BCT Recap

Best. Month. Ever.

One last thank you to everyone that helped complete my collection so I could in turn help complete everyone's collection.

And a special thanks to Chris BCT for being cool enough to give some inside info on each release.

Goo times indeed!

BCT #27 - V/A - Experience The Freedom Of Total Control

From 1986. 8 Bands. 29 Songs.

BCT #27

Chris BCT Says:
The second of two BCT tape comps compiled by Steve of Flush (Productions as I recall) in Berkeley using the last batches of tapes sent to us for BCT tape comps. As I mentioned there were 30 sent to us after these tapes but every single one sucked bad in every way. Stunning, like the musical Altamont to the end of our musical punk window of '83 to '86. Thanks Steve! 

BCT #26 - V/A - Barabbas Records

From 1986. 9 Bands. 44 Songs.

BCT #26

(Editors Note: There might be some mislabeling going on with this one. I apologize and welcome any corrections.)

Chris BCT Says:
I don't remember our exchange with Barabbas Records but somehow we agreed that BCT would release this tape comp. I don't remember if they were associated with Barabbas zine from Finland but it was big in size and one of the finest zines in the world, all in Finnish. They made this tape. I thought they made the sleeve but I recognize one of our hand writing on the sleeve. As ever, ya can't usually go wrong with classic Finnish 80's HC.

BCT #25 - V/A - They Decide... You Pay!

From 1985. 8 Bands. 24 Songs.

BCT #25

Chris BCT Says:
This was the second of two tape comps that someone else had already released and then we released it on BCT, the other being #16 Senza Tregua. This one was made by e.s.t. label in Italy. It's definitely one of my favorite BCT tape comps or comps, period. They did the sleeve. Ya got a great pic of the sleeve here. I'm impressed with the clarity of it. Released 12/84. Two other of my favorite Italian bands from the 80's, P.S.A. and Noise noise noise. I had the tape release of each band, also great.

BCT #24 - V/A - Car Crash Music

From 1985. 9 Bands. 40 Songs.

BCT #24

Chris BCT Says:
Bloodlake was from Vista, a city in north county of San Diego. They did 2 demo tapes. The first one is on You Tube. The second one I gave to some girl whom I never ever saw again cuz we both liked them and I dunno, it's all I had. Simon, the drummer, went on to be in Crash Worship. I went over to Simon's house once and Bloodlake was doin' a rehearsal in their garage. I tried to record it. I may have actually. Mar Moreno of Diatribe may know how to get hold of Bloodlake. He's on fb. Someone did a 7" of this Youth Quake material. By this time, 1986, me and my 2nd BCT partner, Christopher had just got burned out making tape comps. Somehow we'd hooked up with Steve of Flush, a small tape label in Berkeley. Went to his house and he agreed to put together this tape comp and our final one, #27. He did a great job. They both sound just like what Christopher and I would have made. Made being selecting the strong songs and not using weak songs and then it's tough deciding a third of the songs that are sorta mid range. We had the tape made and were listening to it through for the first time and a part time BCT helper, Andy Social was with us and mid tape he goes, "That's car crash music!" And I go, "That's the name of the tape." It's funny how names for the tapes was like a whole element of doin' BCT. This is one of my favorite BCT tapes. We also listed in the BCT catalog all the zine reviews of any of the tapes we could find. And we put in a list of all 27 tapes and rated them ourselves for both musical and recording quality. I gave this a 9 musically and 10 recording quality. 
The tape sleeve drawing came unsolicited from a punk who ordered about 5 tapes. I just ran across his original letter as I set aside and saved the 20 or so letters we got that had art drawn on them. He's got BCT on his t-shirt so I just had to use it. I like it.

BCT #23 - Funeral Oration + Gepøpel - Split

From 1985. 2 Bands. 35½ Songs.

BCT #23

Chris BCT Says:
Oh, don't forget, Velved distro sells all 27 BCT tapes. Just ask him. This is the 3rd of 3 tapes that a band we asked to send their music sent their tape in, premade. I still think the lst 2 demo tapes, the pink and then the blue one of FO are stunning. This material just doesn't blow up as I recall. And I'd never heard of Gepopel, like 2/3's of the bands that sent tapes to us, and we only used this full tape cuz we asked FO to send something in. If we'd used our usual editing, using only songs that rip we'd a used maybe 10 to 15 minutes of the FO songs and none of the Gepopel. Released 5/85. They did the tape sleeve too.

BCT #22 - V/A - Spanish HC

From 1985. 6 Bands. 45 Songs.

