Attack in Black - The First and Second Efforts of a Band That Died Before You Could Kill Them

 

I have a strange relationship with eBay these days. I don't use it much, and when I do it's almost entirely buying Manic Street Preachers or Jason Molina records. But sometimes I just browse it a bit when I'm bored, and type in the names of bands that pop into my mind whose records I might like to buy. I still long to own a copy of Attack in Black's Marriages LP on vinyl (any version will do, and there have been some nice reissues since the original that I didn't buy when we saw them blow us away supporting Far in TJ's), so I mindlessly typed their name into the search bar one evening. Somewhere near the top of the results was this LP which I don't think I was even aware of, and for only £8 (£10.35 with postage). I put in a-slightly-over-starting-bid offer and waited until the clock ran out.

The record is, as the title describes, the first two releases from the band pressed onto one (45rpm) record - their 2005 debut, self-titled EP and the 2006 Widows EP that preceded Marriages. Apparently there are 750 copies in total, and only 200 on yellow, so I was lucky to find a copy at all, let alone for just over a tenner.

I have a copy of the debut EP from a trip I took to Canada in the spring after I'd seen them in Newport (they were touring, but the dates didn't work with our trip around the east of the country, which is a shame). I found a record shop in Toronto called Criminal Records and bought a lot of music, including two Attack in Black LPs and the debut EP on cd (the only format it was released on). Later that same day, I found a copy of Hum's You'd Prefer an Astronaut on cd; it was a good day. When I got back to Cardiff I popped the cd in and was amazed to hear five scrappy hardcore punk songs thrashed out in under 15-minutes. In hindsight, the inclusion of a cover of Depression by Black Flag should have been a clue, but I definitely expected them to be doing it more in the style of the band I knew from Marriages (as it turns out, it is very faithful to the original). I'd already been caught off-guard by their change in sound between Marriages and The Curve of the Earth, so hearing their hardcore beginnings added to a ridiculously fast change in style. We saw and listened to a lot of hardcore bands when I was in Cardiff, and this version of Attack in Black sounded like pretty much every band we were into at the time. But there were hints of the melody they'd eventually find in the choruses.

I'd not heard Widows before getting this record, but was very familiar with the songs Broken Things and The Love Between You and I from my over-playing of Marriages over the years. However, these recordings are different, and different enough to make the arc from the debut EP to Marriages more understandable. Broken Things is one of my favourite songs (in general, not just by the band), and this version is a bit looser, a bit thrasher in places and feels less polished (in a good way). The bare drums and group vocals in the chorus are every bit as perfect as they are on the later version. Something about the guitars in The Love Between You and I have much more in common with the debut than the album version. Similarly, there's a hint to the vocals that's a bit more hardcore, despite the fact that Daniel's signing is actually singing now. The link between the two eras is much clearer on the other two songs, Cut and Run and 1950, which both would have been the least hardcore thing on the debut, but not sounded out of place - the hints of melody almost doing battle with the older style within the songs themselves. It's nice when those linking pieces fall into place and you can see better how a band's sound developed. If I'd heard this before the debut, I wouldn't have been quite so surprised putting that cd into my player back in 2009.

Format: 12", numbered (50/200)

Tracks: 9

Cost: £10.35 new

Bought: eBay

When: 16/01/21

Colour: Transparent yellow

Etching: none

mp3s: none

Pitch Shifter - The 1990 Demo

I probably didn't need to buy the demos of Pitch Shifter's debut album, but here we are. On one hand, the band meant a huge amount to me for a good and important period of time, and despite not being a fan of their earlier industrial stuff when I first heard it I've found I quite enjoy it now I'm older. On the other hand - and I say this as something of a compliment I guess - I'd honestly struggle to tell you whether I was listening to the demos or the album itself, and I already have that album on vinyl and on cd; this LP feels pretty redundant. I was vaguely aware of the band putting the record out via Kickstarter but I didn't go out of my way to buy it, only picking it up a while later when it found it's way into the Record Culture sale section (where I think there is still at least one copy). I can't turn down a good offer.

Of the eight songs on Industrial, six of them have demos here (Gravid Rage and New Flesh are missing), and we instead have Behemoth, an unreleased song from the era, originally called Mouthscape. Musically, the quality of the demos is on a par with the album itself. I wouldn't necessarily call either "good", in fact part of the charm of Industrial was the bleak, imposing wall of sound and lack of frills. Mark's barked vocals might be different, or they might be exactly the same - there are only a few moments when you can really tell what he's saying anyway. I'm sure someone somewhere would have noticed if they'd just pressed six of the exact same versions of these songs in a different order, but I can't help but wonder if this is just some elaborate prank - that maybe they did just put out the exact same mixes but call them demos (possibly even by accident). Or maybe I should listen to the actual album again to be more sure. The vocals on Landfill do sound different (a bit more echo, perhaps?) but I've not listened to the album in a while, so maybe I'm just mis-remembering. I still love the simplicity of those lyrics. Behemoth is the only thing that really sounds like a demo - it fits perfectly onto the album musically, although the vocals are much cleaner than anything else from the era. It's a nice addition, but not worth the entry cost on it's own.

