NEWSLETTER 027
SCHEME REPORT:
Week 2 of the rest of your fucking life. Scheme of Pain back again, hardcore aighttt….today brings yule type tidings. We have imported (RARE) (EXPENSIVE) ALMIGHTY WATCHING - Like Sand… 12”s from Re-Ignition Records. The name “Like Sand,,” is in reference to lyrics I thought I wrote, until I got fact checked but still liked the name..so now it’s in direct reference to time…the time it takes to create, the time it takes to sell 550 7” records, the time we still have to go on this little blue fucking marble. Its got a nice layout, we picked premium materials for everything and really did try to make its own thing so its not like were fleecing you for another hard fought $25. We only have a limited amount for domestic customers…for all foreign fools you can go direct and probably save a few deutsche marks at:
Shout out to my man FIlip for all the help and trust with this whole process.
We’ve also got a slight restock on SCHEME UNTIL ITS YOUR REALITY COMP Shirts…no records yet but more shirts… as in there's like 2 of each size left over from pre orders so get them while you can or something….
And most importantly for all the head wear heathens in our midst we have an ever more frequent restock of Scheme Hats, due to a fortunate error we ended up with an unintended white OATMILK version of our new line of Silver Embroidered jointz so very rare and not that expensive. Say what you will about our business practices but the more of this horse shit we sell A. the better you look…Isn’t it about time Grato bought a Scheme hat? B. the more mobility we can have when deciding to do new records..so you know its like you’re putting out the next great 1.5 Scene1 hardcore record just by throwing us the cost of one meal at an alright restaurant where you have to tip.
As far as the stupid pieces of spinning plastic that everyone likes less than hats…
Were offering a handful of the band color exclusives for sale in the store for the all the inept followers of Scheme who can’t be pained to go to a show to get one in person…like I said handful so if you want one for your complete collection get one and I’ll even combine your order and refund some of your shipping if you leave me a little note. Otherwise the Scheme Comp 12”s are possibly in the middle of the Atlantic (on a boat) and going to be ready to be collected inside the next 2 weeks and with any luck they’ll be out of my house the week after that and in your house collecting dust and having its several pages of content neglected and unread.
SCENE REPORT:
Been a man of the scene lately as in I went to a NEVER ENDING GAME show and than two shows with GRAND SCHEME / DEAD LAST / COLLATERAL.
Despite what SOME people2 are saying around the water cooler, I thought the NEVER ENDING GAME / GRIDIRON / SCARAB show was perfectly acceptable. Dancing…a little bit of fightin..at the end of the night everyone went home and I got to spend some quality time with my boy Dario3.
Now…for what I personally dubbed the HARDCORE MAYHEM weekend … that’s more than fine. If every show I went to was like the Syracuse date of the weekend I could retire in peace like a Batman without purpose in a crime free Gotham. Obviously we were insanely late...can’t believe Sc**** let the plan develop as it did but alas that's in the past. After late flights, tardy hobbits, botched airport pick ups and a Burger King stop we finally made it to the Syracuse sweat box. The pros who organized the event held the bands until they knew we were close so the show didn't have a bunch of dead air to kill the vibe…personally I think waiting around for the touring bands is as old school as it gets. After schlepping gear and merch down the stairs we got to catch GRAND SCHEME right as turned on da amps. STRAIGHT AHEAD cover ..the old way.. also had an existential crisis and thought it was a FREE SPIRIT song for a little while. COLLATERAL brought it, despite being crammed in a van for like 7 hours and on a plane for 2 before that. These kids got something special…keep an eye out…. DEAD LAST was good..but I like to say that..but they really were and its really nice to see people receptive to what they're up to.