BCT #22

Chris BCT Says:
Never did care for this pic for the tape sleeve. I shoulda been more assertive and asked for a different one. I'm not sure how this tape came together. I think we had several Spanish tapes come in over about a year period and it was easy to make this single Spanish tape. It came out 10/84. We got one more Spanish band after these came in, Subterranean Kids and put them on #24. R.I.P. just contacted us saying this is the best recorded live show of them back in the day. We have an alt version of the tape sleeve in the catalog. I shoulda swapped it out for that other one. What was I thinking? I think Ultimo Resorte is the only band on BCT with a female vocalist. I'd occasionally go to Tijuana and I'd try to make some copies, like 20, to sell for the TJ punx price of $2 and always made a few more of the Spanish tape for 'em and, naturally, it sold like hot cakes.

BCT #21 - V/A - Kaaos Zine Presents

From 1985. 6 Bands. 32 Songs.

BCT #21

Chris BCT Says:
I got together, of course via snail mail, with Kaaos zine in Finland. He proposed that I send him 3 tapes from bands who sent their tape to us and he'd use the music from 3 bands he had there and make a single tape. This is the tape he made. It's what can happen when you have no control over what music shows up on your tapes. I think the 3 U.S. bands are strong while the 3 Finnish bands are not. This is Kaaos ll cuz there was a Kaaos l but I can't remember why it was never released. I even have the set list of bands and songs for Kaaos l but I have no idea where the tape is or if it even came into existence. The Kaaos guy did the total sleeve too.

BCT #20 - Injections

From 1985. 25 Songs

BCT #20

Chris BCT Says:
Local band in existence from '80 to '81. We worked with Cliff Cunningham, a local stalworth of the scene who made the tape. I'm willing to call this the only non HC tape we released. It's certainly punk. Their 7" is on here (I think they did two?). Prison Walls is one of the great songs ever. I 'commissioned' this tape sleeve from our main punk artist for BCT, J. Yarbrough. We made a song title for #12 that was the same notion, "I'm Taking a Drug, It's Coming From These Speakers." Released 10/84.

BCT #19 - Indigesti - Sguardo Realtá

From 1985. 25 Songs.

BCT #19

Chris BCT Says:
This came out 12/84. It was, at that time, all known recordings of Indigesti. It's our only tape that's not very close to a full 60 minutes (maybe 20 also?). Indigesti asked us if we'd do a tour for them in '86 like we'd done with Raw Power and Riistetyt in '84. I told my then BCT partner, Christopher that after losing $5,000 on the first tour I had no stomach to do another one. He said we wouldn't lose money. We broke even cuz the U.S. band Follow Fashion Monkeys joined the Indigesti tour and we toured in their van! Made all the financial difference. I got to be on 9 of those days, another 40 day tour. Christopher was on the rest. Stiv of T.V.O.R., one of the world's greatest zines (Italian, in Italian) was also on the tour and a gal who video taped all the show. Unfortunately, she rarely placed herself well so mostly I think she got people's heads. Great tour again. Glad we did it. Our last.

BCT #18 - V/A - I Thrash, Therefore I Am

From 1985. 14 Bands. 45 Songs.

BCT #18

Chris BCT Says:
I was sitting around talking with a long time punk friend and someone else. The other guy says something, my old friend modifies the statement and then I modify his statement saying, I Thrash, Therefore I Am. Still my favorite punk comp tape name. I met Brian Walsby in a parking lot of some gig I think in L.A. and he was happy to do some art for us. This is my favorite punk tape comp cover. When Craig of Schizophrenic Records re-released this on cd in 2002 (500 pressed), it was our first cd and I open the box and they have the worst cover of any punk cd comp of all time which I think is ironic cuz, to my ears, this is the finest HC comp of all time (not that there's a competition and there's several, Russia Bombs Finland, Propoganda, Raw War, Really Fast Vol. l, that rule). It showed what can happen when you do a project via email. I asked him to have the pic at the center of the cover and, sure enough it is, but swamped in this weird design. He re-issued the lp (2003, splatter blue 500 pressed) and the cartoon is there front and center like the great drawing it is. Xpozez is the only British band on BCT. They have one live song here and it's My Generation, punk version. It's about the only song here that's subpar recording quality but it's fantastic. Anti-Cimex has a song 'Fight for Freedom' which was the only song that me and my 2nd BCT partner, Christopher, and I had a disagreement about. He didn't go for what the lyric called for. For me it was one of the best songs and I do believe in fighting for freedom tho, like most of us, I'd rather do other things than fight and war is one of the stupidest things humans do, obviously. This is the only tape comp we did that's all bands from a buncha European countries (7). The RP tracks did not appear elsewhere on BCT. I believe they're from the one of two gigs that were recorded soundboard. For the cd reissue Craig included the best 7 minutes from the Terveet Kadet BCT tape. Fits well on the cd, musically etc.
This was released 2/85. The cd is 74 minutes with about 2 extra tracks not originally used that are good. One by Anti Cimex starts smaltzy slow but then kicks in. I guess we rejected that back in the day. We always had our ears on. Great song, it's on. Sucks, it's off. What was a bit difficult was when a song was like in between. Use it cuz it's ok or ditch it cuz it just don't blow up. Ya live with your decisions. I was glad with almost all our song choices for this tape.

