Best of 2018 Albums/ CD’s/ EP’s
These are my Top 15 releases I reviewed last year. I’ve given up on trying to make it ten and believe me, there’s a lot more I wish I could’ve included. I’m starting with my pick of the year, my favorite- and then following, chronologically, from the start of last year to the end.
Phallus Uber Alles- “Pussy Pawsitive.” This is an all-grrl electro-punk band from Maine who I know nothing of except this recording is now almost three years old! But though I had many great releases to choose from this was easily my favorite. Mixing punk with electronics, when it works, is one of my favorite styles and to throw some riot grrl in the mix only makes it more perfect. Also, “Le Femme Terrible” and “Show Me Yr Tits” are two of the very best songs I heard last year. Exciting music, intelligent writing, electro-fying performances and a band more truly punk sounding than most any of the guitar bands I write about. This is a piece of art and is so, so fucking good!
DNZL- “The Black Box Recordings.” A new band that crosses over the barriers of hardcore, metal and punk. “Propulsive, metal influenced music with venomous lyrics (vocals).” One of the best new bands from Boston.
Pint Killers- “The Dirty Dozen.” Favorite new band of the year before, first full release. “Everything from Irish punk and hardcore, Oi and melodic punk, classic rock…creating an individual and more than worthy style.”
Broken Hearts- “Make Oi Great Again.” From New Jersey and “One of the best and truest Oi bands from this part of the country.” Also, “Could this be the Oi album of the year?” Yes.
No Good- “Citizen’s Arrest.” A hardcore/punk band from Maine. “They have crazy, creative songs full of wild fun and energy.” “And if an officer in blue asks me, “What I’m up to?’ I’ll answer truthfully. “I’m up to No Good…they play some powerfully, potent punk music.”
Prolapse- “Demo 1.” “This music is like if you’re jumping on a trampoline with firecrackers attached to your head. And you’re on a pogo stick at the same time…The ends of the trampoline have caught on fire… someone’s built a moat at the edge filled with piranha. But the soundtrack playing to your own demise is so enchanting- you welcome your certain extinction with a carefree, hapless smile on your lips.” I describe them as a “rock ’em, sock em’ true punk/Oi/street punk band that keeps the spirit and energy…recklessness and fun of the original punk bands.”
The Grubs- “Dropping Out.” “Excellent punk rock…that somehow has the feel of psycho-billy with surf licks adorning it- Could it be The Cramps reborn?” Also, “Are a really fun band, a really authentic band…that probably really like The Ramones and The Queers.”
Two releases from one of my favorite bands, Time Out Timmy- “Animal.” “Far more potent, far more passionate and far more punk than their previous release…Where punk meets hardcore- where The Ramones and X crash headlong into the Circle Jerks and Black Flag.” “Jah B-sides.” “This is music like a monkey riding a rocket ship to the moon with a firecracker up his ass, that explodes when he hits the outer atmosphere.” Great skate punk from New Hampshire, runner up for the top spot.
Tossed Aside- self-titled. A new band that contains members of one of my favorite power violence bands- Crystal Methodist. “It is heavy and powerful, then frantically energetic and propulsive, full of intense aggression…aspects of punk, metal and hardcore are corralled into short explosions that are full of emotion and fury with lyrics that are raw, honest and true.”
The Lost Riots/Cry Havoc! split- Two of the best bands from Connecticut, The Lost Riots (punk) and Cry Havoc! (hardcore) join forces not to fight evil but to cause me to write- “These are two of the very best bands we cover and when it’s time for me to pick the best cd’s/EP’s of the year, I’m confident that this split will be amongst them.” It is.
D-Sagawa- “Is This A Fucking Solution.” Live recording from one the very best live bands I know, a young, D-beat band from Salem, MA. “So to me this is metal based music and extreme hardcore, influenced by the spirit of punk…This is the best cutting edge music I experience now…This is a really great band.”
Firewalker- self-titled. One of my favorite bands. “Hardcore punk but packs the deadly maelstrom of D-beat, power violence or any other current music that is brutal, hard, real and true…They produce a music that is foreboding and lively at the same time, intensely somber and joyfully fun, simultaneously.”
Neighborhood Shit- self-titled. Sounds like, “metal colliding into hardcore…power violence smashing into doom, sludge slipping into hardcore.” Also, “They represent the anguish and anger of their generation- the pain, the disgust, the disillusionment with a life and society that promises them gold but instead, delivers them a turd, a piece of shit, symbolizing the life they’ve been left to deal with, filled with the lies of religion, of government, of society.”
Jerry’s Got Jokes “Help Wanted.” I only state four times in my review that I don’t like ska/punk bands. But I also state, “One of the most fun bands I cover.” And that they “mix the abrasiveness of alternative along with the exuberance of ska that creates the best of both worlds- words and music that is thoughtful and realistic along with words and music that is fun and life affirming.” Plus, “This will probably make it on my “Best Of” at the end of the year.” Yes, it did!
Damn Broads/The Ratz split- Another split with two, great Connecticut bands. All-grrl hardcore/Oi/punk band Damn Broads along with The Ratz, an off-shoot of The Lost Riots. Damn Broads I describe as “punk, hardcore, Oi, riot grrl… to create a style uniquely their own and one that powerful, potent and pure.” And The Ratz as, “the best of garage, punk and hardcore and squeeze it down to create a great sound…that they can truly call their own.”
You can’t go wrong checking any of these bands or releases out!
(Slimedog)
