 |
|
|
|
|
| Can't find Razorcake at your favorite store? Lend us a hand and we'll send you a free issue. |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
 | Razorcake will send you one free issue if you ask your librarian if they would carry Razorcake in their stacks. (This offer is good for both traditional libraries and independent libraries.) To get the free issue, you must send us the librarian's name and email and the library's postal address. We will then contact them directly and donate a subscription to them. U.S. libraries only, due to postage. | |
|
|
|
|
|
| | 
Record Reviews1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50 51 52 53 54 55 56 57 58 59 60 61 62 63 64 65 66 67 68 69 70 71 72 73 74 75 76 77 78 79 80 81 82 83 84 85 86 87 | 0-9| A| B| C| D| E| F| G| H| I| J| K| L| M | | N| O| P| Q| R| S| T| U| V| W| X| Y| Z| < Prev Section | Next Section >  RSS Feed
SPIDERS 4 EYES:
Songs for Nobody: 7”
I just got done taking a shit while reading the Maximum Rock ‘n’ Roll issue focusing on Steve Ignorant’s tour with a Crass cover band. All the punks are up in arms, “Oh my god, the legacy of Crass! What does this say about the heroes we worship, blah, blah, blah.” The whole thing reminded me how laughably flawed this whole punk rock thing is. Hell, I even bought the issue to see how the mess would unfold. I ended up just having a laugh, but, I, myself, am guilty. After reading, I played Songs for Nobody again. Out of my speakers came the ugly, alienated, discordant punk that brings it all back home. It reminds me of a time when a sellout was shrugged off as a sellout and the punks had better things to do, like cut themselves and put their fists through glass. Punks had real stuff to deal with like crippling depression and self-doubt. Alienation and hatred of their surroundings. This was before they were old enough to recognize that these feelings would always be there and found better ways of dealing with them. Before they were so easily distracted by trivia like the justifications of some smug, old fart anarcho wanker from England. On the record, Johny’s voice is ugly, sounding like he hasn’t slept for weeks. It sounds like he drank black coffee and stared at the wall for weeks. The guitar sounds like a buzzsaw, raw and ripping through the songs. These are songs for nobody. They shout into a void. Each song, a raw, furious soul grenade. It’s wretched, anti-melodic and the core of what punk is about. Or what punk was about... before the scene got too big, too comfortable, and made time for bullshit.
–Craven (Cannibal Friends)
| |
|
SPIDERS, THE:
Glitzkrieg: CD
“Shitzkrieg,” more likely. Rotten thru and thru with the marginally camouflaged ick of Rock Orthodoxy. Is there even one good band in Austin? BEST SONG: i actually like “The Invasion” quite a bit; then again, i like that Lenny Kravitz song they play over the PA at basketball games as well. BEST SONG TITLE: “Alive with Pleasure” FANTASTIC AMAZING TRIVIA FACT: On the insert photograph, drummer Gary First is actually second from the left.
–Rev. Norb (Acetate)
| |
|
SPINNING HEADS:
Change the Game: LP
"Fuck, this is good!" I actually said that out loud to nobody when I was listening to this record. It's brutal, heavy hardcore with a real metally edge. You know how you'll listen to Dillinger Escape Plan and think, "Wow, this band would be really good if they'd quit showing off and just rock." That's sorta what this band sounds like. Excellent production and songwriting alike, I never got bored during any song. I'm surprised they're from France, but that just makes them that much cooler. If I was gonna listen to something to get pumped up for a lawnmower race, I'd listen to this.
–ben (Sedition)
| |
|
SPINOFFS:
Street Rock Stars: CD
Some pretty strong punky pop with some pretty banal lyrics.
–Jimmy Alvarado (Black Market)
| |
|
SPINOFFS, THE:
Stayin’ Alive: 7”
This slab of wax was actually supposed to be released by the legendary distro/label Mutant Pop Records. But one thing led to another and the label went into a second hibernation. It’s Alive, much like a young Indiana Jones, rescued the plates from crypts of pop punk (complete with etchings like “I LIKE SHORT SONGS!”—dude!) and released it on yummy orange vinyl. Not only that...but this is the type of awesome shit with hand claps and on-fire guitar solos you expect from It’s Alive. I recommend the shit out of this.