Thinking about it, it's a rather major criticism of a record - the idea that it really doesn't need to exist because it sounds identical to one that I paid the grand sum of £2.85 for on eBay (including postage!). A bigger criticism is the artwork, which looks like someone bashed together in about 3 minutes in a Word doc. The font is definitely the first one they found in the dropdown menu. It bothers me that there's a white square before the word "Pitch" and one after, but not one after "Shifter" - it makes sense when the two words are written one above the other - as on the Industrial artwork, but makes no sense in one line. Mostly it's one of the least interesting looking record sleeves I own, but that aspect is just infuriating. The italic version of the font on the centre label is even more horrific. I'm no design snob, but it looks terrible.

Some nice things to say about it - it's a really heavy, thick vinyl (but why you'd want the demos (allegedly) to be pressed on nicer vinyl than the album itself I don't know), and it's on clear vinyl which is more interesting than just black vinyl. Etched into the run-out grooves are the coordinates of a location in Bristol, which I think is where they hid a "Pitch Shifter skull", although I remember a tweet that no one had discovered it for a good while; I don't have much time to spare, let alone in Bristol, so even if I had noticed these earlier, I doubt I'd have made the journey. It didn't come with a download code, but I'm pretty sure I could just shuffle around the tracks from Industrial in iTunes and have six-sevenths of the experience digitally. 

Format: 12", numbered (462/500)
Tracks: 7
Cost: £18 new
Bought: Record Culture
When: 26/01/21
Colour: Clear
Etching: Side A: "51°26'33'' N - 2°32'10'' W" Side B: "Seth-Wynn-Seth Forever"
mp3s: no 

The Draft - The Fest 12 Edition

 

I don't have mp3s of these songs, so they've had a fraction of the number of plays as The Draft's excellent, only album has had. Devil in the Shade is worth digging the 7"s out for alone, and Hard to Be Around It is pretty strong too. I really should play this much more often.

I wasn't aware of what this record was when I bought it - I'd been buying the "Fest Edition" version of any records I was into that weekend and they're all pretty cool. At the end of the weekend I found this in Arrow's Aim, the No Idea record shop in Gainesville and added it to the stack of records I was buying (before we jumped in the car, realised we mis-calculated our timings a bit and had to drive very fast back to Tampa to catch our flight home). I'd seen The Draft for the first (and only) time at Pre-Fest a few days earlier, but not seen the record there. If they'd played the main event too they must have clashed with someone else, otherwise I'd have watched them again.

The strangest thing about this record is that it's a double-7" version of a triple 7" they'd released for a separate tour (which Discogs refers to as "Tour Edition"). That record comprises all three 7"s they released in 2007, the year after In a Million Pieces came out, but this one is only two of those records; I've not heard the other two songs. I should probably check them out one day.

Format: Double 7", Fest edition

Tracks: 4
Cost: £7 new
Bought: Arrow's Aim, Gainesville
When: 04/11/13
Colour: Purple
Etching: Side A: "Mini soccer? Are you kidding me?" Side B: "I like grown up JB even better" Side C: "Draft beer, not me" Side D: "Draft is a fine cleaning product"
mp3s: no

Radiator Hospital + Martha - Split

 

I should really like Martha more than I actually do. I love ONSIND and have done for years, but this is the only Martha record I own (and that's only really because I got it as part of the Specialist Subject subscription I had for a couple of years). I've listened to all their albums and each time thought "yeah, it's nice, but I don't love it". I'm clearly missing something because everyone I know loves them way more than ONSIND and they've had what appears to be far more success as a foursome too.

I can see the appeal for sure. Chekhov's Hangnail has a huge chorus and a big full sound. Mendable is actually much closer to ONSIND territory and I like it more. I guess what I always quite liked about ONSIND was that weren’t a rock band, but wrote songs that definitely worked as rock songs. The last time I saw them was effectively the Martha line-up (I think) playing an ONSIND set and it was incredible. Maybe I just need to see Martha for it to all fall into place.

I don't really remember having any opinions on Radiator Hospital before, but I'm quite enjoying them now. I can’t put my finger on what it reminds me of (frustratingly) - the singer's very nasal voice is very reminiscent of something, but for the life of me I can't think who. The final song, Dark Sand, has some extra vocals which do break things up quite nicely and adds a lot to the song. Good effort squeezing three songs onto one side of a 7" playing at 45rpm - I don't think I've ever put this record on at the right speed the first time - I always think "three songs must mean 33rpm".

Format: 7", insert
Tracks: 5
Cost: £5 new
Bought: Specialist Subject Records
When: 08/10/15
Colour: Mint green
Etching: Side A: "Put the kettle on" Side B: "Sexy willy riff"
mp3s: Download code

Pale Angels - Four Live Songs

 

When I bought the first Pale Angels album, I figured I'd pick up the two 7"s that Specialist Subject had as well. It'd been nine months since I'd seen them and been really pleasantly surprised at how good they were, and the fact they were basically a grunge band and not a punk band. I'm not sure why it took me so long. I've got a feeling I had a discount to use with Specialist Subject so put in an order for a bunch of things. Either that, or I was just in the mood to spend some money.

The four songs here make up nearly half of the songs on their debut, but these were recorded live on a UK tour in December 2013. The quality, as you'd expect (for a number of reasons) varies from charmingly shit to just shit - Mama sounds like it was recorded on a dictaphone cassette, and it sounds like Reza was playing drums on a table; the "woo-oohs" near the end sound amazing though. I get the desire to get some songs out there, but I can't believe these were the best four live recordings from that tour unless they were the only four live recordings from that tour. Slow Dance is great though - pure Nirvana, but brilliant for it. Slow Jangle has a nice build up to a satisfying beat.

