Classic old school punk rock from the 80s and 90s on vinyl records, CDs and cassette tape

	Minutemen - Joy - 3 Inch CD single on SST Records The Minutemen were an American punk rock band formed in San Pedro, California in 1980. Comprising guitarist D. Boon, bassist Mike Watt and drummer George Hurley, the Minutemen recorded four albums and eight EPs before Boon's unexpected death in December 1985. They were noted in the Californian punk rock community for a philosophy of "jamming econo": a sense of thriftiness reflected in their touring and presentation.
	The Dickies - Second Coming - Cassette tape on Enigma Records With the Killer Klowns EP restoring the band to more of an active duty, the Dickies fully got their act back together with Second Coming, amusing angel/sainthood cover and all. The core Stan Lee/Leonard Graves Phillips partnership remains the same, while the core band, including bassist Lorenzo Buhne, guitarist Enoch Hain, and drummer Clifford Martinez, backs up everything with the expected élan. Things aren't quite at the same all-out just-insane-enough level of the original band in terms of performance -- volumes are sometimes lower, arrangement a touch less hyperactive -- but in terms of good spirit and good fun, Second Coming is an entertaining romp. Two covers continue the tradition of out-of-nowhere "you're covering that?" reactions -- while "Hair" and "Town Without Pity" aren't given the sheer high-speed/slam-dance treatment of times past, it's nice to see the group still tweaking the nose of what's hip and acceptable. The latter in particular is an amusing effort -- straightforward enough, but hearing Phillips instead of Gene Pitney's wailing makes for an interesting change! As for the originals, mostly from the pen of Phillips, things are off-kilter enough, as always, to make for a good time. "Magoomba" reappears from Killer Klowns, guest vocals from Phillips' mom and all, while "Monster Island" celebrates the legendary locale from the Godzilla series with surfy vibes. "Cross-Eyed Tammy" slots into the vein of sweet and silly power pop à la "Pretty Please Me" and "Out of Sight"; "Caligula" reads like the world's weirdest Iron Maiden parody ever (and why not?); and "Booby Trap" makes for a new way to look at goth girls. Even "Goin' Homo," which on the face of it would seem insulting, is good-natured silliness at quick speed -- "Why did god make men with nipples?" indeed.
	Seam - Headsparks - Cassette tape on Homestead records Bitch Magnet started getting a fair buzz of attention right when they fell apart, so it's little surprise that Sooyoung Park's next band, Seam (which also initially included Bitch Magnet's bassist, Lexi Mitchell), would benefit in part from that -- as well as the appearance of Superchunk's Mac McCaughan, proving himself to be a very good drummer on this album as well as two preceding singles. The just over half-an-hour-long Headsparks, literally recorded the month before Rock Changed Forever ('90s Style) with the release of "Smells Like Teen Spirit," contains plenty of touches soon to become hyperfamiliar. There's hints of Pixies, the Louisville underground, the incipient Merge scene, and even a touch of Neil Young's storming melancholia, resulting in a blend that's at once powerful, heartfelt, and anthemic almost in spite of itself. Certainly that could describe the opening song alone -- "Decatur," kicking things off on an emotional (but happily not "emo" in any sense of the word) note. Park's singing throughout varies between the murky and somewhat more straightforward -- while not sounding anywhere like its various shoegaze contemporaries in the U.K., there's a similar use of voice-as-cryptic instrument, often sounding a little lost in the kick of the music. Combined with some of the arrangements, it almost obliquely suggests a parallel to the Wedding Present -- the alternation between gentle chime and pepped-up crunch on "Pins and Needles" really suggests Dave Gedge's crew circa 1990 -- but the sentiments of wounded feeling, vocally and musically, have a wistful catch all their own. Highlights in that vein include "Sky City" and the epic collapse of "Feather," both of which do a fantastic job in showing the strength of Park's guitar playing as well. Two guest performers -- Velocity Girl's Sarah Shannon singing lead on "Shame" and Erectus Monotone's Jennifer Walker handling backup on "New Year's" -- add an enjoyable touch of further variety to an excellent album.
	The Meatmen - War Of The Superbikes - Cassette tape featuring Pushead Artwork on LSR Records 1991 With Tesco Vee's Dutch Hercules proving that chugging biker metal, parodic or not, was arguably a better platform for his intentionally over-the-top attitudes toward uncoolness (i.e., anything not Tesco Vee), War of the Superbikes turned out to be the icing on the cake. If Dutch Hercules' "Wine, Wenches and Wheels" was arena rock satire to the nth degree, War of the Superbikes blurred the line even more, with not one but two Minor Threat refugees -- Lyle Preslar and Brian Baker -- embarrassing themselves with what one hopes was knowing rather than unconscious meta-metal wankery on their part. Certainly nothing else could explain the likes of the Iron Maiden sex fantasy "Pillar of Sodom" and the jaw-droppingly over-the-top flamenco pornography of "Kisses in the Sunset." That said, there's a fair amount of stuff that could easily have fit on some of the early Meatmen stuff, but in its own weird way the role model is less Meatmen and more Meat Loaf, if on much less of a budget. The title track is one of the best things on here, in a comparative sense at least -- the ridiculous lyrics rival films like Streets of Fire for narrative coherence, and Vee certainly sounds like he's having plenty of fun setting himself up as the equivalent of the Anti-Nowhere League's Animal. Meanwhile, calling a song "Abba, God and Me" -- while not trashing either Abba or God in the lyrics -- has to count as a first for Vee. The schizoid nature of the album can best be noted with the two covers on the release -- the Pagans' proto-punk rampage "What's This Shit Called Love" (complete with fake country start on Elvis' "Love Me Tender") and Nazareth's whiskey-soaked boogie "Razamanaz." Ridiculous highlight -- the goony DJ rap at the start of "Punker-Ama," at once juvenile and just plain hilarious.
