[ aquarius records — Rock Pop Punk Hardcore ]

IMPORTANT (Please read to avoid confusion): Some items below may be tagged with a bold, red, all-caps OUT OF PRINT/UNAVAILABLE notice. This does NOT mean that all other items not so tagged are, in fact, in stock — or for that matter, in print and available, though there's a good chance they are. Some folks get confused on this point, and we can see why, so please read this for further clarification and other important before-you-order information. Unlike some mailorder websites, we don't have an electronic inventory system linked to our site, so you can't be sure of what we actually have or don't have in stock at any given moment without asking us — please email our mailorder department for availability status — or better yet, just go ahead and place your order using our shopping cart function and we'll get back to you with the status of each item. If you have general non-mailorder questions, email the store.

Showing results 51 through 100 of 1362.

Chrome meets The Slits!

Angel Eyes are another band ready to make their mark in the blossoming post rock / sludge metal scene, and manage to do just that with Something To Do With Death, making -that- sound completely their own. So much so that upon hearing this disc we freaked out and immediately got in touch with the label and got a bunch of copies for the store. The general vibe is one we've come to love, the slow building brooding moodiness, a creeping post rock slow burn, minor key guitar, distant droney shimmer, simple martial percussion, building in intensity, the opening track could be Mogwai or Godspeed, with its understated majesty and about-to-explode urgency. Track two, the awesomely titled "By The Time He Was My Age, Orson Welles Had Made Citizen Kane", starts off with more loping post rockiness, but quickly lurches into some seriously fierce Neurosisy sludge, but within the roiling churning downtuned brutality, lurks plenty of mournful melody and subtle sonic shadings. Making this more than just heavy, more a an emotionally loaded ferocity. In fact each song is a expansive and beautifully convoluted journey, from massive pummel, to dreamy shuffle, to tribal ambience, to blown out guitarnoise and back again. So fucking good. Obviously, anyone who digs Isis, Pelican, Godspeed, Tides, Conifer, Minsk, Mouth Of The Architect, Rosetta, Minsk or any of the current crop of postrockmetal outfits NEEDS THIS NOW!

MPEG stream: Two Too Many
MPEG stream: By The Time He Was My Age, Orson Welles Had Made Citizen Kane

Bands should really label the side of their records. Especially if it's a split and the band they're sharing the split with has a somewhat similar sound. Similar to how bands that sound like SUNNO))) or Nadja should definitely label the speed a record is meant to be played at, since it often sounds equally good at both (or all three!) speeds. So we were super psyched to finally get a new record from one of our favorite post rock metal combos, Angel Eyes, and we threw it on, and while it definitely sounded similar, it seemed like a lot had changed. The sound was a strange constantly shifting melange of loping metallic post rock, lurching caustic grind and skittery jazziness. We were pretty sure we had mistakenly put the other band's side on, when they shifted gears and kicked out some seriously epic blackened screamo-y Neur-Isis style jams, and then we weren't so sure. Eventually we did figure it out, especially once we laid our ears on the side long single track epic on the flipside, but we did decide that we did indeed dig this crazy band with the crazy name A Fine Boat, That Coffin!, who definitely take the post rock metal thing and tangle it all up with screamo and grind, although we could do without the bits of jazziness, thankfully those are brief. But for sure, heavy and chaotic and epic good stuff. But flipping the record over, we suddenly felt right at home again (boy are we gonna feel dumb after all this if that side WAS in fact Angel Eyes), with a sound both warm and lush, heavy and crushing, brooding, pounding minor key melancholic slow building heaviness, epic and majestic, anguished howled vocals over super melodic metallic crush, monstrous and pummeling and almost orchestral at times, laced with cool expanses of shimmery, dreamlike low end guitar, streaks of glistening feedback, chiming bell like melodies, eventually slipping into a super minimal drift, all reverby and echoey, a woozy soft focus slowcore sprawl, that eventually builds and builds and explodes into a super epic emo metalpsych blow out finale. These guys are so good. One of the few bands, amidst the many who now practice this sort of thing, that should have the big boys shaking in their boots. Cool gatefold sleeves, a bit confusing which band is on which side, but you'll figure it out, and both bands kick ass, but Angel Eyes' sidelong track is worth the price of admission. LIMITED of course, we got our copies direct from the band, their LAST copies, which means when we run out we'll have to get more from the label in Europe, so if that happens, please be patient while we wait for more to arrive from overseas, and needless to say (but since that's the way we roll we'll say it anyway) ABSO-FUCKING-LUTELY RECOMMENDED!

Woah. Just when you thought all the "long lost" bands have already been unearthed, something like this comes along and knocks you flat on your ass. Most of us first read about Angel Face in a great article in Ugly Things a few issues back. Other than that and a piece on the band on Julian Cope's Head Heritage site, the only other meager info that we could find about these guys was in French. Which makes sense, as Angel Face were indeed French. The band's confusing history began in 1974 with the core lineup of the Regoli brothers, Pascal (bass) and Julian (guitar), as well as one Riton Angel Face on guitar. Their biggest inspiration is undoubtedly the Stooges, but unlike every other band to rip off Ann Arbor's finest, Angel Face were in fact swimming in the same primordial waters as their heroes. It makes sense to assume that these guys probably dug "L.A. Blues" and "We Will Fall" as much as any of the Stooges' tunes, because Angel Face clearly understood that "heavy" isn't just about volume and power chords (not that those aren't here in spades), but also about pure noise and total chaos. In addition to this, one can detect a considerable Hawkwind influence, as well as heavy doses of krautrock. While other bands at this time were more likely to incorporate the latest sounds of punk's first wave, Angel Face kept things sounding firmly pre-1977. The end results are pretty mindblowing, tense and aggressive pieces that lock into a groove and pound the hell out of it for the entirety of the song with guitars that sound like sonic flamethrowers. Trying to piece together a timeline here is quite difficult (the liner notes are in French), and the band never even released anything in their lifetime, so what you have here on the first disc are demos and live tracks from sometime between 1975 and 1978 (originally released in 1984 on lp as A Wild Odyssey), strung together to form one surprisingly cohesive whole. We're pretty sure the first tracks feature the singer named Eric Tendz, who was described by the other band members as nothing more than a disreputable Iggy clone. And yes, there will be no mistaking Iggy's influence, but Tendz delivers things so perfectly and frantically that we can't complain one bit. His vocals are often punctuated by shrill little shrieks which seem humanly impossible, and his drunk sounding delivery makes it impossible to tell what language he's singing in (though we think it's English). Other tracks on the first disc are comprised of live recordings which predate the Tendz songs, pieced together in a very Faust-ian way with the band's preferred vocalist Henri Flesh (again, we think). These songs are more loose and unhinged, no doubt due to the guitar prowess of Julian Regoli, whose early presence in the band kept things psychedelic to the highest order. There are also a few tracks that feature just Riton Angel Face and Pascal, on guitar/vocals and synth, respectively. While stripped to their bare essence, these songs come off as strangely powerful and complete sounding. One can only wonder what possibilities might have existed for this amazing band. Unfortunately, there was little working in their favor, and it is easy to imagine scores of idiot punk rockers not knowing what to make of a band of long haired guys with aviator sunglasses. The story didn't end there, however, and in the '80s Angel Face reformed under the leadership of Riton and Pascal. The biggest change was the decision to add a female vocalist, Kim Nguyen. Truthfully, these songs are a bit of a letdown after the pure rock n' roll fury of the first disc, but mainly in comparison. The songs are pretty good, but just a little more straightforward, and the '80s production certainly doesn't help anything. Likewise, disc 3 is made up of some shoddily recorded live tracks and radio stuff from different eras. Some of this stuff appears to be from the first era and is quite good, but the songs don't benefit from the unfortunate sound quality. So, you have no doubt noticed the hefty price tag on this beast, and we realize the above paragraph may hold some people back.... BUT we seriously can't recommend the stuff on disc 1 enough, for folks into the likes of Soggy (anther long lost French band of Stooges worshippers) and of course The Stooges themselves. Check out the first four sound clips to see what we mean, and just keep in mind only 1,000 of these were pressed up - and of the dozen we ordered, we've already sold 10 on account of "tweeting" about it, so right now we've got 2, yes TWO - and we may not be seeing them again any time soon...