Anyway, it's a nice little package - white vinyl and the sleeve is printed on black card and numbered (mine is 124/143). It also comes with a zine of tour photos, which is nice. I hadn't realised that the cover of the Strange Powers 7” was shot in the Exchange until looking through there. 

Format: 7", zine, numbered (124/143)

Tracks: 4

Cost: £5 new

Bought: Specialist Subject Records

When: 05/12/14

Colour: White

Etching: None

mp3s: None

Run, Forever - A Few Good Things

 

For a short while, Run, Forever felt like a really important band. Then they just sort of vanished. It happens a lot I guess, and there's probably not always a dramatic end; a lot of bands just fizzle out. I assume that's what happened here, but I have no idea really. 

Between 2011 and 2015 I bought a bunch of their records. Not quite everything they put out, but most. I even bought all four colours of their second album Settling, although I think that was more because the option was presented to me by the record label than a real desire to actually go deep on collecting them. Even the bands I love the most I don't go down to colour-variant-level of collecting. Those for records are something of an anomaly in my collection with their identical spines all next to each other, but a nice reminder of that brief period when Run, Forever seemed like a really important band.

This 7" came out between their first and second albums. I've not played either in a while now, but this feels like a good mixture of the two, possibly more in common with the first, but I'm only saying that because two of the songs here are huge, and in my memory the first album had more stand-out songs like that. Those two songs are the first on each side - Letters and Get Better. The former probably ranks among their best songs, and both are earnest, eager punk-rock songs, full of energy and hard-hitting. Growing Pains is a nice reflective closer, which is a perfectly normal sort of song to write, but an unusual one to put on an EP when you have fewer songs to play with. Fall Hard is a nice acoustic song, but feels unfinished.

I bought this 7" when I saw them play at Fest in 2013, although I don't particularly remember the set - I couldn't tell you which venue it was in, unlike the first time I saw them at Fest 2011, which is firmly etched into my mind. It was the fifth day of the festival and they were the ninth band I saw that day, sandwiched between 1994! (who I do remember seeing) and Restorations (who I think I remember seeing, like 80% sure which venue they were in). I had the other albums they were selling, but picked up this and a t-shirt. Two years later they released another album and then sort of disappeared. More on that when I get round to writing about the final, self-titled LP.

Format: 7", folded sleeve, insert

Tracks: 4

Cost: £3.15 new

Bought: Fest

When: 02/11/13

Colour: Purple

Etching: Side A: "Better step aside home school, there's a new sheriff in town! Side B: "They’re break dance fighting!"
mp3s: download

Jena Berlin - This is Yours as Much as it is Mine

I bought this record having never actually listened to Jena Berlin. I was, and still am, a huge Restorations fan and they added a bunch of old releases to their website a while back, so I took the opportunity to stock up on a few bits. Most excitingly, they had the Little Elephant session 12", but they also had this 7" and the album by the band that a few of them were in before Restorations by the of name Jena Berlin. I figured it was worth a punt, so I bought both.

It's impossible to listen to without comparing it to Restorations, which is probably unfair - everything about it sounds so much more naive and scrappy; Restorations always sounded so sure of their sound and somehow older because of it. I don't want to use the words "mature" and it's loaded negative "immature" because it'd be doing Jena Berlin a disservice, but it's hard for those words to not pop into your mind. Restorations always felt (to me, at least) as an older-person's punk band. Jena Berlin sounds like the music they made as teenagers in comparison - there's so much energy and a slightly metal-tinged edge in places (Motion Sickness on the album jumps through a bunch of different styles, but kinda works; Oh God on this 7" is even more unexpectedly metal). For reasons I can't quite put my finger on, it reminds me of a lot of the bands we used to see in South Wales - not even in musical style, maybe it's the cheaper production or youthful energy. But there are hints of Restorations in there, along with about a hundred other influences.

As a result, I always think "I'd rather be listening to Restorations" when I play it, so I can't say I've ever listened to it purely on it's own merits. If you've thought "I wish Restorations played faster punk with a hint of metal" then you should probably check out Jena Berlin.

Format: 7", folded screen-printed sleeve
Tracks: 2
Cost: £7.70 new
Bought: Band's website
When: 03/08/17
Colour: Red
Etching: none
mp3s: download code

Hot Water Music - Live in Chicago

It’s now been so long since I went to a concert that live albums are starting to take on new meanings. I bought this Hot Water Music triple live LP because at the time there was no best-of compilation and I quite liked the idea of having all their best songs in one place. And this record ticks that box and then some; just look at those first four songs – A Flight and a Crash into Remedy into Wayfarer (one of their greatest songs full stop) into Trusty Chords. What a way to start a show. That is a truly amazing run of songs, the sort you end a show with not start with. It'd be fair to say that the rest of the album doesn't hit such heights again, but how could it?

And pre-pandemic, this album was just a good way to hear all my favourite HWM songs in one place (although three discs is stretching the definition of "one place" – I could equally play Fuel for the Hate Game, A Flight and A Crash and Caution in their entireties, hear 90% of my favourite HWM songs and have got out of my seat the same number of times). But it's now been 16 months since I last went to a concert, an otherwise unfathomable gap between shows, and it's only going to get longer. So when I put the needle on this record, my mind is thrown back to the first time I saw HWM play, in a sweaty dodgy venue in Newport, South Wales surrounded by every punk I'd made acquaintances in the two years I'd lived in Cardiff - it was 9 months after I'd left for London but there was no doubt in my mind that if I was going to see HWM it'd be in South Wales. It was horrifically hot, beer-soaked and chaotic. We'd been drinking in beer gardens in the afternoon and the show was perfect. More than 10 years have passed since, but this record puts me right back there, struggling to sing along to any of the choruses (partly because I still know less than a third of the words being sung at any given point). I saw HWM twice more after that show - to a disappointingly small crowd at Reading Festival and to a raucous hometown crowd on the first night of my first Fest, but that Newport show will always be my favourite memory. And it's nice that I can take myself right back there with this record.

