This one is out now for couple of months, but it doesn’t matter if the music is good and I want to present this one to the readers of my zine. Axe Collector are coming from San Diego, California and they are playing hardcore punk/powerviolence. There are nine songs on this beauty. Only one song is two minutes long, all the others are under. If you are familiar with powerviolence you’ll know what that means, fast drumming, blast beats, screaming and guttural vocals and raw guitar work. I can also hear some d-beat influences thrown in here and there, but maybe it’s only me. Lyrics are mostly personal with some of them being a bit social themes and you can read that between a few lines. I love such bands that play this kind of music but I can’t listen to them the whole day long, so this one is nice break from other music styles to check out. They kinda remind me of old now defunct Croatian band called Senata Fox, and they were awesome, so I also think that about this album. If you like powerviolence and hardcore punk, raw, fast and aggressive, go check out this beauty. Nice little record, indeed!
This one has been out for a while, but it is never too late to review a good record, eh? This time it is Boston hardcore and punk. Haywire and Dropkick Murphy’s deliver a split ep with both bands having four songs on this one. There are two new songs from each band, each band covered a song from each other and two songs performing together. On Dropkick Murphy’s side I love Citizen ICE(featuring Haywire), and Solidarity. I love how Dropkick Murphy’s can sound still like hardcore punk band as they were in their early days prior to becoming popular Celtic punkrock band. Haywire deliver the goods with superb title song featuring Dropkick Murphy’s and The Henchmen being my personal favorites on this little record. I also love Dropkick Murphy’s cover of Haywire’s anthem Always By My Side. Haywire’s cover of DM’s The Boys Are Back is also not bad. So, if you are into Boston hardcore punk go grab this one if you didn’t do it already.
Modern Love Story are coming from my home country, namely Croatia, capitol city Zagreb. The members of the band are veterans on Croatian hardcore punk scene and this is their new e.p. containing four songs. The lyrics are in English and they are dealing with personal themes, but they are so beautifully written, almost like poetry. The music of MLS is hardcore punk, but mainly in more mid tempo and some grooves, belonging more to punkrock side than this modern metallic hardcore that is popular nowadays. There are also some fast old school hardcore parts and some very fine guitar melodies and hooks for good measure. My personal favorites on this one are Indifferent and Banishment, but you must listen the whole e.p. because it is excellent hardcore release.
