Abolition LP

I'm now going to talk about something that is an increasingly rare event for me - picking up a new release! I got this one about three months ago, but as ever I am behind with this blog and now trying to get caught up by the end of the year.

This here post is dedicated to the debut LP by ABOLITION, a straight edge band who hail from London, UK (i.e. just up the road from me). Abolition have been going for a couple of years now and prior to this LP released a couple of 7"s. They also played first on the bill at last year's UK Unbroken show which seemed very apt seeing as Unbroken are probably their biggest influence. I've met their guitarist Sam a few times and dude is chill. A young kid who knows more about 90s hardcore than most people who lived through the 90s and who (bizarrely for someone in their early 20s) collects Moo Cow Records releases. You can't get much more 90s than that. Anyway, even if you never met Sam, you'd be able to figure pretty quickly that Abolition are heavily influenced by the 90s. They sound like someone threw a few mid 90s metallic edge records in a blender. I hear elements that remind me of Unbroken, Abhinanda, Chokehold, Harvest, Strain, Outspoken, Strife, etc. I think it's probably fair to say that not for sixteen years have I heard a band that sounds so much like 1995.

In terms of the record itself, I pre-ordered and got one of the 100 red vinyl copies, which are now sold out (just like the majority of the bands I mentioned above - ha!).

The LP was released by Holy Roar Records, but also features some weird logo for something called Pink Mist (which is a collaboration of Holy Roar & a couple of other labels). Kinda odd that the whole of the front & back cover is black & white except for this stupid pink logo in the top left corner. Ruins the vibe if you ask me.

I'm also digging the shout out to straight edge. Feels very 90s to me.

Overall I think this LP sounds great. The music is much more powerful than previous releases, although I think this is probably in part owed to the quality of the recording, which really is top notch. Whilst I thought that I had tired of that sound and left it in the past, listening this LP has made me realise that a lot of the mid 90s metallic sxe stuff does still sounds good today, and it's good to see that this sound is not exclusively the preserve of a few bitter old bastards trying desperately to hang on to the glory days of their youth that probably sucked anyway.