various artists - CMJ Presents Certain Damage! - Volume 3

Here's a look back to when people still thought the Red Hot Chili Peppers were edgy, when college rock meant you could loop Fields of the Nephilim, Robbie Robertson, and Kool Moe Dee together, and funk metal was the next big thing. Truth be told: I kept this because I found the cover art so goddamned charming. The Cabaret Voltaire song is pretty solid, Lion was on the "The Transformers: The Movie" soundtrack, and I'm not sure I'll ever get Bryan Ferry solo. 1987 was weird for music, man.

Discogs

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various artists - The Copulatin' Blues Compact Disc (22 Blues And Jazz Classics)

You know, they don't just make compilations about fuckin' any more. I blame Trump.

These sort of compilations of early 20th century American music are a real gateway to me. Collecting and preserving early jazz & blues is probably boomers' greatest contribution to pop culture, even if, in the course of putting these sort of records together, they probably avoided paying the appropriate royalties to the artists. Hey, what can you do? Cultural appropriation and exploitation wasn't a thing back in 1976!

But enough of the shit talk. Bring on the Alberta Hunter! Give me more Sidney Bechet! I celebrate Lucille Bogan and Tampa Red! The theme is unimportant (albeit amusing); the art's the thing, and I'm way into this thing.

Discogs

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7 Seconds - Live! One Plus One

As the handsome fellas over at Trust Records have reissued their BYO releases from the early- and mid-80s, I've been forced to revisit my opinions on 7 Seconds. Like any HC kid worth a damn, I've owned copies of "The Crew" and "Walk Together, Rock Together" since day one, basically. But Reno's finest didn't get a lot of spins over the past decade and a half. They were a bit too "starter punk", right? Super sincere, minimal style; why listen to 7 Seconds when you can either fall back to the original document (DCHC) or jump forward a couple years to the arguably-better Rev bands hailing from the Tri-State?

But Trust Records, about whom I really can't say enough nice things, did such a great job on their reissues that not only did I start spinning the first two full-lengths from 7 Seconds, but I also dove into their underrated 1986 LP "New Wind" for the first time in nearly 30 years. I'd always blown this one off as the record where they started slowing down their sound and started embracing college rock. Dear Reader: I have learned how truly wrong I was. "New Wind", along with the 2023 remaster/reimagination titled "Change In My Head", is no less than the West Coast correspondent of DC's Revolution Summer. This is emotive hardcore, which is NOT cool. Of course Flipside and MRR were going to shit on these dudes.

"Live! One Plus One" captures the classic trio of Kevin, Steve, and Troy augmented by Bobby on guitar, playing a pair of Sacramento shows in 1987. There are songs from all three 7 Seconds full-lengths released up to this point, and if you, like me, were suspect on how "New Wind" tracks fit thematically and sonically with those from "WTRT" and "Crew", this is a good place to dive into. While the document itself isn't an amazing production, it is a great look at a band that was getting ready to take the next step. They'd been playing some of these songs for six and seven years; the band is so tight here. I'd love to see this one polished up a bit, especially since it only got a single go-around with Positive Force and Giant Records.

Should I give the Dissonance two-fer of "Ourselves" & "Soulforce Revolution" a shot, since I'm open to revisiting their catalog? Is it time to buy a copy of the unfortunately-named "Out The Shizzy"? I'm not sure I'm there yet, but who the hell knows? It's turning out that 2026 is the year that I discovered everything I knew was wrong.

Discogs

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Little Richard - Rock And Roll Ressurection

We do a piss poor job of respecting our legends in this country, sadly. It's worse when they're black, and worse still when they're queer. And so it was that, 20 years after he helped blow the doors open for rock & roll, Little Richard cut a re-recording of his greatest hits for K-Tel. Fucking K-Tel. Now, work is work, and the fire is there in these performances, but Ms. Penniman's little boy shouldn't have had to slum it on the oldies circuit. But Little Richard, a legend amongst legends, in a particularly fallow period, deserved better than recutting his finest songs for a "As Seen On TV" label.

This is the 1987 UK reissue on oldies' specialist label Charly, who are still going strong 51 years after their first releases. It has that really rad picture of Richard on the cover; plain artwork, yet still better than the other releases on K-Tel and Madacy over the years. I'm fairly certain I picked them up for a buck a few years ago, but only just got around to ripping it to share.

