Fear Of Listening To Fear Of A Punk Decade

This is a blog in which I’ll listen to every record from the Fear Of A Punk Decade playlist which was made from an excellent feature that AV Club did last year. I’m sure I’m gonna find some stuff that I love that I haven’t heard before and revisit some records that I haven’t listened to since high school. I’ll also have to listen to Social Distortion and that’s gonna suck but hey, whatever.

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Jawbreaker- Unfun

Ah fuck yes, Jawbreaker is one of my top ten favorite bands. Unfun ain’t 24 Hour Revenge Therapy or Dear You but it’s still a solid record. The record kicks off with “Want” which is one of their best songs, period. Blake was just a step above everyone in music, let alone punk lyrically, which is a saving grace for some of the weaker tracks on here. There’s not a lot musically going on here that other Bay area bands like Crimpshrine weren’t doing already, truth be told but the rhythm section of Adam Pfahler and Chris Bauermeister is the best that punk has ever seen. Pfahler could just play in the pocket so well and his fills felt like they had emotion in them. Bauermeister almost used the bass like a lead guitar at times. Blake while not like a prodigy was no slouch on guitar either. They just knew how to be economical and precise at all times. This records short comings are few and far between and it feels dumb criticizing production on a punk record but I can’t stand the production on this. Luckily most of the songs are strong enough to ignore it. There’s a few snoozers on here, like “Incomplete” but it’s also followed by “Imaginary War”, which is another absolute classic track. I haven’t listened to this in a while and I feel like I overlook it a lot because of how quintessential the last two Jawbreaker albums are but there’s not a lot of bad things you can say about Unfun.

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ALL- Allroy Saves

I’m a huge Descendents fan, Milo Goes To College is maybe the most perfect pop-punk record ever but I’ve never been able to get into ALL for some reason. When they get weird like on opener “Educated Idiot”, I can dig them more than when they’re just playing Descendents songs without Milo. There’s just something about Milo’s lyrics and voice that complete Stevenson, Alvarez and Egerton in a way that nobody else can. For the most part this whole album (and band for that matter) is just very middle of the road, not great but nothing horrible enough for me to skip it.

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Green Day- 39/Smooth

Everyone on the fucking planet knows Green Day, except that girl from “El Scorcho” but how cool was that? This is their first album and it’s really clear by listening to this even at 17, Billie Joe Armstrong just knew how to fucking write great pop songs. Sure, every song on here isn’t perfect like Dookie, but “Going to Pasalacqua”, “16″ and “At The Library” are all fantastic and surprisingly mature songs. And boy, did Green Day ever know exactly what they were doing. It’s insane to me that a group of teenagers could nail down such a distinct sound and keep doing it without any real majors changes for an entire decade. If you polished any of these songs up, they could fit on any pre-American Idiot album. Long story short, I’m jealous of Billie Joe Armstrong for being a punk rock prodigy. 

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The Dwarves- Blood Guts & Pussy

This is probably what your parents think all punk is. Gross, immature, offensive as fuck, foul mouthed and fast. This record fucking rules and I say that as someone who is super critical of just about everything the Dwarves have ever done. But it’s hard to just not fucking love this shit. It just doesn’t take itself seriously enough to get worked up about it. If “Lets Fuck” or “Fuck You Up And Get High” don’t get you stoked, I just don’t know whats wrong with you. This record never slows down, not for one fucking second. It’s just 13 minutes of sloppy, noisy garage punk and it’s perfect.

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Nirvana- Bleach

One of my favorite bands ever. I haven’t listened to Bleach in a long time though, so this is a welcome surprise listen. It’s easy to forget that Nirvana was sludgey punk band at it’s heart because Nevermind is so polished and clean. Really, it’s almost the polar opposite of Bleach. Again, I wasn’t even alive when this was released but “Floyd The Barber” and “Negative Creep” don’t sound like the kind of songs that would inspire a major label to sign a band, even in 2015. Sure, “About A Girl” is about as poppy and radio friendly as you can get but that’s the odd song out here. Most of this stuff is dirty and down-tuned punk with a huge influence from stuff like Sabbath and Led Zeppelin. I mean, yeah the hooks that would make Nevermind one of the most important albums ever are there, but they’re hidden under thick heavy bass and guitar and pounding drums. All in all, this shit rules. People who hate Nevermind and In Utero could probably get into it too.

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Turning Point- 1988-1991

I’m not a huge fan of youth crew. It all sounds exactly the same to me. So I think an hour plus of this might drive me absolutely insane. Currently, I’m sitting at seven songs in and I’m just bored. I could be listening to Gorilla Biscuits right now. I’m not even gonna lie, I’ve skipped through a bunch of this. It’s just too boring. Maybe I’m just not east coast enough to get this.

