GENERAL LABOR’S GUTTER GOSPEL! Embittered, anti-war musings on the redemptive and healing and mystical powers of real rocknroll, REVOLUTIONARY BLACKOUT NETWORK, WHEN WE WERE THE BASTARDS WITH ARTHUR LEE, THUNDERFUCK & THE DEADLY ROMANTICS, CHRIS HEDGES ON DEATH OF FREE PRESS, JIMMY DORE, WHITNEY WEBB, CAITLIN JOHNSTONE! STOP THE WAR  & UNDERMINE ALL BULLSHIT MILITARY INDUSTRIAL COMPLEX PROPAGANDA. BOYCOTT PIG MEDIA. ALL POWER TO THE PEOPLE!

DIVIDED SLAVES OF AMNESIA

THEY ARE DOING SOMETHING TO THE WATER [and soil] – YouTube

The Empire Gives People The Illusion Of Fighting The Power Without Ever Endangering Real Power – Caitlin Johnstone

The Correct Way To Treat Scumbag Politicians | Jose Vega Video Goes Viral – YouTube

New Article on Major Free Speech Threat (substack.com)

The 20th Anniversary of the Sociocide of Iraq by Bush and Cheney, by Ralph Nader – Dandelion Salad (wordpress.com)

US Military Aid To Ukraine Exceeds The Costs Of Afghanistan – Activist Post

Chris Hedges: How the Media Misled Us About Russiagate – Dandelion Salad (wordpress.com)

The Trump-Russia Saga and the Death Spiral of American Journalism (substack.com)

Boom: Biden Appoints Member Of The Trilateral Commission To Head The World Bank – Activist Post

Christian Malazarte on Twitter: “An unplanned compilation video of the #RageAgainstWar Rally that I made in 2 days almost non-stop. @MaxBlumenthal @anyaparampil @scotthortonshow @DanielLMcAdams @yopasta @jimmy_dore https://t.co/UBSxDXcW4n” / Twitter

Rachel Maddow Pretends Chris Hedges and Dr Jill Stein Didn’t Attend The Rage Against The War Rally – YouTube

Conversation with Robert F. Kennedy Jr | How The Powerful Captured The Public During The Pandemic – YouTube

HAVE YOU HEARD THE BIG BUZZ ABOUT THUNDERFUCK AND THE DEADLY ROMANTICS?

Apparently they generate some controversy in Canada with their hard rockin’ untamed barbarian party people personas, some sensitive souls compare their vocalist to GG Allin, I dunno about all that, I’m just finding out about ’em cause you know I don’t get around much anymore, some other rock critic called Thunderfuck a “minotaur of a man” which to me, is funny, makes me smile, me and my old sleazy grebo-glam gang got called all that and more, so ya know I get what they’re all about, I think they’re a lotta fun, they’ve been around awhile now but I’m just discovering ’em, they kinda remind me of Sister Morphine, Rose Tattoo, Dictators, the Almighty, Zodiac Mindwarp, all the scuzzy heavy wild bikerpunks we all know and love. Check ’em out!

HOME/ABOUT | deadlyromantics

The Deadly Romantics – Ain’t Too Old To Rock And Roll – YouTube

Drink This Party Dry 2019 – YouTube

Starfucker – YouTube

The Deadly Romantics New York City Official Video – YouTube

Thunderfuck and the Deadly Romantics: Fucked by Rock and Roll – YouTube

Thunderfuck And The Deadly Romanticsannounce rescheduled UK Tour for April2022 – PlanetMosh

Attention Whore – YouTube

The Deadly Romantics – This One’s For You 2014 – YouTube

The Deadly Romantics – How Do I Taste – YouTube

THUNDERFUCK & THE DEADLY ROMANTICS ‘Dirty Sleazy Rock’n’Roll – Metal Planet Music

Thunderfuck & the Deadly Romantics – Edinburgh, Bannermans 23/04/15 – All About The Rock

ANOTHER COLD MORNING IN DISINTEGRATING DEADEND GHOST TOWN

Aint nothin where I live but a Wal-Mart, McDonald’s and some jivessass bullshit rich people trying to gentrify two streets by building all these prohibitively expensive airbandb’s for trendy hipsters from outta town. Trendy hipsters show up here insisting they can transform a deadpoor town of elderly people into OVERNIGHT BROOKLYN HIPSTERTOPIA, but like, by their third day, they realize there aint no audience, aint no chicks, nobody cares about their ZZ Top beard or occultic tattoo. Only people who can afford the ten dollar pints at the tourist trap bar are in their seventies and eighties, and the douchey Dave Matthews yuppified bar-bros are gonna be inhospoitable if you aint high tippin’ em everytime they pour a beer. You wanna go to the deadend desert, you’re gonna have to learn to cope with some deepass tedium. Everything is closed on Sundays AND Mondays. You can go for a power walk by the river with your two pitbulls but you’re likely to meet some low level meth crazies like Badger and Skinny Pete along your way. You can soak in them supposedly healing and therapeutic thirty bucks an hour hot tubs if that’s your thing but the hairy backed, faux new wage, wouldbe shamanic men here in the gold necklaces are all creepy swinger desperados ala “Three’s Company”. Nevermind the flooded streets and extreme winds. My kid is sick and I’m probably gonna catch whatever he’s got cause we are outta the vitamin C and have to order more through the mail, cause the good stuff is not available here. We had Covid over Christmas but knocked it out efficiently with a certain protocol I can only share with you at the hobo bonfire by the railroad tracks. Buncha trees blew down in my yard so I integrated them into the broken down fence, halfheartedly trying to keep the cows out. They love to fertilize the side yard at night. I don’t mind really, I kinda like free cows. I love Susan Sarandon who showed up at Donzinger’s trial fighting the horrible fix is in Chevron fascists. It seems like anytime a rich and powerful person fights for good, they get fuckedover by the pig-media and all it’s loathsome zombies of death slogan reciters and shit slingers. So I just wanna be one tiny voice in the darkness saying, “I Love Susan Sarandon.” Ralph Nader, too. I no longer believe in anybody associated with the DNC services corporation and their pro war stance and primary rigging, not Sanders, certainly not those turncoats and fucking soldout supermodels of the fraudsquad. And those horrible rich women of “The View” are just the worst kind of grotesque servants of empire and kneejerk protectors of the status quo. Yeccch! Horrible. Susan Sarandon though, gives me faith in some human beings still having some integrity, soul, and principles in this rich get richer hellscape society. God bless her. We used to be “friends” on the fascist book, but I understood when she abandoned that corrupt platform of her own accord, way before I got lockedout by the spooks for my anti-war shit-postings and linking to independent media from a Real Left perspective. Remember when people used to say, “keepin’ it real”, but then, that turned into some kinda jive justification for saying something rude to somebody? I still look for the real music, the real news, the real science and the real history. I know that aint gonna be found on the monopoly airwaves or Rockefeller funded public radio-they even got Amy Goodman burying the anti war movement and helping promote future regime change war on Iran. So yeah I don’t really even trust Democracy Now as much as I used to-everybody gets bought or controlled. Somebody killed Michael Hastings (RIP), but even “Rolling Stone” helps sell bullshit war narratives and provides cover for the secret police. I object to that. Shitlibs call that being a crazy conspiracy theorist. I don’t mind. I’m keepin’ it real, yo. I watch the Convo Couch, Kim Iverson, Revolutionary Blackout Network, Glenn Greenwald’s System Update, Lee Camp at Mint Press, and Consortium News personally, I check out what they have to say at www.antiwar.com I think everybody should be doing something everyday to end these forever wars for global empire based on lies and a Davos honcho’s oil and opium and mineral plundering agenda. Lithium is what Elon Musk wants more of. Never trust a billionaire. I don’t even trust very many millionaires, or upper middle class people, really. They’re all hoodwinked and bamboozled by the McCarthyist pants suit on the tv.

Garland Nixon on Twitter: “I can’t understand why the world does not want to follow the US neoliberal economic model so they can achieve these kinds of results? https://t.co/IEanaajvGh” / Twitter

Steven Donziger on Twitter: “Unconscionable for EPA Chief Regan to drink unsafe tap water in Ohio. @EPA still has not tested for deadly dioxins and phosgene gas produced by Norfolk Southern’s reckless detonation of its chemicals. An agency dedicated to public health should never do PR for a polluter. ⤵️ https://t.co/DXUgfGxHMM” / Twitter

Garland Nixon on Twitter: “RAY MCGOVERN INTERVIEW – THE NORD STREAM PIPELINE ATTACK https://t.co/4sqMT6PTXf” / Twitter

Garland Nixon on Twitter: “Good old America and it’s neoliberal freedom… The neoliberal economic model works so well…” / Twitter

Human 6G Antennas? ‘One of the Worst Ideas Ever,’ Critic Says • Children’s Health Defense (childrenshealthdefense.org)

Jimmy Dore on Twitter: “I’m nailing it in this clip! Thanks for posting!” / Twitter

DEBUNKED Distraction Tactics Against Forcing Medicare 4 All Vote! – YouTube

“Why is Tucker Carlson the only corporate news show to allow me to bring on an Anti-War message & tell the truth about Ukraine?

You’re being lied to about Ukraine and by the exact same people who lied us into Iraq, Libya , Syria, etc etc..America is the world’s terrorists.” (-Jimmy Dore)

“As the rest of the world talks about the need for negotiations, NATO continues to talk about the need for more weapons. One of the things Ukraine is getting in the new $10 billion from American taxpayers is money for healthcare. If the United States cared about the sovereignty of Ukraine they wouldn’t have taken it away in 2014. The U.S. Gov’t doesn’t care about the sovereignty of Ukraine or about bringing ‘democracy’ to Taiwan

These countries are just pawns to be used as battering rams against Russia and China because the U.S. wants to remain the world’s only super power. The fewer Americans that continue to care about Ukraine, the more our Gov’t is gonna try to tell us how much we all care about Ukraine. The rulers of the US and our Gov’t are looking at the chess pieces left and for the first time in years sees they can’t win so now like a bunch of spoiled brats they are just knocking all the pieces off the board. Looking at US foreign policy it appears that our ruling class has decided they’d rather see the world end in a nuclear war than the West lose their control of it” (-Black In The Empire)

Glenn Greenwald on Twitter: “NEW: Law Sought by Brazil’s Lula to Ban “Fake News and Disinformation” Online — and to Punish its Authors — Threatens Free Speech and the Free Internet Far Beyond Brazil: Throughout the Democratic World: https://t.co/XSTQdhONOS” / Twitter this is some Davos shit.

