One Minute Silence - I Wear My Skin

Just before OMS released their third album, they released I Wear My Skin as a single, which I eagerly bought, so that I could hear a bit more of the album ahead of its release. As a indication of what I was like back then, three days later I had my long hair dreadlocked into 30-or-so very thick mats of hair. It was the early 2000's and I was into metal; it was acceptable at the time.

I Wear My Skin was a much stronger single than We Bounce and, if I remember correctly, great fun to jump around to at their shows. The break before the final chorus and the outro are particular highlights. The b-side is a non-album track, something of a rarity around that time for the band. It starts off too messy, but comes together and has quite a huge chorus. With a bit of re-working, it could easily have been an album track (and would have actually been better than a couple that did make it on there, as far as I remember).

Format: 7"
Tracks: 2
Cost: £1 new
Bought: HMV Winchester
When: 24/06/03
Colour: Black
Etching: none
mp3s: no

One Minute Silence - We Bounce

We Bounce was the second single from OMS's third and final album, many months after the first. I bought it along with a Therapy? 7" and Funeral For a Friend double 7" one day in HMV in Southampton. I think, had I not been buying the Funeral record, I probably wouldn't have got either of the other two - they were fine additional purchases, but not exciting enough to open my wallet for.

At £2, this record was lucky to be bought, given that it contains the same song twice, where that song had already been released on the Revolution 10", and where the edit is just a censored version of the original (they change "fuck" for "frig" and make it a little quieter, which just sounds ridiculous). I always found the start of the song a little hard to get into, but it does bring it around towards the end. Needless to say, not a record that's had a great deal of play over the years. The image on the cover is almost comically terrible.

Format: 7"
Tracks: 2
Cost: £2 new
Bought: HMV Southampton
When: 03/05/03
Colour: Black
Etching: none
mp3s: no

One Minute Silence - Revolution

In 2003 One Minute Silence released their follow-up to 2000's Buy Now... Saved Later, an album that was hugely popular amongst my friends and me. Quite a few months before the album coming out, they released the first single from it, Revolution, on a one-sided 10" with laser-etched b-side. I only had a couple of 10" records at the time and none of my records had any etching beyond text in the run-out groove. I really had no idea what to expect, but was pleasantly surprised to see the OMS logo on the reverse. I ordered this copy into my local HMV and remember asking so often whether it had arrived that they told me to stop asking and they'd phone when it finally arrived.

Revolution is one of the highlights of One Lie Fits All and has aged surprisingly well. I've listened to that album a few times in the last 10 years or so, and still get some enjoyment from it. The production was slick and the songs sounded great, which helped a lot - their particular segment of nu-metal could have easily sounded shit in 2017, but actually still kinda works. Or maybe it's just so steeped in nostalgia that I can't separate the two. I always really liked Revolution so it's hard to say if it's objectionably a good song, but I like it so that's all that really matters. I think people were put off by the slick sound of the album at the time, and you can kinda see why. But it's still a heavy song, and if you crank it up loud enough you can hear the bass line well enough to hear that.

After that we get We Bounce, a song that would eventually be an album track and another single, much closer to the album launch. It always did less for, but gets going after a slightly uneven opening. Finally there's a live recording of Holy Man one of the singles and highlights from the second album. Listening to it now brings back so many memories of going absolutely fucking mental in the pit at their shows, something we did almost routinely in our teen years. That breakdown in the middle makes me feel tired now thinking about how I used to throw myself around to it. My body definitely could not handle that anymore.

Format: One-sided 10", laser-etched b-side
Tracks: 3
Cost: £3.60 new
Bought: HMV Winchester
When: 03/02/03
Colour: Black
Etching: Band logo etched on b-side
mp3s: no

One Minute Silence - South Central

South Central was one of the biggest songs from One Minute Silence's debut album. My friends and I all became fans of the band when they released their second album, Buy Now... Saved Later and eventually dug out copies of their debut (I found mine in a record shop in Bournemouth). In the early 2000's I developed a pretty unhealthy eBay addiction and occasionally saw this 12" picture disc go up for sale, but I never bought a copy. I liked how shamelessly metal the a-side looked (at least back in the day, anyway).

