Blangk

One of my favourite aspects of record collecting is finding a band you have never heard of before, especially if it is something from a long time ago. I've been listening to hardcore since 1990, and I've been obsessed with discovering new bands since that time when I placed my first order with Ebullition. I would religiously scour mailorder catalogs from Very, Lumberjack and Ebullition, reading record descriptions for everything that was available. I'd use a highlighter and mark which records I wanted and check off those that I owned. I was a fanatic, and spent more time with those catalogs than I did with my college textbooks. I'm not looking for some badge of honor for my nerd level of knowledge for hardcore bands through the 90s, but I feel pretty confident that I know my shit when it comes to that era of hardcore. I'm sure that there are plenty of obscure bands from that time that I've never heard of, but it still took me by surprise when Marcus mentioned the band Blangk on his blog last year. Blangk? Who the fuck is that?

Blangk were a band out of Louisville in the mid-90's. They released a 7 inch, a split 7 inch, and a CD... and coming from the home of Endpoint and Falling Forward, you would have thought that the band would have popped onto my radar at some point. Maybe it was the odd fucking name of "Blangk" that kept them out of my circle of interest, but either way, when some nerd from the UK knows about the band, and I've never even heard their name, I sit up and pay attention. I quickly found a download on Soulseek... because if you are relying on Spotify to feed you all of your music, you are missing out... and I checked out the songs for their 7 inch.

Initially, I wasn't too interested in what they were doing. It was okay, but it didn't really excite me. Still, I'd go back to those four songs occasionally, and sometime over the past few weeks they really got their hooks into me... to the point where I was queuing them up a couple of times a day. Wow. I fucking love this. An absolute treasure to discover 27 years after it's release.

Speedway Paradise

I discovered Speedway at the end of 2020 when I picked up their 7 inch through Triple B Records. I really liked it, but to be honest, I quickly forgot about the band earlier this year until I heard that they were releasing something through Revelation. Even then, it still took me months to bother checking out the new songs on Spotify. After one listen of Paradise, I wondered why I'd let the band fall off my radar so quickly.

Paradise is a great hardcore 7 inch. The band seem to have such great youthful energy, and sound like they could have shared stages with Bane and In My Eyes in the late 90's. I've watched a couple of live videos for Speedway, and the band just seem to have a great time playing music together, and those good vibes are infectious which makes me appreciate them even more. Please give me more from this band.

Orange vinyl was exclusive to REVHQ and was limited to 219 copies.

Hate Uber Alles

Kreator is a classic thrash metal band. Man, that string of records from the Flag Of Hate EP in '86, straight through to Coma Of Souls in '90, is a hell of a run. Each one is a ripper, and I have no problem dipping into any of those records when I need something raw and angry. Outside of those six records (yeah, I'm including the Out Of The Dark EP in there) I don't spend any time with the rest of the Kreator catalog. The band pushed their boundaries through the 90's, and I'm not really compelled to revisit or even own those albums...and even though Kreator got back to some thrash roots in 2001 with Violent Revolution, and released some solid records since then, when I'm in the mood for Kreator I always hit that 80's output. Still when it was announced that Kreator had new album, Hate Uber Alles, on the way, I was sucked into the hype once again and I ordered a copy.

Like the past few Kreator albums, Hate Uber Alles is pretty good. There are times when I find myself really liking it, and then it kind of fades into background music and by the time the album is over, I don't remember much of what I've heard. Hell, with both Phantom Antichrist (2012) and Gods Of Violence (2017), I have barely given those albums any attention once we moved into a new year after it was released. Maybe I'll get a kick out of giving them a spin at some point down the road, but right now, I'm just kind of shrugging my shoulders. I don't see that Hate Uber Alles will be much different. It is nice to hear some new Kreator songs, but really, I think that all I need are those classic records.

The record may be decent, but the packaging is top notch. I love that front cover artwork, and I'm glad to have this in my collection for that alone. 400 pressed on a nice looking clear ink spot in red colored vinyl.

