Nowhere to Hide
(Stiff Pole Records)
stiffpolerecords.com
In honor of Richard "Big Stiff" Konwinski, who passed this past July in Tampa, I'll be juggling between the County Grind and Crossfade blogs doing my "Blast From the Past" thing on the record label that he founded, Stiff Pole Records. In my opinion, it came to define an exciting era in Florida's punk-rock scene.
Here's another outfit I picked up solely because it was put out by Stiff. Where do these guys come from? Tujunga, California? Where is that? Do I care? No, not really. It's on Stiff Pole, and that's good enough for me.
Here's some polished punk rock that owes a lot to its California
upbringing, and though it is polished, there's an underlying nuance that
maybe they got the polish based on an in-studio scam. This quad knows
what they are doing. The 12 tracks here are satisfying punk rock for
anybody who's ever had a casual/passing take on Rhythm Collision, Face
to Face, Screeching Weasel, and the Bollweevils... so all in all, it's a
nice amalgam of Southern California and Chicago-styled pop-punk with
blast beat elements keeping the hardcore edge present.
Need Isay more? I don't think so. Big Stiff saw it fit to release this album (available here and there from internet sources in LP and CD formats), so that's good enough for me. I'll say this much: At the halfway mark, when they do a raging cover of Men Without Hats' "Safety Dance," which is dedicated to L.A. gangs nonetheless, I was sold.
This platter was released in October of 1995. Get a time machine.