| INTEGRITY - "Palm Sunday" LP
Blood red vinyl, limited to 500 pieces.
In this day and age of instant gratification and internet based
impatience, it's strange to imagine that underground music used to
flourish without the aid of chatrooms, downloads and blogspots. Thanks
to a network of tape traders, fanzines and mailorder, word used to
travel and fame was spread a little slower. But, sometimes, through
the aid of chinese whispers, anti-heros were established before a lick
of music was ever heard.
INTEGRITY came into existence in the second wave of American Hardcore
in the late Eighties. Eshewing the crewcuts, sportswear, and youthcrew
positivity of their peers, The Cleveland combo set out on an
altogether different path. Combining the anger of hardcore with
imagery and demon-conjuring of Slayer and Black Sabbath, INTEGRITY
were altogether a more evil beast, inspiring love and hatred in equal
degree amongst an increasingly narrow minded scene and their
conservative musical tastes. And boy, could they kick up controversy.
Not a week would go by without some scandalous behaviour (some myth,
some truth) doing the gossip rounds.
The particular show documented here in limited edition blood red
vinyl, is just one such example. Yes, this is the stuff of true infamy
- the one where the "kid got stabbed" (allegedly) and the one where
"Dwid shot someone" (allegedly). As live albums go, you could compare
this to Hardcore's own "Metallic KO" - a true classic dripping with
violence, menace and wrongdoing.
As an archive recording, you are not gonna get studio trickery,
overdubs or pristine performances mimicking the studio album's sounds
perfectly. What you are gonna get is the definitive lineup of one of
the greatest hardcore bands of all time showing you exactly why, some
13 years on, INTEGRITY still live on. And how they inspired the
legions of "metalcore" bands that came thereafter.
The Dawn Of A New Apocalypse indeed.
SALIENT POINTS:
- 500 copies only on blood red vinyl. You snooze, you lose.
- Stunning packaging featuring suitably controversial artwork by Jo
Ratcliffe (SUNN0))), CAPRICORNS etc.)
- This is the first ever officially sanctioned INTEGRITY live album.
- The definitive band line-up playing everyone's favourite songs from
the early days.
- Hilarious and foreboding in-between song banter.
FOR FANS OF: RINGWORM, CONFRONT, SLAYER, violence and evil in general.
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