Born With A Cruel Hand

I picked up the Vigilant Citizen 7 inch earlier this year from Cruel Hand. It was only two songs, but damn, it was so solid that it left me wanting more. I was recently at a local DNA show in Portland, and noticed that Nate from Cruel Hand was the drummer for them. There are only a couple of drummers that command my attention as they are playing live...DFJ from The Rival Mob is one of them, and Nate is another. Both of those dudes just attack that kit. Anyway, the other thing that caught my attention with Nate is that he was wearing a Savatage shirt. I love that band, and after the show I had to catch him and let him know how great I thought that his shirt was. The guy was all smiles as he told me that he picked up the shirt when Cruel Hand was touring Japan, and he engaged me in a 15 minute conversation about Savatage and collecting original pressing for Metal records. It was a great conversation, and somewhere along the line we got to talking about Cruel Hand...I was asking what else the band was working on, and he let me know about a 7 inch that was due to be released from Closed Casket.

The next morning, the first thing that I did when I turned on the computer was check for that new Cruel Hand record. Sure enough, they were available to order and I grabbed a couple copies.

250 pressed on blue with orange splatter.

While the vinyl itself isn't much to look at, the songs are great. Two originals, and one cover. Pretty bad ass.

500 pressed on "metallic gold with black haze".