PUT YOUR HAND INTO A BOX! with Halifax Collect and friends (Sept 25, 2013)

With SPEDS, DIE YOUNG, INVADE & HELLHOLE

There you go. See, I've been going around and about quite a bit for the last few years, so I needed to store my record collection somewhere.  In an act of yodelling kindness, my friend Ægir and his mom kept a part of my collection under their trusty roof. Thank you, lot! Recently, I retrieved those particular boxes only to find many gems and misfires I'd forgotten about. I wanted to check them out to confirm if they were any good. I put my hand into a box and without any criteria, pulled out any three seven inches that graced the tip of my fingers, called Bob Clueness of Reykjavík Sex Farm! and told him we'd have a listen and I'd blog about it. So there.

BK: Woh. I can't even google this band into existence. That's pretty punk.
Bob: Hey it's DRUNKPUNKHULK TIME! Just wall to wall rebel yell yankee punk that's been done to DEATH.
BK: Proper street punk here I guess. No production values, which is fitting and cool by me. All players cut through in that treably way. Already I can see I'm going to way wordier than Bob here. Shitty solos are crucial. Catchy chorus on this first number. Pretty much by the numbers. I'm not very interested. I dig the Observers/Red Dons-like vocals.
Bob: If I had to hear tracks like this all night then i would get very bored, very quickly.
Birkir: Side B doesn't catch me either but "(I wanna) Rip You Apart" livens things up a bit with broodier mood and early Misfits vibe. Tempo changes on the last song, still heavier than side A in mood and the drums switch things up a bit (finally) and the tempo has changed. This 7", You Can't Win, is a likable "meh," I guess.
On Discogs

Bob: Big up to the Hellhole for some nicely drawn peacocks on the sleeve.
BK: I'm loving the cover art here. Bird looks fine on the "Uppers side" and the bird on the "Downers side" is fucked. Already more interested than during the first band.
Bob: These guys are more yer classic hardcore with really scratchy guitars. All the energy is spurting out in every direction musically as if the singer will die if he just doesn't everything out of him in 29 seconds.
BK: Aren't these guys affiliated with the older guys circle that makes up Mother Night, Torchbearer and that other band - New Jersey stationed? Yeah! Pissed off raging two speed to open things here but with breaks and varying drum accentuations to keep it flying. The second track starts off raging even harder before turning into a noise-fuck, oh, and a cool ass chorus. Rad.
Bob: The track on side B completely flips it all around by being slow and sludgy, with loads of discordant DIY electronics, a bit like early Neurosis as they transitioned from hardcore to doom. You'd expect this to appear on Alternative Tentacles.
BK: Third song on side A is the least interesting one. Side B is one slow-burning and bit maddening noise rock meets My War kinda affair. Lends itself real nicely to the drugged-out cover art, guitar pedals and dirty shit hovering over this mess.
Bob: I liked it!
On Discogs

BK: We have a Die Young/Invade split on our hands, Bob. I know this band well. My band shared a stage with them on two occasions in the States. Prior to that I had some of their stuff. I always appreciated what they were about (talking about the state of the world when few bands did) and there have been moments of awesomeness in their discography. This is proper metalcore (listen (another release though)) this song is! Pre myspace-metalcore.
Bob: "FOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOK!!" is a word that gets used a lot on this record, alongside growled anarcho-marxist diatribe against the USA. Can't pronounce the word terrorists properly.
BK: Yeah, that first long "fuuuuuuuuuck" vomit/scream break makes me want to murder people. Hahaha, you're cat is just staring at the speakers! Ah, song two... Strife up in the opening of this one. Where the first song was more complex, this one is punkier.
Bob: The most metal of the three records. Very lo-fi and dirty sounding. Those guitars come across like a malfunctioning chainsaw.
BK: Invade start with moody drama into "exploding emotions," so popular in the mid '00s. The mosh kinda sneaks up on you in this first song. That's a nice touch.
Bob: Again a single song on side B, this time sounding like an I Adapt song that has been recorded three times over onto a mono cassette.
BK: I don't know about that...This here is almost proper style in and of itself. I can name a bunch of bands around that time better in said style. I like how the lyrics encourage living, but how they are worded - it's too much and overwrought. Not feeling it.
Bob: Very nihilistic, but a bit preaching to the crowd with this one.

Throw your brain against Bob's @ Reykjavík Sex Farm!

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