I've only mentioned the first four songs here so far, but there are some other great moments - "God Deciding" and Kill the Night are two of my favourite non-album songs and both get played, which is great (they'd both be missing from the alternative choice of three records I mentioned above). Moonpies for Misfits is a great slower one that I often forget about. Side 5 has the opening duo from Fuel (in reverse order) which is another huge moment on the album, and The Sense from Caution sounds amazing - it's not a song I'd ever have listed as being amongst my favourites but it's definitely up there.

This copy, as with most variants, is from the second run which featured different colour sleeves to match the records and Discogs tells me that there were 550 of each colour. I bought it one day in Banquet - I don't remember them having any other colours, but I was perfectly happy with blue. I was aware of the record before seeing it there that day, and without the tracklisting printed anywhere on the sleeve I had to trust that it'd be huge, but it was just after Christmas and I guess I just fancied spending some money. Of course £17 for a triple LP is now a bargain regardless what's actually on it.

Two years later an actual best-of compilation did come out, but I've not bought it - mostly because I have this record, which is more interesting owing to it being a live recording, but also because it doesn't have "God Deciding" and Kill the Night on (however does have Poison and Drag My Body, two of the best songs they wrote in their more recent eras). To be honest, if I saw it in a shop, I probably would buy it, but that says more about my compulsive record buying than it does the relative merits of these two albums.

Format: Triple 12", insert
Tracks: 30
Cost: £17 new
Bought: Banquet Record, Kingston
When: 04/01/13
Colour: Blue
Etching: Side A: "I love these chords" Side B: "From voice to ear" Side C: "Scarred but here" Side D: "You are not alone" Side E: "I must always remember" Side F: "This makes me whole"
mp3s: Download code

At the Drive-In - In-ter A-li-a

There are a lot of interesting questions you can ask yourself when it comes to the new At the Drive-In record. Questions like: if you didn't know it was by ATDI but someone had said "if you like ATDI, you might enjoy this album", would I have still been interested? I'd definitely have marked them down for that artwork and font. I might have been into it after pressing play - the opener, No Wolf Like the Present, is one of the strongest on the album and might have drawn me in; it is very At the Drive-In-esque. Would I have spent £22 on it based on that alone? Almost certainly not.

Of course, all these questions are irrelevant, because it is an ATDI record, so I was going to buy it pretty much regardless. After seeing them on their first tour after reforming, I was amazed that they decided to stay together long enough to write another album - at points in the show Omar Rodriguez Lopez looked like he might not even make it to the end of the set. And like all reformations, you do wonder if it's truly necessary to write another album. There are some great moments here - Call Broken Arrow has a really, really good chorus. It's the sort of chorus that makes you think "yeah, this could have worked". Governed by Contagion is the other highlight - if they played it live you'd say "yeah, this isa good song" before really thinking which album it came from. The rest really struggle to stand out in any notable way. Ghost-Tape No. 9 sounds like a Mars Volta b-side.

All in all, not terrible but by no means essential.

Format: Gatefold 12", picture sleeve

Tracks: 11

Cost: £22 new

Bought: Truck Store

When: 10/05/17

Colour: Half black with pink splatter, half pink

Etching: Side A: "In defence of the hero the sermon on the mount will be" Side B: "Administered intravenously by a state appointed therapist" 

mp3s: download code

Far - Water & Solutions: What Happened

This has taken forever to write about. On the vinyl, there are ten songs; nothing unusual about that. But accompanying this particular release is a USB stick containing nearly 4 hours of demos and out-takes from pretty much the entire history of the band. It is a lot to take in.

That said, the five unreleased songs on the vinyl (the other five are demos of songs from Water & Solutions) are probably the highlight of the lot. I remember putting the needle on the record the first time and thinking they were arguably late-additions to the album of the year list that year (the record arrived in December). The first four are all fantastic - Mantra and Sawed Off are both heavy-Far, something they did very well. The second has hints of doom-Far, which is all over the third song, Really Last, a song that would have worked brilliantly on Tin Cans With Strings to You. Accompanying the 52 songs is a zine with notes from Jonah about every single track - in it he says that Kisses From Magdalene was a hit in his brain, but not in reality, but I'd say it was a hit in reality too (later we're treated to another less polished demo) - the chorus is huge. Where Are You Now is the least exciting of the lot but still nice enough. Also would have worked well on Tin Cans, but not in place of any of the slower songs on there.

Controversially (to no one, I'm sure), I'm going to rattle off my thoughts on the other unreleased/non-album songs included first. If I had one criticism of this huge collection of songs, it'd be that it's lacking a coherent order, at least one that is apparent to me. As someone who likes order, I made playlists of the songs on the USB stick and arranged them by album. It was only then that it was really obvious that included were demos for the whole of Water & Solutions, most of Tin Cans and Quick, as well as a bunch of other great songs and some covers. The record and, indeed, the Kickstarter was billed as being a 20th anniversary release for Water & Solutions, but the scope clearly ended up being well beyond that.

