The bands:  Dead Silence, Group of Individuals, Amateur Gynecologists (later changed the name to A.G.s), Cycle Sine, Cancerous Growth, Ozzfish Experience, Intense Degree, Number Nine, Political Justice, The Exposed, Initial Reaction, Screeching Weasel, Denied Remarks, Crib Death, Hates, and Ism.

I recently archived this onto 2CDRs (each disc is one side of the tape) from the compiled master tape (unfortunately I didn't have all the original tapes that were sent in). I'll likely offer a CDR with mini reproduction booklet that will be made to order in the future.

I always wanted to put out records and a big tax refund in 1993 provided me with the funds to do so. Big'n were from Joliet, IL and played noisy indie rock much in the vein of your Amrep type bands. Todd had one of those aluminum guitars like the guy in Tar, and he is the brother of Al Johnson of Shorty/US Maple fame. This was the band's third single, and had they played any shows after this was released, maybe I would have sold more of them. They claim to have sold 1000 of their previous single on Ratfish, which was the basis for my pressing 1000. I have a bunch left. I still like this record and have a copy in my jukebox even! The band would later put out a couple cd's on Gasoline Boost Records. Musket appeared on the first one, but I think this version is better than the one they put on that album, even if it that one was recorded by Steve Albini! The cover was designed by Brian, the drummer, and it was assembled by me. It was printed by PJ Graphics. The record was mastered and pressed at United Record Pressing. The color vinyl edition was sold only through my mail order.

Even though sales were slow of the first record I did, I wanted to do another big'n record because they were my friends. I also wanted to put out another band, hence the split release. Pencil were a band from Indiana that big'n played with a few times. Originally this band named Corn was going to be on this, but for some reason or another it never happened. Having learned from the last one that 1000 records were a lot to have to unload, I opted for half this time. I still have about 100 left. The clear vinyl ones were only sold through my mail-order. I went all out and did a 2-color glossy cover on this one. The Big'n side of the sleeve was designed by the band and myself, the Pencil side was done by the band. The cover was assembled by me and printed at PJ Graphics. I was at Daver's place for the recording of Dirtfarmer, which remains my favorite Big'n song of all. Brian and I almost came to blows that day before they recorded over a girl, and then Bill and I almost did too as he sided with Brian. I still prefer the version on this single to the Albini recorded one on their first album.

The vinyl was mastered by Richard Simpson out in Hollywood, CA. Richard is a great guy and his prices are amazing. I'll be using him for all future releases. The sleeves were done at Imprint, who on top of doing great work for a great price, are very friendly and easy to work with. As always, the vinyl was done at United Record pressing.

To me, there is no more underappreciated band from the ealry days of Los Angeles punk than The Cheifs. Poll a bunch of punks that aren't record collectors and you will often get the response of "who?". This single came out in 1980 with a mere 500 copies being pressed. It has since gone on to become an expensive collectors item.

While on one of my frequent visits to CA, I was over at Dr. Strange Records visiting with my pal, the good doc. He told me he was reissuing The Cheifs CD, much to my delight as I beleive everyone needs to own it. I pitched to him the idea of doing a limited edition reissue on both our labels, a co-release that we would split the costs for. He was up for it. However, when I contacted him a week later he realized he was far too busy to tackle any more projects and instead put me in touch with Bob Glassley to discuss doing it myself on my own label. I found that to be a rather selfless act on the Doc's part and I owe him a huge debt of thanks for doing that.

So I got in touch with Bob and we came to an agreement that I would press up a small amount of them, and make them just different enough to not be able to be passed off as original pressings. Where the original pressing had the spot color on the sleeve as red, this one is blue. The cover art is the same with the exception of on the back where the Playgems label was, now there is a Spontaneous Combustion logo. The record comes with a lyric sheet with tons of old band photos on it, and it comes with a SC sticker. There was 402 pressed and there will not be any additional pressings. I did the run as 100 on clear vinyl and 300 on "mixed vinyl" which resulted in a lot of cool color variations. The record was mastered by Richard Simpson, who mastered the original pressing of this 24 years ago (as of this writing). When I brought it in to have it done, his response was "I remember this band, I did this record way back". The record was pressed at United Record Pressing and again I used Imprint for the covers. I had to get the covers redone as the first batch were way too dark so a different blue was used and the photos were fixed to lighten them up.