Definitivos - Courtrai Moderne: Definitive Definitivos

After reading my Belgian Nuggets review Tony, the owner of Mayway Records, was kind enough to send me a link to pre-listen to the Definitivos record Mayway Records will release on record store day. 'Courtrai Moderne: Definitive Definitivos' will be the first full vinyl release of Kortrijk's punk heroes.

This band out of my hometown Kortrijk has quite an interesting history. They started out in the late seventies when the first wave of punk craze hit Belgium. In well known punk tradition these four guys didn't really know how to handle an instrument but they were eager to start a band. I could be mistaken but I guess they were the first punk band in Kortrijk. They recorded their first single 'The modern dance' in 1980 and it became an instant indie hit in Belgium and France. When listening to the song I can easily understand why. It's catchy, easy to sing along with and has an awesome and raw guitar solo (I guess they quickly learned how to play those instruments). 

Their second single 'Courtrai tonight' was released in 1982 and was produced by Serge Feys of the legendary band T.C. Matic. Reviews were raving again and they could do some touring in France and The Netherlands. 'Courtrai tonight' is a post punk anthem with that typical eighties bass sound that I love so much. I guess this is their most known track and it hit the alternative charts upon its release.

Their sound evolved and was influenced by eighties cold wave and post punk. They had some line-up changes and recorded a 12inch EP called 'Sight seeing'. Unfortunately the band died a silent death after this release. The band was never forgotten though and their releases and songs became cult classics.

Fast forward to 2010. Thanks to social media (these things are both a curse and a blessing...) people got really interested in the band and they started playing again. I saw them play some great shows. They released a best of cd and proved that they still have it and sound pretty fresh. Last year they presented their first new recorded song called '2017, the worst I've ever seen', a protest song in true punk tradition which will also be included on the vinyl anthology. Since 2018 they play with the original line up like in the early days. The punk spirit is still very strong and these guys are real Kortrijk punk heritage.

I can't wait to hold their vinyl anthology in my hands and put it on the turntable. The lay out looks awesome and I have been listening a lot to the tracks Tony sent me. They will play the awesome Textival festival in Kortrijk on the 22nd of april together with some great bands (click here for the full line up and some more information about Kortrijk's cosiest and eclectic festival). Go see them live and buy this record!

The record will be released on the 21st of april, on Record Store Day. More info: Mayway Records.

"You gotta make a choice, stand up and raise your voice!"

Love, Truth & Honesty - The impossible dream... 7inch and the early 8000 scene

I have been wanting to write about this little gem even before I started this blog: The Love Truth & Honesty 7 inch on Machination Records, released in 1992.

I was born and raised in Kortrijk, the mecca of H8000 hardcore in the nineties. H8000 hardcore was well known for its edge metal bands like Congress, Liar, Regression, Spineless,... that had a huge following, not only locally but also international. I was pretty young when all this happened and I was mostly interested in skateboarding, skate punk (I was a huge fan of Green Leaf Records, a subdivision of Goodlife Recordings, the label that released most of these edge metal bands) and chasing girls but I did attend some shows and bought some records.

My favorite H8000 band has always been Blindfold, who played more of a melodic and emo influenced style of hardcore. You can expect some Blindfold posts later on this blog.
Through the Blindfold 'world of fools' 7 inch I got to know Machination Records and through Machination Records I got to know more of those earlier bands when the scene was still called 8000 scene. Somehow those earlier days and bands interest me more than the more metallic H8000 scene (although Congress and Liar, the trailblazers of the H8000 scene were amazing off course). There were some awesome bands active and a couple of local labels: Warehouse Records, PMA Records and Machination Records. The motto of the scene back then was 'Positive, political, powerful', something I can totally relate to. The 'Regress no way' compilation 7 inch on Warehouse Records is a classic and has songs from the 4 most important 8000 bands: Nations On Fire, Blindfold, Spirit Of Youth and Shortsight.

Machination Records only released 7 inches, mainly of local bands (the awesome German band Acme being an exception) and they are all recommended. Even though these records are over 20 years old I still enjoy listening to them and this small label has always fascinated me somehow.

The Love, Truth & Honesty 7 inch was released in 1992 and is in my eyes a very underrated record. You can buy copies on discogs for only 1 euro. The band consisted of Edward (also in Nations On Fire and later of Goodlife Recordings) on vocals, the 2 brothers Dominiek and Frederik (of Spirit Of Youth, Solid, Blood Redemption, ...) on guitar and drums and Ignace on bass. These four songs were also on the Spirit Of Youth demotape on Warehouse Records, recorded by the same line-up a while earlier. So I guess Love, Truth & Honesty is Spirit Of Youth using another name for a short period of time.

