Pure Junk - Pure Junk

Pure Junk was Nolen Strals (Post Typography) on vocals, Ben Claasen ("Dirt Farm") on bass, Alex Fine (Alex Fine Illustration) on guitar, and Chris LaMartina (Midnight Crew Studios) on drums and backups. This is what happens when four amazing, hilarious artists get together to start a punk rock band. If memory serves (and it really doesn't at 3 in the morning), these guys got together sometime shortly after Double Dagger broke up. It was my favorite of the post-DD bands; while I loved Roomrunner and sought out Peals shows, I can't recall missing a single Pure Junk show. Their fliers were handfolded mini-comics. Their songs were proletariat rock, barks and clangs about what it's like to make art outside of the edges of celebrity. Of course I adored them...so much so that they were my personal pick to play with my band at our last show. If you like shoddy, fuzzed out video that I probably shot on a Blackberry, then you'll LOVE this video of Pure Junk playing "Teething".

Now, the fucked part about this record is that some fella in DC paid for the recording and put this out, only it came out a year after they broke up and a year after I left Baltimore. Before I left, I begged Nolen to let me bootleg it onto a cassette, just so they could sell something at shows. So I'm not even certain how I laid paws on it. Maybe it was when I went back to town to pick up stuff from the old house and burnt my hands with boiling water? Maybe Nolen sent me one? Anywho...this record was mad under-heard, and I'm pretty sure never hit Bandcamp, so I don't feel band about sharing it here at all. The download came with an extra song that wasn't on the 7". Like Minutemen? Then you'll probably dig this.

Discogs

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