Brand New – Science Fiction

Leave it to Brand New to do something unusual. The band dropped their fifth studio album completely out of left field, without any sort of announcement. Pre-orders went live in the middle of August and the album began streaming two days later. The band that seems to purposely shroud themselves in mystery for the sake of confusing, misleading and agitating their fan base added new chapters to their already infamous book with the release of Science Fiction.

As is typical with anything Brand New related, people went nuts when word spread about the new album being released. People snatched up the pre-order for the vinyl version of Science Fiction without hesitation. To the point where it sold out within a matter of minutes, only to be restocked and sell out again in nearly the same amount of time. That shouldn’t be surprising to anyone at this point; pre-orders routinely sell out in minutes these days. What is insane about this particular pre-order, regardless of it being a Brand New album, is that people literally blindly threw money at them.

This wasn’t your typical $20 or even $25 record. Science Fiction cost $45 before shipping. And many people said their total came out to over $50 when all was said and done. There were no details regarding this release either; no pressing info, no release date/ship date, no title… not even cover art. The only imagery associated with the pre-order was a white square with black text saying “Brand New Fifth Album  Vinyl / Very Limited. Ships in October.” See photo below, it was saved directly from the pre-order page. The download link given to those who pre-ordered also said release of June 5th, with nothing available to download. Yet another hilarious touch by the band.

Due to all the excitement once word spread about the pre-order, the website for Brand New’s label, Procrastinate Music Traitors! (PMT), pretty much shit the bed. The site was extremely slow within the first 10 minutes, and wouldn’t even load after about 30 minutes. But again, this didn’t deter people from pre-ordering. It was a hailstorm of angry comments all over the internet. Message boards, social media and reddit all bore the brunt of disgruntled, desperate and amused Brand New fans, along with trolls because it was a feeding frenzy for them. The trolling was intense with this record in the first few weeks. Yes, that is how long it lasted.

I loved how one particular message board complained incessantly about how “typical Brand New” this was, and how they seemed to purposely be as vague as possible with this pre-order and provide little to no info about it; yet they essentially trolled themselves by posting nonsense, making it next to impossible for anyone interested, or not in the know at the time, to find any sort of useful information. The same handful of idiots on that message board cluttered up the thread for this record so much that it ballooned out to 12 pages in one day, with 9 of those pages being what they felt was clever, insightful and/or hilarious conversation when in fact it was all complete BS that wastes everyone’s time. Especially anyone looking for real information. Sad, because this message board never used to be like this. It was a great resource 7-8 years ago.

The trolling only got worse when people who pre-ordered the “Very Limited” $45 vinyl option, started receiving unexpected packages from PMT, with the contents being a limited to 500 CD copy of the new album. This CD is only one track, making it tougher to rip and spread on the internet. It came packaged in… you guessed it, a paper bag! All copies are numbered out of 500, which unfortunately is the only way to legitimately know how many copies of the CD were made due to not just trolling, but people who routinely spread incorrect information based purely of speculation or some other means that can’t be corroborated let alone confirmed. The label shipped all 500 CDs via one-day priority mail.

Eventually variants started being announced for Science Fiction, which again, led to chaos. In all three variants were completely confirmed, with a fourth being available but with no concrete info about it, and a speculated fifth in the “very limited,” which was just discussed. The first variant announced was oddly an Australian exclusive, which is on white vinyl limited to an unknown amount, but has the standard “indefinite pressing quantity” statement in the details of the variant. This Australian variant was being sold by Artist First, and cost $2 more than the “standard” variant (assumed to be black) from the same vendor. I say assumed because you can never assume anything when it comes to Brand New, despite the mock up for the “standard” variant depicting black vinyl. Somehow there are no pictures of a black variant anywhere online. The Australian variant cost 45 Australian Dollars, before shipping.

