My Statement Of Life

Last year I heavily got into Disembodied, Harvest and that kind of early metal influenced hardcore sound. I was still listening to those bands a lot earlier this year, and when I had a work trip back in March, I put together a playlist with those bands to listen to on my flight to Philadelphia. As the plane was sitting on the tarmac waiting to take off, I was checking my playlist and noticed that Spotify made some song recommendations based on what I'd included. In the list of songs, I noticed that Seasons from Morning Again was included there. I had bought the As Tradition Dies Slowly CD back in 1998, but I didn't like it at the time and quickly shelved it... however seeing that song recommendation sitting there for me, I wondered how I'd feel about it in 2026 and I hit play.

Fuck yes. This is exactly the kind of shit that I crave now. I was so excited over the song that I ran it back three times in a row before switching over to airplane mode and kicking off my flight playlist with Bloodlet. I could not wait to hear more from Morning Again.

I'd come up empty trying to find a copy of As Tradition Dies Slowly on colored vinyl, but after checking out the Morning Again 7 inch, My Statement Of Life In A Dying World, I had my sights set on a new target. I've found it to be more difficult than I imagined to pick up some of these 90's metallic hardcore bands, so when I discovered that I could pick up every pressing of this 7 inch, I switched to collector mode and grabbed all of them. They aren't super limited by any stretch, but I was thrilled to buy them all.

First press on black vinyl with a booklet held together by twine. 2000 pressed.

Second press was limited to 2,000 for this great looking green/black/white marble. The booklet is in the same format as the first press.

The third press was on clear vinyl and limited to 1200. The booklet is stapled and has a different cover.

So yeah, Immigrant Sun Records made a lot of these, but the numbers don't matter. These three songs are so good, and along with the nice lookign colored vinyl and packaging, I couldn't resist buying all three. Now I need to check out more Morning Again and see what other records I can obsess over.

War Wounds Monday

Back when I started this blog, I was working on collecting the Blue Monday LP, Rewritten. I was very interested in collecting all thing Bridge Nine at the time, and ended up with five copies of that record. Meanwhile, I never even attempted to pick up either one of the earlier Blue Monday 7 inches.

It's been a good ten years since I've listened to Blue Monday, but as I've been spending a lot of time in those early 2000 hardcore playlists, it's made me want to revisit them. Twenty years later and I'm finally giving those Blue Monday 7 inches some attention and I'm having fun getting to know them now. Both What's Done Is Done and War Wounds are perfect for when I want to settle into that era of hardcore. Seriously, there are so many records from that time period that I just breezed over back in the day, and I'm excited to spend time with them now.

The War Wounds 7 inch doesn't appear to have a lot of different pressings. Looks like there is only a tour press and this one on blue vinyl (which looks purple in my photos, but trust me, it's blue), so it feels good to know that I don't have to go nuts if I want to collect this one.

Permanent 110

This year, I've spent some time hanging out in my early 2000's hardcore playlists. It feels like I don't pay nearly enough attention to those records that were released post-2000, and I'm trying to devote more time to that stuff these days.

Count Me Out have been a favorite of mine from that era... probably because they were an extension of those late 90's youth crew revival bands and were keeping that spirit alive during those early 2000 years when hardcore felt a bit fractured. Of course I missed buying CMO vinyl because I was strictly purchasing CDs at the time, and I've been wanting to dip in and pick up some of their records for years, but for some reason it has felt a bit overwhelming to take that first step.

As I was obsessing over those early 2000's playlists with bands like Frostbite, The Answer and The Damage Done, Count Me Out jumped out at me. I rolled through their albums on Spotify and knew that I needed to make a move on one of their records.

Permanent is a perfect album. Lyrically it is so good, and with straight edge hardcore being in flux at that time, the line "there's certain things that even time can't change" hit me so hard. Seriously, tattoo that on my body. So when I started looking on Discogs for Count Me Out vinyl, and saw the red vinyl Permanent available at a good price, I didn't hesistate.

165 pressed on red.

When I noticed that the seller had more Count Me Out vinyl for sale, I figured that I might as well scoop up the other stuff he had... starting with the clear yellow pressing of the 110 album that CMO used for their record release show. 110 pressed.

The seller also had the Posi Numbers 2002 version of 110 with the Marilyn Monroe screened back cover. Number 011 0f 110 is pretty fucking cool.

I love this band so much. It is a shame that it has taken me this long to finally add some of their records to my shelves, but I'm happy to start off with these. I don't need to worry about reissues, but I'd like to continue to pick up more CMO vinyl this year.

Undying Forced Order

Back in April, I was driving back from a weekend visiting friends in Pennsylvania. Shortly after crossing the state line into Massachusetts, I pulled into a rest stop to grab some food before my final three hour drive home. Before getting back on to the highway, I opened up Spotify to queue up some music and saw that there was a new Forced Order song featured. I knew that the band had come out of retirement and played some shows last year, but I had no idea that they were recording some new music. I quickly previewed the song on Spotify, liked what I heard and found that I could preorder the record over at Streets Of Hate, and grabbed a copy. Damn, I like it when I can be efficient like that.

The new Forced Order, Undying Spirit, feels a lot like the old Forced Order. I was suprised to find that I liked this band when I finally checked out One Last Prayer in 2019, but here in 2026 there is no doubt that I appreciate this style of metallic hardcore. It's angry, heavy and fast, and this EP clicked with me immediately. I'm not sure what that band will be doing from here, but I'm glad that they were able to push out another handful of songs.

The half black / half white with red splatter colored vinyl was limited to 100 and only available from Streets Of Hate.

