Category: punk rock

Single Review by William Ruben Helms

II, the soon-to-be released sophomore effort from  Austin, TX-based punk trio Crooked Bangs is slated for an April 21, 2017 release through Nervous Intent Records, and reportedly the album and its material are the result of a protracted period of songwriting and recording in which, the initial sessions were scrapped in favor of a much more raw and immediate sound. And unsurprisingly, the album’s preceding single “Rabbit Hole” managed to capture the band playing with the taut, brooding fury of adult angst of someone who has begun to live a life, complete with the recognition that almost everything and everyone around you is surrounded in layers of revolting, hypocritical bullshit, along with the sensation that the rug has suddenly been pulled out from under you, and the realization that life can often be brutally ironic, embittering and unfair, suggesting that there are no easy answers and no easy solutions.

II‘s latest single “No Future” features lyrics in French and English within a frenetic and forceful track consisting of blistering guitar work and a driving rhythm section. and while drawing from early Joy Division, this particular song leans heavily towards furious, hardcore punk. As a result, the song possesses a feral and primal urgency.

The Austin, TX-based punk trio will be touring to build up some buzz for II across the Midwest, Southwest and West Coast. Check out the tour dates below.

 

Tour dates:

4/27 @ Album Release show at Beerland, Austin, Texas
5/18 @ Austin, TX @ Hotel Vegas
5/20 @ El Paso, TX @ Monarch
5/21 @ Phoenix, AZ @ The Lunchbox
5/23 @ Los Angeles, CA @ TBA
5/24 @ Los Angeles, CA @ Star Bar
5/25 @ Oakland, CA @ Octopus Literary Salon
5/26 @ San Francisco, CA @ The Hemlock
5/28 @ Seattle, WA @ TBA
5/29 @ Portland, OR @ Black Water
5/31 @ Salt Lake City, UT @ Diabolical Records
6/1 @ Denver, CO @ TBA
6/2 @ Kansas City, MO @ Blind Tiger
6/3 @ St. Louis, MO @ TBA
6/4 @ Oklahoma City, OK @ TBA

Single Review by William Ruben Helms

Girls in Synthesis is a rather mysterious London, UK-based punk rock trio, who formed last year with a specific intent and purpose — to aurally represent the noise and violence of the modern world. And within a relatively short period of time, the trio developed a reputation for playing riotous live sets with Cherry Glazerr and Fat White Family side project, Revenue, that include lengthy and intense periods of noise and feedback, band members jumping off the stage and into the audience, garbled Dictaphone-era audio featuring dialogue from the British government’s Protect and Survive nuclear war video, Orson Welles’ speech from The Trial and audio from the Heaven’s Gate’s suicide video.

Building upon their growing profile across London, the British trio released their debut double A side single “The Mound”/”Disappear” today — and from their latest single, “Disappears,” the band captures the frenetic energy of their live sets while pairing almost metronomic-like drumming with sizzling and slashing guitar chords and a propulsive and forceful bass line with punchy, shouted lyrics. Sonically speaking, the song sounds as though it draws from Entertainment and Solid Gold-era Gang of Four and Elastica‘s self- titled debut album, complete with prerequisite cynical sneering and a primal fury.

Single Review by William Ruben Helms

Bad Breeding is a somewhat mysterious punk outfit from Stevenage, UK, a town that the band have described as a bleak commuter-belt town north of London. Formed in 2013, the members of the band feature a group of friends, who muddled through school and they were drawn together by an enthusiasm for old, anarcho-punk and a complete disdain for the misrepresentation and simplification of Brtiain’s working-class identity, the band as its members see it, is an attempt to furiously call out both the rank injustices and political distortion peddled to people existing on the fringes, as well as a desperate outlet from the monotony of humiliating, soulless temp jobs.