MPEG stream: Wolf City Blues
MPEG stream: 12 1/2
MPEG stream: Endless Road (Cut Up Songs)
MPEG stream: I Don't Care
MPEG stream: Secret Town
MPEG stream: Precious Urban Nasty Kid

Here's one of the full-lengths mentioned in our review of the Messthetics Greatest Hits compilation last list, and it's also quite recommended. We first heard Animals & Men (named for an early Adam & The Ants Song) on one of the old Messthetics cd-r comps. Later Hyped To Death released a 21-song cd-r collection of pretty much everything that this band ever recorded both under the name Animals & Men and in their later incarnation Terraplanes. That disc has now been revamped, retitled, and reissued on cd, with four extra tracks tacked on! Plus a mpeg video clip of a live performance of "Evil Going On" as a bonus. What're they all about? Female-fronted DIY art/blues/punk from rural England, totally charming and catchy and homemade, comparable to Kleenex/LiLiPUT, Delta 5 and the Vaselines. And that's right, their wide array of influences included black American blues...and the novels of J.G. Ballard, which would explain "Car Crash Blues". The cd booklet features in-depth liner notes detailing the band's saga as New Wave coulda-woulda beens, with patrons like John Peel and their long-time pal Adam Ant. Obscure though they remained, that should definitely not inhibit but rather enhance your enjoyment of this collection, for lack of commercial success allowed wonderful idiosyncrasies to flourish in their songwriting. PS. what's a Terraplane you might be wondering? It's an American automobile from the '30s, immortalized in Robert Johnson's "Terraplane Blues". And Animals & Men's "Terraplane Fixation".

MPEG stream: Terraplane Fixation
MPEG stream: Evil Going On

Grab a brew, it's Annihilation Time! This is their third album (duh) but their first for Tee Pee (and thus the first we've heard, even though they're from right over in the East Bay... must mean we're more stoner rock than punk). The standard issue spiel about AT is that, as you might have guessed from their name, they're big time Black Flag and Bl'ast! fans, crossing over into the retro-thrash movement, with some classic '70s cock rock moves a la KISS or Thin Lizzy thrown in. Think fellow retro rockin' Oaklanders Drunkhorse, but more punk and skater-ly. So, do such blurbs tell the truth? And if so, does this supposed hybrid of Deep Purple and D.R.I. sound better on paper than on your stereo? Well check out the twin guitar leads towards the end of track 2, "About To Snap", there's shades of Iron Maiden's Smith/Murray right there, and you'll find plenty more in the way of tasty '70s/'80s metallic guitar action elsewhere on the disc, usually smack in the midst of some much more basic, punk styled riffage... while their music ain't rocket science, it is definitely some good times rock n' roll. Not the second coming of anybody, but still a neat mix of elements, glorious guitar harmonies coexisting with hoarse punk rock vox... even if it's hard to know if we're supposed to be pogoing or headbanging. It can't quite approach the shreddingness of their live shows, but it's fun nonetheless.

MPEG stream: About To Snap
MPEG stream: Jonestown
MPEG stream: Bad Luck

Thrashy noisy hardcore GONE METAL?! Woo Hoo! Seems like all those punk kids have GONE METAL. But who am I to complain? I mean, I -do- like metal more than punk. And this -is- good, just not terribly groundbreaking. Think equal parts, Coalesce, Converge,

RealAudio clip: Lucky Sky Diamond

Anopheli are a new, sort of local outfit, featuring members of East Bay doom crust crushers Monuments Collapse (whose recent full length was a big hit around here, along with their split with Breag Naofa) teamed up with members of UK crust punk legends Fall Of Efrafa. The result is a dark, epically heavy slab of melodic, melancholic, string laden crusty doom! Huge, heaving riffage, infused with mournful melodies, churning atmospheric heaviness that explodes into furious D-beat blowouts, galloping and ferocious, but even then, rife with a haunting, wistful moodiness, due in no small part to the strings, which soar and shimmer, moan and keen throughout. Lush, brooding heaviness, all loping, lumbering doomic epicry, sounding a bit like Neurosis by way of Godspeed, especially with those strings, adding all sorts of pathos to the proceedings, and giving the sound a seriously cinematic vibe, the sounds flecked with cool samples as well. A Hunger Rarely Sated is the perfect mix of pummeling metallic crush, furious crust punk bombast, and dense, mathy, melodic, post rock majesty. LIMITED TO 500 COPIES!!! Includes a printed inner sleeve, and housed in a nice, heavy jacket.

MPEG stream: The Embittered Living
MPEG stream: Incompetent Sires
MPEG stream: Forest Of The Genocides

Full length number two from this Canadian combo, and like on their oddly titled debut, Through The Cervix Of Hawaah, Antediluvian continue to hone their warped, damaged and demented blackened death metal, and based on the opening track here, have succeeded in sounding even more fantastically fucked up this time around. Their death metal still bordering on a mutant strain of black metal, the sound here sees the group moving sonically closer to outfits like Wold or Portal, a grinding, dense, chaotic churn of frenzied riffage, wild mathed out drumming, monstrous gurgling vocals, and dense blackened atmospheres. The aforementioned opener begins with what sounds like chanting, some old liturgical music, only to erupt seconds later into a dense, dizzying tangle of downtuned blackened metallic churn, a furious, frenetic tangle of sounds and parts, it's so wild and woolly and there's so much going on, it's nearly impossible to imagine this being actually composed, and to think of this as a song, as much as pure black sound, cuz the sound of it is more than enough to have us utterly mesmerized, a sort of blacknoise rendered in progged out chaotic death metal form. There are moments of doomy dirgery, and crusty thrashing, but it all seems to be woven into a bigger, more fractured and fucked up whole. We described the group's debut as being some of "thee most gnarled and twisted blackened heaviness" we'd heard, but that honor now seems to describe this new one even more, as it takes everything we loved about that first record, and pushes it even further, a dizzying. An utterly exhausting, exhilarating listen, total blackened tech-metal doom-death genius for sure, and like the first record, another roiling, churning, dizzying, mathed out blackdeath blowout. Fans of diSEMBOWELMENT, Wold, Winter, Abyssal, Gevurah and other weirdo death metal, rejoice!

