here we have a rare treat from northeast PA's most favourite pop-punk band during the mid to late 90s, bedford. i'm not sure exactly what year this came out, but i'm thinking 1998 or 1999, and as far as i know, the songs were recorded for a tape to be given away at one show around the holidays. despite this ultra-limited cassette release, a year or so later, there was an even shorter run of the same songs on CD-R format.
bedford pull out all the stops on this lo-fi stocking stuffer. if you're not familiar with bedford's brand of punky rock, imagine taking that old record reviewer's blender and inserting equal parts elvis (fat AND skinny, but mostly skinny), elvis (costello, this time), buddy holly, husker du, action patrol, and doc hopper, blend until smooth, and there you've got a close approximation to the bedfords, as they were sometimes affectionately known.
01 silver bells 02 hurry xmas 03 (night before xmas) sleepwalk 04 hawaiian xmas 05 santa claus is coming to town
members of bedford went on to form an albatross, a highly progressive grindpunk mindfuck synthrash ensemble, as well as the swims, and maybe some other bands you should find out your own damn self! ha!
ps. the songs are labeled and tagged incorrectly, so FUCK YOU! ;D MERRY PUNXMAS EVERYONE!!
been a bit of a nostalgia trip going on over at the columbus sucks message board, old columbus flyers are the topic of one of the most popular threads right now and there are some pretty good ones being posted. lots of old legion of doom flyers, as well as flyers for shows at addition 13, fire exit, and elsewhere. the lot of which corresponded with a few cassette rips i'd recently done of a bunch of demos i've been wanting to listen to, and as your luck would have it, posted here for your listening pleasure as well.
first up, we have the xAND WE REMAINx demo. straightedge youth crew thrash-core featuring past/future/present members of killed in action, dismal, reflect, the ordeal, the dead hate the living, severe, etc. i think they were still all straightedge at this point. which still remain? haha.
it's too late (again) practice makes you an asshole #11...i forgot the title kill your neighborhood drug dealer the tunnels of cu chi this city's ours all that street cred and you're still a loser
next up is the intense justice tape. this band would prove to be the precursor to the styling (and featuring future members) of the infamous columbus power violence cartel, weed steeler.
intense justice that's not normal learn to skate do not go b&r only till september giant bird bass tape rapist live @ madlab 8/29
last, but certainly not least, we have the almighty deathly fighter demo. maybe even better than 9 shocks terror, this japanesehardcore-influenced band pulled out all the stops, and with surgical precision. GISM were given their due run for the money. deathly fighter are kind of still a band, mostly in name only, but are totally different and do not sound like this anymore. christian who provided vocals for this outfit, currently carries the banner with his latest abomination to humanity, vile gash.
(not to be confused with the more recent awakening, from here in columbus, oh)
an historical document in it's own right, a hardcore demo from a band in hazleton, pa back in 1992. i always wondered what type of underground music happened there before this era, if any. i mean there had to be something, right? i completely remember seeing alleyway graffiti there when i was just a wee lad that read PUNK OUT! in red spraypaint on a white wall just behind the main street downtown. years later when i was a skaterat punker, i would sometimes see this mob of older goth punks that used to hang out, but i was too shy to talk to them.
we always used to laugh about how hazleton was 20 years behind the times with everything, and if hardcore began in 1982, then i would say that this demo from 1992 was way ahead of it's time!! pioneers of mob city hardcore? who knows. i was friends with all the kids in this band, was there when they recorded this demo at the unisound in reading, pa, and always helped drive equipment to the shows. i'm not sure if the band even lasted more than a summer. i only remember there being less than a handful of shows and then the band was no more. such was the fate of most NEPA hc/punk bands from back in the day.
i think there was a big oi! influence in this band, especially with the more melodic edge and gruff vocals. i think the bruisers were a favourite at the time. for what it's worth, hardcore existed in hazleton, pa in 1992. this is a document.
