The Lowest Form - Personal Space

"The second album from UK hardcore engine The Lowest Form, Personal Space sees the band cutting through a comedown fug of feedback, sharp butterflyknife guitars flashing deadly over a wasteground rubble of noise. 

Songs drawn up from discord, songs of marshalled cacophony, coils of scritching guitars break apart and reform, coalescing around insistent basslines and heavy drumbeats, before splintering again. It's hardcore constructed from textured noise as much as from breakdowns and riffs, rumbling infectious chants emerging from the wavering clamor, the vile keening of consciousness's half-known edges, noise in the grain of it all, noise as bedrock, an abrasive acid bath of fuzz, susurration and machinewhirr. 

"SMASH MY FUCKIN' HEAD AGAINST THE WALL" is the line that opens it up, rising out of Interplanetary Bad Boy's hissing swell. Driven through the album are anguished explorations of interior/exterior limits, whirling around viciously in the grubby borders of your skull, spinning hopelessly in the cosmic of the aether, untethered, higher than the sky but way down in the muck. From Gak Attack's claustrophobic pogo or Last Smash's drawling thump to Star Slammers manic tumble and Dread Future's rolling barrage, The Lowest Form have brought together another LP of murdered-out panicattack punk, lithe and unleashed, born of bad vibes and background radiation, an album at once uncomfortably close and fully heavy." 

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DAUÐYFLIN - DREPA DREPA EP

"I always searching for great people, making great music and this time I found an outstanding band in Iceleand. A Noisy, raw, energetic, dirty, feminist PUNK BAND, packed in a wave full of reverbed guitar work. Born in Reykjavík and with a great Demo Tape under their belt, Dauðyflin presenting us their first proper EP. And it's even more gnarlier and uglier than their previous work. Someone is obviously mad at you and you were just caught in the middle of this sonic mess presented by Dauðyflin.

The ep just explodes out of the speakers, but it's more than just the in-the-red production that generates the intensity. The riffing is just truly wild and off the wall. They definitely have some POGO vibes going on thanks to the bubbly, front-of-the-snare-kick -mix , but I think that they have a little bit more three dimensionality to their sound than most bands flying the pogo punk flags.

The first outstanding part, rather than focusing on the bouncy rhythms and simple melodies, is the complete brooding, dark, and heavy ugly feeling on the complete record. While the next thing that stuck out, obviously, were the vocals. There are so many ways to approach the hardcore punk vocal but rarely have I heard the howl employed so effectively.

All in all the ramshackle drums, crazy vocals, and the early Italian HC spirit made me fall in love with this band. The raw production and quirky arrangements that put the bass right up front and make it carry much of the weight of the songs feels good, as good as possible for that kind of freak out dark punk music.

This could be the soundtrack to some weird psychedelic punk haunted house movie. So all in all we have an infectious guitar riff- vocal scream dynamic hardcore punk record from the first iceland based hardcore punk band i have ever heared. In my opinion essential, believe the hype!"

Mastered by genius Will Killingsworth at Dead Air Studios

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Cuntz - Force The Zone LP

"Cuntz are, obviously, well hardcore, spitting out noisy garage punk with not a care in the world. Third album Force The Zone offers more of the Australian trio’s gnarly thrashing: they sound like they’ve spent too long in the Yabba and it has warped their minds."

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No Form - Self Titled 12"

"A boundary-pushing record from the North of England. Bathing in the murk, devoid of light, it invokes a dark atmosphere that has little to do with any gothic plod or metal pose. This is punk, as antagonistic and cleansing as it ever can be. NO FORM's notorious live power is finally captured on this, their first record, with four shorter pulsating numbers on Side A and one long jam on Side B that approaches the outer limits. Shrill, disconcerting guitar leads and tormented vocals slither over an affirmative pummel that exists at the meeting point between outlier hardcore punk - SIEGE/UNITED MUTATION/GISM - and post-punk/proto-industrial at its most confrontational - SPK/CABARET VOLTAIRE/GOOD MISSIONARIES. Deceptively catchy thrashing coexists with sinister, siren-call sax that evokes THROBBING GRISTLE. This is music for the perennially despondent. Music for the subconscious, not the fashion conscious. This is music that could have been the soundtrack to the Blood Garden in JG Ballard's 'High Rise'. This is music as life ritual, to be listened to by all or none."

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Permaculture - They Advance EP

"2nd EP from Ryan (Social Cirkle, Confines) and Jen (Nuclear Family, Nervous Trend). 4 new tracks that build on the peace-punk/’Penis Envy’ vibe of the debut record whilst adding some post-punk touches and a more hardcore edge in places."

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Gay Kiss - Preservation Measures LP

Despite the fact that they’re nestled all the way in the southwestern corner of the US (Phoenix to be exact), it’s likely that Gay Kiss has visited your town sometime in the past few years. They’re a touring machine, and the band’s remarkable work ethic is apparent on this, their second full-length release and first for Sorry State. When a band plays this much they get a tightness and cohesiveness that you just can’t fake, and indeed Hoax are probably Gay Kiss’s only rivals in riding a pit-clearing groove. More than just a particularly tasty salad of mosh riffs, though, Preservation Measures is dense, complex, and ambitious, melding the best parts of skewed punk like Rudimentary Peni, forward-thinking hardcore like Double Negative, and ambitious yet heavy 90s noise rock into a sound that is 100% their own.

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Leather - Easy LP

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