[The seven-inch record is a cornerstone for hardcore music. Unlike metal that has diminished vinyl while perversely fetishizing it, hardcore continues to depend on the format as an essential platform for disseminating music. Characteristically shorter song lengths make it possible for a band in this scene to make a statement over the course of multiple tracks and provide it in a way that is affordable. The purpose of this column is to identify and offer short critiques of some new and recent releases in the 7" format.]

If you attended this year’s CMJ and didn’t catch at least one of Trash Talk‘s five sets, it’s your own damn fault. The brisk material on Awake (True Panther Sounds) surpasses last year’s Eyes & Nines as well as earlier singles. The title track is an absolute banger, like Circle Jerks on PCP–furious, yet still so catchy. Their photo adorning the Arts section of the New York Times, Trash Talk are perhaps the right band at the right time, and dizzying cuts like “Blind Evolution” prove they deserve what acclaim they seem so poised to get.

Santa Barbara, CA’s Minus may have only just released their debut 7″ Hard Feelings (Triple-B), but there’s nothing in the content that suggests that. What we get are five downtuned tracks of bummed out metallic hardcore. The vocals are intelligible, revealing lyrics stuffed with doubt, depression, and self-hate. “Weight” just devastates with a severe negative outlook and heavy riffage. Minus aren’t about overcoming the odds; they way they see it, we’ve already lost.

Matt Henderson must have been storing these riffs for a decade. How else could the former Madball guitarist sonically recreate that group’s 90s salad days with his latest project? A veritable hardcore supergroup, S.O.S. windmills all imitators on I Owe You Nothing (Reaper). Throughout, Terror frontman Scott Vogel lives out his Hardcore Fantasy League dreams as Freddy Cricien’s surrogate, no more apparent than on the title track, a pitch-perfect sequel to “Look My Way.” The sound of reinvigoration on wax…

-GS

Iceland’s Mínus made one of the century’s first mega-classics, the brain-rattling Jesus Christ Bobby album. But rather than further explore their singular metal-hardcore-noise thing, Mínus returned with a really entry-level hard rock album in 2004. That was a bummer — they seemed like loud music’s Michael Jordan clumsily starting from near-scratch in a new sport — but hey, they’re from Iceland, where shit doesn’t stay uninteresting for long.

So it was no shock that 2007′s The Great Northern Whalekill was weirder and cooler, like a ice-blasted Monster Magnet or less/more druggy Tomahawk. Around this time, fans like me might’ve gotten re-excited by the sense that Mínus was kinda making their way somewhere — if not back across the sphincter-tightening minefield of Bobby, than at least to somewhere off in the horizon that’s just as rad, like Cave In and Faith No More did.

Good news is that we might arrive at that awesome place this very year, as Mínus promises a 2011 release (“before Christmas”) for their fourth album, KOL. Above is a live clip of KOL‘s “Cradlesong.” So, are we there yet?

-ADF

Find Mínus music and stuff here. And definitely crank this jam.

I am not cool, but it occasionally appears that way cuz my incidental awareness of cutting-edge music. There’s a simple reason for that, one which I share with tons of other fortunates out there: I have an older sibling. She’s cool. She dated cool guys. Those cool punk and alternative and goth guys stopped at nothing to get within sniffing distance of her bod; as such, most found it worthwhile to cultivate the kid-brother endorsement.

The astute dudes recognized that the way to my heart is through my headphones and funneled a lot of free tapes (!) and CDs my way. (One particularly smitten Doc Martens aficionado worked at local college radio and hooked me up with my own evening time slot when I was 15.) My sister and I hardly got along, so my input on her suitors was never solicited, much less heeded; I thank her for neglecting to mention this fact to all those hornballs whose awareness of interesting music exploded my horizons.

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I guess some metal dudes are annoyed by neo-thrash metal bands like Warbringer, Mantic Ritual, and Municipal Waste. No scene is fun for everyone, so whatever, to each his own and all that. But even if Whorebanger, Spandex Ritual, and Munificent Waste make music of no appeal to your fun-hating ear, frankly, I still insist that you acknowledge their value to metal as a genre. First, each makes music that sounds like five guys making music, which feels great when you’re overwhelmed by metal that sounds like the universe collapsing onto itself (SYL, Emperor), a jet landing in your eye socket (Hate Eternal, Minus’ Jesus Christ Bobby), or mankind’s overthrow by fridge-raiding Nazi robots from the future (Fear Factory). Of course, I love that enormity in metal, especially when it’s the expression of an awareness of Earth’s microscopic significance in the universe. But sometimes it’s more fun to just rock out with a bunch of heshers. That’s good thrash metal. It sounds great at the beach.

And a second and unexpected side effect of neo-thrash’s artistic and commercial successes is their impact on other metal bands. This is all conjecture and surmise, but Municipal Waste’s records are big winners, and now we got a goddamn fucking D.R.I. reunion tour to enjoy. And isn’t it reasonable to conclude that Warbringer’s success would provide a shot of confidence and vigor to elder thrash bands, like fucking awesome Overkill? If you’ve heard their excellent 238th record, Ironbound, you know it’s all energetic and snappy metal (normal for them), but also that it’s their most unabashedly thrashy record in forever. And few deserve wallet-love as much as Overkill, who, contrary to their name, exemplify the unpretentious hesher approach. (See The Years Of Decay‘s “I Hate” which features gang vocals that sound like six dirtballs hollering out the back of a van, not a million-strong army of angry mutant outcasts, like say “Hook In Mouth” by Megadeth.) Big sales or not, Overkill did their part and made a metal record to be reckoned with. For this, we can thank the best neo-thrash bands and fans. For the best parts of neo-thrash, we can thank Overkill.

-ADF