Next up was an indie store variant, which is on red/blue vinyl (which matches the jacket and skirt of the girls on the cover), limited to a whopping 5,000 copies. But that rather large number didn’t stop people from going nuts trying to track down a copy. With people paying over $100 for the indie store exclusive variant on ebay after stores started cutting off pre-orders for it. Keep in mind it cost $28 (before shipping) from pretty much every store. The mock ups for the indie store variant had the records being transparent, but they’re actually marbled. The first record is on red, and the second record is on blue. The blue is a light blue; not quite a sky blue or baby blue, somewhere darker than sky blue. It’s a rather unique blue. All copies of the indie store variant have a hype sticker that indicates color. What may be the “standard” black vinyl has a hype sticker that does not indicate color.

I will say I didn’t bother with any of this hype, for any of the variants. I anticipated my local store getting plenty of copies in, and they did, and I was able to easily buy a copy on release day; October 20, 2017. My store was even one of the stores to do online pre-orders that brought so much traffic to their web site it basically shut it down. I even got $10 off as my store has a loyalty program, where you get $10 off for every $200 you spend, which can accumulate over time; it doesn’t have to be all in one purchase.

So I had zero stress and aggravation getting a copy of this record, and I got it for pretty cheap all things considered because I don’t see theses ever going on sale to the point where I’ll save $10 on it or the equivalent price I wound up paying. With the “indefinite pressing quantity” pinned to this release by the label, they will just keep pressing more to meet demand. The “I Am A Nightmare” 12”, “Mene” 7” and the demos 10” they released a few years ago hasn’t ever gone on sale, anywhere, nor have they gone out of print.

The last variant announced was an Urban Outfitters (UO) exclusive, on clear vinyl limited to 5,000 copies. The UP variant also cost $28 before shipping and/or tax. By this point lots of people were worn out, either financially or mentally, maybe even both. Nobody went nuts of the UO variant. It never sold out. But after release day people who pre-ordered said their orders haven’t shipped. UO still hasn’t learned how to deal with pre-orders/highly anticipated releases effectively in terms of shipping orders. Not that they ship online orders in a timely manner to being with.

All copies of Science Fiction come in a gatefold jacket, which is very thick. Probably one of the thicker jackets in my collection, gatefold or not. There are nice elements of gold foil stamping inside the gatefold jacket and on the back of the jacket where the track listing is printed. Each record in the double LP set comes in a printed dust sleeve, but these are somewhat thin paper and can suffer seam splits rather easily. One of the sleeves of the copy I bought in person from a brick & mortar store had a seam split along with side. Also included is a huge double-sided fold out poster. There is a download card through Bandcamp, so you can choose any format of mp3s you want, which is nice. The artwork on the download card is random and really doesn’t make much sense in regards to the album. If you order directly from the label you will get PMT release stickers, which they typically send out with all orders. In the case of Science Fiction, it’s catalog number 009, so the sticker will reflect that.

One important note with the record is that all copies come in sealed, but they’re placed inside a poly sleeve. This poly sleeve is where the hype stickers are located. There are two hype stickers; one is a small pink circle PMT release sticker and the other advertises this specific release. It says the band’s name and the album title, and for the indie variant, says “red/blue vinyl, limited.” There are no stickers affixed to the jacket itself, nor the shrink wrap directly on the jacket.

As of posting this the only variants released/shipped are the indie store exclusive, UO exclusive and the “standard” variant. Not sure about the Australian exclusive, I haven’t even seen pics of it yet. For all the fuss made over the potential “very limited” variant, it has not shipped yet. The label refuses to give a release date for it, and the answer they give anyone who asks about it is “it’s still a pre-order item.” Personallly, I find it hilarious that people who blindly spent over $50 on something still don’t have it, when people like me, who didn’t partake in any of the pre-ordering nonsense, already have a copy in hand; for less than half the price of the “very limited” variant, if that even exists at all. It wouldn’t surprise me if Brand New pulls another fast one on their fans and the “very limited” variant is exactly the same as the rest of the variants, just on a different color. And the extra money charged for it was to cover the CD sent to people and the one day shipping costs.