The band’s forthcoming, sophomore effort Divide is slated for an April 7, 2017 release through Iron Lung Records here in the States and La Vida Es Un Mus throughout the UK and EU and the material on the effort will reportedly sum up our dark, dense, claustrophobic and fucked up times, reveal a world that on a daily basis has become a melting pot of stupidity and hate, marching in blind lockstep towards its seemingly inevitable self-destruction. And fittingly Divide‘s first single “The More the Merrier” is a furious, primal stomp with towering squalls of noisy, distorted power chords and bilious vocals in what may be the angriest and most urgent songs I’ve heard all year, as it captures the anger and confusion of those crushed by a cadre of evil, indifferent greedy, thieving, moronic and lying assholes, who are out to steal from the poor and unfortunate, before stomping them into oblivion.

Single Review by William Ruben Helms

II, the forthcoming sophomore studio album from the Austin, TX-based punk trio Crooked Bangs — comprised of Leda Ginestra (vocals, bass), Samantha Wendel (guitar) and Philip Gonzales (drums) –slated for an April 21, 2017 through Nervous Intent Records is the result of a protracted period of songwriting and recording with the initial sessions being scrapped in favor of much more raw and immediate sound. And unsurprisingly, the trio’s sophomore effort, which was recorded by Ghetto Ghouls‘ Ian Rundell and mastered at Enormous Door Mastering by Severed Head of State‘s Jack Control, captures the trio playing with a taut, brooding, howling fury as you’ll hear II’s latest single “Rabbit Hole,” a frenetic single that features persistent and forceful drumming, blistering, slashing guitar work and a punchy bass line with Ginestra’s vocals alternating between a half singing/half spoken word croon and a ragged howl. The single manages to evoke an adult sense of angst — the angst of someone who has begun to live a life, complete with the recognition that almost everything and everyone around you is surrounded in layers of revolting, hypocritical bullshit, the sensation that the rug has suddenly been pulled out from under you, and the realization that life is brutally ironic, embittering and unfair and that there are no easy answers, no easy solutions.

The Austin, TX-based punk trio will be touring to build up some buzz for II across the Midwest, Southwest and West Coast. Check out the tour dates below.

 

Tour dates:
3/19 @ SXSW Dethscum Presents: Ultimate Bumout at Beerland, Austin,TX
4/1 @ Hotel Vegas, Austin, TX
4/27 @ Album Release show at Beerland, Austin, Texas
5/18 @ Austin, TX @ Hotel Vegas
5/20 @ El Paso, TX @ Monarch
5/21 @ Phoenix, AZ @ The Lunchbox
5/23 @ Los Angeles, CA @ TBA
5/24 @ Los Angeles, CA @ Star Bar
5/25 @ Oakland, CA @ Octopus Literary Salon
5/26 @ San Francisco, CA @ The Hemlock
5/28 @ Seattle, WA @ TBA
5/29 @ Portland, OR @ Black Water
5/31 @ Salt Lake City, UT @ Diabolical Records
6/1 @ Denver, CO @ TBA
6/2 @ Kansas City, MO @ Blind Tiger
6/3 @ St. Louis, MO @ TBA
6/4 @ Oklahoma City, OK @ TBA

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: Working Out with Pissed Jeans in “The Bar Is Low”

Comprised of Matt Korvette (vocals), Brad Fry (guitar), Randy Huth (bass) and Sean McGuinness (drums), the Allentown, PA-based hardcore punk/noise rock quartet Pissed Jeans can trace their origins to when the members of the band met while attending Allentown’s Nazareth High School. Bonding over their initial desire to create, as the band’s Matt Korvette has explained, “a different kind of punk focused on dead-ended carnal cravings, sexual depression . . .” and to “bludgeon the listener with dull, monotonous, droning rock music that just sucks the energy of out, the musical equivalent of watching a toilet flush.” And over the course of their 13 years together as a band, they’ve released several 7 inches and four, full-length studio albums, all which have cemented their reputation for crafting a sound that’s a sludgy, furious, and punishing cretinous, troglodyte stomp that subtly nods at The Stooges, The Ramones and 80s hardcore punk and post-hardcore bands — while evoking the deep primal urges of our reptilian sub-brains.

