Today New Brunswick, Tomorrow the World: Recent Episodes

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Unless your name is Drake, we hope you’re having a great summer!

This episode is coming at you on the Canadian August civic holiday… the middle of the summer for all intents and purposes!

And so here’s where we were circa a week and half ago… our summer jams! Click below… and don’t sleep on the YT playlist, neither!

https://youtu.be/hEFO-yytD48We’re burning up the time! #bogmonstermusicWe’re scorching this audio, fr #bogmonstermusic

Dan’s NotesSummer Jamshttps://youtu.be/besz5nsyQLI?si=vUi6OBJxxljGCWdrKamauu – WeidaminehBrooklyn singer/rapper Kamauu had one of my absolute favorite songs of three years ago in “Mango”, an alt-R&B slow jam which I can only describe as one of the most emotionally mature breakup songs I’ve ever heard. I was excited to see him switch more to more of a grooving hip hop approach in this collaboration with fellow rapper Siimbiie Lakew and cellist Trapcellist. This is some vegan food co-op polycule venn diagram overlap kind of music but in a good way? The way Kamauu weaves between singing and rapping really reminds me of a more patchouli-drenched East Coast version of Anderson Paak. Strings and tablas interweave while the artist assures us he is properly hydrated in the opening verse just so you know what we’re getting into but it’s also perfect music for smoking on hot hazy summer days so onto my list it goes.

https://youtu.be/VeT83ShQbBw?si=eyvEUj1vLjgxsG-JJD Cliffe – Buss Ur Head A fist-pumping experiment in crossing of genres streams, with North London emcee Cliffe rapping over a bass driven post-punk/indie rock track. A relatively new artist, the Nigerian-born rapper grew up with one sibling active in the UK grime scene and one who loved pop punk and emo and after years of absorbing these disparate familial influences started experimenting with a cross pollination of both for a sound he jokingly refers to as “grindie” (for grime+Indie) in the interview that accompanies his Colors Studio (popular Germany-based youtube channel focusing on hip hop and R&B music) recording of this single that mixes 00’s danceable indie rhythms, driving post-punk bass riffs and half-rapped half sung vocals. He’s a newer artist with just a few songs available widely via streaming but one I look forward to hearing more from in the future.

brat nigga summer by Cadena

Cadena – BRAT freestyle CADENA is the hip hop side project of show favorites ZULU’s guitarist/vocalist Destiny Yusuf, with a couple of pretty solid EP’s (also available on his bandcamp) under his belt over the past five years or so. Charli XCX’s BRAT album has been one of the biggest releases of the summer crossing sunny pop with chemically-fuelled club beats (not to mention its adoption as a vibe by a presidential candidate since I first started these notes so why not drop a killer freestyle over XCX’s “360”? This song was originally just available via his Instagram, but has now been put up on Bandcamp for our enjoyment.

https://youtu.be/_A6ApDZkdzc?si=YUnlMz8JPbOyYKENMach-Hommy – Sur Le Pont D’AvignonThis is me trying to catch up on a blind spot regarding Mach-Hommy’s solo work after hearing guest verses by the Haitian-American rapper with the everpresent bandanna covering his face on a few Griselda-related artists songs. It’s got a dusty Madlib-esque beat by Conductor Williams and a chorus borrowed from a French folk song and killer rhymes and is a must-listen for any fans of classic grimy NY hip hop, not unlike his fellow Griselda-mates like Westside Gunn and Benny The Butcher. Hommy really is one of the most skilled rappers in the game and I am glad that I am clearing out that previous blind spot regarding his solo work now (especially this year’s “#Richaxxhaitien” album that this track is from. A little bit of classic style boom bap for this list of songs for the summer.

https://youtu.be/c1UaGJlsw5g?si=UeLZYqBzc2opjlw5Yuki Chiba – Team TomodachiWell, I wrecked my YouTube algorithm again looking into music scenes from other countries again. This time I blame Megan Thee Stallion, or at least the guest emcee on her viral hit “Mamushi”, featuring Japanese rapper Yuki Chiba. I knew the genre was popular Japan but have been pretty unfamiliar with any artists of the genre from that country other than DJ Krush back in the 90’s. Team Tomodachi is Chiba’s most recent hit, and you can tell how popular it is by the sheer number of remixes/freestyle videos featuring seemingly every hip hip artist in Japan jumping on the instrumental all over the internet (I’m partial to the “Dirty Kansai” and “GALS” remixes personally). This total earworm has sent me down a Japanese hip hop rabbit hole lately that I’m sure will creep into a future show but had to find its way onto this list as well.

https://youtu.be/h3GT4xUAT3c?si=gwtKsdZeO2_vmLNkJoey Valence And Brae featuring Danny Brown – Packapunch!A love letter to 90’s “alternative rap” and early 00’s video game/snotty Sum 41 skate punk aesthetics, I have been been loving these guys two albums recently and this song featuring Danny Brown captures their whole vibe perfectly, like an alternate reality Beastie Boys/Cypress Hill collaboration between Valence and Brae’s shouts enthusiastic delivery and Brown’s high pitched nasal rhymes. Their whole deal is very much a conscious pastiche, but a loving one with great care taken in presenting it and goddamned if they’re not really good at what they do. A little bit of “Check Your Head”, a little bit Cypress Hill or Funkdoobiest, and a truckload of Jolt Cola’s worth of energy and charisma equals Joey Valence and Brae and I’ve been loving every second of their music.

https://youtu.be/nIdSPq5G1QU?si=9N1uR76m-Rh3hfbsBeton Arme – L’Union C’Est La ForceMontreal street punks recently on tour with show favorites Home Front whose name translates to “reinforced concrete”, newly signed to the great La Vida Es Un Mus Discos after a couple of EPs released on smaller labels. As Operation Ivy once said “there’s nothing wrong with another unity song” and these scrappy québécois oí boys have brought us one en Francais with a catchy whoa-oh singalong chorus. Have I mentioned that I do love a whoa-oh singalong chorus? They are definitely of the “wearing boots and braces to the function” kind of guys and for sure will be bringing the catchy riffs and passionate choruses with them (and probably lots of beer as well, unless they just drink all of yours instead. Tabernak c’est good punk rock hostie!

https://youtu.be/y0ZoX4dBvwk?si=x7wZ35Sdwk0VskW7Weird Al Yankovic – Polkamania You do not know what a boon to my mental health this was. I have been a fan of Weird Al Yankovic since childhood, and this first recording from old Weird in just about a decade may on the surface just seem like another one of his trademark polka medleys of popular hits of the day, but on a spiritual level represents a four minute dose of pure joy in audio form. Billie Eillish, Miley Cyrus, Adele, Ed Sheeran, Olivia Rodrigo, Ariana Grande, WAP (yes, the Cardi B/Megan The Stallion song) and even Taylor Swift get the polka treatment, with some well placed vaudeville-esque sound-effect work taking the place of some of the less family-friendly lyrics and just nothing but happiness and love maaaaaannn. I dunno, it’s been a bit of an eventful summer that can be a bit hard on the head and sometimes something like a new Weird Al song can really hit the spot st times like that, you know?

https://youtu.be/H58vbez_m4E?si=GgmpE1JCuFKtdLgyKendrick Lamar – Not Like UsWhat do I even need to say about this song? You’ve probably already heard it recently somewhere within the last couple of days and it’s been hovering around the top of the charts for like the whole summer. The final killing blow (for now?) of his series of systematic and thorough complete verbal assassinations of another artists’, he’ll another human’s character I think I’ve heard on record? Plus it’s probably the most straight up catchy thing Lamar has ever released. It’s been discussed to death already I know but there is no way any list like this could NOT have Not Like Us on there, you know? Plus having the legendary South Central community organizer Tommy The Clown and his dance students in the video was pretty awesome too. Also worth seeking out is the live video of Kendrick’s recent “The Pop Out” live show where he played the song through at least six times or more, never losing it’s impact once.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xaPNR-_Cfn0Chappell Roan – HOT TO GOUntil the green wave of BRAT summer washed over the pop culture landscape it looked like this Missouri-based synth popper’s campy angsty 2022 LP Diary Of Midwest Princess was going to creep up on top of the ultra-competitive “pop girly”mountain after years of toil on the sidelines, including backing up her long time friend and collaborator Olivia Rodrigo. This is one I’ve absorbed mainly via my partner who is a huge fan of hers and has been playing “…Princess” on repeat for most of this year but ear worms will ear worm and I’ve found myself humming along as well, even though a middle-aged dude like myself is most likely furthest thing possible from her target demo, but between the catchy songs and her distinct visual presentation that draws heavily from the more clownish end of drag aesthetics mixed with trashy John Waters camp it’s hard to not take notice so on the summer jam list it goes. Also, I can’t not mention that my original introduction to the music is Chappell Roan was via English Teacher turned professional wrestler “The Anxious Millennial Cowboy” Hangman Adam Page and his public Spotify playlists during the past few years.

Miscellaneyhttps://youtu.be/Zw_y3Kj_Sa8?si=lSuSV1RVtCxO8uzihttps://youtu.be/5DmLGUCmxD0?si=u-QgmwRNhzp056Vyhttps://youtu.be/LbDchA3xLE4?si=5CgmPFKytsDBnmKFMatt’s NotesIt’s the dogged dog days!

It’s the days I’m back in Western Canada, sniffing the air for smoke… contemptuous of Drake… getting ready to put down new personal and professional roots again… ready to go another six or eight weeks without seeing my kids…

Rejuvenating summery-like while there’s still time!

These singles have been living in my brain. I wake up humming along with Samiam, and contemptuous of Drake. It’s that kind of summer. It’s a bonfire of the schadenfreude.

Repeat after me: THEY NOT LIKE US, THEY NOT LIKE US!

Now pass the 0% Heineken…

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5suA4DBN6PgNot Like Us (Kendrick)This summer I’ve lost all perspective.

When the Apple Wrap comes out in November or thereabouts, I’m going to see analytics to the effect of MULTIPLE DAYS LEADING INTO WEEKS listening to nothing but Not Like Us.

It’s the catchiest shit in the world. That bass! Those strings!

Everything I dig about Kendrick… the writing… the flawless technical delivery… the personal history… the spiritual journalism… the swagger… the blazing intellect… humor jumping from every bar… educational as a motherfucker…

I’m a guy whose on his third hotel room and second city of walking around yelling:

BEAT YO ASS AND HIDE THE BIBLE IF GOD WATCHIN

CERTIFIED PEDOPHILE

CELL BLOCK ONE

THEY NOT LIKE US, THEY NOT LIKE US

I’ve listened to this track 1000% more than I’ve listened to any other rap track ever. On the other hand I’ve yet to to intentionally listen to a track by the 69 God. I say intentionally because there’s no escaping the Degrassi Cornball from Toronna. I probably watched the visual he did with Future, Khalid, and Bieber for the freak show value two or three times. Times have changed.

ANYWAY

LONG LIVE KENDRICK. HE DESERVES ALL THE AWARDS AND ACCOLADES THIS YEAR.

México (Samiam)https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tu0odiRmQnUThis time three months ago, I was still living in Saint John, New Brunswick, doing e-learning for a security company, and thinking that’s how it was going to go for the foreseeable while.

Subsequently, I was laid off… turned forty-six… recorded around a dozen interviews for this podcast and the education show… sold all my records… lost or replaced almost all possessions I owned whatsoever… got a new job… flew out to BC… visited my kids… and moved to Fort McMurray, Alberta.

I’ve been grabbing singles as a life preserver, basically!

I enjoyed… and continue to enjoy… Samiam’s excellent record Stowaway from last year!

People may recall that I spoke with Colin, their drummer, a couple of months back… and it remains one of my favorite chats of the series so far! I nearly went to Vancouver to see them play a few days ago… but elected to land in Fort Mac early… out of some notion of professional and parental and financial responsibility, somehow…

I’ve listened to this single on repeat for days… again, the Apple Rewind will tell the tale… much like their Stowaway single “Crystallized” was the song I listened to more than any other for 2023… if everybody listened to Samiam as much as I do… I think the world would legitimately be an excellent place!

In a parallel timeline in the Bog Monster Musical Multiverse (BMMM), their track 80 West from Trips is blazing through the Billboard Hot 100 and every other goddamned thing!

View this post on InstagramA post shared by Samiam (@samiam.band)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cef1cmipVugFirst Rodeo (Jon Snodgrass)I’ve had Jon’s brilliant new LP on repeat since I landed in Western Canada around three weeks ago… produced by Bill Stevenson and recorded at Blasting Room, Bill also plays drums on this record… which is part of why the whole thing slaps so hard!

Jon is one of these dudes who’s been around forever! His Instagram says his dates this year are his twenty-fifth anniversary shows! He’s one of these dudes who has been flying somewhat lower than on the radar than many of his contemporaries… I dug into this album at the recommendation of David from Rad Owl during our conversation for this show a month or two ago!

I’m walking up and down the one main street in this oil sands town… I’ve wandered among the dust and the human despair of downtown Kamloops, BC… I’ve watched the gorgeous women playing beach volleyball on the paths of Kelowna…

Somehow my life and my family’s lives are inextricably bound to this wild region of big skies, pickup trucks, and people with ideas that couldn’t belong anywhere else!

I’m running back West whether I want to or not… to anyone who said I’m not that bright… they were right!

There’s nothing wrong with your first rodeo! You’ll do great! Or you won’t!

For my McMoney, this is one of the best punk releases of the year!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mdZac5naBH4https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LEwLPZYkG9IWith Creswell and Wollard!https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wDgHtplAOyoGrowl (Rad Owl)When I started following Rad Owl on Instagram, it was on the basis of some cool images on their account… or maybe I tagged the Replacements or the Descendents and they followed me first…

Whatever the origin story, my interview with drummer David was another highlight for the podcast in a spring and summer full of them!

David is an incredibly thoughtful, intelligent guy… FOR A DRUMMER…

*Drum roll…

But, real talk, our conversation the other month was wide-ranging and clocked in at something like an hour-and-a-half… which is basically a double episode of sorts! And it could have been longer!

Every song on their new LP Rage Gracefully is blasted from the heaviest pop punk you could want… following Propagandhi, the Descendents, Samiam… along with Twin cities heroes The Replacements and Hüsker Dü… along with all the rad terrain thereabouts… they also lean into heavy metal and thrash… particularly Iron Maiden… in terms of leaning on the groove… with Motörhead… and Thin Lizzy… and Sabbath… and all that other fun, scuzzy 70’s and 80’s hard rock never far from reach…

At one point in our convo, David mentioned that everybody in Rad Owl contributes their talents and resources to the band, above and beyond musically… these guys are pros… they’ve been around… they’re lifers in this music… and it comes through in the songs, performance, and how they’re putting the record out!

Growl is just a great, fun barebones punk jam with serious metal and hard rock swagger. In times such as these, these tumultuous-as-fuck 2024 summer times… it’s exactly what the bartender ordered!

Rage Gracefully by Rad Owl

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j6EVwQJN3oABad Town (Op Ivy)Another track from my sojourn through Kamloops, BC!

After an utterly disastrous beginning to a personal trip there…

Let’s just say… in this city my career hit a half-decade of turbulence… my marriage reached the end of its track… I was unemployed for 16 months…

And besides the personal aspects… Kamloops, like no other city I’ve experienced… seems utterly powerless to do anything about significant numbers of homeless throughout downtown… many in acute drug and mental health crises…

It’s among the HOTTEST cities in Canada… and every summer I’m there… you wait anxiously for wildfire smoke, or the lack thereof…

It’s dusty… it’s dry… it almost never rains… there is some absolutely unique and breathtaking nature… and Indigenous and First Nations histories and culture… existing in parallel to an utterly stagnant downtown and North Shore…

And so, to keep my spirits up, I blasted the Op Ivy… give some enlightened formative ska kicks… give me a band from the late eighties that could’ve been anybody’s band…

This LP lands for me just as hard as it did when I heard it for the first time at age eighteen! And for my McMoney it has one of the best saxophone parts in the whole of punk music!

Positive fucking vibes to the rescue, basically!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ULLysSfZIFQhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_Zx-vUlFXEkhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dCcH0BV5sjohttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CoqsLJ2FNBwHenceforth & Furthermore…The Jesus Lizard... have been back for awhile now, reuniting periodically… but with Alexis Feels Sick and Hide and Seek as singles… they’ve released their first new music in more than twenty-five years… in advance of a new record “Rack” coming out in the fall… and they haven’t lost a (weird, shambling) step!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v50G3iSmdi8https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v50G3iSmdi8Ultrabomb… is an international punk supergroup, featuring Greg Norton (Husker Du), Finny McConnell (The Mahones) and Jamie Oliver (UK Subs). Their latest album Dying to Smile is out now! It sounds like all the good 80’s punk and hardcore… which is appropriate, giving the gentlemen’s histories and lineage!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zlveAf37fjEThe Hard Quartet… is a brand new band featuring Stephen Malkmus! Pavement are so rad that I will listen to this and enjoy the hell out of it pretty much no matter what!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JeOQhGkf0IYhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iEgUhAW2L4gNorthcote… I feel slightly weird and bad about Northcote! Matt Goud is a terrific singer and songwriter! He’s a millennial… born in 1985, as per Wikipedia. His record Hope is Made of Steel is one of my favorite Canadian post-hardcore things ever… I’ve written about him and talked about him variously on this show… I tried reaching out to him about interviewing for our podcast twice… the first time he ignored me… the next time, a year later, he initially seemed positive… and then he blocked me! He’s sensitive I guess! Matt… younger man… I’m sorry? No hard feelings, pal! Anyway, Hope is Made of Steel is terrific, and I’ve been listening to it a bunch here in Fort Mac!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LSCzdlJBvSohttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qeT5DyqfCaYChuck Ragan is touring South America with Hot Water Music behind their excellent new LP Vows… I’ve been listening to his 2009 solo LP Gold Country on repeat here in Fort Mac… particularly when out in the massive nature all around here! All of Chuck’s solo and folk and acoustic music is highly rad… and that’s good enough for rock n’ roll!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X4XXZZUPIGkUnless your name is Drake, we hope you enjoyed this! See you later in the dog days, dogs!

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Howdy, fellow aficionados!

On this episode of the TNB, we’re on about family-oriented acts…

As in, family members in the same band! What could possibly go wrong?

Please bowl over your siblings to get to these here media controls!

You will also, of course, want to check the YT playlist to go with this episode!

https://youtu.be/Ln4uJAy4PasWe’re all family, down here in the bog! #bogmonstermusic AKA… audio footage found in a blood-spattered barn! #bogmonstermusic

Dan’s NotesIn the family: Favorite musical relativeshttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oV3ZRbI_snghttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vmBDkYGVqGQNomeansno – Wright BrothersA seminal western Canadian punk band who embraced the darker side of the sonic palate during their 25 or so year run, John (drums) and Rob (bass) mixed the Residents with Joy Division, jazz experimentation with thrash bombast alongside a variety of collaborators (and an occasional hockey-themed side endeavour). I feel Ike there is a time when young folks are first getting into “alternative” types of music where they will initially pick a bigger band from the past as an anchor point and kind of build their framework of taste from there, like “old school” punk forebears as astrological sign or Sex And The City character in some kind of alt-rock training wheels personality test or something, and Nomeansno were that band for me, I played bass (poorly) and love that their songs were arranged around Rob’s gnarling bass riffs rather than the power chord guitar focus of so many other bands of their era. They could still do power chords just fine and better than a lot of people, as evidenced by their Slap-Shot (the movie not the band) inspired side alter egos The Hanson Brothers. There was always something just ugly and nasty in the best way to their music, whether percussive polyrhythmic freak outs or haunting bass driven dirges, literally nobody did it quite like Nomeansno. I am so grateful that I was able to see them in all of their glory, including the Hanson Brothers drummer playing along with Jon for the main part of their set and a fulll Hansons set as an encore, as well as seeing a mesmerizing Rob Wright solo performance a few years later, and will always treasure their music, as nasty and misanthropic as it can be sometimes. I don’t need to sell you on Nomeansno, you already know you love them so you should just go check out one of their albums again as soon as you get the chance, you know?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kOn_nS-Ihmwhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h9ONmfXN9DQHis Hero Is Gone/Tragedy – Todd And Paul BurdetteStalwarts of first the Memphis punk scene and later Portland Oregon, brother Todd and Paul Burdette had played in a variety of bands separately before starting His Hero in the mid 1990s. This band was seriously one of my absolute favorite bands during their brief three album run. Like, I seriously wore one of their shirts until it rotted off my body during my early 20’s extreme dirtbag era. Of course when I bought their debut “Thirteen Counts Of Arson” I didn’t realize it was a 45 RPM record and felt a little intimidated by what seemed almost too gutturally heavy until I put it on the right speed and then was blown away by their mix of anger, melody, and sheer heaviness anchored by Todd’s impassioned growls and ripping guitar riffs over Paul’s thunderous drums. After a couple of years of HHIG the brothers also started side project Deathreat (not to be confused with the similarly named Death Threat, a side project from some of the Hatebreed folks active around the same time) where Paul got to sing while his brother took over drumming duties. When His Hero called it quits following the departure of bassist Carl Auge in 1999, the remaining three members of the band (including both Burdette brothers and guitarist Yannick Lorrain whose praises I have sung on the show previously) reformed as Tragedy, blending a little classic 80’s hardcore-style seasoning into the mix that birthed the unfortunate genre descriptor of “Stadium Crust” to their sound, due to the big epic chords and dramatic dynamics of their songs especially in comparison with the three chord protoceratops bombast of so many of their compatriots. What can I say, HHIG were one of my absolute favorite bands for a good part of my early life so of course the brothers at the centre of it all had to be included on my list.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YL3iHhERWJwhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dmpOntxlbcYWaxahatchee/SwearinSiblings Alison and Katie Crutchfield started out in Alabama pop punkers PS Eliot in the late 00’s/early 2010s before becoming disillusioned with that end of the scene and the crappy macho attitudes and general bad vibes they ran into during that band’s run. Katie released her first album under the Waxahatchee moniker, American Weekend was released in 2012. The same year, Katie’s sister Allison and her Philly-based pop punk/alt-rock unit Swearin’ also released their self-titled debut. Waxahatchee have risen from folk-punk side project to one of the biggest artists in that realm where indie rock meets rootsy Americana over the course of the half-dozen or so full lengths between American Weekend, and her latest release, 2024’s Tiger’s Blood. Like “late night talk show musical guest” level big. Swearin’ had a few more stumbles along the way while still among some great music. They released their sophomore album Surfin Strange in 2013, and then after the next year took a couple of years off while sorting out some interpersonal stuff between band mates, reforming in 2017 and releasing their third album Fall Into The Sun in 2018.

I was even lucky enough to see Swearn twice over the years, once in the back of a weird vintage curio shop and once at Toronto’s famed Horsehoe Tavern. While Alison’s Swearin sound might hew a little closer to the pop punk end of things compared to Katie’s Waxahatchee work, both siblings have stayed close and even appeared on each other’s projects over the years and both write some pretty great songs in their respective styles so I had to include them on my list.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fxvkI9MTQw4https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oVk4xRdD5MAThe Breeders! – Kim/Kelly DealNot originally a family act, The Breeders started out as a supergroup made up of The Pixies’ Kim Deal, Belly’s Tanya Donnelly and Slint’s Britt Walford, by their second album the true core of Kim and identical twin sister Kelly Deal came together in time for their breakout Last Splash LP. “Cannonball” was one of the earliest songs I ever tried learning my ear on bass thanks to that distinctive opening riff that just crawls into your ear and just won’t leave. The band’s runaway success led to a hiatus in 1994 while both Deal sister sought treatment for substance issues but the band got back together towards the turn of the millennium with a new lineup and released the follow up to Last Splash in 2002, Title TK. they released one more albumin 2008 under that incarnation and then reunited with the lineup of the band circa Last Splash for a 20th anniversary tour celebrating that album, which is the version of the band that still plays around currently. While they only released a couple of albums initially, and technically with two very different versions of the band between their first and second albums, but for just a minute, The Breeders felt like one of the biggest bands going in that 90’s alt rock scene. Hell, even Kurt Cobain was a fan. That’s why I thought it was pretty cool to see recently that the chart-topping young pop singer Olivia Rodrigo personally asked the band to open for her at Madison Square Garden this year as they were apparently one of her favorite bands growing up. For their sheer impact over the course of just a couple of records I figured I’d have to mention them (oh yeah and there is Kim’s whole thing with that other band of hers you might have heard of as well, but we can save them for another show.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kSTAzgtps7Qhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nR8RMdQdgkwColin and Taylor Young – Twitching Tongues/Gods Hate/DeadfuckingbodyThese are a couple of younger Southern California dudes who I feel like needed a mention due to their influence together and individually on the modern hardcore scene. Colin and Taylor Young first really made an impact on the scene in their heavy hardcore-adjacent metal band Twitching Tongues whose first album Sleep Therapy came out in 2012. There are a certain kind of dude that you will find in the HC scenes who is not happy unless they have a million different side projects on the go at once, and the brothers Young are definitely of that ilk. They moved on to start Gods Hate afterward on more of a straight up “break your nose in the pit” sort of hardcore end of things, who I’ve talked about on the show before due to their vocalist’s other career as a professional wrestler. After GH made a huge splash at hardcore fests around North America, the brothers started their more death metal oriented Deadfuckingbody project to work on the more technical end of their riffage, not to mention Twitching Tongues reuniting over the past couple of years as well, and their many individual music-related endeavours. HTaylor has made his name as an esteemed producer for records by artists ranging from MSPaint to Xibalba, and Colin has not only composed multiple entrance themes for pro wrestlers on the AEW roster, he also co hosts the popular Hardlore and tends to just kind of pop up everywhere these days. These guys seem like some ambitious and talented young dudes who alsways have a ton of projects going on so I figured they definitely deserved a mention.

Matt’s NotesLet me thank Dan again, as I did in this space last time, for choosing a topic that is pretty easy to populate… in fact, trying to limit this to six or seven artists was somewhat of a challenge… like actually REALLY a challenge…

It turns out family and rock music goes together like Texas and cannibalism…I mean like generational poverty and class exploitation… I mean, uh…

You think your people are better than mine? Why don’t you come over here and say that!

Sir, this is a Wendy’s

ANYWAY…

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P1BjndTZvQYhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Efg1h0EzLeEThe NationalAs mentioned during the recording, I really dig the National! Who are uh… two sets of brothers, one of them being twins… and then Matt, the singer… which for siblingdom gets even weirder!

Boxer, High Violet, and Trouble Will Find Me are all, for me, perfect albums! Not one skippable song in the lot! You can also make a strong case for Alligator as having some of the smartest, darkest, most awkward songs of the mid-00’s!

Anybody who loves indie rock and Spın̈al Tap… which should be all of you!… will enjoy the Mistaken For Strangers film about the National… by Matt Berninger’s somewhat… uh… Lebowski-esque filmmaker brother… or rather his attempt to make a documentary about the National…

To paraphrase Wayne’s World… you’ll laugh, you’ll cry, you’ll hurl!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FNmprL3SOlMhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RqDOS1ckOOghttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=agKbfKt5lRoThe ReplacementsI’m including the ‘Mats here simply because without the Brothers Stinson we have no indie or alternative music as we know it… the entire trajectory of popular music becomes questionable… unmoored from its tether…

The word is, and by “word” I mean “unsourced commentary on rock websites from some years back”, Kurt C named the second Nirvana LP after one of the tracks on Pleased to Meet Me… and to go deeper into the ‘Mats lore than anyone wanted… as per Westerberg, the song in question is a response to his feelings about Bob Stinson… fired for many, many things in a band used to going far beyond driven…

What we’ve learned from Bob Mehr’s brilliant, no-stone-left-unturned Trouble Boys biography is that Bob suffered terrifically from domestic abuse during highly formative childhood years… and that he and his younger stepbrother Tommy went on to have a permanent and profound impact on popular music of the late 20th Century is nothing short of a goddamned miracle.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FHXBOoDmQk8https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_w9sCTtZ9EAhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W1AL2oTiTU0The Jesus and Mary Chain It gives me great pleasure to finally have the opportunity to properly praise the brothers Reid!

Listen, you want noise, drugs, terrible hair, and that utterly dire, particularly Scottish sense of humor and irony paired with deep fatalism… which characteristics tend to run deeply in Maritime Canada, as far as it goes!… you cannae dae better, ken?

I know that Psychocandy is an LP that turned the world upside down… but for me, it’s really Darklands and Stoned and Dethroned that blow the doors down… and Automatic is pretty off the hook… and probably there’s a bunch more in their later catalogue that is worth checking out… Munki, in particular…

I think I got their city in Scotland wrong. As my Scottish forbearers may, somehow, be sad in the Scottish afterlife… TJ&MC hail from Glasgow… you know… like of “Glasgow smile” fame?

Don’t even get me started on Irvine Welsh. Or haggis. Or kilts. Or Robbie Burns! Just don’t!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WdAcS4c0-QkRaised on Losing Ground by Last Wolf in the Woods

Last Wolf in the Woods I didn’t mention this on the show for lack of time, but boy oh boy is this a departure… of sorts! For Ben “Lucero” Nichols! This synth band is a collaboration with his daughter Joslyn Milburn! And I’m here to tell you that songwriting and vocal performance must be in the home… cause this seems way accomplished for a singer of her years!

This came out with low fanfare and a Bandcamp page last year, and what’s caught my attention listening to it for the first time since then… is how much it sounds entirely like it’s own thing… when Ben sings, it’s one of the most distinctive voices in contemporary rock music… but because the instrumentation is so utterly different than the punk Americana that Lucero has made their own over the past twenty-plus years… it really defies separating the parts in your mind when you listen…

Furthermore, as per the Bandcamp… it’s the soundtrack to a forthcoming graphic novel! Which explains the wide expanses of… synths… many bars without lyrics or singing… heavy on atmosphere cause synthwave, but also in keeping with an aural experience to be complemented with a narrative and a visual!

Ben’s brother is the immensely talented Jeff Nichols… whose film “Bikeriders” has opened in theaters across North America lately… that’s to say Joslyn’s uncle… said motion picture being named after Jeff’s brother’s Ben’s band Lucero’s song… it’s downright cinematic, right?

You have families of doctors… lawyers… cobblers… carpenters… and artists! It’s an excellent thing to hear!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NIQbPZXj51Ehttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qVWyLKUQBcMhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w5a-ebgtt-olast man standing by MISSING

And then some!!Really, we need to do another episode, at least one more, about family acts!

As mentioned in the podcast, I have deep love and respect for members of Fredericton skatepunk stalwarts Missing featuring brothers Jon and Matt Bowie! Missing were legit in all kinds of ways beyond the musical… including in the Deleted Scene website (RIP), show promotion, and in many other projects and in many other ways generally… musical and otherwise!

Tough Crowd by MISSING

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fa9nN3G2CSgIf you’re talking family acts in Canada, you have to include the Timmins siblings… the three or four of them who have, for the most part been most of the lineup for many these long decades since the late 80’s when they started out in the family garage in Toronto! That’s about as real as it gets for my era and my milieu… late Gen X and pre-internet teen years for the win! Furthermore, while I can’t speak to any of their other albums meaningfully… I can definitely say that Trinity Sessions is one of the most Canadian folk rock things ever… it holds a special place… it’s nighttime listening, 100%!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6cBIVabiuR0https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zQMMQXlEd3Ehttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ub41uq332F0If, somehow, you missed the documentary A Band Called Death, from about 10 or 12 years back, do yourself a favor and give it a stream! It tells the story of one of the heaviest, early punk bands… Death… from Detroit… managed to record an absolutely killer EP… and then live on in dignified, working class low-key lives… until in the early 00’s when the recordings resurfaced through family connections (?) and thence resulting said documentary and, including presently, playing live and doing some limited touring. …for the Whole World to See is an essential EP for fans of this kind of (rad) music!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RDPDm9_nX0ohttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PE5f561Y1x4Finally, I can’t let these notes go by without shouting out the Screaming Trees… the shoulda-been’s of Seattle grunge… as per Mark Lanegan’s deathly funny memoir Sing Backwards and Weep, recording sessions and live performances could erupt in major fisticuffs… and wrestling… between brothers Van and Gary Lee Conner… thunderously, as these dudes were pretty ginormous! It was largely due to this tension between everyone in the band, as per Lanegan, that they got as far as they did, touring with the likes of Alice and Chains, Neil Young, Oasis, and many others. Now Lanegan is gone, and so is guitarist Van, both within the past two or three years, and both relatively early in middle age.

Weirdly, or not!, this puts me in the mind of something to the effect of take care of the people around you… and reach out to them more than you already do…

I’m gonna get weepy if this keeps up!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SzUMONclI8oWe hope you love and/or are loved by your family! Whom or whatever that may be!!

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https://youtu.be/xl9Z3u___LYFrom Brooklyn, USA… with radness!! #bogmonstermusicEast Coast punks forever!! #bogmonstermusic

Opposition by TheNewSame

More Radness Than You Can Handle??It’s hard to express how stoked I was around a week ago when Colin replied kindly and quickly to my completely unsolicited Instagram DM!

I’m used to artists blocking or limiting their DM’s to people who… are actually friends! Or people in the “music industry”!

My feeling with this show is… punk in approach, professional/academic in execution! And so Instagram is… for me… like the parking lot outside the venue at a fucking rad all ages show! If you’re in the parking lot getting high or smoking or drinking or being straight-edge or whatever… you’re fair game!

And so, much respect to Collin for being a talented, prolific artist… but also just for being a straight-up awesome dude… in the true punk rock spirit! Your genuine kindness and clear passion for everything you do is an inspiration, pal! Real talk!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pMtj2kSpd5USome highlights from our convo are as follows!

Checking out Colin’s significant Discogs page… and his Wikipedia page... these only tell part of the story! But it’s one hell of a story…

Little Rock’s punk scene in the 80’s and 90’s was so rad, they made a documentary about it! And an accompanying soundtrack! And Colin’s early bands are all over them!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8rmqURFbcrkhttps://youtu.be/ht47amM4rdQ?si=YOJeLWPqd1fxUPXZColin remains tight with his pals in Little Rock’s The Big Cats… and they play gigs whenever their schedules allow… which can be tough cause Jason White also plays in a little group called… uh… Green Day…

ANYWHO

Seriously, Samiam’s Stowaway from last year remains one of my favorite of all their many, many brilliant LP’s. I’ve spent entire days listening to Crystalized on repeat! And the video is actually super-cool… a rare thing for any music video, in my opinion! Colin’s playing is a major part of why Stowaway sounds so rad… contemporary and forward-looking, somehow! It’s a pretty awesome thing!

Colin’s been living in NYC since the late 90’s… and he makes music outside of Samiam as TheNewSame… so you 100% need to check his Bandcamp… and TheNewSame’s Instagram!

Probably my biggest takeaway from the chat was how much friendship factors into what Colin is up to! In the dozens of bands and acts he’s been involved in a decades-long career in music, creative potential and hanging with pals figures highly as motivators. That is as rad… and as punk… as it gets!!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5h959KRTiccOctopi ftw! #bogmonstermusichttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=68CLHsN3hPwBerlin, Germany, January 2024 #bogmonstermusichttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Waa9-p3-GUkDudes, we are stoked Colin joined us for this show! Thanks to you’s also for checking it out!

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All we are saying is give war a chance!

Folks, in the nearly two years since this pod slithered from the bog seldom… OK… never… have we done a double-episode before…

Furthermore…

Matt Gay is the rock star we need in such fucked up, tumultuous times such as these! Fire might kill The Thing… but it only makes Matt Gay stronger!

Click below if you think you can hang!

https://youtu.be/HWeQGPw4SOwToo much handsomeness and too few pixels! #bogmonstermusicThis gets you to the smoke break! Who’s got a lighter? #bogmonstermusic

You don’t have to go home, but you can’t stay here! #bogmonstermusic

Your band’s Bandcamp page sucks compared to the the mighty Fuckhawk! #bogmonstermusic

FUCKHAWK: Touch It by FUCKHAWK

FUCKHAWK II: Street Fuckin' by FUCKHAWK

So You Wanna Soar Like a Fuckhawk?I swear on the Hair of Fabio that this is the most fun we’ve had doing one of these… pretty much ever!

Matt Gay is a party you can’t contain.

The cops are knocking, but we can’t hear ’em!

You don’t go to a Fuckhawk show to not see Matt Gay set himself on fire… ON YOUR BEHALF!

The radness contained in these recordings oughta be illegal, but we left society behind a long time ago!

Finally, I am pleased to share that Matt Gay has accepted my generous offer of pro bono employment, sans benefits, and as such is now Principle Consultant — Upper Canada for 506 Consulting (2022) Ltd!

The stoke factor runs amok!

https://youtu.be/-jKXtwe9QAkSeasonally infected! #bogmonstermusichttps://youtu.be/mh8b1yv6XpUWake up and smell the Fuckhawk #bogmonstermusicThe Roar of the Fuckhawk Will Not Be DeniedAnyway, here are as many tracks as I think is reasonable to share from our double-fisting r&r extravaganza!

You definitely have participated in ROCK HISTORY, pals!

Humbling, right?

Better get used to it… whenever Matt Gay is around!

For all inquiries regarding Fuckhawk and/or Matt Gay musical performances and/or speaking engagements and/or other media queries, please reach us via:

Dr. Matt Stranach

Principle Consultant

506 Consulting (2022) Ltd:

https://linktr.ee/matt_506

506 Consulting (2022) Ltd., Trading Cards… coming soon… by unpopular demand! #bogmonstermusic

ANYWHO

Here are Matt Gay’s Three Favorite Bands!

1. Ramones
2. RAMONES
3. R.A.M.O.N.E.S

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sp3zaeOyL7Qhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HJWFsZ_YUc4https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OfIfzVf8t6ET.H.A.N.K. YOU— 4 ALL U DO! Don’t be stranger than you have to be!https://youtu.be/ZOr_x_9GBC4Think you can hang with the ‘Hawk?? #bogmonstermusic

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Dudes, I am shocked… I am downright SHOOK… at the radness of our second TNB interview!

David Jarnstrom plays drums in Minneapolis post-hardcore supergroup Rad Owl… whose members have collectively played in countless vital, significant bands over the decades… including the likes of Gratitude, Samiam, Marble, The Stereo, and many others!

Warning: despite my plan to keep the chat to 30-40 minutes, it turns out David and I have a lot in common… weirdly so, in fact… and so… the convo goes a bit long!

Too much radness is never a bad thing, dudes!

https://youtu.be/uvi0x8lSLn8Our separateness is exceeded only by our radness! #bogmonstermusicWe are getting into prog-rock levels of length! #bogmonstermusic

Rage Gracefully by Rad Owl

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wDgHtplAOyoRadness Contained HereinSeriously, though…

Anybody who has known me since around age 15 will… WEARILY tell you… I’ve had KISS-like… Rush-like… Grateful Dead-like… obsession for twin cities juggernauts the Replacements & Hüsker Dü… so when David starts talking about First Avenue… and the Replacements House… and all these local-to-him things… let’s just say it lands pretty seriously!

Furthermore, it was clear from when I first dove into their Bandcamp… that David and I for sure have lots and lots of the same taste in music… evident in the recordings, and in the LUCKY THIRTEEN (ahem) tracks below…

But… for sure… you need to do yourself the immense solid of checking out their Bandcamp… which will get you to their bio… and various social media!

The new album Rage Gracefully is one of my favorite punk/hardcore things to come out so far this year! It was even released on my birthday… weirdly!

Much respect and appreciation to David for joining us… we’re looking forward to hearing about further recording and touring with these dudes!!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v4luz6oCjCkhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mdZac5naBH4https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oNiD5dYoi0shttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uN8kvgWYuKkThirteen Rad Trackshttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y6UVcvldh7Mhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BuRHgn1avVEhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4OC9r-a_DpAhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J1sYN0PuRs4https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4lgYw5DOZx8https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zYCeLpqWI5chttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FmRpWhC7_bwhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dXTYw4ETyd0https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pMtj2kSpd5Uhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xQF5xuLrjpYhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WxnN05vOuSMhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eiOeBTAI-3EThanks David, Rad Owl, MPLS, & yerselves!!

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Our first-ever TNB interview is with Chris Bose of Horse Funeral Band!

Chris is a Secwépemc multi-disciplinary artist and musician currently based in Secwepemcúl̓ecw (Kamloops, BC). An independent musician for many decades, Chris’s latest project is Horse Funeral Band which he describes as “three-chord acoustic punk”… which it definitely is… but it is also so much more, with influences ranging from early metal, hardcore punk, alternative music, industrial, and even electronic and house music.

It was absolutely brilliant speaking with Chris about Horse Funeral, and some of his other artistic endevours! Links to Horse Funeral music, and other are in the notes below.

Please click for video and/or audio as you like!

https://youtu.be/4G9gHoAV-MQFrom Secwepemcúl̓ecw to you! Via the YouTubes! #bogmonstermusicThe sounds in the background are not horses’ hooves, but instead other sounds of everyday life! #bogmonstermusic

Songs for the Lost by Horse Funeral Band

Notes and ResourcesHorse Funeral: Bandcamp

Horse Funeral: Instagram

Chris Bose Land: Patreon

Chris Bose: Artist website

FirstVoices: a Secwépemc language resource

And of course, there are probably even more!

Be sure to catch Chris and Horse Funeral Band at these upcoming gigs in the early summer!

Horse Funeral Demo by Horse Funeral Band

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DVOImtJY7poFlash before our eyes! Now it’s time to nap! #bogmonstermusicSome of Chris’s FavesDuring our chat, I asked Chris about some of his favorite and/or most memorable musical artists from across the years… here are a few!

Matt’s note: I have absolutely got to check out the Smalls!!*

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VXeWoiESbPIhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9PuLc6wN8M8https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E3R_3h6zQEshttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K3b6SGoN6dAhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T4MBwvZWOQEhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TMZi25Pq3T8https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O1XGmYFPv_shttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t-_6iLE64Lohttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ah9NdBKkEQYFolks, we are so stoked you joined us! kukwstsétsemc!

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Welcome to the one about concept albums!

What a concept for an episode, right?

Phew… tough crowd

Anyway, pleased to be having at the clicking!

https://youtu.be/_StlyFuw2eELife is a highway… Audio

Caption

And… you know for sure the episode goes down way better with the requisite YouTube playlist!

Dan’s NotesConcept Albumshttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ngBhubzCd6ghttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q9YvDfiAXT8Mountain Goats – Beat The ChampPart reflection on Mountain Goats mastermind John Darnielle’s love of the territories era of the squared circle during a difficult part of his childhood, part exploration of the small time grappler’s journeys on the road as metaphor for our struggles against The Big Darkness in life, this album is also one of my absolute favorite bands writing 13 great songs about another one of my favorite things. I feel like films like the recent “The Iron Claw” (whose subjects the Von Erich family’s WCCW promotion was a big part of the so-called Southwest Territory of the National Wrestling Alliance cartel of regional promotions at the time, and was where several of the actual wrestlers referenced on this album like Bruiser Brody and Chavo Guerrero worked back in the day) really capture the emotional weight that the stories told in-ring can carry, as well as the physical and emotional toll it takes on the people who tell those stories for a living, especially in hard-traveling days before it became a big money TV-based industry, so why not have one of the best lyricists in indie rock, whose songs often tell the stories of people en route between one place and another, and often in the midst of destroying themselves in the process, to write an album’s worth of songs about self-destruction for the sake of storytelling? The songs are divided between meditations on the lives (and deaths in one case) of actual figures from pro wrestling of the era, including a chilling retelling of the murder of Bruiser Brody in “Stabbed To Death Outside Of San Juan”, and small stores based around aspects of the small town travelling wrestler’s life like “Werewolf Gimmick” and “Southwest Territory”. On top of it all it’s another great album by one of my favorite bands of the part thirty years or so and therefore definitely a recommend from me and one I had to include here.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B9OaLXdOrkEhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z9cUHHxlLOAPanopticon – KentuckyMasterminded by Austin Lunn from Louisville KY, released in 2011 as his first really high profile release under the Panopticon moniker that he would later expand into a full band in the mid 2010’s. Imagine a musical version of Harlan County USA or Matewan, but with blast beats and also ocarinas and ocarina solos over blast beats. And lots and lots of banjos. The blending of melodic black metal and folk music is something not new to the genre, but usually coming more from the traditions of the Scandinavian regions the genre rose out of, and a lot of time in service of sketchy right wing ideologies. Panopticon take it all in a different direction by marrying black metal with the Appalachian folk music of their home alongside a heavy dose of good old socialism and tales of union struggles against exploitative employers in the mining industry of the region. I thought the idea of mixing black metal with other folk music forms works really well on this album, with bits of quiet melody of the folky bluegrass parts of things add a really cool counterpoint to the blasting black metal bits, and really fit well with the working class themes of the lyrics. Hell, they straight up cover Florence Reece’s union anthem of the 1930’s Kentucky Miner’s strikes that partially inspired the record – the rousing “Which Side Are You On?” partway through the record. The great film podcast Horror Vanguard recently did an episode looking at the 1976 documentary “Harlan County USA” about the bitter fights between miners’ unions and exploitative resource extraction companies in rural Kentucky over the years in the context of a tale of horror, but one where the murders are conducted via economic exploitation and environmental degradation rather than chainsaw or knife fingered glove so why not make an album in the spookiest of metal subgenres to tell a similar story. If you’re interested in black metal, roots/americana type music and/or working class politics I’d say give this album a spin!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mW0-jrDeSgQhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=syg6XGbdUkMFucked Up – David Comes To LifeWhat do you do when you are Canada’s most sonically ambitious critical darling hardcore-meets-shoegaze-meets-etc band after winning one of your country’s biggest musical awards on your second album? Why double album rock opera expanding the narrative of a song on your first album into an 18 song nearly 80 minute epic about love and death set against the backdrop of labour unrest in 1980’s Thatcherite England of course, that being Fucked Up’s David Comes To Life 2xLP released in 2011. Oh yeah with an accompanying “soundtrack” of songs by imaginary bands played by different combinations of the FU crew and their friends making the music that they imagined the central characters of “David….” would have listened to in the accompanying David’s Town 12” released alongside the record to boot. I said they were ambitious, right? One of the things I really like about Fucked Up is that they don’t mind taking time to explore an idea with a song, and while they use a pretty standard punk/indie framework as a starting point, they build all sorts of little ebbs and flows and weird shifts in sound in very galaxy-brained ways of a band that you know are all just a bunch of total record nerds at heart. This makes them the perfect sort of band to try and pull off a full on rock opera in continuing their tragic tale of the fictional titular David who tried to blow up a factory whose workers were locked in a bitter strike to impress Veronica, one of the strike’s organizers who he was also in love with, who first appeared in the song of the same name from their 2006 album Hidden World. Is this the Quadrophenia of the GTA hardcore scene? Who knows, but this band is one that has never let anyone tell them what they should be doing or how they should be doing it, whether it’s a rock opera or their recent collaborations with EDM-meets-First Nations music pioneers The Halluci-Nation or bringing a touring company of punk scene-adjacent professional wrestlers to have matches before their sets on a recent road excursion of theirs. These folks really paved the way for a lot of your Turnstiles and whatnots in terms of expanding the sound and reach of hardcore over the past couple of decades and this double album is definitely Fucked Up at their most Fucked Up-iest so if you somehow haven’t heard it already so for sure check it out.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vBxC_QKHAqMhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qb2BRH5WIbIMilemarker – Satanic VersusThis was going to be a runner-up for me at first, and then one of the key figures in realizing part of the overarching concepts passed away not long before we recorded and I figured it needed to get a slightly fuller mention. I first got into Milemarker via bassist/vocalist/band cofounder Al Burian’s old zine Burn Collector (whose expansive eighth issue is secretly one of the great Punk Rock Novels of the 90’s) and his previous band Hellbender (who were more on the pop punk side of things) and much like his zine, Milemarker are definitely a band I would best sum up as “clever”, from being the first band to my knowledge to make a punk song entirely out of samples of other punk songs on one of their earlier albums, to a whole other album to talking about advertising and using idealized images to sell products on their other concept album Frigid Forms Sell, to this six song mini-LP/EP/what have you from 2002 that examines the encroachment of the digital further and further into daily life but with a hook – three of the six songs were recorded at Chicago’s storied Electrical Audio Studios with the recently departed Steve Albini, using only vintage tube amps for their guitars and analogue synthesizers for their potent post hardcore jams, while the other three tracks were recorded entirely using gasp computers at a time when that technology was not necessarily so available to The Punks, along with using programmed drums and various MIDI sounds and veering into almost Daft Punk-esque electronica. I think the “analog” songs just pack a little more punch to me of I had to pick between sides, but this record came out in 2002 and getting dance music all over your post hardcore was the style at the time in those days for sure. Still, a cool and clever idea for a record from a band with a lot of cool and clever little ideas at the time and worth checking out for sure.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-HW7nj-GUZYhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BjIBOvjL884Prince Paul/Dan The Automator as Handsome Boy Modelling School – So How’s Your Girl? I realized after putting this list together that a few of my picks’ central concepts are a marriage of two disparate flavours – black metal and rabble-rousing folk music in Panopticon, musical theatre and yesterday’s hamfisted attempts at social commentary dressed up in a given medium in Webber’s JC Superstar, and this album – a marriage of celebrating the oddball rough edges of a genre (while lamenting its turn to the consumerist and commercial) while also paying tribute to a beloved obscure TV sitcom – Prince Paul and Dan The Automator’s first album under the Handsome Boy Modelling School moniker, 1999’s “So How’s Your Girl?”. The group’s name comes from an episode of Chris Elliott’s weird and wonderful sitcom “Get A Life!” Prince Paul has been one of the founding fathers of so-called alternative rap since producing the first three De La Soul albums in the late 80’s-early 90’s (and also for better or worse creating the concept of the between song interstitial skit in the process) and Dan The Automator broke out in the mid-late 90’s as producer on Kool Keith’s Dr Octagon album and is probably best known as the non-Albarn half of Gorillaz so their bonafides are there for sure and you could tell how hip hop’s turn to the shiny and pop-oriented maybe was not their favorite evolution of the genre, so on this album they assemble a rogues gallery of indie and left of centre hip hop and electro collaborating on a series of songs . Everyone from Del Tha Funky Homosapien to Kid Koala to Moloko to a pre-right-wing-grift-turn Sean Lennon to Father Guido Sarducci show up to collaborate on the album’s 17 tracks, all tied together by sketches featuring Paul and Automator as the titular modeling school’s instructors trying to entice the day’s rappers into enrolling in their college of fanciness and vacuous fashion and abandoning any grit or integrity. Sure it’s more “compilation of tracks by iconic hip hop producers and a ton of guest stars tied together by some sketches paying homage to an obscure but beloved sitcom” than full on concept album but it’s a favorite and I am making the picks here and I say it counts.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_FA12-0u4Yshttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7svsYXjXT48Jesus Christ Superstar – The Album (1970) A who’s who of UK Blues/psych rockers team up with Andrew Lloyd Webber for his rommeditation on celebrity and the co-opting of political movements through a retelling of the last week of Jesus’ life through the eyes of his friend Judas, leading to a stage musical and eventual movie adaptation. Sure, it’s a musical based on part of the bible that is the epitome of the “well I know about another guy with long hair and some wild ideas who was really trying to make a change, maaaaan” trope of the era, and in the over the top campy way you could expect from the dude who made CATS but goddamn this silly musical has grown on me over the years. I tend to look at it the same way I look at stuff like the original Star Trek series and first couple of Planet Of The Apes movies (seriously check out Beneath The Planet Of The Apes if you have not already) – using genre fiction to pass along some sort of social commentary. Sure the genre in question here is one that may seem a little out of place to a lot of what I talk about on here, not just with the musical theatre but the Biblical subject matter, but it’s more using the characters of Jesus, Judas, etc to tell the story of what happens when popular figures go from leaders to celebrities, with a groovy late 60’s hippy gravy slathered all over it (or the closest Weber et al could reproduce working with folks from bands like Manfred Mann and Deep Purple contributing to to it). Also, anyone who lived in Newfoundland during the lifetime of multimedia magnate and total weirdo Geoff Stirling (check out a pretty apt eulogy of the man here if you are unfamiliar https://www.vice.com/en/article/dpk7k7/geoff-stirling-tv-man-and-cosmic-guru-was-the-weirdest-man-who-ever-lived-in-newfoundland) would have had grown used to annual viewings of the Norman Jewison-directed early 70’s film version on Stirling’s NTV channel (with the audio of the film simulcast on the radio stations he owned as well) that were one of the slightly less oddball requests he would make of the broadcast outlets he owned. I dunno, it’s a campy favorite of mine with some fairly groovy sixties-rock-meets-showtune songs so I wanted to include it on my list, dammit.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DRNT69NN1YcMountain Goats – The Best Ever Death Metal Band Out Of Denton (because it might just be my favorite MG song)https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8KVsaoveTbwMiscellanyhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=whF_EabanNAhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yjuUwG1T_0chttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SrVdvQAqV4IAn excerpt from the DARK SIDE OF THE RING episode on the murder of Bruiser Brodyhttps://youtu.be/x5xMq-pgKjc?si=cvZmMRewOdVcLx_Jhttps://youtu.be/BRNnU1saw3c?si=1WqQEkLrHNXzVEzAhttps://youtu.be/whOnGFCsrGE?si=LCcHedNKIY24AApIhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uMuEnNxX1E8Matt’s NotesAs ever, I dig a gimmick! And the gimmick herein… “concept records” offers an abundance… a veritable plethora… a goddamned early 90’s PONDEROSA STEAKHOUSE SALAD BAR… of options… unlike say… cough

…the comedy episode from some time back… with all respect!

