New York City Hardcore: The Way it Is (1988)
In response to the fact that I just admitted that Euro Hardcore is killing current American Hardcore I feel the need to remind that "not-so-current" American Hardcore is where it all began. In 1988 NYC was the hotbed of hardcore revolution. And Revelation Records was the label with it all. This compilation (a lost art, by the way) is an amazing view of what was going on at the time. With bands like WarZone (r.i.p. RayBeez), Breakdown and Bold and the future heavy weights of hardcore, Youth of Today, Sick of it All and the Gorilla Biscuits, this comp will keep your blood boiling and remind you why Revelation and NYC were so important at one point in the past.
My favorites? Ive always really liked the Breakdown song, Sick People. It is cheesy but powerful and one of the first tough guy hardcore songs. The Side by Side songs are also great and they were an overlooked part of the NY scene. Of course I love the Gorilla Biscuits as they were and still are my favorite of that style of music. The Supertouch song is also personal fave. The only things missing from this comp are non-rev bands like Agnostic Front and the allmighty Cro-Mags.
Anyway, have a good time looking into the past, and make sure to check out the other releases that these bands have put out.
posted by blend77 at 12:32 PM
11 Comments:
WOW!!!!!!!!!!!!! dude, this album reminds me of mowing my lawn when i was in high school. i use to rock this shit on my walkeman, i hated mowing the lawn, but loved this album.
thanks
" ... Euro Hardcore is killing current American Hardcore ... " ... why do you think that? i'm from europe, and i think there is still a great deal of american hardcore bands that carry the torch ... when i think of bridge9 records, i can't think of their european counterpart ...
peace,
xmarkx
p.s. since this is a great blog, i'm goin' to start leaving comments more often ... :)
Theres alot of bands in Europe that are exploring alot of more creative opportunities within hardcore. bands like Louise Cyphre, La Quiete, Amanda Woodward, Aghast, Acrimonie, Aussitot Mort....a bunch of others too....
dont get me wrong though, america has it share of great hardcore. but alot of the best have been around for years or are not original or are just playing metal-core (which is good every once in a while...i mean i do love converge more than almost all hardcore bands)
i'll check bridge9.
and you come back and say hi sometime...
I remember buying this cassette in like 8th grade and being totally blown away. The Nausea track still holds up.
@ blend77:
well, most of the bands you mentioned i put in "screamo" category ... so, i was taking about classic hardcore bands ... some of them are on bridge9 records ... some aren't ... but, bands like comeback kid, verse, go it alone, miles between us, casey jones ... most of the bands from my collection are for the states ... then again, metalcore nowdays is becoming more trendy, so most of the newer mc bands suck ... :)
unlike european screamo bands .. :)
cheers,
xmarkx
i see what you mean...to me screamo is hardcore, cuz i never made the distinction until much later that emo and screamo were separate genres...back then it was all hardcore and punk to me...
otherwise, i am not a big fan of bands like comeback kid or verse....though i admittedly, unnofficially stopped listening to hardcore for almost 5 years. so i didnt keep up on too many bands.
Lion of Judah is one of the best hardcore bands right now...one that cant be considered old school, screamo or metalcore..
Classic. So urgent. So much of this genre is stale and played out currently...
this kids where blazing a trail, not following a formula which is what ruins so much of todays hardcore.
XXX
agreed. that was the best part of it all...the urgency...and it extended to the fans. not only something to rally to but something you had to put in effort for, even to find the records and travel to see the shows, not mention the amount of energy expended while at shows...
the whole thing was amazing...
it definitely still exists, its just a different kind of urgency...
its vague...everything is so available. no one has to search for a group that shares their opinons...or travel to some obscure record store to get into hardcore.
we need a primal urgency. no body even makes war protests songs anymore.
Although this is actually "only so-so" I thank you for posting it, had lost my copy somewhere so good backup! Europe HC sooooo kills US HC though; and I firmly stand by that.
I did everything in my power to ignore all of these bands and everything and anything this label put out back in those days. The only reason this thing sounds decent now is because HC in 2007 is even more pathetic.
Just found this post. I would argue that "Dead Serious" by Negative Approach was the first tough guy hardcore song. Which pre-dates this song by about 6 years.
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