The music always reminds me of Dag Nasty and later era Minor Threat. Good, fast and melodic hardcore. Lyrically two of the songs are in the same vein as the Nations On Fire ones and reflect the 'Positive, political, powerful' motto of the scene. Two other songs are more personal dealing with relationships and friendships.
I've always liked the lay-out of the Machination Records releases, they were always simple and to the point but nice to look at. This release is no different. I always wondered what the medieval looking illustration on the cover meant until Edward told me it was his hommage to a series of classical music compilation cd's that he was a big fan of. Nice anecdote and reference!

Get this record. Spend a euro wisely and remember: "Together we can turn the impossible dream into reality..."

Dinosaur Jr. - The Lung on The Late Late Show in 2005. Five reasons why it doesn't get any better than this.

I have several ideas for new posts and already started writing some but first I wanted to share this great video and give you five reasons why this is one of my favorite youtube clips.

1. They play my favorite song, 'The Lung' of my favorite Dinosaur album 'You're living all over me'. Such a great song with all the classic Dinosaur Jr. elements, a lot of fuzz and other effects, an awesome J Mascis solo, Lou Barlow's trademark distorted yet melodic bass playing, tight drumming from Murph, the loud-quiet-loud trick, ... It doesn't get any better than this.
2. This is the first song they played in public with the original line up since 1989. I was so excited when I saw it. Coming back with a bang! The next day they played their first show and a short while later they came over to tour Europe. With me front row off course.  Three great albums followed later. 
3. J Mascis looks like a wizard with his long grey hair. A guitar wizard that is.
4. Mascis played a prototype of his signature Fender Jazzmaster that came out a while later. Nobody plays a Jazzmaster like J Mascis.
5. That guitar solo! Really. Listen to it and then rewind back to 2:27 in the video to listen to it again. 

Belgian Nuggets 90s - 00s Vol.1 on Mayway Records: Belpop nostalgia!

The story of the relatively new Belgian recordlabel Mayway Records and the Belgian Nuggets series is an interesting one. It's a Kortrijk based independent label that was started out of sheer passion for all kinds of genres of music. The label bought a huge amount of  promo and demo records from the vaults of our national radio network and decided to release the Belgian Nuggets series with selections of these lost and found gems (next to the other bands they release records for).

I got the Belgian Nuggets Vol. 1 double LP as a gift last christmas and was really excited to put in on my turntable. I discovered some great unknown belpop bands and tracks, took a trip down memory lane and got reacquainted with an old crush.

There's a lot of music on this double LP but I'll talk about my favorite tracks.
I used to be a huge dEUS fan. I loved (and still love) their early work. 'My wife jan', their song on this compilation is a B-track from the 'Little arithmetics' single that I already knew but hadn't heard in a long time. I used to tape trade with a girl in my hometown and she had all the dEUS singles and B-sides and made me a mixtape with these songs. So this song was my first trip down memory lane.

When puberty kicked in I had a crush on a couple of female singers. These crushes were very serious in my eyes. My first crush was Vanessa Paradis but a lot of them followed, including Elsje Helewaut, singer of Elisa Waut, a Bruges based band. I loved her voice. The Elisa Waut song on this compilation took me back to those days. It's a nice dreamy song.

A more recent favorite is de Portables. I got to know them at the beginning of the 2000s and I saw them play some great and often hilarious live shows. All of their records are recommended and their song 'Haut gay' (with the extended outro exclusive for this compilation) is my favorite song on this compilation. Listen to this great song here:

A band I had never heard of is Pop Machine. Their song 'Sage' is a swinging tribute to sixties french singers and music like Françoise Hardy. I love this song. Apparently this was produced by Alex Callier (of Hooverphonic and shitty Belgian tv talent shows...) and some label had pretty big and ambitious plans with it but somehow all of those plans never happened. A shame.

I also like the Volt song 'Rincez-moi'. Volt is an early nineties electropop band with Daan Stuyven, known from Dead Man Ray and his solo project Daan. Great song but I would have loved it if their song 'Train to interzone' was on this compilation, a personal favorite of mine.

There's a lot more to discover on this great compilation. And I stil have to dig in deeper to get to know these bands. I'm looking forward to the next volumes of Belgian Nuggets and some other releases on Mayway Records.
Especially the Definitivos LP that will be released on record store day. I'm very excited about this one as Definitivos are a legendary punk band from my hometown.
Mayway Records already released records by Ugly Papas, JTOTHEC and Gèsman. Some talented local acts that aren't exactly up my ally but are worth getting if they are your thing.

