Straight Edge Razor

In case you can't get enough Brendan Radigan bands...XfilesX, Rival Mob, Battle Ruins, Magic Circle, Stone Dagger...React! Records gives us one more with Straight Razor.

Back in February, I was pretty excited to grab a test press for this 7 inch. It was a cool experience to own a record that wasn't yet available to even order at the time.

Straight Razor were a straight edge band, but honestly, I was hoping this was going to be a bit over the top with its edge-ness. I expected this to be right up in your face, with lyrics in the vein of Slapshot. Radigan has an over the top personality with his bands, and I expected this one to follow suit. Basically we just get more Rival Mob style lyrics...still good, but not what I was hoping for.

150 on gold vinyl, and 350 on black.

Gloves Of Metal

The progress I've been making with my Megaforce collection has been slow going this year. Despite the snails pace, I've managed to knock one heavy hitter from the Want List with Metallica's Kill 'Em All LP. For Megaforce silver label pressings, most people may consider that album, or even Ride The Lightning, as the label's holy grail. I'm here to challenge that theory, and present you with what I believe to be the biggest catch from the silver label pressings.

If you do a quick search for Kill 'Em All on eBay, you'll find that without fail, someone is always looking to unload a first press copy with the silver Megaforce label. Now check for Manowar's Into Glory Ride, and chances are you will come up empty. Sure there are plenty of options to pick up the black label pressing with the red Manowar logo, and some of them may even be listed as a "first pressing", but make no mistakes...the silver label is the real deal for an original pressing. I have no idea what the pressing numbers are for this record, nor when Megaforce switched to the black labels, all I know is that they are harder than fuck to find...hell, popsike only shows two copies ever sold...and one of them is the one I grabbed. It shows up so infrequently, that there were times that I doubted that it even existed...like it was myth...the legend of the great white whale. When I finally saw one available on eBay, I pounced. The cost wasn't a concern, I finally had one in my sights, and I wasn't going to miss.

The funny thing about this quest is that, at the time, I wasn't really sold on this Manowar album. Sure, I've been a fan of everything from Hail To England through Kings Of Metal, but for Into Glory Ride and Battle Hymns...I just never bothered. Thanks to my obsession with those early Megaforce pressings, I finally checked out Into Glory Ride, and I'm glad for the push. This is classic Manowar, and I can't believe I've ignored this album for so long.

Got to love those simple silver labels. This record puts my collection at 10 out of 19, and knocks the first three Megaforce releases off the Want List.

Mos Limited Generator

You know how some bands only release new music once every five years (Iron Maiden, I'm looking at you)? Mos Generator are not that kind of band. Seems like every time I turn around, Tony Reed and company are releasing something new.

The band had a new piece of vinyl ready to go for Record Store Day this year, but apparently they weren't happy with the pressing quality, so they scrapped the whole thing. They had 25 of them pressed, which I assume was a test pressing. The band sold a few to close friends and fans, and then put up the last 10 in their webstore. I jumped on it as soon as I saw the announcement, and managed to grab a copy of the most limited pressing Mos Generator has done.

The signed sleeve is a nice touch.

On this record we get one new song, Wicked Willow, and an acoustic reworking of Electric Mountain Majesty. Man, that new song is great...hell, the whole thing sounds great. I'm not sure why the band didn't release a regular pressing of this record.

Mos Generator love their splits. After their split with Isaac earlier this year, they give us this fun little split with Daily Thompson.

Mos Generator cover a song from a band out of Washington state called Golden Pig Electric Blues Band. Apparently the band was around in the mid-90's, and were a big influence on drawing Tony Reed back to playing that Sabbath influenced, heavy rock sound from his teenage years. This is a cool little tribute.

Like most splits, there is really only one side that I'll be spending a lot of time with. While the Daily Thompson side isn't bad, I just don't see myself being draw to listen to it like I will be for the Mos Generator side.

Only 50 pressed on metallic gold vinyl.

High Spirits 7 Inch

I was slow to appreciate High Spirits. It took a lot of prodding from Doug and Sandwell, but I finally saw the light, and got into the band in a big way with their two full length releases.

Last month, I received a message from Doug, giving me a heads up that Electric Assault had a High Spirits 7 inch available in their store. In my excitement, I made the assumption that this was a new release from Electric Assault, and I quickly grabbed one.

