grey gordon fourfourfour cassette

I couldn't think of a better way to end the more than a year long drought of releases on Midwestern Decline than with Grey Gordon's first physical release.  fourfourfour consists of four tracks recorded on September 25 in as many hours on a four track recorder.  Grey and I duplicated 25 tapes one by one in my basement, did the layout, and printed the j-cards just hours after the songs were recorded.

It's good to be back.

To order a copy of the tape, send $5 via paypal to edgegrey@gmail.com.

Dan

Close Only Counts Update

Fort Wayne pop-punk champs Close Only Counts are finally finishing their full length "Do Bad Things" which should be released before the end of the year.  In the meantime, they've put out a free acoustic EP entitled "The View From Down Here" which includes an acoustic version of "She's Lying I'm Dying" and a cover of Saves The Day's "You Vandal"  Support those dudes and download this.

http://www.megaupload.com/?d=C2Q9ZXLG 

News Update

The comp, damien johnston, close only counts, and other releases are all still coming out.  Logistics, and saving for a baby have gotten in the way a bit but I'm too stubborn to let it get me down.  More news soon!

Shitlist

New 260 grinding metallic hardcore, how's that for a description.  Featuring dudes, myself included, who are already in a few bands (Parasitic Twins, Na'Kay, Daisycutter) playing fast and pissed.  How's that for a description?  We recently recorded eight originals and two covers that should be out in tape form in the near future.  The recordings were done with Geoff at The Ensomber Room, who is always an awesome dude to work with and we're glad he could make time for us.  Dude's been working on some really great stuff including the latest Macabre record!

We've got two songs posted on our facebook profile, and we're looking forward to writing and playing more shows.

Life After Death (Ex Iceberg, Karloff)

With Karloff on indefinite hiatus and Iceberg currently split up, some of the dudes from each band decided they still had something to say and have come back even stronger with their new band Life After Death.  Taking their name from the Biggie Smalls record and telling tales of the hardships of the daily grind, the bleak outlook is matched with an attack informed by Hatebreed and Crowbar.

You can listen to their debut EP "Respect is Collected" at their stereokiller site.

Also, find them on facebook here.

Close Only Counts In the Studio

Close Only Counts studio update from Eric Pennycoff on Vimeo.

Close Only Counts working on "Do Bad Things".  Out soon.

April News (Comp update, reviews, new stuff, and more)

Just a bit of quick news to catch everyone up on what's been going on with MXD lately.

The compilation I mentioned a little while back is finally starting to come together.  I originally wanted to have all of the tracks by the end of February, but punk rock time is a very real thing, and I'm still waiting on a few of the songs to get to me.  So far I have tracks from Picked Clean, Chaotic Neutral, Parasitic Twins, Disconnected, Cloud Rat, Kata Sarka, Karloff, and Na'Kay. More bands will be announced soon, and as soon as I get everything together I'll post details on the release.  This should be out by late spring/early summer for tour time!

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Parasitic Twins got their demo reviewed at Devd Formats, a blog written by Damien Johnston, who I believe also runs or has a hand in the excellent Seattle based Dead Accents label.  Damien had some nice stuff to say about the tape, and he also happens to make some noise of his own.  Check that out here.

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Coffin Maker posted a rough demo of a track from their upcoming cassette on their bandcamp.  The cassette should be out sometime in late summer or early fall and will have 8 new songs.

March News Update

I'm sure it's a lame excuse, but March has been a busy month at work and since I sit at a desk and stare at a computer all day there sometimes I just don't feel like it when I come home.  I finally found some time so here goes.

Close Only Counts CD Re-issue

I sent a tweet out on @MXDRecords last Friday the 4th stating that the cd's had arrived.  They have indeed, but the track listing on the discs themselves is all messed up, read completely out of order.  I'm trying to get a hold of someone at the pressing plant to figure out what can be done about this, so if you were wondering why your pre-order didn't get to you this week that's why.  I apologize for the inconvenience and am trying to get it fixed a soon as possible.  Ideally I will be able to send the old shipment back and get a new one with the correct track listing.  If not, they may have to be sold as is which I suppose would be sort of punk rock and make them a little bit of a collector's item.

At any rate, I'll update everyone as soon as I figure out what's going on.

Upcoming Releases

It's been a couple of months since the last MXD releases came out, and I'm finally able to announce some of the new stuff that's coming up.
I've been working on a cassette compilation of Hardcore, Grind, and Punk from the midwest that will include some killer tracks and a few rarities.  As soon as I have all of the tracks, I'll post the track list and release date.  It should be out by late spring/early summer though.

Also coming soon, is a cd from Fort Wayne's Castles who play some surprisingly heavy indie rock and feature current and former members of Metavari, All Nite Skate, and Graves of The Endless Fall.  This will be a follow up to their debut EP which was released in late 2009 and will be a spring release.

