198 days ago I started listening to all of my CDs in alphabetic order to see if I could do it. I found myself bored with what I was listening to and spending more and more time deciding on what to listen to. I realized I had a lot of CDs I never listened to, stuff I never had the urge to put on, and decided to just listen to all of them in order instead. My goal was to listen to everything in a year, or at least to see how long it would take me to accomplish this. I’ve been tracking my progress on Facebook by posting daily playlists and giving my immediate thoughts on what I was listening to as I was listening to it. I've since deleted my Facebook and thought I’d post my progress here instead since I need to make more use of this Blog site anyway. I don’t consider myself to be a writer, a music critic or an authority on music. This is simply a way to alleviate boredom at a job in which very little is expected out of me. I’m also not posting these playlists to brag about my music collection and I’m not burning copies of this stuff for people, so don’t ask.
(*) asterisks note things that are burned copies and not an original release. CDRs without asterisks behind them were originally issued as CDRs.
Day #192
MYTHOS - "Concrete City" CD (Mythos took a strange turn into synth heavy proto-metal sometime in the late-70s. The guitar and synth sounds and riffing styles are similar to the first Tubeway Army album, but the strong Germanic vocals take forefront here. Whenever there's singing, all focus is on that. This is weird rock-opera type shit, but it's awesome. "Neutron Bomb" has parts that sound as if they were lifted from a Candlemass album. I keep listening to this stuff thinking about covering one of these tracks because they would sound great a little heavier and faster. I'm completely on board with this album.)
MYTHOS - "Strange Guys" CD (The first track on this album, "Aeronaut", is one of the greatest proto-metal tracks ever recorded and I will record a cover of it before I hang up my guitar. That song alone is worth picking this up. "Powerslide" is another heavy and groovy instrumental, the other highlight of this album. The brakes are applied from the second song on to the end of the album, but this is a great synth-heavy German rock record with some flute and piano overdubs that harken back to their earlier krautrock roots. I think this album is unfairly dismissed by fans of progressive rock and krautrock. If only their vocals weren't so stiff sounding, this might have been better received.)
MYTHOS / MESSAGE - "Dreamlab" + "The Dawn Anew is Comin'" CDR* (I received this as part of a trade years ago and never got around to buying "Dreamlab" on CD. Mythos' second album is quite a bit more mellow and relaxed than their debut. Lots of acoustic guitar and loose jamming, still with walls of mellotron providing plenty of ambience. This is a nice, spacey cosmic album, but it's my least favorite Mythos album and that's probably why I haven't replaced this burned copy yet. This Message album is pretty good. Very Anglo sounding rock with some prog tendencies. There are moments that remind me of Genesis and King Crimson, but it's nowhere near as active as either of those bands.)
NAILED DOWN - "Anarchy & Violence" CDR* (This is something I threw together after ripping all of my ND vinyl released up to that point. I was fanatical about Nailed Down in the 90s and still am to some extent today. They were one of the best HC bands to come out of Australia, but they slowed down and cleaned up their recordings too much for my tastes. This CDR has their "Violent Distortion" 3"CD, their split 7"s with Dismachine and D.P.P.S., the "Destroy Deceitful Fellows" 7", "Honour and Glory" 8" flexi and the "Atrocious Damnation" 10", the noisiest shit they recorded. 84 tracks in 78 minutes... That's a whole lot of anger and crust riffs.)
NAILED DOWN - "Resurection" CD (It's nice to hear them playing fast again. 16 songs in 14 short minutes, channeling Negative Approach it seems. This shit is ferocious and unrelenting.)
NAKED CITY - s/t CD (Technically, this was released as a John Zorn album titled "Naked City", but there are Naked City songs on this and it's the same band, so I file it in the "N" section. Another one of my favorite CDs from my teenage years, and another I don't listen to very often now. I've always gotten the impression that Zorn was slumming it playing grindcore, one of those "Neat, I can do that too!" situations. I'm not sure how I feel about jazz intellectuals playing grindcore, but it doesn't sit well with me. The teenage me never considered such things. I should just fuck off, pretend it's 1992 again and enjoy this for what it is)
NAKED CITY - "Torture Garden" CD (This is a great CD. 42 songs in 27 minutes of demented jazz/grind. I can assume most of the people reading this will be familiar with this gem, and if not - you should be. It's one of the craziest albums ever released, and yet contains very little "wacky". Still, this is my first time listening to it in at least 10 years.)
