Year: 1980 Genre: Punk Rock Label: Orange Records Tracks: 11 Length: 21 Minutes My Rating: 6/8
GG Allin. GG. Allin. Was a guy... named. GG Allin. He spent the first few years of his life living in a shitty log cabin with a dirt floor without running water and a father who named him Jesus Christ Allin because he believed his son was to be Jesus Christ. Well, I guess you could say this was true. His brother Merle started calling him "GG" because he couldn't pronounce "Jesus"... his mommy tried to re-name him Kevin after the rest of the family managed to escape from his psycho father, but we all know GG was his real name, after all. So anyways, he grew up doing a lotta fucked-up shit with his best buddy, Merle, and stole a lot of things and basically did whatever they wanted.
In 1977, GG started his first band, the Jabbers. After releasing a few 7" EPs and singles, "Always Was, Is and Always Shall Be" is the main LP the band released. GG doesn't talk about being a rapist or eating shit or trying to rule the world on this album, and to be honest, on this album it doesn't really even seem like he's that headed there -- just a somewhat mean-spirited sense of humor and X-rated lyrics, but nothing as over-the-top as what he would be doing a few years later. 1. Bored to Death A classic ode to misanthropy, boredom, and apathy! GG sings of his hatred of people and their society, as well as being BORED TO DEATH of it. The vocal melodies are catchy as fuck, including the harmonies and GG sings really good here. The guitar and drumming and everything sounds real cool! This song was originally featured on the first 7" the band ever released.
2. Beat, Beat, Beat From the first few seconds, you can already tell this song's gunna be really hot! The lyrics are about GG wanting to get a handjob from a woman. Good drumming on this track.
3. One Man Army Pretty upbeat... not far from being '70s "hard rock" musically. GG's early clean-singing voice here sings well, I like the vocal melody here in the verse parts a lot. ONE-TWO ONE-TWO! Then there's a fucking awesome guitar solo in the bridge part of the song. 4. Assface A pop-punk ditty with razor blade guitars. GG was really good at writing catchy-sounding songs in his early career... this stuff sounds poppier than the fucking Ramones! Anyways, this song features GG talking shit about a girl he hates who "reminds him of his ass" (fat, hairy, covered with zits, when she opens her mouth, out comes the shit) and tells her he's gonna hang her from the highest tree!
5. Pussy Summit Meeting This is a somewhat corny skit that features what must be a bunch of chicks discussing their business which involves selling sex, and along comes a member of the Jabbers who hints to them that they have "a little arrangement" with him... 6. Cheri Love Affair A little slower than the other songs so far. Opens with a sweet-ass lead guitar song. This song features a group chorus of girls singing backing vocals. Pretty snazzy... the lyrics feature GG singing of how sexy the chick he's after is and how he wants to be with her. And fuck her, also. This song is pretty fucking awesome. End of the Birth Side.
7. Automatic GG sings about his anger for a girl who plays games with his mind and talks behind his back, or else he will "make her bleed internally".
8. I Need Adventure This song's about Mister Allin's need to constantly party hard and be dangerous all the time and fuck and all that wonderful stuff. I NEED ADVENTURE, JUST THE KIND THEY PROMISED YOU AND ME! This song was later re-recorded for the "Live Fast Die Fast" E.P. in 1984.
9. Don't Talk To Me A backstabbing egocentric jerk is called out on their douchebaggery. Love the guitar riff and the drum beat definitely! CH-CH-CH-CH-CHATTER CHATTER CHATTER!!!!! Gotta love the erratic screamin' like a demon' on this track.
10. Unpredictable Pretty fast song. This song's about a conclusion many a-male has come to at one point or another -- girls are hard to figure out. Kinda tame subject matter compared to what we are used to hearing from GG. Shit, they would probably be okay with playing this in a car commercial these days if not for GG's fucked-up future. ("Ford Pieceashit. It's UNPREDICTABLE.") Hahahahaha! 11. 1980's Rock & Roll This song's about the new decade, and what it means for the band -- PLAYING MUSIC FOR ANOTHER TEN YEARS! And they did. This song even features some jangly synth-piano playing. What else is there to say? This is my least favorite song on the album!
