It Burns When I Pee

Another addition of the Hades Mining Co. vinyl split series. Noisecore truly is living and breathing healthy on Built To Blast this year. How could it not though with so many "amazing" artists releasing new and interesting records every day. The scene around the world is truly at a fantastic peak right now. One of my personal favorite noisey bands I've noticed from afar is Deathwank from the UK. A ski-mask wearing collective that do a great job at creating an intense buzz of grind. This was one of the records I was most excited to check out from the bunch of HMC. splits. Black vinyl out of 144 copies, 33 RPM.

The Hades Mining Co. side is just awesome. All post-irony aside, this is one of my favorite recordings that they've done. HMC. really are at their best when they're just a straight noisecore band. Operating on traits that I think are what makes the genre great. It's over the top, goofy, and aware of itself and exactly what it's trying to do. Ghoulish, cartoony, bellowing vocals intro the first couple of songs, grunting and belching out the titles among other gibberish. Then they slam into some excellent slop blasts. Nice, bassy recording on this one. The instruments have a real nice crunch to them. The second half is a smattering of nonsense band noise and bizarre samples. There are awkwardly edited samples all over the place, it's great. Where does a song end? When does it start up again? It was a wonderful mess of a session, I had a blast.

Deathwank have been on a very good roll lately with some of their most recent releases (like THIS ONE). I think they have some members from Sufferinfuck, remember them? On here they give us 16 tracks of some hard free grind, with touches of PV influence. The musicians on here are definitely fantastic improvisors, constantly switching through riffs and breaks on a dime. A lot of it actually sounds pretty tight for how free and structureless it is. I can't really call this noisecore per se, since I can actually make out real notes a lot of the time. It reminds me of the old jamming sessions I occasionally have with various people. Just hard riffing and having fun. Not the best recording I've heard from them, but a solid as fuck second half.

I'm a big fan of the cover art. 

This record is still available from CONTINUUM. I recommend it.

~VII

Death Rattle Hummer

I am officially admitting here and now that I am completely done with "unlistenable" formats. Like any vinyl nerd, I get a kick out of weird sized and shaped records. They're strange, and uncommon and certainly cool to have. But at a certain point, I reach a point where I physically can not listen to a record because of it's formatting. For example, I can not play this little 3" lathe cut. It's at this point just basically an art piece I have sitting in my collection (along with all my other 4"-5" records). I know you can wrestle a manual-driven turntable to play records this size, but your boy doesn't have that shit. And I can't pay the big bucks for a fancy ass turntable right now. So here is this piece of art. A 3" black lathe cut record between Hades Mining Co. and Colostomy Baguette? from Australia.

You may be asking yourself, "how much music can you actually put onto a 3" record"?. In Hades Mining Co.'s case, fifteen seconds. Fifteen seconds of the most pointless audio ever cut onto carbon fiber. Half of it is a sample, the other have just solo guitar wanking. It's such shit. Colostomy Baguette? manage to cram in 4 more seconds of ear abuse then HMC. on their side. Some standard fare, sloppy, lo-fi grind that actually manages to have a couple changes in their track. This record actually comes with a download card, so you can  still listen to these songs if you're that tormented. If I payed money for this I would be so mad.

This record comes packages in a very tidy looking, double sided sleeve. Hand numbered out of 97 copies. Once again, this is for true noisefreaks and lovers of all that is dumb.

Cute lil' thing ain't it? Pick this up from CONTINUUM if you dare.

~VII

Adult Diseases

Sometimes in my self-appointed roll as a music critique, I am generously and randomly send wonderful packages from bands or labels in return for me to review their records or tapes on this blog. And given that I rarely buy grind albums anymore because of my severe lack of frivolous online spending, these instances really help keep things going. Even if I do feel undeserving of all the kindness sometimes (gifts are kinda sorta hard for me to accept). The next batch of posts will be regarding the longtime Rochester, NY band Hades Mining Co. and their Father label Continuum Records. Gotta give a big thanks to Continuum operator and HMC member Dave, for very generously supplying me with some of these pretty limited releases. So, thank you Dave.
I figured I'd start with a post about this record. Given it's been obvious how much I enjoy records by our favorite Japanese duo Sete Star Sept. Any new SSS record is welcome into my home, and this one is definitely one of their more interesting 7" splits. Black vinyl, limited to 149 copies on black wax (the rest were on color), 33 RPM.