Discogs

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various artists - The Future Looks Brighter

Turned this up a few months ago, and even though I own a couple of these on vinyl already, and had everything but the Symbol Six cuts on my hard drive, I couldn't pass this up on CD for a couple bux. Collecting is an illness; a, at times, delightful one, but it leads to moments like these when you end up with several copies of the same recordings.

But what recordings! This Posh Boy sampler, inspired by and partially derived from 1981's split release with SST, "The Future Looks Bright Ahead", compiles:

• Social Distortion's songs from the original 1981 sampler, plus the three additional songs on the otherwise-unreleased "Posh Boy's Little Monsters" 12" and their contribution to "Posh Hits Vol. 1"
• Shattered Faith's "I Love America b/w Reagan Country", their cuts from "Bright Ahead", and their offering from "Rodney on the ROQ Volume 2"
• The entirety of Redd Kross's 1981 "Red Cross" 12"
• Channel 3's "CH3" 12"

This is an embarrassment of riches. And if you're at all familiar with early 80s LA punk & HC, you know all these by heart. But if you don't, I'll just say this is worth downloading for Redd Kross alone.

But that's me; a Virgo with a sick record collection.

Discogs

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various artists - Lonely Is An Eyesore

I was sincerely stoked to turn up a $2 copy of this in one of my usual haunts a few months ago because, hey, it's winter time. It's time to listen to This Mortal Coil whilst wearing a cable knit sweater in the dark. Winter! Grey skies! Light winds! Howling wolves!

I have a much greater appreciation of these sorts of recordings now than I ever have before in my life; a strange development, considering it's the first time in my adult life where I've felt like my depression has been under control. This is a soundtrack to being in your early 20s, thinking the deep thoughts all alone and feeling just more than a little miserable. So explain to me why I'm digging this so much now than I'm twice as old and pretty much content to turn my brain off for hours at a time.

I skip over Throwing Muses every time it comes on. Still don't get into any of their music; I'm totally into Kristen Hersh's and Tanya Donnelly's solo recordings and other bands, tho.

Discogs

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various artists - Metal Minded

I've been trying to sort out that busted hard drive, so, in the interim, I just muddle along, posting things that I find for a buck or two that I think are pretty neat.

Speaking of neat (or Neat): I turned this up at one of my go-to thrift stores for a buck. It had the look and name of real trash, a sampler of cruddy hair metal from the late 80s, slopped together from the back catalogs of major labels trolling the Sunset Strip. But I've turned up a lot of black metal from the same shelves in the past few weeks, and looking doesn't cost a thing, so I picked it up and saw some names I recognized as originating from the annals of NWOBHM: Raven, Warrior, Steel, White Spirit. In the pile it went.

What this ended up being is Neat Records' 1982 cassette comp "60 Minute Plus Heavy Metal Compilation", minus a few tracks, along with four tracks from 1985's "Axe Attack" appended at the end. It's 15 tracks' worth of early 80s British heavy metal, Frankenstein'ed together into a single disc and available for sale in what I assume was your finer convenience stores and truck stops. Prism Entertainment, the label of note here, is better known in my house as a purveyor of Z-grade VHS; I guess they put out some music, too, albeit nothing as righteous as this collection of jean vest wearing head bangers from the early 80s.

Discogs

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various artists - Thrash Til Death

This is not my rip, but seeing as how I own a physical copy, I don't feel bad about sharing.

I have had a rip of this since the early Limewire days, and it was with some joy that I found my copy of "Thrash Til Death" at Disk Union during my first trip to Tokyo in 2010. I didn't expect to find a long-sought-after Pusmort release on the other side of the world from home, much less at a pretty reasonable price ($20, if memory serves).

It's up there with the Gauze and Assfort 7"s that Prank put out in the late 90s, as well as 625's circa-2000 thrash revival releases, that opened me up to the sicko world of Japanese hardcore, in all of its various iterations. Not a bad song in the whole lot.

Discogs

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Rain - La Vache Qui Rit + demo

When sadness comes, you can watch videos of dogs being obnoxious on YouTube, or you can listen to tight jams. Whatever floats your boat. I guess since you're here that you don't want to see a French bulldog sneak french fries off its owner's plate.