So that's GG's first album. The first three songs are all from the first GG Allin 7" from 1979, by the way. But yeah, most of this stuff is way tamer than what GG & company would be singing/playing by the end of the decade... 1980's rock & roll, indeed. But it's definitely fun to listen to, most of the songs are very good... fits in well amongst bands like the Ramones, the Stooges, the Germs, and other early U.S. punk bands... fun, energetic, badass, but also catchy. But that's obvious, I'm just throwing around a bunch of overused terms to make this review sound more substantial... because who the fuck actually READS reviews anymore? Nonetheless reviews of albums they have already fucking heard that came out three decades ago. Who still reads reviews? Oh yeah, fucking sheep who want some stuffy-assed yuppie from Rolling Stone's opinion on the latest major label/faux-indie pseudo-rock piece of smelly shit caked into a CD shape. So you want me to say something about this album that's TOTALLY UNCONVENTIONAL? OKAYYYY:
It's JEGGA-ZAMMIN'!!!
Top 3 Favorites: 1. Cheri Love Affair 2. Bored to Death 3. Assface
Year: 2011 Genre: Hardcore Punk Label: Unknown Tracks: 7 Length: 14 Minutes My Rating: 7/8
Hi y'all. I've just come back from the doldrums of a really bad fucking trip, so just bear with me, bears. Or whatever, I dunno, I'm just here to say that things got really shitty for a few days and I'm slowly starting to feel loike muh old self again so I'm sorry if I can't be mister sunshiney for a few days. People have their little moments... mine just seem to happen more frequently than not lately. But ol' Chuck Fuck is gonna be okay. I'm pretty sure I don't have permanent brain damage and I should be alright by the end of this week. Let's just say I got fucked up on robitussin and saw n' heard some EXTREMELY frightening, traumatizing, cosmically lame shit. Ever seen the divide between life and death? Yeah, it was gettin' REAL bad, man. When you're sitting on a chair shaking and staring at the shattered remains of reality like a broken mirror, you're about to tip over that edge and you need a break from drugs. It seems like this whole month I've been getting myself into shit. But tonight I'm gunna start writing this review, which is something non-destructive (but still fun, kids) that I can do with my time.
Okay, so we know that T.S.O. is an Italian hardcore ponk band formed in October of 2010. Which is cool. Okay, okay, so we know that. The band's name is an abbreviation for an Italian phrase meaning "mandatory medical treatment" (in English). This is the band's first demo recording and it has a really cool name like PARASOMNIA PSEUDO SUICIDE, and they're not afraid to whore out a jillion images of Lung Leg (who iz cool), and that's awesome... the music rocks really hard also... fast, energetic, harsh, y'know, the works! The members of the band are Sarah Lynn (vocals/guitar), Nicola (bass guitar), and Guido (drums). They even gots a GG Allin cover, which is pretty kol. Look, if we're gonna go review shit, then let's review it. sh but this review isn't SHITE, it's LEGITE, so lut's go listen to these songs and then state the obvious or make really dumb jokes about them or something. I dunno. Here we GOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO..............................
1. My Mind The chorus is kinda catchy. As with many albums, it's too bad I don't know the lyrics. I SMASH YER FACE AGAINST THE WALL, FUCK YEAH!! I like how she yells that "Right noooOOOOOOOWWW" at that last part a lot. Cool song.
2. A Bloody Diving Down Slow song... yaeeeyyyy! The guitar sound is really thick and sludgy, which iz great. Starts out with a kind of psychedelic phaser sound... I love it. YAY FOR HARD-ASSED GUITAR DISTORTION. I like the chorus part a lot... Sarah Lynn (yes, that is the singer's name) has a cool singing voice and the vocal melodies she comes up with are very nice. There's a guitar solo in the middle of the song. Still think the chorus iz the best part. I like this song much. YAYAYAYyysfdsgjdflkgldfgdfjlkgfdlkdfkhfghfghflgjhfg It's like some dude was getting really bloody as s/he's diving down a scrapey scraggly concrete tunnel of PAIN. Pain sucks.