NAPALM DEATH - "From Enslavement to Obliteration" CD (Napalm Death had 1.5 great albums and a whole bunch more that were just okay. This whole album is great and the second half of "Scum" is great. Other than there being too much reverb on the recording, this is just about perfect.)
NAPALM DEATH - "Noise for Music's Sake" 2CD (I bought this thinking it was something else and have been meaning to sell it since then. This is probably a pretty comprehensive collection of Napalm Death's discography, but I haven't heard anything since "Fear, Emptiness and Despair" and haven't enjoyed anything since "Harmony Corruption". I don't know what the fuck I thought this was when I bought it.)
Day #193
NAPALM DEATH - "The Peel Sessions" CD (I forgot about this one when I said they had only 1.5 great albums. This is actually my favorite Napalm Death release after the second side of "Scum". I have the version with the flaming car on the front, atomic green CD and only the first two sessions. Those other sessions are crap anyway.)
NAPALM DEATH - "Scum" CD (I heard this one second, after "Harmony Corruption". Needless to say, it sent me off on a grindcore tangent that hasn't ended yet. I had already devoured Sore Throat's discography before hearing Napalm Death and was well familiar with short bursts of noise, but I wasn't prepared for the intensity of this album.The first side is great, but the gnarly guitar tone on the second side hasn't been equalled since. They should have kept that sound on their next album instead of burying everything in reverb.)
NAPALM DEATH / CARCASS - Split Live CD (Crummy bootleg with lousy sound and very little information in the insert. Mick's between song banter is fucking stupid and annoying. This CD sucks.)
NAPALMED / HERMIT WITH SIST EN 343 - split CDR (This is a reissue by R.O.N.F. of a cassette that was originally released by Abnormal Tapes. Napalmed have been at it forever. I have a bunch of their stuff on cassette, a few 7"s. Radek and I wrote back and forth a few times over the years, seems like a nice guy. There's a lot of variety in his noise, even within a single release. The first song on this is long and sparse with short bursts of noise. Second track sounds like a couple of guys in a factory banging on pipes and dragging sheets of metal around. I've never been in contact with Hermit, but own several of his releases I've picked up from various distros in the 90s. Some of this noise stuff I just happen upon or take a chance with, but Hermit stuff I sought out because it was all good. One of the things I liked about Hermit was that his releases were always so inexpensive. I didn't like them because they were cheap, I just liked that he sold them cheaply. I wonder if he's still recording stuff today?)
NASTY SAVAGE - "Wage of Mayhem" CDR (I acquired this promo somehow, can't remember how. It's two new songs from their new album and their entire "Wage of Mayhem" demo which I already had on cassette. The new songs are good and don't sound too different from their classic albums of the 80s. Good for them for resisting the urge to update their sound in an attempt to make themselves relevant today. The 1984 demo tracks are great and sound like a mixture between "Show No Mercy" era Slayer and Mercyful Fate. How could you not fucking like that?! I'm not sure why these guys were so criminally underrated, but they were. All of their albums were great and Ronnie's vocals were some of the best in the genre. Nasty Savage were a great band.)
NASUM - "En Värld Utan Hopp" CDR (Nasum's pre-Relapse material was some of the greatest grindcore ever recorded, but holy fuck did they suck once they signed with them. Relapse had a knack for getting great grind bands just past their prime. I don't think they had anything to do with Nasum turning to shit, just a matter of bad timing on Relapse's part. As much as I curse Soundlab's cookie-cutter production style for ruining grindcore, this Nasum stuff sounds incredible, even on this shitty Bolivian CDR bootleg with crummy vinyl rips. Tomas Canceras strikes again... I made a better Nasum bootleg for my friend Hagamoto years ago before he moved to Japan, but stupidly, I forgot to burn a copy for myself and have since deleted the wavs I made. It's all been reissued again, so I suppose I could download it if I wanted to. No need to buy it, though, as I already own everything up to the abysmal "Inhale/Exhale" CD. This lousy CDR does just fine in a pinch. Thanks again, Tomas.)
