today
8:30 a.m. Audubon Society Field Trip See Event Description
read >8:30 a.m. Alzheimer’s Resource Center Volunteer Training See Event Description
read >9 a.m. Arcata Farmers' Market Arcata Plaza
read >9 a.m. Speakers' Symposium College of the Redwoods
read >9 a.m. Humboldt Botanical Gardens Foundation Speakers’ Symposium College of the Redwoods
read >9 a.m. Humboldt Botanical Gardens' Speakers' Symposium College of the Redwoods
read >9 a.m. Fall Rummage Sale Arcata United Methodist Church
read >9:30 a.m. AAUW Meeting See Event Description
read >9:30 a.m. Little River State Beach Restoration See Event Description
read >9:30 a.m. Sierra Club Headwaters Hike See Event Description
read >10 a.m. Lanphere Dunes Guided Walk See Event Description
read >10 a.m. 5th Annual Synergy Fair Arcata Community Center
read >10 a.m. Go Green and Boost Your Bottom Line Wharfinger Building
read >11 a.m. Sustaining Excellence and Enthusiasm in Health, Relationships and Work Carlo Theater (Dell'Arte)
read >noon KEET's Kids Club Morris Graves Museum of Art
read >1:30 p.m. Humboldt County Historical Society Humboldt County Library
read >2 p.m. Arcata Marsh Field Trip Arcata Marsh and Wildlife Sanctuary Interpretive Center
read >4 p.m. Woodside Preschool’s 36th Wine and Ale Tasting Gala Adorni Recreation Center
read >4:30 p.m. Harvest Dinner and Bazaar Humboldt Grange
read >5 p.m. A Toast to Music Christ Episcopal Church
read >5:30 p.m. Elvis and the Hound Dogs + Stolen Taxi Trinidad Town Hall
read >6 p.m. The Tumbleweeds Chapala Cafe
read >6 p.m. Arts Alive! Various Locations
read >6 p.m. Day of the Dead Exhibition Ink People Center for the Arts
read >6 p.m. Bar None 10th Anniversary Eureka Labor Temple
read >6 p.m. Randy Spicer Piante Gallery
read >6 p.m. Gallery Open for Arts Alive! Four Paths Gallery and Studio
read >6:30 p.m. ShinBone (Blues R&B) Eureka Theater
read >7 p.m. Mike Craighead and Sari Baker Old Town Coffee & Chocolates
read >7 p.m. Harvest Concert Arcata Presbyterian Church
read >7 p.m. 2 Left Feet Dance Project Redwood Raks World Dance Studio
read >7:30 p.m. Joe & Me Cafe Mokka
read >7:30 p.m. Cyrano de Begerac Eureka High School Auditorium
read >7:30 p.m. Torch Song Summit Eureka Women's Club
read >7:30 p.m. Jeff DeMark and the LaPatinas Westhaven Center for the Arts
read >8 p.m. Stones in His Pockets Arcata Playhouse
read >8 p.m. Humboldt Bay Brass Band Fulkerson Recital Hall at HSU
read >9 p.m. Synergy Six Rivers Brewery
read >9 p.m. Arts Alive! with Akaboom Sound Pearl Lounge
read >9 p.m. Tempest WAVE @ blue lake casino
read >9 p.m. Back In The Daze Dance Party Central Station Cocktail Lounge
read >9 p.m. Swingin' Country Band (country) Bear River Casino
read >9 p.m. The Zygoats + Alder Camp (rock) The Lil' Red Lion
read >9 p.m. DJ Knutz (funk) Muddy's Hot Cup
read >10 p.m. Music by DJ Sidelines
read >10 p.m. DJ Icy Hot Aunty Mo's Lounge
read >10 p.m. These United States (indie folk) Humboldt Brews
read >11 p.m. Hellbound Glory The Alibi Lounge and Restaurant
read >previous columns
May 8, 2008
Third
Album by Portishead. Island Records Third is an unnecessary album. ...
read >May 1, 2008
The Feel Good Record of the Year
Album by No Use for a Name. Fat Wreck Chords. ...
read >April 24, 2008
Pure Abstractions
Spring dance concert April 17 at HSU's Van Duzer Theater ...
read >Photos
Dystopia
By Michael Mannix
Album by Dystopia
Life is Abuse Records
Dystopia's reign over the 1990s hardcore crust scene, particularly here on the West Coast, is one of legend, with its tattered remnants still clinging to the fading black denim of scenesters new and old alike. It's not that their brand of acrid and crushing doom-ridden punk was groundbreaking or new. It was the fact that they performed with an incomparable sense of embittered ferocity that set them apart from the rest of the scene. The band's tenure was during an era in which the nation was lost in a sea of complacency and contentedness, and Dystopia's scathing attacks on technocracy, vivisection, urbanization, police brutality and American imperialism stood in stark contrast to a populace taken by stained blue dresses and little blue pills.
This long anticipated posthumous offering was recorded between 2004-2005 and serves as the concluding chapter to Dystopia's scattered discography. It is a collection of six tracks, one of which is an unreleased recording from drummer Dino Sommese's old grind band Carcinogen. Considering that today's underground is littered with sludge and metal bands aimlessly exercising generic doomy stonerisms and click-tracked blast beats, hearing, or rather feeling, Dystopia's bass-heavy crush and raging wall of raw down-tuned guitars wretch forth from the speakers is a welcome relief. The band manages to preserve the reckless abandon that defines their past, and thanks to some quality studio time and tightening of musicianship, they deliver with a more focused and calculated intensity.
Unapologetic in tone and uncompromising in their verbal assault, Dystopia's target was a passive American public obsessed with the Internet, hooked on their designer meds, and blind to the global effects of its consumption. Dino's shriek and growl drips thick with rancor, highlighting the anger and disgust that has always driven the band. War, of course, is an underlying theme throughout, and on "Illusion of Love" both religion and the nation get their treatment: "Nailed to your cross, it should have been a dollar sign. We can't be part of you, hate all that you do. No love I can see, for God or country."
Jarring and cryptic sound samples weave through most of the album and include excerpts from Eckhart Tolle's The Power of Now, as well as the rambling and sometimes incoherent digressions of the insane and heavily medicated forced to live on the streets. Taken in combination with Dystopia's depressive tones and the disturbing imagery dominating the album's cover and 20-page booklet, we are not so gently reminded that the world is hopelessly trapped in a perpetual state of human degradation, a state for which the band offers no solution but one that we nonetheless need to rail.
In addition to closing Dystopia's career, the release of this album could also mark the unfortunate end of a record label that has been integral to the growth of Oakland's crusty metal scene. Life is Abuse, a fixture in the Bay Area since the early '90s as both label and distro, is thinking about closing up shop, leaving behind a legacy of releases that include efforts from Asunder, Melvins, Graves at Sea, Artimus Pyle and Ludicra. So, keep your nubby little digits off the download button and scoop the new Dystopia legitimately, preferably on vinyl of course. Either way the label decides to go, you'll be sending these guys the respect and props they deserve.



















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