Label: Fan Club; Year: 199?; Format: Vinyl 10"
I never thought I’d be living in New York City one day, and
here I am living in the Big Apple grinding away, and trying to pay all those
bills while still having some fun. Before this city turned into the gentrified amusement
park it often represents today, it was a city where survival of the fittest was
on the daily picking order. The Lower East Side wasn’t a hip place to go to but
instead offered space for artists and musicians to pursue what they enjoyed the
most. I have to further admit that I was also never a huge fan of New York
Hardcore with a few exceptions, and Cro Mags would never make it onto any of my
lists of Top Bands. Still, if there was one 10” I would be allowed to take with
me to a lonely island, it might as well be this one here. Before “Age of
Quarrel” was recorded and released as an LP in 1986 a demo tape of all those songs was recorded
between late ’84 and early ’85, and subsequently must have made the rounds in tape trader circles. Back in the tape trading days demos often ended up in various countries, and so it shouldn’t come
as a surprise that in the early ‘90s someone came up with the idea to press the
“Age of Quarrel” demo onto a 10”. While I have heard the more metallic sounding
LP version in the past it just never grabbed me the same way as this much more
raw and more brutal demo version. Everything, and I really mean everything is
perfect about these recordings, as these songs just can’t be beaten when it
comes to NYHC straight out of the gutters of the Lower East Side. The loud bass
guitar, the screaming vocals, the speed, and above all the sheer brutality of
these songs cannot be put into words, you just have to hear them! Essential
listening for your bleeding ears!
