The return of The Ultra-Fast bands? Maybe..

Question: Earache,

in the last few years there seem to have been some bubblings in the deepest depths of the underground. The story goes that every few years previous styles regain popularity and I suppose we can see examples in the resurgence of thrash (or rather the the resurgence of the popularity of thrash), death metal and so forth. It seems that at the moment, particularly in the north, there are a lot of bands playing the faster styles of hardcore, more primitive grind and power-violence. A lot of them seem to be making waves (even tape trading and tape demo's seem to have made a come back). It is due to this that I pose my question;

Do you guys in your infinite wisdom and experience of the music scene think that the return of 'the fast' is something that may make a major impact in the way that thrash and death have, or will it simply fizzle out?

Also, thumbs up on the Grind Madness at the BBC release. Picked it up at Damnation along with Ian Glasper's latest book and both have kept me rather happy today and clearly led me to raise the question I have! From: 0804513@leedstrinity.ac.uk


Answer: You're right about the demo cassettes- I've seen a few new bands touting tapes, its pretty cool in a retro way but I doubt people will be throwing away their Apple ipods for Sony Walkmans just yet.A original working 80s Walkman sells for decent money on ebay, but for £16 you can get a brand new Sony Walkman today.

As it happens the tape player is still the most successful audio product ever launched, most people don't realise you can play tapes anywhere- because older cars still have tape players, boombox blasters have a deck, and older all-in-one stereo systems come with a tape player.

As for the music, there have been pretty fast bands everywhere you look for the past 2 decades- grindcore and Black Metal acts have been blasting at top speeds, blistering listeners' ears for years, the math-core bands have used blast beats aswell, but I think you mean a different type of stripped down 'fast'HC band.

There are plenty of speed-for-speeds-sake ultra-fast hardcore bands in the North of England, as you say. The sound is stripped down, spazzed-out, not heavy, not metallised, definately not satanic- its just pure speed- and it is quite refreshing to hear actually. We released one of the trailblazers of this type last year- a band called Narcosis.

On this blog I'm often asked if 'such an such' scene is going to be big soon, or wether a certain scene is on the rise.The truth is most scenes are kinda bubbling under most people's radar all off the time, you don't have to dig too far underground to get into anything.Whether the fast-core scene will rise again? I would say its a long-shot because most styles need to be somewhat metallised for the metallic hordes to embrace it.It is pretty much up to you guys- the fans - to decide.

Heres two speedy North of England bands Earache released CDs by, in recent years:

Narcosis- Fuck off Dickhead!


Beecher- Dead for Weeks


Heres 2 North of England bands we didnt do, but both pretty speedy:

Reth- at Obscene Extreme fest



Joe Pesci- live dynamo club