dead serious rec. pt II: xcasey jonesx, deadsoil

after handing out enormous amounts of sweets for the "trick or treat-kids" i finally found some peace to write my 2nd dead serious records post. ok, it wasn't that bad. actually i just gave four chuppa chups to two more or less dressed up children (one kid had a mask at least but the other kid was sensationally disguised as himself). halloween just isn't that big here in germany like it is in the states i think.

xcasey jonesx - i hope we're not the last
i'm aware of the sheer existence of xcasey jonesx since an order at alveran records (a closed down german label that, beside some european bands, had been releasing eulogy records stuff for the european market - unearth, on broken wings, wisdom in chains,...). so i listened to the 2006th album 'messengers' which i got in a promo version as part of the said order at alveran. i can't really recall if i liked it back then and due to my financial possibilities at the time i sold it on ebay - for quite nothing if my memory serves.
anyway, i spotted this version of their 2011 effort 'i hope we're not the last' at dead serious and thought i might give them a second shot. good idea of myself :) the record is great.

catchy as hell hardcore punk with maybe the best song title i've ever read: 'if james hetfield can stay straight edge, anyone can' period ;-)
this was released on ratpack records which is a division of the german mailorder green hell.

it comes in a simple fold around cover. i believe i saw the black vinyl version at burnout record store with a regular sleeve. pressed on clear vinyl. 300 made (another 100 on clear red as pre-order version and 500 on black vinyl). cd out on eulogy records. ratpack records. 2011.

deadsoil - forever the enemy
this was the forerunner to their full length 'the venom divine' of which i posted here. 'forever the enemy' sounds more 'tough guy' because they had a different singer on this who sounds like a human bear. the five songs are pretty good though. not as varied as the venom divine stuff but yeah, i like it. it comes on a 10" format which i think is quite cool. i know that many collectors don't dig it but it looks agreeable on my shelf :)

pressed on thick clear vinyl. it was released by a small german straight edge label called *poisonfree.com records. i think they aren't active anymore as their limited discography indicates. don't know how many of these 10"es were made. 2003.

dead serious rec. pt. I: zero mentality

that order from dead serious records was a downright pain in the ass! i ordered around the end of july and paid all the stuff via paypal the same day. usually i expect to get the records within a week. after one week: nothing. no confirmation mail, no records. ok, no big deal. sometimes it takes two weeks. after two weeks still nothing. i wrote a mail - no reply. three weeks and another mail later i was as wise as before. after four weeks i wrote a slightly more insistantly mail and finally i got an answer. something was wrong with the new shop, they didn't get all the mails and stuff like that but they would send it right now. good - i was relieved. after the fifth week without any package arriving they told me that the stuff was send back due to undeliverability. they sent it again and after six weeks i could finally hold the records in my hands. boy, there was something very wrong with it.

here is part I/II.

zero mentality - invite your soul

a great german hardcore band which called it a day some years ago. i know the band from the time they were active but didn't pay any attention. that seems to happen too often now and i could just bite my ass not being aware of the greatness of this band when there was still a chance of catching them live.

this is their 2nd full length album

zero mentality plays a great mixture consisting of the two chief ingredients hardcore and metal. nothing new you might say but they are adding some lovely melodic punk rock and half german half english lyrics to it. definitely unique. 

the album comes in a gatefold sleeve with a hilarious picture on the inner sleeve. what the hell is that?! knowing that the band didn't take themselves too serious i look at it as some sort of joke ;-)

the record itself looks when put against a dark background more lilac. when held against the light it's more purple.

and the marble looks different too. great colouring on this one! another quality release by demons run amok. 400 made. 2007.

zero mentality/the setup split 7"

as far as the zero mentality part is concerned this was a teaser for the said full length. so the two songs on this are also part of 'invite your soul'. the band which this split is shared with, the setup, comes from belgium. i think they disbanded too but i'm not really sure. they play dark old school hardcore with a metal edge and the two songs on this were a teaser for their full length 'minister of death'. good stuff. i'm looking out for their other stuff on coloured vinyl. if some one can help out?

crazy gold vinyl. held straight against the light it looks like clear vinyl with some dirty smoke in it. 

held in a different angle it looks like flowing gold. amazing colouring!

depending on which side you prefer you can call this split 'soul and death' (zero mentality for 'invite your soul') or 'death and soul' (the setup for 'minister of death'). clever packaging!

gold vinyl. 400 made. demons run amok entertainment. 2006.