I’ll just come out and say it…I think I've turned the page on MIL-SPEC..no funny little book puns intended BUT I am a flawed man..I make judgements..I cast stones and SOMETIMES you pretend you didn't throw those stones in the first place and come to terms with a band just being good for no other reason than they play hardcore on their own terms with style. Also at this point it was 102 degrees in the venue so maybe I had a stroke…but my next revelation could further cement me in the pantheon of the wrong…but WILD SIDE was great in ways that I have never expected to understand. Pure energy, the new song is devilish… I think I'm just a changed man. The only downside to this Canadian invasion was that I was expecting a Best Wishes set this whole time but was left uncompleted.
The next night was more of the same with much more time to catch up with friends and cohorts, every band had more than a good set. I woke up to the singer of COLLATERAL sleeping upright in a chair .. yeah that's the old way.
KYLE’s PLAYLIST:
EXISTENCE - Go To Heaven
BURNING LORD
WARREN ZEVON
DYSTOPIA (LIKE ALOT)
SLOWDIVE
FALLING FORWARD
IRON BOOTS (FOR SOME REASON)
VICTIM (CUZ DOPE)
SCARAB
ALBIN’s PLAYLIST:
OMEGAS - Blasts of Lunacy
ALCHEMIST - Flying High
HOME FRONT
SAVES THE DAY - Stay What You Are
JADAKISS on TAFS
ADRIENNE
MIND ERASER
COLD FRONT
HEADS WILL ROLL INTERVIEW:
Born and raised in the swampy bayous of Massapequa, Long Island...the man, the myth, the legend seen in green rooms throughout the north east drinking other bands beers: William Hanley. We'd exchanged pleasantries for years until we finally broke bread formally at Chili's in Setauket and I realized that something was weird with this fella. I liked it. Is there a fancy name for someone who works in a deli like how there is with coffe and baristas? If so, Billy would be he finest of them and cut you the thinesttttt Boards Head cold cuts. Now, he's one of the front line soldiers in the Scheme Armada - we present you a brief glimpse into the mind of Sergeant Bill:
What was your introduction to punk and hardcore? First shows?
My introduction to hardcore music was discovering CRO-MAGS through being a thrash fan and watching the American hardcore documentary but I didn’t know there was a contemporary hardcore scene at the time. My first show experiences were beatdown/mosh metal shows in 2008/9, I didn’t fuck with the music but kids I knew were going. I got the shit slapped out of me by a Thug Squad guy when I was thirteen at one of those shows. BACKTRACK and TERROR are the bands that introduced me to current hardcore.
What would you describe HEADS WILL ROLL sound to be to someone checking you out for the first time?
HEADS WILL ROLL sounds like straight up no bullshit LINYHC. SHEER TERROR, NEGLECT, KILLING IME, and THINK I CARE are probably the biggest influences on our sound.
If HEADS WILL ROLL was a store in the mall, what would it be?
We’d be one of those kiosks selling shitty t-shirts but honestly as a Sunrise Mall veteran myself I think we’d definitely be banned from the mall for destruction of property and smoking weed in the Wal-Mart loading docks.
As of now, HEADS WILL ROLL has no official demo or songs out besides the breakout track on the Scheme compilation. When can we expect a demo? How many songs? Are you going to keep adding a new song to your setlist every time you play a show?
HEADS WILL ROLL has one song available and only played three originals live but we have about 12 1/2 songs written for a double gatefold LP called “Music for Getting Cut Off At The Bar Too.”
Did Grato break that kid’s nose at the first show?
Grato absolutely smashed TJ Martinez’s nose during our 1st set. Anyone who says otherwise is propagating fake news.
Tell me about the new song "Hair of the Dog"......what’s on your mind kid?
Hair of the Dog is a song I wrote about drinking bender I went on when I was eighteen and the absolutely earth shattering hangover I had at the end. I was pretty much black out for three or four days. I don’t really remember much besides the fact I had a blast until I spent 24 hours puking with the worst headache of my life. I learned absolutely nothing from this experience
Would you rather have the feeling of having wet socks for the rest of your life or have to pee everytime you're about to fall asleep?
