Double Allegiance

When browsing my buddy’s pictures on Instagram after he’d decided to sell his collection, I saw his pictures of the two Allegiances albums and I thought it’d be fun to listen to Allegiance again because I hadn’t done so in a long time. So I went to my record shelf and wanted to dig out their first LP because my first instinct to reach for albums first most of the times these days. I didn’t find it though and after checking my record list there was no doubt that I didn’t own any Allegiance albums (anymore). I could have sworn I owned at least the first one on vinyl, but either I misplaced it or, which is more likely, I traded it away, thinking I could replace it easily along the way, and then forgot about it. Well, at least the replacing part finally came true, even though I actually don’t know how many years later. Listening to Allegiance brings back a lot of memories surrounding the mid-2000s. Not just about the band and their records, but of that whole time in general. Makes me kinda nostalgic. Looking back, there are so many great records that were released in the 2003-2008 era and Overlooked is one of them in my book. 

1st Press on Yellow w/ Red Splatter on Rivalry/603

The second and final album by Allegiance, Desperation, was released in 2007 and the disbandened some time after. I don‘t remember exactly because I think they went rather quietly and didn’t have a big send-off like Champion or Have Heart. I remember listening to this album, probably on some burned CD on a way to a show. It’s also a very good record, but I prefer the first album. 

1st Press on Gold Metallic on Rivalry /600

It’s A Cold World

Cold World is a band I‘ve always been aware of, but I‘ve only listened to them occassionally. A couple of months ago I had a discussion with a friend and he kept talking about how great Cold World is. So, when I saw a copy of How The Gods Chill sit on my other buddy’s shelf, it was really a no brainer to add it to my pile, so I could finally check out the band properly. I‘ve really been enjoying this album the last couple of weeks. It‘s like a harder version of Blacklisted, but with more hip hop and metal influences at the same time. The clear vinyl goes really well with the artwork and I love that shade of blue as well. I‘m really glad I got this record. 

1st Press on Clear on Deathwish /720

The Quest

Considering the fact how much I like youth crew music, I have a very weak collection when it comes to European bands of that ilk. Mainstrike is probably one of the 90s European hardcore bands in general and definitely of the bands that helped establish European youth crew to begin with. A Quest For Answers is the band’s debut LP, offering 12 songs of youth crew influenced hardcore, but not necessarily with typical youth crew lyrics. Definitely an important record for European hardcore. 

1st Press on Black on Crucial Response /???

Chung King?

Humans are incredibly interesting individuals. Some people consider a record trash and don’t want it released at all, others are willing to pay huge amounts of money for that exact record. Some of those people who really want to have said record are apparently also willing to bootleg the record, or at least are willing to help along the way to create the bootleg, so more people can enjoy the record that was never meant to be enjoyed in the first place. It’s really fascinating. 

Then there’s me, who would never spend the kind of money on a Chung King that seems to be the going rate these days, because objectively it is a shitload of money, but I might be tempted to spend a lot of money on other records and not bat an eyelash. I’m not a big fan of bootlegs in general either, but some bootlegs are pretty cool and are maybe even more interesting than the original record because there’s a interesting back story, which then makes them desirable after all.

The Chung King album has been re-released officially by Revelation Records, both as part of the Judge discography and the actual re-release of the Chung King record, so the actual recordings became widely available to the masses, making any further bootlegs obsolete. But at one point, it did make sense to bootleg such a rare record. 

The 10” bootleg of the (in)famous Chung King album, originally released in the 90s, has become kind of a collectible in itself, commanding three figures in some cases, which is kinda ironic. Kinda supporting the point I made about humans being complex beings. My buddy was pretty surprised when I told him about that, but great guy that he is, he didn’t take advantage of that and he made me a really good price.

Close up of the insert, part 1. This shines some light on the bootleg itself. I don’t know how well kept the secret is who bootlegged this record and whose number was whited out, but I have no clue who’s responsible for it.

Close up of the insert, part 2, with the original back cover and label art. 

