A True Perspective

Man, I have been really pressed for time lately. The days and weeks fly by, and it has been difficult finding time to spend at the computer each night. In addition to the time, money has been pretty tight as well. Other than some pretty big pre-orders that I couldn't resist, I've been trying to keep my record shopping on a short leash. I'm not sure how successful I've really been, but it feels like it has been a long fucking time since I've won anything on eBay. The steady stream of new vinyl passing through my mailbox has slowed to a slight trickle. So tonight, I broke away from the TV, while my wife is slowly falling asleep on the couch, to post on the True Colors 7 inch that I picked up on eBay a while back. I couldn't believe that the pre-order pressing of the Perspective record only went for around $7.00, but I was happy to be the winner on it. Number 4 of 200 pressed on white vinyl with the Powered Records pre-order stamp. True Colors are so damn good.

Doing Nothing

Other than sitting on a board and riding it down my driveway when I was 10 years old, I have never skated. I've never felt coordinated enough to even attempt it...knowing that I would soon end up on my ass. So even though I've never done it, I can still appreciate a good skate band. Whether you are Possessed To Skate with Suicidal, catching a Frontside Grind with Underdog, going to Skate and Destroy with SSS, or "grinding slappies all day long" with Nothing Done...I'm down with it. I've been scouring eBay for Nothing Done's Idiot Stomp 7 inch for a while now, and was pretty excited to finally find and win a copy...even if was only on black vinyl and limited to 720 copies. This was released on Not Just Words Records back in 2004, and has been sold out for a while. Man, this EP rages. Hardcore punk with plenty of attitude.

Taking Hostages

When I saw Hostage Calm play at the last show for The First Step a year ago, I was hopeful that they would have vinyl for their newest LP, Lens. I was disappointed to find that they only had it available on CD. Thankfully, Redscroll Records made sure that this saw a proper vinyl release at the beginning of 2009. I'm kind of at a loss on how to describe Hostage Calm's sound, because they don't really have a sound that I can easily compare them to. They do a nice melodic hardcore style that typically turns me off...but really, I'm loving this. Listening to this today, I can't help but be impressed. Packaging on this is pretty slick as well, with a nice big fold out lyric sheet. The copy that I picked up was on a white and black split colored vinyl, and limited to 200.

Mob Rules

I had never heard of The Rival Mob until Sven turned me on to them a couple of months ago. I was blown away. It was rough, raw and ugly. Hardcore. I loved it and immediately set out to get myself a copy on vinyl. It was released on Lockin' Out Records, and to be honest, I had no idea that this label was still around, nor did I know where to pick up their stuff. I was checking through the distro list at the Six Feet Under store, and managed to find a copy there, so I picked it up. To my surprise, The Rival Mob ended up playing Have Heart's last show on Edge Day. I didn't think they were a part of the original line up, but it was cool to check them out live. To balance out their negativity, they did a cover of Crippled Youth's Positive Scene, which was a nice touch.

Edge Day 2009

The Edge Day show this year was both a ton of fun and a huge disappointment. The show itself was a blast. Rob, Paul and I drove down to Massachusetts yesterday, and compared to our previous roadtrip to Toronto, this drive flew by and before we knew it, we were at the club. It was complete chaos trying to get into the show, as the club kept redirecting the lines to get inside. Pat Flynn started off organizing everyone, and seemed to have everything well in hand, and then the people running the club continued to move the lines about 5 or 6 times...moving people from one side of the building to other. By the time they wanted all 1,500 people to organize into a single file line, the crowd lost any semblance of order and started getting unruly and crowd surfing. We were at the front of the line, so we were one of the first ones inside, and therefore were amongst the crowd of 50 that got to see No Tolerance play their set. I was really looking forward to checking them out and they did not disappoint. Waste Management, Rival Mob, Step Forward, Foundation and Cruel Hand all played fantastic sets as well, but the highlight of my evening was when Sweet Pete took the mic and they started ripping through a handful of In My Eyes songs. In My Eyes is one of my favorite hardcore bands of all time, and I went off for Pete and his makeshift band...stagediving left and right, and taking the microphone from him to sing along (I'm in the photo above, next to Pete, with the No For An Answer shirt). By the time Bane and Have Heart hit the stage, I was pretty beat and had to work myself to the back of the crowd for each of their sets. All in all it was a great send off, for a great Straight Edge band. Have Heart, R.I.P.

