Victim of Time

VIDEO FEED: The Teengenerate Documentary (2014)

Sue R. System

For anyone still standing with us that lived through the '90s punk onslaught, TEENGENERATE were the guiding light through the haze. A band almost too good to be true and always full of surprises, their short window of existence from 1993-1995 was just a flash in time in retrospect, but if you were lucky enough to touch the hem of their garments, you know the magic we're talking about. Lucky for us an official TEENGENERATE documentary was produced in 2014 and has to been seen to be believed, so if you haven't experienced it, you're really in for a treat. And it just so happens that Hozac Records has just unleashed the essential Live At the Empty Bottle LP capturing the band at their peak, recorded in the eye of the storm.

An earth-moving night in Chicago, 30 crazy years ago, caught HOT on tape and finally unleashed! Teengenerate were a force to be reckoned with in the ‘90s garage punk underground and with their string of classic singles and LPs, the Midwest was just STARVED for these heathens to break our minds wide open. And they did, and some of us were just “never the same.”

Just an awe-inspiring brute force of punk purity, slashing through incredible covers of THE KIDS, PAGANS, and FUN THINGS and sowing the seeds of obscure punk obsessions to no end with their savage treasure map of sick sounds.

The heat, the power, the rage and the euphoria, it just doesn’t always align like it did when Fink & Fifi took the stage. Sure enough, it was this month 30 years ago that our minds were blown apart and our eyes were opened and a life-changing rock’n roll performance that commemorates the 50th release on the Hozac Archival subsidiary. Secretly recorded by Ken White, the Brides’ right hand man, and mastered by TIM WARREN of Crypt Records for maximum authenticity, Live at the Empty Bottle just explodes out of the grooves and will level anyone within earshot, just like it did when Teengenerate desecrated Chicago TWICE on the same night (check out their VML Live at the Fireside Bowl 7? too!), 30 crazy years ago this month.

Grab a copy HERE while you still can!

TEENGENERATE 'Get Action!' documentary (2014)

TEENGENERATE Live at 251 Club Shimokitazawa

VIDEO FEED: Television Personalities Live in Germany, 1984

Gene Abnormality

Just recently this incredible (and really well-recorded) set from the 1984 lineup of the legendary Television Personalities surfaced on YouTube, and its pretty much the best thing you're going to see for a while. This the the JOWE HEAD lineup, and the fact that stuff like this can just "appear" 40+ years after it happened is one of the only god things left about the ol' Internet. The superb sound quality really sticks out and the blurry, almost hallucinogenic analog TV color really adds that special something. Truly a gift from the lo-fi gods of rock'n roll we don't deserve, so kick this into full-screen mode and ENJOY, and stay tuned for Jowe's upcoming book ESCAPADES 1980-2022 coming later this year on Hozac Books!

From the listing:
On the 7th of January 1984, The Television Personalities were on stage at the famous Forum Enger Club, Germany.

The support band was Die Sauberen Drei. This gig was booked by Macs Beckmann, who got Thomas Zimmermann into booking TVPs by posting him a hand written letter in January 1983. The sound engineer was Wigbert Pieper.

The band: Dan Treacy - Vox, Guitar, Joe Foster - Vox, Guitar, Dave Musker - Vox, Organ, Jeff Bloom - Drums, and Jowe Head (who had just joined on) - Vox, Bass

This nth generation video looks very trippy / fuzzy but it is a unique occasion to see and hear the TVPs play a 2 hours and 20 minutes gig filled with fan’s favourites.

On that night, The Television Personalities played Jowe's song “Shiny Black Shirt”. There are also a couple of more or less unrecorded songs on there.

