Category: Music

Don’t Fear The Davis Baby! Just Download it for Free!

I’m taking a moment here to share a new song from my latest musical endeavor The Davis Baby! Yes it’s named after that little mutant monster baby from the 70’s horror flick “It’s Alive”. See back in the mid 90’s I lived in Wisconsin & I played in a pop punk band called Ben Grim, we were inspired by bands like Descendents/ALL, The Doughboys, The Hard-ons ect, we released some records and toured around the US with our best buddies Fun Size (one of the best pop punk bands of the 90’s). It was some of the best times of my life, as Bryan Adams might say. So I decided to put together a group today that sort of brought that old Ben Grim sound back.

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We wrote four songs of crunchy old school power pop the way we would have done it back in the Ben Grim days. The project features my former band mate Joel Vega, who sang and played guitar in Ben Grim with me, my old pal Kevin Carl from lates 80’s/90’s band G-Whiz & Jim Wadsworth my good friend/fellow D&D player from Portland, Oregon band Danger Death Ray. We posted a FREE/name your price download of our new song “Laid to Rest”. It’s meant to be free but bandcamp doesn’t just let you list the track as purely “free”.  So please no need to pay just download it!

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It’s gonna be featured on our upcoming split ep with Higley (Kevin Carl & Duane Kiener of G-Whiz, Kris Roe of The Ataris & Bill Stevenson of Descendents/ALL/Black Flag) out soon on SP Records. The song also features Mark Arnold from Big DRILL Car on guitar. Which we were fully stoked to have play on it as Big DRILL Car remains to this day one of my favorite bands ever!

Download The Davis Baby for FREE here https://thedavisbaby.bandcamp.com/

Like us on Facebook HERE!

I’m trying to get the word out on this project, and it’s tough in this day and age to get anything out there on your own in the vast sea of the internet, so if you like it please help me share the song-maybe we’ll record more or start playing live!

Filmage – The Story of DESCENDENTS/ALL: Delivers True Nerd Rage!

I was lucky enough to see the new documentary “Filmage” over the holidays, a movie I felt like I’d waited my whole life to see! Yeah it was that good and it chronicles the story of the legendary pop-punk godfathers the DESCENDENTS / ALL from their start in the late 1970’s. It’s about time that these guys get the recognition they deserve and it seems as if these days they are more popular than they’ve ever been.

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If you don’t know who the Descendents are then this is the perfect place to start as Filmage is premiering now all over the USA. But plain and simple The Descendents are the BEST pop punk band of all time. They’ve influenced countless bands and if it it wasn’t for them It be a safe bet to say that a band like Green Day would have never existed. I pretty much sum them up as the ultimate in real teen angst. The true spirit of what it was like to be a nerdy teen with raging hormones. Growing up in the 80’s I loved punk rock but it wasn’t until I heard them the first time that I really found a band that truly spoke to me as a teen.

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The Descendents said all of the shit that you were really feeling growing up, something a lot of the punk bands lyrically were maybe too macho to sing about. Yeah they were most definitely not politically correct, at times even sexist, incredibly sappy, often crude and totally immature but at their core just a band of heartbroken nerds with no punk rock image. They covered the spectrum of hardcore punk while at the same time ripping into shameless love songs simultaneously. How many bands can even pull that off today much less back in 1982?!

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Well Filmage gives us the full scoop into the minds of these guys, their lives, their struggles and transitioning from the Descendents into the much less popular outfit ALL back in 1987. The movie was made by true Dents fans and it shows by how much care was put into this documentary. Filled with amazing vintage footage of the band, incredibly personal interviews, hilarious animated sequences and interviews with the likes of Dave Grohl, Mike Watt, Mark Hoppus, Keith Morris amongst many others whom cite the band as having a huge influence on them.

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It’s funny, sonically awesome and emotional as we follow the struggles of the band members lives up to current times. The movie in the end is really the full story of Bill Stevenson, the bands only constant member throughout Descendents and ALL while also filling us in on his time as drummer for Black Flag from 1982-1985.

