NUCLEAR SPRING DISCOGRAPHY

The complete discography of overlooked US snots Nuclear Spring, released on cassette by Doomtown. Members of this band played in and went on to join CREEM, Ajax, La Misma, NOMOS and others, their pedigree sound capturing a perfect nexus of influence between very early Punk Rock and US Hardcore that makes for irresistibly simple songcraft and burly, hard edged fury. Single note Guitar lines scramble for consonance, crusher chords minimalist and brimming with slashing power, Bass and Drums interlock and rock in march stepping, melodious haste, each mostly mid-paced song covered in dude croons, wails and yowls from one male/one female voice, both possessed of sophomoric rage and youthful enthusiasm. Virulently catchy, loud and vituperative, burning with life and incensed at unequal social outcome, and informed by scenes like UK82 and even a little streak of Oi, Nuclear Spring is positively ion charged with Punk Rock power. Rips beginning to end.

Doomtown Records

FAUCHEUSE SELF TITLED

Faucheuse delivers a falcon uppercut to the jaw with their self titled demo, a bruising serenade of masterful Hardcore Punk. Bloody streaks of violent Rock & Roll guitars peal out outrageously uplifting, blazing consonant melody, slashing atop a steel horse of absolutely battering tumbling drums and torqued Bass rhythm section in extra-tight lockstep, and energised to everlovin’ fuck with furious vocal of desperation and power, with banging, bright, scruffy production. Faucheuse manages to explore lots of ideas here, playing with some more spare dynamics amid the torrent of fury, squeezing these tracks full of memorable hooks, mid-to-fast tempos and intriguing, uplifting melody, detouring into R&R mayhem drenched in dulcet lead work before plummeting back into ‘adult oriented d-beat’ aplomb. Makes me want to throw cops off a building. This is yet another band I’ve checked out from hearing them on Demolisten, recommended to hosts Grey and Nate by Tyler Hammer of the Kings Of Punk Podcast. Both pods are completely indispensable, bastions of correct opinion and perspective amidst a sea of Punk/Metal cultural ‘commentary’ youtube neophyte bullshit. I recommend subscribing to both immediately.

Bandcamp

FENTANYL TAPWATER / DISPOSAL UNIT SPLIT

Recent split on Ohio’s Bizzaro Warrior, filthy shirtless Sludgecore and idiot toothless Noise Rock. Fetty Tap’s tracks feature some burgeoning, burning hot Sludgecore contamination, headache aura ambience, blown out bass harsh noise squall, loping hardcore beats set pace fearsomely beneath impossibly mountainous bass chord beatings, tempos plummet and we are repeatedly lumped about the face and neck with swinging, downcast bass sludge hate, with deathly low vocal brutality, a killer addition to already difficult to swallow sound. Although operating in quite separate areas of Hardcore, this Fetty Tap material reminds me of Matt’s previous band Water Torture, less the blasts. And fuck me, the Poison Idea cover is just perfect, too. Disposal Unit then switches things up from previous Industrial-leaning releases with a scraping, emollient exhaustion of Noise Rockin’ malaise, very weird and leftfield, repeating low-chi obstinate gurning riffs met by lolling percussion clatter and an am-rep disturbed reverend vocal. Dulled edge guitars, slurred vocal spite addled with ritalin, despicable black mood music like a motherfucker. I could have done with one more track on the DU side, but this is a great split of complimentary, horrible sound. Dig in.

Bizzaro Warrior

VARIOUS ARTISTS – ‘CADAVER MONUMENTS’

Banger 4 way split (sorry Andy, compilation) out on wax by Totem Cat Records in France, with each band loaded with un-reformable lifers. Malcontent sour Noise Rock, misanthropic Sludge and forlorn Doom sharing label/tape/board space, killing beers and stinking up the joint something heavy, Man’s Ruin/Shifty/Rage of Achilles style. -(16)- ploughs into their lumbering skate shunt Hardcore crush and downer Alt Sludge Rock scowl, leaning into waxed punk deadweight fury and austere, downer groove of scapegoathood, spots of clean vocal detailing personal tribulations. They never miss. Deadbird glowers and grieves in plodding, prideful Heavy Metal Doom reminiscent of Maryland titans The Obsessed with a dash of that Peaceville 3 sou(r)nd, here occupying the most wax (i think) and sticking out from their split peers with a mournful, heartbroken dirge into grandiose galloping original with falling Icarus lead work, and a pitch perfect Celtic Frost cover. Then Nightstick shift things down a gear or 4 into gibbering psychedelic sledge rock, nightmare fuel greyscale repeater psych that clowns would fear and Larry Lifeless(or Mark E Smith for that matter) would be ever so proud of. Slumped, inert and disturbed Noise Rock, barely cogent and sloughing out of time in their downtuned solo soaked abandon, freewheeling into occasionally tight-as-fuck blues drenched lucidity. Bad vibes. Fistula bring things to an anvil close with corpulent, stomping anti social Sludgecore that will rip your fucking arms off. Lumpy spiky chords, rumbling syrup Bass and leaden drumming, adorned with seriously spiteful, mental harsh vocal, drawing down the moon of Morrow and conjuring the fucking demon. Indispensable, particularly with that seriously silly/seriously fucking cool album cover.

