Too much Integrity

Record Store Day becomes more and more of a drag. Each year I care less about all those reissues and the feeling of saturation is getting stronger not just annually but with each new REV color repress. Maybe RSD 2015 will see me neglecting all those 'special' pressings and stick with the used bins which probably helps record stores a great deal more.

This year though there still were a few things on my list. Unfortunately my top want didn't surface. Seems like I wasn't supposed to get that The Fix - vengeance / jan's rooms 2x7". I tried! When it was sold through Touch & Go I wanted to order a few copies for our distro and saw that Cargo was supposed to distribute them in europe. I got in touch with them. Waited for a while. Didn't get an answer. Went back to the Touch & Go store to order a copy for myself. Gone. Damn! Well, maybe it gets to one of the stores I usually shop at. No luck. Even the Cargo Records store only put out two for sale which a buddy of mine and his friend picked up. Now I could easily buy one since there are currently 8 copies listed for sale on discogs but I really don't feel like paying that much for a reissue that doesn't even have half a year under it's belt. That's stupid. Fucking flipsters.

Anyway. The record that wasn't really high up on my list for that day but turned out to be the best RSD pressing I bought that day is this:

Integrity - den of iniquity 2xLP - Organized Crime Records – OCR0531

Even though it's just a compilation of old demo and split releases it was worth picking it up for the A side alone. I had never heard those demo recordings in this quality before.

These songs are among the hardest and best that came out at the time. And the difference in recording of the songs that made it onto the first 7" (which is not represented on here) is significant. I didn't think it was possible but they sound even better on 'Den Of Iniquity' than on 'In Contrast Of Sin'.

The rest of those songs I could have done without though. Some are good but others are that Integ2000 kinda crap. In the end a single LP with just the demo recordings would have done it for me and would not have weighed that heavily on my purse either. For some reason we here in europe have to pay more than twice than what this record is being sold for in the US. At least according to discogs.
Oh and I love the page of the gatefold with the live pic. The poster is a nice touch too but will definitely never find its way onto any of my walls. I don't need to be reminded all the time of what this band turned into. I hear they are good again but at this point I truely don't give a damn.

Harry Business

Concerning those sketchy political views I mentioned in my last post. What's the deal with Cock Sparrer's 'England Belongs To Me' for example or Angelic Upstarts' 'England'? A german band with a similar song (title) would sure have to answer a lot of questions.

I even heard english kids weren't too concerned with political agendas back then which supposedly led to white power skins playing with redskins in the same band or hanging out together. But you know what. Let's not get into that and just enjoy the musical artifacts this period in the history of humankind blessed us with.

 

The Business - harry may 7" - Ugly Pop Records UP044

This is another official reissue and was released together with the Cockney Rejects 7" I covered in my last post. Of course it's available from us too. And just like that last one it will just be the only pressing in my collection for a yet undetermined amount of time.

Cockney slippers

There's this kind of music which I got more and more into over the last decade. Before that I mostly disregarded it for being a scene of heteronormative macho dudes who drink too much beer and a lot of times have political views that I consider sketchy at least. Yes. I'm talking about Oi. Nothing about that really changed and for the most part I still consider the above to be true but for some reasons I got to hear more and more of the good old classics which made me appreciate the music a lot more. For obvious reasons Blitz are a band that I know and love for a little longer already but this one I sure didn't listen to 10 years ago:

 

Cockney Rejects - flares 'n' slippers 7" - Ugly Pop UP043

This is the official reissue from 2013 that I ordered for our distro and which you can pick up here. It was the bands first vinyl release, no idea if they did a demo, and it instantly became a classic. Selling all of the 5000 first press copies in 2 weeks. Can you imagine getting all these records and then having to send them right out the door again, maybe to a thousand different people/shops? Must have been a nightmare to pack all these orders.

For now I'm ok with this copy but sooner or later, whenever I'll come across an OG copy, I'll add that to the collection. Does anyone know how to tell the first 5000 copies apart from the 2nd press that was made only a few weeks later? My guess is there ain't none.
Share your knowledge.