Presenting the penultimate installment in this ongoing, self-obsessed series. A Spotify playlist featuring all available recommended tracks is being built daily alongside the list, and can be found by clicking here.
20. Rival Schools – ‘United By Fate’ (2001)
Yet another band on the list who are frequently framed as
‘post-hardcore’ – a term that really only tells you that said band will sound
nothing like any other band who are labelled post-hardcore – Rival Schools are
made up largely of alumni from old school hardcore bands. Notably this includes
Walter Schreifels of Quicksand and Gorilla Biscuits, but Rival Schools is a
more grungey and less urgent prospect than either of these. Fuzzy guitars weave
chaotically through steady percussion, mellow basslines and Schreifels’
gravelly murmur, occasionally beefing up to pummel a more harder-edged riff.
It’s a difficult album to both classify and describe, other than in how it pulls
together influences too numerous to mention from all veins of punk rock, fusing
them together to provide a listening experience that is as comfortable and
tender on the first spin as it is on the hundredth. Splitting quite shortly
after this release, they left many wanting more and have thankfully reformed
quite recently – eventual second album ‘Pedals’ has shown they still have what
it takes.
Recommended Tracks: “Travel By Telephone”, “Everything Has
Its Point”, “Used For Glue”
19. Time In Malta – ‘A Second Engine’ (2002)
Melodic hardcore of the kind seemingly obsolete since the
late ‘90s/early ‘00s, Time In Malta never made the splash they could have with
a touch more promotion behind them. ‘A Second Engine’ was their first LP, and
significantly more powerful than the 2004 follow-up ‘Alone With The Alone’. Placing
the emphasis firmly on the melody and emotive pressure in their songs, there is
an expressive side to even the heavier songs with roared vocals and stomping
beatdown guitars. Elsewhere on the album this tendency towards a gentler touch
is more overt, with a few tracks dialling down the hardcore elements
significantly until the band threaten to become one of the most intriguing alt.
rock bands of this century. It’s an almost claustrophobic tightness that the
release binds you in, as each song flows into the next with a sense of real
progression while maintaining a definable sound in and of itself. ‘A Second
Engine’ is a prime example of an album where the whole is greater than the sum
of its parts, simply down to maintaining a sonic authority all of its own.
Recommended Tracks: “This Revolution”, “Against The Tide”,
“Grant’s Stand”
18. Assemblage 23 – ‘Storm’ (2004)
Tom Shear’s Assemblage 23 is a future/electropop project that
has long trodden the boards around the electro scene while maintaining a
healthy distance from the limelight. Undoubtedly it’s one of the best and most
consistent acts on the circuit, but somehow never manages to become a
floorfilling high profile frequent headliner. But that’s fine by me - because
understated genius has an honesty and joy all of its own. Mixing equal parts
modern cyber synth love and Depeche Mode, ‘Storm’ is for these ears the most
powerful and glorious of all the A23 releases. This is partly down to the
end-to-end quality, with nary a filler track in sight. It’s also partly due to
the soaring silver choruses that can be found on tracks like “Human” and
“Ground”, catapulting you into windswept grey skies before bringing you
crashing back down to earth for the beat-driven verses. But mainly it’s because
Shear manages to compose instrumentation and lyrics that carries a whole range
of emotive markers – fear, ecstasy, regret, ego – without sacrificing integrity
or giving in to self-indulgent personal obsession. Of special note is closing
track “30kft”, a self-contained monologue with a minimalist electronic/string
backing and a gutwrenching ending that I wouldn’t dream of spoilering on
something as crass as a review blog list.
