the brightest comet

this band is actually active right now, but who gives a shit. one of the great, overlooked bands of the mid to late 90s emo / indie boom was ribbon fix. they produced several records, all of them well worth tracking down. once they split up, vocalists andi camp and mark allen rodgers went off in different, and enjoyable directions (rodgers is currently in whiskeycore country boys, the devil's own). andi camp though can now be found in the brightest comet, which sounds like ribbon fix reborn, which will surely warm the hearts of many old bastards who yearn for the good old days. there are three songs on the myspace site, and they are all utterly, heartbreakingly beautiful. check them out.

pennikurvers

if you're the kind of dork who can't get enough of non-produced, obscure female fronted emo from 1995, then you are going to love this one. pennikurvers play 3 songs, very much in the spirit of bands such as crash & brittany. the 7" is on dieselhead records too (home of the much under-rated cambria, who none of the mp3mos ever name drop). curiously enough, this band features bobby from honeywell, which is not going to be your first thought upon hearing it. anyway, there are three songs on this. two of them are shorter and fill side a, they are daredevil and halo. it's all gently swaying guitars and soft vocals, clearly recorded on a boombox in someones garage after an evergreen show. well, not quite. recorded on 8 track using half inch tape in april and may 1995. things occasionally up the volume, but not too often. flip the single for autumn in february (emo), and one long song that fills 7 inches on 33rpm. it kicks in with nice repetitious guitars, and distant distorted vocals that are barely audible. around two minutes, emily's vocals join in. the repeating guitars and the vocals get louder and louder, building up to the end, when it just squeals out into feedback and guitar tones. emo. i miss this kind of shit - no production, simple structures and melody... always effective but no bands are interested in sounding like this any more, partly because bands are too obsessed with having good production, and partly because about 4 people would buy their record, the kids into this sound only want the authentic real deal from back when they were 5 years old.

basically if you like the idea of a female fronted evergreen then you ought to try and find this 7". but good luck, you'll damn well need it. it's taken me years.

for now, you can download the 3 songs right here: http://www.mediafire.com/?epyldltwbbd

breaker morant

going to the well with the old 'ex-member' tag in hand, i yanked out the bucket and there was breaker morant. ex-prozac memory, you have to have high hopes in that instance. and rightfully so. breaker morant drive through 5 songs of tense, taut, jagged emo of the kind perpetuated by bands such as griver and sleepytime trio. yelled vocals (but not shouted) over aggressive guitar play and sparse production. it has a very "live" feel which you pick up in a lot of great emo music, like these guys just went out and bashed away for an hour and came up with some good music somehow, no planning involved... addiction solilloquy has a particularly awesome bit in the middle where it drops out and goes all pretty, before bombasting back recklessly. killer. menchu is very much a timid build up and then combusts in an all-action rock out to follow up. i am floored.

the songs that i have here are from a split cd with amputee set, released on BMAS, and they were recorded in 1998 in kansas city, so you have the midwestmo lineage present there too. one song from this cd also appears on a comp cd featuring 40 bands from columbia, missouri. this comp cd is still in print i believe.

sadly i can find no info on what these guys got up to after they finished breaker morant, but it was probably awesome. so if you know, please let me know!

check them out right here: http://www.sendspace.com/file/ouig45

anklebiter

that's torn it, i've gone and written about a band that isn't even that emo. well, kind of. i guess if the promise ring is emo then anklebiter sort of can sneak in there too. this is rough, tuneful indie rock that comes in between the wedding present and archers of loaf. short-ish songs, repetitious guitars that jangle and buzz, shouty off-key vocals and pretty much all the elements of noisier indie rock that get me excited. anklebiter also produced a quality full length lp that is perhaps even better realised than the 7" here. the best song is the final track "dynamic ribbon device", which builds up through the non-existent production and fizzes to the finale. love it.

this 7" is on vinfiz and plow records, and probably quite cheap if you ever find it, i doubt many people want it these days, which is kind of sad. this is a great style of music that is completely neglected.

members of anklebiter now parade in the slightly mediocre beat buttons (although the demo songs up there sound superior to their previous cd). i'd point you in the direction of watson (ex-clairmel) if you want to hear a modern band taking up the mantle.

here is the 7" until the link expires: http://www.sendspace.com/file/2kuyen

manneqvin hand

now here's a highly obscure band that have elements that fall under the emo bracket. and others that don't. the 7" was the first release on shakefork records. the label itself is intriguing as the sound of the early releases such as this formed the basis for the sound of the later, and far better known, releases from bands such as gauge, friction and cap'n jazz. i can't really give you much info about manneqvin hand, but this single features two tracks. "the other side" is a fun blend of east-bay pop punk and rites of spring style emo. the verses are fast and simple with shouty vocals, before it breaks down into the rumbling, chunky chorus that owes a debt to revolution summer. toss the single over for 'black day (JOW)', which opens with a chuggy edgemo sound reminiscent of early still life or the current lp. it's not my favourite style of emo to be honest, but given that this single came out in 1990, it's a very interesting example of protomo as it handily pre-dates many other bands that went on to "popularise" this particular sound.

