I'm no Converge fan, it seems to me that most people who are into hardcore and metal right now regard this band as the best band in the world, I've tried to get into them countless times over the years but something about their music just doesn't sit right with me. Last night they played the Underworld and I was lucky enough to get a cheeky guestlist for the show. My band were playing down the road at the final UK Ruiner gig and I wanted to check out Rot In Hell more than any other band playing at either end of the street. Fortunately enough I was able to check out the RIH set, jib over to the Purple Turtle, bust out our set (which was a banger by the way, new songs and setlist flow smooth as snake shit), then have enough time to hang around outside the Underworld waiting for Converge to strart. Might I add that standing outside of shows is what I do best, the prime example of this was in '04, Mental played London at The Verge. That place is now a trendy wine bar, formerly home to an almost weekly hardcore alldayer on a sunday, anyways, I had made the trip up with no intention of paying in, I just chilled to the max outside, got some food and had than if I had actually watched the bands. I saw Mental the day before in CT, that could have been the last Jube show, I'm not sure, but I know I saw at least some of their set, I can't confirm or deny if I spent most of that evening chilling out of The Break In van.
Back to Converge, I'm willing to give them another go, seeing as anything they put out on vinyl instantly becomes internet gold dust, I'm not about to purchase a $60 copy of one of their LP's only to not like it. So I did the next best thing, bought a £5 7" with one track on it. This thing is limited to 1000 copies for their Euro tour, only to be sold on the tour and I am informed that they strictly took 50 copies of the record into each gig so as to not sell out of them too early. It's not the worst song I've heard, but I still don't get it, for me I prefer this kind of stuff when it's played by band like Botch or Cave In. The B-side has this cool etching on it, which is weird as I receive my Integrity VVe Are The End 7" the morning I bought the Converge record. So that's my first two laser etched 7"s both received on the same day, what are the chances of that happening eh? I'm going to go on record as saying this is one of my favourite pieces of wax, on a purely visual level. The way the etching shows through from the front makes it look really special and not in the kind of way where you had a special kid in year 3 of school who used to eat chalk.
The other cool thing is the label is actually part of the front cover as the front of the record cover has a circle cut out of it. Converge: better looking records than they sound? For me, yes.
