You Only Bid Once... So Do It Right

As you all know, Revelation originally released the Side By Side 'You're Only Young Once' 7" in 1988 and then nine years later, in 1997, reissued the songs on a remastered 12" with live songs on the flipside. One label, one band, one record (albeit two versions). Done. Right?

Well, not quite. Some time in the early 90s, when in between the 7" being out of press and Rev pressing the 12", Lost & Found Records from Germany pressed the Side By Side 7" as a 12"... with live songs on the flipside. There's been a lot of bad press about Lost & Found over the years, with accusations of bootlegging, and I honestly have no idea whatsoever if this release was licensed or given consent by the band.

In recent months, some dude from Lost & Found has been selling off all kinds of stuff. One thing that he has sold several copies of was a red vinyl test press of the Side By Side 12" he released. This is actually a test press of the second (picture disc) pressing. The first press had it's own test press out of five copies on black vinyl. Anyway, I had bid and lost out on a few copies, but finally my turn came and I managed to get one.

Like most tests, it isn't much to look at. It's just a red vinyl 12" with plain labels in a plain paper sleeve. I mainly just wanted it because it was a Side By Side test press which didn't require me to spend a month's pay, like either the Rev 7" or 12" versions would have. The best thing was that I have watched several of these sell, all starting at $49.99 and all ending higher. This was the first one the dude sold that went for the starting price and one bid. Hence the title of this post.

Survival Assistance

I first saw this Outspoken 'Survival' 7" on split orange & clear vinyl on instagram. I think it was Lins87 who posted a picture of this and caused a mild panic. I mean, what the hell was this and where did it come from? The second I saw it I was trying to find the New Age Records website, but the site had gone. So where did Lins pick this up exactly? Despite putting a comment on his post to ask, he never replied, but in the end it was Mike who figured it out. In the end it was as easy as placing an order in the band's big cartel store.

Looking at the store, that the photo of the 'Light In The Dark' LP on orange vinyl looks kinda familiar, don't ya think?

Same Shit. Different Day.

In October last year I went to see The Rival Mob play in London. In twenty something years, it was one of the best shows I have been to. The amount of energy in the room was off the scale. It was a great reminder of why I still love this crap. The only bad thing was that they didn't have the records they were supposed to have. Apparently they had ordered a repress of 'Raw Life' and there were supposed to be 200 copies for their UK weekend jaunt... but there was some kind of mess up and they only got the black vinyl copies before they left the States. Well, that's what Doug Free told me anyway. This of course meant that I had to find a yellow copy online... which I finally did.

They very subtly changed the color of the 'Raw Life' text on the cover from red to orange. I love stuff like this. It's good attention to detail and let's you know which pressing you got... which is obvious if you have a colour vinyl copy, but otherwise wouldn't be if you had black.

I guess people have short term memories and forget about bands if they haven't brought a new record out for a few months. I assume that's how I was able to score this copy for a reasonable price.

Finally... I didn't film this, but here's a link to the show I went to where these should have been for sale. Worth it for the first two songs, which are insane.

Gold Breakdown

Slowly I've been chipping away at the color vinyl Black Flag 7"s. At the end of 2012, I finished collecting the Black Flag color vinyl LPs, and realised that I had next to no 7"s. So I made a list of what I was missing, and started out shopping. I've picked up a few, and here's the latest... 'Nervous Breakdown' on gold.

I'm not exactly sure why, but this gold vinyl and red and white sleeve combination looks great. Definitely one of the nicest looking Flag 7"s I have.

I'd been looking for one of these for a while and never so much as seen one. Then two appeared on eBay at the same time. One appeared listed at $150. The other started at $0.99. I wrote off the expensive one and watched the cheaper one, which I won for $21 in the end. I was happy enough with that.

I only need three more colour Flag 7"s now - 'Six Pack' on both blue and yellow vinyl, and 'Nervous Breakdown' on red vinyl with large hole. If anyone has any leads, get at me.