Set List:
• Jack The Ripper
• Silly Girl
• Someone to Share my Life with
• The Picture of Dorian Gray
• Stop and Smell the Roses
• Look back in Anger
• La Grande Illusion
• David Hockney’s Diaries
• I know where Syd Barrett Lives
• The Painted World
• The Love is Gone
• If I could Write Poetry
• Pablo Picasso
• Conscience Tells me No
• Sense of Belonging
• Shiny Black Shirt
• Part Time Punks
• Three Wishes
• Painter Man
• Arthur the Gardener
• Back to Viet Nam
• Day in Heaven
• Where's Bill Grundy now
• Set the Control to the Heart of the Sun (Medley)
• Waiting for my Man
• Sister Ray
• Roadrunner
• Batman
• Miles and Miles / Substitute
• Louie Louie
• Pushing too Hard
• 96 Tears
• She Loves You / Helter / Skelter
• Hang on Soopy
• Venus in Furs (beginning)

VIDEO FEED: The BRIDES at Beat Kitchen 2001

Gene Abnormality

“Mid-90s… stumbling about sloshed on as much cheap beer as I could drink… The times had turned from bands covering the Sonics to the Dead Boys/Pagans Midwest Killed By Death axis. Fast, real punk was IN and it felt good. Loli & Chones, Problematics, Registrators, Rip Offs, Reatards, Teengenerate… so many good bands killing it, but none that hit as hard me as The Brides. Snotty no-frills Midwest punk like it should be played- desperate, mean, frantic, fast and perfect. The legitimate heirs to the Pagans/Dead Boys/Zero Boys highest punk honors. Amazing live and on record – not always the case in those days, either. Shoulda had an album, more tours, fame, and all that. But live fast, die punk. So it went with the Brides. Happy to have this compilation, more worthy minds will get destroyed by The Brides!” – Eric Oblivian

The mid-’90s, Chicagoland. Suburban highschool angst… Ska, math-rock, and the dying embers of pop-punk were the rage. I actively disliked all of it. I’d spend the occasional weekend at the Dummy Room (a record store) off of Ashland Ave. and the owner would recommend ’70s/’80s punk and rock’n roll that would become essential in the years to come. Pagans. Viletones. Heartbreakers. But I needed more rock’n roll. I had to start a band to fill the void that I felt in the Chicago scene, but things were dire back then. Cultural starvation. I left a flyer at the record store and eventually got in contact with brothers Nick and Damien Dagovitz and then The O’Langutan, the latter of which would eventually blame me for him breaking my own bass that he was playing because “Why would you ever think that’s it’s cool to let a wildman play your bass? You knew that I’m a wildman”. That should have been a clear indication that his brain-moths were not circling the lightbulb correctly, but nope, I looked past it and the band kept on for another year or so. We played some great shows, thanks to Alec Budd of the Problematics and Tom Smith in Green Bay. And I guess that we recorded some okay songs, mostly thanks to Jim Kuczkowski in Indianapolis. But the band wasn’t getting along and after fights and some really difficult gigs, it became a slog. So, by 19, I dissolved it and moved to San Francisco. And that was the end of it.

Until now. I haven’t listened to these tracks in years, but some of them still hold up. Thank you to my old buddies at HoZac for kicking this dead horse, also Al and the Kooch, and thanks to Todd G. from Indy. Eric O. always had our back, as did Tom S. All my respect goes out to Ken White, who was like a fifth member of the band. And of course Jim O., Erik B. and especially Russ C.

I hope that you kids enjoy these tunes as much as I enjoyed writing and covering them. Cheers,
– J. Ross Fisher

It' finally here! The long-awaited LP comp from “Chicago’s Best Band of the 1990s” is in the pipe and on the way. Featuring the legendary previously unreleased 8-song 1997 demo tracks, the scorching 7? tracks, and previously unheard alternates & live demos all set to provide the soundtrack to your inaugural decapitation upon receipt.

