Blast Rites: Cacasonica – Las Primeras Bullas 2006-2012 Review

Friends and fellow fans of the fast and fun, who among us hasn’t said at least once, if not with disturbing regularity, “I should really listen to more Ecuadorian noisecore.”

I know I have, and I know you have, too. Thankfully, now we can both make good on our resolutions by checking out this 142-song, 2-CD-and-2-hour compilation of Guayaquil’s finest noisemongers direct from a label in *checks return address on CD package* … Iowa.

I kid, of course, but seriously, though, it turns out we should listen to more Ecuadorian noisecore because it rules. I must concede my inexpertise on this one, admittedly: Cacasónica is a band with whom I’m almost wholly unfamiliar, as I’m unfamiliar with the Ecuadorian scene, in general. Prior to this, my knowledge of Cacasónica goes no further than having seen their name on a split with Captain 3 Leg that sits uncollected in my Discogs wantlist. (Coincidentally, one of the members of C3L operates the Mortville Noise label, the Iowan wellspring of grinding goodness from which I purchased this Ecuadorian insanity, which is a co-release with Cacasonica’s own Canchis Canchis Records.)

But learning is fun, right? And how better to learn about a new(-to-me) old band than diving right in? I am a devout and shameless sucker for a grindcore discography compilation, always and forever, so I cannonballed right into the deep end and bought this without a second thought. Although Las Primeras Bullas 2006-2012 only covers Cacasónica’s first six years, well… again, this is 142 songs clocking in at a wee bit over two hours, on two CDs for $10 (plus shipping from Iowa), and also, to cut to the chase of this already meandering review, it pretty much kicks mucho culo. So now I’m waiting for any possible Vol. 2 (and 3, maybe 4) to complete the Cacasónica canon.

Of the band’s 50 releases currently listed on Discogs, Las Primeras Bullas 2006​-​2012 brings together the Cacasónica portions of 18 of them, starting with a split with Gorgonized Dorks and including the Captain 3 Leg collaboration and beyond, even a three-way split that features a band called Defecasound. (What are the chances that bands with those two names found each other, right? It must’ve been love at first smell and sound.) Compiled as it was by the band and collaborators, Las Primeras Bulles also features a fancy booklet with info and art for the original sources, plus pages of posters and flyers.

Most importantly, what Las Primeras Bullas is is exactly what I expected from the description: This is noisecore, punkish and puckish rockin’ anti-music, running the gamut from short freeform blasting cacophony to short psych-rock rave-ups to short hardcore bursts of silliness. It’s Paùl Troya’s screaming and chattering and maniacal laughter with Juan Carlos’ downstroke power chords and dissonant skittering, all atop the frantic bashing, thrashing beats of Patricio and Fabricio. There’s a song called “Clitorisaurio,” which translates to what you think, and one called “Tampon Deluxe,” and ten songs in a row called “No Titulo.” There are deconstructed pisstakes on Metallica, the Doors, the Offspring, the Police, and Deep Purple. There are nods to noisy outfits like Germany’s WBI, Japan’s Carcass Grinder, Kentucky’s Hellnation, and Ecuador’s own Pesmenben IV and Rebelión Disidente (the latter of which shares two members with Cacasónica). There are sidesteps into electro-R&B disco jams. The lyrics and themes are apparently irreverent, humorous, often offensive (make of that point what you will), and there are between-song samples and such, but aside from some sexy-time moaning – a universal language if ever there was one – all of this is in Spanish, which, of course, I don’t speak because I’m American and people here get very angry if we attempt to use tax dollars to make children smarter. (Which is why a depressingly large amount of people I grew up with will not get the half-assed joke above about Ecuador not being in Iowa. Still, el sigh, and digression, I am thee, so… back on topic…)

(Author’s note: Hell if I know what song to feature here — it’s noisecore, so it’s a crapshoot. I picked this one because it translates to “catcore,” and that’s pretty cool.)

You see that, though? That digression, an ADHD stream-of-consciousness jump-cut from one point to the next with a random aside in the middle, and then across a link to a completely different place? Well, that’s also what Las Primeras Bullas sounds like, and while it sounds like it could be exhausting – and should be exhausting, and at least, in one way, it is exhausting because of the excessive volume of material here, all of which should probably be played at excessive volume, especially if you’re trying to get evicted – Las Primeras Bullas really isn’t all that exhausting, when it’s approached as what it is: A round-up of Cacasónica’s manic brand of madness, distilled and collected into one-stop shopping for anti-music nerds like me.So, yes, 2 hours of noisecore is a lot, be that noisecore from Ecuador or Iowa (or both), but it’s also not technically enough because it’s not all of it, dammit. There’s still a decade of Cacasónica left and counting.

And yes, it turns out that we actually should listen to more Ecuadorian noisecore. From here, I’ve already dived into a bit of Ruido de Odio, Pesmenben IV, and Rebelión Disidente, and all three are worthy of deeper exploration. So here I sit, listening and sinking deeper and deeper into this whole wonderful mess, a new part of the noisy world laid open before me.

It’s not for anyone expecting anything less than chaos, this ear-rending sonic poop, and gloriously so.