nb pre-order: knuckledust

knuckledust - bluffs, lies & alibis

my mail address is part of the gsr-music mailing list. therefore i'm pretty up to date when it comes to new releases. i believe it was august when a new mail of gsr appeared in my mail account. two dispatches i was excited about. first was the new release of 'born from pain' and 2nd the new effort of knuckledust with a video of each band's single. whilst born from pain's new song plain sucked (they are just not the same without che on vocals) i was very pleased with knuckledust's song. gsr-music is from the netherlands and that's why i didn't want to pre-order directly from them because of shipping costs. i knew i could get it from per koro rec after the release date. only thing a bit risky was the point that i couldn't pre-order plus the low pressing number of 300. but i know that there isn't much of a hype about knuckledust so i wanted to take the risk.

one day sneaking around at nuclear blast i faced the opportunity to pre-oder it after all for a reasonable price and reasonable shipping. sometimes my self-control pays off :)

this album is quite good. maybe the best stuff i heard of this institution from london. some punk influenced hardcore with lots of crew-shouting (i love crew shouts) and some thrash metal influenced hardcore. great mix which makes the record a real treat!

the record comes in a gatefold sleeve, 180gr vinyl and a download card. i have what the label states to be 'oxblood' vinyl out of 200. looks more like brown but i think that's just the way oxblood red looks like. another 100 pressed on dark-grey. gsr-music. 2012

the river card big cartel

the river card - momentum

yet another find inspired by j@screamingforrecords. seems that it's always worthwhile to check his posts ;-) greetings to you, dude.

the river card is a british band playing hardcore in the vein of bands like naysayer, backtrack, cruel hand, ect. 'momentum' is a pretty strong record and if you can get into afore-mentioned bands you should definitely check them out. listen to the album on their bandcamp site from which you can get forwarded to the big cartel shop. exactly from that shop i ordered. as i got the stuff and opened the record i was a little bit confused not to find a download dropcard of which i thought that i read something about in the description at the shop. so i thought i could download them at the bandcamp site like this is sometimes possible with other bands. but nope, no option like this at bandcamp. i didn't really pursued a solution 'cause i was a little tied up in work. one day i got a mail by chris (don't know if it was the drummer or the singer, they're both named chris) sending me over my download code and apologising for forgetting to include it. decent chaps!

lovely cover art! i like it a lot. white w/ red splatter vinyl. 100 made (and still available). bare necessities records. 2012.

the river card - the great fall 7"

of course i wouldn't buy just one item when checking the other stuff. so i grabbed this nicely coloured 7" 'the great fall' which came out two years before 'momentum' was released. actually two songs were featured on this release first before appearing again on the full length (the songs 'the great fall' and 'momentum' obviously). sound wise i prefer the 7" to the 12" - the drum sound is more organic.

 again the cover art is superb!

great white/grey split vinyl. 200 made. a clear vinyl version also available (300 made). bare necessities. 2010.

ugly & proud rec.: raindance/allocation split

raindance-allocation split 7"

since i fell in love with allocation's 10" 'corvus corax, corvus corone [soul birds]' i wanted the rest of their stuff available. speaking of that there was a split 7" with a band called raindance. just like the 10" i ordered this split directly from the ugly and proud bigcartel shop. the allocation songs are just lovely! dark, depressing tunes from these belgians. raindance is a band from massachusetts. they contribute only one song to this split and i don't like it. they are compared to strife and 108. i cannot endorse the comparisons made but i have to admit that i'm not too familiar with those bands.

again an allocation release comes with a nice artwork. it was made by a guy named volker henze. in regard to the name this seems to be a german guy. i googled the name and an artist from berlin was the first hit. couldn't find any link between him and that release so i can't be 100% sure. if you consider that this 7" is a co-operational release by ugly and proud and zwarte dood records this is an all international thing. a band from the states + a band from belgium + a label from bulgaria (ugly&proud) + a label from belgium (zwarte dood) + presumably an artist from germany.

this is the complete artwork unfolded. additionally i got a short note by niki - the guy running ugly&proud. i love stuff like this. makes you feel like being part of a big hardcore family ;-)

a pretty cool effect emerges when held against the light. nice marbled vinyl. 100 copies made. another 100 on clear vinyl. ugly & proud records/zwarte dood recordings. 2011.