Amongst the other songs that didn't make it onto the album are some gems. Jonah notes that Nine Miles has some Drive Like Jehu vibes, which I can see. A second version features Grady from Will Haven, which is even better. Probably the surprise of the lot is Heather's Homework, a song which sounds like it's going to be a Jonah-dicking-around-song from the title, but is actually a crushing, heavy industrial beast of a song. It's probably the heaviest Far song I've ever heard. Jonah's vocals are great, particularly when screaming "I am calling". If there's one thing these songs really show, it's how great Jonah's vocals were when they were rough and raw in the demos - somehow varying between gruff-punk and metal-screams. There are two versions of a song called Tides but neither really do it for me; I'm Gone sounds different in a way that I couldn't put my finger on, until I saw that it was from the At Night We Live sessions; it's essentially a very polished rock song, which is why it doesn't sound very "Far". Bingo is a 9-minute long instrumental jam that has its moments but ultimately doesn't justify its length. The messing around with the tape buttons at the end ruins it. There's also The E-Bomb Snippets, which is nothing but a fascinating glimpse into how things were done when the internet was still in its infancy.

There are a handful of covers included. I've never really listened to PJ Harvey or 7 Seconds, so I have no idea how Long Snake Moan and Satyagraha compare to their originals, but the chorus to the former is great (having heard Kevin Seconds voice on this record, I'm probably not going to bother with 7 Seconds). I was excited to hear their cover of Monkey Gone to Heaven but that was, surprisingly, the worst song here I think. I always thought "no one can do that song badly", but it turned out I was wrong - the best bits are all messed about with (in a bad way) and the highlight of the song - where Frank sings about the devil being six - is painful to hear. Also included is the semi-famous Sacramento-bands cover of Do They Know it's Christmas. I had an mp3 of this from the old days of file sharing and never really knew how legit it was. It's nice to finally have a proper version of it. It sounds like they had a great time recording it. 

I'm going to work through the rest chronologically by album, because that's clearly the right order. I've still not got a copy of their second album, Quick. This is mostly because I have a copy of their first album, Listening Game, and it's either the work of a band trying to find their sound, or terrible, depending on how generous I'm feeling (usually the latter). However, based on these songs, I should get a copy. Both versions of Man o' the Year are better than anything on Listening Game by a good distance. Less is very heavy, probably the heaviest they ever sounded whilst still sounding like themselves. Again, Jonah's vocals at the end are incredible. I didn't realise Girl was on both Quick and Tin Cans until I looked up the tracklisting on Discogs (this is a nice acoustic version). The Ballad of Simon & Constance is nice and All Go Down has some lovely warm strings in the chorus and a great melody too, but does drag on too long. Sister is a bit of a slow dirge though (not in the good way), but again Jonah cracks out some nice vocals at the end.

As I've said many times before (and to anyone who'll listen), Tin Cans With Strings to You is my favourite Far album and I was genuinely shocked to find that the general consensus was that Water & Solutions was the highlight. We get treated to demos of about half the songs here, which is nice. I never thought I'd say that a song from Tin Cans was too slow, but that is the case with the demo of In the Aisle, Yelling (great title). The chorus does sound amazing. Job's Eyes and Punchdrunk are both even slower somehow and sound brilliant - the former has these crunching heavy guitars that make you realise how easily the band could have been Helmet if they'd wanted to be. Punchdrunk, despite sounding like it was recorded underwater, shows how tiny little changes in the mixing can have such a huge effect on a song - there's a little bass line just before the chorus in the final version that really makes the song, but here it's low in the mix and not the focus, which is a shame. Whoever decided to bring that to the top of the mix made a great call. Boring Life is painfully quiet and it's a shame that there's no demo of Joining the Circus - one of my favourite memories of seeing Jonah live (of which, there are many) was seeing him play that song upstairs in the Garage; I could listen to that song for days. We do, however, get three versions of Sorrow's End which is a lot for a song I wouldn't have been able to tell you much about in particular before writing this. The loud version is a great example of how different a song can be, at least musically - Jonah's fucked-with vocals are totally wrong for the speed and volume - it needs a crystal clear singalong, not echoey whispers. It could be a great punk-rock song, but isn't here.

Water & Solutions is, as expected, the star of the show, with demos of all the songs, five of which made it onto the vinyl (that I've barely mentioned in countless paragraphs). There's an interesting mixture of results - Really Here sounds like it was recorded super-early on and Jonah hasn't entirely figured out or committed to the vocal delivery; the title track sounds amazing but like it probably hurt to sing; Nestle has a hint of a 60's style to it but is also way fuzzier, which is a strange combination. There are three versions of Mother Mary, the first of which sounds bare in the chorus, but I couldn't tell you exactly what was missing. We're also treated to an acoustic version from the Daytrotter Sessions, which I've had mp3s of for a long time - it's lovely, but that should come as no surprise - Jonah has played that song a lot in the years between. Bury White is also from that recording and sounds great too.

Finally, we come to At Night We Live, from which we have three songs, two from the Daytrotter Session - the title track and The Ghost That Kept on Haunting. I quite enjoyed the album and enjoy these versions too. The "ambient mix" of the the title track is interesting, but not as good by a long way. An interesting experiment if nothing else.