NASUM - "Industrislaven" MCD (Yep, this should have been their last release. Always leave them wanting more.)
NATURALS - "Kaballah-Core" CDR (I assume that's the title, anyway. 3 minutes of grindcore from Las Vegas recorded on a boombox and packaged in a used Phobia CD jewel case with a Priority Mail label stuck to the back of it.)
NECRONOMICON - "Tips Zum Selbstmord" CD (Originally a private pressing of 500 copies, even the CD version of this krautrock oddity fetches big money these days. Crude, rough around the edges and heavy, but not in a Black Sabbath sort of way. "Tips for Suicide" was their only album, and while it's really good, it's nowhere near as great as people make it out to be. I think it's scarcity has built a legend out of this album and created hype it can't possibly live up to. You have to wonder if they had chosen the name Dictionary instead and called their album "Book of Definitions", would anyone be talking about them at all?)
NECRONOMICON - "Vie Kapitel 1" CDR* (At some point their only LP was reissued as part of a 4LP expanded set, the third LP being the album. Call me crazy, but I think I like the bonus stuff more than the album itself. It sounds like it was recorded on two tracks during rehearsal, but the songs are looser and bluesier. I'm used to low fidelity recordings, so the sound doesn't take away from the enjoyment at all. Thanks to the Internet for making this stuff available again.)
NECRONOMICON - "Vie Kapitel 2" CDR* (From the same recording as the above album. The two long tracks that close each side are fantastic.)
NECRONOMICON - "Vie Kapitel 4" CDR* (Eh, see above posts. Fuck it, I can't write about the same album three times.)
NECRONY - "Pathological Performances / Mucupurulent Miscarraige" CDR* (I missed out on Necrony while they were around and don't own any of their releases. I downloaded this stuff a few years ago when I remembered they existed. Nasum formed as a side project of Necrony, then sort of took over. Necrony are more metal sounding, less straight forward grinding. The triggered drums sound horrible, and it could be because I'm 30 minutes away from getting off work, but this CD is putting me to sleep.)
Day #194
NECROPHILIACS - "Discography" CDR (German grind/noisecore with some of the stupidest ham-sandwich-in-the-mouth vocals ever. Contains their "Primitive & Uncultivated" LP, "Hardcore Psychos" 7" and split 7"s with Incisive, Meat Shits and W.B.I., all ripped from my vinyl with the exception of that pesky W.B.I. split I was never able to track down. I was never able to find their split with Leucemie, either. The material from the bands they did the splits with is on here, too. Any band that writes a song about David Hess is okay by me. At least one of these guys went on to form Flachenbrand.)
NECROS - "Bloated Discography" CDR (Someone from a message board I used to post on sent this to me years ago. The guy who owns Touch & Go Records, Corey Rusk, used to play in this band and has refused to reissue any of this stuff. By doing so, he's just succeeded in feeding the bootleggers. I have most of this stuff on a bootleg LP in addition to this CDR, but I'd rather have a nice, official CD release with liner notes, etc. I'm sure this CDR was sourced from vinyl rips, but the audio sounds great. Necros were one of the first HC bands from Ohio releasing their first 7" in 1981. This disc collects all their material from 1981-1983 + a live set and an interview. I didn't like this stuff when I heard it the first time, but it grew on me, enough so to purchase the aforementioned bootleg LP.)
