New Record! Appalachian Terror Unit: Greenwashing

Review # 70
Artist: Appalachian Terror Unit
Title: Greenwashing
Format: LP
Label: Vex/Profane Existence
Year: 2008
Songs: 7




We're going back to "A" one more time. My band had the privilege to open for these folks recently and I had to pick up their record. I was annoyed by having to go back to "A," but this record is well worth it.

Appalachian Terror Unit is an anarcho-punk/crust band from West Virginia. The sound is reminiscent of some of the heavier anarcho-punk bands like Amebix and Antisect that would become the sonic inspiration for crust punk. Featuring heavy (but not sludgy) guitars and shouty (but not overly growly) vocals, ATU fills that space that bands like Aus Rotten used to occupy in the late '90s. There's nothing super original about their musical performances--they play a genre. But they play it REALLY, REALLY well. The performances are flawless and powerful, the production feels full without being overproduced.

This record features female lead vocals that alternate with a male backing vocalist in a way that remind me a bit of Nausea. The singers deliver passionate, urgent protests against the drug war, environmental degradation, the two party system, commercialized health care, and similar topics. The lyrics are intelligent and the content seems well-researched and thoughtful (leaving aside some spelling and grammatical errors in the accompanying lyrics booklet). Some of the songs feature rants in the middle that add a lot more content and substance than some bands in the genre bring to their lyrics. While there's nothing terribly original about the topics or critiques they offer, the band does a bring an interesting perspective to their discussion of environmental issues. Hailing from West Virginia, the destruction that is  inherent in Appalachian coal mining is right in their backyards. They have firsthand experience with the devastation that this industry leaves behind, and their lyrics recognize the hazards that workers in this industry face, the damage that is wrought on the environment, and great lengths that industry will go to cover up both of these travesties.

All in all, if you like crust or heavy anarcho-punk, this record is really good. I'd go so far as to say it's a must have for fans of Amebix, Aus Rotten, Nausea, Anti-Sect, or Icons of Filth. And their nice folks, too!

Here's the title track if you want to check it out.

Total songs listened: 857

Born/Dead & Consume: Split LP

Review # 61
Artist: Born/Dead & Consume
Title: Split LP
Format: LP
Label: Yellow Dog
Year: 2003
Songs: 15







My last two reviews have featured complex records by innovative bands. This one doesn't, really. Born/Dead and Consume are generic, but I don't mean this in a negative way. They aren't generic in the sense necessarily of being bland or boring, but rather in the sense that they represent well the qualities of a genre of music. From the grainy black and white cover featuring armed to insurgents to the typewriter font lyrics poster, to the recording quality of these fifteen songs of angry protest, everything about the record conjures in my mind a hundred memories from the last 13+ years of dark rooms filled with black-clad punks, packed in to see to see the touring band or some local favorites on a Saturday night. This record sounds like crust. If you like crust, there's a lot to like here.

Let's start with the Born/Dead side. Born/Dead, not to be confused with Born Dead Icons, play Tragedy-esque hardcore punk. With alternating vocals, heavy guitars, one long sample, and pounding drums change effortlessly between breakneck speed and mid-tempo shout out parts, this band may not be doing anything new, but what they are doing, they do very well. Their lyrics address poverty, the military industrial complex, the culture of surveillance, the objectification of women, and the inability or unwillingness of either the left or the right to deal with any of these problems. Born/Dead are an anarchist crust band. If you've listened to many bands like this, you won't find a lot of surprises here, but what you will find is the style done right. It's passionate, high-energy, and musically competent.

While I don't have any deep investment in Born/Dead as a band, the same cannot be said of Consume. Consume was a Seattle band in the early part of the 21st century, during a time when I went to DIY punk shows nearly every weekend and was playing more than a few myself. The band included at least one member of late '90s Seattle punk luminaries Whorehouse of Representatives, and were one of my favorite local bands during their existence. I was disappointed when they went their separate ways (although the gap has largely been filled by Deathraid, which contains, if I'm not mistaken, at least a couple of the same folks). So obviously, I have a personal bias in favor of this side of the record. Consume played fast, metallic dbeat crust with socially conscious lyrics. Perhaps slightly less articulate than Born/Dead, these songs are none the less impassioned statements against war, consumerism, dependence on television, and, of course, George W. Bush. Everyone had a song about him back then, and rightly so. These songs are faster than the Born/Dead side of the record, and perhaps slightly less complex. It's just good, straight-up crust, played well. They were a lot of fun to see live back in the day.