The big disappointment was the lack of a Have Heart Last Show vinyl pressing. Once inside, I rushed to the merch tables, but no one had any limited Edge Day vinyl...I was pretty bummed. Given the number of special covers and tour presses Have Heart has for their records, I was really looking forward to something really epic for their last show. The only piece of vinyl that I picked up was a tour pressing for the Foundation 7 inch on Six Feet Under. This record really impresses, sounding like it came straight out of the early 90's hardcore scene. Comparable to Unbroken's Ritual LP, or maybe Chokehold's Prison of Hope. I'm liking it.

Following Through On The Edge

Since tomorrow, October 17th, is Edge Day, I figured that it would be appropriate to post a record that I received recently from a great mid-90's Straight Edge band. It would probably make more sense for me to actually make this post tomorrow, but since I'll be celebrating my 18th year of the Straight Edge at the final Have Heart show in Boston, I figured that I'd get things started a little early.

Led by singer Craig Mack and bassist Jesse Stand Hard, Follow Through never seemed to reach the legendary status as Ten Yard Fight, In My Eyes and Floorpunch, but damn, they should have. With songs like You Booze You Lose, this Connecticut band were unapologetically Straight Edge and proud. I've had this on CD since it was originally released in 1997, but when someone posted a list of vinyl they were selling on the Livewire board, I didn't hesitate to take this Edge classic off his hands and finally get it into my record collection...and for the $3.00 price tag, I would be a fool not to. Now, you'll have to excuse me while I drop the needle on this album, and practice some stage dives on to my couch.

Don't Fear The Reaper

The vinyl for the ON LP was a split release between React Records and Reaper Records (not to mention a Euro release from Powered Records), and both labels had their own pre-order colors pressed. Needless to say, between the three record labels, I spent a ton of money the day that pre-orders went up. The first to arrive was a huge order from React, but I soon heard that numerous people had received their Reaper orders weeks earlier. I still hadn't seen mine, so I fired off an email to Patrick from Reaper Records to ask him if my order had shipped. I'm not sure what had happened, and I was getting a little paranoid after my Alert 7 inches didn't arrive from Life to Live Records, but a couple of days later Patrick replied...apologizing and promising to send it out right away. Not sure if he didn't mail it the first time around, or if the Post Office black hole sucked into another dimension to keep my Alert records company. Either way, Patrick responded quickly and within a couple of days, I had my Reaper pressing for the ON Double Vision LP. I thought that originally it was going to be on clear vinyl, but it seems there was a change of plans and it was pressed on a nice looking grey wax.

In addition to the ON vinyl, Reaper also threw in a copy of the new Maximum Penalty LP. To be honest, I wasn't really familiar with the band. Yeah, I knew that they were on the Where The Wild Things Are comp, but I've never really paid any attention to them. In fact, other than Gorilla Biscuits and Breakdown, and can't really tell you who else is on that comp. For New York Hardcore comps, I was drawn more to The Way It Is, so I never really paid it much attention. So back to Maximum Penalty...the sticker on the cover states that it was produced by the same guy that did albums from Lamb of God and Ill Nino...which was a big load of "who the fuck cares" to me. Seriously, it really lowered my expectations for this album. I'm not a fan of "tough guy" hardcore with a metal influence, and I was really not excited for this album. I convinced myself to give it a shot, and I was pleasantly surprised. It wasn't a Hatebreed/Terror style of hardcore that I expected, but reminded me more of Leeway. Not bad. I'm still not entirely comfortable with some of the singing on this album, but really, it's not bad. Packaging on this is top notch and the vinyl comes with a slick looking download card, but you have to download one song at a time which is a pain in the ass.