–Mr. Z (It’s Alive)
| |
|
SPIRAL:
Mind Trip in A Minor: CD
It can be rather cool when a musical work can evoke a sense of time or place. I suspect the fellows in Spiral were well aware of this when making this disc. Mind Trip in A Minor plays like a musical triptych taking the listener through a quasi-psychedelic voyage through the desert of the mind. The whole thing plays like a concept album of sorts. The tracks are listed as parts one through nine as opposed to just song numbers. If you ever saw Oliver Stone’s The Doors, there was a scene of the Doors wandering around the desert tripping out on psychedelics. This disc feels like the musical equivalent of that scene. As far as the music itself goes, the nine parts tend to be fairly passive affairs with hints of metallic guitar work weaved in for good measure. I personally found the atmospheric, instrumental tracks to be more enjoyable than the ones featuring vocals. All in all, not too bad if you dig soundtracks and psychedelic stuff.
–Garrett Barnwell (Spiral, thespiral.bandcamp.com)
| |
|
SPIRES:
Flowers and Fireworks: LP
Like some post-rock, metal (to a point), and screamo, it must be done well for me to care at all. That said, though I would call this a screamo album overall, there is enough variance on that theme with the post-rock and metal bits to keep Flowers interesting. In fact, it seems that Spires owe more to bands like Explosions In The Sky than any band from the screamo genre. Spires earlier work was more grinding metalcore than anything else; much of that is abandoned on this album for a more melodic screamo bent. The weakest part of this album comes from the group vocals. They aren’t often, which is nice, but one of the few instances in which they do occur, they are rather off-putting. The music settles to a calm point. It seems as though the vocalist is about to make a confession or breakdown into a mania—something that expresses solitude and loneliness—but instead come these other voices joining him, which seem inconsistent with what is actually at hand. Let those who feel the same join in live, but the album is for the band. Still, it’s not enough to detract from the album’s overall worth. Pretty all right.
–Vincent Battilana (Hive, Inkblot, no address)
| |
|
SPIRIT OF DANGER:
Self-titled: 7"
Four songs featuring heavily distorted guitars and vocals with loads of echo. There is a hint of grunge or ‘90s Alternative Tentacles to the song structures and sound. “Rats and Trash” is the most driving on the record. I would like that song except that it has an intro. The song moves and shakes. The intro loses me. But I’m not big on intros, so I may be out of my element. “Broke and Alone” is a simpler song that starts in high gear. It’s about a guy named “Johnny.” That appeals to me on some level. If you can’t learn anything from a story about a guy named Johnny in a rock and roll song, then you’re missing out on life lessons. These guys keep the energy up, but it’s not my thing.
–Billups Allen (spiritofdanger.bandcamp.com)
| |
|
SPIRIT OF DANGER:
Self-titled: 7" EP
This debut from a hardcore NYC quatro pulls from British outfits splicing Discharge and GBH with Nik Fiend vocals. The offspring being four melodic hardcore cuts built on tight guitar riffs and vocals that oughta get you in the pit. “Broke and Alone” and “Rats and Trash,” bearing another likeness to GBH, show off the beauty in simplicity with a classic verse, chorus, rinse, repeat song structure. Absolutely solid throughout, this is getting heavy rotation at Casa Kristen. For those that dig ‘80 U.K. punk. Recommended.
–Kristen K (spiritofdanger.bandcamp.com)
| |
|
SPIT ON YOUR GRAVE:
2005 Demo: CD-R
Tough-guy hardcore with enough metal to result in an average song length of two minutes, which calculates to an excess of approximately a minute and a half, according to chapter thirteen, section five, line seventeen of The Hardcore Handbook on Song Lengths and Footwear Fashion. Nice to know that backyard bands sound pretty much the same in other parts of the country, too.
–Jimmy Alvarado (figthingchancemd@hotmail.com)
| |
|
SPIT ON YOUR GRAVE:
2005 Demo: CD-R
Burly Baltimore HC that, at its best, brings to mind early Paint It Black. It’s a lot more tough guy/crew/stabbed-in-the-back than I go for, but the vocals are good and the playing is solid. We’ll see what happens when they get a record out. They are teetering right on the line of being really good and getting lost in the pack of tough and burly East Coast hardcore.