I couldn't find a song from the Born/Dead side of this record on youtube, but here's "Walk the Plank" from the Consume side.

Total songs listened: 762

New Record! Age of Collapse: Burden of Beast

Review # 59
Artist: Age of Collapse
Title: Burden of Beast
Format: LP
Label: Aborted Society Records
Year: 2011
Songs: 7






Happy New Year, readers!

I've been trying to finish up my "B" LPs for a while now, but I just keep on buying "A" records and having to backtrack. I've actually passed up a couple of "A" records that I wanted lately, because I don't want to back up again, at least until I get on to another letter of the alphabet. But I couldn't pass on the new Age of Collapse LP. I've been into this San Diego based band for a couple of years now, ever since I first saw them play at the now defunct vegan restaurant Squid & Ink and picked up their excellent split album with Warscroll. My band had the privilege of opening for Age of Collapse on Tuesday of this week, and after hearing the new material in their set, there was simply no way I could pass up their new LP (not that I really planned to).

I'll put this in simple terms and then elaborate: If you like crust at all, go get this as soon as you can, because this record is phenomenal.

Age of Collapse demonstrates with their new LP Burden of Beast that they are one of the best bands today playing in the crust punk genre. Their music is intense and spirited, but unlike so many punk rock bands, they refuse to trade trade proficiency and innovation for energy and passion. This band manages to escape that devil's bargain that so many bands fall prey to. They are as precise as any metal band and inventive as any prog or experimental band, yet manage to hold on to all the passion, energy, and excitement of the best hardcore bands. This record is the best of both worlds. Add to that that it is beautifully packaged clear vinyl and includes a free MP3 download of the album and you have no reason not to pick up this fantastic LP.

The music here shows a clear Neurosis influence, and listening to it, I also hear what appears to be an Iron Maiden influence in some of the lead guitar lines. Tempo changes abound, reminding me of some of the better crust and hardcore bands from the late 1990s (e.g. Botch). Melodic yet crushing bass lines weave in and out of the guitars, adding another level of sophistication to the music. Desperate, roaring vocals are backed with higher, shrieking backing vocals. The songs alternate between morose, trudging slow parts and moments of such intense speed that I am reminded of bands like Stack, Spazz, and Capitalist Casualties. Judicious use of guitar effects other than distortion create a layered sound without veering into shoegazey territory, and precise drumming with occasional hints of a tribal style pound out furious rhythms. This record really has the best off everything that crust punk can be.

The lyrics are very good too. The songs on this record speak out against environmental devastation, vivisection, and the confines that technological society impose on all our lives, and does so in a way that avoids sloganeering and mostly steers clear of cliche. The songs often use stories to make a point rather than simply saying: "it's bad to shoot wolves from helicopters," or "it's bad to kill elephants for ivory." And, to top it all off, the writing at times verges on poetic. Not in a crappy high school poetry sort of way, either. The lyrics are articulate, well crafted, and compelling. It is clear that as much care was invested in the lyrical content of these songs as was invested in crafting the music of these songs.

Burden of Beast is, in my view, one of the best records to come out in 2011. It came out so late in the year that I expect it missed a lot of people's top 10 lists, but I'll say it again: if you like crust punk at all, this record is a must. It's powerful, compelling, and interesting from beginning to end. It demonstrates what punk rock can be when placed in the hands of creative and competent musicians. And on top of that, they're a nice bunch of folks.

I'll stop gushing now.

Age of Collapse has a bandcamp site. If you haven't heard this album, go listen to these songs now.