3. Scummy Human Being This one is really fast. Fucking great guitar riff, I already know that... the vocals are packed with an intensity and fire, the beat is fast like Minor Threat... it's simple but it get ze job done, which is the job of being an awesome, fun to listen to punk song. Human beings can be pretty scummy if thuh haven't showered in a long time. It has a great energy to it. Awesome production also.
4. Dried Root I like this song a lot too. Starts out with a bass riff and then a guitar riff and you can hear the (henry) rollin' (s) drums and then things get all kicked off n' shit. Part of the reason I like this song so much is because the verse riff is the same riff as the ending part of one of my own songs that I wrote... and I wouldn't have used that chord progression if I didn't like it. The chorus section is more upbeat-soundin'... like those maniac "HAHAHAHA"s she throws into the second verse, it's awesome... kind of a Johnny Rotten-soundin' flair; violent and sarcastic like good punk muzick should be, fucker!!
5. Beat to Death (Murders) Once again, this has got cool chords. I like the singing. A bunch of other shit I've said about other songs. But it's a good song, OKAY??!!!! Towards the end there are a bunch of samples of people talking to eachother. There's a solo, too.
6. Lotta Per Il Potere This is a cover of a band called Kollettivo. It's really fast and aggressive and the singing is very fast here. It's the shortest song on the record, being just under a minute long. But it's short and sweet and awesome! Great song to slam to in a power-pit o' mayhem.
7. Bite It (You Scum) Who doesn't know this one? OH YEAH... PEOPLE WHO DON'T KNOW THIS ONE! SILLY MEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEHEEEHEEEEHEEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!!! Oh, fuck. This a mid-tempo, angry but confident rock song (what'd ya think it was gonna be, hip-hop?) about wanting to kick the ass of somebody who wants you to do a bunch of shit for you... the "you" in this case being Mister Allin, of course! In a way I have to say this is the weakest track on the demo, not that it isn't good, or even musically my least favorite, but it doesn't feel nearly as angry or fucked-up as the GG Allin version... GG sounds really angry and the vocals here don't sound as convincing... not knocking, it just doesn't feel exactly the same. But it's hard to be exactly the same as GG Allin, isn't it? Oh shit, I must be the very type of person this song is raging against. Fuck me! FORGIVE MY SINS, OHHH LORDIE! There's a guitar solo in the middle too. But yeah, it's a decent cover but obviously not as good as the original.
So there's my review on the T.S.O. demo. Definitely worth listening to... one of the hardest-rocking releases to come out this year so far, almost every song on this is totally awesome and it's got all the right ingredients to some good, totally awesome music! The chord progressions are very potent, the singing is good and unlike a lot of hardcore nowadays, Sarah actually attempts to sing, which is really refreshing... c'mon you motherfucks, it's not THAT un-punk to actually use vocal melodies! Try it, it might actually make your band BETTER! I think this band has "it". What is "it"? THEY SAY "what is it?" THEY SAY "what is it?"... YOU WANT IT OUT BUT YOU CAN'T HAVE IT... (yeah yeah yeah), IT'S IN YOUR FAAACE, BUT YOU CAN'T GRA --sorry 'bout that. Sorry very much, sirs n' ladies of the world. Okay, yes, listen to this band, they are on MySpace, they are Reverbnation, so go listen. NOW!!!!!! Bye bye.
(p.s. -- lyrics and names of other band members would be nice to know of.)
Top 3 Favorites: 1. A Bloody Diving Down 2. Scummy Human Being 3. Dried Root
Year: 2011 Genre: Black Metal Label: None Tracks: 5 Length: 26 Minutes My Rating: 6/8
Tryblith is a black metal band from Dayton, Ohio. It was formed in 2009 originally as a solo project of Havik/Alex Jones (also drummer for the End of Time). The band has not yet released a full album but they have released a demo. The band now consists of Havik (drums), Helvete (guitar), Tzaboath (bass guitar), and Nihilus (vocals). According to founder and drummist Havik, the band is centered around the concepts of abstract subconscious philosophy, Shamanism, occultism, and anti-cosmic Luciferianism. The demo consists of five songs.
