Abyecta Inténtalo O Muere 7″ (Metadona)
Concurrently residing in Chile, Spain and, surely worst of all, now even the United States, Abyecta pack a lot into this seven-inch single. This is music made by punks who take two hours to get dressed for punks who take two hours to get dressed, the charged-hair, boots n’ braces realm of underground punk that I’ve always admired if not personally belonged. At five and a half minutes, “Inténtalo O Muere” barely fits within the confines of a seven-inch record, but the track benefits from its relatively epic length. Imagine Randy Uchida hitching a ride with The Varukers down the highway to Hell, or the Epic Handshake meme (you know the one) where the two muscular arms are “heavy metal” and “punk rock” and the handshake is “spiked gauntlets”. Songs like this are meant to be five minutes long, with extended instrumental guitar-solo breaks, aggro bridges and fist-pumping choruses. “Amo Y Esclavo” welds Judas Priest / Grim Reaper guitar lines to the powerful gallop of hardcore-punk drum patterns, with no qualms about an epic ninety-second instrumental opening passage. It’s larger than life (metal) and street-level urgent (punk), befitting an unsanctioned outdoor punk fest with active volcanos in the distance, preferably full of melting cop cars.

Bill Converse Zone Zone 2×12″ (Fixed Rhythms)
Lace up those Chuck Taylors and let’s roll out, Bill Converse is playing tonight! The Austin-based DJ/producer is known for his atypical triple-turntable setup, though unlike Queensrÿche’s drum kit, there’s a keen purpose to Converse’s excess. The evidence couldn’t be clearer, as the second record in this double twelve-inch set showcases an absolutely mind-melting live set at Jackie O’Body in Denton, TX, sometime in 2024. It’s a thrilling acid rollercoaster, though if I insist on likening the performance to a carnival ride, the bumper cars are a similarly-appropriate attraction. Arpeggiated acid lines are bouncing from all angles, but Converse has a keen sense of order and pacing, whipping up a hero’s feast of analog dance grooves. Don’t let the live aspect scare you, either – the recording is crisp and full-bodied, if lacking the screams and hollers of what must’ve been a frenzied dance crowd. The studio tracks are great in a different way: “770” is like a Satanic mass derived from the Dr. Katz and Seinfeld themes; Converse’s plucky MIDI bass over pitched drums is a highlight. “Lure Me” chops it up with a laser security system fit for the Bellagio, and the title track is a steam-engine running on acid, like when Jamal Moss presses all the buttons at once and it somehow sounds euphoric. I’d say someone should get Converse a fourth table, but until we understand the possible ramifications, certain forms of power are not to be messed with.

Early Grave Sewer Baby Eaten By Worms 7″ (Stupid Bag)
Philly upstarts Early Grave have fun with metal aesthetic signifiers (see: band logo, cemetery-themed art, machetes and scythes brandished in group pic) while clearly worshipping the one and only true god: hardcore punk. They released this nine-song demo late last year, which Stupid Bag has now upgraded to an attractive seven-inch slab. They’ve got a great thing going: the music recalls the frantic speed-runs of Neos and Gang Green with a smidge of Septic Death’s gloriously-confusing songwriting and the occasional fast-core bludgeoning redolent of Slap A Ham’s late ’90s output. Perhaps it’s the vocals where the metal influence seeps in, as they reached into the cauldron for United Mutation’s grizzled mutant intonation and accidentally pulled out a severed larynx with the fiendishness of Glen Benton. As a trio, it’s either the bassist or guitarist responsible for the vocals (no front-person!), which is far less prevalent in hardcore than metal. But I digress: Early Grave named their damn thing Sewer Baby Eaten By Worms and seem to approach their frothy speed-core from the perspective of that sewer baby, writing and contorting among so much unspeakable vermin.