Total songs listened: 738

Axiom: Apathy & Privilege

Review # 24
Artist: Axiom (w/spoken word by Mike Antipathy)
Title: Apathy & Privilege
Format: LP
Label: Tribal War Records
Year: 2000
Songs: 8



We've now reached the end of the LPs beginning with the letter "A." Axiom was a crust punk band from Portland, Oregon, the singer of which I met in 2001 (?) when we were both practicing with a local band called Poxy for a few weeks right before they dissolved. But I digress. This was Axiom's third (and I believe final) release, and it is unified by a single theme that runs through the various materials that make up this album: we have a responsibility to bring about the social changes we want to see, and if we don't at least try, we're complicit in war, poverty, and environmental destruction. We have resources available to us that most of the world don't have access to, and it's up to us to use them to affect change. It's a hard message to argue with if agree that there are important problems in the world, and it's delivered here compellingly and in multiple media forms.

This album includes a poster, a booklet that features the lyrics to all the songs and a bunch of other writing, 6 metallic crust songs by Axiom, and two articulate and passionate soap-box speeches by Mike Antipathy. The aforementioned theme runs through all of these.

The music here is mostly fast, heavy crust with alternating screamy and growly vocals. This is definitely on the more metal side of the crust genre, with a few of the songs even featuring noodley solos. A friend of of mine who's the guitarist in a local punk band said to me recently, "when you start to get good at playing punk, you end up end up playing metal," and this band really demonstrates what he was talking about.  This isn't a straight-up metal album by any means, but the influence is pervasive with a lot of double-kick on the bass drum, thick distortion, palm muting, and the aforementioned solos. This band is proficient in a way that is just not necessary for playing '77 style punk or street punk or what have you. I would imagine this would appeal to fans of death metal as much as it would fans of punk.

The booklet that's included with this album is better than most crust album booklets.  It features not only the lyrics and song explanations, but also ideas about how to get involved in activism, suggestions for further reading, and information on a specific environmental issue that the band must have been particularly passionate about, the Lowry radioactive waste landfill. It's clear here that the band actually wanted to give listeners tools for getting informed and involved, which takes this record to a level beyond the typical shouting about socio-political issues that characterizes so many punk records.

In both the writings in the booklet and the spoken word pieces, Mike and Axiom endorse a variety of tactics, from letter writing to protest to direct action. It's a refreshing and smart approach that invites people to participate in the way they feel they can best contribute. One of my favorite moments on this record is actually the first spoken word piece, which concludes side one. Mike Antipathy is persuasive, informed, and articulate. He'd be a great spokesperson for any political group, and he's apparently now an immigration lawyer, which I can imagine him being quite good at.

I guess I talked less about the music here than the other stuff, but I think that's in part because the other stuff is what sets this record apart.  But don't get me wrong, if you like thrashy crust, the music is good, too.

My favorite song on the record is "This Isn't Life."

Ok, so that wraps up "A!" I'm excited to get on to "B," in part because glancing at the records, it looks like there's a bit more variety there. Check back soon for the first "B" review!

Total songs listened: 282

Aus Rotten: The System Works For Them

Review # 22
Artist: Aus Rotten
Title: The System Works For Them
Format: LP
Label: Tribal War Records
Year: 1996
Songs: 11




The System Works For Them is Aus Rotten's first LP, but for reasons of alphabetization, is second to review. I've never played these two records back to back before, but I'm actually sort of surprised by some of the differences that are apparent between this and ...And Now Back To Our Programming. We're not talking about "are these by the same band?" level differences, but there's definitely some development that's taken place between the two.

In the last review, I called Aus Rotten "masters of their genre," but this record is more... well, generic. It's not that it's bad. If you're into crust, this is still a solid record. In fact, it's got a little bit heavier sound that I think comes largely from more distortion on the bass which actually makes it sound a little more "crusty." And there's no shortage of passion in the delivery in these songs about capitalism, religion, war, etc. So if crust is your thing, you probably still enjoy this record.  On the whole though, the song writing here is much less developed than on the bands' second effort. The songs on The System Works for Them are simpler and much more repetitive. The influence of bands like Discharge and the Varukers comes to the fore in fast, metal-edged songs with only two or at most three parts, which are themselves more basic than the riffs on the band's second record. The vocal delivery is also rougher and has more of a barking feel to it that makes the lyrics a little harder to follow in places than on the band's second album (although still clearer than a lot of crust bands). It's not that this record displays incompetence, and I don't get bored with it necessarily, but I guess I understand better now why I listen to the other one more often.  This record really has a first-album feel to it: good energy, but not as developed as it could be. While the second album, as I suggested, has moments of what might be described as creative over-reach, I appreciate the band trying to do more than they did here.

