Screaming For Purple

I haven't bought many records for two months. Not really sure why. But all of a sudden it seems there are LOADS of records out there. New releases, newish releases, and people offering me stuff. And stuff on eBay that I can't resist having a go at... like this Uniform Choice LP:

I wish there was pressing info available for this record. I have seen different shades of this record, from a light lilac colour like this one, to a more deep purple verging on maroon. There is also a grey. But the more I look at variations, the more I wonder whether they are actually different pressings or whether (like the recent Youth Of Today 12" reissue on 'purple') it was all one pressing on the 'recycled' vinyl that usually ranges from grey to purple even though it's all one pressing and one 'colour'. I don't think that is the case with this LP, because I've not seen that 'colour' used on records that came out pre-late 90s, but it would be a convenient explanation for the colour variations. If only somebody actually knew!

THE (RE)LAUNCH OF ENDLESS QUEST RECORDS

Once upon a time, before I did this stupid blog, The Endless Quest was a record label.

Back in 2006 I released a 7" by UK band SEARCH AND DESTROY, and in 2007 I put out an LP by Boston, MA band 27. After that I spoke to three other people about future projects, which all eventually turned to nothing. Out of boredom I started writing this crap instead and other areas of life got busy. But I always hoped that I would one day be able to release another record. And now here we are in 2011 and I'm finally ready to have another go.

Almost a year ago a friend of mine (fellow blog nerd Doug) mentioned that he was in a band and sent me some demo recordings. I didn't expect much for some reason, but I gave the songs a listen and was blown away. The sound coming out of my speakers seemed to combine elements of various bands that I liked, and I found myself listening to the songs a lot. It then occurred to me that this would be the perfect opportunity to re-start Endless Quest Records. So I asked about releasing the demo on vinyl and the best part of a year later here we are.

The result of all of this is that I am now taking pre-orders for the debut recording by HOPE DEFEATED.

In January of 2010, five friends who had grown up in and around the Calgary hardcore scene realised that they were feeling let down by the monotony of "adult life". The anger they had felt growing up still burned bright, brought on by the daily frustrations of careers, families and domestic bullshit. They needed a release, and Hope Defeated was formed. A few months later the band hit the studio to deliver a message to themselves and the outside world.

The '2010 Demo' 7" contains four songs that bring together the best elements of mid 90s and early 00s hardcore. These guys have lived through both eras and come out fighting with a fresh sound that is difficult to pigeonhole. Throw the vocal rage of Striking Distance & 108 over the chugging groove of bands like Snapcase & Burn, mix in a strong straight edge influence, and wave goodbye to your dreams that everything is going to be ok.

"I never meant for anyone to ever care. This is mine on my own the badge I wear"

PRESSING INFO
- 50 'blog nerds' edition (Red vinyl, hand numbered with stamped labels in a very special sleeve, specifically intended for readers of my & Doug's blog)
- 100 White vinyl
- 155 Black vinyl

Please note - this is not being announced anywhere else yet because I want to give the people who have supported my & Doug's blogs the first opportunity to get the special version. Once the 50 blog nerd copies are gone, I will start selling this elsewhere.

To order, go to my online store:

ENDLESS QUEST RECORDS ONLINE STORE

Oh yeah, also I thought I would run a TEST PRESS CONTEST - anyone who orders three copies or more will be entered into a draw to win a test press (which comes in a hand made cover of 15 copies).

I'm expecting that pre-orders will start shipping the first week in September.

Also, please note that I still have a few copies of my previous releases available, which I have listed for sale at a reduced price. Please take a chance and check 'em out.

Labels / distros / stores - please get in touch if you would be interested in helping distribute this record.

Time Is Now / 25

Bargains on eBay seem increasingly rare these days. But sometimes you can pick one up as a result of a seller making some basic listing errors.

Let's just say, for example, that you were selling a marble red vinyl copy of the late 90s straight edge compilation 'The Time Is Now' 7". You'd probably be pretty keen to mention somewhere in the auction that this particular version is numbered out of only 25 copies, right? I mean, completely failing to mention this at all would be a pretty basic error, don't you think? It could only be worse if you also somehow also failed to take a photo of the numbered dust sleeve which clearly shows the #/25 written in thick marker pen. I mean, you'd be completely missing the main selling point of the record. Pretty much the only other mistake you could make would be to not show the vinyl at all in main listing photo and instead opt to show only the (crappy) photocopied sleeve. Thinking about it, I reckon that if you made these mistakes then you're really not going to do a very good job of making the record seem as attractive as it really is, and you're probably going to lose a lot of potential bids. On the positive side, however, you're pretty damn likely to make someone's day as you leave the door wide open for a person who knows exactly what this thing is to win it for a really low price. Someone like, for example, me.

