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 /???

Manic Perfection

I love anniversary presses, well, I love anniversary presses that give you something besides the actual record. And Quicksand and Iodine went above and beyond. I’d be hard pressed to say what you can do actually better with an anniversary presses. 

Manic Compression is a great record - Landmine Spring is a phenomenal song and one of the best songs in Walter Schreifels’ extensive catalogue - and the artwork is just so awesome. One of my favorite album covers of all time. Despite the fact that I love the original art work, I really like how they made this bascially a black and white cover, gives it a totally different vibe.

The red/orange swirl looks pretty sick and works really well with the adapted cover art. For once I’m glad I had access only to the most common variant.

30th Anniversary Press on Red/Orange Swirl on Iodine /1500

The book is done so incredibly well. Lots of information, quotes, flyers and pictures. It was so hard to choose a page, but I went for Walter Schreifels in a Minor Threat shirt. 

Now I’m really bummed that I didn’t get a copy of the 30th anniversary presses of Slip, because those reissues are pieces of art in themselves.