Deluxe Paranoia

Picked up another Black Sabbath deluxe vinyl pressing. This time around it is Sabbath's second album, Paranoid. I'm not sure what the difference was between this one and the self titled Black Sabbath album, but for some reason, Paranoid was around $10 more. Still, it didn't stop me from buying it. Quite possibly the best Sabbath album. Sure it has songs like Iron Man, Paranoid, and War Pigs which have been played into the ground, but as a whole, this album is near perfect. Seriously, drop the needle on War Pigs, turn it up loud, and try and tell me that the drumming on this one is not amazing.

Somewhere Back In Time

One of my first concerts was to see Iron Maiden on tour for the Powerslave tour. It set a standard on stage shows for all other Heavy Metal bands to follow, and for very few to ever meet. When Maiden decided to tour last year, only doing songs from their "glory days", which includes their albums up through the Seventh Son LP, Jeff and I made sure that we got our tickets to see them for the Massachusetts show. The show was an amazing one, exceeding my expectations. It was no surprise when Iron Maiden released a live album to document the tour, and it was probably no surprise to anyone that knows me that I ended up picking up a copy in every format that was released. On release day I bought the CD, then Rob ended up buying me the DVD for my birthday, and for the final piece of the puzzle, I bought the picture disc double LP with the last of the birthday money I had received from my family.

I am typically not a fan of the picture disc, but come on, there is no denying that this looks amazing. Nice, heavy dust sleeves that are loaded up with full color pictures from the tour to accompany the vinyl. All in all, great packaging, complete with a nice looking gatefold sleeve.

A New Cover Is Revealed

Every time that I find a different pressing of the Reveal 7 inch, I'm surprised. I know nothing about the pressing info on this record, so I get excited each time I find something new. This time around, I stumbled upon the pressing with the limited edition cover...except this one was blue and not orange, like the one I already have. Anything else that I was watching on eBay took an immediate back seat, as I set out to win this at any cost.

Just like the orange cover that I own, this one is hand numbered out of 100. I'm assuming that this is just one run of 100 on black vinyl with the big hole, and they just a couple different colors for printing the covers.

The question now is, are there any other different pressings that I don't know about?

Lost And Found

Sometime around 1991, I really started to immerse myself into the hardcore scene. It really became everything to me, and I felt like it was something that I could call my own. Even though I was 20/21 years old, this music really helped define who I am today. The bands from that time period hold a lot of sentimental value for me, but apparently I'm alone in this opinion as I was able to pick up Encounter's Lost 7 inch, for only $5.50. Seriously, I would have paid 5 times the sale amount to get this into my collection. I already own this on black vinyl, but I didn't hesitate to pick up this copy on grey colored vinyl. A classic from Redemption Records.

Adolescents In Canada

This past weekend, Rob, Paul and I headed out for the 6th Annual Guy's Roadtrip. Our destination this year was a return trip over the Canadian boarder and into Toronto. A 12 hour drive, we made our first stop at a town called Niagara on the Lake, where we had reservations to take a jet boat ride down the river at Niagara Falls. The ride was awesome as the jet boat takes you down some class 5 whitewater rapids, plus it did some pretty sweet 360 degree spins as we were rocketing down the calmer parts of the river. Definite adrenaline rush. After changing into some dry clothes, we headed out for Toronto. We got to the hotel a little late, but we did bump into David Faustino, who played Bud Bundy on the TV show Married With Children back in the 80's. He talked to Rob and Paul for a bit while I was checking us in to our room. Seemed like a cool enough guy. Hanging out in Toronto was a lot of fun. We walked the streets for miles and miles...from record store to record store, but I only bought something at the first store we stopped at, Sonic Boom. Pretty cool record store with a nice selection of vinyl, but they didn't take American currency, so I had to put it on my credit card (which I was hoping to avoid). It made me hesitant to buy anything at the other stores, although I'm totally regretting not picking up the Slayer bootleg album that I had seen at Rotate This. After record shopping, we went to see a Toronto Blue Jays game. The home team won in the 10th inning with a walk off home run. Very nice. All over town we had been seeing movie posters up for this film called Dead Snow. None of us had ever heard of it, but he movie poster was so cool, that we hunted down a movie theater and caught a 10:00 PM showing at the end of the day. Movie was as good as we had hoped it would be...Nazi zombies with plenty of blood, guts, and gore. Nicely done. We spent all day on Sunday driving home, which was a little exhausting. All in all, it was one of the best roadtrips that we have been on. Good times.



