TENEMENT - Tape - 2009

    The one and only time I ever played a show in Appleton, WI, my band showed up to the house to find some half drunk punks that had little interest in talking to us (even though we were standing in their living room looking confused and trying to introduce ourselves) and an overturned oven range with bloody handprints on it. I asked, "What's up with the stove?" and the punks turned silently to walk out on the porch and ignore us some more. My bandmates dealt with the situation by leaving to find food. I dealt with it by buying a lot of beer and trying to befriend the drunk punks unsuccessfully. Eventually, I struck up a conversation (finally!) with the one and only sober person there; a young punk drinking soda and wearing a BOLD hoodie. He made fun of me for getting drunk. I made fun of him for drinking a three liter of soda. We hit it off pretty well. He revealed that the bloody overturned oven and the broken windows around the house were caused by the ex-drummer of his band. Apparently, they woke him up a few days earlier to leave for tour. Unbeknownst to the rest of his band, he was still drunk and possibly blacked out from the previous night's festivities. The whole band got in the van, started the engine and as they were about to leave, the drummer jumped out. He ran inside the house, started fighting the oven and breaking out windows with his fists. Then, he passed out wasted in a bloody heap...or something like that....my beer started working by this time in the conversation. The young straight-edge punk's name was Jesse and he said that his band's name was TENEMENT. Even though he told me this story about their wasted drummer, some part of my brain categorized them in my mind as a sXe hardcore band, probably because of Jesse's BOLD hoodie and his overbearing straight-edgeness, which for the record, I found endearing and entertaining. Jesse was the only local I hung out with all night, even after we tried to talk to the first band about their rampant misogyny  and after I busted my head open on my bass and blood was trickling down my face as we played.
   It wasn't until I got this tape in the mail that I ever even heard TENEMENT. I was completely surprised and delighted to hear their take on the long tradition of Midwestern punk that was laid out for them so many years ago by the likes of HUSKER DU, THE REPLACEMENTS and many others, but they added a BLACK FLAG-like intensity to it. Their songs take some unexpected twists and turns (in the present more so than on this tape), but retain some insane pop sensibilities. The last time I saw them play a show, they were the most energetic band I had seen in months. They played a short, sweet set of killer songs interspersed with noisy, between song feedback improv that gave me a feeling that was close (but not the same) to seeing HICKEY for the first time. It was great.
   This tape collects seven early ragers that found their way onto their early EP's as well as a cover of the SS DECONTROL song, "Glue", which may be unreleased...I'm not sure. I don't have a lot of their records...just piles and piles of unlabeled tapes. Turn it up loud and kill an oven.

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Updated 3/2020

TENEMENT is touring the US in Aug/Sept. You can find the dates at http://temement.blogspot.com/

ADULTS - "Vol. I" - Tape - 2011

    This entry will be kinda short since I already wrote about this band last week. Previously, I sang the praises of their Vol. II tape, but now we are going back in time to the Vol. I edition. This one finds the band a little scrappier and possibly more manic, but still keeping the energy of a lost DICKIES or JAY REATARD demo. I don't like it as much as the Vol II tape, but saying that is kinda like saying, "I don't like 'Rocket To Russia' as much as I like 'Leave Home.'"  Do you know what I mean? They're both still great. The band expertly blazes through six songs in just about eight minutes. As before, you can get your own tape from the band by writing to chiesaram@yahoo.com

Download ADULTS

Re-uploaded 2014

   A few days from now will mark my four year anniversary of moving back to the Bay Area and I have not regretted my move one bit. Last night, I went to the Marin County Fair, rode some rides, ate some gross food, walked through some fun houses and saw JOAN fuckin' JETT play an awesome show. Tonight, I will go to the Hemlock in SF and see ADULTS play a show with LIBYANS from Boston. If you live here, please join me. What else are you doing on a Tuesday?

