The World Inferno Friendship Society always have the most passionate shows.  On Thursday night, I headed out to West Chester’s Note in order to catch the cabaret punk, and due to an emergency, unfortunately missed both Spraynard and Mischief Brew.  I came close to missing part of Inferno as well but walked in right as the band began their call to arms “Tattoos Fade”.
In all honesty, I was a little bit nervous about the crowd being lackluster due to the fact it was in West Chester as opposed to Philly (even Municipal Waste shows at The Note leave me desiring a little more action) however my fears were put to rest almost immediately.  Right, this is an Inferno show, and we’re a passionate bunch.

Moshing, waltzing, and makeouts, Inferno shows are always a surreal experience.  The band played tight as usual, with Jack entertaining the crowd with his banter.  They played songs spanning nearly all of their releases, and the crowd responded positively to them all.

I may have also seen the youngest kid to ever stage dive that night, kudos to him (and to the rest of you stage divers… don’t make me come out of stage dive retirement and show you youngsters how it’s done.)

Setlist (not in order and from what I remember… pretty complete I think):

Tattoos Fade
My Ancestral Home, New Jersey
Jake and Eggers
Brother Of The Mayor Of Bridgewater
Cats Are Not Lucky Creatures
Everybody Come To Rick’s
The Apple Was Eve
13 Years Without Peter King
Thumb Cinema
I Am Sick Of People Being Sick Of My Shit
I Just Make Faces
Zen and the Art Of Breaking Everything In This Room
Ladies And Gentleman Of The Road
Politics Of Passing Out
Naughty Little Rat Makes Friends
So Long To The Circus
Canonize Philip K. Dick, OK
The Models and the Mannequins

Mp3:
World Inferno Friendship Society – Go With It Girl

More:
World Inferno Friendship Society – The Anarchy And The Ecstasy
World Inferno Friendship Society – A Demonstrational Introduction to the Astral Plane
World Inferno Friendship Society – Addicted to Bad Ideas
World Inferno Friendship Society – Just The Best Party
World Inferno Friendship Society – Red Eyed Soul
World Inferno Friendship Society – East Coast Super Sound Punk of Today

Buy:
Chunksaah

There’s just something about Signals Midwest’s “Latitudes and Longitudes”.  I’m not usually into the particular style that these Cleveland, Ohio dudes play, and while it’s not in my regular rotation (yet), I do enjoy the album.

Signals Midwest play that gruff midwestern punk mixed with melodic emo influences that seems to be randomly big these days, but unlike 90% of similar bands, they’re able to keep me hooked.

You can hear their influences through each melody, from The Menzingers, Braid, to Smoke or Fire (shit, listen to the opening vocal pattern of “The Weight And The Waiting”, it’s the exact same as Smoke or Fire’s “Neon Light”). Speaking of melodies, some of them are just straight up addicting, particularly “Family Crest” and “The Quiet Persuader”.

For fans of people who like sticking their hands in their hoodie pockets and nodding furiously along to songs, only to take it out and thump on their chests for the really exciting parts… oh and beards.  Definitely beards.

Mp3:
Signals Midwest – The Quiet Persuader

More Melodic Punk For Your Melancholy Heart:

The Menzingers – Chamberlain Waits

The Reveling – Tributaries

Crucial Dudes – 61 Penn

Buy:

Tiny Engines

It’s valentine’s day, that special day where single people are bitter and wish they were in relationships and people in relationships wish they were single… oh and something about Al Capone killing a bunch of people on a boat or something.

Here’s a little vday mix for all you punk hearts out there, because I’m your valentine.

MP3:

Propagandhi – Utter Crap Song (The As Close To An Emo Song As We’ll Ever Get Song)

Bouncing Souls – I Like Your Eyes

Vandals – (I’ll Make You) Love Me

Adolescents – I Love You

Teenage Bottlerocket – Be Stag

Against Me – I Still Love You Julie

Black Flag – Bastard In Love

Bomb The Music Industry – I Don’t Love You Anymore

World Inferno Friendship Society – Velocity Of Love

Casualties – Punk Rock Love

American Nightmare – Young Hearts Be Free Tonight

Dead Milkmen – If You Love Somebody, Set Them On Fire

NOFX – Love Story

More Mixes:

Scenester 101: How To Be A Modern Day Street Punk
How To Be A 3rd Wave Ska Dork
How To Be A Skinhead
How To Be Hardcore

Buy:

Interpunk

Cincinnati’s Mixtapes have been an incredibly busy band.  In a span of less than two years, they’ve released an album, 3 EPs, and a split.  Their latest EP “Hope Is For People” is one of those albums that just immediately puts you in a good mood the second it starts.

