237.5: Not On Spots
Killer episode on Patreon this week for tha real onez. The Patreon feed usually gets two bonus episodes per month and the 185 Patreons are the people who keep this podcast (and Substack) alive. Consider becoming a member here.
For the 185 Miles South main feed, we generally stick to chatting about music that is on Spotify just to make it easy for everyone to check out the tunes we talk about. I like the idea of a shared experience and listeners have different levels of free time, internet savy, interest, etc., so it makes sense to make a playlist that everyone can check out and jam together to go with the episode.
Hardcore in 2024 is in a weird place. Between Taco Bell & PBR sponsorships, bands attempting to sing and frankly its popularity being massively propped up by Alt-HC bands, I’ve found myself digging into different pockets of this thing recently that would be of little interest to your average civilian. Really that’s what this podcast is about anyway: showing love to all sides of this big, beautiful beast we know as Hardcore Punk - from The Pagans to Anti Cimex to Ten Yard Fight to 100 Demons. Hell yea.
If you ever get played out on something, there’s always some other nook to dive into. That’s the long winded way of saying I’ve been jamming a lot of stuff recently that’s not on the streaming platforms, either by diving into my record collection at home or making playlists of non-streaming stuff to listen to while I go on bike rides or walks. This week on Patreon, I picked out 12 songs and went through them with the listeners. I’ll break a few of them down here for the stack as well.
Discard “Death From Above” Death From Above 7”, 1990
On the pod, I talked about Discard possibly being the first proper D-beat band - not the first band heavily influenced by Discharge, but the first trying to straight up clone them. So of course, today I opened up the Sorry State newsletter and there’s Usman dropping like eight paragraphs of knowledge on my ass about this stuff. Apparently Disaccord, also from Sweden, beat Discard by a year. I’d never even heard of that band…what a poser.
And I think I’m still riding the poser train on this one. I can appreciate the novelty of the Disaccord tape, but it just sounds like a rehearsal session, whereas the Discard record sounds bright and fucking savage. I think an important component of Discharge that sometimes gets overlooked is the records just sound great. Even their first 7” sounds awesome from the needle drop, and we all know that the 2nd 12” sounded so good that longhairs across the globe loved it. But yea, back to Discard…for bands just straight ripping Discharge, this record is probably my favorite along with the Disaster LP and the first Meanwhile LP.
A final thing on Discard, we should call out the fact that this project happened in 1986, the same year that Discharge completely shit the bed with their bunk ass LP Grave New World. Want to hear how those tunes went over in LA at the time? Check out my interview with Big Frank on Episode 227 of 185 Miles South.
Disclose “Mass Death And Destruction” A Mass Of Raw Sound Assault 7”, 2001
Who is the ultimate cult punk band? If you surveyed 1000 troo punx, I bet Disclose is making the top 10. While they were definitely a D-beat band, I’d argue against them being a pure Discharge clone as a whole. To my smooth brain and diminished ears, Disclose is more about running the Discharge machine through the blown out filter of early 80s pioneers Disorder or fellow Japanese punk icons Confuse. Instead of simply trying to copy, they’re pushing the madness forward with their own sonic twist. Ironically, my favorite Disclose record is probably Nightmare Or Reality which is the easiest on the ears and the most straight up Discharge-sounding one.
On the pod, I talked how I enjoy jamming their first LP Tragedy at home a lot. I hate to be that guy, but the blown out sound just sounds better on vinyl. There’s something about the MP3 compression just doesn’t translate that sound properly (although at full blast with windows down on the freeway gives it a fighting chance.) Their final, and most savage sounding LP Yesterday’s Fairytale, Tomorrow’s Nightmare always kinda missed me. Keep in mind, Suffer is my favorite punk record ever and I still listen to “Badfish” at least once a month so give me a break - I know where I stand. Yesterday, I was chatting with friend of the pod, and mosh icon, Kevin Hare and he was saying Yesterday’s Fairytale was his favorite so I’ll have to get one of those recent represses and jam it at home like I do with Tragedy.
This is all a long way of saying I’ve pretty much only fucked with the songs off of those 3 12”s, but recently I’ve been diving into the EPs. A Mass Of Raw Sound Assault is currently my favorite and it offers a nice back to back comparison to their final LP cuz they share the same first track. This thing just slays front to back and sounds killer. It was hard to pick a favorite track, so I just picked the first one. Vibes, man.
Warm Gun “Accident” Chinese Gangsters 7”, 1977
Calling Discard the first D-beat band wasn’t the only thing I got wrong on the pod. For whatever reason, I said that the band Warm Gun only put out one 2-song 7” ever. Of course there were 4 songs on the EP and they’re all killer. Luckily for me, the Patreons are a fierce but forgiving bunch and I didn’t get crucified over this misstep. A while back I did a project where I listened to 1000 7”s that came out pre-1984 because I was under the impression that anything that was 1983 or earlier was of some note. For hardcore, I was pretty much right but in the punk lane there is so much trash.
You know when you’re in the record store and some schlub brings in a stack of ring-worn Streisand or big band records he scored off a dead relative thinking he’s going to strike it rich? Yeah, just cuz it’s old doesn’t mean it’s worth anything, dude. That’s like a lot of old punk. First there’s just a dearth of stuff that is bad power pop, followed by the new wave stuff. Prior to that you get a ton of bands that are Dolls or Stooges clones but they’re not skilled at the art of apeing like Discard.
France’s Warm Gun on the other hand is just killer, plus they’re legit 1977 so that’s cool as hell. I get more US influence off this than UK, and while maybe it’s a little slicker than the 1970s NYC sleaze, the swagger is still there. I love all FOUR songs off of this thing.
Here’s the whole list of songs I went through:
Consider SMASHING that Patreon button and have a killer week.
- ZN