Who Ruined Boston Hardcore?

[version sound]

Seriously, after listening to the Death Wish/Loved Ones 12" I need someone to blame. Why the fuck did every goddamned band in that scene suddenly want to exchange the Gallery East for the fucking Sunset Strip? The music is actually decent, but the lyrics make Motley Crue seem like poets.

[lewdd]

Springa

[Knutsen]

Gang Green's Budweiser Rock sucked.

[Chris Shary]

Heavy Metal ruins everything.

[dave123]

I didn't know it was ruined. It has just has some ups and downs. Rock star ambitions are a nasty thing. It is funny how some of the modern bands are doing metal right (Magic Circle, Stone Dagger) without messing with their hardcore bands. It's too bad the old Boston crew didn't think of that.

[The Snake]

In 90´s few bands brought it back, Ten Yard Fight and In My Eyes for example. And then in late 90´s and 2000´s some more bands brought it back, like: Last In Lane, Cops And Robbers, Cut The Shit, The Prowl... These days hardcore is pretty alive in Boston.

[version sound]

Yeah, it came back, but boy was it shitty circa 1985 or so.

[Mark T.]

I blame Pedro.

[dave123]

Yeah, it came back, but boy was it shitty circa 1985 or so.

Agree, things got pretty rough for a while.

[yourenotevil]

yeah, i think you can just blame ssd and dys. at that point everyone else either followed their lead or just broke up. the late 80s were a pretty dark time for boston hc for sure. so were most of the early 90s too i guess.

[john stabb]

As much as I dug playing with SSD and Gang Green early on when in GI, it seemed that those guys really wanted to be AC/DC all along. Now I love me some AC/DC (Bon-era mostly) but that's what they were from the start. They didn't jump on a hardcore/punk XXX bandwagon only to decide let's be Arena Rockstars like SSD. Those generic ROCK album cover art days were just plain embarrassing. Hey, TSOL (minus Jack ), and others tried that cliche shit, too. And maybe Gang Green were always just a noisy garage punk group who decided to really promote coke & beer so perhaps their falling off the hardcore radar into cheese ball idiot Rockstar behavior was not as extreme as SSD's, after all

They're just the ones who are so easy to peg when it comes to ruining hardcore for me.

[dave123]

Looking back, Boston hardcore had come back around by the late '80s with Slapshot leading the way and other decent bands like Wrecking Crew and Intent to Injure. The '90s started well with Eye for an Eye carrying the torch and Slapshot continuing on with Sudden Death Overtime. Things got awesome in the late '90s like Snake said with In My Eyes and Ten Yard Fight as well as Bane, Blood for Blood, American Nightmare, etc. Things didn't slow down in the early '00s with great bands like Righteous Jams, R'n'R, Stop and Think, and Mental. From this point, things have been pretty great for Boston hardcore (especially Boston straight edge)... No Tolerance, Boston Strangler, Rival Mob, Prisoner Abuse, etc. etc.

Also, you can't forget that the mighty Siege was active in the mid '80s. That's definitely a highlight even if they didn't reach legendary status until later.

[The Snake]

I forgot about Outcold, one of the rare bands that played stripped down classic hardcore punk in the 90s.

I am not sure what was in the heads of SSD and DYS in 1984. and 1985.
Even though I dig some of the songs on DYS second album.

[dave123]

I forgot about Outcold, one of the rare bands that played stripped down classic hardcore punk in the 90s.

Ouch... how could I forget Outcold.

[yourenotevil]

Looking back, Boston hardcore had come back around by the late '80s with Slapshot leading the way and other decent bands like Wrecking Crew and Intent to Injure. The '90s started well with Eye for an Eye carrying the torch and Slapshot continuing on with Sudden Death Overtime. Things got awesome in the late '90s like Snake said with In My Eyes and Ten Yard Fight as well as Bane, Blood for Blood, American Nightmare, etc. Things didn't slow down in the early '00s with great bands like Righteous Jams, R'n'R, Stop and Think, and Mental. From this point, things have been pretty great for Boston hardcore (especially Boston straight edge)... No Tolerance, Boston Strangler, Rival Mob, Prisoner Abuse, etc. etc.

Also, you can't forget that the mighty Siege was active in the mid '80s. That's definitely a highlight even if they didn't reach legendary status until later.

you probably just listed the three bands from 87 to like 92 who were any good though! ha! personally i don't like most of the late 90s boston stuff, but i know A LOT of people do. same with the 00s. i liked mental when the eps were out, but they don't really hold up well IMO. i do dig a fair amount of the chris corry/painkiller stuff though. mind eraser are by far the best band out that group. i like no tolerance too.

[yourenotevil]

also didn't siege play like less than 10 shows though? they were great, but i never really considered them as part of boston hardcore since they were so obscure.

out cold were a good band. overlooked for sure.

[dave123]

you probably just listed the three bands from 87 to like 92 who were any good though! ha!

To be fair, you are correct, but Slapshot had a big enough presence to make up for around 10 bands;)

[Neal]

i'm sure if people were griping then like they are 30 years later, i would have moved on from hardcore too. i'll take later gang green, the freeze, jerry's kids and the fu's/straw dogs over any ssd or dys (the 2 bands who got rock wrong imo).

[dave123]

also didn't siege play like less than 10 shows though? they were great, but i never really considered them as part of boston hardcore since they were so obscure.

I know what you mean. That is why I gave them a separate mention. Legendary but in a weird way.

[version sound]

i'm sure if people were griping then like they are 30 years later, i would have moved on from hardcore too. i'll take later gang green, the freeze, jerry's kids and the fu's/straw dogs over any ssd or dys (the 2 bands who got rock wrong imo).

All six XClaim! releases > Negative FX >>>>>>>>> other Boston hardcore.

[xxxMidgexxx]

I blame the Red Sox for everything. And their fans.