New Punk Adds: Together Pangea, Downtown Boys, The Descendants

Together Pangea - The Phage: Together Pangea is a band that has been around the LA Garage punk scene for the last few years. Their last album, Badillac,is one that I still listen to regularly because it managed to be heavy and fast and gnarly, but it also had some slower, cleaner tracks like the title track and "Offer" that incorporated cleaner guitars and melodies that other bands in the scene like FIDLAR have consistently used but haven't pulled off very well IMO. These kind of songs are also on The Phage, and those are the tracks that make the EP stand out from at what this point is a pretty robust scene. The first two songs are burners and the opener specifically is awesome, but the song that really stands out is the third track "Blue Mirror". The guitars are cleaner than most other Pangea tracks, and the variety of textures make it probably one of the best tracks the band has released. I don't know if the band's best music is on the horizon, but at the very least they aren't regressing. JACK

RIYL: FIDLAR, Ty Segall, Criminal Hygeine

Recommended Tracks: 1, 3, 4

Downtown Boys - Full Communism: It's kind of hard to describe this band. They are a self described "bilingual political dance sax punk party", but they aren't really a ska punk band like the horn section would make you think. The best comparisons I can think of are Bikini Kill with saxophones, or a hardcore version of the Might Mighty Bosstones. It's definitely something interesting and different, so if you like interesting and different they're worth checking out. JACK

RIYL: Bikini Kill, Mighty Mighty Bosstones, Bruce Springstean (but not really)

Recommended Tracks: 2, 5, 8, 11

The Descendants - Milo Goes to College: The Descendants are a legendary band in the annals of punk. Pretty much all of the punk bands of the 90's take cues from this band as far as musical style and lyrical content, which is basically hardcore punk coming straight out of the suburbs instead of the inner city. This album specifically is the one that was an inspiration for all of the Green Day's NOFX's, and Offsprings' (and thankfully not the Good Charlotte's). But if you're not going to spin this album because of that, at least give it a look because I drew the album art for the CD on the wall.

RIYL: NOFX, Green Day, Bad Religion, 

Recommended Tracks: 1, 4, 7, 9, 11, 12