7"s! (Ribbon Stage / Lost Cat / Romero)

Things are looking up, finally. By looking up, of course, I mean a bunch of ace new 45s have appeared or are imminent. Not Unloved's pals at Monorail Music did the intros to New Yorkers Ribbon Stage yesterday. On the evidence of "Favorite Girl" (from their contribution to  K Records' IPU series), lovers of amped-up guitar pop that's not over-worked or over-wrought (hey...that's me!) have a new crush to set their hearts racing.

Outro Records has been busy over the last couple of years cranking out a slew of fine throwback garage punk records (The Premonitions, The Night Times, etc.). Their latest 7" to land at UK distros is the mighty fine "Don't Need A Man" by Lost Cat. The lead track makes me miss The Bobbyteens but "He's Gone" on the flip is moodier and stands up to repeated plays. I'm pretty sure you could you could sneak it unnoticed onto an early volume of Girls In The Garage without too many listeners filing a complaint with their MP.

Julian at Drunken Sailor does sterling work keeping on top of what's going on in the worlds of punk, hardcore, trash, power pop etc. so lazy lumps like Not Unloved don't have to.  For example, Australian group Romero's debut single, "Honey" (Cool Death), has been out since February but only landed with a bump in my world when Julian stocked it. It's a zesty concoction comprised of Blondie-worthy guitar lines and impassioned vocals that is clinically proven to cause fist-pumping and the shouting of "What happened at the discotheque?" . It's somewhere between Sheer Mag and The Strokes but less rock than the former and way more fun than the latter. Turn it up!

Protruders "No More" 7"

Italy's Goodbye Boozy cranks out an admirable but unmanageable (not to mention unaffordable) number of 7"s so I have to be choosy. Within seconds of hearing "No More" by Canadian chaos-bringers Protruders, however, I was scrambling to Paypal Julian at Drunken Sailor Mailorder the pennies to secure a copy. "No More" is a sandwich of 2 blasts of premium blend 142mph scrap-punk either side of a minute or so of derailing noise. Mayhem seldom sounded more fun!

Public Service announcement

Mary Anne Hobbs just finished her 6Music show with Public Enemy into Public Image Ltd. Unfortunately, Shaun Keaveny didn't pick up the baton and start his with Glasgow's Public Service. Talk about a missed opportunity to give yr audience a jolt! "I'm Gonna Kill That Man" is the first 45 by Public Service and inaugurates Glasgow's newest, fiercest label, Anxious Music:



Public Service are a fearsome prospect live; all screams, marauding and lacerating guitars. It's hard to capture that level of ferocity in a studio but this 7" makes good on their live promise and certainly pulls no punches. If you dug Not Unloved's recent Current Affairs 7", you're gonna need this 45 immediately. Glasgow sure is coming up with the goods right now!

There's a launch for the 7" this Saturday (12th, January) at Glasgow's, Old Toll Bar on Paisley Road West. Full details here.

The Salvation Army "Mind Gardens" (New Alliance)

Around Black Friday last year (2018 - yikes!) I saw a bunch of Stateside folks posting the cover art of an lp featuring The Dream Syndicate, The Bangles, Rain Parade and The Three O'Clock covering each other's songs. Hopefully, it'll show up at some point in UK-based record shops (there's no way I'm handing over next month's pay cheque to the US Postal Service to get a double lp sent across the Atlantic) as the concept behind it is sound. Reading the name The Three O'Clock again gave me the wee jolt I needed to finally pick up a copy of the sole 7" by that group''s precursor, The Salvation Army. "Mind Gardens" (New Alliance, 1981) zips along at skatepunk speed while Michael Quercio, masquerading as Ricky Start, sings in a cute, interestingly-accented manner (the way he sings is 'goes' and 'grows' is so endearing!). I love it for all the same reasons I love early Redd Kross or that first lp by The Descendents. 

