Add a MFT of Kerum pictures on an ancient external hard drive to the list of things we lost in the war. Hence the above flier for what I remember being a pretty crucial show at the Bloodshed. Here's what I remember:
Kerum started out with Chuck and Clint from Baltimore A.R.A. and Brian Redbeard. Redbeard and my little brother were high school buds who were super into computers and once ate a bunch of acid in my backyard. He grew up down the road from our townhouse, threw awesome garage shows, and was a generally good dude. I knew fuck all about grindcore past Napalm Death at the time, so their arrival to my awareness became a bit of an education in death to false grind.
Brian left the band and moved down to D.C., and Kerum added my buddy Bachman on bass and Eric T. Neal on vocals. Bachman was a real-deal farm kid who was equally into punk and hip-hop; likewise, Eric T. was the assistant manager at the record store in town and was the first person I knew to get into John Zorn. Josh came in on second guitar; I'm sorry, but I literally have no recollection of him.
They kept playing out, literally all over the place. They were the first band from HarCo that I remember making a national tour. They were the local short/fast/loud opener du jour for half a decade; they could slot anywhere, and Eric T. had an incredible visual aesthetic that he applied to fliers for Kerum shows. They would eventually add Jimmy from In$pite on co-vocals, morph into Shitdogs of War, morph again into Deceiver when Eric T. left for Texas after a false diagnosis of brain cancer, and then fragment as everyone got a little older.
So, about this disc. This is everything except their split tape with California's Abysmal Terror: the "Twilight of the Apocalypse" LP, their split with Unholy Grave, some unreleased tracks and their 2002 demo. I know there are some recordings from radio show appearances floating around as well. While this lacks the visual flair of some of their physical releases, it does capture that moment around and after 9/11 when we played with reckless abandon, made records with no heed to anything but art, and occasionally committed some light larceny,
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