Pre-ORDER from Hozac HERE and stream the 2001 Beat Kitchen reunion show right here:

BREAKING SOUNDS: Gentilesky "In The Flesh"

Slick Predicament

Tighter than nails, and with an irascibly bleak swagger, this indefinably irresistible female-fronted Sardinian/Istanbul supergroup with members of The Rippers, Love Boat, Maggot Madness, Haywire Desire and Poster-iti is just what your witch’s doctor ordered. Lightning-fast bass-blast rhythms intertwined with uncontrollable surges of anguished vocals from one Yaprak Kirdok, one of the best new vocalists you haven’t heard yet. Sounds of regional UK compilation cuts from ’79-80 seep in, and a blistering byproduct of invigorating post-punk cultural complexity pours back out, showering you with cuts of paranoid precision and an ever-growing intensity that seems to loom behind each passing track. A driving repetition, an escalating scale of confrontation, and it’s teeth-cracking tracks like “In The Flesh” that will persevere long after these souls pass on through the ether. It won’t be long until someone covers that one!

With one of the most perversely addictive takes on the post-punk sound we’ve heard in ages, Gentilesky has a really great thing going with their sweepingly frantic style, and you just can’t help but get excited about this “City of Boredom” they keep referring to, either. The impeccable accents, the visceral heat, and the power of restraint have never come together so well. Do not miss Gentilesky in any way, shape, or form; truly one of Europe’s newest powerhouses of modern underground excitement.

Recommended If You Like: Bush Tetras, Mo-Dettes, Lizzy Mercier Descloux, Sweeping Promises, Celia & the Mutations, Tyrades, Spread Joy, Liliput, Edith Nylon, The Slits, Consensus Madness

Ways Of Seeing LP by Gentilesky

STREAM "In The Flesh" from the debut LP HERE and order a copy of the first pressing of 350 HERE.

EXHUMED: THE KIDS with Johnny Depp (1982)

Gene Abnormality

Did you know actor JOHNNY DEPP was part of the punk/new wave scene in Florida in the early 1980s? Sure enough, Depp and his first band The Kids gigged around Miami & South Florida punk venues in the early-mid 80s before departing for LA and joining the Rock City Angels, one of the later 80s coulda-been contenders. The majorly under-the-radar South Florida punk & new wave scene of the late 70s-80s is covered extensively in the new upcoming book release PUNK UNDER THE SUN - '80s Punk and New Wave In South Florida by Joey Seeman and Chris Potash, shipping next month from Hozac Books.

Check out an exclusive first glimpse at once of the many interesting excerpts from this new book shedding a much-needed light on the non-traditional punk scenes that sprung up in the wake of First Wave punk in the US. Dig in and be sure to get your PRE-ORDER in for this amazing new book!

The Kids, or Kidz as they originally called themselves, rose out of the ashes of the Tight Squeeze scene. Bruce Witkin had been the last bass player of Tight Squeeze (after Teddy Rooney) and was young and ambitious enough to keep going in the local music scene after Tight Squeeze disbanded. Bruce assembled the Kids with himself on bass and vocals, John “Beano” Hanti on drums, and guitarists Mitch Perry and Gio Ardizolla, in 1978. They played at the Tight Squeeze until it closed 1979 and then went on to other venues such as the Agora Ballroom and the Treehouse.

Mitch Perry: I was hitchhiking to the beach and who pulls over? Bruce and Beano! Needless to say, I never made it to the beach that day.

As a band manager, owner of a booking agency, and all-around maternal figure, Sheila Witkin kept various bands and musicians working on the club circuit, providing emotional support as well as steady gigs to the bands in her orbit. Now, with a little help from Sheila—Bruce’s mom—the Kids soon found themselves regularly packing the Agora and landing coveted opening slots for bands like Psychedelic Furs, U2, the Pretenders, Iggy Pop, Joan Jett, and even Chuck Berry. Once Mitch Perry left for greener pastures, there was room for a new guitarist: Johnny Depp.

Mitch Perry: I had been telling Johnny I was getting ready to leave the Kids and head to L.A.

Bruce Witkin: Johnny had a little band that was sorta like ours, ‘cause he wanted to join our band. We were in the middle of a transition, changing guitar players.