I've always had my eye on the latest batch of Hades Mining Co. splits. Even though I wasn't that initially impressed with them in brief streams online, they've been working with some cool bands. They're definitely one of those noisecore bands. They're totally oldschool sounding, genre fucking, completely free slopcore noise. One that you could write off as absolute talentless shit for their obvious wankery and fuck-you to actually "writing a song". Or a band you can take in with that great, sort of B-movie experience. Enjoying it for all it's flaws and just having some fun. And you're both right. Because goddamn this is shit, but I definitely do dig it. Four tracks make up Hades Mining Co.'s half. Opening up with a slow as molasses, drumless, doomy bass riff driven opus. Industrial, hissing guitar feedback and occasional soloing are a constant too. Basically sounding like the worst Sunn O))) cover band you've ever heard. HMC have embraced going totally slow and sludgy, which I think helps set them apart. It works better sometimes (definitely in this case) then others. The rest of their side goes more into standard noisecore territory. The second song even features a saxophone (standing ovation), and the band just proceeds to clusterfuck the crap out of anything resembling music. The last track is so lo-fi it literally sounds like a recording, of a recording, recorded and played through a cassette Walkmen.

Sete Star Sept's side was a very interesting and fulfilling listen to me. I love it when SSS record stuff that's a little stranger, more adventurous and creative then the standard noisecore fare. Unfortunately these are usually kept for their VERY limited cassette splits and don't see much vinyl treatment. This batch of songs is definitely in the spirit of this side of the band. The massive opener (taking up more then half the side) consisting of almost riffless bass feedback, with sporadic drum hits from Kiyasu. Sort of reminds me of the last track from their split with Lung Cancer, the feedback almost works as a power electronics instrumental. The next 4 tracks, entitled "Square Root A"-through-"D" are quick instrumental noise bursts, ending with a track that consists solely of Kiyasu's drums and some cartoonish grunts. I've never heard the band be this bizarre and different on any of their 7"s. So that right there says something It's a wild ride, and is one of the more unusual vinyl splits from them that I own.

I always saw the black and white, fold-over cover packaging that Continuum gave their releases and was not impressed. But only because it just looked like photocopied covers on printer paper with low pixel count artwork. But actually no, these are professionally done, sturdy and glossy sleeves. I was very pleasantly surprised! Hades Mining Co. certainly keeps a consistent aesthetic, and I like that a lot.

There were two 7"x7" inserts included for each band. Each one displaying an eye-bleedingly high amount of color in contrast to all this black and white. I kinda honestly wish these were the images for the sleeve, but it's a cool bonus. The test pressings were all adorned with these covers I believe.

This split is still available from the LABEL, and I've started to see it pop up on Discogs. If you feel up to it, dive into this slop. For true noise freaks only.

~VII

Sick Child

Despite my huge, fetishized obsession with the harsh music that comes out of the midwest, particularly Chicago. It took me until two days ago to acquired the ruthless split 7" between Socially Retarded and Daisycutter. It's baffling that it's taken me however many years to actually buy this monster. So much so that I've had friends tell me they were surprised that I didn't already. My love for Chicago filth is known and apparent. Released on Prgnt Records back in 2011, 45 RPM.

Now I bought this strictly for the Socially Retarded side, originally. I've known about Daisycutter, but never actually heard their half. Socially Retarded however still hold a spot as one of my favorite bands, and I've jammed passable MP3 rips of their side for a long time. Finally hearing it on vinyl was everything I had wanted. It's crushing, and disgusting, and the recording honestly doesn't even sound all that different from my beloved rips. Front to back though, it's a perfect five song collection.

In the bloated, rotting corpse pile of noisy/edgy powerviolence bands that have come out in the past five years, Socially Retarded were always one of the bands that performed this style the best. And also the most convincing at that. Seeing how members of SR have also served time in incredible PE groups like Constrictions and Machismo. Their love and blending of harsh electronics with powerviolence is not just done for the sake of cool noise. Opening up with the sleazy, raw PE track "Relations". Which became all the more disgusting once I read the lyrics. The lyrics all around are fantastic, unsafe and coated in perverted obsession. Graphic tales of blood spots, bleached needles, drug abuse, violence, screamed at their rawest from the perfectly suited vocals of Mitch Buller. The impact of song like "Permanent Damage", "Dark Space", and the incredible "Sick Child" is just visceral. Even if it does have the most no-fi recordings of their existence. Goddamn I love this band.