gusanofsharpton on Twitter: “I Love History.” / Twitter

“ADDICTED TO NOISE” by MICHAEL GOLDBERG

Goldberg likes a lot of the same music I do and his descriptions are astonishingly vivid like when he says John Lee Hooker is so careful with what notes he plays, he compares each note to hundred dollar bills, ya get me? He’s a real gifted and descriptive writer who can entertain somebody like me for hours by digging deep in to what makes our favorite performers tick, he asks real questions. My wife was saying she aint interested in some entertainer’s backstory, only in how their song makes her feel. I’m quite the opposite in that regard, I always wanna know what happened that made Sinead O’Connor or Bob Stinson become who they did. Not so much nowadays, none of those short shelf life face tattoo rappers, or lab born Dizney slut puppet girls speak to me at all except I turn it off. I don’t ususally like anything that big 5 corporate media qualifies as mainstream, I did not even like the manufactured “alternative” they saturation marketed, Starbucks style, to people in my age group and younger in the nineties, so you can safely bet, if I was not all that wild about Lillith Fair or Lollapalooza or Woodstock 99 era acts, it’s gotten only worse, since then, which is why it is so refreshing and rejuvenating to read these dispatches from the last days of real rocknroll being heard on the  mainstream airwaves, as penned by a really intuitive and perceptive watcher of popular culture and appreciator of authentic music, Mister Michael Goldberg. Like me, he started off doing a fanzine called “Hard Road” before graduating to taking photos of Morrison and Janis and in 75, he and his old lady did an interview with notoriously difficult Frank Zappa. Ya know I been reading this guy’s stuff all my life, ’cause he wrote for all the good rock mags before they were weaponized by The Man. You can feel how he is a right-on cat and shares our genuine love for good rocknroll music, whether he’s talkin’ ’bout “When You Were Mine” and “Manic Monday” or the majestic, shimmering tones of sound poet, James Calvin Wilsey from Silvertone, the original Chris Isaac band. He wrote the book about those dudes, and it is one of my favorite rock tomes of all time THIS WORLD IS ONLY GOING TO BREAK YOUR HEART | Reviews (i94bar.com), partly because I love the subject matter, but also because this writer is so compassionate and genuinely hip and gets it, and is so clearly and sincerely devoted to the music, you can feel he has an emotional investment and therefore skin in the game, he aint one of those paycheck cashing hustlers and shysters they pay to promote fabricated culture wars and lie to us about assemblyline post-boyband muzak in “Spin” and “Rolling Stone” nowadays. 

‘Too loud to read in my crazy household on the edge of town, so I’ve been enjoying this beautiful hardback book from the comfort of a lounge chair in the middle of my yard beneath the desert sky, surrounded by butterflies, raptors, and an omnipresent symphony of birds song and the windchimes in the tree out front. It is a wonderfully curated collection of his inspired rocknroll raves, he’s less judgmental than many of us, I mean I was telling my old lady how I’ve become a real bastard in recent years, you get burned enough times by ex friends and music industry vampires, fakes, and the government and corporations, but I repeat myself, lying to you all the time, about every topic, you start to think the worst about people. Michael Goldberg’s writing was more open minded than that, he was one of those real old school just the facts ma’am geezeers who were all about reporting the observable truth on the ground. He’d go and ask Prince questions, and come back with a real story. Prince didn’t do autographs. I had no idea and I think I know shit about Prince. Erotic City Come Alive: Holy Holy PRINCE Raved Unto The Slut Glamtastic by General Labor – Veglam I don’t usually go for many of the big name music journalist compilations filled with official narratives and conventional wisdom, same people who always fuck up that bogus Hall Of Fame farce so badly. Greil Marcus wrote the foreward to this book and the cover illustration is old Hardy Boys retro pulp fiction illustration, but my dude’s writing will take you back to what was for me, a better, freer, more joyful and innocent era, when music did not suck, the news was less fake, and the culture had not deteriorated to the point where Milli Vanilli and Spice Girls seem like O.G. soul people. He interviews Mark Eitzel from the American Music Club who I always kinda appreciated as a songwriter-I knew his muse (RIP)  Kathleen’s best friend, so I brushed with her a couple of times and my old drummer Boogie was quite enamored with her. Goldberg’s books make fine companions. This one is jam packed with top notch music writing, the likes of which we seldom see in this country where print media was killed off by the monoplies. At least you city slickers can still sometimes access “VIVE LE ROCK”, which is the last beacon of real rocknroll journalism, if you ask me. I’ll be telling you more about “ADDICTED TO NOISE” as I dig deeper into it. So far, it’s exactly what I was hoping for from the author of that poignant and powerful James Calvin Wilsey book. SENSATIONAL MUSIC WRITING ABOUT MANY OF OUR FAVORITE ARTISTS!

Addicted to Noise | WIRED

Things to Do: Read Addicted to Noise by Michael Goldberg | Houston Press

Michael Goldberg (Author of Knockout Networking) (goodreads.com)

LOVE

So yeah once my first band split up into what I came to see as the hot rod faction and the glam fag faction, I brought in the former roadie/bodygard on AC/DC guitar and we commenced to write a lotta good songs together, even as our other guitarist was beginning to drift away from us. He’d met some more adultish, career minded people who were telling him about how to get into college while me and the rhythm guitar player were at our most decadent and dangerous, spontaneous fun loving and debaucherous, going to all the derelict bars in the ghetto every night, meeting lots and lots and lots and lots of girls. The women and the booze you might say were distractions from the music, but really fuelled and inspired all the songs we were writing back then, predominantly about drinking and girls. So we met a guitrarist at our horrible affinity credit card telemarketing job-he was our supervisor. He shared our love of recreational pharamceuticals, I think one or both of those guys were supplementing the telemarketing wages with selling acid to telemarketers. Sometimes, our associates and roommates were probably alienated by our ridiculous LSD loud laughing, you know we thought we were like real rocketmen space explorers, star commandos. One of my closest pals back in the sticks was the ultimate garage punk connosieur acidhead sixties burntout who was still really living the hippie code. He was one of the only other people besides me and a bullfrog voiced, train hopping anarchist drinking buddy, who really was not chasing the Yankee Dollar or any kinda prestige or popularity. He was a real super cool laidback cat who loved to drop acid, drink, smoke weed, or as he always called it, “Get Mellow”! Aw man I loved that guy-we lived together for about a year at my purple apartment that has since burned down supposedly by a vagrant but I tend to suspect gentrifying forces downtown. Anyways, that was who had been teaching my friends and I about all the sixties punk bands, it was like we knew Lenny Kaye. He got us into cool reggae, cool country, the blues, so much farout stuff. Hooker, Wolf, Muddy, Lightnin’, Canned Heat, the Seeds, the Elevators, the Stooges, the 5, and Love. Our trippy telemarketing supervisor really loved T. Rex and Bauhaus, so we were realy compatible with that guy, even if his shit was more hippieish than what we were doing. He had a goth band that played the Middle East all the time, and that place was supposedly the hippest place in town back then. He played a 12 string guitar, all these weedly leads over our very savage and primitive three chord punk songs, and suddenly we were sounding more like Dogs D’Amour. Or Crybabys. He helped co write two very epic songs I felt were kinda dark and poetic and had many parts to them, but with some real potential to get us signed to a label if we could get ’em heard by an A&R person. We knew one guy who had a studio and was sorta famous, but he was more interested in one of my girlfriends back then. So we were doing a lot of drugs and listening to a lot of Mother Love Bone, the Cult, and the Jacobites and Waterboys. When I asked our new lead player if he was hip at all to Arthur Lee’s stuff, he kinda chuckled and said, “yeah when I was a kid, my mom was his manager, he’s my godfather and we used to live with him in Laurel Canyon”. The rhythm guitar player and I made brief eye contact to confirm telepathically how neither one of us believed this farfetched story, but we were at his house and weren’t gonna call him a liar, as we were basically all semi immobilized by the acid and the speedballs and the whiskey and cheap champagne. I have cassette tapes from those days full of promising songs that had hit potential, and the rhythm guitar player’s hedonistic preacher’s daughter girlfriend laughing at us because we were too high to record effectively. I’d forgotten how to work the tape recorder and was nodding out during their lengthy introductions. They’d co created this snaky, Middle Eastern sound tapestry and it was a little hypnotic if you were on speedballs and acid and booze. I was mad at our old bandmates for jumping ship cause I knew me and the Rock Savage had some heavy punknroll mojo working, and this new guy was really contributing to our endeavors, mostly by adding nuance and texture, like Brian Jones. He had a difficult girlfriend, we all did, and all the girlfriends had their own problems with various substances. But yeah, our songs were starting to really happen, they were blossoming, it was like seeing flowers grow.

 When Ray Manzarek and the poet Michael MacClure came to town, I wanted to go because the Doors were my first real rebellious music pre punk and new wave, when I was like in the fifth or sixth grade. They were playing at the supposedly hip bar that was never friendly to us leather clad hoodlums cause it was like all about ska and folk music at the time, but imagine who the opening act was. None other than Arthur Lee. He did some acoustic stuff, “Signed DC” was very moving, and a loud psycheddelic set backed by Das Damen, basically. This dude influenced everybody-Hendrix, the Doors, on and on, Jimbo just wanted to be ‘as big as Love”. So I took the lads backstage and Arthur was signing stacks and stacks of rare antique vinyl all these old Cambridge hippies had shown up with. I nudged the lead guitar player who was sortof shy all of a sudden. He nervously stuttered, “Uh, hey, Arthur…” Without looking up from all his autographing Lee says, “Yeah, what, kid?” Me and the Rock Savage are sorta smirking now. “Well, I don’t know if you’ll remember, but when I was a kid…” Arthur looks up with a big look of shock on his face and drops all the expensive vinyl straight to the floor, pissing off all the boomer collectors with the big hippie beards and he embraces our dude with the warmest hug and biggest love. “TONY! What did you ever do with that Vespa scooter I bought you?!” It was all true. Our lead guitarist who was enhancing our jangly punk songs was indeed, Arthur Lee’s godson and had lived with him when he was growing up. So Arthur picked up some groupie and after the show, we spent the weekend getting wasted with Arthur Lee back at Tony’s second floor apartment, me kinda still tripping from the night before. You can’t make this shit up. Arthur was a delight and totally downhome and summa the stories you can hear him tell in those documentaries, we got to hear from him, in the flesh. It was wonderful and I probably forgot to call my old girlfriend in all of the excitement, or we were arguing, or something cause I don’t remember her being there. So anyways, we kept working on new songs and sometimes, we’d be joined by our other musical friends, the ex guitar star who’d been reinventing himself would even showup and co wrote a pop song with me that people in NY still cover. We were rounded out by a  couple of real talented brothers, some pop dudes, and occassionally by some mercenary industry hustling song stealer we did not know was a snake at first, our other drugdealer roommate the guitar teacher, a sax player from Killbuck. Eventually the guitarist’s difficult girlfriend became too difficult so we said he could move in with us. We had a bigass apartment in the ghetto. As I recall, we continued having many nights of merry frivolity as a band together, writing, singing, drinking, making a lotta merry, we ran some cheap Casio through some effects pedals and were doing some musical experimentation and this lifestyle went on for awhile until dude kinda put the moves on my difficult girlfriend and we asked him to move out. Never saw him again. I always liked him, though. We replaced him with a Beatlehead pop guy, but I never felt like the chemistry was as good as it was with the departed 12 string warlock goth/hippie. It was sad because he had it. He was one of us. He brought his own authentic rocknroll flavor to the hobo stew, whereas, after that, it was usually just like a lotta leeching deleinquents stealing ideas and songs. When we were the Bastards, Tony was one of the full fledged Bastards as far as I am concerned, he had a rare star quality, not everybody has that. I hope he’s alive and still doing his thing.

