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I was never overly fussed about any of the Voorhees LPs other than the first one. I just always had it in my head that they weren't very good and I didn't need them. But a year or so ago I picked up the third LP ('Crystal Lakes Legacy') and enjoyed it, albeit about 24 years after it came out, so at that point it became evident that I needed the second LP. I finally got a copy recently from within the UK.

After avoiding this for so long, I am cursing myself. Any preconceptions I may have had were completely wrong. This is a seriously good record. The sound vaguely reminds me of the Integrity 2000 LP... but the one on Victory, not the shitty one on that other label.

This record came out in 1999 and was put out by Armed With Anger Records in the UK, and also Six Weeks Records in the US. And even though I picked this up from a seller in the UK, this copy is the US pressing. I now kinda want one of the UK pressing copies, mainly because I helped to finance it. But more on that when I get one of those.

Two Years Of Toothache

Last year I picked up a cool record by an old UK band, Jailcell Recipes, which was put out by a newly ressurected First Strike Records. The label was around in the late 80s and early 90s and is probably these days best remembered as the label that put out the UK pressing of the 2nd Chain Of Strength 7". But they also put out a few other releases by bands that are largely forgotten these days. The record they did a couple of years ago was a kind of 'best of' compilation, and it just made me want the original records. So I kept my eyes open and recentlyish picked up a couple of their original releases.

The 'Poulton Road' 7" was released by First Strike Records in 1989. The grey vinyl is a second pressing, and hand numbered out of 1063 copies on the back cover.

This 7" is musically a bit slower than the first LP, but definitely 'hardcore'. As far as I can tell, Poulton Road is located in Wallesey, where the band came from, but I'm not sure of the significance ot this particular street. The insert has them thanking the 'Poulton Road Posse', so maybe they lived there, or skated there. Not sure. If anyone knows for sure, please comment.

I also picked up the second LP, 'Two Years of Toothache', which was also released by First Strike Records, in 1991. This one marks a bit of a change from the previous records, with a slower and more melodic sound. Also, the front cover art was done by none other than Karl Alvarez of The Descendents, which is pretty cool.

I get the sense that this LP did quite well. The CD version was the first CD that the label made and it sold out in a month. I know that the label had quite good distribution too. So it's a bit of a mystery as to why this band wasn't way bigger. On the strength of this LP, they should have been huge.

The World Is Yours

Back in Summer I spent some time driving around California, and the record that that I listened to the most was the first LP by a melodic UK punk band called Diaz Brothers. I was late to the record as it came out back in 2020, but given how much I enjoyed it in summer this year, it was inevitable that I would eventually pick up the second LP, 'The World Is Yours', which was released this year.

I just got back from another trip to the States, and this was probably the record that I spent the most time playing whilst driving around Texas. There's something about melodic punk and american roads that makes for a good mix.

This was pressed on 4 different colours of vinyl (red, blue, green, white) and there is no pressing info. I assumed that there were similar quantities of each, and ordered the white thinking it went better with the cover than the others.

Spoiler alert, but given it's almost the end of 2025, I'm pretty sure that this will be in my list of top releases for the year.

There's Love In This World If You Want It

Ten years after I first herd of and saw Higher Power play (supporting Burn at their London Show), and they're still going strong and this year released their third LP, 'There's Love In This World If You Want It' on Nuclear Blast Records. I'd seen it was coming out, but as is often the case I figured I would get around to ordering one later. I'm not sure exactly whern this was announced, but when Mike posted about it at the back end of September it reminded me to chek it out.

I had a vague memory of seeing preorders go up and thinking that the limited colour looked really ugly. When I saw Mike's post I started scouring the internet for a copy to buy. What became apparent very quickly was that there was only one vinyl colour available... purple vinyl. And even though I thought it looked better than the rarer colour, I decided that I wanted to wait for one of the rarer ones. There must be thousands of purple copies out there, and I just figured that it would be coloer to get the other one.

A couple of weeks back the bands posted on instagram that they had put a bunch of merch up in their online store, so I had a quick look and they had some copies of the rarer 'light green sky blue splatter' vinyl. This version is limited to 300 copies. I have no idea how many copies were pressed on purple, but significantly more.

I only got around to listening to this once I'd bought the record, so I missed out on this being the soundtrack to Summer, which I think it very much would have been. But this has been on heavy rotation for the last few weeks, and will very much be in my best of 2025 list... if I make one. The band has clearly 'progressed' from their earlier sound, and I'm very much on board with it.