If you’re not smiling (or at least singing along with the whoas) halfway through, I’m forced to assume you hate fun or have no soul.  With 6 songs clocking in at 11 minutes (and one of those songs are just an acoustic version of another), Mixtapes really hit their stride on Hope Is For People.  Playing dual guy/gal vocals pop-punk mixed with indie, “Hope Is For People” is poppy without being too sugary.

Songs like “Where I Live” and “The New Ride The Lightning” are your relatively straight forward disgustingly catchy pop-punk, while title track “Hope Is For People” and “You’d Better Bring More Dudes” are acoustic-turn-punk jams.

I’m usually pretty picky when a band is this poppy, but Mixtapes does it fucking right on “Hope Is For People”.  You can’t go wrong if you like your punk a little more poppy, or if you just like fun music in general.

MP3:
Mixtapes – Where I Live

More:
Mixtapes – A Short Collection Of Short Songs
Bomb The Music Industry – Vacations
The Menzingers – Chamberlain Waits
The Copyrights – North Sentinel Island

Buy:
Animal Style Records

San Francisco’s Punch have done what I previously would have thought as impossible.  With their latest “Nothing Lasts” EP, the band somehow managed to create something even more ferocious and pissed off than their “Self Titled” album.

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: while many have touted Punch as one of the most aggressive female-fronted hardcore bands around today, I want to take it a step further and say that Punch is easily one of the most furious hardcore bands around.

Their 7 song, 9 minute long “Nothing Lasts” EP is one hell of a ride.  Blending d-beat, power violence, thrash, and straight up hardcore, Punch is incredibly reminiscent of other Cali bands such as Ceremony and Dangers.

No frills found here… if you like hardcore raw, pissed, and energetic as all fuck, then Punch’s latest is a must.

Mp3:
Punch – The Chase

More:

Punch – Self Titled
Cokebust – Lines In The Sand
Ceremony – Violence Violence

Buy:

Punch

Sometimes it seems like Canada has it all: public health care, better maple syrup, and a plethora of damn good skate influenced punk rock.  Ontario based Adelleda is the latest band to add to great canadian punk, and their 8 track “Herkimer Street” is 20 minutes of melodic skate bliss.

While I realize that it’s certainly cliche to compare a melodic punk band to early Propagandhi, I can’t help but listen to some of Adelleda’s riff’s and be reminded of the Manitoba legends (hell, their song Implausible Denial reminds me of I-Spy a bit before I even knew where they were from).  Adelleda is able to avoid pigeon holing themselves though by pulling influences from other melodic hardcore bands.  Song GBN is incredibly reminiscent of Ignite and opener Farley reminds me a bit of Vision.

If you’re a fan of melodic punk rock at all, it’s hard to steer wrong with Adelleda’s “Herkimer Street”.  Oh, and I forgot to mention they offer it up on their bandcamp completely for free… so really, what are you waiting for?

Mp3:
Adelleda – Just A Shame

More:

Housewives Interview Propagandhi
Man The Change
Strike Anywhere – Change Is Sound

Buy:
Adelleda

When I first heard Graf Orlock, I was blown away immediately.  Any band that could take the Jurassic Park theme song and turn it into a grindcore song gets an A+ in my book.  Los Angeles self described “cinema-grind”, Graf Orlock mixes music and movies, and with their latest (well, released in 2009) “Destination: Time Today”, the band brings some of the most furious grind I’ve heard in a long time.

Admittedly, I don’t watch many movies.  I simply don’t have the attention span to sit for 2 hours at a time and stare at a screen without any iteration, but I have to say, Graf Orlock makes me want to see a few.  Their songs follow a pretty simple formula: open with a quote from a movie, base the lyrics on the script or from a perspective of a character, and mix it with some of the best, heaviest music around.

I usually shy away from most grindcore as it usually has cookie monster death vocals similar to metal, but like the other grind bands I listen to, Graf Orlock takes a lot of influences from hardcore punk as well.  Much more melodic than most in this genre, Destination: Time Today is chock full of infectious guitars, scatter shot drumming, and desperate (in a good way) vocals.