LOVE the castle – YouTube

Love Story 2 – Arthur Lee revisits the Castle – YouTube

Love Story 1 – Arthur Lee on war – YouTube

Michael McClure – YouTube

Michael McClure reading poetry to lions – YouTube

Riders on the Storm – Ray Manzarek & Michael McClure – YouTube

“The Black Alliance for Peace has been clear on Ukraine war from the very beginning. We always understood that the war started in 2014 & cost 14 thousand lives before the 3rd phase of the war started last year. We were also clear that NATO was a white supremacist structure.” (-Ajamu Baraka)

“”Their whole function is to divert all meaningful leftward movement away from inconvenient areas like demilitarization and economic justice and toward convenient areas like whether there should be solar panels on Abrams tanks.” (-Caitlin Johnstone on gender hustling DNC bullshit warpig capitalist scam merchants.”

“Musk started Tesla with a huge U.S. government welfare grant. He has taken taxpayers to the cleaners for his factories and for Starlink. He is a gigantic corporate welfare king masquerading as a capitalist businessman.” (-Ralph Nader)

“I DONT CARE WHO YOU VOTED FOR WHEN CRISIS HITS WE ARE ALL AMERICANS, WE ARE ALL HUMAN BEINGS.

Let compassion be the cure to our division.” (-Erin Brockovich)

Corporations Have ‘Weaponized’ the Government. Here’s How to Stop Them. • Children’s Health Defense (childrenshealthdefense.org)

sarah on Twitter: “not satire https://t.co/eDwVFVryTg” / Twitter

Katie Halper on Twitter: “Removing art by Palestinian children because some people feel “victimized” by it? This is the grossest, most cynical, self-indulgent weaponization of trauma. Anyone who feels the “vulnerable” because of this art is either unwell or a disgusting human being. If @UKLFI had any 1/ https://t.co/AZCBZKtYtP” / Twitter

Simon Ateba on Twitter: “BREAKING – DEADLY LIES: Independent researchers at Texas A&M University have just contradicted federal government regulators, saying that toxic air pollutants in East Palestine, Ohio, could pose long-term risks. The Washington Post writes, “Three weeks after the toxic train… https://t.co/PLOhfY1ko2” / Twitter

No more lies. on Twitter: ““The sooner Americans stop falling for the fake two-party puppet show and begin pushing for real change, the sooner our world can move toward health. These people do not care about you.”” / Twitter

🕯Brian Morgan🕯 on Twitter: “You absolutely have a choice in every single election: Right or Center-Right, and in the end they honestly don’t give a fuck which one you pick as long as you’re out there tweeting stickers and shaming non-voters https://t.co/rC8iajqzgr” / Twitter

Anti-China rhetoric is off the charts: what explains the mass hysteria in the West? – Pearls and Irritations (johnmenadue.com)

Nick Brana – #PeoplesParty on Twitter: “On my way to London right now to speak at #No2NatoNo2War with anti-war heroes @georgegalloway @DerbyChrisW @ClareDalyMEP @wallacemick @Lowkey0nline @MaxBlumenthal @anyaparampil @danielmkovalik @richimedhurst and more! https://t.co/psdNZsqmk3” / Twitter

Glenn Greenwald on Twitter: “So will this be the policy going forward from now on? When a newspaper like the NYT or the WPost get an exclusive sent to them by a government source, or when CNN and NBC get told what to say by the CIA, will they immediately share it all with every other news organization?” / Twitter

Dan Kovalik on Twitter: “Looking forward to this event! Thanks @georgegalloway for spearheading this! https://t.co/vpkxWj7LVO” / Twitter

Margaret Kimberley on Twitter: “”Peace in the Crossfire of Modern Media” Webinar Saturday, 2/25, 1pm ET #Ukraine Register here: https://t.co/UI0P2TEJYq https://t.co/nkS4cQ3y94 @DrJillStein @danielmkovalik” / Twitter

Ben White on Twitter: “Israeli forces invaded Nablus today, & killed 10 Palestinians. 100+ wounded, dozens shot. Armed, unarmed, young, old – all killed by an occupying army using incredible violence in a busy city in broad daylight. 59 Palestinians shot & killed since Jan 1. https://t.co/H5hguBkVyh https://t.co/hKZejWcmcG” / Twitter

No More War (skyhorsepublishing.com)

CenterClip on Twitter: “Where is the worst censorship and disinformation? @TedRall does a 4 minute analysis in light of war in Ukraine: https://t.co/eZOpoMcsvZ” / Twitter

Rod on Twitter: “On Today’s Episode of The Backstory We Have: Guest(s) Ted Rall @TedRall -Forgotten History, Jose Vega @JosBtrigga – Confronting Our Pro War Political Class “Mediocrity is America’s New Standard of Excellence” Rumble Link👇 https://t.co/mvzoRbRjsa” / Twitter

kanekoa.substack.com on Twitter: “Did you know gay liberal activists stormed the NIH in 1990❓ They blamed Dr. Anthony Fauci for blocking cheap and effective AIDS treatments and for only promoting expensive and toxic drugs that benefited Big Pharma. Fauci did the exact same thing during Covid-19. https://t.co/WM8ZSPOAkk” / Twitter

WE LOVE NEW OLD NEW WAVE!

I’m so ginnedup about Z Raw, very cool, right up my alley, my kinda jam, exactly! It’s always so thrilling to discover a current band who is making heartfelt music I can relate to. A friend of mine in 80’s Ft. Wayne, Indiana had a birthday yesterday, so HAPPY BIRTHDAY, SOUL SISTER! I remember her playing me some demos by a local Indiana goth dude who she knew way back in the day, real low budget, D.I.Y. style and me just not being open to it because it felt like he was a celebrity for imitating Robert Smith and I was envious of his stardom, like one is, at that bitchy age, but now, when I look back, I imagine I’d probably really appreciate his stuff. I’ll try to find out his name from my dear comrade, it was kinda in the same spirit as Z RAW, which is to say, cool and dark and emotional. Z RAW is summa the best new music I’ve  heard in awhile.

Z Raw | Facebook

Dark inside (ep) | Z Raw (bandcamp.com)

“Ghosts Again” – Depeche Mode (LIVE on The Late Show) – YouTube

“Personal Jesus” – Depeche Mode (LIVE on The Late Show) – YouTube

VAGUE SCARE – Mind Monsters (Official Video) – YouTube

Vague Scare – Strangely Enough – YouTube

New Order Bizarre Love Triangle 12′ ( Best Remix ) – YouTube

OTHER COOL SHIT:

TEX PERKINS & THE FAT RUBBER BAND – LIVE – YouTube

Joey Pinter Rock and Roll (facebook.com)

Arthur Lee – Andmoreagain – live – Forever Changes Tour 2003 – YouTube

Love – You Set The Scene – YouTube

Love – Live And Let Live – YouTube

Arthur Lee with The Fuzztones – 7 and 7 is – YouTube

Arthur Lee and Love – Forever Changes Concert (Alone Again Or & A House is Not a Motel) – YouTube

Arthur Lee & Love: August – Live 1970 – YouTube

Long-awaited and definitive Spencer P Jones bio released | News (i94bar.com)

Vicious Kitten Records | Facebook

Merle Haggard I Think I’ll Just Stay Here and Drink (Great Jam Session) Austin City Limits 1984 – YouTube

Residents Of East Palestine Gathered For A Meeting. “We’re At War. We Need Help Now, Not When These Lawsuits Come…We May Not Be Here.” (substack.com)

MintPress News on Twitter: “”People these days leave propaganda on in the background like it’s elevator music” – @LeeCamp WATCH LIVE: https://t.co/KPHlq0zq98″ / Twitter

Jimmy Dore on Twitter: “We’re ruled by psychopaths.” / Twitter

The Dark History of Pfizer – by Rav Arora (substack.com)

“On Stupidity” – by Peter A. McCullough, MD, MPH™ (substack.com)

More Evidence Emerges That US Wanted Russia to Invade (consortiumnews.com)

Jimmy Dore on Twitter: “War Pig Rachel Maddow will never tell her audience the CIA instigated a Coup of Ukraine in 2014 & installed a puppet aligned with actual Nazis & then blew up the Nordstream Pipeline. Instead she lies about Peace activists so her audience stays Pro-War: https://t.co/UxAeSNIdMs” / Twitter

Ukraine 2023: Black Agenda Report Special Issue | Black Agenda Report

A Fantasy of Angelic, US Omnipotence (consortiumnews.com)

Black Politics and Ukraine | Black Agenda Report

New Studies Deliver Harsh Verdicts on Mask Mandates, Vaccine Mandates for U.S. Cities • Children’s Health Defense (childrenshealthdefense.org)

woke my ass Massachusetts Bill Would Give Prisoners Time Off Sentences For Organ Donation | CovertAction Magazine

Jimmy Dore on Twitter: “.@maddow Is a straight up psychopathic warmonger. That’s actually not hyperbole. She’s pretending that NATO & The U.S. did not intentionally provoke this war. And she focuses on some rando holding Russia flag to discredit peace rally. Of course she did.https://t.co/UxAeSNIdMs” / Twitter

Peter A. McCullough, MD, MPH™ on Twitter: “I know Dr. Littell very well. Ashamed for @SMHCS and all those in the room. Hospital boards are obligated to hear all points of view on therapies to help patients, particularly in a novel #coronavirus pandemic. #censorship kills. #courageousdiscourse @AAPSonline” / Twitter

The Vigilant Fox 🦊 on Twitter: “Bill Gates, the World’s Leading ‘Health Expert,’ Predicts “We’ll Do Better Next Time” With the Vaccines @jimmy_dore: “Here’s a guy who’s a college dropout, talking like he’s a scientist, a virologist, a specialist. He’s neither of those things. He knows about as much about it as… https://t.co/Da4pygwHPZ” / Twitter

susan abulhawa (@sjabulhawa) / Twitter

Amazon.com: Susan Abulhawa: books, biography, latest update

“Forcing cultural beliefs on countries halfway around the world while people are sleeping under every bridge in your own country is textbook imperialism.” (-Dirtbag Leftist)

SPEECH: Racism Was Central to the Invasion, Albert Barrow, 1990 | Black Agenda Report

Stef Zamorano on Twitter: “Great to know there is so much diversity in Biden’s admin and even better that women, people of color and LGBTQ folks all agree on #MoreWar #LoveMIC #PeaceIsForPussies” / Twitter

Nick Sortor on Twitter: “Wait, what?! Environmental scientists heading to Ohio just killed in a plane crash?! https://t.co/7IDWMhxAOu” / Twitter

Unsettling Events: Five People From CTEH Die In Plane Crash, En Route To Ohio To Investigate Bedford Explosion AND Man Found Murdered At Crash Site (substack.com)

WTVG 13abc on Twitter: “All five people on board were CTEH employees headed to the site of the deadly Ohio factory explosion earlier this week and the same company had representatives in East Palestine recently. https://t.co/whE1dzY3L3” / Twitter

“Before Covid “Doing your own research” just meant “READING”.