Anyways, I feel very much like this could be part one of many, many more. But… I leave this, conveniently, to Dan… the Director of the wider TNB endeavor, to be sure…

So… in terms of concept albums… these are basically the ones I thought of first. And the first bunch of them are mightily essential documents of rock any which way you look at it…

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m1tMfKl5b8Mhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x1TR13o1KsMLiz Phair: Exile in GuyvilleGoddamn.

How the fudgsicle to even start without sounding creepy.

She’s my all-time female musician that I crush on. It’s her… along with PJ Harvey… and Nina Simone… SINCE ABSOLUTELY NOBODY ASKED…

Good Lord.

I’m officially out with these part of the notes!

But for real, Guyville is one of my all-time favorite double-LP’s by any artist… it’s one of my all-time favorite specifically-Chicago records by any artist… it just fucking swaggers like it owns the place…

The Stones are worse off, if we’re going to go with concepts or comparisons or whatnot… and it’s my favorite Stones record… for whatever that means…

And… Liz has a book and many many great other records!! She’s 100% badass.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s5l0MasLClAhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J2RxKym-Dz8The Joel Plaskett Emergency: Ashtray RockThis is simply one of the funnest records I can think of, full stop.

Like, if you were to ask why I fucking love being a fucking Maritimer… the case could be made within this entire album… without having to go too much further… with apologies to Stan Rogers… and/or Stompin’ Tom…

But, real talk…

Joel’s talent as a bandleader, songwriter, and singer are as good as they’ve ever been… or ever will be… on this record… in the midst of a just unsurpassed creative run with the preceding albums… and it swaggers like a guy paying the rent doing something he loves in his late twenties or early thirties or whatever…

I am a Joel Stan. Listen, between this… Down at the Khyber… Three… Scrappy Happiness… and my personal fave La De Da… the dude has documented for me what it’s like to be a weirdo from Atlantic Canada at a certain point in the early 21st Century… for lack of any other way of putting it… I find it relatable as shit… and on this record Joel and the Emergency are firing on all cylinders…

Say it loud, and say it proud:

DRUNK TEENAGERS, LET’S START A FIGHT…

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GKDgkcx9richttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3tgzv2Tk_74https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9s1zxoEahOEBen Nichols: Last Pale Light in the WestFor me, this record is inseparable from the Cormac McCarthy novel… and from the birth of my first son. And from my first few years of being a teacher.

Of living overseas.

Of making more money than I’ll likely ever make in my career again.

I can’t express why this record means so much to me more plainly than that… although I tried… with a ghazal… which can be found elsewhere…

I’ve returned to the novel and this album both variously throughout my life… before my son was born for both… and after… and for sure I will again…

Say it loud, and say it proud: LONG LIVE LUCERO!

Rest in power, Cormac McCarthy

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JwOMXfkh1c8https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JG_XYVbq6vYHusker Du: Zen Arcade / Minutemen: Double Nickels on the DimeWe’re running short on space, but you can’t get more conceptual than these two double-LP’s produced by two of the most influential punk/hardcore/what-the-fuck-ever…

*Do yourself the immense favor of reading Corporate Rock Sucks: the Rise and Fall of SST Records by Jim Ruland… for full-blown insights! Gossip! And so much more…

I am going to simply call these both some of the best late-Twentieth Century American records of all time.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KZvsAh5VFRwEmotionally poignant… meta-as-fuck… post-modern… wild in ambition, narrative, musical concept, musical weirdness…

In other words, perfect American folk music… spirited, violent, visceral, and… optimistic, at the end of the day…

Christ, I’m about to get weepy… well, not really, but you know…

DEFINITELY MORE THAN A LITTLE DAMP.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=haUJyCRTiXghttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GsRpS6XGiOsSlint: SpiderlandFuck me and then fuck the guy next to me.

I MEAN UH… NO…

Listen, Albini had to show up in this podcast somehow. So… fuck it… I’m calling the entire SLINT oeuvre a concept album… notably but not exclusively because of SPIDERLAND…

You see? It’s so goddamned artsy I felt compelled to do some that shit in caps.

“Just keep in mind for the next few days that we’re in Louisville, Kentucky. Not London. Not even New York. This is a weird place.”

Hunter S. Thompson

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ygNAnIG8g_ELou Reed: New YorkI am a fan of Lou in every single way… unapologetically.

When I was I guess in my late teens or early twenties… my friend played this a few times…

Just wow, is all. So much story. So many characters. It’s so fucking straightforward and linear, without giving up a centimeter of subtlety or emotional weight..

Is this a sort of spiritual journalism? Does he know Kendrick won the Rap War of 2024? Christ, I’m about to get… nearly damper than I was before…

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UP8xL5dbJiohttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bR27xTdHvNsThe Hold Steady: Separation SundayEverybody should own this record.

Especially the Catholic of you.

If you ever want to get literature and music together talking about the Minneapolis Twins, the Replacements, the Descendents… and then going to chug something sticky and/or sweet prior to the mindnumbing job…

Go no fucking further.

THS are, blessedly (beatifically?) still a going concern these decades later is a testament as much to the narrative talents of Craig Finn as anything else…

Poetry plus bar rock has been a winning combination for many, many other artists. Finn and Tad Kubler and everybody are in awesome company, as far as it goes.

Thanks every danged one of you for stopping by! May all your schemes go better than expected!https://www.youtube.com/watch?app=desktop&v=rAR2__bX7_U

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Heey-ya! It’s the spring squidfall episode, don’t you know?

Actually, it’s the “Open Format” episode! Wherein Dan learns about a new thing… and I take a deep, random dive into a box of download codes!

We are truly in the torrents of spring, friends!

https://youtu.be/7MO82TNln-IWhen it rains, it pours… squid, that is! #bogmonstermusicSteve Albini would probably hate this podcast! #bogmonstermusic

You’ll find the value of the show is upped significantly when you hit the YT playlist!

I’m also here to say… at least in my notes… farewell to Steve Albini… gone far, far too soon! He’s one of those people who changed the music we all listen to on a scale that’s all its own. Rest in Power!

Dan’s NotesDan learns about a new thing!So I just turned 48 about a week and a half ago and I had been feeling like my music listening had been in a bit of a rut as of late, you know? Liked had heard a few things that I thought were good enough recently, but ultimately not a lot really new and exciting to me. I am not someone allergic to checking out what is popular on “the charts” on occasion just out of curiosity as to what the world outside of my own online bubble/suburban office drone life are into these days and one thing I’ve noticed has been the rise of what I guess you’d put under the umbrella genre of Regional Mexican music into the US charts through sheer streaming numbers and growing Latin American diaspora communities around the rest of North America, though that term covers a pretty wide swath of rootsy folk traditions from accordion-driven Norteno and Tejano bands to the brass-and-strings ballads of northern Mexican corrido music (whose subgenre of narcocorridos is notoriously controversial within the country for its songs focussing on the exploits of various cartel figures, mostly known in the US and Canada because of the cold open of a particular episode of Breaking Bad and a few touristy articles in English language music publications in the 00’s). I noticed it as a thing but didn’t really take much time to check out the actual music until my girlfriend and I were checking out the livestreams of various Coachella stages as there were a few artists she and I liked on the bill this year. Anyway, one stream kicked in with huge lettering text and news clips talking about Mexican censorship of corrido artists whose music discussed local drug trades and government corruption over a blackened stage while a Morgan Freeman soundalike boomed out about “those who rise up from the darkness”, followed by what I can only describe as a performance by one of the biggest just straight up rock stars in the best possible way that I’ve seen in a while, and mostly working in a subgenre I was almost entirely unfamiliar with before this point. So as part of this rise of Regional artists on the charts in Mexico and the US, there has been a whole new scene of artists crossing this rootsy rural corridos music with modern hip hop influences and imagery while also drawing on those narcocorridos traditions to document the lives of the people on the front lines of NPR’s Alt.Latino podcast,s miniseries on the rise Regional Mexican music on US charts describe that I listened to recently as one of Mexico’s five largest employers across all industries – into what they call corridos tumbados or “trap corridos”. The biggest star to come out of that whole corridos tumbados scene was the artist whose Coachella set I was about to witness on that stream and who would totally blow me away during that time – a thin, raspy voiced 24 year old singer from Zapopan, Mexico who goes by Peso Pluma. I was really impressed by his whole performance and seeing that style of music given the big pop fest staging and presentation, and spent the next couple of weeks perusing playlists on various streaming services and trying to read up on the emerging subgenre and some of the big names, so in lieu of my usual collection of album/artist picks relating to a given theme I kind of ended up getting distracted from our previously selected show topic for this episode and went for more of a grab bag type list of a few of the artists who really jumped out to me.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NAVzjKNa6rohttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lZiaYpD9ZrIPeso PlumaBroke out in 2021 with El Belicon, his 2023 song Ella Bailla Sola has been a huge crossover hit breaking into the US, making appearances on late night TV and big awards shows and stuff, but still very much carrying himself as a “voice of the people” bringing the stories and culture of Mexican life out to the rest of the world. I guess he’s like Mexico’s most-streamed domestic artist or something like that and his third and most recent album GENESIS has so many killer tracks on it.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-njVpIGri3Mhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DWRj2BB8YHshttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xGI3ky4kLwENatanael CanóThe guy who literally coined the name of the genre on his 2019 song Soy El Diablo and one of the first to really try to fuse hip hop vibes with corrido music. His collaborations with Peso Pluma, Gabito Ballesteros and Fuerza Regida have been some of my favorites of the genre. Plus “O Me Voy O Te Vas” is just one of my favourite roots/country songs of recent years.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kMp_-ePwEC4https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OIUZEQ-80_oFuerza RegidaFrom San Bernardino California, FR are one of the flagship acts of Street Mob Records, one of the bigger labels focussing on the subgenre. According to the NPR doc I listened to, they are currently in a rivalry with Peso Pluma over top streaming tumbado artists.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uIuSv7NU2KUhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c3YOJ4jBMrgChino PacasA young up and comer on the Street Mob Records roster, Chino Pacas is still in his teens and already has a few killer singles under his belt.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pV04bEBlbC8https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4zLh1QI4bMAXaviHailing from Phoenix AZ and focussing more on songs of romance and heartbreak than more illicit topics. He also makes me feel hella old but La Diabla was one of the first tracks to jump out at me on the playlists I had been checking out.

….. Anyway, I feel Iike a lot of artists have tried to cross hip hop and country music to various degrees from either side for a little while now but these young corridos tumbados artists have made the most effective mix of those genres, but just a different style of country than your usual glossy Nashville stuff.

And also, on a totally unrelated note:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r3STQ1Lpv9Ahttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EfCROIuI9VESPEEDSPEED from Sydney, Australia just announced their first full length album will be coming out this July and I’m pretty stoked about that. I know they’re one of those bands that ends up on all of those “Who will Be The Next Turnstile (etc)” listticles but something about their tough riffs mixed with golden retriever energy in interviews has made me a fan since their “A Gang Called Speed” EP from a couple of years ago. They’ve released an advance single called Real Life Love that features lots of footage of the band bro-ing out and being positive and stuff. One wild trivia thing about the band is that their singer Jem is actually a professional classical flautist as a day job outside of hardcore, though don’t expect to hear any big symphonic parts in their pounding riffage. I am very much looking forward to checking out their album “Only One Mode” when it drops later this summer.

Miscellanyhttps://youtu.be/1LGM82uPuvA?si=Fqs7f1JfUGERXbachttps://youtu.be/M1eOfyFrkSw?si=5CGTn72zv0x_nPefA Short Highlight Reel of Bad Bunny’s dalliances with the WWEMatt’s NotesWhat a few days it’s been!

Let me start by saying that up until yesterday, this was going to be a pretty straightforward post… roughly corresponding to my picks for the episode…

And so… to that end…

Jesse: Complete DiscographyJesse Complete Discography by Jessehttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kPDugknwpm4First of all…

Leatherface is probably my favorite band of all time… or else it’s a tie with the Replacements…

I’ve known about this record since around ’99 when it was handed to me on a burned CD by a friend who I think downloaded it from Napster.

It arrived around the same time I discovered Leatherface in the first place.

Years went by. The CD got lost to one vortex or other, likely while moving between apartments…

I’m thrilled Little Rocket Records is doing to much to get Leatherface LP’s back into print… and now this long-overdue reissue… plus, Frankie is playing a few festivals in Europe and around the UK it looks like lately…

It’s as personal as anything Frankie’s ever written… it’s visceral emotionally but it also swings and sways and swaggers… it really is as good as good gets…

Rest in Power, Steve Albinihttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ubqWbfg2elQTheir last gig, mind you… #bogmonstermusicAll you have to do is look in his direction for quality in everything he touched as a musician, producer, engineer, and goddamned everything that he was to so many people…

I’ve spent since yesterday morning when I first learned via Jack White’s IG account of all things. My memories are of records he made first… and I discovered Big Black, Rapeman, and Shellac in my late teens and early twenties… going to somebody’s house and it was on… or on a mix tape or burned CD… whatever exactly we did before the internet was everywhere…

Goat (Jesus Lizard) & Rid of Me (PJ Harvey)So… a couple of the download codes I pulled from the Random Box of Random Download Codes are records produced by Steve… PJ Harvey’s Rid of Me… which is the first record of hers I became aware of… and the Jesus Lizard’s Goat album… they are both brilliant records by artists in their prime… sharing something harsh and visceral in the music for sure… and owing much of that to the set-up… to the production or engineering or whatever the hell Steve was there doing…

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cPA9kcVfcvIhttps://youtu.be/UKQLVrtWN2M?si=u0oxveRy9Phc8YPGAnd so, like lots of other people online yesterday, tomorrow, and probably for days to come… here are a few Steve things that have cropped up… or resonate… or what-have-you…

RapemanIn Utero (Nirvana)https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ABiKcjM3wXEhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2pvP6xJdDx4Some of the invective… the edgelord schtick… has aged poorly… and he owned it…. he’s been candid in interviews about interrogating his past words… so… let’s all agree… Rapeman is the world’s worst name for a band… AND… the music slays on every track… like… it swings and shit…

I remember very clearly in grade ten when In Utero came out. It was a big deal at the time. It was so fucking menacing and heavy and intense. That intensity was for sure owing to Albini setting things up just so. Who knew at Fredericton High School circa September, 1993… the fall of grade ten… this record is tied very strongly to the things I liked about that time…

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a0not3-Gr9Y1000 Hurts (Shellac) / Songs About Fucking (Big Black)I’m in the midst of downsizing… as much as I can… for various reasons… but really, the thing has taken on a life of its own…

In the past few weeks, I’ve reduced my record collection by around 70%. Roughly. I’ve sold in the hundreds of records. This is to help ensure that everything I own materially can be fit into six oversized airplane bags, plus two items of carry-on luggage. And so… every artist, just about, had to contribute vinyl to the local stores here in Saint John… and thereby save me paying to carry them across the country or WHEREVER… so… why these two records as opposed to any others of theirs? That’s a totally good question. Basically… 1000 Hurts came in a box… thereby occupying more space in a piece of Air Canada luggage… and… Songs About Fucking is a perfect album… but so are Pig Pile… and Racer X… and so… you have to get rid of something… they’re all equally good… you see my problem? Maybe, maybe not…

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3d9BCY82px8It hurts… #bogmonstermusicFast-forward to yesterday… and as I dove into Shellac on Apple Music like I’d yet to do so far… I listened to Excellent Italian Greyhound for the first time… and friends, there is some unprecedentedly fucked stuff there… this is some many years after Big Black…after Rapeman… Genuine Lulabelle stands out as some kind of weirdness… that works… it’s kind of awe-inspiring…

Excellent Italian Greyhound (Shellac)https://youtu.be/OvMfLEdtWLY?si=VfFrIAwIBKysLc9BTo say nothing of the new Shellac record To All Trains coming out literally next week…

Or the fact that Steve was a World Series of Poker champion a bunch of times over…

Or that I literally learned just now that he recorded 24 Hour Revenge Therapy by fucking Jawbreaker…!

https://youtu.be/bTUgYxNy-9k?si=IJayVfXL88-oChIGAnd on and on and on… good God… or non-God, if that’s your thing, man…

This is all to say it’s a drag! One could have hoped the man would continue on for many years, putting out excellent music for like… a lot more years… the man leaves a staggering path in his wake… and we’re all following on in one way or another… Jesus… that’s kind of heavy… I’m going to insist on ending this on a positive note… so here’s Steve versus Nardwuar…

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1Vjn8u7HP1oIt’s been a time!! Let’s get at ‘er again soon!

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Happy Friday! And if it’s not Friday where & when you are, here’s hoping it’s on its way soonish-like!

On this episode, we’re all about female-fronted bands! It’s been a year-and-a-half of this show and so it’s about frigging time, yes?

https://youtu.be/pMyhJ5tOpLUWho are we to disagree with Kim G? Nobody, that’s who! #bogmonstermusicCreeping through an audio jungle… with only an audio machete and our wits to survive! #bogmonstermusic

While you’re here, do yourself a favor and check out the YT playlist!

Dan’s NotesNot just boys fun – fave women-fronted bandshttps://youtu.be/MmTWz656QgU?si=BN_1B9ReAC4TcOUIhttps://youtu.be/4vMkeWHk6oU?si=g1SZ_P8Z4mq8C72qThe DishragsOne of Western Canada’s first punk bands, founded in 1976 as “Dee Dee And The Dishrags” in Victoria and in 1977 were the opening band on Vancouver’s first ever “punk rock concert” opening for The Furies while all of the members of the band were still enrolled in high school on the island. Over the next four years they would share stages with the top bands of the emerging Vancouver/Victoria scene and would make their recorded debut with two songs on the “Vancouver Complication” compilation LP in 1979, followed by a pair of EPs, Past Is Past in 1979 and Death In The Family in 1980. That year The Dishrags would cease to exist as a band but the members would continue to make music outside of punk into the 80’s. In the early 90’s some of their songs were featured on the excellent Zulu Records double CD compilation of Vancouver punk and alternative music from the 1970’s, 80’s and 90’s, and in 1996 Other People’s Music would release a complete discography of all of their singles, compilation tracks and live recordings titled Love/Hate. In 2005 they would also release the singles collection There’s No DeeDee and in 2022, show favorite archival label Supreme Echo Records released their posthumous “Three” LP. This year Jason from Supreme Echo is set to release their follow up “Four” album, making it a perfect time to check out this groundbreaking early Canadian band.

https://youtu.be/r0kCJNn2JWQ?si=oKPnoA6lAtjtJDyyhttps://youtu.be/gjw5D4Y2hDA?si=-1gpOi-6Nhzjm-PX-DamadPrank Records was home to a lot of the greatest really heavy hardcore punk of the 1990’s and 00’s and Savannah GA’s DAMAD were one of their flagship bands. Their signature blend of crushing sludgy riffs and Victoria Scalisi’s intense vocals that alternated between a deep howl and demonic snarls over top of it all. I feel like the southern US produced a good portion of that whole Prank scene and Damad were one of the first bands from that whole wave to really break through to the national scene and beyond. I was a big reader of Virginia-based zine Slug And Lettuce at the time and they constantly featured intense photos from Damad’s shows around the region, and S&L editor Christine Boarts-Larsen wrote glowingly of Scalisi in the memorial article published in Vice Magazine after her passing from cancer in 2017. Their two full-lengths, 1996’s “Rise And Fall” and 2000’s “Burning Cold” are classics of DIY heavy music, with the iconic punk/metal graphic artist Pushead even lending his talents to the cover of the latter at a time when he wasn’t really doing a whole lot of art for newer bands at the time. The band would ultimately split up in 2001 after the guitarist and drummer departed to start the doom-metal power house Kylesa, but Damad have remained a favorite of mine that I had just not revisited in a bit until I listened to the Kings Of Punk Podcast’s “90’s Hardcore March Madness bracket” series of episodes and their name came up as a band that The Kids (™) had not really picked up on in recent years compared to some other bands of the era. I hope that more folks go back and check out their music as it totally holds up with the best of the genre but maybe isn’t remembered as well as some other bands from their scene.

https://youtu.be/6xlQXcDPuzQ?si=sdZV4pH-h_HtW4tzhttps://youtu.be/ytj8f1c3JYI?si=ZnlfuvICOPfTb3DOSamuel SCOne of those “could have been” type bands that helped create a sound that went on to explode in popularity not long after they called it quits. Haliling from State College PA, Samuel were at that crossover point of angular post-hardcore and melodic indie sounds during their original run in the early-mid 90’s that germinated into modern “emo” tropes as we know them (with vocalist Vanessa Downing, who had previously fronted post-hardcore band Junction, being one of the few women fronting high profile bands in that scene at the time), even though they only managed to release a couple of 7”s and a split EP with Texas Is The Reason before the stresses of a bad tour followed by an unsuccessful attempted move by the band to Washington DC led to the end of their initial run. Even though they were short-lived the first time around, the band’s second EP “Empty And Then Some” on Art Monk Construction remained a longtime favorite of mine. Flash forward a couple of decades, during which some of their melodic emo peers like Hot Water Music and Jimmy Eat World rose to international acclaim, to the early 2020’s where the pandemic led to the band reconnecting for old times sake and deciding to give it another go, this time under the slightly altered moniker of Samuel SC. Not too long ago I was searching YouTube for a decent rip of that old 7” of theirs that I had loved and ended up stumbling across the band’s channel and catching up on the band’s newer run. After getting back together, they reworked songs from recordings for an unreleased album recorded back in the 1995 with indie rock superproducer Bob Weston that ended up coming out in 2023 as their debut(!) full length album “High Places”.

All of their recordings are definitely worth checking out for fans of the “Midwest emo”/melodic indie punk type sounds.

https://youtu.be/joEekC7yY4M?si=POBYlLyUwAiMUjpIhttps://youtu.be/gGcr0agw1GY?si=VlFt1Xe55730BvJtSpitboyBay Area punk legends whose career has gotten a little bit of a new focus over the past few years, Spitboy’s career spanned from 1990 to 1995 and resulted in one full length, a classic split LP, a few 7”s and later one of my favourite autobiographical chronicles of the era, drummer Michelle “Todd” Cruz-Gonzales’ excellent book The Spitboy Rule released in 2016 which chronicled the adventures of the band over their five year existence. As an all-woman punk band on the West Coast of the US at the time with a penchant for feminist-themed lyrics, they were frequently compared to and lumped in with the Riot Grrrrl scene that was exploding at the time, much to the band’s chagrin. The members of Spitboy were all quite vocal with their criticisms of that movement, and what they saw was a something that excluded women of colour and centered on privileged white women and their experiences, as well as what they saw as a somewhat infantilized aesthetic. Whether or not you share that view, you cannot deny the passion and force of their music. I was first introduced to the music of Spitboy via their classic split LP with Chicago’s Los Crudos on Ebullition and quickly made a point of picking up the rest of their releases when I had the chance. They were mainstays of underground spaces like NYC’s ABC No Rio and Berkeley’s 924 Gilman and others around the world during their five year span, after which vocalist Adrienne Droogas left to move to the east coast and join Pittsburgh’s Aus Rotten and the rest of the band continued as Project Hate. Flash forward a couple of decades and their drummer’s memoir and subsequent touring of punk literary and academic circles supporting it rekindled interest in the band in the modern DIY punk scene. In 2021, New Jersey’s Don Giovanni Records (home to Screaming Females, Jeff Rosenstock, and others) released “Body Of Work”, a comprehensive discography of all of Spitboy’s long out of print records from their original run, making it all that much easier for today’s audiences to check out their awesome music. Anyone interested in passionate politician punk should totally check them out.

https://youtu.be/pVp6A0Ufots?si=qGit_FyG3jJagF38https://youtu.be/_jiX-Svw7KQ?si=Tuoxtrec0xJstsqASleater-KinneySpeaking of the riot grrrl scene and artists who cut their teeth there, Sleater Kinney are simply put one of the greatest bands out of the US Pacific Northwest of the past three decades or so (give or take a nine year break from 2006 to 2015 where the members pursued and excelled in other projects inside and outside music), and probably the biggest band to come out of that Olympia-based scene outside of maybe Bikini Kill. Carrie Brownstein, Corin Tucker, and Janet Weiss (who would ultimately leave the band in the last couple of years due to creative differences) paired catchy twin guitar riffs, driving melodies and passionate lyrics over Wiess’ rockin drums over the course of eleven albums on labels like Donna Dresch’s Chainsaw Records, Kill Rock Stars and Sub Pop. I was fortunate enough to get to see them live in Portland Oregon during my time living there in the late 1990’s and by the height of their original run they even managed to win over folks like all of the grizzled old rocket line cooks from my last kitchen job in the mid 00’s after their stop here in Halifax opening for Pearl Jam . Oh yeah you may have seen that TV show about that one city that Carrie had with the drummer from Chicago noise-rockers Trenchmouth for a while there during the band’s late 00s/early 2010s hiatus as well. I know they are a fairly well known band at this point, but by some strange chance you have not yet heard the music of Sleater Kinney at this point I would suggest you change that and check them out for sure.

Newer Bandshttps://youtu.be/OWdzceTQ_Wg?si=14rXjVgxodQ-bt9_https://youtu.be/kWDcqjcvwbA?si=utF8SKMHwUzCNC8hhttps://youtu.be/57FiZ-gwHvI?si=MxWSqBCDX4mya5RVAlso a quick shoutout to some great woman-fronted indie and punk bands from my neck of the woods : Jale, plumtree, Bubaiskull, Rebecca West , The Chitz, The Stolen Minks, Rule Of Thumb, Vixens (RiP Rosie), Eekum Seekum, Thousand Knives, Suspex, Cell Deth (PEI)

https://youtu.be/9QX4bQPw-_w?si=_wcAfcrEScxnFqjqMatt’s NotesOK! I’m making danged sure that these notes are ready to go before we record the episode… or mostly so!

As is my habit, I’ll quibble and I’ll also throw out some caveats! As is my wont.

First off, we’re excluding powerful solo artists.

Liz Phair and PJ Harvey have each never been a part of any bands that jumped out in public! And they are I guess my among my top favorite recording artists ever, generally… same for Billie Holiday… Nina Simone… Sarah Vaughan… Etta James…

Or women co-fronting bands! Like Sonic Youth… Eric’s Trip… the Pixies…

And. And. And.

My lack of awareness of Riot Grrrl history or culture will be completely evident here.

On the plus, side… it’s a chance to revisit Royal Trux! And Cowboy Junkies! Among others… And so…

The Supremes / Sharon Jones and the Dap-Kingshttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Itn438i30hkhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=une981B7Q4YI’m happy as always to start any of these shows with shout-out’s to 60’s or 70’s soul music!

I could have thrown in Ike and Tina. Or Gladys Knight and the Pips. Or The Marvelettes… or many from among the girl groups! The if list could be very long if I allowed it to.

So why the Supremes? Besides artistry, songcraft, transcendent vocals, in a group where any one could step out and be a star in their own right? Who brought us Diana Ross?

And besides the visual spectacle… and the huge historical significance of these empowered young black women practicing their art at the highest level… to a massive mainstream audience…

And all that’s for starters!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AYuxQillJXMSharon is less well-known, I think! I grabbed one of their LP’s from the stacks of Barnacle Records in Kamloops, BC on a whim… and the cover art, mainly… and they are known for curating at their store out there…

I’m going to be real… I know so little about Sharon… I do that with artists lots… intentionally not looking anything about them to preserve my entire image of them from their music…. and so… just for some basic info for this post… and it turns out SJ&TDK are “actually” of the mid-90’s until about seven or eight years ago… whereas I was thinking from all aspects of their sound and recordings they were maybe a lesser-known sixties or seventies entity… I’ll be danged and then danged some more! As a revival act (as per Wikipedia) they are pretty damned into the hard soul groove!

ANYWAY…

But those two records I own slap! They are, have been, and will be part of the ongoing vinyl rotation… in perpetuity! Which is almost the best thing I can say about any musician or artist or album! It will make you get down… but only if you have a pulse!

Portisheadhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=un8EW82GwKchttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4qQyUi4zfDs All I can say, really, is that every second of every track on Dummy makes my hair stand on end… it gives me palpitations… I grab their LP’s, few though they are, whenever I can…

Look, I think I probably CHEERED in that scene from Fincher’s the Killer this past winter when Glory Box drops… on a soundtrack with nearly a dozen songs from the Smiths (and that’s EXACTLY THE SAME number of songs I’ve heard by the Smiths… weird, right??) even though (or maybe especially because) it lands in an incredibly tense scene early in the second act of the film… if we’re talking FIVE ACT STRUCTURE… English degree FTW…

There are times when I will throw this on the record player and eight, twelve, nineteen hours it’s still playing… Beth Gibbons’ voice just hanging there, filling up the apartment completely… and I am 100% sure I need to check out her bands and solo records outside Portishead…

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vg1jyL3cr60It makes you… or maybe just me… want to dance like a spider… herky-jerky… you could thrown it into a hypothetical Beetlejuice movie… or a high brow art film, for that matter… spooky, warm, herky-jerky… groovy as fuck… all this turntabling and so forth… get out of town… clearly so good as to leave me sputtering for terms that are actually descriptive…

ANYWAY…

All their albums are great. Dummy takes me to another place entirely… whatever kind of music you call that…

Royal Truxhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TtsbkrzSZ08https://www.youtube.com/watch?app=desktop&v=pCVp6spHn2wIt bugs me sometimes how they never seem to get discussed in the “best alternative bands of the 90’s” conversations… or social media accounts all about 90’s music…

Look, they were big enough to show up at the end of High Fidelity, back in the day!

So what to say about them? I cherished this band in high school and early university. Cherished is the word. I cared about them enough that I drove from Halifax with friends to see them in Montreal in the fall of what would be the year I dropped out of university for the first time…

*They met us after and they were SOOO nice…

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AfKblFXTh6sJennifer Herrema is absolutely fierce. Her snarl would scare anybody in hardcore. She remains a vital musical entity in all kinds of ventures I’ve yet to check out. I’ve just discovered she has an Instagram.

I mean, Neil Hagerty does like a lot of the singing and most of the instruments… but for me, it’s Jennifer’s band. I could listen to her over just about anything. The fact that Neil is/was as weird and aggressive with the guitar is a bonus. Plus they always surrounded themselves with top-notch session players… I feel increasingly like this should be its own entire blog post…

They broke up. Got back together. Put out an album and a couple of excellent compilations… Neil got arrested… but if you go into just about anything from the nineties… they had a run of five basically perfect records, for my money… from Thank You until Pound for Pound… and the records before Thank You are, I’m sure, definitely worth checking out more than I did as a teenager… and, really, who puts out five perfect albums in succession… without a single skippable track? It’s pretty rare….

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a16igonZo20Cowboy Junkieshttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fg6Uw2cGhQEhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T2odlGAxuwQI don’t know why, but the Canadian-ness of this band is like… integral to my thinking of them as a band…

Thinking on why that is the case, I go back to late eighties and early nineties MuchMusic… wherein they must have been playing… but they were on the soundtracks of two films… Pump Up the Volume (1990) which I watched with my friends on VHS a bunch of times… and Natural Born Killers (1994) and you know… the same… in both cases they’re doing covers… of Robert Johnson, and The Velvet Underground, respectively… pretty danged cool, yes?

There’s like six or seven people in the band and like four of them are siblings including Margo, the singer? I think?

I’m actually trying to preserve as much of the mystique around this artist, as I do with many others… where I intentionally avoid looking stuff up about them… but for sure hearing those songs on those movies… pre-Internet, mind you… where cinemas and VHS took up a lot more of your media bandwidth…

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fa9nN3G2CSgBut for real… The Trinity Session is a start to finish perfect album. Every single song lands. And so’s the same, I’m sure for their third record the Caution Horses… which I’m not as familiar with or passionate about… but that’s really just cause of not owning it ever on vinyl… I’m sure they have all kinds of legit things both in the past and present, as well as perhaps solo things between and/or among the however many siblings there are…

Margo Timmins’ voice can carry you wherever you want to go… and then some…

I’m grateful they have a rich discography nearly 40 years deep for discovering!

The Runaways / Joan Jett and the Black Heartshttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_EBvXpjudf8https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HYxUAeEs8mEI was late to the game on the Runaways! Like… I was in my early or maybe even mid-twenties… that’s how long it took for me to end up at somebody’s house where it would have been playing… because pre-streaming times you still had to pay for music downloads… the algorithm was still in its infancy… my impression being at the time: “surprisingly heavy” as in… “for a girl group”, I suppose! But the closest analogies I find myself reaching for real are the Ramones, the Stooges, and Motörhead… like… their contemporaries in the late seventies, mostly… they occupy this sweet spot in hard rock between punk and glam metal… which from me is extremely high praise!

I’ve bought copies of the Runaways vinyl and given it to a girlfriends’ daughter. And when I gifted the Mom in question a starter vinyl collection… for sure Change Up was in there… a double acoustic Joan LP! It’s fantastic… as a listening experience… but also spanning her career… of which I have let largely to discover besides the major early eighties hits… basically, my primary reference point for much of her catalogue is the acoustic versions… which is rad!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xboJlL_1ru8https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lOFHOADTm7oI mean, Joan’s teamed up with Paul Westerberg who… I mean… for him to go outside the Replacements or his own solo recordings, that’s a hell of a thing! And she covers Androgynous on the Change Up… and I think she’s played that song with Miley Cyrus… she starred in a movie with Michael J. Fox as a badass rocker…. and she’s shared stages with Dave Grohl among probably many many other top-level rock people…

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kX9xUrEcGuAAnd… Good Lord… just when I was even done writing this… super-early on a Thursday AM… I discovered a single on Apple Music as of less than two weeks ago… Joan Jett and the Blackhearts doing an up-tempo, punky take on the Lou Reed Transformer classic I’m so Free… so… thanks to everyone who made this moment possible, I suppose…

Because… at the end of the day… it’s Joan’s world… and we’re just living in it…

Folks, we are supremely grateful to you for checking this out!! Let’s do this again, soonish-like!https://youtu.be/iiaPL17889A?si=TU88Bojqa_FLIj1ZA PAUL SCHRAEDER film ffs #bogmonstermusic

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Howdy, and thanks for joining us!! On this episode of the TNB, we’re all about comedy albums… and that’s no joke!!

Waits for applause.

And waits…

Phew… tough crowd…

ANYWHO… far be it for us to deny you links for clicking!

And… allow me to say… as somebody who does two podcasts, one of which is on a more-than-weekly basis… I’ve really, really struggled finding my contribution to the notes… which has held this up as long as it has… more about that from me later!! Thanks as ever to Dan being such a rad colleague and collaborator and pal with more patience than one would reasonably hope for!! And to you… for checking this out…

https://youtu.be/2YWewEwTGmgIf you can’t handle the video, wait’ll you get a load of the audio!! #bogmonstermusic

Dan’s NotesFunny StuffMeg MacKayhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ASUK-l5vUfshttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m-naSNSfbRgShoutout to the locals, or at least the started-out-as-locals. If we are covering comedy I wanted to make sure to give a shoutout to one of my favorite standups that I’ve seen come out of the maritimes and someone I was always super stoked to share a stage with during my stint as a fair-to-middlin-at-best open mixer, Meg MacKay. Meg originally hails from small town PEI but got their start in standup while attending university in Fredericton, eventually making the big moves first to Halifax, and later Toronto as they began to ascend the comedy scene ladder. I was fortunate enough to get to see them at mic’s in Fredericton that I would travel to and then many times around Halifax during their stint here. Meg was also one of the folks who always seemed game to do a set when I was running a show mixing comedy and live music at the original Sad Rad location here in Halifax as well, which was not necessarily every local comic’s cup of tea due to being a windowless warehouse upstairs from a radiator shop converted into a DIY music venue. Meg has since moved to Toronto to expand their standup career, and has released two great comedy albums – 2020’s “Probably A Witch” and 2023’s “Clown Baby” on top of writing for shows like 22 Minutes and appearing on stages big and small. All across the country. Meg also cohosted a great podcast that seems to be on hiatus currently called Big Gross Movies that dissected hit movies of different eras in the context of what was going on in history when they became hits, that was a must-listen for me when it was active. If we were talking comedy, there is no way that I couldn’t mention Meg as one of my current faves to come out of the local scene.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RQJZbM-hBfYhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L4Wo0LtsR64BA JohnstonA true road warrior who takes funny music very seriously, releasing 15 albums over the past 23 years or so, travelling the country relentlessly in a shitty station wagon singing songs of love for Hawkins Cheezies, the Hamilton Tiger Cats CFL team and brave purveyors of contraband cannabis. I first became acquainted with BA’s music back when I was in the employ of Halifax’s Seashorse Tavern in their original basement-level location on Argyle St, at an energetic show where a pipe carrying sewage from the fancy restaurant that just happened to run right above the dance floor and front of the stage area burst open and started raining down all over the audience and BA himself, who did not miss a single step while crooning odes to installing a deep fryer in his bedroom, and fist fighting squirrels on sight. Like Stompin Tom before him, a few different cities lay claim to BA, but Hamilton is his home base from whence he launches his many great rock and roll adventures. Like this dude is a serious entertainer who gives it his all, even when belting out the silliest songs over chintzy Casio synth beats. Seeing him jump from table to table in a cape and a captain’s hat, waving around a cane for emphasis while neon letters flashed his name onstage in a weird railroad bar with collapsing ceilings and well water on tap as part of a music festival in Sackville NB is a show you do not soon forget, especially while belting out his anthemic story-song recounting an encounter with local law enforcement while zooming on shrooms at a Van Halen concert, “Going to Jail (Except Pete)”, and his ode to all of the snacks he would buy with his next GST check. BA is a real working-class dirtbag rock hero who takes his silly songs very seriously and keeps cranking out great album after great album, and even collaborated on a children’s book about a junk-food loving seagull with former Cold Warps frontman and visual artist Paul Hammond a couple of years back. BA always gives me a good laugh every time I listen to his music and his live shows are totally not to be missed.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B6F_EQ0k_EQhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1Lz94ijZbQEAtom and His PackageThe Weird Al of 90’s hardcore, started out in pop punk band Fracture and then started making music with “the package”, a QY700 sequencer he used make music that sounded like classic Lookout Records pop punk as arranged for flip phone ringtone, with lyrics about starting a special punk private school since so many of his friends were becoming teachers, making friends with Norwegian black metal bands, and measuring the sheer footage of cringeworthy records in his collection. Atom was a rare dose of humour in what could be an otherwise pretty dour and serious era of the punk scene circa the late 90’s and early 00’s, and his albums on labels like Bloodlink and Hopeless all still hold up for the most part (as all attempts at humour, no matter now skilled have that even chance of aging like milk as time passes). I was lucky enough to see Atom live twice in his heyday of touring, once opening for an Alaskan black metal band and once on a showcase of solo artists where he shared the stage with an earnest singer songwriter, a harsh noise artist, a musical puppet show, and some explorations in loop-pedal-driven prog rock by the ex-bassist of the Melvins and on each show he was able to win the crowd over with his nerdy synth-punk anthems sung in a high cracking voice. Eventually he retired from full-time performing due to some health issues but Atom’s music is still something I enjoy all these years later, especially his second album “A Society Of People Named Elihu”. Also, I will also credit him with introducing me to one of my all-time favorite bands, The Mountain Goats, through his pretty serious and sincere covers of “Going To Georgia” and “Alpha Desperation March” on his otherwise very funny 2001 album Redefining Music. Atom was funny when not a lot of people were trying to be and when discussing the humorous end of things I had to give him a mention.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wALIez5L7yMhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=py0Wt2i8N3wBobcat GoldthwaitYes, that guy. With the voice. From the 80’s. The thing is, Bobcat Goldthwait was very much that guy but is so much more. Starting out in Syracuse NY in the late 70’s alongside frequent collaborator and fellow small town punk weirdo Tom Kenney (later of Mr Show fame and probably best known as the voice of SpongeBob SquarePants) as joke writers for Boston-based political comic and activist Barry Crimmins (whose life was chronicled in Goldthwait’s great 2016 documentary “Call Me Lucky”). Bobcat then developed his well-known unhinged stage persona, leading to fame as a standup comic as well as parts in movies like Police Academy 2 (and later installments), Hot To Trot, and his eventual directorial debut Shakes The Clown. He also set Jay Leno’s Tonight Show set on fire during an appearance on the show, and even toured with Nirvana on what would be their final tour before Kurt Cobain took his life as the band’s frontman had long sung the praises of Goldthwait’s “Meat Bob” album. After some box office bombs in front of the camera, Goldthwait stepped behind it and began directing, first in TV and then moving to the big screen with the dark 2006 romcom Sleeping Dogs Lie, followed by 2009’s later-career Robin Williams highlight Worlds Greatest Dad and eventually moving on to found footage horror with Willow Creek and his previously documentary tribute to Barry Crimmins, Call Me Lucky, on top of directing standup specials for folks like Kyle Kinane and Marc Maron. It’s really cool to see someone who made art you loved when you were young evolve into making different art you love on other levels later in life, while still retaining the same irreverent stage-burning energy in different manifestations. We could all do so well as to age as gracefully as the squeaky voiced gang leader from Police Academy 2 I tell ya.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vk5wCY1kZrohttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1GkZe57PrsoChris GethardA true punk rock weirdo polymath who has managed to cultivate beloved following by small but beloved fanbases in his every pursuit. Originally starting out in standup as well as studying improv ot NY’s Upright citizen’s brigade, which led to the creation of his wild punk rock real-life Wayne’s World of a weekly public access TV/Youtube show, “The Chris Gethard Show”, that ran from 2011 to 2018, eventually ending up on real life cable TV for its last couple of years. You may also recognize Chris from popping up in roles on shows like Broad City and The Office in the early 2010s, or from his podcast Beautiful/Anonymous (or his other podcast, New Jersey Versus The World). Gethard has also written a few books as well on top of it all, and was even working to try and adapt his book of essays “A Bad Idea I’m About To Do” into a television series at one point (though unfortunately that one didn’t get off the ground). Chris may have started out as a standup but has moved on to so much more since then, and brings the same welcoming weirdo vibes to all of them, building this cool little communities of fans around his projects whatever they may be. I am so glad that his public access show has been preserved on a couple of different channels of YouTube as there is truly nothing like it. Imagine the Howard Stern Wack Pack crossed with the crowd at a particularly nerdy pop punk show, with themes like having viewers call in to suggest ingredients for a “smoothie” that Gethard would then drink on air, or passing a rule for the night that everyone had to speak in the style of a professional wrestling promo interview (with tips from their guest that week, indie wrestling superstar Eddie Kingston), it’s just one of those magic and weird and wonderful things that only shows up so often in any art form. His standup is great, I’ve loved his books, and his podcasts have been a chance to explore topics he finds interesting (people’s internal lives, weird facts about his home state) but I will always go back to his wild and weird and super punk rock show (especially the cable access incarnation, though the “Fight For The Fish” and “Guess What’s In The Dumpster” episodes of the actual-cable-network version were later standouts) as my favorite work of this multi-talented nerd whisperer who very much stresses his punk rock roots while honestly exploring all of the wacky and weird sides of the human experience, while also making it funny. One of my favourites in comedy for sure.

