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Foundation Vinyl Newsletter

Welcome

Hello and welcome to the latest Foundation Vinyl newsletter!  To gets things started, we have write-ups on four cracking new arrivals.

First up, two debut full-lengths – Unrelenting Forced Psychosis from Suffocating Madness on Toxic State and Parte from Lasso on Sorry State. Then, a generation spanning split, To Stop The Conflict, courtesy of Life and Destruct on Desolate Records and we round things off in style with the latest 12-inch from Iris Paralysis, Dormant Visions, on Hieb & Stich.

Next, before we get too deep into the new year, I thought it would be timely to take look back at some of the music that defined my 2024 in A Year In Ten Records.

As always, we have an updated London gig listing, including a just announced Cosey Mueller / Stingray show (22/02) – quite the double header! Plus there is a quick run down on some of the cracking records heading our way in the near future, including next week’s new arrivals from Faze, G.O.O.N., Prey, and The Losers.

Featured New Arrivals

Dormant Visions by Iris Paralysis / Unrelenting Forced Psychosis by Suffocating Madness / Parte by Lasso / To Stop The Conflict by Life and Destruct (clockwise)

Suffocating MadnessUnrelenting Forced Psychosis

12 Inch

‘Social lobotomy of the masses, Don’t dare to think there are no answers, We are powerless, If we are divided, Get off your arses, The suffocation is madness’ (Imposed Restrictions)

Seeking an antidote to the bleak greyness of early January? Then look no further than this utterly feral slab courtesy of New York’s Suffocating Madness.  Featuring members of Savage Pleasure, Anti-Machine, and Nurse, to name but a few, this is the band’s debut album following-up on their 2021 self-titled EP.

Blown-out guitars, squalling solos, and a pounding rhythm section unleash a thoroughly uncompromising battery of thrash fuelled metallic d-beat.  But this barrage is anything but monochrome.  The band are not averse to letting their more brutal groove-laden riffs breathe, such as on Slaughter and Reality, or conjuring rhythms of infectious, swaggering intensity, most notably, perhaps, on Burn and the aptly titled Wankers.

The raw, rasping vocals meanwhile launch a searing indictment of our society’s distorted priorities and one that resists with every fibre the notion that there is no alternative.  Entrenched economic inequality, religious intolerance, and the rise, indeed institutional acceptance, of the far-right are all tackled with a fierce directness before the visceral, yet unifying climax of Their Legacy Shall Die.  The album also includes a bruising cover of Thermonuclear Devastation Of The Planet by 1980s’ Bristol thrash metal pioneers Onslaught.

LassoParte

12 Inch

‘Escrevo frases apagadas, Nego o empenho das memórias, Algum olhar é capaz de mudar o rumo da história? Um quarto tomado por imagens, Mostrando onde eu devo estar’ (Rio Frio) ‘I write erased phrases, I deny the commitment of memories, Is any look capable of changing the course of history? A room filled with images, Showing where I should be’ (Cold River)

Lasso, who hail from Salvador in Brazil, have evolved in an admirably old school spirit.  Three 7-inch EPs and relentless touring have laid the impeccable groundwork, and it is bearing rather rich fruit now that they have turned attention to their debut full-length, Parte (Portion).

That the 14 tracks whip through in a blistering 17 minutes will reassure that we are not talking about a radical reinvention here.  But rather the relentless honing and finessing of the band’s trademark sound.  The emphasis remains very much on dense, precise, frenetically fast hardcore, laced throughout with an understated deathrock sensibility.  The progression emerges through the sheer dexterity of Lasso’s musicianship, the subtle accents, textural shifts, and flares of melody that they fluidly braid into the remorseless rapid-fire fusillade.

Lyrically, the concerns reflect the tense, anxious energy of the band’s delivery – cryptically allusive, rooted in a fragmented, uneasy sense of ill-defined dread.  Personal stand-out moments include the shimmering, serpentine Enquanto Descana, Carrega A Pedra (While Resting, Carry The Stone), the off-kilter frenzy of De Onde Vejo (From Where I See), and the absolutely stomping closer Ilha De Silêncio (Island Of Silence).

Life, DestructTo Stop The Conflict

12 Inch

Tokyo’s Life and Richmond, Virginia’s Destruct are both purveyors of darkly metallic crust, the former one of the founding creators of the genre over thirty years ago, the latter at the forefront of the contemporary wave of bands taking it forward.  And while both bands are exploring similar sonic terrains, they both bring quite distinct interpretations to bear.

‘Nature exists not only as a resource for humans, co-existence is what saves both sides, we humans are not special’ (Losing Biodiversity, Life)

Life focus on unleashing an almost elemental wall of noise.  Heavily distorted guitars, cleaner bass, roared vocals, and almost crumpled sounding, cymbal drenched drums are barbarously fused.  And just when it feels as if this savage bombardment may overwhelm, the band prove unerringly adept at offering just a glimpse of respite – surges of groove laden riffage, bass and drum fuelled eruptions, and frenetic solos. Personal highlights among their five tracks are the rampaging opener Don’t Give Up Hope and the absolutely rabid title track.

‘Loss makes the road to now, where death sings in the wind, dream of peaceful tomorrow, love and hope instead’ (We Survive, Destruct)

Destruct deliver six tracks that match this fierce velocity, but with each of its elements more singularly delineated.  I would hesitate to call them more restrained, it is rather that their sound is, perhaps, a more consciously disciplined one.  The vocals remain guttural, the drums a touch less primitive and equally awash with cymbal.  The guitars are, however, more discernibly front and centre, the riffs unfurling in menacing waves, interspersed with searing metallic solos.  The escalating violence of Endured and the crushing final track We Survive perfectly embody this brutal intensity.

The lyrical preoccupations of both bands – the wastefulness of war, environmental degradation, social oppression – form a similar unifying cohesion across the album.  Life favour a direct call-to-action, Destruct lean into a more bleakly poetic imagery.  A powerful, generation spanning split.

Iris ParalysisDormant Visions

12 Inch

Iris Paralysis speaks to a condition when the pupil fails to respond to external stimulation.  And while it may at times feel like we are similarly paralysed in the face of a world slowly eating itself, Dormant Visions will soon stir you from your horrified stupor.

Iris Paralysis are an English / German synth duo, featuring Marco Palumbo of Zuletzt on vocals and Tobo Schazmann marshalling the electronics.  Dormant Visions, their third full-length, playfully weaves together cold wave and post-punk influences into a bleakly dystopian, yet infectiously danceable soundscape.

The darkly pulsing synths, underpinned by coldly clinical percussion, tease out swells of recurring melancholic melody, the skittering electronic effects fuelling a growing sense of unease across the seven tracks.  Meanwhile, the enigmatically detached, deftly layered vocals deploy the power of repetition to potent effect as they evoke a society being relentlessly drawn into the predatory thralls of technocracy and surveillance capitalism.

From the futuristic slow burn of Non-Registering Body to the insidiously catchy Trapped Within A Dreamscape by way of the pulsating austerity of Paraffin Sky, Iris Paralysis inexorably lure you into their enticingly ambiguous embrace.

A Year In Ten Records

Highlights of 2024

Before we get sucked too deep into the twists and turns of 2025, I thought it would be timely to have a quick look back on what was a pretty spectacular year in terms of new music.  I must admit I find the notion of league tables rather unhelpful in anything but a sporting context.  So, perhaps, think of this more as a roughly chronological review of a year through the lens of ten records that helped shape it for me personally.

Someone Else’s Dance by Canal Irreal / The Land Is Not An Idle God by Wreathe / Heel Of The Next b/w Physical God by Flower (clockwise)

The year kicked off in style with the new Flower EP, Heel Of The Next b/w Physical God.  There are some who claim that the 7-inch is the perfect format for hardcore.  Not a view I’ve ever concurred with to be honest as they typically feel more like an appetite wetter to tantalise than the full meal.  But no such reservations here.  Just the two songs, but what a two songs.  Venomously rhythmic vocals sneered in conjunction with wave upon wave of searing metallic riffage.  My appetite is fully sated.

Canal Irreal followed with their second full-length Someone Else’s Dance, which is an absolute belter.  Blending darkly melodic post-punk with a bristling hardcore attitude, the Chicago band serve up, perhaps, the singularly most contagious album of the year.  The crystalline, almost brittle, riffs quite simply steal your breath away and your body will soon be possessed by the innate need to move in a way that you didn’t know that you were even capable of.

Then, The Land Is Not An Idle God, the debut album from Wreathe landed with crushing relish.  Featuring four members of Morrow, Wreathe are in many ways a simultaneously stripped back yet more muscular interpretation of that band.  The soaring melancholic melodicism is countered by a fiercely defiant anger in a vividly realised fusion of emotional crust and vocalist Alex CF’s allegorical fiction, which explores the deterioration of our relationship with nature and the corrosive impact of individualism.