1. Adorning the Circle of Stones With Laurel and Flame Starts out with a soft, wispy sound/vibe flowing through yer eardrums... very tranquil, but it's hard to tell whether it's going to ascend or drop... you can hear what almost sounds like the wind blowing in the background... towards the end of the song you can hear other types of instruments, often abruptly cutting eachother off... it's a really beautiful sound.
2. A New Aeon of Desecration Real crunchy guitar riff and a very slow beat... the guitar sound is crunchy but it has a flow to it, like water or wind almost. Not potato chip crunchy. Like, maybe if there was an ocean or river of potato chips flying towards your head. Sometimes the guitar sounds like it's doing a somersault or something... those little parts where it stops momentarily and goes into a different riff. I say the word "riff" to much... there needs to be another word for chord-progressions... suddenly, you hear a monster-like growl and the song transitions to a thrash mode... very fast now. The vocals sound like a fucking beast... growled, bellowed noises... fucking rabid. I love vocals that sound like that. They echo too. Barely even sound human. No idea what the lyrics are about but I'll just take the song title's word(s) for it. A new aeon of desecration? OKAY. But desecration of WHAT? SO MANY MYSTERIES... OFFF RUUUAHAHHGHHHHHHHhjhhhhblonnkkjgguurrruuaaahhh. Yeah!!!
3. Convergence of Eternal Winter Really fuckin' fast! The vocals are more of a dark-sounding whisper here... more intelligible than the last song but I still don't know what the hell he's saying. The riff feels like mayhem... like a volcano's about to errupt and there's nothing you can do about it... because you are standing right on top of the piece of land where the volcano is about to erupt. 1/3 through the song, it fades into a cleaner-sounding section with a really beautiful guitar melody being played. However, it cuts back into a fast but not as fast as the first part. Different riff here. Eventually it returns to the original section of the song... and then there is another clean guitar-only part, but it's a different melody here. After that fades out, the song returns to a fast part with a guitar solo. Song fades out when it is over.
4. Visions of a Long Dead Past Begins with a really awesome guitar riff and an extremely fast beat... the chord progression changes and the beat slows down to half as fast... the vocals are screamed like a fucking demon. Or whatever sounds like what the singer of this song sounds like when singing this song. This one's packed with a lot of rage and aggression. It's like a freight train headed full speed ahead right for ya! Your best push in the opposite direction won't stop it from crushing you. Imagine if you played this music to people in the fucking 1950s... then suddenly there's a clean guitar-only part with the vocalist (not sure which one) saying some spoken lines while the guitar plays. The strum of the chord with the watery sound is a great touch. Things get real powered-up again for the ending part. The ending port. I'd say this is my favorite song on the demo.
5. The Light Fades Upon a Darkening Horizon Instrumental. Starts out with a clean guitar intro with ambient sound in the background... as the guitar playing continues, the ghostly noise surrounding it intensifies and almost seems to overpower the central section of this part of the song. It's like a jillion clouds slowly moving in until they fog up everything... cold. Or is it? Maybe they are warm clouds... for some reason I get visuals of the cold and cold things when listening to this album but maybe that's 'cuz it's raining out right now. Appropriate way to end the album seeing how it started off.
So that's the Tryblith demo. I forget if they said they were making an actual album anytime soon but here we have this, and plus, they are playing live so why not just go FUCKING SEE THEM LIVE OR SOME FUCKING SHIT BEFORE ALL OF THE MEMBERS DIE IN SOME FREAK ACCIDENT INVOLVING CLOUDS???!!!! I haven't listened to a ton of black metal to be honest so I don't know how this compares to other black metal bands, but I like what they do... the combining of fast thrash music, more mellow ambient sections, and unhuman vocals is something I really fucking like... kind of similar to what I wanna do musically but in a more "punk" way than this band. If you havun't check aut the band The End of Time, which contains two members of this band, I suggest you do, if you are a fan of hardcore punk rock. I just wish I knew the lyrics. So there's yer Tryblith... they write about the occult and weird subconscious events and shit like that. And they even sing about it, too! SOMETIMES, they even scream about it. 'Cuz THAT'S just the kinda people they are... this is like the kind of music you listen to when you're lost in the middle of the icedesert or something and you're starving to death. Or maybe the band has somethin' else in mind. I don't know. Go listen to this.