Miscellaneoushttps://youtu.be/AC3kDnHS-k4?si=dMaeGqYgkpqZhO7L https://youtu.be/ksP3–IpBbc?si=ubXnzzyj68JL5aP0Matt’s NotesIt took some doing to get this one out the door! Personal circumstances… I actually think a week-long February holiday to offset winter doldrums & fatigue should be on a thing… so… if you ever see my name on a ballot in your city… WHICH YOU MOST ASSUREDLY WON’T… you will know my stance on said issue.

ANYWAYS…

It was also challenging because when I think about it… the comedy album isn’t something I’ve spent a ton of time with… there were those scratchy Bill Cosby LP’s in my grandparents’ basement and boy has that not aged well… but otherwise… lots of time in front of VHS copies of Eddie Murphy… Living Color… Kids in the Hall… staying up to videotape copies of KITH and Saturday Night Live… in my teen years getting an awareness of Lenny Bruce thanks to Pump up the Volume…

So… the comedy album thing is largely uncharted for me! It’s been a great reason to dive into these here titles… which I’ve more or less listened to all for the first time just prior to your reading or hearing this. Consider yourselves warned!

Richard Pryor: Live on the Sunset Strip (1982) andGeorge Carlin: Life is Worth Losing (2006)I’m putting these both in the same box for the purpose of these notes… both legends… both of the same generation… both born and died within five years of each other… you try to think of comedy in the 1970’s and 80’s especially… and who comes to mind?

https://youtu.be/0jII2piAUaYhttps://youtu.be/KLODGhEyLvkThis episode has been sitting on the shelf so long I’ve listened to both of these since we recorded in January… and forgotten enough of them… that I had to go back last night to listen again… to see how much I’d forgotten… for writing purposes…

Still feeling jazzed from the Chris Rock album I just listened to, I threw both of these on… again… and then folded laundry… did the dishes… had tomato soup and toast points… it was raining and snowing and then raining some more outside…

ANYWAY

Both of these gentlemen are killer at using their voices. The audio format works for both! Listening to one person talk for an hour is a feat for me…

Richard, obviously, just bleeds on the stage. But from the standpoint of storytelling he’s just knocking it out of the park… this is monumental late stand-up career Richard… it’s got the one where describes lighting himself on fire while freebasing cocaine and ending up in the hospital with serious burns…

George goes dark on this. He’s also 69 years old… and at the time of the recording two months away from his 50th year in show business. So… it really is late George… inasmuch as he lives two more years after the special… his highly verbal bits… it’s watching somebody somebody who spent more than two thirds of his life making a life doing exactly what you hear him doing here…

Two complimentary geniuses of their generation… and their formats… if you accept standup comedy as an art form… you have two of its highest practitioners… and everybody since does so in their wake…

Sarah Silverman: Someone You Love (2023)I threw this on right after trying to get through Dennis Leary’s Lock ‘n Load.

They’re both from New England… both major… contemporary comedians… but Sarah I think… is in another stratosphere… she’s made of different stuff…

On this recording she’s in front of a Boston crowd and she’s clearly digging the shit out of the energy in the building. This is where an audio recording added value. You have imagine what the fuck is up…

Jewishness to the Nth degree… and I appreciate her for it! Which is weird-ass thing to say, but there it is! And… Sarah is raunchy as a motherfucker… masterfully so… and also out there vulnerable… I’ll be real… my notion of her as a comedian is due… at the beginning… is the fact she is straight-up gorgeous… it turns out without any visual reference point… her voice by itself is absolutely lethal…

So I’m sitting around listening to this record gobsmacked, essentially. She’s a pro at the top of her game and she’s enjoying the hell out of herself. I might have to watch this thing on Crave or whatever…

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jSBwni58WXgDenis Leary: Lock n’ Load (1997)https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HB9RFRTiW70The opening bit is this whole thing about what a pain in the ass it is opening a new CD… we are squarely in the 90’s, folks!

Then the dude comes out and the first five minutes of his act are this highly visual, highly boringly unhinged lambasting of uh… Lord of the Dance!

We don’t dance like THAT… we dance like THIS… like… it’s a show going out on an audio format… and uh… no visual to go with the CD… but, beyond that… it comes off as a bro doing angry-ish stuff. The bro factor was high. Maybe it works as a visual! But as a CD… thing strictly for listening in the pre-internet era… it was a fail…

I tapped out after fewer than five minutes!

Adam Sandler: 100% Fresh (2019) / Chris Rock: Never Scared (2006)With this one you have recent Sandler! I dig Sandler… I thought Uncut Gems was brilliant… and the one where he’s a basketball agent… I love his M.O…. his schtick… his sartorial choices… a pro in all things and in all ways related to being a cool, hilarious creative dude… and his Instagram post on the recent passing of Joe Flaherty was personally-felt, you could tell…

I didn’t dig this special! The musical bits completely fucked it for me! I know the failure is on me, as I’m clearly out of sync with a key aspect of Sandler as entertainer… he’s enjoying the shit out of it… so is the audience…

I tapped out after five minutes! The fault is mine, I’m sure…

I was iffy on this. I was. I thought it could go the way of Leary or Sandler.

As it turns it out, this rules… he’s in peak, mid-career form…incisive… personal… energized as hell… I mean… you couldn’t want better for the time… And this is the only case I’ve encountered so far of the interstitial bits adding value to the comedy album…

My questions for Chris about his approach as an artist are many… for instance: have you written any books? If not, will you? Why were you in that one Saw movie? Would you do another?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4QuujfSqU7Mhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WWERzwbobOkWe are deeply, significantly, and hyperbolically grateful to you for swinging by! Until next time… probably!

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Folks, it’s Easter Sunday… and I’ll be danged if we’re not getting out at least one more… LONG-GESTATING episode of the TNB… to wit… a much-delayed… or SERIOUSLY FREAKING EARLY… Black History Month special… dealing with black punk… metal… and other heavier guitar-based music!!

We are pysched to the exact extent that this episode is late out of the gates!! If not more so…

Please check it out below as per your interests! And don’t miss the YT playlist while you’re at it…

https://youtu.be/FjZNucLZrrMYou say two months later for BHM… we say… 10 months early!! #bogmonstermusicDan’s NotesMore than Bad Brainshttps://youtu.be/Paj1QSKIWHs?si=awKFz8n1GgqOWrsFhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SzCUzyAoLsYPure HellThe first band chronologically on my list, Pure Hell predate the “birth” of punk by a couple of years with recordings going back to 1974. They were the wild weirdo underground rockers holding down the fort for stripped down nasty rock and roll in Philadelphia when bands like the New York Dolls were walking the earth elsewhere and were an early influence of the CBGB’s scene as well as bands like Bad Brains. I first heard of Pure Hell through Nancy Barile’s book I’m Not Holding Your Coat about her time booking hardcore shows and managing bands in the City Of Brotherly Love during the early 80’s, where she mentions their vocalist Kenny “Stinker” Gordon as one of the very first people to welcome her into the scene there. While they were based in Philly, Pure Hell ended up becoming friends with a lot of the NY scene during those very early years of Punk, and were friends with The New York Dolls and Sid Vicious (during his ill-fated time in the city). The band took a big trip to London in 1978 to try and break into the scene in that city with some shows with The UK Subs, but would ultimately decide to end the band in 1979 after a falling out with their manager/producer who would also end up refusing to hand over the recordings from the album they were working on during the London trip (which would finally be released in 2010. They would reform the band in the mid 90’s to work on new recordings in LA produced by members of bands like Nine Inch Nail, LA Guns and the one and only Lemmy of Motörhead that would ultimately go unreleased as well (though their duet with Lemmy “The Call” from those sessions is available out there on there on the internet). The band would play their first live show since the 70’s at a festival in Blackpool UK in 2012 alongside Rancid and PiL, and still get back together for festival gigs here and there to this day.

https://youtu.be/0B61XAN2Ujw?si=hsFNEz46Ja9Peomchttps://youtu.be/KK640dPPhXE?si=D8FxPNvDd0pluF0SFishboneNot punk per so but definitely punk adjacent and one of very few Black bands to really break through the otherwise very white late 80’s/early 90’s alternative scene, Fishbone were a huge part of my early teen years whose work helped introduce me to a ton of other music across genres. Formed in 1979 in Los Angeles and rising to prominence in the mid to late 80’s, Fishbone’s music is a wild mishmash of metal, funk, ska, rock and soul with intense wild live shows full of crowd surfing and huge mosh pits to thrashing covers of Curtis Mayfield songs and hyperkinetic ska singalongs. Fishbone were part of the same end of the SoCal alt rock scene that the Red Hot Chilli Peppers came up in, they signed to Columbia in 1983, and hit wider audiences in 1987 with an appearance in the movie Back To The Beach (where middle-aged Frankie Avalon and Annette Funicello fight a gang of evil punk rockers over their old beach hangout)as well as the opening spot on the Beastie Boys’ License To Ill Tour. They rose to prominence on the alt rock scene of the time through the late 80’s and early 90’s, through the killer three album arc of 1988’s Truth and Soul, 1991’s The Reality Of My Surroundings, and 1993’s Give A Monkey A Brain And He Will Think He Is The Center Of The Universe. It was 1993 when things got rocky for the band, with their guitarist Kendal Jones leaving the band for mental health reasons and moving to Northern California, actions which were misinterpreted by their bassist Norwood Fisher as him leaving to join a cult, leading to a failed “rescue mission” and attempted kidnapping charges against Fisher. The band has still chugged on in various forms with vocalist/saxophonist Angelo Moore at the helm and a variety of members over the years, though in the early 2010s the entire original lineup save for guitarist Jones reunited and you can still see them going wild onstage at a ton of bigger festivals like Punk Rock Bowling annually.

https://youtu.be/tysYoy7wycA?si=zwefcawf7VQ2dypThttps://youtu.be/gMyHo5ZCMsE?si=bbHfW5QlxAaa21VzHiraxSeminal Bay Area thrashers who debuted around the same time as Metallica and 2Exodus and the like,with the band’s frontman Katon De Pena being one of the few Black musicians occupying a relatively prominent place in the nascent speed metal scene. Hirax brought thrashing headbanging riffs, blasting drums rivaling their peers in DRI in thunderous speed mixed and De Pena’s soaring melodic vocals (as he had mentioned wanting to bring a classic R&B vocal influence through his love of Sam Cooke to heavy music. Over the course of their initial three album run on Metal Blade Records in the mid 80’s the band developed a devoted cult following, with Katon somewhat retiring from playing in bands for several years and spending his time working in a Bay Area music store. It was there, a decade after Hirax’s initial run that he became friends with longtime fan of the band Max Ward, of 625 Records and the band SPAZZ (who had written a tribute to De Peña’s old band called “Skatin’ Satan and Katon”), leading to Katon giving Max some unreleased Hirax music for a split 7” with SPAZZ. This ended up leading to a whole new wave of interest in the band leading De Peña to reform the band in the late 90’s followed by a series of reunions every few years throughout the late 90’s, 00’s ans 2010s, leading up to their most recent album in 2014. True thrash originals worth checking out for sure.

https://youtu.be/9SwE7cXT01I?si=9dxnLhGpfBNNxh1lhttps://youtu.be/8-bmLNDfI50?si=olcj0pvHa1GruJM3Move BHCOne of the newer bands on my list, MOVE are pissed off hardcore with a passion for politics on top of their mosh-heavy riffage. Named for the Philadelphia Black nationalist activist group who were firebombed by that city’s police department during a raid on their homes in the mid-80’s, they have just released their first full-length album Black Radical Love on Triple B Records in late 2023. They are also one of the bands behind the awesome Dark Side Of Da Moon festival (alongside my other newer picks ZULU) in New York annually, which showcases Black punk and hardcore bands from all over the USA. They are young and pissed and passionate and awesome and wear their politics on their sleeves in the best punk rock way over big modern hardcore riffs and their debut album is a wall to wall rager that even takes a little aside from talking about the big issues to pay homage to having fun getting kicked in the face by friends in Ode To The Pit (they are a Boston HC band after all, politics or no). They also have guest appearances by Aaron from Jesus Piece, Christine from ZULU, Gjared from Out Of Body, all fellow Black or Black-fronted punk and hardcore bands who’ve taken part in DSODM in the past also. Like I said, they are a newer band with just a couple of EPs and their one full length under their collective belts, but if you like your hardcore angry and political instead of soundtracking fast food commercials, MOVE (with the BHC added to represent their hometown scene as well as making for easier googling) are a band you should check out for sure.

https://youtu.be/N9zpwIngpDs?si=OxEQlt4wWtytIlzphttps://youtu.be/fkkxt0M5mPo?si=7c7QPY8fR51tQd-LZuluI know I’ve talked about this band multiple times. I could just copy and paste my notes from other times I’ve mentioned them but seriously, this LA-based band’s debut full length from 2023 A New Tomorrow was one of my favorites from the year, and they are also a band that very much puts their Blackness front and center in their music. Really, just check them out. Their previous two EPs from when the band was more of a solo studio project with vocalist Anaiah Lei Mohammed playing all of the instruments as well are also worth checking out as well. Heavy passionate blasting hardcore with interludes of jazz, hip hop, spoken word and other genres either played live or woven in via samples, ZULU are an exciting young band for sure. I am just going to cheat here and say check out more of my thoughts on Zulu during our “Best Of 2023” episode notes, and enjoy the songs linked above.

https://youtu.be/ziU-DgTDE0A?si=OXOuns9wxtaPK87tOut Of Body – Going Wronghttps://youtu.be/8xMqdbwcljA?si=DGhDpEv3SI43MMvTBallista – Gang Of Ratshttps://youtu.be/V-G8eOVi4_o?si=hsPE8DDRWEdlHu6SBleed The Pigs – Nightmare ChildMissellanyhttps://youtu.be/MqYDinmynag?si=9JHyn77pbwZlvjJjTruth Cult -Naked In The End https://youtu.be/23ejHoQ3R2Q?si=MTenhBhUU2LjTn1YUnityTX -Ruckushttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ug7L8K1ZSk4Word On The Street -Streets On Fire demohttps://youtu.be/wcBhf8neiEA?si=HqUdbln7aGpo1NovPlayytime – Fun Never Endshttps://youtu.be/eersUF6HRYw?si=ywgqk1iMQJr2L9AoSwiz – Ninehttps://youtu.be/WxF0UTnhaxo?si=C4HibXk3phAYZiPnBURN -Ill Togetherhttps://youtu.be/h2MJpkwxESE?si=ey3mM0520er4ke2gKnife Wound – Show Your FaceMatt’s NotesSo here we go, yo!! I’ve had the worst, most weird vibes around this topic! Like…

I’ve come to determine that 95% of punk, 90’s hardcore, post-hardcore, alternative rock… is all just lily fucking white…

The stuff that’s rad, fucking slays!! As evidenced in this episode!

And, as I’ve said, my R&B, Soul, Jazz, Blues vinyl collections are all pretty slick… as far as underfunded-but-awesome record collections go… my rap and hip-hop vinyl collection is not as weak as my classical music vinyl collection but almost…

And so… two months late for the first day of Black History Month… I’m sitting here like a tit… listening to A Tribe Called Quest at such a volume that it’s ALMOST disrespectful to the upstairs neighbor… ALMOST…

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O3pyCGnZzYAANYWAY

I’ll limit my pathetic meanderings for now if only because I’ve promised Dan and myself that this episode will be ready to go in fewer than a couple of days… but, in my experience “a couple of days” can turn into “a week and a half” like nobody’s business!

One is more accomplishable than the other, by a pretty damned wide margin.

God bless us everyone! Or something…

Soul Glo https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0IaAs4D14kwI mean, holy fuck!!

I really thought for awhile about just doing my entire notes on Soul Glo… and kind of footnoting everything else…

I guess this is the year I expand my top list of bands ever… like all time… to include this fucking behemoth from Philly Rock City…

I’ll leave the wanton salivating for whatever transpired in the video/audio… however… like a goddamned Easter miracle, on Good Friday their FB feed showed up with Soul Glo inciting the FIRST-EVER TINY DESK MOSH PIT!!

That, in a nutshell, is why I love this band… here’s hoping for more in ’24!!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uA5hf_94Ffchttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wb5xOmg0W6cI mean… REALLY… Holy… Fuuuck!!

I mean… FUCK… man…

I just think it’s cool…

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EMoE4fSAXWEThin Lizzy / Little Richardhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nN120kCiVyQWord is… the boys are back!! #bogmonstermusicOK… so… this is where I go against the specific topic of the show to get to what I consider an important general truth about popular music…

That’s to say that the parts of modern rock… or any rock beyond the fifties, sixties, seventies, and eighties…phew… that I value… is significantly indebted to either and/or both of these artists in ways that run far beyond my feeble abilities to express…

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wMOL6C8f0MYYou want your shrieking and caterwauling and stomping?? Look no further… #bogmonstermusicTo wit, a band called Motörhead.

To wit, a band called Metallica.

I’m saying Thin Lizzy is a black band. If that’s the wrong approach, I’ll walk it back. Who can deny Phil Lynott? Nobody, that’s who. And Good shrieking Lord my knowledge of most things factual or implied about Little Richard is weak. Except for what any fool with eyeballs and/or eardrums can plainly tell. I don’t need Lemmy or Paul Westerberg to give me an anecdote on that.

And… thanks to Google, I’m now chuffed to know that Thin Lizzy and Motörhead shared a guitarist in one Brian David Robertson… furthermore Lemmy said in at least one widely available video that Little Richard was one of the main reasons he got into music…

Like… when you give yourself to Little Richard you’re giving yourself all the way…

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=boanuwUMNNQhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UqF_rVaGyvohttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ou2kDVt7pKQSPOT (SST Records)https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JwOMXfkh1c8https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5qN3rAc5mPYWe’ve talked about Spot variously on this show… so… in the interests of avoiding stepping too much into what’s already been said…

The sound of seventies and eighties So-Cal garage, punk, and hardcore is hugely to do with SST Records. And Spot is inseparable from SST producer, engineer, and musician…

Let’s go further: no SST… you don’t get those Sonic Youth, Dinosaur Jr, Screaming Trees, or Soundgarden records…

To wit: nearly the entire basis for 90’s grunge…

To wit: all the Foo Fighters, Pearl Jam, and whatever other 90’s behemoth bands are still out there, playing arenas to the aging Gen X’ers…

We can’t blame Spot for all that! But if you go back to just about anything with Spot’s name on it into the mid-eighties… it’s an astounding body of work!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8pNAJFNd8LkLiving Colorhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i6p3Es4TJJAIt’s almost embarrassing how little I know about Living Color… except that back in the early 90’s they had a couple of videos that hit hard… that I still remember them at all is pretty impressive, all things considered… I mean… I’ve forgotten way more important stuff over the years…

As Dan referred to the recording… you’d read about them in Guitar Player magazine… not that I did!! Circus Magazine… on the other had… for a little while… and likely Spin and Rolling Stone… I definitely subscribed and also purchased issues of these print publications from uh… Mazzuca’s variety store downtown Fredericton… during the years they were popular…

Anyway… I’m pleased to report these songs still rip! And it’s likely worth diving into their wider discography!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7xxgRUyzgs0A Band Called Deathhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=klCL0krHKqchttps://youtu.be/dgYeJAK3czg?si=0SMkWnBVNW3LhajvAs mentioned in the recording, the story behind this band is just so rad.

Do yourself a solid and watch a Band Called Death on whatever streaming service you can…

…For the Whole World to See is an absolutely perfect album title… for an 7-song EP that almost never got heard… that UTTERLY SLAYS… a reminder that we never know that the universe has in store…

OR SOMETHING. HAPPY EASTER AND WHATNOT!!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R5Pf3MlUo7cWell, somehow we’ve gotten two episodes out within 84 hours! Life should always be so rad! Thanks for joining us…

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Boo-urns, Matt Stranach!!

What in the actual feck, Matt S?

You prefer Dr. S? Go take a long walk off a short pier!

So… due entirely to circumstances owned by me… we’ve had three episodes recorded this long 2024 so far! So… in an act of stunt production… contrition… and RAPID INSTRUCTIONAL DESIGN PRACTICES… for uh… any educators in the house… here is the first of 3 episodes in 72 consecutive hours… in… drum roll… REVERSE CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER!

In this most recent episode in terms of recording… but NOT IN TERMS OF RELEASE DATE… we are on about 5 things we are/were listening to! As this was recorded roughly only a week ago, I’ll own that much of mine is still current… Please click below for audio and/or video as per your preferences!

https://youtu.be/5dPyM3FNUlgWhere we are and where we were… two drastically different things!! #bogmonstermusicWe’d be remiss not to present this accompanying YT playlist!

Dan’s NotesWhatcha listening to March 2024The Chiselhttps://youtu.be/RaXu_5PWxFc?si=RwQlgv45nP8xxjCuhttps://youtu.be/F9YVyfeE5oo?si=cxNJBknX_f5wQDZ0As far as punk subgenres go, Oi! has never necessarily been at the top of my list but these Brits have been making a strong case for me to explore more of the genre as their recently released second album “What A Fucking Nightmare” is a total rager. This is “jump around in with a pint in your hand” kind of music, with some killer hooks thrown in four good measure. Their debut from last year Retaliation was one of thr first things I think I talked about on this show (as well as their guitarist’s other band the neo-pub-rockers Chubby And The Gang) and this second album is even better. One of the things I love about this band is all of the catchy hooks and melodic riffs they throw into their stomping street punk ragers. Hell I even smell a blatant (but obviously loving) wholesale lifting of a classic Mush-era Leatherface riff as a little transitional bridge on “Cry Your Eyes Out”. This is a super fun album that had me bobbing my head and wishing I had a pint in my hand to hoist aloft while singing along from the first note. This is also The Chisel’s first album for Pure Noise Records, taking them from the scrappy indies to being label mates with modern heavyweights like Knocked Loose and Drug Church, and they are currently on this side of the pond on tour. with fellow show favorites Home Front (whose song “Nation” features Cal from The Chisel on guest vocals). The band also recorded a pretty killer cover of Elton John’s “Saturday Night’s Alright For Fighting” recently as well. For a smart and catchy take on the street punk/Oi!, I would heartily recommend giving this little rager of an album a shot.

The Ex with Tom Corahttps://youtu.be/jkHYvVE8Edg?siha8rfqgrRJf2nunuhttps://youtu.be/yfskVxCn_qo?si=ODZ9UupN-Sd16XhnDutch art-punks meet American avant-garde cellist in a wild blend of musical styles, languages and politics. The Ex have been running strong since their inception in 1979 in an Amsterdam anarchist squat, though their sonic path was more heavily influenced by The Fall and the burgeoning no-wave post punk scene than any of their circle-A waving peers. Tom Cora was an American avant-garde cellist and composer who had previously worked with folks like Bill Laswell and John Zorn, and who had become a fan and then collaborator with the Dutch art-punks after sharing a stage with them during one of his European tours. The Ex were a band I had heard about at the time, but whose music was not really readily available to me in that pre-internet music streaming except via pricy imports for the most part, but their collaborative album with Cora from 1991 Scrabbling At The Lock gained a bit of popularity on campus radio and that was how I finally ended up getting a chance to enjoy the great music they made together. Cora’s cello adds so much depth and extra heaviness to their sound and I totally hear the blueprints of bands like Submission Hold who would also mix similar influences and unconventional instrumentation in the late 90’s/early 00’s in this collaboration. The two forces would come together again a couple of years later for 1993’s And The Weathermen Shrugged Their Shoulders, but this first collaboration between the two has been a favorite for decades so it’s been a blast revisiting it for the first time in a little while.

Canal Irrealhttps://youtu.be/LZnJUeEAXiM?si=-YayWfZwy1jN9oKohttps://youtu.be/XGjLVMquMI0?si=NDO9yaMhr3KtTOFTA South Side Chicago punk rock supergroup who just dropped a killer new album at the end of February. In my opinion, Martin Sorrendeguy is one of the greatest hardcore punk frontmen of all time between his work in Los Crudos, XLimpXWristX, and NEEDLES from the early 90’s through the 2010s. This latest project of his alongside members of 00’s South Side hardcore heroes Sin Orden is now two albums deep with the release of their sophomore full length Someone Else’s Dance. Unlike their previous bands, Canal Irreal turn down the speed of their previous bands to a bit to a more medium pace with darker tones, mixing the moody vibes of The Wipers with the sounds of earlier melodic Chicago punk bands like Naked Raygun and The Effigies. Who’d have thought the guy from Los Crudos would be the one to belt out one of the year’s catchiest breakup anthems in the lead off single from the new album, “I Failed”. This is a great catchy yet mature album from one of the titans of the genre’s newest projects and totally worth your listening time.

Team Dreschhttps://youtu.be/DO5wJ7VzV2M?si=7upti1V-uHwlEKTshttps://youtu.be/in70MjwdEmw?si=C_DveEvxnSJTocgpIcons of the riot grrrl and queercore scene(s) since the early 90’s, Olympia’s Team Dresch are one of those “if you know you know” kind of bands who maybe didn’t get as much recognition outside of those communities for their music as far as crossing over to “straight” punk audiences as much but they still stand as one of my favorite bands from that whole era. I was excited to find out recently that they have been back together off and on since the mid 00’s and touring, after coming across the video for “Your Hands, My Pockets” from their EP of the same name released in 2019 while looking around for new music on YouTube, which led to revisiting their discography from their original 1990s run as well, which were some longtime favorites. My sister was pretty deep into the riot grrrl scene back in the day and this band was one our tastes overlapped on for sure. Built around longtime Olympia scenester and zinester bassist Donna Dresch (who had previously filled in on bass with The Screaming Trees for a time and played guitar for Toronto’s Fifth Column on their breakout album “36C”) and duelling vocalist/guitarists Kaia Wilson and Jody Bleyle (the latter also of Portland’s HAZEL), TD played driving melodic punk in a scene mostly known for more stripped-down sounds, and their two albums from the early-mid 90’s, Personal Best and Captain My Captain have been longtime faves that I hadn’t really revisited much recently until that YouTube algorithm turned me on to threat more recent recording, and their whole discography has been in rotation for me since.

Mojo Nixon/Jello Biafra Prairie Home Invasion

https://youtu.be/6FuTiGdN-i8?si=w6eunRw_hWbDCWJEhttps://youtu.be/ktIdmO4ZXeU?si=u_GcgnGXXCYJ-4D1First off, rest in peace to the low-culture outlaw country wildman god Mojo Nixon in his crossing over to the great NASCAR track in the sky. What seemed upon first glance a novelty genre piss-take at best, this collaboration between Dead Kennedys frontman and Alternative Tentacles Records head honcho Jello Biafra and the alt-rockabilly wild man Nixon has a surprising amount of heart and depth and a genuine love for American roots music. Sure there are some countrified takes on the usual Biafra subject matter like “Mascot Mania” and “Buy My Snake Oil”, but they also cover environmental activists Daryl Cherney and Judi Bari (rest in power)’s modern protest folk anthem “Where Are Gonna Work When The Trees Are Gone”, an updated for the time version of Phil Ochs’ “Love Me I’m A Liberal” and lots of potshots at the ever more commercial country scenes in places like Nashville and Branson, Missouri. When news came out of Mojo Nixon’s passing earlier this year, this was the album of his I ended up listening to the most afterward, though given the Jello of it all your mileage may vary all in all but it is still a nostalgic favorite that I’ve been enjoying revisiting, even if it’s definitely of a time and bearing the very distinct hallmarks of its creators.

Miscellany and some tracks from albums I’ve purchased recently and totally forgot to mention at the end of the ep:

https://youtu.be/HpVhnkKqrYc?si=iHiUM98Woi1K9ZxVJaredactyl (RIP to this Moncton synth pop artist)https://youtu.be/iyOrqb85leU?si=OU5ErTqgABcTvcp4https://youtu.be/5DcTY9i-fx8?si=r0i1ps3azxbV0I5fhttps://youtu.be/_Gw58NYktVY?si=0xjbOEZ6t8cOMvC(from his Wild And Crazy Guy album, another recent vinyl auction purchase)Superchunk – Slack Motherfucker

RUFUS featuring Chaka Khan – Ain’t Nobody (as featured on the soundtrack to the 1980’s movie BREAKIN’, which I purchased on vinyl recently through a local auction group)

Matt’s NotesYou wanted the best? Well, they didn’t make it! So here’s what you get instead!!

Notwithstanding the aforementioned humming and hawing about various delays of a personal nature and whatnot, I’ll own that it’s always a pleasure to talk TOP FIVE ANYTHING!

And so… above and beyond whatever was spoken to in the episode itself… hereabouts are some further… uh… SUPPLEMENTAL MEDIA RESOURCES… for any educators in the house…

Jesse Malin: New York Before the Warhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6-5mB3gs8b8https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OX3tJ7gFmPkI’m doing myself the immense solid of listening to this on repeat on my turntable before and after work for going on three days in a row.

What else do I know about Jesse? Google challenge: what do I know about him without going to Google? I know that he was in a punk band once. Probably 80’s. Probably NYC. And he opened a show once for Tommy Stinson. That last bit is the part I’m most confident is true.

So what the hell? It’s just relatable thirties or early forties indie aging punk guy blues, it sounds like…

Some year I could take a deep dive. Google the gentleman. Read the lyrics. Pleasures saving for another time… you don’t really need a lyric sheet anyway. The less I feel I know about an artist sometimes, the more the mystique adds to the music or whatever.

But seriously… Jesse’s an artist with all kinds of stuff out there… all of it likely rad… and I for one love having artists with a rich discography out there waiting to be heard…

Who am I to disagree? Or you, for that matter…

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9fjishmb2wQSmoke or Fire / Joe McMahonhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ygWQRAT5TpQhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EIrP4cEGmT4https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VU-zDAu09jII can’t stop listening to these two albums:

The Speakeasy &

This Sinking Ship

Both on Fat Wreck Chords

The main reason I’m listening to them is the Apple Music Algorithm (AMA)! As I think we discussed during the recording…

I’ll also maintain that the AMA heard me intentionally listening to the Brendan Kelly / Joe McMahon Wasted Potential split acoustic record like… incessantly… for many many months… and counting!

Dudes, I went so far to buy a TEST-PRESSING of that record!

Which led to me getting in touch with Iodine Records who reissued SoF’s amazing Beauty Fades LP.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pkbzQhfoCw4Wasted Potential by Brendan Kelly and Joe McMahonSo… to the extent that the AMA has handed out some solid recommendations lately… also, the Joe McMahon solo LP Another Life is really really good as well…

Another Life (LP) by Joe McMahon

Alkaline Trio: Blood, Hair, and Eyeballs https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CprfYX6hij4https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IpZj9JZJT7sOK… so we’re living in an era wherein Foo Fighters, Rancid, the Gaslight Anthem, Blink-182… to name just a very few… besides those covered on the show!!… have released albums in the past year and a-half… Pearl Jam has a new one coming out… and not that I listen or even intend to listen to almost any of this! But fans of punk, pop-punk, and alternative particularly of a 90’s vibe have seldom had it so good…

This is a solid entry by an awesome band who clearly enjoy each other and their audience so so much… in all their significant volume of IG posts… and the Alkaline Trio Addicts FB page… and all kinds of venues and fandoms I’m not even aware of… there’s a goddamned glut of good vibes coming from these dudes and their supporting bands and fans and venues… Matt Skiba got sick right in the throat but wouldn’t let that keep him from nearly any shows… by all accounts the Montreal and Vancouver shows were lit!

So… their new album holds up great to any of their other 9 albums… and takes it further… many kudos to Derek Grant’s last hurrah on the drums for this band… welcome Atom Willard… Their accompanying deeply-felt, reciprocal engagement with their fans and peers and supporters is cool as feck to see! 28 years and still going strong…

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UX6CmPG2CjsHot Water Music: Vows // Wayfarer’s Clubhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FmRpWhC7_bwhttps://youtu.be/X4XXZZUPIGk?si=yMRYt_OE7kVvevQhLook, I’m somebody who’s going to like anything Hot Water puts out. Like… out of necessity… since I heard the split with Leatherface back around when it came out, in the previous century… so…

It’s a foregone conclusion!

The vibe coming off the new album is one of collaboration and life renewals and affirmations… the guest list is unusually stacked on this upcoming release… including the likes of Turnstile! Thrice! City and Color! And others…

Also, their Wayfarer’s Club… punk rock Patreon… is in its early days pretty OK! I really have to hold off from being too much of an e-learning nerd… and punk nerd… in the discussions. All the band seems pretty engaged with it so far… and some of the commentary coming out of the discussions makes my EDUCATOR INTEREST… in… you know… e-learning… light right up…

Of particular interest… at least for me… are the Hot Water acoustic series exclusive to the Patroen! Maybe they’ll reconvene Rumbleseat for a tune or two? One can only hope…

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IQpfOx3pkoAANYWAY…

It’s amazing to see Hot Water stepping up… much like Alkaline Trio… with a new record, tour, and as vital three decades in as they were back in the day…

https://youtu.be/DU3ZFAYHhH4?si=sThkndAnpQ2AXk9-Frankie Stubbs / ST 10″ vinylhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tvn505NCtYchttps://youtu.be/FELFX7n3MEg?si=XCPtGYjtaaEC2PKVIt’s a beautiful record.

Everything about it… lyrics, package, arrangements, singing, texture.

Here’s hoping you’re enjoying the first days of spring, Frankie…

They really don’t come any better!!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LyciMaR49SUFolks, we and I are/am grateful for you checking this out!! We have two more episodes coming within the next seventy-two hours! You should join us for those too…https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rA6VNnDWoUI

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Greetings and salutations! We’re glad you’re here for the latest TNB/TTW shenanigans! As we plummet towards the end of the year like pilots ejected from planes and hoping for a safe landing, we thought we’d send you some of our favorite albums from what was a surprisingly(?) solid year for music! Please click below as you like!

https://youtu.be/T8642Als-0wOnly 51 more weeks until 2025! We might do a few more of these before then… #bogmonstermusic

We’d be remiss if we didn’t document some of this awesomeness with the YT list!

Dan’s Notes Favorites from 2023First a note on SO MANY GREAT REISSUES!

https://youtu.be/ny2giOExVHI?si=ieP0R_tdkdV_TyW0https://youtu.be/WCX1mYNMUvA?si=xeChIKTE6RhiR3CtJonas by Supreme Echohttps://youtu.be/BkfeiFQcIyI?si=2oDTCi5Dk57s6m8ahttps://youtu.be/QhzI8NlC_CQ?feature=sharedOn top of all of the great new releases in 2023 we got some pretty awesome reissues! One that I know both Matt and I got very excited about was the 3xLP boxed set collecting all of the albums, splits and other releases by the great Shotmaker, but I haven’t also shout out the great Supreme Echo Records for their LP reissue of the sole demo by Victoria’s Jonas, a band I missed out on seeing live during their brief run in the mid 90’s, “Patterns Of Dominance”. Jonas were a band I heard so much praise for when I moved to the west coast so I was stoked to check out their sole recording of awesome hardcore-meets-grindcore, with the shrieking abrasive vocals of Hadji Bakara maybe coming as a little bit of a surprise to fans of his later work as part of Montreal indie rockers Wolf Parade. Also it was so great to finally have De La Soul’s catalogue freed from sample-clearance limbo back in March, even if it all came to pass just a little too late for group cofounder Dave Jolicoeur to see in full as he passed away not long before the group’s albums were finally made available on streaming and for purchase again in March of this year. Also notable on the rerelease front was SS Decontrol’s “The Kids Will Have Their Say” LP which finally saw a proper non-bootleg vinyl pressing (with all kinds of positive thoughts going out to SSD guitarist Al Barile during his recovery from cancer surgery recently) of the raging debut album from the Boston hardcore stalwarts available once more after being out of print for decades. There was also a really cool coffee table book of archival photos and interviews of SSD in their heyday published this year, assembled by Nancy Barile and Philin Phlash and called “How Much Art Can You Take” that is definitely worth tracking down for the punk rock history fans out there as well. As one more point of reissue-related interest, the 1986 demo by Italian anarcho-punks Contropotere “E Arrivato Ah Pook” received a really sweet looking gatefold LP reissue by FOAD Records just a couple of weeks ago that is for sure something I plan on picking up in the new year as well, as their “Solo Selvaggi” EP is one of my favorite records in a particular lane of arty crust-punk with its occasional piano and operatic vocal interludes, a band I could for sure see as an influence on later artists like Submission Hold and Antiproduct. Oh yeah, and The Replacements also had something out too you may have heard this year as well (which Matt will also go into greater detail on in his notes). So much great stuff becoming available again!

https://youtu.be/LHQDb0WDRU8?si=Elp49ODktPSCnnRJhttps://youtu.be/54JmNv3lcpw?si=KGBXOP7bMCvTlp_LFiddlehead – Death Is Nothing To UsI wasn’t really a big fan of Pat Flynn’s old band Have Heart when they were ruling the sXe hardcore scene in the 00’s, just one of those “not the style I was into at the time” sorts of things, but over their past couple of albums especially I have really been enjoying his more recent project Fiddlehead a bunch, especially their newest record “Death Is Nothing To Us”. The Massachusetts-based band plays melodic post-hardcore that could be pulled in under the “emo” bandwagon that I would probably best compare to the more robust Chuck Ragan-era Hot Water Music works. Flynn’s lyrics deal heavily with balancing grief and working through personal mental health challenges with the joy and heartache of fatherhood, as Flynn’s becoming a parent has been a major source of inspiration over the last couple of Fiddlehead releases (a major influence on 2021’s “Between The Richness” especially). Since it’s release in late August of this year, this new Fiddlehead has been in pretty regular rotation around my way and definitely worth checking out if it sounds like your sort of thing.

https://youtu.be/6GW_kIygcNE?si=tr6OmOzUUkGhC9DFhttps://youtu.be/yOvn3-hSQ7o?si=qqV8vsgOZQQ2S1ISMilitarie Gun – Life Under The GunHas it really only been like three years now that Ian Shelton and co have been purveying their blend of post-hardcore, indie rock and as time goes on just more and more straight up catchy pop-rock vibes? After their collection of EPs “All Roads Lead To The Gun” last year, it was nice to get a cohesive debut album from this California band who have been working their way into my regular music rotation steadily since their first couple of EP’s and with each new release you can see Shelton moving away from the more gruff barked vocals of their earlier releases to more of a raspy melodic sound. Apparently Shelton was considering quitting music (he had previously been in the much faster and heavier Regional Justice Center) before starting MG and I’m glad he gave his new project a chance. Do I occasionally shake my head a little bit when I hear a band interviewed and they seem to think they are inventing the very idea of adding melody and catchy hooks to a sound that started under the hardcore punk umbrella on the spot? Yes, but when the band in question puts out a great melodic punk album like Life Under The Gun in the process I will for sure cut them a bit of slack. ive been listening to them to the point that I sometimes catching myself mimicking their signature “ooh ooh” ad lib to myself that gets thrown around in their songs where a “whoah” might go in another band, which you will know what I meant if you know it (or listen to a couple of their songs). Plus goddamn if “My Friends Are Having A Hard Time” isn’t secretly a “This Is A Long Drive…”-era Modest Mouse b-side (in a complimentary way).

https://youtu.be/HY0gvnHFCvQ?si=E6IIt9j_P4zk0Xm-https://youtu.be/vuLQhr9Y5eo?si=wmt5uWzhCPMIvlGtScowl – Psychic Dance Routine EPOkay so this band is pretty well known at this point after their debut “How Flowers Grow” from a couple of years back and getting picked by Fred Durst to be the opening act on a recent Limp Bizkit comeback tour, and have had the misfortune of being that band people dismiss as industry plants or generally engage in various low key sexist questionings of their “cred” on the whole, especially given the slight change in direction their sound has begun on this EP from spring 2023. On this newest record the band has started to work in more of a mid-tempo alt rock influence along with their more straight ahead punk sounds which is something that kind of picks up from where “….Flowers…” mid-album melodic punk standout track “Seeds To Sow” left off. I feel like some online chatter came off shocked at them starting to work in influences from classic woman-fronted 90’s alt-rock artists like Hole and Veruca Salt but it feels like a band starting to grow and explore new influences rather than just cashing in on trends. This is one of those records that found its way into regular rotation for me back in late spring and has stayed there ever since. I know I am an old timer trying to catch the music of today’s youths and all, but at one point this year I was even entertaining plans to go see them live with a few other bands (which ultimately didn’t happen but ah well). Still, while they may end up being that more accessible band that helps introduce new kids to “the scene” in the current era, that is a totally fine and needed place to occupy in the world, they’ve been making some pretty great tunes in the process.

https://youtu.be/r9n7-22clP0?si=frAZmII_zXU7MqdBhttps://youtu.be/Yd0Bwa15BQc?si=MTDA-7iy7fjoJJV_Danny Brown – QuarantaDanny Brown got sober this year, went to rehab and therapy, celebrated his 40th birthday and dropped two killer albums – all within 2023. I talked about his excellent collaboration with JPEGmafia, Scaring The Hoes, on a previous episode and have to give kudos to his second album of the year, Quaranta, as well in our favourites of the year list. It’s a sequel of sorts to his breakthrough 2013 album XXX, which really solidified the jittery, nasal, pilled out trap banger sound than ran through a lot of his workof the previous decade. This newest release is more filled with dark boom bap and nervous jazzy rhythms with less of the higher pitched voice (what is it with Detroit rappers and slipping into high pitched nasal voices when they what to rap about getting all fucked up?). Lyrically Brown uses the album to document the changes he has been going through, whether working on sobriety and mental health concerns or relocating to Austin Texas after spending his life in Detroit while detailing the heavy gentrification that has affected his home city (on the standout “Jenn’s Terrific Vacation”). In a year where Andre 3000 ruminated as to whether anyone wants to hear rappers talk about aging, Brown does a pretty good job at letting us know how it can be done well and how stories of growth and change can be just as engaging as his old party tales. All in all Danny has had a pretty great and prolific year on top of all of the change as I have really enjoyed both of his big albums from either end of the year. Also I need more from BruiserWolf as well ASAP as his guest verse on “YBP” is an album highlight.

https://youtu.be/CtyKEAyfHPU?si=pJ1Sn_tG0oIiFaIqhttps://youtu.be/0BtIiBI8rGc?si=LBkhhskwyzrPFfj0Home Front – Games Of PowerProbably my favorite Canadian release of 2023, this is best anthemic post-punk-meets-new-wave-meets-street-punk band of the 1980’s to actually be from four decades after that. Home Front are an Edmonton-based studio duo with a wild resume of previous bands including oi stalwarts The Wednesday Night Heroes and 00’s indie dance groovers Shout Out Out Out Out, and who also include members of No Problem and Rhythm Of Cruelty in their live formation. Their sound mixes catchy new wave melodies and more driving post punk like later BLITZ when they got into listening to the Factory Records catalogue. In my mind Home Front are basically the greatest 1980’s new wave band to not actually exist in the 80’s. I really enjoyed their debut EP so I was super excited to hear their full length Games Of Power on La Vida Es Un Mus Records back in the spring of this year and it did not disappoint at all. “Faded State” might be one of my absolute favorite songs of the year.

https://youtu.be/NKaXs38HTsE?si=I0o720eY_Ln4rRLMhttps://youtu.be/afBcovsYJIA?si=Us0Ut4pRMoKVHKCqMSPaint – Post-AmericanLove a bunch of small town weirdos with their own take on a given genre, especially when it’s driving and passionate hardcore with a dash of abrasive hip hop a la Death Grips that just happens to not bother with adding the traditional six string guitar part of things and instead concocting fiery anthems with bass, drums, keyboards and vocals. As I mentioned when I talked about them on the show previously, I got turned onto their demo via praise on a couple of different podcasts and was so excited to hear they finally had more music besides those four great songs from 2020 that I had been playing to death up to that point. Post American did not disappoint and it’s one of the three big albums on the year I can’t help but heap praises on to anyone who may be of interest when given the chance (the others being the previous next on my list, respectively). It’s been a year for some really strong debut full length albums from a crop of young bands trying to do their own things within genre conventions, and their “what if a bunch of great Revolution Summer-era Dischord bands, Check Your Head-era Beastie Boys and MC Ride all did the Steven Universe fusion dance” sound has really kept me going through the ever spicy times of our modern era. There are even some great guest cameos on the album by band mentors Pierce from Soul Glo and Ian Shelton from Militarie Gun. They are seriously one of my very favourite bands to come out over the past few years and I have played this album TO DEATH and will most likely continue to do so into 2024 and beyond.

https://youtu.be/YUob_IPSEco?si=-4d2h82qnQl5H2DVhttps://youtu.be/Xt7J8nhWI0c?si=UJ4bWP_zKCcYyw6kZULU – A New TomorrowAnother band I’ve talked about previously but whose debut full length made such an impression that it took up most of the top positions all over my Spotify Wrapped for the year (and i may or may not have ended up with copies on both green and yellow vinyl), that being Los Angeles’ ZULU and their album “A New Tomorrow”. They play a mix of heavy modern moshy hardcore and powerviolence with interludes of jazz, hip hop, and even a bit of spoken word poetry and the whole thing is just so great and passionate and exciting, you know? The band is at the forefront of the past few years waves of bands really working to make punk and hardcore a more diverse and interesting place, and make some great music in the process. They tend to stick to heavier and chuggier side of hardcore mixed with blastbeats and breakdowns but it’s the other genre nods woven in and the whole passion and energy of it all that really takes them to the next level for me. Hell, they even made a faithful recreation of A Tribe Called Quest’s “Scenario” music video for the song “Where I’m From”. Everything from the album art to the music videos they’ve created for some of the songs to the snippets of other beloved Black artists between some of the songs all just creates such a great exciting package and I am looking forward to seeing more from the band in 2024 for sure.

Honorable MentionsSome of my other favorite albums from 2023 that we’ve talked about in recent episodes, and some honorable mentions :

https://youtu.be/xxGv-JdWRWU?si=EkGup1hL8G5sGrlZhttps://youtu.be/KtClECC-7Y8?si=ouRYk9Z9URCXNAgthttps://youtu.be/MJ-00HEeY-A?si=mz54wCfKq1ugPj67https://youtu.be/IQneXJbok1c?si=I1r7iQKEzPERadarhttps://youtu.be/B79aKhfP9_U?si=I48_cUDewFXdPJZhhttps://youtu.be/jQCpVroU0wU?si=hPIep-Fpc_vGWzQLhttps://youtu.be/kz_sXzcRkKQ?si=_O3lxwAhThEkZYCJhttps://youtu.be/_rjCwraXdGc?si=Md5krEhpY7uyxsnrMatt’s NotesBeing that this is almost by definition a contemporary episode… I’m not gonna let myself feel too badly about the complete lack of representation of non-rock artists, or more significantly, no works here by any female artists… namely because if this were about our favorite albums of the year… that weren’t put out this year… that would be another thing entirely! But still… in the interests of “tracking” our coverage of artists across the life of this show, I’ve THIS VERY NIGHT at least BEGUN to tag artists in the WP post… so… we’ll at least have further analytics and data… to do WHATEVER with…

It’s been a year and then some, amiright?