Authoritarians always try to sell ignorance as strength. Pro-Censorship Authoritarians like Sam Harris hate that you get to have the same access to information as they do & so they shame reading as “conspiracy” (-Jimmy Dore)

“Secretary of State Antony Blinken says the US does not support Ukraine attacking Crimea, a major red line for Russia.

Under Secretary of State Victoria Nuland then turns around and says the opposite. The Biden administration is a neocon hellscape that’s gonna get us all killed.” (-Danny Haiphong)

Mick Wallace on Twitter: “As I emphasised in #EuropeanParliment last month, #Israel is a lawless Terrorist State which has no respect for International Law and no respect for the Human Rights of #Palestinians – And they carry out atrocities on a daily basis because #US and #EU have no problem with it… https://t.co/0T8ril80k5” / Twitter

Unsettling Events: Five People From CTEH Die In Plane Crash, En Route To Ohio To Investigate Bedford Explosion AND Man Found Murdered At Crash Site (substack.com)

Rachel Corrie Foundation on Twitter: “In a few weeks we’ll mark the 20th anniversary of Rachel’s death. She was killed just before her 24th birthday, on April 10. There will be several events in her hometown – Olympia, WA, and we hope you join us wherever you are in carrying on her vision for Gaza and for the world https://t.co/zXmf4qetQn” / Twitter

Ben Norton on Twitter: “Malcolm X’s “internationalist perspective and practice politically and structurally integrated the struggles of Africans in the U.S. into the global anti-colonial/anti-capitalist movement”. Brilliant article by @AjamuBaraka https://t.co/zDleGhXy2R” / Twitter

Trump ADMITS U.S. Was Behind 2014 Coup In Ukraine – YouTube

Retired Army Colonel Senator Black: We Are Headed For A Hot War With Russia AND China – YouTube

Jimmy Dore on Twitter: “There’s no bottom to Trump Derangement Syndrome. These people are the monsters they claim to oppose. Joe Biden just crushed a railroad strike & is currently in charge of ignoring East Palestine while giving $500 million to a proxy war in Ukraine. They want u to #HateUrNeighbor” / Twitter

The Other Son on Twitter: “Wonder if Joy Behar knows Obama won Ohio twice?” / Twitter

David Moss on Twitter: “@KeithRuscitti They don’t care. They’d blame the residents of a “blue” state too. Anything to punch down and never ever blame anyone with any power, or the system itself.” / Twitter

Nathan J Robinson on Twitter: “Mike Pompeo’s new memoir acknowledges openly that the U.S. attempted to force regime change in Venezuela because it “violated the Monroe Doctrine” (i.e. we own Latin America), and even considered “the military option.” https://t.co/vwEVP5hV3r” / Twitter

“The Daily Mail can’t bring itself to note that Middleton was a central target of a foreign espionage investigation and pled the 5th over 20 times when he testified about it to congress, incl when he was asked if he was a foreign agent. No interest in going deeper from DM. This is probably because that scandal is sort of a successor to Iran Contra (many of the same ppl involved) and Epstein was meeting with Middleton at the WH at the same time he and Wexner took over the CIA airline from Iran Contra, Southern Air Transport. The above podcast is roughly half of the research contained in Vol 2 of One Nation Under Blackmail. Much more detail in the book and, if I ever make a Vol 3, a lot of it will be about the Epstein-Middleton relationship – that’s how significant it is. For starters – Middleton was a central figure in the 1996 campaign finance scandal, also known by some as “Chinagate”, apparently the Daily Mail is allergic to that information. This is probably because that scandal is sort of a successor to Iran Contra (many of the same ppl involved) and Epstein was meeting with Middleton at the WH at the same time he and Wexner took over the CIA airline from Iran Contra, Southern Air Transport.” (-Whitney Webb)

Whitney Webb: One Nation Under Blackmail (by Jeffrey Epstein) – YouTube

Toxic Forever Chemicals Found in More Than 330 Animal Species, by Kenny Stancil – Dandelion Salad (wordpress.com)

Radical Graffiti on Twitter: “”ACAB includes (NYC Mayor) Eric Adams” Poster seen in New York City https://t.co/PiDTDLXfJw” / Twitter

ANSWER Coalition on Twitter: “We have the power to stop the war machine from stealing our right to peace and a livable future. Say NO to endless U.S. wars! March with us⤵️ 📝Sat March 18, 1pm 📍Washington, D.C., the White House https://t.co/PZJCAnbt6F” / Twitter

Communist Party USA on Twitter: “On this day in 1868, the father of the movement for black liberation, W. E. B Du Bois was born. Du Bois was a prominent civil rights activist, historian, and a proud member of the CPUSA. (1/6) https://t.co/pF1dIFTD86” / Twitter

Richard on Twitter: “”In the CIA we didn’t give a hoot about democracy. If a country didn’t co-operate with us, democracy didn’t mean a thing, and I don’t think it means a thing today” (ex-CIA Philip Agee) https://t.co/WvmmmattDv” / Twitter

BurningMama420🌿 on Twitter: “I just want to punch him in his rat face” / Twitter

In Context on Twitter: “Ray McGovern, former CIA analyst and peace activist, addresses the UN Security Council on the sabotage of the Nord Stream pipelines. “Has the New York Times mentioned Seymour Hersh’s article? Or has it even reported the denials? No, not yet.” https://t.co/mq2yljZvBx” / Twitter

ANSWER Coalition on Twitter: “Dozens of anti-war, anti-racist, and other progressive organizations have now signed on to support our national protest! March alongside us to demand peace in Ukraine! 📝Saturday March 18, 1pm 📍Washington, D.C., the White House See our updated list of endorsers below⤵️ https://t.co/PgYmv5JUnw” / Twitter

NEWS, SPORTS & WEATHER DESK:

US Power Alliance Says It’s Coordinating An “Information War” Against China (substack.com)

Caitlin Johnstone on Twitter: “This is the Democratic Party’s true face. This is them telling you who they are.” / Twitter

🔥✊🏽fluxus✊🏽🔥 on Twitter: “Classic example of why we despise liberals and Democrats sooooo much!!!” / Twitter

Residents Of East Palestine Gathered For A Meeting. “We’re At War. We Need Help Now, Not When These Lawsuits Come…We May Not Be Here.” (substack.com)

In Context on Twitter: “Need more reasons to defund the police? How about 1.1 billion? That’s how many US dollars New York paid out over alleged police misconduct and civil rights violations since 2015 says @RichardSudan #ReparationsNow #refundcommunities #PoliceBrutality #BlackHistoryMonth https://t.co/P0T8nXw06R” / Twitter

Dollar Store “Mania” Hits Small Kentucky Town | ZeroHedge

George Stroumboulopoulos 🐺 on Twitter: “Last night, Dr. Gabor Mate and I had a compelling conversation on Instagram Live, getting into the important topics he covers in his new book ‘The Myth of Normal’. In this clip from, we delved into the complex interconnection between masculinity, toxicity, and the economy. https://t.co/9W3od28SIg” / Twitter

5G Towers Can Make Healthy People Sick, Two Case Reports Show • Children’s Health Defense (childrenshealthdefense.org)

Steven Donziger on Twitter: “On day one of my private @Chevron prosecution, two extraordinary women showed up in support. One is an actor-activist; the other now plans to be President of the United States. Our system is broken. A leader like @marwilliamson will help us dismantle corporate corruption.👊👏❤️ https://t.co/NTg4TYukeR” / Twitter

Yellen Says US Will Send $10 Billion in Economic Aid to Ukraine – Activist Post

Michael Tracey on Twitter: “Leaving aside the substantive question of whether the war was “unprovoked” or not, it’s enormously creepy that they’re all using the exact same word as though it was programmed directly into their brains https://t.co/64RqFaQSiw” / Twitter

Canada Criminalizes Dissent – Activist Post

After The Fugue – Caitlin Johnstone

Supreme Court Hearings on Section 230 Point to Broader Showdown Over Future of Online Speech • Children’s Health Defense (childrenshealthdefense.org)

WORLD WE LIVE IN

Max Blumenthal on Twitter: “Israeli apartheid forces invaded the occupied city of Nablus, assassinating several Palestinian resistance fighters, while the army fired indiscriminately at residents and killed an additional 8 Palestinians https://t.co/qa7RFgxd1e” / Twitter

Max Blumenthal on Twitter: “We’re live” / Twitter

Max Blumenthal on Twitter: “US corporate media: book burning is a “powerful symbol”” / Twitter

Max Blumenthal on Twitter: “There’s that Sonnenrad on the Ukraine state-backed Azov Regiment’s uniforms which Brenton Tarrant emblazoned on his rucksack. The ADL recently cleared the former’s reputation for some reason.” / Twitter

Glenn Greenwald on Twitter: “There are now countries with laws banning and punishing “fake news”: Saudi Arabia, UAE, Egypt, Qatar (where those guilty of “fake news” can be jailed for 5 years). The results are exactly what you’d expect: dissent is deemed “false” or dangerous. Turkey: https://t.co/zvkCkAlH0s” / Twitter

Glenn Greenwald on Twitter: “The Omidyar-funded #NeverTrump neocon site headed by liberal icon Bill Kristol attacks Gov. DeSantis for his failure to pledge eternal loyalty to Joe Biden’s policies of fueling proxy war in Ukraine. Neocons and Dems are 100% fully aligned on everything. https://t.co/GNPZnoRcYs” / Twitter

Glenn Greenwald on Twitter: “But, alas, this is the world we live in. Bernie, AOC and the Squad mindlessly march behind Biden’s policy of endless proxy war. To hear skepticism on the war, one needs to listen to non-Europe nations, the international left, and Trump/DeSantis/.🤷‍♂️ https://t.co/rnRnw8dQE5” / Twitter

Glenn Greenwald on Twitter: “All sorts of subsequent forensic analyses conducted by experts concluded that there was no evidence of fraud in Morales’ victory. Do you think the US media and political figures who supported the coup based on this call themselves “election deniers” and “pushers of the Big Lie”? https://t.co/wMy2mEF7SL” / Twitter

Glenn Greenwald on Twitter: “What is deemed Absolute Truth in one moment (WHO, March 2020: don’t wear masks for COVID!) becomes falsity the next (WHO, April: Everyone wear masks!). In 2018, fact-checkers affirmed the truth that Lula was a “thief.” In 2022, courts barred election material that asserted this. https://t.co/XlIoTNtYhc” / Twitter

Dildo Gaggins on Twitter: “Hey look, the administrator of the EPA during 9/11, who told New Yorkers that the asbestos filled air was safe to breathe, is now the co-chair of Andrew Yang’s Forward Party. https://t.co/89pNw10mkZ” / Twitter

YOU GOT GOOD TASTE!

