Tales Of Never Letting Go

When I first got into hardcore and started going to shows in Boston, there was a band named Only Living Witness that would often be on the bill and I saw them a number of times in 1991 and 1992. I bought their Complex Man 7 inch at a show, and enjoyed it, but my taste was rapidly changing at the time and before too long OLW was "too metal" for me. I lost track of the band after that, and completely missed when they broke up and the singer, Jonah Jenkins, started up a new band with Miltown.

Miltown didn't even cross my radar until Marcus mentioned them to me in 2016. The band had released a 7 inch in 1996 and a split with Cast Iron Hike in 1997, and I there I was 20 years after their release hunting them down and obsessing over the new found discovery. Now almost ten years after I first heard those Miltown records, I guess there was more to discover.

Back at the end of 1997, Miltown went into the studio and recorded an album, but then shortly after that, they broke up. I guess they weren't interested enough at the time to get the songs released, so the tapes just sat on a shelf. Thankfully someone recently had the thought to finally release this to the public almost 30 years later. When Marcus sent me a message to let me know that preorders were up for the long lost Miltown album, I was excited to quickly get one into my cart and check out.

It's crazy that things like this can sit around for years just collecting dust. Tales Of Never Letting Go is so good that I can't believe that it took this long to get released. The perfect melodic post-hardcore groove that I can't get enough of from that mid to late 90's era.

297 pressed on glacier blue colored vinyl.

Killing Someone Else's Train

One of my favorite discoveries these past couple of years has been The Cure. The whiplash of having zero interest in the band to having them at the top of my listening stats for two years in a row has been shocking. I've kept my experience with the band pretty narrow, only really listening to Disintegration (1989), Wish (1992) and their latest, Songs Of A Lost World (2024)... and occasionally dipping in to check out Pornography (1982)... but I really love those albums. At one point I was content to just listen to the albums through streaming services like Spotify, but more and more I feel the need to own the physical media and to have original UK pressings in my collection. I picked up the Pictures Of You single last year, and here I am fucking about with more singles from The Cure instead of actually chasing down the albums.

Last month I was checking out one of the Spotify playlists that included some bands that I wasn't too familiar with like Pixies, Basement and Joy Division. Normally I wouldn't stick with a playlist full of songs that I didn't know, but I was in the mood to just chill and read my book, so I took a chance and hit play. After a few songs, Jumping Someone Else's Train started to play, and I was like "oh cool a song from The Cure that I've never heard" and I was excited to give it a listen. I was surprised to find that the song was familiar, forgetting that Miltown covered the song on their split with Cast Iron Hike... but hearing the original version for the first time blew me away. I fucking loved it and immediately set to tracking down which album the song was on.

Turns out that Jumping Someone Else's Train was one of the early singles from The Cure and wasn't on a regular studio album... although it did appear on the US frankenstein version of The Cure's first record, Boys Don't Cry, where the label took a handful of songs from the actual first album, Three Imaginary Boys, and mashed them together with some various singles from that time, including this song. With that useless fact in mind, I kind of wanted the original UK single. The price for this was a bit high, but I was so obessed that it didn't matter... I just had to have it.

Initally I found one for sale from a US seller on Discogs, and I fired off a message to ask for him to confirm that the center label matched what was pictured for his listing. I wasn't even asking for a photo... just a simple confirmation that what he was selling matched what was shown. I got no response, so fuck that guy, and I ordered them from a UK seller on eBay instead.

As I was picking up the Jumping single, I noticed that the seller also had a single available for Killing An Arab. I'd never heard of this song either, so I checked a live version that was available on Spotify and I fucking loved it. That song was so rad that I said fuck it and threw more money to the seller to pick up both of those 7 inch singles.

Killing An Arab was the first single from The Cure, released back in 1978. Apparently there were 5,000 pressed for Small Wonders Records initially, and then two months later it was reissued on the new Fiction Records label. Kind of cool to own an original here... and in great condition.

Maybe I'll get around to picking up a Cure full length album for the collection in 2026.