Diaz Brothers

Yet another record that I spent a lot of time playing whilst driving around California, but this one isn't a new release. This is the first album by a melodic punk band from the north of England called Diaz Brothers. I checked them out semi recently after I saw Lins87 posting one of their newer records. It sounded like it could be of interest, so I checked the band out, and was immediately into it, so I decided to invest a few quid in a copy of their first LP.

This record was originally released in 2020 during peak covid times so is now five years old. The band has a new LP that came out recently, but I decided to start with the older one. Sometimes listening in chronological order makes most sense.

This clear vinyl copy is from the 4th pressing, and there are 250 in existence.

This is a really good record, and ended up being the record that I played most on my recent California road trip. I think I played this one every single day, and have continued to do so every day since getting home. Definitely the soundtrack to Summer 2025 for me. Clearly I'm going to need to also pick up the new one too before it sells out.

Jailcell Recipes

Towards the end of last year I started seeing lots of pics of a new Jailcell Recipes record. The band were around at the end of the 80s & start of the 90s and had a few records released by First Strike Records (a label most known for releasing the 2nd Chain Of Strength 7" on a number of colours of vinyl). Back in the early 90s I had a Jailcell Recipes record at some point and ended up letting it go, because it didn't fit with my tastes at the time. But seeing lots of pics of this new record on various different colours of vinyl got me interested, so I gave them a listen, and immediately loved what I heard. So I decided to throw some cash at it. Therer were 5 different colours of vinyl (including black) and I decided to go for the clear as this was exclusively for a store in Japan and so has a bonus obi-strip.

Ok, so technically 'Energy In An Empty Tank Record' is not a new release. It is a kind of 'greatest hits' record. There are 17 songs on here, which is made up of 8 songs from the first LP ('Energy In An Empty Tank World'), 3 songs from the 'Poulton Road' 7", 3 songs from the second LP ('Two Years Of Toothache') and 3 'new' songs that were recorded in 1992 but never previously released.

The packing around this is absolutely top notch, with a poster, lyric sheet and a huge thick booklet.

The booklet is so big and heavy that it barely fits inside the sleeve with the record. It probably also weighs more than the record. The booklet is a great read, with bits written by each member of the band about how and why this record has been made, the history of the band and some rumours which are confirmed or denied. It's really well put together and is a great read.

I also made the decision to buy a test press as the price wasn't too bad. It's not really a proper test press in my opinion as there are 50 copies, but it's still cool as it comes in a different sleeve and is hand numbered on both the sleeve and the record label. The tests also come in various different colour sleeves. Mine is orange but I have also seen green and I think yellow too.

The test also ccomes with aome bonus bits. As well as the giant square booklet, it also has a couple of extra zines - a vegan cookbook and one which is an old interview with the band.

As much as the 18 or 19 year old me didn't enjoy this band, the old me very much does. Somehow in 2025 this band is exactly what I want from a hardcore band, fast and raw. From reading the booklet, it seems that the main point of this record was to improve the sound as the original recording of the first LP was apparently not good. I can't comment as I don't have the original pressing of the first LP, but these songs sound great. Combine the sound quality with the top notch packaging and this is a highly recommended purchase. You can still pick up all versions direct from the label (hosted by Alan's BMX shop).

Mob Handed

It's been almost a month since I last updated this blog. I've had a few things going on, but finally life is settling back down again so I'm keen to crack on with writihng about some new records that I have been listening to.

Just before xmas I ordered a 7" by a new UK band called Mob Handed. I was keen to pick this one up as it features Tony Maddocks on vocals, who used to sing for a band called Above All in the 90s. They came from Southend on Sea, which was a town that I lived in for a bit during the 90s and where my Dad & brother still live. The guys from Above All were kinda influential to my future music journey, so I was interested to hear this new band.

This self titled 7" was pressed in a really small run, with only 102 copies made in total. The first 30 copies come in this limited cover. It's a parody of the first Bad Brains album, but instead of the US Capitol building, the lightning is striking The Kursaal, a local Southend landmark. I got number 7/102.

When this went on sale the label also put up one test press for sale, which I grabbed. It was sent to me in a plain white paper sleeve, but then a couple of weeks ago I was in Southend and invited myself around to the guy's house who released it, at which point I asked for a spare sleeve to put it in. 'Good idea' he said, and gave me one of the regular sleeves for test press number 2 of 5.

The front cover features an artistic photo of Southend Pier, which in case you didn't know, is the longest 'pleasure pier' in the world.