See The World On Fire by The Ar-Kaics / Contempt by Bad Breeding / Abattoir by Subdued (clockwise)

The next-in-line though was a bit of a surprise if I’m honest.  The Ar-Kaics earlier output comprised of some well-executed garage punk, but it just wasn’t my particular thing.  But when I checked out their new album, I was blown away by their evolving direction.  See The World On Fire is an album imbued with a surging sense of the dramatic and saturated in a sombre Southern Gothic atmosphere that is equal parts rollicking and haunting.  An unexpected treat.

I was then back in more familiar territory with the much anticipated return of Bad Breeding.  Now, not many hardcore bands last five albums, even fewer reach new heights with their fifth.  But Contempt sees the band in utterly rampant form.  A seething yet precisely constructed denunciation of the distorted priorities that are bringing our society to its knees and all entwined with their most discordant, brutal, and skilfully crafted onslaught yet.

And the anarcho-punk fuelled riches did not end there, as Subdued promptly weighed in with Abattoir.  Their blistering new material had been well flagged during their wave of early year shows and it certainly didn’t disappoint.  The bleakly ominous atmosphere is one of bitter fury at what has preceded, and an existential dread that yet worse is to follow, all brilliantly evoked by an utterly inspired guitar attack – dense, complex, almost unremittingly fast.

Moraliser by Negative Gears / Società Mentale by Festa Del Perdono / Delirik by Freak Genes / Nuevo Dogma by Muro (clockwise)

Then came a change of pace with the debut 7-inch, Società Mentale, from Festa Del Perdono, featuring members of Spirito Del Lupo and Porta D’Or.  Hypnotically rhythmic Italian vocals are intertwined with an otherworldly tapestry of guitar and electronically programmed flaring organs and punchy brass that transport you somewhere entirely unexpected.  A hazily dream-like yet urgently gripping EP.

I don’t think I will provoke much dispute with the notion that the Australian hardcore scene appears to be absolutely thriving at the moment.  The stand-out release for me was the debut album, Moraliser, from Negative Gears.  A thoroughly potent blend of ineffably catchy post-punk with brilliantly acerbic, anarcho fashioned vocals that sardonically dismantle the false ‘common sense’ defining our lives.  They hit the UK next month – not to be missed.

And then landed another leftfield delight.  Now, I’ve been enjoying the electronic evolution of Freak Genes, but nothing had quite prepared me for their latest release, Delirik.  This is a genuinely mind-bending album, one that seems to incessantly shift shape.  It segues from dancefloor euphoria to the jarringly percussive by way of darkly enticing choruses, and from the reflective to the bombastic, all with a disorientating ease.  It is unsettling and challenging in all the right ways.

Finally, my year reached a satisfying finale when I managed to land a healthy stock for the distro (now all gone I’m afraid) of Muro’s new album, Nuevo Dogma.  Muro’s strength has always been their ability to inject their recorded output with the explosive energy of their live performance, and by leaning a touch further into their metallic inclinations, this feels an even more vividly instinctual album.  One that revels in the relentless push-pull between dissonance and melody, the primal and the progressive.  And, of course, all in the context of the band’s compelling political narrative and lived DIY ethos.

So, there you go.  A year in ten records.  I think it’s fair to say that it wasn’t a bad one at all!

Shows And Tours

Adult at Corsica Studios on 14th February

This section lays no claims to being a definitive listing!  It is simply gigs coming up in London that catch my eye and that I think people who read this newsletter might be interested in.  I will always try and highlight where a show forms part of a wider

17th January Diaz Brothers, Soulscraper, The Charlemagnes (Hope & Anchor)

17th January Reality Unfolds Weekender featuring Wristmeetrazor, Dry Socket, Long Goodbye, Vicarage, Hour Of Reprisal, Closed Hands (New Cross Inn)

18th January Reality Unfolds Weekender featuring Ringworm, Bitter Wood, Broken Vow, Malignant, No Relief, Impunity, Imposter plus many more (New Cross Inn)

19th January Reality Unfolds Weekender featuring Stormo, Sorcerer, Shooting Daggers, Perp Walk, Hidden Mothers plus many more (New Cross Inn)

23rd January One Step Closer, Dynamite, Life Of One, Uzumaki (New River Studios / Sold Out)

1st February Trail Of Lies, T.S. Warspite, No Relief, Impunity, Violent Offence (Downstairs at The Dome)

6th February Grief Ritual, Calligram, Harrowed, Worn Out (The Black Heart)

7th February The Lunacy Of Flowers, Fiscal Harm, Rabbitfoot (The George Tavern)

8th February Surowica, Daughter, State Sanctioned Violence (The Bird’s Nest)

9th February Bent Blue, Major Pain , Without Love, Chainlink, Swear Down (New Cross Inn)

14th February Adult, Spike Hellis, Sacred Skin (Corsica Studios / UK Tour)

15th February Negative Gears, Grazia, Rubber, Life Forms (New River Studios / UK Tour)

22nd February Cosey Mueller, Stingray, Labrys, Moist Crevice, Spine Portal (The George Tavern)

22nd February Vultur, Deathfiend plus more (Helgi’s)

24th February Love Letter, Heavy Hex, Hell Can Wait, Supernova (New Cross Inn / UK Tour)

5th March Touche Amore, Trauma Ray (Electric Ballroom)

8th March Delivery, Fruit Tones plus more (Moth Club)

8th March Misantropic, Nujorvik, Wreathe, System Of Slaves, Traidora (New Cross Inn)

16th March Ignorance plus support (New River Studios / UK Tour)

15th April Thou, pageninetynine, Moloch (Scala)

19th April Disaffect, Haavat plus more (New Cross Inn)

23rd April Blind Girls plus support (Moor Beer Vaults)

17th May Boom Boom Kid, Traidora, plus more (The Shacklewell Arms)

19th May Time Heist plus support (New Cross Inn)

Coming Soon

Big Upsetter by Faze lands next week

Next Week

Faze ‘Big Upsetter’ 12-inch (11PM)

G.O.O.N ‘God’s Only Option Now’ 12-inch (Convulse)

Prey ‘Loathing’ 12-inch (Doom And Gloom)

The Losers ‘Land Of Opportunity’ 12-inch (11PM)

Late January / Early February

Armor ‘More War’ 12-inch (Mendeku Diskak)

Atomic Prey ‘Atomic Prey’ 12-inch (Iron Lung)

Enyor ‘Catalunya En Blanc I Negre’ 12-inch (Mendeku Diskak)

EVA ‘II’ 7-inch (Chicken Attack)

Faux Départ ‘EP’ 7-inch (Mutant)

Forced Humility ‘Forced Humility’ 7-inch (Mendeku Diskak)

Gaoled ‘Bestial Hardcore’ 12-inch (Iron Lung)

Golpe ‘Subisci. Conformati. Rassegnati.’ 7-inch (Static Shock)

Ignorance ‘Nothing Changed’ 7-inch (Iron Lung)

Impotentie ‘Zonder Titel Deze Keer’ 12-inch (Mendeku Diskak)

Killing Frost ‘Years In Permafrost: Recordings 2021-2024’ 12-inch (Mendeku Diskak)

Litige ‘2 dégres b/w Je Crie & Ca Reviendra’ 7-inch (Echo Canyon)

Paprika ‘Paprika’ 7-inch (Iron Lung)

Pest Control ‘Year Of The Pest’ 12-inch (Quality Control HQ)

Rotary Club ‘Sphere Of Service’ 12-inch (Iron Lung)

The War Goes On ‘Death Wish’ 12-inch (Hasiok)

Träume ‘Wrzask’ 12-inch (Quality Control HQ)

X2000 ‘Gótico Tropical’ 12-inch (Symphony Of Destruction)

Zikin ‘Bala Galdua Zure Buru Galduan’ 12-inch (Mendeku Diskak)

Late February

Benin ‘Treibjagd’ 12-inch (Static Age)

Corrective Measure ‘Not For You, Not For Anyone’ 12-inch (Refuse)

Judy And The Jerks ‘Total Jerks’ 12-inch (Refuse / 2nd Press)

Laura Agnusdei ‘Flowers Are Blooming In Antarctica’ 12-inch (Maple Death)

Point Of No Return ‘The Language Of Refusal’ 12-inch (Refuse)

Tv Dust ‘Transition’ 12-inch (Maple Death)

 

 

Foundation Vinyl Newsletter

Welcome

Hello and welcome to the first Foundation Vinyl newsletter of 2025!  We’re kicking things off in style with an Indecision Records showcase.  The label is run by Dave Mandel out of Orange County, California and has been active since the early 1990s, cutting its teeth on bands such as Ensign, Nineironspitfire, and Strife.  It remains very active in the West Coast DIY hardcore scene and we have two of the label’s newest releases plus two rather special 30th anniversary reissues.

First up, we have the debut album from San Diego’s Bent Blue, So Much Seething, and the return of Seattle’s Heiress with Nowhere Nearer.  Then the reissues of two seminal 1990s’ albums – Unbroken’s Life. Love. Regret., a double LP edition that includes a live recording of their full set from the Indecision 30 festival, and Undertow’s At Both Ends.  Full write-ups can be found below.

