ebay: the distance

the distance demo ep 7"

this was more an impulse buy on ebay. it was sunday, i had nothing to do but surfing around a bit on ebay and through references of madball and terror in the description i stumbled across this auction. there were only some minutes left and no bid. the guy selling it said that this is the pre-order edition of very limited quantity. ok, if nobody wanted it i would take it for some peanuts. no sooner said than done. i won it for one lousy euro and some postage. 

the 7" comes with the big hole, hand stamped labels and is one-sided. what the hell?! a one sided 7"? weird! i mean, why would someone do that when there are four songs of more or less normal length? but anyway, the cover can be folded out into a nice poster. not that i would hang it on the wall because then there would be no cover, but it looks nice.

the dust sleeve is stamped too. as i said before i bought this because there was the opportunity to get it on the cheap and not because i really wanted it. i listened to this two or three times but i don't really like the distance. this will be filed away with the good feeling to have it in the pre-order version. that's it.

white marbled blue vinyl. 100 made. takeover records. 2003.

impericon: war from a harlots mouth

war from a harlots mouth - voyeur

my goodness, after i listened to this record for the first time i had to lean back and take a deep breath. wfahm asks a lot of the listener! 'voyeur' gives you everything if you're willing to make the effort. it's fast, it's slow, it's chaotic, it's heavy, it's dark, it's dreamy, it's frightening, it's quiet, it's beautiful - all of this on a vinyl plate. they pretty much stood true to their development. the next logical step so to speak. it's not far from 'mmx' but you can't deny the new additions to their sound. first thing that jumps right at you is the cleaner sound. 'mmx' rumbled a bit more. these changes are always a question of personal taste. i like it. next thing is nico the singer. almost imperceptibly he added more variety. listen to 'the black lodge' and you'll know what i mean. lastly and i think this is more a personal opinion again, this record is darker. from the cover art, over the intro, skip and outro (old horror movie string ensemble) to the lyrics which all seem to deal with the current control mania in western society and the trend of building total police states. there is an overall dark feeling to it.

it's amazing how wfahm plays with harmonies and disharmonies. they are always hard on the edge of overstepping the mark of too much dissonance before they push you into another wonderful soundscape. check the song 'scopophobia' on youtube with guest vocals by arkadi zaslavski of dioramic. i think it's pretty representive for the rest of the songs.

wfahm changed their record label for this release. from lifeforce records to season of mist records from france. at first i thought i had to order from france because the most common distro nuclear blast records didn't offer it. 'damned be foreign shipping costs!' was my thought. moreover i exchanged some mails with a dude of season of mist asking for eventual colour pressings. he said that most likely it would appear only on black vinyl. so my anticipation wasn't that cheerful. that changed immediately as i got a link to the impericon site, a german hardcore merchandise giant. first point to be happy about was the lower shipping costs and the second was the pre-order deal.

with the lovely clear vinyl came a download card, a poster, a sticker and a shirt. nice stuff! on the bonus stuff picture you can see the cut out pressing info sticker that was attached to the shrink wrap. as i always remove the shrink wrap to store the records into reclosable poly bags, the attempts of removing these stickers are everytime a gamble. sometimes they can be removed easily, sometimes they crease or even rip. after a great trick revealed by mike of the one thing that still holds true blog i was able to solve that problem ;-)

season of mist records. 2012.

ebay: black friday '29

black friday '29 - the pursuit of happiness

one of many pick ups i made on ebay recently. as i mentioned before in my verse posts, this type of hardcore engrossed me lately. black friday '29 is, or better was a band out of the ruhrpott area, germany. they were pretty popular and one of the heavyweights of european straight edge hardcore. i don't know if their reputation made it across the pond but u.s. fellows may know them by the split shared with death before dishonor on bridge9. anyway, this album was their 2nd output and is such a great record. songs like 'ghosts' or 'the best in me' are real crackers. timeless!

