The Witzard

XREDLINEX is a Chicago-based Straight Edge Hardcore/Punk started by Marko Karacic, formerly of 90's SWedish/Chicago Post-hardcore band Blindside . Karacic brought on both current and ex-members of 2Minute Minor, Colt Snuffer & The Dead Horsemen, Life Force, Monroe, October Bird of Death, To Live As Sons, Vangard, What's Your Damage?, xIron Sharpens Ironx, and ZAO. XREDLINEX's current line-up features Karacic on guitar along with frontman Wiley "Murder" Willis, bassist Mic Cox, guitarist Joshua "Josh" Conlee, and drummer Larry Passenier. XREDLINEX has been in the gestational stage for quite some time now and we've been in contact with both Marko Karacic & Wiley Willis from 2Minute Minor about the progression of the band leading up to their debut release. Earlier this month, XREDLINEX self-released their first single, "11th Hour," onto streaming services, as well as an accompanying music video. Said video was shot by Wiley Wi...

Mikey Erg with Jeff Rosenstock, Alex Clute & Lou Hanman (CREDIT: Emily McKern) "Mikey Erg continues to set the gold standard for hooky Punk love songs. Love At Leeds is him at the top of his song-writing game—just one finely tuned ear-worm after another," writer Dan Ozzi gushes within a press release. Love At Leeds is the realization of many dreams for Mikey Erg. A life-long music obsessive, growing up in the early 90's, there was one sound he'd always hoped to capture on his recordings: the sound of Steve Albini. Steve's credits include Pixies, Flogging Molly, Iggy & The Stooges, and, of course, Nirvana's iconic third album, In Utero, one of Mikey's absolute favorite records. Mikey had never in his 20-plus-year recording career ever been able to make a fully-analog recording. Love At Leeds was the perfect time to rectify all of that. Love At Leeds by Mikey Erg Utilizing the same group of musicians that helped him realize his debut solo alb...

Beach Rats (CREDIT: Matthew Gere) Beach Rats were one of our favorite Punk/Hardcore super-groups to emerge in recent years and we've alays wondered if and when they would return with a proper full-length. It appears as though the New Jersey Punk/Hardcore Gods have heard and answered our prayers, as Beach Rats have announced their first proper full-length album, Rat Beat, dropping this July! Beach Rats consists of frontman Ari Katz (Lifetime, Ex-Ressurection,) guitarists Brian Baker (Minor Threat, Bad Religion, Dag Nasty) & Pete Steinkopf (The Bouncing Souls,) bassist Bryan Keinlen (The Bouncing Souls,) and drummer Daniel/Danny "Dubs" Windas (A New Enemy, The Arsons, Let It Burn.) Beach Rats' 2018 EP, Wasted Time , was released on Bridge Nine Records and featured the same line-up—just with Daniel "Dubs" Windas appearing in a somewhat less official capacity. Beach Rats have now signed with Epitaph Records, an imprint owned, operated, and founded by Bake...

After Anthony Green left rehab in 2020, he started writing a song called "I Don't Want to Die," a sentiment that captures the raw, sometimes heartbreaking, but, also, hopeful nature of his new solo record, Boom. Done. It turned out to be a lightning strike to his song-writing and, with the help of long-time friends and bandmates Tim Arnold & Keith Goodwin of Good Old War , Green wrote one of the most intentional and formidable bodies of work in his expansive career. Out everywhere this July on Born Losers Records, Boom. Done. was written over the last couple of years following an overdose where Green's struggle with addiction led to him, actually, losing his life for up to eight minutes. Around this time, Green was, also, formally diagnosed with bipolar disorder and while most of his music has grappled with the realities of addiction and mental illness, there's something different about the songs on Boom. Done. "I don't dance, the world around...

We've Got A Flyer On You will (hopefully!) be a new recurring column here at The Witzard. It's set to feature, examine, and re-visit mixed bill/genre, once-in-a-lifetime, iconic, and otherwise noteworthy Punk/Hardcore show flyers and their corresponding line-ups. As often as possible, we plan to speak directly with the promoters, bookers, flyer artists, soundmen/women, show attendees, and, most importantly, the artists themselves. If all goes well, we're even hoping to, eventually, cover a handful of shows we attended ourselves in years past, as well. For this slightly re-vamped edition of We've Got A Flyer On You , we'll be spotlighting a noteworthy musician, rather than a singular infamous show, for each installment. Fred Mascherino is the guitarist, frontman, and namesake of West Chester, Pennsylvania-based Indie Rock/Emo band The Color Fred (T.C.F.) Mascherino recently started his own label imprint, Heading East Records , whose first release was T.C.F....

