Wednesday, February 4, 2009

Punch It Like Kojak

click for enlarged view

"Confusion Comforts Me" by Atlas is just about my favorite Connecticut 90's single side (including even Monsterland), maybe second only to Grand Passion's "Negative Jesus". Not only does it have a great riff-- one that Flipside called "the MTV theme as played by Small 23", which is kind of a joke, actually-- but I've always liked the sound of fret squeak for whatever reason, and here, the fret squeak is practically a part of the riff itself. I know that's a stupid reason for liking a song, but "Confusion Comforts Me" is way cooler than that, trust me. Then there's "Punch It Like Kojak", which isn't hardcore but still has a serious mosh part in the place of a chorus-- "aaaaahhh, PUNCH IT!" Try beating that one.

The Atlas 7" was Capsule 002; Capsule One was a compilation 7", which I posted last September if you want to go back and look for it. Besides a few compilation tracks and the 7", Atlas also released a CD, which is a truly great thing in and of itself; eventually when I post it I'll include the Atlas interview from Brushback #6, which is pretty darn hilarious (Angela: "We played with Drew Barrymore's mother's boyfriend's band." Dave: "Oh, you mean Creature Did?").

There were only 300 of "Confusion Comforts Me" pressed, on clear vinyl, and it's almost impossible to find a copy despite the fact that I don't think it ever actually sold out. I'd been on a two-year search to replace my original copy and not having any luck, until Brian from Atlas contacted me out of the blue last month and I begged a copy off him. So here it is, thanks to Brian. You rule.


click for enlarged view

Atlas -

"Confusion Comforts Me"

"Punch It Like Kojak"

(these files are now listen-only)



click for enlarged view



click to see more reviews


click for enlarged view

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

...AKA future and former Brunch Mummie/current CT Rollergirl, Angela.

(Rollergirl the thing...not "the band".)

Jere said...

You beat me to it, Bruce, though I will add Newfangled Gadgets to the list, as well as just saying she has the best teeth in Connecticut rock 'n' roll.

What's her roller derby name again? Avengela? Revengela? Anjelica Bootskin?

Hey, maybe this would be a good time to mention the video of my old band's performance as the Spice Girls, since Angela is seen right behind "Scary Spice" at the 1:00 mark.

Anonymous said...

REVENGELA...indeed. I remember that Halloween Spice Girls performance! I swear it had NOTHING to do with my switching loyalties from Posh to Baby!

Brushback said...

I didn't know about the Ct. Rollergirls thing-- I looked it up, and sure enough, there she is.

The one Atlas tidbit that I can pass along is that John-- the drummer in Atlas at the time I interviewed them-- said that he had been in Aware ('80s Ct. straight edge band). Good luck finding stuff out about Aware using Google, though.

Brushback said...

The mp3 files on this post are now listen-only (non-downloadable) files. They're now being hosted on my Vox page (accesible through any of the listen-only links on this blog), along with the third song from the Atlas 7" which wasn't included in the original post.

For those of you who missed the boat, I will do my best to respond to any e-mailed requests for the original files.