Guzzard

The Queers, “Too Many Twinkies”

Eh. Next!

Guzzard, “Deaf Ears, Gamma Rays”

As the world moved on from Amphetamine Reptile once Helmet was no longer there, the later bands never got much attention even from the alternative press. But there were some real gems from the mid-90’s releases, with the third Guzzard record (The Alienation Index Survey) being one of my favorites. They started as a pretty straightforward punk band, but evolved over the course of their three albums to something more interesting. Maybe they just refined their songwriting, but this thing totally slams and is one of my favorite releases from the back half of AmRep’s fertile period.

Pretty fun one today.

Mastodon, “North Side Star”

Mastodon released Cold Dark Place in 2017, an EP of miscellaneous songs that were recorded during the sessions for Emperor of Sand and Once More ‘Round The Sun. Like most leftovers EPs, it’s a bit of a mixed bag, but basically fits in well with those albums. If you really want more latter day Mastodon, you can do worse than this record. For instance, you could buy an album from a totally unrelated band. That would be a bad move!

At some point, I’m going to do a full writeup of just Amphetamine Reptile Records. I loved that label so much. Here’s today’s music.

J-Zone, “Caddy Coupe (Instrumental)”

Another J-Zone track, and another one that isn’t actually him rhyming. This is the instrumental of one of the better songs from Fish-n-Grits, his most recent hip-hop album. The original is a meditation on what his grandfather considered luxury, and what a Cadillac meant to him, along with Has-Lo contributing a verse on the same subject. Anyway, you can’t hear all that. Sorry!