Like the other Aus Rotten record I reviewed, my copy of this one is also missing the cover/poster. In fact, it's missing everything.  I don't even have a paper sleeve for this, it's just in one of those vinyl covers that people use to protect the outer jackets of records.  Bare bones. It's too bad, but I'm not invested enough in this particular album that I would buy another copy just for the packaging.

Total songs listened: 260

Aus Rotten: ...And Now Back to Our Programming

Review # 21
Artist: Aus Rotten
Title: ...And Now Back To Our Programming
Format: LP
Label: Tribal War Records
Year: 1998
Songs: 7



Aus Rotten was  one of the classic and best known bands of 1990s crust, spanning most of the decade and garnering considerable attention and credibility among crusties and more than a few fans of street punk with a sound that drew heavily off of the anarcho-punk bands like Conflict, but injected it with a more hardcore and metal sounds. I never bought a full-length record by the band but ended up with two in my collection thanks, again, to receiving my friend Tim's records.

...And Now Back To Our Programming is the band's second effort. It starts off, rather ambitiously, with a single 15 minute song, the title track. A song of this length for a punk rock band is a bold and ambitious move.  There's just one problem: even though it's all one track, it's not really all one song. It's probably three different songs. They have thematically linked lyrics, but structurally, this just isn't one song.  There are pauses, followed by completely different parts.  There are choruses, but they don't repeat throughout the 15 minute track, just one specific part of it. So as a piece of music, the song "...And Now Back To Our Programming" just doesn't hold together.  I'm not saying it doesn't sound good.  I'd say there are probably three good songs there.  But trying to make them all into a single song in this case feels either like a failed attempt at something that exceeded the band's creative grasp, or just a little bit pretentious. This isn't some epic opus, it's several good punk songs. Oh well. Side A of the record also includes an old ad for Phillip-Morris which extols the healthful qualities of their cigarettes. It's pretty preposterous that such claims were at one time widely accepted.

Side B of the record is more straightforward.  It's comprised of six  medium to fast paced hardcore songs denouncing sexism, homophobia, war, and greed. The vocal delivery is such that an ear that's used to this kind of music can actually make out most of what the band has to say, which is often not the case with bands like this. The message actually gets across in the music if you want to listen for it. Musically, what this has to offer is good, solid, hardcore punk with alternating lead vocals. There's nothing all that intricate or progressive on this record, but Aus Rotten are masters of their genre, and they deliver their material with passion and energy like a good punk band should. A few of the songs feature backing vocals from Adrienne Droogas of the band Spitboy, which is a nice touch, especially on the song "Sexist Appeal," which is thematically quite similar to a lot of the Spitboy material.

What my copy of this album lacks is the cover/fold-out poster.  I'm pretty sure Tim had this up on his wall at one point, and when the vinyl got boxed up and handed off to me, this didn't make it back into the package. So unfortunately, I don't have any of the album art or lyrics. What did come in this record was a pamphlet on veganism and a copy of "Resistance: A Journal of Grassroots Direct Action" from 1999. I'm not sure how this got in there, if it was from Tim or some previous owner of the record. It's got stories on the Zapatistas, Mumia Abu-Jamal, the McLibel case, and other stuff you'd commonly find in an radical publication back in the late 1990s (and, to varying degrees, today). Most of it is kind of dated, but it the publication itself looks pretty well done and is a slice of what was going on around the time the record came out. I don't expect I'll spend a lot of time with it, but it's sort of a cool find from a historical standpoint.

Next, I'll be reviewing another Aus Rotten record from Tim's collection, and then moving into the last two artists in my collection of LPs that start with the letter A....

