"Totally Exploited" Album Description
"Totally Exploited" gets mislabelled all the time, so let’s stab the myth in the eye right away: it’s not The Exploited’s 1981 debut. The debut is "Punks Not Dead". "Totally Exploited" is the band’s early-years grab-and-smash compilation, released in December 1984 on Dojo/Blashadabee, and it plays like a scuffed photo album that still smells faintly of sweat and stale beer.
Context, without the classroom voice
Early 80s Britain wasn’t exactly a spa weekend. Everything felt tightened-down: jobs, money, patience. Punk’s second-wave crowd did not need a lecturer to explain why it sounded angry; you could hear it in the way the music lunges, like it’s late for something and happy to start a fight about it anyway.
What it sounds like when you actually play it
This record doesn’t “unfold.” It hits. Buzzsaw guitars, drums that stomp like they’re trying to crack concrete, and Wattie’s voice doing that sandpaper snarl that makes polite people suddenly remember an appointment elsewhere. Tracks like "Punks Not Dead", "Army Life", and "Sex & Violence" don’t offer nuance; they shove you into the pit and let you work it out in motion.
What it’s really for
As a compilation, it’s less a single artistic statement and more a convenient weapon: one sleeve, a stack of early anthems, no waiting. It’s the kind of record you put on when someone starts saying punk was “just a phase” and you feel like answering with volume instead of conversation. For collectors it’s also a neat snapshot of that first-run attitude before the later stylistic shifts start creeping in.
One quiet personal anchor: this is the sort of album I’d drop on while tidying a room and somehow end up standing still, doing nothing, because the energy won’t let you treat it as background music. It demands attention. Rudely. Which, honestly, is the correct personality for this band.