NEE! - "Nee Means No" CD (Nee! were a great noisecore band from Holland. This was a self-released CD they did 300 copies of. They were one of the earliest bands I was in contact with and they were the first band I released a record of. Their singer, Dennis, always sent great letters with weird doodles all over them and even contributed artwork for a couple C3L releases. I tried getting in contact with him a few years ago about releasing a Nee! discography CD, but he doesn't seem to be online and the letter I sent him was returned. He's in an awesome sludgy band called Death to Music now, well worth checking out. Nee! played 30 second or so blasts of noisecore, usually starting out with a riff, then dissolving into noise. Their drummer was fantastic and played strong blastbeats while Dennis made retarded monstrous screams, sometimes with a pitch shifter. Their drummer eventually sold his drum set and got heavily into analog synths and making noise. As great as they were, their material was sometimes spotty. Their demo was excellent and the reason I asked them to do a 7", but the material they sent me for the record was probably their worst. Years later one of the members told me he didn't like that material either and wondered why I didn't refuse it and request better material. I never questioned it. I figured if that's what they sent me, they were okay with it being released. Pairing them with Warsore didn't help matters. Few bands could hold their own when compared with them. Listening to this now fills me with regret. I wish I had done a better job of staying in contact with these guys. The Internet age sort of ended that. Maybe one of them will see this and leave a comment?)
NEGATIVE APPROACH - "Total Recall" CD (Their first 7" is pretty great, the LP less so and the live stuff that fills out this CD is pretty forgettable. Usually when I listen to this CD I just turn it off after the 7" tracks. The 7" alone secures their spot as one of the best HC bands ever. I heard that "Reproach" tribute before I heard Negative Approach, actually, so when I listen to this CD it always makes me think of Rupture, Dropdead and Spazz, haha...)
NEGATIVE FX / LAST RIGHTS - split CD (Today has been a great day for HC. NFX were a great HC band from Boston, harder and faster than most of their area, except for maybe Siege. Last Rights was a band the singer did between NFX and Slapshot. They only released this one 7", but it fucking rules. This CD is great, gets listened to frequently at my house. They should've included the NFX demo, though. It's great, too.)
NEGATIVLAND - "Dispepsi" CD (My first introduction to Negativland was through the Over the Edge series. I found one of them used in my home town and picked it up because I've heard the name before and because it was cheap. I'm not sure what made me buy more of their releases. I don't remember liking the one I bought, but somehow I acquired more. Lots more. It clicked for me when I heard "Escape From Noise". I Picked up "Dispepsi" when it was released and liked it right away. This is one of their more musical releases, compared to a lot of their releases this seems pretty accessible. Essentially a 43 minute commentary of the cola-war mixing samples, sound collage and folky songs. When this was released, that cola-war shit was all over the place. It seems that shit was crammed down our throats everywhere we turned. Nothing is solved, though a solution was offered in the liner notes, but this was very topical at the time and someone needed to tackle it, I guess. "Happy Heroes" is a great song, one of my favorite Negativland songs. This is one of their better albums.)
NEGATIVLAND - "Escape From Noise" CD (This is probably the Negativland CD I listen to the most often. I'm not going to say it's their best, but it's my favorite. Their albums are so hard to describe, that's part of what I like about them. There are several memorable songs from this release that stick with me for days after hearing them. This contains the great "Christianity is Stupid" song the band used to try to inject themselves into controversy by saying the song had nothing to do with David Brom killing his parents. They would later cover this in more detail on "Helter Stupid".)
NEGATIVLAND - "Free" CD (They tackle patriotism, violence, religion and drunk driving on this one. Again, fairly song heavy compared to a lot of their catalog, but still with heaps of sound collage peppered over it. "Happy the Harmonica" breaks up the dark tone of this album with a 10 minute reading of a children's story by the Weatherman. Another great album.)
NEGATIVLAND - "Happy Heroes" CD (A short stab at commercialism with multiple ads for Mertz, a fictitious brain shaped pill that makes your mind up for you. Orson Welles reveals what a colossal prick he is in outtakes for a Green Giant commercial, Col. Sanders reveals he can't fucking talk and OJ Simpson let's us in on his workout routine.)