JAMES F BECK - "A Slippery Subject" - CD-R - 2004

    James F Beck is a singer/songwriter from the middle of Indiana who is tall and lanky. I lived in his basement for a short time and he spent most of his days in his room writing and recording heartbroken songs on his beat-up guitar. He also played in an under-appreciated local indie-rock band called LEG, who were nothing short of amazing every time I saw them. Jim always seemed to be putting out self-released CD-R's, which he sold for almost nothing at the local record store or gave away to anyone who asked. If nothing else, he was prolific and focused.
   At some point, he released this cover album of the BANANAS LP, "A Slippery Subject". I was kind of skeptical at first, but after listening to it a few times, I realized the genius behind it. Sure, it's 12 cover songs, but Jim made each song his own by lending a melancholic vibe to the whole thing that really accentuates exactly how depressing and doomed this album really is! Listen to "Disappear" or "Slippery Subject" for proof.  I barely even think of this as a cover album anymore.  It transcends all of that and manages to stand on it's own.
   I've been carrying this one around for years and putting it on during the low points in life and some of the high ones too. It still holds up after all these years, but the CD-R is getting a little worn, so I thought I would put it here for eternity.
  In the intervening years, Jim moved out to Vermont and started a family. I'm having a hard time finding any other info about his music, but you can find one of his other albums here and a little bit of info here. Expect to see the long out of print LEG 7" here in the near future.

Download A Slippery Subject

QUEERWULF - 18 Songs - CD-R - 2003

   Back in 2000 in Chattanooga, my roommate, Ryan asked if I wanted to play drums for a recording project that he was working on with my future roommate (Ed), our neighbor (Anthony) and our friend, Josh. For some reason, I declined and Ryan just decided to play the drums himself. The end result of that project was the first 4 or 5 songs by the band, QUEERWULF and when I heard it, I was impressed. The band was too good to just stop right there, so they kept going...for a few more years. The bulk of those first songs ended up being on their first 7", "Cockroach City", put out by This Here Records in Chattanooga.
   Their singer, Josh always seemed to put everything he had into the live performance of any band he was in. In his teenage punk band, CAPITAL SICKNESS, he would fuck up playing bass because he was singing so hard with his eyes closed...and they ruled. With QUEERWULF, he didn't have any instruments to hold him back, so he was allowed to completely lose it while the rest of the band blazed through the songs behind him, which often resulted in broken glass, bloody microphones and/or a destroyed basement. Nothing about his lyrics or performance was an act though. Josh kinda lived this life 24 hours a day. Once, Josh walked out of his job and came to my house to get drunk. We rode bikes all over the city, drinking whiskey and spraypainting shit. I don't really remember the end of the night, but when I woke up on the floor in my room the next morning, Josh was a few feet away and we were surrounded by shards of broken glass. My roommate later told me that he came up to my attic room really late to find the two of us singing along to PETER STUBB as loud as we could while smashing beer bottles against the wall.
   Also, when he sang about pissing on someone's grave and smiling, I could picture it vividly.

Blurry pic of the first QUEERWULF show at Rear Entry.

   The rest of the band were no slouches either. As the band progressed, it seemed like were trying to make the music more and more intense as the years rolled by. Twists and turns in their songwriting became more unexpected and calculatingly precise. Sometimes, I felt like seeing them play was probably something close to what it felt like to see BLACK FLAG during the Damaged years (fortunately, QUEERWULF did not go further than that and start doing spoken word/instrumental albums...but I bet it would have been interesting). 

   The later years of QUEERWULF coincided with my departure from Chattanooga, so I don't know what happened to them or why they broke up, but I can assume that a band with that much intensity can only blow up at some point. The best bands are always the most volatile and difficult to maintain.

Download QUEERWULF

This CD-R collects their first 2 7" records and their side of the split LP with SHARP KNIFE. You can still get their posthumously released LP from Do Ya Hear We.

