Once upon a time I listened to a split record because of Acid Deathtrip and Hangman's Chair. I really liked one side of the record and was not really impressed by the other band. So I never really followed Hangman's Chair after that. I am now slowly working backwards in their impressive discography, as Saddiction is one hell of an album. It got me properly hooked with it's sad grunge doom sound with amazingly good vocals. It's funny to see a band I hardly ever gave a spin grow to a band who released an album that might just end up as my record of the year. 

I had never heard of this band before, but their brand of post-hardcore blew me away instantly. There is so much going on on this album it is impossible to be bored with it. When writing these folks must have said to each other: there are no boundaries, everything is possible! And the great thing is: they make it work!

This debut full length delivers what their demo and tapes promised. Unrelenting old-school hardcore in the vein of Hoax is the name of the game. And boy, this band is good at that game. The production is nice and rough, like this type of music needs. It is violent and cathartic and just the kind of musical grenade I need to help me deal with the world and being alive.

After reading the really nice interview on this very site I decided to check out to check out the new record on Iron Lung Records. Well, the fact that they are on this label helped with giving them a chance, because this label has just the nose for excellent brutal noise. Retirement fits on this labels roster like a glove. This record is punishing. Like Slon they have a production that is fittingly rough around the edges. Another cathartic record in my most listened albums so far. What a year, huh?

This band continues to wow me with the amount of swag a hardcore band can have. It is what got me into them on their debut, they still had it on their sophomore record and well, here we are for their third album. This band is a bit more clean than Slon and Retirement, but energy-wise as unrelenting. A different, cleaner vibe, but again a record that I play a lot. This band is working hard to become my favorite hardcore band of the last ten years.