Psywarfare / Full of Hell Split 7"

Many great records were released as part of record store day this year. Of course there is the split I mentioned above, but that wasn't the only thing worth getting my hands on this year. Second in my RSD haul is this split 12" from the ever mysterious Psywarfare and Full of Hell. 

Upon hearing about the release of this split I was certainly intrigued as to how the two bands would work together. On the one hand we have the eclectic electronic noise of Psywarfare, and on the other we have trashing power of Full of Hell. If there is one thing to go by with this record, it is to not try and guess the record before you hear it.
Gone are Psywarfare's harsh electronic noises and samples and instead we have a slow, repetitive track that was inspired by Hawaiian music. This inspiration does come through, even if in an immensely twisted way. Full of Hell have also taken a step away from their norm, and produced an experimental track much more like other Psywarfare recordings, full of noise, drones and samples terrorizing your ears.

Once again, A389 were responsible for this split release, which comes in three varieties. The first was a green and white mix, which was only available at participating RSD stores. My local wasn't selling anything like this, so I was lucky when A389 announced the online sale of a clear with camo splatter variant. This version looks brilliant, but there was another that looks equally impressive. For sale on the Holy Terror website was a blue/pink splatter version that just looks insane.
A neat feature about these records are the tiny centre labels. They are about a third the size of the regular labels, and open up a lot of that clear and camo wax.

The Hawaiian theme has also seeped out of the wax to influence the packaging of the record, well the Psywarfare side at least. The artwork is very coloured and looks like it has come right of a dark forest from a Pacific Island.
The Full of Hell side is incredibly bleak in comparison, consisting of a single blade on a white background. It does perfectly suit the mood of the track though.

For the first time in a while, the tracks aren't available on the label's bandcamp. The Psywarfare side is streaming via Holy Terror, so if you missed out on another great record you can at least experience some of what it has to offer.

Rot in Hell / Psywarfare split 12"

I'm always excited for new records to arrive at my doorstep, but there are some releases that surpass all others in terms of anticipation. These may be ones that have been lingering in the land of rumour for some time, or ones that you without a doubt know are going to be worth their weight in gold when their tracks first make their way into your ear drums. In this case, it is certainly both.

 Rot in Hell have done it again with an absolutely stellar split 12". If that wasn't enough excitement for you, the other side of the split comes from a band that arises back from the dead after (almost) 14 years, Psywarfare. It is a combination that offers a little strange, but definitely FANtastic record.

Rot in Hell play three new acoustic tracks, "Parthogenesis", "Theodolite and Pendulum" and "Poetry of Worms". At times I feel the acoustic tracks are where Rot in Hell really shine, and these have affirmed that belief for me. In fact, I think that Parthogenesis is probably the best track by the band thus far. The guitar is incredibly ominous and has the perfect blend of POIs singing and Lecky's screamed vocals. It sends shivers down my spine.

 Psywarfare is of course something entirely different again. For anyone who has heard Psywarfare before, you will at least be prepared for the audial onslaught that this side bestoys upon you. For those you have not, be warned. To give those an idea of what to expect, the project is the harsh electronic brain child of Dwid Hellion. Supposedly comprising of four tracks (1 new and 3 unreleased from the 90s), this side takes you through a journey of intense static noise, voice samples, bass, distorted screams and all other kinds of noises you could possibly imagine. The name of the project says it all really.

 The packaging for this release is also top-notch. Both of the bands have artwork that take up one side of the cover. My favourite of the two though is the classic Psywarfare figure. It is as if this character jumps right out of the record grooves to destroy your brain.

Two colour variants of the record are (currently) in existence, white and clear. I opted for the white, and it turned out great. A pet hate of mine is when a bit of black gets smeared into the white from the standard version, but this is incredibly clean and looks great. I'm not sure how many of these were pressed, but they are currently available from the bands directly or through the Deathwish E-store. Strangely, this is Magic Bullet records release, but I am yet to see it for sale from them. At any rate, I doubt these will stick around for too long.

 

If you dare, the Psywarfare side is up for streaming and download on the Holy Terror bandcamp page. 

If you also have a look here, you might just find a couple of the RIH tracks too...

Psywarfare - Candyman 7"

This is definitely one of the more mysterious and obscure pieces in my record collection. Housed in a clear red bag arrived a record straight out of 1999, well kind of. 1999 was when Psywarfare originally released the Candyman EP, but it wasn't until a surprise box of these records turned up at the HT vvebstore a few weeks ago that I was able to get my own copy.

I don't know an awful lot about this records, but from what I have been able to find out there were at least two copies of this record. There is this version with the mysterious man is glasses, which I think is the regular version, and then there is the version with the more limited blue cover (with a different face on it). For a while HT were selling a deluxe version of this which contained both versions, but as you'd expect that sold out incredibly quickly.

All four tracks are on pink vinyl, which does look surprisingly good. Each side has the same man/robot centre labels, with inverted colours. According to vinylsearcher.com (I've never heard of it until now), the pink is limited to 396 copies. I have no idea if that is true, correct me if I'm wrong..

The last interesting thing about this release relates to the red bag and inner sleeve. On the HT site the record is said to come in an embossed red bag with this accompaning picture:

However, my red bad was completely free of any such logo. Instead I have the Psywarfare logo branded on the inner sleeve. I don't know how many others are like this, but I think it is rather neat.

A Compilation For Atonement 7"

We've come to the second item located from the VVegas vvault. It has just occurred to me that like the fantastic 7.17 compilation I mentioned a while ago, this is also a 4 band compilation 7". Perhaps I should have got something other than compilations from the vvault. 