When the package arrived in the mail, I was surprised it was actually the Hells Headbangers 7 inch release from last year...and even though I didn't own a copy of this, I was kind of disappointed that it wasn't new High Spirits material.

250 pressed on clear vinyl.

Colored Vinyl In Our Time

Back in the late 90's/early 00's, I absolutely loved Good Riddance. In fact, at that time, I may have even considered them my favorite band. I even went as far as bleaching my hair, and then coloring it red, so that it would look like the style Russ was sporting on the inside photos of the Ballads From The Revolution album. Yeah, I may have been man-crushing...you got a problem with that?

By the time that My Republic was released in 2006, I was barely paying attention, and while the band broke up in 2007, it took me over three years after the release date to finally pick up that "last" Good Riddance record.

Earlier this year, I heard that Good Riddance were back together and were putting out a new album. More shocking than this bit of news, was the fact that I was actually interested in checking out what the band had to offer in 2015. I was surprised at how much I liked that last Only Crime record, and I figured at the very least, a new Good Riddance album would be able to top that.

I thought about ordering the record direct from Fat Wreck Chords, but it wasn't really clear if I was ordering the colored vinyl option or not...and I didn't want to get stuck with black vinyl that was going to be available in every record store. Fat Wreck colored vinyl seems to draw some attention with collectors, and if I was going to buy a copy, I wanted to do it right.

Since it seemed like a gamble ordering direct from the label, I took the easy way out and just paid more than I probably needed to, and grabbed a copy off eBay.

Colored vinyl came with a bonus 7 inch, with an etched b-side. I love how the 7 inch is incorporated right into the front album design with it's own coordinated cover and plastic sleeve that is attached right to the cover.

I'm really impressed with this record. Feels like it is 2001 all over again.

Rock You Like A Hurricane

A bit of an "Odds and Ends" post, really. This is basically just some cheap records that I've picked up over time, and I'm sick of seeing them laying around, so I'm bundling them all in this post, so that I can finally file them away properly.

I bought the Scorpions Love At First Sting album last summer. My original plan was to pick up a couple more Scorpions records, and then bundle them with this one for a single post. Christ...here we are, almost a year later, and that plan hasn't come to fruition. Oh well. I guess that when I finally get around to picking up that German pressing of In Trance, it will warrant it's own post.

I've enjoyed the early Scorpions albums for a while, but my cut off had always been Blackout, and I stayed away from anything after that 1982 release. Love At First Sting had some monster hits, and because of this, I've stayed away from it, and wrote it off as "too commercial". When I saw it in the used record bin last year, I figured that maybe I should give it a chance. I'm glad I did, because this album is a blast to listen to. Over 30 years past it's release date, and I'm finally appreciating this classic.

As much as a tool that Ted Nugent is these days, I still can't help but enjoy his 70's albums. I'm not terribly familiar with the Weekend Warriors album, so when my friend Jeff offered me a copy on vinyl, I didn't hesitate to add it to my collection. It's not as good as the first three Ted Nugent classics, but it is still a good 70's rock spin.

I spent a lot of my teenage years hating Aerosmith, but as my appreciation for 70's rock has grown over the years, so has my appreciation for this band. 70's bands loved their double live albums, and Aerosmith was no exception. This live "bootleg" is cobbled together from a bunch of live shows through '77 and '78, and is a pretty cool listen.

Saint Vitus Dance

In issue #13 of Iron Fist magazine, to celebrate the 30th anniversary of 1984, they compiled a list of their Top 20 albums from that year. Who doesn't love a good "Best Of" list, and the opportunity to scrutinize it? What? Scorpions 'Love At First Sting' made their list, but Dio 'The Last In Line' didn't?!?! Heresy!

While I was reviewing the list, there were only two albums that I wasn't familiar with. I'd never heard the number one pick, Bathory, and in my ignorance, I wasn't even aware that the first Saint Vitus was a self titled release from 1984...I'd always assumed that Hallow's Victim was their first.

When it comes to Saint Vitus, I prefer the Scott Reagers albums, over the Wino releases, so when I learned about this debut, I quickly downloaded a copy.