As always, we then have an updated London gig listing, which includes just announced shows from Blind Girls (23/04), Time Heist (19/05) and Traidora (17/05). Plus, there is a quick run down on some of the cracking records heading our way in the near future, including next week’s new arrivals from Iris Paralysis, Lasso, Life / Destruct, and Suffocating Madness.

Recent restocks from Class, Mirage, Savage Pleasure, Corker, and Yellowcake (clockwise)

Finally, a quick heads up that an enticing haul of restocks has just landed, including the recent releases from Class (A Healthy Alternative), Corker (Hallways Of Grey), Mirage (Legato Alla Rovina), Savage Pleasure (Savage Pleasure), and Yellowcake (A Fragmented Truth).  Don’t miss out the second time round!

Featured New Arrivals

So Much Seething by Bent Blue / At Both Ends by Undertow / Life. Love. Regret. by Unbroken / Nowhere Nearer by Heiress (clockwise)

Bent BlueSo Much Seething

12 Inch

‘You wreak of bad faith, With the games that you play, Your actions betray, The outrage that you fake, You claim civility, Feign morality, Hate with impunity’ (The Pearls You Clutch)

San Diego’s Blue Bent return with their debut full-length, So Much Seething, following two earlier EPs, most recently 2022’s Where Do Ripples Go?.  The band’s sonic roots reach back to the melodic hardcore of the early 2000s.  But they continue to complement this with elements drawn from DC’s Revolution Summer to post-hardcore by way of dark punk, even dashes of mid-1990s’ alternative rock.  In this respect, they rather bring to mind Syracuse’s Another Breath. Not so much in the final musical execution, but rather the combination of their shared magpie instincts and their innate ability to hone disparate, unexpected influences into a compelling whole.

The opening three tracks perfectly capture these dynamics.  The supple bass lines of the swinging Born On Third feed into the contagiously layered chorus of The Other Half, before the bristling fury and gang vocals of The Pearls You Clutch erupt.  The production is bright and bold, ensuring a crisply punchy delivery, the sheen never threatening to overwhelm the grit.  The vocals match this virtuosity step for step, sweeping from rasping anger to more melodic expressions with impressive versatility.

Lyrically, the album explores the self-serving myths of meritocracy on Born On Third (‘You flex fake elbow grease, Yet others wear the stains’) and hypocritical morality on The Pearls You Clutch that in turn fuel the social conflict of Shatterbelt Blues (‘Worn necks the boots try repressing, Are attached to a name’).  Grappling with such a polarised environment shapes Home In My Head (‘The outlook’s bleak, I just can’t take it, No tried and true, only unknown’) while Rough Mason is a more introspective reflection on the value of craftmanship and collective endeavour (‘Brick by brick, foundations laid, For those obscured, no thought for gain’).

HeiressNowhere Nearer

12 Inch

‘I was the wrong you raised, I was the first fire to smolder, I was the last forgotten, I was the first in drifting days, I was the last in fatal fears’ (The Wrong You Raised)

Heiress have been scratching a very particular musical itch for me ever since their early split EP with Narrows back in 2010.  Since the outset, the Seattle band have harnessed a unique blend of post-metal that draws on inspirations from doom, early 1990s’ death metal, and even classic heavy metal, while forging them in a crucible that is equal parts shaped by the competing dynamics of hardcore and sludge.

Throughout their evolution, Heiress have sought to balance aggression with reflection, discordance with melody, and heaviness with melancholy, to create a deeply atmospheric soundscape.  Over time the band’s pacing had become slower, ever more expansive, only to be interspersed with short cathartic eruptions to cleanse the palette, before locking into the unrelenting groove all over again.  Their song writing has always retained a lean, yet intricately detailed elegance.

Yet on Nowhere Nearer, the band’s fifth full-length, it feels like their always present hardcore instincts have been given greater rein.  The velocity has been notably increased to a surging, more mid-paced tempo and the song structures are even more tightly constructed.  Their inherent, bone shuddering heaviness though is undiminished and there remain flourishes of hauntingly beautiful introspection, but a conscious attempt to relentlessly funnel their power though a more disciplined lens is evident.

And it works an absolute treat.  The guitar tone alone is utterly spine-tingling, underpinned by a powerfully limber rhythm section, the onslaught perfectly embodied by the fiercely fluid Take Me Away, the slab-like riffage of The Chain To Thread, and the seething oscillations of The Wrong You Raised.  Meanwhile, the ferociously roared vocals (courtesy of John Pettibone formerly of Undertow / Himsa) explore bleakly allusive themes of lost hope, misplaced optimism, and yearned for redemption.  This is Heiress distilled to their very purest form – balancing the meditative and the malevolent.

UnbrokenLife. Love. Regret. - 30th Anniversary Edition

12 Inch Double

‘If it was real progression, greed would not dictate our souls, If it was real progression, we’d give back what we stole, If it was real progression, we’d burn these lies all down’ (In The Name Of Progression)

San Diego’s Unbroken were originally active between 1991 and 1995, and since reforming for a memorial show for guitarist Eric Allen in 1998, the band have made periodic returns to the live arena.  A year after the release of their debut album, Ritual, Unbroken returned to the studio to record 1994’s Life. Love. Regret. While the band’s sound was one that continually evolved and reformulated itself around its central tenets, this record is for many the band’s definitive statement.

From the moment that the darkly ominous opening riff to D4 unfurls, the intensity never dims.  The riffage still bristles, but feels more muscular, the haunting melodicism that flared throughout Ritual is now riven through the music, and the vocals remain raw, impassioned as they explore both our society’s distorted socio-economic drivers and more personal reflections of emotional isolation.  Defining moments abound.  The spoken word interlude of In The Name Of Progress before the cathartic climax, the menacing melody that fashions the utterly ferocious Razor, the swinging bass line that propels Final Expression, the stomping aggression of Blanket with its frantic mantra of ‘It won’t save you’, the fraught, intense, almost brittle, closer Curtain.

Indecision Records have pulled together a special edition to celebrate the 30th anniversary of this seminal album.  The first 12-inch is, of course, the album itself.  The second is a live recording of Unbroken’s full set at Indecision 30, the 2023 festival to celebrate the label’s own longevity.  Now, recording a live hardcore show is inherently challenging – how do you accurately capture the sheer energy, the coming together of band and audience in common purpose?  Yet, this recording vibrantly succeeds in capturing the texture of the show.

The sound is raw, without losing the integrity of the songs themselves, the vocals straining and impassioned.  The between song chat, the surges of recognition coursing through the crowd as each track opens, and the bellowed audience participation vividly evoke the positivity in the room.  You can literally envisage in your mind’s eye the utter chaos as the show progresses – the mic-grabs, pile-ons, and flying stage dives seem to be physically woven into the soundtrack.  A thoroughly worthwhile addition to the Unbroken canon.

UndertowAt Both Ends

12 Inch

‘Falling into the same trap, so brittle and broken, one twist and I snap.  Now I’ve burned the wicks at both ends, I’ve done it to myself all over again’ (At Both Ends)

Undertow were a hardcore band from Seattle.  Although the band has made a handful of live appearances since, most recently at Indecision 30 in 2023, they were primarily active between 1990 and 1999, the year of their final show.  Having released five EPs and splits in the early 1990s, the band recorded their sole length album, At Both Ends, in 1994.  This album has now been given a welcome 30-year anniversary reissue and remastering by Indecision Records.

And have no doubt that At Both Ends is one of the defining albums of 1990s’ hardcore.  Darkly foreboding, harshly metallic, Undertow forged a very different sound to many of their West Coast predecessors.  Spryly bouncing bass lines and notably fluid drumming underpin the groove-laden guitar, hints of dissonant melody flaring throughout.  Meanwhile, the rhythmically spat vocals explore the experiences of a young band forging an understanding of the world – a raw, honest exploration of their hopes and disappointments, of seeking to escape the stifling social constraints of tradition and religion.

Densely rhythmic, structurally fluid, At Both Ends is, perhaps, a reflection of a time when genre was less rigidly prioritised.  Undertow already having shared a stage with bands as diverse as Poison Idea, Seaweed, The Accüsed, and Jawbreaker by the time it was recorded.  It is also an album that continues to impressively stand the passing of time.  From the swaggering fury of the title track to the utterly bruising Taken, by way of the brooding menace of Where Do We Go and the crushing closer Sink, its searing intensity is undimmed.

Members of Undertow went on to play in a myriad of (post) hardcore bands including Ensign, Great Falls, Heiress, Himsa, Nineonspitfire, and Shift.

