Southern Lord seems to be making its move towards becoming a hardcore label official. All jokes aside, the recent releases of material by Xibalba, Nails, Trap Them, and even d-beat lycanthropes Wolfbrigade is telling of the direction that the label wants to go in. But Poison Idea? Now there’s a throwback.
Reaching back in time to re-re-release the seminal classic, Poison Idea’s third release, not-so-subtly entitled Kings of Punk, so that we may educate ourselves on what actually defines the phrase Hardcore Punk in a world where tough guy crews like Crowd Deterrent wear proverbial Burger King crowns and refer to themselves as such with no irony. It’s raw, nasty, dirty, uncompromising, and pretty damn good. I’ve been late to the party as far as this band is concerned, and I even missed their recent show in Quincy, but better late than never, because if you never, then how can you at all?
Jerry A.’s drug and alcohol infused spit will get in your ears as he yells about cops, being angry, and leading different ‘Lifestyles’ (see what I did? I hope not). “Pig Champion” plays licks that are simple enough to be punker than you, but also tastefully executed and catchy so songs like ‘God Not God’ manage to stick around in your head while you imagine yourself drunkenly making room for yourself to slamdance. The rhythm section rumbles dutifully behind, but still has enough energy to feed positively off the guitar and vocals to create an atmosphere that lives up to the album’s semi-facetious name. I’m coming across as too academic here, but only because otherwise this review would be detailing what kind of foolish act I would partake in while listening to any given song.
While the original material on its own stands the test of time, there are also live versions of every track and beyond, intermingled with some chuckle-worthy banter by Jerry A., this being the product of altogether too much liquor and too few brains left intact from just being too “punk” to articulate linear thought. It’s an exercise in how many different ways one can huff glue and still be functional enough to say something negative. Also a completely original forgery of Motörhead‘s self-named jam which I can’t seem to remember the name of, and a hateful sampled piss-take where someone clearly is in need of Mr. Clean.
Taking the time to listen to Poison Idea has shown me just how important they were in the formation of hardcore punk as a genre, so I feel like even more of a nerd because I’m gonna namedrop them like everyone else when asked about the history of hardcore. It’s always good to learn things.
8.5/10
Sean Pierre-Antoine