Baroness - Yellow & Green

I started writing a blog post about this record a few years ago. The saddest thing is that was probably when I last listened to this album (these albums?) - I chronically under-appreciate Baroness.

I bought this double LP on something of a whim - I was in Banquet and found it in the racks. It was about a month after their infamous tour of the UK where their bus crashed near Bath, so the name was firmly lodged in my head. However, I'd heard a lot about Baroness in the months leading up to that event too - Yellow & Green had got great reviews and their tour was clearly incredible based on the things I'd been reading. On top of that, there were a bunch of other factors that made me decide to buy it that day - it'd been a month since I'd bought any records and I was already picking up a bunch of other ones, and at £20 for a double album, it was only really £10 per album, which is a steal (kind of). I also hoped that the records would be coloured, since having them on yellow and green vinyl is so obvious, but it seems that that luxury was saved for those who bought the album sooner. Oh well.

I knew Baroness were a bit proggy, because it's impossible to have a prog-influence without someone calling it out, but up to the point the needle hit the record, I don't think I actually knew what Baroness sounded like. The vocals were the thing that hit me first - they're very distinct and not 100% my cup of tea, but I enjoy them nonetheless. The thing that really surprised me about Baroness was that they weren't heavier - I was definitely expecting a much heavier sound from them. I guess that was guided by a few things, but most notably from thinking about the people I knew who were fans, as well as the name and that very-metal artwork.

Despite those initial struggles, I enjoy these albums - whilst I just said they weren't as heavy as I was expecting, they're certainly heavier than most prog-rock (just not as heavy as regular metal) and that really works. On top of that, there are some huge choruses (take March to the River and The Line Between for example) and great moments littered throughout (like Psalms Alive). The slower ones like Eula work well too. Green starts in a hugely triumphant way, which always reminds me of Bill and Ted in the best possible way and Board Up the House was the first time I heard their punk-influence coming through.

It feels like such a petty complaint, but not getting an mp3 download with this LP has really impacted my enjoyment it though - that is, I've not spent anywhere near enough time with it to really get into it properly. I certainly wouldn't have gone years without playing it had I had mp3s of the album to listen to at work. The sad reality of life is that I don't spend anywhere near as much time in front of my record player as I do sat in front of my work computer with iTunes open. I like Baroness, I should probably try harder with them.

Format: 12", gatefold sleeve, picture sleeves
Tracks: 18
Cost: £20 new
Bought: Banquet Records, Kingston
When: 11/09/12
Colour: Black
Etching: none
mp3s: no

Atmosphere - When Life Gives You Lemons, You Paint That Shit Gold

I have three Atmosphere albums - Godlovesugly, Seven's Travels and When Life Gives You Lemons... , their most recent back when I was getting into them. A week after I found Godlovesugly in London I found this copy in Spillers in the hip-hop section, which I didn't check out anywhere near as frequently as I ought to have during the Tuesday-record-from-Spillers year. I had been enjoying Godlovesugly and was easily convinced by the limited edition coloured vinyl.

When Life Gives You Lemons... is a mixed bag for me. Much like the other two albums of theirs I have, there are some great songs - really genuinely brilliant rap songs. But, like the other two, there are far too many songs and a few of them that are either really annoying or really unnecessary. Case in point is the opening duo: Like the Rest of Us is both annoying and unnecessary and does nothing for me except to ruin the opening of the album; Puppets on the other hand is one of the best songs on the album and would make for a far better opener. If I'd heard Puppets as the first song on the first listen to this record, I'd have been in a much better mood than I was after hearing Like the Rest of Us. (Incidentally, Seven's Travels tries that approach with Trying to Find a Balance as the first proper song. The result is that the rest of the album can't hold up what they've started, so maybe there's method in their madness).

There are some other interesting moments on the album - Dreamer is a fine example of Slug crafting a rich story (which makes for a pleasant change to his usual self-loathing), Your Glass House is a bleak tale that most people can relate to a bit and Guarantees is the highlight of the second record by a long way. Wild Wild Horses and The Waitress are good songs too.

What it comes down to, I suppose, is that I'm just not that much of a fan of Atmosphere. After this album I got Seven's Travels a few months later on cd and realised I should probably stop buying Atmosphere albums. I don't think they're incapable of writing an album of songs that I want to hear, I just don't think they're ever going to make such an album. And that's fine - it just means they're not the band for me.

Format: Double 12"
Tracks: 15
Cost: £13 new
Bought: Spillers
When: 23/09/08
Colour: Yellow
Etching: none
mp3s: no

Apologies, I Have None - Black Everything

A few years ago Apologies, I Have None released their debut album, London. I was quite the fan - so much so, I picked it as my album of the year. Three and a half years later, I'm still a fan, although I don't listen to it quite as much as I used to - I know the songs very well. After that album, it felt like the band slipped on the momentum they'd built up. I remember a few line-up changes and a shows that all felt very different. I've increasingly realised that AIHN are something of a chameleon band - whatever bill they're on they'll sound like the bands they're playing with - whether it's punk with Calvinball and ONSIND, or metalcore with Pianos Become the Teeth.

