Advent (aka best band currently in hardcore)

It may seems as though I dwell in the past due to this blog. While bands today are nowhere near as good as in the past, there are a handful of bands who still get me every bit as excited as I used to when I first started going to shows. Advent is one of these bands. You've probably never heard me speak of this band if you read this blog due to both of their full length albums being readily available through Solid State Records and my refusal to publish music still in print.

What I'm posting here is an unreleased demo from 2006. They had recorded three songs prior to this and continue to do another set of three tracks afterwards in 2007. In fact, the band will be self-releasing a CD with all three unreleased demo sessions in the near future. Let this serve as a sampler for said album.

None of these songs were re-recorded for either full length. While these un-used songs are better than pretty much anything else from any other band, they still pale in comparison to both full lengths; especially the most recent effort entitled "Naked And Cold". Go to myspace.com/adventnc and check some of the new tracks.

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Path To Misery videos

Uploaded these a few weeks ago and realized I never put them on the blog. Here are a few samples from some of the shows we played right before going on hiatus.

Third World War & For The Innocent at The School - September 6th, 2008



Forget Me (Disembodied cover) at The School - September 6th, 2008



Victims Of Our Own Device & Relentless Persistence at The School on September 6th, 2008



Cheating Life in Auburn, NY on March 14th, 2009

Creation Is Crucifixion Discography pt 2

I just realized that it was one year ago exactly when I promised you all that I would be posting up all of the vinyl releases from Creation Is Crucifixion. Time fucking flies when you're running an Mp3 blog (which may or may not be considered "having fun"). Anyhow, I am a man of my word whenever I remember that word ... so here it is.

Included in this split is Descent From Heaven, Dethrone Or Devour, The Re-Recorded Vinyl Splits CDEP, the original splits with Fate Of Icarus, Suicide Nation, and Unruh as well as a relatively unheard of split with UUM put out towards the end of the band's existence. I made a point to include both sides of all splits because all of these bands are ALMOST as good as Creation Is Crucifixion.

Don't ask how because I am quite sneaky at times, but I managed to obtain a master copy rip of the original Descent From Heaven 7". These songs were written and recorded under the moniker of Chapter yet released as Creation Is Crucifixion's "debut" material. In comparison to later material, these two tracks are quite standard, yet in comparison to most other metalcore, it is quite groundbreaking.

Dethrone Or Devour was the first effort to feature the playing of Paul Nowinski, formerly of Abnegation, on guitar. The musical progression is noticed immediately on this recording. The inclusion of noise tracks are first heard on this release. The samples at the beginning of the first track are monumental. This 7" is still relatively easy to pick up a copy of ... I strongly suggest you do as the layout is quite awesome.

The first split 7" effort was with Fate Of Icarus, a local Pittsburgh power house. I'll probably end posting up a blog on these guys as well in the future. The split with Suicide Nation was next and followed by Unruh ... both amazing bands from Arizona who Creation Is Crucifixion toured with in consecutive years if information serves me well. CiC contributed one track to each split and would later go on to re-record the three tracks for the highly-sought after "Re-Recorded Vinyl Splits" CDEP on Willowtip Records. By the time the band got around to releasing another split with the band UUM, they had taken the strictly noise route.

Hopefully this blog post serves as an addition to the initial first part of the Creation Is Crucifixion discography I posted a year ago exactly HERE. This is all pretty much essential listening. Excuse the brevity of this post as I feel as though I covered most of the history and relevance of the band in the initial post. I also recently amended it to include the re-mastered version of in_Silico. Check that.

This is all essential listening ... DOWNLOAD

IN LOVING MEMORY

I NEED THE IN LOVING MEMORY CD

I NEED THE IN LOVING MEMORY SPLIT 7"

I NEED INIT RECORDS TO PUT OUT THE FUCKING DISCOGRAPHY ALREADY

If you can help with any of these ... PLEASE get in touch. Top 5 favorite bands of all time ... no collection of them. I especially want the CD.

In case you're wondering who I'm speaking of ... go check them out in an earlier post I made on the band.

Hearts Breathe Every Day

I was thinking about amazing splits after posting up my blog on the Pensive & Seasons In The Field split and remembered that I've been meaning to post this split between 200 North and Every Life On Cold Keen.

200 North is quite possibly THE most underrated band in hardcore history. They were from a small town in Maryland called Cumberland not too far from the PA border. I really don't even want to get started on how much I like this band because I know I won't be able to express myself as desired. Imagine if any of these melodic, supposedly passionate hardcore bands of today were interesting or genuine. There are only three songs on this split, but they're all perfect and should serve as motivation for you to check out their full length which came out on Da' Core Records out of Pittsburgh. I'm pretty sure members are now in Circa Survive, Carry The Torch, Signs Of Hope, and Delilah Why. Better Days is probably one of my favorite songs of all time; takes me to some higher place.