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Rorschach- Remain Sedate

Again, a band that I’ve heard about a ton but never listened to. I have been fucking up. This shit is angry as hell. Hardcore was pretty stagnant around this time too. Most hardcore kids were making shit that ripped off Fugazi, but uh, Rorschach took obvious cues from bands like Siege, Die Kreuzen and Napalm Death.  This is crushingly heavy, angry and fast and everything that hardcore should be. Listening to this for the first time ever, I can hear the huge influence this had over tons of bands that I love, namely Converge. To be honest, I’m probably gonna go out and buy this shit when I get paid. 

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 Shudder To Think- Funeral At The Movies

I’ve always heard great things about this band but never actually listened to them, and really, I’m conflicted on how I feel about them. Musically it’s really cool but I’m just not a fan of the vocals. From the first notes of “Heaven Here”, you know what you’re getting which is that 90s Dischord sound (that I’ll be hearing tons of through this) but with a much poppier slant. Fugazi would never attempt to pull off hooks like this. You can tell there’s huge influence from earlier bands like Rites Of Spring and I can hear some of The Smiths in here (Especially on “About Three Dreams”). Sometimes I can hear little bits of Jane’s Addiction style flamboyance and a little Queen-ish theatrics. I’m really getting thrown off by the falsetto in this I think. The vocals just feel too pretty for this genre. I don’t know, this whole thing is very middle of the road for me. I don’t hate it at all but I like my post-hardcore more aggressive and dark than this. 

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Pitchfork- Eucalyptus

I’ve never even heard of this band before. I’m super into it though. They sound super angular but also something that with like major label money could’ve had hits in the mid-90s. And I just wikipedia-ed this and found out that it’s John Reis and Rick Froberg, which makes perfect sense now. This sounds like a completely logical place for them to start everything they did with Drive Like Jehu and Hot Snakes. Not a ton to say about this one really, but I will definitely be revisiting it. 

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Fugazi- Repeater

I mean, shit. This band is everything you need to know about the underground punk scene in the 90s. I honestly can’t think of anything that even sounded remotely close to what Fugazi were doing before this. I mean, yeah they took influence from The Minutemen and everything that happened during the Revolution Summer but just this is pure innovation. I can’t comprehend what this must have sounded like to everyone in 1990 but it still sounds fresh and modern, even a quarter century after it’s release. It’s fiercely political (and sadly, lyrics like “When we have nothing left to give, there will be no reason for us to live”, might be more poignant today than they were in 90), funky, aggressive and just down right inspiring. This is one of those records that’s influence and importance could be seen immediately and is still responsible for tons of music that’s being created today. If Fugazi had only made Repeater, they would still be heralded as one of the most important bands of all time.

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Bad Religion- Against The Grain

I mean, what can I say about Against The Grain that hasn’t already been said ten million times? It’s obviously one of the most classic records by one of the top five most important punk bands of the 90s. Obviously, it’s full of wordy political songs, amazing harmonies and genre defining drums, bass and guitar. A million bands have ripped off everything Bad Religion was doing on the perfect trio of records they put out between 1988 and 90 but hardly anyone could even dream of touching them. I personally think that Against The Grain is better than both No Control and Suffer (sorry, Greg Barnett). Every song on here is an absolute classic and fuck, it just makes me want to pick up a dictionary and mosh my ass off.

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Social Distortion- Self titled

God damn it. This band is so boring. Social D has like 6 good songs and all of them are exactly the same. Luckily, half of them are on here...One of which is a god damn Johnny Cash cover. I’m convinced the only people who like Social D are either all 35+ dudes who gave up on punk to be rockabilly dickbags or 14 year old kids who just don’t know any better yet. This one is painful. HOW THE FUCK IS “Story Of My Life” six minutes long? This is punk rock Mikey, you could’ve cut out half of the song because lord knows it doesn’t go anywhere past the second verse. People give Gaslight Anthem shit for being corny but I don’t think there’s anything cornier than that fucking “I strum an outlaw love song” line...And that’s one of the songs that I like. Seriously, just shut up about your goddamn white boy blues and cut it with your stupid fucking guitar riffs that are just the same thing played over and over.

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Fear of a Punk Decade

This is a blog in which I’ll listen to every record from the Fear Of A Punk Decade playlist which was made from an excellent feature that AV Club did last year. I’m sure I’m gonna find some stuff that I love that I haven’t heard before and revisit some records that I haven’t listened to since high school. I’ll also have to listen to Social Distortion and that’s gonna suck but hey, whatever.