Gruesome Echoes

I've loved Gruesome since hearing their first record, Savage Land, back in 2015. They came together to pay tribute to the late Chuck Schuldiner and the band Death, and they have stayed true to that mission with each record sounding like a long lost Death recording session. I loved those first three Death albums, so I'm here for what Gruesome has been doing.

It's been seven years since the last Gruesome record, Twisted Prayers, and I kind of expected that the band was done. I was surprised to see that the band had a new record on the way this year, and I wasn't sure if I was going to really want to spend a lot of time with it. Sure, Twisted Prayers was good, but I've only listened to it a handful of times since its release, so was I really going to bother with a new album?

It took me a couple of months to get around to checking out the new Gruesome record, Silent Echoes, but when I did, the timing was perfect because it was exactly what I needed at the time. There have been a few times this year when I just want to listen to something angry and ugly, and this was one of those times. It hit perfectly and I've already listened to this more than their last album.

Since picking up a couple of Relapse records this year on clear vinyl, I'm kind of hooked on it. These are limited to 100 and only available to friends and family of the band an label, but I've been lucky to grab the few Relapse releases that I've been interested in straight off Discogs for a decent price.

Ignite Anniversary

The first time that I heard Ignite was when I picked up the Scarred For Life CD back in 1994. The CD contained the songs from the first Ignite record, plus a few bonus tracks, but I had no idea that the 7 inch even existed at the time... even though I was buying lots of vinyl at that time... so I was content with the CD. It wasn't until MANY years later that I even realized that the Where They Talk 7 inch was a thing, and by that point the colored vinyl carried a price tag that was a bit out of range for what I'd pay. When I was picking up the Carry Nation records from REV, I noticed that they had this Ignite reissue and figured that I'd grab it as well.

This 12 inch pressing of Where They Talk was released for the 30th anniversary, and includes all five songs from the orginal session (only three appeared on the 7 inch). This early record was before Zoli joined the band for the classic Call On My Brothers, and has Randy Johnson on vocals. I remember initially being a big hesitant on Randy's vocal style here, as he aims for a more melodic approach, but I quickly grew to really like how these songs sound. I kind of forgot all about this recording after getting heavily into Call On My Brothers and Past Our Means, but this anniversary release is a great reminder of just how great this first version of Ignite was.

Nice packaging with the newly designed cover, colored vinyl and insert. As with most anniversary editions, I wish there was more info here on the band's history... how they came together and why they separated with Randy... but overall this looks really nice. 300 pressed on turquoise colored vinyl for the REVHQ store.

Live Nation

I have so many new releases that I need to get posted up here before the year closes out, and here I am mucking about with a new reissue. I may have actually let this one slip me by, but when I saw Marcus post about it this summer, I found myself influenced into picking it up.

In June of this year, there was a memorial show for Big Frank Harrison that featured a ton of great older bands, and it would have been great if I had the forethought to plan a trip out to Cali to check it out... but I seem to be out of the loop with hardcore most of the time, and didn't fully realize what was going on until Marcus over from the UK that weekend for the show. In any case, as Big Frank was a member of Carry Nation, the band decided to reissue their one 7 inch to help raise some additional money for Frank's daughter. This alone made it a worthwhile purchase, but what really sold me was how great the record looked.

The gold vinyl and the new cover design looked so good that I needed to buy this.

The nice thing about this 7 inch is that there aren't 10 different pressings to collect. You just get the original black and clear vinyl pressings from 1989, and then the newest reissue. Got to like it when record collecting doesn't get stupid and just keeps things simple.

Confession time. I've never owned, or been too interested in the No Control At The Country Club live 7 inch that Nemesis put out in 1990. I don't know... one live song each from four bands never really appealed to me as a music consumer (hey, at least the East Meets West live comp had the unreleased Carry Nation song Temple Walls)... and while maybe I should track one down at some point to appear as a real record collector, I've just never made it a priority. For the Big Frank memorial show, the band decided to press all five songs from their Country Club set to wax, and that was something that I could get behind more than the original live comp.

This is a cool recording to have. The drums sound a bit annoying at the start of Grave Mistake, but overall, it is a good reminder of how good the band was, and hearing the song Thinking Of You for the first time here just makes me wish that we got more from Carry Nation.

