Tough Statement

I usually don't blog about records I haven't listened to yet, but since I'm not home over Xmas and New Year and I don't want to deal with a huge backlog when I'm home again, I'm going to bend my own rules a little bit. After all they're my rules. And also, reasons not rules make us strong. Anyway, a buddy of mine plays in Statement X and I'm a strong believer of supporting friends' bands. A few months ago they played a record release show for their split 7" with Hangin' Tough. I couldn't go there for some reason, most likely because I was travelling at the time. I asked him if they had something special planned for the release show and he told me they'd have a record release sleeve and another special cover, which turned out to be a Brotherhood 'Fuck Racism' rip-off. I have the Statement X demo though and I saw them live before. The demo was a little weak, but they put on a fun live show. As you probably guessed, they're a axe band. I've never listened to Hangin' Tough before, but I have a vague idea what they might sound like. The record says test press out of 75, but I think they just used the labels for this record release edition. Cool Stop And Think rip-off. The regular cover can be seen on the left.

Forty Hour Train Back To Penn

While traveling during summer the wife and I were listening to quite a bit of The Movielife on long drives. This particular record was still missing from the collection though. This copy of Forty Hour Train Back To Penn on red vinyl is part of the most recent repress as far as I know.

The Suicide File

I've been after this LP for quite some time, but since the original records don't go for that cheap, I had to wait until Indecision decided to repress Twilight. Great music my a great band.

Enough

I really liked what I've heard from Enough so far, so picking up more of their releases was a given. One of the mailorders I order regularly from is run by the same guy doing Assault Records, which is the label that released this Enough 7". That's the reason I ended up with a pre-order copy more than two years after it was released. Green marbled vinyl. #75/158.

Anchor

My friend I traded the Burn 7" to also threw in this test pressing of Anchor's 7" Captivity Songs along with the DING demo. I got some stickers, too, and he also wrote me a really nice letter. It's these seemingly small things besides the actual trading/buying/collecting that make this so much fun.

Demo Is Not Glamorous

I think I've said it before, but I'm really into Death Is Not Glamorous. I picked up yet another copy of the special edition Burn sold of their 7" at the London show for a good buddy of mine, and once I was back home, we made a quick deal. He had a spare copy of the DING demo, a record I didn't have yet but that I really wanted, and that was that. This copy is part of the first press on black vinyl in a sand colored sleeve. There are 500 copies of this, all of which are handnumbered.

Our Impact Will Be Felt

There are mainly two reasons why I bought this tribute sampler. First of all, I really like Sick Of It All and I feel it is somehow justified that they're being paid the tribute they deserve. Secondly, my favourite band Bane is one of the bands contributing a cover. It'd have been awesome if they had played their version of We Stand Alone live at some point. This sampler was originally released as CD only, but after 8 years Think Fast finally put it out on vinyl too. 500 copies on clear green vinyl.

Turning Point

The new Turning Point discography has been highly anticipated because, well, Turning Point are awesome, and because there has been 'new' material added compared with the previous discography version. You now also get a live set on WNYU. Think Fast has really done a beautiful job with this release. As a bonus you get the original demo on a 7" as well. Pretty cool. There are 1,000 copies of the yellow vinyl you can see here. There are also 500 copies on blue vinyl.

Parting The Sea Between Brightness And Me

I'm not the biggest Touché Amoré fan, but so far I definitely have enjoyed some of their output. Sometimes even without knowing. On the last mixtape my wife made for me, she put on this one song that I really liked, but I never bothered to look up which song by which band it actually was. Sorry. Anyways, while listening to this LP, I found out it was a song by Touché Amoré. On Parting The Sea... there are definitely some more good jams, too. This is the third press on black vinyl. Quantity unknown.

Kids Insane / Slander

Kids Insane is a band I like quite a bit, both on record and live. When I ordered the Marrón LP I was kind of surprised to find out that Kids Insane also had a new record out, so of course I picked up their split as well. The music is good, as usual, but who really needs a 12" split for five songs in total? What a waste of money an raw materials... I also like the Slander side, but Kids Insane still take this one home.