Have You Tried Jogging?

I was kind of surprised to see a new Bitter Branches record this year. When older dudes come out of hardcore retirement with a new band, I guess that I don't really expect them to stick around too long. Bitter Branches released a five song 12 inch in 2020, and then a two song 7 inch in 2021, and I expected that that might be it for the band. I was happily proven wrong.

While I enjoyed the first Bitter Branches EP, it wasn't something that I returned to very often. So while I was happy that the band was releasing a new record, I didn't feel the need to hunt down any special limited pressing, and I just grabbed a copy of Your Neighbors Are Failures from REVHQ when I was placing an order. Initially, I was put off by the color pattern used for the vinyl, but I'm starting to come around and now I'm kind of digging the orange and black version that I received, and think it flows nice with the cover art. As a side note, I didn't even think that the band name was on the front cover until I was looking at this photo that I'd taken.

As for the record... holy shit... this thing surprised the hell out of me. I really liked the Along Came A Bastard 7 inch, as those two songs hit hard, and with Your Neighbors Are Failures, Bitter Branches continue that trend of anger and agression. I'm surprised with how much I am loving this record.

I don't really collect multiple copies of new records anymore. I'm not interested in keeping up with the dozen different shitty looking color vinyl variants that the labels push out these days. Instead, I will usually just take whatever less offensive color vinyl option I can get and be okay with it. Cover variants, however, are my weakness. As soon as Marcus mentioned that Equal Vision was selling a version of Your Neighbors Are Failures with a special screen printed cover, I jumped into the store to see what was up. Like I said, I was really liking the album, and while I wasn't excited over the splatter vinyl, the special cover had me sold.

Number 100 of 150 made with the red and black splatter vinyl and the special cover. This is a really nice looking version.

After I originally picked up the ACAB 7 inch on clear with yellow splatter vinyl, I discovered that the record was also pressed on pink. I kind of wanted one since pink is the best vinyl color, but I had talked myself out of chasing one. As I was in the EVR store buying a second copy of the Bitter Branches album like a fool, I figured that I might was well go full idiot and pick up a second copy of the 7 inch as well.

Enact

War Records has released some solid records lately, so I've started to pay more attention to what that label is releasing. I didn't know anything about Enact, when the label announced that they were releasing a record by the band, but I've been loving a bunch of newer hardcore bands lately so I decided to see what they were about. Rather quickly, I discovered two things that really piqued my interest... one, they were a straight edge band... and two, Kyle Deville from Get The Most and Cutting Through was playing guitar. I checked out a couple of songs on Spotify, but I didn't pay too close attention to them, and quickly found myself preordering the album.

When the record arrived, I gave it a couple of spins, but it really wasn't catching my attention and it quickly became background noise to whatever else I was doing. I kind of gave it a shrug of my shoulders and put it in the pile of records that I have stacked up as my backlog to write about for the blog. I just didn't find it too exciting. As I was getting closer to pulling the record out to write about here, I gave it a couple more spins, and suddenly things clicked. Wow. It grew on me with each listen, and I found myself listening to it daily. I even get a kick out of watching their video for the song The True Balance, even though they do that goofy "walking down the street while singing the song" camera shot. This is a really good record, and even with the seven and a half minute final song, Still In Silence, that features an angry spoken word piece set to music, I love this record all the way through. I've heard some people say that they will probably only listen to this Still In Silence song a couple of times and then skip it, but Rikki's voice is so passionate and powerful, I don't see how you could ignore it. It is surprising just how much I've come to like this record.

170 pressed on "grape" colored vinyl... which seems like an odd choice... I mean why not go with yellow or red vinyl to match the cover?

Clutch Collector's Series #2

Last year, Clutch introduced their Collector's Series with a special pressing of their Blast Tyrant album. The plan with the Collector's Series is to reissue a number of Clutch albums, repackaging them with some reimagined art work. The one for Blast Tyrant was fantastic, and I was eager for the next one.