MPEG stream: Homunculus Daimon-Eon (Awakening)
MPEG stream: Consumate Spellbound Synapses
MPEG stream: Towers Of Silence

Rarely does a band make it to its third or fourth record, especially when the band plays sloppy, trashy, violent, totally uncommercial punk rock. But here it is, the year 2000, and Antiseen are still carving their messy, bloody swath across the punk underground, 15 years and counting. Especially amazing considering that frontman Jeff Clayton has been abusing his body in true rock and roll style, ending every show in a bloody disheveled heap on the floor. This is a collection of 7"s, compilation tracks, weird out of print stuff and some unreleased songs, as well as a bunch of covers (Roky Erickson, Screaming Lord Sutch, Troggs, Stooges) showcasing Antiseen at their trashy, fucked up, southern-fried best.

An amazing lost artpunk artifact from the early eighties San Francisco punk rock scene, and we're talking really lost, as no one we know had even heard of these guys, but from the very first note we were smitten. The opener is a super spare and spacious bit of post punk dub, subtly groovy, a throbbing new wave bass line, sounding like Gang Of Four or Interpol slowed waaaaaaaaay down, a simple krautrock beat peppered with handclaps, some dissonant guitar clang and a bit of moody post rock strum and jangle, with the occasional huge dissonant wash of atonal horns. Dark and creepy and almost danceable at times, that is if your dance of choice is some sort of zombie shuffle. The other three tracks are not nearly as spare, but have the same sort of angular clang and low slung groove, the vocals sort of sung spoken, the rhythms loping and tribal, guitar harmonics ringing out, bits of angular riffage, vocals very reminiscent of Slint actually, laconic and buried way down in the mix. Stumblingly propulsive, the mix occasionally engulfed by some weird low end swell and some damaged electronics, the whole thing lurching and lumbering amidst a swirl of off kilter guitars and dubbed out ambience, it's sort of like Gang Of Four mixed with Slint mixed with This Heat. Which, we hardly need to tell you, is a very good thing indeed.

MPEG stream: The Ballroom
MPEG stream: Angels / Aliens

First off, let me just say that Artimus Pyle is one of the best person's-name-as-band-name ever, second only to Lynyrd Skynyrd (and oddly enough, the real Artimus Pyle just happened to be a member of L.S.). Pounding furious crusty grind from this Bay Area super group (featuring members of What Happens Next?, Fuckface, Los Rudiments...). This posthumous cd collects most if not all of their of their recorded output.

Sprawling double disc of self described 'other planetary field drone' from this mysterious REDACTED duo featuring members of doomsludge heavies REDACTED, avant noisemakers REDACTED, and grey metallers REDACTED, one disc of collected tracks, the other disc a 'collaborative' collage put together by ARTIST 08, and made up entirely of an unreleased collaboration between the now defunct REDACTED and the also now defunct REDACTED, but more on that in a second. The collected tracks disc, gathers up various jams from the last few years, all of them hushed and minimal and mysterious, strange dronescapes of abstract ambience and microscopic events, field recordings and performances, long stretches of creak and whir and thrum and rumble, laced with mysterious voices, fragments of melodies, a sound somewhere between the free forest clatter of Avarus, the ritualistic black abstraction of Abruptum and the free sonic exploration of A Handful Of Dust. Long streaks of feedback, overloaded mics, monstrous howls, low end crumble, whirring layers of glitch and hum, washed out hazy shimmer laid over murky sonar mumbles and muted clatter and clank, doomy crumbling rhythms pulled apart into sprawling industrial blurs, all smeared into creepy hushed black ambient drifts, and groaning, creaking, whispery abstract free noise minimalism. The second disc, finds ARTIST 08 assembling somewhat similar sounds, but using only a recording of REDACTED and REDACTED from 2006 as source material, and according to the liner notes: "pots, pipes, a clay skull and a wooden tube". And it sort of sounds like it. Sort of. Ultra minimal, abstract and ambient, stretches of what sound like alien field recordings give way huge heaving swells of crumbling buzz, squalls of roiling blacknoize splinter into full on drum freakouts and blurred drone jams, deep cavernous rumbles explode into jagged shards of hissing static and beastly vocal mewling, gorgeous blown out swells of chordal whir dissipate into chiming metal-buzz minimalism, these lengthy bursts of sonic energy, which actually don't sound all that messed with, more like they're just straight up recordings of those two bands rocking out, but those blowouts are all separated by short interludes of barely there shimmer and hazy muted drift. Killer stuff. On bad ass REDACTED label REDACTED, and most likely crazy limited...

MPEG stream: sample one
MPEG stream: sample two
MPEG stream: sample three
MPEG stream: sample four
MPEG stream: sample five

As Mercenarias were one of the highlights of the Soul Jazz compilation The Sexual Life Of The Savages, which alongside the superior Nao Wave compilation introduced us to the Brazilian post-punk scene of the '80s. Like plenty of their contemporaries around the globe, this all-women quartet wore their influences on their sleeves, especially early Gang of Four, Nina Hagen, The Dead Kennedies, and Liliput. Not surprisingly, As Mercenarias dabble throughout the broad spectrum of what punk could mean, one track exploding as a taut pogo punk anthem then the next might be a sinewy art-rock tune sounding like a less dubby Slits track with a hell of a lot more fury behind the spidery guitar work and serpentine basslines. Where Soul Jazz sort of dropped the ball on The Sexual Life Of The Savages comp was choosing to include some of late '80s tracks drenched in studio production slickness, but they the mark in uncovering the spittle and contempt of As Mercenarias. Far from being novelty album, O Comeco Do Fim Do Mundo is actually a pretty amazing document from one of the nearly forgotten chapters of punk.

MPEG stream: Me Perco
MPEG stream: Inimigo
MPEG stream: Loucos Sentimentos

Thanks to AQ pal Matt for the low down on this slab of pre-Sleep heaviness, long out of print singles finally available again, collected on a single cd: We used to see Asbestosdeath in the very early '90s around the Bay Area,�at the East Bay punk institution 924 Gilman and various punk rock parties. They released two singles, the latter on the Minneapolis label�of anarcho-punk stalwarts, Profane Existence. The band that evolved into Sleep -- who fans would like to think of as a�"doom" or "stoner" band today -- was actually more akin to the then crust-influenced Neurosis, Christ on Parade and various UK anarcho and�post-Discharge bands. Slowed waaay down, of course. At the time, liking Asbestosdeath was a seriously guilty pleasure. Their worship�of Neurosis and Melvins was obvious. If you liked the sound of those bands -- and lots of people did -- this band was not all that surprising.�Highly enjoyable, but not groundbreaking. Upon re-recording slower and more polished versions of these tracks for�Sleep's debut album "Volume 1," they officially entered the arena of the�world's slowest, heaviest bands... a field then dominated by the Melvins�and perhaps Drunks with Guns but soon to be populated by the likes of�Eyehategod, Grief, Buzzov-en and Earth, among many. Over time, they definitely got better. Their songs got more interesting. And they�added wizards. And doobies. And the rest is history. Sonically, these tracks belong squarely alongside Neurosis' The Word As�Law and Melvins recordings up to Bullhead. They're gritty and more�aggressive than what you'd expect. But they still sound fresh, and the�arrangements have a sparse, atmospheric quality that typifies the�aesthetic of most of the bands on Southern Lord today.