Samiam Stowaway https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pMtj2kSpd5Uhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Waa9-p3-GUkAt this point, I’ve been awake 24 hours and I’m not totally sure what else I can say about this record that I haven’t said already. I feel like I’ve been talking about this album on this podcast a whole bunch of times! And… moreover… I made an “unofficial lyric video” which whoever reps them on FB did NOT ask me to take down. I’ve got a bunch of their records, give or take, and I’m just glad that 2023 saw them put out one of their best LP’s… at least so far as I’ve heard!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5h959KRTiccLucero Should’ve Learned by Nowhttps://youtu.be/w1lHdIspv0o?si=exNJo-0GHXT4vgSshttps://youtu.be/lSUmTOnOJW0?si=YOzTba8T7hJQXZbBMuch as with the Samiam record, I feel like I’ve been talking about this one all year… and I keep throwing it on! When I have money for vinyl again, I am going after the 20 year re-issue of That Much Farther West… one of the best of the punk band doing a country band thing… or is it the other way around?… ever!

It’s hard to think of a time over the past 12 or more years that I haven’t been listening to Lucero reguarly.

And for the amount of walking I do… and at one point running… I don’t drive, at this point I’m confident in saying I’m NEVER going to drive…

So when I’m getting where I need to go in the cold, rain, heat, snow, and whatnot… there’s a good chance I’ll be listening to Lucero. Which is to say a lot.

Dave Hause Drive it Like it’s Stolenhttps://youtu.be/YXMFq85Sf8s?si=EhWGt6y5PRkQzPbthttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X85zYHGZX-MThis came out of left field for me! I became aware of this record while I was in the midst of dating a woman in Kelowna in the spring. There was an aura of doom hanging over the thing… I had been unemployed for a year… and so on and so forth!

ANYWAY

I think it was something like Brian Fallon tagged him on Instagram or something… and then it turns out he’s done all kinds of cool things from his home in Philadelphia for many, many years…

I enjoyed the shit out of his Bury Me in Philly album. That was the one I had on repeat for a while in Kelowna while hanging out near the Marriott… near somewhere… and then his new one came out! And I bought it! And I enjoyed it! And I still do!

AND

My girlfriend here in Saint John said at one point: “This is the best of your music that you’ve played for me so far”.

That, friends, is some high praise.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MkG5PXmP1SUThe Replacements Tim (Let it Bleed Edition) https://youtu.be/HwLr-8YWhMs?si=1_74wnw0V7Nmjcqjhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O_siWl-AenEI think I’m going to have to make a resolution to shut up about the Replacements in 2024, unless they either get back together (0% probability) or do another super-deluxe re-issue (50/50 odds, surprisingly). It boggles the mind what they could do with All Shook Down!

Anyway, at one point over beer this fall… late at night… and I was playing this amazingly rad re-issue, and my friend Mike said: “Matt, I can’t think of the Replacements without thinking about you”. It wasn’t a cool thing. It was a resigned thing. And I know what he meant. I think.

Sorry, Mike!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E5hJeQa81ggShotmaker: A Moment in Timehttps://youtu.be/qF_DqYtx5Q0?si=PHXvG52K_Ex5rlBZhttps://youtu.be/JRtAu4fK_jk?si=ZkEPGVrFJ2cRp61qThree months ago I knew a shitload less about Shotmaker. Pardon my French.

Then my social media blew it open. A meta app owned by a billionaire alerted me to this.

And, they have an IG handle…

I am forty-five and I have never been less culturally relevant. I don’t know the slang. I never knew the slang.

And that’s fine!

Emo is officially a nostalgia industry, and has been for awhile… and in that regard, it’s never been more relevant… for geezers like me!

Every aspect of my 18-21 year old self jumps out when I hear this stuff. It was unlike music I’d heard, and to this day I can listen to it at virtually anytime. I missed seeing them live, but ultimately it’s so awesome just to have a well-designed, thoughtfully curated set. I can’t imagine what else could have been done… this actually sets a really high bar for other 90’s h/c and associated bands who still have significant audiences…

The clips that have managed to make to YouTube give us a lot to appreciate, such it is!

https://youtu.be/SkUBFnFd52I?si=RtrCZv-ov2rwQYs8And Also…https://youtu.be/xE90F_gNs48?si=wjyo8TdrzQ0goE5Ahttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hHVkPMt-o7MSlip (30th Anniversary) by QuicksandTommy Stinson’s Cowboys in the Campfire Wronger. At this point there is literally nothing Tommy S can do besides be himself… and it’s worked out great for most of his career! This record was long-gestating… like… an elephant… or a sperm whale! It’s great to hear him and his conspirator Chip Roberts having a blast and leaning deep into slightly weird Americana terrain…

Lektron S/T. This was again a case of having the money that now I don’t. It’s simple, really. Did I buy both the pink and blue variants of this limited run 12″ single from Asian Man Records even though I am generally not a fan of said format? Maybe. These songs do rock like murder, leastways.

Quicksand Slip (reissue). I was in the last throes of my “still having money” phase of life… not so long ago! And during such, I got this from Iodine Records… and I’ve been listening to it on the regular… sometimes more than once. I am DEEPLY hoping the universe and I can somehow make tickets to see them with Hot Water Music next spring in Toronto where in all likelihood HWM will be touring the album they just finished recording!

Heroin Discography. I loved the shit out of this band when I got the 1997 Heroin CD. I copied the CD cover and put it on a shirt. It made me have all the feelings when I found this ACTUALLY IN THE SHELVES at Barnacle Records in Kamloops, BC on Record Store Day.

Northcote Wholeheart. I went about this, somewhat, when it came out! It is 100% worth your time, for your mellower introspective nighttime self… more likely than not!

Dead Bob Life Like. John Wright— old AF, let’s be real—of NoMeansNo!! This coincides with some NMN reissue moves by Alternative Tentacles. This one smokes the expensive stuff!

https://youtu.be/HV1EDhK5LJ0?si=hNVlp-zXCmAj5YXIWholeheart by NorthcoteLife Like by Dead BobDid you ever know that you’re our hero? And everything we would like to be? That last part is actually not true, but still… we appreciate you!

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Come all ye (un-)faithful! Welcome to the first of two “2023 in retrospective” type episodes! In this outing, we’re looking at some of the artists who left this earthly plane over the past fifty one-and-a-half weeks! Please click below as per your preferences!

https://youtu.be/tUCM8u2Fo8kWe had joylessness and funlessness… we had seasons in the sunlessness… #bogmonstermusicAudio is like video without our handsomeness! #bogmonstermusic

Please be sure to check the YT playlist, if that’s your bag… man…

Dan’s NotesIn memoriam 2023First off, one more round of Rest In Power to Sakevi Yokoyama of GISM (whose passing we discussed on the Favourite Compilations Episodes ep), Dave Jolicoeur of De La Soul (discussed on ep one “Five Band That Made You”), and Sinead O’Connor (discussed on our Favourite Non-Punk Artists episode). Check the show notes for those respective episodes for my thoughts on the artists in question!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wrq0cZ7SYLQhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=da2BxnVD-lcGlenn Lockett aka Spot (producer)The mastermind of the SST Records sound who had a surprise post script to his punk career by having a hand in one of the early bands of the folk punk scene later on. One of the overlap points between my list and Matt’s to no surprise, Spot was an integral part of SST Records and the creative community around the label. A longtime friend of Greg Ginn’s and the son of one of the legendary Tuskegee Airmen of WWII, Spot produced records for Black Flag, Husker Du, Saint Vitus, and a host of other legendary bands who released records on SST, and the wild details of his life and adventures during that era are best summed up by Jim Ruland’s book on the record label “Corporate Rock Sucks”. One thing from after that time in Spot’s life that I thought was kind of a cool post-script to his original run of involvement in the scene, was that apparently he ended up at an early show by Florida country-folk punkers This Bike Is A Pipe Bom and was impressed enough to introduce himself to the band afterward, according to an interview with This Bike… frontman Rymodee I read awhile back, and mentioned to the band that he had been teaching himself to play the viola, leading the band to invite him to play the “fidola” on their Dance Party With…. album on Plan It X Records in 1999, which was a seminal record in the folk-punk subgenre. I always thought that was cool little mini-second act on his involvement in putting out some truly great records, and his 8mpaft on punk rock on the whole just from the SST era is unparalleled. RIP.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PKURhqmSLmMhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ym-Oz0TMSb0Shane McGowan (The Pogues)Shane McGowan is one of the great poets of the 20th century, the face of a band who flew to unexpected heights for artists of their sub genre and even contributed a song to the legit canon of (sometimes inescapable) Christmas music. After starting out fronting early UK ‘77 punks The Nipple Erectors, McGowan formed The Pogues in the early 80’s to fuse traditional Irish folk music and a more raucous punk edge, weaving his own heartrending tales of sex workers, war veterans and the unhoused on the grimy streets of London with traditional folk standards like “The Wild Rover” and “Dirty Old Town”. His lyrics were like this amazing little heartbreaking short stories delivered in a gruff but soulful voice through snagged teeth and the slurring of maybe one drink too many (as he would leave The Pogues for “health reasons” in the early 90’s due to his notorious amount of alcohol consumption). For him to pass around this time of year when his most famous composition, Fairytale Of New York, enters its usual place in the canonical rotation of kind of edgy holiday music that you can still put on without the aged members of the family take offense, makes his passing hit that much harder as his voice is just so much more present this time of year. I’ll admit I took a bit of a break from the music of the Pogues for a few years after my time working in a very music-focussed Irish Pub where they unfortunately became the soundtrack to a bit of a cruddy overworked era of my own life and therefore had built some unfortunate associations in my mind but revisiting it now in the wake of his passing he really deserves a spot in the canon of great singer songwriters of the 20th century alongside his country mate (and fellow 2023 passing) Sinead O’Connor and will truly be missed.

https://youtu.be/iRrUS8gCvaU?si=f4f2cWjdExnwdHsXhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lzJ4oovsdtIFounder of legendary hip hop crew Flavor Unit and archivist of the breakbeat with a fondness for 45 RPM singles (hence his DJ name), Mark James (1961-2023) was from the Bronx but helped put New Jersey on the map in the rap world at a time when just being from the wrong borough of NYC could call one’s hip hop credentials into question, let alone admit to being from outside the city (or even out of state). He first broke out in 1987 with “The 900 Number”, and then started putting together a crew of like minded artists he wanted to help get over from around NY and NJ like Lakim Shabazz, Chill Rob G and their breakout star Queen Latifah. The 45 King was also Latifah’s tour DJ while still producing for other artists (including remixes for the likes of Madonna and other), and also released multiple series of classic breakbeat compilations before stepping back from music altogether for a time in the 90’s dues to substance issues. By that point Flavor Unit was also home to other breakout stars Naughty By Nature and Redman, further increasing New Jersey’s profile in the hip hop world. In 1998 Mark returned to the world of hip hop long enough to produce two massive breakout hits for thir respective artists – Jay Z’s “Hard Knock Life” and Eminem’s “Stan”, his last musical efforts before stepping away entirely. He was 62 when he passed away this fall.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=02MAcqIvX7whttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wUBajd8-6gkRick FrobergSan Diego icon and one half of Jehu’s twin guitar onslaught. San Diego is one of those cities with a small but highly influential music scene, and the bands synonymous with that small but influential scene all either featured Froberg in some way (either through his musicianship or skill as a visual artist which he used to create album art for several of his own and other bands) or where influenced by his work in some way. Drive Like Jehu were also the rare heavy underground post hardcore type of band to get a major label push and distribution at a time in the early 90’s when that sort of music was something not as easily found so often, due to the fact that his Jehu-mate John Reis’ other band Rocket From The Crypt became a hot commodity in the music biz, with Reis insisting that his other band with Froberg also get a release alongside with them, leading to their second album Yank Crime getting a major label release at a time when not too many bands with screamy vocals and angular guitars were getting attention above the underground level. After DLJ, Froberg and his frequent collaborator Reis started Hot Snakes, who released several albums throughout the late 90’s and early 00’s on San Diego indie Swami Record, with album art by Froberg in his distinct style as well. After Hot Snakes, he played in The Obits whom I am still kicking myself over missing out on the one time they came through Halifax during Pop Explosion in the early 2010s. Unfortunately, he passed away from an undiagnosed heart condition at the relatively young age of 55 at the end of June this year, way too young for sure.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0iQQT2kNiVQhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Orw1QXciF7MBen Brennan (Barlow, Weed Thief, A Sight For Sewn Eyes, Surveillance, Word On The Street)Had to include this beloved Halifax musician who passed away way too young at age 29 back in April of this year. This hit hard. Ben is someone whose music I first became acquainted with back in his early bands Megalodon and Castle Wolfenstein, though by the early 2010s during the nascent days of Halifax DIY venue Sad Rad, around the time that I was playing in my last band while also trying to bring my (not very good take on) standup comedy into underground venues outside of the traditional club environment, I feel like almost every single show I did in town was with one of Ben’s other bands like Barlow, Weed Thief, or the mighty Word On The Street (whose great 7” Street Spirit is still available via bandcamp). Ben’s other long-running project A Sight For Sewn Eyes were labelmates with Alexisonfire and more recently he had been playing with melodic indie rockers Surveillance, and he can also be seen on the cover of Botfly’s Lower Than Love LP from 2021. Losing Ben hit hard because he was a huge part of the past decade and a half of the Halifax music scene, and who knows how many other great bands he could have come out with had he been around a bit longer. Sorely missed.

End notes/honorable mentionshttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=idGZLKX7pfwhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gcm-tOGiva0https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G9jHiifI74QMatt’s NotesAfter one heck of a year, I’ve got not much to say! For a change! Color me winded…

ANYWAYS, as mentioned during the episode… let’s a moment or two for some of the righteous souls who moved to their next phase of existence…

Van Conner (Screaming Trees)https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SzUMONclI8ohttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rwvlUEm_fmAImagine forming a high school band with your miscreant brother and some other miscreants in your small, violent pre-internet WA state nowhereville… and within two years you’re on legendary punk and hardcore label SST Records… and within five you’ve also been on Subpop… and landing on a major label circa Nevermind-era grunge… you can’t go far into the major label “90’s northwest” wikis without reaching the Trees… and the Conner brothers…

And to which we can also add… an entire post-grunge musical life to be discovered… Respect…

Andrew Laing (Leatherface, Cockney Rejects)https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nwQ0hAD7_r4https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kbpUdjHJXuoThese men lived hard and looked fifty before they even got started in the mid-eighties. I was scrolling around making notes for an episode of TNB… Leatherface related… and found this out. Not shocking by any means, but still… one of the greatest guitar bands of all time lost one more member… there are fewer and fewer left… respect!! And he leaves a whole bunch of music outside of Leatherface to be discovered for years to come…

Gordon Lightfoothttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0xwfTGxg_KEI can’t be Canadian and not post about this. I just can’t! Influential… and probably my ideal night-time-by-myself LP’s… The Replacements have released exactly one album of new music in the past thirty-three and counting years… which is the 2013 Songs for Slip EP… including a cover of I’m Not Sayin’… which is what led me to even going… Lightfoot… not just from your parents’ box of dusty phonographs…

Shane MacGowan / Sinéad O’Connorhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fYmB4Qej9U4https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0-EF60negukTwo amazingly generous, artistically brilliant Irish artists who left us too soon but having blessed us with hours and days and years of amazing recordings, writings, photographs, and other ephemera.

When I returned to NB from Korea after my first year of teaching… I was living with my Dad in an apartment on Regent Street… doing the one-year B.Ed teacher training program… living without my then-wife for the first time in a few years… that was the last year I was friends with a guy who went on to have a (more) troubled personal life… I had no idea I was going to go to Qatar or have two amazing kids… or do a Ph.D…

And Hell’s Ditch was the album I listened to most that winter, no question.

Suaimhneas síoraí

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j7pLeAGsFCsSpot (Producer, SST Records)https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5qN3rAc5mPYhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JwOMXfkh1c8I’m going to defer in these written comments to everything that Dan said earlier! A major talent, without whom American alternative and punk music would sound far differently than it does! Under-recognized in his time, as with many legends!

I strongly recommend reading Corporate Rock Sucks: The Rise and Fall of SST Records by Jim Ruland for an amazing read generally… and also to get some fascinating glimpses at some of these folks in the “prime” of their musical and cultural influence!

Sixto Rodriguezhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QL5TffdOQ7gMy only thing here beyond what was mentioned during the recording…

He was a unique person who ultimately had the chance to share his music with the world well before passing this year. Respect!

We’re on the cusp of the New Year! The very freaking cusp! Have a frigging great holiday time, will ya?

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Holy cow! In 50-odd weeks of this malarkey, we’ve made it this far! That’s like 1.363636363636364 episodes per month! How do we do it? We are masters of efficiency! And we are very handsome! It’s so easy when everyone’s trying to please us, baby…

Uh…

In one corner we have Dan talking about some his favourite wrestling and music cross-overs! In the other, we have Matt talking about his favourite academia and music connections! We are totally crossed-out and criminally over-connected!

https://youtu.be/BR2e-rXzReMIf you’re not checking this playlist, you’re doing this wrong!

Dan’s NotesPunk and wrestling crossovershttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EQfrHkjvx6ghttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1Z58qcG42P4Bob Mould in late WCWWorld Championship Wrestling was in a weird place at the cusp of the millenium, before its ultimate demise and sale to the WWE after the heady years of “the Monday Night Wars”. Under the creative direction of Vince Russo and his “Crash TV” artistic credo a lot of wild things went down, and during that time a lifelong wrestling fan from the Twin Cities named Bob Mould who was looking for a little direction after the breakup of his band was brought in first as a consultant and then writer/producer to help provide a young and hip perspective during the company’s attempts to regain their heights of success from the earlier part of the late 90’s. I know that a day job is a day job, but I still find it totally wild that the person behind some of my favorite thoughtful melodic punk songs of his era had a small hand behind the scenes during the wild and wacky waning years of WCW. The company had definitely sunk a bit at that point since their heyday of 1996 to 1998 when they were actively challenging the WWE for dominance of the industry and at this point were aiming squarely for the lowest common denominator while also trying pull in new eyes through pop culture tie-ins with Insane Clown Posse, KISS (who paid them to dress wrestler Dale Torborg up in a variation of Gene Simmons’ onstage getup and facepaint and bill him as “The KISS Demon”) and the movie Ready To Rumble (by making Rumble star David Arquette the company’s World Champion for a brief time). Oh yeah The Misfits (sans Danzig in the Michael Graves era) were also there for a bit accompanying luchador Vampiro – who had grown up a fan of the band as a young punk rocker in Thunder Bay ON before moving to Mexico to learn that country’s high flying grappling styles and taking the Lucha Libre scene by storm and later joining the WCW roster to break into the US market. Mould’s talk of his time working there usually lead to stories of him more being the one invariably trying to pass along whatever potential Russo-penned storylines that late era-Hulk Hogan was destined to reject with a resounding “Doesn’t work for me, brother….”, than any sort of real backstage power figure of any kind, but still a pretty cool little side gig to have as a fan while taking a break from the music industry, and a neat little crossover between the punk rock and wrestling worlds.

Andy Williams, The Butcher Of Buffalohttps://youtu.be/_Gau6SL-Xt0?si=8ZiQb5JOaYljYl98https://youtu.be/V5x1BxH2U-s?si=b7PnjS3L64_Ge-tkYou know how sometimes you may start out in one creative milieu but some force or other drives you to maybe try something else out for awhile, only to not get back to the other thing years later? When aspiring Buffalo pro wrestling student Andy Williams injured his knee and picked up a guitar, a new path opened up that would still lead him to the ring, but first to a different sort of stage. He and a few Buffalo pals founded metalcore heroes Every Time I Die in 1998 during his break from in-ring training and released nine full length albums over the course of a little over two decades, though towards the end of the 2010s Williams started contemplating a possible return to the ring during his off time between ETID tours, and the band even started featuring wrestling matches featuring friends from around Buffalo and beyond during their “Merry TIDmas” holiday charity shows. During the latter half of the last decade Williams joined forces with longtime wrestler and trainer Jesse Guillmet and started making appearances around the indie wrestling scene with him as tag team The Butcher And The Blade. The band drew the attention of the budding All Elite Wrestling and were soon appearing on TV regularly, primarily as in-storyline goons for a variety of heel characters and with Williams aka “The Butcher Of Buffalo” dressed in biker-esque attire while usually exaggeratedly chewing on a pork chop or comically large sandwich while making his way to the ring. The role of “enhancement talent” is an important one in the world of pro wrestling and B & B have occupied that role for a large part of their All Elite run thus fa, with Williams organizing tours around wrestling appearances and balancing both until Every Time I Die ultimately called it quits in 2022 due to alleged tensions between their vocalist Keith Buckley and most of the rest of the band. While Andy Williams hasn’t joined either post-ETID project (the Keith Buckley-fronted Many Eyes or the rest of the band’s new project Better Lovers who released a pretty solid full length last year), he has continued to appear on AEW’s three weekly TV shows regularly, even if it is in the capacity of storyline hired goon.

Brody King/Gods Hatehttps://youtu.be/ATSD1-J7jnQ?si=PEqK2Lomb50MB-O7https://youtu.be/9aB269zq_lo?si=p4Wq1boQgQiJbsPXSometimes there are people who seem to function as the unofficial ambassadors between various scenes, and Brody King is someone who serves that function in the worlds of hardcore music and professional wrestling, and has also had a hand in one of the most popular reality TV competition shows of the past decade or so in his day job era. For the past decade or so he has been the frontman of SoCal moshy hardcore heroes God’s Hate, who have been growing in popularity steadily in recent years after their pretty great self-titled album on Closed Casket Activities in 2021 and a string of appearances on high profile events like the annual Sound And Fury Fest in Los Angeles. On top of that he has been a professional wrestler working for New Japan Pro Wresting, Ring Of Honor, and now AEW as part of the House Of Black faction. Also as a side note on top of all of that, his day job prior to becoming a full time wrestler and hardcore frontman was working onset as part of the lighting crew for various TV productions like The Newsroom on HBO and several seasons of RuPaul’s Drag Race. On top of that, through King’s involvement with AEW some of his bandmates have been getting involved with the wrestling scene in their own ways as his Gods Hate-mates Colin and Taylor Young have written and performed entrance music for House Of Black as well as other AEW wrestlers like Wardlow, The Gunn Club and Danhausen, and AEW recently released a 12” record compiling various songs used as entrance music by House Of Black, including tracks by Gods Hate and related bands like Twitching Tongues and Deadfuckingbody.. King and Danhausen were also notoriously part of a backstage crew of straight edge hardcore enthusiasts who gravitated to the orbit of CM Punk during his stint in AEW. CM Punk is a whole other can of discourse worms for another podcast that is not our own haha, but still something I thought deserved at least a mention. As far as my side of the topic this week goes, Brody King is one of those rare folks taking on both music and wrestling with equal fervour at the same time, and integrating bits of both into his presentation of the other and one of my favorite current in-ring performers currently so I had to include him on my list.

Jeff Cannonball – Altered Boys, Gary The Squirrel and deathmatcheshttps://youtu.be/k24YW4k8EYw?si=qNcxAVvQwyMiEQyPhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-8wRWEkFZE8The first time I was exposed to the work of Jeff Cannonball, it was in his capacity as backing musician to a squirrel puppet voiced by a 2000s underground comedy podcast icon, that being Gary The Squirrel voiced by Tom Scharpling of The Best Show, on a 7” of songs performed by the squirrel puppet in question as a fundraiser for the show. Little did I know that the bassist from the squirrel puppet’s backing band was a longtime stalwart of the more underground end of the death match wrestling scene working for companies like the infamous Combat Zone Wrestling on top of playing in a killer garagey hardcore band with records on boutique labels like Deranged and Katorga works, and occasional collaborations with alt-comedy squirrel puppets. Cannonball’s wrestling is definitely part of the grittier end of an already pretty grimy and away-from-the-mainstream part of the indie wrestling scene. His matches are more likely to use metal chairs, light tubes and barbed wire than any sort of high flying acrobatic moves or intricate holds. The death match wrestling scene definitely skews closer to the grassroots end of the music scene a lot of the time in general, with it not uncommon for the audience to also be more into stuff like death metal and extreme music as well as the more visceral and bloody end of indie wrestling. Cannonball and his wife and fellow wrestler Terra Callaway have both also been very involved with fundraising and grass roots advocacy around mental health issues with their peers in the indie wrestling scene through her Dropkick Depression organization as well. While his band the Altered Boys ceased playing together in the 2010s, Cannonball’s latest project Big Heads continue along a similar fast and rocking hardcore sound and have been teasing a demo release on bandcamp soon. While maybe not the biggest star in either arena, I thought it would be cool to mention someone like Jeff Cannonball travelling in the more DIY and underground ends of of both punk and wrestling at the same time currently.

Billy Corgan and The NWAhttps://youtu.be/q-KE9lvU810?si=emnQ49vQ-x8w6Yo1https://youtu.be/v1Ua-DNtTN8?si=UiLk63qXAJ79Zby9The National Wrestling Alliance was one of the most important forces in pro wrestling for decades, a cartel of promoters that literally ran the industry nearly unopposed until Vince McMahon Jr’s purchase of the WWWF from his father Vince Sr, which led to a whole other thing you may have heard of called the WWE. If you are interested, the book “Death Of The Territories” by Tim Hornbaker gives a good account of the organization’s history during its original run. In the late 2010s a group of old timey wrestling fans decided to purchase all trademarks and rights to title belts and stuff associated with the NWA in hopes of reviving the brand via YouTube, and needed an investor (or “money mark” in the slang of the industry). Continuing the spirit of Rick Rubin’s patronage of Smoky Mountain Wrestling in the 90’s, a lifelong wrestling fan named William Corgan of Chicago Illinois decided to sink a chunk of his money from playing in a lttle band called Smashing Pumpkins into helping them revive it as a boutique promotion on YouTube with a self-consciously retro vibe to its shows, first in the documentary series Ten Pounds Of Gold and later their weekly showcase NWA Powerrrrrrrrr. Powerrrrrrrrrr had a bit of an online following at first, and early on attracted some pretty high profile up and comers and indie stalwarts like Ricky Starks, Thunder Rosa and Eddie Kingston who all quickly jumped ship to the higher-profile stage of AEW. Unfortunately the company also attracted controversy by adding territories-era in ring performer, wrestling historian and internet troll Jim Cornette to their commentary team who decided to “add” to the show’s self-consciously retro image by some 80’s-style racist jokes to his play by play commentary on an episode of Powerrrrrrrrrr, and while they did fire him over the incident, it definitely laid bare the fact that part of the subset of wrestling fans who were drawn to said self-consciously retro image also were maybe a little less progressive than fans of other independent promotions currently. Unfortunately Corgan saw this and noticed an opportunity, and after a title run by indie veteran and actual grandparent Tim Storm, the NWA championship was put on ex WWE wrestler Tyrus, fka “The Funkasaurus” Broadus Clay who had gone from dancing in a Dayglo tracksuit on Monday Night Raw to trading in conservative talking points (including some pretty nasty homophobic rhetoric) as a personality on Fox News, where he would carry his title belt onscreen during various Gutfeld Live appearances as a means of drawing the network’s devotees to the promotion as a throwback to “simpler times”. Corgan also welcome the remains of the failed “Control Your Narrative” promotion to join his roster, a weird right-libertarian themed wrestling company that made up of a handful of mid card ex-WWE wrestlers fired during early pandemic cost-cutting measures and a couple of one-time indie stars no longer booked by more credible promotions due to their histories of abuse allegations (and therefore “victims of cancel culture” or whatever). While on occasion he has still featured some enjoyable performers like Matt Cardona and Max The Impaler, Billy Corgan’s misadventures in wrestling promotion have leaned more towards courting controversy over putting out a quality project, and after Tyrus’ loss of their title became a meme from how overall lacklustre their match was and a potential TV deal with the CW cable network was shot down due to a segment of their YouTube show where wrestlers were pretending to snort cocaine on camera during an in-storyline celebration, the Smashing Pumpkins’ frontman’s efforts in wrestling promotion has not exactly been the most celebrated of late, but he is certainly one of the more high profile pop culture figures to try his hand at the wrestling promotion game at that level (even if the end product has kind of sucked).

Miscellaneoushttps://youtu.be/PscOK3hR4tM?si=lRQgi4Cx78I_yB_ZManner Farm fits on both lists! Here is their 1997 demo Oppression And Compassion circa when Happy Kreter fka XStrife The Vegan WarriorX of various Vancouver-area indie wrestling promotions, and later of Gob, By A Thread, and Between Earth And Sky was playing bass for them. Their drummer is now a professor of Indigenous Geography in Vancouver.

https://youtu.be/_UQCUlOx14o?si=8Agax9wBMWwTLwPvVampiro and the Misfits from WCW.https://youtu.be/9_RSqO8JmK4?si=0U4p8hpspCtLOjESThe story of the time a future WWE wrestler and a member of GWAR saved The Misfits from a very angry Randy Savage.https://youtu.be/0gkwACGxILo?si=cZ6CY3x4gY4yTd3HRancid performs “Ruby Soho” for Ruby SoHo’s entrance at AEW Double Or Nothing 2022 pay per view.https://youtu.be/HCO3phsMeQo?si=DvPTll_XUMUrUrojI can’t not mention CM Punk in a show about when punk/HC and wrestling cross over, so here is him going back to his old entrance music by AFI at AEW Revolution 2022 PPV.Matt’s Noteshttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yOfvPNaNEMAGreg Graffin (Bad Religion) / Milo Aukerman (Descendents)Of course, I’m going to include them. Of course, they’re at the top of the list.

Did you know Milo had a heart attack not that long ago? Mild as it turns out.

Milo’s described by Internetish sources as punk blah-blah and “former research molecular biologist.” You learn new things here all the time, right?

Dr. Graffin is listed on Google as “American singer and evolutionary biologist”.

Being one of these doctorate people myself I know the insanity you throw yourself into in the programs. I know nothing of the insanity of being in popular punk bands from California. Like… it’s your job… and the science stuff… also a job… is mainly the fun thing?

I mean, well-done to anybody who can keep those two enterprises going at once.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=12kcpP-8jfMPatterson Hood (Drive-by Truckers)https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NddjumC3Rcohttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hEUOoJKmlC0This is a case where a college or university degree is pursued but left incomplete due to any number of factors. I would call this academically crossed-over to the extent that were it not for said incompleted (sic) academic endeavours, there would either be no DBT, or DBT would exist far differently than it currently does or has. In this case, DIFFERENT actually would be BAD, children.

Here’s an article from long enough ago that Patterson looks young! Six albums into the DBT’s career, and he gives a guest lecture on the music business for some Southern university or other… it’s as cool as anything else they’re involved in…

Ben Nichols: The Last Pale Light in the West / The Lawrence Arms &/or Brendan Kelly: Blood Meridianhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3tgzv2Tk_74I feel like I must’ve mentioned the Nichols record before on this podcast… possibly on the mixed media special? And even I know that I mention TLR way too often. But… to the extent that they both deal with one of the Real Great American Novels… I’d be remiss not to include them both here… or all three… or all four… or whatever, man…

To the extent that there exist at least three significant recordings by singers known to be literary generally and outright loquacious when performing about this one novel. Well, it’s one hell of a thing. Downright academicish? I’m stretching the limits of the format to be sure. And yet, I do so knowing that I have no credibility to risk by such shenanigans. Which shenanigans, as a bona fide post-academic worker person, I can tell you are rampant in academia… so, in a very roundabout way, this is relevantish!

Cormac McCarthy for the win, now and forever, obviously.

And here is a downright charming interview Ben did with the small Southern university where he did his History degree… thirteen years into Lucero… which means some DECADES have clearly passed!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1Dlu6HOoCCshttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cgemchflN0MShotmaker (somehow)a moment in time: 1993-1996 by SHOTMAKERhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pBY2-wh1KAEI am absolutely determined to make Shotmaker fit into this topic, somehow, so I will have an excuse to talk about the amazing new collection 1993-1996: A Moment in Time.

In terms of my particular moments in time, I was in high school those exact years.

There’s something about those of us who grew up in the 90’s, man… I’ve been known to call us the Greatest Generation… have I mentioned that before?

Anyway!

Because for sure the three guys in Shotmaker have had day jobs, families, and everything else… their lives are not as documented as say Dr. Greg, or Dr. Milo… or that guy from the Offspring… so… one would say that in all likelihood at least one of them is among the seventy-five-ish percent of Canadians who complete some kind of post-secondary education..

Case closed! The monkey did the murder in the morgue!

Also, the answer may POTENTIALLY lie in this interview with Nick from Shotmaker on the Washed Up Emo podcast. Dan probably knows about this awesomely named thing, but I didn’t! But I do now!

And I also can’t recommend the boxed set strongly enough!

*Important update: Nick from Shotmaker has had a significant career in the arts and is now a professor at OCAD in Toronto! So THERE’S my academic connection on this. Phew.

Finally, there is a really good interview with Tim and Nick in a now-defunct music blog… but it’s from 2019, so… recent-ish!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fycZnbr8QocTitus Andronicus: The Monitorhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=08fqHr_KGPYAll I’m saying is, making a double record themed around the American Civil War is pretty goddamned ambitious. And, with his high-minded caterwauling Patrick Stickles leaps viscerally into the schtick. Viscerally like a bayonet to the soft parts… viscerally like… you get it, I’m sure! From the state that brought you Sinatra, Springsteen, and Glenn Danzig… and William Carlos Williams!

AND: The Lamentable Tragedy of Titus Andronicus is Shakespeare’s first play (as per the so-called “literary canon” eyeroll, puke-puke). And pretty hardcore in terms of violence for the time (I guess!) and for the Shakes-ster’s collective body of work (more guessing!). Academic-ish? A mile wide, says I!

For more on this SEMINAL (Editor: Must you??)(Me: Like Butthead: He-huh He-huh He-huh) album, you should check Ye Olde Wikipedia entry on the same! I could refer you to Pitchfork & whatnot, but by now my work here is either completely done or completely UN-done. But, either way, you know!

A PERSONAL APPEAL TO PATRICK STICKLES: PLEASE WRITE AN ALBUM ABOUT THE WAR OF 1812 BETWEEN THE UNITED STATES AND CANADA!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ljUcFuAp_G0New Jersey’s finest! Followed closely by Danzig… #bogmonstermusic And, holy crow, there is a one-hour “making of” documentary which I just discovered now! Next time I’m just going to get an AI to write these notes.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=enEdLGZ48vUKira (Black Flag)https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WeYqzXJYkyYhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m8V0NvhACzIKira Roessler was the bassist for Black Flag for their most productive run of albums. As per Wikipedia:

Roessler was majoring in applied engineering at UCLA, and Black Flag’s subsequent tours were scheduled around her classes—a condition of her joining the band. Her bass playing was featured on five of Black Flag’s studio albums and two officially released live album.

She went to university! Which means I get to include her, and Black Flag, in this episode!

I became aware of this fact in the first place through Jim Ruland’s excellent book Corporate Rock Sucks: The Rise and Fall of SST Records which I’ve mentioned on the show before. Out of all members of Black Flack across it’s lengthy-ish existence, Kira has found the most durable, successful career in music over the years… working as a dialogue editor in Hollywood, and winning an Academy Award with her team for the sound design on Mad Max: Fury Road. She also won TWO Emmy Awards for dialogue editing on HBO shows! Accomplished in all kinds of ways, this Kira!

If you look at the Black Flag discography, a couple of things should be evident:

1. Kira played on many (most!) of the albums people think of when they think of Black Flag… minus The First Four Years, and Damaged….
2. How does a band record and tour 5 full albums within two years? By punk standards… or ANYBODY’S… this is incredibly prolific… you only have that kind of energy in your twenties… says a guy who probably NEVER had that kind of energy!

At some point I’m going to dive into all things Minutemen for one of these episodes… which will be another great opportunity to talk about Kira. Until then…

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hEJnMQG9ev8You wanna get nuts?? Let’s get nuts! #bogmonstermusic

*Honourable Mention: Wilco: Yankee Hotel Foxtrot Super Deluxe Editionhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V7uXx_2ToXwBack in the not-so-distant Before Times, when I was solving as many problems as I thought I had by, in a large part, leaning into IPA & Vinyl Dad mode…

Is this the Ulysses of early-00’s Americana? He thought, distractedly, typing foppishly. What an utterly weak line. Weak. And how is it that I’m still pecking away at these notes all these blasted days later?

Uuuhhh… [Clears throat] SUPER productive night up in here. Yessir….

Oh! And! Replacements biographer Bob Mehr wrote the significant liner notes! And he won a Grammy for such! Making him a two-time Grammy winner… the first being for the amazing Replacements reissue Dead Man’s Pop… making it the only thing related to the Mats to win that coveted (?) statue. Go writers! Somebody in this mess has been to college.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VYAfs9WKRdw*Extra Honorable Mention: The Great Unwashed & Unknown (TGU&U)https://youtu.be/sOsHgjOQM0M?si=-h7ArzKNHu0BQkclAll you people out there with college certificates… diplomas…. MBA’s…. arts degrees… PhDs in Engineering… whatever… meat cutting school… CompuCollege…

Or who attended a thing and didn’t finish it… or put it on hold… or took forever to finish it…

AND

Who play in bands… or go to shows… or pay for music…

All of you… the 75% of Canadians who attend post-secondary… no word on how that skews in or around or among the punk subculture!…

You are all “crushing it”, to use a term!

Please forgive me… I am a middle-aged man and I am prone to fits of sentimentality…

We couldn’t be more obliged for you visiting than we are, even if we wanted to! Which we don’t!

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Good early (early!) morning! It’s 04:03 on the first workday post-Thanksgiving weekend… and exactly one day after the last episode went out into the world… it’s a new strategy… leveraging neuroses and insomnia for the benefit of this podcast!

This episode is called “Late to the Party”! And it’s all about artists we discovered late (late!) in their careers! The links below are for clicking… if you’re late to this whole World Wide Web experience…

https://youtu.be/d6Pn2RKfb90Times ain’t tough, they’re tedious! It’s our hayday…. #bogmonstermusic

The sounds of lateness! Coming at you early! #bogmonstermusic

Don’t sleep on this aged playlist, neither!

Dan’s NotesJeff Rosenstockhttps://youtu.be/MbD_KegM_mQhttps://youtu.be/3QHv-4u_REUOkay so I have been onboard for most of Mr Rosenstock’s solo era, but I missed out on enjoying the first solid decade of his musical output due to pre-judging his old band due to the fact they they were a ska punk band with what seemed like a not so creative teenager’s idea of an incendiary name ( “Bomb The Music Industry”) travelling in the same circles as a bunch of bands I just wasn’t all that into so they really didn’t end up on my radar at all st the time. However, when Rosenstock served as musical guest on an infamous episode of the cable access incarnation of The Chris Gethard Show (where the entire first fifteen minutes or so of the show were entirely derailed by the audience chanting “Eat More Butts” over and over again until the perplexed host through to Jeff and his band to play a selection from his solo debut “I Look Like Shit” from 2013. He has since become one of my favorite artists, and Bomb The Music Industry weren’t actually all that bad of a band to begin with, yet as I end up saying about multiple other artists throughout the episode, there was definitely a time where all music was not necessarily just there for the listening at no cost whenever and during that time, sometimes things just never ended up entering your listening orbit until actively sought out and I let myself miss out on some great earlier works from one of my favorite musicians because I thought the name of his old band was kind of silly (the guy who has acts with names like Fun With Chainsaws on his musical resume). Regardless, I’m glad I caught on when I did as he is definitely one of my favourite current artists going.

Jay Reatardhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S2DFsW_2T5ghttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DqtfCTbU0oAThe mid-late 00’s were a weird time and I grew away from a lot of “the scene” as it were during that period. I worked something like 60 hours a week between my line cook gig and weekend bouncer shifts at the same Irish pub where I was frying fish’n’chips and microwaving prefab Cornish pasties during the week, while dating a DJ who specialized in rare breakbeats and listening to mostly weirdo abstract hip hop and doomy gloomy atmospheric post-metally things and therefore there were a lot of things that just didn’t end up entering into my listening orbit, and the masterful garagey power pop singer songwriter born Jimmy Lee Lindsay was someone I had filed away as “one of those Vice type dudes” and not really looked into when I really could have gotten in on the ground floor with his solo output while he was still around. Lindsay even played a show here in Halifax as part of a late 00’s Pop Explosion lineup one year while I was living here and little did I realize that would have been my one opportunity to catch him live, which I unfortunately missed. Eventually I did check out his great Blood Visions and Watch Me Fall full-lengths, true power pop gems of the early part of the millennium’s garage rock and roll revival, and little did I know that I had even been introduced to his music prior to going solo via a friend who was a big fan of his old band The Lost Sounds and had played them for me a few times years before but i had not made the connection between the two. Lindsay unfortunately passed away far too young in 2010 after an overdose so we only got a limited amount of wonderful music from him during that time, and I wish I had taken the time earlier to fully appreciate his art more while he was still around.

World/Inferno Friendship Societyhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G-y_yLC5bakhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G9f41ARabQsFunny how something like one lukewarm review of a debut will cause you to just not bother investigating an artist’s entire catalogue. That’s is the case when it comes to me and the works of The World/Inferno Friendship Society, and I will admit that it took the passing of frontman Jack Terricloth a few years ago for me to finally take a chance on them and admit my error in not looking into their music previously, though the mix of punk, jazz, klezmer, occasional fifties-style crooning, and general school band-meets-theatre-kid-who-developed-a taste-for-Emma-Goldman-essays energy the band brought to the table over almost two decades maybe seemed a little out of place on the roster of NJ hardcore label Gern Blandsten Records when their debut first came out in 1997 on that label. The hapless HeartattaCk reviewer who was tasked with giving the band’s debut full length on that label a listen at a time seemed perplexed by and genuinely unenthused for their melange of genres, which led to me (who used that sort of this as a major taste making guide at the time) just entirely missing the boat on their output due to sheer ignorance until Terricloth’s passing a couple of years ago and accompanying online talk lauding the music he had made. Dear reader I realize my error as their mix of theatricality, theory and genre-hopping music nerdery is exactly my shit. This is music for the sloppy after party at the anarchist book fair, and their 2005 full length Red Eyed Soul finds itself in regular rotation on my end still over two years after his passing. The band was known for wild energetic live performances as well, especially at their annual Halloween “Hallowmas” shows, with Terricloth cutting a figure not unlike a younger mustacheless John Waters weaving around a legion of horn players, percussionists and guitarists and enthralling the crowd with between song monologues on top of their wild and catchy jams. While not for everyone I am sure, I would still recommend you not make my initial mistake and give their music a shot. Terricloth’s pre-WIFS band Sticks And Stones were much more of a straight ahead punk rock affair but their few EPs from the late 80’s/early 90’s are also worth seeking out.

Armand Hammerhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xEse84Nd944https://youtu.be/MJ-00HEeY-A?si=902zrQUMGnHR1WFHEver hear an album, fall in love with it and then realize it’s the artists’ EIGHTH full length? That is my relationship with Armand Hammer via their 2023 full length “We Buy Diabetic Test Strips”. I am a recent devotee of prolific NY underground rap wunderkind billy woods, and his 2022 full length Aethiopes was one of my favorite albums of last year. And have I mentioned how prolific woods is? This most collaboration with ELUCID under the Armand Hammer banner, this time featuring a revolving door of today’s top noisy/glitchy avant- garde hip hop beatmakers like jpegmafia, Pink Siifu (with help from Philly experimental artist and frequent woods collaborator Moor Mother) and even El-P is billy woods’ fourth(!) full length since the start of 2022 and the group’s eighth collaboration together in the past decade. With catalogues like this, my philosophy is to just pick a jumping on point, try and keep up from there, and fill in from there as best I can so I was totally unaware of how deep the Armand Hammer catalogue goes on it’s own let alone woods’ total output. So yeah, this is me finally jumping on board with album number eight by a long running and respected group, here we go. Regardless of my lateness to the party, AH’s “We Buy Diabetic Test Strips” is a great album for horrifying times where we know things are not going to be okay right now. It is bleak but enthralling, and the experimental atmospheric vibes even lean towards almost industrial sounds in with their wordy abstract hip hop onslaught. Next on my homework list is previous AH full length HARAM, produced entirely by The Alchemist. I guess there are worse problems to have than than even more great music to catch up on by a killer pairing of artists I suppose.

Ink And Daggerhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nswEARmnvJMhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AhJ9bJPnbO8Another case of “bad review+lack of immediate access to actually hear it on my own=never really checking something out until much much later”. I was a big fan of Philly straightedge emo screechers Frail, who I first heard through the Ebullition XXX comp (discussed last show), during their brief existence, at a time when the music that spoke to me most was in my mind very serious and earnest and “heartfelt”, so when I heard their new band was a little more of a high concept endeavour involving face paint and costumes and pretending to be vampires or something, in my mind my favorite emo band had just turned into that days version Ghost or AFI or something and just not something that really appealed to me at the time. Of course, had I actually listened to Philly’s Ink And Dagger would realize that while they may have added a little more rock in their riffs and tempered the dying-bird shrieks of Sean McCabe’s vocals in Frail with a little more gruffness (not to mention the addition of heavy vampiric imagery in the lyrics), they were still a pretty great rockin but spooky and theatrical hardcore band in the vein of maybe like Swiz at a Halloween party. Part of my reason for finally going back and revisiting them was finding out that they briefly featured weirdo comedy provocateur Eric Wareheim (of “Tim And Eric Awesome Show Great Job” and “Tim And Eric’s Billion Dollar Movie” fame) on bass after his time in Philly’s Elements Of Need (who had also released a split 7” with Frail during their run), though Wareheim has stated that he didn’t really have much of any input on the band’s music during the brief time he played with them. Luckily, their music has stayed fairly easily accessible via streaming services, and I’ve heard rumours of a possible oral history project documentimg vocalist McCabe’s notorious “pranks” (like dressing up in a fur coat to pelt notorious hardline vegan straightedgers Earth Crisis with yogurt at a big festival where they shared a bill) being in the works as well, so you should give these Philly creatures of the night a chance.

Miscellanyhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sNJ8_emG7Tkhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MEiqSSzvLKghttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=35B_HviNLIIhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FYJ1dbyDcrIMatt’s NotesI’m in a funny situation lately!

I’m in a relationship for the first time since uh… earlier this year! But it’s healthier than any relationship since my marriage! And not the dicey, stressful later years of it, either!

ANYWAY…

I’m loving (loving!) my job here in the Maritime Wilds! But… I also need another job if I’m going to sustain A) a roof over my head, B) child support payments, C) food, and D) the occasional record store splurge… so if you can help hook a (n undead) brother up, we’d be much obliged!

These are all issues to do with growing older… and gnarlier (more gnarly?)…

And so it goes with my list for this episode! I’ve been late to the party for nearly all my favorite artists… mainly because many of them were in their respective haydays before I was born… or in my early childhood… so… I’ll leave the Replacements and Hüsker Dü and Motörhead and uh… a bunch of others… OFF the list… cause maybe they’re a little TOO OBVIOUS at this point…

Since we haven’t actually recorded the episode yet, I can’t say for certain if we spoke to all of these or a few of them or none of them (unlikely) or what. The teacher (and the parent) in me is like “good for you for getting something done slightly early for a change”. The middle-aged punk in me blows joint-smoke in that other dude’s general direction, rolls his eyes, and says disdainfully:

Eat my shorts, man.

Alkaline Trio & The Lawrence Armshttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kZdjFaby6JIhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AASinpIqhtYWe’ve been doing this podcast since last December, and for sure I’ve mentioned the Trio (as they’re called by us ardent fans) for many (most??) of these episodes so far. So here it is again! Here they are. Again. Again!

What do I know? I got into them in spring of 2022 when I thought for sure I’d be back to work within a few months of being unemployed… when I was doing lots (LOTS!) of interviews.