Many years later I was in Auckland and stumbled across a copy in the huge Real Groovy. It was a mere £1.85 (or whatever that was in NZ$ at the time) and it seemed rude not to. It had been three years since OMS had released their third and final album, although I still listened to them from time to time. It wasn't remotely like the indie or post-hardcore I'd been getting into for the few years around that time, but I felt like I owed it to younger me to buy it. He'd have been pleased that I had him in mind when I made that purchase.

I guess the most curious thing about this record is how it made it all the way around the globe in the first place. I wonder if the band ever had much of a following in New Zealand? If so, it almost feels like a bit of a shame that I should buy it and bring it back around the world for it to reside in my record collection in the country it came from. The b-sides are Stuck Between a Rock and a White Face, also from the debut album and Half Empty a song that made it onto the Japanese version of the debut. It's a fine additional song and would have fit on the album just as well as a lot of the other songs.

This is another slightly (understatement) underappreciated record in my collection, but I'm glad I have it.

Format: 12" picture disc
Tracks: 3
Cost: £1.85 second hand
Bought: Real Groovy, Auckland
When: 20/04/06
Colour: Picture disc
Etching: none
mp3s: no

One Minute Silence - Buy Now... Saved Later

One Minute Silence were, along with Pitchshifter, one of the most important bands of my middle-teenage years. Both bands made their first impression on me on a free cd given away with Kerrang! magazine - the now legendary (in my world at least) The Devil's Music Volume 1. Pitchshifter opened things up with Everything's Fucked, followed by my introduction to Henry Rollins (in the form of Rollin's Band), followed by One Minute Silence's Food For the Brain. That first 10 minutes changed my world in huge ways. My young mind didn't know what hit it.

That was more than half of my life ago, but it's a pleasant surprise that OMS's brand of Irish nu-metal has aged so well, although that might partly be due to the very firm place they hold in my heart. We saw them four times over three years - the most memorable was in the Astoria with Will Haven (featuring some terrifying circle pits) but I also fondly remember the last time, in an old church in Salisbury. I used to have so much fun throwing myself around at their shows - it's comforting to think that my youthful energy was not at all wasted.

I can't think when the last time I played this album was before today. I've played their third album once of twice in recent years and got moderate enjoyment out of it. However, Buy Now... Saved Later was always the classic. Their debut, Available In All Colours, had some huge songs (Brainspiller, South Central, Pig Until Proven Cop - I might have to give that album a play today too!), but didn't quite hit the same spot. I picked up a promo copy of BN...SL on cd (with alternative artwork) on holiday in the states when I was 16 but I already knew all the songs - Hugh had bought a copy a long time before and I had a very worn-down cassette of it.

I think the reason why OMS worked so well for me was that rare mix between quite smooth vocals, genuinely heavy music and a groove that you could dance (mosh) to. On top of that, there were occasional quieter moments (important for regaining one's breath in the pit), but they always exploded back into something heavy. I used to love hearing them play any of these songs, but it's worth calling out Rise and Shine, 1845, Food For the Brain, Fish Out of Water (what a side A), If I Can Change and A Day in the Light Of in particular. I loved trying to sing along to the fast-paced lyrics (with moderate success, probably adding to how knackered I was in the pit). Even the slower Words builds up to a hugely aggressive outro and closes the album in excellent style.

I picked up the LP during a trip to Selectadisc in Nottingham, which resulted in a number of incredible bargains - I was returning home after an open day at the university I'd go on to attend, but took a detour via Nottingham on the way. It was 2003 and clearly the staff there had decided that the only way to shift a OMS record was to price it at £2. I wonder how much more I would have paid for this album back then? I'm glad my desire to own everything on vinyl went so far back.

Format: 12", picture sleeve
Tracks: 14
Cost: £2 new
Bought: Selectadisc, Nottingham
When: 20/02/03
Colour: Black
Etching: none
mp3s: no