** Edit/Addition posted 12/16/17** I mentioned above that the when pre-orders for the “Very Limited” variant sold exclusively through the PMT web store went live, there was literally zero information about what it was. Well, in earl-mid December 2017 the label started shipping them, and let’s just say it was pathetic. First off, the “very limited” variant does not even come in an actual jacket; it comes in thin paper envelope packaging with the cover art glued to the front of it and has the back open. So it’s not even sealed. This packaging has cryptic text on it that lots of people are likely reading too much into. People are speculating that there are bonus tracks on the record that are only unearthed if you play the record as different speeds. Some speculate that those who bought the “very limited” variant will gain access to yet to be be released songs.

Also included is a booklet of random nonsense, probably a part of their infamous Pogolith series of booklets that band started releasing as lyric books for various albums. It comes with the same foldout poster that is included with the traditional variants that come in an actual jacket, but it’s in black and white instead of color. There is an exclusive slip mat that was included with all copies too as well as get this; a traditional letter envelope with dried rose pedals in it. Probably the most random and pointless thing to ever be included with the release of any music

On top of that stuff, the “very limited” variant has exclusive center labels and dust sleeves, which are nothing special really. The ones that come with the traditional variants are actually much nicer and more elaborate. One side of the center labels on the “very limited” variant are literally blank, and the dust sleeves, while printed on card stock instead of thinner paper, have little artwork/imagery printed on them compared to the ones that come with the traditional variants.

Brand New – Mene 7″

After a few years of silence Brand New released some new material. At first it was only one new song, called “Mene,” which was initially only released digitally. “Mene” was quickly followed (by Brand New standards) by “I Am A Nightmare,” and then the band re-recorded three of the songs that were part of what has been dubbed the Leaked Demos from 2006 and released them, along with the original demo version, as a 10″ EP.

“Mene” was released as a 7″ about one year after it was released digitally. The 7″ features another new song on the b-side, “Out Of Range.” The 7″ was pressed on clear vinyl, with an unknown amount pressed. I’ll get into the pressing info a bit later, but first some more details about this release. All copies come with a download card for high qaulity 320 kbps MP3s.

The “Mene” 7″ has some nice touches to it. The artwork for this 7″ is great, and it was done by Morning Breath, the same artist/company that did the artwork for the “I Am A Nightmare” 12″. There is a slip cover, which is a nice, clever touch. The slip cover is essentially tracing paper. The cover art that comes with the digital release is not exactly the same as the physical version, and it doesn’t do the physical version justice. The slip cover only has the head of the snake drawn on it in color. No words, no title of the release, nothing but the snake head. The actual jacket of the 7″ shows through the slip cover, which has the skeletal structure of the snake head along with the track listing and artist name printed on it. The text points to certain parts of the snake head, to imitate a scientific drawing you would find in a text book. There is more artwork on the back of the jacket. Nothing is drawn on the back of the slip cover, but the artwork on the back of the jacket obviously still shows through. The back of the jacket has a scientific drawing of a snake fang on it, along with the credits. This artwork scheme continues on the download card as well, as there is a scientific bisection drawing of some part of a snake. Forgive me, I am not a herpetologist.

Pressing info for the “Mene” 7″ has not been released. And based on the phrasing “indefinite pressing quantity” used on the band’s label’s official web store listing for this single, pressing info, if there is any to be had, will never be released. If that phrasing is indicative of anything, it’s that the single will be kept in print, and there were easily thousands of these pressed.