The first album that I picked up at Sonic Boom was the Adolescents LP. I first heard this album about four years ago...somehow avoiding this punk/hardcore classic since it's release in 1981...and I've fallen in love with it. I have been meaning to pick it up on vinyl for the past couple of years, always putting off ordering it from Frontier Records. Seeing the 25th Anniversary pressing on grey colored vinyl at Sonic Boom was as good a reason that I needed to finally pick this up.

Another album that I've been wanting to buy for a while now was some of the Motorhead vinyl reissues on Back On Black. The pressing that they have done for the Motorhead catalog have looked absolutely amazing, but due to the price of these UK imports, I've held off on picking any up. I saw a few at Sonic Boom, and finally took the plunge by picking up Volume One of the BBC Live & In-Session double LP. Featuring some early live performances from '78 and '79, I was happy to finally add one of these Back On Black Motorhead pressings to the collection. Sonic Boom also had the 4 LP pressing of the band's 1980 classic, Ace of Spades, but with a $60 price tag, that one was still too pricey for me to pick up. Maybe some day....

Overloading The Collection

Just Another Day Records is really impressing me. I loved the Debaser 7 inch that I received earlier this month, and their newest 7 inch from Overload, We Live Here And Now, is a quality release as well. The pre-order version for this record is pretty sweet. Not only do you get the dust sleeve personalized and hand numbered (which is a nice touch, even though he spelled my name wrong and had to scratch it out!), but it comes with a different cover, and is one of the sickest looking pieces of gold vinyl that I have ever seen. Pictures do not do it justice, but it really looks amazing. Sebastian from Just Another Day had intended to press 88 on gold vinyl, but the pressing plant ended up only giving him 44, which make the pre-order version even more limited. Apparently the plant ended up pressing this on a lot more colors than Seb had requested, so like the Debaser record, there are a bunch of these to collect. In addition to the gold pre-order pressing, I also got the purple/pink marble (limited to 74) and the brown/grey mix (limited to 95).

Like Debaser, I had never really heard Overload when I purchased their record. A few guys, who's opinions I trust, had been saying good things about the band...plus with that record cover, it is no surprise what kind of hardcore they play. Straight Edge Old School Hardcore. I'm liking it, and will be talking to Seb to try and get my hands on other pressings of this solid record.

We're Gonna Rise Above

Back in April, I set myself up with a project. My mission was to listen to all of the music that I have downloaded for free and burned to CD over the past 10 years or so. I would give it a fair listen, and if I decided that it wasn't something that I would ever purchase, it went right into the trash. I had over 800 burned CD's in my collection, so this was not going to be a quick and easy task. So, from April through August, these burned CDs were all that I would listen to...starting at Abhinanda and ending with ZZ Top...tossing out over 100 pieces of shit like Dashboard Confessional and Static-X, and buying CDs of those that I wanted to keep like Dead Kennedys and Van Halen. At one point, I had no problem downloading free music, but no more. If I like it, I buy it. It is going to take some time to clear up the remaining 700 burned CDs that I still have, but I'll keep chipping away at it each month and make my record and CD collection more respectable.