NEGATIVLAND - "Helter Stupid" LP + "Guns" EP + "U2" EP CDR* (I have "Helter Stupid" on LP, but wanted it on CD, too, so I downloaded some stuff I didn't have to fill out the disc. "Helter Stupid" is great. "Guns" was released as a substitute for "U2" after it was deleted. All of this stuff rules.)
Day #195
NEGATIVLAND - "Over the Edge Vol. 1: Jam Con '84" CD (The OTE discs are great, but they're an endurance test to listen to. Taken from their weekly radio show, it really does sound like tuning into 5-6 different radio stations at the same time. There's always some loose concept involved, but the content is all over the place. It's not for everyone, that's for sure. Years ago I bought loads of the OTE sets from an online distributor that was going out of business. They were too cheap to pass on, but I probably wouldn't have paid full retail for these. I bought loads of stuff from that distro: Residents, Renaldo & the Loaf, Snakefinger, Fred Frith, Drums & Tuba, Henry Cow, Negativland, etc, all at half price or cheaper.)
NEGATIVLAND - "Over the Edge Vol. 1 and 1/2 The Starting Line" CD (Dick Goodbody leads us through a round of automobile trivia and other nonsense. Dick's voice is hypnotic, perfectly suited for radio. This was the first Negativland CD I bought and it's one of my favorites now. I don't think I understood what the fuck was going on at the time, not sure I do now, either. The phone-in singalong is one of my favorite pieces from their catalog. We also get an uninterrupted 5 minutes of the Weatherman's neighbor's Roto-tiller in action. I guess I should feel stupid for paying money for this at this point, but I don't.)
NEGATIVLAND - "Over the Edge Vol. 2: Pastor Dick: Muriel's Purse Fund" CD (When my friend Hagamoto still lived in Minneapolis, listening to these OTE discs on the drive up to see him was sort of a tradition. Being stuck in a car for 5 hours is the best way to listen to this stuff. I think I may have listened to this only once. I'm not remembering anything as I listen to it just now. Dick Goodbody returns as Pastor Dick doing a pledge drive to replace the $180 taken from Muriel's purse. Callers confess to three sins, then Dick tells them how much they should pledge for their sins, then takes a sip of champagne for every dollar pledged getting drunk in the process. As usual with these OTE discs, it dissolves into complete nonsense and overlapping noise towards the end.)
NEGATIVLAND - "Over The Edge Vol. 3: The Weatherman’s Dumb Stupid Come-Out Line" 2CD (David Wills opens up the lines for people to follow his example and come out of the "Homosexual Closet" and attracts a bunch of angry homophobes instead. The Weatherman criticizes people's pronunciation "homa-sexual", claims to have had sex with his Super-Booper and states that he's a complete embarrassment to the homosexual community while a cacophony of noise including "YMCA" and a repeated clip of "fuck this faggot" plays in the background. On the second disc the Weatherman turns into the Clorox Cowboy, but there's no real theme to this disc, just a bunch of nonsense.)
Day #196
NEGATIVLAND -"Over the Edge Vol. 6: The Willsaphone Stupid Show" 2CD (The Weatherman gives us an interesting glimpse into his childhood by playing tapes he recorded of him and his family as a child. David recorded everything, kept everything and broadcast it over KPFA. His whole house was wired with microphones and speakers, he would tape his parents talking in the kitchen, then speak to them from his bedroom over the speaker. His parents were terribly supportive of his hobbies to allow such nonsense. At one point he even gets his mother to say "Are we not men? We are Devo." One of the better OTE installments.)
NEGATIVLAND - "Over the Edge Vol. 7: Time Zones Exchange Project" 2CD (I'm cleaning the house while listening to this, so I'm only half paying attention. This sounds more like a Fireside Theater broadcast than Over the Edge. I'm having a difficult time figuring out what the fuck is going on, to be honest.)
