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For its day, The Zero Boys “Vicious Circle” lpis a bit of a curiosity. A lot of the songs are bouncy Middle Class style thrashers that are just tuneful enough to stick to your ribs, but there’s also a fair amount of rockin’ mid-paced material that really sounds a lot like Leave Home/Rocket to Russia Ramones with big 60’s melodies and crunchy guitars. Actually the guitars on this one have that unmistakable early 80’s stereo chorus. I read that Vicious Circle was basically recorded live, and so in place of a 2nd guitar track I’d assume they just had the guitar player do his thing in stereo through a chorus pedal.  Despite that dated piece though, this one’s pretty timeless. One of my favorite Midwest (Indiana) HC/punk lps that there ever was.

The title track opens things up in a swirl of dizzy call responses and it’s over in under a minute, which segues into the first mega-classic jam Amphetamine Addiction. This one has that great Ramones style that I mentioned before. Catchy and memorable til the last, this song will be bouncing around your skull til you die after you hear it. Definitely not a drug glorifying song, which I suppose was the style at the time, but it’s so energizing it’s like a virtual amphetamine shot in your arm. Next is New Generation, then Dirty Alleys Dirty Minds, and then my fav track on the A-side Civilization’s Dying - a classic anthem for the 80s, or now. This song is just such an expertly crafted piece of pop injected punk (the good kind we like, not the bad kind on your tv), it’s almost hard to describe. The chorus is solid gold, it ought to have been honored by some official body of musical achievement. It’s a peace song I guess. The opening lyrics: “Civilization’s dying/and no one’s realizing/The position of hate stuck inside the gun ” are a decent summation of that. This is probably the best, and most recognized Zero Boys song, not to down play their many other great songs. Closing out the side they revisit “Livin’ In The 80’s” from their giga-rare single, and then do “Drug Free Youth”, which predates the Abused song of the same name and actually was the reason I purchased this lp in the first place.

The B-side while not quite as perfect still has a fair share of hits, and probably leans a little more towards the hardcore side of the Zero Boys’ sound. Down The Drain, Outta Style, and You Can Touch Me last about a minute and change each. Forced Entry has a good call-response and is a tad longer. Hightime returns to the mid-paced rock side of things with vocals by I think the guitar player. This one’s a totally under rated NY/Detroit style rocker, there’s even a “Hey Ho Let’s Go” thrown into the lyrics. Not sure where it fits in with Drug Free Youth but it woulda made a great single A-side for its pogo-a-bility. Charlie’s Place is a second teir jam, but that’s still pretty good if it’s the Zero Boys. Trying Harder is the big Rock N Roll closer running at 3 minutes, and even more Ramonesy than than anything else on the lp. It’s definitely teir one sugary punk though.

Original pressings of Vicious Circle are on Nimrod records, and supposedly were kind of hard to find even back when they hit the streets. There were several represses, first on Toxic Shock, then Bitzcore, then Lookout, and most recently Secretly Canadian (who also released the odds and ends anthology The History Of The Zero Boys). This is one of the original Nimrod pressings, and it’ll probably run about $100, maybe a little more or less, but it looks pretty clean in the pictures.