After I'd listened to that album everyday for about two weeks, I figured that I should probably buy a copy. With that black album cover, I expected it to be a complete nightmare to try and find a copy. I needed this shit to be in great condition, and I expected to have to wade through all kinds of ringwear and banged up covers to find one that was good enough for my high standards.

Soon after starting my search, however, I found a still sealed copy on eBay. I have no idea what pressing this is. It has the embossed logo, and is in great shape, so I was sold.

I love that metallic silver embossed logo on the front cover. So damn cool.

Man, what a great and heavy album. I'll take issue with Iron Fist rating the superior Trouble LP below the Saint Vitus debut, but really both records are absolute beasts.

Iron Magus

Back in December, Rise Above reissued the first four Grand Magus albums on vinyl. I was late to the party, and considered myself extremely lucky that the most limited pressings on clear vinyl were still available when I finally stepped up to place my order a couple months later. I grabbed the Wolf's Return LP at the time, and imagined that by the time I got back to their store to place another order, both Iron Will and Monument would long be sold out of the clear vinyl.

When I placed my order for the Sheavy vinyl in April, I couldn't have been more shocked to find the Grand Magus albums were still available.

Sandwell introduced me to Grand Magus through his blog with his post for the Iron Will LP back in 2008. Seven years later, here I am picking up my own copy of the album on clear vinyl. Man, what a solid slab of metal.

Clear vinyl for this pressing is limited to 100.

I wonder if my luck will hold out long enough to grab Monument on clear vinyl in the near future.

Awakened From The Electric Sleep

It blows me away that I'm still able to find hidden treasures. I've been around the block a few times on this musical ride, and I like to think that I've got things locked down on all the good bands from the past 45 years or so...and then, along comes Rise Above Records and Sheavy to prove that there are still some surprises out there.

Sheavy are a stoner/doom band out of Canada. To best describe them, all you need to know is that the original band name, Green Machine, was taken from a Kyuss song, and the singer, at times, sounds like a dead ringer for early 80's-era Ozzy. I'd heard of the band throughout the years, and had given a couple of their albums casual listens from time to time, but I was not prepared for the greatness of The Electric Sleep.

This album was originally released on CD by Rise Above back in 1998, and this year the label decided it was time to give it a proper release on vinyl (and throw in a couple of bonus songs for good measure). Not one to turn my back on a Rise Above release, it seemed like it was a good time for me to finally check out this album. Holy shit. I had no idea what I'd been missing out on. Before I decided to make a purchase, I gave the the title track, The Electric Sleep, a quick listen. The song immediately had it's hooks in me, and I quickly grabbed the clear vinyl direct from Rise Above...high shipping prices be damned.

After finding a quick download of the album, it quickly became a permanent fixture in my daily playlists. After a month or so of listening to The Electric Sleep, my jaw still drops when I hear it. This may be one of my favorite records that I've heard this year.

Face Aggression

In addition to the Ancient Heads record, React! also deliver a new 12 inch from Break Away.

Break Away play HARDcore...this is some angry and heavy shit. I think I've made some comparisons to Right Brigade in the past, and I'd say that still holds true with this latest record. The sound is tough, without sounding like some tough guy, meathead shit that I stay away from. Bonus points awarded for getting Mark Porter to add guest vocals to one of your songs.

Once again, React! does an amazing job with the layout and design for this release. I love the colors, and how the vinyl looks next to the cover. Nothing but quality.

150 pressed on white, 350 on orange, and 500 on black vinyl.

Retaliator/Vigilance

Jason Tarpey has made some serious changes as a singer since fronting the straight edge, youth crew inspired Far From Breaking back in the early 2000's. His style got more dark and aggressive when he took the mic with Iron Age in the latter part of the decade, and now with Eternal Champion things are full on metal.

I fell in love with his new band when I finally checked them out earlier this year. That two song 7 inch was not nearly enough to satiate my appetite, and now they follow it up with a one song split 12 inch. I wasn't going to take any chances on missing this limited pressing, and ordered my copy from overseas at No Remorse as soon as they became available.

The song Retaliator rules, but for the love of all that is metal, this band needs get in the studio and record a proper album! Three songs released over the past two years, and I want more.

The flip side of this split features some epic metal out of Canada with Gatekeeper. This is a pretty good introduction to the band, and I'm digging their contribution, but really, all I want to do it listen to the Eternal Champion song over and over again.

