Split It

This is another record I picked up from the same local seller as the two Spit Boy 7"s. I also got a Growing Stronger comp, but that was intended as a present for a friend from the beginning, so I'm not going to post it here. Anyway, I picked up this Burn / Prison split because early Burn rules and it was pretty cheap. I own both songs on different records, but I still kind of wanted the record. The sound quality is not as good as on the comp and the 7", on which both songs appeared originally respectively. No idea when and why or even if they re-recorded this. Might be this is just due to the level of technology back then. I have no idea how Lost And Found would have got the audio to release this split, and I probably don't want to know, haha. The Prison side is alright. It's not Burn, that's for sure, but it's good 90s hardcore. 

From The Ashes

One of the more anticipated records for me recently was the new Burn 7". There was some hype, because, well, Burn were awesome when they were around. Plus, they were on tour in the US and twice in Europe over last one and a half years, so people were talking about them again.
I thought about pre-ordering the new 7" from Bridge 9 because, well, Burn, and they also had some cool variants, but I couldn't bring myself to shelling out that kind of money (shipping across the Atlantic sucks more than ever). Now that I've listened to the new songs a bunch of times, I have to say that I'm really glad I didn't spend that much money on this 7" because I don't feel the songs at all. I know that Burn have always been a very innovative band and never cared about trends, which I think is pretty cool. It made them write some of the best hardcore songs and arguably the best 7" on Rev ever. The fact that they continued to do their own thing in 2016 and still don't care about trends apparently is still aweome, but in this case the result is rather disappointing.

Forever

7" compilation have gone a little bit out of style I guess. This is a good one from 1990. Yellow label version.

Last Great Sea II

Another copy of Burn's Last Great Sea. Paulo and I had agreed on this being part of the trade before I picked up the tour copy of this 7", as I was just looking for a copy to listen to. Now that I have two, I'm not sure if I actually need two copies. We'll see. Having said that, a blue copy would be pretty cool...

Last Great Sea

Things have admittedly been really slow on here these last few months. Work was rather crazy lately and I sort of took a break from buying records, just to prove to myself that I could. Does anyone know that feeling when buying records seems more like becoming routine than something you feel genuinely excited about? When you start fretting about (not) missing out on pre-orders, tour pressings, first presses on limited colours etc. to a degree you don't feel comfortable with? Like a burn out for record collectors? That's how I felt a little bit and I thought it was necessary to take a step back and reassess a couple of things.

I didn't quit collecting completely though because I love it too much. I still bought a couple of new releases and I was lucky enough to do some cool trades. Even though I cut down the amount of records I bought, somehow I managed to pile up quite some backlog...

The first ever Burn show in Europe, which took place in October 2015 in London, was pretty hyped. People from all over Europe travelled for this show. It was a good evening as far as I'm concerned, and for the collectors out there, there was a cool variant made especially for this show.
Before the show I had been to talking to an acquaintance I had met by chance while waiting outside the venue if this was actually going to be the only Burn show in Europe or if they might do a tour at some point. We both agreed that judging by other old bands first doing shows again in the US, and then a few exclusive shows in Europe, that yeah, they'd be back at some point.
In the end, it took them less than six months to come back, haha. They played a show at one of the venues I used to go to on a regular basis when I first started going to shows, so that made for a promising evening. However, the show itself turned out to be really weird. The opening bands were horrible, there were only maybe 40-50 people in the audience, and I was definitely one of the younger people there - and I'm 34. Burn played a very good set though. They didn't really care that the turnout wasn't all that great and seemed to have a lot of on stage. Again, they had a special variant of one of their records with them. Last Great Sea had been repressed shorty before that on green and orange vinyl. The tour variant is also green vinyl, plus it was stamped "Europe 2016". Some of the green vinyl copies have this black smudge/thumb print. I've been told there are 100 copies of the tour press. Correct me if that's wrong.

Close up of the stamp.

Burn London, Burn

Last Sunday Burn played in London. An event that had cast a very long shadow. It was the first show Burn ever played in Europe and kids from all over Europe were travelling to London. I'm pretty sure there were more people from other countries than Brits at the show, which is kind of funny. I struck lucky because I had to go to London work related during that week anyway, so I had no extra travel expenses. No need to talk about how awesome Burn are. The first 7" is not only one of the best 7"s Rev have ever released, it is one of the best hardcore 7"s period. So (my) expectations were pretty high. And Burn didn't disappoint.
I must say I didn't care for the location the show took place at. Too big, stage too high, commercial venue, pretty much everything I dislike about a venue. The two bands that opened the show weren't really my cup of tea either. Then again, I hadn't really come for them, so my level of disappointment was pretty low. Burn played a great show, although they could have just played the songs off the first 7" because that's when the crowd went wild. During the other songs, the audience was much quieter. I'm pretty sure that at least 95% of all the pictures of the show posted on the internet were taken during those four songs. But anyway, it was a great set and I'd have been content if they'd only played Godhead. One of the songs I'd always wanted to hear live. I probably wouldn't have travelled to London just for the show, as many other people did, but I'm also glad I was able to attend the show.
About a week before the show the promoter posted on Instagram that there was going to be a surprise, which turned out to be a special pressing of the 7" on Rev. Surprisingly - well, maybe not that surprisingly since there are 300 copies, but still - the record didn't sell out before/during the show, so I was able to pick up a couple of more copies afterwards to help out two collector buddies.
Speaking of collectors, it was really fun meeting so many people I'd only known via messageboards and Instagram so far in real life and I had some nice conversations. Definitely a memorable show.

