Lately, like a lot of people, I am totally obsessed with the GameStop situation in the American stock market. There's so many different angles of interest to me. I'm always fascinated by weird ways internet culture influences real life and exemplifies different parts of the human psyche. I was obsessed with Twitch Plays Pokemon for basically the same reason. The way large groups of people, without any formal organization or leadership, can rally together and act as a group, strangers cheering each other on by shouting into the void with memes, and that's enough to accomplish basic yet unspoken goals. I think this style of group formation and participation is seriously heightened and fueled by the internet, and sometimes this stuff is super dangerous and super negative, but it also has the potential to be so positive. How do we utilize it for the positive?
I'm also very interested in the way this otherwise apolitical financial play, which is a kind of funny and interesting play in its own right and speaks to bullshit nature of our financial markets, the way this apolitical act has several layers of politic projected onto it by outsiders. In November 2020, nobody was buying shares of GameStop as a political act. It was a strategic financial play by people that are into the stock market. By January 2021, it's basically the ground floor of practical class war in the USA, and thousands/millions of random people are out to "bleed Wall Street dry" by buying and holding GameStop and other similarly shorted corporations. (As if these corporations are so noble and really deserve our saving, but that's another line of discussion.) How did this narrative change? I wonder if this speaks to a latent sense of class politic that is not generally associated with the USA?
The use of propaganda and how that influences people and situations, the way access can evolve into power, everything involving Robinhood which illuminates the bullshit "rules for thee but not for me" way our systems are rigged against the common person, the international spread of a basically American situation, the billboard fad and of course I went to my local GME billboard and took pictures and had a nice conversation with some internet hipster about cryptocurrency, fuckin AOC and Donald Trump Jr and Mia Khalifa and Ja Rule and Elon Musk all on the same side of this incredibly random topic....ahhhh I think Morgan's about to stop talking to me because I never shut up about this shit hahaha, but it's just so interesting!
Well, if you're holding GME, keep holding....or don't, fuck it man, you do you. But I am super curious about your experiences and motivations so maybe someday you can tell me about it.
Anyway, records!
-Dan
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FEBRUARY NEW ARRIVALS
So this month's big shocker for me is Nuclear Post Mortem/Amusia split 7". Amusia is totally rock solid fast and raw from Hungary, but I really want to focus in on Nuclear Post Mortem. This is the new band of my crew Morte Lenta, and has had a couple demo tapes over the years but this is their first vinyl release and easily their best material yet. While Morte Lenta was straight-forward and relentless, just nonstop blasting attack with a piss raw sound, Nuclear Post Mortem really adopts a more "musical" grindcore approach. More riffing, more dynamic arrangements, bigger and heavier production. I place it it pretty close to bands like Noise and Industrial Holocaust. This is the true spirit of Brazil noisecore, new generation, and it really makes my heart sing to hear records like this. Powerful shit. I highly recommend it. Keep your earplugs in because there are some more hot releases from this band right around the corner.
On the opposite side of the coin, the other thing I cannot stop listening to is this Accidente collection CD, compiling their second and third LPs and the split 7" with Duelo. Accidente is one of my very favorite bands in the world right now, their records are never far from my turntable, and now that I can listen to this shit in the car too, ahhh I just can't stop. Their blending of melodic Euro punk style (think La Fraction, The Assassinators, Post Regiment, etc) with Fat Wreck-style pop-punk truly captures the best parts of both. They have a new LP dropping, mmmm I think this month? We pre-ordered a small stack so please keep your eyes open for it.
Okay, so first topic: yes my stupid label has 3 new releases that are out now. A total noisecore attack. A lot of people are asking about the first full-length 12" album by Atrofia Cerebral (Peru). If you're somehow not already familiar with this kvlt band, this is the best starting place, their big statement to the world. Yes it is ready and shipping now lol. Also we have a compilation 10" by Exacerbacion (Costa Rica), tracking their long career of being the primary noise export of Central America. And finally, CSMD/Crack split 7" (the Netherlands/USA), of course CSMD should need no introduction since they're fucking legends, and Crack finally follow up their 2016 tape on No Fucking Labels.
If we already sorted out a trade or wholesale buy in advance, your package will ship this week.
Also if you are excited about this gruesome threesome of ugly sounds, you maaayybbeee would be interested in the new tape of my own crappy noisecore band Anal Butt. Our new tape on Kaz Re-chords is out, I think basically sold out now, but I have a small handful of our band copies up on the webstore. One side is proper dumbass noisecore belligerence as we do, one side is more atmospheric soundscape-type composition because that's what our recording session leant itself to. Well, I am proud of it.
At the time of me writing this we still have a handful of Apocalypse LP left but it's really flying out the door. But don't even stress if you miss it because there's an American pressing on Prank coming soon. Well, even if you miss these copies, maybe you'd be interested in new Crude split 7", featuring two guitars again!, or Military Shadow tape, if you're still fiending for more after the spectacular LP on FOAD. Ah also, since we were all talking about Gouka in this Discord....I bought some of those Gouka discography 2xCDs too. Hot damn did that band kick ass.
I got a big stack of oi. I don't even like oi! But apparently you people do because there were a few orders for Mess LP and Repeat Offender EP the moment they went up for sale. (Morgan chimed in, "Of course, because oi is good music and you are wrong" lol). Well I don't have much to say about this stuff but I did find Cuero LP to be a particularly pleasing catchy listen. And I guess Puro Odio LP isn't exactly oi, it's fuuuucking harsh, and it's been a popular one in this apartment lately.
And finally, we have the usual spread of hardcore and punk from around the globe. Lots of people hyped on Herejia reissue LP, and I am too, my experience has been it's pretty hard to find and I still don't have an OG, so this reissue will fill that gap in my heart for now. We also restocked Kalashnikov EP reissue since people were still asking about that. But what really took me by surprise is Vicio EP. This was completely off my radar except for an appealing MRR review and man, fucking AWESOME. Label says "if Bad Brains was from US/Mexico borderlands" and, yeah, I hear that. Totally rampaging and bursting at the seams with franticness and desperation, a nice raw production, well-constructed songs, fuck, this is the sleeper hit of the season for me seeing as I haven't seen any other discussion of it.
For more commentary on this stuff and more, please scope our Instagram page, where we review choice new arrivals as they come. If it sounds cool when we talk about it, it'll sound even cooler when you hear it streaming on the online store, and even cooler still when you buy the record and slap it on your turntable.
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arriving in the mail someday:
-a nice spread of crust and d-beat records and tapes
-giant boxes of reissues from Hungary and from Russia and from Poland
-giant box of metal from Italy
-giant box of grind from Germany....maybe someday this will arrive
and more more more !!
Thanks and talk more in March.
-Dan