Futures & Pasts | MRR #408
I’ve been doing this monthly column in MRR for over two years now; life is wild. Still not punk enough for the punks, yours truly, Grass Widow & Y Pants-listening “cool” librarian. This one’s from Maximum Rocknroll #408 (May 2017).
Last year’s Subnormal Girls LP compilation was one of the best archival punk collections in recent memory, and Waiting Room Records are back with a second volume of international femme-punk obscurities from 1979 to 1984. There’s a handful of selections this time around that have been included in some other really great (and for the most part, still in-print) reissue efforts over the last few years, but if you’ve slept on picking up, say, the Life It’s A Joke/We Live In A System anthology LP that Softspot Music did for spiky synth-wielding Belgian anarcho-punks KEBAB, or Danger Records’ 7” re-release of the three songs that Austria’s PLASTIX had originally contributed to the Die Tödliche Dosis compilation in 1981, this might be the motivation that you need to finally remedy that. A few other highlights from the compilation’s “previously rescued from the dustbin of history” faction: “Herpes Simplex” by hallucinatory minimalist French No Wave duo ROSA YEMEN, whose amazing 1979 EP was included in the expanded 2015 reissue of vocalist/guitarist LIZZY MERCIER DESCLOUX’s solo Press Color LP; “Double Acting” from moody Danish art-punks TEE VEE POP (track down their criminally overlooked Only Years anthology LP from 2013!); and a stuttering DIY detournement of the riff from KRAFTWERK’s “The Model” called “Creeps” by Iceland’s Q4U, presented in a slightly later version from the one on Dark Entries’ Q1 1980-1983 LP spanning the band’s progression from rudimentary punks to stark coldwavers.
That being said, the truly deep cuts on Subnormal Girls are what really warrant your attention, not to mention the high cost of postage if you don’t live near Germany. The lone single from mysterious Welsh post-punks VAIN AIMS has been one of my holy grails for awhile, one of those records that is so elusive and rare that I’m not entirely sure it actually exists - feel free to send me a copy to prove me wrong, though! The B-side of that 7” (“Count”) is included here, and it’s an absolutely perfect slice of rough-around-the-edges femme-punk, with a wildly zigzagging bassline, some scratchy guitar and the deadpan recitation of lines as brilliant as “he was the man of my dreams / I think I had a nightmare.” I’ve extolled the virtues of UK DIY one-single wonders OCCULT CHEMISTRY in this column before, and there’s a reason why their song “Fire” is basically a permanent part of my arsenal alongside my MO-DETTES and DELTA 5 records when I DJ out at bars. Other personal faves on this volume include Québécoise punkers TÉRAPI’s jagged new wave ripper “Camisole,” with urgently snapped vocals en français and warbling, ‘60s garage-trash-style organ, and “Lost In Madagascar” by Australia’s ANNE CESSNA & ESSENDON AIRPORT, a totally warped minimal wave classic based around giddy sing-song lyrics nearly obscured by kaleidoscopic buzzes, whirrs and beeps of synth. Yet another essential compilation in this series (with hopefully many more to come), and it’s limited to a mere 300 copies - buy now or cry later! (Waiting Room, waitingroomrecords.bandcamp.com)
Sharp-cornered post-punk with skronky saxophone seems to be enjoying somewhat of a underground renaissance these days (a development that I thoroughly back), although BLANK SQUARE’s sax squeals deviate from the two prevailing influences of most of their peers - namely, the fiery dub/punk synthesis of Rough Trade’s late ‘70s/early ‘80s UK brigade or CONTORTIONS-worshipping No Wave dancefloor deconstruction. Rather, their debut LP Animal I has all of the clenched-jaw intensity of the more art-damaged bands operating on the early ‘80s Southern California/SST Records hardcore axis (okay, maybe just SACCHARINE TRUST), with a tightly-knotted rhythm section pummeling away behind raw-throated shouts and saxophone blurting. But alongside the moments of violent punk whiplash like the breathless 48 seconds of “Put A Lid On It,” there’s also a more foreboding and slow-burning side to BLANK SQUARE (see: “I Was High” and “Empty Head”) that has invited some pretty dead-on comparisons to the FLESH EATERS’ psychedelic hellfire rave-ups that I won’t argue with. Don’t let this one get lost amidst the endless procession of THEE OH SEES records flooding the Castle Face roster. (Castle Face, blanksquared.bandcamp.com)
French quartet SIDA have just released their first LP after a handful of cassette and singles going back to 2010, and whenever I hear people casually dropping names like NERVOUS GENDER or the SCREAMERS in reference to modern synth-punk outfits, this is the sort of terrifyingly unhinged, born-in-flames noise that I always hope for and very rarely actually find. If anything, the synth plays a supporting role here to the seething, snarled delivery of vocalist Maïssa (the brains behind one-woman minimal wave project THÉORÈME), adding a blown-out and appropriately harrowing electronic texture to her spitting and howling. The bleak, serrated sheet-metal noise of “Commercial” and “Le Crève” immediately brings to mind the more punishing and confrontational No Wave faction that included THEORETICAL GIRLS or pretty much anything that LYDIA LUNCH was involved with (particularly TEENAGE JESUS AND THE JERKS/8 EYED SPY), filtered through the distinctly 21st century techno-dystopian nightmare lens of like-minded contemporary French post-punk groups like LE CHEMIN DE LA HONTE and DELACAVE (SIDA shares their drummer with the latter). It’s not all quick flicks of the switchblade here, though - “Enterrement de Vie” grinds on a drone of spin-cycle drumming, synth static and distorted bad trip vocals for a sprawling nine minutes that makes “Death Valley ‘69” sound like the fucking MONKEES. C'est chouette! (Population/Le Turc Mecanique, population-label.bandcamp.com/album/sida)
From the vault of underrated and neglected early ‘80s US post-punk: the VERGE started out around 1980 or 1981 in Albany, New York, which is one of those perfectly nondescript places that I’ve often heard described as being a ideal stand-in for generic city settings in TV and film productions, but otherwise stuck in the overwhelming cultural shadow of New York City. The group’s only release was 1983’s four-song Habitual EP, which completely ignores the frenetic disco-not-disco dance leanings and mangled No Wave freakouts that dominated the NYC underground at the dawn of the ‘80s, aligning itself more closely with the desperate and dissonant post-punk approach of bands like MISSION OF BURMA, NATIVE TONGUE, or even the PROLETARIAT further east down I-90 in Boston - slightly off-kilter rhythms, razor-sharp bass hooks, trebly slashes of guitar, and dual (and sometimes dueling) matter-of-fact vocals. But the VERGE were also obviously affected by the reverberations from UK post-punk’s initial waves, as evidenced by the hyper-angular choppiness and lyrical agitprop of “Tradition” that could pass for an American interpretation of GANG OF FOUR (or is that a proto-FUGAZI?). It kind of blows my mind that none of these songs have found their way onto Hyped to Death’s extensive Homework compilation series chronicling the late ‘70s/early ‘80s US DIY weirdo-punk scene, but picking up those loose threads is essentially why this column exists, right?