FRKSE Through The Slow Dusk LP (Iron Lung)
There’s a rich allegory to be gleaned from the arresting cover of FRKSE’s Through The Slow Dusk, though it’s unclear to me exactly what the decapitated horse-head’s vomited objects imply. It’s been fun to ruminate on though, particularly while jamming FRKSE’s newest iteration of discomfiting underground electronics. Through The Slow Dusk is the closest FRKSE has ever come to sounding like a “real band”, with recognizable percussive elements (is that a trap-kit in there on some tracks?), synths and vocals, recorded by none other than Martin Bisi. As such, it sounds like Public Image Ltd. had they signed to Broken Flag instead of Virgin, with imposing fields of dub-constructed post-punk given an early industrial walloping – the punishment is in fact the reward. FRKSE aren’t interested in glorifying historical frights, though… the group has always wielded a dark-knowledge, deep-web lexicon rooted in the contemporary, and the lyrics of tracks like “Sort” (“Forbes list of dilettantes: / spreadsheet / populate the cells”), “Coax” (“Online broker / saw me in a magazine”) and “Fled” (“I want to be white / I want to be white like overexposure”) don’t play games. For those intrepid Iron Lung Records fans who listen to more Einstürzende Neubauten than Infest, their misanthropy is once again rewarded.

Giallo Tenebrarum LP (Convulse)
The black leather glove has been enjoying a resurgence in hardcore-punk’s popular imagery. It’s kind of the perfect visual signifier for modern hardcore bands who want to imply some level of dark trangressiveness without actually getting in trouble for it. Mercifully, the days of bands using pictures of scantily-clad, suffering women without getting called out for it have passed, so the black leather glove offers a reasonable solution: perhaps sleazy celluloid violence is implied, perhaps consensual BDSM is implied, or maybe they just want you to think someone in the band knows how to operate a motorcycle, but whatever the case, it’s safely edgy territory for would-be Youth Attack bands who release records they’d never show their parents. The gloves are central to Giallo’s debut full-length (complete with two band members wearing them in the live photos), but their form of contemporary hardcore hits pretty hard, even if they went bare handed. Giallo’s sound is indebted to groups like Civilized and Vile Gash (and with the slasher movie aesthetic, City Hunter’s presence looms especially large); it’s an overtly aggressive approach, shrouded in feedback without any creeping metal influence, and they do well by it. Their songs are faster than typical, even the parts that benefit from being slow, and I appreciate that about Giallo’s approach – “Sleepwalking” is a shock to the system when it kicks into high gear. The two extended songs on the second side show signs of curiosity: a creeping, textural synth-scape from Terror Cell Unit leads into a demonic, sax-laden slam with throat-clearing coughs reminiscent of Pharmakon’s Hoax-album starter. I hope Giallo washed their hands after, but what do you know: another great reason for those gloves.

Annie Hogan Tongues In My Head LP (Downwards)
There are a dwindling few among us who can claim to have worked closely with Nick Cave, Lydia Lunch, Marc Almond and Foetus; of those, there’s an even smaller percentage that continue to make meaningful work. Annie Hogan is that rare character, having shot through the early ’80s industrial/goth milieu and, like a rent-controlled pioneer, lacking any good reason to leave. Tongues In My Head is her latest for Downwards (champions of all darkly-shrouded musics) and it’s a deviant joy to behold. These six songs are slinky, deliberate and cunning… elegiac synth-pop brimming with trippy peculiarities befitting a morbid German folktale. Think of Leslie Winer if her modeling career started in Alice’s Wonderland instead of New York City, or November Növelet if they were estranged from each other, if or if Kate Bush joined Current 93 in 1984 and was promptly never heard from again. These are fun fantasies for me to conjure up, but I want to make clear that Hogan knows how to write songs, not merely moods or atmospheres. If we still made mixtapes and you wanted to seduce a completely inappropriate crush (your professor, your bully, your stalker fan), “Scorpions” would lure them to your doorstep promptly, handcuffed and desperate. Sorry to talk like this, but why don’t you spend some time with Tongues In My Head and try to not act creepy after!

