Engaged And Empowered

There was a time when I thought that I was familiar with the history of Redemption Records. However, after discovering a few Redemption titles recently that I was completely unaware of, I realized that I was only ever really down with those first four releases (Intent, Encounter, Four Walls Falling and Ressurection). After that initial run, I guess that I had stopped paying attention.

One of the records that I discovered in recent months was Redemption number 12, the Empowerment LP from Engage. Originally released in 1993, this album musically fits in with the melodic hardcore sound of the time... Engage were out of California, but totally sound like they were out of the Northeast corner of the US, so they sound like a perfect fit to what Redemption had been doing up to this point. Definitely worth checking out if you are into this kind of thing, and a really cool find for me 30 years down the line.

After I received this LP, I realized that I actually own one of the Engage 7 inches from '91. I bought it through Ebullition mailorder at the time, but it never left much of an impact on me... other than it having a weird song about being okay with it when your friend wants to kill themself ("suicide, I understand. suicide, I cherish."). I didn't know what to make of that song, so the record got filed away in a corner with a bunch of other records that I pushed aside at the time. I might have to revisit it and see if it holds up next to this LP.

Intent Redemption

Intent were a hardcore band out of Texas in the early 90's, and while I absolutely loved their Drift 12 inch back in the day, it took me until 2013 to finally discover the band's 7 inch from 1990. Here we are, ten years later, and I figured that I might as well own another copy of it.

Initially, I didn't think too much of this 7 inch, but I've really come to appreciate it over the years since I bought my first copy. There is just something about early 90's hardcore that hits me, and I never seem to get tired of it.

I believe that this version on Redemption Records is only available on black vinyl, while the blue colored vinyl saw a release under the Punchline Records label with a different cover. For the longest time, I didn't think that I needed this black pressing, but as Redemption Records number one, I kind of needed it just for its historical significance. Plus, I needed that Empty cover version.

I figured that I might as well get a photo of both versions for this post.