MPEG stream: Nail
MPEG stream: Scourge

MPEG stream: Shroom Thrash
MPEG stream: Embers
MPEG stream: Congested Optics
MPEG stream: Re-Throned Emperor

MPEG stream: Through Tha (W)Ringer
MPEG stream: Red Tape
MPEG stream: Puncture The Quiet Life

THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.

SORRY. These emo punk heroes go big time with the release of "Relationship of Command" on Grand Royal, the Beastie Boys' label. Produced by Ross Robinson of Korn fame! (But don't let that dissuade you.) Sounds amazing, of course -- that's what Andee thinks cos he's already a big fan. For those new to At The Drive-In, these El Paso, Texas, kids are underground wunderkinds, having toured with Rage Against the Machine and honed their Texas-punk-via-DC-influenced sound. Fans of Fugazi and Nation of Ulysses will love this record. Totally aggro, definitely pop, so energizing it's amazing that the disc doesn't explode when you open the package.

RealAudio clip: Arcarsenal

Okay so now that a few years have passed and things have sorta flipped around -- i.e, kids are more likely checking out At The Drive In because they dig The Mars Volta (or Sparta for that matter) as opposed to vice versa (which was certainly the case shortly after ATDI disbanded in 2001) -- here's a comprehensive collection of the songs to get the kids up to speed on the ferocious firepower of Omar and Cedric's former emo-punk band. There's loads of rare material to thrill their fans, both old and new! The cd features 18 tracks total compiled from a bunch of their early releases on the Offtime and Fearless labels, some split 7"s, their Grand Royal album Relationship Of Command such as "One Armed Scissor", as well as one previously unreleased song (a cover of The Smiths' "This Night Has Opened My Eyes"). This Station Is Non-Operational closes with another cover, this one is of Pink Floyd's "Take Up They Stethoscope and Walk". The dvd includes videos for "Metronome Arthritis", "One Armed Scissor" and "Invalid Litter Dept.", an "Operations Manual" (aka an electronic presskit), their full discography, and some cd-rom extras. The insert booklet lets the pictures do the talking, jam-packed with tour and live photos, and precious little in the way of liner notes.

MPEG stream: One Armed Scissor
MPEG stream: This Night Has Opened My Eyes

Nice 200 gram vinyl reissue of the 1981 debut from this British post-punk quartet that reminds us of a Pylon/Pretenders hybrid with sharper teeth. Smashing the power politics of sexual relationships with biting critique, this two female, two male foursome deliver cleverly disaffected songwriting with an urgent rhythmic energy. The band only put out two records and this one is their best, with infectious hooks and a bracing cynicsm that remains razor-sharp. They even pull off the rare David Bowie cover that far surpasses the original with "Repetition", a creepily banal look into the mind of an abusive spouse. For fans of Gang of Four, Delta 5, Xmal Deutchland, The Slits, Mo-dettes and the bands mentioned above. Recommended!!

MPEG stream: Dear John
MPEG stream: Come Again
MPEG stream: Repetition

The German label that brought us the first two albums from ambient doom-jazzers Bohren & Der Club Of Gore is much better known for crusty punk/metal/hc stuff. One of their top acts is Audio Kollaps, who tear it up on their latest, the aptly-titled juggernaut of blurring brutality that is Panzer. It's full of fast, fierce grinding metal with chugging breakdowns and gruff, German-language vocals growling lyrics that we're pretty sure must be politically progressive, anti-war diatribes. Though, just from listening to this aggro music, you wouldn't necessarily take 'em for peaceniks!

MPEG stream: Schuld
MPEG stream: Was Ist Die Warheit?

This is probably gonna sound like total sacrilege. And it is, we know it is, but it's all we can think when we're listening to these guys, quite possibly our favorite drum machine driven duo, is that yeah, they sound like Big Black, the super distorted guitar chug, the sung spoken vox, the thick floor shaking bass, the fucked up and funny lyrics, it's like Big Black, bit kind of, well, you know, BETTER. There we said it. And before you get your hate mail machine in motion, realize, that we revere Big Black, every single song, a fucking misanthropic masterpiece, but if you were to ask us, what could make BB better? Well, we would have said, let's see, you could make it heavier, make the songs more complex, add tons more dynamics, fuck it, the Austerity Program is just that, like a super charged, ultra heavy, way more complex Big Black, but they are so much more, they have taken that sound, that classic, timeless (to us at least) sound, and made it all their own. The super tense slow build of "Song 25", with its sprawling guitar buzz, and hushed spoken vocals, gradually growing more and more intense, the drum machine and buzzing bass soon joining in, a churning low slung dirge, the guitar doesn't even show up until a minute left in the song, but suddenly the track is transformed into a lurching metal machine prog blow out, with some awesomely weirdly clipped rhythms, chugging guitar, it's the sort of part most bands would (and should) stretch out for minutes, but the AP make it last seconds, cuz they know, they have way more up their sleeves. "Song 26" explodes in a throbbing downtuned crush, stopping, starting, stuttering, hiccupping, until things bliss out, and suddenly it's a shimmery whispered drift, only to lurch into a grinding metallic robotic pound, finally finishing off with more churn and crunch. "Song 27" starts off all distorted strum and more clipped drum machine, droney and tense and hypnotic, before splintering into a stop start stutter, that explodes into what sounds like "Jordan, Minnesota" at triple speed, and then back again, a fucking epic proto prog metal jam with some MIT worthy drum machine programming, and anguished ultra pissed vox. "Track 29" might be the weirdest, and perhaps the coolest of the bunch, a cloud of soaring guitars, a chugging bass, and another robotic looped rhythm, but the vocals are sung, sweetly, a lovely melodic counterpoint to the churn and chug beneath it, taking some subtle detours throughout, but always returning to that relentless crunch, another track, that seems way too brief at 5:30, epic and melodic and majestic and heavy and fucking awesome. We've listened to these 4 songs about 20 times, and we're bound to go 20 more, but they've got us really hoping there's a full length around the corner. And yeah, that means buy it, it RULES.

MPEG stream: Song 25
MPEG stream: Song 26

THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.