i'm gonna go out on a limb and say that this tape might very well be THE holy grail wilkes-barre, pa hardcore demo. option (usually along with sideover) played support to just about every major name in hardcore that came through the area during the early to mid 90s, and ventured out of town on occasion as well. option could headline a bill of all locals and there would be 2-300 kids there, all singing along!! these songs were staples in their super-energetic live set, the choruses often inducing large dog-piles of kids with backwards baseball caps. wilkes-barre has a pretty rich history of hardcore, DIY shows at firehalls, kids doing fanzines, etc. and where most bands and spots were flashes in the pan, option were there through the thick of it, and really deserve their due. or at least an MVP award for keeping the scene alive all those years.
i bought this tape from one of the members of the band when i was on tour with a band called deckard (more about this band soon), back in 1995. i believe it was this same tour that we met up with a band called hot water music, and procured their "push for coin" demo. it would be this demo, along with discount's "mom lied to me" that became the soundtrack for the rest of tour, putting it on most times for repeated listens, until one day the deck in the van decided that it, too, needed some breakfast. sad to say that the only thing on the menu was hot water music "push for coin" omelet. unfortunate as it was, i am glad the discount tape survived the devious game of russian roulette.
if you're unfamiliar with this female-fronted poppy punk rock band, here's some info from wikipedia: Discount was a punk rock band from Vero Beach, Florida that formed in 1995 and disbanded in 2000. They released three full length albums, several EPs, and two b-side collections. Members have gone on to form The Kills, The Kitchen, Black Cougar Shock Unit, Unitas, the Routineers, The Draft, and Monikers.
shotwell are the gritty SF mission district punks that probably pack dynamite in those guitar cases of thiers, and maybe they do.
yeah, so strawman called it quits after returning from an european tour, leaving jimmy to form shotwell coho with aaron cometbus, and open up for sublime and strung out at their first show in december of 1994. since then, shotwell has seen numerous lineup changes, including the departure of aaron cometbus on drums. in one form or another, shotwell could be seen over the years, touring the nation in their leprechaun mobile home, or taking the streets back by setting up and playing guerrilla punk rock shows in the streets of the mission. it seems to me that shotwell are one of those bands who LIVE the chaos!!
i'm pretty sure i got this tape when they played cafe metropolis, in wilkes-barre, pa, perhaps in the late 90s. however, i also saw them once a few years prior to that, at the teen center/3rd + b st., in davis, ca.
01 once in a while 02 geneva avenue fall out 03 sinking the ship 04 eppli 05 cheap tragedies 06 days into days 07 half the truth 08 what it takes 09 don't need a mirror
in keeping with the theme today of early 90s northern california bands, here's a demo from the bay area's wynona riders. this demo goes back to the days of tape trading through snail mail (ha! remember that!?). unfortunately though, it was obtained from a hasty trader who couldn't be bothered with copying inserts or even writing track lists. yet, it is still worthy of a post here, since this band was one of my favourites from the bay area lookout records pop-punk onslaught of the early nineties. the wynona riders were formed from members of a couple of other notable bands such as the soup, filth, vagrants, pot valiant, and sweet baby.
