The Macc Lads - Beer & Sex & Chips 'n' Gravy

Come this way for some grade A 80s' filth from the semi notorious and legendary Macc Lads . Released in 1985 this album achieved a sort of cult status among aficionados of puerile/juvenile humour,Punk Rock and Viz . Which I suspect many would not admit to liking now. Well after a gap of nearly twenty years since the last listen I'll admit it still makes me chuckle . A lot . Rumored to have been funded with the aid of a government grant this sort of reminds me of a mix of Sham 69 , Half Man Half Biscuit and Chubby Brown. The lyrics are bordering on genius , for instance -  "Vauxhall Vivas's all covered in rust , but you can't shag yer bird on a 29 bus" or rhyming George Michael with menstrual cycle ,which everything written about The Macc Lads since 1985 has to mention by law. Quite fittingly The Macc Lads later went on to have their own cartoon strip in gentlemen's art pamphlet* , "Fiesta". Although I'd like to think the lyrics are all done just fer a laugh as all songs appear to be ARE about sex, drinking and fighting there is a whiff of homophobia hovering over it in places, which in one track come close to a frenzy (no pun etc )of anatomical detail which are either mean spirited or maybe ,cod psychology ahead, self hatred. And many will find the track "Buenos Airies" extremely jingoistic as this was released not long after the Falklands War . Just bypass those songs  and listen to the hilarious "Blackpool" and "Dan's Underpants'" or maybe "Sweaty Betty" - "She wore big knickers and worked on sewage farm". If none of that puts you off play this and offend everyone  within earshot or listen with headphones and try to keep a straight face . Boozy,bawdy humour from Northern England (macclesfield , as is quite rightly pointed out throughout) . Vinyl rip HERE .  BET THIS GETS DOWLOADED MORE THAN ALICE COLTRANE

Repo Man - Original Soundtrack

Storming soundtrack for one of the best films of the 80s' featuring Iggy Pop on the title track with Steve Jones doing his thing on guitar , bracing LA hardcore from Black Flag,Suicidal Tendancies,Fear and The Circle Jerks. Plus added Latino punk, a spacey instrumental mixing surf guitar , synthesizer,choir and orchestra which sounds like it ends on a snatch of Also Sprach Zarathustra , and throw in a mean "n"moody lowdown cover of Jonathan Richman's "Pablo Picasso" and you have a soundtrack completely devoid of any duff/filler type tracks.
For a film that is creeping towards a mind blowing 30 YEARS OLD "Repo Man" made in 1984 still looks,feels and sounds to me like it could have been made anytime since then. First saw it while I was still at school on VHS and was blown away by the mix of comedy,violence,punk rock, sci-fi, swearing and Harry Dean Stanton ,"Ordinary people I fuckin' hate 'em". The film bears up on repeated viewings as it reveals much more . Probably the best film Alex Cox ever made , the guy portraying John Lydon in Cox's next film "Sid And Nancy" makes me cringe to this day just thinking about him .
 While googling "Repo Man" found out that Alex Cox has made a sort of sequel called ...... "Repo Chick" which I will leave everyone to judge for themselves by the trailer here.


For all things "Repo Man" this site has it all  http://www.bobcantor.com/repo/repoman.htm

Tracks:
1. Repo Man - Iggy Pop
2. TV Party - Black Flag
3. Institutionalized - Suicidal Tendencies
4. Coup D'Etat - The Circle Jerks
5. El Clavo Y La Cruz - The Plugz
6. Pablo Picasso - Burning Sensations
7. Let's Have A War - Fear
8. When The Shit Hits The Fan - The Circle Jerks
9. Hombre Secreto - The Plugz
10. Bad Man - Juicy Bananas
11. Reel Ten - The Plugz

Vinyl rip of soundtrack here 

Jonathan Richman And The Modern Lovers - 23 Great Recordings

Another tape from the box is this compilation from Jonathan Richman And The Modern Lovers released in 1990 covering his most commercially successful period on the Berkley label from 1974-1980. Many people probably know Jonathan Richman as the guy who pops up now and again singing to accompany the plot, once up a tree , in "There's Something About Mary".

A Velvet Underground influence is quite evident on the earlier tracks , this was a guy who left home at fifteen to go to New York to meet them and had John Cale produce many of their early demos which were eventually released as the classic album "Modern Lovers" ,from which many tracks make up the the first side of this compilation including "Roadrunner","She Cracked","Pablo Piccasso" and the anti hippy/stoner "I'm Straight" .