Definitely check it out if you like your music fast and heavy as fuck.  Also I give them props for going out on a limb and doing something different than most bands (the only other band I know that has done something remotely similar would be Municipal Waste with their Tango And Thrash EP.)

MP3:
Graf Orlock – Chapter III

I Don’t Think You Understand, These Boys Killed My Dog:

Municipal Waste – Tango and Thrash
Dangers – Messy, Isn’t It?
Phobia – Cruel
Swallowing Shit

Buy:

www.vitriolrecords.com

Yesterday was completely ridiculous. After heading to the Philly’s piazza to watch a free Newfound Glory show (I don’t think I’ve ever seen so many fights break out), then Philly’s shit show “Makeout Club”, I headed over to the Fire to catch melodic hardcore legends Grey Area.

Unfortunately I missed all of the openers sets except the last two by The Reveling (to which I requested Ironbound, and was informed they already played it… that’s what I get for being late) but caught all of Grey Area.

Grey Area

The Fire was the most intimate place I’ve seen Grey Area play, and I was pretty damn excited (so much so that I bought tickets the day they went on sale out of fear it was going to sell out. It didn’t.) Grey Area took the stage and immediately started playing… Cannonball. Uh, ok, strange choice for an opener, but we were singing along. It wasn’t until they started their next song Insomnia that we got all rowdy and went batshit crazy. They kept it up, playing tight and fast (that’s what she said), and covered songs from all of their releases.

The band bantered with the crowd a bunch, Ernie informing us he broke a rib at their last show (I couldn’t tell if he was serious or not), and when someone yelled “NY Giants Suck!” the band was quick to quip back “who said that? Must be a dude with glasses and a beard… oh wait…”

I wish they would play more often, but with them putting out 4 new songs in the past year, I won’t complain (too much).

Setlist:
Cannonball
Insomnia
Sour Grapes
Hold On Tight
——————-
No Guarantees
Reminder
Take My Chances
Rotten Eggs
——————
Lucky
Bad Anything
(Sick Of It All cover I think)
——————
Bliss
Before Me
Colossus

Encore:
As One (Warzone Cover) (I think)

Mp3:
Grey Area – Lucky

More:
Grey Area 4 Way Split
Grey Area / Go Rydell Split

Buy:
Black Numbers

If there is one band that always manages to surprise the hell out of me, it’s Fucked Up. I remember listening to their demo and Epic in Minutes back when it came out and thinking they were pretty solid hardcore band, but not the messiahs of hardcore many were touting them to be. Now ten years later they release “David Comes To Life” and not only are the ‘too cool for school’ writers at Pitchfork collectively jizzing their pants over it, it’s listed as #83 of Billboard’s Top 200 of 2011… Kudos Fucked Up… kudos.

To be honest, I haven’t listened to anything by Fucked Up since their compilation retrospective “Epic In Minutes”, and it is a LOT different than the blistering hardcore I was used to from these Toronto punks. For starters, David Comes To Life is for lack of a better term: a rock opera. On the surface, the entire 18 song album is about light bulb factory worker David, his new love Veronica, them conspiring to build a bomb together, her dying in the process, his guilt, battling the narrator for control, and redemption. Of course the whole thing is symbolic as stated by singer Damian “we could hide behind characters and pretend that we’re talking about David and Veronica when really we’re talking about my breaking with my girlfriend or something”. Some of the lyrics are incredibly witty “we need a Peter / we get a Paul / at least Judas had some balls.”

Ok, so how about the actual music? For starters, there’s a lot more pop elements involved. Fucked Up has long stopped touting the hardcore flag, and it’s a lot more rock with hardcore influences than straight up hardcore with Damian’s rough punk vocals being the biggest mainstay (I just used hardcore three times in a sentence, new record.) Still, the music is incredibly catchy although with 18 songs at 77 minutes, the album definitely gets pretty repetitious at times and is not really made to be listened to in one sitting.

Very different from the hardcore I’m used to, I give Fucked Up credit for going out on a limb and trying something different. It’s refreshing to see a different topic for an album than the often overplayed ones found in hardcore (we’re looking at you every straight edge band out there). One of the very few hardcore bands hipsters are allowed to like (along with Trash Talk, and soon to be Ceremony), definitely give Fucked Up a chance, some catchy songs in here.

MP3:
Fucked Up – Queen Of Hearts

More:
Trash Talk – Plagues
Ceremony – Violence Violence
Ceremony – Rohnert Park

Buy:
Album Website