TAD

TAD, one my favorite bands and one of a many great bands that have gone largely unnoticed, existed from 89-99...birthing a total of 4 full length LPs and countless 7"s/LPs. Like most awesome bands, they now lie discarded to side, obscured from view by overrated releases from a bunch of other bands that don't really matter anymore.

Back in their initial years, they played alongside bands like Mudhoney, Soundgarden, Nirvana, among others. When touring with Nirvana in 89 out in Europe...they HEADLINED. People went to the gigs to see TAD, not Kurt Cobain's magical heroin caravan. Kurt Cobain had a falling out with the band in the following years, citing them as (paraphrased) "boneheaded grunge", even when the band had made clear signs of impending musical growth. Sure their final album, Infrared Riding Hood, was a cheesy, over-sentimental, poorly written piece of shit compared to 8-Way Santa and Inhaler, but fuck--it was different; I still enjoy it for what it is. Maybe if people threw a little more love their way back then, we would've gotten at least one more killer record from the band. Go back and listen to their single Kevorkian's Holiday. Listen to Demon's Seed off of Live Alien Broadcasts. That shit fucking rules; it breathes the same energy heard on 8-Way Santa but made it darker, even poppier to a certain extent, which isn't a bad thing at all. Had the band received more support, I have no doubt they would've had an eventual comeback.

TAD was dropped by their label in '93. They were picked up by another on a trial period after the release of Infrared Riding Hood. After terrible reception to the record, they were dropped from their label AGAIN, and left releasing singles with any independent label left that gave a damn. Attribute their demise to this or one too many years of the whole redneck shtick.

Why write about them now? It's 15 years too late for anyone to really start caring. This band embodied the spirit, the grime, and the filth that accreted to become the backbone of that fad that died once fuckheads like silverchair, pearl jam, and whatever over-generalized things, ran it in the ground, and kicked the shit out of it while it laid defenseless in it's toughest of times. This is a post invested in the hope that someone else will pick up the band's records, appreciate them for what they were, and stop over-generalizing something from 20 years ago that has only come to express the musical output of 4 or 5 shit bands in the public paradigm.

and so, I lay in front of you the majority of TAD's body of work:

1989/1990 Salt Lick/God's Balls
1991 - 8-Way Santa
1993 - Inhaler
1994 - Infrared Riding Hood

Banned by MTV in 1989:

Wood Goblins


Other TAD Posts
TAD (Salem) Post over at [shiny grey monotone]

--fred

Melvins - Three Albums You Already Have

Here we are again, on the pre-ignition of another monday, and there's none more of an appropriate time for us to appreciate the Melvins. (MELVINS MONDAY!) That and I have more schoolwork I'm avoiding.

Prior to 93, the Melvins were anything but typical compared to their contemporaries from the region (see: grunge); they were sludge, they were metal, they were punk. When that whole dumb thing in the north-west corner happened...something changed. Bullhead wasn't too far removed from the formula we heard on Ozma--if anything it represented a transitional period. But in 1993, they veered off-course for better or worse.

The Melvins made a straight-ahead "rock" album, not unlike what everyone else was doing at the time. Were they cashing in? Were they taking the piss out of everyone else? It's not like they completely abandoned what they were doing before and turned to some contrived sound without reason; vestiges of their old style still soaked through in a few tracks (Hag Me, Copache, Set Me Straight, At the Stake, yadda yadda). What gets me about the whole change is that it's not like what they were doing on Ozma, Bullhead, and Eggnog was worn out or unoriginal...they fucking INVENTED sludge and played it for not even 5 years--then said fuck it--and moved on. Something so innovative, so new and fresh, although not all that accessible compared to other music, was at the very least THEIRS...and they just fucking threw it aside for other bands to pick up and march on with.

Really though, if they hadn't grown into a different genre of music, chances are their records would've ended up as stale, boring and unexciting as a Slayer or Cannibal Corpse release...the type of shit that only someone like Angry Pantera Kid would cum all over himself about. Or they could've suffered a slow painful death like TAD did from the mid to late nineties.

...nonetheless: whatever they were doing--they did it WELL, and that's what counts. Here's to 3 years of Mark D, solos, and KISS covers:

1993 - Houdini
1994 - Stoner Witch
1996 - Stag

--fred

Castrovalva

It's nearly 5 o'clock, I've got another page to add to this fucking Shakespeare paper due in class later today at 2pm and I'm sitting here about to spend 30 minutes on a post why?

Castrovalva (UK) is a band I've been putting off for a good long while for no good reason besides from me being a lazy inactive asshole piece of shit. Point is, I finally sat down and listened all the way through their s/t mini album and am sitting here kind of dumbfounded that I, like a jackass, let this band slip by and sit on my hard drive without notice for like 3 fucking months. This band hemorrhages pure energy with the kind of determination only matched by bands like Lightning Bolt and Godstomper. Of course, I make these comparisons because they're fast as fuck and primarily a drums-n-bass kinda band.

...Alright, I'm going to use this really trite formula to describe this band: cram Sabot, GODSTOMPER, Lightning Bolt, and a tiny of MiTB into a blender, crank it up to bludgeon and you've got Castrovalva.

Castrovalva - S/T Mini Album

They're putting out a single with their new line-up titled "Thug Life"...preorder that here.

...and now it IS 5am. Fuuuuuuuck.

--fred

Insect Warfare - Evolved Into Obliteration

Here's a new vinyl release adapted from their Demo CD that ran out of circulation shortly before the release of 'World Extermination'. Apparently some people like this more than the actual album...but that's probably because people get so damned sick of listening to the actual album (for instance: Grey, Nirvana, Black Flag). There's not a whole lot of difference I can hear between the demo and the final record, besides from the mix sounding a little dirtier (and the drums sounding a fuckload better). Nonetheless--a cool thing to have:

Insect Warfare - Evolved Into Obliteration 12"

--fred

Agathocles

Mincecore (politically driven grindcore) based in Belgium. The whole album is carried by one badass blastbeat through this noisy grinding mess of palm muting, distortion, and throaty vocals...my kind of shit.

Agathocles - Humarrogance

--fred