Specific Wonderland

Moonkisser are a band that I enjoy, but it feels like I rarely listen to. They will release a new record and I'll give it a number of spins, really like it, and then put it on the shelf and forget about it. Then they will release something new and I'll be like, "oh yeah, I should listen to Moonkisser more". Also, when I listen to the band, it will remind me of that mid 90's emo post-hardcore stuff like Lincoln or other Art Monk bands and then I'll just want to listen to that instead. But yeah, Moonkisser is really good and when I heard that they had a new record on the way, I jumped in to preorder.

I've been slow to check out any new record that I've received this year. I won't hesitate to buy it, but then I'll just let it sit there for months before going "well, I guess I've got to blog about this, so I should probably listen to it". So over the past two days, I've listened to Specific Wonderland five times... and not just so that I could act like I knew what the fuck I was talking about in this post, but because it is really good. I've even gone back and pulled Summer's Fleeting Majesty off the shelf to listen to that one as well. Yeah, this band is so good. Thank you new record for the reminder.

The label lists this colored vinyl as "neon magenta" but I prefer to just call it "hot pink". Looks so good. Limited to 100.

Dynamite Hardcore Pride

Last year I missed out on the colored vinyl pressing for the Wreckage 7 inch from Scheme Records. That shit hurt, and still a year later I haven't been able to track one down. So when I saw the label announce preorders for the Dynamite 7 inch earlier this year, I didn't hesitate to get my order in.

Dynamite flies the London Hardcore flag proudly, and play a great straight forward style that never gets old for me. Five songs in eight minutes is the perfect hardcore blast. I'd never heard of the band before this record, but apparently they also released another 7 inch last year on Quality Control that might be worth tracking down... if one ever becomes available over here in the the States.

Everything about this record feels like a Youngblood release. The music, the design... it all just feels like it would fit with what that label does, so all around this is a solid release... and honestly it kind of makes me want to collect this kind of stuff again.

100 pressed on red vinyl.

Living With A Harvest Complex

I've found myself obsessed with a few 90's hardcore bands this year. Bands that I didn't think that I really liked all that much, but suddenly I've found myself unable to get enough. The problem that I've found with some of these bands is that their records seem more difficult to find than I had expected. Because of course, since I wasn't listening to or collecting records for these bands, no one else was, right? I should be able to scoop these records fairly easily. Wrong. I want this shit now, and Discogs and eBay aren't delivering. With Harvest, Marcus even asked a friend of his if he wanted to part with any of his records, but it seemed like that was one band that he still wanted to hold onto. Fuck.

As I was scouring the internet, I found a label called Hardcore Matinee that was doing a special run of Harvest shirts. It was a preorder where they were only doing the one run to cover orders and then it was done... and I kept playing with the idea of buying one. I went back to the store every couple of days to wring my hands over if I should buy one, and then I noticed that they had found a few copies of the Living With A God Complex reissue that they did back in 2018, and they put them up in the store... so I took it as a sign and bought the record and the shirt.

I try to stay away from reissues, but this 21st anniversary edition is so nice... and since I haven't been able to track down an original copy, this one will do for now. That's okay though, because this edition is really nice. With the special sleeve, the thick booklet with lyrics and photos, and all the special touches like the stamped labels, I'm happy to own this.

Number 268 of 300.

Mil-Marathon

When I picked up the World House record from Mil-Spec back in 2020, I really enjoyed it. I played it quite a bit for about two months, and then we moved into a new year, and my focus shifted to other things. I forgot all about the band for about five years, until Marcus sent me a message recently to let me know that Lockin Out had colored vinyl available for the second Mil-Spec album, Marathon.

Marathon was released back in 2023, and honestly, I'd never even heard of it. I know that I'm not connected too well with happens in hardcore most days, but I still figured that I would have been aware of this record. I didn't really remember anything about Mil-Spec, and wasn't even that excited to revisit World House, but I figured that if Marcus took the time to give me the heads up on a record, I might as well check it out. I found Marathon on Spotify and from the first song I was interested. They had a familiar sound that I couldn't place... I was thinking it was something like Abuse Of Power, but Marcus said that they just sounded like Mil-Spec and maybe he was right... but I was really liking what I heard and so headed over to Lockin Out to buy the record.