SORRY. This latest chunk of mechanized Big Black-ian post metal crush from aQ faves is not only available as a super limited test pressing / needle cleaning kit version elsewhere on this list, it is now also available as this even more limited data dvd-r, which contains 24 bit .wav files of song mixdowns and all the seperate instrument tracks, as well as instructions and artwork files. Why you ask? Well, so you can customize the record how ever you want, ditch the vocals, crank the vocals, blow out the drums, remix it, add sitar, tuba, sing along yourself, you've got the parts, use 'em to make your very own and utterly unique version of Backsliders And Apostates Will Burn! Oh, and you can always still just listen to it, and you should, cuz it rules... This is probably gonna sound like total sacrilege. And it is, we know it is, but it's all we can think when we're listening to these guys, quite possibly our favorite drum machine driven duo, is that yeah, they sound like Big Black, the super distorted guitar chug, the sung spoken vox, the thick floor shaking bass, the fucked up and funny lyrics, it's like Big Black, bit kind of, well, you know, BETTER. There we said it. And before you get your hate mail machine in motion, realize, that we revere Big Black, every single song, a fucking misanthropic masterpiece, but if you were to ask us, what could make BB better? Well, we would have said, let's see, you could make it heavier, make the songs more complex, add tons more dynamics, fuck it, the Austerity Program is just that, like a super charged, ultra heavy, way more complex Big Black, but they are so much more, they have taken that sound, that classic, timeless (to us at least) sound, and made it all their own. The super tense slow build of "Song 25", with its sprawling guitar buzz, and hushed spoken vocals, gradually growing more and more intense, the drum machine and buzzing bass soon joining in, a churning low slung dirge, the guitar doesn't even show up until a minute left in the song, but suddenly the track is transformed into a lurching metal machine prog blow out, with some awesomely weirdly clipped rhythms, chugging guitar, it's the sort of part most bands would (and should) stretch out for minutes, but the AP make it last seconds, cuz they know, they have way more up their sleeves. "Song 26" explodes in a throbbing downtuned crush, stopping, starting, stuttering, hiccupping, until things bliss out, and suddenly it's a shimmery whispered drift, only to lurch into a grinding metallic robotic pound, finally finishing off with more churn and crunch. "Song 27" starts off all distorted strum and more clipped drum machine, droney and tense and hypnotic, before splintering into a stop start stutter, that explodes into what sounds like "Jordan, Minnesota" at triple speed, and then back again, a fucking epic proto prog metal jam with some MIT worthy drum machine programming, and anguished ultra pissed vox. "Track 29" might be the weirdest, and perhaps the coolest of the bunch, a cloud of soaring guitars, a chugging bass, and another robotic looped rhythm, but the vocals are sung, sweetly, a lovely melodic counterpoint to the churn and chug beneath it, taking some subtle detours throughout, but always returning to that relentless crunch, another track, that seems way too brief at 5:30, epic and melodic and majestic and heavy and fucking awesome. We've listened to these 4 songs about 20 times, and we're bound to go 20 more, but they've got us really hoping there's a full length around the corner. And yeah, that means buy it, it RULES.

MPEG stream: Song 25
MPEG stream: Song 26

Rabid punk obsessives and collectors are probably already familiar with this eighties Stockton punk rock band, having been featured on the legendary first volume of the Killed By Death series and having released an almost 'classic' single called "I Hate Cops" (of course), and we have to admit, when we first got this reissue in, we immediately recognized the iconic cover photo, with a big dog licking the face of a policeman, but we have never actually heard them until now. Turns out, "I Hate Cops" is a killer jam, with the guitar simulating the siren at the beginning, and a wicked anthemic chorus (and don't let that first line throw you off, they say that all cops are "piggers"). The flipside "Radiationmasturbation" is pretty awesome too with some of thee most ridiculous lyrics ever. Poppy and hooky, punk as fuck, killer riffs, some wild shredding lead guitars, a killer vocalist, and some seriously kick ass songs, hard to believe these guys managed to stay so far under the radar for so long. This comp collects pretty much everything the group ever recorded, 14 songs, 22 minutes, all of it ruling! Includes a big booklet with lyrics and liner notes.

MPEG stream: Godhead
MPEG stream: Slam The Ham
MPEG stream: Between The Thighs
MPEG stream: Your Life

The major label debut (after three AQ-recommended indie label releases) for these "you've got your emo chocolate in my heavy metal peanut butter" punk rock kids from SoCal. With their capable and practically seamless blend of soaring, melodic emo-styled vocal choruses, Sunset Strip cock rock swagger, slayin' metalcore breakdowns, and Maidenesque gallop (all flawlessly executed with tons of energy), Avenged Sevenfold certainly have their fans here at Aquarius! To be sure, we might have to lump 'em into the guilty pleasure catagory, 'specially with City Of Evil's big-leagues production polish. But if you're not afraid of a band whose vocalist unleashes a few heartfelt (if whiny) "Whoa-oh-oh-ohs" per song, then this album gets our recommendation for best Bad Religion-meets-Helloween record of the year, so far, for sure! Or is it Anthrax-meets-Faith No More? Or the Get Up Kids-meets-Bang Tango-meets-Metallica-meets-Alice In Chains-meets-The Offspring-meets-Yngwie Malmsteen-meets-Poison The Well-meets-Skid Row? Heck it's all of that and more. And even though they make it really easy to play games of "what's that part remind me of? and that part?" within each track, what's amazing is that their songs remain so dang catchy and definitely Avenged Sevenfold's when all's said and done. Reactions to A7X's cheese-to-crunch ratio (a lot of both, really, each drawn equally from their metal and punk influences, and that's ok with us) will assuredly vary according to one's individual taste -- we say yum!

MPEG stream: Beast And The Harlot
MPEG stream: Bat Country

We were totally blown away by this band when we got the ep precurser to this record and we've been super anxious for the full length and it's finally here. Avenged Sevenfold are kids from Southern California who play some of the most explosive metallic

RealAudio clip: To End The Rapture
RealAudio clip: The Art Of Subconscious Illusion
RealAudio clip: We Come Out At Night

We eagerly anticipated this second full-length from SoCal's Avenged Sevenfold, and now that it's here, it proves to be equally as impressive as their AQ-fave debut. If you haven't heard 'em before, these kids are sick experts at blenderizing LA metal/emo/hardcore/pop-punk into something that shouldn't really work but does. It's like Jimmy Eat World meets Iron Maiden meets Pantera meets Get Up Kids. Their blender is friggin' clogged with chunky, chugging guitar riffs, emo vocal choruses, Euro-bright leads, punishing drumming, lush piano interludes, Zakk Wylde pick squeals, Phil Anselmo growls, and MTV-ready pop hooks. It's a total you-got-your-peanut butter-in-my-chocolate kind of thing, and it totally works, crushing you with metallic brutality one moment, lifting you up and wringing your heart with vocal melody the next, bridging the gap between the two with soaring '80s metal guitar harmonies... Avenged Sevenfold might not appeal to people stuck at either extreme end of that spectrum, but the rest of us are lovin' it. There's other hardcore bands attempting to mix these genres, but we think Avenged Sevenfold are the most traditionally metal AND one of the most poppy. Oh, is it at all ironic? Let's just say you can enjoy it on many levels. Maybe they were being fun and ironic before, but now they've realized the commerical potential of their approach. Recommended.