i scored this clear version for 8 bucks which is definitely at less than fair value. but who am i to complain? it was a bargain. 

the cd version was released on blacktop records. never heard of them. the vinyl got put out on uk's dead and gone records. irony of fate this label is just what they were calling themselves. 

clear vinyl. 300 made. dead and gone records. 2007. 

cobra rec.: coldburn, empowerment, hell & back

coldburn - the harsh fangs of life
pre-order time at cobra records. previously i wrote about coldburn's first 7" called 'hybris'. their full length is definitely a step forward. they still got these pretty unique melodies and strange but lovely pace changes included in their heavy hardcore sound. what really stands out is the development of the singing abilities of the vocalist. he added a melodic edge to his screaming without ever sounding cheesy. all in all they don't managed to keep the high quality of the first half of the record throughout the whole play time but that just means that they're that close to a masterpiece.

the record comes in a nice matte paper sleeve and with a poly bag that has a sticker with band and album name attached to it. furthermore you get the always welcomed download dropcard.

i have the pre-order version. i got sweaty hands as i read the colour description 'red/white'. thought it'd be a split coloured record. as i pulled it out of the dust sleeve i was a bit disappointed. it's a clear red vinyl with some white streaks. they are hard to see, not only in this picture :-)
pre-order edition. limited to 100 copies. cobra records. 2012.

empowerment - gegen.kult
this stuttgart based band with ex-members of teamkiller got a bit hyped recently but empowerment deserves this. they are different to your average hardcore band repeating itself over and over again. they maybe aren't different in music but definitely in words. empowerment has a message and plenty of statements. statements against rasicm, police, politics, consumerism and conformity. loud and clear, without any metaphors or common phrases - and in german. so this will probably stay a german thing. but even if your mother tongue isn't german, empowerment is packed with energy and that'll work non verbally. music is somewhere around madball, merauder and biohazard. nyc school ;-) listen to it here.

the packaging is outstanding, too. the sleeve has some kind of cardboard turntable attached under the upper cover. so you can choose between 4 characters standing in the door of the trailer.

i've chosen the best looking chick ;-) additonally you get a fold out lyric sheet in poster format with a band picture on the flip side. sadly there is no download card but i got the rarest vinyl colour so that thing evens itself out.

cyan blue vinyl. 200 made. cobra records. 2012.

hell & back - everything you say is just how bad things are 7"

another band out of stuttgart. usually this isn't my taste. you find hell & back somewhere between punkrock and hardcore. but this is such great, positive music that makes you feel good immediately. i couldn't resist... my girlfriend said it sounds a bit like old foo fighters. yeah, she isn't that far away. you can listen to their stuff over at partyausfall.

just like the coldburn lp i thought i would get a split coloured 7". description was red/clear vinyl... ok, i should have known. i was lesser interested in the 'clear/black' coloured vinyl. now i saw that it's clear with black smoke. damn! but to be honest, i'm not too bothered to buy another copy. although it itches...

200 made. comes with a download code. cobra records. 2012.

ebay: only attitude counts

boy, i can't catch up with myself at the moment. the records are piling higher and by now i have a two months delay from recieving to finally writing about them. the main problem here is that i want to really listen to the music to form a proper opinion. so here is what i purchased in early october on the bay.

only attitude counts - triumph of the underdogs

this record i see around ebay every once in a while. it often comes up as a 'side effect' when i search for bands like agnostic front or sick of it all. this austrian band is one of the 'i heard of them but i never came around checking them out' bands. this record is up on ebay by multiple sellers for a buy it now price from 12€ to 16€. these sellers don't provide much detailed descriptions and so i couldn't tell if there was a coloured pressing. but i didn't really checked discogs or any other source for pressing informations either, other stuff caught my attention at the time.