The “Mene” 7″ costs $6 before shipping directly from Procrastinate! Music Traitors, the band’s label. Their web store, which is hosted by Merch Direct, is pretty much the only place to buy the single, it hasn’t been distributed, at least not yet. With that said, Run For Cover Records (RFC) did get some copies of the single in their distro section, which is where I bought it from. RFC charged the same price for the records as Brand New, but RFC only charged pretty much half of what Merchdirect wanted for shipping; $5.75. Combine that with a 15% off coupon and by shopping smartly I got what will likely be the best deal possible on these records. Even if Merchdirect offered one of their many sales they do on a somewhat regular basis, shipping would pretty much negate any discount price. So you would spend basically the same as what I wound up spending buying these records from RFC. Merch Direct didn’t offer media mail shipping if you bought all three of Brand New’s new records, so shipping was just under $10 from them. And If you bought each of the Brand New records individually from Procrastinate! shipping would be $4 each time. However, after writing this I discovered that Bull Moose is carrying this 7″. But even with their free shipping it would be more than what I bought them for from RFC. Bull Moose marked up the records a bit; 97 cents for the “Mene” 7″.

One thing I will say about ordering directly from the Procrastinate! is that they send you two free stickers with each of the three records. You get a generic Procrastinate! label sticker and a release specific sticker. You don’t get those records if you order from RFC, but I’d rather save money.

 

Brand New – I Am A Nightmare 12″

After a few years of silence Brand New released some new material. At first it was only one new song, called “Mene,” which was initially only released digitally. “Mene” was quickly followed (by Brand New standards) by “I Am A Nightmare,” which was released as a single-sided 12″ single with an etched b-side.

The “I Am A Nightmare” single has some nice touches to it. Yes, it only has one song so it could have easily been a 7″ to keep costs down. But it’s Brand New, the band has been known to take the road less traveled and do odd things just for the sake of being odd. As aforementioned, the b-side of the record has an etching, which is the lyrics for the song going around the record in a circular pattern from the outer edge inwards. There are no center labels on either side, which is a bit odd but not completely out of the ordinary. It’s typical for records with an etching or screen-print to not have center labels on the side those art effects are applied to. Where the oddity comes in is the a-side of this single does not have a center label.

There are even more creative touches to this single that make it stand out. The cover is die stamped, not embossed like some sites are claiming. An embossing is raised lettering or design. The single’s title and artist name, which appear along the top and bottom of the jacket, is stamped into the cover, and is indented. It’s not raised up. On the digital artwork the text is done in light blue ink, but on the cover it’s just stamped into the jacket. The process involves taking a metal design, called a die, and either manually tapping it with a hammer, or using a hydraulic or other mechanical press, to imprint the design into whatever material you’re working with. It’s typically used on leather, but can also be applied on wood, other (softer) metal or card stock like material, like this single’s jacket is made of.

On top of the die stamping on the cover, there is also a circular sticker that covers the women’s head that appears on the cover art. This sticker can be removed to reveal a star lit sky. I tried to peel the sticker off, but I don’t want to damage the jacket or the sticker itself. The sticker is not easy to remove. The back of the jacket is die cut. For those curious the artwork was done by Morning Breath.

Included with the record is an insert of sorts, which is placed along the cover and shrink wrapped that way. The insert does not come inside the jacket like most inserts. The pictures below illustrate how the insert originally came, and if you buy a copy of this 12″ it’s immediately evident where the insert is located. It’s a small, double-sided rectangular insert. It has the lyrics on one side, likely the back side, and imagery on the other side (front) that has caused endless speculation.

The front has a tombstone on it that says “Brand New 2018.” Some people are theorizing that it means Brand New will break up in 2018, or they’ll release their final album in 2018, or they’ll release their next album in 2018. Endless possibilities when Brand new is involved, and the band themselves seem to love this type of rumor mongering as they routinely feed into it. Just to prove that point, the band released a new t-shirt in the summer of 2016 with “Brand New 2000-2018” printed on it, to add further fuel to the fire. Those shirts and the insert included with this single are on top of the lyrics books the band released about a year ago, which come with a post card that had “RIP 2018” printed on it.

Pressing info for the “I Am A Nightmare” 12″ has not been released. And based on the phrasing “indefinite pressing quantity” used on the band’s label’s official web store listing for this single, pressing info, if there is any to be had, will never be released. If that phrasing is indicative of anything, it’s that the single will be kept in print, and there were easily thousands of these pressed.

