If you happen to dig a bit in the the early 80s' hc/punk scene from my hometown, Kobra is one of those name that, sooner or later, will pop up. It's one of those quite obscure bands that's mainly known between the collector nerds for their only release, 1985's "corri nel sangue dei tuoi nemici" (run in the blood of your enemies) self-released 7". Like it frequently happens, obscure doesn't necessarily mean great. It's like how Wretched would have sounded if they had a poor guitar work and were influenced by bad metal. Not even the fantastic cover could save that ep from its mediocrity. Apart from that, Kobra are mainly known for their 1983 UK tour with Wretched. Recently I was reading in General Speech #9 about a great live recording captured during that aforementioned tour. I usually avoid live recordings but this one intrigued me. I've asked around but since I'm not cool enough in the tape trading circuit, I couldn't get my hands on it. Then this bootleg ep, pragmatically titled "live queen's walk community centre nottingham 13 aug 83" surfaced in a distro. Recording is of course raw but not bad at all for being captured on stage. What really surprised me is that you can hear a completely different band here. While "corri nel sangue..." totally lacks of the trademark urgency of italian hardcore, songs here are more energic, faster and direct compared to the material they released 2 years later. It reminds a lot the Wretched side of their legendary split with Indigesti. All the eight songs featured here were also completely unknown to me. Perhaps material for a demo that unfortunately never got recorded? Anyhow, this bootleg re-evaluated completely Kobra in my books. A great piece of history for Milano and 80s italian hardcore in general.
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