Apparently the there were 220 pressed on orange vinyl, with 70 of them getting an OBI strip for a Japanese tour. This one obviously doesn't have the OBI, but at least the colored vinyl matches the front cover. Also, strange that the packaging for this record does not mention "Mil-Spec" anywhere on it, except for the small print copyright info on the back sleeve. If I saw this in a shop, I would have skipped right by it, thinking this was some band named Marathon that I'd never heard of before.

Druid Cult

Druid were a metal band out of Massachusetts in the mid-80's. Despite having two self released records back in the day, I've somehow never even heard of them. As I was going through Tim's collection that Jeff was selling I saw the album cover for Vampire Cult and I stopped dead in my tracks. What the fuck is this? That black and white cover looked like something a bunch of high school kids would have thrown together for their band... rough and completely not professional... and I was fucking interested in whatever they were trying to do here. I found a download of the songs on Soulseek and after hearing one song, I fired off a note to Jeff to tell him that I wanted to buy the album.

Jeff got back to me and told me that he couldn't sell it to me because it was too expensive. The fuck you say? I've spent stupid amounts on records, and you are gonna say the price of this is too high for me? At the time, Discogs had an average price of $150... with one available for over $600... so I told Jeff that I'd send him $200 for it that day. No eBay fees... no additional packaging and shipping charges... just $200 straight into his bank account... and he turned me down. Okay, now it was a matter of principle, and when I saw another seller had one listed on eBay at a slightly higher price, I bought it. Suck it, Jeff. Don't tell me a record is too expensive for me.

Turns out that the copy I bought was still sealed, and had the singer's signature on the shrinkwrap, which was kind of a cool and unexpected bonus.

While the eBay listing for the Druid album was higher than what I was offering Jeff, it was okay because it also included the Druid 7 inch, Four Curses, as well. There were only 200 pressed for this 7 inch, and it tends to sell for over $100 on its own, so I was happy to scoop it along with the album. Fun and obscure 80's metal... such a cool discovery 37 years after its release.

Never Turn Your Back On Budgie

About ten years ago, I was really obsessed with Budgie and wanted to collect UK pressings for all of their albums. It was a nice dream, but I only managed to pick up two of them, Bandolier and In For The Kill, before I got distracted and moved on to chase other things. When I was picking up the Zero Boys record on Discogs and saw that the seller also had a UK pressing of Budgie's third album available, I figured that the time was right to finally add one more to the collection.

Never Turn Your Back On A Friend was released in 1973, and has one of my favorite Budgie songs, Breadfan, on it. Of course the first time I heard the song was when Metallica was covering it on the b-side for the Eye Of The Beholder single, but this Budgie version hits hard too. Throw in other Budgie classics like You're The Biggest Thing Since Powdered Milk and In The Grip Of A Tyrefitter's Hand, and this record is so good.

Man, it was really nice picking up this record and a great reminder of how much I enjoy listening to this kind of stuff. It's got me thinking of those other 70's bands that I was hot to collect at one point... more Budgie, Thin Lizzy, Kiss, Deep Purple... and wondering what other holes I still need to fill.

Vicious And Toxic

There was a time when the focus of my Instagram page was nothing but records. That got stale after a few years when the excitement of monthly photo challenges started to fade and it seemed like everyone was posting the same 25 records over and over... plus I was starting to discover bookstagram and so I shifted my focus over to what I was reading instead. I've been posting nothing but books for a while, but sometimes I still get the itch to throw some records up in my stories and I'll do a Discogs shake to see which record I should randomly pull from the shelf and post. Over the summer, the Discogs shake dictated that I pull my copy of Vicious Circle from Zero Boys.

The problem with pulling my copy of Vicious Circle from the shelf was I was reminded that I only owned a reissue from 2009. Nothing cool or special about that, and seeing it only made me want to rectify the situation and find something better to replace it. As I started checking Discogs, I was immediately intimidated by the first press of the album on Nimrod Records. I wasn't sure if I wanted to drop $500 for that record, but when I saw a colored vinyl reissue from '87 on Toxic Shock, at a price that I was much more comfortable with, I was happy to pick up this option.