Day #197
NEGATIVLAND - "Over the Edge Vol.8: Sex Dirt" CD (It might be that I've reached saturation level with Negativland at this point, but this CD seems lazy and stupid, like a couple of guys fucking around in a studio for an hour laughing at the same joke over and over, which is exactly what this is. Lazy dance beats with samples of sex ed records over them while the Weatherman talks about Clorox and Formula 409. I understand that coming up with original material for a weekly radio show is difficult, but they probably could have left this off of a CD release.)
NEGATIVLAND - "Points" CD (No, I haven't reached saturation point. This album is great. Their second album, and one if their weirdest/darkest sounding. The krautrock influence is really apparent in this one at at times this sounds like Faust or Cluster. Negativland too their "band" name from a Neu! song, afterall, and their label name, Seeland, from another Neu! song. David's mother starts out the album with her rendition of "Harry to the Ferry", then things move into darker territory after the happiest song on the album, "The Answer is...". We're treated to a mixture of home made electronics, tape manipulation and samples. Without the samples, this really would sound like something recorded in 1971 Düesseldorf.)
NEGATIVLAND - "These Guys are From England and Who Gives a Shit?" CD (The expanded deluxe version of their infamous "U2" single. There's speculation that the band released this themselves, but it's released on Seelard, not Seeland, and is considered a bootleg. The "U2" single is great, and some of these bonus tracks are great, too, but we're hearing variations of the same material for 74 minutes, more or less.)
NEMESIS -"The Day of Retribution" CDR* (I made this CD from rips I did of my cassette I bought in Minneapolis in the late 90s. I don't know if it's ever been released on CD, but there was a 2LP reissue of it a few years ago with bonus stuff. Nemesis was Leif's band before Candlemass. The music is very similar, but the vocals are nowhere near as strong. Awesome mid-paced, doomy metal with decent production. The cassette I bought was the reissue on Metal Blade and has a two song Candlemass demo at the end, also with Leif doing vocals. This stuff is great, right up there with "Epicus Doomicus Metallicus", essential for doom metal fans. I've always wanted to record a cover of "Black Messiah".)
NETJAJEV SS - triangle 8", bonus 5" + final 7" CDR* (Clay from Rescued From Life sent me this after I bought the 8" and it wouldn't play on my turntable. He said I was the only person who complained about it not playing, but sent me this CDR so I could listen to it. Magnus of NSS gets bored easily and ends one project and starts another all the time. Even within one project he'll change styles a few times, as was the case with Netjajev SS. What started as sort of a Rupture tribute band eventually added surf parts, keyboards and other weird shit later on. No complaints from me, though, I loved the changes. I just wish he would stop changing the name of his projects so it would be easier to keep track of this shit. I didn't even realize Syphilitic Vaginas was his band until after he stopped using that name and moved on to something else. I think I liked NSS the most of all his projects, but Rupture are my favorite band, so that makes sense.)
NEU! - s/t CD (I was so happy when this was reissued. I found bootlegs of the other two albums in Iowa City, but never this one, so it was the last one I heard. It's also their best album. Both members of Neu! played in an early version of Kraftwerk. I can't remember if they quit or were kicked out, but the human element of Kraftwerk's sound left with them. Klaus Dinger, their drummer, pioneered the "motorik" beat (if you've heard it, you know what I'm talking about) and in the process created one of the most defining elements of krautrock. This first album is an absolute classic, not only in krautrock, but it's one of the best albums in any genre. It's mixture of light and airy hypnotic instrumentals, dark ambient industrial noise and pre-punk aggression somehow works to create a spectacular album, not just a collection of diverse sounds. This is a masterpiece of sound, a 10/10 album, in my opinion.)
NEU! - "2" CD (A bootleg on the Germanofon label, the first Neu! album I heard. I distinctly remember being completely underwhelmed by it and felt as if I had been ripped off. Having run out of money half way through recording this album, they slowed down, sped up and fucked with existing songs to make "remixes" out of necessity to create a full album. I still think the "remix" songs are terrible, but the proper songs on this album are fantastic. I usually just skip past the fucked up songs, but I'll be listening to them today.)
