Yes, yes, y’all, it’s the weekend, once again. Specifically, it’s Friday, August 26th, and it’s a busy one, to be sure… The biggest on my personal list is the latest installment of the Canned Acoustica series put on by photog/scenester Mark C. Austin…
Star Fucking Hipsters are a classic punk band. Their songs rarely clock in over two minutes. Their live shows often involve a couple bottles of Jameson’s and a ton of aggression. Their lyrics are politically charged, awakening calls for nonconformity and awareness…
Minneapolis punk band Dillinger Four finally returns with their fourth album. Civil War is another slice of their Hüsker Dü-meets-Southern Califoria sound. If anyone was worried about the band’s six-year break between albums…
Don’t be fooled by the title; on their latest live CD (the most recent of five), iconic California pop-punkers NOFX sound better — tighter, faster, smarter — than they have in a while. It’s probably because these guys really do shine live, where they can bounce shit off the audience…
The Mad Caddies play ska and reggae with a Clash-style punk core, and Keep It Going is their fifth album (although, if the world were fair, they wouldn’t have any). Their songs carry on the Fat Wreck tradition of irritating and sappy attempted-anthems…
The Flatliners are a Canadian group that plays ’80s-style punk, with some hardcore and reggae thrown in to change things up and the singer using that standard punk-style shout. They try to write big catchy melodies, but they fail more than they succeed, unfortunately…
Okay, so this is a little weird. Here you’ve got a band called American Steel, but almost every damn comparison I can come up with is to bands from the now-former British Empire. Like I said, weird. Large chunks of Destroy Their Future remind me strongly of oft-overlooked pseudo-punks New Model Army…
Strung Out sets out a big task for themselves: bridging metal, punk, and prog-rock, three approaches which at one point were mutually exclusive, though not anymore (for better or for worse). They set metal riffing atop a rhythm section that switches effortlessly…
One CD plus two great bands equals nothing but politics-filled punk/ska fun, doesn’t it? Citizen Fish and Leftover Crack. Two great bands, one split album, expectations are high. 15 tracks with Citizen Fish covering Choking Victims’ “Money”…
“It’s true there is a color divide / It’s not black or white, it’s green.” Nice. I already dig this band’s worldview. I’ve not heard Smoke Or Fire’s previous LP…
I’ve tried to write reviews for both of these discs, Anti-Flag’s For Blood and Empire and Strike Anywhere’s Dead FM, for a while now, and it just hasn’t worked. I keep finding myself viewing them both together, rather than separately…
This is a NOFX album. You know what you’re going to get: of course, it’s going to be punk rock. It’s going to be the kind of punk rock that made you feel cool to crap in your pants or put egg yolk in your mohawk. You’re going to get power chords…
I can’t get over this CD. Oh! Calcutta! is the latest creation from Brendan, Chris, and Neil of The Lawrence Arms. You might remember them from such underground punk acts as The Broadways and Slapstick…