Zen Arcade II

It was only two months ago that I picked up my first copy of 'Zen Arcade' by Hüsker Dü. It happened to be on greenish vinyl. Well, guess these things are like buses (you wait ages for one and then two come at once) because shortly afterwards I picked up a clear blue copy too.

The funny thing is, just after I won this one I missed out on a red copy. It was on eBay and I forgot to bid. To make it worse, it ended cheap. Ah well, you know how it is - there's always another day.

Hated And Proud

It's been so long since I bought these that I can barely remember what the story was. But I felt like I got a good deal. These are three different variants of the Let Down 'Crossed Off' 7" on Dead By 23 Records, in a limited 'Iron Cross' sleeve. No idea how many were made with this sleeve, but I have to say, it does feel slightly extravagant to have three.

So the story... not particularly exciting. These were on eBay. I think the seller listed them all with a starting bid of something silly like $35. And unsurprisingly, not one of them sold. Then they got relisted with a starting bid of $9.99 each, but each carried a buy it now of $35. I figured nobody would bite at the $35, but figured someone would bid an take the price above the minimum. Well, I watched them and bid and won all three for the minimum bids. I paid and almost expected that the seller wouldn't send them to me. But he did. And three months or so later I finally have them.

I really need a test of this 7" by the way. Just in case anyone can help.

Blue Monday

What more perfect record to showcase on a Monday than this Blue Monday 'Rewritten' LP with a special 'Sink With Cali' cover. There were 50 of these special covers made way back in 2005. 20 of them contained the green vinyl and 30 the purple vinyl. I wasn't exactly out searching for one of these. I just stumbled across one on eBay and it was listed pretty cheap, so I just figured I'd have it.

I'd seen pictures of this cover before, but until I picked this one up I hadn't realised that the cover was printed on an inside out regular cover. So inside the sleeve you can see the regular artwork:

I hadn't listened to this record for a long time. I'd for gotten how much I liked it. It came out at a weird time and it didn't make a huge impact with me, but it's a solid record for sure. Until I checked the pressing info five minutes ago I'd actually forgotten that Bridge Nine also made a picture disc version of this one. Weird.

Please Die!

Back when American Nightmare was a band, I only really collected one or two copies of most releases. If a band had like ten versions of a record, I would probably pick up one or maybe two and leave it there. So whilst I had their first 7" on red vinyl, I never took it any further. Then of course the prices of their records started going up and up, and even if I had wanted to collect multiple versions of their records, it seemed too expensive to get into. Recently I picked up this blue vinyl copy of the first 7" with the limited 'Please Die' labels, mainly because it was a pretty good price.

This was, I believe, some kind of pre-release version of this 7" that came out on some tour before the pre-orders went live. There were 300, so it's not really that rare.

I kinda feel that I now need to go after a couple more versions of this one. The white vinyl and grey vinyl copies aren't too rare, so I'd like to bag them. Anything else would be a bonus, but is unlikely due to the scarcity factor. We shall see. Anyway, thanks for reading... now, please die!

Everything Still Sucks

Last weekend I received a box containing 80 records, and during the week I moved house. I'm now settled in and can start blogging my way through three months worth of records. I'm gonna try to post every day until I clear the lot...

So I'm starting with a couple of recent-ish Descendents represses. A couple of months ago a purple vinyl copy of 'Everything Sucks' appeared. Then a few weeks after that, an orange pressing surfaced. I was forced to pick up both. They continue the tradition of having a small round sticker in the corner to denote the vinyl colour.

The purple is the usual clear purple that looks black unless you hold it up to a light source:

I saw something somewhere which said that purple was out of 700 and orange out of 300. Not sure I believe it to be honest. And who really cares?

All I need now is the purple vinyl repress of 'ALL' and I can take the ultimate Descendents colour vinyl photo. Still hoping to get one before the year is out...

