ebay: empty handed, bleed into one

empty handed - perspectives 7"

i got to know this band by reading a fanzine called 'project print'. i discovered some other bands through the same way as you can read here. empty handed is a young band from leipzig, germany and they formed in 2009, i think. they play some modern, emotional hardcore i would call it. reminds me of verse and carpathian. it was actually released in 2011 as a co-release of four labels: blackheart inc., anchored rec., heads down rec. and shitpiece rec. two colour ways were made back then. a blue/black and a white with black marble version. i missed it in 2011 and as it had sold out, ebay was the best opportunity.

the seller loaded up a pretty blurry picture of the record but i was pretty sure it was the blue/black vinyl. i won the record for a really reasonable price and as i opened the package i was surprised that what was in front of me was the more limited white or better grey with black marble version with an even unused download dropcard. cool thing!

the second press is up now at blackheart inc. bigcartel. first press: 100 on grey with black marble vinyl and 200 on blue/black vinyl. 2011.

bleed into one 7"

this may be the last release of bleed into one according to musik-sammler.de. a shame that is because it's really good. the songs of side a are just class a! a whole record that way and they would have gone through the roof! side b isn't that overwhelming but still good.

it came out in 2010. don't know if it's some kind of farewell release but they broke up shortly after that, i think. it was released on final exit records. stunning how many little d.i.y. labels are around in germany.

i got this 7" from the same seller and it came for cheap too. a real bargain with this two 7"es. i didn't find any pressing information on this one but considering the small popularity of both, label and band, i doubt it was more than 500. don't know about other colours as well. 

final exit records. 2010.

nb pre-order: hatebreed, the black dahlia murder

hatebreed - the divinity of purpose

a hardcore heavyweight. around since the mid nineties and they never seem to disappoint me. i know them since their probably most successful album 'perseverance' (which screems for a proper vinyl treatment!) but after 'supremacy' of 2006 i little bit lost track of them. as soon as nuclear blast announced the release of the new record 'the divinity of purpose' i had the determing feeling that i got to have it.

and again no disappointment. the record is more in the vein of the 'supremacy' spirit. while 'satisfaction is the death of desire', 'perseverance' and 'rise of brutality' especially were really angry or rather pissed, 'divinity...' is a positive, head-up, looking forward piece of heavy hardcore.

while i like the pissed albums more, 'divinity...' is still packed with mean breakdowns that weigh tons, lovely crew-shouts and just good and simple hardcore. you get what you expect and that's a good thing. i saw them live in hamburg in january with agnostic front, h2o and the acacia strain and yes hatebreed has grown way more professional over the years than your average hardcore band. and yes, to me that kills a bit the feeling of meeting a whole bunch of friends, stage diving and singing along, but hatebreed still delivers and it was a cool gig - even without the possibility of climbing the stage...

nuclear blast did the vinyl version for europe. while razor and tie released it on a single lp version for america, nb made it two lp's with a d-side etching. the first coloured version that was available was white. i pre-ordered it and shortly after that nb put up a clear red version. but i think opaque colours look nicer and so i stuck with white.

the whole presentation is quality through and through. heavy gatefold sleeve, nice layout of the inner sleeve with all lyrics, additional poster, 180gr white double vinyl and one fresh hatebreed skull etching on side d. only thing i can complain about is the missing of a download option. don't know why nuclear blast and metal blade avoid to include them. the third of the big three (century media) gives you a cd with every vinyl release which is even better than a download code. so why don't you, nuclear blast and metal blade?

this baby is limited to 150 copies. mine is number 24. nuclear blast. 2013.

the black dahlia murder - nocturnal

good re-release! or better: good vinyl release! 'nocturnal' was my personal door opener to the black dahlia murder. of course i knew 'unhallowed' and 'miasma' before, i actually had them on cd but i was never completely sold to tbdm. so i remember that i wasn't too keen about this album. but i ordered it after it was out and i was blown away by it. the musical fury and those occult, old horror movie -ish lyrics made this real special.