React Heads

My record collecting habits have changed quite a bit over the past year or so. Part of this change has been a strong pull to listen to more and more metal, and the result of this shift has been that I find I'm not as quick to check out each and every hardcore band. I still love the music, but I haven't had the drive to chase many new bands. The second change in my behavior has been in the desire to buy each and every pressing for each new hardcore record that I like...I'm not feeling it anymore. Thanks to the constant stream of REV reissues, and Reaper shoving four new pieces of colored vinyl down our throats every six months for each Turnstile record...it lost the magic.

One of the eye opening things about focusing my attention on buying older metal records is that back in the 80's, labels at that time didn't give you ten different colors of vinyl. You want the vinyl? Here it is...black vinyl is your only option. Take it or leave it. Collecting shit from those days, the only decision you are faced with is, do you want the US pressing on Combat, or do you go for the overseas pressing from Under One Flag. Sure you could get into it deeper, and start looking at if it is a green label Combat pressing, but really, it is basically that simple. I guess that for the most part, the same could be said about hardcore bands. Somewhere over the last few years, things changed. Shit got out of hand.

Record collecting is about the love of the music, and the passion for chasing the vinyl...preserving a piece of history. When labels continually churn out different pressings of limited colored vinyl, it becomes a commodity and collecting loses the appeal...I start to feel like I'm being taken advantage of...I get bitter, say "fuck off, I'm not playing". I won't contribute, and I hope labels choke on their excess.

Now that I've had my rant, and can step off my soapbox, I'm going to post the recent release from React! Records...where I bought all three pressings that were available at the time of preorder. React, along with Youngblood, are still one of the few labels that I continue to have a love affair with. These labels still have a level of integrity, and I don't feel that they are just pushing a product. I feel there is a deep appreciation of the 'core with these labels...and while I'm not looking down on any other labels...all I'm saying is that React and Youngblood are the only two that I still feel that dedication towards, and I will step up and buy whatever it is that they are selling. No questions asked...just take my money.

Don't go looking for anything new with the latest Ancient Heads record. This is just straight forward, hoods up, x's on hands, hardcore. These young dudes are all fired up over their hardcore pride and the straight edge, and their passion is infectious. Hardcore needs bands like this.

150 pressed on red, 350 pressed on white, and 500 pressed on black vinyl.

Re-engage

I might not be paying very close attention to new hardcore releases this year, but it is still a safe bet that I'll be jumping at anything that Youngblood releases. This label, along with React, are probably the only two hardcore labels that I will still follow religiously.

I've always liked Disengage, so this purchase was a no-brainer. Still, given my metal state of mind, I didn't expect to listen to it regularly. Six songs in five minutes, hardly seemed like it was going to be enough to really chew on. Much to my surprise, along with Aggression Pact and Public Suicide, the new Disengage is getting regular spins on my iPod.

200 pressed on blue, and 300 pressed on black vinyl.

Aggression Pact

As I mentioned in my last post, I haven't been very motivated to seek out newer hardcore bands. When your daily playlists are back to back 80's metal albums from start to finish, I guess that tends to happen

When Painkiller announced preorders for some new hardcore band, Aggression Pact, I was tempted to just ignore it. Pfft...who has time for another fucking hardcore band? Still, I live in fear of "music regret"...not wanting to miss out on some hidden treasure...so I gave the band 30 seconds of my attention. After a brief listen of one of the songs, I wasn't completely sold, but I figured that I'd throw a few bucks to the label and grab the record anyway.

Sitting here, a month later, and listening to the full record, I'm thinking that this may be the best gamble I took all year. I can not get enough of this record. Damn...these six songs have got me in a hardcore state of mind. What other shit have I missed out on this year?

150 pressed on green vinyl.

Nuclear Suicide

I've been slacking at getting this blog updated with new records. A couple months ago, I was all caught up and had zero backlog. I committed myself to keeping shit under control, and I was going to blog new records as they came in. Yeah, right. Without the pressure of trying to keep up, I got lazy...and now here I sit with stack of new records to blog about. Time to get serious, and start posting and dig myself out of this hole...again.