Rain was a short-lived DC band of the Revolution Summer vintage whose recorded output consisted of a 1990 12" on Guy Picciotto's impeccably curated Peterbilt Records and an appearance on 1989's "State Of The Union" comp on Dischord. The lineup is a Murderer's Row of DCHC/post-hardcore luminaries: Scott McCloud (Soulside, Girls Vs. Boys), Eli Janney (Girls Vs. Boys), Bert Queiroz (Double-O, Youth Brigade, Manifesto), and Jon Kirschten (The ChrisBald 96). And you get exactly what you'd expect: that heady mix of emotive hardcore that stood apart from much of the East Coast's dominant trend of youth crew and crossover from the same era.

Now, typically, I wouldn't share a record that you can readily acquire via an inexpensive Bandcamp download (which you should totally do). But I thought it'd be good to contextualize the real gold, which is a 4-song demo dating from 1986 of Rain, featuring a track ("In Rain") that didn't make it onto the EP. I think I might have gotten this from Stormy over at Blogged & Quartered before his hosting service went tits up; I do know I've had it for a long time.

Anyway, I figured it was a good time to share this one, it being that time of year, and all.

Thank you. I'll be here all week. Try the vegan pot roast; it's better than it sounds.

Discogs / Bandcamp

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Primal Scream (NYC) - Volume One

This little slice of late 80s thrash is one of my favorite crate digging finds. My in-laws live on California's Central Coast, and when there isn't a pandemic on, and we aren't both unemployed and staving off eviction, Mrs. Ape and I try to go down at least once a year to hang out. Because my in-laws are rad, you see. And I really like the area south of San Francisco; it's the promise of California, writ large.

So we're putzing about one afternoon, checking out Salinas when we see this dinky little thrift store in a strip mall. I already have good feelings when I walk in, see a G1 Soundwave for $5 (a perfect gift for my brother), and Mrs. Ape grips a pair of late-60s, high-waisted gabardine slacks. I dig around in the vinyl, shoved onto a rack of industrial shelving, and pull a copy of "The Coming War With Russia". Not a ground-breaker, but who am I to resist the bat-shittedness of the good Rev. Jack Van Impe? I see a stack of around 25 CDs. Most of it is garbage, but I see Primal Scream on the spine of one and figure, "Well, maybe this is a Creation collection I don't have yet." I take my finds up to the counter. The fella behind and I start talking about the Germs and thrifting around Atlanta. He rings me up for everything. "How about $10 for it all?" "Sure."

I walk out to the car for a smoke, and start logging my music. And that's when I see that my fav Glaswegians (sadly) never put a two-faced baboon on the cover of one of their records.

This Primal Scream was a "throk" quartet from NYC that ran for about 3 years and only released this record along with a demo tape. The best known name here is guitarist/vocalist Keith Alexander, who had started Carnivore with Peter Steele and played with the band until 1986. This reminds me the rockier side of crossover: "Cause for Alarm", "Best Wishes"...you know, those first few years when the metalheads learned how to circle pit. This isn't perfect, but it's more fun than any number of Pantera records. And isn't that what we're all looking for out of life?

This would be the part of the post where I offered to let my cherry-looking copy go for a good deal to a friend of the blog. BUT! The good folks at Pittsburgh's Divebomb Records, who do a fantastic job with their reissues, are re-releasing "Volume One" for the first time in over 30 years in October!!! WHOA!!! That's incredible news for 80s thrash fans, or folks who don't want to spend three figures on a CD. Not only will this rarity be available again, but Divebomb has tacked on the 1986 demo, "The Outrage Continues", as a special bonus. You can preorder the deluxe edition here. At $12, that's a fuggin' killah deal!

Discogs

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Doughboys - Whatever

Doughboys

Montreal's Doughboys were simpatico with ALL and Mega City Four; hell, Wiz from MC4 even joined Doughboys for their last two records of punk pop. Led by ex-Asexual John Kastner, they made a go of it, making six LPs between 1987 and 1996. They are the kind of band I wish I had been familiar with during their heyday; their last three albums came out on A&M, not some indie with cruddy distribution, and their sound should have broken through as part of the alternative boom of the early 90s.

"Whatever" was their first album, originally released in Canada by MTL Records and Pipeline Records, and reissued in the States by Cargo Records. It's arguably their "punkest" record. The ten songs here blur by in just 28 minutes and, like their contemporaries from California and Hampshire, blazed a path for the sort of tuneful punk that'd be championed by No Idea and Boss Tuneage a decade later.

Discogs

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