Made To Order Targets

Last year I was introduced to Moving Targets. They were from the Boston area, and released a few albums with TAANG! in the late 80's/early 90's...yet somehow I'd never heard them. On a whim I checked out their Burning In Water album from '86, and then proceeded to play the ever-living shit out of that record. It was, by far, the most played album for me last year. I could not get enough of it.

I'm not familiar with the Boss Tunage label, but as soon as I heard they were looking to do a special pressing of early unreleased demo recordings and radio sessions from Moving Targets, I was sold. The concept for the release is cool as hell. It is a part of their Made To Order series, and it works just as it sounds. The label takes pre-orders for the record, and then they only press enough vinyl to cover that order. No other pressings will exist. It isn't available in stores or distros...the vinyl is made to order for this pre-order only. If the label can't generate at least 30 orders, the whole thing is scraped. I'm not sure how many were actually pressed, but I was pretty siked when it showed up on my doorstep.

This is a cool piece of history to own for the band, and there are a few songs that don't appear anywhere else. Pretty goddamn sweet.

TAANG Targets

In my continued obsession of early Punk, I've been discovering bands and albums that I'd never heard previously. Over the 30 years or so, since I first stumbled upon Punk, there has been some classic shit that I've just never followed up on. Everything was moving by quickly during those early years, and there was bound to be stuff that I overlooked because I was focused on something newer...or heavier and faster. With this latest Punk obsession, I'm digging in the weeds, looking for old stuff that I've never taken the time to check out before, and the payoff has been huge so far.

I'm "friends" with Al Quint, of Suburban Voice fame, on Facebook. A month or so ago, he posted a photo of the first Moving Targets album, and then a couple of days later there was an old picture of him wearing a Moving Targets tshirt. I honestly don't remember ever hearing this band's name before, but since they appeared to be an old Punk band that Al liked, I figured that I'd give them a chance and download the band's first album, Burning In Water.

I'm not sure what I was expecting, but I was a bit thrown off when I first started listening to the album. When I think TAANG!, I can't help but think of Slapshot...and Moving Targets is no Slapshot. I made it through the first two songs of the album, and then I put it aside slightly disappointed.

The next day, I decided to give it another shot...but with more of an open mind, and I was sucked right in. It reminded me of some of those more melodic punk bands of the late-80's/early 90's that I was eating up at the time. What a great surprise.

Over the past month, I've listed to Burning In Water more than any other album. This is a pretty good sign that I should buy a copy, so I set out on my mission. The discogs marketplace comes to the rescue once again, and hooks me up with the vinyl at a decent price. This copy included a poster, a sticker, and a TAANG! merch sheet.