MPEG stream: Chapter Four
MPEG stream: I Won't See You Tonight part 1

One of THEE greatest punk rock records ever, from these legendary SF punks finally gets reissued, and reminds us just how good the Avengers really were (as if we had forgotten). As a band, they existed for a scant 2 years, and only released an ep before they broke up, their debut lp, this one right here, was only released in 1983, four years after the band disbanded, but displayed an incredible knack for writing amazing pop songs, and hinted at what could have been, had the Avengers survived to make another record. But really it hardly matters, as this record, often referred to as The Pink Album, is so good, not only is it an incredible collection of impossibly catchy songs, but is there anything more punk than making a record this good and then hanging it up? Hell, hanging it up before the record even came out!! Juts give a listen to the first few sound samples and you'll be sold (if you haven't already worn out your old copy). "We Are The One" is a total punk pop anthem, with Penelope Houston's snarled/crooned vox and Greg Ingraham's killer guitar playing, the whole band killed, and the songs were untouchable. And if "We Are The One" isn't already enough, "Car Crash" will seal the deal, all super melodic bassline, and chugging churning riffs, dark and minor key, Houston's vocals all raspy and occasionally cracking, and the crazy catchy "wooooah oooh oooh" chorus that you'll find stuck in your head forEVER. It's hard to know what else to say about this record. If like us you already had it, you might want to buy it again, for the bonus tracks certainly, or maybe just cuz there's some weird satisfaction in rebuying records you love (vinyl resurgence?), but if you've never heard this before, and dig poppy punk or punky pop this is gonna blow your mind. The cd includes a big booklet with tons of photos as well as liner notes from Greil Marcus. The cd version also includes a whole extra disc of bonus material, which includes a bunch of rehearsal, studio and live tracks!

MPEG stream: We Are The One
MPEG stream: Car Crash
MPEG stream: I Believe In Me
MPEG stream: Open Your Eyes

Eight brand new tracks of pummelling blasting grind from these Buffalo thrashers (not actual thrashers of buffalos, but thrashers -from- Buffalo). Insane blast beats with a dual vocal attack (one bark, and one growl, the growl being maybe one of the best

ALSO ON CD!!! A while back we reviewed Three Virgins, the 1986 debut from NZ pop weirdos the Axemen, and as a frame of reference for what sort of deviant pop to expect, we mentioned Strapping Fieldhands, Guided By Voices, Sebadoh, Thomas Jefferson Slave Apartments and older outfits like Captain Beefheart, the Velvet Underground, we also posited that these guys would have sounded right at home on legendary label Shimmy Disc. Well by 1989, very little had changed when the Axemen unleashed their second long player, Derry Legend. If anything, the songwriting was better, with some crazy catchy poppiness tucked amidst the sonic chaos, but otherwise, the sound was as ramshackle and al over the map as ever. The sound has definitely got some Flying Nun DNA running through it for sure. But those genes were mutating big time, and whatever similarities these guys shared with their fellow 'Nuns, the Clean, the Chills, the Bats, in the Axemen, those sounds were all twisted and tangled up into warped and warbly shapes, the sounds melty and druggy, loose and wild, and on the edge of total collapse. No surprise that Derry Legend was one of Kurt Cobain's favorite records, cuz it definitely has much in common with lots of his other faves: The Vaselines, Half Japanese, the Shaggs, etc. From snarly, snotty, swaggery jangle glam pop, to noisy, stumbly, fuzz drenched post punk, to hazy, drugged out fug-pop balladry (replete with Velvets style 'do-do-do-do' background vox), to damaged twee pop warble, to organ driven garage rock crunch, to almost fifties sounding rock and roll, to ominous, brooding drug folk, these guys tied all these disparate sounds into one ever-shifting, outsider mutant pop that will have weirdo pop obsessives freaking the fuck out!

MPEG stream: Disc To Disk
MPEG stream: You Gave Me The Power Of the Gangbusters
MPEG stream: Hey Alice!
MPEG stream: Mounring Of Youth

Baader Brains. This is one of those wonderful instances where the name kind of says it all: frenzied, powerful, pummeling hardcore punk mixed with the aesthetics and politics of extreme Marxist urban guerilla movements. It's by no means a novel combination, but it's incredibly rare for a band of this ilk to be so well done and for every one of its elements to have been given so much obvious consideration. Musically, The Complete Unfinished Works Of The Young Tigers takes the majority of its queues from Damaged-era Black Flag and the Gravity Records catalog, but manages to still sound vibrant, and totally current.�It's muscular, angular, fractured and anthemic all at once and recalls everything that makes us excited about this particular brand of punk rock (post-hardcore, or whatever you want to call it).�This should come as a surprise to anyone familiar with the pedigree of Baader Brain's membership: Mike Kirsch and Jose Palafox (guitar and drums, respectively) have done time in some of the heaviest hitters of the West Coast US hardcore scene since the late '80s.�Kirsch, in particular, is a revered figure in the Bay Area, having lent his talents on guitar, vocals and electronics to a long list of bands including Fuel, Torches To Rome, and Please Inform The Captain This Is A Hijack; while Palafox's drumming has been an integral part of Struggle, The Swing Kids, and Yaphet Kotto.�Both also did time in the mighty Bread and Circuits, who sole LP is an underrated classic.� Suffice to say, if you have even a passing interest in the catalogs of Ebullition, The Mountain Collective, Level Plane, or Gravity Records, this is going to freak your beak. Where Baader Brains becomes (as the youth say) some seriously next level shit, is with everything that surounds the music itself and their uncanny ability to balance the two without either one outshining the other.�The group's devotion to the aesthetic of leftist paramilitary revolution is beyond impressive, while their command and use of its related tropes and references is encyclopedic.�The packaging, album art, liner notes and samples that bridge most of the songs together manage to string together a bewildering series of shout outs (both blatant and subversive) to everything from the RAF to the Khmer Rouge to the PFLP to the Black Panthers and more (there's even some John Zerzan-style future primitivism thrown in there for good measure)!�It's a flood of images, sounds and references that manages to capture the frenetic audio-visual overload of the band's live show, something that we here in the Bay Area are lucky enough to get to see on a semi-regular basis (picture ever-evolving uniforms of the Young Tigers, imposters posing as the actual band being run off the stage at gunpoint, tiger striped balloons falling from the ceiling, split screen video projections, and a seamless integration of live music and samples all crammed together in about 20 minutes of whip-tight performance).�Baader Brains' commitment to its rigorous aesthetic is so complete and so all-encompassing in its mix of different media, that it almost makes more sense to think of this LP as a small part of a much larger piece of ongoing performance art.� That said, this is a seriously ass-kicking record and those of you with no interest in the band's political leanings or no knowledge of the references will find nothing lacking in the record's musical content. Unsurprisingly, The Complete Unfinished Works Of The Young Tigers comes lavishly packaged to the point that it took three separate labels to come up with enough resources to make it happen.� You get a full-colour jacket printed inside and out), an LP-sized obi, two separate insert booklets, and a fully printed inner sleeve.�It's seriously over-the-top, it's limited to 1000 copies worldwide (300 of those are on swirled yellow and black vinyl and yes we have a handful of those, but will be doled out RANDOMLY!!!), and is selling out all over the place.�Don't sleep on this one - this is one of the most exciting hardcore records we've heard in a long time, and we can't recommend it highly enough!

There aren't a whole lot of badass bands from New Hampshire. Hell, there aren't a whole lot of any kind of bands from New Hampshire. But if Backstabbers Incorporated are any indication of the kind of unrestrained metallic fury that lurks just below the surface of their seemingly placid New England home state, then we'll give New Hampshire a much wider berth in our future travels. Furious downtuned metallic punk rock crossover, with grinding riffs, thrashing drums, throbbing low end, howled vocals, but all packed into incredibly chaotic and head spinning arrangements, with plenty of plodding doomy breakdowns, and full on near-noise blow outs. Super intense and emotional. Way too metal for most punk rockers, this is fucking brutal and heavy and utterly pummeling. Think old Neurosis, Converge, Drop Dead, SSD and the like. Awesome.