Parasitic Twins has been writing and are planning to record a bunch of songs this spring, some of which will see release on a 7", the rest of which will be kept around for splits, comps, etc. Expect to hear more old school hardcore with as little slow as possible.  Coffin Maker is also currently recording 8 songs for a cassette that should see release sometime this summer.  Expect more dark, sparse, ominous tones with occult themes.

I've got one more under wraps that I should be able to talk about shortly, just don't want to announce anything and then have it fall through.

Do Bad Things for Close Only Counts

Fort Wayne's own Close Only Counts are currently working on the follow-up to last October's "You're Not Going To Like What I Have To Say" and are looking for a little help in the art department.

"Hey everyone. We need pictures for the album art of our upcoming full length "Do Bad Things". We need people to make these shirts, do bad things, and have someone take your picture while doing so. If you can make this happen just send us the picture and we will make sure to put it in the cd. Please send the highest quality photos possible (no shitty cell phone camera pics). Thanks. Hope to hear from you guys. Get gross with it."

Just try not to get yourself arrested.

Also, more copies of "You're Not Gonna Like What I Have To Say" will definitely be in stock around the first of March.  If you've already pre-ordered a copy we'll get it sent out as soon as they come in.  If you haven't then get on it.  They are sure to sell out again, and may never be re-pressed. 

Midwestern Decline, Neat Neat Neat, and You

Fort Wayne finally has a proper record shop, which means we also have a proper place to sell our releases locally.  Starting today all in stock Midwestern Decline releases will be available at Neat Neat Neat Records and Music on Calhoun Street.

The shop, run by Morrison Agen, who also puts out some awesome records on his label of the same name, carries all sorts of vinyl from any genre as well as a selection of cd's and cassettes.

Aside from Midwestern Decline and Neat Neat Neat releases, fellow Black Heart Mountain Culture Collective member Adam Meyer will have his Sacred Phrases releases available there as well.  Sacred Phrases is responsible for a lot of excellent noise and ambient stuff and we recommend just about the whole discography.

If you're in the neighborhood stop by pick up some music and support a local business that's also supporting what we are doing.  Of course if you aren't in the area our webstore and bandcamp site are always an option.

Close Only Counts Re-Issues have been ordered

The second pressing of Close Only Counts' "You're Not Gonna Like What I Have To Say" is finally on order and will be at MXD headquarters early next month.  This pressing is limited to 100 CDs as the band is currently working on their follow up tentatively titled "Do Bad Things" which should see a spring/summer release.  We are currently taking pre-orders at the MXD store, and they will ship as soon as we get the CDs in.

If you'd like more information regarding Close Only Counts studio time you can follow them on twitter @CloseOnlyCounts.

Speaking of Twitter, Midwestern Decline has also joined the rest of the world and can now be found @MXDRecords.  We will mostly be using the account to tweet news regaridng upcoming releases as well as info on shows and other events in the area.  If you have something you'd like us to tweet just follow us, we'll follow you, and we'll retweet anything that's relevant.

Lastly, the new design on the blog is the handy work of the very talented Dusty Neal who found some time away from his tattooing and zine creating to create the totally badass new look to the blog.  Thanks dude.

Midwestern Decline on Bandcamp

The threat of blizzard like conditions, and terrible roads brought a level 1 snow advisory to most of Northern Indiana yesterday which meant work was closed. I fought the urge to build a snowman and instead stayed inside and uploaded the entire Midwestern Decline catalog to our new Bandcamp site.

This means that every song from all seven MXD releases is available for your listening pleasure. Many of the releases are also available to purchase in digital form for less than their physical counterparts if that's how you roll. The Cloud Rat record is the exception to the rule, as it was a joint venture between three record labels and to my knowledge neither of them are selling digital copies either. In respect to fairness and the hard work that both IFB and Otherwise Dead put in to make that record happen it will only be available to stream.

If you do make a purchase from our bandcamp site you should know that 60% of all sales, after paypal fees and other BS will go straight to the band. The rest will be put back into the label to ensure we can continue to release music in 2011 and beyond.

The bandcamp page can be found at http://midwesterndeclinerecords.bandcamp.com.

Happy Listening.

Parasitic Twins Download Codes

For those of you who have purchased a tape, you've probably realized that there was no download link included. This was something that was initially planned, and did not get done by the time the tapes started showing up in the wild. If you have purchased the tape and would like to have it in mp3 form please send an email to midwesterndecline@gmail.com. Also, we now have download links that will come with every tape.

Shirts, as promised in the post back in October are still on the way. A design is still being finalized.

