ALBUMS OF THE WEEK

D-Clone 'Drop A Noise Bomb' 7" EP 2009, Damaging Noise Records

Smashing your face again and again, Japanese folks know how to do it with ferocious precision. This is the nastiest and loudest plate that I've heard in a while- Fuck! Rough and rugged hyperspeed crust simply doesn't sound the same everywhere else in the world, as it does from Japanese dudes. They rage through records, peeling our eyelids and stabbing our earholes back into our heads. I can definitely not solve the great questions of the world with one meager record column, but a real head-scratcher there nonetheless. However, I accept this mystery; I have been able to slice my melon into a million pieces with the blade that is known as Japanese Hardcore over and over again through the years and what a fantastic, bloody mess of a way to spend my time. D-Clone are from Nagoya City, they fucking rip. This I believe, is their 3rd 7" release, compared to their joints from last year it is way thicker and fatter and greasier, and fast as fuck. Without a doubt they make severe nods to the legendary UK anarchist hardcore band Discharge, as do about one million other sorry bands, but this is proper and doesn't sound much like Discharge, it is Japanese so think the weight and power of Deathside mixed with the blurred fury energy of Gauze, and noisy nasty G.I.S.M. style distortion over the whole thing. Well done volume. And if not implicit, they definitely 'drop the noise bomb.' This just came out and I am trying to avoid importing this joint myself so hopefully one of these distros will grab some of these and make it reign (in blood).


Crow 'Death of Nuclear Arms' 7" EP 1998, Crow Records

It is silly to think that I would review one of the newer-school Japanese hardcore blasters without paying respects and proper dues to the (in my world view) fucking greatest band there, Crow. This may be a repeat for some of you punx as I reviewed their 2006 Prank Records skullsmasher, Bloody Tear, last October, but Crow are from Osaka and have been blistering the earth with their crust metal attack since 1980 and they destroy shit, period. So anyways this three song gem was recorded at someone's house in 1998, a trait reflected by the generally low-fi but thick as fuck production that only intensifies whatever grimeyness or gutter shit you already imagined they were up to in Japan. The power exerted here is unbelievable and for anyone who has ever sprayed a beer while listening to Crow, you will know that this is the truth. More excellent, this EP's version of 'Death of Nuclear Arms' (a song which appears eight years later on the Bloody Tear LP) is different and the guitar solos at the beginning completely flip the whole track to smash your head with a rock, rather than the razor blade version featured on the LP. This is hard to get- I hope to obtain it one day. Dearest Brother David, you should help me out over there, in other words, help a brotha out. Befriend some suspicious Japanese punks, find the hardcore spots, and mail me these records. Its quite simple. I would cry a million bloody tears. And you would be more of a man, in my mind.