His Hero is Gone, Medicine demo

I saw His Hero is Gone in New Orleans in 1997 or 1998 at a tiny warehouse space off MLK called The Temple of the Becoming. Andon did a reunion show to open, and that in and of itself was pretty insane--with them thinking Shaggy wasn't going to show up, and him running in the door at the last possible second and grabbing the mic just as the vocals to the first song were supposed to kick in. He ended up puking in front of the stage after their set. So then His Hero is Gone plays. And they were amazing. And after that, these crazy bywater-style circus freak weirdos start putting all kinds of metal rods in the face and lighting the ends on fire, swinging a flaming ball and chain around the small space just inches from folks' faces. I only wish I had heard more of His Hero is Gone before seeing them live--like so many amazing bands who I would catch live before really getting into, Avail, Dropdead, Tragedy, etc--I would've flipped out if I had only seen them a year later.

For people who don't know anything about His Hero is Gone, they were from Memphis, Tennessee and played music that was dark and heavy. This is real hardcore. Ex-members of Copout, Man With Gun Lives Here, and Face Down. Folks from this band went on to be in Tragedy, From Ashes Rise,Deathreat, Call the Police, Dimilaia, Warcry, and Union of Uranus.

uncut live set at the Shelter Club in Tokyo, February 18th a long time ago

Medicine demo tape
Like Hell
View from a Holding Cell
Ghosts of Regret
Explosion
The Oracle
Of Thieves
Descent
Thank Your Lover in Sincerity
Bombs Away

Robinsons post-discography tracks

It's Just Rock & Roll
Slow Down
Vanessa
She's Basically My Girl
Cruisin'
I Keep Hitting on Girls, They Keep Hitting Me
Hop to the Record Shop
You're Just a Cover
You Can't Run From the Sun
Bryan Funck Ripped Us Off
I Love You (But the Game is One)
Bye Bye Baby

I Wanna Be a Ramone
Fun Times
Do the Gal-I-Gator
I'm Doing Fine
The Lucky One
Punk Rock Girls
I Should've Known Better
Tell Me Why
It's OK
She's Coming Over
I Hate Sonic Records
Excited
Dianna
Heathcliff Theme Song
Lovely Day to Break Up
You've Got to Hide Your Love Away
Where's the Rock & Roll?
Butch
Rock & Roll High School

Heathfliff / Suzie
Vanessa
She's My Girlfriend
I Hate Sonic Records
Stay the Same
Pulling Strings
I Keep Hitting on Girls, They Keep Hitting Me
Beat on the Brat
KLSU
Lucky One
Bogalusa
Punk's Not Dead
She Likes the Beatles
Beat on the Brat
She's Coming Over
Adam's Kazoo
One for Me
829 Kurt
Angela
And I Will Be with You
Hold Your Hand
Forty Dollars

Marrow tour demo

From the ashes of Greyskull comes Marrow. The new band includes Adam and Tony from Greyskull, Justin from Degania, and Parker from Taiga. Great, amazing hardcore. They're still looking for a full time bass player. Anyone live in the NW? The photo above is by Paul Smith. The demo below is three songs they did for a recent tour with Sojourner, a few songs that will probably be on the full length they're about to record.

Water Liver Fire - 1st Movement
Water Liver Fire - 2nd Movement
To the Lighthouse

Greyskull demo

One Christmas I got an email from a guy named Adam from a band from Tacoma, Washington called Greyskull. They were touring with Bafabegiya from Reno. They wanted a show on Christmas night, and some friends were already throwing a show at the infamous Dixie Taverne. I explained to them ahead of time that it was a bar show, but that they didn't card and that this was well known, so the show was all ages for all intents and purposes. Well, when they got there, someone was carding, so they were basically like "F this s!" and left. I think they tried calling me, but this was before I broke straightedge and had a cel phone. So they took off, and that was that. Until I moved to Oakland following the hurricane. I went and saw both bands open for Requiem at Gilman St., and dude from Bafabegiya got up and said "I love Gilman, blabbidle blah blah. You know, New Orleans just got hit by this hurricae or whatever, and it might never get rebuilt. We tried to go there once and the show wasn't all ages, so we didn't play. So who cares if New Orleans ever gets rebuilt? F it. Gilman rules." What a cracker.