I like the different colored cover, moving from the original yellow over to this weird blue/teal color for the Toxic Shock pressing, which makes it feel more unique. Plus this version has six songs that weren't on the original record, and I'm hearing them for the first time in 2025. I love finding cool shit like this.

Clutch Collector's Series #4

A funny thing has happened recently. I've always been a "new Clutch is better than old Clutch" kind of guy, but in the last year or so, I've found myself changing position on that. I think it started when I bought the Clutch Collectors Series version of Transnational Speedway League last year, and then this year I saw the band play live and they were packing their set list with a bunch of songs off their self-titled record. Suddenly I understood the attraction, and while I can still hang with any of Clutch's albums, there is something about that early stuff that I find myself being more drawn to these days.

With this new found love of early Clutch, I was beyond excited when I heard that their 1995 self-titled albumn was getting the Collector's Series treatment. With the alternate cover art, the autographed and numbered insert, and all the extra touches... the packaging for these things always looks amazing. This was the first in the series that didn't get pressed on colored vinyl, but the black goes nice with the cover art and the d-side etching of the original artwork looks good.

Animal Farm. Escape From The Prison Planet. Spacegrass. Fuck, this album contains some of my favorite Clutch songs.

I think that initially I'd heard that the Clutch Collector's Series was going to only span four records. With this one being the fourth, I hope I'm wrong or that they changed their minds and continue with this special edition series. Sure they are a bit expensive, but I'll gladly pay if they keep releasing them.

Speedway Refrain

I received the new Speedway album, A Life's Refrain, back in April, but the box was so badly damaged that the record ended up with a warp that left the first song unplayable. I was disappointed and just tossed the record on my desk... and soon it was covered with a bunch of new books that I'd received, and I forgot about it. When I was trying to organize and clean up all the clutter on my desk months later, I saw the Speedway record. I slid the record from the cover to see if the warping was as bad as I remembered... and I couldn't find it. Seems that forgetting the record under a pile of books fixed the problem for me.

Because of my initial disappointment with how the record arrived, I didn't bother listening to this Speedway record... and the longer it sat there, the less I was interested in it. I don't know what my problem was, but I couldn't get myself excited to listen to this album. As we close in on the end of the year, I knew that I was going to have to get this record up on the blog, and so I gave it a spin... and it clicked with me immediately. Man, this record is so good. I liked the band's two 7 inches, but I don't really remember much about them, but this record is so good, I'm going to have to go back and revisit those as well.

Sometimes this kind of hardcore hits perfectly with me, and this is one of those times. This band always makes me think of Damage Control, so I guess it is time to pair A Life's Refrain with What It Takes, and let them rip.

Deadbeat At Dawn

Earlier this year I was spending some time in one of the Spotify playlists. I can't remember exactly what it was, but my song history from that day shows a string of Melvins, Danzig and Cycle Sluts From Hell... so I was just hanging out and having a good time with it, and then it dropped a song from Zig Zags into the mix. I'd never heard of this band before, but they certainly had my attention. After the song finished I immediately queued it up again, and then when I started to check their Spotify page, I saw they had just released a new single for an upcoming album, so I checked that song too. That's all I needed. I was sold and I jumped over to preorder their new album, Deadbeat At Dawn.

The thing is, when the record arrived in May, I wasn't in the mood to check it out and just tossed it in a pile with a bunch of other vinyl that I'd been receiving in the mail, and forgot all about it. I've been slowly picking through that stack of records and when I saw that I was going to have to blog about that Zig Zags album now, I was feeling kind of indifferent about it. I'd forgotten all about the band and couldn't remember why I'd picked up this record in the first place. To be honest, I really wasn't in the mood to listen to this, but after a couple of spins, I recognized what attracted me to this... this is just a good time. Zig Zags have kind of an Annihilation Time thing going on with thier punk charged rock sound here... not as grimy and raw as AT, but it feels like they are in that same vein. I'm really digging this right now, and it appears that the band has been around for a while, so I might have to check out more from them at some point.

500 pressed on teal vinyl.