Promises Kept In Secret

Could Bridge Nine have made this any more confusing? For the fourth pressing of Champion's Promises Kept, Bridge Nine posted two different pieces of colored vinyl in their webstore, right along with three different colors for the Time Slips Away LP. B9 also posted a package deal that included one of each LP in the most rare color that was available. Pretty straight forward, right? I ordered all 5 different pressings, so I figured that I was good to go, and I passed on the package deal because I didn't need another Champion poster.

Turns out there was an additional color pressing of Promises Kept. The problem is that Bridge Nine never indicated that there was a third color and that it was limited to this package deal. Why not mention this detail for those that are ordering? Was it some kind of secret, or was it just bad advertising?

After I learned about the green vinyl, I emailed Bridge Nine to confirm that it was still available. I wasn't thrilled about having to go back and place another order, but I was thankful that the package deal hadn't sold out. Hell, here we are two months after I placed my order, and the Champion package is still listed. Wow. I can't believe it hasn't sold out yet! Then again, maybe they could have marketed it better and mentioned the exclusive colored vinyl.

Since I had to order the package deal, that meant that I had to buy another copy of Time Slips Away on clear vinyl, and I now have a spare copy.

It had been a while since I'd take a group photo of my Champion collection, and with these newest additions, I figured I'd drag them all out for a picture.

For those of you at home keeping score, Promises Kept is currently beating The Things We Carry, 14 to 10.

Still A Champion

I'd heard rumors a while ago that Bridge Nine was going to press Champion's Promises Kept LP on vinyl again. While I already had 11 copies of this album on vinyl, I was pretty excited at the prospect of another pressing. Promises Kept was my starting point for collecting vinyl. Not just buying it, but COLLECTING it. It had been quite a few years since I'd really bought any vinyl, but I happened to pick up a copy of the LP at one of Champion's east coast shows...it was the clear blue pressing that the band was selling on tour. I remember looking at the vinyl after the show, and having that feeling I was holding something truly special. That moment breathed new life into my love of Hardcore, and at that moment I knew that I needed to become a record collector.

No matter how many times Bridge Nine presses this record, I'll be first in line to order a copy. When preorders went up, I quickly added the two copies that the label had available for the fourth pressing...one gold and one clear colored vinyl. Yeah, there was also a "package deal" available that included both the Promises Kept and Time Slips Away LPs, and a poster. I could give a fuck about posters, so I passed it by. It wasn't until I saw Doug's post, that I realized that the package deal included a piece of vinyl that you couldn't order individually. It seems that Bridge Nine made this more difficult than it had to be, and now I'll have to make a special effort to pick up the last piece of the puzzle.

The gatefold packaging looks great. Bridge Nine lists that the jacket was printed with "metallic ink"...I'm not too sure what that means, but it does look pretty sweet.

In addition to the Promises Kept vinyl, Bridge Nine also made the Time Slips Away compilation available for the first time on vinyl. Sure I have multiple copies of Champion's first two 7 inches, I've got CD copies of each EP, plus the Time Slips Away CD and it's loaded to my ipod...still it feels good to have these songs combined and available as one vinyl LP. Of course I'm never happy, and I wish that they had fully completed the compilation of material and included the three songs from the split with Betrayed, and even thrown on the SSD cover of Glue.

I'm really impressed with how great this looks. From the album cover, to the colors chosen for the vinyl...Bridge Nine did an amazing job.

As typical with Bridge Nine, they haven't posted any pressing information for these records, so as of right now, the numbers for each is a mystery.

Another Promise

A while back, Bridge Nine cleaned out their warehouse. They found some loose vinyl with no sleeves, so they packaged them up with a special Warehouse Edition sleeve and put them up in their webstore. Outbreak, the Black Friday '29/Death Before Dishonor split, and No Warning all got the Warehouse treatment, but the one that I REALLY wanted was Champion's Promises Kept. No Warning and Champion sold out before I could get one, and I was PISSED...so pissed, in fact, that I said "fuck it", and didn't even bother buying the ones that were available. I moaned and groaned, whining about it on various different messageboards. Eventually I got an email from Aram saying that Bridge Nine was going to send him a few, and that he would set one aside for me. I was thrilled, but over time, the record never arrived. Seems as though Aram didn't get very many copies and didn't have enough to go around. That's cool, I was glad that he had made the effort, but now the mission was mine. I finally came across one on eBay a couple months back, and was happy to finally add this to the collection.

It wasn't the most limited of the Champion Warehouse Edition. 205 were made with the left over vinyl from the last show. Not as cool as the one that Doug got, but I'm still happy to have a copy to once again complete my Champion collection.