Caged Grave

If you read the page on this site titled ‘about this blog’ (link at the top), then you will know that this blog is not about reviews. This is just an online diary of records I pick up. I do get a few emails from various labels or bands asking if I can review their record, or link people to their latest video or whatever. Most of these requests I just delete without replying. As far as I’m concerned, anyone asking me to help with any kind of promotion has completely missed the point, and therefore I can’t be bothered wasting my time to tell them that’s not what I’m about. But once in a blue moon, someone who very much does get this blog will get in touch and ask if they can send me a record. The good thing is that anyone who knows this blog knows what I like, so chances are the record they want to send me is going to be something decent.

A few short weeks ago I received an email from Craigos. Dude lives in Australia and has a band called Caged Grave. He wanted to send me their latest record, a 7" titled 'Gutless'. Well, until he emailed me, I don’t think I had heard his band before, mainly because I don’t actually listen to too many bands via the internet due to being old fashioned. But given he was offering to send me a record at his own expense, I figured I would check it out. If I didn’t like it then I could at least save him a few dollars in postage costs. So I found the Cagedgrave bandcamp, and about thirty seconds later was replying to his email with my address. The noise coming out of my speakers was brutal, and seemed to be was exactly what I needed in my life at that moment in time. So I gave him address and a couple of weeks later a 7” showed up.

I was lucky enough to get sent one of the clear vinyl copies, of which there are only 100.

This comes in a black and white sleeve, and the band logo is stamped on the paper dust sleeve. I'm generally not good at describing bands, but right off the bat when I saw this I was thinking of Mind Eraser. I guess it's the black and whiteness of it, and the font used for the band name.

If you're still wondering what this band sounds like, the back of the sleeve gives you a clue. I mean, ten songs on a 7" is never gonna be some emo prog rock record.

Interestingly, the band describe themselves as 'powerviolence'. That, to me, is a term that I associate with the mid to late 90s bands that played songs for thirty seconds at 100mph with indecipherable grunted vocals, like Spazz or Charles Bronson. Stuff that was recorded badly. Stuff that seemed kinda cool, but was ultimately not easy to listen to. Caged Grave does not fit this description at all, as the songs are well played and recorded, and sound hard as nails. It's as if Caged Grave is the long lost brother of Mind Eraser who just so happens to have emigrated down under, and who phones now and again to shout at you and tell you how much he hates you.

Check out the Caged Grave Bandcamp and see what I'm waffling on about.

PS Thanks, Craigos. I really appreciate you sending me this.

Guitarmageddon

Instagram seems to be more and more important these days. A few weeks ago, several people on my feed put up pictures of an LP called 'Sacrifice Poles'. I had no idea what it was the first couple of times I saw it, but the more it cropped up the more curious I became. So I looked it up, and I was glad I did, because it was something that I previously hadn't known that I needed. If you read this sticker that was on the front of the poly sleeve, you'll understand why.

Being a big Cave In fan, I decided that I needed this ASAP. Unfortunately, the label was already sold out. I guess pressing only 500 meant that they got through them pretty quick. However, I found an eBay seller in the UK who had some, so I got one pretty quickly and easily. I wasn't given a choice of colour, but by chance I got the black vinyl, which is actually the rarer of the two made (200 black, 300 blue).

As you can see, the packaging is pretty minimal on this. I guess it suits the music. At first I found this quite interesting, but then I got bored before I even got to the end of the record. These are instrumental 'songs' that were outtakes of the recording sessions for 'Jupiter'. I can see why most of them never really went anywhere or got used. Having said that, I need to give it a few more chances. Never write anything off prematurely is a lesson I've learnt many times over the years.

Blue Phobia

I first wrote about Mega City Four two years ago when I bought their 'Tranzophobia' LP. I'd got one of their songs stuck in my head, which had appeared from the darkest reaches of my brain, so I bought a record. Then someone commented on the post that the record came on blue vinyl. So I added it to my wants list and started searching. Last week one appeared on eBay, which was the first one I'd seen after looking on there unsuccessfully every week for two and a half years. I bought it right away.

