What didja buy: Bandcamp Friday in June

Sniffany and the Nits (photo by Upset the Rhythm)

To be perfectly honest, I hadn't planned to buy more than one or two things this past Bandcamp Friday. Ah, the best laid plans of mice and men...

Let's start by saying something about Death Domain, the release that spurred me to action. Dark Entries, the folks behind the great Patrick Cowley reissues, pinged me with a notice that there were copies of the "Ethidium Bromide" 7" available again. I never got one of these when they were originally released back in 2009, so it seemed like a great chance to grab one. It also spurred me to grab the latest Death Domain jam, "CDC-PSA", a COVID-19 jam if I've ever heard one. No, seriously; Adam has sampled a coronavirus public service announcement and laid it on top of a tense synth-punk snare sound and bubbling keyboard. It's cool to play these three tracks back to back, if only to get a sense of the musical progression present 11 years out. Here's to a fella who I first met due to his Robocop fandom.

I also figured it was high time I picked up the latest record from Baltimore's Curse. I got to book some of Jane & Logan's early shows in Baltimore, and with their regular touring, they're friends from home that I actually get to see from time to time. "Metamorphism" is their third full-length, and first on Fake Crab Records. These folks have been making doomy synth-punk for eight years now, and, dare I say, this is a real breakout for them. This one is less of a cacophony than their previous records, but retains a lot of the slinky ooze that I've always found so appealing about them. I didn't want to make the comparison, but I've listened to this twice since picking it up, and it actually reminds me of Björk's "Homogenic", especially in Jane's vocal phrasing. I also picked up Curse's 2018 split with Cincinnati's Street Sects, for good measure. I'm glad I did; Street Sects' name has popped up around me for years, but I've never had chance to listen to them until now. Their two songs have a real Big Black meets Xiu Xiu vibe. I think I might be in love.

I've always trusted Chris and Jon from Fake Crab's taste in releases; they've put out some great releases over the years, including 2018's Bustdown tape and a pair of Eyelet records that knocked me on my ass. So I took a wag on their final 2019 release, the self-titled 7" from Tokenized. What I didn't know at the time is that this is the newly-renamed band formerly known as Joe Biden. It is little wonder that I loved these four songs. These folks have dropped some of their more PV tendencies and released a four-song EP that reminds me a lot of early Poison Idea. Do they deserve the comparison? Fuck yeah, they do. I would stan this hard if I still lived in the 410.

I wrote about Manuela Iwansson as my comeback post for "Primitive Offerings" back in April. Go back and read it to get up to speed. Go ahead, I'll wait. Night School in the UK is now hosting the digital download for her 2018 12", "Dream Lover", as well as doing mail-order for that 12". I hope this means that we'll be getting a new record this year. I stand by my earlier comparison to Pat Benatar, and add a healthy dose of Berlin. I also stand by my earlier opinion that a total of $40 for six songs across two records is a fucking INSANE price to pay, so I'll stick with digital only on these. I hate being a little crybaby about this, but it really grinds my gears.

Sticking with UK releases that I'm too cheap to buy physical copies of: I've been meaning to check out London's Static Shock Records for a minute. The team at Sorry State Records always recommend their new releases, and Iron Lung is a good US source to pick up their records. So I downloaded the new EP from Powerplant, and I did deem it most good. The marketing text is pretty spot on: this has a strong early 80s synthpunk/new wave vibe, with some damned delightful crooning on "A Spine". I mean, if you're going to wear an influence on your sleeve, Devo is a pretty good one to do so with. I'd be remiss if I didn't note that there's a cassette edition available out of Dreamland Syndicate in Warsaw; it's pricy to ship into the States, but you can always combine your order with the Powerplant LP from last year to amortize the shipping.


One of the joys of Bandcamp is discovering something you'd never otherwise discover, simply by typing in a few keywords. I've been trying to pay greater attention to what's going on in Australian punk since getting the Chats 10" a couple years back, so I picked up the demo from Perth's Gaffer. Coming from the same label as the recent Cold Meat records, I guessed (correctly) that I'd enjoy this. The music here reminds me of my favorite Damned songs, as well as Baltimore post-punk bands like the Fuses and the Miss, while the vocals are straight-up barks. This would fit right in on the early Frontier Records catalog...if they were from L.A. instead of western Australia.

I like a good gimmick. If your gimmick is to play snotty-nosed pogo punk, I'm probably going to enjoy your schtick. If you throw in "vocalist dressed as a nurse", you'll not only have my curiosity, you'll have my full attention. And so it was that I learned about Sniffany and the Nits. This Brighton group released a pair of recordings in the past six months, chock full of feminist fury headlining UK-82 revival tracks. I grabbed the earlier of the two, last December's "I Love You (...But You've Got Nits)" cassette. What can I say about this? Well, if Vice Squad had a decent sense of humor, or Crass's "Penis Envy" was less musically adventurous, maybe they would have sounded like this. I hope that these folks lean into the lo-fi aesthetic, because it all sounds very dangerous and vital coming from a blown out speaker.

Kansas City's Warm Bodies has been on their bullshit for a few years now, making what is charitably described as "weirdo jazz punk" and getting some decent word of mouth. I picked up 2019's "UFO EXTREMO'S", just for shitz and gigz, and I think it might be my favorite purchase from Bandcamp Friday. There's a ton of tape manipulation and freaking out and brain riot going on here; it's a lot for 10 minutes of recordings. I definitely feel like I smoked some Sherm during and after listening to this. I have a feeling that, live in action, these folks are all over the place in the best possible way. I just hit me, on my fifth listen: this gives me a real Wrangler Brutes/Mika Miko vibe. It's just delightfully weird and I want to hear it all the time.

I capped out my purchases for Bandcamp Friday with a little bit of Canadian screamo/skramz. I started following Middle Man Records in Indiana after they released my favorite record of 2018, Closer's "All This Will Be". It'd been on my wish list for a minute, so I picked up the second and final full-length from Toronto's La Luna. This is exactly what I'm looking for when someone tells me I should listen to a modern emotional hardcore band. Vanessa Gloux's vocals here are outstanding; powerful, right to the edge of shrieking at times. The rhythm section does its job, pushing out a throbbing low end, which guitarist Nicholas Field rides to create some really fascinating sounds. This style has always been a favorite for me, going back through La Quiete, Majority Rule, Spitboy, and Current. "Always Already" will be a mile marker for screamo for years to come.

And that's what I got. Now I'm broke. The next Bandcamp Friday is in two weeks, on June 19. Judging by this month's response, and the ongoing social awakening worldwide, I'd guess a lot more artists are going to climb on board and get music posted, tout en suite.