R.E.M. 8 X 12

A few years ago, I had a slight R.E.M. obsession going. I probably listened to them more in 2023 than any other year... including the early 90's when I first discovered them. I was in deep that year, and I was very excited about picking up a couple of albums... and was giving serious thought to chasing some of the R.E.M. singles. Like most of my obsessions, it faded with time, and R.E.M. was just another band that I would occasionally take out for a spin.

When Jeff offered me eight R.E.M. singles from Tim's collection earlier this year, I wasn't really that interested. Did I want to spend the money and dedictate the shelf space to these records? Not really... but still that old obsession was scratching at the edge of my mind, telling me that I may regret it if I let them pass me by... plus they were all UK 12 inch versions, so with an average price of about $10 for each one, I said "fuck it" and just bought the lot of them.

S. Central Rain (I'm Sorry) was the first single from R.E.M.'s Reckoning LP in 1984. That song is really good, and combined with the non-LP track Voice Of Harold on the b-side makes me happy to own this as I listen and write this post at 10:00 at night. So calming for my brain that has been frazzled from a busy Monday. Finishing up the single is a cover of Lou Reed's Pale Blue Eyes, which is just okay but still I nice exclusive song to end the 12 inch.

(Don't Go Back To) Rockville is the second single from Reckoning, and might be my favorite song off the album (although admittedly I'm not really too familiar with this album). The rest of single includes Wolves, Lower, which is a killer song from their Chronic Town EP, plus live versions of Murmur's 9 - 9 and Chronic Town's Gardening At Night. My copy has some water damage to the cover, but whatever, it was cheap.

Now we move on to the 1985 album Fables Of The Reconstruction, and the lead single Can't Get There From Here. Another great song, as I'm listening to these singles while I write this post, I'm feeling more and more glad that I bought these. It's such a nice late evening vibe. Two more exclusive b-side songs here with Bandwagon and Burning Hell.

Another single from the Fables LP with this one for the song Wendell Gee. This one seems like an odd choice for a single. The song's okay, I guess, but I don't love it. B-side has a cover by another Athens band, Pylon, for the song Crazy, plus a live version of Driver 8.

There are times when I think that Life's Rich Pageant might be my favorite R.E.M. album, and this single for Fall On Me is from that one in 1986. Great song, with the b-side instrumental of Rotary Ten, and then an amazing cover of Aerosmith's Toys In The Attic. That cover was such a cool surprise.

Another one from Life's Rich Pageant with this Superman single. I had no idea that this song was a cover, until I was writing this right now. The b-side has a surf rock instrumental, White Tornado, and another Lou Reed cover with The Velvet Underground's Femme Fatale.

Arguably another possible favorite R.E.M. album with Document, with probably the band's biggest single, It's The End Of The World As We Know It. The b-side here is for live versions of This One Goes Out and Maps And Legends.

Another single from the Document LP with Finest Worksong. We get two different mixes of the song here, including a "lengthy club mix", plus a live version of Time After Time.

Whew, that was a lot of R.E.M. and a lot of work for eight singles, but putting this post together made me appreciate these records a bit more... which is nice because I was really dreading having to write this one up.

Sub Pop Screaming

A couple of months ago, I mentioned a music project that I've been doing with my friend Sarah. At the start of the year, we picked 12 albums from 1996 (happy 30th anniversary) and we would dedicate a month to each one... getting together on a call to discuss them. It has been a lot of fun, and it has introduced me to a number of bands that I most likely wouldn't have listened to otherwise. While I don't feel the need to go back and listen to a few of those full albums again (Sebadoh and Cake specifically), we have still been able to pull some songs we've enjoyed from each release and create a Spotify playlist that is a fun listen.

One of the more interesting experiences has been for the Screaming Trees record, Dust, that we did in May. I initially struggled a bit with that one, but it really grew on me over the month, and now I think that I really enjoy it. Dust was the last record from Screaming Trees, and in the middle of checking it out, I had told Sarah that maybe it wasn't the best starting place for me with the band.. like I really should have checked out someting earlier in their career first.

I took a quick look at the Screaming Trees discography on Discogs, and when I saw that they had a double 7 inch release on Sub Pop, I figured that I'd check that one and compare it to what they were doing with Dust seven years later... plus that cover photo, live on stage, just looks cool to me. Oddly, the Sub Pop songs weren't available on Spotify, so I did a quick download from Soulseek and settled in to listen.

I don't know if it was because I was somewhat familiar with Screaming Trees through the album Sarah and I were listening to, or maybe these songs from '89 just sat better with me, but very quickly I knew that I was going to need to get the record for this.

Screaming Trees have a sound that isn't easy to nail down. They kind of fall into that "grunge" style, but also, not really. All I know is that I really don't think that I would have liked this a few years ago... but here in 2026, this hits perfectly. I love the songs on this double 7 inch, and keep returing to the Dust LP. I see more Screaming Trees in my future.

Keepin It Real

It is kind of shocking to me just how quickly I forget about recent bands and records. Even though I've slowed way down on the number of new releases that I buy, I still find that the majority of them don't stick around on my radar for very long. I listen to them throughout the year they are released, but then in January my brain resets and I kind of leave them behind. After picking up this Struck Nerve 7 inch, I took a look back at what else had been released in 2018, and there was so much good shit that year that I haven't thought about for years. Thanks for the reminder that hardcore rules.

I love finding other cool records when I'm buying from a Discogs seller. As I was scrolling through what else the seller had when I recently added a record to the cart, I was very surprised to see the record release version of the Struck Nerve 7 inch... and even more shocked that it was listed for under $10.

Special record release cover... number 13 of only 15 made.