so now, six years after its initial cd release, metal blade decided to release this modern classic on the one and only true format. no gatefold sleeve which i prefer, printed dust sleeve, a poster and clear blue vinyl with black smoke. good vinyl colour choice as it matches the damn cool cover art. finally this album sounds great on vinyl!

in early february i saw them live in hamburg together with devildriver and cannibal corpse. as devildriver live  always disappoints me (they sounded like a mess the three times i saw them) and cannibal corpse is cannibal corpse, the black dahlia murder were just great. lots of energy and the singer trevor got this infernal grin the whole time, you really could see that he was living tbdm's music.

the album is limited to 500 units worldwide. at least that is what the sticker says. another source (discogs) says that there are 1000 copies. but i don't really care how many copies existing. i just lean back and give 'nocturnal' another spin. 

metal blade records. 2007/2013.

shark men rec.: zero mentality, bury my sins, at daggers drawn

zero mentality - black rock

i really fell in love with their 2nd full length 'invite your soul' and so i was out for their other two releases. their debut 'in fear of forever' (which seems to be pretty hard to come by on coloured vinyl) and their last output 'black rock'. the last mentioned i can now remove from my list. i was looking around a bit on discogs with no direct intention of buying anything. i stumbled upon a seller named shark men records. in my previous post a shark men release was just the referred to object. so i thought i should check out what else shark men has put out because i wasn't really familiar with their releases.

to my surprise i found out that black rock got the vinyl treatment through shark men and that there were still some limited copies of the pre-order run left over. for the ridiculous amount of €5 i just couldn't say no. the fact that i could get a pre-order copy for lousy five bucks doesn't really speaks for the record but hell no! some people just don't seem to recognize a quality record. the album is superb!

ok, it's not a second 'invite your soul' and the last third of the record lacks a bit power but it's still a damned good listen. period! as the album title implies they developed an even more rock sound. and then with the crossover of hardcore and metal they just can't do wrong for me. check out the song 'electric lips'. just the right song for driving to work in the middle of winter's return here in north-germany.

the purple record is housed in a lovely gatefold sleeve of thick quality and comes with a poster, a sticker and a download dropcard. the cd version was handled by powertrip records. white vinyl version with a lot of multi-colour traces in the vinyl. don't know how many have been made. 

shark men records. 2009.

bury my sins - rats e.p.

bury my sins was a small german metalcore band that never really got any attention. before this e.p., which was their last release, they can look back on two full length albums. they were washed up in the flow of many german metalcore bands in the mid 00's but did only small local shows, which isn't a bad thing though. they called it a day in 2011.

like all their other stuff the music here is quite good. it's not a masterpiece but enjoyable (this will probably explain their comparatively little reputation). really cool is the life of agony cover song 'river runs red' at the end of side two. again the price for this record was so low that i just had to buy this.

the description at discogs said that the vinyl would come with a download code. but as i opened the package i just couldn't find a dropcard. i actually wanted to contact shark men but then i found what i failed to notice all the time. the code is glued on the printed dust sleeve. cool idea!

shark men called this colour 'golden' vinyl. i don't know. in a certain light it looks like some kind of gold, pretty dark though. against the daylight it looks more like a shade of green. pressed on pretty thick 10" vinyl and 500 copies in total.

shark men records. 2010.

at daggers drawn - new bruises e.p.

to be honest i wouldn't have bought this when it was only about this record. i got a bit over excited as i saw the prices with that shark men offered their stuff. and as i just had to pay three more coins i just thought why the hell not. i listened to one song on youtube and decided it was good enough to loose 3€.

and for that amount it was worth it. ok, it's post hardcore and i usually don't even have a good yawn listening to that kind of music but i can enjoy at daggers drawn from berlin. make your own opinion here.

the presentation by shark men is again out of question. top notch! thick gatefold sleeve with all lyrics inside, thick clear 10" vinyl and some extras.

a self written postcard by the band (cool), a band sticker and the always welcomed download dropcard. couldn't find pressing information. shark men rec. 2011.