By the time Punk and New Wave were exploring and expanding on the territory laid down on these early recordings , Jonathan Richman had moved on to a more mellow sound accompanied with more whimsical lyrics with songs about Abominable Snowmen,Roller-coasters and Ice Cream Men which have a kind of laid back charm to them but unfortunately probably influenced a number of god awful fey indie type dross in the past but lets not hold that against him. Wiki Here. 23 Great Recordings Here .

Hardcore Holocaust - The Peel Sessions

Here's one to blow the old cobwebs away or listen to first thing in the morning instead of sipping your favourite branded caffeine stimulant to get your day started .Twenty five tracks recorded for John Peel over twenty years ago that still seem as startling now as they did all those many moons ago . John Peel seemed to love dropping a bit of hardcore in to his show , god knows what the indie kids of the time made of this coming up after the The Pastels .A few of the sessions from The Stupids ,Doctor And The Crippens and Electro Hippies are closer to US hardcore/skate type punk, the rest from the likes of Extreme Noise Terror and Napalm Death (probably two of the greatest names for groups ever IMHO ) are full throttle 1000mph riffing drumming and sometime twin vocals although probably closer to Tibetan throat singing recorded in the depths of hell than conventional vocal duties . I believe da kids of today now refer to this as grindcore . For best effect go straight to Napalm Death and Extreme Noise Terror and take in small doses ,most tracks are around the 1 minute mark apart from Bolt Thrower's epic "Attack In The Aftermath at 3.29.

Tracks:
Heard It All Before, Dog Log - The Stupids
Sheep, Chickens, Mother - Electro Hippies
False Profit/Another Nail in the Coffin/Carry on Screaming/Conned Through Life - Extreme Noise Terror
Attack in the Aftermath/Psychological Warfare - Bolt Thrower
Skate Bored/Intense Degree/Day Dreams/Bursting - Intense Degree
Voice Your Opinion - Unseen Terror
Moral Crusade/M.A.D./Divine Death/Control - Napalm Death
Pink Machine Gun/Garden Centre Murders/Skin Tight - Doctor & The Crippens
Exploitation/No Religion - Doom

For some songs concerning war,skateboards,religion,vegetarianism ,dogshit,death and more death come here .

Burning Ambitions : A History Of Punk

This was a recent eBay "win", as the eBay money making machine likes to inform you on their emails. Remember seeing this back in the day but being only twelve years of age and not having the sort of cash to buy a double album for about a tenner I just had to content myself with staring at the Sgt Pepper spoof/homage cover instead and long for my own copy of this one stop shop punk rock comp minus Pistols,Clash,Banshees,Jam and a few other notable omissions. Despite these absences this is still a killer compilation with hardly a duff track which covers 1976 to 1982. Currently grooving to The Exploited's evergreen classic "Dead Cities" and Anti-Pasti's "No Goverment".

Tracklisting:
Boredom - Buzzcocks
Bingo Master's Breakout - The Fall
1, 2, X U - Wire
Life - ATV
Keys To Your Heart - 101'ers
I'm Alive - 999
Gary Gilmore's Eyes - Adverts
Justifiable Homicide - Dave Goodman and Friends
Where Have All The Boot Boys Gone? - Slaughter and the Dogs
(Get a) Grip On (Yourself) - The Stranglers
Your Generation - Generation X
Baby Baby - The Vibrators
Identity - X-Ray Spex
Read About Seymour - Swell Maps
I'm Stranded - The Saints
Chinese Rocks - Heartbreakers
Lock It Up - Eater
Ain't Got A Clue - Lurkers
Lady - Adam and The Ants
Love Song - The Damned
Looking After No. 1 - Boomtown Rats
Where's Captain Kirk? - Spizzenergi
In A Rut - The Ruts
Angels With Dirty Faces - Sham 69
Stranglehold - UK Subs
Flares and Slippers - Cockney Rejects
The Wait - Killing Joke
No Government - Anti-Pasti
Holiday In Cambodia - Dead Kennedy's
Dead Cities - The Exploited
Last Rockers - Vice Squad
Harry May - The Business
Police Story - The Partisans
Someone's Gonna Die - Blitz
City Baby Attacked By Rats - GBH
Complete Disorder - Disorder
Russians In The DHSS - Attila The Stockbroker
Lust For Glory - Angelic Upstarts

Not too bad vinyl rip here...

...and The Exploited introduced by David "Kid" Jensen on Top Of The Pops in 1981