Vicious Pop

The Conformists are fucking legends. At least to me. I've been playing shows with them, either booking them in basements in Shorewood and Riverwest or traveling to their hometown of St. Louis, for about a decade now. It's hard to explain just how fucking weird they were the first five years or so of seeing them live. They'd use subtle intimidation techniques that were 1000 times more disturbing than the usual run-of-the-mill hardcore posing, pinwheel kicks or other generic forms of outward violence. Instead they'd slowly rock back and forth on their heals towards you until you were trapped in a corner, or stare you down until you got so unnerved you walked out. The first couple of times they played Milwaukee the room would slowly empty and afterward I'd hear people saying shit like "I really liked their songs, but I just couldn't take it anymore. Too intense!" Which seems like a strange criticism for a rock band. Eventually people started to get the hang of it though, and for a brief period of time their increasingly frequent trips to Milwaukee were met with sweaty kids trying their hardest to bang heads and pump fists along to time signatures they couldn't comprehend.

In recent years, there has been a resurgence in the kind of thing the Conformists do so well; bands that incorporate influences like the Fall, Rapeman and all that post-punk stuff that uses Captain Beefheart's musical sophistication, freaky attitude and seeming randomness as a springboard into another realm of their own. But these guys have been doing for longer than any of these young upstarts, and at their peak they did it better and way weirder than the anybody. I mean, their fucking logo is a pair of dead cats hanging from a tree.

The Conformists have a new record out called None Hundred (part of a trilogy with their other long players, Two Hundred and Three Hundred, respectively). They recorded it with Steve Albini. It's more of a slow burn, less maniacal take on their signature sound. "Mature" is the word, I guess. You can stream the whole thing on their bandcamp page, but I suggest you buy the 12". It comes with a free CD copy, too.

LISTEN TO AND BUY THE NEW CONFORMISTS LP, NONE HUNDRED!