Shows And Tours

Reality Unfolds 2025 at the New Cross Inn, 17th-19th January

This section lays no claims to being a definitive listing!  It is simply gigs coming up in London that catch my eye and that I think people who read this newsletter might be interested in.  I will always try and highlight where a show forms part of a wider

11th January Harrowed, Hellscape, Mortal Karkass (The Bird’s Nest)

17th January Reality Unfolds Weekender featuring Wristmeetrazor, Dry Socket, Long Goodbye, Vicarage, Hour Of Reprisal, Closed Hands (New Cross Inn)

18th January Reality Unfolds Weekender featuring Ringworm, Bitter Wood, Broken Vow, Malignant, No Relief, Impunity, Imposter plus many more (New Cross Inn)

19th January Reality Unfolds Weekender featuring Stormo, Sorcerer, Shooting Daggers, Perp Walk, Cassus, Hidden Mothers plus many more (New Cross Inn)

23rd January One Step Closer, Dynamite, Life Of One, Uzumaki (New River Studios / Sold Out)

1st February Trail Of Lies, T.S. Warspite, No Relief, Impunity, Violent Offence (Downstairs at The Dome)

6th February Grief Ritual, Harrowed, Worn Out (The Black Heart)

8th February Surowica, Daughter, State Sanctioned Violence (The Bird’s Nest)

9th February Bent Blue, Major Pain , Without Love, Chainlink, Swear Down (New Cross Inn)

14th February Adult, Spike Hellis, Sacred Skin (Corsica Studios / UK Tour)

15th February Negative Gears plus support (New River Studios / UK Tour)

22nd February Vultur, Deathfiend plus more (Helgi’s)

24th February Love Letter, Heavy Hex, Hell Can Wait, Supernova (New Cross Inn / UK Tour)

8th March Misantropic, Nujorvik, Wreathe, System Of Slaves, Traidora (New Cross Inn)

16th March Ignorance plus support (New River Studios / UK Tour)

15th April Thou, pageninetynine, Moloch (Scala)

19th April Disaffect, Haavat plus more (New Cross Inn)

23rd April Blind Girls plus support (Moor Beer Vaults)

17th May Boom Boom Kid, Traidora, plus more (The Shacklewell Arms)

19th May Time Heist plus support (New Cross Inn)

Coming Soon

Parte by Lasso lands next week

Next Week

Iris Paralysis ‘Dormant Visions’ 12-inch (Hieb & Stich)

Lasso ‘Parte’ 12-inch (Sorry State)

Life / Destruct ‘To Stop The Conflict’ 12-inch (Desolate)

Suffocating Madness ‘Unrelenting Forced Psychosis’ 12-inch (Toxic State)

The Week After

Faze ‘Big Upsetter’ 12-inch (11PM)

G.O.O.N ‘God’s Only Option Now’ 12-inch (Convulse)

Prey ‘Loathing’ 12-inch (Doom And Gloom)

The Losers ‘Land Of Opportunity’ 12-inch (11PM)

Late January / Early February

Armor ‘More War’ 12-inch (Mendeku Diskak)

Atomic Prey ‘Atomic Prey’ 12-inch (Iron Lung)

Enyor ‘Catalunya En Blanc I Negre’ 12-inch (Mendeku Diskak)

EVA ‘II’ 7-inch (Chicken Attack)

Faucheuse ‘Rêve Électrique’ 12-inch (Symphony Of Destruction / Restock)

Forced Humility ‘Forced Humility’ 7-inch (Mendeku Diskak)

Gaoled ‘Bestial Hardcore’ 12-inch (Iron Lung)

Golpe ‘Subisci. Conformati. Rassegnati.’ 7-inch (Static Shock)

Ignorance ‘Nothing Changed’ 7-inch (Iron Lung)

Impotentie ‘Zonder Titel Deze Keer’ 12-inch (Mendeku Diskak)

Killing Frost ‘Years In Permafrost: Recordings 2021-2024’ 12-inch (Mendeku Diskak)

Paprika ‘Paprika’ 7-inch (Iron Lung)

Pest Control ‘Year Of The Pest’ 12-inch (Quality Control HQ)

Rotary Club ‘Sphere Of Service’ 12-inch (Iron Lung)

Träume ‘Wrzask’ 12-inch (Quality Control HQ)

X2000 ‘Gótico Tropical’ 12-inch (Symphony Of Destruction)

Zikin ‘Bala Galdua Zure Buru Galduan’ 12-inch (Mendeku Diskak)

Late February

Tv Dust ‘Transition’ 12-inch (Maple Death)

Laura Agnusdei ‘Flowers Are Blooming In Antarctica’ 12-inch (Maple Death)

Foundation Vinyl Newsletter

Welcome

Hello and welcome to this week’s edition of the Foundation Vinyl newsletter!  This will be the last of the year, so I just wanted to say a quick thank you to everyone who has bought a record, read a review, or dropped me a note, as well as to the bands and labels who have have kept us so well stocked with great music over the past year.

No new records this week.  Instead, we have a short blog exploring successful community resistance to state-led gentrification in London.  This is discussed through a new book, Disrupting The Speculative City: Property, Power And Community Resistance In London, and complemented with lyrical contributions from Industry, Lágrimas, Negative Gears, and Qlowski.

Then, we have a quick reminder regarding the ‘A Mutual Aid Benefit For Gaza’ compilation series and an updated London gig listing – 2025 is already looking to be a very busy year!  And to round things off, a quick heads up on the cracking new records that we will be kicking off with in the New Year, including releases from Indecision, Iron Lung, Maple Death, Mendeku Diskak, and Toxic State.

The online shop will be running as normal over the festive period and the newsletter will be back from mid-January.  Thanks for reading and have a great Christmas break!

Hope Springs From Haringey

The Wound by Qlowski / Moraliser by Negative Gears / Split by Lágrimas and Habak / A Self-Portrait At The Stage Of Totalitarian Domination Of All Aspects Of Life by Industry / Disrupting The Speculative City by Amy Horton and Joe Penny (clockwise)

‘My landlord called in sick today, My landlord has anxiety, My landlord has nowhere to stay, He calls me up just to say…Your rent will rise, By 300 percent, Starting next week, Extract wealth and die’ (Extract Wealth And Die, Industry)

It is difficult to be positive as to what the future holds at present.  Internationally, levels of militarised violence, state oppression, and climatic breakdown are accelerating at an alarming pace.  Closer to home the degradation of public services, entrenchment of socio-economic inequality, and the trappings of the surveillance state continue unabated.  Even when a government is elected who claim to be ‘progressive’, it soon becomes clear that they remain wedded to the worn-out doctrines that dug us into this hole in the first place.  As I say, it is difficult to be overly hopeful.

Yet, amidst the prevailing gloom, you do still come across examples of community action that restore your belief that an alternative future can be realised.  And one such story is vividly brought to life in the excellent study, Disrupting The Speculative City: Property, Power And Community Resistance In London.  The book explores how a community-wide coalition came together in the London Borough of Haringey to defeat one of the most rapacious ever planned programmes of state-led gentrification.

‘I grew up in this city, this is my home, soon I will not be able to live here’ (I Can’t Afford It, Lágrimas)

From London (Qlowski) to Sydney (Negative Gears), by way of Berlin (Industry) and Los Angeles (Lágrimas), the story of cities being subjugated to the demands of real estate capital are starkly consistent.  The specifics of each city’s experience are, of course, coloured by local history and politics, but the driving forces that connect the lived experiences and patterns of urban development across major cities are readily identifiable.  Housing is no longer recognised as a social good by which society can redistribute its wealth, but rather as an asset through which wealth can be further accumulated and extracted by capital.  This process which has been unfolding over the past forty years, manifests itself in the stigmatisation of working-class housing, the wholesale privatisation of public land, and the return of an exploitative private rental market wildly out-of-step with the economic realities of work.  The ripple effects of insecure housing on people’s lives in terms of health and wellbeing are difficult to overstate.

‘Rotting in my own bed, Black mould crumbling through my mattress, Drowning in my defeat’ (A Vision, Qlowski)

In London, this dynamic has seen many of the city’s councils seek to exploit housing through speculative development vehicles – land is now a financial asset to be exploited, homes a ‘unit’ to be sweated for investor gain, and inner London’s working-class communities are no longer deserving of a place in this new landscape.  One such vehicle was The Haringey Development Vehicle (HDV), which sought to exploit the aftermath of the 2011 riots sparked by the police shooting of local resident Mark Duggan, to unleash an unprecedented programme of demolition and gentrification that would dispossess large swathes of the local community, while enriching one the one world’s largest property developers, Lendlease.  And, for the council, deliver an ‘improved’ resident profile and a more affluent electorate.

‘Yeah, there’s cracks in the roads, disposable shitholes they call affordable homes’ (Ain’t Seen Nothing, Negative Gears)

However, Haringey’s Labour council massively underestimated not only the scale of the local opposition, but even more importantly the skill with which the community would co-ordinate its resistance.  And this is the story that Disrupting The Speculative City richly animates as it examines how the community contested the plans through street protest, electoral challenge, and planning / legal contestation.  It also details how the campaign developed a broad coalition spanning local residents, housing activists, and political campaigners from across the left of centre spectrum to maximise their support.  After a bitter six-year battle the plans for HDV were cancelled in July 2018, the council leader, Claire Kober, having been forced to resign several months earlier.