The day after this arrived, one appeared for sale on discogs for half the price. Typical.

I now have a black vinyl copy of this that I don't really need. Anyone want it?

WNITA Blue Cover

Youth Of Today are one of those bands that I don't really think that I collect. But somehow I now own something like 32 Youth Of Today records. In the early days I remember I wasn't interested in owning any of the European pressings, but then at some point that changed and I decided to try to pick up the coloured pressings. Oh, and then I decided that I wanted one of the We Bite Records copies of 'We're Not In This Alone' because I liked the blue cover it came in. So here we are. I finally picked one up.

The front cover has the same photo as the Caroline Records version with the red cover. But the back of this blue version is completely different to the Caroline version. A weird blotchy logo in yellow and individual photos of the band members which are very different choices to those chosen for the Caroline pressing.

I love how Ray actually looks like the Incredible Hulk on here. I mean, seriously, this could be a photo lifted straight out of a Marvel comic. Interestingly, Porcell looked a bit 'hulkish' on the back cover of the Caroline pressing. Makes me wonder if they were engaged in some kind of 'who can look most like the hulk' contest at the time this was recorded.

The inner sleeve is one of those that doubles up as an insert. It has lyrics on one side and THAT photo on the reverse:

I might get around to taking a photo of my Youth Of Today LPs at some point soon. I have a lot more than I thought I did. Quiet how I amassed them all I'm still unsure.

Now Is What Matters Now

So when I ordered my blue vinyl Bane LP recently, I saw that Green Hell had an exclusive colour of the new Gameface LP in their store. I was always a fan of Gameface, although their last couple of LPs lacked the energy of the others... but that was years ago. I figured that if the band had taken the time and effort to reform, and found the energy to record a new LP, then maybe it would have a bit more 'get up and go' about it than the last couple of records. So I took a chance and picked up a copy. I don't speak German at all, so had to use google's translator to check out in the store, but without understanding a word of German I could tell that this version was limited to 100. The description in the store said 'Bei Greenhell gibt es eine auf 100 St. weltweit limitierte col. Version (Transparent Dark Green)!'. So I figured it was worth checking out.

The only thing that seems odd is that there's a number stamped on the back cover, and I have number 501. I'm guessing that either this is not limited to 100 after all, or these are numbered from 500 to 600 if there are 100, as the label has two different colours in their webstore which are out of 250 copeis each.

After the first listen or two I thoguht this was boring and started wondering why I bothered buying it. But I gave it a couple more chances and now it would be fiar to say that I'm hooked. This kinda stuff seems great in Summer for some reason, so please excuse me if I slap on my shades and some sun cream and listen to this laying on the lawn.

Xs Always Win

Not long ago someone asked me if I had any spare Violent Reaction records. I told him I didn't, but it jogged my memory that I never picked up the third press of the first 7" with the fold out sleeve. So I hit the streets (or rather, the internet) and managed to find somewhere still selling them.

This comes in a sleeve which appears almost normal from the outside. I mean, it has a front and a back...

... but then when you open it out, it forms a big X with a mean picture inside.

I was stoked to hear that this band have been signed to Revelation. I really hope that they can bring a new record out by the end of the year. I know there's a new 7", but I want another LP already. What can I say? I'm greedy I guess.

Words Run... In Solid Green

There are some records that I don’t feel that I am ‘actively collecting’, as I already have enough copies to be happy with, but then I still seem to pick up extra copies every couple of years or so. This record here is a classic example. Brotherhood ‘Words Run As Thick As Blood’ on Crucial Response Records. I bought my first copy of this LP back in the early 90s, and have just now added a sixth copy to my collection.

This copy here is, as you can see, on solid green vinyl:

Just so that you know where this sits in the scheme of things, the first press of this LP featured 273 copies on green vinyl out of 1080 copies pressed in total. And, according to the Crucial Response discography, ‘a few are on solid green vinyl’. I’m not sure exactly what constitutes ‘a few’, but whatever the exact number, the solid green represents a small minority. The majority are on clear green. So basically, this thing is rare.