Totem Cat Records

SUPPRESSION WITH BASTARD NOISE – ‘INFERNAL LEGIONS’

Collaborative LP from Suppression and Bastard Noise, a transmutation of Powerviolence mayhem in just under 20 minutes delivered by the hands and minds of the genre’s inceptors and early peripheral experimenters, some of the underground’s most blessed operators. Swelling, roiling bursts of psionic harsh electronics, steaming hissing freak Bass riff bodyblows augured with molten wailing electronics hell, matched beat for pace with rumbling mutant fusion jazz hardcore drumming, Hodges’ and Parrish’s unmistakable firebreathing raged-out mad man vocal, Wood’s synthbanks overloading and exploding with hostility and wyrd energy, harnessing powers that could depopulate the planet of Mancruel’s shitstained ‘civilisations’. Canon slow bass grooves churn in a mid paced lumber of pachyderm torment, slamming from deathsiren electronic disarray to furious fast, detailed, grinding Hardcore insanity with aplomb. Suppression’s masterly assimilation of early progged-out MITB and BN 4 steel girder era power Fusion elements, which comes off like their own overlooked mid-era ‘Release The Piranha’ material honed and dialed to unbearable intensity, and Wood’s sublimation into this fearsome sound imperceivably perfects a cacophonous, anti-human Powerviolence ordeal. Entirely crucial shit. Get one from Anthems of the Undesirable or Grindfather.

Undesirable-027

DOLDREY – ‘CELESTIAL DECONSTRUCTION’

Colossal dungeon serpent Death Crust from Singapore’s Doldrey. Deathly and despotic, crusading Crust from the deep, deformed in it’s darkened succor into a beast of mutant Death Metal, Stenchcore and Crust, with frosty elements of Black Metal and straight up Integrity style Holy Terror Hardcore too. Massive Guitars rippling with siege spikes form a wall of thrashing vast stench Crust, full of lithe Heavy Metal riffing and deaththrash chug, battering battlement Bass and cruiser pummeling drum work which stomps and heaves with savagery, heavily utilising tupa tupa D Beats and UK 82 style stomp along with descents into axe swinging breakdowns as it  smashes into the fray with a swift and thunderous rhythmic bent, all adorned with gritty puking Crust vocal. Gloomy, murderous Crust from the dark recesses, full of repeat-listen headbangin’ bangers. Get into it.

Iron Lung Records

Pulverised Records

Pissed Off! Recs

SEA OF SHIT SELF TITLED

Chicago’s Sea of Shit triumphantly returns from hiatus with a fearsome self titled full length, a pugilistic expression of brutal Hardcore power. Caustic hammer of grinding Bass, turgid stiff armed anvil blasts, scorched guitars form igneous slabs of lumpen, cudgel Hardcore downers aflame in white hot rage, sludgy feedback drenched and almighty pissed, topped off with a commanding bellowing vocal performance of terrifying volume and hissing spite. There’s extensions and complexities within the songs that represent new ground for Sea of Shit and they nail them fearlessly to their mast, some searing bluesy lead lines, post hardcore leanings in the chording and arrangements, and mindless drooling droner beatdowns only adding to their particularly terse, discourteous Power Violence influenced Hardcore sound, inflecting each dynamic swing of tempo or rhythm with uniquely devastating results. A total smile ruiner.