With the band’s recently released fifth, full-length album Why Love Now, the Allentown, PA-based band focuses on the mundane comforts and discomforts of modern life — from fetish websites to office supply deliveries; to the emptiness, confusion, dissatisfaction and convoluted nature of modern relationships and our contemporary world of hypocrisy and bullshit. As Korvette explains in press notes on the new album, “Rock bands can retreat to the safety of what rock bands usually sing about. So 60 years from now, when no one has a telephone, bands will be writing songs like, ‘I’m waiting for her to call me on my telephone.’ Kids are going to be like, ‘Grandpa, tell me, what was that?’ I’d rather not shy away from talking about the Internet or interactions in 2016.”

Why Love Now’s incendiary and furious first single “The Bar Is Low” will further cement the band’s reputation for crating sludgy and bludgeoning cretinous trogolydte stomp-like anthems in which Korvette’s guttural, Lemmy Kilmister-like growling is paired with with pummeling drumming, a throbbing and insistent bass line, and blistering guitar chords to evoke a knuckle dragging, slack-jawed Neanderthal on the hunt. According to Korvette, the song is “about how every guy seems to be revealing themselves as a shithead. It seems like every guy is getting outed,” Korvette continues, “across every board of entertainment and politics and music. There’s no guy that isn’t a total creep. You’re like, ‘No, he’s just a dude that hits on drunk girls and has sex with them when they’re asleep.’ Cool, he’s just an average shithead.” Throughout the song, Korvette and company point out that stereotypical concepts of straight male, masculinity is defeating, empty, and clownish.

Directed by Joe Stakun, the recently released video follows the members of the band at the gym; but they don’t know how to properly use any of the equipment. And while there, the band begins an absurd and ridiculous competition with other gym goers that ends up with a hilarious and horrifying conclusion.

Single Review by William Ruben Helms

Comprised of Sally Spitz (vocals), Ali Day (guitar, bass), Max Albeck (drums), and Daniel Trautfield (bass, sax), the Los Angeles, CA-based feminist art-punk quartet French Vanilla can trace the band’s origins to the members being partially driven by a desire to forcefully challenge Southern California’s established music scene, dominated by a few influential, male tastemakers and to do cool shit while hanging with friends, the band played their first shows within their hometown’s queer punk underground. Interestingly, the quartet quickly developed a local and regional reputation for socially conscious lyrics paired with a post-punk and No Wave-leaning sound — and as a result, the band has opened for the likes of Girlpool, Screaming Females, Tacocat, Genesis P-Orridge and Cherry Glazerr and others.

Adding to the growing buzz surrounding the Los Angeles-based band, their self-titled full-length effort is slated for a March 24, 2017 release through Danger Collective Records — and as you’ll hear on the album’s latest single “Anti-Aging Global Warming,” the quartet pairs the propulsive and angular bass lines and slashing guitar lines with incredibly neurotic lyrics that express the narrator’s anxious and neurotic worries about the impending end of the world as we know it, and how easy things can suddenly turn to shit before you know it; but sonically speaking the song strikes me as being reminiscent of Talking Heads: 77 and Fear of Music-era Talking Heads, Entertainment and Solid Gold-era Gang of Four and A-Frames.

 

 

 

Single Review by William Ruben Helms

Initially begun as the solo recording project of Salt Lake City, UT-based founding member and frontman Jordon Strang and now currently a quartet, indie rock/shoegazer rock band  No Sun has seen regional and national attention for a harder and more modern take on shoegaze that draws from the genre’s masters,  Swervedriver, RIDE and Failure and contemporaries including Pity Sex, Silversun Pickups and others. The Salt Lake City, UT-based band’s full-length debut It’s Only was released through  The Native Sound Records and hot on its heels, the members of No Sun released a brooding, sludgy grunge rock-leaning cover of Dead Kennedys “Nazi Punks Fuck Off,” a song that’s become much more urgent, in light of increasing anti-Semitic and racist-based attacks and bullying across the country.