Well, throughout all this tom foolery, I finally got to meet Adam from Greyskull who is sometimes awkward, but definitely a swell dude. Greyskull pretty much blew me away. It was like the second coming of Catharsis even more so than with Die Young. After this demo, they did a few splits, and had recorded a full length LP that was going to be released on Crimethinc. But they had some kind of band drama and broke up instead. Adam is now in Marrow, Tony is in Marrow and Owen Hart, Stephen is in Graf Orlock (and he also played in Owen Hart for a minute, I think), and Jules played in Elphaba. The picture above is by Seth from Mohoram Atta. The tracks below are from Greyskull's 2004 demo.

Rainbow Glitter Unicorn vs Rambo Nuclear Uniform
Smuttire
The End Result of Four Years in Temp Labor
Vegan Death Squad
When You Use the Word Gay as a Pejorative, You Sound Like a Big Fucking Idiot

Tragic Girls End Up Like This unreleased LP

When Shanga was first telling me about her new band, I think she said something about them being a hardcore band, or maybe just that they were hardcore. Anyway, I had this image in my mind of some sick ass all girl band, combining elements of the grindy late 90s screamo and the dark and chaotic late 90s hardcore. Unfortunately, Tragic Girls End Up Like This are more in the indie rock Sleater Kinney vein. Oh, well. They still ruled. The band featured Erin (Ovary Action), Sarah (Ovary Action), Shanga (Ovary Action pretty much), Emily (Hatchback), Cassia (New Bloods, My True Love) and Laine. This recording was done just a little bit before they broke up by James Whitten and Eric Martinez. It also features Amy Martinez on cello, I think.

Man of God
Mutiny
Femicide
Separate
Till Something Breaks
Dance Song
The Death of Me
Reflection
Ghost
Beckoning

The Carrie Nations demo and live sets

One time my friend Scott Beecher was coming through New Orleans on tour with the Carrie Nations who were playing a show at Nowe Miasto with This Bike is a Pipe Bomb. Not really a fan of Pipe Bomb, I went to the show to hang out with him and support Nowe Miasto. Am I glad that I did. Carrie Nations totally blew me away, and I wound up having their demo in my car on repeat for the next couple of weeks. Later on, I ended up doing a few shows for them in New Orleans, playing with them in Athens, and helping out some of their other bands. They broke up in early July of 2005, and I saw their last set in Athens where they basically played every single song they knew. It was amazing. Their other bands: American Cheeseburger (John), Dark Meat (Forest), Hot New Mexicans (Ian), and Welcome Home Nemo (Ian's solo thing which he was actually doing before Carrie Nations broke up as well). The picture above was taken by Eric Martinez on February 6th, 2003 at the show they played at the 829 House in Baton Rouge with the Robinsons.

demo:
Farming Communities
Occupation
Girlfriend
Former Babies
Citalivinded
Dumpsters as Providers of...

The Carrie Nations Are Ready to Party live CDR:
Magnum
Red Dawn
Bad Ideas, Brick Walls
Tri County Vampires
Ready to Party
Top Gun
Hell to Pay / Farming Communities
Sofa King
Former Babies / Red Dawn
Top Gun
Raving Notion / Civalivinded
Caveman
Outro

old interview that also has two mp3s from Be Still

The City is the Tower demo

Nathan Jesse lived here for a while with Jonathan West (Ghostwood, Gathered Here, etc.); then he moved back to his hometown of Albuquerque to be with his 12-year-old Christian girlfriend and "go to school." That didn't last, but he eventually finished college out there with a sweet degree in Philosophy and a love for straightedge hero Friedrich Nietzsche. In between all that he was in a pretty tight band called The City is the Tower. They were sort of sassy screamo, maybe influenced by a lot of that Level Plane stuff--but actually really, really good. There were plenty of great sing along parts, but not overdoing it the way bands like Comadre might, and they also still delivered on high energy and emotion. Nathan would eventually return to his real home in New Orleans, and Rob would move out to Boston to play drums for Constants. There's talk of CJ moving out here, but who knows? And where is Nathan? Is he still representing the ABQ, bee-yotch? Well, even though these guys are all split up across the country, they just played at South by Southwest, and they're meeting up in Albuquerque this summer to write and record new songs for split seven inches with Drowning with Our Anchors (San Francisco) and Thou (Baton Rouge). And after that, they plan on touring Europe in July 2009. Here are the five songs from their Party Ideas demo.