i believe this is the demo mentioned in their following bio from lookout records: I encountered THE WYNONA RIDERS first at a Sunday afternoon show at Gilman Street with a dozen or so other people. I was still new enough that I jumped at any chance to hang out at the graffiti-coated club and be bombarded by any manner of punk rock allowed to mount the stage. Sunday afternoon shows were musical pot lucks: they seemed to book bands that pestered the staff for so long they had to be given a show—my own first band was one of them. They were almost always all local bands that I'd never heard of, but it was fun to just hang around, and if the band sucked you could talk outside on the sidewalk. When THE WYNONA RIDERS started playing, I looked up from whatever conversation I was engaged in. They sounded good, the songs were melodic and catchy, and they seemed well-practiced, unlike the other bands they were appearing with that day. Pat and I were putting together The Can of Pork Compilation, and I asked the vocalist, Skip, who later ran for mayor of Alameda, CA, if they wanted to contribute a song. He gave me their demo tape, with which I became preoccupied. Their music was even more infectious on further listenings, and the lyrics were cryptic, humorous poetry—or at least, I hoped they were because they made me laugh. THE RIDERS went through some lineup changes and two East Bay band veterans and scenesters, Richie Bucher (SOUP, SWEET BABY) and Dave E.C. (FILTH, THE VAGRANTS) ended up in the band. Lookout! released a 7"EP, then recorded demos for an LP when the band broke up, all in 1992. Then in 1995, THE WYNONA RIDERS reformed in response to the resurgence of '92 era melodic pop-punk. The time seemed perfect. After two ambitious and arresting releases, THE WYNONA RIDERS broke up again over the question of whether to internet or internot. Skip and '95 era guitarist Joe Selby went on to form the short-lived but still great TOYBOAT.—Christopher Appelgren
and the break-up of the band, from the wynona riders entry on wikipedia: After a successful tour that saw the Wynona Riders play over 40 shows around the country in six weeks the band decided to try to stick it out with the touring line-up and began writing new material for a follow-up record. An interim release under the name The Nation of Wenonah was released on What Else? records out of Indiana as a split EP with band Lynrd's Innards. The EP was a send-up/tribute of the Washington D.C. band the Nation of Ulysses. As more new songs were written the style of the band was veering towards the agitpop styles of other D.C. bands from the early 1990's and Richie and Dave found themselves less than enthusiastic about the direction the band was headed.
Time was booked into Andy Ernst's Art of Ears studio, where "J.D. Salinger" had been recorded to do an EP for Lookout!, but before the band entered the studio they suffered something of a meltdown and broke up onstage at 924 Gilman St. in Berkeley, ironically while performing as the opening band for another Lookout! band, Fifteen's farewell show.
Skip and Joe formed the band "Toyboat" with former Red # and Hi-Fives drummer Julie Rose and bassist Adam Turk, E.C. joined the band "Three Years Down", and Richie went to work at a bakery. A short year later toyboat would disband and Joe Selby would join Three Years Down as their bass player with Skip moving to New York to pursue a career in information technology.
also, one member of wynona riders is (or at the very least, was) in a band called surface wound with members of too much joy.
during the mid to late 90s i spent most of my time (when i wasn't traveling) in northern california. in davis, california, to be precise. i had a radio show at community free-form alternative radio KDVS, as well as helping run Food Not Bombs with my pal Punk Roge, and a little side-job washing dishes for some spending cash. after Food Not Bombs, sunday afternoons were usually spent poring over records and tapes at any of the localthriftstores. it was one of these such sunday afternoons that i plucked this cassette out of the sea of cheeseball hair metal and corny new wave offerings that were usually par for the course. i was already familiar with the band, having had a copy of their only vinyl outing, the hard up EP, which i may be their only other output, period. someone please correct me if i'm wrong!! i would surely like to hear more. every song here is pretty much a winner, topics range from rootbeer (LESS FILLING, TASTES GREAT!), skateboarding, cops, girls, insecurities, etc. basically anthems for being punk and young. think bay area hardcore meets RKL...
from the posthumous circus tents myspace: Old Skate Rock Band from Grass Valley, Ca from 1989 to 1993 (or something like that).After the Circus Tents broke up, Matt and Chad went on to start up The Force, Jon played in Cigar, and Scot did the Wimpy Heroes with Matt and later played in Superuin. Jon now plays in Ra Ra Rabbit. Matt now plays in Viva Hate.
01 skateboarding in grass valley 02 why the fuck? 03 to protect and to serve 04 criticized 05 colonel pickering 06 trust 07 root beer 08 can you hear me? 09 worthless 10 go away 11 raid dave's house 12 four count
in keeping with the theme today of early 90s northern california bands, here's a demo from the bay area's wynona riders. this demo goes back to the days of tape trading through snail mail (ha! remember that!?). unfortunately though, it was obtained from a hasty trader who couldn't be bothered with copying inserts or even writing track lists. yet, it is still worthy of a post here, since this band was one of my favourites from the bay area lookout records pop-punk onslaught of the early nineties. the wynona riders were formed from members of a couple of other notable bands such as the soup, filth, vagrants, pot valiant, and sweet baby.
Posts