“America has shown its very disgusting underbelly over the past few months, and I’m sure it will only get worse. Going to shows, and the DIY community in general shoudl be a place where everyone feels safe, except for those that live to make others feel unsafe for something as simple as the color of their skin, their gender identity or their sexual orientation. We covered this song to let everyone know that we think Nazism and bigotry is not welcome, and will not be tolerated within our fanbase or at any of our shows,” the band’s founder and frontman Jordon Stang says of why they decided to cover the song.

Lyrics 

Punk ain’t no religious cult

Punk means thinkin’ for yourself
You ain’t hardcore ’cause you spike your hair
When a jock still lives inside your head

Nazi punks
Nazi punks
Nazi punks fuck off
Nazi punks
Nazi punks
Nazi punks fuck off

If you’ve come to fight, get outta here
You ain’t no better than the bouncers
We ain’t tryin’ to be police
When you ape the cops it ain’t anarchy
Nazi punks
Nazi punks
Nazi punks fuck off
Nazi punks
Nazi punks
Nazi punks fuck off

Ten guys jump one, what a man
You fight each other, the police state wins
Stab your backs when you trash our halls
Trash a bank if you’ve got real balls

You still think Swastikas look cool
The real Nazis run your schools
They’re coaches, businessmen and cops
In a real fourth Reich you’ll be the first to go

Nazi punks
Nazi punks
Nazi punks fuck off
Nazi punks
Nazi punks
Nazi punks fuck off

You’ll be the first to go
You’ll be the first to go
You’ll be the first to go
Unless you think
No Sun will be embarking on a lengthy tour to support their debut album throughout March and April — and it’ll include an NYC area stop at Saint Vitus on March 25, 2017. Check out tour dates below.

Tour Dates: 

3/9     Salt Lake City, UT @ Urban Lounge
3/10    Denver, CO @ Mutiny Information Cafe
3/11    Kansas City, MO @ The Couch
3/12    St. Louis, MO @ Foam
3/13    Milwaukee, MN @ Ground Zero
3/14    Minneapolis, MN @ Safe Haus
3/15    Chicago, IL @ Quenchers
3/16    Fort Wayne, IN @ The Tiger Room
3/17    Elyria, OH @ Blank State Elyria
3/18    Toronto, ON @ The Smiling Buddha
3/19    Montreal, QC @ Brasserie Beaubien
3/20    Syracuse, NY @ The Reformed Church of Syracuse
3/21    Florence, MA – 13th Floor Music Lounge
3/22    Boston, MA @ The Middle East
3/24    Montclair, NJ @ Meatlocker
3/25    Brooklyn, NY @ St. Vitus
3/26    Wilkes Barre, PA @ The Other Side
3/27    Baltimore, MD @ The Windup Space
3/28    Philadelphia, Pa @ Kung Fu Necktie
3/29    Richmond, VA – @ The Castle
3/30    Charlotte, NC @ The Station On Central
04/1    Houston, TX @ Satellite Bar
04/2    Austin, TX @ Beerland
04/4    El Paso, TX @ The Sandbox
04/5    Tempe, AZ @ 51 West

 

 

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: The Frenetic Visuals for Alexander F’s “Call Me Pretty”

Best known as a co-founding member and co-primary songwriter of renowned indie dance pop/indie funk act and JOVM mainstay Rubblebucket, Alex Toth’s side project, Alexander F, which features Steve Marion, Dandy McDowell. Christian Peslak and Noah Rubin as part of the project’s touring band, along with contributions from Kimbra is a decided change in sonic direction for him. Reeling emotionally after the suicides of a couple of musician friends and struggling with living as recovering alcoholic, Toth went to an eleven day, Buddhist, silent meditation retreat in Quebec. And as the story goes, during the retreat, a handful of Buddhist-themed experimental punk songs exploded in Toth’s head — and as a jazz-trained musician, it was a rather unexpected revelation. Now, if you had been frequenting this site towards the end of last year, you may recall that I wrote about “Swimmers,” off Alexander F’s self-titled debut, and from that single Toth and company revealed that his newest project would specialize in infectiously anthemic, frenetic and stompingly boisterous, pop-leaning take on punk rock — while in the case of that particular single, a mischievous take on the concept of prenatal memory in which the song’s narrator imagines how it must have been to be sperm swimming towards an egg to fertilize it.

