“CHEAP JAPANESE BASS OPUS 236 1ST ARIA” By Steve Lieberman, The Gangsta Rabbi

Steve Lieberman, eternally stamped as The Gangsta Rabbi and long-feted as The King of Jewish Punk. The new long-player, “Cheap Japanese Bass Opus 236 1st Aria,” serves yet again as a serrated ultimatum to complacency. Spanning eleven tracks, the set is out now and everywhere on Spotify, ReverbNation, SoundCloud, and YouTube; it counts as the seventy-sixth gold-foil set of a five-decade run that still defies the mainstream to quarantine the subterranean. Lieberman, the man, the myth, logged a Guinness citation for the longest commercially available cut, "The Noise Militia" (#38 of 76), a psychedelic endurance test that sailed past the thirty-five-hour mark. That voluminous catalog springs from a single, unrelenting source: a confrontation with the twin demons of manic cycling and progressive leukemia, warred upon not with quiet resignation but with a blood-on-the-strings creative spree. This new disc, to the uninitiated just more data in an algorithm; to the initiated, a long-anticipated no-adrift battering, more a manifesto of ill-behaved survival, a middle finger pretty much permanently affixed to any guardian of decency.

Kicking things off with "Surrounded by Pretty Girls – Remastered," the new record drags the patient listener right into Lieberman’s trademark militia punk arena: brutality-hardened noise punk colliding with serrated metal, sealed off by just enough bugle flourishes to feel like the Joker commandeered a parade. The song sits somewhere between party and siege camp, the controlled riot of buzzing bass, splintered guitar, and whirlpool-brass colliding like a violent marimbaphone, then crunching into brass-bands-of-the-apocalypse territory. It’s a welcoming blast of gritted-effort percussion and easy nihilism, the war sound of youth-in-fuck-you mode, and signals everybody not just to unbuckle their seatbelts but to use the seatbelts to strap on armor. The decades hang on each chromed edge: a live grenade etched into the fretboard, a blinded snare shot doubled up like artillery rounds. The record promises the same nurse: pain on the outside, the inside flooded with eerie calm.

“That Skinhead Made Me Tilt – Exacting the Penalty – Remastered” charges ahead with the same razor-to-the-bone fury of the original while polishing the blade until it gleams. Lieberman takes the stage, blasting open the sutures of intolerance with sharp-jawed irony. His bass throbs and hisses, a growl primed for clash; the horns swell behind it in serrated lines, a brass battalion tattooing defiance across the air. Across the alley of this track, the entire LP stretches the banner of “militia punk,” not a mere dermal tattoo, but a doctrine of broken bottles and drill formation, where rebellion learns to march and order learns to spit.

The title cut, “Cheap Japanese Bass – Remastered,” anchors this collection firmly in the center and manifesto at once. Across decades, Lieberman has cradled that cheap Japanese beast like a trophy of grit, a talisman of the underdog’s shrug at luxury. Inside the battered wood beats a pulse of refuse-fuel ferocity; the monument is the noise itself. Here, the simple framework gives loud credit to the creed: a torched bass riff tumbles like armor on broken concrete, brass blares like stray ordnance, and Lieberman’s voice, serrated and shirtless, flings gallows comedy layered over holy stubbornness. Junkyard carol, battlefield prayer certain polish would only blunt the blade. The middle of the album sees a run of tracks that expand Lieberman’s narrative world. Ok, Dr. Puppeteer, Dude I’m in Command – Remastered and My Bass on My Shoulder Like a Rifle – One-9 Litre – Remastered are militaristic marches in spirit, their titles alone evoking images of defiance and battle-readiness. The former brims with a sardonic humor aimed at figures of control, while the latter fuses his trademark bass-driven assault with imagery of resistance, the instrument itself becoming a rifle slung over his shoulder as he marches on. We “Welcome You to Our Coalition – Remastered” shifts slightly in tone, offering a chaotic yet oddly communal moment, as though the listener is being drafted into Lieberman’s sonic militia, a fellowship of the loud, the broken, and the unbowed.

The album’s second half showcases some of its most striking moments. Hey You Superstar (With an American Guitar) – Remastered is a sneer at superficiality, a track that cuts down the cult of celebrity with jagged riffs and brassy explosions. Approaching 1974 with My Weapon, a Cheap Japanese Bass – Remastered is nostalgic yet confrontational, a march back through time armed with the same tool that has defined his artistic life. “Get the Heck off That Mic! Remastered” feels like a moment of raw, unfiltered venting, an anthem for the underdogs silenced by over-produced mainstream noise. Then comes “Rusty Dusty Garage Gloom Decor – Remastered,” a track that stands out for its almost gothic atmosphere, grimy, grinding, its punk-metal skeleton dressed in the gloomy trappings of a decaying rehearsal space. Closing with “Militia Klezmer Overture to Cheap Japanese Bass – Remastered,” Lieberman ties the album’s threads together. This track is a distillation of his identity: Jewish klezmer motifs collide with the militaristic stomp and punk abrasion that define his style. It’s an overture not at the beginning, but at the end, a fittingly unconventional choice that suggests this “Aria” is just the beginning of another expansive chapter in his work. There’s a sense of triumph in its chaos, a celebration of the outsider’s persistence, and a wink to the traditions he both honors and subverts.

What makes “Cheap Japanese Bass Opus 236 1st Aria” stand out in an era of algorithmic playlists and formulaic songwriting is precisely its refusal to conform. It is noisy, abrasive, sometimes overwhelming, and that is the point. Lieberman’s music is a chronicle of endurance: each album heavier than the last, each note carrying the weight of his battles, his faith, and his 50-year odyssey through music’s underground corridors. He sings, he plays every instrument, bass, guitar, flutes, brass, and assorted exotica, and in doing so, he creates a soundscape that is as personal as a diary and as loud as a military parade gone rogue. For fans of outsider music, experimental punk, or anyone seeking something that doesn’t just break the mold but melts it into scrap metal, this album is both a challenge and a reward. It can be streamed worldwide on Spotify, ReverbNation, SoundCloud, YouTube, and other platforms where its chaotic textures and militant marches are waiting for the brave and the curious. And for those familiar with Lieberman’s previous works, it’s a testament to his refusal to fade quietly, even as life has handed him more battles than most would endure.

In conclusion, “Cheap Japanese Bass Opus 236 1st Aria” is not just an album; it is an act of defiance, a survival march, and a celebration of noise as art. Steve Lieberman, The Gangsta Rabbi, remains one of underground music’s most singular figures, not despite his battles with illness and his outsider status, but because of how he has transformed them into fuel for creation. This is not music that asks to be liked; it demands to be confronted, experienced, and remembered. In a music world obsessed with perfection, Lieberman offers something far more enduring: truth in distortion, faith in dissonance, and 50 years of uncompromising sound.

Written by Manuel