13 Years In The Making

About 13 Years ago I traded away my copy of the Internal Affairs LP. I must admit that I didn‘t think all that much about Internal Affairs in the years since and I‘m not sure how many times I listened to them in the past 10 years. Still, when I saw this record amongst my buddy‘s collection, I kinda wanted to get it. He and I came up around the same time in the hardcore scene and we have a similar taste. So, on the one hand, there were a lot of the same records we both own, on the other hand it was a very nice walk down memory lane and I saw a bunch of records from the early and mid 2000s that I don’t own (anymore). 

The s.t. album is such a fun listen after all these years, even though I didn’t quite remember the vocals being so high. Listening to this record is a great throwback to the mid 2000s.

In case anyone was wondering, I traded my copy to Marcus and after all these years I can say with certainty that only positive things have come from that one trade. 

1st Press on Black w/Record Release Cover on Malfunction /300

Disco Boots

There was a time when I bought pretty much everything released by Grave Mistake records. One of those records was the Iron Boots Demo 7“, even though Grave Mistake only took over pressing the band‘s demo with the third pressing. I really liked that demo, but for some reason I never picked up any of the band‘s other records. When I spotted the Discogrpahy among my friend‘s collection I saw no reason not to buy it. In 2026 a 12“ discography with all the band‘s material seems much more appealing than getting the individual releases. It‘s funny how these things can change, because up until a few years ago I was a staunch defender of buying releases only in their original format. This is a fun listen and even though there are 20 songs on this 12“, the record doesn‘t get boring or feels long. 

1st Press on Orange on Grave Mistake & Triple B /225

Cast The First Stone

Let‘s stick with the 90s. Ensign have never been a huge band for me, but I do like their catalogue as far as I‘m familiar with it. Cast The First Stone is their second LP. It‘s a good album, but overall I prefer their debut The Direction Of Things To Come which is overall more straight forward hardcore.

1st Press on Black on Nitro /???

Back On Track

I’ve always enjoyed the Ten Yard Fight 7”s I own, but for some reason never managed to buy a copy of their only LP, Back On Track. When I saw a copy of the album in my friend’s shelf, I put it on to my pile pretty much without thinking. My buddy had told me before visiting him that he was going to make me some really, really good prices, so adding to the pile was way too easy. 

Back On Track is such a fun record, exactly what I want from a youth crew record. Yes, the cover is so cliché, but a great live picture plus bold lettering just works for youth crew records. An orange copy would have been nice, but as long as I can finally listen to this record on vinyl, I’m fine with black too. 

1st Press on Black on Equal Vision /???

Choose Wisely

This post is the start of a series of records I bought from a very good friend of mine a couple of weeks ago. He’d told me a while ago that he was thinking about selling (part of) his collection and he finally pulled the trigger about a month ago. I looked through his Instagram and picked out a couple of things that I was interested in, but I also knew that he didn’t have pictures of all of his records online, so I decided on a whim to make the 5 hour trip by train to hang out with him and browse his collection. It kind of was perfect timing, too, because it was the start of the summer holidays for me, which meant the weather was really nice and I didn’t have a care in the world about grown up stuff. So, in the end I got to spend a great weekend with an even greater friend I rarely see and I went home with plenty of new records. What better way to start the summer? Now the big question was, which record should I start with? Newer record? Older classic? In the end, I decided on a modern classic, at least in my opinion.

Magnitude released one of my favorite albums of the last 10 years. I can’t really fathom that this is a pre-Corona record, but To Whatever Fateful End was indeed released in 2019. It’s such a great throwback record to 90s hardcore and hits all the right spots for me. It’s one of those records I would love to collect, but since there are so many variants out there, I can’t really get myself to actually start a collection. As a compromise, I decided to just go after the special covers, which is a more manageable taks. Not necessarily cheaper and easier, but more interesting. 

This particular variant is a repress done as an exclusive version for Disorder, which is a record label and record store based in Atlanta. The limited variant comes with a special cover, which is just a single sheet of paper on top of the regular cover. The alternate cover is also stamped and hand-numbered /75. 

Sidenote: Purple and pink are my favourite colors for records in general, but there is something about white and clear for records by straight edge bands. 