ALYX Ryon & Jumbled still from "Stan Kenton" music video (CREDIT: John Bachman) We're proud to share "Stan Kenton," the latest collaboration from D.C. emcee ALYX Ryon and Baltimore beat-maker Jumbled (by day, known as John Bachman) self-released today on Bandcamp. It's a raucous less than two-minute track encapsulated over a squalling drum-lade horn sample expertly executed by Jumbled himself. This new song serves as an introduction to their upcoming collaborative album slated to drop this summer. Said project has been in-the-making for a few years now following fruitful collaborations on Jumbled's Christmas album, Merry Christmess (2017,) and his Doo-wop indebted project, Jumbled's Jukebox [Doo-wop Inspired Hip-Hop], last year. ALYX Ryon is an up-and-coming rapper from the Washington, D.C. area with many singles and a few albums under his belt. He's a member of JUSTGORILLA, YungZILLA The ZillaGAHD, and TIXE, in addition to his own solo a...

A Vulture Wake (SOURCE: Earshot Media / Thousand Islands Records) Midwest Rockers A Vulture Wake hit harder, darker, and more soulful on their upcoming EP, Kingdom. It will be their sophomore effort and first of two releases slated for 2022 produced, engineered, and mixed by Mike Kennerty (The All-American Rejects, These Enzymes, Screeching Weasel.) It's been lauded as sounding "exactly how I thought it would sound" by NOFX frontman and Fat Wreck Chords founder Michael "Fat Mike" Burkett. Kingdom is lyrically dystopian while building a feeling of hope and victory—all under A Vulture Wake's mantra of "do no harm; take no sh*t." A press release explains, "their new single, "Red," is a rallying cry for the people and a punch in the gut to the "cult of c*cks" spreading the disease of dread and deceit across nations of souls reaching for hope." A Vulture Wake's "Red" shrouds a wicked battle for righteousnes...

BE WELL L-R: Aaron Dalbec, Brian McTernan, Shane Johnson, Peter Tsouras & Mike Schleibaum (CREDIT: J.C. Carey) Today, BE WELL have shared "I Will Leave You with This," the second single from their forthcoming EP, Hello Sun, out May 20th on Revelation Records. On the anthemic "I Will Leave You with This," frontman and life-long musician/producer Brian McTernan spends a rare moment taking stock of his career. The video for the song reflects on these memories through photos and video from his Salad Days Studio, showing footage not only from recording Hello Sun, but from working with bands like Circa Survive, TURNSTILE, Thrice, BANE, Fireworks, Strike Anywhere, and PRAISE just to name a few. It additionally showcases a quick super-exclusive glance at the infamous Salad Days Studio "singles ad book." McTernan states that his newly-found view has been healing and inspiring: "one of the most incredible things about putting out the first BE WELL re...

Following the recent announcement of his sophomore album, Get On The Otherside, Helsinki-born artist Bobby Oroza shares a new single and accompanying video, "Sweet Agony." The 12-track album will feature the new single, closely following the quasi-title track, "The Otherside," and the string of singles released last year, including "Make Me Believe," " I Got Love," and "Loving Body." The visual for "Sweet Agony," which Bobby directed and edited himself, plays out like a nightmarish audition tape where he casts himself as a vampire with aspirations of being a performer, singing the soulful ballad to a group of unimpressed talent agents. The song itself mirrors that vulnerability, addressing the tug at the heart that comes with longing for someone dear, and acknowledges the sweet side of such intense emotions. Having conquered "The Otherside," Bobby Oroza returns to cast another spell of Dreamboat Soul and achingl...

The Folk Implosion originally existed from 1993-2004 and primarily featured Lou Barlow (Dinosaur, Jr., Sebadoh) & John Davis, as well as players Russ Pollard & Imaad Wasif. Folk Implosion were on an indefinite hiatus between 2004-20 and at different stages thoughout their career, were also known as Deluxx Folk Implosion/D.F.I. with memebr sof Boston's Deluxx, Ljudska, and The New Folk Implosion/N.F.I. Davis left the band around 1999-2000 and Barlow recruited Pollard & Wasif to help record The New Folk Implosion (2003.) "After 22 years, Folk Implosion have, today, self-released a new single: Feel It If You Feel It (two songs, two remixes) available on Bandcamp (it'll be on [your] Apple Music, Spotify etc. on April 29th.)" Feel It If You Feel It by The Folk Implosion "We got three physical formats to choose from: CD, cassette (get 'em now!) and 12-inch vinyl (pre-order, get it in November.) These songs will *not* be on the LP we are working ...