Buttigieg Press Secretary MELTS-DOWN Over Palestine Questions – YouTube

The Saints (’73 – ’78) – (I’m) Stranded – YouTube

London Quireboys – 7 oclock – HD – YouTube

“I Won’t Investigate Nord Stream Attack” – Dem Leader Hakeem Jeffries – YouTube

Why Embracing Anti-Colonialism Made Malcolm a Marked Man | Black Agenda Report

Tucker Carlson Given Unreleased Jan 6 Footage-Democrats FREAK OUT! – YouTube

10 Ways the War in Ukraine Threatens Our Environment – Dandelion Salad (wordpress.com)

Protest March 18-19: Peace in Ukraine – Say NO to Endless U.S. Wars – ANSWER Coalition

ALL MY BROTHERS & SISTERS & FRIENDS OF THE REVOLUTION,  STAY WILD! STAY FREE!

Alex Sindrome “Fantome”

New album by French artist ALEX SINDROME (aka SINDROME) and this one is released on CD and on cassette tape (with great artwork!) “Solidaire Dans L’Isolement” brings the best of 80s French new wave to mind and sounds very appropriate in those lock down times! “Class 1987” (probably my favourite track) will probably make you remember your carefree teenage years if you can understand French and “Nos Ames En Noir” is a dark and catchy dancefloor tune. The minimal influences that could be heard in SINDROME‘s previous releases can be found in “Mélancolie”, “Vampire”, the nihilistic “Sans Issue” or in “Norma Jean” (although you’ll hear a quite powerful and haunting chorus in this one) while you’ll hear some slight disco touches in “Halloween à Neverland.” I was glad hear a bit of SIGUE SIGUE SPUTNIK in “Antonin Artaud” since I know that our man is a big fan too but you’ll also hear some Peter Hook influenced melodies in the last part of the song. You’ll also get some German industrial influences in “Dès Ce Soir” and some darkwave in “Misanthrope” before ending on an electro dance note with “Aux Fantômes.” “Fantome” is a good album to discover ALEX SINDROME‘s music if you haven’t yet and quarantine should be a good time to find out about new bands and artists, so… /Laurent C.

https://www.alexsindrome.com/
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New Jarama RPM Recs releases: Honeychain and Autogramm

HONEYCHAIN is a power trio from Los Angeles that bring us 2 songs on transparent yellow vinyl on Spanish record label Jarama 45RPM Recs . “Go Away” is mix of 90s alternative rock with modern girl powerpop and “Through Your Purse” sounds more like punk rock with a college rock touch. You’ll get lots of energy and good melodies on this 7″. A good one for the summer!

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AUTOGRAMM also delivers two songs on Jarama 45RPM Recs. This power trio hails from Vancouver, Canada and plays synth driven punk rock reminding of The CARS or DEVO. “Bad Day” is quite catchy and “Quiero Estar Sedado” sounds like The RAMONES playing with synth. Quite fun!

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https://jarama45rpmrecs.bandcamp.com/

Kevin K “and The CBGB Years”

The CBGB was KEVIN K‘s own rock’n’roll highschool, a classroom in which students would carefully study the RAMONES, the DEAD BOYS and the NEW YORK DOLLS. This is an 18 song live retrospective CD of Kevin (and his brother Alan) K’s years in New York City’s rock’n’roll temple, from 1984 to 1997. It starts with NEW TOYS and their catchy new wave, then you can hear 7 LONE COWBOYS songs recorded in 1985, including beautifully chaotic covers of RICHARD HELL & THE VOIDODS (“Love Comes In Spurts”) and ALICE COOPER (“Raped and Freezin”‘.) Honestly, I’ve always wondered why LONE COWBOYS didn’t make it in those days… While their music was the logical road to take after NEW TOYS, they had this dark and urban feel that people refer to as post-punk nowadays, making them the right band at the right moment. Well, you’d think so… Maybe England and France would have welcomed them better in those days? The same way they did with The LORDS OF THE NEW CHURCH for instance, who knows?…
You’ll also find 3 ROAD VULTURES songs on this CD (recorded in 1993), and 4 KEVIN K BAND songs recorded in 1997. It’s interesting to hear Kevin’s musical evolution through these 18 songs, from American new wave to JOHNNY THUNDERS inspired rock’n’roll. It all seems natural and logical after you’ve listened to this live album.
Besides the document value of this record, it’s good to hear real live recordings, you can almost feel the beer, the smoke and the pee Kevin talks about in the introductoiry text. /Laurent C.

Kevin K CD Baby store
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Godfathers “A Big Bad Beautiful Noise”

(-maximum bottle review by General Labor)

…Aw, man, it’s apparently, all been forgotten and photo-shopped, whitewashed and revised, now, to fit-in to various updated narratives of convenience, but in the actual push and struggle eighties of my wild, wild youth, our gang was an unlikely alliance of thrash metal dudes in army camo and Slayer shirts from abusive homes; a sweat-shorts wearing, redheaded, Red Hot Chili Peppers, white dude who liked Prince-he heroically intervened on my behalf, while five or six rednecks were beating me to a pulp, in front of the local teen night at the MTV era disco-he and I were like Robin Hood and Little John, for several years after that, and I rallied him to take up bass and join the band; exactly two mohawked hardcores-until one met a chick, went straight, and delved into real estate, or some shit, he vanished promptly after graduation; the other one was a deeply anti-social, talented painter, about ten years older-who lived in a rodent infested basement and made stained glass, we bonded over our common love of Alice Cooper and Johnny Thunders and I gradually lured him in to my longhaired rock-punk band, if only for a year or two; there were only three, or maybe four, death rock chicks, who this whole army of oddballs were all competing for; a Dead Or Alive “want surprises” gay disco kid who owned some cheap drum machines; A Cure bed-headed goth DJ from a nearby town; a mean hearted garage record collector kingpin from a different nearby town; a cologne wearing Duran Duran dude transitioning into INXS, who worked at the record store, in the mall; a bruiser motorcycle riding white trash hellion who had absurdly painted the Mountain Dew logo on the front of his guitar, who initially, served faithfully, as our bodyguard and roadie, he kept burning apartments down by cooking while drunk, and eventually, he became my primary riff-meister; five or six very progressive and open minded, oldschool hip-hop, O.G. rapper/DJ/breakdancer/beatboxing B-Boys from downtown; an aging Blue Cheer stoner who ran a hippie record shop in another nearby town; an extravagantly gorgeous and sensitive and generous and encouraging Smiths fan who broke my stupid heart, and her cousin-a marching band Billy Batson who was somehow (ahem) struck by punknroll lightning and miraculously transformed into a muscle car driving, “Oi Oi” shouting, skinhead Captain Marvel; a white mulleted, Randy Rhoads metal god who we lost to the military when he turned 18; his replacement-another skateboarding, nimble fingered guitar prodigy with a boyish Eddie Van Halen smile who all the girls loved, who also got drafted into my group; some other kind of stunted and awkward guys with real emotional problems we were kinda trying to protect and look out for-peripheral energy suckers, who ended up causing us trouble and creating divisions, later on; and me, in the glasses, whatever I was. Not much of a Scene. Some of my Catholic School “Animal House” beer drinking fratboys-in-training, and the rural town, hick mechanic, pizza delivery drivers, who worked with some of us, at fucking Little Ceasers, where that awful woman, Michelle, always made me change the urinal cakes, as soon as she saw me, in my much loathed hairnet and polyester.

Not much was happening, at all. That’s why I was desperately encouraging all my friends to take up instruments and create a communal space where we could freak, freely. There was nowhere to go, without being hassled by Journey fans in Trans-Ams. I was hated by most of my classmates and considered a disruption at my suburban football highschool. I had spiky, dyed black hair and wore two earrings, sometimes, a little eyeliner, which was, unbelievably, still a big deal, back then. The history teachers were also wrestling coaches, and I knew the bullshit they were shoveling into my peer-group’s heads was all capitalist nonsense about the value of competition and squashing the little guy, and transparently racist, winning is everything, “greed is good”, bullshit propaganda. I consistently challenged their outright falsehoods, and flag-worshipping, golf-shirted, macho-talk, in class, and was therefore, sometimes, well, okay, pretty frequently, made an example of, when I was abruptly jerked from my chair, and manhandled into the classroom closet, or dragged to the principal’s office for a paddling, which they still did, back then. These whistle-wearing, oafish, muscleheads actually encouraged the dumb jock rich kids to knock me down stairwells and elbow me in the face, that kind of stuff happened all the time. Not once, or twenty times, but regularly, for years, hundreds of often unprovoked altercations, seemingly, all because I had a big mouth, and would not wear Izod golf shirts. I’m still kind of pissed-off about all of it.

That awful morning dread, waiting for the school bus filled with hostile preppies, who all totally despised my makeup wearing guts-the bloody noses, repeated pummeling’s, being thrown into a lake, the routine daily humiliations, and the sick, sick adults and administrators who enabled and thoroughly validated the relentless boot-camp torture those suburban country-club rich kids constantly subjected me to. Imagine: “Ducky” from “Pretty In Pink”, but less cute and clever, and nowhere near as smoothly put-together. All I had was a library card that would allow me to escape into books about Houdini, or the Beatles, and Jim Morrison, and music. Sunday, our intimate ritual was to gather together in small groups of freaks and geeks, or just talk, on old-timey rotary land-lines while watching “120 Minutes” in our own little Smashed Hits and N.M.E. magazine pin-up wallpapered boxes. That show transported us culturally deprived, pained little punks and anti-authoritarian weirdos to far more glamorous and exciting, sensual, colorful, free and tolerant realms inhabited by liberating super heroes from misfit galaxies, older rebels, like Iggy and Bowie, who were succeeding in spite of their eccentricities, and that gave us so much courage and inspiration, in spite of all the abuse, and amputations. We could watch Robert Smith and Morrissey and Billy Idol and Dave Gahan and Martin Gore, with awe. They were magic, to me, to us, I know I was not alone, back then. The spirit of wonder and rebellion was still in the hearts and trousers and leather jackets and Epiphones of my former contemporaries…wild possibility was in the air, we saw crazy possibilities, all because of offbeat stars like Cyndi Lauper, Prince, and Richard Butler. Music had not yet been fully weaponized by the Henry Kissinger NWO powers that be. Real, original, outsider voices could still be heard. The Ramones, Bauhaus, Gene Loves Jezebel, Dead Kennedys, Lords Of The New Church. We sponged up all that stuff, from Rick James to Mojo Nixon. From Sisters Of Mercy to Dramarama. U2 had not even started sucking the devil’s dick, yet! I guess you could say, that my own Personal Pistols, were the Godfathers. As an angst-ridden, achingly frustrated and profoundly alienated, bubblegum breathed sixteen year old, with too much hairspray and clownish Bozo makeup, they had the punch and crunch and venom and vigor the wimpier synth-bands all lacked. I can actually HEAR that white-hot fucking solo from “Birth, School, Work, Death”, as I type this. “I’ve been high and I’ve been low and I don’t know where to go” said it ALL, to me. They wore suits, but they were not hypocrite juvenile court judges, or golf-playing school administrators. Peter Coyne, man, he got me. He got it, he understood. This was a role model I could believe in. The Godfathers expressed all the genuine rage and angst I was enduring. Fast forward…25, wait, is it thirty, oddball years or so, and all the same shit sucks even worse, NOW, than it did, in the bad old days. At least in the bad old days, I had my friends in black leather who claimed they felt the same way as me, about the injustice of the world, and we still had all that high-quality, authentic, imaginative, emotion packed GOOD MUSIC to listen to and be revitalized by, it fuelled us, gave us some bottle, gave us some hope, set a good example, “makes you wanna feel, makes ya wanna try, makes you wanna blow the stars from the sky”, as one mop-topped guitar band we loved sang, back then. Ya know?


