About a year ago, I received a supercool gift from an old boss of mine. It’s a photographic reproduction of late punk, grunge and alternative tape spines. Bands include Nirvana, Ministry, Living Colour, Sonic Youth, Rage Against The Machine, The Surf Punks, and many, many more. The art is digitally printed on canvas and fastened onto wood and it’s so fucking badass that it’s now hanging up in our hallway. (Click to zoom-in or check out the Bughouse studio’s website for this and more.)
Some of the tapes included on the print are old fave’s – Green Day’s Dookie, Soundgarden’s Superunknown, and Hole’s Live Through This, for example. Other tapes led me to revisit albums I hadn’t thought about in awhile by artists like Temple of the Dog, Marilyn Manson and Faith No More. I decided that I’m going to listen to every single album included in the print…all 105. It’ll be a nice history lesson/recap of the Post-Punk and Grunge eras, and so far, I’m having a great fucking time doing it.
Most importantly, however, are the artists I’ve never heard of before. I’m plugging the headphones in, digging deep and scraping the depths of the Internet to find them all. For this week’s Music Monday, I thought it’d be cool to highlight this mini-project and include a video from an American heavy metal band with an unforgettable name: Cycle Sluts From Hell.
The group formed in 1986 and sadly only released one studio album, 1991’s self-titled release. They’re all female and all badass, having stage names like Queen Vixen, Venus Penis Crusher, She-Fire of Ice, and more. This particular track, “I Wish You Were A Beer,” was even watched and loved by Beavis & Butt-head. (How’s that for legitimacy?) It’s the epitome of outdated 80’s metal and I LOVE IT SO MUCH. The 90’s had arrived, but these ladies were clearly still kickin’ it like it was 1985.
It’s strange that a piece of art got me here, but in a world where streaming music gives you access to everything at once, you need to change up your filters sometimes and discover shit however you can.