Recommended Tracks: “Human”, “Ground”, “30kft”
17. Engerica – ‘There Are No Happy Endings’ (2005)
Bitter and twisted pop-punk with unexpected screaming
spazz-outs, Engerica were for a short while the creepy little brother of the UK
alt. rock circuit. You know the kind. The ones who sit in the corner staring
blankly at you before cackling maniacally when someone relates a particularly
harrowing piece of bad news. ‘There Are No Happy Endings’ was their debut (and,
it turned out, only) LP and it’s a shamelessly addictive cut of lean festering
meat that leaves a more-ish rotten taste in your mouth. The off-kilter wordplay
and song construction are pleasantly at odds with a rather slick production
sound, and any potential bleakness inherent to the material is tempered by
humour and weirdness. If you’ve been tempted by nothing else in this entry,
perhaps the real clincher will be that this is a band unafraid to write a
chorus solely consisting of the lyrical refrain “I look like an arsehole!
Arsehole!”
Recommended Tracks: “Roadkill”, “My Demise”, “Crooked Sex”
16. Hundred Reasons – ‘Ideas Above Our Station’ (2002)
The majority of Hundred Reasons fans would struggle to argue
that they have dipped significantly in quality since this, their debut album.
But for one shining moment they were the pinnacle of fresh UK talent – their
youthful emo rock more than capable of bringing the sunlight out of the clouds
even in our dank, rain-sodden country. ‘Ideas Above Our Station’ is in many
ways the perfect example of a debut release. You know within seconds of pressing
the ‘Play’ button what is in store for you, celebratory anthems that bloom
readily from one moment to the next. Bubbling over with harmony and modest
grandeur, I would struggle to think of a better summertime pop album. It’s an
LP that infects you directly on the brainstem with irresistible optimism – and
for those of us able to briefly set aside our cynicism, that’s a beautiful
thing.
Recommended Tracks: “If I Could”, “Shine”, “Silver”
15. autoclav1.1 – ‘Visitor Attractions’ (2006)
Beat-driven ambient utilising a wash of different synthesised
instrumentation, sometimes autoclav1.1 comes across as akin to a darker version
of early Moby. Perhaps with a fishnet top and some threatening tattoos on his
bald, bald head. There’s a warmth to the sound that belies the potential
bleakness of the song structure and melodies, while beats are used primarily as
a framework for the song as a whole rather than the driving force behind them.
There are a couple of other solid releases from this decade, but ‘Visitor
Attractions’ picks up this medal simply by sounding the most intuitive and
natural of all of them. The only vocals or samples present on the entire
recording reside on the track “Miags” which utilises a cut-up monologue on the
subject of misanthropy to good effect. If you are in desperate need of a good
album to listen to on headphones while walking thoughtfully past poorly-lit
allotments in the dead of night, I can’t think of a better choice than this.
Recommended Tracks: “Nothing But Pillow Teeth”, “Dead Sea
Tears”, “We All Have A Window”
14. Hopesfall – ‘The Satellite Years’ (2002)
I think by now I have said all I need to about bands being
described as ‘post-hardcore’, so this entry can remain sanguine and free of
bile. Subsequent releases from Hopesfall brought with them lineup changes and
massive disappointment in equal measure, but ‘The Satellite Years’ has a
blissful sound all of its own, composed of roughly painted guitars raggedly
sewn over a background of echoes and deep black water. Vocals range from
strained, mournful singing through to biting growls – and the band is unafraid
to throw in seemingly dissonant elements such as gang vocals and hand claps
when they deem it necessary. It’s an album bounded by nothing at all, so
expansive at times that listening to it intently leaves you floating in orbit,
your limbs stretching to infinity and your eyes full of stars. The atmosphere
that pervades throughout has the feeling of being constructed instinctively
with little to no conscious thought from the band members, providing an easy
sense of honesty that pulls the LP back from a progressive brink that it is led
to with a reverb-glazed spacey production. There are many albums I absolutely
love while feeling unable to articulate precisely why, and this is one of them.