Get to know Mayway Records and their releases here.  Totally recommended!

One off duo projects: Ray & Porcell and Egg Hunt.

Something I find pretty interesting is side projects in every genre of music. There's something about musicians who go off their regular track and make something next to their current bands that only lasts for one record or even one seven inch.
I would like to write about some duo projects that happened throughout hardcore history. I'm sure there are a lot of solo and duo projects but here are two of them that come to mind and that I have in my record collection:

• Ray & Porcell: Fame/Broken Glass 7 inch (Revelation Records: 23) (1991)

The infamous drum machine record. Hated by many, loved by many. The first Shelter record was already released when Ray Cappo and Porcell recorded these two songs at Don Fury's in 1991. I got this 7 inch really cheap some time ago and listening back to it for this post leaves me with mixed feelings (as I'm sure it does for most people). These songs aren't that bad but the drum machine Porcell used to record them sounds a bit strange to say the least. Honestly: I like the song 'Fame'. It's well written and has interesting lyrics. On 'Broken Glass' the drum machine is way too present which prevents me from getting into the song.

However, the blueprint for future Shelter songs is pretty much here. Which makes it an interesting record to have in your collection. 

• Egg Hunt: Me and you/We all fall down 7 inch (Dischord Records) (1986)

Now this is something completely different. These songs are good, the sound quality is awesome, there's real drums on the record and this is the blueprint for a sound and a scene that was emerging in Washington DC, even though the songs were recorded in England as a one off project.

Ian Mackaye and Jeff Nelson went to the UK to visit Southern Records and got asked by John Loder (Southern Records founder) to record some songs while they were there.

This single can be situated towards the end of Embrace (such an awesome band and record...) and some time before the start of Fugazi. 'Me and you' is a great song but 'We all fall down' has to be one of my favorite Ian Mackaye songs (and I have plenty of those!). He had originally written this song for Embrace but the band turned it down. In my eyes this is a blueprint for Fugazi. It starts off with a great and slightly dubby bass intro (which would be an early Fugazi trademark) followed by a verse and a great chorus which has Ian Mackaye both singing and yelling like only he can. I lost my copy of this 7 inch a while ago and had to buy it again as I love to listen to it on a regular basis.
Highly recommended if you don't already have it!

If you know more of these kind of projects please let me know. I'm always eager to learn more.  There's also a ton of solo projects from people in hardcore bands (or who used to be in hardcore bands). There are tons of them and maybe I'll mention some in a future post. There's Wes Eisold's Cold Cave off course ('Oceans with no end' is one of my favorite songs to dance and sing along to with my son) and so much more.

For now: be sure to check out Glitterer, Ned Russin (of Title Fight)'s solo project. It's awesome.
Go listen here.

My precious Dischord Records shirts and a little note from Jeff Nelson.

It's no secret I'm a big Dischord Records enthusiast. I love every era of this legendary label and a lot of the records they released. Dischord doesn't print shirts for their bands or for the label but Jeff Nelson does make official Dischord shirts through his Pedestrian Press imprint.
At the end of last year I decided to treat myself for the holidays so I ordered two Dischord shirts from Pedestrian Press. They showed up pretty fast and look awesome.
They came with a little note on the invoice from the legendary Jeff Nelson himself, thanking me for the order and wishing me happy holidays.
Being the nerd I am this made me really happy and I keep the invoice and note in my archives.
See the shirts and note below. Go check out Pedestrian Press here.

Welcome to Hello Bastards Zine!

Hello and welcome to yet another new blog.

Some 7 years ago I had plans to start a paper zine called 'Hello Bastards'. I did some pretty cool interviews and articles. I interviewed Dan Yemin for example (of course I had to do a Lifetime interview with a name like 'Hello Bastards Zine'), I also did a cool but short RVIVR interview and a pretty lengthy but really awesome article about the ending of my favorite hometown band Hitch. Mich (the singer of Hitch) wrote a long and great article about his former band.
Most of these interviews ended up in the Mini WAR zine and blog I did together with my friend Kristof for a short time. You can still read them here.

I miss writing so I decided I'd start this blog. I hope I will find the discipline to write stuff from time to time and to not let this page die a slow death. I already have some ideas about posts and interviews so come and check back often.  Posts will of course be mostly about music as I'm a total freak.

See you soon!