Both sound pretty terrible but I’m pretty good at falling asleep while I have to pee. I once dumped a lot of chicken blood on my shoes and worked 9 hours with cold blood soaked socks and it really sucks.
You've covered a BREAKDOWN song that may or may not have a naughty word in it. What other songs do you want to cover?
Yeah we covered Safe In A Crowd because it’s one of my all time favorite hardcore songs. Some of the words may be outdated but it’s a product of its time. I don’t think most hardcore heads take offense to it in the context of the song/era it’s from. Even if there are people who would be upset I honestly respect and understand their view but we’re still gonna cover it.
We got a whole bunch of covers we wanna do including a less traditional cover that’s gonna be on our debut release EP called “This One’s For You” coming out on Scheme later this year.
What can we expect from HEADS WILL ROLL in the coming months? Any closing words?*
We’re gonna be putting out the split with that band I mentioned earlier in the interview. We’re mainly gonna play Long Island/NYC but hopefully we get to play some new places after we have music out.
Knob creek 120 proof bourbon is the nectar of the gods.
Top fast food chains(chain restaurants without a drive thru aren’t fast food):
In n out
McDonalds
Arby’s
Popeyes
Checkers
*Editor's note*: Although Scheme does not support the unsolicited tiered review of fast food locations, we support free speech and do not censor the voice of artists.
KYLE’S MAIL BAG:
This was intended as a vignette of its own design but well you know…
These are not paid promotions.
Just a road map to how and where to spend your money when you're not trying to keep up with our flash hat sales and adding our compilation to your cart (and not hitting check out…)
EXISTENCE- Go To Heaven, BLOW YOUR BRAINS OUT EP, and INSTRUCTOR LP from Quality Control via Sorry State
If you’re one of my 6 friends who I actually talk to about things I enjoy (as opposed to the other hogs I feed slop to on a minute to minute basis) you’ve heard me talking about EXISTENCE, a band from Sweden. They got one of the only HC LPs out that I will listen to back to back multiple times a week. This record paints a whole picture with music that sounds like SLAYER but in the INTEGRITY way (insert picture of a double in Slayer shirt and white jeans). I don’t really want to talk about how this record sounds. This isn’t NME, I’m trying to sell physical goods here. The cover art is the original hook that got me snagged on the line, it’s original and tasteful and generally well crafted (and something I could never do). Back cover is nothing to write home about but the insert has a lot of moxie and bonus points for having what looks like a letter sized piece of paper reduced to 50% and pasted in the middle with all the lyrics at an unreadable size. It’s bright, it’s colorful and most most most importantly it looks like it was made by a person not a fucking robot.
Special bonus: The EXISTENCE t-shirt I ordered from the band got to my house in 6 days. You can’t beat that customer service. Also probably the only NEW hardcore band t-shirt I’ve purchased online in nearly 5 years.
BLOW YOUR BRAINS OUT - The catalyst of this order was the EXISTENCE record, I cannot pretend otherwise. It’s something I couldn’t do without but as a fan of this record and as an even more rabid fan of a deal I had to throw this in my cart. Everything about the layout screams and shouts THE ABUSED. you really gotta see the whole thing to get the whole picture. It’s got a raw stippled cover with simple fold over packaging covered in eurostile and makes no delusions about what kind of hardcore music is contained within. On the subject of the deal Quality Control offers all of their records at reasonable and often times below market price, unlike some rats who are just chasing the cheese… above par hardcore offered at pre 2020 prices should be on all consumers' radar.
INSTRUCTOR- LP I saw this band's name on a flier for a show with ARKANGEL and I’ve been perplexed ever since. I knew these guys were in the mix with Quality Control, a label I respect almost like no other, and ARKANGE who also like alot being on the same local gig has me asking questions. Like most things, demystifying a situation with simple facts and logical pursuit can really make a former confusion or assumption feel like a child's brain lack of understanding for what the world actually is.Obviously both bands hail from the same or adjacent Belgian HC scenes … BXL baby ……why wouldn’t they play a show together.So you know I did my due diligence when the promo tape came out and it had cool covers and I realized they play a style of hardcore that for all intents and purposes I should really like, you know that middlingly popular brand of HARDcore that’s not influenced by Perseverance. A German told me Belgium people are insane, and these guys are skinheads or something so like I had to get a record if not only to collect another modern master piece of cover art produced by SPOILER.
