#Bob Vylan Is Killing Punk Rock

[aeolianblues]

SIMPLY THE BEST

[carrionkid]

5 genres you have a soft spot for and personal favorite bands from them? Love to hear what music you find neat

You absolutely activated my autism trap card so I apologize in advance lmao I am VERY passionate about music. Gonna bold the ones I really like

1. INDUSTRIAL - KMFDM, ministry, orgy, my life with the thrill kill kult, nine inch nails, chemlab

2. PUNK - lots of subgenres here lmao

dead kennedys, bad brains, the clash, pure hell, minor threat, rancid, Bob vylan, circle jerks, crass, stiff little fingers

Queercore: pansy division (one of the best bands I've seen live), the muffs, middle aged queers (part of my local scene), hunx & his punx, against me! (Also anarchopunk but I don't wanna add another subgenre), gloss

Riot grrrl: (albeit there's a lot of issues wrt race among other things in that scene but the label is useful for categorizing) bikini kill, L7, bratmobile

Folk punk: AJJ (another fantastic band to see live), the taxpayers, oh lonesome ana (another one from my local scene)

3. NEW WAVE - talking heads, devo, Adam and the ants, Blondie, gang of four, the psychedelic furs, XTC, Elvis costello

4. DARKWAVE - using this as a very BROAD label

Older: sisters of mercy, Bauhaus, depeche mode, soft cell, new order

Newer: ritual howls, the soft moon, type o negative

5. OLDER ROCK - this is another really vague label sorry

Girl groups: the Supremes, the shangri-la's, Lesley gore, the shirelles

Blues & soul: Nina Simone, Billy Holliday, Nat king cole, otis Redding, Percy sledge

Country: Loretta Lynn, Wanda Jackson, Johnny cash, Dolly Parton

Folk: Arlo Guthrie, Pete Seeger, Phil Ochs, Peter Paul & Mary, Joan baez

And here's some other artists I really like that I couldn't squeeze into any of these 5 categories: Viagra boys, fugazi, Ezra Furman, Jane's addiction, hole, the boomtown rats, electric wizard, 100 gecs

I've also got a big mix of punk music, and a big playlist of stuff I play at work, plus playlist of jrock

[theemeraldforestafterdark]

Diary - Tewkesbury Medieval Festival 2023 

I’ve been going to the festival since 2013 and this was the first time since that it took place under grey, occasionally rainy skies. It gave the whole festival a different feel. The infrequent but soothing rain showers actually meant it was probably the most enjoyable time I’ve ever had there. Usually it’s super boiling, barely any shade, and a bit of a mission to manage to feel half-decent throughout its duration. In a previous year, for example, battle reenactors were literally fainting in their encumbering medieval armour. I remember helping hydrate a few, whilst they lay on the ground trying to fight off the punishing heat. No such thing this time - I even stayed to watch the entire battle reenactment (as usually the heat gets too much for me, as a spectator, and so I often leave before the end). The general crowd felt different this year too. There were way more alternative people - so many people wearing Iron Maiden shirts (fresh from the UK tour - you could tell, as they looked super crisp and new), one guy in a The Cure shirt, lots of Sabbath shirts, lots of GNR ones, even one guy in a Cro-Mags shirt which led me to having Doomboy by The Dirty Nil in my head every time I passed him. I did see a few Ghost shirts, but not too much in the way of newer bands representation. My award for best spotted shirt though, goes to the guy wearing a ‘Bob Vylan Is Killing Punk Rock’ shirt. There’s niche and then there’s niche. I didn’t chat to him, but I did raise my figurative glass to that guy. Around 4pm the battle reenactment started - and as I said, I stayed for the whole thing. I managed to take some decent photos too. And yeah, overall it was great… except for… half way back through the town, on foot, and the heavens opened. A violent, raging thunderstorm rolled in and I… well, it was as if I’d taken a shower with my clothes on. I got absolutely soaked. But it didn’t get to me really. It’s just so nice to end the day feeling fulfilled and not regretful in any way.

[sinceileftyoublog]

Riot Fest 2022 Preview: 4 Reasons to Come Early, 1 to Stay Late

Bob Vylan

BY JORDAN MAINZER

This year’s Riot Fest offers a lot in the way of postponements from previous years, whether Nine Inch Nails’ headlining set 1 year in the making or My Chemical Romance’s triumphant return to the stage 2 years late. But there are plenty of great bands to check out before the sun sets. I’ve highlighted 4 bands worth showing up early for and 1 that will make you want to stick around. Oh, and even if you’re not going, you can buy some or all of each band’s music on Bandcamp.

FRIDAY

Boston Manor, 1:30 PM, Radicals Stage

Next month via SharpTone Records, British rock band Boston Manor will follow up their breakout record Glue and last year’s Desperate Times, Desperate Pleasures EP with Datura, their biggest but bleakest album yet. Recorded with Hundred Reasons guitarist, vocalist, and producer Larry Hibbitt, Datura reflects the time-warped days of the pandemic, nights filled with drinking too much and mornings filled with the repercussions of the nights. Lead singer Henry Cox immediately rattles off a series of stark observations on the alien opener “Datura (Dusk)”: “There’s a fire in the cark park / I see it smoldering / Heard my neighbor kill his own dog for going in the bins.” The music of Datura mirrors a similar pervasive sense of dread, harsh noise enveloping the otherwise dreamy guitars of closer “Inertia” and synth bounce of “Crocus”. The rest of the band--lead guitarist Mike Cunniff, rhythm guitarist Ash Wilson, bassist Dan Cunniff, and drummer Jordan Pugh--provide storming instrumentation alongside the pulsating electronics of “Floodlights on the Square” and synth glitches of instrumental “Shelter From The Rain”. 