Year: 1989 Genre: Doom Metal/Hardcore Punk Label: Boner Records Tracks: 17 Length: 35 Minutes My Rating: 6/8
"Ozma" is the second full-length record from the Melvins... shortly after the release of their first album, the Melvins split with Matt Lukin and decided to move down south out of the redneck shithole known as Aberdeen, Washington to the more musically happening land of San Francisco, California! There they met a new bass guitarist named Lori Black who previously was in a thrash band called Clown Alley and also the daughter of the actress Shirley Temple! I believe Buzzo even was dating her for awhile but I'm not entirely sure if this iz a fact or not. At this time they also got signed to a new label called Boner Records which was apparently reliable enough to release 6 more albums for the band within the next several years... Boner Records is run by Tom Flynn, a member of Fang. He also played bass for the Melvins for a short while when Lorax was sick and Slammytown was in prison for you-know-what...
In a lot of ways Ozma is very musically similar to Gluey Porch Treatments, but there are subtle differences between the two... first off, the mix on this record feels a bit weaker... the drums are louder than the guitars... I usually look to the Melvins for heavy, powerful guitar riffs, but on this album the guitar feels a bit more muffled than it should. Nonetheless, it doesn't really ruin this album. Also, as weird as GPT was, this album is a bit more, well, weird in composition, and the songs are even more unpredictable... not as Black Sabbath-y and more Black Flag-y here. Probably the closest a Melvins record gets to sounding like a Black Flag record production wise... would remind me of "My War" if the drums weren't as trebly. It's still an fucking great record that would blow me away if it came out todday but I find it to be the weakest Melvins record of the pre-Atlantic period since it has a few too many so-so songs and the production have as much of an "oomph" to it. But I'm not here to Ozma-bash todday, I'm here to sing its praises to all the littel flowerchildrun of the WORLLLLDDDD...
1. Vile This song used to be called "Vile Vermillion Vacancy" back in the mid-'80s and this version of the song has, like the title, been shortened a bit. The song starts off with a weird humming noise speeding up, and then a deep, heavy guitar riff plays... now you fucking KNOW it's THE MELVINS, MANG!! YA KNOW IT... Buzz's voice has transformed from a youthful growl to a wail of mayhem starting with this album. The riff just chugs along... one chord is all it takes. All it takes in the verse section, as the drums climb up the Stairway to Heallven and the like. The original version of the song (V.V.V.) had a bunch of extra sections but that is absent here...
2. Oven This song's a little quicker... feels kinda like thrash metal. After the first part, the song changes into a section with only a drum beat and Buzz yelling more nonsense! Thun the loud guitar pummeling ambushes again.
3. At A Crawl The Melvins had written this song pretty early on, and it even appeared on their first E.P. and on an obscure K Records comp before that. This time it's gone total fucking heavy ground-shattering boulder mode, like a bull charging at .10 miles per hour but with all the same intensity n' density! "FUCK... I'M CRAWLIINNN''.... ON MAH BELLY CRAWLIN'.... SUCKIN' LIVINNNN'... DIVINE MESSSSS!!!!" -- the next-to-holy moans and shouts of agony from Buzzed Osborne, the afro-headed guitarist/vocalist/founder of the FUCKING MELVIN BAND, KIDZ! This song really does feel like yer crawlin', just gasping for water/air/whatever, just in pure torment, yer fucked up under the weight of all that doth oppress... there's backing vocals on this recording of the song which I think is a nice touch but I can't tell if it's Dale or Buzz himself doing them. This version doesn't have the long drawn-out ending part.
4. Let God Be Your Gardener An especially creepy cut... it starts off with a slow lead-driven intro with a spooky type of sound to it... it transitions into another part, and then abruptly into the main part of the song, which when it is done is totally unexpected yet it flows... really creepy feel to that. From then onwards is pretty hard-rocking, just a nice punk rawk riff and cool weird lyrics and singing...