Having seen them on that second bill above, with Pianos Become the Teeth and Touche Amore, it wasn't too much of a surprise to hear AIHN go dark and heavy on their follow-up EP, Black Everything. The opening track, Raging Through the Thick and Heavy Darkness of a Bloodlust, is brilliantly heavy and sounds nothing like London, a comment I mean in the best possible way. It wasn't what I'd come to expect from the band, but I enjoyed it. The chorus is pure sludge. With a title like that, there was no way the song couldn't sound the way it does. The only problem was that it was the only song that sounded that way. The other three songs couldn't stand up to the beast that is ...Bloodlust - Two Bombs in a Box in particular always pains me as a way to follow on; the intro feels strangely triumphant (given the previous song) and grates a little. It's also something that came across live for a while - I remember seeing them at the Dead Punk All-Dayer and the first song sounding very different to the rest. It's settled these days, especially with their new album. The other two songs are both fine.

I was very excited to get the new EP, having enjoyed the album so much, and ordered a copy to pick up from Banquet. The artwork - or lack thereof - is nothing to get excited about but the 12" is one-sided with lyrics printed on the reverse - the only place where there are any words at all other than the sticker on the sleeve. It certainly fits the theme of the EP. The internet tells me that it was supposed to be black lettering but a mistake mean it ended up being bright white, which is a hilarious mistake all considering.

Format: One-sided 12"
Tracks: 5
Cost: £9 new
Bought: Banquet Records
When: 24/05/14
Colour: Black
Etching: Screen-printed lyrics
mp3s: Download code

Art of Burning Water - Love You Dead

I bought this record on something of a whim - I don't think I'd ever heard or seen The Art of Burning Water before, but I knew the name for some reason. It was £5 in All Ages, which seemed like a bargain, so I decided to chance it; wherever I'd heard their name, it was in such a light that I thought they'd be worth listening to (the more I think about it, there was some connection to a friend of a friend's record label possibly. I think I knew they were relatively local, somehow).

I mentioned the purchase to my friend Sarah who said "you might like it. It's very crust-punk", which was a term I've never heard used for music, just about the older punks people seem to complain about at Fest. It meant I went into the first listen of The Art of Burning Water slightly sceptical about whether I'd actually like it, which isn't the best of starts.

Despite that initial worry, I've spent most of the second half of 2016 absolutely loving Love You Dead. My usual go-to albums at work tend to be instrumental and calming, but I've found that sometimes I need the exact opposite in my day, and this album does that perfectly. After a brilliant intro about the revolution, the album let's you know exactly what's going to happen for the next half an hour with a huge wall of heavy guitars and blistering drums. Every now and again, it settles into groove, which is the closest you get to a reprieve other than turning the record over. The vocals aren't my usual style, but in this context I love it. The songs are fairly hard to tell apart, except for the lengthy, sludgier Nicaragua at the end, although you don't really notice whether you're listening to three 4-minute songs with slight gaps between or one 12-minute song. But then again, I'm not listening to these guys expecting to hear a perfect single - I play it to hear 30 minutes of brutal, intense noise and ticks that box very firmly.

Format: 12", folded sleeve
Tracks: 8
Cost: £5 new
Bought: All Ages
When: 25/03/16
Colour: Black
Etching: none
mp3s: no

And So I Watch You From Afar - All Hail Bright Futures

I wrote about ASIWYFA's second album, Gangs, a few years ago. I'd not long seen them for the first time and they'd blown me away live. A short while later they released All Hail Bright Futures and I picked a copy up in Banquet after a period of not buying many records. Gangs introduced the idea of the songs having vocals in a very simple way (no actual words), so it wasn't too surprising to hear vocals at the start of All Hail Bright Futures - the line "The sun is in our eyes" repeated throughout Eunoia and Big Things Do Remarkable; it worked.

The surprise for me was quite how many of the songs on All Hail Bright Futures would use vocals - Like a Mouse, Ambulance, The Stay Golden, Ka Ba Ta Bo Da Ka and Young Brave Minds (it's almost easier to count the songs without lyrics, which is a strange thing to say for an instrumental band). It mostly works - they tread that fine line between using some vocals but not too many fairly well. but fall off a couple of times. It doesn't work for me on Ambulance where the band simply spell out the word "ambulance" over and over again. I'm mostly on-board with their style of math-rock, but that songs always feels like they're spelling a word to music simply for the fact that seems like a math-rock thing to do. The trumpet is a nice touch though. Ka Ba Ta... suffers a similar problem, but is more forgettable.

In the years that have followed buying this album, I have tended to go to Gangs when I want to listen to the band. I like All Hail Bright Futures, but the vocals are thing thing that tends to put me off; it's proof you can't please everyone - I got so excited at the hint of vocals on Gangs, but this amount is too much for me! I think if I had the two albums on shuffle that'd be the right balance, although you'd have to group the parts of The Golden Stay together.

I've since seen ASIWYFA a couple more time and they never fail to impress live. At ArcTanGent this year they should have been the headliner on the Saturday night - I think everyone there would have happily watched them for twice as long and well into the night. Much like the first and subsequent times I saw them, they brought the party.