Listen to "Sexist Appeal"

Total Songs Listened: 249

Armistice: Fluff and Stuff

Review # 15
Artist: Armistice
Title: Fluff and Stuff: The eps & early years
Format: LP
Label: Despotic Records
Year: 2005
Songs: 16






This is a record made up of early recordings and EPs by the crust band Armistice. The thing that makes Armistice unique is not their music.  It's not their lyrics.  It's their obsession with Winnie the Pooh. Yes, that's right, it's a crust punk band that obsessed with Winnie The Pooh.  So much so that Armistice have declared themselves to the first p-beat band. For those not in know, d-beat is a particular drum beat (and variety of crust that uses it a lot) that goes "do dotoo, do dotoo, do dotoo, do dotoo" (if that makes anys sense).  Armistice, as a Pooh influenced d-beat band has declared that they are a p-beat band.

So what does that mean exactly? Well, in terms of their lyrics or music, not much. It sounds like d-beat crust. Lyrically, the Pooh influence is subtle or non-existant--it's songs about war, environmental destruction, television, and capitalism.  Where the Pooh influence comes out is in the visuals.  I read an interview with this band a long time ago, and they said they were attracted to the Pooh motiff because, while most crust bands feature images of doom and gloom, they wanted to show images of the better, kinder world they wanted to bring about. A world which, apparently, is best embodied by Winnie the Pooh.

The result is images like this one:

Crusty Pooh and Piglet holding hands in front of a peace symbol.  Weird, right?

But let me be clear: I'm not being critical of this.  Far from it. I thought I was the only crust fan in the world who was also into Winnie the Pooh, but it turns out, I'm not alone. Winnie the Pooh and crust punk, it turns out, are totally compatible. I love it. I'm not being sarcastic at all.

So, you may be asking, how's the music? Well, it's fine.  It's sort of generic d-beat crust with both male and female vocals.  It's kind of predictable, to be honest, both lyrically and musically.  But, it's solid enough, if you like this kind of music. Nothing wrong with any of it, especially if you are into bands like Doom, Discharge, and One Way System (who they do a pretty good cover of on this record). I would definitley go see them live, given the opportunity to do so.  I would say I don't really need any more their records, except that I want these records for the visuals. So yeah, not mind blowing, but decent crusty crust if you like that sort of thing.

Ok, no more punk reviews for a few days. As we move toward the end of "A" we're going into some different sonic territory for a bit.

Wanna hear Armistice? Check out "Endless Struggle."

Total songs listened: 199

Antischism: Still Life

Review # 13
Artist: Antischism
Title: Still Life
Format: LP
Label: Prank Records
Year: 1991
Songs: 13





Hello, readers.  Sorry about the absence of posts in the last couple of days. I've just returned from a fantastic weekend in Portland, where I picked up a half dozen new jazz records. A couple of these will find their way into this blog in the next few days, but in the meantime, I'm going to review a couple more punk records.  For those of you less inclined toward this type of music, please bear with me. I'll be into some different stuff in just a couple more reviews.

With that said, let's talk about Antischism's Still Life. Had I not gotten out of place in terms of alphabetization and not reviewed some Sinatra on Friday, this record would have come immediately after Anti-Product's The Deafening Silence of Grinding Gears (review # 10), and the pairing of the two would have been appropriate.  There are number of similarities between these records (aside from similar band names). Both records are by crust bands from the 1990s, featuring alternating male and female vocals and similar topical content -- environmental destruction, racism, war, the plight of native peoples, the need for radical change. Both show a clear Nausea influence in both vocal delivery and musical stylings.

These are, however, in other ways, very distinctive records.  Still Life is sonically a heavier record that relies more on distortiona and standard crust and d-beat rhythms than does The Deafening Silence. That doesn't mean it sounds the same all the way through--tempo changes and precise starts and stops during the songs keep them from all running together. The songs here are not what I would call ground-breaking, though they might have sounded fresher in 1991 than they do today. In any case, though, the songs on this record  are generally well-written and competently performed late 80s/early 90s style crust. Not genre-transcending, but more than adequate if you like this kind of music.  Lyrically, Antischism tends more towards the abstract than Anti-product, though personal narratives also surface here and there, and the band avoids the excessive sloganeering of some political bands.