one day, i was poking around ebay killing time i found a seller who had a proper picture of the actual item up showing white vinyl. as i'm always out for new records i finally took the chance scoring it at a low price. my maximum bid of 6,57€ was the winning bid. i think i didn't even listen to a single song of that album before. i fully based this purchase on the low price and the fact that tue madsen and his antfarm studios did the production on this. i wasn't let down.

the comparisons with agnostic front and sick of it all are quite appropriate when you think of the recent outputs of that nyhc legends. more af if you ask me. nothing new here but they sound fresh and there's no way of holding still when the needle is dropped. to my disappointment this vienna based band called it a day in 2010.
don't know how many were made. white vinyl. thingamajigger records. 2009.

xsentientx: verse

firstly you may have recognized that i changed a bit the look of this page. inspired by other blogs i wanted to give it a more personal look - but maybe it looks just like the other blogs right now ;-) i like it anyway... 

verse - from anger and rage

realising just what a great band i missed when i listened to the first verse record "rebuild", the hunt was immediately on for other releases. "from anger and rage" is their 2nd album from 2006. as this record is similarly admired it foreshadowed that it would be difficult to get an original pressing of rivalry records. i was outbid several times on ebay and so i searched some distro to probably have it in stock. per koro, unlike the last time for "rebuild" was a dead end. so i put 'verse from anger and rage lp' in the search field of a popular search engine and came across a d.i.y. distro from bremen, germany. xsentientx mailorder is the name. as luck would have it, the in my last verse post mentioned label prügelprinz records, that already re-released "rebuild", did also a re-release of "from anger and rage" for a similar occasion (euro tour 2008) and xsentientx had some in stock.. 

prügelprinz did three colour variations. regular black, clear red with black splatter and a black/red split. if you are a constant reader you know that i'm a sucker for split coloured vinyl. i just love the look of it! so i requested one and i was happy to recieve a mail with a positive answer. especially as this was the rarest colour of this re-press.

it comes in a lovely gatefold sleeve with all lyrics. positive and straight forward political. stuff which is not to be consumed easily but i like it that way. it challenges you to think, just like good hardcore should.

just like "rebuild" the dust sleeve is stamped and hand numbered. love the way the stamping is split coloured too. nice touch. all in all a lovely packaging by prügelprinz records. 275 made. 2008 re-press.

coldburn big cartel

coldburn - hybris 7"

coldburn are a young band from leipzig, germany. by the time i was living in leipzig i heard nothing of that band. but maybe they didn't existed when i left town, 2010 that was. anyway, i check the cobra records site from time to time and came across a pre-order for their latest output 'the harsh fangs of life' of which i will post soon. i checked their stuff at bandcamp and was blown away by the song 'love left me'. if you like stuff in the vein of naysayer, final prayer, backtrack, downpresser and and and... check it and get it!

after informing myself about other releases i hit their big cartel shop and ordered one of the last copies of their first 7", called 'hybris'. lucky me!

lovely cover art work. reminds me of terror's 'always the hard way'. actually i don't know which piece of art they used as cover here. maybe someone adept in art can shed some light?

the 7" comes in a fold around piece of thick cardboard. looks nice! the record itself is on bottle clear vinyl. you can download this release at their bandcamp site. 

worship records. 2011.

per koro: verse, backtrack

verse - rebuild

i didn't know verse until this year. i mean, i heard of their name once or twice in the past, for sure. but i thought they just wouldn't be my cup of tea somehow. and actually that maybe would have been the case. but in the more recent past i'm opening myself to a wider range of hardcore stuff. i used to listen to a lot of so-called "tough-guy" hardcore. stuff like hatebreed, first blood, black my heart, born from pain, etc. i still like this way of hardcore but now i find myself liking this type of melodic hardcore (or whatever it is called) in the vein of verse pretty much. the actual initiation to check them out came through the band carpathian from australia. i love their 'isolation' album and their music is often compared to verse.