NEU! - "75" CD (Another Germanofon bootleg. Not able to come to an agreement on styles, the two members decided to split the album up so each could do whatever they wanted on their side. Rother's side is awesome, totally mellow ambient piano heavy instrumentals. Really spacious and melodic, simply great. Dinger's side is much more aggressive, almost protopunk with snarling angry vocals and hard rhythmic beats. Both sides are great, but the mellow stuff wins out by a mile.)
NEUROPATHIA - "Graveyard Cowboys" CD (I bought this in Felix Havoc's distro after looking through it, not finding anything else and not wanting to walk away empty handed after taking up so much of his time talking about stupid shit. This sounds like Exhumed with a touch of early Blood Duster, but with stupider vocals than both. I don't remember the vocals on their other releases sounding like this. I'd sell this if anyone wants it. I'm not digging it today at all...)
NEUROPATHIA / PUTRESCENCE -split CD (Neuropathia's vocals are just at average level of stupidity on this release, sounds as if they've hung up the pitch shifter for the most part. This is way better than the CD above. The songs are faster, recording is better, etc. Putresence's half of the CD is even better. Nice grimy grindcore with unique throaty vocals and a slightly dirty recording that suits this style just fine.)
NEUROSIS - "Pain of Mind" CD (I realize I'm doing it wrong, but I really only give a fuck about Neurosis' early HC stuff. Their apocalyptic doom stuff from "Souls at Zero" and on out doesn't interest me at all. I've come to the conclusion over the years that the "Pain of Mind" CD and "Abberation" 7" are all I need. I have the Alternative Tentacles reissue of this, the one with Bud Dwyer blowing his brains out on the cover. It was reissued again as a 2CD with loads of bonus stuff, but I've not heard that version. My first exposure to these guys was "The Thing That ate Floyd" 2LP. Neurosis and Stikky were the two best bands on that compilation. I bought everything I could find of both bands then, but didn't acquire this one until it was reissued. By that point I had lost interest in them for the most part, but curious enough to hear it anyway. I'm glad I picked it up. It's pretty heavy, but those touches of dark/emotional shit that would take over on their later albums was present at the very beginning on songs like "Black". I'd rather all of it sound like "Dominoes Fall" instead, and enough of it does to secure a place in my CD collection forever.)
NEUROSIS - "The Word as Law" CD (This CD is pretty good, too. The recording is certainly better and the songs are still really heavy and tighter than on their debut, but it's noticeably less HC and Scott started doing that annoying thing where he stretches out words as he sings them on this one. It's also about 20 minutes longer than it should be. It's better than I remember it being, actually. I don't think I realized there was a Joy Division cover on this album until just now, though. It's been a looong time since I've listened to this.)
Day #198
NEW YORK AGAINST THE BELZEBU - "Are You Ready For Noise?" CD (I live for this kind of sloppy noisecore shit. NYAB were from Brazil and essentially played German style noisecore: short musical intros followed by short blasts of noise with shouted group vocals, usually silly. The great thing about having your own label is you can release whatever you want, including your own band. The guy from Rotthenness Records was in NYAB, and while they might have been able to find another label to release this stuff, it might have been difficult talking someone into doing a proper CD of live boombox recordings. There are a couple "studio" sessions mixed in among the live tracks, but the majority of this sounds completely overloaded and maxed out, but I'm not complaining. I traded with Nelson a bunch of times in the 90s. He was always quick with sending his stuff out and seemed like a nice guy. There's 82 songs on this CD and it's just under an hour. It took me years to find a copy of this, and once I did, it was well past noisecore's heyday new for $5.00.)
