Until I Wake Again

One of the more anticipated records for me was the I Recover LP. I fell in love with the band when I saw them play at a DIY space not too far from where I live. The two 7"s they have released so far were really good, not only musically and lyrically, but also visually they were top notch. It certainly helps when one band member runs a printing company. 

Things had been rather quiet for the band for a number of years, so hearing about them releasing new material was very exciting to me. Chris, singer for my band Fragment and CEO of Influences Zine/Label, got to listen to the record early to review it for his zine and was talking constantly about how good it was. I wasn't as privileged as him, but wouldn't have listened to the record in advance anyway, because I'm and old-fashioned idiot and prefer listening to records I'm really looking forward to on vinyl for the first time, even if that means I have to wait a little bit longer. And I Recover didn't disappoint. The songs are melodic and catchy. Daniel's voice sounds great and I really love the guitar work. It's a perfect DC Revolution Summer hardcore worship record. And not only does the record sound fantastic, it is also really pleasing to the eye (at least mine). Plus the haptic of sleeve and lyric sheet is really awesome. The only thing I could criticize is that there are only seven songs on Until I Wake Again. Then again, this leaves me hungry for more. 

When I got the record I didn't listen to anything else the whole weekend. I just flipped the record over and over and over again. And it's been on constant rotation since then. This is definitely in the top 3 for this year. 

Sick Of It

I am patient boy, I wait, I wait, I wait, I wait. In this case I waited for about 17 years (goddamn...) to get this limited sleeve of Sick Of It All's 7" Death To Tyrants. SOIA released an album under the same name in 2006 and the 7" has two songs from said LP, plus an otherwise unreleased song (I think). This was the last SOIA LP that I actually liked (and at one point collected). The songs on this 7" are good, but it's not the best SOIA material in my opinion. I got this record purely for collecting purposes to be honest because I love the first SOIA 7" and I'm into rip-off covers, even though it's kind of weird that a band does a rip-off sleeve of one of their own records. 

The records with the Gilman Street rip-off cover are numbered out of 50. My copy is #30 as can be seen below. 

There are three versions of this record, clear and white with the regular sleeve and some of the white vinyl copies come with the limited sleeve. Here's a nice family picture. I don't know if test presses for this release exist. 

Walk Together Rock Together

7 Seconds are an awesome band and incredibly important to me and my coming of age in hardcore. I often feel they don't get talked about enough when it comes to legendary 80s hardcore bands. Maybe because they didn't break up like most of their contemporaries. 

Be that as it may, Trust Records has re-released both The Crew and Walk Together Rock Together, which is definitely a good thing. I'm always in favor of keeping hardcore records in print, so hopefully younger hardcore kids have easy access to the classics and the bands can get the recognition they deserve. I usually don't play the repress game, but Trust Records has been doing such an incredible job with these re-releases, I just had to get a copy. The main selling point for me was the 20 page booklet that has a ton of flyers and pictures as well as interviews with the band and people from way back when. I was a little torn between picking up a copy with nice looking vinyl (this one) OR a copy on rather ugly splatter vinyl, which come with a bonus 7" though. I opted for A in this case, even though I really want one of those 7"s. Oh well...

Life Under The Gun

I‘ve been a fan of Militarie Gun since I heard All Roads Lead To The Gun. “Stuck In A Spin“ was one of my favourite songs in 2021 and it is still my favourite song of theirs. While it was love at first listen when I heard the 12“ back then, this LP had to grow on me a little bit. It‘s much poppier than their previous releases and I‘m always a little hesitant when bands go that route. But I‘ve been listening to the record constantly over the last two months or so and it‘s become better with each spin. It flows really nicely and is just an all around enjoyable listen. I like the artwork as well and the vinyl is just beautiful. As is customary these days, there were a million versions of this record right from start, a trend I‘m not a big fan of. This is green with blue splatter, “limited“ to 1000 copies. 

