Kick to Kill

TEST DEPT. - Beating the Retreat (1984)


Being a New World Man of thee Kanück Mütt persuasion, I have little to no grasp of the British class system. As far as I can figger-- at least where it is applied to underground musicians-- is that one should be "working class," not speak with a "posh accent" and for thee Love of Lucifer: no fooking way can you have attended a school where the tuition exceeds a few hundred pounds. Also I've duly noted that British folks sho' like to yammer on about it-- especially Oi! bands and Ray Davies.

A lovely British um... "bird" once explained to me that Test Dept. were a hyper-liberal bunch whose songs tackled much of what I failed to understand above, even going so far as to collaborate with a Miner's Union Choir in support of their strike of 1984-- (at least I think that was the gist of it... she had a really heavy accent) and here I thought their lyrics were nothing more than monosyllabic utterances of cathartic rage. I mean, what was I supposed to think? These New Cross, London blokes used discarded hunks of scrap metal from local factories to create a pulverizing form of musique concrete that has since become the soggy, pre-packaged rebellion known as industrial music. Luckily, they sound nothing like the tripe the kids think is all "heavy" n' shit like Marilyn and Two-Inch Male (bet those guys went to Ivy League schools). Nope. Here's where the sheep get separated from the goats, matey. Ya got drill bits spinnin' into yer skull and tribal beats that sound like they were pounded out on the lids of barrels of toxic waste.

In comments.


CORONER - Death Cult Demo (1986)

{First off, inspiration for this entry goes to the lovely & talented Mogo for his recent post of this here band's "No More Color" LP}

Switzerland has given us quality, if not quantity-- ya got chocolate, watches, cheese, Hellhammer/Celtic Frost, Fear of God, Messiah, Samael before they went all techno-wimp, Jack & the Rippers, Negativ, Sperma, Glueams, garage-punk heroes the Sevens and a handful of hardcore bands I'm not in the mood to type right now. Oh... and these guys. Hailing from Zürich, Coroner would become renowned as virtuosos of thee highest order for thee bewildering complexity of LP's like "Mental Vortex" and the aforementioned "No More Color." In 1986 however, they were still primitive thrashers not unlike countrymen Hellhammer whose Tom G. Warrior provides the vocals for this here demo. The sound quality is crisp, and has that most excellent farty bass sound lovers of metal demo tapes have grown to love (or at least I have). Best of all, of the six tracks featured here, only "Spiral Dream" was ever given the full studio treatment (on their debut album).

Track list:

1. Spectators of Sin
2. Spiral Dream
3. Aerial Combat
4. The Invincible
5. Arrogance in Uniform*
6. Hate, Fire, Blood*

* = bonus tracks featuring Ron "Royce" Broder on vox.

In the comments.