The “I Am A Nightmare” 12″ costs $10 before shipping directly from Procrastinate! Music Traitors, the band’s label. Their web store, which is hosted by Merch Direct, is pretty much the only place to buy the single, it hasn’t been distributed, at least not yet. With that said, Run For Cover Records (RFC) did get some copies of the single in their distro section, which is where I bought it from. RFC charged the same price for the records as Brand New, but RFC only charged pretty much half of what Merchdirect wanted for shipping; $5.75. Combine that with a 15% off coupon and by shopping smartly I got what will likely be the best deal possible on these records. Even if Merchdirect offered one of their many sales they do on a somewhat regular basis, shipping would pretty much negate any discount price. So you would spend basically the same as what I wound up spending buying these records from RFC. Merch Direct didn’t offer media mail shipping if you bought all three of Brand New’s new records, so shipping was just under $10 from them. And If you bought each of the Brand New records individually from Procrastinate! shipping would be $4 each time. However, after writing this I discovered that Bull Moose is carrying this 12″. But even with their free shipping it would be more than what I bought them for from RFC. Bull Moose marked up the records a bit, 97 cents for the “I Am A Nightmare” 12″.

One thing I will say about ordering directly from the Procrastinate! is that they send you two free stickers with each of the three records. You get a generic Procrastinate! label sticker and a release specific sticker. You don’t get those records if you order from RFC, but I’d rather save money. All copies come with a download card for high qaulity 320 kbps MP3s.

 

 

V/A – Friends Comp (“1st Press”)

In late 2013 Enjoy The Ride Records announced one their releases, which was a joint effort with Fadeaway Records, a not defunct, but dormant label. It was a compilation on a grand scale. It wound up being a triple LP featuring unreleased songs from many popular indie scene bands. Profits from the comp went towards cancer research. Some of the bands on this comp included Brand New, Saves The Day, Motion City Soundtrack, Hot Rod Circuit, Nightmare Of You, Far , Fred Mascherino of Taking Back Sunday and Terrible Things fame, The Honorary Title, Vinnie Caruana of The Movielife and I Am The Avalanche fame, Andy Hull of Manchester Orchestra fame, Matt Pryor, Reggie And The Full Effect, Head Automatica, Frank Iero of My Chemical Romance fame, and Kevin Devine. It was comprised mostly of bands producer and head of Fadeaway Records, Michael Dubin, worked with or had some connection to over the years. The comp was simply entitled Friends.

The record is housed in a triple panel gatefold jacket and comes with an insert to boot. Each copy is also hand numbered out of the variant total, not the total amount of copies pressed. All copies were also pressed on colored vinyl, some sort of splatter was used for the several variants this comp has. There were some, what I feel were shady goings-on with the variants.

There is a “1st press” and a “2nd press” of this record. I use the quotes because they really are one combined pressing. The “1st press” sold out, rather slower than expected, and right on the heels of it selling out, before the “1st press” even shipped, a “2nd” pressing was announced and put up for pre-order. Anyone with common sense would say how can there be a second pressing when the records from the first pressing were not even done and pressed yet.

The nonsense with the variants continued even after all the “pressings” were announced, as the “1st press” had a friends press, limited to 100 copies. When the comp was first announced there was no mention that there would be a friends press, only that the comp would be limited to 500 copies. Since it took so long to sell out the actual 400 copies of the pressing that were available to the public didn’t matter. It continued still with the“2nd^” pressing, as it had a friends press of sorts, which was called an “extra special variant.” I’m not making that up for giggles, the two labels responsible for this comp actually called it that; “extra special variant.” This “extra special variant” was split into two groups; 50 copies were randomly given out in orders for the “2nd pressing” and 50 copies could only be pre-ordered at the compilations’ record release show. Yes, a compilation album comprised of unreleased songs had a release show, where I should point out none of the bands featured on the comp played.

