IF HOPE DIES & BEYOND FALL

Hell Fest 2001 ... a show I talk about quite often. I moshed for essentially every band over the course of three days; minus Thursday and a few others. I was actually the only one moshing for certain sets. Remembering Never was one that sticks out in my mind. Another two were If Hope Dies and Beyond Fall. They both played earlier in the day and were essentially local bands (Auburn is roughly 25 minutes from Syracuse).

Neither band had been around for a long time and if I remember correctly, this "split EP" was essentially both of their demos on one CD-R stuff into a folded piece of glossy computer paper. I think I may have paid $10 for it, but I can't recall. Either way, even if I did ... I am very glad I did so. The three If Hope Dies songs remain amongst my favorite metalcore tracks of the era. The epic mosh in Death Of A Salesman is rarely accomplished by even the most exalted of the genre. Beyond Fall isn't too shabby either.

If Hope Dies were actually a Vegan Straight Edge band at the time. I know they carried on with the gimmick for a while but honestly lost track of the band after the release of their full length on Iron Clad/Metal Blade Records. I remember their first full length being a huge leap in production value but, as expected with bigger production budgets, I never seem to like the re-recordings as much as the originals. Death Of A Salesman was recorded for the follow-up full length and never struck me as being as powerful as the version found on this split. It was that song specifically that got me really psyched on the band. I was really jamming the In Flames - Clayman album a lot at the time and this song essentially took it and made it moshable ... what more could I ask for in 2001?

Beyond Fall had a bit of a "meaner", more aggressive sound than If Hope Dies (who relied a bit on melody). I'm not sure if they were also from Auburn, but I know they were from upstate NY somewhere. They played the "other" kind of metalcore I was into at the time. Experimental and sloppy without making a lot of sense. Oh yeah, and without the slightest bit of listenability.

I actually think the general lack of attention to detail is what draws me to this split. As previously stated, the re-recorded, tightened-up versions of Death Of A Salesman and The Null Set by If Hope Dies never struck me as being quite so awesome; not to mention the fact that they skipped right over Chrysalis (the song with the horrid singing part) when choosing songs to re-recorded for the full length. There is a sense of genuineness on this split that is becoming a further distant memory as we speak due to digital recordings and the whole schpiel.

I'm not too sure if Beyond Fall ever went on to release anything after this split ... but if anyone has anything else by them, I would love to hear it. If they would have ever re-done that final track on the split, I bet it would be up there with 7 Angels 7 Plagues on the syncopated double-kick mosh awesomeness scale.

Path To Misery was actually lucky enough to play the If Hope Dies reunion when we both played in Auburn for the Shane Dirisio benefit back in March of 2009. They played Death Of A Salesman ... and yes, I moshed.

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Mind Intrusion

By far the best "90s" blog I've come across. I put "90s" in quotations because there is no dogma prescribed to by the guy who runs this blog. If something that was recorded a year ago is awesome, it gets posted. Similarly, bad albums don't get posted here simply due to the decade in which they were released.

It just started a few months ago but already has more content than most blogs. Some of the music I've already downloaded from this page has blown my mind; both in the sense that I've never heard of most of the bands and also in how amazingly good most of it is.

If you have an open mind and are into music that is equally passionate as it is obscure, then check out Mind Intrusion.

SHOULDER: Touch

I feel like I need to balance out the blog with all of this over-the-top hardcore shit I've been posting lately. I've always contemplated starting to post up some more "indie" type shit despite it not really having much influence on Path To Misery outside of the attitude of the bands. I then realized that Shoulder probably has as much of a musical influence on Path To Misery as Krutch does and, in turn, have every much a right to be here as does Comin Correct. From here on in, I will be posting good music regardless of genre or amount of influence on the Path.

That being said, Shoulder is pretty much perfect. Coming out of London, Ontario, Canada, they were one of those bands from the mid-90s (album was recorded in 1995) that really blurred the lines between what was "hardcore" and what was "emo" or "indie" or whatever term was being thrown around at the time. The songs most certainly do not lack in the emotion category, while at the same time regularly having the ability to burst into considerably fast, upbeat punk parts. Every bit of melody is matched by equal parts intensity. I'm not one to romanticize hardcore in the 90s, but listening to this album makes me long for a day whenever bands playing music this varied still were linked together by a mutual scene; sharing a similar outlook on life, music, and society. I am sure this band shared the stage with quite a few open E-chord chug bands in their day and were more than OK with it. Fuck, they even put out a split 7" with Morning Again. Band also apparently had some sort of connection to Grade as Kyle Bishop took all of their pictures and did their layout for them.