An aspect of this record that I find distinctive is the heavy use of non-musical samples.  There are numerous tracks on this record that feature samples of dialogue from films or news broadcasts that either stand alone or are paired with eerie backwards recordings of what I presume to be the band's own material. I can't identify all of them, but there are at least two samples from Michael Moore's Roger and Me, some that appear to be from television news segments, and another ("Ladies and Gentlemen") from a film I can't identify that features someone who sounds a lot like Jeff Goldblum (but might or might not be him) arguing with two women and in doing so making a number of extremely sexist remarks.  The anti-sexism message of this sample is clear. The sample I find a little more thought provoking is "Pets or Meat," which features a conversation between Michael Moore and a woman who butchers and sells rabbits for a living. Whenever I listen to this record, I find myself wondering whether Antischism is intending here to  to reposition this segment as a purely animal-rights message. The descriptions of the rabbits' living conditions and ultimate fate are disturbing, and are presented here out of the context of economic desperation depicted in Moore's film. In Roger and Me, the unfortunate fate of these rabbits is used to show what some people are driven to in face of an economic system which has left them behind. In the film, one sympathizes with both the rabbits and the woman who sells them.  Here, in the absence of context, the segment seems to take on a different message: "look how people mistreat animals."  I'm not saying the band is right or wrong to reposition in the sample in this way. In fact, I find the appropriation  and re-purposing of this sample to be an interesting move, made more interesting still by the potentially different meanings that one might bring to this track based on whether or not they've seen the film. I bring it up here not so much as a criticism as something I find intriguing.

As a side note, I bought this record used several years back, and there's a flyer in the sleeve for two punk shows at a place called the Mr. Roboto Project in Wilkinsburg, PA. I've never heard of any of the bands, but I looked at the website on the flyer, and the venue has apparently been active since 1998 and continues to be an all-ages music venue today. It makes me wonder how far and how long this record travelled before ending up in my possession.

In a nutshell: very competent crust with interesting samples. Recommended for fans of the genre.

Total songs listened: 164

Here's the opening track, "Failsafe."

Antiproduct: The Deafening Silence of Grinding Gears

Review # 10
Artist: Anti-Product
Title: The Deafening Silence of Grinding Gears
Format: LP
Label: Tribal War Records
Year: 1999
Songs: 8




To begin with, I want to make it clear that this is a record by the American crust band Anti-Product, not the English glam punk band AntiProduct, who do something entirely different and which I don't particularly care for. The next several reviews will deal with hardcore punk type bands, as a lot of such bands have names that start with "A" (go figure).

The Deafening Silence of Grinding Gears is a good, solid crust punk record.  Not the most inventive ever, but not overly repetitious and always smart and heartfelt.  Alternating male and female lead vocals that sometimes sing and sometimes shout create a dynamic sound that holds your interest. A crunchy (but not distored beyond recognition) guitar plays metal-influenced punk riffs, while the drums manage to avoid excessive reliance on same two beats that characterize much of genre, and bass does more than just follow the guitar. Good, competent crust. I would compare this to Nausea, but little less metal influenced.

The record comes packaged with a hefty lyrics book that, in 1990s-crust style, includes not only the lyrics to all the songs, but also an opening statement and a paragraph about each song explaining its topic and signicance. These songs draw straight, clear lines between imperialism, racism, industrialism, sexism, environmental degradation, and our lives and choices. There is a smart reclamation of term "feminism" in "Modern Day F* Word," and a comparison drawn between colonialism and and an unquestioning belief in scientific progress in "It Festers in Their Hearts." These are topics that often lend themselve to finger-pointing (not that there isn't a time and place for that...) but Anti-Product goes a step beyond the standard "those guys are bad, let's resist them" and examines also the struggles of people (i.e. themselves) trying to overcome internalized assumptions and prejudices, which does much to humanize this band and make the record feel more personal than one made up entirely of songs that exclusively criticize other people or simply "the system."