   Members of the band went on to be in TRAILER PARK HEROES, ASSHOLE PARADE, GHETTOBIRD, ADD/C, ONETIMERS, HIDDEN SPOTS and many, many more.

This CD is from the mixed up files of Anandi Wonder.

ADULTS - "Vol. II" - Tape - 2011

   Last year, my friend Robert asked me if I could help him do demo reviews at MRR because the amount of demos that roll through their P.O. box every month is staggering. He was writing 20+ reviews for the magazine every month and still had piles and piles left over. I agreed and decided that I would almost exclusively review terrible looking CD-R demos; the horror-punk, the bar rock, the folk punk and the bedroom projects of young teenage couples who did bad renditions of radio hits. Some of these bands send multi-page promotional hype for their band and I'm treated to some of the most hilarious (or banal) bullshit I've ever read. My recycling bin is stuffed to the gills with this garbage. It's not all bad though. Sometimes, I come across insanely inspired punk, brutal hardcore or weird, nutso experimentation. It makes this thankless job totally worth it every time.
   Most of the time, I pass over the tapes in the demo box until all of the CD-R's are gone, but this tape by ADULTS was lingering around in the bottom and something in my brain said that I should take it. There was no note, no fucking promo sheets....just this tape and a mailing address. When I put it on, I was instantly hooked. They play straightforward punk with hooks to spare, like if the DICKIES lost their keyboard player and never even thought about playing slow songs. What if THE HEARTBREAKERS just shot speed exclusively and lived in a punk house in Oakland? They might sound like ADULTS. This is the funny thing about living in the Bay Area. This band lives a short 10-12 miles from my house, yet I had never seen them or heard of them even though I go to punk shows all the time. It's too hard to see every good band in this area. It's impossible, actually. I still haven't seen this band, but I plan on doing so in the near future. Until then, I will be blasting this tape in my room. You should too.

  Download ADULTS
Re-uploaded 2014

CISMA - "Imagenes Podridas" - Tape - 2012

   I just returned from a mind-blowing European tour with my band. Like all tours, there was a string of not-so-great shows. You see, I play punk music and I have devoted my life to punk, for better or worse. Oddly, I have high expectations. I want other punks involved in this scene to play music like they're gonna die afterwards. I want punk writers to speak from their heart with guts to spare. I want punks to look fuckin' punk, fucked up but approachable. This doesn't necessarily mean mohawks and bullet belts...it means you've lived the life you've been given with nothing holding you back. I want punks to play music like they mean it and I want to feel the intensity coming from them. That being said, we had just played a few shows with bands that seemed like they might be happier at their day job and I was questioning what exactly we were doing here in this foreign country. Then, we played with MUNDO MUERTO from L.A. As soon as they struck their first note, I was instantly reminded of why I love punk. They played with passion and a fierce energy that was infectious.
   After their set, I looked at what they had for sale and saw this tape by CISMA. Their roadie, Marta explained that they were a fuckin' hardcore band from the Canary Islands! I was all like "What?" and she was all like "Yeah!" and then I was all like, "Dude, I gotta get this!" Seriously though, I figured that the punks in MUNDO MUERTO wouldn't be peddling some trash along with them on their tour and I was right.
   CISMA plays raw, energetic hardcore that makes me wanna smash my head through a wall. They have a fucked up, noisy guitar sound that rules. Everything about them screams "Punk!" in a way that makes my heart sing. Just fuckin' download it.

Download CISMA

If you'd like to order a tape for yourself, get in touch with them here: cismapunk@gmail.com

   Don't get me wrong about the intentions of the European punks. The squats we played, the people we met and the way people get shit done over there was inspiring to say the very least. If you can keep an anarchist squat open and vital for 40 years, you're definitely doing something right. If you can manage to set up a show for some dumb US band, feed them, give them a comfy place to stay, give them more alcohol than they could ever want and still manage to do 40 other things in the same night, you're doing a lot better than most people in my country. I can't thank the punks in Europe enough for their hospitality and organization. All I'm saying is that we had a rough 4-5 days there and MUNDO MUERTO and Bremen, Germany put us back on track. Thanks. 