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It’s his journey as the band leader and all of the friends along the way that helped make his dream a reality. It tells us exactly why the band is finally getting the attention they deserved all these years. While watching it I was almost glad they never hit the big time, as the band always stayed true to their signature sound til this day. We also get a great glimpse into ALL’s struggle to fill the shoes of the bands most valuable musical weapon, Milo Aukerman, the ultimate nerd front man.

I don’t wanna give away to much of the story but I put this up there on the same level as “A Band Called Death” one of the years best rockumentaries. So check this out if you’re jones’n for the full story of the greatest melodic hardcore band of all time-you won’t be disappointed!

Check out the trailer:

Absent Minds: Portland’s Krusty Kids!

I had to take a second of your time today to put up a cool new video from local Portland Oregon punks Absent Minds new video “Krusty Kids”!

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It’s a helluva lot of fun and I got a chance to see these guys play last week and they were great, blending their 90’s style punk ala NOFX & Lagwagon during their heyday but putting their own spin on it while incorporating a cello into the sonic mayhem. Check it out!

Mister Saturday Travels to the Land of the Lost……Riddim!

I thought I’d share this new Mister Saturday track just posted up to Youtube yesterday. Yeah I know you’re still wondering who in the hell Mister Saturday is? Well in short it’s me. I started this little project years ago, where I’d take dancehall and instrumental hip hop tracks and rapping or DJ-ing (as it’s referred to in Jamaican culture) over them. I became a big fan of reggae dancehall when I was just a kid and always wanted to hear songs about stuff that I liked, like say The Incredible Hulk, Star Trek and Dungeons & Dragons. That stuff though isn’t real big in Jamaica so I decided what the hell, I’ll make my own songs about that stuff! Somebody had to do it. So I did it, and songs like the one below are the result. Nerdcore reggae dancehall.

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I figured if MC Frontalot could invent nerdcore hip hop, then I could invent it’s reggae rappin’ counterpart. This track was an instrumental from 1985 called “Land of Rhythm” by Sly and Robbie the legendary riddim twins. I always thought it deserved some vocals so I added them, get out your break dancing attire, grab a spliff and boogie down! Subscribe to my Youtube channel to as I’m always adding more songs and vids! Been working on a live show with my partner in crime Ensly Mogul who also has been makin some wicked beats & riddims, now all I gotta do is get Frontalot or MC Chris to take me on tour with them!

Lyrics:
“The Land of the Long Lost Riddim”
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A Band Called DEATH: The Founding Fathers of Punk Rock!

I just saw the recently released documentary “A Band Called Death” documentary on VOD. Let me guess, you have no idea who Death is? Well that’s not a surprise as the band is only recently getting the recognition they most rightfully deserve and it only took about 40 years! So just who the hell are these guys? Well without spoiling too much of this excellent documentary I’ll say this, they were punk before punk was punk. Yeah Death formed way back in 1971 and they were an all black punk band long long before The Bad Brains. Yep before The Ramones these guys were kicking some serious ass.

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Three brothers all who had the passion for bands like The Who and Alice Cooper got together to make some of the most ass kickin’ punk rock songs of all time. To say these guys were ahead of their time is an understatement as they were turning up loud and fast during a time when the Motown scene was booming. Not a label would touch them with a name like Death but they never faltered for nearly ten years these guys went virtually unheard and only released a 45 record to the public yet had an amazing full album that never saw the light of day until recently. They eventually disbanded and that’s where the story gets real interesting.

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This is easily one of my favorite rockumentaries I’ve ever seen it ranks right of there with ‘The Story of Anvil’ in terms of portraying the true fight of an underdog band. It’s a truly heart warming movie full of some amazing rock and roll and a load of great stories. If you’re a fan of music in general you have gotta check this out. If you thought you knew everything there was to know about punk rock and it’s origins the you need to see this. The unlikely rise of a band called Death who formed over forty years ago proves that dreams really can and do come true…

Goblin Comes to the USA to Perform Suspiria Soundtrack!