Repress on Clear on Triple B w/ Alternate Cover (Disorder Exclusive) /75

Close up of the stamp and numbering. I don't know what the deal with the raccoon is, but I guess they look cool. 

The More, The Merrier

Well, another month, another Bane repress. I’m really glad that there seems to be still so much demand for Bane records, but I wonder sometimes how many of these are sold to younger hardcore kids and how many copies just go to collectors. 

2026 Repress on Yellow (“Golden”) w/ Black Splatter (Rev Exclusive) on Equal Vision /500

Red Red Medicine

One down, one to go and then my micro collection of colored Fugazi represses should be complete. Red Medicine might not have as many hits as the albums before, but I still really enjoy listening to this album.

2024 Repress on Red on Dischord /???

Bring On The Psychics

Any new material by Walter Schreifels is always a reason to be happy. When a friend texted me if I’d seen the announcement for the new Quicksand LP, this put an instant smile on my face. The tricky part was to find a version that looked good and was available in Europe. There are ten variants I know of, but only a handful is actually nice to look at. But after some research and letting some days pass, I found out that my go-to mailorder was getting one of the variants I’d eyed anyway. 

The record wasn’t readily available, but the wait for the pre-order wasn’t too bad compared to a lot of other other records released in recent years. The artwork is alright, but I really, really love the color of the record. I think I chose wisely. The album starts off somewhat slow, but picks up tempo (and groove) halfway through the A-side and starts sounding more like Quicksand. After the record ended, I immediately flipped it over and started listening to it again. And then again. There’s no particular song standing out so far, but the album flows very nicely in itself. I have a feeling that I’ll be playing Bring On The Psychics a lot and that it will end high on my 2026 list. 

1st Press on Dusk Blue w/ White Swirl (‘Retail Exclusive’) on Equal Vision /???

Two Words

A couple of weeks ago I met with a good friend of mine for a coffee date. We hadn’t seen each other in person in quite a while, which is one of the woes of adult life: one-on-one time with friends is getting scarce. At some point during that period of time he’d texted me that he’d finally picked up a bunch of classic 80s hardcore records he’d long wanted to own. We acutally ended up having a fun conversation about those records (and some newer stuff) during the aforementioned coffee date. What he hadn’t told me was that along with the records he’d ordered, he’d been sent an album by a relatively current band called Two Words.

Since he wasn’t into the album, he decided to give it to me because he knows my love for youth crew. I really appreciate the gift. Thanks again. In case you were wondering, yes, youth crew is what you get on Rejoining The Forces. I mean, the band name, the name of the album, the insert, the cover art - it’s all there. Add the fact that the album was released on Crucial Response. Even without looking it up, I sort of knew this was a project by slightly older folks, which as it turns out, was the correct assumption as all of the band members are veterans of the Italian (straight edge) hardcore scene. This is a well done record and you get exactly what you expect. 

1st Press on White on Crucial Response /???

Split Decision

Sunday Drive has become one of my favorite labels these past few years, so I regularly check their web store for new releases. I’d been recommended the Turn Of Phrase demo by a friend, but it was sold out on their website and ordering from the US was not an option because it’s become way too expensive. But when I saw that Turn Of Phrase had a vinyl release out, I knew I could get my hands on a copy through German mailorders. It’s still a very steep price you have to pay for a 7” these days, but it’s still much cheaper than ordering directly from overseas. The Turn Of Phrase side is really, really good and I definitely want to hear more from that band. The Square One songs are good as well, but don’t grab me the same way the Turn Of Phrase ones do. Overall, this is a really good split record

1st Press on Clear Green on Sunday Drive /200

Not Nothing To Me

The Start Today 7” was one of my favorite 7”s in 2025, so ordering the LP was a quick and as it turns out smart decision. Nothing To You is a great follow up for the 7” and leaves nothing left to be desired. 9 Songs and the longest one is not even 1:30 minutes. Just the right length for this kind of music.

I would have preferred the ice blue version, because that is a sick looking colour, but this was the much cheaper alternative. 

1st Press on Olive Green on Rebirth /100 (‘Merchpit Exclusive’)