As you will have gathered from the title, the book itself is an academic one having been written by Amy Horton and Joe Penny from UCL.  However, they wear their detailed research lightly and the narrative unfolds with a satisfying clarity of argument as to what defines the speculative city, whose interests does it serve, and how did the residents of Haringey succeed in defeating it.  The authors ensure that the momentum never dims, even for the lay reader.  A community victory to put a spring into even the most jaded of steps.

Disrupting The Speculative City is available from UCL Press, including as a free download, at www.uclpress.co.uk.

'A Mutual Aid Benefit For Gaza' Compilation Series

The Three Compilation Cassettes Comprising The ‘A Mutual Aid Benefit For Gaza’ Series

This is the European press by Symphony Of Destruction of a series of three benefit compilation tapes co-ordinated by Philadelphia punks, The Dissidents.  All profits are donated to non-profit organisations delivering on-the-ground humanitarian aid in Gaza.  Each tape comprises typically rare, or previously unreleased, tracks contributed by bands drawn from across the hardcore punk community.

VariousNo Genocide: A Mutual Aid Benefit For Gaza (I)

Cassette

Side One The Mob, Mižerija, Oi Polloi, D.O.V.E., Scarecrow, The Dissidents, Part 1, Rat Cage

Side Two Uzu, Peace Talks, The Ire, Behind Enemy Lines, Toxic Rites, Zanjeer, Zowiso, Dogma, The Pist, Commoners Choir

VariousNo Occupation: A Mutual Aid Benefit For Gaza (II)

Cassette

Side One Alien Nosejob, Miss España, Blessure, Hooper Crescent, Dark Thoughts, Apsurd, Interrobang, Soup Activists

Side Two Collate, Belgrado, Eraser, De Rodillas, Prison Affair, Tiikeri, A Culture Of Killing

VariousYes Liberation: A Mutual Aid Benefit For Gaza (III)

Cassette

Side One Vaaska, Khassarat, Neutrals, Nuevo Cuerpo, Quarantine, Golpe, Mujeres Podridas, Nightfall, Hellshock, Piñen, Nightwatchers, Disappearances, The Masochists

Side Two Burning Kitchen, Pura Mania, Class, Aus-Rotten, Fairytale, Alement, Chain Cult, Rogo, Gurs, Zounds

All profits are donated to the following non-profit organisations: Gaza Soup Kitchen, Gazaesims, Palestinian Children’s Relief Fund, ANERA, Palestinian Red Crescent Society, MSF / Doctors Without Borders, Palestinian Legal, 1for3, and Heal Palestine.

For further details on the wider project and full track listings, check out: www.thedissidents.bandcamp.com

Shows And Tours

Harrowed and Hellscape play The Bird’s Nest on Saturday 11th January

This section lays no claims to being a definitive listing!  It is simply gigs coming up in London that catch my eye and that I think people who read this newsletter might be interested in.  I will always try and highlight where a show forms part of a wider UK tour.

12th December Alvilda, Music City, Zeropolis (The Waiting Room)

17th December Terror, Nasty, Combust plus more (229 / UK Tour)

11th January Harrowed, Hellscape, Mortal Karkass (The Bird’s Nest)

17th January Reality Unfolds Weekender featuring Wristmeetrazor, Dry Socket, Long Goodbye, Vicarage, Hour Of Reprisal, Closed Hands (New Cross Inn)

18th January Reality Unfolds Weekender featuring Ringworm, Bitter Wood, Broken Vow, Malignant, No Relief, Impunity, Imposter plus many more (New Cross Inn)

19th January Reality Unfolds Weekender featuring Stormo, Sorcerer, Shooting Daggers, Perp Walk, Cassus, Hidden Mothers plus many more (New Cross Inn)

23rd January One Step Closer, Dynamite, Life Of One, Uzumaki (New River Studios / Sold Out)

1st February Trail Of Lies, T.S. Warspite, No Relief, Impunity, Violent Offence (Downstairs at The Dome)

6th February Grief Ritual, Harrowed, Worn Out (The Black Heart)

8th February Surowica, Daughter, State Sanctioned Violence (The Bird’s Nest)

9th February Bent Blue, Major Pain , Without Love, Chainlink, Swear Down (New Cross Inn)

14th February Adult, Spike Hellis, Sacred Skin (Corsica Studios / UK Tour)

15th February Negative Gears plus support (New River Studios / UK Tour)

22nd February Vultur, Deathfiend plus more (Helgi’s)

24th February Love Letter, Heavy Hex, Hell Can Wait, Supernova (New Cross Inn / UK Tour)

7th-8th March Damage Is Done 4.5 Weekender (Line-up and venues to be confirmed)

8th March Misantropic, Nujorvik, Wreathe, System Of Slaves, Traidora (New Cross Inn)

16th March Ignorance plus support (New River Studios / UK Tour)

15th April Thou, pageninetynine, Moloch (Scala)

19th April Disaffect, Haavat plus more (New Cross Inn)

Coming Soon

Unrelenting Forced Psychosis by Suffocating Madness

Armor ‘More War’ 12-inch (Mendeku Diskak)

Atomic Prey ‘Atomic Prey’ 12-inch (Iron Lung)

Bent Blue ‘So Much Seething’ 12-inch (Indecision Records)

Corker ‘Hallways Of Grey’ 12-inch (Feel It / Restock)

Enyor ‘Catalunya En Blanc I Negre’ 12-inch (Mendeku Diskak)

EVA ‘II’ 7-inch (Chicken Attack)

Faucheuse ‘Rêve Électrique’ 12-inch (Symphony Of Destruction / Restock)

Faze ‘Big Upsetter’ 12-inch (11PM)

Forced Humility ‘Forced Humility’ 7-inch (Mendeku Diskak)

Gaoled ‘Bestial Hardcore’ 12-inch (Iron Lung)

Golpe ‘Subisci. Conformati. Rassegnati.’ 7-inch (Static Shock)

G.O.O.N ‘God’s Only Option Now’ 12-inch (Convulse)

Heiress ‘Nowhere Nearer’ 12-inch (Indecision Records)

Ignorance ‘Nothing Changed’ 7-inch (Iron Lung)

Impotentie ‘Zonder Titel Deze Keer’ 12-inch (Mendeku Diskak)

Iris Paralysis ‘Dormant Visions’ 12-inch (Hieb & Stich)

Killing Frost ‘Years In Permafrost: Recordings 2021-2024’ 12-inch (Mendeku Diskak)

Lasso ‘Parte’ 12-inch (Sorry State)

Laura Agnusdei ‘Flowers Are Blooming In Antarctica’ 12-inch (Maple Death)

Life / Destruct ‘ To Stop The Conflict’ 12-inch (Desolate)

Paprika ‘Paprika’ 7-inch (Iron Lung)

Pest Control ‘Year Of The Pest’ 12-inch (Quality Control HQ)

Prey ‘Loathing’ 12-inch (Doom And Gloom)

Rotary Club ‘Sphere Of Service’ 12-inch (Iron Lung)

Suffocating Madness ‘Unrelenting Forced Psychosis’ 12-inch (Toxic State)

The Losers ‘Land Of Opportunity’ 12-inch (11PM)

Träume ‘Wrzask’ 12-inch (Quality Control HQ)

Tv Dust ‘Transition’ 12-inch (Maple Death)

Unbroken ‘Life. Love. Regret. – 30th Anniversary Edition’ 2×12-inch (Indecision Records)

Undertow ‘At Both Ends’ 12-inch (Indecision Records)

X2000 ‘Gótico Tropical’ 12-inch (Symphony Of Destruction)

Yellowcake ‘A Fragmented Truth’ 7-inch (Not For The Weak / Restock)

Zikin ‘Bala Galdua Zure Buru Galduan’ 12-inch (Mendeku Diskak)

Foundation Vinyl Newsletter

Welcome

Hello and welcome to the latest edition of the Foundation Vinyl newsletter!  We have a stacked line-up, so lets dive straight in.

To kick things off, we have four cracking featured new arrivals.  First up on La Vida Es Un Mus, the frantically claustrophobic self-titled debut album from Second Death, who feature members of Permission, Subdued, and Last Affront.

Then, we take a rather mellower turn with the the hazy dreamscapes of The Green Child on Looks Familiar, a co-release between Upset The Rhythm and Hobbies Galore.

To round things off with a bang, we have two new albums on Symphony Of Destruction – the politically charged blackened hardcore of Rogo on their debut LP, In Un Mondo Senza Violenza, and the return of the searing raw hardcore punk of Inferno Personale on La Scelta É Tua.

Also courtesy of Symphony Of Destruction, we have the European press of a series of three benefit compilation tapes raising funds for humanitarian aid to Gaza.  Bands contributing typically rare, or previously unreleased, tracks include A Culture Of Killing, Alien Nosejob, Belgrado, Burning Kitchen, Chain Cult, Class, Fairytale, Golpe, Gurs, Hellschock, Miss España, Mižerija, Neutrals, Nightwatchers, Quarantine, Rat Cage, Rogo, Scarecrow, The Ire, and Uzu.  For full details of the contributing bands and beneficiary non-profit organisations, check out the feature below.