Overall this is a really solid 7". There are six songs, four of which are around 2 minutes long and the other two are about one minute. Short hard blasts like hardcore should be.

If this sounds in any way interesting to you, then you can still buy a copy of this on the Then And Now bandcamp page, HERE.

Guided Tour

Without doubt one of the most anticipated new releases of 2024 is the third album by High Vis. It was announced back at the end of July that this was coming out, and I was not expecting it at all. It felt to me that the band had been pretty active since their last record ('Blending') dropped in late 2022, partly due to it being such a huge success. The band has played a lot of shows and played overseas a lot, so I was surprised to find out that somehow they had also written another record. But what a cool surprise. In a rare move for me, I preordered immediately as I didn't want to miss out.

'Guided Tour' was officially released on 18 October, and arrived at my door on the same day. I was impressed that whoever dispatched this obviously planned to make sure that people like me who ordered a physical copy got it on the same day it came out, so we could enjoy it at the same time as people who used new fangled technology to stream songs through the ether.

At the point I preordered, all colours were available and I had a choice. I ignored any splatter sounding colours, and then ended up choosing the 'onyx' vinyl because it was described as the 'artist version', which was not available through the same link as all the other versions. I figured that the artist version and the harder to find link would mean that this would be the coolest one to have. But if the info on discogs is correct, it seems that this is the second most common. Oh well.

I've had this for just over a month now, and I have played it every single day without fail. And even though I'm enjoying it, I still don't feel that it has grabbed me in the same way as 'Blending', although I guess it's always going to be a tall order for any band to follow up their breakout record. Still, this is a solid record, and I'm nowhere near bored of it, which is rare these days as my interest lasts on average three weeks. So I'm sure this has a lot more mileage in it yet.

Burning Bushes And Burning Bridges Test

I've posted about a few Understand records on here over the years. I've said it all several times. I won't repeat myself again (you can read some old posts HERE, HERE and HERE), but they were a pretty important band to me for a few reasons, and I will happily talk about them anytime anyone wants to listen.

Well anyway, back in the lockdown era, Thirty Something Records put out their debut album, 'Burning Bushes and Burning Bridges', on vinyl for the first time. At the time I emailed the label and asked if they had a spare test press they could part with, and I was told that no, sorry, there was only one 'unallocated' test press and it was not for sale. I was disappointed, but that's how the gane plays out sometimes. As Mick Jagger might say, you can't always get what you want.

Earlier this year, when I was picking up the Orange 9mm test pressings from the same label, I had a look around the store and was excited to see that there was also a test press for the Understand LP for sale. Four years after I first asked about buying one, it seemed that I was actually going to get what I wanted after all.

Just like those Orange 9mm tests, this comes in a custom Thirty Something Records sleeve, and is personalised and numbered 11 out of 13 copies. I figured this was reason enough to pull out the other copies that I already owned for a collection photo:

I'm super happy to have this record, and feel pretty lucky to have bagged it. And even though it was back in April that I ordered this, I have just checked and as I type this almost 7 months later and it is still possible to buy a test press of this record in the label's store, in case anyone is interested. If it's still there in a few weeks I might just buy another for myself.

This Is A War

Last year I was stoked on the debut release by Unified Action, a UK band playing old school 1980s styled UK hardcore. The debut 12" EP looked and sounded great. The band mainly came to my attention as it has Lins87 from Tied Down on vocals, and I really liked the 12", so when the same label put up preorders for a 7" up around a year ago, I was on it immediately. Somehow the label flaked for months and then the band managed to find another label to put it out, so I ended up getting mine about 8 months after I initially expected to. But you know what they say - good things come to those who wait.

The record is titled 'This Is A War' and comes on two different colours of vinyl, white and green, both being limited to 120 copies each.

I was also lucky enough to pick up a test press in an inverted cover, which is hand numbered out of 10 copies.

This is a really good follow up to the first 12". Five songs in seven minutes in a black and white cover probably tells you everything you need to know. Fast, no frills old school hardcore from the north east of England.

The label still has copies available to order HERE if this sounds like your thing (which in theory it should do if you're reading this in the first place!). Go get it.

The Basilisk Gaze Of A Tyrant State

Back in May last year a new Rot In Hell record was announced. The band has a long tradition of split releases with other bands, and this followed suit, being a split with a UK band called Cruelty, who I had never heard of before.

Having been a longtime fan of Rot In Hell (since their first release back in 2007!), I was keen to check out this new record, especially since they have been pretty quiet for a few years. I've lost track a little in recent times, but I think I am right in saying that they have not released any new music since 'Oblivian Songs' which came out in 2018.