steeltown rec.: the lines we cross

the lines we cross - s/t 7"

actually i don't have fragrant memories concerning this order at steeltwon records, a german d.i.y. label from eisenhüttenstadt. i was looking for a record from narziss, a not very popular german new school hardcore band with german lyrics. steeltown had it in store and i included some other stuff to make the order worthwhile. i picked up project print 3# (reading project print 4# already led the pleasant discovery of wolfxdown as you can read here) and the self titled 7" of 'the lines we cross' - a band from my former hometown leipzig which i also discovered by reading that fanzine.

first thing that sucked was the information within an e-mail which was forwarded to me by the guy running the label. he told me that he was sorry but the 'narziss' record had sold out. it had been a shelf warmer for years but then somehow a great demand for it came up and i was too late... shit!

anyway, i ordered the rest.

there are two versions available. a white one and the orange vinyl you can see here. i ordered the orange 7". but then what i got was a white copy plus the wrong fanzine. 4# which i already have instead of 3#. i was pissed. as friendly as i could be i wrote a mail to steeltown asking for the right stuff. they asked me to send back the wrong items. i wasn't very happy with paying extra money for postage but then again anyone can have a bad day, right? fuck the €1,50!

i got my orange copy within two days and all trouble was forgotten. the colour of the vinyl is kind of pale but that makes it an interesting shade of orange. that thing which looks like a curtain in picture one is the fold out insert and the flip side is shown on pic two. as a bonus you get a patch and a download dropcard for their first full length album 'screams at sunday morning' which was released some month earlier in 2011.

the lines we cross play some old school melodic hardcore. good stuff, not briliant but solid. all together 1000 copies made. all hand numbered. 500 white and 500 clear orange. steeltown records. 2011.

ebay: cradle of filth

cradle of filth - darkly, darkly, venus aversa
yep, stone me to death but i'm a cof fan, at least their post 2000 stuff up from 'midian'. i love those freaky islander with their bombastic sound scapes and their metal punk attitude! the first song/video i heard/saw of them was 'babalon a.d.' from their scorcher 'damnation and a day'. not long ago i held the cd version of this album in my hands and thought: 'damn! i definitely should have this one on vinyl.' that was the point from where i was looking out for cof vinyl. the first record i could get my hands on through ebay is their latest output 'darkly, darkly, venus aversa'. it's one of their lesser good albums but still a crazy journey through many styles of metal. another thing which sets them apart from other bands in that genre and which makes them unique is the lyrical content. they deal with the mythological character liltih. a kind of female demon who gets reincarnated in the body of a nun after she was exhumed by some isaac. this is how far i got with understanding :-)

there is some more stuff going on which i fail to comprehend and to speculate about would lead too far into irrelevant detail. the record comes as a double vinyl version. record one on opaque blue and record two on opaque dark red.

gatefold sleeve and printed dust sleeves with all lyrics.

their brand new effort 'manticore' will be released on first of november this year i think. i already put my pre-order in. thankfully 'damnation and a day' will be re-issued this month by music on vinyl. i included that on one in my pre-order. so expect more cof stuff soon.
2000 copies made. mine is 1707. peaceville records. 2010.

ebay usa: nile

nile - annihilation of the wicked

after i picked up 'those whom the gods detest' i really wanted to score this one, my favourite nile record, desperately. just like with 'those whom the gods detest' i waited pretty long on a discogs option, this time with the end result that it was gone before i decided to get it. arrgghh... he that will not hear must feel... 

so i extended my range of purchase options onto ebay worldwide as i was able to track down various stuff from e.g. ebay france or ebay usa in the past (not only records). the problem was to find a seller who would offer a coloured version plus for an, in my eyes, adequate price. thank god for the official exchange rate of the euro at the moment. i came upon a buy it now offering of $44,99 for the grey marbled version which is round about €35. i thought that'd be adequate and i pushed the button.

all in all with shipping it cost me around €50 which is quite a lot money for a record for me but it seems that it won't show up for less referring to popsike.com so i'm ok with it. the record itself comes as a double vinyl version on a marbled opaque grey colour. record two is way more marbled then #1. 

printed dust sleeves and a gatefold cover indeed. the liner notes and the lyrics are put down on the inner gatefold all together which is a better solution compared to 'those whom the gods detest', where the lyrics and the liner notes are printed seperately on inner gatefold and dust sleeves.

i love the black and red colour scheme on this. looks real apocalyptic. the god sebek on the back.

side d contains an etching. as i pulled out my digi-pak version of the cd i realised that the cd label and the etching are one and the same picture, only i don't know what it shows :-) looks lovely put against the light correctly. the picture really doesn't do the actual effect justice but it was hard to capture with my shitty digi-cam.

900 made. relapse records. 2005.