So the pressing info for this comp is as follows: “1st press” – 400 copies on red/white/black splatter and 100 copies on red/clear/white splatter (friends press). “2nd press” – 500 copies on milky clear/red/blue/yellow splatter and 100 copies on black/blue/white splatter (“extra special variant”). Again, a triple panel gatefold jacket houses the records. An insert is also include.

The biggest issue I have with this comp is the price gouging and downright ripping off of people. The comp cost $40 before shipping, a bit outrageous but since it was a triple LP and came in a nice jacket with an insert it became a bit easier to swallow. My justifiable pricing, a price which I consider acceptable for multi-disc releases is $10 per LP. So in that train of thought this should be closer to $30 than $40. Again, the finer points of the release somewhat justify the price tag. After hearing how much it cost to produce this comp, which was stated publicly by the head of Fadeaway Records on a public message board (and which I took a screen shot of for posterity), each copy cost at most $20 to produce. I understand the business model of doubling your money or don’t bother, but in this case that markup is a bit drastic.

The shipping charges are where I have a major problem; I find them unacceptable. Fadeaway Records charged $9 for shipping, and they wound up shipping it media mail, which as well all known is the cheapest shipping method available for records. The actual cost on my mailer said $3.65; factor in material costs (guy who runs the labels packaged orders himself so no employee costs) and shipping shouldn’t have been more than $6, and that’s being generous.Fadeaway Records justified the price points as, direct quote; “The proceeds are going to charity. Any overages on shipping will be donated to charity.”

I have no problems with charitable donations, but customers, anyone really, shouldn’t be forced to pay more money so someone else can make a bigger donation to charity. If I wanted to donate more of my money to charity I would donate the money directly to the charity of my choosing myself. That decision shouldn’t be made by someone else and it definitely shouldn’t be made by a bias third party.

Brand New – Jude Law And A Semester Abroad 7″

Arguably the hardest and most expensive Brand New record released thus far. More emphasis on the hardest to find though since the couple hundred people who have it are not in the selling mood. Price wise this 7″ rivals Deja Entendu as when it does pop up on ebay or other means of sale it tends to go for close to $300. There were only 200 copies pressed on black vinyl and it was released in the UK on Eat Sleep Records.

I was not only fortunate enough to find a copy up for sale, but very fortunate it to be on the very cheap side all things considered. My out of pocket expense on this was $30, and no, I’m not joking. I couldn’t believe my luck but was a little skeptical because of the low price tag. While I’m not 100% sold on Discogs because of some of the people who sell on there (rude, uptight, refusal to cooperate  answering questions) and how wrong and/or out of date some of their information is this, but time it was a huge benefit. Actually one of the few times everything worked out, where I got the email update for things on my wantlist quick enough for the record to still be available and the price was not somewhere on Jupiter. In the end it was not too good to be true, as the 7″ was shipped the next day, was packaged properly and was not beat to hell when it arrived.

Brand New – Your Favorite Weapon (10th Anniversary Edition)

Brand New’s Your Favorite Weapon finally got a re-pressing after years and years of fans clamoring for one. It seems the new trend these days, aside from media repeatedly talking about the vinyl resurgence as a trend every year as sales go up, is anniversary pressings or re-pressings. The 10th, 20th, or even 40th anniversary of an album’s release can sometimes mean a re-pressing is due to celebrate it, sometimes with extra bonus tracks, other times with nothing new added in.

Your Favorite Weapon was no exception, as in the 10th anniversary year (2011) Triple Crown decided to finally give fans what they wanted by re-pressing Brand New’s debut album on vinyl. The album had been on nearly everyone’s want list or was their white whale, and was probably the single most album people practically demanded a re-press of since at least 2006.

