Various Artists - Murder Punk Vol 2

OVERVIEW: THE VIEW FROM THE OUTBACK CELLAR

If you thought early American hardcore was feral, you aren't ready for the absolute switchblade savagery on Murder Punk Vol 2, thrown into the world by the ghost-label Murder Punk Inc. (MPI 002). Originally surfacing as a mythic underground artifact in 1991 and re-dropped in 1997, this 25-track monster zeroes in on the raw, blood-soaked golden era of Australian punk from 1977 to 1980. This isn't just a tracklist; it’s an audit of hyper-rare independent singles and completely self-funded 7-inch EPs that were originally pressed in editions of a few hundred copies for paranoid kids dodging cops in Perth, Brisbane, and Sydney.

What makes Murder Punk Vol 2 an absolute holy grail for crate-diggers is its total dedication to archiving. Instead of giving you just one teaser track per band, this bootleg gives you complete, unedited EPs in their absolute entirety, mostly ripped directly from scratchy, original vinyl. It acts as a beautifully grim, photocopied monument to a scene that was entirely geographically isolated from London and New York. Because they were cut off from the rest of the punk world, these bands grew up weirder, meaner, and packed with a distinct, garage-born venom that you simply couldn't find anywhere else on Earth.

REVIEW: HIGH OCTANE VENOM AND SWEATY AMPLIFIERS

Drop this disc into the machine and you are immediately flattened by a sonic cocktail of Detroit garage rock, pub-rock brawn, and pure nihilistic velocity. The album kicks off with the frantic, jagged grit of Sydney's The News and immediately crashes into Razar’s legendary Brisbane anthem "Stamp Out Disco"—a track that sounds like a riot breaking out at a youth club. The relentless energy never drops for a second. The sonic cohesion here is unreal; despite being recorded across completely different states and studios, every single track feels bound together by the same claustrophobic, beer-soaked urgency of a Friday night pub brawl.

The absolute centerpieces of this compilation are the comprehensive sweeps of The Scientists, The Fun Things, and Perth’s legendary gods The Victims. Hearing The Victims’ "High School Girls" and "Disco Junkies" back-to-back with the prehistoric, fuzz-laden stomp of early, pre-synth Scientists is enough to make any serious vinyl archivist lose their mind. These tracks don't just mimic the Ramones or The Saints; they possess a heavy, proto-grunge swampiness that proves Australia was already inventing the sound of 1980s alternative rock while the rest of the world was still figuring out how to tune three chords.

From a production standpoint, it’s a beautifully blown-out, lo-fi nightmare. You can practically hear the stylus skipping over the worn grooves of the ultra-rare plastic used for the master sources. The guitars don't just chime—they hiss, scrape, and scream, buried underneath vocals that sound like they were shouted through a broken megaphone. It is beautiful, unfiltered chaos that makes modern, studio-cleansed punk rock sound like a pop commercial. The liner notes are allegedly written under a dark pseudonym referencing Tasmanian tragedies, cementing the album's pitch-black, outsider mystique.

Ultimately, Murder Punk Vol 2 is a mandatory text for anyone trying to map out the true DNA of underground rock. It captures a fleeting, wild moment when a handful of Australian teenagers completely disregarded the rules of the mainstream music business to press their own vision of noise. It is fast, ugly, catchy as hell, and entirely out of print—the exact definition of what a real punk zine lives for.

Ripped to MP3

THE NEWS

1. "Dirty Lies"

2. "Chop, Chop, Chop"

RAZAR

3. "Stamp Out Disco"

4. "Task Force"

THE SCIENTISTS

5. "Last Night"

6. "Bet Ya Lyin'"

7. "It's For Real"

8. "Pissed On Another Planet"

FUN THINGS

9. "When The Birdmen Fly"

10. "Lipstick"

11. "(I Ain't Got) Time Enough For Love"

12. "Savage"

THE LEFTOVERS

13. "Cigarettes And Alcohol"

14. "I Only Panic When There Is Nothing To Do"

15. "No Complaints"

THE VICTIMS

16. "I Understand"

17. "Open Your Eyes"

18. "High School Girls"

19. "T.V. Freak"

20. "Disco Junkies"

THOUGHT CRIMINALS

21. "More Suicides Please"

22. "The Cut-Out Man"

23. "Display Response: Action"

24. "So All The Superheroes"

25. "Stolen Air"