Jailbreak - 'The Rocker' (Family Vineyard)

We haven't checked in with Mr. Chris Corsano for awhile, so this comes a nice a surprise. Jailbreak was a duo of him and Heather Leigh, which put out two releases in 2010 and then that was it; hardly a surprise as they were living on different continents so rehearsal must have been a bit tough. Leigh's pedal steel and vocals would threaten to take over the whole soundstage here if it wasn't for Corsano's thunderous drumming. It's safe to say that there's no other pedal steel player out there who sounds like this, as the strings are drenched in a fuzz pedal, amped-up just to the edge of feedback, and moving in 50,000 different directions at the same time. It would also be safe to say there's no drumming anywhere else like this, except on other records Corsano plays on; together, it's a balancing act that works well.  Yet this isn't to suggest that The Rocker is teetering or restrained; it's aggressive to the max, with building blocks of pure energy, forcing the listener to strain to find the subtleties. 'Brought Down' starts off with solo Leigh for a minute or two before the drums kick in, and there's no going back one this cork is pulled out of the bottle. The vocals are twisted and shouty, enough in the background to be lyrically unintelligible but directly conveying power, wonder and energy. It's reminiscent of hardcore punk, an influence surely felt throughout The Rocker, as if that anger was merged with a free music approach. The flipside, 'Sugar Blues', isn't a huge departure, suggesting that maybe these edits were made out of one massive, epic blowout recording session. The dynamics at play are unified; when Jailbreak shifts they do so together, thus the moments when Corsano drops out (particularly about halfway through side two) are the most dramatic; when he comes back in at the moment parenthetically referred to in this sentence, it's like a massive weight dropping, and manages to incur a jolt of higher-level energy into a record that at this point has been almost a half-hour of being cranked up to (presumably) 10. The sliding strings, when distorted like this, genuinely reminds me of the pick-slides used in a lot of 80s metal guitar bands, which I'm sure is a comparison Jailbreak wouldn't object to. When Leigh hits the higher register vocally, it's like a banshee soaring over this violent chaos, and that world of destroyed possibilities is a beautifully rendered one. The Rocker isn't an easy listen - or rather, it's not a relaxing listen - but it's a rewarding one, and one that may be forgotten already among the prolific output of these two.

Human Investment (Rotten Propaganda)

I didn't remember this was in my vinyl accumulation; ah, the glorious days of the late 90s punk/hardcore scene. I was always a fly on the wall here (or fly in the ointment?), discovering this subculture in my own hometown and finding it equally curious in terms of lifestyle/community as with the actual music. These people lived in big houses and spoke a shared language built around historically overlooked (by the mainstream music press) records from the 80s and had their own weird Xeroxed cookbooks and a whole code of ethics that was more inviting than intimidating. I remembered this being a long record of thick, dense songs that were almost prog-leaning in their duration and parts, but my memory was wrong. It's really a mini-LP, eight songs that are certainly dense and thick but not particularly long; there aren't any solos or long instrumental sections here, just hardcore delivered between mid-tempo and fast, and totally angry. Human Investment was a local 'supergroup' and this record is all they have left us; it was a side project for everyone involved, though they were popular and certainly had the pedigree. I know I saw them live once, but I can't remember where or when. I wish I remembered enough about the hardcore field of the time to be able to situate their musical stylings in relation to the other names of the time: Born Against, In/Humanity, Assfactor 4. Guitarist Dan Goldberg tends to favour minor interval riffs, and when he switches instruments with bassist Andy Wright, his bass playing takes an active, riffy element under Wright's more wall-of-noise guitar shredding. The dominating figure is vocalist Dave Trenga of Aus-Rotten, who wrote the majority of the lyrics and delivers them in that ridiculous-if-you-think-about-it hardcore delivery style, where they are mostly unintelligible without the accompanying lyric sheet. Trenga's approach is interesting, or perhaps quotidian - he's throaty and angry but it doesn't veer towards metal as so much hardcore is always tempted to. I would describe his approach to phrasing as 'whatever makes it fit', and while there's often rhyming couplets, the concept of metre is completely jettisoned. Do you like topical? Cause Human Investment tackles the death penalty, corporate media, the American two party system, imperialism, prescription drug addiction, hunger, nationalism, and veganism. I'm amazed at how there can be so many words without saying anything really concrete, just outrage and slogans. This isn't anything against Trenga personally, but a product of the genre; no one comes to records with artwork like this seeking nuance and introspection. There are samples from films or other media where appropriate (particularly chilling before 'Capital Punishment', under which the musicians improvise an apocalyptic soundscape before the song starts properly) which is another product of the time, and one that I sort of miss. I'll never understand why hardcore records from this time are recorded so poorly; this is an 8-track recording done by a competent engineer so it's probably as good as it could sound, but these records are always muddy and murky. I guess the genre is partially responsible - Human Investment, like many of their ilk, weren't exactly interested in creating space in their songs, and the mix is always loud and thick. I know for a fact that these guys used nice tube amplifiers, yet somehow it still sounds like scratchy solid state, the rich dynamic of a powerful band being somewhat dampened by the compression of the recording. The songs have hooks buried in them  ('A Life For Meat' is bouncy and almost sing-along) but like the artwork, forever black and white, there isn't enough colour in the songcraft. Still, it's more than a curiosity and was fun to revisit; maybe in a few years I'll try again and see if it ages like a fine wine.

Crass - 'The Feeding of the 5000' (Small Wonder)

"Small Wonder" was this terrible TV show that I watched when aged in the single digits, about some girl that was actually a robot but masquerading as a suburban 9-year-old. I don't know if it took its name from the record label that released this first Crass record (is this an LP or EP? I've never been sure) but this is the famous pressing where they refused to press 'Asylum', which is an explicit, transgressive spoken word piece that I know from the CD reissue. But that was so many years ago that I forgot and was like "WTF is the first two minutes of this record silent?" I gotta say that 45 rpm suits Crass well - these songs sound great. How did these crusties achieve such a good recording quality? It's on here twice, and it's the most iconic Crass song, but seriously, did punk ever achieve a better song? I came to Crass late so I don't have this deep resonance with them; their ideas were already bouncing off my jaded ears by then, so I have to just assess the MUSIC. And I think this slays. 'Do They Owe Us a Living?' is on here twice, but then again, it's Crass's most famous song and a high water mark of the whole idiom. Listening to this, I'm transported back to many punk house kitchens, where black-clad friends had lengthy discussions about quinoa, Proctor and Gamble and In/Humanity. Crass had chops, unlike many of their followers - the rock crunch is there, the anthemic nature undeniable (yet not cheesy). 'General Bacardi' fucking slays; there's a confidence that can only come from a communal dedication to a philosophy of which the band is almost a byproduct. When listening to this, I found myself thinking I ought to grab copies of the other Crass records I don't have (which is everything except this and Stations). I came to Crass late -- late enough to appreciate, for sure, but also too late to make the life-defining bond with this music that so many others have. Is it too late? I don't fucking know, but I guess we'll see.