The self-titled album’s third and latest single “Call Me Pretty” is a decidedly off-kilter yet rousingly anthemic track featuring guest vocals from Kimbra that sonically seems to owe a debt to New Wave and punk rock, with a neurotic and frenetic energy at its core — and in some way, to my ears at least, the song seems like what I’d imagine if Talking Heads randomly decided to cover A Flock of Seagulls. (In the alternative facts universe, indeed, right?) Lyrically, the song evokes the cripplingly neurotic self-doubt, shame and confusion of the song’s narrator, who despite his every effort, has begun to realize that he can’t run from himself — or his own foolish mistakes. And in someway his only hope is that his friends and lovers will ignore him and his perceived ugliness and unworthiness by “shutting their eyes and calling him pretty.”

The recently released music video for the song employs a relatively simple concept as it captures Toth and his backing band playing with a frenetic, unhinged energy — while nodding at the fact that being defiantly, proudly weird and loving music and art, and participating in music and art are the best way to resist.

Single Review by William Ruben Helms

Best known as a co-founding member and co-primary songwriter of renowned indie dance pop/indie funk act and JOVM mainstay Rubblebucket, Alex Toth’s side project, Alexander F, which features Steve Marion, Dandy McDowell. Christian Peslak and Noah Rubin as part of the project’s touring band, along with contributions from Kimbra is a decided change in sonic direction for him. Reeling emotionally after the suicides of a couple of musician friends and struggling with living as recovering alcoholic, Toth went to an eleven day, Buddhist, silent meditation retreat in Quebec. And as the story goes, during the retreat, a handful of Buddhist-themed experimental punk songs exploded in Toth’s head — and as a jazz-trained musician, it was a rather unexpected revelation. Now, if you had been frequenting this site towards the end of last year, you may recall that I wrote about “Swimmers,” off Alexander F’s self-titled debut, and from that single Toth and company revealed that his newest project would specialize in  infectiously anthemic, frenetic and stompingly boisterous, pop-leaning take on punk rock — while in the case of that particular single, a mischievous take on the concept of prenatal memory in which the song’s narrator imagines how it must have been to be sperm swimming towards an egg to fertilize it.

The self-titled album’s third and latest single “Call Me Pretty” is a decidedly off-kilter yet rousingly anthemic track featuring guest vocals from Kimbra that sonically seems to owe a debt to New Wave and punk rock, with a neurotic and frenetic energy at its core — and in some way, to my ears at least, the song seems like what I’d imagine if Talking Heads randomly decided to cover A Flock of Seagulls. (In the alternative facts universe, indeed, right?) Lyrically, the song evokes the cripplingly neurotic self-doubt, shame and confusion of the song’s narrator, who despite his every effort, has begun to realize that he can’t run from himself — or his own foolish mistakes. And in someway his only hope is that his friends and lovers will ignore him and his perceived ugliness and unworthiness by “shutting their eyes and calling him pretty.”

 

Single Review by William Ruben Helms

New Audio: Toronto’s Career Suicide Returns with a Blistering and Furious New Single

Featuring founding members Martin Farkas and Jonah Falco, who splits his time as the drummer in renowned punk act Fucked Up, the Toronto, ON-based hardcore punk band Career Suicide formed back in 2001 and over the past 16 years, the band has written and recorded several records and played a ton of shows across the world. Machine Response, the band’s forthcoming full-length effort is the much-anticipated follow-up to their blistering and critically applauded Attempted Suicide and interestingly, the album which is slated for a February 24, 2017 release finds the band’s most recent lineup — founding members Farkas and Falco, along with Dallas Good (guitar), who has played with The Sadies, Andre Williams, John Doe, Half Japanese, Elevator and others, and guest vocals from Souichi Hisatake, a member of Forward, GISM, Insane Youth, Gudon and others furthering the band’s long-held reputation for blistering, furious, acidic and mosh pit worthy punk rock.

