music and writing. Michele was a reviewer who wrote for a local weekly and lost her job straight away due to giving Sugar Ray a bad review instead of giving the album a big push. She describes her posts as "more like sensory reactions than reviews; it's about what the music did for me, not what it should do for you". So the reviews in her blog are brief, personalized and to the point with minimum bullshit.

The reviews are of her personal music collection and goes from the quirky cool of Steel Pole Bathtub and Nomeansno to the metal of Metallica and Pantera and then to Neil Diamond and Steely Dan usually with no sense of shame. You know you're in for honesty and decent writing when the reasoning behind it is: "Just once I would love to see a smug critic put something totally mainstream amongst on his list amidst all the earnest and self aware bands. Like right in between Songs Written in a Bleak Afternoon in Prague and This Album Title is Really an Obscure Reference to a 13th Century Philosopher, there would be the latest offering from Papa Roach, with the explanation that it makes the critic feel like a pre-pubescent boy just discovering his dick, and he likes that".

Read it.

Black Sheep (Swedish punk)

Avoiding the delete button from the email were Swedish band Black Sheep. I'm not sure why exactly I bothered to check them out as they don't have any songs streaming on the internet. I guess it was the country of origin thing as a lot of Swedish bands are often ass kickers. I've been listening to Avskum's new one a lot lately so one thing led to another. The email described this band as hardcore. After downloading I don't hear that. What I hear is a band that sounds somewhere between Sham 69 and Angelic Upstarts after 8 minutes of recording their demo discovered Minor Threat and Gorilla Biscuits records. In this day and age, you've got to admire bands who snub the myspace route. Here's the info they sent me regardless:

Black sheep is a Swedish hardcore punk band that started out in the summer of 2008. BS plays straight hardcore without the nonsense parts. It´s more about heart then brain, it´s more about will than whats right or wrong. Black Sheep has recorded a 7 track demo in 12 minutes. These songs are about the daily life and ideas, thoughts about these. At the moment it´s available to download and will be a tape and cd-r in about a week. Both the tape and cd-r will have lyrics and liner notes with it. We hope that you will enjoy listening to the demo.


Swedish Weresheep

Smoking Popes - Born to Quit (1995)

A reader asked me to re-up the Smoking Popes Born To Quit album after the link died from lung cancer. As I swapped filesharing sites to Mediafire, which seems to be great unless it's a big file then it's a case of sticking to the evil I know as sendspace.
I only recently noticed the request for a re-up as like a lot of bloggers I don't usually go through the old comments. I also noticed a request for a Big Drill Car re-up but, sorry, the band have put their entire catalogue on i-tunes and would rather you get their music from there. It's quitting time.

Vas Deferens and Black Lick, Adelaide Tavern, Wellington, Nov 27 2008

Vas Deferens frontman Luger Douche got in touch with me through Youtube because he liked the way I'd filmed the UK Subs at Valve. He was hoping I could film his band playing there but due to circumstances that never happened. The major reason being the venue closed down due to family illness. It really is a shame as it was a huge supporter of underground music and had sound nailed compared to most other Wellington venues.

Wellington band, Black Lick played first. I was eager to check them out, because on their myspace site, their singer didn't sound a million miles away from Blaine Cook of The Accused. I arrived while they were playing and was impressed enough with their first live appearance to pick up their CD.




Above pic: Black Lick
Below Pics: Vas Deferens




Vas Deferens, who were playing 20th anniversary shows, turned out to be a punk covers band and played songs by Zodiac Mindwarp, Ramones, Sex Pistols, Guns 'n' Roses and a few others I can't remember. Even though I went home due to tiredness during their set I'm sure Luger Douche might hold some sort of record for the most beer drunk by a frontman during his own band's set.

A thrashing ressurection

A while back I posted Christian thrash hardcore crossover band, The Crucified's Pillars of Humanity album. but the link has since expired. A reverend emailed me asking where he could find a copy and I sent him on his way. But the link has now come back from the dead.


Pillars of Humanity

As a single zombie is never interesting, I've thrown in their self-titled album too. However I had to take one song off as it simply wouldn't play. Get it and hear the band take swipes at MDC, Slayer and Anthrax in the Insult Circus. At least one song on the self-titled sounds like it was borrowed musically from Minor Threat and The Cro-Mags.



The Crucified - The Crucified

Your life is bland

German punk band Upright Citizens knocked around for a long time before releasing Colour Your Life. Mad Blasts of Chaos featured their 1985 Facts and Views EP

This album came out ten years later and the band have slowed down but magically retained their own sound. The fact that they cover The Saints' Ghost Ships and Cold Feelings by Social Distortion gives some inkling of Upright Citizens' sound on this album although they're far from being just a clone of either of those bands.

Paint away!

Punkfest 2008 Wellington October 24, 25

Unlike last year where I managed to see most of the bands, I only made it to the night sessions of Punkfest this year. Unfortunately The Rocket Jocks who I was really looking forward to seeing played first and I ended up missing them completely. I walked in while Ois 2 Men were playing their final set of sloppy drunken oi.





Above Pic: Ois to men

Next up were all girl band, Cunt of The Cobra. They played hardcore and really I don't remember too much about them musically.



Above pic: Cunt of the Cobra

Next up were Dunedin three piece band Conniption who played dbeat type punk and were my favourite band of the night.

Below pic: Conniption





Above pic: Walrora


Next up were Australian all girl crust band Walrora, who I've probably described wrong so here's a video of them from that night.



Saturday night I managed to catch all of the bands. First up were Entrails who seemed to have improved even more since their Conquest for Death support.

Below pic: Entrails





Above pic: Curfew Girls


Next band up were Curfew Girls, made up of three girls and a guy, who played a poppy old school punk reminiscent of X with funk and new wave parts thrown in.



Coffee Rage were a band I was lookng forward to seeing and they didn't disappoint with their short, sharp hardcore.



Above pic: Coffee Rage

The Users then changed the pace of things with their country tinged rock. I heard at least one kid near me yell "Play some punk rock".



Above pic: The Users

Wellington hardcore band, Shortlived were great mainly due to the frontman's spastic energy although the whole band were really tight.



Above Pic: Shortlived

Australian band Vae Victis, who were possibly my favourite out of all of the bands started playing with no vocals sounds. They describe their sound on their myspace page as "Intro - D-Beat - Slow bit - D-Beat - End" but don't mention great female vocals. Here's a video from their punkfest 2008 set.



Punkfest seemed much more laidback and mellow this year. It could have been that last year was the first one I attended but the crowd didn't seem as nuts this year when the final bands played.