If the band chose to, I get the impression that they could have easily taken their songs to a producer, polished them up and made themselves considerably well-off considering the musical climate at the time. The band had the song-writing ability and enough of a knack for writing catchy songs to where they could have just as easily have been writing hits as big as Hey Jealousy or Found Out About You. The bands definitely shared a tendency for driving their songs through their clean channels but I'm not saying that Shoulder necessarily sounds like Gin Blossoms. You can definitely hear where the band easily had the talent to write such songs if they would have chosen to though.

Perhaps that is where the influence on Path To Misery lays; the band's unwillingness to write accessible music despite having the knowledge and musical prowess to do so. It also appears as though the band was working on a very limited budget despite doing their best to create an inventive full length album. Out of 21 tracks found on this full length effort, only 9 of them were recorded in a studio setting. Presumably the band was forced to cut costs and chose to record all of the acoustic interludes in a home studio setting. These acoustic interludes are also possibly my favorite part of the album. They make their appearance in between each studio track on the album and gives the full length a feeling of being, well ... full. Despite its length of roughly 68 minutes, the album is a surprisingly easy listen and plays through quite nicely, even despite the addition of their demo tracks at the end.

These demo recordings found at the end of this album sound almost as good as the 9 featured tracks, quite frankly. The only failure on this release was the lack of song titles and lyrics for said demo tracks. If anyone by chance has this information, I would love to get my rip labeled up properly. In fact, I would LOVE a copy of the original demo which ideally would include the lyrics. I'd also love to get a copy of the Kindling album which was the follow-up to Touch in 1996.

If you're looking for something different to listen to, I'd strongly suggest this full length that lives up to its title.

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Lake Effect In Effect

There's two people who do as much for Erie as I do for Pittsburgh: EMS and Josh Buck. I mean, there are probably just as many others in Erie who I am not mentioning as there are in Pittsburgh that I'm not mentioning, but we are the ones who relish in old, bad hardcore the most. On top of that, we make blogs about it and try to push the garbage on everyone else as well.

On the real though, EMS' new blog which is dedicated to solely Erie Hardcore Lake Effect In Effect bands is off to a good start. Not really sure how he manages to run a blog when he's already handling Forward Hall (Erie's flagstaff venue) as well as his band Smoke & Mirrors and tattoo shop Ink Assassins, but that's the kinda shit you do when you are addicted to HxC.

He re-posted my Abnegation discography that I did over a year ago now (which is weird to think about) and was apparently inspired to do his own rip of their original Life For A Life demo cassette. I really wish he would have done so before I made my post because his rip sounds literally twice as good as whatever it was I had included in the zip file (which has been downloaded over 500 times thusfar). Had I known this many people were going to read my bullshit I probably would have been more polite about the Verses Of The Bleeding full length. Oh well, it really isn't that good. It's cool though, they kinda redeemed themselves with the final two tracks they recorded for some evil and darkness comp that EMS also posted on his blog.

Anyhow, you can hear it here if you are interested. It also includes scans of the cover, which has some very unhappy straight edge cattle on the cover.

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I hope we all sleep well at night knowing that we are solely responsible for reproducing whatever it is that we do into the digital age to exist for all eternity. I know I do. Check out EMS' blog HERE and check out Josh Buck's blog HERE if you're looking for shit that should have been left for dead in the 90s.

On a side note ....

Set An Emo Kid On Fire

Back in 2001, when I was 15, I decided to follow in the time-honored tradition of putting together a compilation in order to get my shitty hardcore band tagged along with some better bands. Down To None (my first band) had just finished recording for the first time and I was more than anxious to get my band's recording circulating amongst the hardcore world. At the time, CD-Rs were still slightly expensive and, not wanting to waste that valuable space, I decided I was better off filling up the discs as a compilation instead of an eight-minute Down To None demo. It was all about hardcore scene brotherhood and I was always looking for ways to further the unity.

I was doing reviews for hardcorewebsite.net at the time on top of getting into the fine art of show promotion. I was meeting a lot of bands and decided to put my contacts to use. Rick Ta Life had been rearing me (and the entire hardcore scene) to put together a zine, start a label, and to support the scene in whichever way humanly possible. I had already done a zine and was obviously living my life based around supporting the scene at the time; I figured putting out a compilation to start my label was the only natural path in life for me to take.

Most of the bands mailed in CDs in order to get me their tracks. Mp3s were still in their infancy and most people were still ripping at 128 kbps if I was lucky. I specifically remember having to write out instructions to Bad Luck 13 explaining what Mp3s were, what programs to download in order to create them, and how to e-mail them to me. It took over 10 back-and-forths if I remember correctly. I ended up getting a 60 kbps wav file.