It has taken a year for the second release in the Collector's Series to drop, and this time they went with Robot Hive/Exodus. This album was originally released in 2005 on CD and didn't see a vinyl pressing until 2014. I grabbed that 2014 pressing when it was released, and I'm very happy with it, but it is cool to get a colored vinyl version here.

Once again, the packaging for this series is amazing. The new cover artwork looks great, and the colored vinyl is a nice match. You can tell that a lot of thought and hard work went into this pressing to make it special.

There is a bonus 7 inch included with the album, and features two songs from the Robot Hive session that were cut from the original release due to time constraints. Those songs ended up on the Pitchfork And Lost Needles comp from the band, but it is cool to have them packaged here.

Custom art print is included as well, and signed by the band. Pretty cool that I got a low number with 22 out of 7,500.

I was really hoping that Clutch was going to take the opportunity to reissue some of thier older records in this Collector's Series format... it would be nice to get some of those albums that I'm not very familiar with like Elephant Riders and the self-titled Clutch record with this special packaging... but I read recently that there are only four records in this series, so I can only assume that the next two will follow the chronological order set with Blast Tyrant and Robot Hive/Exodus, and the next two will be From Beale Street To Oblivion and Strange Cousins From The West. I already own the vinyl for those two, but it looks like I'll be buying them to complete the series.

Almighty Watching

Almighty Watching had a track on Volume 5 of the America's Hardcore comp that Triple B released last year. That comp was ridiculous with 39 songs by 38 different bands. Almost an hour and a half of music. It was too much for my brain, and it should be no surprise that some bands flew by me and didn't get any attention. One of the bands that I missed was Almighty Watching. It may have been the religious implication of the band name, but I paid them very little attention on that AHC comp.

Sometimes the Spotify algorithm knows what it is doing, and when it dropped an Almighty Watching song into my mix, I immediately dropped what I was doing and had to find out who this band was. I'm not sure who they remind me of... online hype mentions bands like Stillsuit and Mind Over Matter... and Almighty Watching definitely has a 90's hardcore vibe, so those bands seem like a good enough reference point. Whatever the comparisons are, this is surprisingly great, and it wasn't long before I needed to get my hands on this 7 inch.

There were 100 pressed on clear vinyl, and surprisingly this is still available in the Scheme Records store.

12 Inches Of Heavy Metal Love

It seems that most people don't care about singles, so of course that just makes me want to collect them. One man's indifference is bound to be my obsession. Sure, it feels kind of pointless adding them to the collection, but there is no doubt that I still get a big kick out of buying them now an then. When I was flipping through the used bins during a quick shopping trip at Moody Lords in Portland, I came across this UK 12 inch single for Heavy Metal Love from Helix.

Dude, I was all over this style of music a few years ago, and I was a man on a mission, filling holes in my collection for stuff like this. I've been more focused on hardcore lately, and it has been a while since I've give Helix a spin, but this single is a nice reminder on what a good time they can be.

Two songs here from the 1983 album, No Rest For The Wicked, a song from their 1981 album, White Lace & Black Leather, plus one exclusive track with Everybody Pays The Price. This is a cool collection of songs, and at five dollars, the price was right.

Combat Amnesty

I don't really expect to find anything cool when I step into one of Portland's few used record shops. I mean, if you are looking for that Huey Lewis And The News album, they will probably have you covered, but chances are slim for them to have some obscure 80's metal record that will have me scooping it up and heading to the check-out counter. So it was with great surprise that I found a copy of the first Zoetrope album, Amnesty, in the racks when I ducked into Moody Lords one weekend.

While Zoetrope were an 80's speed metal band, I never bothered to check them out at the time. I don't expect that their cassette showed up too often at the Mall where I was shopping back in 1985, but even if it was, the odd band name may have made me a bit hesitant to buy it. Years later, I heard their song on the Metal Massacre 4 comp, but I still didn't bother to check out anything else from the band until 2020. Crazy that it took me 35 years to finally give this band a serious listen, and man, I was missing out. Amnesty is a damn solid record of 80's metal.

