When its 2 in the AM and I start getting hungry Ill usually reach for a Snickers bar, yehyeh I know, I'm a fucking slob, and a hate filled one at that. But bear with me, now you cant go a Snickers without washing it down with a Coke, Snickers'll always leave your mouth drier than a nun's cunt and caked with more brown shit than god knows what. Cos I'm the kinda nerd that dreams about punk bands and wakes up halfway through sleep to listen to whatever the fuck Ive dreamt about, my mind subliminally connects various products, phrases, objects, whateverotherthingsicouldtypehere etc to certain bands and sounds. Coke and Snickers combo will forever and always lead to a compulsion to jam JFA's "Blatant Localism" EP. But I'm not here to talk about that...
Due to the disorder I mentioned above, when i see the sleeve for JFA I always have to listen to Code of Honor's single from '82. Code Of Honor are probably best known for their split 12" with the almighty SICK PLEASURE, who Ill no doubt post about down the line. They basically were SICK PLEASURE but with a different vocalist and a different sound and approach to boot. While SP delved into life's underbelly with songs about Speed Ruling, killing bus drivers and wanting to kill your parents etc COH always had a more idealistic approach to improving both society and yourself. Alot of the time this kinda lyrical approach can ruin a band for me, but while COH's lyrics are overtly hopeful they are not overly optimistic. The main lyrical focus is giving encouragement for the youth of their day to make a change and build a better future, kinda admirable but also naive. Who fucking cares though, its 2008 and this is Internet hardcore talk, right?
Anyway, on with the show. On this here single you get two rippers, the A side "What Are We Gonna Do?" is a crunchy upbeat number with alot of breaks and metallic tendency's, by metallic I'm talking metallic for 82' HC which really means "these cats can play their instruments, dude". For me the backbone and probably the highlight of COH is the riffing of Mike Fox who shows alot of chops and more flair than most of his contemporaries. This is best showcased on the flip, "What Price would you pay?" which is the winner on this split, 80 seconds in vocalist Johnithin Christ lets out a "SMASH IT UP!" and then from the middle of nowhere, in a curve ball comparable to the "Smoke It, Get High" call and riffarama combo on Sabbath's "Killing Yourself To Live", Mike Fox rips into a banger hard rock riff. Ridic.
Anyway, not much more to add here. This is just great Cali punk/hardcore, from the time when men were still men and sheep were scared. Also, bands take not of the art on this one. A picture of a dude on a Vert ramp, or something equally basic, and a handwritten logo will look better than any blood splatter computer dickheadry or Varsity font/finger point combo photo, anyday...
Download the EP here-
http://www.sendspace.com/file/vkm8r9
Also, as a weird side note there are a couple of spoken word parts on the B-Side of the record and at times Johnithins voice reminds me of the young punk from the start of "The Decline...", I think his names Eugene but I'm not to sure. Anyway that inevitably leads me to put on "The Decline...", almost always I'll just skip through to see Derf Scratch spit at people and make sexist remarks while coking like motherfucker. FEAR post, coming soonish, maybe? Give guns to the queers.
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