COI003: Here's to the skinned knees and sutured hearts
Here's to the unhappy endings and all the false starts
A lot of new music comes out every Friday. Allow me to separate the wheat from the chaff for you.
The Aggrolites - REGGAE NOW! (Pirates Press)
Full disclosure: I was hired by Pirates Press Records to write the bio for the new Aggrolites record earlier this year. If you view that as a conflict of interest, feel free to keep scrolling. If not, trust me when I say that REGGAE NOW! (yes, it’s supposed to be in all caps, and no, I do not know why) is the perfect summer record, guaranteed to be the soundtrack to ska-B-Qs nationwide. If you’re somehow unfamiliar with the Aggro sound, “Pound For Pound” is a perfect introduction to the northern California band’s dirty reggae vibe that is as timeless as it is refreshing.
Quick story: I spent a few weeks on Warped Tour in 2008, and my first day was in Scranton, Pennsylvania. Scranton Warped was staged at a place called Montage Mountain, which is a ski resort on the side of an actual mountain, with an amphitheater at the top of it. As was customary on Warped for many years, the second-stage bands would be put into the amphitheatre, with the main-stage bands having their own outdoor stages. That day, a freak storm rolled through Montage Mountain and pretty much wrecked everything. As the festival grounds began to flood and thunder and lightning began to roll in, everyone ran into the previously near-empty amphitheatre, where the Aggrolites were playing to a few dozen onlookers. The next thing they knew, the bandshell was packed with thousands of frightened, waterlogged teens in Devil Wears Prada shirts. I fully believe there was no better band in the history of Warped Tour to get that crowd through that moment than the Aggrolites. Once lightning got too close, Aggro were forced to halt their set, but they kept trying to entertain the crowd, as their drummer had a drum-off with the drummer of the next band up. Here’s a brief video — the best part is the video uploader wrote “the horrible Aggrolites” in its description, which is yet another reminder that children have terrible taste:
Bonus shinfo: I was writing the bio for this record at the same time I was writing the bio for the Cokie The Clown record, and man oh man, these two albums could not be further apart from one another. (But that’s a newsletter for another day.)
Hot Water Music - Shake Up The Shadows EP (Epitaph)
I’ve been a fan of Hot Water Music for more than 20 years, which is kind of wild to think about, but their most recent full-length, 2017’s Light It Up, was their first in their entire career that didn’t connect with me on any level. It was a weird misstep for a band whose logo I have contemplated getting tattooed on my body for a few decades and whose side and solo projects I adore (if we’re being real, I prefer the Draft’s In A Million Pieces to nearly every HWM album, but I think Chuck Ragan’s The Blueprint Sessions might be even better than that). Light It Up’s flatness and the shocking news of Chris Wollard stepping back from the band were some serious gut punches to my fandom. Fast forward a few years, and while Wollard has still not rejoined the band on the road (his shoes have been capably filled by Chris Cresswell of the Flatliners), he is a part of HWM’s new five-song EP, Shake Up The Shadows, the band’s first release on Epitaph Records in 15 years. Sheets’ lead single, “Rebellion Story,” is a fiery number with Ragan howling as if it were his last night on earth, and the greatest rhythm section in punk rock, Jason Black and George Rebelo, continue to impress at every turn. Welcome back, guys.
Zealot R.I.P. - Zealot R.I.P. EP (Three One G)
What do you get when you put together four guys whose combined pedigree includes math-rock icons, Victory Records survivors, grindcore lifers and emo-punk underdogs? You get six-and-a-half minutes of thrash-influenced hardcore that reminds me of the Hope Conspiracy and Black Flag as much as it does whatever d-beat band just played your town’s DIY space last night. Zealot R.I.P. is fronted by Pig Destroyer’s Blake Harrison and driven by nasty guitarwork coming from Darkest Hour’s Mike Schleibaum, with a churning rhythm section comprised of Jason Hamacher (of a million bands, but most notably Frodus) on drums and Peter Tsouras (of the criminally underrated Fairweather and the even more criminally underrated Olympia) on bass. This shit rips. Play it loudly.
Today’s subject line is a lyric from the song “Memorial Day” by Philadelphia’s Paint It Black, one of the greatest hardcore bands of all time that unfortunately plays very few shows these days due to their members being very, very busy in other musical projects, careers and general adult life. Listen to the song below, and if you dig it, you can buy the record it’s from on Amazon (and by clicking that link, there’s a chance I may make a few cents):
This is also my clever way of acknowledging that this is a holiday weekend, and as such, Colors Of Insomnia will be taking a brief vacation. Expect emails to resume next week.
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