–Mike Frame (fightingchancemd@hotmail.com)
| |
|
SPITALFIELD:
The Cloak & Dagger Club: CDEP
Oh sure, it starts off nice - all ringing guitars that portend nothing but Grade-A rock'n'roll in a big fucking way - but like most of the mercifully short dates I've had here, it takes a screeching turn for the worse after a few seconds - literally. After about twenty seconds of guitar work which raised my hopes, it dropped into an underwhelming impersonation of, alternately, The Get Up Kids (only this time with distortion) and Avril Lavigne. I'll cop to owning GUK albums and I'll also cop to throwing this unoriginal piece of shit into the sell pile. Before I moved to central Illinois, I had the impression that it was a hotbed of indie activity; that - since Polyvinyl was so damn close, since Chicago produced some of the greatest bands to ever rock the face of the Earth (Pegboy, Naked Raygun and The Arrivals to name only a few) - the scene would rule. After some serious disabusing (I actually considered filing assault charges when my erroneous ideas were so brutally kicked to the curb), I've realized that this place is a hotbed of bandwagons. I don't care if these guys just recorded for Victory - they still sound like every other shitty emo band with rockist tendencies and stadium show dreams. They still make Night Ranger and Poison seem to have the humanist insight and attention to poignant detail exhibited by Leonard Cohen and Tom Waits. And with that in mind, is it any wonder that I've been listening to Leadbelly and Lonnie Johnson?
–Puckett (Sinister)
| |
|
SPITALFIELD:
The Cloak & Dagger Club: CDEP
Oh sure, it starts off nice – all ringing guitars that portend nothing but Grade-A rock’n’roll in a big fucking way – but like most of the mercifully short dates I’ve had here, it takes a screeching turn for the worse after a few seconds – literally. After about twenty seconds of guitar work which raised my hopes, it dropped into an underwhelming impersonation of, alternately, The Get Up Kids (only this time with distortion) and Avril Lavigne. I’ll cop to owning GUK albums and I’ll also cop to throwing this unoriginal piece of shit into the sell pile. Before I moved to central Illinois, I had the impression that it was a hotbed of indie activity; that – since Polyvinyl was so damn close, since Chicago produced some of the greatest bands to ever rock the face of the Earth (Pegboy, Naked Raygun and The Arrivals to name only a few) – the scene would rule. After some serious disabusing (I actually considered filing assault charges when my erroneous ideas were so brutally kicked to the curb), I’ve realized that this place is a hotbed of bandwagons. I don’t care if these guys just recorded for Victory – they still sound like every other shitty emo band with rockist tendencies and stadium show dreams. They still make Night Ranger and Poison seem to have the humanist insight and attention to poignant detail exhibited by Leonard Cohen and Tom Waits. And with that in mind, is it any wonder that I’ve been listening to Leadbelly and Lonnie Johnson?
–Puckett (Sinister)
| |
|
SPITALFIELD/DON'T WORRY ABOUT IT:
Split: LP
DWAI suffer from trying to be goofy and woah-woahy, like Gorilla Biscuits playing a senior prom in a Sha-Na-Na '50s style. Innocuous, as confusing as it is annoying, but ultimately bland. Not so good. The more I listened to it, the less I liked it. Spitalfield: Harmless pop that has its moments but largely solely repeats the good parts until over and over until it gets boring. Dude, I think my tolerance for second-tier pop punk just bottomed out. Even the hypnotizing yellow and blue swirls in the wax aren't convincing me otherwise.
–Todd Taylor (Walk in Cold)
| |
|
SPITFIRES, THE:
Three: CD
Okay. I don’t ask for a lot. I think that the requirements for being called “punk” are not as difficult as many make them out to be. And I think that if a band gets interviewed on MTV of their own volition, they are not a punk band. Does this mean Green Day isn’t a punk band anymore? Yes. Does this mean that Spitfires aren’t a punk band? Yes. Come on, haven’t you heard “MTV Get off the Air”? Send this to Spin or something, dude. Oh, and while I am it, fuck press kits. This is General Mills test marketing or something. I don’t know. Who needs it?
