Comadre likes to put out mixtapes. I like Comadre. I like free music. What's there not to love? On Mixtape Four? Nothing. Comadre's fourth mixtape is a little out of canon with the rest of their other mixtapes, focusing on collaborations rather than unreleased B-sides, demos and other songs by other bands. The five tracks make up one of the shorter mixtapes from the California hardcore outfit, but it happens to be one of their best.
Sticking with the idea that it isn't canonical, the intro is short and isn't filled with Auto-Tune hijinks. That's actually kind of saddening. The first full song is with Dead to Me and shows off a more straightforward punk style to Comadre, with upstrokes. Dead to Me's song goes into a new remix by P.O.S. I'm a huge fan of Stef, so I know that remixing hardcore bands is nothing new to him. The remix is of the first track of A Wolf Ticket, "Hamlets." The rhymes are sick, as to be expected of anything P.O.S. puts out and it stands up nicely next to some of the remixes from his own Collaborations and Remixes album.
The third song threw me for a huge loop. It's a country song. With Ghostlimb, another hardcore band. But when I say it's a country song, I don't mean country-tinged hardcore. I mean that it's an honest-to-God country song. It's great, too. I'm willing to let Comadre be a country band full-time if they can keep this up. The next track is another collaboration, with Glasses and Trainwreck. It's a cover of the Murder City Devils song "18 Wheels." It rips. Great cover. Finally, an acoustic version of my favorite song off of A Wolf Ticket, "King Jeremy". Broadway Calls is called upon to assist on this cut, and it's a great acoustic tune.
It's hard to say which song I enjoy the most because I keep finding new things I like about every song. From the upstrokes I can't get over to P.O.S.'s line about putting up your money like Harvey Weinstein, to the country Comadre, to the hardcore assault of that MCD song, all the way to the sincerity of "King Jeremy"... This mixtape is all over the place and that isn't bad at all.