Automatic Midnight by Hot Snakes

San Diego’s influential post-hardcore all-stars Hot Snakes – boasting members of Pitchfork, Rocket From the Crypt, Drive Like Jehu, Earthless, Obits, Burning Brides, OFF!, The Delta 72, and more – released three of our favorite rock records of the past 20 years: Automatic Midnight, Suicide Invoice, and Audit in Progress. All three were originally released on Swami Records, with art by singer/guitarist and visual artist Rick Froberg. And now, finally, they’re ours! As we await the somewhat-later- in-2018 release of their first new album since 2004, please make these Sub Pop reissues yours.

Automatic Midnight, Hot Snakes’ first studio album, originally came out in 2000. Both the band and the album began as a "side project" for John Reis in June 1999, during time off from his main band Rocket From the Crypt. Reis wrote and recorded a batch of songs in San Diego with Delta 72 drummer Jason Kourkounis. To provide vocals for the tracks Reis called in Rick Froberg, whom he had played with in Pitchfork and Drive Like Jehu from 1986 to 1995. Most of the material from these sessions was used to create Automatic Midnight, which became the first release for Reis' newly formed Swami Records label. The band’s sound represented a return to the unrealized past of its members: direct, undraped and rock ‘n’ roll while still maintaining the dense and turbulent character of the members’ previous work. In April or May of 2000, Hot Snakes added bassist Gar Wood, found their live sound and established themselves as primo, down-stroke warlords.