In fact, even the bands who sent me their discs didn't get any sort of recording quality justice for this comp. I believe the highest quality rip Windows Media Player was capable at the time was 192 kbps. In turn, the comp sounded like shit. Most people don't notice shit like this, but I actually think that this comp was the reason I've developed such a hatred for low-quality Mp3s. I remember being so bummed that I couldn't really do anything about the sound quality of some of the songs. This post, however, is my redemption.

Call it a re-mastering of the comp if you will, but I went back through and re-ripped all of these songs from their master copies at 320 kbps for your listening pleasure. This comp sounds fresher than ever and I've actually been jamming it for the past few days.

Thinking back, I don't know if it was because things were different back then or if the bands assumed the compilation would never actually come out, but getting permission to include the bands all happened within a week if I remember properly. It was as simple as writing a polite e-mail to the bands and them writing back asking for an address to mail the CD to. No labels, managers or agents needed to be consulted amongst this decision making process. Some young kid was putting out a comp to support the scene and that was that. Sure, why not?

Of course some of the songs did not stand the test of time (or weren't really that good to begin with), but in general this is a pretty solid comp considering it was put together by a 15 year old. I was always pretty proud of this thing for the most part; mainly due to the fact that over half of the tracks were exclusive to the comp at the time. Even to this day, some of the songs never ended up being officially released (Untold Truth, On Our Own, Strength From Within, Inner Revolution, Closer Than Dying).

From a monetary standpoint (yeah right) the comp also did quite well. I remember selling 300-400 copies at a few bucks a pop. It made me enough money to start my label which I called Preserving Silence Records. I put out a few CD-R releases thanks to the money I made from this comp. You can thank (or blame) this comp for the release of The Struggle, Better Off Dead, and Down To None CDs.

As for the bands on the comp, there are a few things that always stuck out to me.

- I definitely put Comin Correct as the first band on the comp due to Rick Ta Life's continual motivation to get me to put this thing out.
- Strength From Within was a local band who I looked up to a lot at this time who essentially recorded a 6 song demo in order to have something to contribute. The band broke up right after the recording and as far as I know, I am the only person to be in possession of these tracks.
- I was the first person outside of the band to hear the new No Retreat track, One By One. Considering they were my favorite band at the time, I was slightly more than excited.
- I have no recollection who the hell Untold Truth is. I remember them being from Connecticut and nagging me so often to put them on the comp that I finally just gave in and did it. I would love to know what this band went on to do.
- Eric Klinger from Built Upon Frustration sent me a CD-R priority mail that not only had Matter Of Time on it, but also three other unreleased Built Upon Frustration tracks that I listened to solely for many weeks to follow.
- The Nailed To The Cross track on here is fucking killer despite the horrible recording. I really wish I was still in touch with their vocalist, Mike, who gave my first band it's first out-of-state show (with Comin' Correct) and made us feel validated in everything we were doing.
- Thinking back, the best part of doing this comp was having Krutch mail me a copy of their Whatever It Takes album. It is by far my favorite Krutch disc and I have never come across another copy in all my days of CD searching. Lucky me.

As for the name of the compilation; well, when you're 15 you don't always think about the repercussions of your actions. After I had put all of these bands together, I realized I had no name or layout for the comp. The title was quite tongue-in-cheek and seemed so over-the-top in my mind that I couldn't imagine anyone taking it seriously. While I was a pretty well thought-out kid, I guess I was either naive or extremely modest in thinking that no one outside of my circle of friends would buy this compilation. Not everyone shares the same sense of humor, however, and a few people were quite turned off by the name.

Oh yeah, the "hidden tracks" on this album make-up the infamous Silent But Deadly demo. They turned into xRepresentx a year or two down the road. Go figure.

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BURIED ALIVE: Demos

I did a post a while back on The Death Of Your Perfect World. It is quite possibly the best hardcore full length of all time. Everyone knows this and many blogs have made posts about it. Therefore, I've decided to do something no one else has done to keep things interesting.

You may or may not be familiar with the Last Rites "full length" that came out both after The Death Of Your Perfect World AND after the band had broken up. Essentially, the album served as a means for Victory to continue to cash in on Buried Alive after their demise. Apparently the band still owed Victory another release or two and the label took it upon themselves to release a collection of pre-production demos that the band was readying in preparation for their sophomore full length which obviously never saw the light of day.