Fun fact: I’ve unsuccessfully interviewed for administrative, staff, and/or faculty roles with some of the best universities and colleges in Canada! Including, but not limited to, U of Toronto… UBC… U of Alberta… Athabasca (for the Ed Tech, natch)… and a bunch of others (a GREAT BUNCH, you can trust) and, to paraphrase just about every Award Loser ever… It was NOT an honor just to be nominated…

Back when I was an unemployed single Dad with enough cash on hand to bankroll a once-in-a-lifetime vinyl collection but not a house… enough dough to smoke and drink my fill but not enough to say… retrain to something a bit more marketable than “learning technologist”… enough coin to date a woman in another town for several months and call it an “open relationship” but not enough to buy the confidence to quit subscribing to Match, Bumble, and Tinder… which as my mom noted in the car today sounds, together, like a law firm out of a Charles Dickens novel…

Oh man, those really WEREN’T the days, come to think of it! [Beavis voice: Dude, you said “come”][Butthead voice: Huh huh huh ne he huh hyuh]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GP60Ygot8MkUhhh… [clears throat]… so according to Discogs the Trio started in 1996 and has put out [shifts papers around on his desk frantically]… uh… around 20 records, going just by long-players and the 8 album Past Live series… and that’s not saying anything about comps, singles, EP’s, or the B-sides and rarities comp… so… spring of 2022… about 26 years late to that particular party… [crumples up the paper on his desk, starts throwing paper balls across the living room of his giant and ultimately unaffordable apartment]…

IMPORTANT UPDATE: They have a new record coming out early next year!!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CprfYX6hij4&t=2sAnd Larry Arms… like the Trio, around for a couple of decades but way (way!) less commercially successful… and uh… [mumble, mutter]… yeah… formed in ’99… they have seven LP’s and two compilations… and I’ve been into them since just… uh… earlier this year…. and when I had the resources to burn I got their logo tattooed on my left forearm right above the wrist… ya know… where you wear your watch??

In conclusion, there’s something about Chicago, man… or maybe there’s something about the nether regions of BC and Atlantic Canada that makes me THINK there’s something about Chicago, man. Either way. Same-same. Second City. Go Cubs. Pizza. Blues music. Ack.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jWthoxAwSZcJohn Coltranehttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8rOMV0A5jd0You can’t really be much later to the party than when the artist in question is uh… DECEASED (like… DEAD, daddy-o!). As in… living a higher OR non-existent life… depending on your beliefs… since 1967. So late to the party… but maybe right about on time for the after (life) party??

Like with most jazz music, you could tell me nearly anything about the artist and I’d have to go “Uh huh? Oh yeah? Do tell”.

I’m not obsessive about it the way I am about lots of the ah… PUNK and ALTERNATIVE and WHAT-HAVE-YOU… it’s more like… I know what I like…

So… from what I was able to glean from scanning Wikipedia for a minute or a few…

The man was just forty when he passed… and spent many of those years battling heroine and alcohol addictions… and he was posthumously canonized as a saint by the African Orthodox Church… and is the namesake of the St. John Coltrane African Orthodox Church in San Francisco.

When I was forty I was just starting out on the job that I would ultimately lose (with prejudice!). I ran a full marathon. I’d finished my doctorate. And here’s a (deceased) guy out there creating something immortal. No biggie. No siree…

Stop me before I start going on about how I discovered jazz as a teen in Fredericton after landing on the amazing CBC Radio 2 show After Hours hosted by Ross Porter… and how I’d sit there in the evening in my basement bedroom in my (single) dad’s townhouse near Skyline Acres and Southwood Park on Fredericton’s South Side… listening to whatever Ross was putting on… reading Jack Kerouac, William S. Burroughs, and writing some terribly bad (but also terribly enjoyable) maybe-stoned teenaged poetry…

Somebody please stop me…

Leatherfacehttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nwQ0hAD7_r4https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vr2Eu09CcK0This is a case where I got into the band after EIGHT records… after their original stint as a band (1988-1994) and they were well into their second (and longer) run from 1998 until 2012… which would see them release another four albums…

It was anyone’s guess in the spring of 2000— when Gumby’s Brother Ben placed a significant mail order which included many of us living in the same overcrowded Halifax apartment— that the Rocket from Sunderland would go on for another dozen or so years… and they continue as an artistic enterprise of sorts, releasing as recently as 2022 reissues of early albums, as well as various merch via their Bandcamp page… to say nothing of the very occasional but also very significant release by guitarist and yowler Frankie Norman Warsaw Stubbs.

The men of Leatherface looked old even when they were young. A Google search of eighties and early nineties era photos reveals men who in their late twenties could have passed for their mid-forties… or older.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AbnpRcQED_sHe’s FORTY-THREE in this interview… As an additional note, at least three of the key members of the band have passed away… early, relative to full lifespan… including bassist Andy Crighton (1998), original guitarist Dickie Hammond (2015), and original drummer Andrew Laing (2023). This was a band who were hard-living and whose members have a tendency to pass away early, but made for many… myself included… the most life-affirming music ever.

When I first picked up the brilliant split LP with Hot Water Music… their first record of their second run… it would’ve been easy to think this group might only be around for another few years… and so I will say I am late to the party… even though I was around twenty-one at the time… more than half a lifetime ago. I consider myself incredibly lucky to have seen them at a show in Worcester, Mass in 2000… with Avail, no less! And in subsequent years I’ve purchased everything I can get my hands on… t-shirts, DVD’s, vinyl test pressings, and more… getting Stubbs lyrics from “Sour Grapes” tattooed on my right arm a few weeks after I finished my doctorate. To this day I thrill to learn of Stubbs solo projects… or appearances on others’ albums, including the excellent Yesterday’s Ring (Montreal) album from 2022 “Goodbye Night Life”.

I was late to this particular party… but the party continued for quite some time, regardless.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Alkdx5M5AnoA Tribe Called Questhttps://youtu.be/Q6TLWqn82J4?si=o1sMQGFtL28Ij5ndhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O3pyCGnZzYAI had the opportunity not that long ago to stack my record collection.

A brief history of said collection, since you didn’t ask?

Cassettes as a youngster! Including under the XMas tree! All now lost to history.

Numerous CD’s and cassettes and vinyl accumulate from the early nineties until my thirtieth year on planet Earth.

All now lost to history!

Then… digital music…

AND THEN… marital and career nosedive leading to…

Massive middle-aged vinyl spending spree which lasts closer to two years than to a year-and-a-half.

And that’s where the Tribe comes in.

Fascinating, huh?

And it tickles me somehow that the Estate of Lou Reed owns the rights to one of their biggest songs. Overachieve much?

Angels & Airwaveshttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZUxCynz-1vkhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9mqVekWJwxoErm. I like it better than Blink?? I own a couple of their records so they must be good. I have a strict policy on ditching vinyl that I can’t get with… if it can’t go in the regular semi-random record rotation then it’s taking up perfectly good space in the plastic boxes in the music room of my far-too-expensive and definitely unsustainably high-priced apartment. Out the door they go!

They’ve been around since… 2005? I bought those records earlier this year? Or maybe late last year? From Barnacle Records in Kamloops which is on the other side of the country ALONG WITH MY KIDS?

Let us also note the Atom Willard connection… the same Willard who is part of Matt Skiba’s band Alkaline Trio and also Matt Skiba’s other band Lektron…

I am eighteen years late to this party. Maybe seventeen. This is as close to most Blink as I’ll probably get to anytime soon (or ever)… and uh… aliens are real! Or something.

Blue Rodeohttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hkMaBy6EX0whttps://youtu.be/EHZW7ZAWyzk?si=RB4xUqOK492JmH3BThat whole narrative about the record collection from the ATCQ segment earlier? Same thing with Blue Rodeo, I’ll cop to that.

Except it is impossible to be a card-carrying Late Gen X Canadian (AKA The Greatest Generation) without having encountered them on MuchMusic an/or local rock radio.

Are they as popular as the Tragically Hip? Probably not. But you almost can’t talk about one without at least being close to mentioning the other.

Yeah? Yeah.

Anyway, my Aunt Jodi and Uncle Corrie couldn’t make it to see Jim Cuddy and Sons (or rather, one son and their friend) at the 506 Container Village and they generously gifted me the tickets! And that was the third date between me and my New Girlfriend! Around three weeks ago?

And we were listening to Outskirts the night before.

And so I’ve lately gone from being a passively middle-class-Canadian-fan-by-default to being a vinyl-owning, ticket-buying (or receiving) full-throated BR enthusiast. You know who else is good? Bad Religion.

Are you fascinated? I think you must be. The silence belies the fascination. Yessiree.

We are extremely (extremely!) grateful you’ve chosen to crash this party with us! Until next time, fellow fiends!

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Howdy and good evening! I’m trying a new thing! I’m writing MY notes for this episode BEFORE WE ACTUALLY RECORD THE EPISODE! That is some wild stuff in my world! It is Friday and I’m a nerdy middle-aged man… the less said in that regard the better, come to think of it!

This is an episode about some of our favourite compilations! Please click hereabouts and/or thereabouts as per your preferences! Here’s hoping that we encountered a mite fewer technical hiccups than we did with episode 12!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-pmis1MEfx8Are we not entertained?? #bogmonstermusic

Audio file… if that’s like your thing, man… #audiophile #bogmonstermusic

And finally there is most def a YouTube playlist. Come get some!!

Dan’s Noteshttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IztmJRegmCQhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ywoA0B7tc34International PEACE benefit comp (R-Radical Records, 1984)I had added this to my list right before it ended up being discussed a bit on social media recently (compared to other 40 year old DIY punk compilations I suppose), for basically the same reason I fell in love with it after buying a copy second hand from one of the older scene vets in our hometown when I was like 18 – it’s an awesome snapshot of the more grassroots end of the punk scene literally around the world in the early 80’s, where more well-known North American and British acts like The Dead Kennedys, DOA, and Crass are featured alongside up and comers like The Proletariat and Articles Of Faith, and plenty of heavy hitters from around the world like Sweden’s MOB47, Argentina’s Los Violadores and Japan’s GISM. In the wake of GISM vocalist Sakevi Yokoyama’s recent passing a few weeks before we recorded this ep, several folks whose music has been influential to me over the years all posted about how this compilation in particular was key in introducing them to GISM and the Japanese hardcore scene in general, not to mention the larger international scene in an era before the internet. Each band recieves a full page of a thick 60+ page 8”x11” zine for lyrics, art, manifestos etc that helps contribute to the sheer deluge of information that hits you when flipping through it. This 2xLP really helped open the door for punk fans in the US to really discover some of the very best bands active at the time all over the world. They even included a a couple of poems written and read by South African punk spoken word artist Zenzile to make sure every continent (save for Antarctica I guess) is included on the record. The original release on R Radical Records is long out of print and there is a truly cursed CD rerelease on New Red Archives Records in the late 90’s that includes none of the supplemental info or other band art, but does add a handful of crappy songs by current-at-the-time bands on that label, which does nothing but take away from the original collection in the end. Luckily Dave Dictor of MDC (who ran R-Radical back in the day), reissued it again in 2020 in a slightly closer to the original form version thankfully without cruddy AntiFlag and Jack Killed Jill songs from the 1997 CD version.

V/a – State Of The Union (Dischord, 1989)https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nIa0-h-Tkn4https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ex4rvfq-stIXXX…Some Ideas Are Poisonous (Ebullition, 1995)https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=alf9kX6xukwhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LL_KUgmrC6wI grouped these two together on the show as “time and place snapshots” from the two record labels whose output had the most formative of influences on me in younger years -Washington DC’s Dischord Records and Goleta CA’s Ebulliton Records. The first, a 1989 benefit for DC-area community groups, State Of The Union is a rockin slice of the era of the Washington scene at the end of the more fast and punk bands documented on the “Flex Your Head” comp Matt mentioned but just before the more emotive and angular Fugazi era of things, with an early pre-Guy Piccioto three piece version of that band as well as Piccioto’s post-Rites Of Spring band One Last Wish. It leads of with a late-era Scream instrumental and then leads into one of my all time underrated punk anthems, Ignition’s “Anger Means” and another 14 killer acts from a cross-section of DC’s greatest bands of this very transitional era. Other standout bands include Soulside, Red Emma, Marginal Man and an early appearance by Shudder To Think.

Jumping things across the continent a few years later, we have Ebullition’s XXX Some Ideas Are Poisonous double LP compilation from 1995. This was the very first release I purchased from this label, and is very much a prototypical release from the label, put together to showcase bands who identified as “straight edge” but did not subscribe to the bro-y tough guy youth crew tropes that most bands who identified as such did at the time. The bands ranged from the more “emo” acts like Policy Of Three and Threadbare to the heavier sounds of Groundwork and Endeavor, into straight up grindcore from album openers Monster X. The double LP (also released as a CD still packaged in the vinyl-sized sleeve to accommodate the large booklet that came with it, featuring one page devoted to each of the 14 bands on the compilation, as well as a lengthy personal essay/rant from label head Kent McClard about what straight edge meant to him at that time. It was a huge deal to me when I first purchased it, and over the time in my life that I identified as straight edge it was a huge part of it. Hell, even my very first tattoo was inspired by the compilation’s cover art. I was even fortunate enough to see one of the bands from the comp live, catching Albany straightedge grinders Monster X at a particularly memorable live show in their home town while I was tagging along with one of Tfw opening acts for that night. It still stands as one of my favourite comps from a label that released quite a few great ones during their heyday,

Soundbombing II (Rawkus Records, 1999)https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-YIhE_xqRU0https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6V8-IppQpbsI feel like there is so much to be said about the record label sampler CD as a means of getting new or more obscure artist’s work out there in a pre-music streaming era that I could go on an extensive side rant at another time, but needless to say, Rawkus Records’ 1999 Soundbombing Vol 2 paints a picture of the (mostly NY-based) indie hip hop scene about to break out large. Ostensibly a mix of new 12” singles released through the label that year, it really showcases that iteration of the indie scene before several key players moved on to wider success, and during a time when Rawkus were considered standard bearers and taste makers of that scene, before certain lore behind it’s funding (specifically the involvement of one of Rupert Murdoch’s sons as an investor in a label that proudly waved the “indie” flag) during this time took a little bit of bloom off of the label’s rose during it’s later years and other artists moved on to imprints like Def Jux and even the majors in some cases into the 00’s. Still; it was a time in underground hip hop where you could find Eminem’s last indie single (“Any Man” featured here) up against one of Company Flow’s last recordings as a group, and up and comers like fka Mos Def, Common, and Pharoah Monche, all blended into a nearly seamless mix by DJs J-Roc and Babu of The Beat Junkies DJ collective. This album was my first real introduction to the iconic label back when it came out, and sought out all of their major releases at the time like Monche’s “Internal Affairs”, Mos Def’s “Black On Both Sides” and CoFlow’s “Funcrusher Plus” afterwards. Even longtime fringe-dwellers of underground rap like RA The Rugged get a chance to shine on here, and like so many other good compilations gives a failry comprehensive look at that era of indie hop hop with artists who wouldn’t necessarily be featured so closely together ever again due to their differing career trajectories. Plus it’s just wall to wall great, some unfortunate lyrical content (the Eminiem song is, well, an early Eminem song and all in re his love of F-slurs) on a track or two aside. Definitely worth seeking out for anyone interested in good hip hop music.

Songs From The Motion Picture “Judgment Night” (Immortal Records, 1993)https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HSaGPEIHxyYhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MnebeYiRxyETechnically, this is the soundtrack to a forgettable early 90’s thriller about Emilio Estevez, Jeremy Piven and Cuban Gooding Jr witnessing a drug deal gone wrong outside a boxing match in downtown Chicago or something like that, but in practice it serves as a killer collection of 11 collaborations between big name “alternative rock” and some of the top hip hop artists at the time it was released in 1993. Some of these tracks may even be some of my favourites by those artists. Seriously though, how the hell is a great song like De La Soul and Teenage Fanclub’s “Fallin” brought into the world to be part of a goddamn Jeremy Piven movie soundtrack? For whatever the reason, I’ll take it. There was originally supposed to be a 12th song on the album, a collaboration between Zack De La Rocha from RATM and the band Tool, but apparently the resulting song was so bad it has been abandoned and disowned by all parties, and it has managed to stay completely buried and has never been released since (which makes me ask, what makes it worse that all of Tool’s already very bad music?). Seriously though, as someone whose musical tastes were firmly planted in the genres of both sides of these collaborations when this came out, it seriously felt like the best of both worlds coming together. All are original songs except “Disorder” by Ice T and Slayer, which is actually a medley of three songs by The Exploited – “UK82” (renamed LA92 in reference to that year’s riots over the Rodney King verdict), “Disorder”, and “War”, with Ice in full Body Count frontman mode on vocals. All of the tracks stand out as at least pretty good, and it’s one of the rare times these sorts of crossings of the genre streams seemed to really earnestly work out without pandering or condescending to the fans if either side, just a bunch of the days top acts getting together to collaborate on a collection of songs so much better than the movie they are ostensibly the soundtrack for.

Matt’s NotesSo! To get right to the chase!

I haven’t necessarily listened to all / any of these RECENTLY… although I am listening to them during the few minutes I’m typing this… I’m not 100% a fabricator and slacker… but when I am, I am probably BETTER THAN AVERAGE at being a fabricator and slacker…

I’M A LEARNING TECHNOLOGIST! I KILL WHAT I EAT!

Thump

I’ll be fine…

*Nor am I sure that I spoke to all of these during the actual episode! But I definitely spoke to SOME of them! And the ones I didn’t speak to are certainly legit in their own rights!

Punk Rock Halloween II – Louder Faster & Scarierhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=spcGMvbwMPchttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EHImjYRHlgkThis is where it becomes obvious that I was more about ANY comps that I happen to own… as opposed to the BEST… but this is great when you want absolutely fun, brainless times! So… pretty indispensable in its own way, really!

There was a time not that long ago that I bought records on a whim—

So I heard Chris Wollard talking about this song on a podcast… and I am deep enough into anything Wollard records that I am going to own this as well! A cover of a Roky Erickson song no less…

Also featuring songs by The Queers, Pully, Down by Law… when will I ever go into Discogs for those? Probably never! So… like we said on the recording… comps are great for that!

Jetstar Records – The Soul Sides & Stax Number Oneshttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ymlZ-LjGqZIhttps://youtu.be/Qsl4A9hZEto?si=H3tEBY_pkTkO2N0yI’m just infatuated with 60’s and 70’s Soul music. Full stop!

Besides that, the Jetstar record was a find because I’ve heard none of these artists anywhere else… the detailed musician bios on the back is helpful in that regard!

For me, Stax Records from Memphis carries lots of weight… mainly due to the Big Star connection… half of this record are hits that anybody should recognize from movie soundtracks… oldies radio… and the like… but then the other half… Eddie Floyd! Rufus Thomas! The Dramatics! I could go on…

These comps are like moments of time in these scenes, man…

Moncton’s Burning: 18 Slabs From The Undergroundhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v3SiLDDWsukKlackers by KlackersMoncton has always been enigmatic and exotic to me. It’s hard for me to say why.

For sure, part of it is Eric’s Trip being from there. As an Anglo in New Brunswick who LAMENTABLY and LAZILY neglected my own French education in public school… Moncton was a place I visited infrequently, even with a family connection there… despite the rich music scene which clearly was and still is going on there… as this great comp attests to!

It’s weird to say that I have different expectations of comps than other kinds of records. I expect more eclecticism and maybe probably lower quality due to throwaway tracks often appearing on these things… from what I can tell there are no throwaway tracks by any of these artists…

Any of them are worth checking out, really! Because it’s a nice vinyl record at a good price point… supporting local or localish artists, labels, and stores checks lots of boxes for me…

While looking things up for this episode, I came across an excellent write-up by Matt Carter at Grid City Magazine It’s also worth looking at the Discogs page for more info on the artists.

Will this go on the turntable all the time? Unlikely! Does it take a respectable place in the regular rotation of vinyl? Absolutely!

Flex Your Headhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lARll8NrTpkhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YeX1HZvksMgIt’s hard to share how cool these songs are via YouTube links. I’m aware of how tinny and generally shittily it comes across in these rectangular widgets. Still, for historical influence it’s hard to overstate its importance… above and beyond the MUSICAL necessity of hearing artists like the Teen Idles, State of Alert, Government Issue, and Void playing songs the majority of which are less than two minutes long. Like I said, influential! For sure Dave Grohl owns this… and probably got it maybe around the time it originally came out… growing up in DC as he did… and since his band Scream put out their first record on Dischord the same year this comp came out…

Zzz

Zzzzzzz— snort, gasp… drool: Yes, I’m awake. Whatever gave you the impression I wasn’t?

Punk Rock Christmas & Punk Rock Christmas 2https://youtu.be/K_lSknrGqDA?si=EjnAnj7RtzpmqGEvhttps://youtu.be/hpnQK0AhdDg?si=t0Z5Ykl60GHokBTzSo… uh… copy and paste what I said about Punk Rock Halloween… including the bit about Ship Thieves! Especially the bit about the Ship Thieves..

Back when the trees of money could be hacked down with an axe and chopped up into digital widgets and from whence converted finally into vinyl discs with these specific sounds engraved into them was a long time ago indeed… all the more reason to own them, to be honest.

It’s a goddamned miracle of capitalism is what it is.

How likely am I to own entire records by Reagan Youth, UK Subs, or Anti-Nowhere League anytime soon? Not very! So… we have these! MDC, Johnny Thunders, and Ship Thieves are all represented in the Punk Rock Halloween series as well. Ho freaking ho freaking ho.

All the President’s Menhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ql5D7oIivFII think the case is there to be made for this to be on a top five 90’s hardcore comps list… by virtue of the roster alone… many of whom were from bands that lasted fewer than five years… and maybe only recorded a couple of records outside of a comp appearance…

And as I understand Great American Steak Religion only put out fewer than a couple dozen records… including Shotmaker’s Crayon Club! And some others where if you’re looking at a survey of the era you’d have to include at least a half dozen of their bands. “They” in this case being Yannick Lorrain… who has been spoken of more than once on this podcast!

So… the tinny shittiness of a YouTube widget playing this on a shitty computer or smartphone speaker doesn’t really do it justice…

For me it’s great to throw on and have it fill the room that I happen to be in. I appreciate the brutal physicality of say ASSFACTOR4… or ACME… or MAXIMILLIAN COLBY… or SHOTMAKER…

Anyway, I’ve argued here and elsewhere that 90’s hardcore is one of the best things that Late Gen X… or, as I say, the Greatest Generation… can be credited with… there isn’t really much else from a musical standpoint… besides some of the rap music, I suppose…

ANYWAY…

Punk Canada Vol.2Tactical Squad by Herd Of Wastershttps://youtu.be/8Xcmp_0FeP8?si=6S1L8euYrHQSUOjtThe prominent position of this on the wall at either Backstreet Records or Second Spin Records here in Saint John was a major factor in grabbing this excellent comp, as was the twenty dollars plus tax price point… do I have to know all 16 bands to know this is rad prior to buying? I do not. I did not. But uh… DAYGLO ABORTIONS! And NEIGHBORHOOD WATCH! This is, I am sure, the only physical media I own by either of those. And the rest… scratches a certain itch! I can throw it on knowing immediately the kind of thing I’m in for and have those expectations reliably met or exceeded. And that’s all you want from a record at the end of the day, sometimes!

PLUS the accompanying booklet is righteous in its own right…

As Dan mentioned in the recording, this is the product of the Punk Canada Facebook group’s collective efforts! This may be the first instance of FB being used positively that I’ve ever heard of…

Oh, oh, oh… and the Volume One Bandcamp looks decent as well….

Motown Greatest Hitshttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DGDyAb6pePohttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=425GpjTSlS4I mean, you can just throw it on and instantly feel good. You want to party? You want to dance around your living room? You want to feel better after ANY kind of day at work? After getting ghosted on Tinder for the fourteenth time in three or four months… OR WHATEVER YOUR THING IS, MAN…

This record will get you where you want to go… any conceivable kind of itch can be clawed at…

Try and imagine how Fugazi would sound without soul music on the brain? You can’t.

If getting down is your business, you will need to turn in the direction of this comp… or else culture is going to turn you there… and if you can’t handle it, frankly you should probably listen to another podcast… for people who refuse to swing!

Thinking on it now, I’m going to say we could definitely do a part two of this episode anytime… cause we haven’t touched very many soundtracks… and there are way more “seasonal” comps the more I think about it… for starters!

We hope the joy of the fall season is burning in you like an affectionate infection, and we also hope you will join us again!

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It’s the fall, y’all!

As we descend into the perennial void of decomposition and decay, it’s worth asking:

What have Dan and Matt been listening to lately?

Since you absolutely can’t get your autumn on without the answer, we’ve got here a couple of media links! We trust you can click below and from there return to wherever your chosen pit may be!

https://youtu.be/jcuhlRh5j3MWe figured, if we were going to de-sanctify the video, we ought’n try the same with the audio!

As ever, we have a pretty sick playlist for listening!!

Dan’s NotesGhosted by That Demon the Sun

That Demon The Sun – Ghosted (2023)https://youtu.be/Q3ngXFYfao4?si=CSZM1F9ir3ZN7ioVDungeon synth/”vampiric Bedroom pop” from Asheville NC, one of many projects by Kelsey (no last name given) released on their label Hadean Holler Records. TDTS play melodic ambient synth music with ethereal vocals recorded to cassette using minimal takes, and “Ghosted” is their first album to feature actual vocals. For those unfamiliar, Dungeon Synth is a genre that kind of follows two streams – one very serious one that initially sprang out of the black metal scene, where artists like Mortiis tried moving away from extreme metal tropes to work in a synth-based take on more orchestral sounds, and a sort of tongue in cheek branch that realizes how ultimately silly some of these attempts at orchestral synth music sound and takes a slightly more tongue in cheek angle on it all, while still creating epic retro-futurist soundscapes suitable for soundtracking your fantasy film or tabletop fantasy RPG campaign. This artist falls firmly in the latter camp, with song titles like “I Ate Your Horses” and “Can I Live In Your Castle?” and hand-drawn images of floating spectres and gloomy castles adorning their cassette releases’ J-cards, with this most recent album adding ethereal vocals to the mix on top of their spooky Moog-ified melodies. This isn’t a genre I really follow normally, but thanks to a friend in a discord server who, like Kelsey of Hadean Holler Records, is also part of the international retro synth enthusiast community and therefore more up on the happenings in that scene, I was turned on to their work and have really been enjoying it since.

Sinead O’Connorhttps://youtu.be/0c4v7fp5GC8?si=CpqZZI2aue_GDQk6https://youtu.be/dHNUrPzQYaw?si=zDi3TQVbK1Jk7uBtGone too soon. Holy shit. I don’t know what to say that hasn’t already been said so much since her passing but goddamn what a legend. I would put her at the level of Dylan or Bowie or Cohen in terms of top tier rock deity status. Her initial rise in popularity coincided with a lot of my own initial explorations of so-called “alternative” music, and she quickly became an icon of that scene, even with her Prince cover from her second album becoming such a giant hit in the mainstream. Revisiting her first couple of albums especially since her passing has been a real pleasure, even if the circumstances are not so pleasant for doing so. While mainstream culture tried to punish her for her brave act of protest tearing up a photo of the Pope on SNL, could you expect someone who survived the horrors of Ireland’s church-run Magdalene Laundries to do any less when presented with such a far-reaching platform? Sinews lived her life the way she wanted to and it was not easy and she is gone far too soon and that’s really fucking sucks. I don’t always take the deaths of pop culture figures so hard, but it really hurt to hear off her passing a few weeks ago and I hope she is free from pain wherever she is, and when Matt suggested we turn our focus away from the usual punk rock stuff for an episode there was no way I could not say something about her in my picks for the show this time around.

As Sheriff “Six Ways To The Ace” LP (2023)As Sheriff by Supreme Echo

Another great find by Jason Flower from Supreme Echo Records. Victoria BC’s As Sheriff formed in 1967 and were one of the flagship bands of the psychedelic rock scene in BC in the late 60’s and early 70’s, playing trippy folky bluesy anthems for the dropout freak out scene of that era, though until this archival LP was released by Supreme Echo earlier this year their sole recorded output was one single released in the early 70’s. Flower became a fan of this single, and tracked down the two,sole surviving members of the band, who led him to these final recordings, a dozen tracks of peace, love, and righteous anger at oppressors and warmongers – the perfect soundtrack to an afternoon of burning your draft card and hitchhiking to the next happening happening or whatever else one did for fun in those days. It’s cool to get to hear this piece of Canadian rock history from the era, especially one with nary a Bachman or Cummings in sight and presenting a grimier groovier side of the era. While not as loud or abrasive as artists like the MC5, they still present a little grittier and close to the front type of take on the era’s counterculture vibes and it’s no surprise to hear that they ended up sharing stages with whatever top cool rockers came through Victoria and Vancouver during their active years, and these twelve songs are a fun little blast from the past to check out of you like your rock a little groove and psychedelic and another solid release from Supreme Echo.

Tyler The Creator – Call Me If You Get Lost (2021)https://youtu.be/Lqvwm3zAILI?si=Q1eObQ6Y8tvr7olrhttps://youtu.be/R4Y7JIQlv20?si=AmbQNpqB9qgJ8IPOne of my favorite summery albums of the past few years – a blend of tropicalia, dusty drum loops and Wes Anderson-esque pastel hued imagery overtop of a tug of war between morbid post-breakup introspection and loud-talking id-powered exclamations about how great it is to eat ice cream with supermodels. A loose concept album about trying to get one’s head together after finding themselves as maybe not the hero of the story in the aftermath of a love triangle that had fallen to an ugly end, Tyler’s lyrics veer from introspection to crass excess, with the latter parts highlighted by ad libs from mixtape legend DJ Drama playing the little voice in the back of your head telling you to just say fuck it and have another drink rather than engage in any sort of self-examination. Tyler The Creator is one of those artists that has taken a long time to really for me to click with, I guess you could say. A lot of his Odd Future stuff and early solo albums were on my radar but maybe just not for for me at the time, though as he as a person has grown and matured over the years and shed some of his more edge-lord tendencies, his music has definitely improved in my mind as well. it’s not that I thought his early stuff was low quality or anything, just not my thing a lot of the time. It was around his Flower Boy album a few years ago that I decided to give Tyler another chance, and with Call Me… I think he has probably released his best album yet, even when taken just as a collection of songs and ignoring the subtle throughlines throughout, plus the vibrant tropical grooves that make up a good portion of the album’s instrumentals make it a perfect late summer listen.x

Northern Boyshttps://youtu.be/sLLQFLXz6VE?si=3081iGS-Pg77n1ewhttps://youtu.be/4VXKhJfRQ7k?si=yHO0tuldo2xcl8uIWith so much of the world on fire and/or flooding and/or trying to kill itself and the rest of us at any given time, sometimes I just need a fucking laugh. Novelty songs and comedic music can be hit or miss at the best of times, but the four tracks so far by Sutton Coldfield UK’s Northern Boys have hit that balance of catchiness and absurdity to bring a smile to my face every time I listen to them or watch one of their music videos. Retired teachers Patrick Karneigh Jr and Norman Pain (alongside backup dancer Kev) initially met while working at the same school and then reconnecting years later through collaborations with their Sindhu Sesh Records label mates Pete And Bas and their Snooker Team collective of elderly hip hop artists. While P&B are more concerned with portraying themselves as aged hardmen, The Northern Boys would rather dive into piles of pharmaceuticals and shake their hexagenarian butts while ranting about pansexual dalliances, hallucinating tiny German men named Juergen, and sleeping in the back yard after getting mocked by their spouses. Also so much cocaine. So so much cocaine. The comedic trope of “old person says filthy things” can often feel like low hanging fruit, but these guys just pull it off for me with their mix of ridiculously over the top celebration of all forms of carnal and chemically-fuelled wackiness and debauchery with a sincere love and support of the LGBTQIA community at a times when that community is increasingly targeted by TERFs and fascists in their home country and beyond (“Give It To Me” acts as an unofficial pride anthem with its dedication “….to the gays and the bi’s and the trans and the girls and the big bald men” ). Sure, the joke may get old as time goes on but for now any of their four videos is pretty much guaranteed to bring a smile to my face when needed these days, and there’s not a whole lot more you can ask of your novelty artists than that.

Addenda and miscellany https://youtu.be/o83uriMyqw8?si=jijUVhY2bf_6id93Mortiis – Fodt Til A Hirske (1994)https://youtu.be/JYsiJ_WzxV8?si=LhiS5k_Z1CDSqu_APete And Bas with The Snooker Team – Windowframe Cypher IIMatt’s NotesOK… so… as per every other time, the delay between recording and production is mine & mine alone.

And!

In addition to whom and whatever I spoke to in the recording, I’m going to vouch for all these additional ones!

It’s my latest “non-Punk” listenings! From the currently-ish played stacks! (Of wax)!!

And those are nothing but the facts, Jack!

Sonny Clark— Cool Struttin’https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b6K9Bzq0VDkhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VpAtX3CEINoI literally just finished listening to this after a day and a weekend that were not particularly stressful, but not exactly without stress either!

Let’s just say, I’ve been reading The Gulag Archipelago over the past few days, and it is really hitting me! I’m like: this is naturally interesting to me right now.

When faced with such rampant midlife un-malaise, you have a few options to immediately shake yourself out of it! One of the least self-destructive I’ve found is Blue Note Records artists… of any decade, and any tradition.

It swings! It’s got a working class kick to it! And that’s as far as I’ll go with why I like it… except that swinging, uptempo mid-fifties to mid-sixties jazz… I mean, it’s just hard to go wrong, that’s all!

The Deepest Soul of Otis Reddinghttps://youtu.be/NGgDkWqy4kw?si=08T9RUmB0nAi5_xXhttps://youtu.be/6wHDjaF9A4Q?si=jo5414rSvGk-Tr09Also, in my opinion, you can’t go wrong with 60’s Soul! Atlantic Records, Motown, and a whole host of others… if they put it out, it was worth having!

You might go, isn’t he the Sitting on the Dock of the Bay guy? And the answer to that would be yes. He’s also the I’ve Been Loving You Too Long (To Stop Now) guy! Which latter track is on this record!

This record is a compilation put together by Volt Records in 2013. The record is blue for reasons being blue music, I suppose! The selection of tracks is, for the uninitiated like myself, a dive into deep cuts… i.e., songs other than the two mentioned previously! What a voice! What a person behind the voice… you can’t imagine it cause it’s so real… and that’s all I’ll try to say on that!

It makes me curious to see more of Volt Records’ roster when I have money to spend on vinyl again which will likely be in the longer term future than the sooner! (Blue) things to look forward to!

Justin Townes Earle— The Saint of Lost Causeshttps://youtu.be/F9pXYG1ZITk?si=Nf8Sz0E2DR6sJ_k-https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UNsSW0-57f4And here’s where we see a guy I consider of my generation… and GOD… he was actually younger than me!

1982-2020. Thirty-eight years. He accomplished a lot. I’m glad there’s still lots of his catalogue I haven’t checked out yet.

I mean, I didn’t know ANYTHING when I was thirty-eight.

Drive-By Truckers— Go-Go Bootshttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mv2abTH4Z7Ehttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kvJ-lWOZMYgWe’re now getting deep into Americana land! I’m into this band enough to want to spend dollars every time I see their records in person. As with JTE, there’s lots of their discography that I have yet to discover. I find a sameness to their albums… call it reliability, durability… you can almost take them for granted for how long they’ve been around and how consistently they’ve been playing in their own league.

I would pay good money to see them live anywhere that I could.

The rock doc The Secret to a Happy Ending is totally worth watching. And it makes me curious, somewhat, to check out Jason Isbell’s records.

This album in particular, I can say for sure, is a DBT album. I throw it on and don’t think about it too much. And it’s outstanding.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hEUOoJKmlC0Sugar— Copper Blue (LP)…. & Beaster (EP)https://youtu.be/bclEqz_tlj0?si=fY908Uur5fq6pdnohttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PAUck1IXJ0UThis is a total cheat. Definitely I am stretching the “Anything but Punk” theme. Also, I could, and have, and will talk about Bob Mould, Grant Hart, and/or Greg Norton and any and all side projects or collaborations or offshoots or solo records for many, many, many (many!) hours.

And each of these stands righteously on their own. But if you put them together… which is legit, cause Beaster came out within a year of Copper Blue! Although when I throw them on, I put on Beaster first because I remember reading the review in the first copy of Spin Magazine that I bought in grade eight or 9 and the album cover glared out at me. I don’t remember the article! But when I heard Hüsker Dü for the first time in the summer between grade nine and ten, it all made sense… or, rather it didn’t but it was kind of starting to…

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5UAfeb0zLWQWe are horrendously thankful you took some of your diminishing allotment of time to check out this pod-thingy!!

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Yup, it's more of the same! But also different!

Really, you're getting off easy...

Let's be real... I have PROFESSIONAL COLLEAGUES over at the EDUCATION podcast who have been waiting for a danged long time as well...

CAUSE I'M A PROFESSIONAL WITH A JOB NOW WEE-HEE HOO HOO

HO HO

HA

Clunk

Uhhh...

According to Dan's notes, this episode is probably part one of a series on mixed media! Not to be confused with multimedia! Cause that would be a crime against aesthetics...

We've got links! You know (?) you wanna click 'em...

https://youtu.be/Xmn8HpTPeLc The world's changing... and the monsters gotta change with it! #bogmonstermusic

Podcasts are not as cool as travelling by jetpack, but a damn sight cooler than getting mauled to death by submariner zombies... #bogmonstermusic

Here's a playlist if you care to partake!

Dan's Notes

Mixed Media special

Two books, two movies and a podcast about bands and music and or being in a band (and what folks in bands do when not in bands)

Books:

I’m not holding your coat by Nancy Barile

https://youtu.be/nwN_f74LQFA clip of author talking about teaching and Punk

Originally conceived as the first half of a book on how life lessons learned as a participant in the nascent American hardcore scene made her a better educator, Nancy Barile’s memoir reads like the shaved-heads-and-suburban-circle-pits version of Patti Smith’s Just Kids. Barile details her time booking all ages shows in Philadelphia and later Boston in the late 70’s and early 80’s, at dawn of the DIY touring loop for hardcore punk bands looking to play for all ages crowds outside of the traditional bar scene, when bands like The Dead Kennedys, Bad Brains and Minor Threat were the ones showing to play your local church basement or VFW hall. There are bombings and biker fights and lifelong friendships and lovers met through trying to build something outside of the mainstream music scene of the era. She was inspired to tell her story after a wave of nostalgia for the early 80’s scene seemed to exclude and belittle the women who were involved with things in that era, so she wanted to let the world know that in the words of 7Seconds, it was “Not Just Boys’ Fun”. I love reading about the histories behind different local scenes and Philadelphia seems to have its own “unique” culture in regards to all kinds of music and sports fandoms so it was cool to hear Barile’s stories of the beginners of the hardcore scene there. She also recounts how she met her eventual husband Al through booking shows for his band, Boston’s iconic SS Decontrol, which led to her becoming a member of their infamous “Boston Crew” that travelled around to shows all around the Northeastern US at the time as well. I thought it was really cool look at the beginnings of the more grassroots DIY end of the hardcore punk scene and definitely worth a read. 

Mutations: The Many Strange Faces of Hardcore Punk - essays by Sam McPheeters

https://youtu.be/Zyno8vqdjBM Born Against -

My Favorite Housing Project

https://youtu.be/fMwcamFrO0s Men’s Recovery Project - Normal Man

Born Against are one of my favourite punk bands ever, full stop, and their frontman Sam McPheeters’ dark sarcastic lyrics were a big part of that. I even stuck along following his musical career through his more experimental Men’s Recovery Project albums that were as much him trolling his listeners as they were a “band”, and enjoyed his columns for Maximum Rock N Roll and other publications. Somewhere in the 00’s McPheeters fell in with Vice and started working on becoming a “real writer” and publishing a couple of novels before releasing this collection of essays that serve as a brutal dissection of his earlier works as well as expressing his thoughts on a music community he had somewhat grown up/away from and his own place in that community, as well as his thoughts on various artists who were formative to his growth,

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Hey there! Howdy!

I've got to say it loudly:

Thanks, Dan.

I kind of arbitrarily foisted a nearly two-month hiatus on this thing! A function of moving across the country and starting work in a new industry...

So... upon review of Dan's notes... I see that this episode was about what we were listening to at the time! Which might be fairly different than now! But... it was only within the last month...

You know it's probably good!

Nothing whatsoever to do with submarines. Or bogs. Or monsters that take submarines to get to bogs. But then again, maybe!

Uhhhh...

Click below! You will (?) be glad you did!

https://youtu.be/t1uxNwVy5pA

From the rec room to the home office and maybe the porch... if we had porches... #bogmonstermusic

The audio is really the piece de resistance of the podcast... we think... #bogmonstermusic

We also have a list full of music for playing!

Dan's Notes

Fucked Up/Halluci-Nation collabs

https://youtu.be/QLVzYGwtHsk Electroshock

https://youtu.be/VdJubxEeblk John Wayne Was A Nazi

A cool pair of collaborations between good friends on tour, paying tribute to longtime favourites of theirs. Fucked Up released their first LP as a full band in nine years at the start of 2023 and have been hitting the road this year with their kindred spirits from another genre The Halluci-Nation (fka A Tribe Called Red), which has resulted in the two bands coming together to record a couple of fun cover songs to promote their tour (which also features live wrestling matches as openers). The first of these is their take on Ritmo Peligroso’s “Electroshock”, one of the first punk singles to come out of the Mexican scene and a longtime record collecting holy grail until recently for FU vocalist Damian Abraham. The second of these collaborations is a cover of the Millions Of Dead Cops classic “John Wayne Was A Nazi”, a song whose early 80’s hardcore vibes and anticolonialist lyrical sentiments meshes well with the vibes of both bands on a variety of levels, and while some may balk at the wubba-wubba bass drop breakdown in the midst of the cover’s industrial punk angst, I would remind everyone that the original’s slap bass intro was a little bit cringe at the time too. Still, I think it’s really cool that these two bands are not only touring together but making music together too.

End It

https://youtu.be/7BgQEyKeQmE New Wage Slavery

https://youtu.be/RaA_loWu1oM Hatekeeper

Baltimore is starting to get a whiff of that Seattle/Chapel Hill type of hype in terms of the new wave of hardcore bands over the past decade or so and End It are holding it down for the ugly, angry and thrashing side of things, especially on their Unpleasant Living 7” from last year. The band leans heavy into the punk side of crossover thrash, with a wailing solo here and a wailing vocal there, without veering into full on red-Ibanez-metal (if you know what I mean in that bands that leaned a little too hard into the cheesier metal side of crossover thrash always had a guy playing a red Ibanez guitar somewhere in the lineup - this a fact I will not tolerate any arguments on). Anyway, End It rip through six songs in eight minutes on this rager of an EP and it’s just a perfect little package of pure anger and spite on wax. Vocalist Akil Greenley is one of those rare folks in hardcore who can actually sing when needed and has a dark sense of humour mixed in with his angry and pessimistic lyrics. He also co-hosts a podcast called Up The Blunx that leans towards the comedic and has also started standup comedy outside of the band recently due to making a fan in Mister Show alumnus and metal connoisseur Brian Posehn who had heralded the band on social media after hearing their EP played in a pizza shop after a show one night. Also the band has one of the best nonverbal ad libs in hardcore when Akil follows the last line of “New Wage Slavery” with the deepest, most anguished “UUUGH!” committed to record.

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Greetings and salutations! Every time I think we've broken a record for the gap between recording and production of this podcast, new circumstances arrive that put that record to lie! Picture it... Victoria Day, 2023... some two-and-a-half weeks ago... which, in contemporary click-bait terms may as well have been an eternity. Anywho... or is that anywhat??... this episode sees us taking on some of our favorite artists from la belle province... join us, if you dare!

https://youtu.be/c8kO-HPU9yQ All the #bogmonstermerch in the world won't keep us safe this time...

A toast to this audio... with all the fingers and toes at your disposal... #bogmonstermusic

Be sure to goose this legitimately sick YouTube playlist while you're at it...

Dan's Notes

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4qXf2ajh4tc

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OwQEqIysYw8

Born Dead Icons

Making emo kids listen to Motörhead and crust punks listen to The Wipers. Record Store Guy Core. Featuring ⅗ of Quebec City emotive HC band Jonah (who had releases on Great American Steak Religion Records, which we talked about last week) plus Pete Beaudoin of Gatineau’s Warfare State, took a turn to to the more rock’n’roll side while mixing in variety of influences from around the punk spectrum, and were not shy about wearing them on their sleeves. Released 3 LPs and a few 7”s during their run from 1999-2007, most of the band kept going under the name Complications through the late 00’s and 2010s afterward. Their sound could be loosely described as “rock’n’roll punk with a dark edge” but not in a posturing dress-up way like so many other ex hardcore kids who embrace guitar solos and long-haired 80’s style excess, but fused raging apocalyptic d-beat with tuneful rocking riffs in a way that appealed to a wide variety of the scene, not just the Discharge loving chain punk crowd or the serious Ebullitions style hardcore crowd or fans of more accessible straight up punk stuff. Their three albums and many EPs are definitely worth searching out, as well as the band that rose from their ashes Complications who are still active, to my knowledge.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9thvHDskYvA

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dh_wnykggWM

Godspeed You! Black Emperor

What if those breakdowns in Neurosis songs were a whole band/when anarchists become Real Musicians. GYBE’s debut “f sharp a sharp infinity” is one of those rare records that blew pretty much every one I knew away whether they were into punk or metal or indie or classical or not all that into music but fans of the band’s anarchist politics, with a few members having ties to the hardcore and crust scenes as well as Montreal’s activist community. For a band whose music is entirely instrumental they always seemed to use whatever platforms given to them in all of the hype when their music started getting popular among fans of more mainstream “indie” type music started gravitating to their sound. It’s a rare band that draws the vocal admiration of both big time Hollywood directors and the Crimethinc Collective, but GYBE managed to do so throughout the 2000s and 2010s. There was a point in time where one could still bump into members of the band volunteering at anarchist bookstore Librairie Alternatif long after they had become relative stars of the Canadian indie scene, but that’s one of the things I always thought was so cool about the band. They would go from the stages of huge music festivals to playing on the front lines of antiglobalization protests right there on the streets, their music with a sound so very much their own and never afraid of using their platforms to platform the ideas they felt were important to them. Their music evokes a certain mood like no other, which is why they were so perfect on the soundtrack to films like 28 Days Later, and are one of the punkest bands with a full string and horn section anyway as well as one that seems like a pillar of the modern Mon...

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Hey there! From our vector of the Interwebs to yours, it’s the latest TNB/TTW! This time we’re spinning some yarns about artists we enjoy who are at the centre of multiple projects! We’ve got them preserved in digital silk for you to dig into! For my Interwebs crypto-dollar, this may be my favourite episode thus far… but I am, naturally, biased AF! We’re looking forward to spending this time with you…

https://youtu.be/soKnqWq0wJQFIRST… we tie ’em up in scarves… THEN… we pounce… #bogmonstermusicUntil they come up with a better price than “free”… that’s the price we’re going with! #bogmonstermusic

And of course, we’ve spun the crawlingest YouTube playlist that we’re capable of…

Dan’s Noteshttps://youtu.be/5Ra3enj8zhQhttps://youtu.be/k47VVqMiUTghttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vsKQIuTeXLwEl-P (Company Flow, RTJ, solo)My introduction to the music of El P came via a mix CD made by a hip hop DJ from Florida who had moved to Portland on the run from The KKK after he had made some burning confederate flag buttons that they were not too fond of (whose couch I happened to be living on at the time), and who had convinced me to join him in driving around the back alleys of Portland’s industrial district for the afternoon, crawling through dumpsters looking for old fluorescent light fixtures and other weird stuff he could sell for scrap and smoking crappy 90’s weed in his jeep between stops. The wild scratches and fried vocal samples of Company Flow’s “Patriotism” blared out as we hopped into baking metal container filled with industrial detritus and old lunch wrappers and it just seemed like the perfect bleak soundtrack for such filthy late-capitalist scavenger business. Co Flow’s mission statement of being “Independent As Fuck” mixed with their stripped-down and abrasive take on classic NY hip hop really appealed to me on so many levels, even if the group itself was soon to go their separate ways. He spent the 00’s and early 10’s working on his three solo albums (Fantastic Damage, I’ll Sleep When You’re Dead, and Cancer4Cure) as well as a ton of production and guest appearances for other artists, not to mention running his label Definitive Jux and even putting out an instrumental jazz album (High Water). It was his next big project that most people would probably recognize as he teamed up with Atlanta rapper Killer Mike to form Run The Jewels about a decade ago, releasing four critically acclaimed (and pretty damn great) records together since then, plus a couple of remix albums and all released for free online. It’s been cool to see El get respect from a larger audience over the past decade after being a fan for more than twice that amount of time, and on his own terms.

https://youtu.be/xS4qVOsJch4Sarah Kirsch (Fuel, Sawhorse, Torches To Rome, etc.)https://youtu.be/Q4U4nY0MYv0https://youtu.be/PXIL7H0oR2gSarah Kirsch was someone whose music played into a huge part of certain formative years, even if the only one to have more than or two releases to their collective name was one that she left after the first couple years after helping found them (Pinhead Gunpowder).