You may or may not notice that the name Every Life On Cold Keen makes absolutely no sense. They're from Japan though, so its OK; plus their music does the talking for them. As with 200 North, the Shai Hulud influence is definitely there, but to an even stronger degree and moreso on the progressive metalcore side. There is even a song that ends with an entire section of piano. These guys had no problem experimenting and I love every bit of it. They are still together and have shortened the length of their name to Evylock, you can keep up with them at myspace.com/evylock

Their tracks were recorded in 2003 while 200 North's contribution was put to tape in 2000. Not sure how that works out, but if my memory serves me correct, 200 North simply donated some pre-production material for their full length to serve as a split with Every Life On Cold Keen on a Japanese label known as Falling Leaves Records.

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The Psalms Of Ariana

Alright, so anyone who knows anything about me understands both my knowledge and obsession with 90s metalcore; especially that in which roots from western Pennsylvania. For whatever reason, it was only yesterday that I got my hands on this monumental release. I am quite ashamed that I had never gotten my hands on this earlier; especially considering I own every other release on the often-ignored Akeldama Records out of Michigan. Either way, I finally got my copy of the Pensive & Seasons In The Field split and I feel a bit more fulfilled as a human being considering.

While I was fully aware of the respective legacies of said bands and knew I would be very into their musical undertakings, I never would have guessed to what extent. I'm talking better than Zao and better than The Juliana Theory here, people. In case anyone is not familiar with the names I've been tossing around, I'll give a bit of history. Pensive featured Brett Detar, Chad Monticue, Martin Lunn, and Joshua Walters. Brett Detar was responsible for Where Blood And Fire Brings Rest ... at the very least, the catchy guitar riffs of the albums. Along with Joshua Walters and Chad Monticue, he also started (and fronted) The Juliana Theory. Martin Lunn, a half of a decade later, would join Zao to fulfill bass duties. Seasons In The Field has an even larger connection to Zao as its members consisted of Daniel Weyandt, Russ Cogdell, Steven Peck, and Jason Keener. Daniel Weyandt and Russ Cogdell are obviously the members who took Zao into the next level of metalcore with their contributions that came in the form of Where Blood And Fire Bring Rest. Steven Peck would also join Zao around the same time as Martin Lunn (in 2004) to take the place of Jesse Smith on drums. To top things off, Joshua Walters (of Pensive) was supposedly going to be playing drums for Zao a year or so ago, but it never came to fruition for whatever reason. Enough about Zao, though ... this post is about Pensive & Seasons In The Field.

The first half of the split comes from Pensive in the form of six songs. This was a follow-up effort from their debut release, The Subtlety Of Silence which was released a year earlier. The pre-Juliana Theory mention gives you a pretty good idea what this sounds like. However, while there is definitely the hooks and catchiness of The Juliana Theory, there are also plenty of screamo-esque backing vocals matched with the occasional Blood And Fire styled metalcore riffs. While the last thing I want to do is paint these songs out to be "predictable" or anything close, it is the exact music you would expect coming from someone who would later go on to be in both The Juliana Theory and on Zao's Where Blood And Fire Brings Rest album. It makes sense, that is all.

The true infatuation I am developing with this album comes in the form of Seasons In The Field, however. To sum it up in a sentence, it sounds like kids who would eventually go on to write Where Blood And Fire Brings Rest while they were still worshiping Passover and ripping off Iggy from Abnegation's vocals. In fact, they even recorded in the same studio as Passover as admitted by Daniel on the Zao documentary DVD. Surprisingly, however, Daniel was merely playing bass on this recording while Jason Keener was handling the vocal duties. The true talent of the vocalist lays in his ability to simultaneously sound like Iggy from Abnegation while also sounding like Jack from Passover. I should mention that when I make these comparisons, I make them with the highest regard.

I really don't know how to sum up the perfection of this band. In the aforementioned DVD, the members seemingly minimize their efforts put forth during this era. Without any disrespect to the monumental works that they've accomplished with Zao ... Seasons In The Field kills all of it. I may be alone in this thinking, but I know of at least one other person who sees it my way.

Speaking of which, this entire post is dedicated to one Derek "Poop Toss" Camp. If it wasn't for his insistence on Seasons In The Field being the best metalcore band of all time (and consequentially his favorite band overall), I would have probably never spent the time that I did tracking this album down. His dedication to obscure, over-looked metalcore from the 90s rivals that of myself and I respect him just as much for that as I do his shit-scooping abilities.

Check this split out NOW. I will hopefully be collaborating with The Poop Crank to bring you demo material from both bands in the near future. Oh yeah, the layout for this album rules ... but you need to do your homework and track down a real copy to see that part.