Format: 12", picture sleeve
Tracks: 12
Cost: £15 new
Bought: Banquet Records
When: 18/07/13
Colour: Black
Etching: none
mp3s: Download code

Against Me! - Transgender Dysphoria Blues

I read an interesting article on Vice magazine's website a while ago written by that guy who does all their music stuff . The short version was that he was a fan of Against Me! early on and really loved what they were doing, then the music kinda drifted away and he felt less attached to them. Then Tom Gabel became Laura Jane Grace, the band released this album and they started meaning something again, but now to a different crowd - they were an icon for an LGBT crowd rather than just a punk crowd. The writer felt pleased that they meant something to people again, even if it wasn't the same thing they meant to him back in the day.

I was introduced to Against Me! on their first album and loved it. I got different amounts of enjoyment out of the albums that followed, but the trajectory was a negative one and I feel very little attachment to White Crosses. I still enjoyed seeing the band live but wished I enjoyed their newer stuff as much as their first two albums. When I heard the news about Tom becoming Laura I wondered what effect it would have on the band; despite my indifference to their last album at the time, I was hoping they'd continue.

I didn't buy Transgender Dysphoria Blues when it came out - song titles like Osama Bin Laden as the Crucified Devil and Fuckmylife666 definitely put me off; I couldn't help but think they weren't the titles of Against Me! songs I'd enjoy. Early in 2015 I met up with my friend Sarah in Kingston and we went to Banquet (because I can't go to Kingston during the day and not visit Banquet). I mentioned that I still didn't have a copy and she insisted on buying me one as a belated Christmas present; I obliged.

I enjoyed the album much more than I thought I would. By far the most striking thing about it is how intense and raw the lyrics are. I can only imagine these were songs that Laura Jane Grace had been wanting to write and sing for a long time. The opening duo are amongst the highlights for me, Drinking With the Jocks is one of the heaviest songs they've released and Black Me Out is an unexpected anthem. Even the two songs I mentioned above are far better than their dubious titles imply.

Throughout the whole album you're reminded just how honest the songs are and it's a wonderful thing to listen to. I never thought I'd say these words, but I agree with that writer in Vice magazine - Against Me! may not be the band they once were to me, but I love that they now mean so much to other people. I love that they can hold these songs as close to their hearts as I do with the first album.

Format: 12", gatefold sleeve
Tracks: 10
Cost: £0 new
Bought: Gift
When: 01/03/15
Colour: Blue and white splatter
Etching: none
mp3s: Download code

...And You Will Know Us By the Trail of Dead - IX

Back when I was 16, Trail of Dead were suddenly a very big name amongst people I knew. Source Tags and Codes had just come out and people were raving about it; I particularly remember Guy singing it's praises one day at college. I was familiar with Another Morning Stoner but didn't pick up a the album until four years later when I found a copy in a very metal record shop in Vienna. I'd seen them at Roskilde the summer before which I think put their name back in my mind. I remember there being countless band members on stage and enjoying it at the time.

I gradually bought their other albums that were out at the time - Worlds Apart in a very cool record shop in Auckland, So Divided in Resident Records in Brighton, Madonna in Damaged Records in Cardiff and the self-titled one in Kelly's Records. I have a strange relationship with their albums. I didn't get on board with the first two for years - so much so I think the first got relegated to being stored at my parents' house - but I quite enjoyed the two that followed Source Tags. I've read scathing reviews of those albums, but I enjoyed their pomp and grandeur. I can see if you were a fan of the early stuff you wouldn't want that from this band, but I thought it kinda worked.

I then kinda drifted away from the band for a while. I saw them at ATP and got another album but it didn't really click. Then I saw them with Rival Schools in London and I was blown away. They'd gone back down to just four members and barely played anything from those middle album - just early stuff and new stuff. It was incredible; less is more is certainly true for Trail of Dead. Since then I've become a huge fan of the first three albums and rarely listen to the middle ones (I still enjoy them but, like I said, that's not what I really want from this band). I try to see them whenever they play because they're just incredible to watch these days. In hindsight, that Roskilde set just seems so unexciting.

I bought IX in Banquet one day after this revelation. I've not been keeping up so much with their recent albums despite my love for their live show - not sure why. Anyway, I'd not seen their albums on vinyl very much so thought it'd be nice to get this one, and it was relatively well-priced. The Ghost Within and Lost in the Grand Scheme are the highlights on this album for me. Doomsday Book is a strange opener (it's strange that there isn't an instrumental build-up like almost all their other albums) and the way Conrad sings is very odd - the words seem to intentionally slur together. However, the brief transition into Jaded Apostles is lovely and the drums really dominate that songs. Lie Without a Liar has annoying chorus that isn't bad, but that dangerous combination of not good and impossible to get out of your head - I'll wake up in a few days time with that chorus in my head. It's not a strong starting album, but it gets going. The sticker on the front says "If you can't relate [to loss] then you aren't human and deserve to die", which is a tad strong perhaps.

Format: 12", gatefold sleeve, picture sleeves, cd
Tracks: 11
Cost: £16 new
Bought: Banquet Records
When: 26/10/14
Colour: Black
Etching: none
mp3s: cd included