Esoterica/Black Heart Mountain Culture Collective

Midwestern Decline is proud to announce our participation in the Black Heart Mountain Culture Collective. The Collective is a likeminded group of artists committed to creating culturally relevant art. We're also planning on collaborating and doing what we can to further each other's craft.

The fruits of the first such collaboration are now available through Sistine Press. The first 50 copies of "Esoterica", a book of black and white photography focused on esotericism, religion, and the occult, by Dusty Neal will ship with "Invocation.Possesion.Excorcism." the debut 3 song EP from Fort Wayne post-black metal band Coffin Maker.

More information on Black Heart Mountain and it's excellent artists can be found at http://www.blackheartmountain.com/

All three tracks from the Coffin Maker EP are available for streaming at http://www.coffinmaker.bandcamp.com/, and you can pick up a copy of Esoterica for yourself at http://www.sistinepress.wordpress.com/.

Review Time!

Graham Scala from aptly named Richmond, VA based RVA magazine (www.rvamag.com/articles) had some real nice things to say about the Cloud Rat LP on the magazines blog. Grind blog Grind and Punishment also gave it a good review. Jeremy Jones mentioned the Parasitic Twins cassette in the first issue of the Face to Face zine. Iceberg's "Born as Bastards" is also listed as one of the year's best EP's in the zine and we are nearly sold out of the first pressing. That issue also contains interviews with Bitter End, Product of Waste, and Rattletooth. You can pick up a copy at http://www.facetofacehardcorefanzine.bigcartel.com/. Parasitic Twins made the cover of new issue of the excellent Negative Trend (http://www.treehouseinitiative.blogspot.com/) zine out of Indianapolis.

Thanks to everyone who took some time to review our stuff, and Grey and I encourage anyone who has not yet done so to check out each of these publications and continue to support a real DIY culture.

More End of Year Sale Info.

From now until the first of the year whenever you purchase any MXD release at the webstore or from either Grey or I personally through the distro you'll recieve a copy of the Bodycheck/Resilient split and the Karloff EP for free. That's 3 discs for $5!

Also, the Parasitic Twins cassettes are finally available in the webstore. Check it out at http://www.midwesterndecline2.bigcartel.com/.

Finally, for anyone looking for a copy of Close Only Counts' "You're Not Gonna Like What I Have To Say" we have you covered and should be re-stocked shortly after the first of the year.

Parasitic Twins Cassettes Available Tuesday the 16th

Just a heads up, the Parasitic Twins 8 song debut cassette will be available on Tuesday at their show at The Dojo in Indianapolis with Parasytic, Chaotic Neutral, and Raw Funeral.

On Wednesday it will be available to order from the Midwestern Decline shop, for $3 plus shipping. Every copy comes with a code to download the music, in case you don't have a cassette deck around the house.

Sales at the Midwestern Decline shop

Karloff's "Bled Dry" and the Bodycheck/Resilient split have been marked down to $1 plus shipping on the webstore. This means that after shipping you can score both for only $5. If you already own either of these, this is a great chance to pick up a copy for a friend and at the same time support a local label committed to promoting local music and treating bands right. Check out the sale at http://www.midwesterndecline.bigcartel.com/.

Parasitic Twins

We're pleased to announce that we'll be releasing the upcoming Parasitic Twins cassette next month. Download codes will be included with each cassette, and a short run of t-shirts will also be available. Parasitic Twins plays abrasive early 80s styled hardcore taking cues from Negative Approach, Black Flag, SSD, and Minor Threat. The band is comprised of members from Daisycutter and Karloff and will be playing shows throughout the region for the rest of the year. For more info check out their blog at http://www.parasitictwins.blogspot.com/.

Game On!

After some long talks with friends and my wife over the last week and a half or so I've come to the conclusion that I probably pulled the plug on Midwestern Decline too quickly. I realize that this flip-flopping comes off as more than a little wishy washy and for that I'm sorry. However, it is what it is and I can't deny that often the pressures of running my lable, even with how small it was, proved to be frustrating more often than not. I realized though that once I wasn't doing it anymore that I very much missed it and it was probably worth all of the stress, money, and risk. I only get to live once, so I might as well do something that I find both meaningful and enjoyable (when it's working right).

With all that being said, consider this my official statement that Midwestern Decline is operational once more, and several projects are currently being planned.

First off, Karloff had some material recorded prior to their breakup, and in the upcoming months that will see release as a free high quality mp3 download. Grey and I are also looking to publish a bi-annual zine complete with CD-R compilation of music from various genres we find interesting. We will also be repressing the Close Only Counts CD which sold out of it's initial run of 100 on release night. Also, some t-shirts, buttons, and stickers should be out early next year.

Thank you to all of those who have purchased some of the music Midwestern Decline has released, you all make it worth it. It feels good to be back.