This is some friends of mine's band, Troops of Tomorrow. This is the pre-release tape for their upcoming 7", The World Won't Listen. Good up-in-coming D.C. band. They play a mix of street punk and hardcore. It's a pretty good recording I have to say and though street punk isn't really my thing, it's a solid release. I believe the 7" release show is on Wednesday in Baltimore with Rotting Out and Soul Search. Give 'em a listen here.

So I had to open an eBay case to get this record. Didn't get it in the mail for like 3 weeks, opened a case and it was at my door in two days. Funny. This is the record release of the latest Down to Nothing 7" All My Sons. I was unable to go to the show in Richmond, which was a bummer because I'm sure it was a banger.


This was done pretty well, one of the better special cover releases I've seen. Clean design, simple, stamped, numbered and it even has different labels on the 7" than the regular release.

In yet another installment of Down to Nothing, this is the On Thin Ice split from Grave Mistake Records. This is one of the rarer red ones, which apparently is out of 50 or so. The 1st press was supposed to be pink, which it is, but some came out darker than others, and completely red in this case. Here's a comparison of some of them for you.

Alex as usual completely hooked me up, got me some added goodies for the collection. I also asked Alex to put two zines in the package for me.

I'm starting to get in to zines. I feel like they need to come back in popularity. The left one is put out from a guy in Toronto I believe, or somewhere in Canada. Apparently all of these interviews are from like over two years ago and he just didn't get around to putting this out until more recently. Pretty solid material, nothing amazing with presentation, pretty standard. Worth checking out. The one on the right is great, Just Say Yo!. Pulling Teeth, Trapped Under Ice, Not Sorry and Police and Thieves are all in this one. Great artwork, quality print and good content. This and The Effort are the two best zines I've seen. If anyone knows of any good zines I should check out please comment on here.

This is I think is two copies of the Fireworks 7" from the second press, not totally sure. I saw this band a little over a week ago for the first time and they were pretty good. Dudes seem in it for the right reasons. Oh yea, there's a Kid Dynamite cover on here and they have some Misfits cover demos on the internet somewhere. These guys sound a lot like New Found Glory, to the point to where people think it actually is them.

I picked this up at a yard sale a few weeks back. The cover is a little beat up as the picture shows, and when I bought it I looked at the vinyl and it looked pretty good. Now that I've looked at it in better light, not so much. O well, I probably should've haggled the guy. I'll try and clean this one. I haven't cleaned a record in a while, so let's see if I remember how.

I won these both on eBay for pretty cheap for what I think they would go for. Both are second presses and out of 250. Apparently these came out when Bridge 9 also put out the Time Slips Away CD, thus the reason for the labels. The copy of Count Our Numbers is supposed to be purple, but apparently some came out blue, and this looks like one of them. Supposedly this may mean its more like out of 60 or 70. I would need one on purple to compare.

In another eBay pick up I got Juggernaut on red, the most rare of the regular pressing.

I made an order from Heart in Hand records to get the two Mass vs Cali compilations. I also picked up two copies of Control's A Step Apart, Life to Live Records' first release. Control was a D.C. youth crew band a few years ago. The band is still together and I think still has all the same members but is now Broken Bodies, which is a harder band, similar to Carry On I'd say. I'm glad I was able to get this.

After a long wait, I finally got this one in the mail. I honestly just didn't believe it was here. This is the UK Tour copy of Splitting Headache, out of 30. I think Rick from Speedowax still has a copy of this somewhere between Europe and the states, that's just chilling somewhere. The first time he sent this to me It took like almost two months I think to come back to his house. So he sent me a different copy, and that I think is the one that's lost now. He then sent me a third copy, I think his own copy? Odd, it got to my house in like a few days. All the waiting for it to take only like 6 days to get here the third time around. Either way thanks to Rich, and when I get the other one I'll send it back to you Rick.

This is an Australian pressing of All My Sons from Dead Souls Records. I think this is the preorder color out of 100, but when I ordered this it was the only copy available. Seemed strange to me to do just a pressing of 100 only, but whatever I made the order, and not for cheap I might add. So after I got this I checked back to their store for the pressing info. There are two more colors available now, great. So now I have to pay like $50 after shipping to get the two of them. Is Australia currency that much stronger than the dollar or am I just getting ripped off?

Snowed In

So since I can't really do anything this weekend with the snow, I decided to finally do this post, it's over-due and has a lot, so it should be worth your time. In other news I did get to go to the Trapped Under Ice Video Shoot last night in Baltimore before it got really bad. It took 3 hours to get home however, bummer.

The first record was giving to me as a Christmas gift from a friend. I'm pretty stoked about records as gifts.

This is the Explosions in the Sky Double LP, The Earth Is Not a Cold Dead Place. I've been meaning to pick up some Explosions vinyl but never got around to it, probably because it was just easy enough to get that I didn't think I ever had to get it at the time. Luckily someone took care of this for me. This is actually a pretty cool release, the dust sleeves both have artwork on them and actually makes the whole layout of the record pretty cool. I thought that just with the cover alone, it was pretty boring, but with the dust sleeves it works.

The second LP is one sided, with the B side etched. Another nice touch that really works with the whole layout of the album. I'm looking forward to seeing this band again someday.

Ok next I got a large package from Six Feet Under Records, in it were the Title Fight and True Colors pre-orders. First is Title Fight.

This was pressed with three colors and a limited deluxe version. The deluxe version is on transparent red with black swirl and has a special cover with an actual Polaroid, limited to 88 copies, nice touch. The grey marble vinyl is also limited to 97. Overall I was a little disappointed with the colors for this one. I think the original press just had better colors.

So the main reason I ordered was for the latest True Colors LP, finally released in the U.S. Like Title Fight, this had 3 colors and a special limited jacket package with Rush of Hope and Focus on the Light. I think the insert is awesome, what's better than a picture in D.C.?



So the copy of Focus on the Light that came with the special cover was on white and had very plain labels, I guess to just make is more limited and simple that way.

The last thing I got was my Outlast pre-order.

This was done really well. The white is the pre-order color, limited to 100. I think the colors were done very well. I do wish that the blue vinyl was more like a Carolina Blue like it is on the cover, oh well. Good job overall.

Trade and Alert

I traded my Alert tour press for The Carrier - No Love Can Save Me Sound & Fury '09 cover, on purple. Mine's numbered #5 of 51.

I'm kinda disappointed with the cover. The This Is Hardcore cover was much better.

I mentioned to my buddy Ryan about trading my Alert tour press and he said he had one in his distro. So the next show I asked him to bring his distro so I could buy one, I also bought the other two copies he had, making him have no more Alert records in his distro. So I got another copy of the tour press limited to 20 and then I also picked up the clear and black versions each limited to 200. Now I just need the Red Pre-Order. Anyone wanna trade?

MASS Straight Edge

I picked up the Alert Demo Tour Press during their tour with xEnvisionx. Only 20 of these, with what seems like a photo copy of the original cover and the writing on the dust sleeve. Youth Crew Alex posted about this release in his blog check it out here.