Daisycutter are a band I haven't heard in years. I remember initially hearing them on Myspace back in 2009 or so. I think they were going to do a split with Hooker Spit Windex or something. Anyway, they definitely impressed me back then, and they have held up. Super heavy, Despise You/Benümb influenced fastcore. With an equally rough, and super bass heavy recording. There is little to no presence of any powerviolence tropes in Daisycutter's side. The punch's and kick's here are from the sharp riff changes and fast tempo's. But keeping in typical midwest fashion, the image here is negative and grim. The vocals also give off a bit of a macho/tough guy delivery, which doesn't thrill me that much in this case, but I'll allow it. All in all, Daisycutter's side definitely doesn't have the same impact or response I get from Socially Retarded, but it's by all means incredibly solid.

This is the standard edition of which 300 copies were made. A one-sided, silkscreened fold-over cover with a lyric insert. There also exists a more limited edition with chipboard covers and different color ink. That could be fun to hunt for. Also, idk if other people had this problem but my center labels are reversed.

This record is still stupidly easy to find for a good price. If you haven't experienced Socially Retarded's filthy brilliance, you need to buy this. And then seriously consider spending the 20+ dollars for the Sea Of Shit split.

~VII

Disgusting Taste

I have not been very good at keeping up with my beloved Archagathus very well this year. Truly, the pains of being an avid collector of an active-as-fuck band like the this are heavy. And the Prince of Mince has definitely not been slowing down. They released the brutal, gore worshipping full length "Dehumanizer" last year, and the usual spree of crucial splits with bands like Sordo, Lt. Dan, Sete Star Sept, and Carcass Grinder. Sadly, many of these are still not in my possession, and I mourn that every day. However, one split I was very happy to recently land is the incredible split 7" with Self Deconstruction from Japan. Released on Agromosh Records this year in a run of 1000 copies.

This split seems to be unanimously received as one of the best things that Archagathus have done recently. I do definitely place myself in that club of opinion, to me one of the best group of songs they've done since "Canadian Horse". Opening shit up with that perfect and notorious cover of Dahmer's "Thomas Hamilton". Absolutely nailing it with an attention grabbing drum intro and the right amount of shameless worship of the band they're honoring. Dahmer's influence is all over this side, most notably in the layered vocals (which are the bomb btw), and repetitive and consistent riffing styles song-for-song. Archagathus's more recent evolution into a mincegore band often doesn't always leave me satisfied, but they really nailed it on this one. Throwing in a lot more catchy riffs, like on the closer "Government Influenza", which to me is an excellent blend of the gore side, and the fun punk as fuck mince of their earlier works. Goddamn I love this band.

Strangely enough, I really don't see many people mention Self Deconstruction's side when they're talking about this split. Which is really unfortunate, because I feel like that definitely would detract people from checking this band out. I initially wasn't that motivated to turn the record over and hear their side, cause I didn't hear any real hype. Holy crap though, Self Deconstruction's offering is just insanity! Admittedly, a pretty weird band to share a split with Archagathus, as their approach to writing grind is almost night and day. If you didn't know this band was from Japan, you'd probably figure it out pretty quick from just a few seconds of their side. Metallic, semi-free, chaotic and dissonant spazzcore is what they bring, with a huge thrashcore influence. Distinctly over-the-top and unhinged song writing, bouncing from riff to riff at the speed of light, but still sounding tight and professional. I was really pleasantly surprised with this band, and I'll definitely be on the lookout for them in the future.

Standard packaging on here, with all the proper info and credits on the inside. All copies are on this purpley, marble vinyl. Fun fact: Archagathus side plays at 33 RPM and SD's plays at 45 RPM. Don't let that fool ya.

There's 1,000 copies of this, so you should have no problem finding one. Buy or forever pose.

