NOTES from the UNDERGROUND.

Say Kiss has a gnarly ripper of a new 7": Rounded Down on Sorry State Records. The Phoenix HC unit has been around for a while but this is their first release in a few years--and it's a doozy. Brutal and fast and heavy in the right places, if you're a fan of Born Against you will eat this shit up. Record of the month for sure. Just head to your local record shop and ask the clerk for 7"s of Gay Kiss... Nothing like a crummy publicist to try to ruin something for you. Case in point: Suss Cunts 7" Get Laid on Emotional Response Records. The sticker says "sex positive female anthems, brat punk debut wax," and if you're like me your immediate reaction should be to run in the opposite direction as fast as possible. Undeterred, I checked it out and it's pretty good. Rudimentary and low-tech but still pretty rocking Aussie-inflected simplo punk, and they do sing about getting laid so, you know, everyone's happy in the end. Not quite Thee Headcoatees "Come into my mouth" but perhaps on the way there... Someone passed me the Morons' Crackin Up 7" on Imaraca Records and good goddam this one is a scorcher. Breakneck, punk as fuck with a garage tinge and dirty sounding to boot, this is the kind of stuff that gets shit wound up. It's a hell of a lot of noise for a three-piece and there is some killer guitar work on this slab. This is a band that would kill live, I bet... On the full-size tip is the new one from Timmy's Organism and it's a smoker. Fuzzed out, tripped out, psyched out and all out, this shit is music that will melt eyeballs and pop brain cells, and if you ain't a real rock 'n' roller it may just leave you a sobbing puddle on the floor. It's called Eating Colors and it's on BMT Records... I hadn't seen or heard anything from Seattle's Blue Stool in years--maybe a decade? On my last trip home I found myself getting a twelver of Rainier and into the 7-Eleven walks a dude with a Blue Stool patch on a denim jacket. I had to say something, and it turns out it's their guitar player Hasil, and they have a practice space around the corner where they're jamming and partying. Was I down to check it out? Does a bear shit in the pope? Some rock 'n' roll girls rolling Js and some of the heaviest, stoniest jams I'd heard in a long time. Apparently they're getting ready to put out a record and tour, but they haven't played in ages so they're gonna get some shit down. Looking forward to that sludge... On the live front, I caught Sonido Gallo Negro in Mexico City and was completely and utterly blown away. They play surf-inflected psychedelic cumbia, a genre I didn't know existed but which is now, I think, one of my favorites, and they feature theramin and computer-boosted lysergic hand-drawn projections. The whole place was writhing as if under some otherworldly trace and it was impossible not to move. Their most recent LP is a few years old but worth tracking down as a summertime mind-melter but word has it they've got some new dope in the works. Don't think tabs, but mezcal, pulque or peyote...