I'll just start by saying how much I love this compilation. I've had it on mere mp3 (somehow) for a while now, and was eager to own a vinyl copy. As you can see below, the compilation consists of Integrity, State of Conviction and Psywarfare, who you are probably familiar with. It does however feature one of the very few releases by Rapewhistle. From memory they only ever featured on two other compilation CDs and consisted of Dwid, the Melnick brothers and Chris Dora. It's a shame this band didn't continue really. They were more on the experimental side of hardcore, but definitely showed some great promise.

I've seen at least three versions of this out there; a grey, a green and a hybrid of the two. Mine is the grey version, which does tie in nicely with the rather bleak album artwork. This version is out of 1000, while the green is only out of 100. To be honest, I'm not even sure if the hybrid is really a variant, although I suppose that does make it more unique.

Obviously the above centre label on this side simply has the band names listed aptly on "This side" and "That Side". On the reverse side is the logo of the "Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms". When I saw this i had no idea what it was about, but after some wiki-ing it turns out this is a federal department of the US department of justice. Interesting...

The sleeve folds out into a multi page book. Each band has a page each, except for Psywarfare. I suppose it's fair enough, two songs should deserve two pages really.

I've actually mentioned this record once before. I was specifically talking about the Integrity track (of course right?), as it is called "All is Lost" on this compilation. The song does appear again later on "Seasons In The Size of Days", although it is called "ATF assault". It's rather strange the name was changed to this, as ATF assault was already the name of the track appearing on the split with the kids of Widney High 7". Perhaps it something to do with the alleged stealing of Integrity's recording of the original ATF assault on the split with Hatebreed ("BATF would be proud" on that split).

Psywarfare - Process of Elimination 7"

Where do I begin with Psywarfare? In the mid 90's Dwid from Integrity fame decided to start a side-project involving harsh noise. That is the best way to describe what this music is really, harsh. Harsh right from the start of "Preparation (Your Only Salvation)" through to the end of "Process of Elimination". Listening to it literally almost makes my ears want to bleed. Whats more is that from the beginning to the end, this record can literally take as long as want (I'll get to that later) to be over. 

Anyway, onto vinyl stuff. The colour this was pressed on is literally fantastic, a gorgeous light green/teal. 

If you could really make out the grooves from this picture, you'd be able to understand what I meant when I said this'll play for as long as (or little) as you like. Instead of the usual concentric circles seen in regular records, this is filled with several lock grooves. Below is about the best diagram I could find to explain it to those who don't know what I mean. (courtesy of Kempa.com) Basically the needle becomes stuck in the loop playing the same small section repeatedly. I've included a stream of the EP below, check out the various "Signals" to see what I mean. I'm usually into gimmicks such as this, I find them unique and interesting. However I've got one of those automatic armed turntables, which inevitably can be rather temperamental. Having to change through all these lock grooves is just too much of a chore.

As per usual, there are several variants of this floating around. There are versions with clear teal vinyl, as well as a somewhat deluxe version in an embossed cover with a massive 24-page booklet written by the elusive Jacob Abernathy, titled "Release the Fiend". These were released 16 years ago now, so the chances of picking one of those up are slim to none. Instead I've got the more regular version on solid teal with the normal cover. These are still quite hard to come by at a reasonable price though. The cover really does complement the music very well, it disturbs me just as much visually as the tracks do audibly. 

One insert was included along with this record. It's actually quite a bit greener than it appears on the photo, my camera seems to distort colours quite a lot sometimes. Anyway, you can see the same cover picture as on the front, behind the track listings. There seems a lot of tracks for a mere 7", but bear in mind all the lock grooved tracks. Some of these are really only seconds long.

I bought this on Ebay, and as such didn't personally know who (or what) I'd be buying it from. It turns out it was the guy who runs Hemlock Thirteen, who was nice enough to write me a wee note inside the sleeve. If you happen to read this, I do dig it. Thanks.

I've used words like harsh and disturbing to describe this record and in all honesty I can't stand listening to it for too long. So you may be wondering why I bought this? In fact I've briefly wondered that myself. But then I remember that's what I like about music, and why I'm into such music in the first place. It makes you feel something. It may be that you feel empowered, or even disturbed like in this case, but its something. It makes you appreciate the music for what it is, independent of "genre" and nonsense labels like that. Plus it's part of HT history, so it's always fun to collect right?

Integrity / Psywarfare split 7"

 Lets face it, Integrity is pretty much Dwid, and Psywarfare is all Dwid. This makes this record basically a Dwid/Dwid split. 

Musically, this is not my favourite Integrity split. The first track "Sarin" is an early recording of a song on "Seasons In the Size Of Days". While this all of course great, the rest of the tracks on here are experimental noise tracks. I'm not saying these are bad, they are just not really to my taste.

There is no cover artwork this time, instead we have this awesome picture disc. 

The reverse side of the record is the Psywarfare side. In keeping with the obscurity of this band, the artwork is pretty mysterious. It appears to be a guy in the woods, although I honestly can't say for sure.

The plastic outer sleeve contains a nice little surprise addition. I kinda want to try this to see what does happen.

The insert contains a bit of information about the recording, lyrics to "Sarin' a long thank you list (featuring the mysterio Jack Abernathy) and a few lines accompanying "Learn How To Die". Right down the bottom there is information about obtaining some work by the HT church. Seeing as this was released ages ago this probably no longer gets you anything.

The reverse of the insert has a lot less going on. I love how these email addresses are all for AOL.com, such a 90's feel.