PunkNews.org

First vinyl purchase since getting a turntable: sweet.

Arriving in my mailbox 5 days before official release: sweet. 

Tie-dyed vinyl: sweet. 

Mistakenly believing that all 7” records are best played at 45 RPM: not sweet. (Russ Rankin, I dub you an honorary member of the Chipmunks while spinning at anything greater than 33 revolutions per minute.) 

Punk rock supergroup Only Crime and Maine's Outbreak convened at the Blasting Room in Ft. Collins, CO a few months ago to record what would soon become one of the most ass-kicking and face-bludgeoning split EPs in recent memory. And while both bands deliver in their limited capacity, the two songs each artist provides will barely satiate the fix needed after getting hooked on the authentic hardcore of Only Crime and Outbreak. 

Side A belongs to Only Crime, commonly known for boasting veterans of Good Riddance, Black Flag, Bane, and GWAR. Their unique brand of heavy hardcore is intense and powerful without being metallic, a sharp way of updating their roots, instead of going “metalcore” like most hardcore bands trying to outdo their elders. “Brand New Scene” is dispensed in traditional Only Crime form, with melodic verses that seem to reflect on the state of hardcore, particularly in relation to the passing of vocalist Russ Rankin’s former band Good Riddance: "Just push around while I’m running away from / I see myself inside you / Leaving trails and the blood you ignore / Leave lies behind you / […] / Like all the other perversions / Leaving time for the versions of that sound / […] / I’ve seen enough to drive it all away / This time it’s done so take it all away." The second half of Only Crime’s offering is “Revisionistic,” the obvious standout of the EP. Light, teaser riffage gives way to melodic hardcore that with an extremely catchy tune and slightly less heavy approach sounds like Good Riddance in the prime of their existence. Side A score: 4.5/5 

Outbreak’s three minutes of the split don’t exactly give a full introduction to the novice listener, but they do offer a glimpse of what a typical Outbreak composition might entail. Lyrically, Outbreak closely resembles the forefathers of East Coast `80s hardcore: simple, angry, and concise. If you’re thinking about playing Side B around your parents because there aren’t any expletives in the liner notes, you can forget it. Even though they don’t appear in the written lyrics, Outbreak drops the F-bomb in both of their tracks. The band’s approach to songwriting is interesting in that their songs are essentially composed of one big verse with some lyrics repeated to form a quasi-chorus. As the first song “Single File” bleeds right into “Deaf and Blind,” the somewhat convulsive drumming gives Outbreak more of a D.R.I. or Suicidal Tendencies feel than that of fellow East Coasters like Agnostic Front or Madball. Outbreak shows promise here, but their contribution is over right as they begin to pick up pace. Side B score: 3.5/5

Overall Score: 4/5

PastePunk

At first glance, ONLY CRIME and OUTBREAK seem like an odd pairing. The former band is a bi-coastal assembly of well-known hardcore figures that plays straight-up, coarse 80s hardcore-punk. The latter offers a thrashy attack of skatepunk with a heaping of pissed-off vocals and snot-rag attitude. OK - so maybe ONLY CRIME and OUTBREAK aren't so far apart. Each band on here carries two new songs with ONLY CRIME's material coming from the recording sessions of their recent full-length Virulence. Not surprisingly, ONLY CRIME are instantly definable by the eternally distinctive vocal style of frontman Russ Rankin. Tuneful, yet potted with plenty of anger, Rankin remains the ultimate focus of ONLY CRIME (despite having punk rock legend Bill Stevenson on drums!). Lest one think these are mere throwaways from Virulence, the band's second track, "Revisionistic" is a standout through and through. OUTBREAK's half of the release is of more intrigue because the band is without the musical and historical baggage that Rankin and company bring with them. Slowed down a dab from the band's raging material on Failure (Bridge Nine), OUTBREAK seemingly have room to breathe. That's sort of an odd statement to make considering that the band's three songs clock in at a combined three minutes! OUTBREAK let 'er rip with a neck-snapping guitar lead on "Deaf and Blind," and plow through you on the 80 second romp "Single File," which incidentally still manages to cram in a tightly wound breakdown. To recap: More! More! I want more!

Ink19.com

Remember vinyl? Remember splits? Remember when punk rock and hardcore was relevant, dangerous and sweaty? All of this was in the day before digital downloading, before MTV and the Warped Tour sucked the saturation right out of aggressive music and diluted it for distribution at Hot Topic. These were the days before gloss punk.

Think Fast! Records has not forgotten these bygone years, but they have embraced the future by sending out a first for me (as a reviewer): an advanced copy of their vinyl release of the Only Crime/Outbreak split arrived in my mailbox as a credit card with a web address and a special code -- it's also available to the public as a digital download at Downloadpunk.com). This is the future of independent labels looking to promote their releases with less risk of financial loss. While I already would have been excited to get a fresh new batch of traditional hardcore punk, the environmentally friendly way in which it arrived broadened my interest tenfold.

So what of the music? At 4 songs, clocking in well under 10 minutes, the simple teaser release is a dirty appetizer that has found me replaying it again and again. The first half of the release offers Only Crime's punk friendly melodies (band members include former mates of Black Flag, Descendants and Good Riddance), while the last half is 3 minutes of Outbreak's metal-tinged fist-fight hardcore. It's short enough for even the most television-torn attention span.