Vertigo – Burnin’ Inside // 3220 (Insipid Records) 1992. Vertigo. Remember them? One of the great also-rans. Vertigo were part of the “third wave” of Minneapolis punk / underground music that started up in the late 1980s and ran into the mid-1990s. It was largely centred around the Amphetamine Reptile Label. The proprietor of Am Rep was an ex-Marine and U-Men member named Tom Hazelmeyer who launched the label in 1986 to release a pair of Halo of Flies 45s. This label went on to define not only a distinctly Midwestern identity but also influence the entire path of rock music in general in the 1990s. But that’s another story albeit a very interesting one. Where does Vertigo fit into this? Well, they were one of the hometown bands on the Am Rep roster. I believe they had a hard time carving out their own identity. They were a little bit Boss Hog (note the B-Side Robert Johnson cover), a little bit Tar, a little bit Cows, a little bit God Bullies even. This made them a consistently good band but sometimes they were not so easy to recognize mixed in with the sheer greatness of the Am Rep roster. This release was from the Australian label Insipid who released quite a few Am Rep related items down-under. The A-Side would go on to be on their second album Ventriloquist.
Hardcore Podcasts
September of 2010 I put together eight Hardcore Podcasts. You can check them out here if you are interested. For more insight into how I came up with the years 78-90 for the First Wave you can read about The Hardcore Superiorty Myth.
The first Am Rep record was a flexi by the mock-heavy metal band Bludgeon that came with an issue of Your Flesh. I am pretty sure Bludgeon was Halo of Flies in disguise.