Nerve Altar

Bandcamp

RAT CAGE – ‘SAVAGE VISIONS’

Rat Cage follow up their incendiary 2020 full length ‘Screams From The Cage’ with rancor and vim, ascending their Hardcore Punk to a plateau of powerfully potent, anthemic riff soaked perfection. An utterly head kicking, tory lumping, chainsawing cut of catchy as fukk Kang mayhem, UK 82 knuckle-up bounce and brusque, teeth rattling Mangel, D-Beat & Anarcho Punk, and Punk Rock &Roll each represented within the face smashing mace strike of desperate, furious Hardcore, a barnstorming hosanna to the dispossessed and downtrodden inmates of brexit Britain, terrified drunken rats with callous smirks in the fukking pit of despair. Darkly anthemic throttling chords and soaring, brazen, blazing 4 note blues crusted leads slammed out with murderous intent, wallowing in thuggish harrying melody, a torrent of saturated drums leaping from fast to fucking fast to doomed plod to stomping mid-paced tumble enmangled with total bulldozer mid bloody Bass, and full throated super pissed violent vocal outcry, a voice of wounded despondence and outrage amidst the fire sale capitalist meltdown of england’s post tory social abattoir. ‘Savage Visions’ careens from fist banging Punk Rock chorus consonance to blank eyed Hardcore chord wall with the verve and swagger of champions, an indispensable masterwork of modern Hardcore Punk. This is England ’23.

La Vida Es En Mus

NAGASAKI SUNRISE – ‘DISTALGIA’

Portugal’s Nagasaki Sunrise loose a firestorm of furiously canorous, uproarious Burning Spirits Hardcore with their first full length ‘Distalgia’. Fusing thuggish, drunken NWOBHM onto mid-to-fast paced brute D Beat mania, summoning a sound of intense melodic war-obsessed Metalpunk triumph and wasted euphoric Hardcore power, auguring their supercharged kamikaze sound with tight musicianship and dialed audacious energy. Defined by high-payload artillery drumming, which matches dis-rocking D Beats and Heavy/Speed Metal roll and roil with ease, and thunderous warhorse bass interlocked and buckling under the barreling victorious riffermania and outrageously uplifting flamethrowing lead work, wrought with mastercrafted Metal might and drenched in soaring, often joyfully simplistic melody, and announced with wailer echo bandana Crust vocal. DiAnno Maiden’s sleaze and prowl, Bastard’s towering Burning Spirits melody and irresistible force, Motorcharging enVenomed D Beat battery. A glorious feast of explosive Metalpunk brilliance. Fukk yeah.

Bandcamp

NOOTHGRUSH – ‘ENTROPY’

Noothgrush’s ‘Entropy’ 7″ EP, released in 2014 on the estimably consistent Fuck Yoga, the last of a run of new material and re-releases following their 2011 reactivation. Two intensely miserable tracks from one of the most under-rated bands in the Sludge scene, the masters of despairing minimalism and brief Doom leaden atmospheres. Hulking mid paced drums plod and tumble a sodden death march, mournful sludge riffs curl from the speakers drenched in spiteful intoned melodies atop a coil of torqued Bass, grooves decaying under Dino’s life-impaired vocal scraping the varnish from a false hologram of reality… the morose melodies are wounded and calloused, furious with damaged psyche and broken outlook, the production is concrete and caustic. The re-recorded ‘Life Shatters Into Pieces of Anguish’ features clean vocal, Dino wailing a sorrowful bellow to devastating affect across the dismal Sludge feast, the sound of inert rage and exhausted agony. Great 7″, get one here.

Fuck Yoga

FENTANYL TAPWATER DISCOGRAPHY

Dismal bulldozing Bass & Drum Sludgecore from the fertile ground of Rochester NY, featuring Matt from of Water Torture, Deceiver, blessed relief for mother and more, and Tim from Hallucination Realized, Holy Money and other projects. Exploded amp bass chord Sludge with miserable, morose melody and droning dissonance, brute heavy hardcore drums drift from death march dirge to loping mid paced stomp, D Beats and Fastcore forays without straight-up blasts, hurtling ahead with fearsome idiot power and crushed crashing cymbals, harsh blown up spite vocal, knuckle dragging groove, obtuse, shambling and ignorant Sludge for punks. Being a collection of split recordings, the audio is variable, at best the loud and punishing production ramps up the noxious Bass fuzz thud and presents the drums as a clattering, weighty affront. At their most rumbling, trudging and concussed they resemble Ride For Revenge via Flipper and Grief, a toxic and hellacious Sludge/Hardcore construct of sound to pollute and poison. Fucken gnarly.