~VII

Sedem Minut Strachu Promo 2015

The amazingly awesome Sedem Minut Strachu have been one of my favorite musical crushes this year, but I've sadly been unable to collect almost any of their discography. Hopefully soon that will be fixed soon when I get my online ordering back on track, and I'll have a lot more interesting things to post. But, the noisecore God's gifted me with the perfect tape for me right now. This is a promo/compilation tape that Noise Not War Records put out a month or so ago. Limited to 100 copies on clear tapes. 

I guess this was mainly meant to be sold/given out for their stint at Obscene Extreme Fest this year. Rado, one of the vocalists/noise makers in $mS very generously sent this tape from the leftovers. For any beginner to Sedem Minut Strachu, this tape is a perfect entry into a large chunk of their recordings. Mostly sticking to records and tapes put out in the past year. Like the "Overmassonanizationated Twist" 5" and Percy Jerk-Off split 7" lathes, and the split with Castration Rite. All of them are kicking the shit out of everything. Consistent, fantastic, no-fi, aggressive recordings with monster drums that I've played over and over many times in the past. There are also pre-released sides for upcoming splits with Paranoia, Noiseattack, and a split lathe with Deche Charge (!!). The later being basement-quality, bass rumble attack. A fittingly old-school sound and homage and another complete disregard for trying to create anything musical. I love it so much.

I dig the very minimal layout on the tape. it looks like a real deal, well, promotional item. The 7MON worshiping logo is so shameless, it looks so good. I think there actually is a Sedem Minut Strachu/Seven Minutes Of Nausea split coming out sometime, wouldn't that be something? Sadly, no hints of that are on this tape. Or the splits with De Blenders and PTAO, which are some of my personal favorite SMS recording. Oh well. Noise Not War did a very good job with the dubbing, thankfully. 

I cannot wait to hear everything else this band makes in the future. 

~VII

Ausländer

The "Window Hammer" 7" was one of the first grindcore-style Sissy Spacek records I really got into, even before "Contretemps". It was released last year by super-noise label Chondritic Sound, but avoided being in my possession until a few weeks ago when I spent way to much money at the SS merch table. Limited to 313 copies, all on black vinyl, 45 RPM. My copy came with the bonus DVD-r which I'll get to later.

The A-side consists of all nine tracks of "Window Hammer" that I was familiar with until getting this record. Yet another very focused and visceral take on stripped down noisecore/grindcore. This session featuring the trio line-up of Corydon, Mumma and Wiese. Loosing the guitar noise and going for more stand-alone bass riffage. Brief stick clicks are the only break between songs before all three members immediately snap into attack mode. Everything on here is tight, do not be lead to believe otherwise from the lo-fi recording and lack of song writing variation. What this group does with only blast beats and bass is very impressive. You can tell a lot of attention was put on the different variations of blasts and cymbal hits to make these songs still flow as, well, songs. Instead of just taking the easy microsong/noise burst approach. Fun fact, Joe Preston of Thrones/Melvins fame supplies some back up vocals on a couple tracks.


The B-side was a new listening experience to me, consisting of a single track entitled "Seven Dwarfs". As you could probably guess, this is another collage/cut up piece, created by the Mumma/Wiese duo line-up. If you've heard any of this line-ups work, like the "Brath" full length, you'll feel immediately familiar with the mayhem on here. Consistently harsh and blurred throughout it's whole run-time, leaning towards more of a raw noisecore style. Buried drum hits and vocals fight against blaring junk distortion and bass fuzz. It's a chaotic mess, I dug it a lot. Very similar to something that would be on their first "S/T" full length, or Charlie Mumma's other noisecore band Surplus Killing.

"Window Hammer" comes packaged in a standard fold-over, double sided sleeve. Again, no lyrics or insert of any kind. I do really wish I could read some of the lyrics. I've always been curious what Corydon is yelling about.

My copy also came with this bonus DVD-r, which contains a couple live concerts from the band during the "Contretemps" era. Most of the footage is very intimate, claustrophobic. Lots of close-ups of the band and crowd, with some extra spliced in footage of the band shooting guns, and recording a concreté piece with Smegma (I believe). The sound quality is tastefully overblown, it definitely fits the footage. I'd say it's worth trying to find a copy with the DVD, though I'm not sure how many of these were made.

Definitely another essential piece of the Sissy Spacek catalog, and thankfully this is still pretty easy to find. Don't sleep.

~VII