Julian Heresy Julian Heresy LP (No Coast)
Madison, WI has a rich history of stoner metal with ties to the punk scene, care of labels like Bovine and Rhetoric (both of whose proprietors suffered weed-related arrests and incarceration, if I’m not mistaken!). They lived for it out there, and if the recent arrival of Julian Heresy is any indication, that flame continues to burn eternally. This new group features Bobby Hussy on lead guitar, apparently shifting his worship from the altar of one devil (Jay Reatard) to the more traditionally red-tailed, pointy-goatee-with-pitchfork variety. Hussy enlisted some friends, with none other than Mikey Makela of Bongzilla to lend his vocals to these sloth-paced stoner epics. Makela sounds grizzled on opener “Stash Jar”, but by the time his voice hits on “Emerging From The Quantum Extremal Surface”, he’s more like a rotisserie-marinated Gollum, not dead but far from alive. These boilerplate, slow-shifting riffs demand a good fifty to sixty percent of his throat, but he’s giving one hundred and ten percent here, primed to scare the neighbors so long as Julian Heresy is blasting at the appropriate volume. “In Vino Veritas” takes the angst down a notch, almost sounding like Nothing were they a thousand years old; a brief dual-guitar composition leads into the final track, “Illium Township”, a righteous Spirit-Caravan-on-ludes chonker that praises Sabbath with every fiber of its being. Bringing it back to Gollum, riffs like these bear strong similarities to The Ring – when you feel their power in your hands, it consumes you.

Low Jack Market 7″ (Bambe)
As we usher in the backyard-party season, be sure to have some fresh tunes ready to scare off those stragglers who insist on lingering past their welcome. Low Jack is a great producer when it comes to dance tracks with alienating energy, as “Market” reiterates on this all-too-brief seven-inch single. “Market” was originally composed for an “immersive installation” by Australian visual artist Thomas Jeppe, but we receive it in “Radio Edit” form here, a disgruntled array of samples organized in dancehall formation. Pounding low-end meets chattering typewriters (or automatic rifles cocking?) and thrillingly garish siren effects for an energetic sound-clash sure to leave your clothes smelling like some form of smoke. It’s a party ambulance from Sodom, and as the track fades over a bed of rain and reverse-flanged doinks, I’m wishing this track was given an additional five inches of vinyl to explore. Bambe label-head Bambounou snagged the b-side for himself, flipping the original into a vicious electro groove, JJ Fad all dressed up like Mad Max‘s Furiosa. It’s less feral but equally dangerous. Now that I think about it, no one is gonna want to leave if you start blasting either version of “Market” – you’re going to be pulling partygoers out of your futon for weeks.

Jae Matthews Man On The Beat 12″ (Heartworm Press)
Boy Harsher have been on the top of the minimal-synth-pop heap for a while, yet their banger output has all but dried up. Careful is seven years old, “Pain” dates back even further, and while all the soundtracking work has kept them creatively busy (not to mention Gus Muller’s time well spent with Safe Mind), the lack of new club material is glaring. Vocalist Jae Matthews reassures us then that she hasn’t forsaken the dance-floor with this new single for Wes Eisold’s Heartworm Press label, a cover of Buzz Kull’s “Man On The Beat”. Buzz Kull has been lurking around the Heartworm corridors for a while now, their sexy, fashion-forward dark-wave a latex-tight fit, and Matthews takes the opportunity to reassert herself as the most gorgeously bleary dark-wave siren in the game. Over a nimble synth sequence, an unflagging goth-industrial beat and some atmospheric pads to help dim the lights, Matthews’s breathy intonation will have all the bat-kids flapping their wings long into the night. In true new-wave fashion befitting a Kaos Dance Records release, the b-side is an extended version, care of the Los Angeles duo Spike Hellis, splicing in the original Buzz Kull vocals alongside Jae Matthews for a celebration of all things black, leather and lust-scented (I think I may have just described a specific Diptyique candle). It’s not quite Lemmy Kilmister with Wendy O. Williams, but what is?

