Razorcake Podcast #114: With Jimmy Alvarado
Decade End Podcast Part One
(Phantom Limbs photo pilfered from their website)
One of the more fun aspects of being involved with punk for nearly thirty years is that you get to hear folks perpetually lament the sad state of the scene and pining for the days “when punk was punk,” and you get to hear it year after year, DECADE AFTER FRIGGIN’ DECADE. I’ll be the first to admit that I had a lotta fun back in the early ‘80s and yes, it was indeed a very special time, but I’ve also had a helluva good time in every decade since. I’ll even further admit that in some ways it’s markedly different than when I first got into it, beginning with the fact that one can find/contact virtually any band they want with just a few pecks on a typewriter-like keypad. To say, however, that no quality punk rock has come out since, oh, 1985 or so is a load of shorts-stuffin’. To my mind, punk continues to evolve and revolve, ebb and flow, expand and contract much as it always has since the first wave of punks lamented its demise nine months after they found it. Those that deem anything past a certain day “crap” is someone who a) gave up on the very scene they purport to miss; b) forgets the efforts of the bandwagon jumpers and opportunists of the late ‘70s, the tons of generic thrash bands of the early/mid ‘80s, the insipid speed metal of the late ‘80s, the bad rock/grunge wannabes of the early ‘90s, the endless supply of ska-punk and plastic pop punk of the late ‘90s, and the emo/screamo scourge of the early/mid ‘00s. Every decade has had its share of suckage and more than its share of cool tunes to keep a person involved, and both classifications are interchangeable based on who’s doing the assessing.
With that in mind, I offer up this first of a two-part podcast highlighting stuff from the past decade. You’ll find all kinds of sounds from bands both fresh-faced and long in the tooth, with a number of the subgenres represented. Keep in mind that this is by no means a “best of” compiling, but rather as a sort of mix tape of stuff that I came across that I thought would sound nifty together. First up: stuff from 2000-2003. Enjoy.
-Jimmy Alvarado
Trackling:
Smogtown – “Domesticviolenceland” (Domesticviolenceland, Disaster, 2001)
Allergic to Whores – “Kill All the Snobs” (Simple Minds are Easy to Assemble, Firebrand, 2000)
Heroine Sheiks – “Jew Jitsu” (Rape on the Installment Plan, Reptilian, 2000)
BellRays – “Stupid Fuckin’ People” (Grand Fury, Upper Cut, 2000)
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Mensen – “City of Lights” (Delusions of Grandeur, Gearhead, 2001)
TSOL – “Anticop” (Disappear, Nitro, 2001)
Ex Models – “He Can’t Put it Into Words” (Other Mathematics, 2001)
Ratos De Porão – “Biotech is Godzilla” (Guerra Civil Canibal, Alternative Tentacles, 2001)
Out Cold – “Control Freak” (Will Attack if Provoked, Acme, 2001)
We March – “Electrode for Pleasure” (Life in A Bubble, Non Prophet, 2002)
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A Frames – “Hostage Crisis” (Self-titled, SS, 2002)
Tyrades – “Mannquin Girl” (I Got a Lot 7” EP, Broken Rekids, 2002)
FM Knives – “Summer Holiday” (Useless and Modern, Moo-La-La, 2002)
Skulls – “Incomplete Suicide” (Therapy for the Shy, Dr. Strange, 2002)
Marked Men – “Not Too Late” (Self-titled, Rip Off, 2003)
Channel 3 – “Just on You” (Self-titled, Dr. Strange, 2003)
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Gun Crazy – “Talk to Jane” (Dropping Like Flies, Mortville, 2003)
Mexican Blackbirds – “Can’t Win ’em All” (Just to Spite You, Dirtnap 2003)
Spits – “Spit Me Out” (Self-titled, Slovenly, 2003)
Vulvettes – “Frogs Mice Ants” (This Is the Science We Believe In, Dragnet, 2003)
Phantom Limbs – “Active Verbs” (Displacement, Alternative Tentacles, 2003)
The Weegs – “Pink Elephant Walk” (Meat the Weegs, Hungry Eye, 2003)