Alternative Tentacles US Vinyl & CDs

Review: You may have heard that former Dead Kennedys frontman and now multi-project artist Jello Biafra leads his very own School Of Medicine, inspired by the pioneering medicinal discoveries of his antecedents Iggy Pop and hip-hop greats such as Hieroglyphics and Digital Underground. The Audacity Of Hype, the School's first patent, was the logical chemical synthesis that made up these ingredients; fiery, crunchy, high-velocity, hardcore punk and post-punk, with a dashing of metal drumming and political emphasis on "Homeland insecurity". Now reissued via Alternative Tentacles a full fifteen years later - cracking stuff!

Review: Dead Kennedys' best frontman Jello Biafra's onetime collaboration with the band D.O.A. produced this hardcore punk gem - 'Last Scream Of The Missing Neighbours' - which fused the best of both bands' sounds, while namechecking every popular and/or political scandal at the time, such as Willie Horton, the Iran-Contra Affair, Oliver North, and the US crack epidemic. Just six tracks on this indelible EP, now reissued via original label, Alternative Tentacle do well to satirize the powers that be in true punk fashion, culminating in the 14-minute military meat-grinder that is 'Full Metal Jackoff'.

Review: Revered as one of U.S. hardcore punk's most humorous, yet politically outraged projects, Last Scream Of The Missing Neighbours is a gem by Jello Biafra (Dead Kennedys) and the band D.O.A., in a collaborative effort that spans every blood-boiler from the gentrification of Colorado to the then nascent (putatively C.I.A.-fuelled) crack epidemic. Less concerned with a piercing sonic aesthetic than getting its lyrical point across, this mini-album was a conduit and awareness-raising exercise in the battle against capitalist doublespeak and is best known for its culminating in the closing fourteen-minute dramaturgy 'Full Metal Jackoff', decrying everything from racial scapegoating to the U.S. military-everything complex.

Review: Originally released in 1989, Wrong was the fourth full-length from highly influential progressive punk outfit Nomeansno (or NoMeansNo or No Means No) and is often cited as not only their magnum opus, but one of the most quintessential albums of the formative punk scene and its expanded malleability throughout the nineties. Praised for being one of the most technical, progressive and avant-garde group of musicians within punk, Wrong distilled every facet of their maniacal aura; haggard spoken word-esque howlings of depraved, intellectual societal woes, frenetic jazz meanderings with utter disregard for time signatures in place of two-chord stompers, and an overwhelming sense of cathartic menace that would lay major influences at the feet of future noise-rock and post-punk experimentalists. Out of print for quite some time, rest assured this repress will dissipate in quick succession before joining highly inflated flipped copies on Discogs, so mark our words, snatch up a copy of what many deem to be the first ever "jazzcore" release before we've to have this same conversation again in another decade.

Review: The fourth full-length LP by Canadian punk rockers Nomeansno comes as their most popular album to date, a whirlwind of post-hardcore, heavy metal and jazzcore influences that harks back not only to nineties interpretations of post-punk, but also fresh renditions and fusions of the sound in the 21st Century. Pondering catacylsmic themes and cryptic modern aporias, this is a veritable walloping in sound from the Vancouver troupe.