5. Creepy Smell Starts off with a drum intro as Buzz whispers things off in the distance. Then the magick starts up and the song gets real fucking hot... love that guitar riff. It's really aggressive and powerful. Then there's a slow part towards the end with the unforgettable line: "CREEPY CROVER". HEY DALE... BUZZ THINKS YER CREEPY!!!!
6. Kool Legged This one is extremely slow... very similar to the types of songs the band would start cranking out in the early '90s but not quite the same thing since this song is less than three minutes long... I can't help but think he's talking about a vaggina when he sings "THE RIVER WHERE YOUR LEGS MEET"... what do you think? THERE'S A PICTURE OF JESUS AS AN INDIAN. Love that line. In the middle there's an odd part with Buzz moaning with weird jangly wiggly guitar noises. Love it!
7. Green Honey Starts out with a really cool drumbeat and then it gets to a more upbeat mode kinda like the beginning of "Oven". I think the lyrics are supposed to be about getting venereal disease or something. V.D. sucks.
8. Agonizer Starts with a cool drum intro like many songs here do. Unfortunately this song doesn't do a ton for me. It's just kinda there, and it's decent but nothing that unique about it. End of Side A.
9. Raise a Paw This one's pretty cool. It has a cool boingy guitar sound and a funky lil' bass line and a hard drivin' drum beat. PAW GRANT ME IT'S WISDOM! The "waste nothing ever you never" part at the end with the zig-zag guitar part just lingering at the end sounds awesome too.
10. Love Thing This is a cover of an instrumental by the band KISS. It's short but it's decent. The bass guitar reminds me of funk metal like the Red Hot Chili Peppers or Faith No More or something. It fades out...
11. Ever Since My Accident It's funny because the original version of this song was extremely fast and frantic... well, the franticness is still here but in a different form. I mean, it's practically a completely different song, but maybe I'm missing something here... it fades in like a large snake crawling in, ready to constrict its prey and consume. Slow. I STAND ALONE LIKE A TREE! ALONE I STAND! Nice scary guitar riff here.
12. Revulsion/We Reach Two songs in juan. The first song is "Revulsion". It's a pretty good song. Slow, heavy, weird intro, y'know the drill. Or do you? Halfway through, the song "We Reach" begins, which is even slower and cooler. The guitar riff sounds like a chisel ripping off chunks of wood from something very large and hard and made of wood (a penis, maybe?). I love slow music. This one is laden with ghostly humming of feedback and very somber-feeling... pretty bassy, also. Strong bass presence. Buzz roars at times... whispers so soft at others.
13. Dead Dressed This one kicks a lot of ass. Nice guitar riff and sweet singing and drumming. It's pretty close to bein' the full package.
14. Cranky Messiah I get the image of Jesus being really grumpy and hung over and whiny with this one.
15. Claude Twisty n' turning. Claude Monet, maybee??
16. My Small Percent Shows Most Shortest song on the album. It starts with a cool guitar melody, starts off sounding pretty normal and gets more weird and discordant from there onwards. Hell yeah!
17. Candy-O An actual pop song on this record! It's a cover of a song by the Cars. It's better than the original and it rocks hard and should get any party going, fuckers! The "CANDY-O... I NEED YOU SO" part kills! Makes me wanna eat M & M's at night on a full moon. Sadly this song is only available on the CD version.
So yeah, there's OZMA, baby!! It's a pretty sweet album... after this album the band changed things up and started making their music insanely slow and droney. If you like non-generic, aggressive music that's true to the punk attitude but can appreciate all that is good about heavy metal, then this record is for you. Do listen, it may change your life. THE MELVINS RULE, OK??!!
Top 3 Favorites: 1. At a Crawl 2. Creepy Smell 3. Candy-O
Year: 2011 Genre: Punk Rock/Psychedelic Rock Label: Gnar Tapes Tracks: 12 Length: 39 Minutes My Rating: 7/8
I first got into Grrrl Friend almost exactly a year and a half ago... I couldn't believe what I heard, it was a band that fucking had it, and they were new, and they were young, and talented! Later on in the next year, the formally released their first album (Isolation, Chronic Masturbation & Daydreams), but it just contained songs from the already-released E.P.'s that they had recorded in the last several years. Since the early days of Grrrl Friend, the band's lineup has changed almost completely after undergoing several changes in 2008 - 2010... the band has found a steady line-up of Duffy (of course), Lilian Void (bass guitarist), Tom Henkel (drums), and Sierra Stinson (other guitar). The band is now signed to Gnar Tapes, a record label that releases cassette tapes of rock bands in the Portland scene... however, this record can be heard and downloaded for as cheap as free on the Grrrl Friend web page. Anhueaise...