I got a bit carried away when this went up for order. There were 6 options to choose from, and I found it impossible to say no to any of them. So I came away having ordered six copies, which I probably wouldn't have wanted to do if you had asked me in advance. Oh well. This is how things go sometimes. The nicest looking copy, I think, is the pink vinyl which is limited to only 20 copies.

I was also able to buy a test press, which comes in a different cover and is hand numbered out of 26 copies.

The other colours are all quite dark, but this also makes them difficult to take photos of, but I did my best.

Shown in the pic are the following:

Top row: Test Press (26), Teal (18), Blue (8)
Bottom row: Maroon Marble (45), Pink (20), Swamp Green (9)

Annoyingly, after I laid these out to take this photo and write this post, it came ot my attention that there is also a black vinyl copy which was/is only available to buy from the bands. This gives me a slight dilemma, as I don't feel that I need another copy, but without it this collection is not 'complete'. Hmmmmm. What to do?

The only slight disappointment is only one Rot In Hell song on here ('The Basilisk Gaze Of A Tyrant State'), although in terms of 'value for money' it is over 6 minutes long. It's also worth mentioning that this recording is the band playing 'hardcore' as opposed to 'neo folk' (or whatever you may want to call these two styles), and this may potentially be the best song the band has ever recorded, in my opinion. The hardcore songs are usually played at 100mph and go at it right out of the gate, but this song here takes time to build, and then fades out for a while at the end. This is a useless description, I appreciate, but what excites me here is that this shows that there's plenty of potential still left in this band, if they have time to explore it. I hope so.

Sunny Blunts

In my last post I mentioned that I recently took a trip up north to visit a friend and see a show. I went to see Jeff Caudill perform an acoustic solo show, and even though there were other bands playing, I managed to miss them all... apart from one song by a band called Fast Blood. I liked the one song that I heard, and given that some dude that I have vaguely known for about thirty years was on drums, I figured I wuold support them and buy a copy of their debut LP that had just come out and that they were selling that night.

The record is titled 'Sunny Blunts' and is named after the estate on which the singer grew up (as opposed to being a reference to smoking weed in the summer). As far as I can tell, all copies are on white vinyl.

I started playing this about two weeks ago and it is my current obsession. The band play melodic punk sounding tunes, with a female vocal over the top that really reminds me of some other band from the past, although I am not sure which. The vocals range from softly sung to screams of rage, and now again you hear the british northeast accent coming through, which I think works really well here, a bit like a female version of Graham's accent in High Vis songs. The music is really, really catchy and even though I know nothing about music, I can tell that these guys are very talented at their respective instruments.

I'm probably not doing a good job here of describing this, but I will end this post with two things. Firstly, this might just be my favourite record released this year. Yes, it is that good. Secondly, based on this, you should give three minutes of your time to checking out one of their songs to see if this might also be your cup of tea. I'd suggest starting with the opening song, 'Sexual Healing'. If you don't like it then that's fine, but please be aware that we may not be able to be friends anymore.

Fade Tests

How time flies. Somehow it was almost 9 years ago that I went to see BURN play a big show in London (the one where someone sold a purple vinyl pressing of their first 7"). This show was where I first saw and heard the band Higher Power, and I also picked up a 7" by a band I had never heard of called Fade. I took a chance on a new release and it was great. Then over the years since I have continued to pick up various copies of the three different Fade 7"s, to the point where I have quite a few. I still listen to the band from time to time and enjoy their 90s influenced post hardcore vibe.

Well, a few weeks ago I got an email from discogs showing that there was a test press for sale for the third 7". There's beena copy on discogs for some time, but I felt that the price was too high. So when another one got listed at half the price, and which was being sold by someone I know, I got on the case. In the end we did a deal outside of discogs and I got the records a couple of days later.

When I mentioned I was interested, dude said he had another Fade test press and asked if I was interested. Of course I was. This is a test for the 'One With Serenity' 7" and is visually a little less interesting.

And as if that wasn't enough, he also had a copy of the final show sleeve version of the demo 7". I already have one of these, but the price was so low that it was almost free, so I grabbed that as well. When it came it had two copies of the 7" inside, which is clearly a mistake.

I figured that I would sell (or give) the above record to someone who may want it. So if you're interested, please get in touch. I just want it to go to a good home.

Choose Two Lose

Today High Vis posted a new song online ('Mob DLA') and I don't doubt for a second that about a million people would have given it a listen. It therefore seemed appropriate that I posted this record today.

