September, 2025 Show

 Hello, everyone, here is my additional commentary for my September, 2025 show on Dandelion Radio (dandelionradio.com):

 

I am a huge fan of cover songs in general, but I particularly like cover versions that really get creative.  I wanted to include a handful of really interesting cover versions of Black Sabbath songs, which meant setting aside "faithful" covers done in a more or less metal style.  I think you will enjoy these five interpretations that I chose.  My favorite of the bunch is probably the Brownout song because it is such a powerful arrangement.  It goes well beyond the familiar (but often uninspired) genre transplants that appear everywhere:  a reggae version of a punk song, a surf guitar version of a Taylor Swift song, etc.  

The other Sabbath covers are each outstanding in their own way.  Could there be a more powerful and effective choice than Beth Gibbons for a chilling cover of "Black Sabbath?"  Did you check out the restrained version of Four Tet's "Iron Man?"  The added vocals and lyrics of the Ruder Than You track ("paranoid, paranoid... makes me paranoid") lifts this version into unique territory.  Finally, we have the BBQ Chickens and their version of "Symptom Of The Universe."  I gotta be honest, though I love this cover my favorite is by far the Sepultura version from twenty something years ago, but the BBQ Chickens version is a better fit for the show.

 The KLBDE track is interesting mainly because the band's musical style is different from most of the other artists on Poland's Enigmatic label, which typically skews toward modern and traditional punk.

 While Washington, DC is better known for Dischord bands and Go-Go music, there are a number of current bands that are coming up with their own stuff, including Light Beams and BRNDA.  

 The Fuzz Club label puts out almost all great stuff, but there are a few albums from them that have come out in 2025 that are just incredible and the Aank album by Kombynat Robotron is an excellent example of that.  There is some sort of cross-pollinating of early Killing Joke and Pelican and a little Osees.  Brilliant.

I mentioned how great the new DC bands like BRNDA and Light Beams are, but let's never forget how masterful most of the Dischord bands are.  This month I included songs from Soulside and Shudder To Think, who appeared in the late 1980s very early 1990s period of Dischord.  Sadly I never saw Soulside live though I did see Shudder To Think open for My Bloody Valentine in Detroit in 1990 or 1991 (don't hold me to the year).

I am so happy that there are an incredible number of bands from Spain and Latin America that are taking traditional Latin song styles (tango, cumbia, salsa, etc.) and really spinning them around into something quite unique, and this new album by Julián Mayorga is a great example of that.

The Fall fans (including me) can argue endlessly about how many eras exist of The Fall, and where the boundaries are (does the "Brix" era begin with Perverted By Language or The Wonderful and Frightening World Of... ?).  That is a book length discussion.  Regardless, from this chronological era of The Fall I do really like Light User Syndrome.  For several reasons it takes me back to the Beggars Banquet years.

So how about that Bar-B-Q Killers track?  The tone of the tune reminds me a lot of a band called Inca Babies- if you don't know them do yourself a favor and check them out.

I'm honestly not sure what to make of Tism just yet.  At their best they sound like the second coming of Stump, but at other times they seem to creep toward the line of a novelty act.  

The Varukers... one of my favorite D-Beat bands.  Just incredible.

I know I mentioned the Spanish/Latin bands that are doing great new things with the core of traditional song styles, but we also have a wealth of great artists putting out cool music in every current style: punk, cold wave, stoner metal, you name it.  Sexores:  muy bien!

Envy Of None are making some really cool indie rock music that is not only really good but let's the music speak for itself.  Yes, they have Alex Lifeson of Rush on guitar, but here they are on a teeny tiny label, with their music available on Bandcamp and all of that.  No big shot rock star promotion or attitude in sight.  

Have you ever wondered what Half Japanese would sound like if Jad Fair had a hardcore band backing him?  This is what it would sound like.  You are welcome.

I haven't listened to this Dead Kennedys EP in ages- literally probably decades.  Something made this song pop in my head while I was putting this show together, so there you have it.  The In God We Trust EP definitely has a faster, more hardcore sound and pace to it, much like Misfits had with their Earth A.D. album.  Nothing wrong with that.

I know nothing about Red Dragon.  I heard this song in 2000 or 2001 when I had cable television.  The cable channels included a few dozen music only channels, and I heard this song on the reggae channel.

