Verse - BCUG Record Release

I am a sucker for special one off covers. Record releases, fest pressings or farewell shows, give me a good looking cover with decent artwork and hand number it and I will be there with cash in hand.
The last one to really catch my attention was the Verse Bitter Clarity, Uncommon Grace record release. The stark yellow cover just really impressed me.
When it first popped up on ebay I tracked it with every intention of bidding and winning. I mean, how much could it really go for? Well when it crossed the $100 threshold I had to back out. There is no way that could have been right?!?! I chalked it up to the fact it was put up for sale on ebay the day after the damn record release show and people were just bummed they couldn't make it. Instant gratification and all that.
Well patience and time let me score one for a reasonable price and now I get to file it away next to my other four copies of this record.
The version I scored was on the limited color of clear and black split.

There were only 300 of them pressed in total and apparently either 50 or 60 were used for the record release. I'm going to go with 50 just because that was the number used in the description of the record I won. Oh and I just happened to win it from this guy. I think he would know.

I scored the incredibly random number of 94 out of 150. There s absolutely nothing special or meaningful about that at all.

The good thing about finally getting this album almost a year after it was released is that I kind of forgot how much I liked it. Damn fine album no matter what Preston thinks. Dude, you are just wrong on this one.

Cursed III - Good Friday Edition : Record Release

A couple years back, I did a post on the Cursed III: Architects of Troubled Sleep lp. You can check it out here. One of the things I wrote about was needing to get my hands on a copy of the record release edition. Well today, that finally happened.
I don't really like record swap meets. In fact, they kind of bum me out. Huge sausage fests with some of the weirdest obsessive compulsive or just insane dudes milling around like walkers in the zombie apocalypse. Boxes of crap that their owners seem to think are worth their weight in gold. Mountains of boring mainstream vinyl to flip through and on top of it all - please pay $5 for the privilege to do so. No thanks.
My buddy Shawn was going to head down and check it out. He is good like that. I just asked him to let me know if there was anything cool. I had forgotten all about the "show" and was surprised to see  a picture of this bad boy come through on messenger. After a few minutes of planning and texting back and forth, I was loading the kids into the family car, heading to the ATM and then off to a community recreation centre where they set up the show. I had Shawn watch my kids while I made my way into the hall (Thanks again dude!) and snatched this bad boy up for $15 less than the lowest ebay price it had ever sold for. Not a bad Sunday afternoon. We went for candy after.

The Good Friday Edition Record Release was hand numbered out of 85. I like that the numbers on the artwork and DJ sleeve match. Too bad about the smear, but it wasn't exactly a deal breaker; especially after the effort it took to get it.

The record release came on the more common black vinyl with the standard dreaded printed inner sleeve.

The table I scored this was like a Toronto punk rock museum that had it's own Chris Colohan wing. Ruination and The Swarm 7"s, Cursed albums, the Cursed demo cd-r and I think there was some Left For Dead there too. I just didn't have the cash to buy much more and plus my kids were waiting outside. I left with only this album and a Fucked Up 7", but I think I did just fine.

Prisoner Abuse - s/t

I have never been more out of touch with the hardcore scene than with my epic fail regarding the Prisoner Abuse lp. I try to stay on top of things through blogs, message boards, twitter and facebook and still this one eluded me completely.
It wasn't until Marcus emailed me asking if I scored a copy of the Prisoner Abuse album that I had ever even heard of them. I literally had no idea what he was talking about. The next thing I know blogs all over the place are posting their copies of the record. What the fuck?!?!?
So after reading up about the band and listening to a couple songs it was back to the salt mines and yet another album ends up on my want list.

The first one I was able to score was the clear vinyl version. This one has quite a bit of black swirled in which I assume is common with the everyone else's. There is no info on the pressing numbers on the Painkiller discography page yet, but a few on HYE? have it as only 100 copies on clear.

The next one on black vinyl was relatively easy to score as a message on the Painkiller site stated that after a brief hiatus, black vinyl copies were available again. I can only assume it is a second press but with Painkiller you never know. Their pressings of common black vinyl usually ends up being identical with the first.

Pretty standard layout with a single insert.

Musically, this stuff is awesome. Boston straight edge hardcore in the vein of 80's bands like SSD and Negative FX. But you know that already. I'm the one with the late pass.