Hey, Uh... Could You Please Tell Your Dickhead Friend to Shut Up?
Dr. Whistletooth, D.D.S.
Wait, What the Fuck is a Panthomy?
Fhore or SSS-Hicks
Yuma, Yama, Yoma

Rougarou demo

Rougarou is pretty much my favorite band in New Orleans right now. There are a lot of good pop bands playing out these days--Black Belt, Ruben, Mad-E Ruthless, Attack the Gas Station, Further Reasoning--but I definitely think Rougarou is the best. They sound like everything you would love about poppy 90s alternative music channeled through a bunch of contemporary punks. And you can really tell that Paul listens to country and bluegrass. And Zegota. This is an allstar cast of musicians: Paul (The Critics, Paul Thibodeaux), Eric (Red Beards, Chopsley, etc.), Melissa (MCA), and Adam (Days Off). This demo was recorded to four-track by the band with some help from Greg Stein. They were recorded to tape and packed in wooden numbers each having a unique, handwritten message.

Freebird

Frozen Bones
Bottlecap
Success Approximation
Jefferson Parish
Even Flow
Window

Path of Daggers, Crown of Swords

After the hurricane in 2005, a bunch of us moved to California for work and nicer weather. Path of Daggers, Crown of Swords was an attempt at forming a New Orleans band while we were out there. It lasted about six practices and zero shows over the span of five or six months before I ended up moving back to New Orleans. The folks involved were Jonathan (Ghostwood, Gathered Here, Structural Damage), James (Ghostwood, Structural Damage, the Picts, Ginger Quail), Bryan (Dear Diary, Chopsley, Eat a Bag of Dicks, Morality Dictates), Matt (An Arrow in Flight), and Dominic (Days to Streaks). Matt was going to move to third guitar and was talking to Jose Palefox (Baader Brains, Swing Kids, Struggle) about taking over on drums, but that never happened. These are the five songs we recorded in James' apartment before I moved back to NOLA.

Everyone Who Abandoned New Orleans is Dead
Not All Fascists Look Like Hitler (Some Look Like Me)
Punks Who Make Trouble and Commit Crimes
Freedom Under Capitalism
Reincarnating Axl Rose

Mohoram Atta demo

I caught Mohoram Atta at one of the first shows I went to in Santa Cruz after moving out to the west coast. It was a pretty amazing show with Requiem, Greyskull, Gather, and Burial Year on the university campus in some small room. This is some brutal, dark stuff for fans of His Hero is Gone, Catharsis, etc. Randy from Gather used to be the second singer (he's on the demo), but he's moved on to the hobo life of travel. Mike Wreck has played in a bunch of other bands--Elliott Fucking Smith, Fell Voices, and tons more that I can't remember. And I know one of their guitar players is in some bro-hardcore band that I saw, but I can't remember their name either.

Cracked Face of a Megalith
Judgment Rising
Haud Caritas
Unfulfilled Hopes in Standard
Cursings for Disobediance
Violence, Internalized

Scourge demo

After Gather Broke up, Dustin started a band called Scourge with some other guys from the Bay Area scene: Frank, Harjit, and Andy. They sound like a black metal-influenced version of Left for Dead. I think they were all vegan straightedge.

Consequence
For the Horns
Blackened Hearts, Blackened Skies
Pretend You are a River
Songs of Wolves

Moloch demo

Moloch are an amazing hardcore/metal band from Nottingham. Their sound brings to mind old German metal bands from the 90s like Acme and Carol or the despondency of someone like Dystopia, but with that fuzzed out, sludgey, Sabbath/Eyehategod thing at times too. Ex-members of Braindead plus folks from Army of Flying Robots. Chris Braddock from this band also runs Feast of Tentacles Records, which is a pretty solid label. Thou is going to be doing a split with these guys sometime in the summer and, hopefully, touring the UK with them in the summer of 2009.

Green Pills
Mirror Fucker
Epidemic

Madeline Adams live sets

To celebrate Madeline's return to New Orleans next week, here are a few live sets! The photo above is from the New Orleans Plan It X Fest in 2005 and was taken by Chris George. The photo below was from the show at Eldon's House that Madeline played in 2006 and was taken by Tate Carson. And if you live in New Orleans or Baton Rouge, come hang out.

Live at the Bike Barn in Maine on June 22, 2005. Not sure who did the recording.

