45 Grave - Black Cross 7"

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The other day down by the creek behind my house the buzzards (turkey vultures) slowly started coming out for what must have been something dead or dying in the trees.  We never did find it but a couple of days later as we were out hiking you could smell death and decay in the air.   If you check, there are 13 buzzards in the last picture.  Kind of foreshadowing this post.

I know this has been posted elsewhere, like here, Detailed Twang, but if you know me you know that redundancy is not such a bad thing.  Some things need to be said over and over again, just like some records need to be posted over and over again.  This one is that good in my opinion.  I think it was my first purchase at Vinyl Fetish in Hollywood, about the time it came out in 1981.  I had already been exposed to the occult through my family and I bought this one for the record cover alone.  If the cover was cool though, the music just blew me away.  Punk, hardcore, deathrock (in that order?) is the best way to describe it.  If somehow you are unfamiliar with the band check this, 45 Grave for a little bit of info.  This is one of my favorite 7"s hands down... [youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PGVXTX3NHxE]

While doing this post I was kind of enjoying doing some research on the band, checking out their discography and just listening to their music.  I had never heard their first vinyl track, off of the Darker Skratcher comp.  A new wavy cover of an old early 60's tune but kind of interesting... [youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eed34wTE2h8]

Other than the Black Cross 7", I knew I liked their tracks off of the incredible Hell Comes To Your House comp, but my copy has a needle fracturing scratch on that side of the album.  If you haven't heard that comp you need to because there is a lot of good music to be found there... [youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I4zwXaLLYHc?start=1177]

After these tunes the band basically got completely deathrock and kind of lost me on their other recordings.

In my search I was surprised to find a cover of one of the tunes off of the 7" I posted by none other than the Red Hot Chili Peppers.  Kind of a trip but these guys were old Hollywood scenesters so I guess it's no surprise that they would choose to cover one of Hollywood's best. [youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gl-fv1o_Tgw&w=560&h=315]

EDIT: Sorry, links to tunes deleted for fear of the copyright police...they were damn good too.  Go give your money to itunes or something...in all seriousness pick up a repress of some of these and support the band/label...