the band also featured on a 4 way split 7" on shakefork ("no punks in the pit") but i am not aware of any other releases, nor have i heard this comp.

anyways, here's the 7" until the link expires : http://www.sendspace.com/file/aftlbu

spirit

australian emo (aussiemo) really does delve into the obscure depths of the genre, as there are relatively few examples of the beast. spirit was one of those.

spirit released little material (a pre-requisite for this shit, naturally), but the 'in memory of...' 7" on penfold / spiral objective should find a niche in the record box of any self-respecting emo hoarder. in addition they have a split 7" with canadian mathmo band, blake, which isn't as essential, but still worth a listen or two. the single 'in memory of...' was recorded in april of 1998, and spirit pounds out four sobbers that immediately bring to mind native nod and bob tilton. 'i am the locus' starts the single off impressively, yet there is room for improvement. the guitars clang around and the screamier vocals are all particularly reminiscent of native nod. entirely forgiveable though, as it's a style that has been tackled all too infrequently down the years. 'the philosopher' jazzes into earshot next, hinting at mohinder initially before they really ease off the accelerator and glide into the spot on spoken vocals and more native noddery. but just wait for the bit where they lay on the twinkles and get all pretty. totally great shit.

over on the flip we up speeds to 45rpm and, coincidentally enough, get dealt the faster side of the band. 'singing in your ears' piles on the desperate vocals over the native nod riffage, and really kills when they drag the pace down and drive up the guitars towards the end, and if you're anything like me you'll be rocking back and forth violently in your chair to this one. 'tin can virus' winds things down with a top notch twinkly intro and more of those spoken vocals. by now you know what you're in for and it all is hitting the right spot, over and over.

the packaging scores highly on the emo points scale too, with a screen printed cover, lyrics printed in an unreadable font, a little envelope containing a picture of a tree and some words from penfold records, and some mclard-esque ramblings from spiral objective on nature and spirituality.

you may be able to buy both spirit records here:

missing link records

i hope you can.

but for now, until the link expires, you can download the whole 7" here:

http://www.collective-zine.co.uk/emo/obscuremo/22/

enjoy.

lonely broken radio

fine choice of band name right there, it tells you everything you need to know - i.e. these guys are emo bastards. they released a solitary 7", featuring 2 songs recorded in may '96, on chrysanthemum records (more emo bastardry out of san francisco.

hey, i am dragging this bit out as that's about as much information as i have on the band. there is no insert and i have stumbled across little useful information in web searching. however, this 7" delivers an absolute killer song in 'bigger miracles', a free falling, slow burning effort that nudges aside the more theatrical elements of indian summer and borrows a touch more from slint, barring the vocals. it builds up into a massive roar in mid-song before dying down and twinkling out of sight at the end.

i am fairly certain that this band in fact involves at least one character from indian summer, although i have no real evidence for this. search for them on google, you won't find shit.

download: Lonely Broken Radio - Bigger Miracles mp3

days in december

for a long while i was under the impression that days in december had no output other than a split 7″ with sweater weather (http://www.polyvinylrecords.com/ although you would do well to find mention of this release on their website), which featured a song entitled ‘main in vine’, a song which fused sunny day real estate and the midwest emo style to great effect. so, i made do with that one song, rediscovering it for mixtapes every now and again, and rarely ever considering that there were other recordings out there.

until march of this year. someone unearthed a days in december live set, the ‘WEFT radio sessions’. 5 songs (including a version of ‘main in vine’) and almost half an hour that suggests that days in december would have been more than capable of producing one of the great mid west emo lps. and we should be rather upset that they didn’t. the songs are lengthy, often quite simple and repetetive in structure, and lean heavily on the sound boys life generated. this is a band still finding its feet, but they were truly onto something, a style which lay dormant for quite some time until rockets and blue lights blundered on in. the music here features gentle twinkles and vocals build into energetic bursts of noise and urgency. my pick of the bunch is the sublime ‘ad free radio’, which meanders elegantly and winds down into the final two minutes of waltzy repetition that will leave you on the floor. wow.

of course, there is probably a demo too. most bands have a demo. it’s just not been rediscovered yet. but for now, you can always make do with these songs. here comes the autumn.

download: Days in December - 5 song radio session