The intro track of the brand new Godfathers platter is a fully charged, powerhouse spray of inspiring fireworks, reminding me of doing L.S.D. while listening to Love & Rockets, as a misunderstood runaway teen in the middle of a creative awakening-it’s got fuzzy vocals phoned down from the friendly neighborhood spider webs of Mars, blisteringly psychedelic black light poster guitars and smart, simple, streetwise lyrics from a determinedly proud, working class hero perspective. This is what know-nothing sucker NYU grads who write for “Spin” and “Rolling Stone” always pretend that this weeks Oasis spin-off bands are doing, but the Godfathers were the real godfathers of Brit-Pop. These pint-guzzling, graying, hard lads still effortlessly outrock all the smirking copycat Hot-Topic Americans with the white belts and show-biz uncles. The Godfathers bring generations of music history and poetic authority to their regal songs that have one Cuban Beatle boot in the grand Sixties pop tradition and a vomit stained brothel creeper in the post-punk era, with the Steve Jones aggressions and chiming, new wave romantic, noir film sound tracking, of their diverse and impactful song mastery. “Til My Heart Stops Beating” is a thing or majestic beauty like old Echo & The Bunnymen, or Leonard Cohen. Quite dashing and very soulful and uplifting. If radio people weren’t all so drunk on their own stench, those bragging, bought-off paychecks and rule obeying robots, this tune would be on Nirvana rotation, and we’d all be turning it up, as we tooled around in our ruined cars, driving aimlessly around the reservoir and the old Dairy Queen on a sunny spring day.

It’s such a life-affirming, courageously righteous hit song. It reminds me of my own foolish devotion to loved ones, lost loved ones, spontaneity, sunglasses, cruising around the town in ancient blue Oldsmobiles, and the indomitable power of genuine rocknroll. This Peter Coyne fellow abides and abides in his own truth and never sweats the bullshit and lies, like some of us weaker spirits. Trends and gadgets, products, and garbage come and go, and Peter is still standing strong. The hard won voice of bloody knuckled experience, still surprisingly vital and alive in middle age. I have said that Alex Mitchell from Circus Of Power is the only artist I can think of besides Morrissey who rocks significantly harder in his fifties, than he did in his twenties. I have to amend that, now, to also include the powerhouse modern-day Godfathers crew. Peter still has a pop heart, just like I do, but loves the slashing, thrashing adrenaline of the raunchy rocknroll dizzied pogo-pit. “You Don’t Love Me” is upbeat Smithereens, or Deadbeat Poets-style pop-genius that is as likely to appeal to fans of Paul Revere & The Raiders, or Badfinger, or Psychedelic Furs, or Birdland, or Manic Street Preachers-it is timeless, radio-ready, and custom made for accompanying sulking sad sack nostalgia yearnings, or boys are back in town, back porch beer guzzling. People of all ages can appreciate the Godfathers, because they ain’t fakin’ it, like so many others, like nearly all the rest. They still have The Power. I always wonder to myself is my long missing first loves and dwindling pack of former Adam & The Ant and the Alarm enthusiasts are still somewhere listening to any of the same songs I am, and then, I stalk summa them on social-media and see them talking about sports and acquisitions and quoting rightwing radio bigots, and buddying up to our hometown bullies. It kind of makes me question if I ever knew them at all. I know I am the same old reliable, last of the last of the last of the last, in the bulletbelt and mascara, still clinging to the old ideals and the old copy machine, D.I.Y. cassette and vinyl culture, pre cell-phones, pre Starbucks. Nothing’s changed, ultimately. No such thing as was. I’m still perceived as a bad influence and as a disruption and I still refuse to wear those Izod golf shirts.

“If you USED to be punk….!” Peter Coyne is still punk to the core-from his first cigarette, to his last dyin’ day, he is a bona fide rocknroll hero, like John Lennon or Johnny Rotten. He don’t fuck around with the partisan political dog and pony show, unreality tv stuff, he stands firmly with The People, all the time, every time, no questions asked. He’s a real king of the mountain Jetboy, through and through. I respect that so much. I guess that is why I am writing this. I want you to listen to his music, not only because I think you will find it entertaining, it has a good beat and you can dance to it, but because I am hoping it will catch a spark inside you and remind you of who you once said you were, and make you want to live up to that. At least, that is the effect it has on me. It makes me almost kind of want to care, again. Love is the answer and Peter Coyne knows that for sure. The pigs could not break him, the industry could not bend him, no one could kill his fire. Here he is, still writing sensational, surefire tunes about love and hate to accelerate my adolescent summer hijinks and escapades and I am fucking 47. “Poor Boy’s Son” is a proletariat protest song about the rigors of low wage drudgery and the pointless futility of being shamelessly exploited until you are sucked dry to enrich some selfish fat cat bastard who does not give a fuck whether you live or die. When your knees and lower back are ruined from warehouse labor, big-box merchandising, dish-dogging, or house painting, all the office-casual khaki wearers who never laid carpet, or carried shingles up ladders in the hot sun even one single day in their lives, will all still have the audacity to call you lazy, because you suck at math, or maybe weren’t as book-smart, or as good at taking tests, as they were. What a sham. Peter’s been on massive stages and on TV for decades, but he never abandoned his working class roots. He and his tight band-Tim James, Darren Birch, Steve Crittal, and Mauro Venegas, are still WORKERS. They are ALWAYS working. “One Good Reason” is the tune I would open up my radio-show with, tonight, if anybody would let a dangerous Dr. Johnny Fever malcontent like me, anywhere near a microphone. It’s melodic like Cheap Trick, but has a gritty Izzy Stradlin or Tom Petty, highway drivin’ through the cornfields ambience to it. Steve Crittall, Paul Robert Gray, and THE GODFATHERS did a fantastic job producing this record, because every song has an atmosphere all it’s own, but they all hang together perfectly as a collection. This is the right way to make records. “Miss America” is a dynamite social-commentary about the deadly daughters of blood-horny pervert, Uncle Sam, and all his tiny tyrant, figureheads, bribe-taking lawmakers, and petty enforcers with their small hands, long nightsticks, gigantic 4X4 white trucks and big bombs. All those rabid, soulless, blonde-haired millionaire harpies hired to spew Honky Death SpellTM propaganda for Fox “news”. He acknowledges the twisted, hypnotic, car-wreck allure of all those twerking, texting, gossiping, celebrity feuding, Botoxed coke whores of unreality tv we decline and fall Murkkans can’t take our screen-sore, tired eyes, off of. It’s kind of like a Stiv Bators song. Good stuff. Again, with the glorious guitar playing! Whoever that is playing the dreamy coda at the end of that tune, my compliments to you.

“Defibrillator” is a bit like hearing the Jesus & Mary Chain covering “White Light/White Heat”…it’s just remarkably excellent. If you like rocknroll music that has bruised but unbeaten soul, you gotta get this album, “A Big Bad Beautiful Noise”, it is, hands down, my album of the year! It is such a spectacular achievement when a die hard rocknroll hearted geezer like the esteemed and venerable Mister Coyne is able to successfully assemble a fully devoted, crackerjack team of worthy soldiers willing to be merry, for tonight we ride, and tomorrow is a good day to die, who fearlessly storm the barricades, unintimidated by vats of hot boiling oil, being spilt from above. They flawlessly segue from delicate, butterfly winged pop tunes like the La’s, to pounding, tough as nails, Stooges hardcore bluespunk. They make it look so easy, too. A couple of you know, that when I was seventeen and eighteen, I used to publish a dodgy fanzine in my own handwritten scrawl because I couldn’t type, full of collages of photos cadged from Penthouse and Kerrang! and Creem and Hit-Parader, and I frequently wrote about punk and glitter gangs like the Godfathers and Birmingham’s glorious polka dot shots, Gunfire Dance. So it was not much of a surprise to see my old compadre and pen-pal Darren Birch join forces with Coyne & cohorts. He had already played alongside Brian James, and I have long seen him as the son of Tregunna or Yaffa, so it was a natural fit. I am proud he never quit, he’s still at it, playing thundering, emotional rocknroll, even with the aches and pains of no longer being 21. I loved their old bands-Sid Presley Experience, Gunfire Dance, Black Bombers, all prior Godfathers lineups, but in my opinion, right now, they are IN THEIR PRIME. Honestly, these tough as leather old dudes are a ferocious force to be reckoned with. If I had a band, and they asked me to open up for them, I would have to say no. I may be poor, but I am not dumb. The Godfathers remain the flaming embodiment of still surviving, street fightin’ integrity and songwriting greatness from the authentic hard knocks ragged school of rocknroll coolness. A glutton for punishment, I do admittedly still dream about corralling some hoodlums of my own and putting together a discreet punk band, ya know, a humble, basement version of all my old heroes, to more properly document all the songs I’ve written over the years, even though everyone in this dumb world keeps screaming at me that, it’s too late. The Godfathers are a rock group that will always give you hope, and that will never let you down. They keep on showing us what is possible. THEY ARE DOING IT. Why can’t we do our own amateur hour version? We might as well, we’re gonna die, either way, why not die with our winklepickers on, like glam outlaws?

