GODZILLA - "Victim" demo (France, 1996)

As promised a while ago, here's the very first 4-song demo tape by Godzilla, the early death metal incarnation of the band now known as Gojira. Already heavy on the ("Human"-era) Death influence. Not much to add to my other entry about the band, except my underground minute of fame was helping them lay out this demo cover at the time. The right chanel sound level is pretty low on the first two songs, my tape is like that and I'm way too technologically retarded to figure out how to fix it. Sorry.

GODZILLA - Victim demo (France, 1996)

HIATUS / HEALTH HAZARD - "Don't Think With Your Dick…" split live tape (Belgium/UK, 1994)

Two of the most popular '90s "Euro crust" bands gathered on one tape, both recorded live in the South-West of France in 1993-94 and released by Utopia Tapes, a cassette label run by Fred a.k.a "Tony", also drummer for Enola Gay, Vomit Yourself, and Disbeer. I got the opportunity to see both bands on stage at the time and they were super solid, as those recordings can attest. The Hiatus side was recorded in Auch on August 17th 1993 and the sound quality is excellent. Soundboard recording. I really had a soft spot for this band, they always killed it live and were our own French-speaking, heavy drinking, continental answer to Doom. Talking of which, the tape ends with Hiatus' hilarious studio rendition of Doom's "Relief" taken from the split 7" shared by both bands. The Health Hazard side has a much rougher audience recording (Toulouse on February 22nd 1994) but is still totally listenable. The UK band logo was (and still is) on a lot of patches and shirts, for good reason. Blazing fast thrash/crust with raging female vocals. Ex and future members of just about every band in the UK ever, an attempt at a family tree would give even the most die-hard genealogist a headache within minutes. There's also the Not Just A Nightmare EP as bonus material to top it all off. The tape came with a really cool booklet featuring lyrics, pictures, collages… They don't make them like this anymore.

HIATUS / HEALTH HAZARD - Don't Think With Your Dick… split live tape (Belgium/UK, 1994)

TOXIK TRASH - Promo tape (France, 1990)

Toxik Trash was a late '80s thrash/grindcore band from Brittany that released a couple of tapes and, if memory serves right, had a song on one of the later 1984 compilation LP series on New Wave Records. By the time this (third?) demo came out, it seems they were already heading for a more death metal sound, but I don't think any recording from that era exists. Nothing groundbreaking on this 12 song effort, but there were so few bands playing that style in France at the time that it deserves to be documented, I guess.

TOXIK TRASH - Promo tape (France, 1990)

"Le Retour de Crème d'Enklüme et du Yaourt Pliable" - Radio show (France, 1988)

This is a 1988 radio show by one of my earliest pen pals, Laurent of the infamous Roger Mag (who might be better known by internerds as the main man behind the Church Of Zer music blog) back when he was still living in France. The hilarious and totally absurd chit-chat is in French but non-French speakers may enjoy the excellent set list.

En français du coup, car seuls les francophones seront à même de saisir la subtilité de l'humour absurde et décalé de Laurent, animateur de cette émission radio grenobloise datant de février 1988 à l'intitulé énigmatique, Le Retour de Crème d'Enklüme et du Yaourt Pliable, dans la fidèle lignée de son zine Roger Mag, de ses groupes de l'époque Eat Yourself et Ovorof, ou de sa désormais légendaire participation au jeu télévisé Tournez Manège. Les morceaux ne sont pas toujours annoncés, j'ai reconstitué la playlist de l'émission du mieux que j'ai pu à partir de mes propres connaissances et archives… vous n'êtes donc pas à l'abri de quelques approximations, ce dont je m'excuse bien platement. Notez une sélection plutôt pointue et de très bon goût pour une émission française de cette époque ! Laurent vit depuis pas mal d'années chez les cousins Québecois, d'où il anime le blog musical Church Of Zer que je ne peux que vous recommander.