Marrón

I really liked the Marrón demo from last year, so when I read recently that they were going to release a new record, I knew I had to pick it up. And I certainly didn't get disappointed. This mini LP is really good. 150 copies on clear vinyl.

Through Being Cool

I really love the 2nd Saves The Day LP. As far as ego records from the 90s go, this is one of my favourites. So many good songs. I fell a little bit ashamed to admit that I've never owned a physical copy on vinyl so far. So I was really happy to learn that Equal Vision was going to do a reissue a few months back, because the nice looking colour copies of the first press go for a pretty penny these days. I finally decided to pick up a cream coloured record, because I thought it would match the cover really nicely. When I got the record though I was really disappointed because the colour doesn't really look like cream to me. It's more an ugly white mixed with an even uglier yellow. Sort of a scrambled egg colour. I'm glad I finally have a copy of this awesome LP, but I might have to upgrade it at some point.

Bringin' It Down in 2015

I'm not a Rev nerd, actually I'm far from it. There are certain bands on Rev I like and some bands on Rev that I try to collect, but I wouldn't call myself a Rev collector. On the downside, my record collection might lack a lot of records many people deem crucial. On the upside I don't have to play the repress game, which can get pretty annoying if you're a true Rev collector. With some reissues they still get me though. When it was announced that Rev was going to do a reissue of Judge's classic LP Bringin' It Down for its 25th anniversary and I saw a picture of the planned reissue, I certainly got intrigued. Fast forward a couple of weeks and everybody and their grandmother has their copy, which also includes your humble blogger. The record turned out to be a different colour, but in my opinion it looks a lot better than the one on the mock up picture posted on the internet. The purple swirl looks pretty fucking great. Rev really put in some effort here and also included a die-cut hammer logo, just in case you and your crew want to show respect to Judge and take it back to the streets.

Misfits II

Not much too see here. Standard repress of the Misfits Collection II. More classic Misfits songs.

Flexi Your Head!

This may be one of the weirdest records featured on my blog. It's not even rally a record, it's a flexi disc. Flexi discs are known for their poor quality, which is probably the main reason there not that common. I don't any other flexis, but since this one was made by a band that I collect, I made an exception. You could only get this flexi when you sent in the backcover of a fanzine and in return you'd get the flexi. I didn't take a picture of it, but the back of this flexi is actually a postcard. That's how it was shipped. Now, I never got my hands on a copy of said zine, but I did contact the guys in Punch and asked if they could send me one if there were any left. Brian, I think, agreed, but it got lost in the mail somehow. Since my want list is pretty long and seems to be getting longer instead of shorter every day, I didn't spend a whole lot of time and energy on finding one of these. I stumbled across a copy for cheap on discogs a few weeks ago, plus it was sold by someone in Germany, so shipping wasn't really an issue either. As I said, the quality is rather poor, but I like the whole concept of this release. Plus you get a bunch of covers of classic hardcore songs. But honestly, this one is to be filed entirely under 'collectible'.

Trial

I've never really been into Trial. I knew they existed and were sort of influential in the 90s, but I never really checked them out. I remember reading the bit on Trial in the Burning Fight book last year, which sort of intrigued me to finally give them a listen, but it wasn't until I caught them live at a Festival last year that I actually listened to them. I liked their live show so I decided to pick up a few of their records when possible. Some time after that a buddy of mine decided to get rid of some of his records, a chance I gladly jumped at. I must say though that I don't like Trial on this record as much as I liked them live. Then again, maybe this is not their strongest output, so I'll probably grab some of their other releases at some point. This 7" on brown marble is from the repress run New Age did in 2011. 500 copies exist.

Grade/Incision

This is a weird release. Originally, there was a split between Grade and Believe, which was released as CD only in 1993. In 1999 there was a reissue, but Believe had been dropped off this release and this other band, Incision, came in as replacement. So one could argue that this is not really a reissue, but more like a new release. It gets weirder though, because Grade was originally founded as Incision, but changed its name to Grade later on. So this is not really a split release either. Like I said, weird.
Honestly, I only knew about Grade before buying this record and I only discovered the whole background story while doing a little research for this entry. I really like the Grade side, but I like the songs on the Incision side a little better. This was a one-time only pressing limited to 500 copies on black vinyl.