She was a massive part of the Bay Area scene that I don’t know if I could do justice in describing on my own but If you take a look at the MRR news memorial page I have linked here https://www.maximumrocknroll.com/for-sarah-kirsch/ you will get a much better summary of her life and work.

I was a big fan of Ebullition Records back in the 90’s and 00’s and it felt like for a good part of that label’s lifespan every third or fourth release was some band that Sarah was playing on that that would pretty much always end up being absolutely killer. I was only able to catch her playing live once, in 1999 while she was with Bread And Circuits and that show stands as one of my favourite all time live music experiences and in my mind represented some of the best artists of that era, and even though none of her bands ever seemed to last longer than a couple of years at a time but each one was an evolution on the last, eventually starting detours into electronic music, samples, and onstage theatrics in later projects like Baader Brains and her final band Mothercountry Motherfuckers while still keeping their fiery emotive hardcore edge. Sarah passed away in 2012 from a rare blood disorder but her work lives on in the many great records she made with over a dozen bands during her lifetime, and when I think of artists whom I’ve been a fan of over the course of manybprojects she is one of they very first to come to mind.

https://youtu.be/cptyoRD3-gQYannick Lorrain (Uranus, His Hero Is Gone, Tragedy)https://youtu.be/anFWFQh9ZbIhttps://youtu.be/6GCCUveWL_IYannick was a late addition to my list but after Matt mentioned Shotmaker I figured I would I’d add someone related to that band whose work left a major impression on me through multiple projects. Yannick Lorrain was a huge part of the Ottawa area scene in the early-mid 90’s through running his record label Great American Steak Religion (that released Shotmaker’s first LP amongst other great bands from the are) as well as running the basement show venue 5 Arlington and playing guitar in one of Canada’s greatest hardcore bands of all time, URANUS. After the end of URANUS he was invited to join another iconic band (and one of my all time favourites in the hardcore punk genre) Memphis TN’s His Hero Is Gone, who had parted ways with one of their guitarists not long after their debut album Fifteen Counts Of Arson was released. Their next album, and first with Yannick on board, 1997’s Monuments To Thieves is seriously a classic of the genre, with his trademark “spooky” riffs being a welcome addition to their already crushing sound. When HHIG parted ways with bassist Carl Auge in 1999, Yannick and the other remaining two members of the band (brothers Todd and Paul Burdette) relocated to Portland OR and reformed as Tragedy, releasing multiple albums and touring a bunch through the 2000s and 2010s, while Yannick has also continued releasing music for other likeminded bands through his rechristened Feral Ward record label. While he may have only played in a handful of bands over his career, Yannick has been a man contributor one some of my absolute favourite albums in the punk/hardcore genre and deserves major recognition for it.

https://youtu.be/aSQjn_SiVbwMF Doomhttps://youtu.be/QYp28tEAVvshttps://youtu.be/gSJeHDlhYlshttps://youtu.be/jRn9BRo4IgwDoom is an artist’s artist, which is cliche but seeing the amount of tributes from his peers when he passed in late 2021 is undeniable. He’s a legend and an icon in the genre of hip hop who transformed into a variety of incarnations whether solo or working with likeminded collaborators such as Madlib and Danger Mouse. His original stage name was Zev Love X as part of the group KMD with his brother DJ Subroc, and after two albums and a bit of fuckery on behalf on their record label KMD ended when Subroc was fatally injured in a car accident and Zev took a break from music while mourning his sibling’s passing. Eventually a few years after KMD’s end he started showing up at various open mic events in his trademark Doctor Doom mask, and over the course of the next couple of decades also made appearances in other guises like the Toho Films-inspired multi-headed kaiju King Geedorah, and the more human street level hustler Viktor Vaughn. While he was never the sort of artist to top the charts during his decades-long career, doom was a stalwart of the underground independent rap scene and revered for his off kilter creativity and intricate dense rhyme schemes over stripped down dusty beats, and at one point even started crossing over into television, occasionally hosting segments on the Adult Swim network (a gig that led to his Dangerdoom collaboration with producer Dangermouse and various voice actors from Adult Swim series like Brak Show and Aqua Teen Hunger force). Unfortunately, Doom’s family life and music career were interrupted brutally when he was barred from re-entering the US after some European shows in as it was discovered that he had never officially become a US citizen after being born in the UK while his mother was visiting family there and being stranded away from his wife and children from 2010 until his passing a couple of years ago. He kept making music from his new home in the UK the entire time, working with everyone from Thom Yorke to Westside Gunn. When it was announced that he had passed in 2020 it hit me hard, as he was a truly unique artist in a genre where a lot of performers seem more concerned with trying to sound like 5he next most popular thing instead of truly forging their own path.

https://youtu.be/K6R98WmH5eISteve McBeanhttps://youtu.be/7KOD-wSijx4https://youtu.be/Z3c-haCK7EEhttps://youtu.be/_USHKQ4Ntc8I’ve talked about my love of Steve McBean’s music on the show before, and I’ll do so here again (right now, even). While he was active in bands starting in the early 80’s like Red Tide and Mission Of Christ but I first became familiar familiar with his music through his band GUS through their EP on Slow To Burn Records in the early 90’s, and then was fortunate enough to see his next and also excelle y band Ex Dead Teenager a few times before half of that band morphed into the mighty Jerk With A Bomb, whom I’ve expressed my love for on the show previously. That seed then grew into the psychedelic force of nature that is Black Mountain, and the more stripped down Pink Mountaintops alongside his more high profile big band project. McBean has been one my favorite musicians in the punk/indie/rock milieu for decades, and truly deserves a spot in the pantheon of greatest Canadian singer/songwriters of all time in my opinion. Seeing him literally go from basements and community halls to big time tours and movie soundtracks and stuff while bringing the same fire and heart to it all has been really great to see, so there’s no way I couldn’t include him on my list for this show.

https://youtu.be/3RThaRCRfW4Runner ups and miscellanyhttps://youtu.be/7KOD-wSijx4https://youtu.be/Gq8m5eLn9yYOpen Mike Eagle – For Doom

Refused– Rather Be Dead

Fake Names– Delete Myself

https://youtu.be/q31Fh-nZMQMArachnids just wanna have fun… #bogmonstermusic

Matt’s NotesThis here is a most multi-faceted episode of TNB! For those who multi-task… for those restless souls who keep on keeping on in all circumstances… we salute the hell out of you! I’ve jumped around variously in my career… and point of fact, I’m currently hanging in the air, waiting to land… in the meantime, I get to call myself “consultant, writer, podcaster, and teacher”. It sounds great! And if there were any dollars landing in my hands from any of this, that would be gravy! To all you all hustlers, unpaid workaholics, and other folks out there living your version of The Dream… cause that’s all you have… eight hands up to receive eight VERY high fives! Thanks, Dan for this topic… and I am sure we could revisit this one again… and again….

Tommy Stinson: The Replacements, Bash & Pop, Perfect, Guns n’ Roses, Soul Asylum, Cowboys in the Campfirehttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z729GbQRMV0https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-Q2ALJcESnEhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dOWASvOuv0kFar be it from me to spend even MORE time on the Replacements… they’re so much a part of my musical fandom DNA that I didn’t think of adding Tommy S. to the list until after all the others… and given the scale of his career… clearly he belongs at the top…

Far be it from me to belabour the why’s and wherefores… I’ll put aside my KISS Army-level obsession with the Mats… I’ll bracket my Grateful Deadly cultdom…

Here’s a 56 year-old man who has been touring and recording as a professional musician since the age of ELEVEN… he’s been on indie labels, majors, and every shade in between… after the Replacements folded, he moved to LA, formed two amazing bands— Bash & Pop, and Perfect, respectively— got no support or traction with record labels… gigged around that city with Brian Baker (Minor Threat, Bad Religion, a million others)… and was working at a call centre to make ends meet when he got the call to play bass as Duff McKagen’s… replacement… in the Chinese Democracy-era Guns n’ Roses… which he played in for SIXTEEN YEARS… longer than the time he played with the Replacements, even with the three-year reunion from 2012-15 thrown in…

He’s put out solo records… he helped out Soul Asylum with recording and touring following the death of original bassist Karl Mueller… now he travels Europe and North America as a solo artist and leading the first-a-duo-now-a-trio Cowboys in the Campfire… who have a new album out this summer… and are playing dive bars, back yards, and bespoke venues across the US… a musician’s musician… and from all media and social media appearances… a cool, well-adjusted middle-aged dad… no mean feat considering his decades playing with the likes of Paul Westerberg and Axel Rose…

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=by2A5pTmuNMhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QJt4nJ3TmwwMatt Deline: Shotmaker, 30 Second Motion Picture, Three Penny Opera, Slow Parker, the Gray, Dark Plainshttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7x_4S6IiLGMhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m0jnPPDjBosThere’s probably a really good essay… or even a whole PODCAST EPISODE (nudges Dan across the Internet while winking knowingly) about how much of the current “90’s punk / hardcore / emo” nostalgia is based on the fact that… as far as rock formats go… this was the last surge of pre-Internet guitar-based music… you can say “we had the email” and “we had the message boards” as much as you like… but in 1994 or 1995… in Fredericton, New Brunswick, Canada… and, I have to assume, many other smaller cities and towns across North America… you were still in a situation of finding out about bands word-of-mouth… bands from your town cobbled together enough coins to tour their small area… and interacted with others doing the same… and then came back with zines, records, tapes, burned CD’s…

Such was the case with Shotmaker! And I will lay my knowledge of these Ottawa titans at the feet of Phil Clarke of Catch-23 along with many other projects… and his 2% Records distro… which puts me in the mind that we could probably do an entire LOCAL and/or Atlantic Canadian version of this episode… (winks at Dan in Halifax while typing these words in Kamloops, BC).

How influential were Shotmaker? Influential enough that when I recently posted the Crayon Club YT clip (above) on the popular 90s Hardcore/punk/emo Records, CDs, Tapes and Zines FB group…. with nearly 36,000 members… it got 95 likes… which is pretty high, as far as it goes! I’ve also gone down a Discogs rabbithole and been in touch with Shawn Scallen in Ottawa who took a bunch of iconic photos of the band and he’s hooking me up with Matt Deline post-Shotmaker projects 30 Second Motion Picture and 3 Penny Opera on vinyl… along with some other awesome albums & artists from that era… including Okara (Orleans, ON) and North of America (Halifax)… there’s a Shotmaker Official IG account… and I’ve been chasing down The Gray… and anything else on Matt D’s Discogs page that I can find… some of which was only released on CD… like the phenomenal Slow Parker album…

His current project is Dark Plains… and only available on Bandcamp… last updated six years ago…

So… all this has reinforced for me that to love a band of that era… is to really love an entire scene… and as they / we / all of us get older… I’m turning 45 in a couple of weeks!… it’s cool to see that despite day jobs, kids, relationships, (cough) divorces and unemployment… deaths of family and friends… that these “networks”… formed largely before “networked social media” was even on the horizon… are still capable of sharing awesome music… and other cultural artifacts… not to sound too much like a post-academic nerd! But that’s exactly what I am!

Click here for a really cool and fairly in-depth history of Shotmaker… including interviews with Matt and other band members…

00001 by The Dark Plains

Chris Wollard: Hot Water Music, Rumbleseat, the Draft, Blacktop Cadence, Ship Thieveshttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FlZ8qI4bLl4https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aBGV1fZ5b8ELots has been said and written about Hot Water Music… my personal knowledge and lived experience goes back to 1999 or thereabouts… living in Halifax, working as a line cook, dropped out of university for the first time… and getting the excellent Leatherface and Hot Water Music split when Ben AKA “Gumby’s Brother” MacFarlane organized a mail order through some distro or another… and got a bunch of us in on it to reduce the shipping costs… again, early Internet era… pre-Internet era for many (most?) of us…

Chuck and Chris are both amazing songwriters and performers… but what really causes Chris to stand out such as to be included on this episode… is his excellent band Ship Thieves… originally presented as Chris Wollard and the Ship Thieves… by the third record, he’d dropped his name out of deference to the fact that this was no solo project at all…

As mentioned in the recording… and in previous episodes!… I just find his songs relatable. The fact that he’s been upfront about his struggles with mental illness… namely, anxiety and depression… and that he’s around my age… he’s 48, as per Wikipedia… I’ve been stopped in my tracks three times in my adult life because of mental health issues so far… and for me, being open and public about it has been one way of taking care of my own well-being and mental health… but also, as much as possible, hopefully helping to remove the stigma around mental health issues… and providing some kind of reassurances to anyone out there dealing with the same…

This may seem a long way to go from simply saying that Chris W. and all of his projects that I’ve heard jump out at me… as punk music and “90’s hardcore” and folk music…

My most popular post on the 90s Hardcore/punk/emo Records, CDs, Tapes and Zines FB group was, in fact, a post sharing a photo of my Leatherface / HWM split beside my copies of HWM’s first album “Fuel For the Hate Game” and Leatherface’s “Minx”… with 122 likes so far!

I think that speaks in some small way to the fact that there are many out there who feel similarly about HWM… and Chris W’s contribution over the decades…

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XdJ5kDVL41wDerek Grant: Alkaline Trio, Suicide Machines, Walls of Jericho, Thoughts of Ionesco&Neil Hennessy: The Lawrence Arms, Baxter, The Falcon, Sundowner, Smoking Popes, Joyce Manor, SpartaDerek Grant and Neil Hennessy were the first two artists I thought of for this episode… because I’ve discovered their respective long-running Chicago bands Alkaline Trio and the Lawrence Arms within the past year plus… and because they both, respectively, fit my long-running hypothesis that “drummers make the scene”.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GNS4CR7vP4chttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ksy13DPbVkYThis is a case where the “relative to obscure” factor comes into play… or the “rising tides lift all the boats” hypothesis…

If you look at 90’s punk and hardcore, it’s hard to find bands from that era more revered than Baxter… who, incidentally, featured Tim McIllrath who would go on to form Rise Against…

If you don’t know these bands at all, that would place you squarely as a mainstream music listener. You might also be a fan of punk music… but have, like I did, missed them for many years…

As per Wikipedia, the Lawrence Arms have made music industry charts… the “heatseekers” chart, no less… just once in their careers… Alkaline Trio have sold in the many hundreds of thousands of albums… and Rise Against… featuring neither Derek nor Neil… have earned gold and platinum records in multiple markets…

Same scene, same era, overlapping musicians, and wildly different levels of commercial success…

Drummers are, as near as I can tell, the glue that hold music scenes together… regardless of geographic region… Neil and Grant are both guitarists and singers… but rock guitarists are a dime-a-dozen… I’ve never been in a band, but I’ve been around enough shows and musicians to know that this is true… the same for singers, albeit perhaps a bit less.

A drummer is the unicorn in any town… if you’re good at it, you’re fighting off offers… incidentally, Matt from Shotmaker is that rarest thing of all… a SINGING drummer….

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Av1EkhpI9MEhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mRDtqR0sYaIhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kkDZr12cxbEThis is all to say that until this episode… and having a close look at their respective Wikipedia and Discogs pages… I had no idea how many projects each of these guys were involved in… apparently Neil is a touring member of Sparta… and, more recently, of Joyce Manor… both of whom are of relatively high popularity on the “relative to obscure” scale…

These guys (probably) don’t have day jobs… because drumming IS their day job… and if you can hit your midlife doing something you love then you are, truly, Living The Dream…

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dxV4AttsR50Duane Denison: The Jesus Lizard, Cargo Cult, Tomahawk, Denison-Kimball Triohttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9cT5UlUFQ98I’m really just shoehorning the guitarist for the Jesus Lizard into the episode… he’s phenomenal, of course… and the Jesus Lizard are one of the biggest Touch and Go artists of the “grunge” era… I used this episode as an excuse to get the Cargo Cult record into my Discogs shopping cart… and my limited exposure to Tomahawk so far basically ensures that I’ll be shelling out for those records as well…

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again… there’s something about Chicago, man…

Do yourself a favor and watch these Jesus Lizard sets… shot decades apart… what you see here are men fighting themselves, the audience, each other, and time… “raging against the dying of the light”, to paraphrase Dylan Thomas…

I am so far from being a musician. But in the scenes… and in the aging… I feel more than a bit of relatability here… and so that makes me your basic stereotypical midlife music fanatic… and, at least most days, I wouldn’t want it any other way…

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oykH7FnJ71wWe appreciate your jumping down from your WebSpace tm to join us! We are looking forward to seeing you again quite soon! In as long as it takes for us to finish digesting what we’ve already captured…

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Welcome to what was intended as an Easter Monday episode of the TNB/TTW! We’re coming at you fifteen days late… and counting… but, compared to what the Son of Man went through to return after three days, we’re doing a’ight… all things considered! Today… and by “today” I mean “this week” and/or “this month”… we are talking about bands and solo artists who released only one or two or a few documents into the world… AKA “one and done”… AKA… “The short-timers”… not that we have a Messiah complex or anything…

https://youtu.be/ZqCswbT7n6EWe’ve got t-shirts! Next up… unbusiness cards… #merch #bogmonstermusicIn this economy… audio costs the same as video!! #bogmonstermusic

Similarly… or is that sill-ily?… the YouTube playlist can be got for the same cost of zero dollars… and only a fraction of your precious life essence…

Dan’s Noteshttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tMAnTqDAA84https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OxO2cIDESdI Cannibal OxOkay, given that two of these guys did get back together eventually in the mid 2010’s using the Can Ox name I may be stretching my own theme to include them, but that stuff was done without original producer El P handling beatmaking duties and his contributions are part of what makes Can Ox’s sole full length of their original run so classic, then it’s really not the same group then is it? (Yes it is, I suppose, but I wanted to include them here so humour me). The product of a fledgling producer (who had previously only made beats for his old group Company Flow) inviting two talented emcees – Vordul Mega and Vast Aire,who were in need of some structure to work around, to move into his spare room for a year and feeding them dark, spaced out synth heavy beats until they cooked up their classic “Cold Vein” LP in 2001 – an apocalyptic mutation of futuristic New York-style boom bap rap, if the future in question was an alternate version of Blade Runner that involved the Tyrell Corporation building their robot factory pyramid in Brooklyn instead of Los Angeles. From there the members went their separate ways pursuing various solo projects to differing levels of success while also coping with real life circumstances like mental health crises etc and then things never really came together for any sort of follow up from all three, though Vast and Vordul did get back together in the mid 2010’s without El-P and have done a few things using the Can Ox name since but none with the impact of Cold Vein and none with any production from El-P, who was such a big part of the sound of that sole full length from their original run.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uHYhzg8QWbIhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x90x3cLjapcThe UncludedTwo truly unique artists coming together for one of the catchiest meditations on grief and loss put to record. Aesop Rock and Kimya Dawson have deep deep catalogues of their own and started collaborating here and there in the late 00’s/early 2010’s initially via appearances on each others’ Skelethon and Thunderthighs albums respectively, and then by more actively working on material together that culminated in their one album under the name The Uncluded, 2013’s Hokey Fright. While Dawson and Aes my seem like an odd mix at first, they are both New York weirdos of a certain vintage transplanted to the west coast after going through life changes, and felt like a perfect combination of seemingly incongruous flavours that compliment each others’ styles perfectly. It’s really too bad they only did the one album together as everything the two have done together have been quite enjoyable. On a related personal note, it was looking into another performer who collaborated sang with the two of them on the song “Captain Lou” from Dawson’s Thunderthighs record, one Bryan Danielson fka former WWE World Champion Daniel Bryan, which was one of my introductory points to the world of pro wrestling fandom, a point I forgot to mention on the actual show so I had to include it here.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lmpd0eqSfF0Behead The Prophet No Lord Shall LiveI know there are plenty of great punk bands that only released one album, but these folks were truly ahead of their time in so many ways that it’s really too bad we only ever got one full length and a couple of EPs before they parted ways and some members went on to more accessible and popular acts. Loud fast and queer (all five members of BTP NLSL openly identified as gay or bi), Behead The Prophet had the name of a metal band, the visual style of a post punk band (tight black and white suits), the riffs of a hardcore band, and layered over all of it the free form noise elements provided by violinist Michael, who despite being in his late 60’s during the time the band was active, tied it all together with waves of distorted effects-laden violin virtuosity. BTP NLSL burned bright for just a few years in the mid-late 90’s, releasing a handful of EP’s and their one full length before moving on to other endeavours. The guitarist and bassist moved on to form Tight Bros From Way Back When (one of my favourite band names of all time) afterward with folks from KARP, their violinist kept working on his noise project Noggin until his passing the late 00’s and last I googled their vocalist is now a well-loved chef in the Pacific Northwest culinary scene. Even though they weren’t around for all that long they are still one of my favourite bands from that scene and era today.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SkSkOKlDFu8https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1LMNTNaTlZ0https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1LMNTNaTlZ0Exploding HeartsA tragic story story of a career cut short, though with the upcoming reissue of their sole full length “Guitar Romantic” on Third Man Records, more people will finally be able to check out their awesome power pop punk songs again 20:years after their initial release. The Exploding Hearts were darlings of the Pacific Northwest scene of the early 00’s, with a sound akin to a mix of an American Buzzcocks or Undertones and what the Strokes wished they sounded like, with an extra heaping dose of snotty punk swagger over top of it all. Unfortunately, in July 2003 just a couple of months after what would be their sole full length was released, the band was driving home from a series of shows at San Francisco’s Bottom Of The Hill Club and the the diver fell asleep at the wheel, crashing the van. Three of the four members of the band passed away due to injuries sustained in the accident, with only guitarist Terry Six surviving. Six would later go on to form The Riffs with Scott Goto (who was later to become front man of LONG KNIFE, who we talked about on a previous episode), and as mentioned previously their album is being reissued on Third Man Records this year to celebrate it’s 20th anniversary, and I highly recommended you pick up when it comes out.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YnIEgnar4aYhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RjR0GUOAXOUGorilla BiscuitsIt’s wild to me that this band only really one full length album but they’re one of those bands whose members started playing together young (they met in high school) and then moved on to new ideas, new projects and new careers while still in their early 20’s. They occupy a similar space as Matt’s picks Operation Ivy , but in the subgenre of youth crew straightedge hardcore instead of ska-punk, being a young band with a passionate but still accessible take on their respective subgenre who usually end up being one of most folks’ early introductions to said genre and who had members move on to more successful acts later on (in this case GB guitarist Walter Schriefels’ recently reunited 90’s era project Quicksand). Mixing the speed and anger of their contemporaries with the melody of bands like The Descendents they created a potent offshoot of the hardcore genre that lives on today, with their sole 1989 full length on Revelation Records still widely available as an accessible but awesome and passionate introductory point to that era of hardcore for sure and the genre as a whole.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XmCWfJAPwbAMiscellanyMain Source – Live At The BBQ (feat 18 year old Nas), a runner up pick of mine for the topic that may be discussed more in-depth on a follow up to the topic.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ij5TfkKrL1Ihttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DHODAJClUd4Quicksand – Landmine Spring (Walter Schriefels’ post- Gorilla Biscuits band)

Schlong – I feel Pretty (Dave Mello’s post-Op Ivy band, from their 1993 “Punk Side Story” album, guest vocals by Anna Joy from BLATZ)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J4OO7GVJU1khttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZzwnPLH1wCchttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k47VVqMiUTgKimya Dawson – Captain Lou feat Aesop Rock and Bryan Danielson

The Riffs – A Million Scars (feat members of The Exploding Hearts and Long Knife)

Company Flow – Patriotism (El-P’s first group)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8LLe8TycsDsTight Bros From Way Back When – Hurricane (post BTP NLSL band also featuring Karp/Big Business members)

Matt’s NotesAs it’s been… checks notes… 16 days and counting… since we recorded this episode… through no fault of Dan’s… it turns out we’re here for a long time rather than a short time… as far as these things go…

In fact, we’re only a few days out from our next recording session! And I’ll be goddamned if I’m running away to Kelowna for another week without getting that episode up as well…

Drill Sergeant: What a load of happy horseshit! You think anybody gives a sweet fuck about your “personal issues”?

Private Matt: Derp

DS: What the fuck did you just mumble out of that gasping piehole? This isn’t some kind of goddamned all-you-can-mutter group therapy jack-off session!

PM: Yes, Sarge. I mean no, Sarge.

DS: You passive-aggressive little weasel! No wonder you can’t sustain a marriage or even a single goddamned Tinder date. Christ, I’m trying not to puke just looking at you!

PM: Sorry, Sarge.

DS: Did you just APOLOGIZE to me, you goddamned shitstain? And if you think going “meta” here is going to save your sorry, ridiculous, unemployed ass you have another think coming!

Sorry… where were we?

For the sake of getting ‘er done, these notes will be necessarily brief! Here’s the original game plan for my part of the show from 2.5 weeks back… we didn’t get through all of this on the episode… that I remember, anyway… nor will these notes cover all of it… but… for those interested in “process”… here’s a peek behind the camo curtain…

Slow Parkerhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EU_at-R2Ry0This is a paragraph about Slow Parker. It’s not as cool or relaxing as listening to SP. And it won’t make you headbang & flail your way into the ER the way Shotmaker did… But it still is trying to convey something of that essence.

I went to the show at the Odd Fellows Hall… I did my nerdy sideways dance near the front… it was the best of times… full stop...

Many thanks to publisher, writer, musician, and all-around awesome guy Matt Carter for writing this amazing piece on Fredericton venues from “back in the day” which was invaluable when I was writing the preceding sentences…

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7x_4S6IiLGMMedictationhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EOyeCvnahNMThis is a paragraph about Medictation. Leatherface (Sunderland, UK) + the Sainte Catherines (Montreal) = L-O-V-E. Especially when you consider it was the last recorded music by Dickie Hammond… who passed away far too early… shortly before the album was released… the Stalingrad clip above pays tribute to one of the best to ever pick up the axe… and he could sing just as well as Frankie as well, as it turns out…

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IUlka2nQb6whttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=58fkiMfGRaEOperation Ivyhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ABbp6AoMCikThis is a paragraph about Op Ivy. What can I say that’s original about them? Absolutely nothing. Right! That takes care of that!

Note: Back when this was recorded… two-and-a-half very long weeks ago… I could have sworn that the new Jesse M & Tim Timebomb project was called Bad Optix… but now all the official Internet stuff from Hellcat Records says Doom Regulator… anyways… do check it out! If good music is your thing…

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s5w5MbtykeAAlderknothttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RH0xwP-a18AThis is a paragraph about Alderknot. I wrote as much about them as I’m reasonably capable of back in the notes for Episode Four…

One of my favorite gigs of the era was seeing them at the Boyce Farmer’s Market in 199-whatever… and then getting the demo tape… and playing it to death on my shitty boombox / multi-CD changer of the day…

Shoutout to the aforementioned Matt Carter for being the drummer of record when the Barn Overload album came out… and who appears on their Discogs page… also: a shoutout to whoever is behind this goddamned lovely and informative blogspot about Atlantic Canadian punk and hardcore…

The Broadways & Rapemanhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ongzmI3-ij4https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JI4keToT1jMThis is a paragraph about two massively awesome and hugely influential and short-lived bands from Chicago, Illinois, USA. Brendan & Chris, later from the Lawrence Arms, started out in the Broadways together… and their one full-length is still available on Asian Man Records… from what I can tell from random interactions online this band meant one hell of a lot to a lot of people at the time… and, for my money, it’s an amazing historical document of a scene I never heard from at the time… Somewhere across town, I like to imagine, Steve Albini was doing Steve Albini things… including this much-lauded and much-protested band Rapeman… questionable and problematic… definitely… rocking as hell… undeniably… what makes this worth including is that Steve A has since made a turn to accountability… stating unequivocally and clearly on the record that he regrets his past “edgelord” behavior… including the naming of this band…

And furthermore…https://youtu.be/d64oGPreIEkhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=htOEq6JKNDkBen Nichols… Singer, guitarist, and writer for Lucero has released exactly ONE solo EP… written specifically about the epic, apocalyptic novel Blood Meridian, or, the Evening Redness in the West by certified American genius Cormac McCarthy… this came out in 2009 when I was living in Qatar… about six months before the birth of my first son… and I read the novel twice around the time… while listening to this EP on repeat… flash forward nearly a decade-and-a-half and Lucero is still going strong… with their latest Should’ve Learned by Now released just a month or two ago… as well, Ben has recently collaborated with his daughter… and released a fascinating and deeply cool synthwave album on Bandcamp…

Raised on Losing Ground by Last Wolf in the Woods

Nerve Shack & Crisis Party

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QJlrPS9SqXUWelcome To The Party by Crisis PartyWhen somebody I know cares enough to recommend a band to me, I try and check it out!

Many thanks to my friend and former colleague Paula for letting me know about her best friend’s son’s band Nerve Shack… this is indeed something that fits with this show! Contemporary hard rock hailing from The Rock… I dig the bits I’ve heard so far… which gives me hope for the young’uns of our region… When (not if) we get around to doing another episode about Atlantic rock music I will be digging more deeply into their YouTube and Bandcamp…

Finally… Dan gave me the heads up to Crisis Party… who were playing a show in Kamloops… and while I didn’t make it to the show… “middle-aged Dad syndrome” winning that evening… they are also worthy of further follow-up on an episode of regional scenes… in this case Ottawa and Halifax…

Thanks as always for choosing to spend any of your dwindling hours with us! We appreciate you! Tread lightly into the rest of your time… and we’ll catch you again, hopefully, in three days and a wakeup!

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Dance like you’ve got eight legs… #bogmonstermusicWelcome to Today New Brunswick… Episode the Sixth! We are crawling out of our skins to share this content with you… continuing our look at regional and local scenes… in this case going broad and mostly flat… as we discuss our prairie favorites… bands and scenes from Alberta, Saskatchewan, and Manitoba… We’re stoked you’re joining us!

https://youtu.be/_zHmZNl6a5kYou’d be grinning too if you had this much #bogmonstermusic…Less monstrous but no less insidious audio content… #bogmonstermusicHear ye, hear ye… we’ve got the YouTube playlist here…

Dan’s Noteshttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=25IO5zA8AC0https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YdxzNy-apdYWeakerthansWhat do you say about a band like The Weakerthans? John K Sampson’s songs on the first two Propagandhi albums always stood out like poetic sore thumbs, so when I heard he had a new band with some of the Red Fisher guys I was full of anticipation, and that first album of theirs, Fallow, is one of the pieces of music I have had to repurchase in physical format multiple times due to just playing them to death. Over the course of their four full lengths plus a live album and a collaboration Jim Bryson, the Weakerthans perfected their brand of melancholic prairie rock full of cities of small lives and long drives, with Sampson cementing his place alongside folks like John Darnielle and Craig Finn as one of the top lyricists in the indie rock game. Sampson never abandoned the politics of his Propagandhi days but instead shifted more to painting portraits with his words rather than issuing screeds, with the band mixing country, folk, indie rock and pop punk into their haunting ballads of prairie angst. They definitely helped proved the soundtrack of a certain part of my early adult life, and I cannot think of taking the bus along extended stretches of the Trans Canada Highway without remembering the sound of their music playing in my ears.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YyPDxSyzY1khttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PqcvyBxhUkECadence WeaponFormer Edmonton poet laureate Rollie Pemberton aka Cadence Weapon has been a stardardbearer for the avant-garde side of hip hop in Canada over the past two decades. I’m in the middle of reading his memoir Bedroom Rapper right now and have been revisiting his music because of this which has been a rewarding experience. His beats mix UK grime and techno influences with weirdo indie vibes and lyrics that artfully mix the personal and the political, and reading his memoir really shows how deep his love and knowledge of the genre goes, though that makes sense given that his father was the DJ who literally introduced the province of Alberta in the early 80’s. I’ve been a fan of his work since his debut (2005’s Breaking Kayfabe) and even managed to catch him live here in Halifax a few years ago. Reading Bedroom Rapper inspired me to go check out his newest album Parallel World from 2021 and I heartily recommend giving it a listen. Opening track “Africville’s Revenge” starts with Pemberton listing off historically Black communities from across Canada that have been destroyed and made defunct by racism, gentrification, and other factors and stating that they are coming back for revenge, and never lets up from there over the next half hour or so of music. Cadence Weapon is an artist whose music has always been just a little too left of center for mainstream but he deserves his accolades as one of Canada’s top hip hop artists of the music log era for both his lyrics and his groundbreaking beats while also being an immensely talented writer outside of music as well. Oh yeah, did I mention that he was Edmonton’s poet laureate? Oh yeah, yeah I did. Also he wrote reviews for Pitchfork in the formative years of that site, before he had even finished high school, and is largely responsible for that site even covering rap music after taking them to task over their previous (lack of) coverage of the genre at the time. For these and many other reasons I had to include Cadence Weapon here on my list of faves from the prairie region.

Basement show favesWhat is an episode of our show without a band I used to see in basements or weird rented community halls in the 90’s? Here’s a quick twofer of bands that played venues like Calgary Multicultural Center and the Carpenter’s Union Hall while I lived in that city in the mid-90’s.

Bonaduces and Showdown 76"K" is For Catherine by The BonaducesThe Democracy of Sleep by The BonaducesBonaducesThe Bonduces were around from 1995-1999 and were a bridge between the Winnipeg DIY political punk scene and the more indie-pop Endearing Records scene of bands like B’ehl and Duotang. They also made the trek to play Calgary frequently while I was living there in the mid 90’s. They stood out for their wordy, narrative-driven lyrics and catchy three chord melodies alongside the high-jumping onstage antics of guitarist and young Al Yankovic lookalike Mike Koop. Their songs were all (possibly fictionalized) short stories of the romantic foibles and allergic reactions of young vagabonds and weirdos in a chilly prairie town, that, in retrospect give off real strong theatre kid energy but still had me tapping my toes while revisiting them in prep for this ep. Also, their blatant theft of the art of Adrian Tomine for one of their shirt designs led me to discovering the work of that great comic creator as well so bonus points there as well I guess.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U67ZtMtIQ1EWords That Sting LP (1997)Showdown 76The workhorses of the Calgary scene circa the time I was living there in the mid 90’s. I don’t know if they even ever left the city on tour during their time as a band but Showdown 76 honed their craft like few ever do while playing cruddy and not so cruddy venues around the city pretty much every weekend during those years. Guitarist Jeff Caissie also hosted a long running and beloved punk rock radio show on U of C’s radio station, and later went on to more regional fame while fronting 00’s emo unit Porter Hall, but SD76 always seemed like the sort of band that seemed down to play your show if you asked them, even if they never really toured outside of the city at all during their shortish existence. To be totally honest they’re a band I had not thought of in years until doing a bit of research for this episode and found their album uploaded to YouTube, which blew me away and made the realize I had to include them here to share their awesome melodic punk tunes on the show so please check them out at the link above,

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kTfxoBGLCOEhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=md44wo2Ah-ESNFUSNFU were a major band in multiple eras of the punk/hardcore scene h their initial run of albums on BYO Records in the mid-late 80’s, through their reunion in the early 90’s (where they first popped on my radar through multiple tour stops in Fredericton including the time people thought St Charbel’s Hall was on fire because of the steam coming out of the windows due to packed bodies dancing, the time they recruited dozens of the TNB skater crew kids to destroy the UNB campus Social Club where they were booked despite allegedly telling the promoter that they had only wanted an all ages show, and the time singer Chi Pig pelted the crowd of the Pyramid Warehouse with the multiple deli trays they had insisted the promoter but for them included in their rider while dressed as Fred Flintstone and also wearing a Frankenstein wig. This 90’s reunion led to them eventually signing to Epitaph Records and being one off the many boats whose tide rose in that label’s post Offspring heyday and making appearances on Muchmusic and other big media outlets, all while still being a bunch of arty skateboarding weirdos from the prairies whose singer was gay and a person of colour in a scene that at times could be less than welcoming to either of those communities. They kept going all through the 00s after a few lineup changes and inter-member squabbles, while Chi’s issues with addiction and mental health problems worsened, It feels insensitive now to recall how in that era folks started commenting on his in reading resemblance to the skeletal visage on their iconic t-shirt design but I do remember noting the similarities. Still, every time I remember seeing them in that era he wa always happy to talk with anyone who came to the merch table and would offer hugs to those he reorganized from previous stops. There is a great and sad documentary feature film on his life made in this era that tells his story better than I could, but he is missed and SNFU’s legacy still stands today as a seminal Canadian punk institution.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=58rP44NSNNshttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DLw5b70OJH8Chad Van GaalenA weirdo polymath – composer of psyched out indie pop rock jams, record label/studio co-proprietor, and acclaimed 2D cell animation art film creator, CVG has been releasing albums of spacey yet catchy indie guitar jams peppered with circuitbent electronics, warped toy synths, noisy oscillations, and his watery falsetto vocal melodies via his own Flemish Eye label since 2004’s Infiniheart. His songs mix fuzzed out guitars, synthesizers, lo fi drum machines and acoustic string band instrumentation with noise machines and his aforementioned vocal melodies in short, often melancholic and sometimes creepy but occasionally even joyful pop blasts. Fans of stuff like our beloved Eric’s Trip will most definitely fall in love with his music, and in keeping with the themes of the podcast he even has ties to New Brunswick due to his tenure as artist in residence at a gallery in Sackville NB for a time due to his wild psychedelic 2D cell animation work. He has also released music under the name Black Mold and put out collaborations with members of bands like Dog Day (more Maritime ties) and Xiu Xiu and has moved from self releasing his stuff through Flemish Eye to the big time of Sub Pop. Full disclosure I used to play in a band with his Flemish Eye partner and sometimes live drummer Ian Russell, which was my initial introduction to VanGaalen’s music but I’ve been a massive fan since, and have always enjoyed the times that I’ve had the chance to see him live so he has be included as another one of my favourite artists from Cowtown and the prairies as a whole over the past nearly two decades.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hQPvy_oprN4Rhythm Of Cruelty – The Heat ((members of Home Front)https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oK4w5F6rPU0Hip Hop Weiners – Poor Folk (all stars of the Peanuts And Corn Records 1990s indie Prairie hip hop scene)End notes/miscellany https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nzPj35QC2c0Field Day – Denial (early 90’s Calgary pop punk featuring the manager of the The Werx, a grimy punk bar I worked at in that city that was my first ever bouncer job)https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SS5V4wlST1oSwallowing shit – Ruins (90’s Winnipeg HC w/ Todd from Propa on bass)https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dypS8wI3biUBeyond Possession – Final Daze (Calgary Crossover Thrash from the 80’s)https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bq-SMmYo0eA Painted Thin -For Sarah And Me (Winnipeg emo/pop punk, pre-Weakerthans)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zXgGqYpZzVg I SPY – Perversity Is Spreading…. (Complete discography, screamy Regina punk feat. Todd from Propagandhi)https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ViEm4bVb-rgThe New 1-2 – The Summer Knife (90’s Calgary post-hardcore, first band I saw at a DIY basement show in that city)https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z0KwO2ccLl0Personality Crisis – Empty Sky (early 80’s hardcore from Calgary)https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=31gRsptSeYcJr Gone Wild – I Don’t Know About That (Edmonton’s Replacements? circa late 80’s)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dEUt5TKPBUcGlory Stompers – Go away (early 90’s oi with Edmonton scene stalwart Nik Kozub)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ejfc_Eda9YIShout Out Out Out Out – Forever Indebted ( Edmonton Dance Punk circa mid 00’s feat members of Home Front)https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i4G-89u5qLsNo Problem -Eyes Of A Killer (Singer and live drummer from Home Front’s other band)
https://youtu.be/Aqufoc3IdxATrailer for documentary feature on Ken “Chi Pig” Chinn of SNFUShoutout…to Zach Worton, Regina/Calgary hardcore frontman turned graphic novelist of books like Klondike and Charley Butters… and also to the Calgary Cassette Preservation Society…

Just passing thru… #bogmonstermusicMatt’s NotesSo… it’s been a week since this episode was recorded… for those who follow the ed tech podcast as well… the brave, hardy, and slightly foolish few of you… you will recognize this story…

I fucking ran away to Kelowna for (another) week… to hang out with my lovely friend who lives there… and some of the lovely other people in her life…

This lovely-ish podcast sat still-born for days and days…

NOW I’ve got the paddles charged… and the electrodes are set to FRIZZLE FRY…

Administer the fucking jolt, Dr. Stranach…

But… the patient mightn’t live…

Godammit, this is exactly why you’ve been unemployed for thirteen months and eight days…

Dr. Stranach reluctantly readies the paddles…

There is the smell of creosote… and burning flesh…

The WordPress post begins to twitch…

We have SOME KIND of life, doctor…

Yes, and may God have Mercy on our souls…

Uh… anyway!! Now that we’re up and lurking, here are a few of my faves discussed digustingly on the show… and otherwise…

This animated corpse is smoking strictly for medicinal purposes… #bogmonstermusicSuch Monstrous OverlapWe could make the world’s most hideous Venn Diagram between Dan’s list and mine… particularly with regards to Weakerthans and SNFU…

As mentioned during the show, I’ve only come to the Weakerthans recently… during this… joyous journey of divorce and prolonged unemployment…

Having said that, the obstacle is the way… as per the Stoic philosophers… and if that isn’t punk as fuck, I don’t know what is…

Our actions may be impeded, but there can be no impeding our intentions or dispositions. Because we can accommodate and adapt. The mind adapts and converts to its own purposes the obstacle to our acting. The impediment to action advances action. What stands in the way becomes the way.

Marcus Aurelius… possibly written at the borders of a Second Century all-ages show…

A head of his time… #bogmonstermusicJohn K. Samson (Weakerthans)Uh… anyway! Do yourself a solid and check out any and/or all tunes and/or albums by Weakerthans singer and guitarist John K. Samson… who also did time in Propagandhi…

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qvrm4FY-fagI’ll admit I feel this… #bogmonstermusichttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bACyauuMmvgIn case you need more reasons to listen… A shoutout to my best friend Jon Bowie who sent me a text message telling me most emphatically that I had to own Provincial… and that such purchase WAS NOT OPTIONAL…

Jeez, I love my (provincially-minded) friends…

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_S5UpGx6470Have you been living my life, man? Cause this is relatable AF… #bogmonstermusicPropagandhihttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CqWsreZl_dwSo much relatability… https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_bEK0s69pcMThey can play short… and they can play long!!Have I known about Propagandhi for many years… decades…? Yes, yes I have.

And why then, you bandwagon jumping motherfucker, did it take you so long to actually buy a record or stream their catalogue?

Shrugs. I was listening to other artists, man…

You’re not gonna last another fucking month as a vegan with that kind of lackadaisical attitude…

Shrugs again. Positive (anarchist) vibes only, man…

Uh, anyway…

This is clearly my way of filling space in this post for my lack of experience or significant personal anecdotes about this band prior to a few months ago… but in that time I’ve grabbed at least two or three of their records… and paid into a GoFundMe to help them repress their classic and highly influential Supporting Caste LP…

Yes, I just used capitalist cred to hype one of the most staunchly uncommercial punk bands on the planet. Don’t @ me…

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vrk88EYv4o8&t=2sBronze Age and/or Iron Age slabs of riffage… Chixdiggithttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JMif7ZPZfsoIt is weird to say, but their gig at Fredericton industrial park’s Pyramid Warehouse in 199-whatever was a highlight of going to shows that year…This is one of those things where I haven’t thought about this band FOR YEARS… decades?… prior to preparing for this show.

Running late as this production is, I’m doing my best to write these notes in full within the length of I Should’ve Played Football in High School…

And… I’m not gonna make it…

Types a couple of things… restarts the clip…

This is it for fucking sure…

What was noteworthy at the time… when I was in high school… not playing football… or any sport… were the melodies and the energy… and the ASCENDANT GOOFBALL ENERGY….

Plus, they wrote back to fan mail!! Back before the Internet was a thing. A few blurry pics from the Fredericton show… and a brief handwritten note. It was nifty as fuck (NAF) at the time!

Whatever these dudes are up to now, I’m sure it’s awesome. My homework, after these notes are finished, is to listen to the two tracks below… which I have hitherto not bothered with…

I feel like these guys are now middle-aged somewhere and working day jobs somewhere in Canada… in fact, I’d love to think so. Cause punks who work day jobs AND find time to tour and record… are doing the Lord’s Work… in my unhumble opinion…

In any case, well-fucking played, gentlemen…

**Pats himself on the back for completing this post within four plays of Should’ve Played Football…

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gnfs32rl6_sI refuse to google this song’s title for context… #punkasfuckhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jBklpM_eCnMA punk band that loves to play dress-up…Northcote (Again)If You (Single) by Northcotehttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HgXuzaSumj8&list=PLWtSmUYnmP9MfNstuduJq2pj9qt-LqcX_&t=4sAt this point, Matt Gould is probably like: What the fuck, man?

I’ve gushed about his performance opening for Hot Water Music in Vancouver last fall… tagged him on a bunch of episodes on this show… and I even messaged him on Instagram asking if he’d like to weigh in with a pithy quote or two about the Saskatchewan punk scene that propelled he & his Christian hardcore band Means to international tours… ultimately leading to a solo career that’s seen him create numerous albums… and touring with the likes of Chuck Ragan and Dave Hause…

As of the time of writing, he has yet to respond.

So… this is all to say… I’m a fucking fan…

His “songs about turning thirty” thing resonates… cause MY life changed significantly when I was thirty… that was the year I moved to Qatar… after which nothing was the same… in the best possible ways…

ANYWAY

I will refrain from calling this dude Young Man… and I’m straight-edge now so… fewer worries about shouting besottedly during one of his gigs…

His new album is called Wholeheart and he is touring Western Canada beginning within days…

I can’t recommend him enough as a writer and performer. Sorry, dude!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CeY86vginDw&list=PLWtSmUYnmP9Pk_Ov-tZ0X-RR-uTZrOSyh&t=3sLots of positive vibes on the Revival Tour… #bogmonstermusic That & This… This & That…https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g78R787eaOghttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kT-_LJf4Rfkhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pMtj2kSpd5UI’d be remiss (and inaccurate) as a motherfucker if I failed to list a few of the non-Western Canadian must-listens of late…

Brendan Kelly and Joe McMahon’s split acoustic album from a bunch of years back wears you out with its tunefulness and grinning existential malaise. That’s right, I fucking went there… and I’m never coming back…

Dave Hause is one of these dudes who’s been around seemingly forever… always seemingly mentioned in relation to another artist… like Chuck Ragan… and Northcote… for a couple… and his records slay on their own terms. Bury Me in Philly is some hard rocking post-hardcore… it swings and sways and thumps, with hooks aplenty and clever wordplay for days… his new record Drive It Like It’s Stolen is coming out any week now…

I’ve also had the Sainte Catherines’ amazing 2010 album Fireworks on repeat for many days… to be in Quebec in the springtime is a lovely thing… not that I’ve been since 2001… In fact I lived there for September 11th… and then left back for New Brunswick shortly thereafter… Dear Universe… remind me I have to fucking go back there one of these glorious fucking springs…

Finally, Samiam’s new album Stowaway is coming out in three days! My son will turn eleven that day… and I will be listening to Crystallized several dozen times… as I have been each day for the past GREAT MANY weeks…

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CVkaqsGJQU4https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KMvwJlw6FKoFire Works by The Sainte Catherines

Speaking of shoutouts, we would also like to give a shoutout to YOU… “the listener”… because otherwise this endeavor is less than an iota as interesting… so thanks as ever, & until next time!!