And as always, we end with an updated London gig listing, which includes a just announced Negative Gears European tour (London 15/02).  Plus, there is a quick run down on some of the cracking records heading our way over the next few weeks.

Featured New Arrivals

Look Familiar by The Green Child / In Un Mondo Senza Violenza by Rogo / Second Death by Second Death / La Scelta É Tua by Inferno Personale (clockwise)

Second DeathSecond Death

12 Inch

‘Blood sucking parasites, Grasping for the spotlight, Social games to be played, Again and again, Feast on one another, Until they’re all the same’ (Sycophant)

Permission are to my mind at least, perhaps, the most undervalued hardcore band to have emanated from these shores in the past decade.  So, I was more than a little excited to see that members of that band, plus Subdued and Last Affront, had a new enterprise, Second Death.

And their self-titled debut is an absolute stormer.  Many of Permission’s defining attributes remain firmly in place.  The utterly claustrophobic atmosphere is tensely fraught and uneasy.  The guitar is often blisteringly fast, with the rest of the band enveloped in a frenetic race to keep up with the unremitting pace.  It feels utterly chaotic, the flares of melody swallowed in waves of discordance.  As the album unfurls the level of intricacy and complexity that propels the relentless barrage becomes ever clearer.

Yet this is no simple reworking and Second Death rapidly establish their own identity.  Firstly, they have relaxed the rigorously enforced prism that defined Permission – very fast, always very, very fast – and are prepared to allow their songs to breath just a little, to lean into more of a mid-paced groove.  On occasion, there is even scope for a fleeting yet bruising breakdown.

The second evolution is vocally.  The urgently breathless growl has become a still desperate but more roared expression as the vocals explore darkly allusive reflections rooted in a sense of isolation, distrust, and uncertainty.  This shift is most likely both a cause and effect of Second Death’s more varied pacing and works a treat.

The frenzied The Burning Light kicks proceedings off in style with further stand out tracks including the pounding Sycophant, the choppy riffed ferocity of Caving, and the swaggering, bass-fuelled closer, Stripped.  Abrasively compelling, this is hardcore without artifice.  Permission may be dead, but Second Death is quite the resurrection.

The Green ChildLook Familiar

12 Inch

On first listen, Look Familiar is an album built on a certain spartan simplicity and the momentum of looping repetition.  Yet as you immerse yourself deeper into its rather bewitching embrace, its delicately subtle secrets reveal themselves almost imperceptibly.

Look Familiar is the third full-length from Melbourne-based The Green Child, and the follow-up to 2020’s Shimmering Bassett.   Brightly shimmering guitar and a metronomic rhythm section that locks into driving motorik beats and more limber, supple cadences with equal understated relish, provide the album’s bedrock.

Glistening synths intertwine recurring melodic motifs throughout, while the flourishes of lead guitar are, at times, surprisingly strident, and further depth is added by flares of sombre violin.  It would be easy to become lost in this dream-like reverie.  Each track, however, retains its own vivid charms, especially, perhaps, the chiming propulsion of the opening Wow Factor, the vibrantly layered Easy Window, and the gently escalating dissonance of Year Of The Books.

The vocals emerge, semi-chanted, enigmatically melodic, floating above this sonic tapestry in ethereal synchronicity.  Their intense yet hazy, trance-like quality, and the wider psychedelic glow that envelopes the album, reflect lyrical themes that delve both into family memory and more contemporary concerns, evoking our increasingly fragile grasp of what is real and what is not.

The title track itself refers to a ‘monumental haze’.  Yet the album sweeps forward with an unwavering impetus, conjuring a hypnotic, ever-shifting patchwork of both memory and chimera.  The warming colours and spectral figures of the beautiful artwork, taken from a 1991 painting by Raven Mahon’s (bass / vocals) mum Jane, are a perfect fit.

RogoIn Un Mondo Senza Violenza

12 Inch

‘Sei venuto da oltreoceano, a svoltare la tua situazione, cos’hai trovato? Stanchezza solitudine rabbia malessere e un paio di occhiaie’ (Illusione) ‘You came from overseas, to turn your situation around, what did you find? Tiredness, loneliness, anger, discomfort, and a pair of dark circles’ (Illusion)

Hailing from Rome, Rogo (Pyre) feature members of both Sect Mark and Education.  On this their debut album, In Un Mondo Senza Violenza (In A World Without Violence), they unleash an utterly uncompromising blackened hardcore onslaught.  Erupting into life through waves of squalling feedback and discordant electronics, the opening track Perdidos (Lost) perfectly encapsulates all that follows – a visceral blend of barrelling hardcore ferociously fused with the buzzsaw riffs of early 1990s’ European death metal.

The band are notably adept at cultivating an inexorable sense of anticipation, leaving the listener hanging expectantly for just long enough, so that when they finally deal the killer blows, they land with a breathtaking ferocity.  From the crushing breakdown on Illusione (Illusion) to the infectious malevolence of the stand out Salvador Blanco (White Saviour), and from the savage Bagliore (Glow) to the venomous riffage of La Tua Condana (Your Condemnation), there is not even the merest glimmer of respite.

The guttural, growled Italian / Spanish vocals, with harrowing screamed backing, explore the lead singer’s own immigrant experience since arriving in Italy on tracks such as Illusione and Salvador Blanco (‘They will speak for me, and fight for me, without asking my opinions’).  He then widens his critique to the atomisation of Italian society on La Tua Condona (‘Separated and argued, there is no union, talking without doing, will bring extinction’) and Malcontento (Malcontent / ‘Entire neighbourhoods of unfortunates, gentrification and evictions’), before ending on the more tentatively hopeful note of El Di De Me Muerte (The Day Of My Death / ‘And to be happy for a day, and my smile will return’).  And you finally have a chance to draw breath again, before plunging straight back into the abyss.

Inferno PersonaleLa Scelta É Tua

12 Inch

‘Noi soli con noi stessi, La tua forza é in te stesso, Riazlzati fazzo adesso, La scelta é tua’ (La Scelta) ‘We are alone with ourselves, Ready your inner strength, Get off your knees now, The choice is yours’ (The Choice)

Inferno Personale (Personal Hell) are Bremen-based, but call upon members from Argentina, Colombia, and Italy as well as Germany. Their self-effacing claim to be ‘just another raw punk band’ is true in its simplest interpretation, but few bands execute this style with such an explosive intensity.  As on their fierce 2002 debut In Ira Veritas (In Anger Truth), they call primarily upon the traditions of 1980s’ Italian hardcore, seasoned with just a dash of Japanese crust by way of the cymbal awash drumming.  The first wave of mid-1980s’ thrash metal is also suggested, not least in the band’s deftness in just about holding their more chaotic impulses in check.

And while it is, of course, the unbridled ferocity that firsts draws you in, it is this very deftness that keeps you coming back.  Whether it’s the searing riffs that fuel Stammi Lontano (Stay Away From Me) and Alienazione (Alienation), the stomping rhythms of Schifo (Disgust), the thunderous bass that propels La Scelta, or the piercing clarity of the melodic flourishes laced through the battery, this is an album rich in memorable moments.  Meanwhile, the howled Italian vocals confront the corrosive individualism and fractured social relations fostered by our current economic paradigm.

'A Mutual Aid Benefit For Gaza' Compilation Series

The Three Compilation Cassettes Comprising The Mutual Aid For Gaza Series

This is the European press by Symphony Of Destruction of a series of three benefit compilation tapes co-ordinated by Philadelphia punks, The Dissidents.  All profits are donated to non-profit organisations delivering on-the-ground humanitarian aid in Gaza.  Each tape comprises typically rare, or previously unreleased, tracks contributed by bands drawn from across the hardcore punk community.

VariousNo Genocide: A Mutual Aid Benefit For Gaza (I)

Cassette

Side One The Mob, Mižerija, Oi Polloi, D.O.V.E., Scarecrow, The Dissidents, Part 1, Rat Cage

Side Two Uzu, Peace Talks, The Ire, Behind Enemy Lines, Toxic Rites, Zanjeer, Zowiso, Dogma, The Pist, Commoners Choir

VariousNo Occupation: A Mutual Aid Benefit For Gaza (II)

Cassette

Side One Alien Nosejob, Miss España, Blessure, Hooper Crescent, Dark Thoughts, Apsurd, Interrobang, Soup Activists

Side Two Collate, Belgrado, Eraser, De Rodillas, Prison Affair, Tiikeri, A Culture Of Killing

VariousYes Liberation: A Mutual Aid Benefit For Gaza (III)

Cassette

Side One Vaaska, Khassarat, Neutrals, Nuevo Cuerpo, Quarantine, Golpe, Mujeres Podridas, Nightfall, Hellshock, Piñen, Nightwatchers, Disappearances, The Masochists

Side Two Burning Kitchen, Pura Mania, Class, Aus-Rotten, Fairytale, Alement, Chain Cult, Rogo, Gurs, Zounds

All profits are donated to the following non-profit organisations: Gaza Soup Kitchen, Gazaesims, Palestinian Children’s Relief Fund, ANERA, Palestinian Red Crescent Society, MSF / Doctors Without Borders, Palestinian Legal, 1for3, and Heal Palestine.