Close up of the stamp: place, date and the numbering. My copy is #252. 300 copies in total, three variants for the nerds. Apparently the numbering was done with two different pens, black and red. And there are also a couple of sleeves that didn't get numbered. All of this was deduced just hours after the show from pictures on Instagram. That's what you get when a whole bunch of nerds attend a show like this, haha.

This is what the record looks like when being held up against the light. Pretty sweet.

Shall Be Cleansed

Burn wrote one of the best hardcore 7"s of all time. I guess that's a pretty well established fact. That's why I always thought it a little bit surprising that there was only little talk, if at all, about their other releases, especially about the 12" EP Cleanse, which came out in 2001. After listening to it a couple of times I think I know why that is… The record is not that good to be perfectly honest. Maybe the bar has been set too high by the first 7", but the six songs on this EP don't even come close to the songs on Shall Be Judged. To me it sounds like Burn tried to sound like someone else (Rage Against The Machine?), which is not necessarily a bad thing, but it doesn't work too well in my opinion. The songs also lack the power and urgency that made the original 7" so great. I've listened to the EP a few times so far and after the original shock the songs sort of grew on me a little bit, but it won't become a favourite of mine.

Judgement Day

I was finally able to get my hands on one of those dark yellow copies of Burn's Shall Be Judged 7" that came out for RSD 2011. There were 1090 made with mainly two main variants, dark yellow and light yellow, as you can see in the pictures, but who knows how many slightly different shades there really are. I'm definitely satisfied with the two yellow copies I have. No need for transition colours or slightly different shades of yellow for me. I still 'need' a first press and third on black, but I won't loose any sleep over this one. Probably.

Here's what I have so far (starting top left).

Burn - …Shall Be Judged - Revelation - 2nd press on black /????

Burn - …Shall Be Judged - Revelation - 1st press pink /1000

Burn - …Shall Be Judged - Revelation - 4th press on black /300

Burn - …Shall Be Judged - Revelation - 4th press on light yellow /1090 total

Burn - …Shall Be Judged - Revelation - 5th press on blue /487

Burn - …Shall Be Judged - Revelation - 4th press on dark yellow /1090 total

Same old story. I didn't want to pick up just one record from the guy selling the Burn 7", so I also bought the Brotherhood LP Words Run… As Thick As Blood. I wanted to get a copy of this for a long time, so it was just as well. This 2nd press version comes on nice pink vinyl with some black smudges/streaks. There are 375 copies of this particular variant.

Record store pick ups

I totally forgot that I picked up a few other records when I went to Rekomando Records in Prague some time ago. I did some cleaning up today and found these again in a pile of records. I now recall that I wanted to make two different posts about my trip there, because the two other records I bought had nothing to do with RSD 2014. Plus I got some other exciting records in the meantime, so these two records somehow slipped my mind.

The first one does have something to do with Record Store Day, but a previous one. Back in 2011 Rev re-released one of the most classic records in their back catalogue: Burn's - Shall Be Judged 7", making this the 4th press. There were two different shades of yellow totaling up to 1090 copies, and there were also 300 copies on black. I managed to pick up a Burn 7" on light yellow back then, which was actually the very first copy of Shall Be Judged I ever got and which got me hooked as a listener and collector. As a result of my trip to Rekomando Records a few weeks ago I now also have a 4th press black copy. Apparently it's been sitting there for the last three years, which is kind of sad considering that this is such a good record, but since it worked out well for me, who am I to complain? I still haven't got a dark yellow copy, so if anyone has one and wants to sell or trade it, feel free to hit me up.

I also picked up the 2012 repress of the Texas Is The Reason 7" while I was there. This comes on opaque orange vinyl and is out of 500. Can't go wrong with this one.

...Shall Be Judged (Again)

I don't know why but I really have a soft spot for pink (and as a matter of fact also for purple) vinyl. I just think it looks almost always awesome. Just like this Burn 7", which is one of the best hardcore 7"s ever recorded. I know that I said this before, but some things need to be said just every so often. Great music, great lyrics, awesome pink vinyl. What could a record collector want more? First press /1000.

On a side note: this year shapes up to be pretty good music and collecting-wise. I've managed to pick up some classic records and some long-time items on my want list, plus there have been a lot of new releases that turned out to be really great. Let's see how it keeps going.

Shall Be Jugded

Sorry, Shall Be Judged of course. My bad. Or actually it's Rev's bad since they made this spelling mistake on the back cover 24 years ago (and never bothered to correct it!). This is one of the best records that Rev has ever put out. I can never decide between this one, No Spiritual Surrender by Inside Out or the two Gorilla Biscuits records. Tough choice if you ask me. Godhead is probably one of the best hardcore songs ever written.
This is also one of the few Rev releases I care about in a true collector's sense, meaning I want all of them! This is a 2nd press copy. Comes with a black&white insert and there's still the Connecticut address on the back cover. I picked this up when I was at a festival recently and some guy had a box of 2nd hand records with him. Not mint condition, but it plays fine and at the price I paid it'd have been stupid to not pick it up.