The craziest part of this story is that this album was still sealed. Insane that I was the first one to break the cellophane wrap and drop the needle on this record. Man, it gave me chills to see that green Combat label when I pulled it out of the record sleeve. Classic.

Peace Test

At the start of the year, the band Peace Test popped up on my radar. I'd never heard of them before, but I'm usually down to check out new hardcore bands, so when I saw that they had a new record coming out, I jumped over to Spotify to see what they were all about.

Oh man, this record is straight up vicious. 14 songs in 15 minutes and it just pummels you with some intense Infest worship. The guitars are a blur and the vocals are filled with a hate filled rage. Fuck, this is so angry. I knew that I was going to need a copy, but I wasn't prepared for the limited color vinyl to sellout in eight minutes... and I didn't want to end up empty handed in case the black vinyl option sold out too, so I grabbed the only option that was left. 400 pressed on black.

2022 continues to deliver some great hardcore records.

Can't Relate

Earlier this year, I was heavily into my 2008 playlist on iTunes. There were a bunch of records from that year that I hadn't bothered to listen to in a long time, and diving into them again had me hooked quick. So many great bands that I imagine no one really thinks about in 2022... records from Alert, Broken Distance, Balance, Coptic Times, and Thought Crusade... and I was having a blast revisiting them. As I was digging into stuff from that year, I discovered that I had the songs from the Can't Relate demo in there. I didn't remember a thing about that demo and was kind of expecting that could just delete it from my computer. I expected very little from it, but before I trashed it, I figured that I'd give it a spin.

I've been surprised with how much I've enjoyed some of those long lost hardcore 7 inches from 2008, but I don't think that any of them have surprised me more than the Can't Relate demo. I probably didn't listen to this more than a handful of times back when I downloaded these songs, and it has easily been ten years since I've bothered to listen to this demo, but holy shit, this thing is a blast. Straight forward hardcore that would have probably fit right in on Youngblood or the early days of React Records... so you know this shit is my jam.

The demo was originally released on cassette in 2008, but apparently Positive and Focused thought this needed a vinyl release and pressed it to a 7 inch in 2013. After repeat listens, I knew that I needed to find a vinyl copy of this. I was so desperate to get a copy of this 7 inch, I didn't even mind paying for overseas shipping when I found a German seller that had it available on Discogs. Black vinyl with a special stamped cover and dust sleeve... number 34 of 42.

The seller also had a test press for the Can't Relate demo. At only 10 euros, I couldn't resist picking it up as well. I've been out of the game of collecting multiple pressings for so long, and it feels a bit weird to be picking up my third test press this year.

"Hey dude, if you hold this record you're one lucky bastard!" Number 6 of 21 for the test press.

Double The Damage

People expect you to mellow as you get older. Those hard and fast rules that you lived by when you were an idealistic kid are supposed to crumble a bit as you age, right? Yet, here I am, turning 52 years old today and I'm probably more passionate about straight edge than I was at 20. Even at this age, I still don't understand the attraction in drinking, and now that weed is legal, it all just seems to obnoxious and in your face. Hey, I have friends that do all that stuff, and that's fine for what they do, but I have no interest in being around it. No thanks. So yeah, as an old angry edge dude, when I recenly discovered this limited cover for Damage Control's What It Takes album, I needed to fucking own it.

Seriously. A band of straight edge warriors, x'd up and ready to fight with their broadsword and battle axe...fuck yes, I don't care how cheesy it might be, give it to me.

I'm not sure what this cover was made for. Preorders? Tour sleeve? Whatever, it is cool as hell. Red vinyl and number 67 of 100.

Here is the deal. I was just starting to get back into buying records when What It Takes was released in 2005, but I still went with the CD at the time. When I picked up the special cover a few weeks ago, I felt like I needed to own a proper Livewire Records pressing for this thing too. As I was buying the Police & Thieves record release from Gene Melkisethian, I noticed that he had a copy of the Damage Control album available as well, and I figured that I might as well add that to the cart too.