My latest attempt to clear out some of those ugly CDRs came from an order to Rise Above Records. I've wanted to get my hands on Witchcraft's The Alchemist LP for some time now, but having to order from overseas was a bitch on shipping. I finally got to the point where I didn't care about pricing...I wanted this. The album is now on it's fourth pressing, and has been released on numerous colors, which now go for a hefty price on eBay. Rise Above had some of the third pressing available, so I went for it. I had the choice between green or purple vinyl, but I went for the "black sparkle". It is a very cool black vinyl pressing with bits of glitter in the wax. Nice. The band rocks a heavy Sabbath vibe, and I'm loving this album more and more with each listen. Seriously, this record is so good that I want to go back and order a couple more colors. Yeah, maybe when I've got an extra $100 burning a hole in my bank account.

The other album that I bought was the Gentlemans Pistols LP. Marcus introduced me to this band about a year ago (check it here), and as soon as I heard them, I was in love. Definite 70's rock influence that's got some serious hooks. Man, I remember being so excited when I first heard this band...it was just before I was headed up to bed one night, and after listening to one of their songs on myspace, I was too excited to fall asleep and tossed and turned for a while. Since it took me so long to finally place this order, I missed out on the colored vinyl, but fuck it, the black vinyl is limited to 200, just like the yellow pressing, so who cares.

React Records For The Win

The latest React pre-orders arrived this week. I typically do a first in, first out method for blogging, but since Marcus has already written about this one, I figured that I knock this one out know instead of putting it on the bottom of the pile. When pre-orders went up for this one, my bank account took a huge hit as I ordered the Hardcore Lives package deal from React, the Reaper Records special pressing of the ON album, plus another chunk of change was sent over to Powered Records for their pre-order of the ON album as well. In one day, I managed to blow over $100 on pre-orders. The race was on, and I wondered which label was going to get me the vinyl first. React easily took first place as I'm still waiting for the other two labels to cross the finish line.

I didn't hold back with my React pre-order, and went for the Hardcore Lives package deal which got you 2 pressings of the ON LP, three copies of the Gone But Not Forgotten 7 inch, plus 1 shirt from each band. Judging from Marcus' pictures, it looks like it also got you a different screened cardboard mailer (which are always a cool bonus).

I was happy with my ON records until I noticed that Marcus got a blue pressing of the record. I was at work today, and all of a sudden I couldn't remember if my colored vinyl for this was blue or white. Blue was the more limited color with only 150 pressed, where the white pressing was of 250. I was certain that I had received blue vinyl, as Marcus had, but I couldn't be sure and started having doubts. It got so bad at one point that I considered calling my daughter at home when she got off the school bus, and asking her to check which color I had. I stuck it out and checked immediately when I got home...shit....white vinyl. I was bummed. How was I going to get my hand on that blue vinyl pressing? I made a couple comments on Marcus' blog, expressing my disappointment in finding out that I had white vinyl, and within a couple of hours I had an email in my inbox from a friend saying that he could hook me up. Made my day.

The last piece of the Hardcore Lives package was the three colors of the Gone But Not Forgotten 7 inch pressing of the demo. React had previously released this on cassette, and while I hate the format, I still bought one. I'm glad that React decided to release this on vinyl as well. Great straight edge hardcore, with a strong Brotherhood feel to it.

Cheap Shots

After picking up the Cheap Tragedies 7 inch on Livewire Records back in July, I immediately sought out their other records. To keep things simple, I was able to order both the LP and their first 7 inch through Mad At The World Records. The band was pretty busy in 2008, because all three records were released last year, and all of them are solid. Great hardcore punk from Tony Erba and the boys. Mad At The World released the LP, Volume 1: Souvenirs & Evidence, which I picked on clear vinyl (limited to 300)...while No Idea released the self titled 7 inch (I don't know how many were pressed on purple).