the only problem that emerged after i decided that i wanted a copy of this record, was the fact that 'rebuild' was released in 2004. considering the big status this first output has i was pretty sure i would have to pay big money on ebay. just out of curiosity (i wasn't really expecting to find anything) i put 'verse' into the search box at per koro. i was surprised to find a copy on vinyl, especially the addition 'coloured' got my heart beating faster. no hestitation. i placed an order.

more information from discogs led to the insight that this version is a 2012 re-press by prügelprinz records in celebration of their euro-tour '12. after i saw all the other colours of the original pressings by rivalry records and the re-presses by prügelprinz i'm quite happy with this cream colour. beside the marbled green vinyl of the first press this is my favourite.

the record comes with the original artwork on heavy cardboard and hand numbered, stamped dust sleeves. i have 119 out of 141. the fold out insert comes in poster size. one side with the lyrics, flip side with the cover art. nicely done by prügelprinz. this label seems to be an one man enterprise with a strong political left wing attitude. maybe i'm wrong but check the banner on their blogspot ;-)

marbled cream vinyl. prügelprinz records. 2012.

backtrack - deal with the devil 7"

a band i wanted to check just because of the strong reaper records roaster. i wasn't let down. damn, that 7" sounds rad. from the first tune to the last this stuff grabs you and just won't let go. 'deal with the devil' was released by 6131 records and their pressing info says clear vinyl, black vinyl and blue vinyl. so when i got my copy that i ordered together with the verse record i was surprised to see that it's a clear red copy. wow, is that something special? checking jake's blog i came to the harsh realisation that it's just a copy of the 2nd pressing. but fuck it, i still like it.

deal with the devil that i try to escape

don't know about pressing numbers. it was supposed to come with a digital download. mine seems to be gone... clear red vinyl. 6131 records. 2009.

ebay: meltdown

meltdown - demolition + demo 12"
a chance bargain i made here. i came across the name meltdown several times before and just knew that their demolition 7" got quite some positive response. so as i was looking around the bay i found this,again, lovely demons run amok release. i was bidding on some other stuff ending the same day as the meltdown record. i threw in some max bids and unfortunately the only record i got was this european release of meltdown's 7". but hey, i don't want to complain. as said it was a real bargain.

the band features members/ex-members of verse and learn but i'm not too interested to find out who. meltdown plays some heavily thrash metal influenced hardcore. although sometimes they play more hardcore influenced thrash. a lot of anthrax and a lot of slayer. it's a fun listen for sure. but at the end of the day nothing really sticks in mind. but that's propably just me not being the biggest thrash metal fan. this european release came out a bit later than the u.s. and was issued by dead serious recordings. the vinyl release was handled by demons run amok rec. it comes with the demo that was released one year earlier, i believe.

clear green vinyl. 418 made. printed dust sleeve. demons run amok entertainment. 2007.

discogs: down to nothing

down to nothing - the most

i have to admit it took me some time to warm up with down to nothing. i remember this record being hyped pretty much here in germany when it came out. i think i listened to one or two of songs at the time but it didn't really grab me. i saw them playing live in leipzig with some other bands (terror, the ghost inside i believe). their show was pretty intense. lot of action in the crowd, sing-a-longs, stage dives - the whole thing. i enjoyed it but i tend to like every hardcore band live when they play their stuff with energy and are able to set the crowd into movement. so with the songs in mind that didn't grab me i didn't put any effort into getting to know this band better. five years later i'm checking out alot of different vinyl blogs around the net and what do you think which record strikes my eye with persistence?! time to think over my previous opinion.

pretty good stuff! songs like 'conquer the world', 'serve and neglect' or 'higher learning' don't get out of my head. a short, crisply record that has everything a good hardcore album needs. i recently read that they were writing new stuff - good news. before that i need to check the rest of their releases. 

i bought this record off a guy from france at discogs. it's of the second pressing and as i'm a big fan of split colouring i'm very pleased with it. great combination. 

clear purple / opaque orange split vinyl. 525 made. revelation records. 2007.