by Chris Skebo
Spread the Love – H8 Mile
Key Tracks: “Television,” “Greener Grass,” “Bel Air”
Release date: 9 August 2024
Label: Painters Tape/Remove Records
Available Formats: cassette (limited run of 50 copies), vinyl (limited run of 100 copies), streaming on most major platforms
The Skinny
Spread the Love is the fourth album from no wave/punk/hardcore band H8 Mile. The sound was cultivated on the Detroit club scene. The recording was released by “Detroit’s Worst Cassette Label.” The band is fronted by bassist/vocalist Charles Stahl (The Stools), with Anna Christinidis on guitar, Antonio Keka on drums, and Dee Obscenity on keyboards (vocals on “Outro”).
Sounds like
Minor Threat, Rites of Spring, Ty Segall Band, Whiplash, Black Flag, Fugazi, The Pixies, The Beastie Boys
Deeper Thoughts
Spread the Love, as with many albums by the great hardcore bands of yore, is short – 9 tracks clocking in at 15 minutes – and fits on a single 7” record. Emerging from the Detroit DIY scene, Spread the Love propagates a grit & grime, us-against-the-world mentality. This record is a handmade delight, packaged in a black & white sleeve and featuring a handwritten center label. The cassette version is dubbed on a clear glitter cassette.
Let’s take Spread the Love for a spin, track by track:
The album opens with “Hope,” a hardcore march that firmly sets the tone for this recording with the ominous opening line, “Hope is pathetic / all people regret it.” Pessimism and loss pervade the lyrics that follow throughout the album. You could say “Hope” is the thesis statement for Spread the Love.
“Go Out” is 37 seconds that any hardcore band would be proud of – hard hitting and to the point. Hate and sadness are universal emotions, but this band is not dealing in contrived feels. H8 Mile’s hate and sadness are authentic – “more than your whiny emo band or your cliché stand against the man.”
“Television” is the catchiest song on the album. Stahl screams the best “fuck you!” I’ve heard in a while.
One of the hardest hitting tracks is “H.I. V.I.” featuring some of this collection’s most scathing lyrics, “Arrogance is ignorance and ignorance is bliss / walk around, you always frown, another hypocrite.” These could be the lyrics of a punk Bob Dylan or The Beastie Boys at their most hardcore.
On “Another Happy Song,” Christinidis’s metronomic guitar propulsion, beautiful in its simplicity, drives the song. The lyric is a relatable list of the things that would make the protagonist happy – “showers, sunshine, flowers, windchimes, fresh paint, cut grass, cheap paint, dead rats.” Works for me.
“Low Art” is a churning anthem, tongue in cheek, honest in its evaluation of the middle class and art. “It’ll never pass / Low art for high people”
Dee Obscenity’s keyboards are featured on “Greener Grass.” The opening line “Greener grass never lasts” has never rung more true than it does now.
The penultimate track, “Bel Air,” is a Doors-esque blues number, with keyboard once again taking center stage. The title and lyric refer to catching a double feature at the now-defunct Bel Air Drive-in movie theater that was located on 8 Mile Road in Detroit (it was demolished in 1986 to make way for another shopping center). A nice, hypnotic reprieve from the grinding hardcore of side A, the verses evoke Weezer’s “Sweater Song” and Pixies’ “Monkey Gone to Heaven.”
The closing track, “Outro,” is a story that I hope is true, because almost anyone with gigging experience has a version of it to tell. You will learn the “true meaning of rock-n-roll” from the “classically-trained guitarist” with “thousands of dollars of gear.”
The Sonics
This is a lo-fi record in every sense of the word. Loud and in your face, hard-wall compression and pure adrenaline confront you when you drop the needle on this album (or engage the capstan). It’s not a polished record, which is exactly the point. The album’s beauty lies in its raw nature and unbridled energy.
Cheers to these ferocious young hooligans!
To purchase a copy of Spread the Love visit H8 Mile’s bandcamp site
[NOTE: As of press time, the band reports that a very limited number of records and tapes remain available for purchase.]