For further details on the wider project and full track listings, check out: www.thedissidents.bandcamp.com

Shows And Tours

Love Letter Play New Cross Inn, 24th February (plus Brighton Daltons 25th and Leeds Boom 26th)

This section lays no claims to being a definitive listing!  It is simply gigs coming up in London that catch my eye and that I think people who read this newsletter might be interested in.  I will always try and highlight where a show forms part of a wider UK tour.

7th December Svdestada, Wreathe, Head Of The Baptist (The Dev)

12th December Alvilda, Music City, Zeropolis (The Waiting Room)

17th December Terror, Nasty, Combust plus more (229 / UK Tour)

17th January Reality Unfolds Weekender featuring Wristmeetrazor, Dry Socket, Long Goodbye, Vicarage, Hour Of Reprisal, Closed Hands (New Cross Inn)

18th January Reality Unfolds Weekender featuring Ringworm, Bitter Wood, Broken Vow, Malignant, No Relief, Impunity, Imposter plus many more (New Cross Inn)

19th January Reality Unfolds Weekender featuring Stormo, Sorcerer, Shooting Daggers, Perp Walk, Cassus, Hidden Mothers plus many more (New Cross Inn)

23rd January One Step Closer, Dynamite, Life Of One, Uzumaki (New River Studios / Sold Out)

9th February Bent Blue, Major Pain plus more (New Cross Inn)

14th February Adult, Spike Hellis, Sacred Skin (Corsica Studios / UK Tour)

15th February Negative Gears plus support (New River Studios / UK Tour)

24th February Love Letter, Heavy Hex plus more (New Cross Inn / UK Tour)

7th-8th March Damage Is Done 4.5 Weekender (Line-up and venues to be confirmed)

8th March Misantropic, Nujorvik, Wreathe, System Of Slaves, Traidora (New Cross Inn)

16th March Ignorance plus support (New River Studios / UK Tour)

15th April Thou, pageninetynine, Moloch (Scala)

Coming Soon

Atomic Prey by Atomic Prey 

December

Atomic Prey ‘Atomic Prey’ 12-inch (Iron Lung)

Golpe ‘Subisci. Conformati. Rassegnati.’ 7-inch (Static Shock)

Ignorance ‘Nothing Changed’ 7-inch (Iron Lung)

Paprika ‘Paprika’ 7-inch (Iron Lung)

Pest Control ‘Year Of The Pest’ 12-inch (Quality Control HQ)

Träume ‘Wrzask’ 12-inch (Quality Control HQ)

January

Bent Blue ‘So Much Seething’ 12-inch (Indecision Records)

Corker ‘Hallways Of Grey’ 12-inch (Feel It / Restock)

Faucheuse ‘Rêve Électrique’ 12-inch (Symphony Of Destruction / Restock)

Heiress ‘Nowhere Nearer’ 12-inch (Indecision Records)

Lasso ‘Parte’ 12-inch (Sorry State)

Suffocating Madness ‘Unrelenting Forced Psychosis’ 12-inch (Toxic State)

Unbroken ‘Life. Love. Regret. – 30th Anniversary Edition’ 2×12-inch (Indecision Records)

Undertow ‘At Both Ends’ 12-inch (Indecision Records)

Yellowcake ‘A Fragmented Truth’ 7-inch (Not For The Weak / Restock)

Foundation Vinyl Newsletter

Welcome

Hello and welcome to the latest edition of the Foundation Vinyl newsletter!  I managed to catch two very different shows last week.  On Thursday night, that all-too-rare luxury of a gig that I could walk to, with the first night of the Attempting Something weekender being held at Spanners in Brixton.  Housed in a half-sized railway arch, Spanners is small (capacity can’t be more than 50 people) yet perfectly formed and proved an excellent setting for a show focused on electronic-leaning acts.

Brendan Wells of Uranium Club played a mesmerising set, the abrupt end to which shocked you into realising just how much you had been drawn into his reverie.  I’m not entirely sure what instrument he was playing, but the closest I can come to describing it is a non-wind bagpipe channelled through a series of effects boxes and pedals.

And earlier in the evening, Fiscal Harm aka Al Aldous, fused saxophone and percussive electronics into an insidiously entrancing dub-meets-jazz deconstruction.  The tracks when he was joined by a flautist were particularly haunting.  Both sets were also an intriguing insight into the travails of the solo performer in juggling all of the elements of their performance, not least the need to shed your shoes to ensure sufficient precision in pedal / button toe pushing.  A big thanks to Another Subculture for organising Attempting Something – it sounds like the whole weekend went off in style!

And then on the Friday I was off to The Dome for Unbroken’s final (and only second ever) UK show.  As I headed up to the gig, it struck me how few times I have had to endure this rather soulless hangar, bearing in mind its impressive longevity – Bolt Thrower (a rather different venue in those pre-refurbishment days!), Burn, and Static Shock Weekend IV.  But if you were picking a band to make short work of it, Unbroken would surely be near the top of that list.  The skate punk-emo magpies Shooting Daggers warmed things up in spirited fashion, before Deaf Club unleashed a typically visceral set.  If there is a band who seem to be the physical manifestation of their own music, it is Deaf Club, as they twist and writhe in convulsive unison with their acerbic hardcore assault.

And then, it was to the main event.  Unbroken were in rampantly imperious form and the chance to hear, indeed feel, tracks like Razor and In The Name Of Progress live again was utterly intense.  But what the show reminded me of most is the sincerity and generosity of spirit that has always defined the band.  Their music is the embodiment of the understanding that the personal is political, that how we live our own lives shapes the society around us.  And also, perhaps sharpened by the tragic loss of Eric Allen, the appreciation of the courage that is required to recognise, rather than to suppress, our own vulnerabilities.  An absolute privilege.

And so, what do we have lined up this week?  We have two great new releases from Maple Death Records – the euphoric melancholy of The Wound from Qlowski and the darkly enticing, cosmically inclined folk of Sprecato from James Jonathan Clancy.  Then we have the bleakly contagious debut album, The Abandoned Flesh, from Zuletzt on No Front Teeth, before we round things off in style with the triumphant return of Straw Man Army with Earthworks on La Vida Es Un Mus.

As always, we end with an updated London gig listing, which includes just announced dates for Adult (14/02) and Ignorance (16/03).  Plus, there is a quick heads up on some of the cracking records heading from our way, including new releases from Atomic Prey, Golpe, Ignorance, Inferno Personale, Paprika, Rogo, Second Death, and The Green Child over the next couple of weeks!

Featured New Arrivals

Sprecato by James Jonathan Clancy / The Wound by Qlowski / The Abandoned Flesh by Zuletzt / Earthworks by Straw Man Army (Clockwise)

James Jonathan ClancySprecato

12 Inch

‘Rested on easy laurel swamp oak, Dreams must mean the most, They must always mean forever, Fixation guides us all’ (Out And Alive)

Having previously recorded in the guise of His Clancyness and Brutal Birthday, Sprecato (Squandered) is the first release under his own name by Jonathan Clancy, who also runs Bologna-based Maple Death Records.  And working with a collective of fellow-minded instrumentalists, the Canadian Italian singer songwriter has crafted an album of darkly enticing, cosmically inclined folk.

The backbone to the compositions is Clancy’s own richly nuanced vocals and warmly strummed guitar.  These are then layered and braided with a broader palette of instrumentation from eerie flute to assertively serpentine saxophone, by way of skeletal piano and looping, noise infused electronics.  Meanwhile, the underlying rhythms segue from the languorously acoustic to the more driving, clinically programmed.  The song structures are lushly detailed, intriguingly constructed, rarely evolving quite as you would expect, and the skill in weaving each of these elements into such a cohesive whole is captivating to watch unfold.

Both sides of the album are conjured into life by two shorter, insidiously contagious tracks, the hauntingly beautiful Castle Night and the joltingly compelling Fortunate.  What follows in each instance is an entrancingly evocative dreamscape, the hazy, blurred lyrics reinforcing a sense of frustration at the opportunities wasted, both real and illusory.  Clancy sweeps from the beguiling I Want You to the mesmerising A Worship Deal, with its thrillingly discordant, saxophone fuelled climax.  Then from the ethereal Had It All to the swirling dissonance of Out And Alive.  It is a journey that provokes a sense of deep-seated comfort and spectral unease in almost equal measure.

QlowskiThe Wound

12 Inch

‘And still you might say we are resolutely in the camp of the defeated, but you should know, defeat has nothing to do with surrender’ (Liner Notes, Qlowski)

Inspired by an interview with the late Palestinian poet, Mahmoud Darwish, this statement is included in a series of short thought sketches that accompany The Wound.  It captures the very essence of the themes that Qlowski have set out to grapple with.  A grief, a trauma, an overwhelming despondency arising from the unrelenting social corrosion of late-stage capitalism.  Yet a belief continues to burn that collective action and community co-operation can still build an alternative.