The album itself is quite different from the last one... style-wise this one's all over the place... there are many songs that flirt with the whole dream-pop sound that has become very popular in the hipster scene (or "garde-core", as Duffy prefers to call it)... there are some zanier, more no-wave type songs and even a few fast thrasher songs... the production is a bit less raw than the previous recordings... this album is laden with echoes and layering of tracks and guitars which muffle the other instruments in their presence. Most of the songs are pretty new, some of them never performed live before (?), but there are three re-recorded old Grrrl Friend tunes as well. Anyways, it's time to talke a listen, so why don't we, huh? HUH??!!
1. Happening Now It's not like any Grrrl Friend you've heard before... like a sunbeam through a window comes the buzzing guitar melody and the more blunted but strong rhythm guitar chunks wallowing about... the chorus is catchy and pleasant. Awesome lead guitar work! Duffy's voice is kinda obscured by the rest of the instruments and sounds more like a ghost faintly beckoning you from another world than a screamer... Lilian (the new obligatory co-vocalist) sings a few lines here. The heavy usage of melody culminates and it really gets good. Smoke weed.
2. How Allah Stole Christmas Not sure who's singing here... is it Duffy or Sierra? His voice sounds a bit different here if it's Duffy. It's pretty upbeat and noisy, with hard-edge steel-cold sounds bouncing and jagging around the echoey walls of the studio which said band had molested. Reminds me of the some of the songs off of "Confusion is Sex" by Sonic Youth. It's wild, it sounds like the band is using ray-guns as instruments! I imagine an inebriated ray-gun battle taking place in the middle of a laundromat being confused for the inside of a space ship.
3. doppelganger 12-Step Another pop song. It has loud punk guitars but a feel-good melody and guitar riff and it's a nice happy song and stuff. The section before the chorus is a bit angry-sounding but then things change again once the chorus happens... really enjoying the backing vox from Lilian! If not for the warm nature of the song this would easily sound like a huge barrage of skull-crushing noise. 2/3 through the song, Duffy says, "DO THE DOPPELGANGER 12-STEP"... the song speeds up and segues into a very fast part!
4. Dirtgasm This is actually a remake of one of the first songs the band ever wrote called "Come Clean", but it's been slightly changed. Duffy says that this version is the way that he intended it to sound like. More of a downer than the previous songs, though. The intro of the song, with the high-pitched hums of whateverthehellitis making the melody of the song, with the guitar riff playing... it's one of the most beautiful things I've heard in a song in awhile. Soon enough, the bass and drums join in and the first verse is sung. This version of the song has way more reverberation and feels more laid-back while the original recording of the song sounded more like a straight punk song. Kind of a droopy, collected but still somber song. There's more lead guitar trickery here, though... the song ends with a repeated bassline and the instruments slowly dropping out of the mix until the bass is all that's left and then it's over.
5. Black Jesus Christ This one reminds me of Flipper a little... Flipper if it had Gene Ween on vocals, that is! The drum beat is pretty sweet in the verse parts... the guitar work lays all to waste. By the way, I just jacked off a few minutes ago. Just thought I would share that. Okay. I like food. I'm eating this "Milano Melts" right now, and they're REALLY FUCKING DELICIOUS. You can always count on Pepperidge Farm, motherfuckers!
6. Hydroxyzine This one starts off sounding like a heavy metal number... however, that it is not. The wisping voices lead the way through this confused voyage into the chaos... not as chaotic as BJC or HASC (the songs Black Judas Chimney and How Alice Stucco ChaFUCKYOU), but still discordant none the less. It's also the longest song on the album, 'cuz it's near six minutes long. Side A ends after this song. Now time for Side B!