MPEG stream: We Attack At Dusk
MPEG stream: Voorhees, Krueger, Myers And Bush
MPEG stream: Like Virgin Vinyl... In Bed

Okay drug rock freeks, space rock explorers, doomlords, sludge demons, prog obsessives, metal maniacs, stoner dudes, noise nerds, and basically most of the other folks who read this here aQ list, Bad Acid is the magazine for you. And calling Bad Acid a magazine is a bit of a misnomer. It's more of a multimedia spacemetaldoomprogsludgenoise experience. You think we're exaggerating? A seventy minute dvd, an ELEVEN HOUR mp3 audio disc, a nearly two hour long label sampler, AND a 60 page booklet/magazine packed with liner notes, articles and interviews. Packed with SO many aQ favorites, but just as many new bands we'd never heard, a bunch who could very well turn into new favorites. We've barely scratched the surface, since if we spent 14 hours on each review, the list would be, oh, about 5 items long. But from what we've heard / seen / watched so far, this latest issue of Bad Acid is pretty essential. The dvd first, a series of music videos, film excerpts and slide shows, we were mostly excited about the scenes from an Antonius Rex movie, Antonius Rex being the dude from JACULA!! Tripped out and satanic and appropriately what-the-fuck. Some killer live footage of doom mongers Ogre, a killer art gallery slide show from the Malleus artist collective, featuring an awesome soundtrack from Morkobot, a Northwinds video, and then some more obscure stuff, Manatees tour video, Wicked Minds video, King Suffy Generator video, Lento live footage and tons more. All woven together by some super creepy animated menus. Then there's the cd-r, featuring 11 hours of mp3's from Moss, Danava, White Hills, Barbara, Hey Colossus, Orange Sunshine, Capricorns, Khlyst, Acid King, Heresi, Raw Radar War, Fire Witch, Taint, Orange Goblin, Shinjuku Thief, Litmus and those are just the bands we know and already dig. 57 bands total, 102 tracks, tons of new bands to check out and discover. Also included is a label sampler focusing on the Bone Structure cd-r label, whose releases run the gamut from raw black metal, to buzzing industrial noise, to black ambient to grinding industrial weirdness. We actually have some BS stuff on the way, to be reviewed on the list soon, but this is a killer way to check out tons of stuff on the label. And then there's the actual magazine component, with notes on each of the bands on the cd-r, a feature on each of the bands on the dvd, tons of info about Bone Structure and the bands on the label, as well as interviews with Fire Witch, Taint, Orange Goblin, and probably most exciting of all Alan Dubin, formerly of Khanate, talking about his new band Gnaw, which features folks from Burning Witch, Thorr's Hammer, Atavist, Enos Slaughter and Ike Yard(!). Man, we can't wait to hear that. All of the above packaged in a standard dvd style case, with killer cover art from the Malleus Rock Art Lab. A bit pricey due to the weak dollar and the expensive overseas shipping, but pretty well worth it.

Yet another incredible collection of far out sights and sounds from the folks at Bad Acid. Everything from sludge to doom to psych to stoner rock to noise to weird jazz to fractured electronics to post rock and pretty much every stop in between. Rumor is that Bad Acid might be shifting to a monthly release schedule, which is certainly fine with us, but considering how much stuff is jammed into each Tab, we have no idea how these guys will be able to pull it off. But here's hoping, cuz not only is every issue loaded with tons of mp3s and videos and live performances from bands we already love, but also included are tons of bands we'd never even heard of before, many of which end up being be big time favorites. This time around, the audio compilation includes tracks from Gnod, Harvey Milk, Oxbow, Trollmann Av Ildtoppberg, Moss, 5ive, Berkowitz Lake & Dahmer, Blue Sabbath Black Cheer, Zu, Btong, Skull Defekts, Burmese, Cadaver Eyes, Pendo, L'Otracina, Enablers, Outrageous Cherry, Millions, Kenji Siratori, A Fashionable Disease, and that's just the bands we know, there are FORTY FIVE other bands!!! The dvd features Bay Area stoner stalwarts Acid King, as well as a whole mess of mostly new to us bands, offering up promo videos, live sets as well as animation and other visual weirdness. There's also a label sampler included on the disc, and then there's still the printed magazine! A thick dvd sized booklet, overflowing with interviews and articles and features and reviews, with most of the bands featured on the dvd as well all the notes for the artists included on the dvd (both the audio and video portion). Easily one of the most amazing resources for tripped out weird underground and independent music, and for discovering new bands, or even for actually finally hearing bands you'd always wondered about, it's a big ol' earful, and an eyeful, so best to set aside some serious listening / reading time, and just dive in. After all, since they might be bumping up their schedule, you might only have the next 30 days to make it through all this Bad Acid before you have Tab 9 to contend with...

All right doom / grind / stoner / sludge / heavy music obsessives, it's time for your now monthly (!) fix of extreme heaviness, in the form of the latest Tab of the Bad Acid audio/video zine, which is supposedly gonna be a monthly occurrence, which is definitely good for our ears, but makes keeping up a bit tough. But if you're into heavy sounds, then you're pretty much for sure gonna want one of these. First there's a DVD, this time featuring a couple aQ faves, Mono, Le Ira De Dios and Blood Fountains, a few bands we'd heard of: The Atlas Moth, Seven That Spells, as well as a whole bunch of new-to-us artists: Das Bluul, El Thule, !Xazzaz! and more. And that's sort of what makes Bad Acid so awesome, a few favorites, but even more new discoveries. Which is where the insane and epic audio compilation comes in. Check out this list: Circle, Cough, Skitliv, White Hills, Pelican, Weird Owl, Vincent Black Shadow, Poochlatz, Tusk, Grey Daturas, The Atlas Moth, Ufomammut, Sunroof!, Kemialliset Ystavat, Lords Of Bukkake, Atlas Sound, Eternal Elysium, and that's just the bands we've heard of. There are about 50 or 60 more! Then there's a sample for the Murkhouse label, as well as an art gallery, and that's just the DVD. There's also a huge printed magazine, with reviews of ALL the bands featured, plus interviews with Ancestors, White Hills and more. Not to mention the bad ass cover art. Housed in a dvd case, killer stuff, better grab one of these quick so you have time to digest all these heavy sights and sounds before it's time for Tab 10!!!!

