Midiron Blast Shaft - Igneous Assertions

I'm pretty certain that Friday show was the first time I had seen Pg. 99, Pig Destroyer, and Midiron Blast Shaft. I don't think there were more than 75 people at either show. Chew on that for a second.

I dashed off a quick post about my favorite forgotten Reptilian band, Midiron Blast Shaft, almost 12 years ago on the heels of my next door neighbor setting his house on fire with a lit cigarette, rousing my ex-wife and I from a sound sleep and into the yard for 3 hours. Thankfully, my justification for revisiting this, the first Midiron Blast Shaft record, is simply the entire world sick and/or on fire. Great timing.

Chris X always had a soft spot for noisy bands from his hometown of Philadelphia, and this quartet of wig-wearing guitar humpers fit the bill to a T. There's some tasty Shellac worship at play here on their first album, along with the barely-intelligible vocals that were Midiron's trademark. The songs here are pretty straightforward compared to "Starts Fires In Your Pants"; it sounds a lot more Ink & Dagger than it does Cherubs, but it's still pretty damned good. There's enough sexy in these jams to make you want to sniff a couple poppers and get wild in a bathroom stall.

The Midiron Blast Shaft tree takes some interesting turns after their 2002 break-up. Members would spin off into Fight Amputation and Gunna Vahm, and would later turn up in Philadelphia's Faking, who've been making some pretty bad-ass noise rock of their own in recent years. At any rate, if you're feeling this, you absolutely should snag their second and finest record, "Starts Fires In Your Pants", from Reptilian Records - STILL a quality purveyor of devilishly fine rock 'n' roll like Grandpa used to hump to.

Discogs

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Re-Re-up: Sweep the Leg Johnny - 4.9.21.30

(Re-up, June 2020: this is one of the first things I ever wrote for this blog [if not the first]. It's possible I re-bought this on vinyl last year just to have a vinyl copy.)

So I'm dating this girl. She's a riot grrl in 1997, so that should tell you something right off the bat. Or maybe not. But she & I get along swimmingly. We both live about 15 minutes from the Pennsylvania border in Maryland. We have a lot to do, but we spend most of our time making mix tapes for each other, hoping on the hood of my Grand Prix and shouting "Anarchy" and going to DC for shows. After all, the Ottobar was newly open, Memory Lane was a distant memory and the only thing Fletcher's was good for was the occasional H2O show.

She & I drive into DC to see Sleater-Kinney for the first time. We trek down to the old Black Cat, me terrified someone is going to break into the Grand Prix. It's probably the month "Dig Me Out" comes out, so we are fucking down for the show. I think Versus opened. Wow, they sucked. I'm not feeling it at all. Neither of us is legal drinking age, and if memory serves, there was no re-entry that night, so we both hawk the merch stand, furiously puffing cigarettes like only 20-year-olds can. (Now that I think about it, maybe it was 1998. I definitely seem to recall drinking a beer.) (But I digress.)

We end up behind the soundbooth, trying to talk over whatever P.A. music happened to be on. She had seen a flier for Fugazi's annual Fort Reno show, and we quickly made plans to attend. The music changes on the P.A. A marching band beat quietly plays. A guitar drops in for 8 bars, maybe 12. Then...fury.

"What the fuck is this?" I ask her. A shrug. Stop. Start. Weird time signatures. Whispery vocals that barely raise over the driving rhythm. For a kid raised on harDCore and John Coltrane, this was a revolution. "Seriously, have you ever heard something like this before-" and then I'm cut off by this skronky saxophone. And Mr. Whisper is hollerin' over the beat, and I really want to break a window out. That's how tightly by the throat this track has grabbed me.

I lean in to the soundguy. "Sorry to bug you, man," laying on my best impression of a hipster. "What is this you're playing?" "They're called Sweep the Leg Johnny. I think they're from Chicago or something." And that was the first time I heard Shower Scene.

I got to see Sweep live twice: once at the Ottobar, on a bill with Yaphet Kotto, the Exploder & League of Death; and out at the last Michigan Fest, where they were one of three reasons I drove halfway across the country for a show. I've heard them described as math-rock, but they always struck me as a little too aggressive for that tag.

Enjoy the reason I started this blog.

Discogs

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Enemymine / Vaz

If it feels like a bit of a letdown, after a week of really good records, you're not alone. But trust me: this is a good one, too.

I bought this because of Vaz.  I didn't know anything about Hammerhead when they were active, but Reptilian had put out Vaz's first 7", and I was stoked on how heavy it was. So, you know, why not buy? It turns out that "Blocked By Satellites" became one of my go-to mix tape cuts for the next few years. It's out of step with what I'd experience when I finally saw them a few years later. I wasn't prepared for how much of a goddamned racket they'd be, with trash can lids for crash cymbals and every song like a dive-bomber attacking, even though it was only two fellas playing. I like the way the vocals are recorded here; Apollo Liftoff sounds a little more...romantic crooning, compared to the recording two years later on "Demonstrations In Micronesia". 

This was my first experience with Enemymine, Mike Kunka's short-lived, post-godheadSilo/pre-Dead Low Tide trio from WA state. I honestly don't remember playing this side of the record until a couple years later, but I like it now. It just builds and builds and crashes down on your head in that noisy PNW way that's not quite metal, not quite post-hardcore, not quite math rock.

A shout out while everyone's paying attention to Olympia's Thin the Herd Records, purveyors of this fine slab o' wax. For a label that only existed for three years and a baker's dozen worth of releases, they put out some real solid jams. They released the initial vinyl for the first Vaz full-length, the first Tracy & The Plastics LP, a Teen Cthulhu 7" that I really like, and a weird-ass one-sided Sunn 0))) 12". Sure, this is all some turn-of-the-century PNW weirdness, but everything they put out is well worth tracking down and jamming out to.

Discogs

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