I guess this whole disaster could only be worse if you then saw someone else sell their copy of the same record about two weeks later for about three times as much just because they took an extra photo and mentioned that there are only 25 of these things out there.

Outface 'Friendly Green' LP Pink Marble

Here's another one for the Crisis (technically part of Revelation) Records collection - a weird pinky marble type colour variant of the OUTFACE 'Friendly Green' LP. I've owned this album for many years (not even sure when I first picked it up - probably about 1994) and never seen it on this colour before. My longstanding copy is on clear red vinyl. Once again, it makes me wonder how many variants of records are out there that I do not even know about.

This band featured some dude called Derrick Green on vocals who took over the shouting duties from Max Cavalera when he left Sepultura. On guitar was a dude called Charlie who later went on to play in CIV.

I never really liked this album much. It always sounded kinda confused to me, like the band didn't know what they wanted to sound like. There are moments of hardcore, reggae, ska and funk. The vocals came off sounding like a weird mix of Bad Brains, Into Another and Faith No More. I guess it always sounded too eclectic to make an impression on a young me and I filed it away and forgot about it.

After seeing this record for sale on eBay, I recently went back and checked it out again. Funnily enough, I've been enjoying this the past couple of weeks. It has a nice chilled out vibe which makes it perfect for my bike rides home from work in the sunny evenings. Sixteen years later, I finally get it.

Tarpit 'Checkmate' Test

Back at work after a week off and there was only one piece of mail sat waiting for me... this test press of the Tarpit 'Checkmate EP' on Collapse Records.

A few short years ago someone sent me a 7" by this band. I never asked for it, I just got it thrown in with some other record I bought. I loved it & went on to pick up more of their records, including their LP, which I freakin' love. However, this is one band that I know nothing about. Literally nothing. Were people into them? What happened to them? I'm intrigued. Maybe if Bob could give me some info, that would be great.

Jesuit Discography & Big Trouble

Did I ever mention that I used to call up Aaron Turner on the phone in the late 90s and reserve records for which I would then send money through the mail? Only 15 times? Well, I'm telling you again. This time to casually slip into the conversation that one of the records I bought whilst knowing nothing about was a 7" by a band called JESUIT. And now, 15 years or so later, their discography has just come out.

I know pretty much nothing about this band. Living in the UK I never saw them or heard anything other than the releases that came out many years ago (a 7" and a CD-EP). All I know is that they were oft referred to as insanely heavy with chaotic live shows. Dudes from the band went on to play in more successful chaotic heavy bands, namely Converge & The Dillinger Escape Plan.

Released by Magic Bullet Records, this discography apparently took 8 years to put together. After receiving it, I can see that's probably because it took the label that long to save up enough money to pay for the fancy packaging.

The cover art is, in my pointless opinion, outstanding. It features an illustration by Florian Bertmer, who clearly has an interest in boobs, butts and death. I can get with two of those. I love the bright colours used here, and I picked the green vinyl copy of the LP of the many choices available, just because I thought it went best with the artwork.

The package also comes with a 7" which contains the band's demo recording, wrapped in a sleeve which is the same art work that was used for the demo. Nice touch.

Also included is a 24 page booklet containing blurb from several 90s heads, as well as some great photos:

Oh yeah, and there's also a big fold out photo collage poster thing. So all in all, quite a lot of bang for your buck.

Generally I would advise anyone who likes Converge and collecting records (which seems to be about 5,000 people these days) to pick this one up. You won't be sorry.

I also bought a kinda novelty record at the same time from the same label. This LP is themed around the film 'Big Trouble in Little China'. It's by a pair of dudes calling themselves 'Big China & Little Trouble' and the record is entitled 'Lo Panning'.