Blasting off for tour!

   The blog is closed until late June because I am going to travel and tour in Europe. In the meantime, why don't you download everything I've posted from Alabama? Or everything with the tag drunk? How about weirdo? Or you can just go outside and go on a bike ride. If you live in Europe, please ride your bike over to one of our shows in one of your fine countries. You can find all of the tour dates for our band, NEON PISS, right here. If you want to hear the band first, you can listen to us on our bandcamp page. We will have a new LP for sale with us. Thanks!

NO HOPE FOR THE KIDS - Discography - Tape - 2006

   In 2006, my current best friend/confidante/life partner Anandi mailed me a mix tape that is probably the best mix tape I've ever received in my life. Alongside classic standards like THE CLASH and YE OLDE BUTTFUCK, I was introduced to bands I had never heard before (and grew to love) like HUL, GORILLA ANGREB and KNUGEN FALLER. There was another Danish band on the tape that I overlooked on the tape for a while, even though their song was excellent ("Secret Police"), just because I thought they were an older band. I was trying to find out about the newer bands that were exciting to me. One day at work, it hit me how good that song is and I looked up more info about the band. It turns out that they were a current band and they were born out of former projects like AMDI PETERSEN'S ARMI and the always outstanding YOUNG WASTENERS. I tracked down everything that I could by the band I was not disappointed.
   Even though their LP has this crazy flanger effect throughout the entire thing, it still has great, dismal songs on it, like "Rainy Day", which starts with the illuminating line "I stuffed myself with pills today. Doesn't seem to be working." Their lyrics cover aspects of war and don't seem to take a side on it, much like 80's bands that sang about nuclear war with no clear objective. I don't really know what else to tell you. I never got a chance to see them and I don't know much about them. I will tell you that I was walking around on a beautiful San Francisco day with my good friend Cinque once and we mutually decided that our day would be vastly improved if we went and sat in my dark room in a building at 7th and Market while drinking beer and blasting every song by this band. We were right. If you like driving, melodic, depressing, tragic punk with guitar hooks that will stick in your head for days, download this right now.

Download NO HOPE FOR THE KIDS

If you want to order this tape from fucking Poland, it's still available from Trujaca Fala, who have released a lot of other great stuff as well. Check out BARAKA FACE JUNTA and SJU SVARA AR.

SUNSET BEACH - "Long Walks, Short Piers" + Cassingle - Tape - 2002

Think of this as "Part 2" of  the post about Matty Luv and Sarah T.

   Matty Luv was gone and the next day we still went ahead with the already-planned 5 year anniversary of Mission Records, even though it seemed like the hardest thing in the world to do. To date, it is still the saddest show I have ever been to in my life. Even though the show was set to start at 5 pm, people were already hanging out in the store, lighting candles, crying in corners and telling stories over beers when I woke up that morning. It felt natural for people to come there to grieve and be with friends. I'm glad that the space was there for them.

   When the bands started up, it just felt awful and counterintuitive. We were trying to celebrate this place and time, even though an integral piece of its entire day-to-day operation was missing forever. I felt crazy depressed and I'm sure everyone else did too...possibly more so. I barely remember anything about the show besides three things: 1.When my band, ALLERGIC TO BULLSHIT played, we were out of tune since Matty always tuned Iggy's guitar. 2. We gave Aesop (one of Matty's oldest friends and bandmate in HICKEY) a mic for the whole show so that he could loudly heckle every band. 3. When THIS IS MY FIST was playing, I was crying my eyes out. I looked around and everyone else was too, including the band.

