Description
7 Seconds – “New Wind / Change In My Head” Double LP
This reissue of New Wind has been remastered by Grammy Award-winning engineer Michael Graves. If I understand it correctly, this version has become a double album by the inclusion of a second version of New Wind with all the tracks remixed in their entirety by Ian MacKaye and Don Zientara at Inner Ear Studios (in January 2023). And their version also includes two restored and previously unreleased tracks, “Change In My Head” and “Compro”, taken from the original 1985 Washington, DC session.
Finally, Trust Records has reissued the third full-length by the Reno, Nevada, band who are rightly celebrated as one the first-wave pioneers that incorporated both anthemic melodies and a more positive lyrical approach into their take on the early hardcore-punk template. The release of this album in 1986 (a split release between BYO and Positive Force Records) cranked things up another couple of levels. Essentially, two recording sessions jumbled-up together. One was a 1985 session at Inner Ear studios in Washington DC, with Ian Mckaye and Don Zientara – and it is very good, a clear continuation of the classic 7 Seconds hardcore style, last heard, earlier that same year, in Walk Together, Rock Together. The other tracks were recorded in Venice, California in 1986 , and are… not so good. Like (too) many of their peers, 7 Seconds stumbled into post-hardcore without really knowing how best to do it (thankfully, a couple of years later Fugazi came along and said, hey, here, try this…) To my ears, back in the day, the 7 Seconds of 1986 sounded like they were slightly under the influence of U2. And that – for me – was a difficult hurdle to navigate. Despite which, gotta be said, “Man Enough To Care” is a landmark classic.
I haven’t opened a copy of this high-priced repress, but it does look and feel like a substantial package with high production values (it certainly weighs a lot), so, I think you will get your money’s worth ok. It includes a 24-page oral history with unseen photographs, flyers, and memorabilia. This is the yellow and clear vinyl versions, exclusive to Rev Records and limited to 1,000 copies.
