How about some of that old-tyme Swedish garage punk?
Henry Fiat's Open Sore are the yang to the Hives' yin. Both bands wear suits onstage, play garage rock, and generally act like cocks of the walk. But while the Hives can headline festivals, HFOS is better suited playing in the back of a dive bar. It's all gimp masks, three chords, and attitude, paving the way for bands like Carbonas, Black Lips, Sick Thoughts. Naturally, I loved finding this out in the wild for a mere $3. It's the kind of shithead punk that I just can't get enough of, slotting nicely with my Dwarves, Sniffany and the Nits, and Queers records.
This collection of the first four years of HFOS singles came out in 2002 simultaneously with the American reissue of their first LP on Berkeley's Coldfront Records. Coldfront was run by one of the guys who wrote/edited for Hit List magazine, and reflected that zine's focus on streetpunk, garage, and Oi! They were both short-lived and amazingly prolific, putting out close to 70 releases in just over 5 years. There are some great overlooked releases in that catalog: I'll write about their Wynona Riders comp in the future, and I love their various samplers, which capture a really fun slice of American punk rock. As for Henry Fiat's Open Sore, they went on hiatus around 2004, reappearing with an LP in 2008, then fully reuniting in 2019 with a pair of new records on Stockholm's Push My Buttons.
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