A Cheetah hooks up with The Dogs and goes coasting

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By The Barman

The Barman

09 March 2021

Hits: 3351

Los Angeles-via-Detroit underground punk legends The Dogs have unleashed a new digital single “Under The Coast” that was co-written with and features fellow rock ‘n’ roller Frank Meyer (The Streetwalkin’ Cheetahs, James Williamson & The Pink Hearts) on guest vocals and guitar.

The socially conscious, topical song is available now through Chicanery Chick Records/Die Laughing Records on all digital formats, and deals with the chaos and dissonance of modern times.

• the dogs
• frank meyer
• streetwalkin' cheetahs
• loren molinaire
• mary kay

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Greasy Psalms

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By General Labor

General Labor

08 March 2021

Hits: 2923

Everything is Radiant Between The Hates
By Rich Ferguson
(Moon Tide Press)

Rich Ferguson is the best poet in the world, if you ask me. All his words have medicinal properties; they are magic spells and healing incantations. If you love John Cooper Clarke or Lydia Lunch, Exene, Nikki Giovanni, John Trudell or Tupac, you'll probably love Rich Ferguson, too.

If you are lonesome, isolated, alienated, suffering, worried, exiled, dry-drunk, evicted, locked-down, locked-out, tripled masked and permanently veiled in black lace mourning, abandoned, back-stabbed, betrayed, robbed, in grief, forlorn or melancholy, remember there is power in the word.

"Everything Is Radiant Between The Hates" is my newest sidekick, imaginary friend, silver bullet, rosary, garlic and crucifix, force field and holy water, pepper spray and hip-flask, trusty shank and pimp-stick, Marlboro Reds, harmonica, Roy Rogers holster, double secret fan club only secret decoder ring, 45 spindle, miniature spy camera, flashlight, utility-knife and I-phone. Flash Gordon spacegun. Secret scrolls, wobbly jukebox at the last greasy spoon in town. It's probably the most rocknroll artifact I've unearthed since the Humpers from Long Beach released that CD, "Positively Sick On Fourth Street", like 25 years ago.

If you're like me, you’re used to carryin' nothin, mighta spent most of your life empty pocketed, no watch, no wallet, no keys, no credit card, no proper identification, or name-tag, or money-clip, but once you get this book in your hands, you'll probably keep carrying it around with you. It's become essential to my sense of wellbeing, like a guitar slide, or bottle opener, Brill Cream and unbreakable comb. You won't leave home without it.

It's a Greyhound ticket to another time. Drinks for free. Mirrored sunglasses. Feather earring. The gospel truth confirming all the good ghosts you got floatin' around inside your traumatized skull. Like a rhinestone horseshoe, a Best Western ashtray, a universal remote, or black cat bone. It's like Pete Seeger's Wobblies songbooks. You better get a copy, now. Also look for "8th & Agony" (Punk Hostage Press).

Buy it 

Just two Suburban boys

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By The Barman

The Barman

06 March 2021

Hits: 3613

Born in the Suburbs – Suburban Urchins (Aeroplane Records)

The concept of “let’s get the band back together” isn’t new. Not by any stretch. And the thought of yet another obscure ‘80s garage rock crew reassembling and trumpeting how good they were/are doesn’t automatically fill anyone with confidence.

Of course, the proof of the pudding is always in the eating. If only every band’s midlife crisis sounded this good.

Suburban Urchins were a mid-‘80s band from Hobart, the epicentre of a small but fevered Tasmanian underground music scene that notably spawned The Philisteins, with whom they shared stages.

• garage
• melbourne
• hobart
• tasmania
• suburban urchins
• born in the suburbs
• philisteins

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Cultured pop-rock from an unlikely place

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By The Barman

The Barman

28 February 2021

Hits: 3048

Deritend – Cult Figures (Gare Du Nord Records)

If pressed to name a heartland for rocking hard pop you don’t normally nominate Birmingham. Call it the loudmouthed opinion of an Aussie who blew in once to drink some warm pints, but its Industrial Revolution décor and shitty weather makes it more of a Black Sabbath kinda place.

Of course the West Midlands of England has pumped out its share of pop (Duran Duran, anyone?) but, musically speaking,  if you’d heard of Cult Figures you wouldn’t put them be among that crew.  (Fun Fact: Roger Taylor drummed for them for one show.)

