Shake off the Dust

This past week I've been revisiting all the old bands i used to listen in the late 90's when i was starting to really take to music. Tooth And Nail Records used to put out these compilations called Songs From the Penalty Box, i think they release four versions before the compilations for the most part went downhill along with the label. Anyway, it was through those compilations that i found out about bands such as MxPx, Slick Shoes, Dogwood, The Huntington's, Ghoti Hook, Craig's Brother, and The Undecided to name a few. Those bands, although shunned upon sometimes for their lyrical content were bands that had a profound impact on me as a kid and are still a part of me today. I have my friend Ben to thank for buying me a couple of those cd's for my birthdays over the years we hung out, he moved to North Carolina shortly after high school started and i haven't talked to him much since then. Thanks dude, wherever you are.

I dug out one of those cd's today because i remember there being a band that played skate/pop punk i really liked but could never manage to get a hold of any of their material. It turns out the band was called Off The Record. They only had one formal release entitled Remember When. So finally today i looked the record up, it was out of print so i resorted to soulseek, i wasn't expecting to get any results but fortunately i was able to find a copy and download it. I just finished listening to it once through and i was smiling through the whole thing. It kind of sounds like Blink 182 Dude Ranch era with a few more hard hitting, more technical riffs. The vocals have more attitude than Blink 182 could ever muster, as much as i like Dude Ranch, this blows it out of the water. At least upon initial listen.

One of the coolest things about music is that you can go back and revisit the bands that helped shape who you are today. You can feel just like you did when you were a 15 year old kid and didn't have to care about anything other than how you were going to explain your latest truancy from school to your parents or where you were going to skate without having the cops threaten to take your board away. Even though i only heard one song from this record previous to today, listening to this record let's me relive a part of my life i wouldn't change for anything. That's priceless.

Ohh yeah, on a side note, i started a new blog called Against the Grain. So from this point forward this one will be reserved for all things music since it pretty much already is. And the other one, well i don't really know i guess political/philosophical banter that will make no sense to anyone but myself. It probably won't even make sense to me.