This is the label's official description:

Simply denoted “Part I” and “Part II,” both sides of the LP successfully capture the hypnotic, enveloping vortex of David Lo Pan’s ancient raw powers. A subtly constant and humming melody anchors both sides almost like a raga, as Eyestone and Haley blast and churn compositional improvisation across the sonisphere. The results are a deliberately glacial and powerful presence seeping and oozing away from the melted minds of the creators and into the listening rooms of the new hosts of these diabolical spirits.

No, I have no idea what that means either. But what comes out of the speakers is some lo-fi drone type shit a bit like Sunn 0))) but without any vocal noises. I'm generally not into stuff like this, but I have to say that this is a really perfect noise to listen to late at night in a dimly lit room.

Oh yeah, and also you should note that this record glows in the dark!

Yes, that's right - IT GLOWS IN THE DARK!!!

Integrity 'Detonate VVorld's Plague' LP

Mike was saying the other day how I should do more posts about Integrity records. So I rushed off an order for the latest 12" just so I could keep him happy.

I did a post about the test press for this record last month, and I don't have anything new to say on the matter. So instead, let's just get straight on with the photos...

Plain old black vinyl. 550 copies made.

Purple vinyl (250 copies) which comes with a huge white patch:

Red vinyl (or pink as mine seems to be) of 100 copies with red patch:

There's also a gold vinyl that I don't have yet because I wanted to save money. But I'll probably get around to it eventually because that's the kind of idiot I am.

I wonder what the most appropriate place for the patch would be if I were to attach it to something? Maybe across the ass of my jeans like those people who walk around thinking they look really cool when the rest of the world thinks they look like a fucking idiot.

Some Girls 12"

Today I have two questions for you to ponder:

1. When is an LP not an LP?

2. When's the best time to buy stuff on eBay?

And now, by sheer fluke, I have identified a record that just so happens to answer both of those questions... the debut LP by the early 2000's super group Some Girls entitled 'All My Friends Are Going Death'. This came out in about 2004 and in my typical 'slightly late to the party' style, I've just picked it up for the first time.

When I say that this was the band's debut LP, I was of course being economical with the truth because (shock, horror) this is not an LP. Rather, this is a compilation of their two previously released 7"s and four other songs.

This is kinda cool because it has no insert... mainly because it doesn't need one. It has all the lyrics and other information etched into side 2. I don't actually think I've seen that before.

I wasn't looking to buy this thing. I just stumbled across it on eBay and looked to be going for a low price. So I threw in a bid and won it for £3.50. Not bad considering I spend more than that on lunch each day. This of course means that the answer to question 2 is "when shit's cheap"... which unfortunately doesn't seem to be very often these days.

Zero Tolerance 'Fuel The Fire' / 100

Zero Tolerance. Most known for being the other band to release a 7" on Hi Impact Records (the label that released the Turning Point 7" back in 1932). I got my gold vinyl Zero Tolerance from the dude who released it quite late (circa '96/97) and that was it. I was stoked. Fifteen years later I find myself buying a new Zero Tolerance 7"...

Well, not exactly. This isn't a new record. It's a vinyl pressing of a cassette release from 1991. Reaper Records pressed this onto wax last year and I didn't get around to buying one even though I kinda intended to. But then my friend Adam at The Essence announced that he was releasing his own version, so I decided to waited for that.

However, rather than actually press their own version, The Essence just bought 100 copies of the clear vinyl second pressing from Reaper on the cheap and packaged them in a different sleeve and numbered them. An interesting business model no doubt. But the result is a great record in great packaging. You can tell that time, thought & effort was put into this one:

What I find weird is that the sleeve for the Reaper version seems to have ring wear. Even on the test press copies. It's as if the ring wear is a part of the artwork. See HERE and HERE. Not a good look really, and in my opinion the sleeve of the Essence version is way better than the sleeve Reaper used.

Even though there were only 100 of these things made, it looks like there are still a few copies knocking about in the store waiting to be picked up by persons like you. So go here if you are interested before they're gone forever:

http://www.theessence.bigcartel.com/

Full Speed Ahead! (for the 11th time)

Believe it or not I bought my first copy of this 7" back when it came out circa '97 or '98. Thirteen or fourteen years later I am still picking up variants that I don't have. I probably pick up another one about once a year on average... although truth be told, I only had one version for the first 7 years. So trying to collect the lot is a fairly recent objective.

This is one of the four different colour sleeve variations of the third pressing. There were 100 each of a red sleeve, yellow sleeve, green sleeve and blue sleeve. They were made as a tribute to the Minor Threat 7". For some reason this yellow one seems to crop up least often. At least, that's how it seems to me, as this is the last one I needed to complete the third pressing set of four.