“She’s Mine” showcases Peter’s Ian McCulloch like croon, it’s like a lazy Sunday-ish deep track from some long lost Doors record, minus the carousel keyboards. It’s a beautiful, tender, summer of love song. Makes me wonder why so few can tap in to that divine, soulful, childish purity, anymore. ‘Makes you wanna take your sweetheart to the woods to look for deer and throw pebbles in the shimmering creek, and wear dandelion necklaces and drink cold Thunderbird from the bottle. “She’s mine ’til we’re both outta time”….I guess the thing I love best about The Godfathers, besides their enormous catalog of intensely listenable songs, is how Peter Coyne just IS. He don’t give a flying fuck about what the critics and posers and liars and heiresses and politicians and puppet show/showbiz kids say. He does not change who he is according to seasons, commercials, opinions, hoaxes, what the in-laws or the neighbors say, he is blissfully oblivious to big-media, and it’s empty promises, and multi-platform marketing campaigns. Like Jimi Hendrix, he just shrugs, “it ain’t me”. I don’t know how he acquired that iron man constitution and unshakeable conviction, but he knows who he is, who he loves, what he stands for, and he never strays from that. That is The Cool. He stands with the outcasts and underdogs, the downtrodden, and the dispossessed. He has guts, stamina, sincerity, a nonstop work ethic, and amazingly…a band of really talented, empathetic, like minded, virtuosos who tour relentlessly and somehow manage to look like immaculately dapper dandies under all the harsh lights amidst the slam dancing pits of sweaty, enthusiastic, beer spilling punters who still flock to their shows for cathartic and synergetic displays of primal, “Feedbackin'”. “Let’s Get Higher” is a life-long dropout’s brass-knuckled battle-cry, the kind of thing that Primal Scream would write, if they were only a bit more cerebral. Peter Coyne has a streak of sixties Sly Stone shaman, in him, he’s a gutter punk in a sharp suit, who never obeys orders or follows bandwagons, but he remains here….for you and me, too. “You & Me Against The World” is the name of the acid drenched, gospel tinged, album closer to a record you never want to end. It’s a real sapphire-another absolutely stunning masterpiece, reminiscent of Pink Floyd or Arthur Lee’s Love, it’s a dreamy, heartfelt tune that will steal your dirty hearts away. This is the sort of magical, quicksilver pageantry one can conjure if they ain’t afraid to die, have planets of soul power, and an ace band of dedicated rockers. I always loved the Godfathers, but this, their current, phoenix from the flames incarnation is undeniably as bold as love. When Peter Coyne sings, “it’s you and me against the world”, I understood he means his wife, and band, or brother, or others, but I also knew, immediately, he was talking to me. To Us. I & I. The rocknroll people. VIVE LE GODFATHERS. “A Big Bad Beautiful Noise” is an unparalleled monument to ageless and soulful, mean it, maaaan, rocknroll motherfuckery. Life is fleeting. Have no fear. Do your thing, now. Do it with mercy and grace. BE like the Godfathers.

http://www.godfathers.uk.com/bio
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Sindrome “Alarmiste”

12 new songs from French darkwave solo artist SINDROME. “Pavillon Noir” sets the mood of this new album right from the start, 80s synth in different shades of black, from robotic dancefloor tunes (“Detox”, “Discocaïne”) to apocalyptic industrial ones (“Errance”, “Sens Le Pire”, “1R2DSFAC.”) SINDROME displays his love for the holy 80s without sounding purely retro-nostalgic, and still manages to surprise us with his visual and musical references (MICHAEL JACKSON, MICHEL POLNAREFF, ALBATOR, RATT…), you’ll even find a tribute to PRINCE in “Minneapolis.”
If you had to compare these new songs with his previous works, we can say that you’ll find more vocal melodies on this record (“Kaléidoscope Noir” and its strong French new wave touch,”Une Dernière Fois”, “Mode Alarme”, or “Démons”), which can only be a good thing since pop melodies can unfortunately rarely be found in the new synthwave scene. As on the previous album, you’ll find cool hard rock guitars by SINDROME‘s longtime friend and FROZEN DEAD KITTENS guitarist Greg Bergen (“Astéroïdes”), so don’t be afraid of the dark.. /Laurent C.

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Club Wow “Nowhere Fast”

(-review by Anguish Young)

“Somewhere down the line, it will all be found…” (-Lazy Cowgirls)
“Let’s get the band back together…” (-Andy Shernoff)
“Those twangy voices stole my choices all away from me…” (-Paul K.)

“If you’ve been trying for years, you already know this song…” (-The Clash)

BLACK CELEBRATION….

Like 32 or 34 years ago, I met this girl over the phone through a friend of a friend, one summer, when all my real homeboys were out of state visiting non-custodial parents, and she was a real marvel-a brilliant, funny, gorgeous, happy/sad person who who was into the Psychedelic Furs and David Bowie. She was a smart, arty chick with deeply woeful blue eyes and a beguiling, million dollar smile who introduced me to The Smiths, Lloyd Cole and The Commotions, Tears For Fears, Depeche Mode. She became my “Pretty In Pink” new wave crush that lasted years on end. I wrote a bunch of songs for her, hundreds and hundreds. In my outdoor unheated attic above a neighbor kid’s garage hide-out, and in my older guitarist’s mouse infested basement rat’s nest apartment with the loudly clanging and hissing, turn of the century pipes providing us with Throbbing Gristle style percussion. Lots more in a Cambridge, Ma sub-basement and in an abandoned pool hall. Many were lost to time, some might still exist on cassettes in mouse infested storage spaces, or in notebooks in milk crates in old friends’ garages. Probably all lost. I sang for over a dozen nowhere bands, all inspired by the groups we loved as wayward teenagers. ‘Been putting out “musicians wanted” fliers for the first time, in well over a decade . If you know that Ian Hunter song, “Irene Wilde”, she was my own personal Irene Wilde. Haunted when the minutes drag, haunted by the ghost of her precious love, the ghost in you, she don’t fade. If you know me, you know I left a part of me back there in the eighties, ya know, when the Pretenders and Divinyls and The Cult and Dream Academy were considered the “new music”.
Anyways…Nobody bothered archiving any of our many bands’ own original post-punk rocknroll music much, beyond some sucky covers recorded on tiny tape recorders in somebody’s mom’s living room, and maybe a video taped show or two when we were still stuck in stage fright stunted impersonations of our musical heroes, mainly because my hard rock gang of leather punks rarely coughed up the cash needed to rent yuppie ass recording studios, and were always reviled violently by trust funded trendy bandwagon music scenesters. Damn shame, too , ’cause summa those songs were rather ripping. Most got shitheaped in midnight moves when I could not pay landlords, or when grunge-era girlfriends threw me out. It’s tough losing your songs and personal affects, artifacts, personal scrapbooks of dead friends and family members all because you lost some collegetown popularity contest when “alternative” got trendy. Everybody remembers the Metallica covers band turned Knack nerds in thriftstore suits, the fat cocaine fratboys doing the Barry White karaoke, and the fat rich kids who knocked off the cool underground band few college dweebs were hip to, and the college boy hot rod “Happy Days” spaz-birds jumping up and down, but all those years I squandered in futile negotiations with local monopolies and namebrand associates only ever ended up with other people getting to record covers of our juvenile demos and a handful of college town copycat bands affiliated with my ex bandmates, it was all a big failure, and tragic waste of time. Gutted.
Some of the old pals are still alive but totally unrecognizable as people, after years of military service or upward mobility. Others, are still rocking in the no longer so free world and have all my love and admiration-I see their stuff online sometimes and always feel happy for them. Less happy for me. Sometimes, we just don’t win, we just don’t make it. It’s tough. Losing with dignity. Summa my old cohorts swear by “Appetite For Destruction”, but really, aside from those first Pretenders records, my fave eighties disc was probably “Disconnected” by Stiv Bators, and all his Bomp! singles…ya know? “I stand accused of lovin’ you, babe…”

THERE’S A FIRE….

ClubWow“Nowhere Fast” by Club Wow is the crisp, instantly likeable sound of true power pop perfection. It’s inconceivable to me that this excellent eighties-rock group failed to make it big, while so many lesser shoes and haircut bands became Smash Hit celebrities with synthesizers and mimes. Club Wow had it all-chiming pop hooks galore, excellent cupcake sweet singing, gleaming guitar lines and glistening banks of teen friendly keyboards, smart lyrics about delinquent angst, and a line-up of underground music all-stars from the Dead Boys and Testors, Stiv Bators band and Waldos. If you like Blondie, The Romantics, The Plimsouls, The Shoes, Paul Revere & the Raiders-that kinda thing, Club Wow‘s hot new retrospective collection on Zero Hour records is an urgently essential addition to your most cherished stack of cd’s. Raspberries, Cheap Trick, and even Badfinger fans will rejoice when they get their gnarly old hands on this super shiny disc, as it’s a kickass artifact that transports us back to another time when we still knew common people who had two car garages and wood paneled basements with old pool tables and Kristy McNichol and Olivia Newton john pinups from “Dynamite” magazine on the walls and they still let my greasy kid bands with the Steve Stevens hair hangout, listening top Rick Springfield and Billy Idol and plotting out our futures as famous rebel stars. The guitars on Club Wow are out of this world amazing, the drums, the vocals-these fuckers really studied their “Revolver” and “Rubber Soul”, as kids, and had learned how to compose really nearly flawless pop tunes. It’s just so, so good. It’s as groovy as the Records and I almost never say that. If you loved The Las, or Hello Disaster, or The Beat or 20/20, this is right up your record store alley. My friend, the heavy metal drummer who loves Oasis will totally geek out over sthis stuff. It was the early eighties and Frank Secich was managing a chain record store and juggling that with producing and managing a group called The Infidels, with making this extraordinarily marvelous post-punk group, who were steeped in sixties garage and British Invasion pop craftsmanship. Bratty soul music with hints of bright, skinny tie new wave. Most times after reviewing somebody’s record, I pass it on to one of my kids-ya know, if you can’t afford to buy them cars and send ’em off to college, you teach them what you do know-which is just rocknroll, for some of us, but it will be hard to part with this disc, if I ever do decide to share it with one of them. “It’s A Lie” is a sweetly McCartneyesque masterpiece famously covered by Hanoi Rocks frontman, Mike Monroe, on his first solo album. It’s so beautiful, here-easily as good as Mike’s version. Exquisite popnroll treasures from one of the ultimate coulda, shoulda, woulda bands. I love Hollywood hair-popsters, Candy, but had Club Wow been the mop tops to open up for Rick Springfield on that big tour, you can easily picture so many of these songs being turned into overwrought Cyndi Lauper style videos with over-acting drama and colorful threads, and having a smash-hit appeal to my generation of stripey shirted hair product abusers. “Norman Green” is gonna stay in your head all night long, while you are scraping plates, and taking cake orders, and mopping the kitchen floor at your too old for this shit dead end job. Ya always wondered what happened to those guys from Stiv Bators‘ gang, and here they are-a rare compilation of non stop fun. “Reptile House” is remiscent of The Church‘s early sounds, or vintage Flesh For Lulu, or New Zealand’s Nights Of The Iguana. It has that spooky, sultry, gothic tinged menace that served their brother, Stiv Bators, so well in The Wanderers and Lords Of The New Church. I’ll be listening to this L.P. a lot, from now on. How thrilling is it that Frank Secich and Jimmy Zero’s long lost works of heroic genius are being unearthed and dusted off and made available to sneering generations of sensitive bruisers and brooding leather jacket wearers of all ages! “Sally Is Not Home” is as sweet as the Flamin’ Groovies of Boston’s power-pop powerhouses, The Neighborhoods. It really belongs on the soundtrack of a buttery popcorn teenage summertime sex comedy with heart. Why did they stop making those? I don’t get it at all. Frank and Jimmy “knew people”, this should have been a major, major band, even though all you lifers already know how the best rocknroll is frequently unheard, unsigned, unheralded, and seldom-sold by media monopoloies to mass-markets. Your lead-poisoning, slave plantation rulers and depopulation czars and gentrification city managers and enforcer patrols want you listening to Adele and Pharrell, Kanye and Blake Shelton–not Ronald Koal or Paul K & The Weathermen or Chamber Strings or Club Wow. It’s a cryin’ shame you never hear modern bands with creativity and originality anymore like we did when The Cure and Killing Joke were on the airwaves, and you definitely don’t hear music with heartfelt emotions like the sweet side of the Ramones and all the 60’s bands. Frank and Jimmy were both moody geniuses. Ya know, when I was a bad teen, I thought my idol, Stiv, wrote all those songs by himself, the covers, all of it. Man, did he ever have a lot of help. Talented help!