Recommended Tracks: “Decoys Like Curves”, “Escape Pod For
Intangibles”, “The Bending”
13. Raging Speedhorn – ‘We Will Be Dead Tomorrow’ (2002)
UK sludgecore stalwarts Raging Speedhorn were never a band to
feel diluted or restrained, and ‘We Will Be Dead Tomorrow’ is possibly the best
example of their spit-soaked, knife-to-the-spine delivery. Rumbling bass and
deep-fried Sabbath guitars roll forwards like a rusting juggernaut driven by a
dying tiger, sustained only by irresponsible amphetamine consumption and truly vast
blood-alcohol levels. Percussion akin to constant meteor impacts strains to pin
everything into place while the screaming/screaming a bit harder dual vocal
delivery serves to hammer home what you probably already knew – this is not
music for the faint of heart or pretty of face. There’s more variation on show
that on their eponymous debut, with a couple of tracks being quick, deliberate
and approachable enough to make it as singles. It’s maniacal stuff and heavy as
well, but remains just about accessible for anyone not completely given over to
riffs ragged enough to leave raw, bleeding wounds.
Recommended Tracks: “The Hate Song”, “Iron Cobra”,
“Heartbreaker”
12. Front Line Assembly – ‘Improvised Electronic Device’
(2010)
‘Improvised Electronic Device’ is a masterclass in
metal-tinged EBM, delivered by the fathers of the genre in the third decade of
their existence. It’s a reminder that though it is tempting to dismiss musical
pioneers once their initial burst of productivity and inspiration has run dry,
one should never assume they cannot continue to shock and awe you years later.
Almost effortlessly the best record put out by FLA since 1992’s definitive ‘Tactical
Neural Implant’, this album takes the prospectively disparate elements of
industrial beats, clipped and bruised metal guitar riffs and trancelike EBM
synthlines before guiding them together with such confidence you feel like
firmly kicking genre conventions back into the gutter where they belong. It’s
almost shameful that this isn’t an ability shared by their peers and
descendants, many of whom have had more than enough time to ease these
transitions into place. Backed by a gaggle of younger rivetheads (and on one
memorable track, eternal brain terrorist Al Jourgensen), scene stalwart Bill
Leeb lurches with his machine voice like some gargantuan spider constructed of
repurposed circuit boards and shattered glass. This is all especially
impressive given the lack of sometime-member and electronic guru Rhys Fulber
for this LP, since the quality of an FLA album can typically be measured
against whether he is on board or not. Perhaps the injection of youthful energy
helped make ‘Improvised Electronic Device’ what it is – regardless, it is a
glorious thing when old favourites manifest themselves again and prove that they’re
just as vital now as they ever were.
Recommended Tracks: “Angriff”, “Shifting Through The Lens”,
“Pressure Wave”
11. mclusky – ‘mclusky Do Dallas’ (2002)
Oh, mclusky. You are missed, in the very special way that
comes with leaving a decent swathe of follow-up bands in your wake. But though
the former members have gone on to great and good things (on this very list, in
fact) nothing may ever match writing and singing the lyric “Cartoon monkeys got
you hard / It must have been the hair.” They were a dry heave to the face of
the alt. rock mainstream, a punk-tinged raw noise in the middle of the night
that left you shivering under the covers and masturbating furiously to drive
away the demons. At times schizophrenic in the best (and most incorrect) sense
of the word due to having two songwriters at war with each other, ‘mclusky Do
Dallas’ makes the most of its bubonic Steve Albini production and embraces you
like a seductive co-worker in evil clown facepaint. Guitars and bass played by
devious insects writhe alongside bile-strewn oddly intoned vocals under a vast
cracked lens made by socially awkward scientists for purposes best left
unmentioned. It would be great music journalism cliché if I could confidently
say there was some beating, tender emotional heart under all this. That there
was something to tether to other than a creeping sense of addictive discomfort.
But no. No. There is just mclusky. Stood there, trousers down and blunt
instruments in hand. Waiting for you to stop screaming so they can tell you
what is wrong with your haircut inbetween each crushed nerve and broken bone.
Recommended Tracks: “Dethink To Survive”, “To Hell With Good
Intentions”, “Alan Is A Cowboy Killer”