The Kids played an infectious brand of new wave meets power pop. Their live sets were a mix of original songs and crowd-pleasing covers, much like Tight Squeeze before them.

Bruce Witkin: We were playing around town, Hollywood, Hallandale, everywhere we could. We’d go up the coast. We could make a living playing music in Florida! It was odd, because when we moved to L.A. that was not the case at all.

One of the Kids’ shows was their appearance in 1980 at the John Lennon Memorial Concert in Miami’s Bayfront Park. Also on the bill that day, the Reactions were up first and thoroughly pissed off the audience by refusing to play anything resembling peace-and-love tunes. They instead delivered a noisy, rambunctious, typical Reactions set, refusing to compromise for the occasion. The Kids went on next and soothed the crowd by catering to what they wanted: a bunch of well-played Beatles songs.

Also in 1980, the Kids reached the finals of the Rising Stars battle-of-the-bands competition at the Agora. Local rockers Freewheel ultimately won the night, but the Reactions and the Kids were both heavily favored to take the prize.

By 1982 the Kids were starting to feel the limits of the local South Florida scene, so they decided to cut a single in the hopes of getting some radio airplay and expanding their reach. The self-financed “I Wanna Be Me” b/w “Time to Explain” 7-inch was released on Aria Records. Open Books and Records kept the single stocked by ordering at least 50 copies, recalls Open Records founder Leslie Wimmer.

Bruce Witkin: When Johnny joined, things got to the peak of what they could be. So we just decided it’s time to get out of Florida because no music business was coming down there... at all. The industry didn’t think there was any original rock music there.

On December 1, 1983, the band moved to Los Angeles on the advice of promoter Don Ray and had some modest success under the name Six Gun Method. By the time they arrived, however, the musical landscape had changed. The new L.A. glam metal sounds of Mötley Crüe and Quiet Riot had taken over the Sunset Strip and the radio airwaves. Power pop and new wave were losing their footing.

Bruce Witkin: The band never really broke up. One of the guys went home for a minute, and you know . . . fast forward twenty-five years later and we’re playing a reunion show in Florida for my mom (the Sheila Witkin Memorial shows). When we first got to L.A., we heard Mötley Crüe on the radio and we knew we were too late.
Between gigs, guitarist Johnny Depp landed a role in Oliver Stone’s 1986 film Platoon. While Witkin and Depp were both going out on casting calls and looking for their break, Depp also started playing guitar in another transplanted South Florida band, the Rock City Angels. Depp had known vocalist Bobby Durango from back in their early club days.

Bobby Durango: My head was not in a good place in those days, I was doing a lot of drugs. And it was Johnny who helped me get off them. I don’t even know if he’s aware of it or not, but he really helped me.
The Angels had scored a major-label deal and were being whispered around town as the next big thing. Depp contributed writing to the song “Mary,” which ended up on their 1988 MCA debut album, Young Man’s Blues. However, Depp’s next acting gig, on the TV series 21 Jump Street, would take him off the rock ‘n’ roll path for the next few years. Still, the Kids kept gigging and rehearsing sporadically.

Check out "I Wanna Be Me" and "Time To Explain" by THE KIDS from their sole 7" release in 1982, right here and make sure to PRE-ORDER the Punk Under The Sun - 80s Punk and New Wave in South Florida BOOK, shipping SOON from Hozac Books right HERE..

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EXHUMED: Screaming Urge BUY LP (1980)

Beck Teria

“Homework” was an earth-shaker the first time I heard it. Blasting off the sketchy CD-R on the Hyped2Death volume of Homework Volume 1: American DIY R-T, it defined frantic punked-out power pop from the Midwest. In such great company on those comps, sometimes the tracks seemed to seep into each other, yet Screaming Urge seemed to consistently dig itself deeper, standing out and don’t forget, they named their entire SERIES after that invigorating cut! Columbus, Ohio, in the late 1970s had an incredible cast of characters running around Mr. Brown’s, Crazy Mama’s and such. Tommy Jay, Mike Rep, Ron House, Jim Shepherd, Nudge, it must have just been a brown leather fever dream! “Released” on Mike Rep’s New Age label in 1980, the “Homework” single is pure American DIY punk gold that really checks all the boxes.

