Worshipping japanese hardcore since the day before yesterday!
If you couldn’t deduce it from their name, here’s a heads up: Varaus SS sound a lot like finnish Kasikaks. This posthumous 10″ is a compilation of very raw tracks from several demos, and you’ll get lots of distortion, delay-(or is it reverb?)-laden vocals, mangled pseudo-finnish song titles, plus (strangely) one cover of the Shitlickers’ “Warsystem”.
Masturbation were one of the those bands whose style of punk could not be described in just one word. Like Niku-Dan and Kikeiji (at least in some songs) they played something between dark, disturbing and slow punk, death rock and sometimes (proto-)hardcore, although they’re not really alike. No Trend or Flipper might be a possible comparision, too, although Masturbation are not quite as dirty. So that’s why you’ll get one long, brooding dirge of almost 4 minutes and one short hardcore-like smasher on their 1984 flexi 7″ Shinigao (“Face Of Death”, maybe?).
The last of the three money savers! It starts off with Sha-London’s 8″ flexi “Short Cut To The Hell” and 11 songs of lo-fi thrash. Next are A-Bomb, who looked and sounded like teenaged glue sniffers and must’ve thought treble was the only channel of the EQ-band they needed for their 7″ “Hell’s Story”. Side B has The 4th International, who play very minimalist and punky songs (without overly much fuzz or distortion for a change) and had the longest title for their record (“日常性ノ破壊ハ我々ノ幻想 – Destruction Of The Illusion Of Our Everyday”). Last are the rockin’ Bones with “In A Sick Society!”, who are definitely the most punk guys on this LP (just like Kruw they didn’t really need to tune their instruments)!
“Reincarnation” from 1986 was Gas’ last official release. It’s got three tracks from their Split 8″ with 肉弾, all four tracks off their “Sweet Emotion” 12″ ep from 1986 plus four more tracks from an aborted recording session for their LP (some of which are re-recordings).
Gas obviously could not catch a break with MRR, as Tim Yo had the following to say about “Sweet Emotion”:
“Rock punk with crooning female vocals, metalish rock guitar, and overall late-PENETRATION sound. Singer bugs me a lot with her ‘sweet’ singing.”
If you’re going to release a bootleg compilation LP of 7″es, why name it after one further ep (Gudon‘s 卑下志望 7″) that you’re not going to include? Anyway, this comp has Ghoul’s first and second 7″ in all their awesomeness. Just as high on the awesomeness scale is the Gastunk’s self titled 7″ from 1985. Although it’s not yet as hard-rockin’ as Mr Gazime, it’s got melodic and metallic thrashers that surely made all these NWOBHM dudes swear off hairspray forever out of sheer envy. Last is Systematic Death’s “Flash Back” 7″ from 1986 which definitely breaks the records in velocity, thrashing wildness and underproduction on this record.
Zouo released only 6 tracks during their time. Luckily someone discovered an old live tape of theirs from 1984 which had a decent sound quality, so Crust War could release this monstrosity in 2011 for uplifting gormandizers like us.
By the way, could there have been a better place to find an old Zouo recording than an occult shop?
SIC may have sounded like one of the typical late eighties thrash bands influenced by US youth crew hardcore, less typical were the american band members. They never released a full-length LP of their own, but a shit load of tapes, e.p.’s, split-releases and most of all compilation tracks. This 7″ is a (pretty cheaply made) bootleg of their split LP “Throbbing Of The Needy” with Roserose, and it’s chock-full of lo-fi stomping, thrashing and blastbeating goodness.
I have to admit that I don’t know very much about Nubile, but one thing I know: I want more! Nubile released their self-titled flexi single in 1983 on ADK Records. In Sight on Side A is a slow, ominous and darkly melodic post-punk song, while Strawberry Hill on Side B is an aggressive, mid-tempo number with pounding drums and cool guitar hooks. One thing has me wondering, though: if they were good looking enough to call themselves Nubile, why didn’t these guys include a band photo?
Taking their cues from classic Suomi Kasikaks, Laukaus sat down, studied finnish (or at least learned the typical buzzwords like hatred, power, freedom, death and destruction) and in 2002 released this 7″ in the vein of Mellakka, Pohjasakka or Poikkeustila. So, you’ll get lots of shredding guitars and drawn out “aaaaahs” just like it’s 1982 in Tampere! Don’t you wish you’d been there?
I guess there is no point in debating about the best Death Side release, but their 1994 “All Is Here Now” 7″ is definitely a top contender. Unbelievable power, aggression and anger, great songs, an almost scarily tight performance, “All Is Here Now” definitely has it all! Plus, how can you top a 7″ cover where a smiling guy rips out his own entrails?
狂気の日本 