This is the London band’s second album, following on from 2021’s Quale Futuro? (What Future?).  Formerly a duo, comprising Cecilia Corapi and Mickey Tallarini, the ranks of Qlowski have expanded by three new members – Christian Billard, Lucy Ludlow, and James Luxton – in a revamped rhythm section.  Tautly angular post-punk guitar and pulsing darkwave synths are underpinned by dancefloor inflected bottom end, while Tallarini’s desperate, gothic tones wrestle back and forth with Corapi’s brighter, more hopeful urgings.   The atmosphere evoked can only be described as one of melancholic euphoria.

The title track and Surrender share not only an utter infectiousness but are in many senses lyrical companion pieces – the former suffocating in its sense of powerlessness (‘We’ve spent all the words, we’ve raised all the flags, It looked grandiose, It was already gone’), while the latter bristles with a renewed defiance in defeat (‘Can you hold it your heart? Can you hold it in your hands? Can you hide it in the dark?’).

The rentier capitalism that has ravaged London’s housing is the focus of the jarring A Vision (‘Rotting in my own bed, Black mould crumbling through my mattress, Drowning in my defeat’) and the inhumanity of Europe’s treatment of migrants is that of the deceptively upbeat In Cold Blood (‘Choose the hand that holds your head, Under the water’).  Meanwhile, the darkly intoxicating Praxis (‘You were a fire that never expires’) teases out the power of personal grief as a force for change.

Straw Man ArmyEarthworks

12 Inch

‘Which way does the spiral spin, inside out or outside in? It’s a choice and it’s always been…, Feast and famine back-to-back’ (Spiral)

Which way indeed.  This is a question that fundamentally pervades our current predicament.  Society increasingly untethered, militarised conflict escalating, the earth’s vital signs alarmingly erratic, and institutionalised inequality breeding a sense of hopelessness that change can ever occur.  Our hearts hope that such volatility could yet be a harbinger for positive change, yet our heads tell us that things are only likely to get much worse, as the spiral spins out of control, eating itself in a frenzy of exploitation and extraction.

New York’s Straw Man Army are back.  Earthworks is the duo’s third album, following on from 2020’s Age Of Exile and 2022’s SOS.  The stripped back, anarcho-punk backbone to their endeavours remains firmly in place, but each release has seen an incrementally more expansive palette brought to bear, without compromising the strident immediacy of their song writing.  Leanly structured, tightly executed, the underlying richness is revealed in the subtle detailing.

Spryly bouncy bass lines and tautly crisp drumming are intricately interwoven.  In contrast to this rhythmic density, there is a spartan directness to the brightly angular, enticingly melodic guitar.  The insistent, cleanly enunciated vocals unveil a sardonically eloquent, poetically rhythmic exploration of the linkage between neoliberal economics, colonial legacies, and the environmental decimation of our planet.

The urgent Look Alive sets the scene perfectly, calling out our own lethargy in the face of a world unravelling (‘Prisoners of comfort, we dig our heels, forever stuck!’).  This theme is reinforced on the delicately, slow burn Rope Burn (‘In the country that can do no wrong, you’ll go along…’), and interspersed with the rollicking vitriol of Spiral (‘Is this all that’s left for us these days? Apathy and rage!’).

Urban dispossession forms the focal point for the roiling Staring At The Sun (‘What does it take to get locked away? Being poor in a public place’) and our disintegrating sense of community on the juddering Mass Production Of Loneliness (‘Our lives are mass produced, To break the link from you to me’).  Meanwhile, the roots of our continued refusal to engage with the looming environmental catastrophe are probed throughout the album and delineated with particular clarity on the forcefully compelling Extinction Burst (‘Chasing our extinction and we wonder why?’).

ZuletztThe Abandoned Flesh

12 Inch

‘A broad daylight attack on my optimism, A public execution, A broad daylight attack on my enthusiasm, A public execution, I’m only liberated to be incarcerated’ (Perpetuated Misery)

With members spanning London and Munich, the debut album from Zuletzt (Last) deals in post-punk that brims with an aura of ominous drama.  The pulsing synths, resonant bass lines, shimmering guitar, and crisply punchy percussion are all given room to unfold with striking clarity.

Yet there is also a restless invention that permeates through the album.  This is post-punk in its broadest iteration, calling upon darkwave, cold wave, anarcho-punk influences, even flourishes of new romantic pop, and then refracting them through the band’s own anarchic lens.

But, perhaps, it is the vocal delivery that proves the defining factor.  The lead vocals lean into a sonorous baritone and passages of austere, mechanical detachment.  They are then layered almost continually with supporting vocals that skitter with a vibrant melodic energy.  The result is an almost boisterous austerity as bleakly allusive themes of social atomisation, dystopian futures, and personal isolation are rendered.

It is telling that, across the album’s fifty-minute run time, the band’s propulsion barely dims for even a moment.  Personal stand out moments are the raucous Trains In My Tunnel Vision, the brooding Time Without Purpose, and the darkly pulsating Non-Linear Future.

Shows And Tours

Despize And Imposter Play Peckham Audio This Friday

This section lays no claims to being a definitive listing!  It is simply gigs coming up in London that catch my eye and that I think people who read this newsletter might be interested in.  I will always try and highlight where a show forms part of a wider UK tour.

29th November Big Problem, Silica, Hellscape, Snub (The Shacklewell Arms)

29th November Despize, Imposter, Disengagement, Infinite Wisdom (Peckham Audio)

29th November Pitchshifter, Black Gold, The Sad Season (The Garage)

30th November Poor Old Dogs, Dead Raze, The Fish Mittens, Inner London Violence (Magdalen Hall)

7th December Svdestada, Wreathe, Head Of The Baptist (The Dev)

17th December Terror, Nasty, Combust plus more (229 / UK Tour)

17th January Reality Unfolds Weekender featuring Wristmeetrazor, Dry Socket, Long Goodbye, Vicarage, Hour Of Reprisal, Closed Hands (New Cross Inn)

18th January Reality Unfolds Weekender featuring Ringworm, Bitter Wood, Broken Vow, Malignant, No Relief, Impunity, Imposter plus many more (New Cross Inn)

19th January Reality Unfolds Weekender featuring Stormo, Sorcerer, Shooting Daggers, Perp Walk, Cassus, Hidden Mothers plus many more (New Cross Inn)

23rd January One Step Closer, Dynamite, Life Of One, Uzumaki (New River Studios / Sold Out)

9th February Bent Blue, Major Pain plus more (New Cross Inn)

14th February Adult, Spike Hellis, Sacred Skin (Corsica Studios / UK Tour)

24th February Love Letter, Heavy Hex plus more (New Cross Inn / UK Tour)

7th-8th March Damage Is Done 4.5 Weekender (Line-up and venues to be confirmed)

8th March Misantropic, Nujorvik, Wreathe, System Of Slaves, Traidora (New Cross Inn)

16th March Ignorance plus support (New River Studios / UK Tour)

15th April Thou, pageninetynine, Moloch (Scala)

Coming Soon

Second Death’s Self-Titled Debut LP

December

Atomic Prey ‘Atomic Prey’ 12-inch (Iron Lung)

Faucheuse ‘Rêve Électrique’ 12-inch (Symphony Of Destruction / Restock)

Golpe ‘Subisci. Conformati. Rassegnati.’ 7-inch (Static Shock)

Gurs ‘Gerran Bizi Gara’ 12-inch (Symphony Of Destruction / Restock)

Ignorance ‘Nothing Changed’ 7-inch (Iron Lung)

Inferno Personale ‘La Scelta É Tua’ 12-inch (Symphony Of Destruction)

Paprika ‘Paprika’ 7-inch (Iron Lung)

Pest Control ‘Year Of The Pest’ 12-inch (Quality Control HQ)

Rogo ‘Rogo’ 12-inch (Symphony Of Destruction)

Second Death ‘Second Death’ 12-inch (La Vida Es Un Mus)

The Green Child ‘Look Familiar’ 12-inch (Upset The Rhythm)

Träume ‘Wrzask’ 12-inch (Quality Control HQ)

January

Bent Blue ‘So Much Seething’ 12-inch (Indecision Records)

Corker ‘Hallways Of Grey’ 12-inch (Feel It / Restock)

Heiress ‘Nowhere Nearer’ 12-inch (Indecision Records)

Lasso ‘Parte’ 12-inch (Sorry State)

Suffocating Madness ‘Unrelenting Forced Psychosis’ 12-inch (Toxic State)

Unbroken ‘Life. Love. Regret. – 30th Anniversary Edition’ 2×12-inch (Indecision Records)

Undertow ‘At Both Ends’ 12-inch (Indecision Records)

Yellowcake ‘A Fragmented Truth’ 7-inch (Not For The Weak / Restock)

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