• birmingham
• swell maps
• cult figures
• deritend
• jon hodgson
• gary jones

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Get the Hard-Ons onto the silver screen

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By The Barman

The Barman

25 February 2021

Hits: 3149

The forthcoming Hard-Ons documentary by "Descent Into The Maelstromn" producer Jonathan Sequeira has qualified for tax-deductible donation status with Film Australia. There are no crowd-sourcing rewards other than enduring gratitude (and maybe a name-drop) but don't let that stop you. You can tell from the trailer that it'sgoing to be great. You can send some cash here and claim it on your tax return if you're Australian.

• hard-ons
• radio birdman
• descent into the maelstrom
• jonathan sequeira

Expat Aussie shows Who Dez Wins

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By The Barman

The Barman

23 February 2021

Hits: 3474

Back in the ‘90s, Darren Smallman was immersed in the fertile Geelong-Melbourne punk rock scene in Australia as a player, label head and manager. These days, the ex-member of Toad, Warped, Thee Vinyl Creatures, The Wells Collective and The Sound Platform lives in the UK, working in the charity arts sector and producing his own music under the moniker Dez Dare.

Dez Dare and Melt Citizen (El Paso, USA) have unleashed a DIY fuzz EP , "Spl;itz", that they promise will “melt your brains and hearts”. It’s available through Bandcamp with a crowdsourcing campaign underway to get it out on vinyl.

In the pair’s words: “Hidden away in spare rooms and makeshift studios while in very different pockets of the earthly domain, there were two who worshipped at the altar of guitar pedals and heavily discounted recording plugins. This split EP digs deep into the cacophonous divide between reality and the two countries entrenched in denial, grasping to find a way out of the long grass. Back into the light.”

• warped
• dez dare
• melt citizen
• darren smallman

Thee Minks deliver that killer Philly garage sound

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By The Barman

The Barman

21 February 2021

Hits: 3108

Right Now Baby – Thee Minks (self released)

Philadelphia is a place that’s always punched above its weight. Bill Haley, Todd Rundgren, Hall and Oates (yikes) and Pink are among musical offspring of the City of Brotherly Love. And for the fourth year in a row, Philly has more homicides than New York City, a place four times its size, and currently ranks second on the USA per capita Murder League Table.

So here’s a recommendation if you’re a fan of rough ‘n’ ready, no bullshit garage rock and roll: Look up Thee Minks. Hook into this album like there’s no next week. Go to their Bandcamp and plonk down your credit card number or Paypal handle. Do it right now, baby.  Thank you. You’ve been a great audience. I’ll grab my hat and coat.

• garage
• pandoras
• thee minks
• right how baby
• philadelphia

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Complete Hell ain't a bad place to be

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By The Barman

The Barman

20 February 2021

Hits: 4258

Destiny Street Complete – Richard Hell and the Voidoids (Omnivore)

Reports that “Destiny Street” had been re-recorded and was being pressed on vinyl in 2004 were alarming. The late Robert Quine was five years gone and his wired, highly-strung guitar-playing was an essential and revered element of just about anything the Voidoids did. This was surely an act of madness, if not sacrilege.

Its prime creator, Richard Hell, had never been happy with “Destiny Street”, the 1982 follow-up to “Blank Generation” that was recorded in troubled circumstances. Hell was debilitated by a drug habit and absent for much of the sessions. His penchant for intravenous coke to counter his reliance on smack had left him fried and unable to leave his apartment for long periods of time. His attempt to make his mark while largely AWOL was to summon up guitar overdub after overdub.

• complete
• richard hell
• voidoids
• robert quine
• destiny street
• repaired
• ivan julian
• dim stars
• omnivore

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Voodoo Rhythm reprises Roy and the Devil's Motorcycle's noisy birth

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By The Barman

The Barman

20 February 2021

Hits: 2754

Good Morning Blues – Roy and the Devil’s Motorcycle (Voodoo Rhythm)
 
In case you never noticed, this place often celebrates the weird and non-conformist end of the rock and roll spectrum, and it doesn’t come much stranger than Swiss band Roy and the Devil’s Motorcycle.

Resident on the Voodoo Rhythm label (“Music to Ruin Any Party”) since it first released this, their debut 10-inch mini-album, back in 1996, its mix of bass-less, guitar distort-skronk and megaphonic vocals sounded fucked up then and sounds fucked up today.

It’s worth adding context: “Good Morning Blues” was unleashed on a world full of techno and the Real Rock and Roll landscape was a wasteland. Major labels still roamed what a musical Jurassic Park, looking for underground bands from which they could extract blood and turn into mainstream melange. A dead dog’s scrotum had more chance of being signed than Roy and the Devil’s Motorcycle.

• voodoo rhythm
• swiss
• fuggs
• deviants
• roy and the devil's motorcycle
• good morning blues

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