For a period of time, Myspace rebranded its social media presence as a music-oriented content site. I both wrote and contributed to a number of pieces published there, all now scrubbed from online existence. In their absence, I share selections of some of that work, albeit sometimes in submitted draft versions, sometimes with draft titles, as opposed to edited form.
This piece was originally published at Myspace in May 2014 and later expunged from their site. This is the edited, published version. If you are the copyright holder and wish to have the piece removed from this page, please contact the site owner.
If you've ever caught Tyler, The Creator live or attended pretty much any Odd Future event, you probably noticed a few things about the people around you. Both a youth cult and a youth subculture, this definitively all-ages scene teems with unbridled excitement and healthy aggression at their shows. Through apparel and paraphernalia, the Odd Future fanbase publicly celebrates its shared in-jokes and an iconography replete with panda masks, cropped cat faces and pink frosted donuts. Whether or not you identify with or understand these misfits is irrelevant; simply by being at one of their shows, you are by default subject to their rules and customs.
In a way, then, an Odd Future crowd resembles a hardcore one, which perhaps helps explain how Trash Talk, a Sacramento band that makes abrasive uncompromising punk music, can share some of the same audiences as rap artists like Earl Sweatshirt or Mellowhigh. The t-shirts may be different but they serve the same purpose of expressing active participation and inclusion in a community that doesn't have much regard for the outside world. Limbs go wild to the music and failing to be vigilant about dodging them can lead to certain injury. Lyrics are memorized and recited in unison as a show of appreciation. Fun times, to be sure.
Another chapter in a longstanding history of hardcore punk and rap camaraderie, Trash Talk linking up with Odd Future for 2012's 119may have endeared them to an audience of Golf Wang bangers. Yet it hasn't softened or otherwise made more accessible their abrasive breakneck-paced crunch. Though not the sheer nightmare fuel of Converge or Young and in the Way, their music might be off putting to those on the lighter or poppier side of the punk rock spectrum eager for sing-along choruses and catchy hummable verses.
Admittedly, as is par for the course in hardcore, Trash Talk's sound hasn't changed all that much since its 2007 debut, though it boasts comparatively low lineup turnover by contemporary standards. Though the drum seat has recently shifted, frontman Lee Spielman, guitarist Garrett Stevenson and bassist Spencer Pollard have steadily guided the band from into their current status as one of the most visible bands in contemporary American hardcore. As such, the bulk of No Peace, Trash Talk's latest full-length and second for the Odd Future Records imprint would seem at home on 2010's Eyes & Nines or even prior releases. "The Great Escape" and "Jigsaw" charge forward at brisk speeds, all galloping drums and inscrutably effective guitar work.
That's part of the beauty of No Peace, a major label distributed record whose commercial viability has less to do with what's actually been recorded than the vibrant subculture it's associated with. Not to diminish Trash Talk's notable accomplishments in cultivating and energizing a fanbase with a grueling tour schedule and frequent social media updates, but the album has a lot more potential with Tyler, The Creator's stamp of approval than it would on an empathetic indie like Reaper or Six Feet Under. Devoid of radio-friendly singles, Earl's Doris too was an uncommercial effort, after all.
Operating at the height of their craft, Trash Talk haven't resigned themselves to playing things safe. No Peace isn't a perfunctory showing or some carbon copy of those earlier records. There's more depth to this record than their impressive career standout 119, and effective hardcore formulas essential for genre classification have been modified just enough, tweaked like a classic cocktail in the hands of a creative yet faithful bartender. When the band tinkers with the tempo, it careens downward towards grunge, revealing a slightly sludgy, Nirvana-esque depth often lost in the bustling raw power of their faster cuts. Incesticide-like post-adolescent hookery makes "Just A Taste" and "Leech" absolute delights. Conversely, mutant hip-hop bookends "Amnesiatic" and "Reprieve" capture just how easily Trash Talk can morph into Odd Futurians when they feel so obliged. If the group ever truly tries to branch out further into either direction, the results could prove extremely worthwhile and rewarding. For now, it's just great to know they're not stuck in a rut and instead are energized and emboldened by their relative success.
Though hard to come by, gateway bands have been critical to music discovery for decades. The music that moves us when we're young often defines or at least helps to shape our tastes in the ensuing years. Every self-professed music lover has that band or album that entered through the ear canal and changed his or her brain chemistry. It's entirely conceivable that a teenager dragged by pals to the Odd Future Picnic might hear Trash Talk for the first time and have such a moment. With a sprawling summer of festival offerings and loads of great bands making invigorating new music, it's a great time to get into hardcore.