When I received this, one of the first things I did was to get my clear green copy out to compare the two. As the photo shows, the clear and the solid are quite different in appearance.

And of course, I then had to then get my other copies out to take an updated collection shot:

If you’re not familiar with the pressing info of this record, or you’re too lazy to click the link above, here’s the detail of what’s in the photo:

1st press – 273 on green vinyl (a few on solid green)
2nd press – 375 pink vinyl, 52 swirled vinyl
3rd press – 320 white vinyl, 101 black vinyl with silkscreened sleeve

If I wanted to make this collection complete then I’d need to pick up the black vinyl copies from the first, second and third pressings in the ‘regular’ sleeves. But personally, I’ve never really been too interested in regular black vinyl pressings. So this collection is unlikely to go any further… well, unless someone wants to throw me a test press of course.

On a related note, Southern Lord are putting together a discography at some point in the near future. I’m not sure exactly when it’s likely to launch, or what it will contain, but I’m pretty excited for it. I’m generally trying to avoid reissues and discographies these days, but I'll probably make an exception for this one.

Don't Wait Up II

When I got my European pre-orders of the new Bane LP, 'Don't Wait Up', I then discovered that there was a third vinyl colour in the first press. So I had to place another order and pay more postage. Ugh. Anyway, it showed up a few days ago. This is the blue, out of 400.

So far then, there are three colours out there. 300 Purple, 400 Blue and 500 orange. Here are mine:

Oh yeah, there's also just been a second pressing on clear out of 500. So I need to place yet another order. And of course the rest of the world is still waiting for the US pressing on Equal Vision. So I will end up with at least three more copies of this thing in the not too distant future.

I have to say, this is a really good record. I mean, I know I was bound to say that, but it seriously is. I've read a lot of good reviews, some of them from people who I thought had written this band off years ago. Even if you think you know Bane, you need to check this out. There are a couple of 'different' songs on here, most notably 'Calling Hours', which seems to be everyone's favourite. Check it out.

Palm Sunday

I think a month almost went by without an Integrity post. I'd better fix that quick. How about this test press of the 'Palm Sunday' LP? This is the Organized Crime repress, which comes in a wraparound acetate cover. I got number 7 of 14.

Just to make sure that I don't have a complete collection of anything ever, I still don't have the grey and white vinyl versions of this LP. #Toomanyintegrityrecordsnotenoughtimeormoney

Poetry Of Worms

I picked up this Rot In Hell / Psywarfare split 12" on white vinyl a while ago, but I was waiting until I also picked up a clear vinyl copy before I posted it up on here. Unfortunately, that still hasn't happened, so I decided to quit stalling.

There are three Rot In Hell songs on here. These are the acoustic folk style RIH songs, and I to say I have played them quite a lot is an understatement. If you haven't heard this side of the band then please fix this and seek them out. As for Psywarfare, I first heard this outfit back in the late 90s when Integrity released a split 7" with it. I didn't get it and didn't like it back then, and not much has changed. Psywarfare is noise. Not music that sounds like noise. Just noise. I played this for about 30 seconds then turned it off.

Drive Like Jehu

I've said it before many times, but the passing of time constantly amazes me. I just picked up this clear vinyl copy of the first (self titled) Drive Like Jehu LP, and I was trying to work out how long it is that I have been after one. The answer is... one longass time.

I think that this has been a want of mine for either 18, 19 or perhaps even 20 years. I remember getting a list of stuff in the post off someone years ago when I was at uni and this was on the list. I phoned the dude up but it had already sold. A few years later, circa 2002, a sealed colour copy appeared on eBay, which I bought, and which puzzled me by being on white. Looking back, I'm guessing it was a repress. Then in recent years it was repressed on grey. But I always knew that the original colour press was clear. And finally, eventually, I got around to picking one up.