Minot Walls / People Pleaser 7″ (no label)
Just had a great idea: what if there was a band where the drummer stands, and the bassist, guitarist and singer all sit? It’d be a refreshing change of pace for what is one of the most worn-out and predictable features of rock music. Missoula, MT’s Minot can take my idea for free, as they’ve already got a standing drummer in Noah Mackinnon – all he has to do is tell Flora Holland (guitar) and Alex Molica (also guitar) to take a seat. Thanks in no small part to the Wäntage USA label, I’ve always had fond thoughts of Montana’s underground rock scene, of which Minot reside; on this self-released lathe-cut single, they showcase their rudimentary fuzz-pop leanings. “Walls” locates the urinal in the far corner that still has Cramps and Dead Moon stickers from the ’90s on it and dumps a fresh bucket of ice cubes in there. I prefer this stripped-down and first-attempty style to “People Pleaser”, which looks back to the flower-braided ’60s for inspiration, a sound I personally am content to leave undisturbed in the mold-riddled dollar bin. Not sure I need to harp on such details, though – if I’m going to experience Minot, it’s hopefully blaring from the other end of the bar while I’m doing shots with Mordecai, and then faintly audible across the street once Mordecai have convinced me to steal a horse from the nearby stable and ride it home without a saddle. Welcome to big sky country!

Pura Manía La Banda Es La Ley 12″ (Roachleg)
By the early ’80s, punk rock began to fantasize how it might sound in a post-nuclear fallout situation. It’s no wonder that in our current moment, punks are drawn to similar aesthetics: desolate, flanger- and chorus-effected guitars; primal, tom-heavy drumming; a synth that buzzes like some sort of infrared scanning device used to locate survivors. Vancouver’s Pura Manía are preparing for the wasteland with this new six-song EP, a spikier counterpart to fellow Second Empire Justice-worshipping Canadians Home Front. “Zona De Alto Riesgo” translates to “High Risk Zone” and it ties today’s anxieties to that paranoid, retro sound nicely. It’s almost a comforting nostalgia when those woah-ohs hit two minutes in, at least until you remember the rate at which innocent people are dying. Pura Manía have every right to hammer on the negative endlessly, but they wisely mix up the vibe, going from warning-alarm downer punk to major-chord crowd pleasers like “Planeta Gótico” and “Amor De Coladera (Veneno Y Glam)”, the later of which is a perfect set-ender for when you just want to lock arms with a stranger in a Templars shirt and sing along to keep from crying. The cover lightens the mood as well, a mischievous gang of punxsploitation Madballs ready to swipe all of William Hanna and Joseph Barbera’s acid for themselves. It might not seem like it at the moment, but the punks are bound to win.

Reek Minds Eternal Reek 7″ (Black Water)
Portland’s Reek Minds share multiple members with Alienator, whose profile is steadily growing if the number of t-shirts and hoodies I see people wearing is any indication. Don’t think of them as twins, though, unless you’re thinking of Basket Case, Reek Minds being the malformed, basket-transported monster. Eternal Reek is their third and newest seven-inch EP, and it remains far too frantic and unsavory to move a lot of merch. While still a tangled mass of hardcore patterns (blast-beats, d-beats, scissor-beats… maybe even a false-start breakdown or two), the recording is ever so slightly cleaner this time around, and their songs showing a willingness to honor the mid-tempo menace of local legends Poison Idea, if only for brief flashes of time. They remain indebted to Siege, but by allowing other hardcore reference-points to enter their pungent brew, Reek Minds avoid writing the same songs over and over. “Desolate” could’ve been an Alienator song, as far as the crawlspace-tight filthy crossover thrash riffing is concerned, but Reek Minds gather a gang of those DRI skankermen and beat it to a pulp. If the increased technical prowess concerns you, fear not: their hearts still went with fresh entrails on the cover.