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Come all ye bog monsters… #bogmonstermusicHey hey, my my… something something! And possibly something else! It’s Episode the Fifth… which is to say our SIXTH outing… and we are here to… crow… about that… in our chats about Fave and/or New to Me in 23. Thank you muchly for checking in!!

We got basements! We got scarves! #tnbttw #bogmonstermusicScreech with what you were given… #bogmonstermusic As per the usual, we have all these tracks in a burnin’ hot YT playlist…

Dan’s NotesZuluInitially a solo project of former DARE/Culture Abuse drummer Anaiah Lei, LA’s ZULU play heavy heavy hardcore full of blast beats and big breakdowns with lyrics celebrating Blackness and Black culture in the context of the punk and hardcore scene while incorporating influences from hip hop and spoken word poetry into their sonic assault. They had released a couple of EPS over the past few years but are gearing up to release their first full length this spring (on hot label du jour Flatspot Records) and all of their new material they’ve released in advance has been awesome. How many other bands are quoting Paul Mooney over sick mosh breakdowns in 2023? I dunno but I am looking forward to their debut full length. The band has a vision and a message and an energy that you don’t often run into in a genre where screaming can just be another genre trope rather than genuine expression of anger. Plus they made a music video recreating Tribe Called Quest’s classic “Scenario” for a song featuring guest vocals from members of Soul Glo and Playytime which is pretty fucking cool in my book. Zulu are one of the most exciting young bands going right now and I’m looking forward to seeing how they grow and expand their sound.

Domi and JD BeckI honestly think they are aliens or something, or at least grown in a lab somewhere. I had first seen these cherubic instrumental prodigies as back up band for equally prodigious bassist/oddball Thundercat in a video on YouTube but never really looked too deep into their music as a unit until recently. Domi Louna is a jazz pianist from France, and JD Beck is a drummer from Texas and they are so talented at what they do that my hair turns white and my bones turn to dust when I watch them play. Their debut album “Not Tight” features hip hop jazz with vocals by folks like their frequent collaborator Thundercat, indie heartthrob Mac Demarco, Anderson Paak, and even Snoop Dogg over their complex polyrhythmic keyboard and drum compositions. It’s not hard to hear the influence of avante garde beatmakers like Madlib and J Dilla in Beck’s stuttering, often hyperkinetic drumming, and while a lot of their stuff is a little outside of what I normally listen to and I honestly don’t know a whole lot about the finer points of the jazz styles they traffic in, I can’t help but sit in awe at their technical ability and have to wonder where they are hiding all of the extra sets of arms they must have to be able to pull off their songs.

Long KnifeI first became aware of Portland Oregon’s Long Knife through various year end lists of best punk and hardcore records of 2022, though it turns out some of the members had previously been in some great bands I was familiar with like The Riffs and Remains Of The Day (who coincidentally happened to play the night of the “Jesus Loves You, Aaron Cometbus” incident I tried to recount minus various incriminating details in the notes for Episode 1, Five Bands That Changed Your Life). They have been kicking around the Pacific Northwest since the early 2010’s though their 2022 full length Curb Stomp Earth on Blackwater Records is arguably their most high profile and 26 minutes of purely pissed off hardcore punk rock and roll that is not afraid to play with a spooky keyboard interlude here or art-damaged saxophone solo there to enhance the mood while kicking you in the face with speedy riffs and spite-filled vocals. These are big ugly dudes playing big ugly songs but it would be reductive to say their sound is more than just a clone of fellow big ugly Portlandians Poison Idea, though Jerry A and co could definitely be considered influences on Long Knife’s sounds. Despite the speed and anger and aggression of their sound, Long Knife have big hooks, catchy choruses, and songs that under different arrangement choices could make good dark rambling country songs with their tales of dingy bars and boarded up storefronts, like Hoyt Axton teaming up with Battalion Of Saints or something, with vocals that sound like the singer chases his PBR with ground glass. Curb Stomp Earth is rapidly becoming one of my favorite releases of last year even if I may have been late to the party by six or so months.

Screaming FemalesTheir new album is great, and I can’t believe I have neglected them.

I would ask what’s in the water in New Jersey that causes that state to produce so many great rockin’ artists, but I assume it’s just ambient evaporated Springsteen sweat that has re-entered the water table mixed with nuclear waste and tire fire runoff. Anyway, Screaming Females are a great power trio built around the massive riffs and powerful vocals of singer/guitarist Marisa Paternoster. The band’s sound is a powerful mix of punk and for lack of a better term alt rock that sort of resembles PJ Harvey or Patti Smith jamming with Greg Sage of The Wipers. It had been five years since their last record, but their 8th studio album Desire Pathways just came out this last week and it’s pretty killer to the point that I am kicking myself for letting the band fall off of my radar like that until this new batch of tracks they have graced us with. This was a very recent addition to my list, just being released on Feb 17tn of this year (making it the newest to me in 2023 by default) but the impression it has left so far made it impossible not to mention on the show given the topic this ep.

(Getting back into) Ted Leo And The PharmacistsTed Leo’s music was a huge part of the 00’s and early 2010’s for me but I’ll admit I had drifted away from it a little until very recently when talk of his breakthrough third LP with backing band The Pharmacists “Hearts Of Oak” celebrating its 20th Anniversary a week or so ago. I think I was first introduced to Ted Leo’s music through a label sampler CD from Lookout Records around the time his previous album Tyranny Of Distance was released, but I became most familiar.air with his music a few years after that through his frequent involvement with legendary comedy and music program The Best Show in its terrestrial radio incarnation on New Jersey’s legendary WFMU. Ted and his band appeared on the show fairly frequently, whether he was crowdsourcing lyrics to a new song line by line from the show’s callers (“The World Is In The Turlet”), performing for one of the listener-supported station’s many fundraisers, or even debuting his post “…and The Pharmacists” collaboration with Aimee Mann, The Both, on one of The Best Show’s last episodes on WFMU before a brief hiatus and move to online streaming and podcasting exclusively. Best Show host Tom Scharpling even directed the video for Leo’s song “Bottled In Cork” from his final album with The Pharmacists in 2010. I just got around to finishing Scharpling’s memoir It Never Ends recently which got me nostalgic for The Best Show’s classic era, including a bunch of moments Ted Leo was involved in. Between that and Hearts Of Oak’s anniversary I’ve been giving his catalogue a bit of a revisiting lately. Ted Leo plays catchy melodic punk rock mixed with reggae, new wave, soul, and even Irish folk music at times, all with smart wry but heartfelt lyrics and an underlying sense of humour and it’s been great revisiting his classic albums from the 00’s again recently.

MiscellanyRIP Dave Jolicoeur aka Trugoy of De La Soul (1968-2023)This is actually very common in Atlantic Canada… #bogmonstermusicMatt’s NotesThanks as ever, Dan for the radical topic!! This one keeps MUTATING as the days go by…

And so… with or without you… we continue… [WTF, man… Editor]

Didja know… (lowers voice, secretively)… There are bogs in Ireland, too?? #bogmonstermusicAlso… very real respect to the memory of Mark Lanegan… who passed away one year ago on this day… Feb 22, 2022… in Kilarney, Ireland… singer, songwriter, author, poet, producer, auteur… singer for Screaming Trees… and about two dozen albums many of which many of us have never heard of… including me… and much, much more…

I can’t recommend the dude’s memoir Sing Backwards and Weep enough…

Rest well, Scratch…

Better than the original? At least as good? Either way, man… The Lawrence ArmsPassive-aggressive, confessing, repressive…I fucking love Fat Wreck Chords so fucking much… #fuck #bogmonstermusicThis is it… they’ve leapfrogged in a very short time into the “holy pantheon” [Editor: SERIOUSLY…] of punk &/or alternative music from me… including…

• The Replacements
• Leatherface
• Hüsker Dü
• Fugazi
• Hot Water Music
• Alkaline Trio* new since ‘22

And now…

Lawrence Arms…

Again… I’ll defer to whatever gushing I put on during the recordings… but their lyrics are exactly the kind of smart, desperate gasps that I’ve gravitated towards since I was a squirt…

From the land of Nelson Algren, with Bukowski on the brain…

Their Best Of (Fat Wreck Chords) is exactly that… every song on it is a banger… with most songs clocking in closer to 2 minutes than longer… I’m holding off on taking a deeper dive on iTunes cause I’d prefer the first experience to be on vinyl as much as possible… with the notable exception of the Buttsweat and Tears EP… which I’ve listened to incessantly for at least the last couple of weeks…

Not as popular as Alkaline Trio or Hot Water Music or other Fat and/or Epitaph bands, they still perform and record… at least as recently within the past couple of years…

I could go on. I will. But that seems like plenty for now. My only regret is that I was late to the game discovering them at all… but… they’re fucking dope… so… it’s all good…

I’m like a record player… I keep going ’round with a needle in my arm making someone else’s sound…SamiamThe fact that these dudes put out music on Burning Heart Records makes me dig them even more somehow… #fwiw… It’s all fucking dope, imo… I feel like sometimes I should call my segment of the notes and/or the show… Late to the Fucking Party by Matt Stranach…

Not be pejorative about it… simply… these guys existed for so long and were / are clearly so fucking good…

But uh… onward and upward? Or some-fucking-thing? Lol.

So… MAJOR shoutout to No Idea Records for keeping a bunch of their records in print… it’s not clear to me if they released them in the first place or if they are rereleasing things originally put out on other labels…

At this point, I dig the mystique… these dudes have been flying somewhat below the radar… maybe like the Lawrence Arms?? And so I am deliberately NOT GOOGLING them… which is ridiculous, but there we are… I’m a middle aged man… etc., etc., etc….

The only reason I know about this band is from an interview or IG post by Chris Wollard (Ship Thieves, Hot Water Music) I forget which… and some beautiful lyrics in a gorgeous song by Yesterday’s Ring… see my next thing about Mudie for more about that… so… this is a band THAT PEOPLE IN MORE POPULAR BANDS revere… it’s one of those…

Which now reminds me how much I fucking love that Yesterday’s Ring record from last year…

Do you remember when we drank coffee all night… smoking cigarettes… and listening to samiam? #fuckingwow #lyricsmanANYWAY

I was stoked to learn they have a new record coming out this year! On my kid’s birthday, no less! Which I am celebrating by going to see David Spade in Vancouver by myself…

Huh? Uh… yeah… mutter, mutter… mmmm….

I literally… LITERALLY… cannot fucking wait for this album… being released ON MY SON’S BIRTHDAY… which I will be voluntarily elsewhere for… #awesomeparenting Northcote (Victoria, BC) + Mudie (The Saint Catherines… Yesterday’s Ring… etc.)His new one lands next month… Bad Vibrations by MudieThis is like next-level fucking post-punk craziness… for starters… #bogmonstermusic

These are two dudes who are both amazingly accomplished punk and postpunk and posthardcore and folk musicians… they’re both fucking as close weirdly… in a fucked-up millennial way… to Springsteen as we have among the younger cohort in this country… each in their special, slightly skewed way… as in… they both sing their faces off every time out… as near as I can tell, anyway…

I feel like I kind of rambled on this (these??) for a good amount of time during the recordings… so…

AND… I think I’ve provided enough info here about these artists here… and/or previous episodes of this show… so you can sample and track this stuff down if yer so inclined…

To reiterate… cause I’m middle-aged like that… both of these artists… and all their preceding work(s)… as well as the works of the associated scenes and musicians… are all worth checking out. It makes me… slightly… maybe… weirdly glad to be… oh fuck it…

The song about divorce went to the top… I’m alone in a hotel bed feeling half-dead… #facts #bogmonstermusic Bad ReligionGreat song and utterly fucking surreal music video…We’ve got the American Jesus… See Him on the Interstate… So.. I’ve REALLY not got much to say here… except…

They deserve 100% more credit than they get within mainstream music. While this is nothing new… we have members of Tom Petty’s band showing up on these albums… they put out videos when all the other Epitaph bands were doing the same and getting richly rewarded for it… forget how popular they are… it’s nearly unbelievable that they still tour and record and show no signs of slowing down…

And then… all of these dudes have worthwhile side projects and solo records and everything else… it’s actually pretty difficult to imagine 90’s music… and therefore the music of my generation…. WITHOUT Bad Religion… you might as well say that the whole 90’s music that wasn’t grunge just… didn’t happen…

ANYWAY

The lyrics are fucking phenomenal. It’s easy to forget how smart both lyricists… Greg and Brett… are… cause for the speed and melodies and oozin’ ahhs… creating and perfecting a format which so many other bands post-grunge rode to such wild success…

I can’t recommend Jim Ruland’s co-authored band autobiography enough… or any of his other books for that matter…

And… fuck…Just because this came up on the show while Dan and I were talking about The Lawrence Arms… Chicago… and Nelson Algren…

If you can’t love this, you got no heart… just saying… #nelsonalgren I got drunk with a Chicago hotel minibar blasting this on repeat… and it was pretty good, tbh… Plus… Great song… and Stone Temple Pilots-esque Music Video… might include Cirque du Soleil as I didn’t necessarily watch it all the way through… The new Lucero record… is going to bang (bang on the door, baby)These are retro indie England kids doing retro indie and/or post-punk things and what the fuck is not to like about that, have you no fucking heart…?Left to right, top to bottom…

• Alkaline Trio have, rather ingeniously, reissued a double comp album of outtakes, live, alternates… and the like… I do indeed hope for new AK3 music this year… but if not… this is fine…
• Lucero are one of those rare bands… from my standpoint… that have yet to release one album… or even one song… that I can’t fucking support effusively… the new one Should’ve Learned by Now… will probably be out by the time you read this… as in… a matter of days…
• October Drift were a band I discovered via FB message from Jeremy from the Rocking Argentos… like a couple months ago? Anyway… on the LP that I have of theirs… the first of two… I have the other on the way… I actually finding myself thinking that this singer guy sounds eerily… NOT UNLIKE Mark Lanegan… with a whole bunch of Joy Division and Northern English misery thrown in for good measure… this is high praise in my world…
• What, you think I need a reason to hype the Tribe??

If you can’t relate… I don’t know what to tell you, man… #bogmonstermusic Hey hey, you you… thanks for swinging through! May you roam freely and/or weirdly until next time…Chill AF, actually… #bogmonstermusic

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Raise yer claws in the air… and wave ’em like you just don’t care… #bogmonstermusicWelcome, welcome! We’re on the fifth episode of this wildness— AKA “Episode Four”— and this time it’s all about some of our favourite artists from Atlantic Canada… clocking in at over ninety minutes… this special, monster-sized episode is maybe the first of more episodes on the Maritimes scene(s)…

This episode is in memory of Andrew “Drew” Crawford (1977-2016).

We miss you, bud!! Love, Matt & DanIt might be an Atlantic Canadian episode… but we can’t be lobstered to bother… #tnbttw #bogmonster musicWe’ve got so much talent on this episode… we went MEGA sized… #bogmonstermusicWe certainly have a YouTube playlist! Come back for seconds if you’re not adequately stuffed… and comment on the post, the YT clip, or wherever you’re encountering us!

Dan’s NotesAn aside in praise of the 709-

First off, I feel like during the recording of the pod I neglected to provide a full description of what an average show in St John’s was like in the early 00’s. Imagine a 6 band bill where the same handful of people in different combinations plus a ringer or two here and there make up every band, but there are 200 people in the crowd and they are moshing so hard that the floor of the venue might give out, and then next thing you know someone is dragging a trampoline into the pit and the bouncers are trying to take a steel chair from the hands of a concert goer as said concert goer was trying to swing it at his fellow concert goers Rock-Vs-Mankind style, and then next thing you know the entire crowd is on the floor because the vocalist of the band had just cartwheeled into the pit causing everyone to tumble to the ground. A view from outside the venue would almost make you think the place was on fire between the red stage lights and steam generated from the moving bodies inside. The city of St John’s has had a small but vibrant scene since the late 70’s when Da Slyme released their self-titled double-LP with their logo spray painted over the dust jackets of whatever old album covers they could find and reuse rather than spend the extra money to have their own professionally printed, through the crossover thrash of Schizoid and Tough Justice in the 80s to the birth of the “modern” hardcore scene there in the early 00’s. Unfortunately a lot of the bands from that era didn’t get the chance to record, and those who did do so in that early 00’s period mostly kept their releases to a handful of burnt CDRs distributed between friends and their music rarely made it to ears of anyone outside that province. With all of this in mind I wanted to highlight two St John’s bands from around the turn of the millenium, one (The Killing) made up of older more experienced scene members playing an angry and vicious take on the genre of straightedge hardcore who set the standard for that genre in the region and became the province’s most notorious live act (proudly banned from the ski town of Pasadena NL for their antics), and another (Geinus) made up of younger musicians at that time who went searching for the influences of their favourite grunge bands from the previous decade and had their minds blown by bands like Scratch Acid, The Melvins and Big Black and working those sounds into their own mix of melody, bombast and shredding guitars. Both had a massive influence on their town’s scene in the decades since their respective foundings around 2000 or so and are fairly unsung outside of their home province and I wanted to show them some love for it:

Geinus (St John’s)Geinus are what happen when a gaggle of early 00’s oddballs from the suburbs of St John’s (shoutout to CBS)are fed a steady diet of 80’s and 90’s AmRep and weirder SST Records stuff and then holed up in someone’s parents basement until they had honed their off-kilter abrasive craft to devastating sharpness. From their very first show “in town” as a last minute replacement act on a benefit show for a local community group in 2001 and beyond they were the one band who managed to draw in the punks, the metal fans, the indie rockers, and even just your average joe out for the town with their mix of devastating riffs, intricate guitar melodies and sometimes off kilter rhythms. I saw them play countless times during that couple of years that I was living in St Johns and they always killed, no matter what genres of bands they were playing with. They recorded one full length in the mid-00s that can be found on YouTube these days that provides a well rounded cross section of their earlier material, and continued playing together on through the 2010s as well when they recorded their second full length Keeper in October 2018, which can be purchased through their bandcamp page. In preparing for this episode I think they were the band I found myself listening to the most out of any of my picks as I had not given them a listen in several years due to the fact that it had been so long since I had had the chance to listen to their earlier material but much thanks to the HeavyNfld YouTube channel for preserving these recordings, alongside those of so many other artists from the province.

You can make music….we're gunna make war by The KillingThe Killing (St John’s)The perfect storm of creative individual from another town shows up and recruits like minded locals to make fun music, douse people in vegan fake blood and usher in a new era of their scene.

The Killing ran from about 2000 to 2004 in St. John’s, after Dave Munro moved from Toronto to start a tattoo studio and some of the locals learned of his ties to the hardcore scene and eventually convinced him to do vocals for a Misfits cover set on Halloween. It was a chaotic blast and next thing you know they were working on originals, and ended up started a whole new era of the hardcore scene in the city. Their intense and very physical live shows became notorious, to the point that when former locals turned major label nu-metal adjacent rockers Bucket Truck would come back through town they would ask the Killing to share the bill because of the crowd they would bring out, and let the straightedge thrashers play last because there was usually no following their set. When new local HC bands were looking to learn a cover song to get the crowd moving, more than one added their takes on The Killing’s usual set-closer “The Death Of Optimism” which would drive the audience into a frenzy. Despite having very little recorded output, their live shows were legendary, especially their annual Halloween performances usually held at a venue they were not planning on using again due to their antics in the spirit of the holiday. These sets usually involved the band in some sort of costumes, with life-sized coffins holding “backup dancers” who would spring out and spray the crowd down with the band’s special vegan-friendly fake blood mix, then cover the sticky crowd with trick or treat buckets full of flour (which would then stick to the fake blood and make a nasty sort of dough) or maybe just start pelting the mosh pit with rotten jack o lanterns depending on what was on hand, all while the band was playing drop-tuned Misfits covers at double the speed and occasionally stopping to light off gas station fireworks onstage or occasionally attack the crowd with their instruments. They released a hard to find self titled CDR at the start of their existence, and then towards the end of their run in 2004 recorded “You Can Make Music….We’re Gonna Make War” as the sole decent-sounding testament to their existence, though as previously mentioned, the band’s live experience was truly the best way to experience their rage.

Phone Jerks (Moncton)In the mid 2010s it felt like Moncton’s punk scene went through a bit of a renaissance. Claude’s House, a venue/practice space/crash pad owned by the proprietor of a local veggie restaurant and left in the care of “the kids” provided an incubator for a ton of great younger bands as well as convincing quite a few older locals to get back in the game. Of all of those bands, The Phone Jerks were always my favorites to see (and share stages with, during the years I was travelling to their city to perform standup comedy sets at punk shows fairly often). With an “ex-members of” resume that includes veterans of such acts as Cape Breton’s Teenage Hurricanes, late 90’s Seattle rockers The Valentine Killers and local dirtbag acts such as Impulse Items, The Beaten Hearts and Nerve Button, the Moncton four piece serve up a spicy catchy take on garage punk with lyrics that mix working class laments, odes to their favourite drag queens and meditations on parenting with more standard rock and roll topics. From around 2015 to when they called it quits in early 2022, Phone Jerks were the flagship band of this new Moncton scene and one of my favorites to see live when I had the chance either sharing the stage with them or just enjoying the show.

Booji Boys (Halifax)I have no idea how Cody Googoo does it. The guy has been a fixture of the Halifax scene since the mid-late 00’s to date and always at the center of like 3-4 bands at a time….according to to discogs he’s been in something like 20 bands over the past two decades of involvement in the local scene (and I can think of another half dozen at least that aren’t listed on there). All of these projectstotally killer in their own ways, though for long time mostly on the faster and uglier sides of things. Around 2017 he and Alienation-bandmate Steve Earl (not that one) joined up with members of local indie band Bloodhouse to create the Devo-referencing juggernaut of melodic punk mixed with new wave doused in swirly vocal effects and ear-grabbing guitar hooks. Between their pair of LPs that bookended 2017 (s/f released in Feb 2017 and “Weekend Rocker” on Xmas Day that year) and their final full length “Tube Reducer” in 2019 (along with a handful of EPs and compilation tracks) the band was a constant around stages all over Halifax and possibly the most accessible music project Googoo or Earle had been a part of up to that point (as in not crust punk or full of blast beats and screaming), though some of the more psych-rock elements of the band’s music were given the chance to flourish in one of Cody’s other newer bands Heavenly Blue with Booji’s rhythm section that lean more into the Syd Barrett than the Greg Ginn of it all if you catch my drift. Like so many other bands that burned fast and hot and then moved along to explore other creative lanes, their intensity during the time they were around made up for how short that actual period of time was, but at least they left us with a pretty killer trio of full length records out the whole deal anyway. Definitely one of Halifax’s best bands of the past decade or so.

Neighbourhood Watch – Vicious CircleNeighbourhood Watch – Vicious CircleNeighbourhood Watch (Fredericton)Full disclosure : some members of this band band basically helped raise me at an awkward time, even if they weren’t really an active band at that point. Nik, who played drums for their initial incarnation in the 80’s hosted the Sunday night punk show on the local campus radio station and shaped my teenage years with his musical selections, and NW vocalist Grant aka Rusty was a constant sarcastic fixture of various downtown coffee spots I haunted during my younger years, and helped introduce me to tons of music, film and other pop culture stuff. The fact that these folks had also had a band together in the 1980s made it all seem that much cooler to me as a youth and was excited to see the rare reunion shows they would play, albeit featuring a few ringers here and there due to some other members not being in town anymore. While living in BC in my early 20’s I scored a copy of their Death At The Hands Of Time EP from a local record collector selling off some of their doubles at a show and it was one of my prized possessions for years and felt like a piece of hometown history while I was living far away. Years later living in Halifax I was overjoyed to see they were back together for a reunion tour with the lineup from that 7”, including their original guitarist who had just moved back to NB and it was great to see these folks who had looked up to so much as a youth back at it again. While not everyone from that lineup decided to keep at it, a new lineup of the band has been formed by Grant, Ciaran (the guitarist who had moved back) and some newer musicians and they have even recorded a full length you can get through their bandcamp.

Always scoping the past… and present… and future… for the best in #bogmonstermusic Bonus NoteI knew that Matt was going to pick Eric’s Trip so I did not give them a full writeup on my side, but they were THE band to me as a teen. Their first full length Love Tara is one of my all time favorites of any genre. I will talk at length to anyone who will listen about this, and really had to struggle at not making this new episode even longer by doing so. I am sure we will talk about them even more in the future as well.

Addenda……and related things that got mentioned in the chat:

Da Slyme “Piss Eyed Sleazoid” (original Nfld Punk)The Reaction “Get The Rods Out” (more early Nfld punk)Hardship Post “My Only Aim” (Nfld indie band from the 90’s)Nerve Attack “Gotta Skate” (Nfld skate punk from the 00’s)Skreeched In 6 song demo (new Nfld punk)Heavenly Blue demo 2022 (new band from ⅗ of Booji Boys)Mutated Void “Ramblings of Nothing” (another new band from Cody of Booji Boys)Gemstones “Anyday” (yet another new band from Cody of BB and Chris from Eric’s Trip) Eric’s Trip “Belong EP”Sloan covering Eric’s Trip!Purple Knight “Thunder And Lightning”And also…Please visit this Vice article on Mark Gaudet of Eric’s Trip, Robins, Purple Knight etc:

https://www.vice.com/da/article/6azq5a/did-punk-rock-start-in-moncton-new-brunswick

*Love the title for that last article! Matt

While we mean you no particular kindness… we also mean you no particular harm! #bogmonstermusic Matt’s NotesNothing to do with Atlantic Canada… I simply can’t fucking stop listening to this song… #bogmonstermusicHey everyone! Or anyone…

Thanks for joining us today! Or now! Or whatever!

This topic is, obviously, close to our… individual and/or collective… heart(s)!

Uuuuhhh….

Anyway! From such random and yet serendipitous connections of people and moments and things… MOSTLY IN THE NINETEEN NINETIES… we’ve kind of hit the muck where indie & punk music seemed popular for awhile… right when we needed indie & punk music to be popular… and then for the decades after… there are so many rich potential trajectories you could follow with this kind of music… and all the spinoffs… and immediate and tangential effects…

Thanks to Dan for choosing to jump into this feet first! I was surprised, and I’m delighted to follow his lead…

Joel Plaskett… and Sloan!! (Halifax, NS)What do you want me to do? #bogmonstermusicI’m looking for you
I’m lost in the blue
I can’t get around it #bogmonstermusicI think I’ll probably save the commentary… as far as Joel… for whatever I said during the recordings!

He’s limitlessly talented, independent, prolific, and real…

The dude is only 3 or 4 years older than me… but his imprint in Canadian music… and in Halifax… is unsurpassed.

I’ve only seen Joel play twice, somehow, over these decades… but both times… literally decades apart… were superb. Like I said during the recording… there aren’t many artists who can pull off a fucking tight four LP box of original music… but he did! I hope I can align whatever I’m up to this summer with Joel’s touring, cause of course he will be…

I’ll be honest… his virtual series during COVID actually helped keep me feeling a little bit better than normal for those times… MAJOR… and the re-recording of Down at the Khyber twenty years later… with the original Emergency lineup… fucking genius in intention and delivery…

Limitless respect, actually…

And fuck… as far as Sloan… the stuff of theirs I liked… I’ll say I distinctly remember seeing the video for 500 Up around age 14… and being blown away… as much by the video as by the song… like… these are four dudes just standing around… and yet it’s awesome…

I “came back” to them about four years ago (I’m 44…) and now I’m getting all of their stuff that I can. Smart, passionate pop music that ages better than you might remember…

And to those who always knew they were independent pop geniuses in waiting… congrats… I wasn’t one of you… but now I am…

SIDENOTE: I always wondered why it didn’t work out with Geffen? They were on the same label as Nirvana at the same time that Nirvana was popular… I mean, I’m sure I could google it… I feel like… MUCH LIKE THE REPLACEMENTS… Sloan have perhaps made choices that worked for them artistically… but maybe weren’t always the best from a business standpoint… anyway… this post is so fucking far into the weeds at this point… so…

Rocking Argentos + EI (Fredericton, NB)Listen, my intention here is… NOT TO THROW ANYONE UNDER THE BUS…

So as such, I’ve included a couple of tracks here THAT REMIND ME OF THESE BANDS. In the best possible way…

I get it! I’ve been involved in all kinds of wild art over the decades… I was seventeen and publishing poetry with Joe Blades (RIP)… and whatever else…

Jeremy from Argentos is super-fucking-cool. We met in Skyline / Southwood in like grade six or seven. Cool as fuck. Nice and creative and everything. Years go by. You fall out of touch. But… I’ll admit to this… I met Moonyea Park, the mom of my kids… at a Rocking Argentos show one night after getting off from likely a double-shift at the Avis / Cendant call centre… and needing desperately both to get drunk as fuck… and preferably to the loudest music available…

I’m not trying to add any undue significance to this one particular night… except there is exactly 0% chance I would have met my kids’ mom had I not gone to that show…

Seriously man, I’m gonna cry if I keep this up…

And… EI… just the coolest fucking guys in the world… who happen to have had the coolest fucking band in the scene at the time… for those of us who were still going to shows…

Eric’s Trip (Moncton, NB)Big feelings… and guitars… from NB to the world… Beyond cool… before or since… #bogmonstermusicThanks to Dan for letting me keep this for my list!

Not that he had to…

I think we could easily have an entire show… an entire Eric’s Trip Podcast if you will… with album-by-album breakdowns, track-by-track analysis, and sharing specialized tidbits about any and all things to do with Julie Doiron, and/or Rick White… including Elevator, Elevator to Hell, and all of his myriad solo recordings over the decades…

As mentioned on the show, SubPop has done a lovely job of keeping most of the records in print… on gorgeous multi-coloured vinyl, no less… if anybody has a line on a nice copy of Love Tara on vinyl, please hit me up…

Finally, I HIGHLY RECOMMEND visiting the Rick White Archive on Bandcamp… just all kinds of stuff from pre-Eric’s Trip to 2022… and you can also find links to the latest edit of the Eric’s Trip movie… fucking heaven, man…

ERIC’S TRIP 1990-1996 (new2021edit) from RickWhiteArchive on Vimeo.

Old (90’s) Fredericton punk… (Fredericton, NB)I fucking wore this cassette tape out when it was released…Here we are: Ground Zero of my teens and early twenties… and I’m struggling to remember a bunch of these bands’ names…

I could give you four or five or maybe ten without having to go too deep into Google…

So this is where nostalgia begins to fail… because at the time it felt like there were TOO MANY BANDS TO COUNT.

So… folks… in my experience there were too many kids and teens and early adults making this wild, innovative and utterly independent music… and, at risk of being even more of an asshole… I will leave it at that for now… or also, some of you could do a better job of curating whatever kind of legacy you think you might want to have via Bandcamp and whatever…

Every fucking show I went to for a certain period between ages like fifteen and twenty-five… was formative in some way… even the dull ones!

The dudes from Alderknot… image via Discogs…We are deeply grateful that you’d choose to spend some time with us, you hosers! Until next we meet in a Maritimey bog…

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It’s a sign of love where they are from… #bogmonstermusicHey, it’s our fourth episode! How’d that happen? Anyway, we’re stoked you’re here…

This is our first in what will probably be a recurring series on our favourite regional or local scenes… today we start with beautiful… weird… and expensive… British Columbia!

From the land of Amor de Cosmos… #tnbttw #bogmonstermusicFrom the East Kootenays to Haida Gwaii… #bogmonstermusic

Click here for a YouTube list full of tracks from the Left Coast! And if you like what we’re doing… or perhaps especially if you don’t… drop a comment at the bottom of this post or on the YT!

Dan’s NotesDaddy’s Hands (Victoria)One of the more tragic tales of Canadian punk/indie music but one of my favourite bands, even if there was a point in my life where some of their songs drove me totally up the wall (the problem when a band you like starts using your basement as a practice space,as was the case circa 1998-1999 for me). Active from early 90’s to 2006 from Victoria, though occasionally based out of Montreal. Started out closer in sound to members’ previous bands like MBlanket mining more of a melodic raspy-voiced punk vein but turning up the weird more and more over the course of two demos, two full lengths and an EP with a full time saxophonist, unconventional percussion (their drummer used an actual kitchen sink and multiple metal garbage cans of different size as part of his kit at one point) , occasional violin and toy keyboards, and wild onstage theatrics involving masks and wacky costumes added to the mix. At their full powers the band sounded like what would happen if you stuffed The Cramps, Jawbreaker, various members of Captain Beefheart, and a haunted doll into the teleporter machine from Cronenberg’s The Fly. Their first full length, Tutankhamen, was originally supposed to come out on Headhunter Records in 2000, to the point of promo copies going out to campus radio even, but the label went bankrupt right before it was supposed to be released. The final incarnation of the band moved back to more standard loud guitar indie-rock on their posthumous 2nd full length and most widely available release “Welcome, Kings” though that material was written after the passing of founding co-frontperson Emily aka Mousey Connection who died in 2002. Surviving vocalist Dave Wenger and Emily had been on and off romantic partners since before the start of the band, and all who knew him during that time said he never really recovered from her passing. Not long after recording finished on that last album in 2006,Dave passed in a bicycle accident. Despite the tragic story of the band, their music has always sounded so unique and vibrant and weird and dark and sexy and melancholy to me in a way no other band has reproduced, and their live shows were pure chaos in the best way.

Third World Planet (Victoria)With no hyperbole, I can say that two piece Victoria grindcore band Third World Planet are possibly the punkest band I have ever run into in my life. From touring across Canada by hopping freight trains from city to city, to relocating to Switzerland to help take care of a long running anarchist squat and arts center, they lived what they believed in. Originally formed by members of Nanaimo’s Droid and Victoria’s Mexican Power Authority (one of whom also performed solo noise shows under the name HERMIT), this powerful duo mixed warped guitars (like physically warped, as their guitarist had to constantly experiment with new tunings to compensate for the toll taken by multiple cold nights riding in an unheated grain car between shows) and lightning speed drumming to mix grind, crust punk and an emotive hardcore passion in 60 to 90 second bursts. Most of their recordings were released on a mix of cassettes and short-run 7”s released in a variety of countries in the mid-late 1990’s and not well preserved on the internet so for the YouTube playlist I’ve included a rip I found of a full 16 song demo “Only Nature Can Control” from 1997, clocking in at just over 20 minutes. Also, their drummer Jason Flower currently runs a great record label and shop called Supreme Echo in Victoria. The label end of things does reissues of notable but hard to find punk and metal from Canada and all over the world and the store sells new and used vinyl with a focus on rare and international music you probably won’t find anywhere else. Definitely worth checking out if you are in the area.

Jerk With A Bomb / Steve McBean in general (Vancouver)In my opinion Steve McBean is one of Canada’s finest singer/songwriters, though maybe doesn’t get the recognition he deserves from certain circles due to most of his bands up to a certain point were pretty squarely centered in punk and . From Red Tide and Mission Of Christ in the 80’s, to GUS and Ex Dead Teenager in the 90’s, until he and EDT-mate Josh Wells started the stripped-down JWAB with Steve on vocals and guitar and Josh handling drums and backing vocals, while occasionally freeing up one hand to also play keyboard while also drumming and harmonizing. Their sound was balanced between alt country and new wave-ish elements, though by their third album they started having a bassist play with them occasionally, and a full time keyboard player, and big riffs more akin a more mature and musically skilled evolution of some of Steve’s early thrash metal projects, and next thing you know….Jerk With A Bomb was no more, with the psych-rock juggernaut that is Black Mountain made up at that point of everyone that was in JWAB plus a few extras rising from their ashes. Not to abandon the more stripped down vibes of the previous version of this band, McBean started side project Pink Mountaintops for his more acoustic and new wave-inspired endeavours. Eventually, a big movie soundtrack song placement later (in the third Tobey Maguire Spider-Man movie) and Black Mountain end up touring with Coldplay of all freaking bands. When I saw them in 2008 here in Halifax they had some guy from Wisconsin opening for them who had just recorded an album at his cabin out in the sticks named “bone something” cough cough (it was Bon Iver). That being said, those three albums as Jerk With A Bomb(one of which is only available via their Bandcamp) hold the dearest place in my heart of all of their projects.

Needles//Pins (Vancouver)Needles//Pins are the most recent band to make my part of the list. I first saw them when they toured east in mid 20teens for No Funswick Fest with Montreal’s late great Mental Fix, and made sure to catch their stop in Halifax as well as I was so blown away. Formed in 2009 and still active at least recently as the past couple of years including releasing an album in 2021, they have spent most of their existence as a trio though occasionally have had former DBS frontman Jesse Gander join them on second guitar and keyboards to further expand their sound over the past few years. Their music draws from a mix early 80’s melodic punk and power pop like Stiff Little Fingers, The Buzzcocks and The Undertones mixed with the gruff emotion and epic chords of bands like Hot Water Music and Leatherface. They’re the kind of band you could throw on a bill with a bunch of “emo” acts, or more Ramonesy leather jacket punk traditionalist types, and they would have everyone tapping toes and hoisting beverages along with the excellent jams in no time. Their four full length albums are all available via Bandcamp -with the first three albums available on the band’s own page and their most recent self titled album from 2021 via their label Dirt Cult Records’ page, and I would heartily recommend seeking them all out. As well, their drummer is the proprietor of cool Vancouver veggie eatery Budgie’s Burritos on top of helping make excellent music if you are ever in search of food in that city.

Bison (Vancouver)Bison are a band I can thank my sister for introducing me to. She used to see them play live quite a bit during her time in the trenches of the Vancouver pastry chef game in the mid-late 00’s and thought correctly they’d be right up my alley, though it turns out that I was familiar with one of the guitarists (Dan And) from around the Vancouver Island scene back in the day, primarily his time in The Afterthought in the early 00’s. Formed in 2006, they were sometimes billed as Bison BC in sort of a BUSH X situation while signed to Metal Blade Records until parting ways with the label in 2013 and going independent once again. Crushingly heavy and favouring slower tempos of bands like Black Sabbath, Neurosis and early High On Fire, Bison trample you with massive doom-filled riffs but aren’t afraid to speed things up on occasion in a stampede of thrashing guitars and pounding drums and then throw in the occasional breakdown nodding towards some of the members’ roots in the hardcore scene . I’m sorry for that pun in the last sentence. It was right there. Anyways these guys are HEAVY but a smart heavy if you know what I mean.Their four full lengths are worth seeking out if you like your music heavy, and while the band is not as active as they may have been a few years ago but they recently headlined a celebration of 40 years of the movie FIRST BLOOD in Hope BC, where 80’s action classic was filmed in late 2022 and seem to still play shows here and there so check them out if you get the chance!

Honourable MentionsOf some other great BC bands over the years and some footnotes:

(the first band to ever scare me) Kat Moore, Writer: https://katmoorewriter.com/

And of course the legendary Submission Hold who we covered on a previous episode!

Can’t stop… won’t stop… #bogmonstermusicMatt’s NotesGonna go to that deep river… Where the water’s moving slow…A word of respect for Screaming Trees bassist Van Conner who passed away on January 18, 2023 at the age of 55 after two years of serious illness. He was the anchor in a band the kind of which only comes along once in a generation… Please forgive my attempts at writing… He was among the best within his immediate cohort… He fucking clubbed… He fucking swayed… He rolled in battleship fashion…. Lanegan said in a late 90’s (?) interview that Van was “the soul” of the Trees. What’s interesting to me has been how the Screaming Trees Fan Club FB group has been a site of public grieving by Van’s brother and Trees guitarist Gary Lee Conner… as well as other members of Van’s family… and fans from around the globe… and the sincere, organic way this seems to be happening… this is a band that has lost its singer and now its bassist within one year… both in their mid-fifties…

Northcote (Victoria)Anything can be realized… but I’m never satisfied…Matt’s newest Wholeheart comes out in March…So… every time I open iTunes on my Android phone… which is about maybe 40% of my music consumption… it’s been to Northcote’s fantastic record Hope is Made of Steel (2015). It’s been like this since just after Christmas… can’t stop, won’t stop…

I won’t go too far (further, FML) into the weeds with this. See the previous show notes for that!

But… the guy is a few years younger than me… and this is an eight year-old record! 2015 was… literally… a lifetime ago for me. Totally different in every possible way. So I don’t want to say that this is the best this artist is capable of. Of course it isn’t! He’s just getting started!

Everything on the record is big. The hooks. The choruses. The drums. The landscapes. The feelings. Every fucking person from a small town in Canada can relate to this record, whether relating with it or against it… it is a punk record, after all. It’s Born in the USA for people my age and of my general demographic cohort. And of all of his four or five awesome records, this is to my mind the one that feels the most like a band release as opposed to the singer-songwriter thing… and the singer-songwriter thing is great! Just different. And I am a lame middle-aged punk, so I always look at bands first…

ANYWAY…

Matt has a new record coming out in March! And a couple (?) of songs from that album are available now…

I will go out of my way to see Northcote this year if he’s playing, and I swear to fuck I won’t be as drunk… #fingerscrossed

Nomeansno (Victoria) and DOA (Vancouver)Have you heard the news?? The dead walk… #bogmonstermusicYou’re fucked up, Ronnie!! Etc…It’s… MY GAME… Now you’re gonna play MY GAME… A few personal observations about arguably the two most influential Canadian punk bands of all time:

• Nomeansno and DOA both landed in my consciousness around the same time… somewhere during the summer between grades 10 and 11…
• Both bands played the Boyce Farmer’s Market in Fredericton in that early-mid 90’s period…
• I missed the DOA gig… likely due to a shift in the kitchen at McDonald’s that night…
• The Nomeansno gig in particular has an almost legendary status among everyone else I know who went to it… a formative musical experience like no other… that may have been one of the few times I tried stage diving…
• Rumors were circulating that the Hanson Brothers would put in an appearance at TNB for a game of ball hockey with local skateboarders before the show… I would be happy to have this either confirmed or dismissed…
• As per Dan on this episode, Fredericton’s mighty Roach opened for NMN… which adds even further to the legend of that gig…
• I’ve been catching lots of references to DOA in Jim Ruland’s books about the LA and So-Cal punk scenes… first in his book from last year about SST Records… and now an earlier book co-authored with Bad Religion…
• Both weird trailblazers…
• I also recall that Gumby MacFarlane presented me with Nomeansno’s Wrong and Hanson Brothers’ My Game on vinyl as birthday gifts one year. Fucking lit!!
• Living in a smallish city in Interior BC… there is one record store in Kamloops that sells DOA records… and even when I go to Vancouver I never see Nomeansno in the punk bins… perhaps it’s a different story in Victoria…

Early Bryan Adams (Vancouver)Caption: Upbeat rock music #bogmonstermusicSo… there’s music… and then there’s music from your childhood…

No, really… I’m onto something here. I think.

I have memories of Bry going back to when I was six years old. In late 1984 Bryan released his one stone-cold classic record Reckless. My Cool Uncle Barry got it for me on cassette that year for Christmas, along with John Cougar Mellencamp’s Scarecrow… solid choices, right? And I remember in the grade one after school program getting into serious arguments with Jon Bowie about who was better… Bry or Corey Hart… Jon had the black leather jacket and I believe spiked hair at that point, so it was clear who won that debate…

How do I associate this with contemporary, early 21st Century BC? I don’t, really… in my mind Bry belongs to this monolithic block of inaccessible corporate rock… complete with bland songwriting and delivery… like Def Leppard, except he’s just the one guy…

*Let me be clear…I fucking love Hysteria… which Jon Bowie gave me on cassette as a birthday present somewhere around age 11… telling me at the time it was a toss-up between that and Appetite for Destruction…

Shit… I love my friends, man…

And uh… you know, Summer of 69 and shit as well…

Oldage (Vancouver)We Honour Rust by OldageJust heavy, nasty, melodic punk from Vancouver, circa mid-10’s. I can assume from the songs these guys have had some pretty hard lived experiences. It sounds to me like how Leatherface = Hüsker Dü plus Motörhead… with Oldage landing squarely on the Motörhead side of the equation…

I will confess that this band could just be on coffee… check the cover art on Bandcamp… but something tells me it runs a bit darker than that… Vancouver being home to uh… third-world living conditions… like a fucking bomb went off… for stretches of the Downtown East side…*

*Says the middle-aged dad who blithely went record shopping and took his kids to nearly the front-row at a couple of Canucks games #truestory

There is no other recorded output from this band that I can find besides this one album… and there isn’t a whole lot otherwise online… like many bar rock bands, I expect they just got preoccupied with life and with other projects… but who knows? In all instances, I stand to be corrected…

Honorary Mention: Moist (Vancouver)Push just a little too late! Sounds like midlife… #bogmonstermusic Look, I liked that one album by them as much as anyone. I may have actually taken this in an ill-advised shoplifting experiment somewhere in my teen years from the Sam the Record Man in the Fredericton Mall conveniently across the street from both the McDonald’s where I worked for 3 years… and Fredericton High School… go Black Cats! I guess!

What were we talking about? That band from Vancouver? The one with that video on Much? Yes, I guess at the time they seemed pretty good! And maybe they still are!

Thanks for joining us on this go-round! We hope to see you again sooner than later!

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He’s having himself a year!! #bogmonstermusicThank you for creeping here to join us!

On our first episode of 2023, we looked back at artists who were significant to us in 2022… who didn’t necessarily have a major release! Dan is to thank for the topic, and Matt is to thank for the tech delays which held this up for a few days… not that you’d necessarily know! And… to the best of my knowledge… TNBTTW is now locatable on Spotify, Google Podcasts, and Apple Podcasts… and probably a few more on the way in coming weeks…

Still holding on to that post-holiday glow… #tnbttw #bogmonstermusicBringing you the finest audio content that we are capable of at this point in time…As is our custom, we’ve prepped a YouTube playlist for listening… and sharing… and spray painting purposes…

Dan’s NotesMSPAINTFrom Hattiesburg MS. they are newer band who released a 4 song demo right at the start of the pandemic and have only really started getting out to tour around the US and Canada within the last year. I first heard of them after the host of Demolisten podcast posted a video of one of their sets on his instagram and strongly recommended seeking out their demo, Another podcast I listen to recently joked after talking to members of the band at their merch table during a live show that this was the only time he’d probably get the chance to meet them under those circumstances as there would be no surprise if they were popular enough to hire someone to sell their merch for them soon enough, and I can see why. The band plays a flavour of emotive hardcore with passionately shouted vocals, but with the standard distorted guitars replaced by synthesizers and fuzzed out bass and a definite groove to the drums, which also incorporate electronic percussion along with regular trap kit. They’re like the bastard children of Fugazi and Death Grips with a slight hint of the era of Beastie boys where they incorporated live instrumentation. Live videos of the band call to mind the sheer fire of bands like Torches To Rome or other Sarah Kirsch projects. While they did not have any full releases in 2022, MSPAINT increased their entire recorded output by 50% this year between their Colin Young-produced single “Acid”, and their collaboration with Militarie Gun “Can’t Get None” released before their tour with that band earlier this year. They are just a the point now where If they decided to make the jump from basements to larger venues they are sure to start gaining wider popularity soon. I would not be surprised if we get more MSPAINT this year and I can’t wait.