Live, Boston Manor should play at least a couple of the singles from Datura, such as the reflective “Foxglove” and the dramatic “Passenger”, while also taking the Glue victory lap they weren’t able to experience at the height of the pandemic.

Bob Vylan, 4:15 PM, Rebel Stage

The liner notes on the deluxe version of Bob Vylan’s debut album We Live Here start with the words, “Recorded in 2019, mastered in 2020 and relevant today!” You could follow the same formula for all songs from the UK punk rap duo. Even the song that begins with an order to kill the now late queen may be updated on their current tour to use King Charles’ name instead. Bob Vylan’s music lives in constant urgency. Their second album, the phenomenal Bob Vylan Presents the Price of Life (Ghost Theatre), begins with a sample of a speech from Guyanese historian and activist Walter Rodney: “People in their day-to-day lives will know what it means to be living in a state of economic crisis.” Considering the ever-present ills of colonialism, an unprecedented cost of living and housing crisis, and even some food banks closing on Monday for Queen Elizabeth II’s funeral, Bob Vylan speak from their own experiences and on behalf of others. With a combination of driving guitars, propulsive beats, shouted choruses, and limber flow, the duo target everything from the surveillance state (“Phone Tap”) and big pharma (“Drug War”) to the blissfully ignorant (“Turn Off The Radio”) and fake progressives (“Bait the Bear”). “They say I’m violent,” laughs Bobby Vylan, before declaring, “The whole country’s fucking violent.” Fighting fire with fire out of survival, they’ll bring the riot to Riot Fest in true spirit rather than just aesthetic.

SATURDAY

Alexisonfire, 4:30 PM, Radicals Stage

They reunited 7 years ago, but it wasn’t until this June that Canadian post-hardcore greats Alexisonfire actually released a new record, their first in 13 years. Otherness (Dine Alone) strikes a delicate balance between remaining faithful to what makes the band tick while exploring new genres and styles, like the 8-minute folk, psychedelia, prog metal closer “World Stops Turning”. While they might not whip that one out during their hour-long Riot Fest set, Alexisonfire should churn through Otherness highlights like “Sweet Dreams of Otherness” and the surprisingly soft “Sans Soleil”. Of course, they’ll play classics from albums like Crisis and Old Crows / Young Cardinals, but the Otherness songs should fit in nicely in a live set.

Read our review of Otherness.

SUNDAY

Zola Jesus, 2:50 PM, Riot Stage

On Zola Jesus’ 6th album ARKHON (Sacred Bones), Nika Roza Danilova bares all. The record was born out of a state of vulnerability--heartbreak, change, writer’s block--with Danilova reaching out to collaborators earlier than ever in the creative process, including producer Randall Dunn and percussionist Matt Chamberlain. The result is the most outwardly expressive Zola Jesus album to date. On “The Fall” and “Desire”, Danilova straight up belts, dynamically over a shuffling groove on the former and raw-like over acoustic piano on the latter. “Lick my wounds like you can taste them,” she asks of a partner on “Desire”, making them tangibly consider the end of a relationship. Importantly, though the record is immensely personal, a product of intense alienation, Danilova finds common ground with the listener, finding subtle, clever ways to express the universality of her themes. She sings around syncopated samples of a Slovenian folk choir on “Lost”, the voices individually disjointed but unified in spirit. Her vocals intertwine with Louise Woodward’s chamber accompaniment on the cinematic and thrilling “Dead and Gone”, and with sinewy synths and cascading drums on “Into the Wild”. Ultimately, she speaks for all of us, wondering “How can love be misguided when your heart learns to beat?” ARKHON is forever truthful and empathetic.

Though Zola Jesus is somewhat embedded within the dark wave or industrial realms, her set should be a comparatively experimental outlier within Riot Fest, a can’t-miss at the festival for those looking for something different.

Photo by David Black

Yeah Yeah Yeahs, 7:10 PM, Roots Stage

The firmly rooted NYC three-piece are back, the band responsible for such Aughts indie rock classics as Fever to Tell and It’s Blitz! bringing their beer swilling, microphone swallowing live show to the Riot Fest grounds. More importantly, they’ve got a brand new album out at the end of the month. Cool It Down (Secretly Canadian) is, remarkably, only their fifth album in over two decades of existence, and judging by the early singles, it might be another gem in the band’s catalog. Expect to hear plenty of it on Sunday night, including slow-burning anthem “Spitting Off The Edge of the World” and the building, orchestrated “Burning”.

[aeolianblues]

🎵 SONG-TO-GO 🎵

Friday is here, so I've got another Song-To-Go poll hot n' ready to go for you!

If you're new, hello and welcome! Song-To-Go is a weekly song poll released every Friday where I present you with new, lesser-known songs to listen to while you scroll.

As always, choose songs based on the 30-second Spotify snippets if you don’t know them (and I try to make sure there’s always something you won’t know). If you like what you hear, go listen to the full songs, they’re yours to carry along on your scroll!

[last week’s poll, playlist of everything so far (in order) and other/future picks]

This week, I’ve picked some Cure-inspired new wave from India that I’ve been digging all year, a Montreal synthpop trio that actually came out of cult favourite band Caveboy, a young but incredible new jazzy Canadian alt rock band (broken up already sadly), American goth rock that iirc I found through tumblr so you might already know her. We’ve also got a punk rock band whose sense of justice is shaped by the fact that their singer is still and was an NHS doctor during the pandemic, and the hip hop musician Hyphen, who is opening for Bob Vylan (another recommendation!) on their UK tour so go catch him live.

Happy listening! Pass it on and let me know in the tags what you liked this week :) I’ll be back with another next Friday!