Jan 12, 2006

INITIAL REACTION "s/t" 7"

Instead of sitting home on this rainy night and putting my time into something productive to the future of my record label, I have sat here for hours toying with a new program on my computer. What type of program you might ask? Well one that I can transfer audio from my cassette deck, 4 track, and my record player. Yup, it's official, I have somewhat figured this out. I know, I know, I'm always a few years behind everyone else... big fuckin' deal. Anyway, this was my first go at this so please let me know how the sound quality of this 7" is and any suggestions anyone has. You can now expect tons of 7"s and demos to get posted so let's all clap our hands in excitement.

Ok, down to the dirt. This 7" has always been one of my favorites for it's rawness and simplicity. I picked this up around 15 years ago now (probably in 1991) and I have seriously only come across one other person who owned this and had even heard of this band. I have never been able to obtain any information at all about them so I'm hoping that someone reading this can shed some light on this band.

The band is INITIAL REACTION and judging by their address in the insert they were from Alexandria, VA. Members included: Josh Woods - guitar, Seth Ford Young - vocals, Ponch Sanchez - drums, & Tom Gorton - bass. Whether or not these guys were in other bands or went on to form other bands, I have no idea. None of the names really stood out to me at the time. They thank bands like: Zero Tolerance, Gut Instinct, Outburst, Four Walls Falling, Release, Turning Point, Step Aside and others. So that can kind of give you the time frame from when they were around. The record label that released this was from Arlington, VA and was called Cornerstone Productions. Well enjoy these tracks and like I said, feel free to comment on the quality of these mp3s as I hope to learn more about transferring this stuff for all of us to enjoy.


1. "Bustin' Out"
2. "Invisible Victims"
3. "Perpetrator"
4. "12 Gauge"

12 comments:

Anonymous said...

quality isnt all that bad man espically since i doubt this band spent like 300000 on the recording. as far as the music goes this shits pretty mid-paced so im all about it. itll be in my playlist for a while.

Anonymous said...

Holy shit, man, I never would've guessed this is half as hard as it is! Awesome stuff. I need to find a copy of this 7" (yeah, right, that'll happen).

It sounds a little muddy and possibly ever so slightly overloaded in certain areas, but no big deal. I always set everything on my stereo's EQ to 0 before I run anything onto the computer, so if you're running from a stereo you might want to experiment with that. There are so many damn variables... I also try to make sure I set the output volume on the stereo to a decent level rather than jacking up the input levels on the computer or a mixer or whatever you might be hitting in between - just make sure you're not bringing anything in at too hot a level. I gotta get a better computer so it doesn't take me fucking forever to save files down and apply filters to the tracks and shit...

Anonymous said...

Fuck yeah!!! Thanks so much for posting this. I remember getting this the same time I picked up the Gut Instinct 7". Shit doesn't get anymore "tuffguy" than this. I agree with Andrew, some of it sounds a little overloaded. Other than that, it's a good vinyl rip. I suppose there's no chance that you have the Step Aside 7"? I've been looking forever, but nothing.

-slavis

EMS / COREGASM said...

yeah i noticed a little bit of the maxed out sound. it was the first 7" i did so hopefully they will only get better from that. it's decent but i have some ideas and techniques to try to make them even better in the future. thanx for listening guys and for the tips.

Slavis: I'm pretty sure that i dont have the Step Aside.

Anonymous said...

Wow, I'm honored that anyone is still listening to IR. We put out that record when we were still in high school, we were the nicest bunch of guys. Funny we were able to sound so " toughguy ".
As far as what we're doing now, I'm the only one who kept playing music, I do it full-time. I play upright bass and mostly do Jazz. I've played with a lot of people and I'm on the next Tom Waits album that should be out in a couple of months. Check out Sethfordyoung.com for other details. The site was built by Tom Gorton who was the bassist in IR.

Anonymous said...

JOCKS!

Anonymous said...

The guy who ran/runs Cornerstone Productions is named Josh, he played in Revelation, Unorthodox, Curse Of Years, and Stout, and tattoos for a living these days. He put this 7" out, as well as "Disturbing The Peace" by Gut Instinct on Cornerstone, and also finally put out a Baltimore Hardcore comp called Belly Of The Beast with some (I believe) unreleased Gut Instinct songs on it.

Anonymous said...

This is Josh Woods the guitarist from IR. Seth sent us this site. Very cool of you to post our 7". Ponch and I still live around DC. Seth and Tom moved to San Fran. I played in few bands after this and played with Boo(Damian) the bassist from Wake Up Cold for awhile but that fizzled out. The singer from Rev 9, Todd Hall was our singer. Rev 9 is bad ass. I'm 36 now and have a wife and kid so playing in a band has been hard. So to stay in music I started djing my next love, dub and reggae.
Here's a link. www.funkweapons.com/music/degobasoundsystem-controldis.mp3. Mad respect for keepin' HC alive and breathing. Best...Josh

Anonymous said...

I posted earlier about Cornerstone, I totally forgot, Richie, not Josh, was the original owner of Cornerstone. Richie put out the GI and IR records and was supposed to put out one for As It Stands, but that never came to be. He then turned it over to Josh who has since put out the Stout CD and the Belly Of The Beast comp on it.

Anonymous said...

Yeahhh! Love that Northern Virginia old tough guy shit.... I have always been a fan.... Like another's previous post, I would love to see some Step Aside on here, especially that 7" with Lance from AS IT STANDS singing... "You Wont Get Any Sleep Tonight!!!!!" Back to Initial Reaction. I still have their shirt and rock it every now and then, I actually borrowed it from Brendan Bobzien years ago, but never ggave it back... When I see him he still asks me when he can have it back, I just reply "I'll have to look for it"..... HaHaHa, more scene points for me..... If you know Brendan, tell him his Initial Reaction shirt misses him....

Anonymous said...

the safari club days where fun times i actually saw mike from gut instinct out here in san diego i answered an add for a singer he placed about 6 years ago ...
everyones changed i also ran into alec from subconscious growth he stops by the record store i w ork at in san diego every now and then ...
DAVE in the old days iw as known as DISCO DAVE

Anonymous said...

If anyone happens to still check back here and is looking for that Step Aside, I've posted that 7" right here.

I'm gonna post Initial Reaction's 1992 demo in a week or two as well...