7. By a Thread Another re-recording of an early song. The original version was just acoustic guitars and singing, but this version is complete with a beat and all that jazz. The first version of the song sounded like they were singing it to you alone in a room but in this one it sounds like they're shouting it out into the mountains... causing an avalanche and killing some indigenous people... GOOD FUCKING GOING, GUYS! This one reminds me of "Kimberly" by Patti Smith a little... just a little bit, my brother. My SOUL BROTHA. LET'S GO HAVE A PICNIC NOW, IN A LITTLE MAZE WITH ALL OF THE CREEPY MONSTERS FROM KEN'S LABYRINTH... THAT GAME RULES.
8. Pet Frownz Ever had a PET than FROWNZ? It's not so good... it's usually the sign that they're about to go feral and rip off your face so your head looks like a giant wad of puss. The guitar is loud and fucked-sounding... Duffy's out there screamin' like a wild man, man... man. The chorus part is fast, which RULES. YAY FOR THIS MUSIC! In the chorus you can hear a sludgy guitar riff pulling the rest of the fucktardery about the MAGICAL ROLLERCOASTER OF SOUND. Most aggresive song of the record. Chuck enjoys thees.
9. Bestiality BBQ Another old song... the original version of this song can be heard on the band's first L.P. It has mutated from a hillbilly sounding song to a fast punker type worthy of a circle pit. In the middle there's a weird reverse-toilet-flushed sounding guitar solo. Drumming sounds nice here. The lyrics are a satire violent rednecks who use guns too much.
10. I Explode Another fast song. I don't know who's singing on this one, but the guitar riff is really good... I can't understand the lyrics well but I think it's supposed to be about a relationship or a breakup or something. This one reminds me a lot of the band Youth Brigade. One of the best of the album.
11. All White People Look The Same (To Me) An instrumental. Features a funky hard-rockin' little guitar melody that is sure to get people dancing... oh yeah, I forgot, dancing isn't "cool" anymore, so you have to get them pretty fucked up first before the real fun begins! What do they know about partying... or anything else?? But it's pretty good. Not the best, but good. The lead guitar can get pretty interesting in some parts.
12. Not Happening Now Okay, so like, it was happening NOW... and NOW it's NOT happening NOW now. But this one's kind of a distorted folk type song... at least in the beginning until the drums start up and make it seem more rock-ish. I like this one a lot... relaxing to listen to... even if you've got no one and you've got nothing (like DUFFY IN THIS SONG), you can still have nothing to say... about...
ummmm...
THIS:
But all puppets aside, this album seems to show the band in a more comfortable place than they were in their early years. And as cool as it is, I'm going to have to admit that I am really going to miss their early sound and their old dingy production values... "The Rag" (counting the unreleased songs) is still my favorite thing the band has ever done. However, when a band changes you can either stop listening or embrace the change, and I embrace the change on this part... cool to see a band grow and shit. They actually had one old song that reminds me of this album and that's "Candy Love & Pixie Dust", which is one of my favorite songs from the Rag. So hey, it's a diverse album that doesn't just stick with one style, Grrrl Friend play several different kinds of songs, so does that mean there's something for everybody here? NO! It just means there's something for about 3% of the population, and that's just being generous, because at least 50% of the planet has SHITE TASTE IN MUSIC, SO FUCK YOU. I do love Blatz, though, just though I'd say that, y'know...
Get high and listen to this album. Have sex and listen to this album. Grrrl Friend are the new harbingers of the PEACE LOVE AND SODOMY GENERATION, AND THEY WANT YOU TO DO ALL OF THOSE THINGS. DON'T EVEN HAVE MONEY. JUST LOOT STORES AND WHEN YOU GET BUTTRAPED IN PRISON LEARN TO LIKE IT! 'CUZ IT'S THE RIGHT THING TO DO, YOU FUCKING ANAL-BANANA!!!!!
(the tape comes out in July.)
Top 3 Favorites: 1. I Explode 2. Dirtgasm 3. Not Happening Now
ALWAYS WAS, IS AND ALWAYS SHALL BE