Now, if you had ben frequenting this site last month, you may recall that I wrote about Machine Response’s first single “Suffocate,” a blistering, furious and acidic and mos pit-worthy bit of punk rock that lyrically evoked claustrophobia and desperation. The album’s second and latest single “Distractions” clocks in at 80 seconds and sonically bears an uncanny resemblance to Suicidal Tendencies’ “Institutionalized” — while further cementing their reputation for crafting furious and blistering punk.

Single Review by William Ruben Helms

New Audio: Pissed Jeans’ Furious and Pummeling Single “The Bar Is Low”

Comprised of Matt Korvette (vocals), Brad Fry (guitar), Randy Huth (bass) and Sean McGuinness (drums), the Allentown, PA-based hardcore punk/noise rock quartet Pissed Jeans can trace their origins to when the members of the band met while attending Allentown’s Nazareth High School. Bonding over their initial desire to create, as the band’s Matt Korvette has explained, “a different kind of punk focused on dead-ended carnal cravings, sexual depression . . . that sort of thing. Mainly, we just wanted to bludgeon the listener with dull, monotonous, droning rock music that just sucks the energy out of you, the musical equivalent to watching a toilet flush.” And over the course of their 13 years together, the band has released several 7 inches and four full-length studio albums, all which have cemented their reputation for crafting a sound that’s a sludgy, furious, and punishing cretin stomp that subtly nods at The Stooges, The Ramones and 80s hardcore punk and post-hardcore bands — while evoking deep primal urges.

With the band’s forthcoming fifth, full-length Why Love Now, which is slated for a February 24, 2017 release through renowned indie label Sub Pop Records, the Allentown, PA-based focuses on the mundane comforts and discomforts of modern life — from fetish welcomes to office supply deliveries; to the emptiness, confusion and dissatisfaction of modern relationships, contemporary hypocrisy and bullshit. As Korvette explains in press notes on the new album, “Rock bands can retreat to the safety of what rock bands usually sing about. So 60 years from now, when no one has a telephone, bands will be writing songs like, ‘I’m waiting for her to call me on my telephone.’ Kids are going to be like, ‘Grandpa, tell me, what was that?’ I’d rather not shy away from talking about the internet or interactions in 2016.”

Why Love Now’s incendiary and furious first single “The Bar Is Low” will further cement the band’s reputation for crating sludgy and bludgeoning cretin stomp-like anthems in which Korvette’s guttural, Lemmy Kilmister-like growling is paired with with pummeling drumming, a throbbing and insistent bass line, angular and blistering guitar chords to evoke a knuckle dragging, slack-jawed Neanderthal on the hunt. According to Korvette, the song is “about how every guy seems to be revealing themselves as a shithead.”

“It seems like every guy is getting outed,” Korvette continues, “across every board of entertainment and politics and music. There’s no guy that isn’t a total creep. You’re like, ‘No, he’s just a dude that hits on drunk girls and has sex with them when they’re asleep.’ Cool, he’s just an average shithead.” Throughout the song, Korvette and company point out that stereotypical concepts of straight male, masculinity is defeating and clownish.

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: Gothenburg Sweden’s LaDIDa Returns with Their Scuzziest Yet Most Straightforward and Anthemic Single to Date

Now it’s been a while since we’ve heard from the Gothenburg-based quartet — and the band’s latest single “You Got It” is arguably the most straightforward yet scuzzy song they’ve released to date as the band’s sound and aesthetic manages to mesh garage rock blues-tinged rock and psych rock with a driving rhythm. Sonically speaking, the song seems as though it were drawing from The Kills, The Black Keys and others, thanks in part to power chords, played with layers of fuzz and abrasive distortion, propulsive drumming and Persson’s growled vocals paired with an arena rock-friendly hook.

