HARSH R

 

Channel late '80s dance club angst in the modern era and you're going to get... HARSH R. God/s this recording is simply beautiful - I could dissect this shit (with a lot of words), but it would really just be me using a lot of words to say the obvious. Physical World is the embodiment of the obvious, and sinister primitive industrial sounds that are (obviously) critical to our....well, these sounds are critical. That should be all that you need. 

PHYSICAL WORLD

MAXIMUM ROCKNROLL

 

It's really cool (for me) to revisit 'old' things - to revisit things that were created in a different time and consume them with the perspective that only time can provide. And with that perspective, this episode of MRR Radio that was broadcast thirty years ago today resonates with such incredible force that it makes me pause for a moment......

I was living in San Francisco and active in the San Francisco DIY punk scene starting around 1995. I always felt 'outside' in some way (if nothing else, I was new and poking around the perimeter of a scene that was well established long before I was even remotely aware), but by the end of the decade I certainly felt like I had my place. When I pulled this MRR tape out of the box though....I realized how completely outside of everything I was (then and now), and I knew before I popped this tape in the deck that this was likely going to be more about a person than an institution. The 717th episode of Maximum Rocknroll Radio was DJed and curated by Ken Prank, a Bay Area transplant from originally from Alabama who was quietly in the process of changing the face of USDIY hardcore when he put this show together, and just a quick look at the playlist will tell you that he knew exactly what the fuck was up years before anyone else did. URANUS, STATE OF FEAR, SPAZZ, POISON COLA, FRIGÖRIA, LIP CREAM, POWER OF IDEA, NEKHEI NAATZA, THE GAIA, OUT OF TOUCH, SUPPRESSION, DISKONTO, SLIGHT SLAPPERS, INSANE YOUTH, VIOLENT HEADACHE, INTEGRITY....you know most these bands, several are are more or less household names now, and some were the standard bearers for late-decade hardcore, but a collection like this at the start of 1996? Dude. Ken put this shit into the world while he was booking studio time for HIS HERO IS GONE to record the EP that completely changed the game....he knew what the fukk was up before the rest of us and has remained steadfast in his commitment to the real shit for the three decades since. Drop a MAKERS track and some unknown Latvian hardcore  (you ever heard of VOMNOSONOLOPPUS, punk?) in between SUPPRESSION and SPAZZ is really just casually letting everyone know you're a genius. 

MAXIMUM ROCKNROLL #717

Of course this post is all about the importance and the reach of MRR as an institution, but it was the people that made the shit important. 

Still is. Thanks. 

SUPERCHARGER

 

This one was just tacked onto the back end of some other tape that had nothing to do with SUPERCHARGER and/or '90s Bay Area garage punk. Some completely different thing clearly documented by someone who knew what was up, and three (plus) decades later it serves as a reminder to me (and you) how fukkn tuff early '90s garage punk was. For no logical reason whatsoever I associate the subgenre (and era) with Austin, Texas (actually, there is a very logical reason and it's the MOTARDS / FUCKEMOS split), but listen to "Lost Cause" and/or "Sooprize Package For Mr. Mineo" and know that the greater Bay Area knew what the fuck was up with this shit. Damn, it was probably SUPERCHARGER (and MUMMIES) that made Tim turn The Bible towards the garage shit and if that's the case....? Fuck man, fair enough. "San Bruno" is maybe the most gloriously bleak punk track I have ever heard, and Reatard acolytes would be well advised to take notes across the board. For whatever reason this encouraged me to listen to THE DONNAS...for that I am grateful. 

SUPERCHARGER

SPEEDKILL // BERBAHAYA

 

Ten minutes of churning, in your face thrash that....man, the shit just fukkn grooves. The first SPEEDKILL cut has serious NUNCHAKU vibes and settles into something akin to the first HAUNTED record, while the BERBAHAYA tracks are full throttle cruising grind/thrash. There's nothing fancy here - they get in, they destroy, they get out. Not sure what else you could possibly want. 

OPIUM PEMBUS MORAL CANDU NADA NERAKA

MISTER BARCLAY 505

 

Look....if you're paying attention at all, then it's very difficult to feel normal right now. It's very difficult to imagine a return to anything even close to normal, or how challenging the path to that return might be. Feeling helpless is fine; feeling helpless is normal. So while you're feeling helpless, here are some innocent lo-fi home recordings from a relatively nice looking fellow from Albuquerque. When I got this tape, it kinda felt like everything was more or less okay (even if it wasn't). So it's kinda pleasant to take a minute and listen to the sounds of DAVID ISAAC BARCLAY now and think about that time and rage cry for a bit before returning to the bitter and very very real knowledge that even if things do return to a kind of normal....you won't be alive to see it. FUCK DHS. FUCK ICE. FUCK MAGA. 

ULTRA LO-FI DEMO

WARTZ

 

I frequently say that I'm at a loss for words and then say a lot of words and I fear I am about to do the same thing again but.....I mean, how else can you approach WARTZ? Manic and maniacal madness that owes equal dents to F.U.S and early 2010s NWI punk and primitive UK82 hardcore....six songs in seven minutes. and every second is perfect. 

WARTZ

1-800-REMIXES

 

If you weren't alive when (most) these songs were unavoidable then mayhaps you can't really grasp what a comfortable listen this is. I was there though - I was high school kid with a weekend job as a small town commercial radio DJ and I heard damn near every one of these tracks countless times. I didn't hear them like this though, and there's a magic in this era-appropriate collection. Until today, I never knew that MC HAMMER name dropped Oaktown in "U Can't Touch This" (which is followed by DIGITAL UNDERGROUND and EN VOGUE, two more outfits that helped put the East Bay on the mainstream map around the same time ECONOCHRIST moved out from Arkansas), and until today I never knew that JANET JACKSON collaborated with HEAVY D on a remix of "Alright." And Canada's JANE CHILD dropped one of the most essential freestyle bangers ever with "I Don't Wanna Fall In Love" and she's basically the arctic Sheila E or some shit. Basically, I learned a lot of things today. MICHEL'LE, ROB BASE, JOHNNY GIL round out a remix tape that was hopefully distributed out of the trunk of a stolen Camry...and could have provided the soundtrack for every episode of In Living Color. 

1-800-REMIXES VOL.1

If anyone has a line on subsequent volumes....you know where to find me.