The release annoys me for several reasons. First and foremost, it doesn't contain the tracks from the Reach The Sky split 7". Those are two of my favorite Buried Alive tracks. Secondly, Last Rites fails to offer up the songs in a chronological order. The nine studio tracks included on Last Rites are actually from three different recording sessions that were laid down throughout 2000. For whatever reason, Victory chose to put them in a random order; robbing the album of any sort of cohesion or continuity. Finally, only half of a live set is present on this album; with the rest of the set making its appearance on the poorly distributed New York City Takeover comps that Victory put out around the same time. I have taken it upon myself to fix these shortcomings.

In this upload, I have taken the Last Rites album and sorted it out to the best of my abilities in hopes that it sheds light on the final days of Buried Alive. I sorted out the songs into the separate recording sessions and put them in chronological order so that one can hear the "progression" of the band throughout the year 2000. If anything, this realization somewhat substantiates the claims made by certain members that other certain members wanted to make the band "sound like Papa Roach". In summary, the songs recorded in May of 2000 are drastically different than those recorded in October of the same year. Listen to the tracks and judge for yourself.

Also, after finally tracking down a copy of the New York City Takeover comps nine years after their release I decided to match up the Buried Alive tracks in order to piece together a complete set. I put them in order of how I think the set went and needless to say, it is quite a solid set. Of course I also included the tracks from the Reach The Sky split, which were actually from the same session as one of the tracks on the Last Rites album.

I hope you enjoy. I'm also re-posting the live video I have of an unreleased Buried Alive track that I uploaded to Vimeo a while ago. Any information about this track would be great.



Last Rites was anything but a suitable farewell to such a legendary band. If Buried Alive would have ever released another full length, I am sure it would been every bit as intimidating as The Death Of Your Perfect World.

Just for the fuck of it, I'm throwing in the original Six Month Face 7" (master CD rips at 320 kbps) as well as the 1998 demo. PIT!!!
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Huge Collection Score!

This past weekend I decided to take my first show road trip in quite some time to see Disembodied in Syracuse, NY. Needless to say, they fucking killed it. The promoter of the show (syracuseshows.com) was gracious enough to allow me to set up my distro to offset some of the gas costs to get up there and back. You'd be surprised at how rare something like this is becoming amongst "hardcore shows" in 2010. Either way, Architect was also on the bill (also a large factor playing into my road trip) and they also managed to play the best set I've ever seen them play. My friend Keith from Architect (or maybe Keith from Hell Fest if you're out of the loop) approached me at my distro and offered to donate "some" CDs for my distro and/or blog as he is a strong supporter of both endeavors. I followed him to his house after the show only to find that "a few " CDs meant over 200 discs of pure metalcore gold.

If any of you know me, you know that my CD collection is an equally respectable entity (humor). There are times when I feel as though there is nothing else left for me to acquire. Well, Keith's collection proved me to be nothing more than entirely wrong. It was almost as though his collection was the missing piece to mine. Despite having very comparable musical tastes, there were very few discs that overlapped amongst our collections. His collection of obscure Syracuse acts was rivaled only by his gathering of "Hell Fest demos" (aka demos of bands who I saw at Hell Fest 2001 in which I have never been able to track down since). As we all know, Hell Fest 2001 remains to be the single greatest show in which I've ever witnessed; and these demos brought back quite a few fond memories.

Some of the most notable CDs donated to me include: Dissolve's Graverobber EP, a pre-Godbelow band called The Last Season's full length album, the original EP and split CDs from xMaroonx only released internationally in 2000 & 2001, Ebony Sorrow's demo (the band who opened up Hell Fest 2001 in which I entered the room and immediately started moshing), Andromeda's self-released full length album, and just hundreds of amazing albums which I will be posting up here over what I'm guessing will be over the next month or two.

I'll start this off by telling a short story related to my trip to Syracuse. I ran into Ryan Hex who I hadn't seen since Sincerity Fest 2007 when his current project Mistletoe was playing. He had his distro set up from which I picked a few gems up from. We got to talking about one of his past projects, The Funeral; and subsequently their elusive 4 song demo. I used to have this as Mp3s from my SoulSeek days. I lost that computer full of Mp3s; most of which I recovered without problem. For whatever reason, however, The Funeral's demo has eluded me for well over 4 years now. If it wasn't so fucking awesome I probably would have forgotten about it by now.

It was no longer than 15 minutes after Ryan and I concluded our conversation about combining efforts to try and get this thing back into Mp3 circulation that I had it given to me by Keith Architect. Life is strange sometimes. Anyhow, here is this perfect fucking demo in its four song entirety.
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If this demo gets you as hyped as it does I, go to my previous post I did on the band almost exactly a year ago HERE and check out their full length efforts.