This pressing of the album featured new, unique artwork from all other releases of the Your Favorite Weapon, whether on CD or vinyl. It differs drastically from the chess piece artwork of the original pressings, as it’s a photo of bassist Garrett Tierney. Some of the other notable changes are the track listing, which features a slew of bonus tracks with the major exception of the vinyl only bonus track, “My Nine Rides Shotgun” that was found on the original pressing, a gatefold jacket and a re-designed insert.

The gatefold jacket mentioned above features an embossed cover, as the album title is embossed along the bottom of the cover. It’s tought to see in the photos below because the title is made to blend into the background and stands out only because of the embossing. The inside panels of the jacket is a mirrored image of the same photo of a crowd. The insert includes liner notes and lyrics, along with photos of each band member. All copies also come with a download card for 320 kbps MP3’s of all entire album including all the bonus tracks found on this version. There was a total of 5,000 copies pressed for this version/pressing of the album.

The record was pressed on four colors, light blue limited to 500 copies, clear limited to 500 copies, white limited to 1,000 copies and black limited to 3,000 copies. As is usually the case these days, certain colors were exclusive to certain retailers, outlets or means. Blue was a Triple Crown exclusive only available through online pre-orders. Blue copies sold out slower than anticipated because people were waiting to hear the full pressing info anticipating more variants, which was not released until a few weeks before the record’s release. Initially black copies were the first to go up through places like Interpunk and Shit Radio Cast, but at the time it was unknown what variant those copies would be. White was a Hot Topic exclusive and clear is a tour exclusive, only available at the band’s upcoming shows in 2012, starting with their New Year’s eve show for 2011/2012. Black was widely available through all other outlets, both online and brick and mortar stores. Going by responses on message boards, blue copies can be discerned from other colors by a sticker on the back of the jacket indicating “blue.” I’m not sure of all of the colors are the same way, but black copies do not have a sticker indicating color anywhere on it.

Each of these color variants had their own respective problems, whether created by the retailer/label or greedy customers. The record cost between $14-$15 before shipping depending on the point of purchase, but the blue copies sold exclusively through Triple Crown’s Merch Direct store cost $18 before shipping (they even charged $16 for the black variant once blue copies sold out). Expecting a wave of orders with multiple copies of blue, Triple Crown set a limit, but rather than limiting it to one copy per customer Triple Crown had the ridiculous limit of 3 per order. As expected tons of people maxed out with three per order and some placed multiple orders as well to get as many as they could to flip. Copies on blue started popping up on ebay before people even had a shipping confirmation let alone had the records in hand. The same thing happened with the white copies exclusive to Hot Topic, as someone who works for them and happens to be a frequent poster on message boards came out and said most people ordering white copies online ordered multiple copies. It was not just limited to online orders, as people were clearing out Hot Topic stores of all their copies too. My assumption is that the same thing will be happening with the clear tour exclusive as well, as the day after the first show they were available people listed them on ebay and tried to flip them on message boards. Some people picked up multiple copies as trade bait as well, but they have such lofty expectations for trades it’s absurd.

This pressing is pretty much completely sold out, except for a select few Hot Topic stores and the remaining shows until clear copies are all snatched up by flippers. In all my years of buying records, through thick and thin and watching vinyl explode into what it is now, I have never seen this happen to any pressing of any album before. It’s a real shame that unfortunately will not end any time soon. I’m willing to bet at least 2/3 of this pressing is in the hands of flippers, with the rest in the hands of people who actually want the one copy or single copy or each color they bought.  Hopefully the market will be so watered down with copies that it will detract some of the value of them and dig a hole into the profits of all the flippers.

Brand New – The Quiet Things That No One Ever Knows 7″(1st & 2nd Press)

This is the only Brand New single to get two different pressings. Why there are two pressing I will never know. Both were released by the same label, Sore Point Records. The first pressing is on red vinyl and comes in a stock Sore Point Records jacket while the second pressing is on green vinyl and comes house in a jacket that features artwork. Both green and red copies were limited to 500 copies each and are long out of print. The track listing between them is different, with the b-side of the green version being a live version of “The No Seatbelt Song” and the b-side of the red version being an acoustic/studio session version of “Jude Law And A Semester Abroad.”

