Two weeks in a row without Saturday Morning Punks?  I’m afraid not, my friend.  Last week, (and for the better part of the week), TrendRobot wasn’t getting updated due to some hosting problems we had as BlueHost was rolling out some new security features that effectively locked us out of FTP and CPanel usage.  Mucho apologies.

This week’s installment of Saturday Morning Punks digs into the Chicago music scene that produced a handful of great, melodic punk bands that would later tap the mainstream.  Alkaline Trio, Rise Against (and their 88 Finger Louie ancestry), The Falcon, and Lawrence Arms.  Lawrence Arms, despite their myriad of side projects, never cease to satisfy that gritty punk taste you’re looking for.  Tongue-in-cheek and intellectually aware, Apathy and Exhaustion is a record that should effectively be in every skatepunk’s library by now.

MP3:  “Navigating The Windward Passage” – The Lawrence Arms

• Official Lawrence Arms Site
• Fat Wreck Chords
• Support The Lawrence Arms on

MP3:  “Anti-Manifesto” – Propagandhi

Seriously. I awoke this morning to my usual case of insomnia and decided that a sugary bowl of cereal was the only way to spend my early Saturday morning. Just like the good old days. The shuffle function threw me the biggest curve ball ever and left me with Propagandhi blaring through the computer speakers sometime around 4am. You can imagine how stoked my girlfriend was (is).

I’ve decided that, while I love every bit of music reviewed on here, there’s still that certain air of pretentiousness involved with indie-rock and whatever makes the college airwaves. I don’t really care how hypocritical that sounds, but there’s very little sincerity in the music world unless you really dig through the bargain bins to when music was made just to piss someone off or to inspire a bit of cynicism.  Now that Fat Wreck has allowed us the permission, you’ll be seeing a lot more of this kind of stuff showing up interspersed with the rest, just to keep you level headed about music.  Saturday Morning Punks is about to supplement your Saturday breakfast cereal.

Propagandhi was always the band who was just a bit smarter than your average punk rock band and had a heavy bit of politics to deliver behind a tongue that was firmly planted in-cheek.  Released in 1993, How To Clean Everything still has the sneer and profane factor about it that makes the current emo/punk stage look like a boys choir.

• Propagandhi Official Site
• Fat Wreck Chords
• Support Propagandhi on