The recently released music video features footage of the band rocking out in a junkyard with footage jumping from a cinematic black and white to brilliant color — and throughout the video it’s obvious that the band’s Persson is the superstar of the act, as you’ll spend more attention on her; in fact Persson seems absolutely possessed throughout the video.

Single Review by William Ruben Helms

With the release of the We’re Set EP, which featured standout singles “Wild” and “Surfer Girl,” the San Francisco, CA-based indie rock/garage rock quartet The Band Ice Cream, comprised of Kevin Fielding (vocals, guitar), Joe Sample (vocals guitar), Bryce Fernandez (bass) and Louie Rappoport (drums), quickly developed a national reputation for a fuzzy, scuzzy alt rock-leaning sound that draws from Nirvana, The Strokes, The White Stripes, The Orwells, Pavement and Link Wray — and for opening for the likes of Hinds, Night Beats, Adult Books, SWMRS, The Aquadolls and others. Adding to a growing profile, the band’s last EP caught the attention of legendary producer and sound engineer Bruce Botnick, who’s best known for his work with The Doors and The Beach Boys, and along with San Francisco underground rock legend Mike Carnahan worked with the band on their forthcoming full-length debut Classical Trained, slated for a March 10, 2017.

Classically Trained‘s latest single “Seventeen” manages to evoke the awkwardness and uncertainty of being a stupid teenage kid while looking back at it with a wistful nostalgia over that period’s seeming simplicity and deep friendships– and without as many devastating mistakes, poor choices, unending complications and uneasy compromises. And while the band has developed reputation for scuzzy garage rock, the band’s latest single manages to be clearly indebted to power pop, thanks to anthemic hooks and some guitar pyrotechnics; but in an expansive, and meandering song structure that possesses both a muscular insistence and a mischievous and ironic wit.

 

 

 

 

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: Renowned Riot Grrrl Act Sleater-Kinney to Release a Blistering, Live Album from Paris

Currently comprised of founding members Corin Tucker (vocals, guitar), Carrie Brownstein (guitar, vocals) and Janet Weiss (drums), the Olympia, WA-based indie rock trio Sleater-Kinney was initially formed as a side project from its founding members then-primary projects — Tucker was a member of renowned and influential riot grrl act Heavens to Betsy while Brownstein was a member of Excuse 17. And when Tucker and Brownstein’s primary projects broke up, Sleater-Kinney quickly became its founding duo’s new focus. And through the release of their first seven full-length efforts, 1995’s self-titled debut, 1996’s Call the Doctor, 1997’s Dig Me Out, 1999’s The Hot Rock, 2000’s Hands on the Bad One, 2002’s One Beat and 2005’s The Woods the band developed a reputation for material based around feminist and left-leaning politics — and for being among one of the more influential and beloved acts of their era. Interestingly enough, I can still remember at least reading at least one music journalist, who wrote an article expressing her devastation upon hearing about Sleater -Kinney’s largely unexpected split up back in 2006.

And upon Sleater-Kinney’s breakup, the members of the trio went on to pursue a number of creative pursuits. Weiss, who is also a member of Quasi, joined her bandmate Joanna Bolme for a stint in Stephen Malkmus and the Jicks, recording two albums with the band 2008’s Emotional Trash and 2011’s Mirror Traffic. Tucker wrote and released two solo albums, 2010’s 1,000 Years and 2012’s Kill My Blues, which featured Unwound’s Sara Lund and Golden Bears’ and Circus Lupus’ Seth Lorinczi as her backing band. Brownstein formed Wild Flag, which featured her Sleater-Kinney bandmate Weiss along with The Minders’ Mary Timony and Rebecca Cole, a project that released a critically applauded debut effort before splitting up in 2014. And adding to a busy and prolific period of creativity for each of the band’s members, Brownstein along with co-creator and co-star Fred Armisen created the critically applauded IFC series Portlandia, which will start its seventh season on Thursday.

