For the past six years I have been assembling a book about the nineties hardcore music scene called Burning Fight: The Nineties Hardcore Revolution in Ethics, Politics, Spirit, and Sound. While Steven Blush's American Hardcore was an excellent examination of the pioneers of the hardcore punk movement, after reading his book one gets the impression that hardcore died in 1986. Although that particular era of hardcore may have ended in 1986, an influx of new bands took the genre to new places, the story of which shall be told in Burning Fight.
Picking up where eighties hardcore punk innovators left off, nineties hardcore sparked profound change and debate across musical, social, spiritual, and political landscapes. Many of the ideals that were ingrained in hardcore since its beginning were taken in new and often controversial directions. Inspired by the music and the community that developed around the scene, many immersed in hardcore’s ethical and social movements such as straight edge, animal rights, D.I.Y., spirituality, and a host of other issues debated these beliefs and implemented them into their own lives, eventually taking what they learned outside the hardcore scene and influencing the broader culture. At the same time, many of the ideologies that united people ended up dividing them in the long run, which eventually led to the splintering this era of hardcore by the decade's end.
Burning Fight: The Nineties Hardcore Revolution in Ethics, Politics, Spirit, and Sound draws upon the memories of many who played influential roles in the scene and understand what made this era of hardcore so unique in its ability to synthesize music and ideology into what for many felt like was a powerful counter-cultural movement, where change was just around the corner.
The book will feature several sections with input from approximately 150 musicians, zine-makers, D.I.Y. practitioners, activists, and hooligans from this era. The chapters will focus on nineties hardcore era straight edge, animal rights/vegetarianism/veganism, politics/ethics/activism, spirituality, and revolutions in sound--the "sound" section will contain "oral history" articles on bands including Earth Crisis, 108, Unbroken, Los Crudos, Inside Out, Burn, Shelter, Endpoint, Groundwork, Integrity, Swing Kids, Vegan Reich, Avail, Threadbare, Cave In, Spitboy, Undertow, Deadguy, Racetraitor, Texas is the Reason, Split Lip, Ressurection, Damnation A.D., Rorschach, Coalesce and many others.
Burning Fight is available right now through Revelation Records: http://revhq.com/store.revhq?Page=search&BandId=8929
It is also available via these fine distributors and outlets:
US MAILORDERS:
REVELATION RECORDS,
DEATHWISH INC,
INTERPUNK,
STICKFIGURE
US STORES:
EARSHOT,
EXTREME NOISE RECORDS,
RED SCROLL RECORDS,
NEWBURY COMICS HQ,
RASPUTIN - BERKELEY,
ULTRASOUND RECORDS,
REDSCROLL RECORDS
BOOK MAILORDERS/SUPPLIERS:
AK PRESS
DISTRIBUTORS:
EBULLITION RECORDS,
INGRAM BOOK COMPANY-TN,
STICKFIGURE,
LAST GASP,
SCRATCH DISTRIBUTION
OVERSEAS:
DISK UNION USA INC(JAPAN),
COMMITMENT DISTRIBUTION (GERMANY),
CR JAPAN (JAPAN),
JAN ALBIN (GERMANY),
JOZSI ANDROS (HUNGARY),
KILL THE MUSIC (AUSTRALIA),
PASAZER (POLAND),
REALITY RECORDS (THE NETHERLANDS),
REFLECTIONS (THE NETHERLANDS),
RESIST RECORDS (AUSTRALIA)