It was almost exactly four years ago, in the midst of the first wave covid lockdown, that I picked up the High Vis 'No Sense No Feeling' 12". I was (and still am) very happy to have a first press copy on yellow vinyl, and whilst I wasn't interested in trying to collect all subsequent pressings, I was interested when Six Feet Under Records put out a US pressing last year.

I liked that the US pressing had a different colour cover, so I decided to buy one. I got in early and got the most limited colour, which seems to be referred to as 'Ghostly Clear/Orange Vinyl' and for which only 109 copies exist.

This is definitely an interesting colour, and I am pretty stoked to have got one. But I do think that the opaque orange looks better. But I simply cannot get into collecting multiple copies of this one. Not at this stage of the game.

As a nice surprise, this record also came with a High Vis 7" flexi, which is a pretty well packaged record when compared to most flexi discs. For starters, it is round, which most flexi discs of the last 20 years or so have not been. And secondly, it comes in a proper sleeve. Although sadly it loses points for being a live recording.

The new song released today sounds to me very much like a 90s grunge band (well, except the vocals), which fits nicely with what I've spent a lot of my time listening to this year. I have no idea when a new record may eventually surface, but no doubt if one comes it's going to be special.

Real Food At Last

I've posted here about the band Understand a couple of times. They were a UK band that came out of the straight edge hardcore scene and existed from 1992-1998. In that time they supported all of the big US bands that came over here, played a few shows in the States, had a 7" released by Equal Vision Records, and an album that came out on a major label. Over time they kinda moved away from the hardcore scene by nature of their decision to sign to a major (the 90s was a weird time), but musically they were absolutely great. They sounded like some of the mid 90s 'post hardcore' bands (Quicksand, Fugazi, Shift are all ballpark comparisons) and I definitely felt at the time that they had a lot more musical talent and songwriting ability than most other UK 'hardcore' bands. Basically they looked and sounded like a US band but lived in the UK, and as a result I think they never quite reached the level of popularity on either side of the Atlantic that they should have. The band came to an end in 1998 and by that time I'm not sure too many people really noticed. They definitely faded away, rather than burnt out.

Well, last year a US label (Rise Records) ended up releasing the 'lost' second album, 'Real Food At Last', which had been recorded following the band being dropped by EastWest back in 1996 or so. The songs sat gathering dust for years as apparently the band weren't happy with how the recordings sounded. Then during the covid period, they decided to spend some time converting the recordings to digital and mixing them. This culminated with Rise agreeing to put it out on vinyl.

This was pressed on 3 colours of vinyl, and I decided to buy only one. This is the 'white and black galaxy' and is limited to 150 copies. The mockup image on the Rise website looks terrible, but thankfully in real life it just looks a bit like a grey marble colour.

I can't imagine too many people (especially those who buy records) are still interested in this band all these years later. But without doubt they have a small following. I used to live in the town they came from and saw them quite a few times, so there is a certain nostaliga factor for me. But these songs still sound great today, and not at all dated. If you didn't know that these songs are over 25 years old, you wouldn't guess, which I suppose is a kind of proof that Understand were well ahead of their time.

Eyeteeth / Burial Rot

Last year I picked up a 7" by a UK band called Eyeteeth. It had Godzilla on the cover and was titled 'Straight Edge Violence', so I was practically forced to buy it based on these factors alone. And here we are in 2024 and they've just dropped a split 12" with a band called Burial Rot.

This went up for sale pretty recently. I saw a post announcing that it was available and clicked the link within about half an hour or it being posted, and the site told me that there were only 12 of the coloured copies left, so I had to grab one immediately. I checked back later in the day and they were gone. So I'm glad I didn't waste time for once. There were only 100 copies on this colour, plus there were 200 on black.

This version is referred to as the 'Diehard splatter' and it comes with a whole host of other stuff... canvas patches, stickers, badges/pins, art prints. It's quite an impressive package.

This comes with a sticker on the plastic sleeve which I think sums it up pretty well:

This record is indeed both punishing and violent, but thankfully it's relatively short so I can take it. It's about 23 minutes long, with the 4 Burial Rot songs take about 12 minutes, and the 10 Eyeteeth songs are over in a little over 10 minutes.

I'm not a metal guy, and both of these bands are clearly influenced in some way by death & black metal, but all I hear here is some heavy, hardcore punk with a dark side to it, and I'm all in. My only real complaint is that there isn't enough. I need more.