MORE SMOKE // TOTAL CEREAL

 

Noisecore Argentine vs. Noisecore Utah in an eight song, four minute grudge match. 

MORE SMOKE // TOTAL CEREAL

ENDLESS STRUGGLE

 

Remember the liner notes on the GRIMPLE EP? I think about the note that read "fuk in every song" while I listen to the first (?) tape from Salt Lake Drunk Punks ENDLESS STRUGGLE, and I wish that they had included a warning that read "Oi! in every song" because then the casual listener might be able to prepare themselves a little better. Perhaps you remember the full length on Charged that dropped around the turn of the century - that record put them in a league with VIRUS, CASUALTIES and the like but my ears hear something closer to DEFIANCE. The songs are a little more ridiculous perhaps; "Red Alert" (me and the boys going out tonight / something something start a fight), "Fault" (it's not my fault), "Beer" (uh....beer), right into "Let's Start A Riot" (just as self explanatory as "Beer," honestly) and honestly this is where ENDLESS STRUGGLE kinda win. It's so fukkn simple, the appeal is so baseline and easy....you just can't go wrong. A note indicates that the bones tracks on the flip are from an Upcoming 7" but I don't know if that record ever materialized. "Punk Rock Girl" (not a cover), "Lost Generation," "Just To Survive" - clearly they figured out what worked and just just kept rolling with it. Tape starts to disintegrate during towards the end...almost sounds like you're watching four studded warriors fading into a hazy orange sunset on the mean residential streets of Salt Lake City.

ENDLESS STRUGGLE

SAFETY KIDS

Play It Smart has brought me great joy over the years, harnessing every ridiculous '80s drug paranoia trope and feeding the propaganda to a bunch of child actors is a winning combination in any reality. But in a reality where grown ups' greatest fear is Gregger getting drugs shoved into his mouth by his "best friend," Janeen Brady's SAFTY KIDS are just a wholesome good time. Brady was a child singer herself, cruising the LDS circuit and singing the Word. She embarked on her own career as a young adult, made a bunch of Mormon babies, and then dropped a series of children's records that landed her an invite to Reagan's White House because...well, because Nancy. Duh. But with a discography filled with easy listening religious diarrhea, SAFETY KIDS is truly her crowning achievement. Nine uplifting sing alongs with genius skits that follow our pre-pubescent heroes as they navigate the danger and confusion that is a world filled with illegal narcotics. 

PLAY IT SMART: STAY SAFE FROM DRUGS

=================

Why do kids do drugs?

....I don't know.

Well, here's what I found out: people put chemicals in their bodies because they don't like how they are feeling. 

Sometimes, I don't like how I feel.

DISASTRONAUT

Heavy guitar rock rooted in the shit that crossed over into college town indie circa early '90s. We're talking GUZZARD, CHOKEBORE, early SubPop and/or AmRep with subtle sprinkles of Homestead. The recording is just a little too hollow (or raw?) to really pull off the style but, not surprisingly, that's kinda why I like it. The focus is on the guitars and on the jam, with vocal sections serving more as interludes between periods of ferociously heavy space rock. This is rarely the thing I need in my life, but there are times when it passes me by - this 2015 DISASTRONAUT tape is one of those times. 

DISASTRONAUT