A History of Albany, NY Punk & Hardcore -- 1980-1991

I built (and may add to) this compilation of Albany, NY off site, ON THIS PAGE. I didn't have time to test all the mp3s and images, so please write comments here if you find problems with the page.

No Outlet demo

Another post for the Albany folks. Thanks to Carl for providing the track names!



No Outlet was a classic Albany style hardcore ("ASHC" in Capital District parlance) band from the mid- to late-1980s. If you weren't there, you probably never heard of them. Their few releases include this demo and songs on two Albany compilations (see more at Middle Aged Youth's posting of the Albany Style Hardcore 7"). Nate of Gloom Records (and Monster X and a number of other bands) just sent me a live No Outlet show from 1989 (one of their last shows?), so keep your eyes peeled here for that.

I lost my copy of this 1987(?) demo years ago and this replacement copy came with no track list. Carl just sent them in, but be advised that the mp3 files don't have the right song names embedded with them. You'll have to set them yourself on your iTunes or mp3 program. Enjoy.


First Glance
Last Time
Just How It Goes
Push Back/Know Yourself
Loser
Abuser
No Outlet
Thanks

Born Against

Trivia: Most people know that BA featured members of LifesBlood. Fewer know that, at various times, BA also featured members of Citizen's Arrest and Moss Icon. There are plenty of sources on the Web to read about them so I won't repeat it here.

Half Mast
Xmas Eve
9 Years Later
Born Again/Witness to a Rape

This release came with a ton of visuals:

Lyrics 1
Lyrics 2
Stuff 1
Stuff 2
Stuff 3
Stuff 4
Stuff 5

Breakdown - The '87 Demo

Breakdown played my home town a lot in the mid to late 80s. I probably saw them 10 times or so, because a good lot of the Albany kids WORSHIPPED them. Most were the very kids who also idolized Youth of Today and the other Positive bands. This, of course, was strange, since Breakdown’s songs are basically all about drinking and fighting. They were kind of like the drinking man’s counterpart to Boston’s straight-edge Slapshot (who’s singer held a broken hockey stick in his hand rather than a bottle).

My friends and I weren’t … uh exactly into them (although, I always liked "Pipedream," the instrumental that, if I recall correctly, served as their "intro bust"). Nonetheless, when they reissued the ’87 Demo on this 7” record, at least a couple of us scrambled to buy it just for nostalgic purposes. It is definitely a classic from the 80s NYHC scene, even though the recording quality is pretty bad. If I had better software I'd try to remove the hiss, but I use Audacity, which always seems to create distortion when you try to reduce noise.

-- UPDATE: Dec. 17, 2007--
I've been asked to take it down per request of Bill Wilson, who claims to be the owner of the masters of this recording (not a Breakdown band member, but I have no reason not to believe him I guess). I'm leaving the first song by his permission. Bill says this is available on

and dowloadpunk.


Sick People
Kickback
Labelled
Vengence
Your Problems
Pipe Dream

Fear of God

For my money, of all the throat bands of the mid 80s, Switzerland's FEAR OF GOD was definitely the throatiest. Amazing. One of my favorite tracks is Prisoner of Your Ideals, which is all of 14 seconds long!

I bought this record (in 1988?) knowing nothing about the band, but figured any band that covered an Infest song was something I should buy. As it turned out, Erich, the singer for this band, actually put out the Infest LP posted elsewhere on this blog.
When I first heard this record, I assumed the band was taking grindcore (or crust-core, whatever you wanna call it) to its logical, perhaps even parodying extreme, as Sore Throat did on their Disgrace to the Corpse of Sid album. My friend and I decided that the main singer (which, I believe, is Erich) sounded a lot like Cookie Monster and, in fact, on two songs ("Which Way" and "Trouble Maker") there are times where I'd swear the singer WAS saying the word "cookie" ... were the lyric sheet not available to correct me.

That said, however, Erich, a band member who runs the awesome Good Bad Music for Bad, Bad Times blog (where he has some live stuff posted), writes that "the label 'Grindcore' that was attached to the band from 1989 never felt right for us. We thought of FEAR OF GOD as a Hardcore band, because apart from bands like MASTER or REPULSION, Hardcore and poststructuralistic Noise was our main influence."

I removed some of the songs at the request of Erich, who informed me that FEAR OF GOD is about to do a reissue of a lot of their stuff for their 20th anniversary and that this 7" I have is a bootleg anyway! He says that there are more bootlegs of this band than actual official releases. I believe it. I'm sure the Japanese went apeshit over this stuff.


Side 1
Rubbish Planet
Controlled By Fear
Prisoner of Your Ideals
Under The Chainsaw
Trouble Maker
Proud On Your Pride
My Hands Deep In Your Guts
Which Way?
Pneumatic Slaughter
A Life In Rigorism
7 Up

Side 2
Circle A
Running Through The Blood
Raise The Siege
Pelzfotze
I'm Positive
The Two Sides Of The Coin
Locked Away
I've Seen
Absolution
First Class People
Chain (Infest cover)