Bizzaro Warrior

SIDETRACKED – ‘AMMUNITION’

Blistering, brief and brutal EP from overachiever extraordinaire Sidetracked, surely one of the most consistent and interesting Hardcore bands of the last 20 years. Usually operating as a two piece, covering ground ranging from Youth Crew to Power Violence, they follow a consistency of visual and audial aesthetic that means their massive discography carries a rarified consistency. ‘Ammunition’ provides 20 super short bursts of Nihilist Commando style Noisecore polemic and audial alienation from peers and colleagues, cryptic personal lyrics contained within a fugue state maelstrom of minimalist dissociative Noisecore with a Hardcore Punk flavour, instrumentation cuts in and out song by song, caustic booming strings appearing three songs in and bursting the fucking dam with shockwave amplified axe wielding, brutal Hardcore vocal perfection, superfast concise blasting with killer harsh drum sound. Short, sharp, shocking body music. It’ll leave you gasping and choking for more.

Bandcamp

BLACKWATER SNIPER – ‘EXTRAVIOLENCE’

BLACKWATER SNIPER is a Chicago based, ghillie suited, 2 piece Hardcore band with an interesting and obliterating songwriting conceit, imbuing Extratone gigasnareblasts into the body of a brutal Hardcore/Power Violence sound to extremity melting result. Songs thrash in stop start blasting deathrolls, building more usual percussive instrumentation patterns to extant, carbonising extrablast parts and switch swerving into slow fatass breakdowns, brusque shrieking/borting vocal, crisp and bouncy drum programming sound with monstrous string sounds ringing with feedback noise – alarmingly memorable songs, too, with touches of extreme Emoviolence and little reliance on the Extratone element to obfuscate lack of imagination in the songwriting, which often comes off like Sea of Shit or Water Torture. Gnarly obscure, gritted with violent purpose and about as extra as one can get.

Bandcamp

 

ZOLOA / FOZA COMÚN SPLIT – ‘ESCUADRÓN DE LA MUERTE’

Split release between two of Eduardo Rodriguez’ (he of the indelible Volahn et all) Hardcore Punk bands. Zoloa is a long-standing Crust project, having existed in some form concurrently with Rodriguez’ better known Black Twilight Circle activities. Here they deliver 3 tracks of blasting anti-kommunist Crustcore with an aesthetic similarity to War Metal in certain respects. Filthy delay war Vocal command, wailing acid-fried terrorist leads swarming across terminal chords, terrifying storming Bass and smashing, strongarm drumming relying heavily on stiff, stacked War blasts rather than D-Beats, and meltdown synth shockwave interludes. Reminds me equally of Acrostix and Blasphemy’s ‘Gods of War’. On the flipside is Foza Común, ANOTHER of Eduardo’s affiliated projects, dealing in a marauder Blackened Punk/Hardcore sound with a RAC edge. 3 more tracks – stomping Rock ‘n’ Rolling lashings of Guitar dripping with UK ’82 licks, King Kong Bass violence carrying thuggish melody and a fiendish streak of Oi! within the rhythmic stamp and the barked yobbo Vocal assault. Barbaric and arrogant, a black flick knife of aggression and hostility. Killer split.

Bandcamp

GUERRA FINAL SELF TITLED

Debut 7″ from scene veterans Guerra Final. 7 cuts of outraged crusading Crust Punk with a fat Anarcho Punk streak in the songwriting and vibe  – slashing, angry Guitar forms rudiments of chord rage reminiscent of classic Punk Metal glory like English Dogs, with fierce, slick, short/sweet solos ablaze, lithe Bass prominent within the mix and extending the furious melodies beneath the Guitar work, swinging drums with plenty of heart and sweat and gruff vocal outcry – gnarly, hellacious, hard-charging d-beat bangers delivered in a furious froth, swollen with urgency and heroic despondency. Falls more on the Hardcore Punk end of the Crust spectrum, songwriting supercharged with fervent, simplistic gut punch intensity the order of the day. Fucking pissed!

Bandcamp

LAPSE DISCOGRAPHY

I found this trawling through To Live A Lie’s main label page on bandcamp and realising that they separately host a bunch of their older releases here, all available to download for free. Lapse’s complete discography, lean and mean as FUCK brutal Hardcore/Grindcore amalgam, pummeling limb crushing arrangements switch tempos from smash and grab grinding blast to slow beatdown toothless carnage, ugly and nasty like a spiked fucking bat – bright burning Guitar, mid Bass strangle/bulge, stacked snappy drumming and baited breath teeth gritted/low burly vocal of outsider pain and rage. I first discovered Lapse from their excellently savage split with Eddie Brock (tracks 1-3 here, some of their best), and I’m chuffed to have gotten around to listening to the rest of their killer output. A Hardcore/Grind alloy to alienate yourself from your ‘peers’.

