Big Dreams

A record I have fallen totally in love with again over the last couple of years is Hoop Dreams by Big Kids. I listened to the record a ton when I got it and I put a variety of songs on . I managed to pick up a pink copy and a red copy last year, so of course I needed to get an orange copy eventually, and thanks to Marcus I finally managed to get one from the US. The pressing info on Discogs is kinda vague and just states ‘random mix (blues and oranges)’ for part of the first press, so there might be many different shades out there. 

Time for a nice family picture. Look at all those beautiful variants. Ah, the good old days… Getting a test press would be the cherry on top, but I doubt that will ever happen. 

6ft 12“

Hard to believe that the Mil-Spec demo came out 10 years ago. They still feel like a new band to me, even though they have a lot of releases under their belt - and I like all of them. So when I saw that they had a new record out, I wanted a copy right away. I didn’t want to order in the US directly, so I had to be satisfied with whatever version showed up in Europe, so black it was. And it works pretty well with the cover, which itself is not that great, but also strangely fascinating. 

The new record has four new songs that make me very happy. I wish there were more songs, then again, those four songs leave me wanting for more, so marketing-wise, the band did a great job.

1st Press on Black on Young Blood /???

Erer

The new Glitterer record - I still call it new, even though it was released in November of last year - picks up where the band left off. Which is exactly what I wanted the record to be. So good. 

The red vinyl really shouldn’t really work with the cover, but somehow it does. Weirdly, the record plays at 33rpm, even though the label says 45rpm. 

1st Press on Red on Purple Circle /1100

This Is Boston

This is the final piece of the repress of Bane’s Boston, 6:58pm. Originally it had been released as a 7” on Triple B, but Equal Vision repressed it last year as a 12”. The other versions were fairly easy to obtain, but this one proved to be very difficult to track down. For the longest time my circle of Bane collectors wasn’t even sure whether or not this version actually existed. It had been announced but no copies popped up anywhere, which was very weird because this the ‘retail version’. But then a friend of mine in Australia picked up a copy, thus confirming it was actually real.

Repress on White (‘Retail Version’) on Equal Vision /500

Here’s a nice family picture, minus the test press, which will be damn-near impossible to track down. Let’s play a game of ‘spot the nice version’, shall we…? 

Blood

In 2023 Bane’s classic album Give Blood was repressed by Equal Vision. I’ve picked up a few copies since then, but I still have a long way to go to catch up with all the variants. Initially, I’d been weary to pick up all colors because there were just so many, but the one I’d wanted from the beginning was the white/red cross one because it looked pretty cool in the pictures. The only problem, this particular variant never really popped up in Europe. Luckily, it was Marcus to the rescue and I was finally able to get one. Actually, Marcus helped me out big time with getting a bunch of records I’m going to post about soon and also the DTN record I talked about in my last post. A big thank you!

This variant is even sicker in person. The colors are chosen well, and not only is the pattern itself cool, but I also love how the red cross pattern of the vinyl aligns pretty much perfectly with the axes of the red cross on the label. 

2023 Repress on White/Red Cross on Equal Vision /500

Down To Six

Down To Nothing were one of the best bands from the 2000s. They released a bunch of great records and were even better live. Their debut vinyl release was their s.t. 7”. The regular version comprised three songs, which absolutely rip. However, there was an alternate version that comes with six songs. It only took 24 years for me to pick up this version. Granted, there are only 34 copies of the clear variant, but that’s still a long time. There are also 16 copies on pink and 5 test presses of this version, which you can take a look at over on Endless Quest. 

Alternate Version on Clear on Dead By 23 /34