Chris over at Unwavering Spirit has solidified himself as a total dude. A couple years ago, he hooked me up with an original pressing of the Nervous Impulse record...for nothing. Just an email of "Dude, what's your address?", and then a record lands in my mailbox. This time around he sends me a photo of a Nuclear Age record that he picked up at the Damage City Fest..."Dude, I know you are a React nut, you want one of these?". Solid fucking dude.

It is pretty sweet to snag an advance copy of this, especially since React hasn't even put them up for pre-order yet. Chris wasn't entire sure what the story was on this pressing. He grabbed a few copies of the record from a merch table at the fest, but it seemed shrouded in mystery. Was it a test pressing? Was it a tour press? I fired off a quick message to Ev at React, and he sorted it out. While the record is technically a test press, there are 100 of them that were quickly pressed up so that the band would have some available for their tour. I can only assume that React also have the standard test pressing...limited to 24 with a cool alternate cover. I'll have to keep my eyes peeled.

While I've been a bit hesitant to dive in to checking out newer hardcore bands this year, when a free record lands in my mailbox, I've got no choice but to give it a spin. Such was the case with the Public Suicide record that Chris included in with the Nuclear Age 7 inch.

Chris didn't just send me the standard pressing for the Public Suicide record...nope...he sends me the record release pressing with some sunglasses wearing cat sticking a gun in it's mouth. Shoot pussy, eat guns.

Chris grabbed one of these for himself as well, but while mine had a blue cover, the cover on his was pink. I ended up with number 3 out of 20.

Damn, this record is actually pretty cool. Nice raging Infest styled hardcore. This is a really cool band that I would have probably otherwise overlooked. Thanks Chris!

Gruesome Death Worship

Suffering from Record Store Day hangover, I swore to myself that I wasn't going to buy any new records for a while. I'd spent way more money than I'd intended on RSD, and I needed to chill for a little bit. Four days. I held out for four fucking days.

I was at work, and killing some time and checking out the latest metal news over at Brave Words, when I saw they had a Featured Video for some band called Gruesome. In passing, I might have just kept on walking, but the album art caught my attention, and I figured that I'd give the song a quick listen. I was half expecting that I'd be investing 20 to 30 seconds before quickly moving on, but I couldn't have been more wrong. This was good...no check that...it was great! I did a quick search on the website for my local record store, saw they had a copy of the vinyl in stock, jumped in my car and 15 minutes later I owned the album. Ain't modern technology and convenience a bitch?

Gruesome are a straight up Death worship band, and they aim for the sweet spot of the Leprosy and Spiritual Healing years. Man, those two albums were in heavy rotation for me back in the late 80's and early 90's, and Gruesome is the purest tribute to what Death was doing at that time. The band logo, the artwork, the sound...hell, they even have a song titled Closed Casket...well done, Gruesome, well done.

Alternative Attack

Last month I picked up a few punk singles, and had a blast revisiting those old classics. Without warning, I had a new obsession, and I was on a mission...searching eBay and discogs for cheap additions to the collection. I was trying to avoid overseas shipping prices, and limit my purchases to the US...and when you are looking at UK punk bands, that limits your search considerably.

While I was on my search, the dude over at Massive Waste left a comment on my punk post, stating that Attack was probably his favorite song from The Exploited. Whoa...wait...I've been listening to The Exploited since I was probably 15 years old, and over the next thirty years, I'd somehow never heard this song? What the fuck? As I started digging around, I noticed that there were a handful of songs from The Exploited singles that I'd never heard. Damn...that's what I get for only bothering with the band's full length albums.

Thirty three years after its release, and I'm discovering new Exploited songs. Awesome. Finding treasures like this is one of the things that keeps record collecting exciting. Never stop searching.

From Beyond

When I heard that there was going to be a new Enforcer record this year, I was beyond stoked. The band's last album, Death By Fire, quickly became one of my favorite records from 2013, and I was looking forward to the follow up this year.

I was prepared to dig into the savings account and waste my money on overseas shipping to get my hands on the more limited pressing, but thankfully Nuclear Blast has woken up to the fact that US dudes buy vinyl as well, and they had the clear vinyl available to preorder as an import from their North American disto. Awesome.

300 pressed on clear vinyl.

I was a little slow to warm up to this new album, but it has it's hooks in me now, and I can't get enough of it. Now, I listen to songs like Destroyer or Undying Evil, and I'm wondering what the hell took me so long to get into it. Absolutely killer.