To Live A Lie

DIRECT CONTROL – ‘FAREWELL’

Released in 2011 on Feral Ward, ‘Farewell’ is Direct Control’s nasty, gnarly Skel masterpiece(piss) stamped in 12″ wax – furious skate thrashing Hardcore for freaks only, an acid cruster rager deranged and off the rails. Super raw guitar scratch riffs tearing across mad manic thrasher Bass twang with perfect punchy blown out sound, careening drums just on the right side of in-time and super sick aggro kid vocal dripping with demented energy! Channels the mutant waste of Cryptic Slaughter and Excel’s early melted Crossover Thrash sound right into the eye of their DC Hardcore, and draws from the spirits of old Heavy Metal and Hard Rock too, with little Surf  passages and jams here and there, warped from some rad dimension and psybeamed into Richmond VA. 15 minutes of far out fast-as-fukk Hardcore/Thrashcore perfection, deep fried in shitty blasting in-the-red production where the drums sound serrated and the vocal booms like a motherfucker. I don’t often throw a link to youtube on here but I had to revisit this record and it’s not on bandcamp. But who cares, it looks like it’s still available on wax – get one and hesh the fuck out! RIP Brandon Farrell.

Grave Mistake Records

Sorry State

youtube

HATRED SURGE – ‘COLLECTION 2005-2007’

Alex Hughes brings the pain on the earliest output of Hatred Surge, here collected on one CD (unfortunately sold out from the source at Blastasfuk), pulled from various early splits, demos and EPs. A cascading, surging wall of barbarous grinding Hardcore set on permanent kill – concrete, titanic, Bass-heavy and completely ungovernable, coalescing parts of Death Metal, Sludge, Noise Rock, Thrash and a massive dose of Crust within the maelstrom of blasting Grindcore to utterly devastating, frothing rager effect. Production is gnarly, brusque and unpolished, with the demo tracks in particular bearing a nasty thin one man production that terrifies and serrates. Unfortunately, the CD is mastered rather on the quiet side, although this does little to blunt the fury within: you just gotta crank the shit. Sledging proper Power Violence tempo switch ups with brutalising hammer-handed drums, torturing lengths of noisy Bass riff haywire and broken beatdown Hardcore, executioner Doom no-riff crush and of course the purging, euphoric blasting Grindcore, perfectly pitched super-pissed aggro vocal trade-offs Despise You/Disrupt style. A poisoned crushing dreadnaught of Grindviolence – total fuckin’ cop melter! Classic.

Blastasfuk

ISOTOPE SELF TITLED

Oakland punks Isotope wield a dark axe of Helion Hardcore Crust Metalpunk in the form of their self titled full length album. Soaring and consonant yet brute and assailing Crust, uplifting and swaggering, drenched in bloody fury – bluesy leads and blazing two note solos, arcing Motorheaded Guitars aflame and varied snappy, war-like drumming of power, insanely aggressive vocal rippling with intonation and ruin, rumbling megabass, loud’n’clear production with plenty of noize – these songs carry some hefty memorable melodies within their war-hardened and bloodsoaked armour. Influences from Old school UK Crust and Thrash and Swedish Hardcore/D-Beat are as the whetstone to sharpen Isotope’s brand of dangerous, pyroclastic Crust. Decimating! Carbonized has already re-released the album as a discography cassette with Isotope’s previous EPs and demo bundled in for good measure – be sure to snag a tape!

Carbonized Records

Bandcamp

VOLCANO – ‘FOOL 2 THA GAME’

Volcano features Cody from Putrid Stu, Murderman and Sanguisugabogg, among others. Their debut EP dishes up an inexorable meeting/mugging of heaving beatdown Hardcore bombast and Death/Gore weight and scale, riddled with aptly pitched samples from ‘Bad Lieutenant’ (1992) – brutalising and violent with an outsider down and out mindset and murder on the mind, ousting rats and turning enemy cranium to pulp – on the warpath of boogie beatdown inhumanity! Super loud, crisp phat production, dry scooped banger guitars crush the shit out of you in chugging, muted blunt abandon, thugger drumming kicking your ass in muscular deathrolling groove, marauding breaks and outrageously dialed snare ala Goregrind, steamroller Bass, junkyard dog vocal. Alienated, castigating Beatdown with little to lose or gain. Snitch heads on a swivel, look the fuck out! Killer, perfect artwork from Pierre Braindead, too. Marks beware.

Daze

Bandcamp