And that brings us to the end of the nearly-4-hours of music here. With international postage, this wasn't a cheap purchase (£47.25, all in) but there's no way you could say there isn't value there. I don't think any Far fan could really ask for more. And there are nice little touches beyond the vast, vast quantity of music too - the zine is signed by Jonah and each sleeve is numbered (mine is #10, surely a reflection of random ordering rather than numbering by order date, because I don't think I paid into the Kickstarter straight away). The last page of the zine lists the names of all the people who contributed and my name is there if you look very closely. I don't engage in Kickstarters as often as I probably should, but I'm very glad I did in this case. You never really know how these things are going to turn out, but Jonah has done his fair share, so knows what people want. And, this package suggests, that what people want is crazy amounts of music.

Format: Gatefold 12", zine, USB drive

Tracks: 52

Cost: £47.25 new

Bought: Kickstarter

When: 08/12/18

Colour: Blue

Etching: None

mp3s: USB drive

Far - Water & Solutions

Whilst I've always been a Tin Cans man, I still have a lot of time for Water & Solutions and I get why people rate it so highly. It took me a long time to get there though - I got Water & Solutions only five months after getting Tin Cans With Strings To You, but I'd been sold on Tin Cans' slightly rougher edges and doomier moments. On top of that, I knew that Water & Solutions was the one that was meant to be the better one, so maybe I went in with higher expectations - I'd read (and still have somewhere) a Kerrang! article that listed Water & Solutions as the third best post-hardcore/emo album of all time, which is a pretty big claim (and a solid list to be in at all - I remember Fugazi's Repeater and At the Drive-In's Relationship of Command also being in the top ten, but not necessarily above Far).

People absolutely adore Mother Mary and I suspect it's the Far song that Jonah plays the most. It is an incredible song, there's no doubt about it. Do I love it more than Job's Eyes or Joining the Circus? No, but I'll agree that it probably is the better song in a traditional sense. The title-track is pretty great too - the whispers of "Soon, a light on" before the chorus is brilliant - you can imagine the comparisons to the Deftones that drew, despite musically being pretty far removed. Nestle and Wear It So Well are highlights too. Man Overboard is the only one that that has those same hints of doom and sludge that my favourite songs on Tin Cans have; it's the only one that would have comfortably fit on that album (it feels bad to constantly compare the album to its predecessor, but I'm not sure I've ever listened to it without thinking about how much I never got it as much as I did Tin Cans).

I saw Jonah play Water & Solutions in full in 2018 to celebrate its 20th anniversary. To play the shows, he toured the UK (and possibly Europe) with the band Witching Waves, which was unusual, but made for an interesting twist on the usual anniversary tour. I was lucky enough to see Far in 2008, so I didn't mind it not being a full-band thing. Given the history of the band, I'm not surprised they couldn't get back on the road together and I'd much rather watch one quarter of the band play these songs than not at all. Strangely, Jonah changed the tracklist entirely, playing the gentler songs first, before exploding into the heavier ones. I guess people don't write album tracklists and setlists in the same way at all - so few albums save the best song for last; it's a fundamental flaw in the whole "playing an album in full" tour idea. Ironically, Waiting for Sunday is a huge song (but not Mother Mary-huge).

Around the time that Tin Cans got reissued, they reissued Water & Solutions too. I had the chance to buy both at Fest, but opted for just Tin Cans because it was a few days before payday and I had to hold back a bit. I'd never really minded having just one in my collection, and I had the one I cared about the most. But over the years I did occasionally think it'd be nice to have both albums on vinyl. Last year at some point I read an email from Jonah that mentioned a new German reissue of Water & Solutions, so I immediately headed over to their site to pick up a copy. In the email Jonah said the last reissue sounded shitty, but this one he was on board with, so I figured it was worth picking up. It also came with a bonus flexi-7" which was a nice added bonus. Annoyingly, the coloured vinyl had sold out by this point, so I snapped up this black vinyl copy (more annoyingly, they did a second run on a different colour of vinyl, which is a pet-peeve of mine - first pressings on coloured and black vinyl then subsequent on coloured - means if you're a bit slow off the mark you get stuck with a boring colour of vinyl, but then you'd have been rewarded with a nicer colour for waiting. It happens far too often. I guess it helps sell records). It is a nice pressing, although the faded colour of the sleeve makes it look cheaper somehow - like a shitty photocopy, even though it's not. The 7" has a home demo of Mother Mary, which is nice, even if hearing Jonah play Far songs on his own is the norm rather than the exception these days. 

Format: 12", square 7" flexi disc, insert

Tracks: 13

Cost: £25.60 new

Bought: Thirty Something Records bandcamp

When: 11/12/19

Colour: Black, transparent blue

Etching: none

mp3s: Download code

Bars of Gold - Wheels

Bars of Gold released their second album, Wheels, a couple of years after I'd got into them. The song Coffee With Pele came out in the August and got me very excited; the album followed in October. I'd been meaning to buy their debut, Of Gold, for two whole years by that point and still hadn't managed to. I came very close once, but was worried they hadn't set up the international postage rates correctly, and felt bad that I might be screwing them over by making them pay the rest of the postage. Anyway, when Wheels came out, Of Gold had sold out on Bandcamp and I couldn't find anywhere to buy them both from at the same time to save on postage and customs fees. Six years later, these reissues came out, and were crippling expensive, but I'm just glad to finally have copies.