	TSOL - Live - Cassette tape on Restless Records In the early years of Los Angeles punk, one of the premiere hardcore bands was T.S.O.L., which stood for True Sounds of Liberty. Offering poppier music than many of their contemporaries and featuring an image that appealed to punks who wanted to dive deeper into the gothic subgenre already being offered by many British punk bands, T.S.O.L. became hugely popular on the local scene but never translated that success to national exposure because of their ever-shifting lineup and sound.
	Sebadoh - The Freed Man - Cassette tape on Homestead records 1988 Since he was a teenager, Tom Scott has been consistent, a talented multi-reedist with little or no interest in playing creative jazz. His mother was a pianist and father a composer. Scott early on became a studio musician and arranger. Able to play most reeds with little difficulty, Scott performed with the Don Ellis and Oliver Nelson bands, and his L.A. Express became one of the most successful pop-jazz groups of the 1970s. Associations with Joni Mitchell, Carole King, and George Harrison were just a few of his successful assignments in the pop world and, although his 1992 GRP release Born Again was surprisingly inventive, it was a one-time departure from crossover.
	45 Grave - Only The Good Die Young - Cassette tape on Restless Records 1989 The members were assembled from various other professional bands, and were all competent musicians. Carrack and Comer had previously played with Warm Dust, and King with Mighty Baby, whose antecedents were the 1960s band The Action. Ace were popular on the pub rock circuit. Their music was pop with a funk influence.
	GBH - From Here To Reality - Cassette tape on Restless Records G.B.H.'s sixth album, 1990's From Here to Reality, marches on in the same direction as the preceding A Fridge Too Far -- only the hardcore is harder, the speed metal is faster, and the energy on display defies any suggestion that G.B.H. were anything but the same committed mob they'd always been. The new musical approach may not have been to everyone's taste -- their most loyal audiences were now in Japan and the U.S., from whence the hardcore influence oozed in the first place. But, within the parameters of that audience's demands, there was no respite. "New Decade" sensibly opens the album, and does so with a discordant edge that proves to be this album's key. From "Trust Me I'm a Doctor" to "The Old School of Self Destruction" and "Just in Time for the Epilogue,"classic latter-day G.B.H. permeates every cut and, though it's all a lot less melodic than Fridge, From Here to Reality compensates for that via a succession of chopstick rhythms and dislocated riffs, a series of edgy anthems whose relentless hammering established this among the crucial punk albums of the 1990s, before the decade was even a year old. Besides, there is respite at the end of the rainbow, as "Moonshine" uncorks a country & western-style knees-up, all sheet-keecking geetars and the world's worst Southern accent, and a guest appearance from Angus Young's cousin, the pseudonymous Casper Wyoming. It's a lunatic way of ending such a hard-hitting album, and it works all the better because of it. Welcome to the 1990s!
	Tar Babies - Honey Bubble - Cassette tape on SST Records The last album from the Tar Babies is their funkiest and in many ways their most successful, though the vocals are still a bit weak and lacking in personality. Indeed, the two best cuts are the ones with guest vocalists -- of a sort. "Spaight and Ashbury" is really an instrumental that happens to be overlaid with recordings of rambling, surreal answering-machine messages. Oddly, the mix works perfectly, with the strange stream-of-consciousness monologue a mad counterpoint to the sizzling funk rumbling beneath it. "Bimbos and Idiots" is a non-politically correct rant that features a female guest vocal, and it comes off livelier than most of the other cuts. Elsewhere, the vocals on "Honey Bubble" are lacking in character -- not bad, but not memorable. This is unfortunate because most of the music here is first-rate, mixing punk, funk, and experimentalism to great effect. Funky slap bass and strident, discordant guitars mix much better than might be expected, and though the horn section never really cuts loose, there are some moments when they add a soulful or jazzy tone to a punkish riff. This band had some very good ideas and weren't afraid to experiment, and even if they didn't always pull everything off, their albums still sizzle.
	Naked Raygun - Throb Throb - Cassette tape on Homestead Records From its onset, the tube-crunch surf guitar intro of "Rat Patrol," Throb Throb sizzles like grease in a frying pan until it comes to a halt some 30 minutes later. Like the tank on its cover, Throb is largely informed by an antagonism that rails against the Reaganism that helped spawn intelligent '80s post-punk groups much like Naked Raygun. Titles like "Surf Combat," a song about the effects of napalm at popular beaches, "Gear," a braggadocio commentary about nuclear weapons and the arms race, and "Managua," in which troops march to their impending death, exemplify Throb's political mentality and musical gravity, which are a direct result of the '80s Cold War. Naked Raygun sends the songs up with a sense-raping frazzle and dissonance. While not as furious as Hüsker Dü or as angry as the Misfits, Throb is no less vehement, and ever the more working-class. With comprehensible lyrics everyone can understand and chant, and a plethora of race-against-time guitar melodies, Throb is rare in that it appeals to academics as well as rednecks, straight-shooters as well as in-the-know punks. Borrowing from the big-guitar sound of English heavy metal bands like Iron Maiden and carving catchy melodies usually reserved for Top 40 pop songs into firebrands like "I Don't Know" and "Libido," Naked Raygun assures Throb's place as a classic that is forever ahead of its time, regardless of when it is heard.