Everything has changed. There was once a time if you wanted to hear something obscure, unknown or forgotten, the only places to go were used record stores and pawnshops. The former often overpriced, depressing slogs through quickly “flipped” pop albums, the latter a spiral into strangeness. Chances were, if you went the pawnshop route, it was possible to find what you were after. But then you would arrive home only to find that there were deep scratches in key tracks and no amount of foil on the topside or polishing with toothpaste would fix. The trip across the river, through the cloudy haze of the other side of town, the peak into beer garden, the junkie on his way home to the halfway house, all of it, obliterated. For the better some may argue.
But what is the replacement? A faceless mob? Glee at being the first, the only? Password protected archives with malware? Fake addresses and e-stores? I knew this guy who claimed to “have” over one hundred Blu-ray movies stored on his hard drive. And, in this age of streaming, of always available media, what does it even mean to digitally “own” something? Last year, I bought an album, my first ever, off itunes. I now own that album. And yet, I cannot sell it. I cannot touch it. I do not own the artwork. But I “have” it.
Blind is the album where C.O.C. went “metal”. Having two guitarists and more varied tempos expanded the tonal pallet, opened up the possibility for groove and allowed the first real, tangible evidence of their “southern-ness”. Overtly political, melodic and possessing a rock swagger this is a metal album which stands out from the class of 91.
Blind was available at used record stores and pawnshops that used to be near you. It is virtually impossible to get on vinyl (drop me a line if you have one), but the apparently obsolete CD version is all over the place. Meanwhile, stay tuned for an albums by the Animosity era line up.
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