skate punk Archives - Vinyl From The Vault

Agent Orange “Living in Darkness”

sfilzen — Wed, 05 Oct 2022 17:25:26 +0000

Agent Orange “Living in Darkness” 1981. Posh Boy Records. Last night we caught the classic OG/OC hardcore punks perform at Shank Hall here in Milwaukee. We bought our tickets back in late 2019 (I think) for a show originally scheduled for October 2020, which was rescheduled for 2021 and then finally came to fruition almost exactly two years late. I believe that 2020 was intended as a 40th anniversary tour for Living in Darkness. Their debut record mixed the emerging California hardcore punk sound coming out of Orange County with 60’s surf rock to help develop the new skate punk sound; it’s ranked as one of the “10 Best Skate Punk Records of All Time” (I did not know that was a list that existed).

Agent Orange played Living in Darkness in its entirety last night, though with other songs as well (otherwise it would have been a very short show as only one song, the title track “Living in Darkness” clocks in at over three minutes; most tracks hover around the 2:00 mark). Unprompted by me, the bassist (Perry Giordano, in the band since 2006) handed me the set list at the end of the night, though I was totally going to ask for it!

Mike Palm, the only original member, on guitar, vocals.

Perry on bass

This album is such a classic that it’s hard for me to pick my top tracks as I love the whole record and know it beginning to end. But! I adore “Bloodstains” with its anthemic and iconic Cali-punk chorus “Bloodstains, speed kills, fast cars, cheap thrills, rich girls, fine wine” set to a rippingly punked-up surf guitar riff. They go 100% surf with their cover of Dick Dale’s “Miserlou” but then remove all the surfy sunshine on the excellent but very dark “Everything Turns Grey” and “The Last Goodbye.” Then, of course, is “No Such Thing” which is now such a classic skate punk song that it appears in a video game aptly titled “Skate.” Finally, there’s the album opener “Too Young to Die,” which they introduced last night as a tribute to the recent passing of Coolio (I didn’t click record fast enough to get that intro, though):

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Doggy Style “Don’t Hit Me Up”

sfilzen — Thu, 17 Sep 2020 20:52:30 +0000

Doggy Style “Don’t Hit Me Up” 1988. Triple X Records. Red vinyl. Cali-skate punk/hardcore from a band with a revolving door of members (in and out other punk bands like Dag Nasty, Adolescents, Descendents, D.I., Don’t No, etc. etc.) that makes me dizzy – the confusion not helped by the fact that when the band first split in ‘86 both factions used the name Doggy Style. But on this release (the band’s 6th since forming in ‘84) the lineup was Rib Finley on vocals (aka Curtis Haller, original DS vocalist, died in 2016), Danny Stone (Johnston) on drums, Ray Beez (Jimenez) on bass (original bassist), Bosco (John Callabero) on guitar and Hedge on second guitar. Both Bosco and Hedge were also in D.I. at the time. It was between their previous, fifth, release The Last Laugh (on National Trust Records) and Don’t Hit Me Up that I saw D.I. and Doggy Style play a show just outside of Green Bay, WI in the fall of ‘87. I’ve written about it before but to recap: both D.I. and Doggy Style traveled back to Appleton to my friend’s house after the show and a fairly wild night ensued. I spent much of the evening hanging out with Hedge at the dining room table – he had played with both bands that evening. I don’t remember what we talked about, probably a lot of shit talk (pretty sure he was hitting hard on me, that went nowhere) and eventually bracelets were exchanged. I thought I still had it laying around somewhere but it might have finally disintegrated, it’s been over 30 years. Anyway! Don’t Hit Me Up is fairly a melodic, mid-tempo (by punk standards, mind you) LP. I’m not a skater but I’m told it’s a great beat for skating. Some proof: That’s Duane Peters on the album cover (pro-skater/U.S. Bombs singer; and a fun fact/the skater-punk world is really small: Joe Schmo – real name Wade Walston – from the movie Suburbia slung merch at that D.I./Doggy Style show I went to and then in the 90′s played bass in U.S. Bombs). Honestly the record pretty repetitive and not a lot jumps out but if I have to pick my top track would be the ass-shaking title track “Don’t Hit Me Up.” “Family Man” is also pretty good: a dark and fast guitar riff with rather predictably punk anti-suburban lyrical sentiments.

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SNFU “Better Than a Stick in the Eye”

sfilzen — Wed, 31 Jan 2018 16:30:22 +0000

SNFU “Better Than a Stick in the Eye” 1988. Cargo Records. Melodic-Ish hardcore skate punk from Canada on marbled blue vinyl. I chose this SNFU album to spin (we have a few) mainly because it has a Dalek on the cover. Better Than a Stick in the Eye is SNFU’s third full-length LP, released just prior to a break-up (they reformed with an ever-revolving list of band members a couple of years later). It’s pretty classic 80′s hardcore punk: killer rhythm section, straightforward pounding guitar and shouty, snotty vocals albeit bordering more on the melodic side (i.e. I can actually understand most of the lyrics). My favorite tracks are the lightning fast “Time to Buy a Futon” (apparently they need one right now), “Tears,” the amusing “Postman’s Pet Peeve” (spoiler: it’s a dog), the almost-metal stomper “Tour Tantrum” and “Wild World,” a cover of the classic Cat Stevens song (actually it’s not that great of a cover but Stevens’ “Wild World” is a song I dearly love so I really just wanted to highlight here).

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U.S. Bombs “War Birth”

sfilzen — Fri, 30 Jan 2015 19:47:08 +0000

U.S. Bombs “War Birth” 1997. Hellcat Records. I pulled this album from the vault because I’ve been thinking my previous post on Wade Waltson/Joe Schmo’s appearance in “Suburbia” and his role as bass player in U.S. Bombs.

Growling, So-Cal skate punk and according to the band’s Facebook page, it is rumored that Joey Ramone had this record on his turntable at the time of his death. We saw U.S. Bombs perform at the Rave Bar sometime in the late 90’s, probably around the time of this record’s release. I had no idea Wade Waltson was the bass player and looking at some band photos, I’m not surprised I didn’t recognize him. My memory of the show is a bit hazy, but it was in ‘97 that U.S. Bombs developed a relationship with Milwaukee’s Beer City Records and the band may have been headlining a 10-band Beer City showcase. (Besides memory, I probably also lost a fair bit of hearing that night – The Rave is notorious for loud and bad acoustics). Also I think Slipknot was playing in the room next door and a couple of those guys in their weird masks were in the Bar checking out the U.S. Bombs show. They were kinda scary, but also kinda short.

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