Prices on these are starting to come down a bit on ebay, but it may be because of the summer months, which is typically when there is a slight price drop in most things. Some people don’t like bidding or buying things during the summer because of fear of warping, but fortunately I’ve never had a problem with warping during shipping. I love bidding on things during the summer months because you can get some great deals. Take this 7″ for example, $25 shipped from the UK to the states when they typically go for at least $50. Typically green copies go for more than red copies, likely because it has actual artwork.

Brand New – Jesus 7″

Another record that somehow slipped through the cracks on me. I’ve had this for a while but forgot to post it. Brand New’s most recent 7″ single, “Jesus,” was pressed as a picture disc. It originally retailed for $8, and now can fetch around $50 on ebay. These are getting harder to find, not just for a decent price. It comes housed in a picture disc sleeve that is sealed with a sticker, which has the tracklisting on it.

Brand New – Your Favorite Weapon (1st press)

I finally got my white whale, Brand New’s Your Favorite Weapon. Minus two 7″s, my Brand New collection is complete. I have all their albums on vinyl, which is the most important thing to me. Two things were fantastic about finally getting my hands on a copy of Your Favorite Weapon, on top of actually having it; I did not spend $300, $200, $100 or even $75 on it and the guy I bought it from did not know what color it was since it was still sealed.

So from that I assumed it was on black vinyl, which was the most common color variant, but when I opened it up it I was both shocked and thrilled that it’s on white vinyl, the rarest color variant. It makes splurging a bit that much better.

The pressing info for Your Favorite Weapon is as follows, apparently there were two pressings but they came out within weeks of each other if not sooner. The first press is spread across three color variants; white limited to 100 copies, blue limited to 500 copies and black limited to 1,000 copies. The second pressing was done on only one color, clear, which was limited to 300 copies. The vinyl version of the album also includes an exclusive bonus track, “My Nine Rides Shotgun,” which most Brand New fans have heard despite not actually owning the album on vinyl. “My Nine Rides Shotgun” is only available on this pressing, even though the album was re-pressed on 2011 for the 10th anniversary . The vinyl version also features unique artwork exclusive to this pressing, which is different from the CD version’s album art.

The Rookie Lot/Yearly – Split 7″

This is one of the rarest and hardest to track down records in my collection and makes it that much more complete in terms of bands I collect. Even though there were 1,000 copies of this 7″ pressed, it’s next to impossible to find due to its age and the significance of it.

These two bands, mainly The Rookie Lot, formed the ground work for many of today’s popular bands, especially in the Long Island scene. Members of both bands went on to form Brand New, The Movielife, Saves The Day, Nightmare Of You, The Stryder and Crime In Stereo. For all those people involved, this is the first record/CD/cassette that was widely released, and the first recorded material that they were ever a part of. Jesse Lacey, Brian Lane and Garrett Tierney of The Rookie Lot all went on to form Brand New. While Brandon Reilly went on to join The Movielife and later form Nightmare Of You after The Movielife’s break up. Alex Dunne, also of The Rookie Lot, went on to join Crime In Stereo. Peter Toh of Yearly went on to form The Stryder and started a solo career after The Stryder’s break up. Scottie Redix of Yearly also joined Toh in the formation of The Stryder. Eben D’Amico of Yearly went on to join Saves The Day and prior to joining Yearly he was in Humble Beginnings, another important band in that spawned many successful and popular bands post break up.

Now back to info on the record itself. There were a total of 1,00 copies pressed, all hand numbered on the center labels. The first 100 copies were pressed on clear and the final 900 copies were pressed on black. Personally I have never seen a copy on clear, not on ebay, not in someone’s collection and not even a photo of one. But they do exist apparently. My copy is on black and is number 550. I believe this is the first time anywhere that complete photos of everything; both sides of the 7″, both sides of the insert and the back of the jacket/sleeve are published online.