Otoboke Beaver just put out two live albums of recent shows, and though I have not yet seen them live (just on YouTube) you can really tell that any live audio of OB, no matter how well recorded, will never come close to being there in person.

This Automatic song reminds me vaguely of Peter Bjorn & John, which is a compliment to both bands.

When I re-listened to this SLF song for the first time in a few years, I forgot just how much the crop of Hot Topic mall punks like Rancid really don't have an original bone in their body.

If you like this sort of neo-soul, be sure to check out Plaid Room Records and their Colemine Records label.  Nobody is doing neo-soul and neo-funk better than them these past couple of years.

We are fortunate to have a lot of really cool bands that are putting out unique variations on old punk themes (like Nunchukka Superfly and their James Chance revival sound) or just putting some fresh muscle into punk themes that don't need change, just fresh blood (Class Act- oh, man, if you like traditional or late-hardcore go out any buy anything you can from these guys in any format available).

I'm not as inspired to see live shows as much as I used to be, but if Conny Frischauf ever plays in Washington, DC or Baltimore I will be there.  Central European music that does and does not sound like Central European music.

I saw My Bloody Valentine so long ago (1990?  give or take) that I don't remember how many songs they played from Isn't Anything.  They were touring Loveless, so of course that was the meat of the show.  That band was LOUD.   

Speaking of live shows, probably around that time I saw That Petrol Emotion at a different show but at the same venue (St. Andrews Hall in Detroit).  It was a good show though I can't remember who opened.  That first album of TPE is so good though the production is a bit claustrophobic.

I got my physical copy of the Blanco Teta album a couple of weeks ago and boy am I happy!  If you are in the USA see if you can get it from the Forced Exposure mail order site- they had a good price on it with reasonable shipping.

What did I say about Tism earlier?  Ahh, so what about Toy Dolls and their pub-punk sound?  Nobody sounds like Toy Dolls, simple as that.  For the life of me I'll never know how a copy of their first 7" (the "Tommy Kowwie's Car" ep) found its way into a local record store in Ann Arbor, Michigan in 1982 but it did and my friend bought it.  I'm not sure what made him buy it but I'm glad that he did.

I don't know much about Just Mustard- I somehow found out about their most recent album and now I need to work my way backward, and I look forward to it.  The same goes for Niis, Smash Your Face, Los Soberanos, and Sex Faces (hello Washington, DC).  

The Halibuts, on the other hand, I am pretty familiar with.  They come out of that 1980s-1990s-2000s wave of surf guitar bands that play well-crafted surf tunes.  Did you notice the sleigh bells?  That's an even better use of sleigh bells than "Melody Day" by Caribou.

Boris has been putting out a few new live albums of past studio records done live in their entirety.  I'm trying my best to keep up financially with the output but I will probably have to settle for digital on one or two of the new albums.

I have no idea how a modern Indonesian neo-C86 band got picked up by Precious Recordings, but who cares?  This is a great release by a band that sound dynamite.  Precious Recordings deserves a gold something for putting out so many great BBC archival releases (like the fantastic Motorcycle Boy BBC Sessions), and here they go putting out really cool new stuff too.  It all warms my little C86 heart.

Listen carefully to the opening rhythm of the La Redada track.  Does it remind you of anything?  If you need help let me know.

TVOD (Television Overdose, according to their Bandcamp page) is really good.  It will be really interesting to hear what their next album sounds like.

Next we have a track by Memest which sounds like some sort of mixture of Dead Kennedys and Motorhead.  It's been eleven years since this release, so I hope that isn't the end of them.

I am a newbie when it comes to Jamaican mento music, but I am really excited to learn.  It definitely reminds me calypso, especially the vocals.  I am very grateful to digital labels like Canary and Dust To Digital that are tirelessly digitizing 78s and the earliest 45s from every corner of the world.

I have that Lice track on one of those Rough Trade compilation CDs.  Between my giant stack of Rough Trade comps and my just as big stack of Messthetics compilation CDs I am staying busy.  Yet another band on my ever growing list of "artists I need to explore in much more detail."

The Bonnie Trash song, which is the first track on their new album, isn't like anything else on the album but I thought it made for a good show closer.  Maybe I should have used it for the October show for the spooky feel to it.

 

That's it for now, I hope you like the September show, which is still on rotation on the Dandelion Radio site for another ten days and on demand after that.

- David