In October 2014, Tucker, Brownstein and Weiss announced that they had reconvened after several years pursuing a variety of projects to write and record their most recent studio album, 2015’s No Cities to Love, which was released to great fanfare and then followed by a tour across North America and Western Europe. Along with the release of the Start Together box set, the Pacific Northwest-based trio confidently reminded critics, fans and others of their importance, relevance and influence on a a number of contemporary band and artists.

Speaking of 2015’s North American and Western European tour, Sub Pop Records will be releasing a live album, Live in Paris on January 27, 2017 and the album consists of a live set recorded at La Cigale on March 20, 2015 — and the first single from the live album is a blistering, furious and incredibly passionate rendition of “Surface Envy,” which is accompanied by live footage lovingly shot by fans over the years. And from the live footage one thing is obvious, these ladies take names and kick serious ass.

Single Review by William Ruben Helms

Many influential artists and characters once played at renowned and long-defunct clubs like CBGBs, Max’s Kansas City and others during the mid-to-late 1970s — including a now cult-favored local-born artist Annie Bandez, who known as Annie Anxiety (and later as Little Annie) was the frontperson of punk act Annie and the Asexuals. After several years of attempting a series of unsuccessful creative pursuits, Bandez relocated to the UK, where she would up joining the famed anarchist commune Dial House, led by activist Penny Rimbaud. And while a member of Dial House, Bandez quickly established herself as an artist with a singular voice with the release of her solo debut single “Barbed Wire Halo,” which was released through Crass Records.

Interestingly, when Bandez relocated to the UK, a number of punk rock artists including Bandez herself had begun shifting towards a much more diverse, multicultural approach, exploring dub, rocksteady, ska and other Caribbean genres. In the summer of 1983, Bandez along with legendary dub producer Adrian Sherwood and members of Crass, Family Fodder, African Head Charge, Flux of Pink Indians, London Underground and Art Interface went into the studio to record her stark, industrial dub-based solo debut Soul Possession, which would be released by Corpus Christi Records in 1984. And it resulted in a number of lengthy collaborations with Nurse With Wound, Coil, Current 93, Swans and Marc Almond.

33 years after its initial release, Dais Records will be re-issuing Soul Possession on January 6, 2017 and the re-issue’s first single “Burnt Offerings” is an ominously apocalyptic and minimalist bit of industrial dub featuring mechanical clang and clatter and twinkling keys paired with Bandez’s half-spoken vocals that manages to bring to mind Annika Henderson‘s solo work and her work with Exploded View — and in some way it wouldn’t be surprising if Bandez’s work influenced Henderson and producer/collaborator Geoff Barrow at some point.

Bandez will be on touring Europe throughout the Spring with Swans. Check out tour dates below:

Tour Dates, Spring 2017:
3/08  Rockefeller – Oslo, Norway
3/09  Kraken Sthlm – Stockholm, Sweden
3/11  Grey Hall – Copenhagen, Denmark
3/12  VoxHall – Aarhus, Denmark
3/14  Fleda Club – Brno, Czech Republic
3/15  Taba Ka Kulturfabrik – Kosice, Slovakia
3/17  Legendos Klubas – Vilnius, Lithuania
3/19  Sentrum – Kiev, Ukraine
3/22  FORM Space Club – Cluj-Napoca, Romania
3/23  Control Club – Bucharest, Romania
3/24  MKC – Skopje, Macedonia
3/25  Dom Omladine – Belgrade, Serbia
3/27  Pogon Kulture – Rijeka, Croatia
3/28  Rote Fabrik Ziegel oh Lac – Zürich, Switzerland
3/29  FZW – Dortmund, Germany
3/30  Kompass Klub – Ghent, Belgium
3/31  Paradiso Music Hall – Amsterdam, Netherland