"After four long years, New York's Warthog finally return in 2022 with their latest EP. Need we say more?" Static Shock Records shared within a brief release statement on their Bandcamp page. Warthog's latest (third?) self-titled 7-inch EP is the proper follow-up to their (second?) self-titled release from 2018. Warthog have since shared an 8-track live release fittingly titled LIVE! on Shout Recordings/Static Shock Records back in May of 2019. It features Warthog's long-time line-up of Christopher "Chris" Hansell on vocals, Michael "Mike"/M. Gorup/Goo & Sully providing guitar, bassist Mateo Cartagena, and drummer Ryan Naideau. Warthog was recorded by Sasha Stroud at Artifact Audio, mixed by Will Killingsworth (Bacchae, Incendiary, The Men,) and mastered by Arthur Rizk (Cro-Mags, P*ssed Jeans, Turnstile) with artwork designed by Alexander Heir. Warthog by Warthog Along with the unexpected announcement of Warthog (III,) Warthog have ...

DJ Shadow expertly sampled boat-loads of artists including everyone from Metallica to Björk across his 1996 break-out debut, Endtroducing..... On an album full of stand-outs and fan favorites, "Organ Donor" has stood the test of time and gradually become a cult classic over the course of the past 26 years. Shadow painstakingly built the track upon samples of Giorgio Moroder's "Tears" from Son of My Father (1972,) The New Breed Feat. Tim & Bill's "Someone" B-side to "Little Bit A Soul" (1967,) and Samson & Delilah's "There's A DJ In Your Town" (1969.) Instrumentally covering the sample source or original track interpolated has become a thing in recent years, as well, so bands, such as Japanese Jazz Fusion trio NAUTILUS have covered "Tears" in tribute to both DJ Shadow & Giorgio Moroder. Birmingham, UK-based DJ, musician, multi-instrumentalist, and Jalapeno Records signee is the latest to take a cr...

We haven't covered Philly violin-aided Folk Punk trio The Deadeyes since 2018, but that's largely our fault for dragging our feet... because The Deadeyes have been far from inactive since 2018: having released their Mind Cabin & No More Later / Narco EP's throughout 2018 and Cover Songs and "Last Days of Summer" in 2020. Those individual songs and EP's have since been pulled and scrubbed from streaming services, as they've been re-mixed, re-mastered, and re-collected on The Deadeyes' newly-released Collected Recordings. The Deadeyes showcases a truly unique one-of-a-kind line-up featuring Patrick "Paddy" McHugh on guitar and vocals, Dave McMullin on drums, and John Coursey providing violins and electronics. Collected Recordings chronicles and re-collects everything McHugh, McMullin & Coursey have been working on over the past 7-8 years since their debut, Demonstrationals & Remixes. Collected Recordings by The Deadeyes ...

Elway L-R: William Orender, Tim Browne, Joe Henderer & Brian Van Proyen (CREDIT: Tom May) Elway have stuck with Red Scare Industries for a few years and, now, we've all been rewarded with their best album yet; or, at least, that's what they're saying. Elway's Tim Browne, Joe Henderer, William Orender & Brian Van Proyen, also, tell us that the prevailing theme of this collection of songs is, "... The Candide/Quixote Dilemma. As in, are we naïve for being optimistic?" Hoo-wee, sounds like Red Scare's gonna get rich off this thing! The Indie Punk quartet recorded a buncha songs out in their home state of Colorado and, then, they painstakingly whittled it down to the best 11 tracks for The Best of All Possible Worlds. All bangers here! Even though it's been lean times for Indie Rock/Punk tours during The Pandemic, Elway has managed to play some recent shows with The Lawrence Arms, Hot Water Music, and The Menzingers and we expect the good tim...

Let's just get a few things out of the way here first and foremost: Yes, KŌYŌ is a Long Island Hardcore (LIHC) band. Yes, they're soemtimes referred to as "Melodic Hardcore,' as well. Yes, KŌYŌ has six members. Yes, their frontman is as ripped as The Incredible Hulk. Yes, their bassist is a semi-professional wrestler. Yes, one of their EP covers is a allusion to Taking Back Sunday's Tell All Your Friends. Yes, KŌYŌ's music is often compared to Taking Back Sunday & The Movielife. To any effect, KŌYŌ is back with their second single for their new label home, Pure Noise Records. Earlier this week, KŌYŌ dropped their new single, "Straight North," whicj features Joey Chiaramonte, T.J. Rotolico, Harold Griffin, Mike Marazzo, Sal Argento, and Steve Spanos. "We just put out a brand new single, "Straight North," with an accompanying video. Thank you all to have already listened. if you haven't, check it out here . Like a lot of the ba...