Death Strike - Fuckin Death (1985)

It should be obvious by now that I am a fan of primitive things. The absence of technicality reduces songs to an intuitive experience. "Does this work or not?" Although it is risky to strip things so bare, there is also potential for greatness in doing so. When it works, it really works. This is the zen meditation of proto-death metal. Let all riffs drift away until you're only left with power chords and Discharge-style drums. Acknowledge other thoughts, but let them pass into the abyss.

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Farid al-Atrash - Compilation

So, I don't know anything about Farid al-Atrash or about Arabian music in general, but this was left at my old apartment by the previous tenants, and it is fucking amazing. I'll post a few more things like this once I figure out how to rip a tape and once I find a computer that can read tricky CDs ("Big Pimpin" content forthcoming).

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Negative Approach - Total Recall

Another issue of Jettison Quarterly has hit the internet. Once again, I've written about cool records, and I also did an interview with former Punk Planet editor and current Cell Stories mastermind Dan Sinker. Check it out, ya dingus. Here's one of my reviews from a previous issue of Jettison.

Negative Approach is possibly the most pissed band I’ve ever heard. This is the musical tradition of The Stooges passed to the next decade: your lizard brain screaming disillusionment with civilization. What separates Negative Approach from other hardcore bands of the early 80s (besides their palpable ferocity) is their effective use of mid-paced rhythms and recursive phrases. Riffs morph sinuously from verse to chorus, referring back while always driving forward into crashing bursts of rhythmic intensity. While most of these songs ostensibly lack dynamics, tension and release are achieved through a manipulation of structure and managing expectations of how a phrase will terminate. As long as humans are crammed together in cities and neurotransmitters are thrown out of balance, this music will be relevant.

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