Dead To Me

My friend, Rob, recently bought a Dead Swans shirt from Bridge Nine and as part of a package deal, he got a copy of the band's 7 inch as well. Since Rob doesn't really have any use for vinyl, he passed it along to me. This wasn't a band that I would have actively searched out and bought anything from, so I'm glad that I got this free 7 inch as my introduction. Neither good, nor bad for me, this one just fails to really make an impression on me. I've listened to it 3 or 4 times now, and while it is some rough hardcore in the same vein as Ruiner, Dead Swans quickly become background music and has me looking forward to the next record that I'll get to play. Maybe it's because this 7 inch ends with such a bad song. I've never heard the original version of My Bloody Valentine's When You Sleep, and after hearing Dead Swans cover it, I know that I never need to. Such a bad song that can easily be ruining the entire listening experience for me. Hey, at least Bridge Nine is now putting exclusive songs on their 7 inch records that prepare fans for the bands upcoming LP. I guess that is a positive, even if they are shitty covers of My Bloody Valentine.

Another Day, Another Record

A couple of months back, I spent a lot of money on records. Seriously, I was out of control. As a part of my record frenzy, I took a chance on the Debaser 7 inch from Just Another Day Records. Not only did I take a chance on buying a 7 inch from a band that I hadn't really heard before, I bought 4 copies...then I ended up paying too much in shipping so the label threw in a tour press as well, so make that 5 copies. My risk paid off, because this record is amazing...one of the best new bands for 2009. Imagine if The Nerve Agents had a head on collision with Panic...from the remains of the wreckage, you would find Debaser's Rich White Boys 7 inch. I can't say enough good things about this record.

The pressings on this remind me of the Have Heart demo from Bottled Up Records. The record was just released, and there are already a ton of different colors and transition presses. Those that don't really "get it" will crap all over this and say that there are too many pressings. Screw them, I love it and want them all.

Here we go...the pre-order pressing is limited to 107 on a dark magenta vinyl (although the pictures here make it look black), and the dust sleeve is hand numbered and personalized...plus mine has a note about the blog (thanks Seb!). The lilac/pink color is the tour pressing and limited to 84. Then there were 100 on blue, 110 on neon yellow, and 87 on solid orange.

Hard As Iron

I'm still not really sure how I feel about the Iron Age 7 inch, The Way Is Narrow, that was released last year on Painkiller Records. First of all, the cover art is absolutely killer...I love the 60's psych vibe of the whole thing, and might have bought this based on the cover alone. The two songs on the record are pretty good, I guess. Everyone seems to be loving this band right now, but I think it will take some time for me to really grasp this one. There are a lot of layers here for me to dig through, and while it didn't really grab me right off, this is getting better with each listen. I'll keep spinning it, and see if I want to invest in the new LP they just released.

Committed For Life

My first experience with 7 Seconds probably wasn't the best. When I first started getting into hardcore, I had heard the band's mentioned left and right. Everyone seemed to like 7 Seconds. I decided to check them out myself, and I picked up their newest CD at the local record store. Soulforce Revolution. Of course the band had been moving in a more indie/alternative direction, and I was left pretty confused. What the hell was everyone talking about? Over time, I grew to enjoy Soulforce Revolution, but it was when I decided to take another chance on the band that I discovered why they had earned their reputation as hardcore legends. I had seen the Committed For Life E.P. at Newbury Comics, and the band didn't really resemble the dreadlocked band that I was introduced to on Soulforce Revolution. No, this band was raw. This version of 7 Seconds was HARDCORE. It wasn't until I was browsing through Al Barkley's eBay listings back in July, that my attention was drawn to the numerous pressings of this 7 inch. I knew right then that I needed to start collecting them.

So here we have the 6th and last pressing of this 7 inch on Squirtdown Records. This one has the orange cover, but according to Al's website, there appears to also be a 6th pressing with a yellow cover. All pressings after this one were on the Pazzafist label. Grabbed this copy for $6.50.