–Maddy (Longshot/Scratch)
| |
|
SPITS, THE:
2006 European Tour: LP
You know The Spits, right? One of their songs plays every time you crack open a PBR. Spits next stop: Rock Hall of Fame, fuckers. Live albums seem more for Frampton and Kiss, so doesn’t it make sense that The Spits would follow those two? Spits already got stage dancers (fat guys) and explosions (bottle rockets) so a live album had to be coming. Live albums have a band’s best songs (all the Spits songs are good) and the band is playing their best since they’re on tour (at one point, they ask Sean if he remembers “Remote Control” at all, the song they’ve been playing since 1995). I love all the Spits stuff so it’s easy to like this, a quick collection of their sour gum punk from live shows and a six-song stint on WMFU. Also includes three live KBD cover songs from The Kids, Black Easter and Crap Detectors, for that “this is still a new album” feel, like when Kiss had that fourth side of Alive II. Recording is pretty darn good for live (bar) sound, and the WMFU recording is great! –Fast, tight, clean. I think this is already out of print, unless you find a Spit.
–Speedway Randy (P. Trash )
| |
|
SPITS, THE:
2006 European Tour: 12” 45
Twelve Spits classics recorded live at various locales, all featuring the band’s archetypical sound: Drums reminiscent of a machine gun high on cough syrup, accompanied by a persistent harangue of corrupted but highly linear buzz and fuzz and voltage, plus vocals that sound like a retarded robot singing bad opera. The compressed acoustics of the live environment suit the band’s sound to a T (whatever exactly that means); i would go so far as to say that this type of recording is such a good fit that this might actually be the quintessential Spits album, if such a thing reasonably exists. Fuck you, monarchy! BEST SONG: “Nuclear Bomb” BEST SONG TITLE: “Spit Me Out” FANTASTIC AMAZING TRIVIA FACT: This is the only Spits album i can think of that isn’t named “The Spits.”
–Rev. Norb (P. Trash)
| |
|
SPITS, THE:
19 Million A.C. EP: CD
Punk rock has always claimed itself to be a sanctuary for society’s rejects and unwanted dorks—the more “organic” of the cultural misfits—as well as the more dashing self-made rebels and troublemakers. Unfortunately, punk isn’t always as open minded as it would like everyone to think and occasionally the natural born oafs get summarily shoved aside by the showier malcontents. So while all manner of crusties and street punks and whatnot bark and seethe and use their ass crayons to mark their various territories, bands like the Spits are content celebrating the happy dumb fun of the Thoroughbred Clod. To get an idea of their sound, picture the most maladroit schmub you knew in highschool—braces, pimples, laughable haircut, diapers and all—and imagine him eating a few handfuls of shoe polish and then doing a wonderfully inept Joey Ramone impersonation. Add some crude Ramones/Misfits type guitar riffs and throw in some random helpings of Devo-ish keyboards that sound like robots shaving or someone’s annoying little kid playing with the tuning knob on a transistor radio and you’ve pretty much got the Spits. And on top of all that good wholesome stuff, they’ve got some pretty damn funny lyrics, to boot. All-in-all, this disc—which is a reissue of their 19 Million AC 7” with fifteen whopping “bonus” tracks—is pure lo-fi, low-brow fun. With Ramones dropping like flies these days, we need someone to pick up the Dork Gauntlet and run and trip with it. I can think of no one better than the Spits.
–aphid (Dirtnap)
| |
|
SPITS, THE:
Self-titled: CD EP
While maybe not as
immediately satisfying as its two predecessors, the boys’ third self-titled CD
is chock full of the same thick-headed brilliance we have come to love, and
they still sound like the Ramones’ autistic cousins, which is a plus no matter
how you slice it. I can think of no better way to start the new year than by
blasting this bad boy with astonishing frequency.
–Jimmy Alvarado (Dirtnap)
| |
|
SPITS, THE:
Self-titled: CD
The boys from Washington return to give the kids more thick-skulled thud punk with just a smidge of keyboards. As can be expected, the resulting tuneage provided here is top notch, mandatory listening for anyone with even a passing interest in punk rock.
