Destroy All Music Presents: Going Home

The DIY music scene is one of the most committed and fostering communities I’ve ever been lucky to be part of, but it’s a community in trouble. The very nature of DIY requires continuous effort from artists, promoters, fans and venues, and this last piece, the DIY space—arguably the most imperative of all—is in danger of disappearing. Issues like unavailability or unaffordability of space and the ever-present threat of shutdown from cranky neighbors or authority figures are taking their toll on the existence of DIY venues.

Without a safe space to create and promote and perform, artists and their art also become threatened. But CT label/distro/collective Destroy All Music is striving to reverse the damage with the release of their new compilation Going Home.

Though still a relatively young project, Destroy All Music have already proven themselves a pivotal part of CT’s DIY music scene. Besides regularly hosting and promoting shows, their very first compilation released earlier this year forwarded all proceeds to the victims of California’s vicious wildfires, so it’s no surprise that they’ve organized a similar campaign to support their own community. And that’s why every penny collected from sales goes directly to supporting important DIY venues in New England.

Going Home is packed with tunes from seminal New England acts, reflecting the massive spectrum of genres and styles this region has to offer. Like Destroy All Music, these acts are all banding together to breathe life into their community, donating their tunes to the record and the cause. Compilations like this not only provide a gateway into the many artists honing their craft in New England, but bring those scattered sects of the DIY community together, reminding us that we are all working towards the same goal despite the distances between us.

Destroy All Music and the many talented bands on Going Home are the very essence of the DIY scene, coming together and leading the way to keep their community alive and thrashing. If you’ve ever been to a basement show or “asked a punk” where to catch your favorite touring act, you know how important this community is. How creative. How resilient.

DIY is where every band starts, where your favorite artist started. So pick up a copy of this comp today, and help make sure there’s always a space for artists to grow, and for fans to support them.

Going Home is available digitally on Destroy All Music’s Bandcamp page. You can also grab physical copies starting December 1st from Destroy All Music's distro or from any of the fine acts on the compilation.

Down with Rent - Entitled Millennial Scum

For the disaffected and marginalized sections of our community, the meeting place is not the town hall, but the dive bars and DIY spaces where hardcore and punk shows are happening so regularly. Punk music gives us a collective outlet for our frustrations, as well as a forum for confronting and changing the asinine aspects of our society. In CT, no band is making better use of this platform than Down With Rent, and with their new full-length Entitled Millennial Scum, they’re breaking out the artillery.

Down With Rent is renowned in the local scene for their explosive live shows, and Entitled Millennial Scum perfectly presses that energy and experience to record. The performances are volatile, almost too powerful for the speakers playing them. The drums thunder out beats so fast, I’m out of breath just listening. The guitar rages along aggressive chord progressions, resonant palm mutes, and searing feedback. The bass guitar’s tone alone feels like a kick in the stomach, riding atop thumping lines and growling low notes that boom within my chest cavity. The vocals thrash with throaty screams and fierce shouts, each absolutely vicious word hitting as hard as the guitar or drums.

The sound of Entitled Millennial Scum is pure and unadultered vitriol, but the lyrics are what give it a focused target. Down With Rent is fearless in calling out the hypocrisies that abound in our society. Lines like “Make no mistake / they won’t hesitate / to take everything / and leave you on the pavement to die” call out the indiscriminate greed and selfishness of the powers that be, a heady reminder that anyone playing the game will happily step on you to win it. In a similar vein, “Entitled to Everything” both pokes fun at generational disconnect with the line “Don’t ask me if you owe us a living / We want this planet and everything in it” before pointing out that action is what earns respect, not age. Entitled Millennial Scum is relentless in both energy and substance, a record seething with honest, no-holds-barred critique of the many cracks in the façade of our country.

One of my favorite aspects of Entitled Millennial Scum is how cohesively it flows. Each song rolls right into the next with nary a second wasted, swells of feedback tying the tunes together and driving the momentum of the record forward. Samples of news reports and police confrontations stitched into a couple tracks help reinforce the political tone of the album throughout. Entitled Millennial Scum is truly a record without a single boring moment—front-to-back, it plays with an integrity and energy that keeps my head and heart locked in.

No matter where you stand, Down With Rent’s new record packs serious punch. Every single song is loaded with kickass riffs, heady screams, and the unbridled energy that is this band’s trademark. Entitled Millennial Scum is a feverish punk powerhouse, the sound of a riot breaking out in the streets punctuated by brutal breakdowns and breakneck drumbeats, giving a furious voice to the fears and unrest so many of us live under every day. So put this record on repeat, and crank it up and up until it makes you deaf—you’re entitled to it.

My Top Track: “Can’t Swim”

You can find more from Down With Rent, including upcoming shows and news, on their Facebook page and on Instagram. Then head over to their Bandcamp and grab your own copy of Entitled Millennial Scum.

Parkinglot - At Least I'm Trying

There’s a strange, cathartic celebration in expressing sadness through music. If it’s done right, the emotion in a song is as real as the moment it was written; yet in sharing that sadness with the world, whether through a record or a live show, it becomes a universal event. The burden becomes just a little easier to bear, because band and listener become one in the experience.

Over the past few months, I’ve had the privilege of sharing in that odyssey with CT’s own Parkinglot, both at live shows and through their debut record At Least I’m Trying. These three punks throw everything they have into music, beating their instruments into splinters by the end of each song. Guitars squeal with feedback against a crunchy overdriven bass, and the drums smash beneath vocals that range from a resigned sigh to furious yells. Tunes like “Song for My Mind and Other Things I’ve Recently Lost” or “984 Miles” barrel at you like freight trains: relentless, and almost frightening in how powerful they are. 

At Least I’m Trying is an undeniably raw record, a factor that not only lends to its energy, but reflects the intensity that Parkinglot is known for. “Conversations” and “Den 2” feature gentle sections of quiet repose, yet there is always an underlying urgency that quickly rises to the surface. These tunes are brutally honest in their presentation, and Parkinglot’s use of dynamics in their compositions, starting small blazes that rapidly grow into infernos, forces the ear and the heart to catch up, to get on the level or get left behind. 

 

Much of Parkinglot’s music revolves around making the best of a dire situation, and the lyrics on At Least I’m Trying scream of struggle, desperation, and disconnection. There is zero pretense in the vocals—every shout is vicious, every word is honest almost to a fault. Lines like “Thank you for showing me how not to grow up to be / miserable and angry and hateful and spiteful and scotch-drunk” present the facts of a very real struggle without a hint of complaint or embellishment. 

Yet through all the pain that abounds in this album’s words, wielding sentiments often nearing suicidal, there is no question of giving up or succumbing to the darkness. Parkinglot takes their suffering and adheres it to catchy, gritty, fun-as-hell punk music, defying their despair and turning it into a celebration of life. 

At Least I’m Trying is easily one of the saddest records I’ve ever heard, but Parkinglot does not let that sadness define them. There is hope and fervor and a small but ever-growing sense of self-worth embedded in every crash cymbal or overdriven bassline. Each song bursts like a light in darkness, growing brighter and revealing more with each flash. Parkinglot proves with At Least I’m Trying that there is a future beyond struggle, and for these three musicians, it’s a goddamn bright one. 

My top track: “Vegetables”

You can find more from Parkinglot, including upcoming live shows and news, on Facebook. Then grab your own copy of At Least I’m Trying on their Bandcamp page, out via Destroy All Music.