“Sweet Sixteen” is another would have been hit song we all woulda eagerly included on the cassette mix-tapes we made for all of our gloomy death rock girlfriends back in the day, or was I the only one who mixed the sunshine and bubblegum and hot pants and milkshakes up with the crucifixes, hemlock, and postcards from my mortuary dwelling bloody wrists? “Terminal Town” is the sound of me and my long-estranged, Oldsmobile cruising, outcast wave-o, small town cronies, spray painting our junk cars with skulls and iron crosses and frowning at passerby in the parking lot of the MTV bar we were still too young to get into, before they all joined the military or went to work for the dreaded Man. in hick towns like ours, smalltime psychos will burn your house down if you date the wrong cheerleader–they are all driven nuts with boredom, envy, religious superstitions, racism, and competitive military sports indoctrination, and tobacco chewing, hunting machismo, so it’s appropriate that this sullen tune evokes some of that dark ambience of wanna die teenage passions and suburban ennui and broken home desperation and dead end donut store jobs and dreaming haplessly of leaving that shithole on a Greyhound for some faroff big city like in an old Pat Benatar video, or ubiquitous radio Journey song. All the best music has a movie-like quality and you can see broken images and home movies of your own lonely youth while listening to this number. It’s honestly as great as anything on that brilliant Stiv Bators “Disconnected” record. If I had anybody to form a middle aged, fat dad, punk band with, I’d probably wanna cover that tune, or just name our band that. “There’s A Fire” sputters with those eighties “Space Invaders” and “Ms. Pacman” video-game arcade bleeps and zaps and “Valley Girl” keyboards, and it will remind you of Debbie Harry-she could still do a bang-up job if she felt like covering this. Makes me nostalgic for “French Kissing In The USA” and if you like the new wave era half as much as me, you will swoon. Jimmy Zero, Frank Secich, Jeff West, and Billy Sullivan were one of the most talented bands of beautiful songwriters in a decade when big industry seemed to still almost sometimes begrudgingly appreciate such talents. Everything was better then. I’d take Men At Work and Madness over the shit we got now, eight days a week, and in fact, I mostly just play shit on cassette or ancient youtube videos. Call me a grouchy old man, all you like. “You Don’t Go Away” is one of my favorite songs, now. Honestly, this version is invested with so much melody and yearning, it’s just impeccable. I’d heard Stiv’s rough demo, but this is no demo-it’s a wonderful work of gorgeous beauty. Jesus Christ, how did this gang go unnoticed? Drop whatever it is you’re doing and order this CD, now, if you loved Stiv, or The Only Ones, or romantic, guitar driven pop music of any era. Fast forward to track eleven. As stunningly hypnotizingly beautiful as your first girlfriend, who talked you into becoming vegetarian because she liked The Smiths.

THIS SOCIETY HAS NO PLACE FOR ME….

“Pants & Jackets” is my kinda mod-cool new wave! You know, like The Beat, or Real Kids, or Holly & The Italians. Makes me think of middle school and trying to impress the Siouxsie & The Banshees older chicks in the lace gloves with the fishnet and bangles with my checkered Vans, salmon fedora, “Modern Love” suspenders and junk shop paisley smoking jacket, and failing so, so miserably. You know that Hanoi Rocks song that goes, “you said I was a born loser, cause losing is all I’ve ever done”?! The cool girls in my town liked some punk and new wave, but they dated older guys from big cities who looked like Neal X and Charlie Sexton—not gawky twerp J. Geils fans like me with the nerd glasses and Alarm hair. Ha. I ended up with several of those once unattainable women, just as soon as I formed my own early bands with the Sears guitars and Cramps covers. Couple of the old collaborators continued playing music. Me, I was always getting ditched like that monster Jack in the Muppet movies who wants to accompany the gang to Hollywood, chasing the in-crowd down the street with shit falling out of his over-stuffed suitcase and shit. You don’t get far on two feet, by your lonesome. I’m a product from that time and left my heart back there, while everybody else moved on, I stayed behind, ya know, I liked what I liked. I’m not gonna pretend to like the Kardashians and Katy Perry so I can have meaningless conversations with eighteen year olds at record stores. Which brings us to “Million Miles Away”, one of the best songs of all time. I know it’s gonna offend all the Cult Of The Dead junkie tattooed Johnnies, out there in hipster land, but this is hands down, the definitive version, the best rendition of that song, even if you think that sounds sacrilegious, just listen to that guitar. Motherfuck. These boys really, REALLY knew what they were doing, back then. Extraordinarily Quintessential. “Like A Wild Animal” is a feral catcall from the Square Pegs era-me and all my friends used to comb all the college town cut-out bins for anything that looked even mildly punk, or new wave, and would have loved this music had we stumbled upon it back when we were the R.E.M. kids in America, standing in front of Poseur, in East California with our dangling sword earrings and best Inxs pouts. They lost a lot when they lost me, and they can’t reach me today. “My Secret Life” is more throbbing new wave, much like any of your fave one hit wonder bands in headbands and parachute pants, but the songwriting ability rivals Duran Duran and The Beatles, the sugary hooks stay with you all night long. Enuff Z Nuff might have lived up to the hype if their music was as catchy as this. What’s super impressive about CLUB WOW is not just the sterling execution and solid gold hits after hits, but the very real energy they invested into each and every cut. “The Girl Downstairs” is still another undeniable song that one can easily imagine receiving massive radio airplay had it received any promotion at all. It’s hauntingly good pop that’s easily in league with the best bands of the post-punk and commercial new wave era, from Adam Ant to Modern English. It effortlessly eclipses most of the Animotion and Hooters shit that got the permanent green light from the fat cats in the suits, back then. Club Wow were like, as good as The Pretenders, in some ways. Stand-alone greats. This is probably the best “new” elpee I’ve had the pleaure of enjoying in years and years, it’s my kinda music, and if you are in my age group and find yourself still pining for Bauhaus postcards and Jesus & Mary Chain hair-dos and nightclubs blasting Public Image Ltd and girls in Ramones t shirts and watermelon candy kisses and your own first doofy garage bands with the Sisters Of Mercy sunglasses and K Mart drum machines and forty ounces of malt liquor and urinating out the rehearsal space window and killing all the grass, like I am, you’ll trust me here, when I urge you to buy some bubble gum, a box of Loreal blue/black hairdye, and crank CLUB WOW‘S “Nowhere Fast” up to eleven and singalong to “Nights Are So Long” at the top of your lungs, clapping to the handclaps, flipping your bighair to the beat! This magic disc is a very real time machine that will spit you right back where we once belonged strutting around in fresh Creepers on long weekends visiting cemeteries and seeing shows and discovering Dead Boys 12 inch records at Singing Dog, or School Kids records on the avenue. “Hope I pull it off cause I’m developing a cough…” Ya know the places that we used to be really have turned to nagging memories-the band house is a tanning salon, your old pad’s a parking lot, the punk bars, the record stores, even the prized and precious scrapbooks and fliers and souvenirs I had hoped to pass on to my grandkids someday were all lost to mice in storage spaces, bed bugs purges, evictions, divorces, and midnight moves without a car. To me, the old times, the scratchy vinyl and dreaming and believing, that was it. I never understood what the squares and haves thought they were winning with the obedient fitting-in and belonging to mean spirited, hateful churches and endangering people speeding in big white trucks and watching sports. I just don’t get it, at all. Nowadays, even our friends and families, loved ones and former bandmates are all vanishing one by one with the landmarks and values and ephemera of our teenage years, and from here out, it’s just back pains, and paycheck to paycheck, Ramen again, nights of tv, suburbanization, slavery and death. At least sometimes, we still have the music to remind us of when we still felt alive and our black hearts were singing, on the road trip to somewhere beyond the hideous sports bars and malls. Brother, brother, it all zipped by in the blink of my heavily mascared eye. Now, it’s all chicken wings and draft beer and watching Bill fucking O’Reilly barking about Muslims with your dad. Still not my thing. It takes a lot of cheek to cover the Beatles, and Club Wow even do a bang up rendition of “Strawberry Fields Forever” and the whole energetic shebang ends with a live version of “Wild Ride with Vera Jane”, a tribute to Jayne Mansfield. I’ll be skipping back and forth between “Terminal Town” and “A Million Miles Away” and “Nights Are So Long” and “It’s A Lie” for the next many hours, and you should also acquire this cd promptly and even if you think I sound like a Ronco or K-Tell hard sell infomercial, “BUT WAIT! THERE’S MORE!”, there really IS more, as it even comes with a bonus disc of cool low budget videos and liner notes and an exquisite package so, yeah, you’ll want this thing as soon as possible. Flawless golden rocknroll perfection. The sound of youth. Buy it now! Thank me whenever.

 

https://thepeaceresource.wordpress.com/2016/01/27/we-have-choices-to-make/

http://www.commondreams.org/views/2016/03/27/why-bernie-sanders-was-right-run-democrat

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mxGzHSxcPTQ

http://therealnews.com/t2/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=31&Itemid=74&jumival=15755#.VtRmHpBrPjc.twitter

https://www.popularresistance.org/inaccurate-metadata-analysis-used-to-kill-thousands-in-us-drone-strikes/

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KlVEbNGxe1U

https://thewordsmithcollection.wordpress.com/2015/09/24/a-vote-for-bernie-sanders-is-a-vote-for-war-but-we-can-shine-with-jill-stein/

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_mDnYJKgOgA

The Bloodtypes “Pull The Plug”

Second album, by Portland’s finest ’77 punk/new wave rock band! The BLOODTYPES have been spreading their toxic sci-fi synth punk disease all over the US and Europe these last years, and their songwriting only improved on this new album.
The band’s energy reminds me of X and early SIOUXSIE AND THE BANSHEES on songs like “Panic”, or “Bored”, “Rejected”, or “Virtual Reality” while their sense of 80s synth melodies in songs like “Going Away” or “Surveillance State” gets closer to BLONDIE (“Television Dreams”), or The REZILLOS.
Punk sometimes has a bit of a garage taste in “Spy”, and you’ll get some darker, horror surf injected atmosphere with “Space Mutants”!
“Modern Love” is a potential hit, it brings space love stories and neon night club romances, mixed to 1978 Berlin images!
The vinyl looks great, and you’ll get a download card with it, so that’s at least two more reasons to get this record!/Laurent C.

http://www.thebloodtypes.com
http://thebloodtypes.bandcamp.com
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