The radio show playlist:

Part 1:
Napalm Death - The Kill
Heresy - Nausea
Zyklome A - Angry Faces
Agnostic Front - Hypocrisy
Satanic Malfunctions - Mosheriphia
Sudden Death - Blackflash
B.G.K. - Pencil Pusher
Fear Of God - ?
Desecration (AZ) - Time To Grow Up
Subverse - 101%
S.O.B. - Give Me Advice
X-Creta - Destructive Outfit
Adrenalin OD - Fuck The Neighbors
Heresy - Network Of Friends

Part 2:
Corrosion Of Conformity - Indifferent (live)
Impulse Manslaughter - Sedation
Neos - Ambitious
Ludichrist - Immaculate Deception
Protes Bengt - Radioaktiv
Wehrmacht - Suck My Dick
Atavistic - Perpetual Motion
Napalm Death - Deceiver
Sons Of Ishmael - Mystery Bonus Track
Negative FX - Punch In The Face
Deathnoise - No Society
Post Mortem - Run Amok
Mutilator (FR) - Wish My Death
Negative Gain - Psychic Hours
Gang Green - Narrow Mind

Le Retour de Crème d'Enklüme et du Yaourt Pliable - Radio show (1988)

DEATHLESS BASTARDS - Demo (France, 2012)

Straight out of Brittany and featuring former/current members of Warkorpse and Necrowretch among others, Deathless Bastards play rocking speed metal punk that has Motörhead written all over it – loud, crusty, heavy and metallic. The sick riffing on the last track reminds me of good ol' Acid (Belgium), but this should also appeal to Inepsy and Midnight fans. Really catchy stuff, looking forward to hearing more from this band! The cassette should still be available from Impious Desecration so support them and order a hard copy if you liked it.

DEATHLESS BASTARDS - Demo (France, 2012)

GODZILLA - "Possessed" demo (1997)

Some of you might have heard of the French metal band Gojira, who are well established in mainstream metal circles now. Not my thing at all, but they started out as a pretty good straight up death metal band. They released a couple of demos under the Godzilla monicker before changing it to Gojira (which is the Japanese name for Godzilla, as you may know). Being from the same area, I got to know and see them early on. I was mightily impressed, they were so young yet so tight and creative — especially coming from a rural area that was not exactly a fertile ground for metal. "Possessed" is their second demo tape and you can guess Morbid Angel and "Human"-era Death were major influences at the time. The drummer Mario was about 15 when this was recorded, was self taught and had only been playing for a couple of years. No wonder he's such a beast now.

I just saw on their Discogs page that this demo was reissued on CD a decade ago. Oh well. This is taken from the actual demo tape. I will most likely post the first demo in the future.

GODZILLA - Possessed demo (1997)

LOS CRUDOS - Live @ Bordeaux, France. 13th Dec. 1996

This one's for the diehards. Or the locals. A very rough audience recording of Los Crudos' show here in Bordeaux, France back in 1996. This tape hasn't be heard by more than a handful of people so far, for good reason I guess. Martin's vocals are way too buried in the mix... and barely audible by the end of the tape. But I swear you can hear me talk between songs at some point. Haha. The tape stops during the first encore song too, sorry about that.

Local heroes Öpstand opened for Los Crudos that night, and they even got to play twice (in case you wanna know, that's because the Crudos guys were wandering in the streets of Bordeaux while Öpstand were playing. Back to the venue they were super pissed they missed them and urged them to play again). I have both sets on that same tape, one of which ended up on the Öpstand discography CD. The other set is basically the same songs, but if there is demand I'll be happy to digitize it some day. This line up of Öpstand with Bruno (ex-Aspro 5000) drumming never recorded anything and didn't play more than a couple of shows.

But I digress... I didn't take the time to figure out the setlist so that's one large soundfile. Feel free to break down the tracklist if you feel like it, I'm sure some people would appreciate.

Last but not least, I'm proud to say that more than 16 years later, some friends and I are still booking DIY hardcore punk shows at this same venue. Old punks never die.

LOS CRUDOS - Live @ Athénée Libertaire, Bordeaux, France. 13th December 1996