Coffee With Pele was a huge song to drop before the album came out - the shouts of "Howling like wolves" in the chorus are brilliant and exactly what I wanted from the band. But the great thing is that it's not even the best song on the album. Connected and Blue Lightning are probably the highlights though - the addition of some smooth backing vocals added a depth I wasn't expecting but was thoroughly into, and the chorus of the former is huge. On their third they stepped it up even further in terms of unexpected sounds for a punk band, but here it was a total surprise and I loved it then and now. Hey Kids starts the album off quite jangly and constantly feels on the brink of falling apart (but in a good way) and 22180 is another highlight.

As you can see in the pictures, the colour of this album is amazing; it's up there amongst some of my favourite looking vinyl. Splatter vinyl always looks great, but the choice of colours and the way the splatter doesn't reach the middle is just lovely to look at. 

Format: 12"

Tracks: 10

Cost: £33.74 new

Bought: Equal Vision website

When: 23/03/19

Colour: White with yellow, orange and green splatter

Etching: none

mp3s: none

Bars of Gold - Of Gold

I've written about how I got into Bars of Gold before, but only briefly because it was when I wrote about a Bear Vs Shark record (nearly 8!) years ago, but I'm going to tell the story again, because the song that got me into them is on this record and it remains a favourite.

In 2011 I went to Fest for the first time, and had a great time getting into as many obscure and new bands as I could. It was a life-changing trip, if only because I discovered bands that I'm still listening to today and became some of my favourites. Mostly that was through seeing the bands play various dive bars across Gainesville, but a sweaty evening spent in the 1984 bar resulted in a sampler cd for a record label called Friction Records. We'd gone because Caves were playing, and I love that band (and it was great to see them playing to such an eager crowd half way around the world). Also on the bill were Charles the Osprey and Shores. I loved Shores and their halfway-between-punk-and-Low sound, and bought two of their records - I was chatting to the guy at the merch stall who was strangely cagey about prices, but said I could have two for $15, which remains a bargain - I imagine they were $10 each, but the exchange rate at the time was ridiculous, so I was keen either way. Sarah really enjoyed Charles the Osprey and bought their album. We both got the free Friction Records sampler cd, which featured Charles the Osprey.

A few days later, Fest was done and we were driving back to Tampa for a few days before flying home (I still wish we'd taken a few more days and gone to Fun Fun Fun fest in Texas the next weekend - that was a killer line-up featuring three of my yet-to-see favourites: Hum, Murder City Devils and Snapcase. Really should have gone). We'd played most of the cds we'd packed driving about before the festival, so any we got at Fest got a play in the car. I remember putting on the Friction Records one because we wanted to remind ourselves what Charles the Osprey were like. I have no recollection of what any of the other songs sounded like, except for The Hustle by Bars of Gold which hit like a ton of bricks and had me amazed.

If you've somehow read three paragraphs of me waffling on without having listened to Bars of Gold, then put on The Hustle. I can begin to explain how unexpected and brilliant it was. Maybe four nights of mostly straight-forward punk-rock was a factor, but I was amazed by that song. I still remember vividly driving along thinking "fuck yes, this is incredible". I remember turning to Sarah to check that I wasn't the only one floored by it - she was enjoying it, but not to the extent I was. I'm not sure anyone would have enjoyed it as much as I was at that exact point. The banjo propels the song at a great pace and Marc Paffi's vocals are everything I want from a singer - unique, distinctive and emotive - plus, gang vocals in the chorus and clapping; who could ask for more? I know that sampler cds are there to introduce you to new bands, but you never really expect to hear your new favourite band on a sampler cd. Usually you've heard the name before you hear them, or you've heard something good about them; it's rarely a complete surprise like that.

Anyway, after returning home, I played the cd again, still loved The Hustle and found the album on Bandcamp. I played Of Gold, Bars of Gold's first and only-at-the-time album, a lot - before that point I'd never seen the guilt-tripping recommendation to buy the album on Bandcamp (of course, that album also caused me to realise that you could listen in incognito mode and not be tracked). For years I meant to buy the album, but I kept putting it off. Postage from the states is always expensive and customs fees a secondary kick in the balls. And then it sold out, so I missed my chance.

Some years later, Equal Vision Records repressed their first two albums (I feel that Third Man Records was involved somehow, but I can't remember how) and I jumped on the chance to get a copy. The postage and customs fees were still horrific - in fact more-so because the exchange rate has tanked - but it was worth it. Yes, this album cost me nearly £34, which is a lot for a single LP (it's nearly £1-a-minute), but it was worth it (look at that colour! It's listed as gold and clear swirl, but what that means is the gold has this almost-chrome effect). Annoyingly, the album didn't come with mp3s but I finally caved on the first of the recent "Bandcamp days" (where BC waive their cut) and bought the mp3s. I love this album and I want to listen to it all the time and now I can.

I should probably say something about the other songs, because they're all remarkable in their own right: Boss Level sets things off to a perfect start with a brilliant riff played out on a keyboard, before Marc's unique vocals kick in, and the build-up/break in Heaven Has Heater is perfect. The guitars in Birds are great fun and Up Up Up teeters on the edge of falling apart but holds it together. Cannibals lulls you into the false belief that the closer would be a quieter affair, only to build up to a huge outro of "I was born a cannibal / Not like any cannibal you've seen before" and more glorious guitars.

Anyway, as I wrote about on that Bear Vs Shark record, this album led me to discover BVS, which has been a great journey too. Who knew that free sampler cd would result in finding two amazing bands and their five amazing albums.

