Powerless with a Guitar

When the clutter of life becomes so entangled as to become a hindrance to living it, I look to bands built on a framework of simplicity. The last month has been one of those times, and Disaffect has been one of the remedies. By now the band is infamous as part of the Scottish division of the more hardcore branch of peace punk produced in the late eighties/early nineties in parallel with Nausea, Disrupt and the like. "Powerless With A Guitar" is a posthumous live document that proves to me at least that Disaffect only gets more classic as the years pass. Side "Punk" is a superior recording of a set in Glasgow in '92, and side "As Fuck" is perhaps one of the band's last sets (1994), and was recorded in Dijon. The 23 tracks hereon make a great bookend to their studio discography, the main contents of which can be found on the resurrected Stay Female Fronted blog.

Disaffect - "Powerless With A Guitar" Live LP

Rock-Out Without Your Cop-Out

For your sake, I hope you already have Ebola's "Imprecation" 7", as it is quite the classic of nineties fast/grindcore. I thought I had convinced myself of the superiority of the band's more hardcore material, but hearing these nine tracks and their split with Servitude has me constantly swaying and reassessing. The band however, could always be counted on to pinch our self-righteous nerves with the forceps of their scathing honesty, and at times to slam our hypocritical ideals headlong into the meat grinder of their sour chords and unforgiving blast-beats. These musicians and people rank way up there in my personal cannon of UK hardcore, so as with the last post, the honor is all mine in presenting this to you...

The "Imprecation" 7" by Ebola (UK)