This is now my 11th version of this 7" and there are still two variants that I am missing (one being the 'Rain Crew' version of 15 copies that I will clearly never own).

And who knows, maybe this post will serve as a reminder to Mike to get back to picking up ROTP 7"s again. Dude seems to have a short attention span sometimes ;o)

Cold World Sean Price

I don't like hip hop. Never have. As a great man once said "it says nothing to me about my life". So when I heard that everyone's favourite wigger band Cold World had teamed up with some hip hop dude to make a record, I was not on the list of people who gave a monkeys. But then I saw some video clip that previewed the song and I found it catchy. Plus I liked the way that it was being compared to the 'Judgment Night' soundtrack from 1993, mainly because I can't imagine that anyone who would be into either Cold World or Sean Price would have heard of it.

This red one is the first press of 300 copies:

The song also comes packaged with 5 other crapper and pointless remixes of the same song, like one version with the curse words skillfully edited out, one with no vocals at all, and three without Cold World featuring at all.

You also get some futuristic 3 dimensional goggles so that you can see the mysterious picture on the front better.

I would also advise checking out the video of the song on youtube if you're a fan of the shirts off big belly mosh dance.

Outspoken 'The Current' 2011 Repress

New Age Records continue their mission to reissue all of their 90s catalogue on limited colours of vinyl for those of us still standing in 2011 to lap up. The latest is the final 7" by Outspoken, which I remember picking up back when it came out like it were only yesterday. 'The Current' picked up right where the LP had left off, but with better songs and a much better quality recording all round. It really was a sad day when this band called it quits. I remember reading the 'final' interview in Second Nature fanzine and feeling truly sad. Yet here I am buying the same record again and somehow 16 years have gone by. And after all that time, this 7" still sounds good.

For this 2011 repress, there were 147 on 'cool blue' vinyl. My copy isn't that blue at all. It's only a shade up from white if you ask me:

There was also an obligatory 77 copies pressed on a different colour with Walk Proud labels that comes in an alternate, photocopies sleeve. The '77 pressing.(Anyone interested in knowing why New Age do this should read my history lesson.

Also, it's probably worth mentioning that New Age now have someone else looking after their mail order, so if you are thinking about ordering these then you don't have to worry that you'll be waiting 6 months. You can still sneak in an order as both appear to be in stock in the New Age store.

Deadguy 'Work Ethic'

Ah, the 90s. My era. Looking back now, some of it was truly fantastic, and some was truly awful. When I get nostalgic I remember most of it fondly because I was there and it was an interesting time in life. But truth is a lot of stuff I forget about until some little reminder comes along of things. And that's what this post is about.

Dave from Six Feet Under Records was selling a load of stuff on eBay recently. I watched a lot of items and ended up not bidding on any of them due to the prices going higher than I was comfortable with. But one little item caught my eye and I was intrigued...

Deadguy. I remember when this band appeared in the mid 90s. Deadguy were born out of the ashes of No Escape (who are most widely known for that split 7" with Turning Point) and man, they were hard, loud and rockin'. There was a lot of buzz about them. I specifically remember how everyone was going nuts for the CD which combined the songs from both their 7"s. Me, I was more excited for the 7"s than a CD (I guess it would take the rest of the world another ten years to catch on to this!). Anyway, I had both 7"s on black, but a couple of years later, in the days of the Revelation trade board, I was stoked to upgrade my 'Work Ethic' 7" for a purple vinyl copy. And that was it. I was done. Until now.

Two to three weeks ago I saw the same record on eBay on clear blue vinyl. Now, believe me, my brain is like a huge vinyl database. No matter how many records I have or want, my brain retains all pressing info and can recall it with ease. So I saw this thing on blue and immediately knew that I didn't have it, but also that I had never seen or heard of it before. I struggled to believe I could be correct though, so I even went to my 7" box and pulled out the copy I have been holding for about 14 years just to confirm I wasn't getting confused. But no, I had a purple... which confirmed that I was right and that I was just finding out that this existed for the first time since it came out in 1994.

For me, this illustrates the fun of record collecting. No matter how much time you devote to it, you constantly find out about things that you never knew existed. It only makes me wonder what else may be out there that I have no clue about...