Overbearing parents, teenage frustration, beer, everything you’d want in a punchy underground would-be hit. Later the same year they released their powerhouse debut LP BUY, (aka The Blue Album) on Garner Records, which has sadly been out-of-print for 43 years, until now. Packaged together with the “Homework” 7” tracks and freshly remastered, this Ohio Punk milestone is finally available again.

Pre-Order the expanded archival LP from HoZac Records HERE

TRACK PREMIERE: BURNT ENVELOPE - "Nothing To Do" b/w "Something To Do"

Sue R. System

There really isn’t much you can do to prepare yourself for something as profound as Burnt Envelope. Punk this “pure” has to be fake these days, or does it? We stumbled upon this band (or is it high concept performance art?) the old fashioned way, on a podcast while being quarantined for a global pandemic, and its charm and impressively brazen lack of luster wiggled its way deep inside the Hozac brain trust, big time. Starring the eternally optimistic Anthony Pasquarosa (formerly of Weeping Bong Band, Frozen Corn, Gluebag, etc), the Burnt Envelope concept is very easy to swallow, and impossible not to immediately heave back up. If there was a “ballet” for sloptastic stoner-sweat exercise routines, this would be the Swan Lake. And Burnt Envelope would probably end up drowning in that lake, because you, my dear, are indeed “Stuck in this World.” If you’ve been curious about Ancestry.com and the like, “23 and Me” will be the song that gets you through the rest of 2023 with a spring in your step, a smile on your face, and a shot in your eye. “I’m A Chameleon Parts 1&2” are some of the most ambitious tracks ever released on this label, a seriously hypnotic soured mash of “Sister Ray” and Randy Savage/Mean Gene Okerlundisms that will cast a heavy spell, only to crack your wits out with a Maggots-esque “Nothing To Do” that will leave you dizzy and drooling.

Set up as singles across the dehumanizing entire LP, every two tracks is in essence a “single” and quickly sears your fingers/toes and brain/ass simultaneously. Burnt Envelope is the modern national treasure you never knew we had, a brilliant barrage of slop punk perfection and black humor that shows we’ve still got a long way to go with “evolution,” and a nasty reminder of the beauty of a perfectly fried guitar solo. Will this immaturity get old any time soon? Not as long as baby shit stinks it won’t, and this incredible LP will give you the courage you need to tackle tomorrow’s hurdles, at least in your brain. Don’t worry, we won’t let many people get copies of this, we promise. People in stone houses shouldn’t thrown glass as it just gets everywhere, and it’s a huge mess to clean up….

Recommended if you like: Jensen & Earles, Red Cross, Peer Pressure, Flipper, The Spits, Macho Man Randy Savage, Black Flag, Black Randy, The Maggots, Hillside Stranglers

PRE-ORDER the LP here, shipping this month from HoZac Records

I'm Immature II by Burnt Envelope

BREAKING SOUNDS: The Rubs "Here In My Dream"

Janet Orr

Oh how we’ve missed The Rubs, let us count the ways! One of the finest of Chicago’s last wave of rock’n roll resuscitation of the late 2010s, who uprooted the whole project for greener pastures in Kansas City, MO, yet still continues to churn forth incredible hooks by the bucket-load, no matter where they land. Here we have the anxiously awaited third long-player, Dust – still entirely written, composed, and performed by the one-man-army that is Joey Rubbish, and still creating those invigorating waves of euphoria you’ve come to know and love from this essential hit-machine. After settling into a new living situation in a new city, the hits just kept pouring out, and as the dust settled after several reconfigurations over the next years, the Dust LP finally took its final, gleaming form, as the LP you have here. Another knockout collection of pristine pop bangers laced with mesmerizing guitar and/or sizzling mellotron solos, woven into impossibly contagious harmonies that should effectively put the CDC on high alert.