So legendary Italian prog rock group Goblin are USA bound to perform their legendary score to Dario Argento’s Suspiria in Austin Texas! Pretty rad idea that was put together by Pantera frontman Philip H. Anselmo and best-selling true crime author Corey Mitchell for the 3 day Housecore Horror Film Festival, which celebrates fright flicks that somehow intertwine with heavy metal music.

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For those who don’t know what the fuck I am talking about Goblin was a 1970’s progressive rock band responsible for some pretty outrageous and awesome scores for films like Suspiria, Dawn of the Dead and Deep Red. They will be performing while the movie plays and in fact  this is their first live American performance. Pretty fantastic, mark your calendar for April 30th, it’s coming SOON and get more info here!

Does MC Chris Deserve His Own Cartoon TV Show?

So a couple days ago we got a six minute teaser of the proposed MC Chris cartoon he’s been hoping would be picked up by an unsaid network. From what I understand it hasn’t happened yet and now he’s trying to get the word out there in other ways to get some sort of buzz going about this cartoon.

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I’ll admit I’m not entirely certain at this point in time about what I think about Chris personally as I have seen some bummer videos on Youtube and heard several stories where he’s supposedly treated fans in a less than respectful fashion. However, the guy has went out of his way to apologize for being a douche, admitted wrongs and seems to have turned around his general attitude toward playing live and respecting the people who have made him who he is today. Yeah all that aside MC Chris is a pretty bad ass nerdcore rapper, in fact he’s probably the best around. So I give the guy another chance for redemption and now we all get to judge for ourselves if his cartoon has the potential to be a bonafide hit! Here it is:

Well what do you think? Is this the next Invader Zim?! Is Chris the next Bugs Bunny?! It’s hard to tell at this point, this 6 minute clip shows some potential. The animation is decent enough for something like  the Adult Swim swim crowd and it’s got some cool, fun action sequences however some of the comedy aspect of it could use a little more work. Parts seemed to drag a bit at points, but I did enjoy how it bursted into a cool rap song after the rather tedious “Don’t get me started” bit. I think personally this could be a pretty rad show, Chris knows his nerd culture and with a little more planning I think the show could move in some genuinely awesome directions. So yeah,  I think this has got what it takes to win over a network, with a little more comedic planning I’d hope this show could prove to be a real laugh, because for me that’s all that was really missing from this otherwise rad little teaser…

New Mister Saturday: Dangerous Nerdcore Dancehall!

Here’s the new track from my alter-ego Mister Saturday! What? You still don’t know who Mister Saturday is?! Only the most popular intergalactic nerdcore reggae rapper of all time! Ok, well maybe the only nerdcore reggae rapper in the universe but whatever! Anyway there’s a bunch of new tracks I am putting online soon, with mega serious topics like Herbie the Robot, Star Trek’s “Trouble with Tribbles”, getting lost in The Land of the Lost, Dungeons & Dragons and this latest track called “Lyrical Weapon”.

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This track is an homage to my fave 70’s & 80’s action  heroes! This track features the lyrics as well so you too can learn how to turn your voice into a deadly weapon! Check it out pleez – and if you follow or subscribe to my blog spread the word It’d be greatly appreciated!

 

Growing Pain’s Alan Thicke’s 1980’s Attempt at Pop Stardom?!!

Most People know good ol’ Alan Thicke as the loving quirky father on the 1980’s cult classic sitcom “Growing Pains” however it’s little known that he also had attempted to be a pop music heart throb in 1984!! Don’t believe me? Check out this his pop single “Thicke of the Night”!

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Nice one, Allen, incorporating your own last name into the title for a little more sex appeal! I’ve gotta say Thicke kinda brings it on this track, I’m kinda impressed at his 80’s pop skills! Who’d have ever thunk it to be true?!

Well I was curious why his single said “Grandma” on it? Apparently that’s the b-side to “Thicke of the Night” yeah a pop song about well his Grandma!! What a sweet guy! Perhaps that’s what spoiled his pop career I’ve heard pop songs about grandma just never quite do it for the kids! Check out Grandma below and judge for yourself!