Sad sad news, UK underground heavy/spacey/metallic/psychedelic magazine/compilation Bad Acid is no more. Longtime readers of the aQ list have no doubt enjoyed an issue or two (or three or four) of this sprawling publication, a combination printed zine, and computerized PDF zine, complete with an audio component that usually clocks in at at least 12 hours, sometimes twice that. It's been 10 years, and Bad Acid editor Dave Gedge has a family, and kids, has been losing money (magazines, even ones as amazing as Bad Acid are most definitely a labor of love) and furthermore is a Buddhist, so in addition to simplifying his life, Gedge has simply been burnt out, which is why this final salvo is called The Burnout Issue. And this final issue is the only bit of silver lining, but WHAT a silver lining it is. This final issue is in fact, THREE issues, #10, #11 and #12, and while the printed part might be the most minimal yet, it's more than made up for by the contents of the 3 dvd-r's. This time, the magazine itself is more of an index, as it takes EIGHT pages, in tiny text, to list all the bands and songs and videos and interviews and articles. As usual, it's split into sections, the first is the PDF magazine, accompanied by music from each band as well as a review of the band's most recent record. Some of the bands in the magazine this time around: Carlton Melton, Aluk Todolo, Bong, Plastic Crimewave Sound, Sylvester Anfang, Residual Echoes, White Hills, Der Blutharsch, GNOD, Jazzfinger, Grey Daturas, Hooded Menace, Necro Deathmort, The Gates Of Slumber, Flood, The Wounded Kings, Full Blown Expansion, Hey Colossus, Ancestral, Isis, Pelican, Scott Kelly of Neurosis, Sutcliffe Jugend, The Accused, Inade, The Brian Jonestown Massacre, Atomic Bitchwax, Snail, The Twilight Sad, Ramesses, Ufomammut, Witchsorrow, Assemble Head In Sunburst Sound, Slomatics, Root, Nordvargr, Antonius Rex, Russian Circles, Centurions Ghost, Nebula, Freedom Hawk, Steve Von Till of Neurosis, Leeches Of Lore, Dianogah, Sardonis, Torche, Turzi, Ancestors, L'Acephale, and loads more, including TONS of bands we had never heard of. The second section is the interviews, and features Meads Of Asphodel, Nadja, Expo 70, Centurions Ghost, Vincent Black Shadow, Gnaw, Unearthly Trance, At War With False Noise, Old Corpse Road, Alice Donut, and more! The next section features label profiles of Denovali, Rocket and Future Noise, featuring loads of recordings from lots of bands on each label. Then there's a section of bonus audio, with still more tracks, including jams from Sundial, B*Tong, Disappears, Fire Witch, Realmbuilder, Jex Thoth, White Buzz, Rich Hoak, Loscil, Jonas Reinhardt, Fauna, Big City Orchestra, and once again, a whole mess of bands we've never heard. There's also a bunch of videos, by Total Fucking Destruction, White Hills, Psychofagist and a bunch more, some short films as well, and finally, a section of bonus MP4's, featuring promo videos from Expo 70 and others, and more short films and live footage. Phew! It's epic and sprawling, and is equal parts rad bands you know and new discoveries. Way recommended for anyone who likes music AT ALL. But definitely Bad Acid leans toward the heavy and the psychedelic and the left of center. So yeah, obviously WAY recommend, and while Bad Acid will continue on in a different, bloggier, form, it just won't be the same, so you best buy this final issue of Bad Acid and add it to that shelf of magazines you keep and treasure and reread...

In case you missed it on our mystery themed in-between list last week, something we reviewed just for that, for the first time... It's pretty much acknowledged that Bad Brains are one of the most influential American bands of the 20th century, having blown the minds of every young hardcore band in the D.C. and New York scenes and beyond. Their sound went way further than just "punk" or "rock", blending jazz, fusion, and reggae into something that defies simple classification. While most people might be familiar with the group from their godly self-titled debut and after, Black Dots collects early material recorded at the then fledgling Inner Ear Studios from a session in 1979. The studio at that point was in owner/engineer Don Zientara's basement, with band members situated inside while H.R. did his thing in the backyard. It's easy to imagine how cramped things were, but between song banter reveals a band in good spirits as they tear the living fuck out of their early material. Bad Brains in '79 weren't as fast, distorted, and manic as they would become, but the chemistry is still totally unbelievable, sounding both loose and ridiculously tight at the same time. And even with modest recording gear the band sounds HUGE. This looser style works particularly well for their reggae numbers, always a point of contention with many fans. These recordings almost sound like some hyper charged group from the 60s taking things into new worlds. Not many bands could sound this bad ass while also sounding like they are having the most fun ever - but I guess if you wrote songs like "Pay To Cum", "Regulator", "Banned In D.C.", "Attitude" and everything else here, you'd also be having the best time ever. Loads of personality with this band (check out H.R.'s hilarious kiss off of "Bye, Celeste" at the end of "Red Bone In The City", their reworking of "God Save The Queen"), it's completely easy to see why they were such a force to be reckoned with. They were just different. Better. And again, completely bad ass. There's almost no point in going on with this review, sure you'll have some people who prefer what Bad Brians became, but others will tell you that music kind of doesn't get any better than this, stripped to its bare form. Whatever the case, it all leads to the same recommendation: ESSENTIAL.

MPEG stream: Don't Need It
MPEG stream: Don't Bother Me
MPEG stream: How Low Can A Punk Get?

We really didn't have very expectations for this one as most big time punk reunion records have been pretty dismal and depressing. But we're happy to report that this is not bad at all, in fact it's pretty damn good! With the original lineup together and Adam Yauch of the Beastie Boys on production duties, Build A Nation was recorded like the good old days, right to tape. Of course nothing Bad Brains could do will ever replicate the fire and intensity of their legendary ROIR debut, but this is for sure better then any of their releases in the '90s. Going back to their roots the record finds a nice balance of punk rock songs and HR's love of roots reggae and offers up a much less metallic slant then their last several discs. You can tell that Adam Yauch put a lot of love and care into recording his heroes and he really was able to get a sound from the band that represents so much of the best parts of who they are. Any self-respecting punk/punk-lover knows that Bad Brains are one of the most important bands in the history of American Hardcore so it's very nice to hear a new record from them that kicks serious ass...

MPEG stream: Build A Nation
MPEG stream: Jah Love

Bad Brains were (are?) arguably the greatest hardcore band of all time, and this collection of killer footage from three consecutive nights of shows way back in 1982 definitively demonstrate what a powerhouse they were. 1982 was indeed a good year for H.R. and the boys for sure, and by the looks of the crowd bounding all over the stage -at times it's hard pick out the actual band members -- they can do no wrong. The dreads may still short at this stage, and yes, there are a few Rasta soliloquies here and there, but for the most part, the mosh level stays high. Frontman H.R. is always in command, staking out his little portion of the stage, and while axeman Dr. Know is still developing his craft, even back then, he was already blowing minds. And it sure is pretty weird to see the bald white kids skanking around to the stony-Jah riddums... But that's part of what made Bad Brains so bad ass. It's a very racially diverse crowd and everyone seems to be there to mosh or skank and not to fight or fuck shit up. Which is pretty cool. The footage itself has a wonderful quality to it, especially for the era, the audio is good and it seems as though the video was compiled using the best songs from each of the three nights at CBGB. You can't go wrong with this, and we'd be hard pressed not to recommend this as CRUCIAL to your '80s hardcore video archive.

The newest offering from this 'intelligent' punk band. And while not their best record, certainly their best sounding (thanks to a sparkling and fairly creative Todd Rundgren production). They still remain head and shoulders above most pop punk bands. Catchy songs, hooks, and occasionally hyper-literate lyrics. It must suck to have helped define a genre, and then wake up one day, fifteen years later, opening for Blink 182. They deserve better.