additionally i got a whole bunch of other stickers. among them was one that is so good that i probably will never use it because i don't know a place worthy of it. check this.

awesome!

ebay: molotov solution-wfahm, black friday '29-death before dishonor

molotov solution - war from a harlots mouth split 10"

another big want off of my list. i can't really tell you anymore how i came across this release in the first place. i think it was played by a friend of mine in the youth club i was hanging around at the time. he used to love every kind of music which was complex and hard to get into - 'frickel' core we called it, which i would, referring to the dictionary, translate as tinker core. so when he was playing some new cd he was excited about he always wanted everybody else in the room to pay full attention to the music. and when a part would come he thought was cool he said 'listen to that, listen to that!' and was imitating the guitar or drum play of that part. most of the time nobody really got what he was talking about :-) what a guy... wonder what he is doing now...

if memory serves one cd he came up with was this split of molotov solution from the u.s. and germany's war from a harlots mouth. unlike the majority of the stuff he usually put on i instantly liked this because of the odd jazz parts both bands included in their sound. inspired by this listen i bought the cd, this time i really can't remember where from. i think this was one of the very first deathcore stuff around. a style that was fresh and new at the time and both bands have outgrown by now. molotov solution because they disbanded and war from a harlots mouth because they play their own kind of music now - like meshuggah maybe.

i myself don't care about this breakdown-death metal-pig squeals music of today either so this is more like a relict. but one i definitely enjoy. still sounds great! i won this on ebay and since i'm into vinyl it was the first time it was up. so i was bound and determined and got it for a good price, i think.

the cd-version appeared in 2006 on twelve gauge records and shark men records, which is a small independent label from my former home town leipzig, did the vinyl pressing for this release. it was pressed on 10" format and 528 copies in total. 418 on black and only 110 on coloured vinyl. pink. it comes with a nice gatefold sleeve which is hand numbered. my number is pretty low - #3.

shark men records. 2007.

death before dishonor - black friday '29 split 7"

along the molotov solution-wfahm split i scored a copy of this 7" from the same seller for combined shipping. this was one of the records that i would take for the right price only. i got outbid on two other occasions and i wouldn't have been too sorry if it didn't work out this time as well. 

but as luck would have it i got it for lousy 4€. a nice addition. as i gave it a spin i realised that all the songs on this split were in my collection already. the death before honor part is taken from 'count me in' and the bf '29 part is taken from 'the escape'. released as a teaser for their full length releases that i already have, made this a little bit of a let down. this will be filed away with the satisfying knowledge of possession.

1500 copies of this split were pressed in total. 1000 of it on opaque yellow with black splatter and 500 on clear with black splatter vinyl. i have one of the last mentioned as you can see.

bridge9 records. 2006.

hellion store: behemoth

behemoth - the apostasy

i really like the last three behemoth releases - demigod, the apostasy and evangelion namely. fast, technical death metal with loads of blasts and doomy melodies plus an mystical edge to the lyrics is just the right mixture for me. i knew that the local hellion record store had in stock since i saw it several times before. after i could pick up 'demigod' in the same store it was about time for 'the apostasy'. of the three behemoth records i like, 'the apostasy' is the lesser good one which doesn't mean this is a bad record. not at all. it's a damn good listen, i just enjoy the other two a bit more.

the vinyl copy i have is a re-press of 2009 made by back on black. regain records, which originally gave the album the vinyl treatment, pressed it on black vinyl only. so i'm happy that b.o.b. made a limited run on coloured vinyl. i scored it for a very reasonable €15 price tag.

the record comes with a gatefold sleeve and on heavy 180gr milky clear vinyl. so the presentation is pretty much top notch. only thing which is a pain in the arse is the missing of the lyrics. back on black did the same with the 'demigod' re-release. that sucks! i mean, i have the cd version too so i have them anyway but why just drop them, back on black? if it's not working with the layout of the inner sleeve then an insert would have made me happy too. ok, whatever - the album sounds great on vinyl.

back on black. 2009.