HOME FRONTFrom Edmonton, released late contender for my faves of 2021 with Think Of The Lie 12” EP in Dec of that year. On record they are a 2 piece with Grant Mackinnon on vocals/guitar/bass and Clint Frazier on synths/drums, but have expanded things to a full band for live shows. Heavily influenced by early 80’s post punk and new wave but with more fire and drive to their music than most attempts at creating a pastiche of sounds from that era. Reminds me a lot of Blitz’s “Second Empire Justice” LP where the street punks embraced more dark atmospheric synthy elements and realized it’s okay to admit you like Factory Records. Mackinnon brings the edge and energy from his main project, melodic hardcore punk ragers No Problem and Frazier’s drums and synths form a driving backbeat so 80’s inspired it could be the audio equivalent of neon lights in the background of a gnarly Cannon Pictures action movie. That is not to say they are some sort of New Wave cosplay act, instead channeling the spirit of some alternate earth’s top gritty 80’s post punk act that magically showed up through a Spiderverisian space time portal to our earth to spread their wicked tunes to our 2020’s ears. They are still a new band so there is not much in the way of press or interviews out there that I could find but the music really speaks for itself and they have also been bringing like minded bands like Poison Ruin (who I talked about on the first episode) and Schedule 1 on tour with them, which has helped me discover even more cool music because of their association. While their debut was just released at the end of 2021 so it could see it maybe a little while before we get anything more from them but I am hoping that wait is not tomorrow long as I’ve been loving their six song debut and can’t wait to hear what they do next.

ANGEL DU$TI’ll admit, I heard this band mentioned for a good couple of heard before I gave them a chance and dove into their music but something about their name made me think they were going to be something like E Town Concrete or something due to the stylized dollar sign replacing the S in their logo and all that but what can I say, sometimes I have very poor judgment as I was missing out on some amazing music. Last year I got hooked on their 2021 album “Yak: A Collection Of Truck Songs”, and was surprised in looking into their background that they share a few members with cool band du jour Turnstile (TS vocalist Brendan plays guitar for these guys and both bands share drummer Daniel Fang and rhythm guitarist Pat McCrory as well). Singer/guitarist and primary songwriter Justice Tripp used to front Baltimore-based 00’s hardcore heroes Trapped Under Ice but in this band channels older acts like The Lemonheads, Violent Femmes and maybe even early Talking Heads. They work in a lot of acoustic guitars but not in a derivative folk punk sort of way and poppy melodic songs but not in a standard pop punk sort of way and cite bands like the aforementioned Lemonheads and The Replacements as major influences. Tripp has also been branching into solo endeavours under the name Cold Mega what with three of his regular band mates being busy getting nominated for Grammies and stuff but hopefully we’ll get more from the full band soon.

CHUBBY AND THE GANGAnother second generation punk fronts London’s Chubby And The Gang, as “Chubby” Charlie Manning Walker’s parents were visual artists who hung around The Sex Pistols in the 70s and worked on the animated sequences in “The Great Rock N Roll Swindle”. Manning-Walker himself has a long resume of former bands and currently also plays guitar in The Chisel as well as collaborating with Jonah Falco of Fucked Up under the name BOSS. COTG seems to be his primary outlet these days and have released two albums since the start of the decade – Speed Kills in 2020 and The Mutt’s Nuts in 2021. They play a mix of punk, oi, pub rock, power pop and even a little bit of Motown, and aren’t afraid of throwing a harmonica or some keyboards in the mix sometimes. Imagine stomping street punk mixed with the garage-soul of various Greg Cartwright projects with lyrics that take on cops, landlords and the enemies of the working class. They even have a couple of holiday-themed EPs for Valentines and Christmas respectively. I know that Manning-Walkers other bands may be taking a bit of his time currently (The Chisel are starting a US tour this coming week) but hopefully they’ll have something new out soon but both albums got a ton of play all year.

NARROW HEADI had a weird thought spiral in trying to best describe Narrowhead’s music in that one could almost think off it as similar in terms of distance of nostalgia’s gaze backward as the wave of dead-on 60’s style garage rock revival bands that started popping up in the 90’s, except now it’s a band at the forefront of a revival or at least major draw of inspiration from sounds of the 90’s here in the 2020s. Their singer/guitarist Jacob Duarte is also a literal second generation member of the punk scene as well, as his father and uncle both played in 90’s/00s Texas pop-punk band The Tie That Binds, which makes me feel incredibly old as I remember them popping up on various comps and stuff back in the day. NH have a triple-guitar attack that draws heavily from bands like Quicksand, Jawbox, and even a Smashing Pumpkins at times with swirling distortion and melodies mixed with a lot of drawn out vocal styles, but all still with a punk edge. They also seem to have nailed the look, or at least Duarte has inherited his father’s old band merch collection as they are always wearing shirts from bands like Sonic Youth and Godflesh in their music videos – which they have several of on YouTube, most with a hazy throwback camcorder vibe and often shot in old school full screen aspect ratio. Their 2020 album 12th House Rock has been in regular rotation around my way and I’m looking forward to the follow up to be released in Feb 2023.

Miscellany
J Church “Mary Provost” (Nick Lowe cover)
Abject Pax “Selfish Hands” (RIP Rosie Davis, who played guitar for them)
The Tie That Binds “Annette Explains It All” (Jacob from Narrow Head’s dad’s band)

The Chisel “Retaliation” (Charlie from C&TG’s other band)
End It “New Wage Slavery” (killer newer band touring northeast US with The Chisel this month)
Is this desire?? #bogmonstermusic Matt’s NotesThanks to Dan for another great topic… Everything that isn’t happening right now is either dust or speculation… and so I have had these artists on the record player… or the Android phone… for as many waking moments as I can cram in…

The artists I’ve included here… all moved me for various reasons last year. In some cases, it was a matter of relatability… this was a year where, being unemployed for almost all of it… and en route to the divorce… I had more time and resources to spend listening to music, in search of music, going to see live music… and all the spinoffs from those activities… silver linings? Unintended consequences? The motherfucking butterfly effect?

Correct answer:

• All of the above
• None of the above
• Fuck this bullshit entirely, man…

Sorry… sometimes my “educator” self wants to jump out into The Bog From Which This Podcast is Broadcast… asking, pedantically… so… is it a bog-cast? Are you bog-casting your pod from a specific bog out there in the Untamed Maritime Wilds?

Errr… anyway! Here are my picks for Episode Number Two!

NorthcoteYour boss seemed fine until the alcohol…Growing up doesn’t need to be lonely…Matt Gould is so fucking cool.

I have my friend… and former Frederictonian… Acharya Samaneti to thank for sending me a timely Facebook message telling me that I should, in all circumstances, go see Northcote when he opened for Hot Water Music in September…

This was good advice because I was staying in Surrey, BC… cause after some experience it’s preferable to stay just outside Vancouver than right downtown…

ANYWAY… I don’t remember that much about the gig as such… but I definitely remember hanging out around middle-back of the Vogue Theatre getting pretty drunk… and I distinctly remember Matt on stage, and I distinctly remember thinking that this was some cool stuff… and when he closed his set with a bit of Chris Wollard’s Reason in My Rhyme… I guess I was “the drunk guy” at the gig, cause I also remember hollering “Chris Wollard, motherfucker! Well done!”. I’m forty-four years old, people…

ANYWAY…

Immediately after getting back to Kamloops, I ordered all the Northcote vinyl that I could find… maybe four or five records? They’re all fucking great. And by that I mean, they speak to me…

He’s a few years younger than me, and it’s something like with Joel Plaskett… prolific, talented Canadian singers around my age… who manage to tap into my inner life in a way that few others do… I can see these parking lots and teen centres and bars and I’ve worked the shitty jobs, and so forth..

And I literally just read an interview from 2020 supporting his excellent Let Me Roar LP… and it turns out the dude has had a day job as a fucking mental health worker… like… this music is coming from a person who is engaged meaningfully in the world… which is commendable to me, although I don’t know why as such…

I trust that by the time you read this, you might have listened to and/or watched the TNB recording(s)… so, I’ll leave the whys and wherefores as to how much this hits for me for the multimedia… let me get it here as well… 2015’s Hope is Made of Steel is basically a perfect record… and I’ve had it on my iTunes on repeat for… all of 2023 so far…

Well fucking done, Matt.

Signed,

The drunk guy at the Hot Water Music show in Vancouver

Ship ThievesOh whatever…I get lost in this town…So… if you’re reading this… there’s a good chance we know each other in some way already… and so… far be it from me to repeat what I’ve said previously… In both previous episodes, I went into my affinity for Hot Water Music… and in that regard, Chris Wollard is 100% part of the larger endeavor, and part of what continues to make that band so dynamic after 25 years or whatever…

So, what is it about Wollard and the Ship Thieves in specific… that compelled me to get artwork from their most recent album tattooed on my left forearm?

Again… where I see it going is… relatability…

He is somebody who has described struggling with mental health issues…depression and anxiety in particular… this was partially why Chris Cresswell joined Hot Water Music… so that band would be able to continue recording and touring…

The guy is four or five years older than me… and speaks to things that are important to me… and in ways me and people like me find relatable…

With these four albums and a few singles and comp tracks, you can go across some pretty broad terrain. The first LP is a legit pop record, in my opinion. The second record… Canyons… is a more straight ahead rock affair… and both No Anchor and Irruption feature dark, angry, fast, and… unanchored… punk music… of the smartest, most literate variety…

Anyway… I’m afraid that anything else I might say could potentially draw you away from this band… and in fact, I’m afraid I might have already done so. Please don’t let my hamfisted description here keep you from checking them out… recommended on vinyl for the better sound, and also for the absolutely gorgeous colored records, with the rest of the packaging adding strongly to the overall thing…

Alkaline TrioGod bless catastrophe…Let’s find some other time to break down…Here it is again! The AK3. Between the first two episodes of this show… and my blogs going as far back as June of last year, if not earlier…

I liken it to trying to get 20+ years that I WASN’T listening to them fit into the present day.

So… above and beyond all that… as per Matt Skiba and Asian Man Records on Instagram, Matt is in the studio working on… something! Since Dan had a solo record out last year, it would (might?)(who the fuck knows?) make sense for Matt to release a solo record of his own.. whatever it is, here’s hoping it’s out sometime in the next 50 weeks!

Mark LaneganAnd all around this place… I was a sad disgrace…Torn like an old dollar bill…You can’t talk about Lanegan without talking about Screaming Trees… I’ve been listening to Sweet Oblivion since I first became aware of grunge… and besides a couple of Mark’s excellent solo records on Subpop… that was pretty much it, as far as engagement or whatever…

Lanegan passed away on February 22, 2022 in Ireland… and that was when I dove into his fucking amazing, dark, hilarious memoir Sing Backwards and Weep… and followed that by reading his fucking harrowing account of nearly dying from COVID… which was published about one month before he passed away…

Anyway, that in turn, has led me to his vast post-Trees discography… he was writing and recording with a constellation of other artists from all over pop music… he was consistent as an artist, but impossible to pin down…

I’ve had a blog post about Lanegan’s books sitting in draft format for more than a month now… I think there will be a time to speak to him as one of the most honest, raw, utterly thoughtful singers and songwriters of his era… with fierce literary talent that was finally being recognized in the last decade of his life…

Lanegan would have none of this, of course. He was just doing what he was capable of. And thank fucking God that he did.

Beastie BoysI too got a beard like a billy goat…Same, bro…I’ll repeat what I said on the show: in around November of 2022, Paul’s Boutique made me ask myself:

A) What the fuck is this?

B) Is this even fucking music?

This leading to:

C) If this is fucking music, then everything I’ve thought about music up until now is fucking wrong.

To say nothing of the persistent, righteous NYHC lineage…

So, thanks, I guess!

xNo Sleep Til FrederictonX

Etc.!

Thank you so much for visiting the bog! Here’s to a radical 2023!

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What… could be in that sack?? #tnbttw #bogmonstermusicWelcome to the second episode! We’re glad you’ve joined us…

This weekend we talked about five bands that made us, for better or for worse. Thanks as ever, Dan, for the compelling topic!

Please click below, as per your preferences…

Not born, but made… #tnbttw #bogmonstermusicCelebrating ~~the birth of Jesus~~ the bands who helped make us who we are…As previously, we have a YouTube playlist to go with the episode…

Dan’s NotesI took a bit of an autobiographical spin on my list, I guess you could say, and selected bands that had a big influence on me during various points of my early life.

De La SoulAge 13-permission to be weird in the time of the mullet
Before I was first exposed to the punk rock scene, I got most of my music through watching Muchmusic after school, especially shows like Rapcity which I used to watch with some fellow nerds from my neighbourhood whose parents went to church with my mom or something like that, before we would take turns being bad at various Nintendo games. This was in the late 1980’s in Devon, where 90% or more of the kids I went to school with were die hard fans of hard rockers like AC/DC or newer thrashers like Metallica, so seeing a video with a bunch of chubby weird-looking guys being pushed around by cooler classmates like “Me Myself And I” really spoke to my very un-cool self. When I saw group member Dave had choppy asymmetrical hair with stuff shaved in the sides of it, my nerdy adolescent self thought that would be a cool thing to try with my own hair, being young and unaware of the appropriative nature of the new looks I was hoping to pull off. This began the early teen years tradition of setting aside part of my allowance to slide to the neighbourhood barber when sent there by my parents for a pre-first day of school cleanup so that said barber wouldn’t call them and ask if they were okay with the undercuts with lines shaved in the short parts or whatever rather than the scruffy mullet worn by the majority of kids my age in Devon at the time. Pos from De La wore big round glasses, so when I found out I needed glasses I picked ones with big round frames. They were a crucial inspiration at a time when I was just realizing that someone could develop their own sense of style, even if execution did not stick the landing based on inspiration, before I even really knew stuff like punk rock was even a thing.

7 SecondsAge 15- a band that felt like mine in an awkward early time
When I first got into punk after starting high school circa the early 90’s, I enjoyed the energy of it all but it took a little while before I found a band that really felt like mine. Most of the folks my age who went to shows were skateboarders who had their own little subculture within the subculture, including bands like NOFX who leaned a little too into irreverent ignorant humor at times for my uptight nerd self who had previously been listening to mostly “conscious” rap like Public Enemy and The Native Tongues collective, even if I only kind of vaguely understood the political nuances of those groups’ messages at the time. Of the more well-known older bands I was exposed to in those early days- Black Flag seemed a bit too macho on the live album that was my first exposure to them, Minor Threat had a couple of songs I wasn’t entirely sure I could get on board with, and the Misfits just seemed silly. Then one day of the only older punks who lived in Devon at the time that I knew of loaned me a tape that just blew me away with its mix of passion, energy, and awkward sincerity – 7 Seconds’ “The Crew”. They were mad at sexism, mad at racism, and didn’t want to get old. They were ready to fight and spray paint the town but fervent about their commitment to positive attitudes, the young people determined to overthrow “the system” with general vibes backed up by three hectic guitar chords can be. Some of the lyrics and stylistic choices may seem a little cringy in retrospect but for a good few years my morning ritual was to throw on this LP front to back while downing most of a pot of sludgy eye twitch-inducing coffee before going out to face the day. Their later albums definitely slowed down, and took on more and more of a blatant influence of things like their frontman’s love of early U2 that led to him falling out of favour with a lot of stylistic gatekeepers of the hardcore genre but The Crew is one of those iconic albums of the genre and on of the first that really drew me in. My morning ritual for many years consisted of listening to this record front to back while drinking my morning coffee to get that blast of aggressive positivity with my morning caffeine to really get the day going.

Submission HoldAge 19 – hometown connections to the secret foster parents of the west coast sceneSubmission Hold were the first band for me to really tie our sleepy little home town to a larger more vibrant community of “the scene”. It didn’t hurt that their singer’s dad was one of the vice principals at FHS so they would make a point of stopping through whenever they toured east. They started out under the name Insult To Injury and spent a week in town during their first cross Canada tour, various band members occasionally wandering into spots like Molly’s while trying to see what the locals got up to. I wrote them fan letters and started my first band when I heard they might come back through in hopes of getting to open for the,M and while they didn’t end up playing that year, they came through on the following tour and that band did get to open for them on our very last show, the night before I moved to Alberta with my family. Once I was living on the western side of the country their growing popularity and influence on the scene became even more apparent. They always had a ton of distinct screen printed patches for sale as merch, and in any city I visited during the time they were an active band, anyone I met who was wearing one of those patches usually ended up being pretty good folks. On top of that they were super involved with local activism around Vancouver, and had legendary bands from the more DIY end of the punk scene from all around the world play in the basement of the big rundown house they all lived in with some other members of the local arts and activism community. The singer and the bassist were also a cohabitating romantic couple who ended up playing de facto mom and dad to so many travelling couch surfers and other weirdos passing through town and letting them stay over for a night or two at said house and get a fancy home cooked vegan meal or two before they moved on. So many people I knew when living on that side of the country had been drawn to Vancouver (occasionally washing up across the Strait in Victoria instead) because of being fans of Submission Hold who had asked if they could come visit them and then never ended up leaving. They pushed musical boundaries too, and by the time they had signed to Ebullition Records in the late 90’s had added unconventional instruments like flute and violin to their avant- garde punk mix as well. There was a brief period of time in the last vestiges of a time before the internet really took over a means of spreading one’s music that they were like a Can Con Fugazi who managed to cultivate a network of connected friends and fans all over the world just by touring constantly and leaving a trail of patches and 7”s in their wake that served as literal badges of coolness if you knew what they meant.

CrimpshireAge 20 and thereabouts – Getting the wrong ideas from a good writerSometimes when you are young and stupid you can easily take the wrong idea from the works any great writer. And Aaron Cometbus, drummer and co-lyricist of Crimpshine and many other bands was a writer I idolized in my early 20’s, and I definitely feel like I took the wrong ideas from his works on the whole, both through music and his iconic COMETBUS zine. I devoured his stories of hopping freight trains, eating out of dumpsters and sleeping on couches or living in rundown houses with too many roommates and other chronicles of the lives of weirdos in the East Bay and beyond, and instead of thinking wow those are some captivating descriptions of crummy times, my stupid brain thought “hey, that must be the sort of thing you have to do to become a writer as good as him”. Crimpshrine were an iconic pop punk band from the east bay scene in the mid to late 80’s but whose members were effectively children at the time they were an active band, and their lyrics were a reaction to their lives at the time, not a proscription as to how a life is best lived. But as I said previously, I was young and stupid at the time and prone to taking the wrong point from things, and did my best to ape the sorts of life situations I heard described in the song lyrics and zine writings and spent my early 20’s like a silly fanboy so convinced of my own supposed “real punk authenticity” or whatever. Why have a bunch of roommates in a rundown shared house when you can sleep on the couch of an even more packed-to-the-gills house instead, and who needs to shower all that often when your plans for the day will peak at scrounging up a pack of smokes and opening your first bottle of malt liquor before noon? Of course all of this was meticulously documented in notebooks for some big writing project or other about my incredibly authentic and not at all just trying to copy my favourite writer at the time sort of life, that ultimately would never materialize because I was too busy getting drunk before noon on someone else’s couch that day. Some ill-advised choices for sure I guess, but the sort we all have to find a way to move through to get to where we are I guess. I did get to meet Aaron Cometbus once, at an all night keg party/punk show at a house I was sleeping on the couch of at the time in Portland Oregon on Halloween in 1999. One of his bands was playing the show and after their set I saw my chance to approach him in the kitchen and maybe tell him how much enjoyed his writings, but didn’t want to seem like too big of a fanboy so I decided to play it cool and open with the fact that I had discovered a store in town run by retired identical twin former pro football linebackers that had tons of cheap black Chuck Taylor All Stars high top sneakers for sale, as I knew that he, like myself, required footwear that could best be described as “boat-like” or “appropriate for clowns” in size. Of course, I had forgotten that I was dressed up as an elderly woman in a cheap grey wig and flowing thrift store mumu at the time (it was Halloween after all) and had been drinking for probably 12 hours straight at that point so it came out more like a long series of slurred syllables punctuated by the words “Big shoes eh?” , to which he responded “uh…..ok sure buddy”. While my remaining brain capacity for conscious thought struggled for a way to recover from that rocky start of the interaction, the whole situation was interrupted by both of us being tackled by my friend Jesse, who was dressed in a fake beard and long brown wig and wearing a blue bathrobe over improvised bedsheet toga and yelling “Jesus Loves You, Aaron Cometbus!” while trying to plant a kiss on the writer’s cheek. Divine intervention indeed.

Aesop RockEarly 30’s – How Alive? Too Alive…the permission to try and fix some things.Late 2007 through the full year of 2008 was a time of big changes in my life, when I made some moves that were ultimately for the better but rocky in execution to be sure. During that time, my listening habits had swung more towards the indie hip hop scene, with my favourite artist at the time being Aesop Rock. His style of writing can be a little hard to parse at first as his words tend to bob and weave around subject matter, with descriptive flourishes and off kilter rhyme schemes that sometimes feel like you are trying to get your sea legs under you when figuring out just what the hell he is talking about. Rather than just being dense for dense’s sake, he packs a lot of meaning into each song once you get used to listening to it. During the times in question I was in the midst of a major career change from kitchens and bars to the world of libraries, evaluating whether to continue with an ultimately unhealthy romantic relationship, and trying to shake off some of the bad habits, poor coping mechanisms, and general shitty thinking picked up through my 20’s. So much seemed to be causing big feelings all at once, so many big things changing and causing upheaval ultimately for the better but still not fun to experience in the moment, that it all just felt like A LOT all at once. Listening to Aes’ most recent album at that point, the chorus of “Keep Off The Lawn” about a man confronting the literal ghosts of his past and trying to shoo them away from his front door resonated hard with me and I ended up getting the lyrics How Alive? tattooed across my right wrist and Too Alive across the left wrist. I had also discovered a secret track on one of his earlier releases called “1 of 4”, an uncharacteristically straightforward thank you to four people who had helped him out during a serious mental health crisis, that was so open and vulnerable in its descriptions of realizing when one needs to seek out assistance, that later in the year when I had hit a point where things in my own life were feeling Not Okay to the point that seeking outside assistance in learning better coping mechanisms was probably a good idea, I was that much more open to the idea of doing so. I don’t mean to make it seem as simple as “my favourite quirky indie rapper said it was okay to go to therapy when my life got cruddy by my own making so I did”, but I’ve found that in times of crisis it can feel validating to experience art that supports positive decisions you may be making during those moments, and at that time it really did when listening to an artist whose own life experiences and decisions felt relatable to my own, and I can say that my life is ultimately better now because of going through all of that. His work with Kimya Dawson (formerly of The Moldy Peaches) as The Uncluded is also highly recommended as well.

T’was the week before Christmas, and all through the condo not a creature was stirring…Matt’s NotesThis is another great idea by Dan! I am pleased to imagine having content for TWO shows ready in advance… this is not normally how my life works!*

*This, and no other part of these notes, was written a month ago…

My first thought off the FB Messenger was… most formative ALBUMS… cause… in some ways that would be easier! I could make cases for albums convincingly on the basis of…”while ROCK is highly subjective… certain instances of musical excellence… are perhaps less so…”

In terms of bands that made me… again, I feel compelled to point out… “it depends on what you mean by “made””.

I am going to stop over-thinking it…

Top Five… out of a potentially much, much, much longer list…

1. The Replacements
2. Leatherface
3. Fugazi
4. Hot Water Music
5. Alkaline Trio

And because I will blow a fucking gasket if I can’t include a longer list… for context… I have to include:

• Hüsker Dü
• Bad Brains
• Lemonheads
• The Horrible Crowes
• Ship Thieves
• The Jesus Lizard
• Reigning Sound
• The Hold Steady
• Pearl Jam
• The Doors
• Metallica
• Guns n’ Roses
• The Gaslight Anthem
• Sugar
• Rancid
• The Joel Plaskett Emergency
• Nomeansno
• REM
• Eric’s Trip
• The Jesus and Mary Chain
• Karen Foster (Fredericton)
• Catch 23 (Fredericton)
• Royal Trux
• Lucero
• U2
• Screaming Trees
• Thin Lizzy
• Motorhead
• Wilco

*OK, Jesus… I think I must stop…

This really isn’t just a Bands I Really Like List… I could back up each of these with specific personal anecdotes… the joys of getting older… and foggier…

Furthermore, I vouch for all of Dan’s choices… the ones that I’ve heard of, anyway!

And… to follow up on a point from Episode Zero… I have been listening to Yesterday’s Ring’s glorious album Goodbye Nightlife (2022) on repeat since we did that episode… I can’t stop listening to it… I am listening to it right now…

OK… after that unacceptably long preamble…

The ReplacementsIn the fall… you knew how much it cost…So… as I said in the Episode Zero notes… There is nothing original that I can possibly say about this band, nor about the ways I got into them and the weight they carried with me and a few other people at age fifteen… and ever since…

I think adding a few quasi-random points here will be more helpful than any kind of attempt at a “think piece”…or an over-wrought personal anecdote…

• They are from Minneapolis, MN… 1979 until their last reunion show at Primavera Sound in Barcelona, Spain, on May 28th, 2015…
• Anything biographically you want to know about the band can be found in Bob Mehr’s New York Times bestselling Trouble Boys: The True Story of the Replacements…
• Bob Mehr also won a Grammy for his liner notes for the recent Don’t Tell a Soul reissue…
• During their reunion tours, Billie Joe Armstrong (Green Day) joined the band as a third guitarist for a handful of dates including at Osheaga Festival in Montreal…
• Paul and Tommy recorded music together for the animated film Open Season (2006)…
• They released THREE records in 2022… if you count the Bleeding Hearts record featuring Bob Stinson’s last recordings… WHICH I DO… the archives are deep with this band…
• There is a fucking charming sequence in the recent movie the New Mutants where the teenaged Mutants are drinking and smoking and partying to Bastards of Young, Breakfast Club style…

Are you completely underwhelmed? I’ll tell you… smoking cigarettes and binge-drinking as a teenager was never as fun as when FUCK SCHOOL or Bastards of Young were playing… and if you want, I’ll make you a mix tape… or burn you a CD…

A final thought… as I’ve grown older and been through a bunch of shit… it’s the last three albums… from the original run… that I play most often now… I cannot wait for an expanded reissue of All Shook Down…

LeatherfaceSpeak now… or forever hold your frown… Jesus, you were frowning before I was born…I’ve got such ESTEEM for Frankie Stubbs as a singer, songwriter, and from all appearances… utterly cool, normal person…

I described the origins of my affinity for this band in the Episode Zero notes…

So… as with the ‘Mats… maybe a quick, bullet-style rundown…

• From Sunderland, northern UK… 1988 – 2012… with a four year hiatus in the mid-late 90’s thrown in there…
• Basically, the definition of melodic post-hardcore…
• The late, brilliant Dickie Hammond played with members of Montreal band the Sainte Catherines as Medictation… their Warm Places LP was the last music Dickie recorded before he died…
• All releases of Leatherface’s Last album… the last before their mid-90’s hiatus… now include an entire bonus LP of songs from Frankie’s post-Leatherface band Pope…
• A bunch of us drove to Worcester, MA to see Leatherface and Avail… and Frankie hung out in his van afterwards, leaning out the window, being cool as fuck… including taking pictures… they invited us to hang out at their New York City show a couple of days later… we didn’t…
• As a post-script, I read a review of the NYC show in the Big Takeover about six months later… Frankie dedicated “Speak in Tongues” to “the kids from Canada”… nobody identified themselves as such… so then he invited anybody who wanted to come on stage…

There is so much more that I’d say here… but… you might be getting tired?? My personal recommendation is… start with Mush… and then go anywhere from there…

*There have been three recent reissues… of Cherry Knowle, Mush, and Minx… which I hope they keep going! The holy grail for me would be a vinyl reissue of Frankie’s Jesse LP…

FugaziDistrusted… I look for wires when I’m talking to you… When Jon Bowie threw on “Facet Squared” sometime in the summer of 1993… the opening track from In on the Killtaker… I had one of those moments where I wondered if this was even music… or something else… some other kind of conceptual or spiritual entity… His living room in Nashwaaksis kind of faded away… and then came crashing back… THIS IS THE HEAVIEST FUCKING MUSIC IN THE WORLD, BRO!??!&…*

*Approximately paraphrased…

So… the academic in me says… go read the chapter about them in the excellent book Our Band Could be Your Life… and, while you’re at it, read the rest of it, too! Including the chapter about the Replacements…

A few casual observations from being a fan for around thirty years…

• Joe Lally is one of the most underrated bassists of all time… half of the dynamism of Fugazi… is that they groove in the hardest way possible…
• The New Maryland Recreation Centre show in the summer of 1998 during the tour for End Hits was literally the perfect gig… all the opening bands were friends… it was a hot, perfect night in July on the outskirts of town… at one point Ian asked the promoter to turn off the fan… it fucking scorched… this was a case where the lived experience EXCEEDED the legend… which in Fugazi’s case is saying a lot…
• I saw them in Halifax the following night! Cause that’s where I was living at the time! A completely different venue and atmosphere… they played a way slower, more “atmospheric” set…
• It was a testament to the awesome, positive energy of the Fredericton show that this was among the first batch of their Live Series releases…

I could say more… but anybody who has ever seen them live or listened to their records already knows…

Listen to your inner fifteen or twenty year-old. They know some shit.

Hot Water MusicAll the months of howling wolves… My constitution’s ready…As with the Replacements and Leatherface, I feel obliged to point to my show notes from a couple of weeks ago…

• From Gainesvile, FL… hometown of Tom Petty… since 1994…
• I will never stop talking about Chris Wollard and how great he is, both in Hot Water and with the Ship Thieves… and with any other projects…
• It is cool as fuck that Chris Cresswell has stepped up to tour and record… and is now a full member of the band… Flatliners are pretty great… but… this band… Hot Water… speaks to me on a pretty fundamental level…
• After I successfully defended my doctoral thesis… I walked around North Oshawa alot… listening to “Never Going Back” on repeat for a few weeks…
• I met Chuck at a Revival Tour stop in Calgary… I paid extra for the VIP tickets… and it was one of the best shows I’ve been to since… my early thirties, anyway… Chuck was super nice… not as tall or burly as you might think from the videos… that same night I met Craig Finn from the Hold Steady… and almost met Tim Barry from Avail… he was talking with Craig Finn… and I didn’t recognize him until he was on stage… he is extremely tall… like maybe almost as tall as me…
• They have so many records… including excellent splits with both Leatherface and Alkaline Trio…
• I finally saw Hot Water in Vancouver in September… I was nearly black-out drunk by the time they arrived on stage… sensibly, I kept to the back… but I did assuredly sing along to the Cresswell singalong Turn the Dial… and I was also wishing Wollard was also there… even though it is totally reasonable that he wasn’t…

I can’t keep it quiet…Alkaline Trio That’s it, we’ve had enough… Please turn that fucking radio off…Despite the fact that this is, numerically, last of the five… I am writing this SECOND… after the ‘Mats…

I’ve been aware of this Chicago band forever… since the excellent split with Hot Water Music… and I’ve listened to all the tracks… including those by ALK3… for like twenty years? It boggles the mind…

But it wasn’t until ordering their latest, 2018’s amazing Is This Thing Cursed? earlier this year that I went all in…

They have something like nine or ten or twelve albums… depending on how you categorize comps, live releases… etc…

I’ve only just listened to I think all the non-comp / non-live releases as of yesterday…

Their last three records… Is This Thing Cursed?… My Shame is True… and Damnesia… are, collectively, the soundtrack of the last months of my divorce! I’ve been listening to these daily since at least June… five, six, who knows how many times… any given day throughout much of this weird, emotional, and transformative year… I’ve tracked down Matt and Dan’s respective solo releases… I’m hooked… it’s led me to the amazing Lawrence Arms… Asian Man Records… novels… other seemingly random pathways that I wouldn’t have otherwise gone down…

I had a wild three-month relationship earlier this year, and the ALK3 were there for that as well…

Matt Skiba is among the best American punk singers and guitarists since the late 1990’s… Dan Andriano is a songwriter’s songwriter… and Derek Grant pummels the drums with precise runs and fills that are casually fucking amazing…

I guess that’s all I ought to say right now… but… in a few weeks it’ll be FIVE YEARS since the last ALK3 record… as per Instagram they’re still an active touring band… one would think they are almost obliged to put out another record in 2023?? We can only hope…

Thanks for checking out Episode One! We will return on January 1, 2023… or thereabouts!!

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Our top five from 22… so far…

We aim for this to be a… multi-tentacled… effort!So here is the new thing! The new music thing! Not that it will be exclusively… or even mostly… new music… rather, it’s a new thing! About music!

Please click on the links below… this will soon be available on Spotify, Google, etc… but not TOO soon!

You may also then dig the notes below!

Thanks for stopping by! We appreciate you!

Matt & Dan

Audio… for you non-audiophiles… #tndttwFrom New Brunswick! Of all places! Fun contest: identify the TYPO in the video and Matt will buy you a case of beer anywhere in the world #fuuncontests Some restrictions applyFurthermore, in the interests of adding value… or further distraction… we’ve each prepared a playlist…

Click here to check out Dan’s Episode Zero Spotify playlist…

& Click here for Matt’s YouTube list

Dan’s NotesHigh Vis Liverpool’s High Vis are one of those bands that I wish I could say I discovered via some cool underground zine or seeing them in a gritty club somewhere or something. Alas, I will confess that I first heard their 2019 debut No Sense No Feeling via one of those “if you like artist x, check out this vaguely related band” playlists on Spotify after falling in love with their peers in the current UK scene like The Chisel, Big Cheese, and Chubby And The Gang, all(like High Vis) made up of folks from late 00’s-early 20teens New Wave Of British Hardcore acts who have since moved on to exploring more sounds than just wall to wall aggression and speed. They play a style of melodic and tense punk heavily influenced by moody 80’s acts like Joy Division and Echo And The Bunnymen mixed with a driving hardcore edge. Their new album Blending released at the end of September this year expanded on this into incorporating more shoegazey melodic guitars on songs like “Talk For Hours”, the lead single and going-to-therapy-and-getting-your-mental-health-shit-in-order anthem that encapsulates a lot of the core themes of the record. Their singer Graham Sayle has stated in interviews that the album’s lyrics were primarily written about his own dealing with addiction, mental health diagnoses and treatment during the Covid pandemic mixed with working class anthems like “0151” (named after his hometown’s area code). Imagine Dag Nasty but fronted by an angry shouting Liverpudlian mixed with Joy Division if their drummer really wanted the crowd to start a circle pit, sprinkled with occasional swirly guitar pedal detours and heavy working class pride in the lyrics.

Poison RuïnPoison Ruin are a newer band from Philadelphia that started as a solo project during the pandemic and back in May put out the three song Not Today Not Tomorrow EP, their fired recorded as a full band. Frontman Mac Kennedy played all of the instruments on their first two demos, also rereleased as a self-titled LP in 2021. I first found out about this project via seeing their name on fliers online when they were touring with another great band I want to find an excuse to talk about on one of these shows, Edmonton’s HOME FRONT, and really enjoyed what I heard when checking out that full length. Their sound is a Frankenstein of proto-thrash a la Hellhammer, bouncing post-punk/new wave in the vein of Wire’s “Pink Flag” album, and spooky dungeon-synth interludes that would fit in perfectly as the soundtrack of a low budget 80’s sword and sorcery epic like The Beastmaster or KRULL. It opens with the sonic equivalent of the sun glinting off the tip of a medieval warrior’s blade, builds to thundering drumrolls you think are about to blast into speed metal, and then swerves into something that could easily fit right in on the lineup of “Urgh! A Music War”. By the end of closing track “Edifice” they are cruising along through post apocalyptic wastelands in a stomper reminiscent of Amebix or some other vintage 80’s anarchopunk. I get the impression that they are just getting to the point of their career where they can afford to have someone else book their shows for them and seem to be hitting the road more often so hopefully we’ll be hearing more of them soon.

GRISELDA – Benny The Butcher x Conway The Machine x Westside Gunn
My third pick is kind of a cheat in that it is the 2022 solo albums by the three core members of GRISELDA – Benny The Butcher’s Tana Talk 4, Conway The Machine’s God Don’t Make Mistakes, and Westside Gunn’s two mixtapes Peace Fly God and 10. I had gotten into their group album from 2019, WWCD, a while back after seeing an appearance by Benny and Conway on the late great DESUS AND MERO show and after checking out that album and some of their other solo records fell in love with these three emcees from Buffalo NY whose sharp rhymes over dark boom bap beats harken back to grittier 90’s/early 00’s NY artists like the Wu Tang Clan or Mobb Deep, and whose lyrics often draw from their pasts growing up in economically disadvantaged parts of their hometown while celebrating the finer things in life they are able to experience now and occasional references to their shared love of fashion, visual arts and pro wrestling . All three make appearances on one another’s albums while also featuring artists both established and up and coming from Busta Rhymes and Raekwon to newer Griselda Records artists like Armani Caesar and Stove God Cooks, and their respective albums all explore different aspects of similar subject matter with Benny exploring more of the gritty street tale side of things, Conway delving into more introspective subject matters of grief and other personal topics, and Westside celebrating his successes over the years while offering newer artists (including his own son on 10’s “Fly God Junior”) a collaborative platform to show what they can do. If you love grimy vintage New York boom bap rap made by dudes in their late 30’s and early 40’s who have lived through a lot, with sharp lyricism and head-nodding beats, these folks are for you.

Billy Woods – AethiopesA haunting series of snapshots of African American history and diaspora wandering through beats that meld Afro beat, reggae, middle eastern and North African rhythms with spaghetti western twangs and eerie ambiance. Woods is a veteran of the “Alternative” rap scene of the 90’s and 00’s and beyond through starting as a protege and collaborator of the group Cannibal Ox before moving on to his own solo projects as well as being half of Super Chron Flight Bros throughout the first decade of the Millenium, followed by an onslaught of music both as a solo artist and a collaborator with artists like ELUCID and Moor Mother. Woods’ delivery is closer to spoken word poetry than pop music and jumps between images of historic atrocities to getting stood up by a date in a fancy hotel room to watching his parents argue from the backseat of a speeding car while album producer Preservation’s samples of snaking horns and ambient synths send shivers up the back of your spine. The album has strong roots in the aforementioned “abstract” alternative rap scene but spreads its wings to travel the world through dusty samples and intense imagery, and collaborates veterans of that scene like Mike Ladd, Despot and El-P alongside newest artists like Boldy James and Quelle Chris. As a fan of stuff like the Def Jux Records catalogue, this album feels like a more mature and well-travelled adult version of that whole scene who has spent the ensuing decades gaining new perspective and exploring new sights and sounds beyond the end to end burners and “lyrical miracle” flows to comb the world for spine-tingling melodies and rhythms from far corners while exploring topics and imagery personal and political. It’s not the sort of album you would put on to get the party started but it will definitely take you on a journey.

Hammered Hulls – CareeningIf you can say any city still has its own regional “sound” in terms of musical sub genres in 2022, then Hammered Hulls are the platonic ideal of the DC sound as codified through the releases of Dischord records over past four or so decades. Frontman Alec Mackaye has been a part of that scene since the start in bands like The Untouchables, The Faith, Ignition and The Warmers (not to mention being the younger sibling of another pretty prominent member of that scene) and has started a supergroup of sorts with members of Helium/Ex Hex, The Make Up/Chain And The Gang and Titus Andronicus that sounds like a distillation of decades of music from that city from the past 40 or so years that might seem slightly derivative if it weren’t for the fact that these are some of the folks who helped codify that sound in the first place. The songs veer between more upbeat punk tempos to palm-muted reggae influenced grooves with melodic guitars and Mackaye’s sometimes staccato shouts over top. This record has been straight up catnip to a lot of folks I know of a certain age, from grizzled old hardcore fans to those into the more melodic ringing indie guitar sounds woven through the record’s 12 tracks. In an era where it seems like we’re getting more and more nostalgia tours by older acts it’s cool to see these folks getting together to make exciting new sounds that build from their past catalogues while not just rehashing or playing the hits. It’s only been out for a little over a month so I feel like I’m still getting around to really absorbing it but it’s definitely

Honorable mention: MSPAINT “Acid” single, END IT “Unpleasant Living” EP, TENSION SPAN “The Future Died Yesterday” LPWe’ve got a new dance over here… it’s called The Flop… #tnbttw #bogmonstermusicMatt’s Notes So… when Dan put this to me as the topic for the first show… I was like… “Fairly straightforward!”. As it turns out, not so much! Rather than extemporize on the how’s and why’s and what’s-it’s and wherefores… I present to you, first, the proper 5 as needed for the show… and then, cause context is everything, the longer list…

My personal criteria… which may be different than Dan’s!… are simply that it… i.e., any given release… was released this year… and that I own it in PHYSICAL MEDIA… i.e., in record, cassette, or CD format… as opposed to whatever I may have access to through my paid streaming services…

Alrighty then!!

1. Soul Glo: Diaspora Problems
2. Hot Water Music: Feel the Void
3. The Replacements: Live at Riot Fest Toronto
4. PJ Harvey: B-Sides, Demos & Rarities
5. Leatherface: Minx (re-issue)

Yesterday’s Ring: Goodbye Nightlife

*This is a very special record, and likely deserves to be part of a show devoted to Montreal punk…

• Kendrick Lamar: Mr. Morale & the Big Steppers
• Viagra Boys: Cave World
• Lemonheads: It’s a Shame About Ray (re-issue)
• Titus Andronicus: The Will to Live
• Neil Young: Toast
• Wilco: Yankee Hotel Foxtrot (re-issue)* Super-deluxe (11 LP, 1 CD)
• Matt Andersen: House to House
• Son House: Forever on My Mind
• Bleeding Hearts: Riches to Rags
• Sloan: Steady
• Red Hot Chilli Peppers: Return of the Dream Canteen
• Dinosaur Jr: Seventy two hundred seconds (EP)
• Sex Pistols: The Original Recordings
• Rise Against: Nowhere Generation II (EP)
• Dan Andriano and the Bygones: Dear Darkness
• Beach Rats: Rat Beat
• Nirvana: Hi, how are you Madrid? (live)
• Penetration: The Best of the Pyramids
• The Replacements: Unsuitable for Airplay

OK!! Here we be: round zero!

Soul Glo!! Fuck! Where to start!?Heading to Valu Village next with this…OK… this was prompted to me by the YouTube algorithm right around the time it was released. In one way… incredibly fucking invasive marketing! Fuck everybody concerned! Including me! But… on the other hand… this record is so fucking tight!

So… I’m a white, liberal, middle-aged guy… and I love Bad Brains… so all that in itself should probably disqualify me from writing about this. Also, I didn’t know this until today… their bass player left the group just around the time the album was released… due to allegations of abuse… so… I don’t know if that means I have to take this off my list… I don’t think it does! This article in the Guardian speaks to this…

So… moving forward on the assumption that this is fucking dope, intelligent, heavy fucking music… I’ve got little else to say! Their videos are worth watching again and again… including live footage! So many stage dives in small clubs…

And fuck… when I look at more recent news and media releases and so forth… it seems like they maybe are planning global domination for next year…

And this Brooklyn Vegan article in which Peirce (vocals) and TJ (drums) do their best of 22 lists… fucking educational, Man… I plan to spend some of my 2023 with their 22 lists…

Hot Water Music: Feel the Void— I’m so fucking glad this exists…Never have I ever gone skateboarding… looks fun though!!It’s hard for me to be objective about Hot Water Music. You will hear me saying this again about the Replacements and Leatherface records that came out this year.

So… Sean and Trip went to Florida around twenty or more years ago, and they came back talking about this band…

Besides that… my first real connection with this band was the Leatherface split… and I got their first LP Fuel for the Hate Game as part of the same mail order… spring of 1999… South End Halifax, Nova Scotia… working as a line cook / dishwasher… and living in half of an attic, with about 9 people scattered elsewhere throughout the small apartment… I had dropped out from University for the first time…

Huh, where were we? I’ve streamed this album incessantly as well… so… besides maybe a couple of non-22 records… this is most likely the one I’ve listened to most this year… I’m sure it’s more than one hundred hours at this point…

In terms of what propels this up the list for me… it’s a record with Wollard and Cresswell as equal partners!

This is the same year that I got a tattoo featuring artwork from the latest Ship Thieves album. As far as I can tell, Chris Wollard is incapable of writing a weak song. Hopefully we will be hearing more from him and/or the rest of HWM in 2023…

*Also, it is due to attending HWM at the Vogue Theatre in Vancouver in September that I am now aware of Northcote! And that is major…

The Replacements: Live at Riot Fest Toronto… I should have been there… I wasn’t… so… thank Fuck for this!!On and on and on and on… which side are you on?There’s nothing original I can say about the ‘Mats… including how when I was 15 there were just a few other people in my small group who GOT IT…

If you’re not into them… there’s nothing I can say to change your opinion!

If… you’re the other kind of person… I don’t need to explain it. You’ve experienced the magic yourself already!

On August 25, 2013… I would have been thirty-five years old, living in Doha, Qatar, and getting ready for my fifth year teaching Communications at the College of the North Atlantic-Qatar… with two kids younger than four years old… and I’d been in Calgary for three weeks earlier in the summer completing the second residency required for my Ed.D degree with the University of Calgary… and those are the reasons and circumstances surrounding my non-attendance of what surely was a show for the ages… all that being said… short of a professionally-shot HD video of the event… which probably exists somewhere… This is the best possible rendering of this historical night that you could want. Worth it for the Sham 69 cover alone.

According to Discogs, this is the first of a planned series of live double albums! If you’ve been paying attention, the Mats have been more prolific over the past 5 years than at any other point in their career… this was actually one of THREE Mats related releases this year… including the Unsuitable for Airplay live disc, and the Bleeding Hearts… featuring the late, great Bob Stinson…

PJ Harvey: B-Sides, Demos & Rarities… she’s simply the best…Larger than life…Similarly, there is nothing original I could possibly say about Polly Jean.

I have a completely incomplete knowledge of her career; nor have I spent a ton of time with her releases…

And yet as soon as this came out, I snapped it up.

It’s utterly fucking primal. I’m listening to the set now for only the second time… and my morning is already in disarray. Holy fucking moly.

What could I wish for in this career-spanning set? Liner notes maybe? But their absence also adds to the mystique.

Anyway, I’ve gone about as far as I can here without drooling on my keyboard.

A final thought:

May 31, 2001. My twenty-third birthday. U2 is playing the Forum in Montreal and me and my friends have the cheapest seats you can get… this, my first time seeing Bono & Co.

My most vivid takeaway from that night was walking back from the beer stand and hearing this wild fucking voice.

Polly Jean is on stage by herself in a red body suit and blue electric guitar… I am as far away from her as I can be and still be within the same building… but in my memory she is larger than the stage and the crowd around her… she is standing maybe 10 feet away… and I can’t fathom the plastic Molson cup anymore…

You snap back to reality.

Bono told a really clever anecdote comparing the collapse of the Berlin wall to Quebec separatism.

I’ll leave you to decide the better memory.

More Polly Jean Harvey across all media, please and goddamned thank you!

Leatherface: Minx (re-issue). Just the saddest fucking punk music ever made…The most devastating lyrics I’ve ever mis-sung

A wallflower living in a guntower

He’s whistling the Brandenburg Concerto thing

Because he can be Sam collapsing and hysterical

And I laugh at the world it’s hysterical

And I love the way it turns

“Wallflower”(Lyrics: Stubbs)

Somehow the easiest way to describe my abiding love for this record was to share these lyrics. Because I’ve been growling along passionately, earnestly to these lyrics since I was nineteen or twenty? Except they were never these lyrics. They were always mine… except for the ones that weren’t… such as the ones I am only learning for the first time today… Brandenburg Concerto thing indeed…

A life full of grand ideas a life full of grand designs

Of noble feats and noble minds an entire lifetime out of petty crime

And eyes full of Pound signs an observer of what people do

“Fat, Earthy, Flirt” (Lyrics: Stubbs)

I went so far as to pay nearly two hundred dollars for an original press… which I never fucking do… and then this reissue was announced! I’ll be keeping both… and when one of my kids finally receives the collection after I pass… I hope that he listens to some of the Leatherface albums…

And then maybe that gets him closer to Hot Water Music… and Motörhead… and Hüsker Dü… and all the places you can go from there…

If you can sing like this through your darkest moments, then you are for sure not nearly as fucked as you imagined yourself. And I’ve been singing along for more than half my life.

Next, let’s have Fill Your Boots… and the Compact and Bijou EP…

*Final note: Frankie Stubbs is indeed still alive, putting out music, and appearing at European punk festivals…

We’ve enjoyed this Episode Number Zero immensely and we hope you have too! See you round a couple of weeks from now!