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Vegan Straight Edge Bible

It's been a while since I've posted up any Mp3s. To make up for my indiscretion, I have spent the last month or so compiling over 8 GB of Vegan Straight Edge Mp3s. Well ... at the very least some drug free and animal rights-oriented music.

I've always contemplated doing blog posts about some of these bands individually, but considering information on these bands is so rare, I don't know how much I would be able to say.

Throughout the 1990s and even into the early 2000s, a small, tightly-knit organization of bands came to fruition from all corners of the globe. Following in the footsteps of Earth Crisis, the most influential band of the genre, these bands took to the stage in defense of all innocent life. Some of the bands went the conservative right wing route while others aided their messages with overly liberal left wing ideologies. The Vegan Straight Edge outlook got tied in with everything from promoting homophobia via the hardline movement to refusing to play shows where women were not shown equal respect in the pit as men.

Sure, a lot of the bands lacked any significant amount of talent; and yeah, 85% of the riffs had already been written by Earth Crisis but the sound still holds a special place in my heart. While there isn't a single band in this post other than the aforementioned band who collectively continues to stand by the beliefs expressed in their songs, the passion shown on the recordings shine through on even the worst 4 track recordings.

Either way, I hope you're ready for an overload of divebombs, open chugging, spoken word lectures, and lyrics that range anywhere from laughable apocalyptic rhetoric to some of the most inspiring words ever put to print. Keep in mind that I am not personally vouching for each and every band in the thread. Finding info and/or Mp3s on most of these bands is next to impossible so I just wanted to make sure I included everything humanly possible within this post.

The following links are hosted on Megaupload due to their larger storage capacity than Mediafire. I wanted to split this up into as few files as possible considering the asinine file size of my collection. I did my best to exclude any releases from these bands that may still be in print. I'm not perfect, however, and I'm sure that one or two albums can still be ordered on some obscure distro's webstore. Do yourself a favor and pick up physical copies of anything you can included amongst this stockpile of Mp3s. Keep in mind that the lyrics of these bands are sometimes even more relevant than the music itself and I have no way of including those as well.

Speaking of which, there are a few rips included that are titled "(BAD RIP)" at the end of the file name. This means that I do not own these albums and merely downloaded lower-quality rips from the internet. If anyone either has copies they'd like to sell me or knows where I can get my hands on them, please get in touch. I also only own about half of the 7"s and demos listed ... so yeah, hook it up.

I'd really like to see some info being passed around in the comments section on this post. I am 110% sure that there are even more bands who I missed or didn't even know existed. I am also 110% sure that I need to hear every possible detail about every possible Vegan Straight Edge band. So yeah, help me feel like all the time I spent on this post was worth it ... SPREAD THIS AROUND!!!

xVx pt 1

Includes most releases from Abhinada, Abnegation, Absence, Absone, Apostle, Arkangel, Birthright, Birthrite, Blindfold, Blood Of Judas, and earlier Caliban material.

xVx pt 2

Includes most releases from Canaan, Canon, Carahter, Chokehold, Clouded, Confine, Congress, Contempt, and Counterweight.

xVx pt 3

Includes most releases from Condolencia, Culture, Dawn Of Orion, Day Of Atonement, Day Of Suffering, Dead Wait, Decontaminate, Driven, Earth Crisis, Ecorage, Everlast, Extinction

xVx pt 4

Includes most releases from Facedown, Falling Down, Faultline, Firestone, Flame Of God, Foundation, Framework, From The Dying Sky, Gatekeeper, Green Rage, Heaven Shall Burn, Ides Of March, Ignorance Never Settles, Kindred, and Liar.

xVx pt 5

Includes most releases from Liar, Lifeforce, Lifeless, older Maroon material, Morning Again, Nations On Fire, On Fall, One King Down, and the Justice For The Enslaved comp.

xVx pt 6

Includes most releases from Point Of No Return, Pray Silent, Prayer For Cleansing, Purification, Purified In Blood, Racetraitor, Raid, Rancor, Recoil, Regression, and Reprisal.

xVx pt 7

Includes most releases from Risen, Sektor, Sentence, Sevin, Shorebreak, Slavearc, Soulstice, Soulstice, Sown The Seeds, Statement, Sunrise, Tears Of Gaia, Tenfold, Trial, and the Stones To Mark A Fire comp.

xVx pt 8

Includes most releases from Undying, Upheaval, Vegan Reich, Vitality, Warcry, Withdrawn, Wrath Of Nature and xDestroy Babylonx.

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POST UPDATE: I fucked up a few listings. I forgot that Undying never claimed a part of the straight edge thing, apparently someone in One King Down ate meat and a lot of the older Euro bands were only vegetarian. Either way, these bands are mostly sweet and wrote some awesome songs that helped me get into the things I'm into today. That's all.