In short: a good crust record, if that's your thing, thoughtful lyrics, but probably not that appealing to most folks who don't care for the genre.

Listen to "It Festers In Their Hearts."

Total songs listened: 122

Amebix: No Sanctuary

Review # 9
Artist: Amebix
Title: No Sanctuary-The Spiderleg Recordings
Format: LP & 7"
Label: Alternative Tentacles
Year: 1984/2008
Songs:13




Amebix is, arguably, the first crust punk band. They blended metal and punk, sang in growly voices, lived in squats, and used dark and at times downright horrifying imagery in both their lyrics and album art in order point out the flaws in the modern political, economic, and social systems. They, alongside their contemporaries Antisect, borrowed the ethic and aesthetic developed by Crass and the first wave of British anarcho-punk bands and it took it a darker place. Thus, crust punk was born.

Musically though, there's a lot more going on here than just a fusion of punk and metal. What makes Amebix unique among crust bands, and in my view, better than Antisect, was their willingness and ability to experiment with sounds that fell outside of punk or metal. In my opinion, this is nowhere more evident than on their first EPs, No Sanctuary and Who's the Enemy, which have been combined by Alternative Tentacles as a single release. While the influences of punk rock and metal bands like Motorhead and Black Sabbath are evident here, this record is equally influenced by post-punk and early goth. Take away the growly-vocals, and a song like "Belief" could almost be a Gang of Four song, while "No Gods No Masters" could almost be a lost Killing Joke track as is. The first half of "Sunshine Ward" sounds more like Joy Division than a metal band, while the second half delves again into Killing Joke's sonic territory. The subtle and judicious use of keyboards and Gregorian chant-like backing vocals add a spooky, gothic quality to a couple of the tracks as well. Every song on this record is unrelentingly dark, but unlike a lot of the bands they inspired, the songs on this record definitely don't all sound the same.

Lyrically, a common theme on this album is each individuals complicity in their own repression, and ultimately in the damage to the world being wreaked by wars, industry, and unfair economic arrangements. As is often the case with Amebix records, the hyperbole can get a little silly at times, but at other times, the lyrics here are genuinely disturbing and thought-provoking. In terms of both sound and lyrics, if I had to sum this record up in one word, that word would be "bleak."


No Sanctuary is not the best recognized of Amebix releases. This is in part because the rights for all the material they recorded in the early days, for fellow anarcho-punks Flux of Pink Indians' Spiderleg Records, were tied up for quite a while. As a result, these songs were mostly out of print and hard to find for many years. Re-issued a couple of years ago on Alternative Tentacles, there are a few surprises here for people who might have previously only been acquainted with the later works of Amebix. Because the thin and trebly guitar sound of Crass and other bands that recorded on their label was so popular in the anarcho punk scene at the time, the recording engineers at Spiderleg gave the Amebix guitar sound a similar treatment. This is a far cry from the thick, heavy guitars that appear on the follow-up album, Arise! and the rest of the band's work. As a fan of the crunchier sound on their later albums, this was initially a bit off-putting to me (as it was to the band themselves when they first heard the recordings).

As I grew to know this album better, however, I've come to appreciate the production.  It allows the post-punk influence to come through in a way that's easier to decipher than on later releases. Innovative basslines, disonant guitar work, and more inventive drumming that would feel more at home on a Joy Division record than a Motorhead record are all more evident here than on later releases. I'm not sure, but I think this may not be because they weren't doing these things later, it's just that they got swallowed up by the devastating wall of guitar distortion that appears on a lot of the songs on the likes of Arise! and Monolith. If I had produced Amebix, I probably would have pushed for a guitar sound that falls somewhere between what we get here and what they gave us on the later material.

In a nutshell, this record is crucial to the evolution of crust as a musical genre, but transcends what most of the bands in that genre have achieved sonically. If you are a fan of punk, post-punk, or metal, this is a record that should be in your collection. And, as a bonus, it comes with 7" copy of the first Amebix single, "Winter/Beginning of the End."

Intrigued? Check out "Sunshine Ward."

Total songs listened: 114