I honestly don't think that this record made much of an impression on me in 2005. It was decent, but I don't think that I really spent much time with it. Listening to in 2022, however, is a blast. Another record from that post-2000 period that I didn't spend enough time with back in the day. It is safe to say that I've listened to this record more this year than when it was released.

Someone was happy that Gene was getting a copy of this. Sorry dude, it's mine now.

Staring At Patterns

I remember that by the end of 2019 I was finding myself very excited over a bunch of new hardcore bands. Bands like Berthold City, Restraining Order, Magnitude and Rule Them All had just popped up on my radar, and it seemed like I was losing my mind over every new band that I would check out. One of the more underrated gems that I discovered was Method Of Doubt. Their Accepting What We Know 7 inch didn't seem to make much of an impact on most, but for me, I was fucking loving it.

After Covid stood everything on its head for a couple of years, I was excited to hear that Method Of Doubt were going to be releasing a new LP, and when preorders went up at the end of 2021 I was mashing that Add To Cart button. I usually like to wait until the physical record is actually in my hands before I listen to it, but with this Staring At Patterns album, there was no way that I was going to be able show any kind of restraint and as soon as it was available on Spotify, I was all over it. While I was hoping that this record lived up to my expectations, I really didn't think that I would love this as much as I do. Holy shit. From the opening bass line of the first song, I knew that this was going to be a special record. Every single song here hits me hard, and I fully expect that this is going to be my Record Of The Year for 2022. Eight months in and this record still gives me chills with how great it is.

Clear vinyl was available exclusively through Disorder Vinyl and was limited to 200.

Glow Police

A few years back I was finally able to pick up a copy of the first Police & Thieves 7 inch with the record release cover. I've got a solid P&T collection, so it made me very happy to get my hands on that special cover, and at only $4 it was a steal. The record release cover was made with glow in the dark ink, and when I recieved my copy, I was a bit disappointed to discover that it had lost its glow. At the time, Marcus joked that since it didn't glow, it was a good excuse to buy another one. Seemed like good advice, and here we are three years later with my second copy.

The first copy of the record release cover that I bought was printed with yellow ink, and when a Discogs seller recently listed a copy with a "nice greenish fade on the screen print", I was intrigued.

I sent a message to the seller to ask for photos so that I could verify that the ink color was different from my current copy. It was a slight pain in the ass when he then asked for me to send him a dollar for the trouble of sending the photo, and if I did end up buying the record, he would refund me the amount. Weird. I'd never encountered that before. The seller ended up being the drummer for Give, and previously Desperate Measures, and apparently was tired of sending photos to potential buyers that never followed through. Once I saw the photos, I obviously had to buy it and add another copy of this to the collection.

This one definitely glows in the dark.

I had to pull out my other record release cover for this 7 inch. There are obviously different colors of ink used here. There is a photo of one on Discogs that appears to have black ink for the text on the cover. Am I going to need that one too?

Number 25 and 16, and it is interesting to see the different shades of yellow for the colored vinyl. The one with the yellow cover is a more pale shade of yellow, which is a nice touch and I wonder if it was intentional.

No One Cares

I really loved those early Outbreak records when they were released, but over the last ten years, I kind of forgot about them. Not surprising since that ten year period through the 2000's fell into my blindspot over recent years. I've been digging into that overlooked decade this year, and it has been a blast rediscovering some of this stuff.

When the first Outbreak 7 inch was released in 2002, I was still focused on CDs. In a couple of years, I would completely change my position on preferring CDs, and by 2004 I was buying multiple copies of colored vinyl for the You Make Us Sick EP. However, for Eaten Alive, here we were twenty years later, and I still didn't own a single vinyl copy. I've been listening to the songs from that 7 inch a lot this year, and figured that it was finally time to grab the record.

This record is vicious. Five songs, with three of them not even breaking 40 seconds... man, this record is just on attack mode from start to finish. Pure anger from these young kids from Maine.