NEW YORK AGAINST THE BELZEBU / EMPTY GRAVE / PURE NOISE - "3 Way Grindnoisecore" CD (As many times as I've listened to this, I'm completely unable to figure out which tracks belong to which band. It sounds as if there are 4 bands on here instead of 3 and there's way more songs than the 99 track markers indicate. NYAB are easy to identify and play the same silly HC inspired noisecore as on their other releases, but this time with a clearer recording and added keyboards on a few tracks. I'm pretty sure Empty Grave starts at track 29. While still super noisy, they take on sort of a black/thrash feel most of the time, sounding at times like Confusion. At track 51 there's another noticeable change in style with even shorter songs, most under 5 seconds, stripped of any metal influence and with pitch-shifted vocals. Track 99 is 15 minutes long, a bunch of short songs together on one track. The songs are tighter and longer than the previous bunch and with two vocalists, one pitch-shifted and another high and raspy like Nate from Black Market Fetus. It sounds like a different band than whoever tracks 51-98 was and I can't imagine the third band would take up the last 30 minutes of the disc while the other two bands had 15 minutes each. Regardless of the murky tracklist, this is a great CD. All of the bands are super noisy with decent production. I sold heaps of these through Mortville.)
PHIL NIBLOCK - "G2,44+/x2" CD (My good friend Mike sent this to me years ago. I'm not sure who Phil Niblock is or if his other releases sound like this, but this is pure drone, one tone for a solid hour. A solid, consistent note is held for 30 minutes on two tracks played by 4 guitarists (including Lee Ranaldo and Thurston Moore). The effect is awesome, and this sounds totally different at various volumes and at various distances and positioning from the speakers. "Earth 2" and SunnO))) have nothing on this guy. This is the purest drone I've experienced.)
THE NIGGERS - "Singles" CDR (Two songs of sloppy, poorly recorded garage rock/punk. The vocals are screamingly loud compared to the music which is barely audible. The insert says these guys are from Ohio and that this is limited to 50 copies. This is pretty forgettable.)
NIGH - 2002 CDR (15 minutes of crispy electronic noise done on what sounds like a synth of some sort. There's some tape manipulation going on, too, I think. This kind of home-made lo-fi noise appeals to me in small doses. 15 minutes is just about right for something like this. Any longer and I'd lose interest.)
NIGHT SUN - "Mournin'" CD (Their only album from 1972 reissued on the great Second Battle label. This is heavy German progressive rock, borderline metal not too different from Deep Purple, Black Sabbath and the first Lucifer's Friend album. This shit's all over the place, crazy arrangements and powerful high pitched vocals. One of these guys played with Guru Guru after Night Sun split up.)
NIHILIST - "1987-1989" CD (Swedish death metal, pre-Entombed. This is a collection of all of their demos I picked up at Extreme Noise in Minneapolis a few years ago. The sound is a bit murky, but better than rips I found online, nice thick booklet with lots of liner notes and photos. I probably listen to this more than any of the Entombed albums.)
NIHILIST COMMANDO - "Noisecore Violations 2002-2008" CD (Brutal, angry noisecore violence from Finland, one of the angriest sounding projects I've heard in my life. Take the angriest and harshest 7MON recordings, run it through an overdrive pedal, strip it of all traces of art and politics and you'll have an idea of what this sounds like. This stuff is insane.)
NIHILISTICS - "13th Anniversary" CD (Reissue of the NY scum punk band's "legendary" first 7" from 1979 and LP from 1983. Totally rough, sloppy and stupid, just what they were shooting for, I'm sure. The 7" is better than the album, in my opinion. The cover of the booklet promises a glow in the dark CD, but it's a load of shit. I bought this in Denver ages ago because I remembered them from the great "New York Trash" compilation, because Rupture covered one of their songs and because it was cheap. It's worth the $8 I spent on it, but I probably wouldn't pay $12 for it.)
MIHILISTICS - "Vaginosis Volume 1" CD (This is a live CD Released by Yeah, Mate! Records in 2000 consisting of a set recorded at CBGB's in 1984 and a set on WNYU in 1989 with a silly interview. The audio is okay, not great, soundboard with a lot of tape hiss, artwork is extreme close-ups of diseased, hairy vaginas. I think I prefer the 1984 live set to their 1983 studio album after listening to them back to back just now. The stage banter is annoying, but funny. These guys sound like they'd be total shitheads to hang out with. This was the only non-Rupture release on Yeah, Mate!.)
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