Intro
What the Devil Don't Know
Fish in the Sea
Johnny Cash
Slow Bang
Uncle's Got a Sweetheart
Got a Light in My Pocket

Live in the Lobby. Also not sure where this one came from.
Going North
I Know You Won't
Why Did You do It?
Uncle's Got a Sweetheart
Oh, Lord, I'm Overcome
What the Devil Don't Know
Silver Trucks
Work My Hands to the Bone

Madeline & the Beets, Very First Show CDr.
Silver Trucks
Scurvy Sailor Man
Oh My Darling
Slow Down
I Won't Be the First
I Left the Light On

Live at the Big Top in New Orleans on February 27, 2006. Recorded by Paul Thibodeaux.
Uncle's Got a Sweetheart, Pt. 2
What the Devil Don't Know
unreleased song
Nobody
Home to Me
Machina de Bella
Against the World and Losing the Battle
Rain, Fire, and Brimstone
Johnny Cash
A Different Place
Shakin in My Boots
I Left the Light On

Live at Eldon's House in New Orleans on March 29, 2006. Recorded by Eldon Ahrold.
unreleased song
Against the World and Losing the Battle
Bella's Song
unreleased song
Uncle's Got a Sweetheart, Pt. 2
Oh My Darling
I Know You Won't
Sleeping Dogs
Nobody
Silver Trucks
Tie One On
I Do What I'm Told
Home to Me
Fish in the Sea

Bonus tracks from the Madeline website:
I Left the Light On
Seein Double
Sailing Away
Shaking in My Boots
Bella's Song
I Do What I'm Told
Home to Me
Against the World and Losing the Battle
To Hell and Back
Sleeping Dogs

And if you really want them, you can probably find a few more live sets here. Just do a search for "madeline" or "madeline adams."

Chopsley (the first)

Chopsley formed in late 1999 and was supposed to be a "joke grindcore band with breakdowns." It became a joke band that we all took a little too seriously and subsequently broke up after only nine months. The original line-up consisted of Steve W. (Head Pro, Dear Diary I Seem to Be Dead, A Hunger Artist, Secret Passage), Andy (Head Pro, The Ghostwood), Eddie (Eat a Bag of Dicks, The Interview), Steve S. (Mad Cow Crisis, Morality Dictates, Eat a Bag of Dicks), and Bryan (Morality Dictates, Eat a Bag of Dicks, Dear Diary I Seem to Be Dead, Thou). We only played a handful of shows, but most of them were with some amazing bands (Zao, Zegota, At the Drive-In, Atom & His Package, Casket Lottery) and we were also scheduled to play with some big bands whose tours fell apart (Incantation, The Varukers, From Ashes Rise, Strong Intention). Chopsley formed a bond early on with fellow local band Hatchback which probably led to Chuck playing bass for Head Pro, Eric coming on the Head Pro tour, and the eventual creation of Dear Diary I Seem to Be Dead. At one point, we had scheduled a week or two of touring with Hatchback, but it was canceled when the first couple of weeks of their tour ended in disaster, and we couldn't get all of the dates on our end booked solid. We did have a show scheduled for Atlanta with Social Infestation and Otophobia. We probably should've gone up for that one.

The weekend before we were supposed to record all of our songs, we broke up. Only these four demos survived. They were recorded by James Whitten and Greg Stein sometime in early 2000.

Rectal Anarchy in the UK
We Broke Your Bass
Uptown Straightedge Ninjas
Monster X is Back

Recently, Chopsley reformed with all the original members except for Eddie (who lives in Oakland, California these days) and with the addition of longtime Chopsley adversary Scott (Head Pro, Secret Passage). Soon after practices began, Andy decided to quit the band and move out to Mountainview, California and was replaced by Chopsley side member Eric (Calvin & the Snobbes, Hatchback, PROMIS, Eat a Bag of Dicks, Dear Diary, Red Beards, Rougarou, Secret Passage, etc.). A few shows have been played, more are in the works, and an LP is being written.

website

Loblaws demo

In the summer of 2007, Mike Patton from Chalmette, Louisiana moved his family up to Nashville, Tennessee thus ending the Robinsons reign of pop punk terror over the fair city-state of New Orleans. He's recently started a band up there with his brother Brett (from Sally Stitches), and his friend-brothers Wyatt and Todd (from Second Saturday). They recorded three demo tracks on Sunday, March 2, 2008.

Tossing and Turning
Betsy Took My Baby Away
Jimmy

Later in 2008, Mutant Pop released the first Loblaws 7" called The Loblaws Won't Stop which has new versions of "Tossing and Turning" and "Jimmy" plus a cover of the Beatnik Termites song "9:15" and a new Loblaws song called "It'll Take a Lot." There will be a split 7" to be released on One Eye Records with New Orleans pop punks The Rooks sometime in early 2009. When that's done, I'll post the mp3s on the blog.

You can find updates on the Loblaws here.

The picture above is from the show they played at the Big Top in New Orleans with the Ergs, Hunchback, and Rougarou (and sort of with Haarp and Thou). The famous Eric Martinez took it, and has one more here. This show was completely over-run with Mike's relatives and kids. It was intense. Surely, the legions of Chalmette can claim the day.