Sealer Sealer 12″ (The Ghost Is Clear)
Against all conceivable odds, cool music continues to proliferate in the generic-store-brand state known to us as “Ohio”. Cincinnati’s Sealer are fresh as a daisy, though their stylish noise-rock is fixing to trample any nearby bouquets. From the jump, “Seeing/Peeling” hits you with an upper-register monotone vocal delivery and fist-hammered notes redolent of the one and only KARP. I’d be happy to settle into a full album of pure KARP worship, but Sealer doesn’t go easy on us, adding some satisfying bounce to the song before dropping off into a saxophone-aided dirge. It feels like going from sober to wasted in two minutes, and it’s a nice way to kick things off. The five other tracks play around with post-hardcore noise-rock’s conventions like chewing gum on a finger, extending breakdowns into full songs and bending Black Flag riffs into Jesus Lizard angles. It doesn’t feel like this music is particularly dangerous or disturbed, but rather true to the group’s married-guy noise-rock essence, one of mostly-stable men pursuing healthy and creative ways to blow off some of the steam that builds up no matter how seriously they might practice yoga or not. Been there!

Ben Vince Street Druid LP (AD 93)
We were due for a fresh solo full-length from collaborator-about-town Ben Vince, and that time is now. Check any hip London-centered experimental release from the last five years and there’s a good chance that Vince lent a helping hand, or at least is tight with someone who did. He generally contributes his tastefully-processed saxophone (that Joy O collab from 2018 is ace), but on Street Druid it’s all-hands-on-deck for Vince, as he utilizes guitar, bass, voice, synths and drum programming to flesh out these pieces. Anyone familiar with his work might expect a tasteful, warm-ambient melange of horns, synths and electronic rhythms, and I’ll assure you now: that general assessment rings true for the album’s duration. For as pleasant as Vince’s music always is, there’s something about Street Druid that clocks as directionless… all the proper parts are in order, but it can feel as though Vince forgot to bring an itinerary or even a map. “Sentient Kinetics” is one of the more vigorous pieces here, reminiscent of Shackleton in a way that makes me want to put on Shackleton. “Deepbluereflection” is as beautiful as the title implies, but it feels comfortable as a background setting, the atmosphere to support something more interesting (or, God help us, vibes-based social-media content). Street Druid is soothing, artfully-crafted music, but by the lofty bar AD 93 has set for its visionary outlook, it falls a little short.

Winged Wheel Desert So Green LP (12XU)
Winged Wheel’s existence has been defined by transformation. The group started as a long-distance project, a successful series of file swaps turned into a band once they gave it a name, and then in 2024, Winged Wheel actually sat down in the same room, further unfurling their dextrous Americana-psych. I forget what year we’re in now, but Desert So Green is yet another reinvention, and perhaps the most exciting one yet, the sort of thing that will get you to stop calling them Winged Wheel and start calling them Winged Wheel. The band, featuring a variety of underground rock stalwarts (Fred Thomas, Matthew J. Rolin, Steve Mutha F’in Shelley and more), dug their heels into songwriting (rather than vibewriting) this time around and the results are glorious. You can’t pin their sound on any conspicuous set of influences, though their approach isn’t so foreign as to fully bewilder. Oren Ambarchi gone post-rock tropicalia? Stereolab dressed as Sigur Rós for Halloween? Kevin Shields’ missing 1995-2005 songs discovered by Jeff Parker and intercepted by Colin Newman, glam-era Brian Eno sitting shotgun in the getaway car? These are all wrong statements, but I’ve accepted that I’m losing to Winged Wheel this round. If every band was able to bridge the gap between the fresh and the familiar like Desert So Green, I’d stop yapping so much and simply sit back and listen, wrapped up in the sensation of previously-unconnected cerebral neurons firing back and forth for the first time.