I bought three records once...

Last year I started a series of blog posts about records I bought. Because I'm an idiot I only did 4 posts, you can barely call that a series. But today I wanna pick it up again, with three records that have been on my to-do-list since I wrote the first 'I bought a record once' post. Here it is.

This time I wanna talk about three 7"s that I picked up sometime early in my hardcore/punk career.

Nuns Go Riot - Damaged Guts 7" (Seasons Records, 2008)
A1. New Born Rage
A2. Frontline
B1. Numb Fight
B2. The Beating Sound

Black Haven - The Cleansing Storm 7" (Holy Shit! Records, 2007)
A1. The Cleansing Storm
A2. My Haven
A3. Thoras
B1. Hel
B2. Gloom
B3. Growing In Grace

Ritual - Wolves 7" (Blacktop Recors/Drastic Action Records, 2006)
A1. The Dead In Disguise
A2. Stone And Glass
B1. If There's A Hell, We're All Going Down
B2 . Wolves

These records are 3 of the very first 7" records I bought, at one of my first shows. The show was July 31st of 2008, and the line-up was Nuns Go Riot, Teenage Lust, Daggers, Black Haven and Ritual. Pretty cool show, huh? It was the Den Eglantier, that was the first time I fell in love with that venue. I've been there countless times since then.
Anyway, the records. The Nuns Go Riot Damaged Guts 7" was out recently so it was cool I was able to pick that up. I still love it. I only saw them play two times I think, the second time being at the Groezrock small stage. Pretty weird, actually, haha. They played a kind of angry hardcore/punk among the lines of Lifetime or Comeback Kid. Really cool, I actually haven't heard this in a long time (say, a couple of years) but it sounds great! Too bad they disbanded with only a 7" (and a (split?) demo tape?) on their repertoire. Great band, great record, and it reminds me of 5 years ago, when I was a punk kid with no punk friends, checking out a show that was up my lane, going there on my own, being blown away by the music and the attitude and thinking "well, yeah, this is cool.".
Black Haven played the same show, as mentioned. I guess I knew who they were, I guess maybe through Lieven, who was my hardcore mentor back then, and he came from that area of Belgium. The Cleansing Storm was their first 7" EP, and it slays. It's not as distinguishing as their full length. It fits right in with a couple of other West-Flemish bands. Kinda metallic hardcore vibe. Their follow-up 7', Lazarus, and the full length Harmbringer take it all to a whole different level, but this 7" sounds pretty safe. It's really good, yes, but it's a safe bet. The artwork is absolutely stunning, the entire feel of the band is dark and carries a negative atmosphere, and I totally dig that.The bass tone is fucking filthy. Love it.
Then, the last 7" I bought at that particular show, was Ritual's Wolves EP. Ritual was a German band, they recently split up after 2 more full length albums and one EP. That show was my first encounter with them, although I probably had heard of them somehow. I remember they amazed me by only having one guitar player, and still sounding loud as hell. The show was alright, but they really did leave an impression on me. They played hardcore with certain melody, which I thought was awesome. Oh, and of course the band introduced me to the popular German hardcore trend of not having sleeves or rolling up your sleeves or simply wearing shirts that look kinda odd.

For the record, Teenage Lust ruled as well that night and I reckon Daggers did too. Here's a show review I did for my old (personal) blog, it's in Dutch but I guess no one outside of Belgium would care anyway. I'm not sure if anyone inside of Belgium would care to read this. It's pretty bad, almost embarrassing:

31/07/2008: show at Den Eglantier
Nuns Go Riot, supercoole set, seveninchke gekocht. Grave band.
Teenage Lust, ook een enorm coole band, keek ik wel naar uit, maar hadden niks van merch bij. Grave zanger, bassist en drummer ook wel! De gitaristen waren op’t einde van de set nog ‘ruzie’ aan ‘t maken of den ene nu vals speelde of niet en al. Achja. Wil ik zeker nog eens zien, en 'k ben benieuwd naar de 'Fuck'-release. Zanger zat vroeger in In Arm's Reach, ook heel cool!
Daggers: ook cool, maar iets minder.
Black Haven: heel hard, heel ruig en heel cool. Zotte basslijntjes, ik heb daar echt naar zitten staren, naar dien bassist, zo cool. Rrraw, bass. Seveninchke gekocht.
Ritual: verwachtte ik veel van, en de verwachtingen zijn ingelost. Ne keer nen hardcoreband met maar 1 gitaar, maar steevast keihard! En den drummer had een At The Drive-In shirt aan! Zot! Het minste volk in de zaal van alle bands, denk ik. Maar wel het meeste sfeer, hoewel er sowieso over ‘t algemeen niet veel sfeer was, behalve een beetje headnodding en af en toe ene die zot begon te doen. Achja. Cool. Seveninchke gekocht.