Great insert paired with a great cover, just something that’s done right from front to back.
Extinction Burst:
You know I’d hate to gush about people I like but I really like Ramon from EB. A man with a plan and a vision for what kind of work he wants to produce for the world. If you don’t have a clue, Extinction Burst is a Victorville, California label responsible for half of the MADHOUSE / FIRESTARTER split + the DEMAND E.P on top of tens of other things that I’m sure hold merit in their respective fields. Extinction Burst is best described as the full package, everything is considered with these releases, The look / the feel / the sounds all in creative harmony. After some parallel flattery we worked out a trade for each other’s releases, and Ramon went above and beyond with sending me the DEMAND 7” featuring my Maine OG Zech and members of other DC area acts including a very intense metallic printed slipcover and crispy white long sleeve showcasing the 7” art. Even more pleasantly than receiving the thing I asked for, he also kindly included a copy of his past band ESPERANZA’s discography LP…a band I didn’t know anything about outside of listening to it on his website a few weeks earlier. This comes back to the full circle thing, the record packaging is clean as a can of sprite is crisp, the bands entire history is summed up and packaged into a beautiful full color booklet with flyers, ephemera and mission statements. He explained that he has partaken in a few of these archival projects and this one he worked on with his daughter.
I’m not gonna put labels on the music, because once again this isn’t about reviewing sounds but I consider it worth listening to or at the very least peeling through the record to show how your hardcore last will and testament should be done.
185 Miles South - Nardcore 4 comp
Oxnard California … never been there but honestly that one IN CONTROL song makes me feel like it’s the secret level in the best Tony Hawk game. When I think of NARDCORE I think of IN CONTROL, my man VINCE and 185 Miles South. Its the podcast equivalent of those long van rides from one shitty place to another listening to and talking about OLC, DEATH THREAT and CHAIN OF STRENGTH… for better or worse. When I heard they spoke fondly of the WRECKAGE 12” I had to thank them by upgrading on their purchase and I was rewarded with a stack of records and stickers I still haven’t worked all the way through yet. My brother hates the YOUTH OF TODAY song “Potential Friends” but that song is perfect for situations like this…we all have this niche common interest and it would really be a shame if we didn't foster that connection sometimes via commerce and sometimes via kind words.
Discogs order from Moo Cow Distro
If you know me on a certain level you know I love a bad 7” record..something with shitty fonts, recycled designs,mediocre music…sometimes I gotta feed the beast and really make a Discogs seller work for their nut. Buying 8 7”s for $25 should be illegal, regardless of how much they qualify as landfill. On this trip to the darkest recess of myself I came back with A major chunk of the french hardcore label INNER RAGE RECORDS discography. A label I don't know have the carfax on outside of them having a serious pulse on C rate East Coast hardcore in the periods between 1992-1997 and it was ran by the guy who was in the french deathcore band DROWNING…who I like a good amount. Along with that smut, I also picked up a few Connecticut crucialities that A.I didn't know existed B. Couldn't bear to pay $6 shipping on a $2 record for. Records like these will be the subject of a future scheme event that I have no concrete details to explain right now.
A dissertation discussing the Three Scene Theory will be written by Quinn Adikes (LETHAL) and published in a future Scheme Newsletter.
The vibes were undeniably kinda buns at the show. BALMORA and SCARAB were dope. Shouts to the girl in the Japanese maid outfit at the show who reclassed her build mid show and went from a Healer build to a Tank build after purchasing and putting on a GRIDIRON jersey.
Legend.