And as The Rubs have always had a clear window open on the meat-grinder of influences, with this outing you’ll feel whisps of the ethereal late 60s Kinks, as well as Thin Lizzy-esque soft explosions twisting effortlessly around core-revitalizing melodic exercises that might even make the Everlys blush with envy. Dust is one of those eternal records that seems like its always been here, and will always remain, its just always been behind a corner you hadn’t looked around yet. The sheer quality of these tracks and seamless execution are a marvel of the modern world’s DIY ethos in practice. There don’t seem to be many folks making records this brutally simple and honest in these sad, sad times, and its our hope that Dust’s hypnotic allure sticks to you as well, as it always has that tendency to do in a world of endless static electricity.

Recommended If You Like: The Beat, Donny Denim, The Jeanies, Kinks, The Toms, Plimsouls, Nick Lowe, Real Kids, The Fevers, Dutchess & Duke, Rockpile, Wreckless Eric

Stream the Kinks-soaked "Here In My Dream" from the new Dust LP right here and order a copy of the 1st press GOLD EDITION here!

Dust LP by The Rubs

VIDEO FEED: Revelons Live at CBGB 1980

Beck Teria

The Revelons are known to punk provocateurs one of the best “lost bands” of the CBGB era who simply released one earth-moving 7” single on Ork Records in 1979, didn’t get signed to a major, and shuffled back into the shadows of an ever-growing scene. Fronted by Gregory Lee Pickard, the band dug into the trenches of New York City’s seedy Bowery life and were frequent players alongside most of the top-tier punk bands of the time, becoming mainstays at not only CBGB but Mudd Club, Danceteria, Hurrah’s and Max’s as well as incorporating a rotating cast of members that at times featured Richard Lloyd of Television and Jay Dee Dougherty of the Patti Smith Group in the lineup.

Incorporating a brash and aggressive pop sound with a vicious edge, The Revelons teetered between Television-like sparkling minimal artistic flourishes, but with more raw & primitive delivery. To which, they solidified their street-level prowess with a tenderized toughness not many other bands could match. The Revelons also were pretty hard to pigeonhole sound-wise then as they are now, with Talking Heads comparisons generally falling short, but there were some genuine Doo Wop moments that sneak in as well, showing their deeper roots to the NYC of days long past.

But the real crime here is that this previously unreleased collection of recordings has never appeared in the vinyl LP format, as it surely would have escalated The Revelons’ profile much higher in the timeline of New York Punk, and in the minds of rock’n roll historians across the globe. Its a fully-realized album overloaded with massive cuts that’s sadly been forgotten for far too long, so of course, we felt like it was our responsibility to make that happen, and we hope you enjoy this instant-classic album of 1977-82 material from one of New York City’s overlooked gems.

Check out the entire live set from 1980 at CBGB right here, and order the Revelons 1977-82 Archival LP right HERE.

VIDEO PREMIERE: SNIPER (pre-Ramones) 1973

Gene Abnormality

So we've ALL been anxiously waiting anything, and I mean ANYTHING from the near-mythical pre-RAMONES band SNIPER, fronted by Jeff Hyman (Joey Ramone you pedestrian), and now that glorious day has finally come.

Just today a Spanish Youtube account posted a SNIPER video from a public-access broadcast of a NYC show called Underground Tonight, featuring this INCREDIBLE video by SNIPER. Literally drop everything and watch NOW.

1973, New York.

America was at such a turning point and punk as we know it was just around the corner, but in this "golden hour" before the safety pins and razor blades took hold, PUNK was an unrestrained unrestricted MASS of possibilities, and that we can't ever forget.