Virulence – If This Isn’t A Dream… 1985-1989

San Clemente, Southern California hardcore punk band Virulence are essentially the gnarled roots of the great, dirty beast of a rock band we now know as Fu Manchu. Originally formed in 1985 by guitarist Scott Hill, vocalist Ken Pucci, bassist Mark Abshire and drummer Ruben Romano, the band suckled at the weighty teats of such legends as The Melvins and the uber-aggressive Black Flag. In 1989, shortly after Abshire had left the band (being replaced by Greg McCaughey) they released their debut LP, If This Isn't a Dream..., on Alchemy Records. When Alchemy folded not long after, sadly the album was lost in obscurity which set into sequence a series of events - the demise of Virulence, the replacement of Ken Pucci by Glenn Chivens, a move away from their bludgeoning hardcore to a groovier, hard rock style, and the aforementioned name-change to Fu Manchu.This reissue is unique in that it contains all known recordings by Virulence. Besides the long sought after re-master of If This Isn't a Dream, there are also some early demos and live recordings to savour. What stands out above everything here is the guts and glory, monosyllabic battering of Pucci’s vocal style. When combined with the steady, relentless clobbering of the guitars it’s enough to even get the Dalai Lama’s blood boiling. After listening to ‘Dead Weight and ‘Spilling It Out’ a few times, the urge to go and whack something very hard is unbearable. It isn’t clever, but, by God, it is utterly addictive. Take ‘Blank Stare’, for instance. It consumes The Melvins thundering assault and spits out something that is so simple it could only be classed as primordial. The pachyderm-paced slog slowly bores it’s way across eight grinding tracks fuelled merely by testosterone.There are moments when Virulence overindulge themselves, rather to the album’s detriment. The shameless instrumentals ’Worse Then Misery’ and ’The Curse’ (a whacking 9 minutes long) are laboriously meandering journeys through an overly ornate sequence of drum breaks and guitar strikes. The live material is probably the weakest aspect here - badly-recorded, feedback-powered and often coming from behind a veil of eggboxes, Pucci’s vocal sounds more like a pig being squeezed than anything else. Thankfully, cracking demos like the furiously speedy ‘Look At It Closely’ and the glorious combination of grunge and thrash that is ‘Something Went Wrong/Promise Is Shot’ save the day and make this an essential purchase for fans of both hardcore and stoner rock, even if the concept of combining those two genres is a little baffling.

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