Bridge Nine #60

Any idea what Bridge Nine's 60th release is/was? Well, according to the discography, B9R060 is this weird CD compilation which was apparently only available from Hot Topic and the B9 webstore.

Interestingly, however, B9R060 was originally intended to be something else entirely. Specifically, the second album from No Warning, entitled 'Suffer Survive'. This originally came out on CD only on some whack label that was part of a major called Machine Shop Records. I remember at the time hearing a few people talking about how bad it was, and that it sounded like Linkin Park. The fact that there was no vinyl and everybody said it sucked meant that I decided not to waste my precious money or time with it. Yes, that's right... I wrote it off without even giving it a chance. If I'm honest though, if Bridge Nine would have put it out on vinyl I would definitely have picked up a copy. But they didn't and I didn't. Fast forward about 6 years to a time when it was easier to check music out without buying it, and I was listening to 'Ill Blood' when a thought entered my brain - 'Why don't I check out the second album?'. So I downloaded it, prepared myself to laugh and/or hit the delete button pretty fast, and sat back. What I heard was not what I was expecting at all. Ok, sure, it was different to 'Ill Blood', but it was hardly Linkin Park. After a couple more listens I began to really enjoy it, and pretty soon I was addicted to it. Shit me, I LOVED it. And I could have had this record in my life six years earlier if I weren't such an idiot.

Well, fast forward another two years and I am now the lucky owner of a vinyl copy of this record. But hang on a second, didn't I just say that there wasn't a vinyl pressing of this? Well, yes, that's right. Almost. Bridge Nine did have the rights to release this on vinyl back in 2004, to the point where a test pressing (consisting of 16 records) was made. After this, the release was scrapped and the B9R060 catalogue number was given to the compilation CD I referred to above. I'm not exactly sure what happened. Rumours and folklore suggest that the album was so badly received that everyone involved wanted to pretend it didn't exist and move on. All I know is that this is perhaps the most 'exclusive' record that I own. I can't think of anything else I own where there are less than 16 copies on vinyl in total.

Perhaps unsurprisingly, the band didn't last long after this record came out. I guess they couldn't go back to being a 'hardcore' band after recording this, but given that this was not well received then they had nowhere else to go. I remember at the time just assuming they were some band that had ridden hardcore to the point of success and then tried to 'make it' but that failed so they called it a day. This kind of thing used to happen all the time. But now, with the benefit of hindsight, it seems like a shame. Regardless of what anyone from 2004 says, this is a damn good record. It was probably just too far ahead of its time when it came out. No doubt if this was released nowadays it would go down a storm and B9 would sell one shitload of records. Ah well.

To wrap this up, I found this video for my favourite song on this album. My favourite moment is the growl as the clock hits 2:53. Great stuff.