Our Time

I've been playing guitar in a band called Fragment for about two years now. Everybody in the band is younger than I am by a lot. Which is sometimes a little weird, because I am the band dad by default. Technically I could be the father of our singer, so there is some truth to that. However, it also has its perks because the others have their finger on the pulse of what's going on in hardcore and I don't have to do that much research on my own. One of the records our singer has been raving about since it came out was Our Time by Wreckage. I think he proclaimed it Record of the Year back in January. I'm not sure I want to make that pick yet, but it is a really, really good record. It's just the right mix of faster hardcore and moshy parts. The vocals are spot on for me and I dig the lyrics as well. The cover is so good, too. Well, the name of the label and the catalogue number are a little misplaced, but the picture itself and the color scheme are A+. The A-Side are actual new songs, the B-Side has demo songs and a re-recorded song.

There are 300 copies on black, 100 copies on clear blue and 100 copies on clear orange. I would have loved to get a copy on colored vinyl - both colors are still available from the label by the way - but shipping to Europe has become so expensive these days and record prices have climbed to heights never seen before, so I often make do with what is available over here. 

Vancouver Clear

Go It Alone is a hard band to collect. Sure, the regular versions, of which there are plenty, are fairly easy to get, but as soon as things get a little bit rarer, those records are very hard to come by. People still seem to really like the band and don‘t want to let go off their stuff. Which is a good thing per se, but a little annoying from a collector‘s point of view. This is a first press copy on clear. 100 copies come with the regular cover (my copy is numbered #91/100 on the A-side label), 50 on clear come with the record release cover. 

Go It Alone have a really good catalogue of music they released, but besides that they were also a band that put in a great deal of effort with the covers and artwork of their releases, which is something I really appreciate. Just look at that awesome threefold cover and the incredible pictures. 

I'm Not In This Alone

I‘M BACK! I‘d been thinking about restarting this blog for quite a while. Five years is a long time to take a break and it feels even longer to be honest. To say a lot has happened in those five years would be an understatement... 

The main reason why I stopped doing this blog was that I had become a dad in 2017, and between learning how to be responsible for another human being and being super busy at a new job, which then got even more stressful because of the pandemic, there was just no time to keep the blog running the way I wanted to. 

Lately however, I‘ve been feeling like I need another creative outlet. I‘m aware that doing a blog is not exactly the most creative thing to do in the world. I also have no idea if people are still into reading blogs, especially about niche topics like collecting hardcore and punk records. Having said that, I like the writing aspect of doing a blog and of course I get to chronicle my musical journey once again. So even if no one else reads this blog, it will be a nice thing I'm doing for myself.

Among the many things that happened during the last five years were two moves within the last three years, but now we‘re settled in permanently - at least I hope so - and after setting up my office/record room, I‘ve been listening to records again a lot more. Our son is now at an age where he doesn’t require attention all the time, which allows my wife and myself to pursue more hobbies of our own again. 

The collecting aspect might have changed for me a little bit, but my love for records and hardcore/punk never went away. Listening, sorting/filing, buying, or just searching for records - I simply like to interact with records in all kinds of ways, so restarting this blog seemed like the next logical step. 

Not blogging about the records I bought in the last five years obviously presents me with quite a backlog, but I‘m not going to post all of the records I bought since I stopped writing here. Couldn‘t if I wanted to to be honest. I can track the purchases of the last couple of months, so this will be my starting point. 

When I stopped doing my blog in 2018, I wasn‘t the biggest Youth Of Today fan. I always liked the message, the style and the music, but Ray Cappo‘s voice was always hard to get into for me. Well, things change with time and I‘m now fully on board with YOT. I even started collecting different versions. While I‘d love to get an original copy of Break Down The Walls on that amazing shade of blue, I‘m also realist enough to realize that this particular record is way out of my price range. But collecting the different covers of YOT releases has been a lot of fun. This might be my favourite version of We‘re Not In This Alone. I really like the blue and yellow sleeve. Plus, I like the layout on the back cover better than the Caroline version that has the same artwork, albeit in a different color.