–Jimmy Alvarado (Slovenly)
| |
|
SPITS, THE:
Self-titled: CD
Mid-tempo, primal and funny punk rock that flat-out stomps much of the competition into the ground. I’m particularly impressed with the fact that they are able to remind me of the Ramones without sounding like a Ramones rip off. Now that takes some doing, and for that alone, I send this along to you with the highest of recommendations. -
–Jimmy Alvarado (Nickel & Dime)
| |
|
SPITS, THE:
Self-titled: CD
Take everything you like about the Ramones and Devo, fuse them together and you’ve got the Spits. The songs are head down, fist forward, three-chord assaults laced with keyboards (that’s right, keyboards) that saturate the songs with runny-nosed nostalgia. There is nothing bouncy about these keyboards. On the contrary, it’s like air coming out of a hot air balloon mid-transit. The keyboards are there to make the song heavier. In the course of a song you might hear five, six different notes, tops. And we’re talking whole notes, as in the finger comes down on the key and doesn’t come off again for a full measure. Then it fulfills the loop and repeats itself, again and again and again, building momentum and tearing it apart. Like a train wreck. Like a robot’s brainwaves. Like a fucked-up punk rocker who “can’t get high offa alcohol no more.” The keyboards turns songs like “Saturday Nite,” “Remote Kontrol” and “Tired & Lonely” into dirges. The progressions may be predictable but The Spits are a brutal reminder that just because you know the train is coming doesn’t make it hurt any less when it runs over your sorry ass.
–jim (Nickel and Dime)
| |
|
SPITS, THE:
IV: LP
Listening to the Spits is riding with the Spits. Riding with The Spits is like being inside a beat-up late ‘70s Nova where both the driver and navigator are both barely lucid enough to not sideswipe a church, always arrive at their target destination a little frayed, but are capable of delivering of a collection of sharp razors. (This time, a great album of ten songs.) Somehow, through simple, well-worn denim jacket aesthetics—Ramones, paranoia, punk-as-a-gang, smelly armpit, no-tech fidelity that’s absolutely clear—are able to simultaneously create both the exact same album as the previous three, yet be able to expand on them like mold growing on the inside of a record sleeve that gets into your ears every time the vinyl’s pulled out, plopped down, and spun around. (Here’s my theory: the Spits have one album. They’re still making it. This is the fourth installment of a larger work. Thus, the same name for each album so far.) My hand’s raised. I’m a Spits fan.
–Todd Taylor (Thrift Store / Recess)
| |
|
SPITS, THE:
self-titled: CD
Apparently these guys are going the Peter Gabriel route by putting out a bunch of self-titled albums on different labels. As for the music, imagine the Ramones with an abundance of tongue-in-cheek idiocy and a thrift store keyboard. This album, their third, isn’t as immediately catchy as the last one (the one with the retard in the wheelchair on the cover), but when it comes to the Spits, who really has time to split hairs?
–Josh (Dirtnap)
| |
|
SPITS, THE:
Self-titled – but I’m calling it Five: CD
Well, I think it’s time to say it. The Spits are—whatever generation this is—Ramones. They simultaneously make the same record over and over again. But that’s a fuckin’ lie. Because there’s always some new mutation radioactively lurking from under the bed or zip-zap lightning bolting from an airborne creature’s eye with each self-titled record. They’ve taken back the alleys. They’re now in the water supply and spray painting dongs on the top of Mt.Shasta. Like mold culture spreading, changing colors, and sprouting hair on the forgotten last slice of pizza rattling around in the box, the Spits have harnessed the power of readymades-made-dangerous. All you—as the listener—have to do is decide to chomp on down instead of throwing The Spits away like an empty box. Pupils dilate. Motor skills slacken. Craving for glue increases. Durable punk for these weird-ass times. Who knew The Spits would have such legs, be so prolific, be some of the last men on earth? Great radiation-mutant rock.
–Todd Taylor (In The Red, intheredrecords.com)
| |
|
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50 51 52 53 54 55 56 57 58 59 60 61 62 63 64 65 66 67 68 69 70 71 72 73 74 75 76 77 78 79 80 81 82 83 84 85 86 87 | 0-9| A| B| C| D| E| F| G| H| I| J| K| L| M | | N| O| P| Q| R| S| T| U| V| W| X| Y| Z| < Prev Section | Next Section > | |
|
|
|
|
| If you live in the Los Angeles area and want to help us out, let us know. |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
| Get monthly notifications of new arrivals and distro and special offers for being part of the Razorcake army. |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