    The next week was filled with a lot of sadness, some group hangouts, countless homemade tattoos and much more. When the funeral happened the next week, I didn't want to go (who really wants to go to a funeral?), but I borrowed a black button-down and did it anyway. After paying my respects, I was headed out the door to unlock my bike and saw a kid sitting in the funeral home who looked like the spitting image of a young Matty, which threw me for a loop. There were friends and family hanging out on the street, but I needed to get back to Mission Records to help out with the last punk show that Matty set up.
    In the days of HICKEY, it seemed like no town appreciated the band better than Tulsa, Oklahoma. From the stories I heard, it seemed like every time they came through town, they were met by an army of cult devotees who's fervor was unmatched by the rest of the country. I remember going there one time and stumbling upon a crew of drunk dudes in a parking lot, blasting MANOWAR. They happened to be listening to the only song I knew by them at the time, which led me to join them, singing loudly. They spotted the HICKEY patch on my jacket, which sent them into drunken hysterics, numerous accolades, and praises of that fine band. I swear that by the time I walked away from them, they would have loaned me rent money and  killed any of my enemies...and that was just for being a fan of the band. Sooner or later, it was inevitable that some of these fervent followers would start a band, but I was never aware of how good that band would be.
    So, here I was back at the record store with a bunch of sad, post-funeral punks awaiting the start of the show. It turns out that the guy who looked like Matty played in the touring band from Tulsa (his name is Aaron and he no longer looks anything like Matty) alongside Jon Paul, who is still one of the best punk drummers I've ever seen. When SUNSET BEACH took to the rickety, sagging stage, they thanked Matty for setting up the show and raged through a relentless set. Some of the songs seemed like total HICKEY-worship while others felt mired in insane metal riffs. By the end of the set, they were pulling out alcohol and a torch. I remember exchanging worried glances with some other denizens of the store as the fire was lit and then trying to scramble up to the stage as visions of the dust-trap of a store going up in flames danced through my head. It was too late. Aaron started breathing fire as they played their last song and I helplessly watched 10 foot flames flow across people's heads and lick the cracks in the ceiling. When I saw that we were not gonna die in the next 5 minutes, I finally exhaled and smiled for the first time all day. It was a great show.
   I ended up getting both of their tapes out of the free box at the store a few weeks later. For a long time, I thought that some fool had thrown them in there, but now I think Jon Paul put them there as a way to distribute them. The first side of "Long Walks, Short Piers" is total HICKEY-worship, but in the best way possible. I remember when I first heard it, I thought "Damn, do you guys only listen to one band?" and being a little annoyed, but over time, it's really grown on me and has become indispensable to my life. In the intervening years, I grew to appreciate them in their own right. If a band is gonna be influenced by someone, I'd rather that it be HICKEY instead of THE QUEERS, GHOST MICE or CREED. Side two starts off with "Napkin" and the first time I heard it, I seriously thought the band had accidentally dubbed a different band onto their tapes. It starts off with a  straight up metal riff and dives into fucking awesome thrash. The entirety of side two stays in that vein and it totally rules. The closer, "In The Name of Justice" delves into some dual guitar riffage that sounds like what might have happened if IRON MAIDEN had grown up on DIY punk and bathtub crank. This tape is pretty ambitious for a demo at a time when not many people cared about tapes at all. I started off casually listening to this band, but this tape soon became fused with the boombox at my shitty kitchen job and provided the soundtrack to many fucked up nights. I love it.
   Also included in the download is their two song cassette single where they sound like another entirely different band..maybe one that is influenced by early 80's radio, THIN LIZZY and good, good indie-pop. Still so good. 

  Enjoy that shit and go start a band that is at least half as good as this.

Download SUNSET BEACH - Updated Sept 2018

IF YOU WERE LINKED HERE FROM THE MISSION MISSION BLOG, I JUST WANT YOU TO KNOW THAT I DEFINITELY DO NOT SUPPORT ANYONE WHO TAKES UP DONATIONS TO REPAIR THE SMASHED WINDOWS OF A FUCKING POLICE STATION. FUCK YOU AND YOUR FUCKING LIFE.