The surprisingly poignant b-side is equally great and possibly even more sing-along-able:

The Trend "Band Aid"

Don't you love studio chat on records? Thinking back, I'm pretty sure the reason why I love it so much can be attributed to Paulie Chastain's endearing "Hey, Mr. Engineer man" at the start of  his adorable "Raining All Day". There's a fine example of studio chat on the astounding "Band Aid" by The Trend where the young guitarist starts playing the wrong song. Something about his response to being corrected doesn't ring true, suggesting it might be scripted. Whatever the truth, it's a fine way to start a track. "Band Aid" is a knockout punch of a song, full of bite and lovable ineptitude (the brief guitar solo shambles along like a shopping trolley missing a wheel). "Band Aid" was a YouTube recommendation and I fully expected to pay 20 quid for it on discogs. A quick search, however, revealed that it was a $1000+ single. It just goes to show how little Not Unloved knows about punk! Thankfully, Rome's Hate Records reissued it in 2016. Turning up a copy proved to be tricky, Hate having long since sold out of it, but Slovenly's online store eventually came up trumps. Now to play the a-side...

Hard Left at The 13th Note (27/11/2016)

Glaswegians!  There's a rare chance to witness Hard Left's oppositional '77 punk barrage downstairs in The 13th Note a week on Sunday.  Come along and pay your respects to Mike Schulman and Stewart Anderson and thank them profusely for all those incredible Slumberland Records and 555 Recordings/Emotional Response releases that have illuminated the last quarter century.  Two of Glasgow's most abrasive and exhilarating groups will be sharing the bill with them: Kaspar Hauser and Anxiety.  Between the mayhem, I'll be playing some records and endeavouring not to kill the vibe.  It'll be ferocious but that seems like a suitable response to how 2016 has panned out.

There are Facebook events for the Glasgow gig as well as the Demand The Impossible tour.

The Petticoats "Normal"

The sarcastic two fingers up to settling for a life of domesticity of The Petticoats' "Normal" was one of many highlights of Stewart and Jen from Boyracer's killer "Kitchen Sounds #1" podcast in July 2008.  With it being from 1980, however, I figured that an original 7" would be tricky to track down so didn't try to and over time kinda forgot about it.  Then, a few weeks ago whilst rummaging about on Group Tightener's site*, I spied that Fungi Girls had also included it on their rather fine mix.  After a bit of internet diddling (it's a compulsion!) I'd turned up a relatively pricey N(ear)M(int) ebay copy and Stef Petticoat's discography page on which, crucially, the entry for "Normal" wasn't followed by the words 'no longer available'.  One email, a week and some exemplary packaging (much appreciated, Stef!) later and I had a perfect copy spinning on my turntable.  Hurrah!  It's a real buzz to hear those clanking guitars and Stef's refusenik vocals turned way up loud and, since I don't currently have any more Petticoats records to play, I'll be spending the next wee while in the company of The Nixe, Kleenex and Lung Leg.  Magic!

{get in touch with Stef here to bag yr very own copy to cherish!}

* - I was keen on getting their Twerps 7" but 18.50 USD for one 7" kinda prices me outta the game unless it's the best thing since "Baby Honey"...

Agitated Romantic

After an unexpected power pop/vintage punk epiphany earlier this year, I guess the time was right for me to encounter crack Australian power pop troupe The Scientists.  The impetus to finally seek out some of their work came upon spying that Moon Duo's* Agitated Records was reissuing "Frantic Romanitc" for Record Store Day.

From the intro's first Link Wray indebted strum and the first chant of "It was romance!" I was smitten and that was before I'd fully digested the unexpectedly cute lyrics.  Take, for example, the opening verse: 

Met her at a dance; it was romance!

Took her by the hand; it was romance!

Gave her my drink; it was romance!

Told her I loved her; it was rooomance!

Remember, these are not Talulah Gosh lyrics!  Only the most tediously macho oaf could hear them and not melt a little.  Guitar solos are usually a sore point round these parts but not this time; it's bendy enough to be interesting but never so noodly that it's unlistenable.  It didn't look like the 7" was flying off Monorail's shelves during Saturday's Record Store Day mania which is a shame but I, for one, couldn't countenance not buying it once I'd heard it.  "Frantic Romantic" marked Agitated's second brilliant Record Store Day reissue following last year's release of this bratty, wild-eyed masterpiece by The Electric Eels:

Thanks Agitated!

* - Moon Duo already demonstrated their love of The Scientists by recording a tremendous (better than the original?) cover of the pained, brooding "Set It On Fire" for the flip of last year's "Catch As A Catch Can" 7" (also Agitated).