Format: 12"
Tracks: 8
Cost: £33.74 new
Bought: Equal Vision website
When: 23/03/19
Colour: Gold and clear swirl
Etching: none
mp3s: none

Run the Jewels - Bust No Moves

The final in a little trilogy of Run the Jewels records, this is a 12" they put out for Record Store Day in 2015. I wasn't buying a huge amount that year - in fact, I only bought four records, but one was a Manics record and the other by the Dirty Three, so both essential purchases (the other was a Clutch album, which I didn't really need but enjoy anyway - I was up early and it felt like a waste to do so for only three records).

I didn't know much about the release ahead of time, but was keen to get it regardless. As it is, we get two new songs - the title track and Blockbuster Night Pt 2, which is safe to assume is a sequel to Blockbuster Night Pt 1 on RTJ2 (I think it might have been a bonus track somewhere, but not one I had). The version of Love Again is the same as on my copy of the LP, but apparently the first pressings didn't have the verse by Boots. Pew Pew Pew is one of the bonus tracks on the second disc of RTJ1 - it's probably the best song on this EP.

It's a nice little record, but easily forgotten between the gatefold sleeves of the RTJ LPs around it - plastic sleeves are rarely eye-catching when side-on on a shelf. The colour is nice, although I couldn't confidently say what colour it actually is.

Format: 12"
Tracks: 4
Cost: £13 new
Bought: Truck Store, Oxford
When: 18/04/15
Colour: Clear with splatter
Etching: none
mp3s: no

Run the Jewels - Run the Jewels 3

I'd started writing about this one yesterday, then I saw that they released Run the Jewels 4 early, so I stopped what I was doing and started listening to the new one. I'd not long finished writing about how I frantically downloaded RTJ3 on Christmas morning when I began frantically downloading RTJ4. As long as Run the Jewels are releasing albums, I'll be aiming to get my ears around them as soon as possible. Anyway, more on RTJ4 another day.

Some people I know didn't rate RTJ3 as highly as RTJ2, but I'd go so far as to say that I love this one even more than RTJ2. Whilst the start is the crazy-catchy big tunes, there are some heavy moments in the second half of the album that hit really fucking hard - Don't Get Captured, Thieves, Thursday in the Danger Room and A Report to the Shareholders/Kill Your Masters are all amazing and have raps that you can't help but be moved by. Thursday in the Danger Room is just devastating - El-P's verse pulls at the heartstrings, but then Killer Mike just destroys you. If you haven't, I recommend listening to that one with the lyrics to hand. Wow. It's hard to not think about all things kicking off around the world right when you hear those songs.

Near the start, you also have one of my favourite of El's verses - his lines in Talk To Me are great, peaking with "You don't get it, I'm dirt motherfucker I can't be crushed". Call Ticketron has a super-annoying hook, to the extent that I skip it most of the time I listen to the album. The first three tracks are a great opening - each one a step up from what came before, and Hey Kids follows this trajectory, so it's just a shame that Call Ticketron gets in the way of that. Panther Like a Panther made it onto my end of the year mixtape in 2017 and, along with 2100 (is that a guitar that pops up behind El's first verse?), was one of my first favourite songs on the album. I think that might be one of the best things about RTJ3 - at various points over the last three and a half years almost all of the songs have been a favourite at some point.

Run the Jewels dropped RTJ3 on Christmas Day in 2016. I found out about it via an email (old school) and frantically downloaded it. It was a strange Christmas Day - we were going to my sister's for lunch, then down to my wife's parents' house in London afterwards - it was the most time I think I've ever spent in the car on a Christmas Day. However, that meant I'd get to listen to the new RTJ on the way; great, I thought. The first hurdle was finding any blank cds to burn the album to. I was trying to find them whilst also trying to pack the car and look like I was being helpful, and eventually concluded that I must have run out. I figured the car had a way of plugging in some audio cables, so I grabbed those, stuck the album on an old mp3 player and hit the road. Annoyingly, that cable was broken, so it was quite a disappointment when we hit the motorway and I couldn't enjoy the new RTJ. Finally, after lunch I asked my brother-in-law if he had any cables I could borrow, and he leant me a 5-meter audio cable, which did the job (and took up most of the glove compartment for a few months until I remembered to return them). As the sun set and we drove to London, I finally got to hear RTJ3 for the first time. Sure, my shitty car hifi isn't the best to listen to a new album on, nor is it easy to pay attention to what they're rapping whilst also navigating the six lanes of the M25, but I enjoyed it. I think I also just really enjoyed hearing the album on the day it came out and having a memorable experience of that. Not sure my wife was such a fan mind you.

A few weeks later the physical copies hit the shelves and I rushed out to get a copy. The shop had this one, or one that came with a gold chain for a small amount more. I decided that I didn't need the chain in my life so plumped for the cheaper option. It's a nice package - gold vinyl and nice touches. I vaguely remember there being an AR app that made the artwork come to life - it wouldn't run on my phone, but I installed it on an iPhone in the office and had a play. I can't remember much of what it did. All that said, the highlight is, as always, the lyric sheet - I remember sitting down with the album and reading every line (sometimes a couple of times as it played) and just taking it all in. There are some fucking genius lines on this album.

Format: Double 12", insert, sticker sheet
Tracks: 14
Cost: £27 new
Bought: Norman Records
When: 20/01/17
Colour: Gold
Etching: none
mp3s: none