various artists - This Is Bad Taste Vol. 3

When I bought this a few months ago, I swore I was picking up a Burning Heart-related sampler of early 90s Ümea hardcore. This, instead, is what some of those X'ed up yoots moved on to when they graduated university. Lest you get it twisted, I'm not unhappy with this. There's a fair amount of snotty-nosed punk rock (Satanic Surfers, Chixdiggit, Trigger Happy), more serious political rock (Weakerthans), and, yes, a smattering of mid-90's hardcore (Within Reach, Misconduct).

But what really matters is there's a Hard Ons track. Who doesn't love a little Ray Ahn? Amirite, or amirite?

Postscript: Bad Taste eventually grew up, quit putting out records, and became a management company, splitting time between Santa Monica and Stockholm. It's a classic story, really.

Discogs

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Christer Pettersson - Empatihaveri

Swedish thrash, bordering on power violence, named after a Swedish assassin, from the days when fascism was still taboo, a fringe idea that everyone would at least pay lip service to condemning.

This is not a blog about politics, but it is a political blog. I find it impossible to align with the art I love and want to share without taking on a fair amount of its ideals. And thus it is that I grew up a punk. And punk says everything is political.

It's less than a month until the American presidential election. The wall between truth and perception has never been higher. I've never been happier to be away from the East Coast. Earlier today, the FBI unraveled and stopped a plot to kidnap and assassinate the governor of Michigan. Last night, I watched the vice president talk loud and say nothing, while his counterpart in the debate bragged about her law & order bona fides. A senator today bragged about ending democracy on Twitter. The people in power seem determined to finalize their erosion of the American dream. This was the plan all along, to use the levers of government to undo that government.

There's so much going on, and I get why people can feel like we have little to no hope left. I can count the days where I've experienced the fulfillment of the American dream on both hands, and still have fingers left over. I wouldn't call myself disillusioned, because I shucked those illusions a long time ago. I can understand the fear that so many are experiencing; somehow, they got left behind in the chase for wealth accumulation. Their generation was subtracted in the math of late capitalism. And they're told that it's a brown person's fault, a yellow disease, that a rainbow stole their birthright.

I don't think we're completely lost as a nation. If nothing else, keeping your hope alive is the ultimate rebellion against control. It's the middle finger to those who benefit from the division currently being sown. The title of this 7" is "Empatihaveri". Translated from the original Swedish, it means "empathy". Hope and empathy are our weapons to fight hate and fear with. This record makes a pretty good soundtrack for that fight.

Bandcamp

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Henry Fiat's Open Sore - Adulterer Oriented Rock

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.

Discogs

Click here to download.