THE GEARS - Rockin' At Ground Zero 1980

Yesterday I was listening to some old 7Inches and got stuck on the first one by The Gears, Let's Go To The Beach from 1979 and thought, oh yeah, do I still have more of them and if so, in the blog right now, and I found one. The Gears were a four piece from Los Angeles and consisted of Axxel (vocals), Kidd (guitars), Brian (bass), Dave (drums) and this is their debut album on Playgems Records. 

Info: "Kidd Spike was a guitarist with one of L.A.'s first punk rock outfits, the Controllers, but by 1980 he was eager to do something a little more eclectic, and he joined forces with vocalist Axxel G. Reese to form the Gears. They enthusiastically embraced the fast and loud part of punk, but they also threw in dashes of surf music, garage rock, blues, and cool sounds of the '50s, and their first album, Rockin' at Ground Zero, is a killer blend of punk speed and fury tempered with greaser cool. Reese is a solid vocalist with plenty of swagger in his voice but no wasted affectations, while Spike's thick, gutsy guitar work and the crash-boom-bang rhythm work of bassist Brian Redz and drummer Dave Drive keep these songs in forward momentum at all times. The Gears could sing about cars, girls, and good times with tongue just slightly in cheek on tunes like "Let's Go to the Beach" and "Darlin' Baby," but "High School Girls" and "I Smoke Dope" show they weren't afraid of more dangerous pleasures. "Don't Be Afraid to Pogo" is a great (and only slightly ridiculous) Punk anthem, and they chronicle one of the most infamous real-life moments in the war between L.A. Punks and cops in "Elks Lodge Blues." "Teenage Brain" is angst at its most enjoyable, and "The Last Chord" and the title cut both manage to make the end of the world sound cool. Rockin' at Ground Zero is good, raucous fun from an unjustly overlooked band; the rise of Hardcore made bands like this seem obsolete at the dawn of the '80s, but history and this album prove these guys truly had the goods." (Mark Deming)

This record is pure energy and Californian Punkrock at its best and one of the interesting D.I.Y. releases of the Eighties and numerous re-releases confirm this and for me a real highlight. Briliant American sound, fifteen times highest quality. Don't miss that!

here