Superpussy U p T o N o G o o d EP ( T r a ns
Elec tric/Music Farm ers ) The cover art is pretty bodge and the name Superpussy makes them sound like a punkabilly garage band, but rest assured, a pussy by any other name would sound as crushing. With cold vocals that do their best to avoid any real singing, basslines that grind like gristle through a mincer, drums that put an exclamation point on every single beat and guitars that sound exactly like Steve Albini, Shellac and Mark Of Cain fans will take this Wollongong trio instantly to heart. They also remind me a lot of the Godflesh/Head Of David side-project Sweet Tooth. Out of the eight tracks on Up To No Good there isn’t a single bad one to speak of, just a couple of fairly unoriginal ones. Personal highlights, however, include the relatively melodic brutal swing of “Closer” (no, not the NIN hit) and the simple tension and release at work in “Shiver”. Shit name, great band.
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Teengenerate L i v e At S h e lt e r [ l i v e ] ( B o p ) Japanese lock ‘n’ loll combo who set the (fast) pace for garage punk in the midnineties, Teengenerate recently reformed to play a tribute show to fallen Guitar Wolf bassist Billy Wolf (R.I.P) and then were coaxed into visiting Australia to play two rare shows at The Tote in Melbourne last December. People flew out from Europe to see it; such is the dedication they inspire in record-collector dweebs. This recording from 1995 shows why. Always partial to a cover, they roar through versions of “I Don’t Care” by Belgian sensations The Kids’, Andy G. And The Roller Kings’ “My GTO”, Chan Romero’s “Hippy Hippy Shake”, and The Zeros’ “Wild Weekend”. It’s beyond garage punk at times, more like Black Flag
or something. It’s obvious why you’d fly to the other side of the world for it. Sadly, though, from reports I got (I wasn’t there so I’m talking through my arse yet again), the Tote shows didn’t live up to the “legend” that recordings like this help to inflate.
Terrorust
Post Mortal Archives (Self-released) Ex-Damaged hard nuts Jamie Ludbrook (vocals) and Matt “Skitz” Sanders (drums) reunite in their second postDamaged project Terrorust (the other was Walk The Earth with DW Norton which Jamie has now quit). With hopes of reviving Damaged-style “hatecore”, Terrorust play very much to the strengths of Lubrook. His multifaceted voice darts here there and everywhere; growling, grunting, squealing, squawking, bellowing, burping… wait a sec, this is starting to sound more like a Dr. Zeus book than a metal CD review. Basically, though, Ludbrook hogs the limelight to such an extent that there’s very little time when he isn’t singing. With a definite Damaged tinge to it, the musical aesthetic is flat-out intensity all the time, with little to no respite. It’s quite one-dimensional from that angle, but these guys have probably got fans who think they’ve gone pussy when they slow down. We call all still marvel at Skitz though. Even human windbag Lubrook can’t steal that animal’s thunder.
Steve Turner & His Bad Ideas
N e w W a v e P u n k Ass h o l e (Funhouse/Reverberation) Another solo release from Mudhoney guitarist Steve Turner, New Wave Punk Asshole is a healthy collection of songs with more
of a classic garage feel than the acoustic folk gear he was initially peddling on his 2003 solo debut Searching For Melody. With shades of things like Kinks, Bob Dylan, Sonics, it’s just simple good-time music played by a band who get the job done in fairly unspectacular fashion. Recorded and mixed by Seattle engineer Johnny Sangster, who contributes the vital Farfisa organ to most tracks, It’s easy to get into, yet at the same time hard to get all too excited about.
Twin City Faction Lo c k e d - In ( D e at h s h e a d )
Twin City Faction is about passionate hardcore that rocks, no bullshit. It’s about playing like your life depended on it. It’s about the huge thumping vein that bulges out of singer Chris City’s head when he yells. It’s about screamalongs in singlets. It’s about working man’s politics. It’s about being locked-in and knowing that your only escape is rock. Locked-In is an appropriate title for Twin City’s second full-length. This Sydney fivesome are locking together tighter than ever these days, and, like a bullock-team with blinkers on, they only know the way forward. The first three tracks are spat out at frightening velocity, and it’s difficult to pick a highlight among them they’re all so good. For something they recorded in their jam space for little more than the cost of the room hire, it sounds bloody excellent, though overall I feel like the songs could’ve been better served by a beefier bottom-end. “Drawn A Blank” and “Make Sense Tomorrow” bring a heavier post-HC sensibility, the former given a subtle freshness via a piano track sitting in under the guitars. Maintaining a steady pace all throughout SideOne, the slower instrumental “Heavy Method” at the start of Side-Two helps break up the monotony before the extremely hectic “You Want / I Got – Blackout” begins the pummeling once more. Get your wife-beater on and get with the Twin City Faction…
Uns a n e
Visqueen (Ipecac/Shock ) Springing back to life in 2003 after several years of inactivity, New York noise rock hardheads Unsane have signed on with Ipecac having spent time on Relapse, AmRep, Matador and various other labels over the course of their long history. But no matter what company logo adorns the back sleeve of the records, the sound never really changes. It may get a little heavier here, a little groovier there, but one reason it continues to impress fans is that it never gets softer. Visqueen is the trio’s sixth studio album and contains practically no surprises whatsoever, just slow, grinding riffs and heavy swinging rhythm. Their wall-of-sound is as dense and impenetrable as ever - perhaps a bit more reliant on groove than extremity ala End Of Silence-era Rollins Band – but across eleven tracks the similarly-paced 4/4 thud can get pretty boring. Good luck getting one of Unsane’s fans to hear a bad word about it though.
Various Artists Half Hearted CD-R (Kickstart My Heart) The compilation that never was, finally is once more - only now in slightly downgraded CD-R format with photocopied artwork. But hey, anytime you offer me unreleased Agents Of Abhorrence and St. Albans Kids (R.I.P) tracks I’ll be there like a hungry rottweiler on a bloody beefsteak. Kickstart My Heart Records from Wollongong NSW had planned to release this Australian/Japanese comp years ago, but due to the label folding it never happened. Now 100 numbered CD-Rs (I got #25) have been made and you can get one by sending AUD$5 to: 30 Baynes Street, West End QLD 4101. Twenty tracks in all, ten from Australia and ten from Japan, the surprises are plentiful, particularly among the less familiar Jap stuff. Kick-off by the incomparable Deep Slauter from Chiba and closed by the now sadly defunct Breeds There A Man from Melbourne, you get eighteen diverse DIY hardcore groups sandwiched in-between. Five bucks well fuckin’ spent.
Witch Hats
W o u n d Of A L i tt l e H o r s e EP ( In - F i d e l i t y/ S h o c k )
Terrorust
Descendants of squalid rock bands like The Birthday Party and Lubricated Goat, Witch Hats are a youthful foursome dragging garage down into the swamp. They’ve cleaned up their live sound considerably for this debut EP, but, like fellow Melbourne miscreants Bird Blobs and The Stabs before them, their songs are strong enough beneath all the layers of molten noise to hold up to the clinical confines of the studio. “Pepperman”