BCT #17 - Raw Power - Live In The U.S.A. 1984

From 1985. 43 Songs.

BCT #17

Chris BCT Says:
RP just popped for us when we got those original 60 and 2 90 (or whatever) tapes from Roberto Schavio in 1983 from Italy of Italian HC. I forget exactly how we heard, I guess by snail mail, that RP wanted to tour the U.S. and would we help them do it. This was nothing like we'd ever done and like fools, we agreed to. It did, indeed turn out to be the trip of a lifetime. I wish I'd done things a bit different but what did come off was grand. I did a report on the tour for KillFromtheHeart in 2002 at the behest of some Italian punk to write something. And I think I recently re-discovered it and cut and pasted it for myself. I'm not sure where I put it. They were total gentlemen, full of energy and joy. It appears I brought a tape recorder, of which I have zero memory, dunno why. I didn't take pics or vids. Mr. Video (an African American) took one at the Philly show and showed us, all chaotic filming. Useless Pieces of S.. did in Tucson. I foolishly never contacted them but I've heard they have it layin' around. Flipside filmed that lst International Olympic gig. Tons of kids on the stage with RP the entire set. And one other show got filmed. Near the end of the tour for the Indianapolis tour we had one extra day there and the band and our host, Paul Mahern, decided to record an lp in his studio which they did. A friend of Paul's did a 10 to 15 minute video of the band recording which I saw a bit of. As it was the end of the tour the band had played the whole tour together. The original screamer/guitarist couldn't come so Davide did and imitated his scream for the few songs they have a screamer on and had a tinge more metal flavor git than the original guy who had, I think none. There was a wonderful disagreement between the band, their only one, I think in Cleveland and I remember starting to record it (audio) cuz it was so verbally furious. I quit after about 4 minutes for what I thought might be respect for privacy. After about 8 minutes they were done and all was well again. I learned it was about Davide's metal tinge he'd brought to the shows all tour. I played the tape for an Italian punk visitor a year or two later and he couldn't understand them as they were talking in some dialect of Italian that he could not understand. The drummer was Elder, age 17. I never could detect Giuseppe's 2nd guitar sound, ever. Clearly, tho it's part of their wall of sound. He and Dode (bass) didn't speak English. I used all 100 words I knew in Spanish and they didn't need a translation for any of them. We all spoke punk, gig, guitar, Minor Threat etc. The band were otherwise in their 20's and I was the old man at 29. It was the first time I'd had punx callin' me Chris BCT. Excellent and that cow bell, man, you gotta see it, a real one, and seemed rough and old. Bigger than I'd expected. They told me usually at home Dode, might jump a bit during a set but all tour was jumpin' lots. I think it was 24 shows in 40 days. The only cancellation was for D.C., bummer. Did spend an extra day due to that in a home in the forest in Connecticut. RIP Giuseppe who passed of I believe a heart attack like in his 40's. High quality guys. I'll never forget that true punk highlight of my life. I highly recommend every punk be on a tour if possible. We released this 3/85. 

BCT #16 - V/A - Senza Tregua

From 1985. 9 Bands. 28 Songs.

BCT #16

Chris BCT Says:
This was the first of 2 tape comps we released that was already made by someone else. In this case by the punk cooperative in Italy, G.D.H.C., Grand Ducato HC. I always liked that duck cartoon. For some reason the original tape version has one extra tack by Juggernaut 7 vs 6 and Useles Boys 3 vs 2. A classic musical example of 80's Italian HC. This was released 6/85. In 2002 enterruption did a stunning lp of this with a cover commissioned to Winston Smith 1,000 pressed with more than 1 different color vinyl. Almost every song also appears live on the LWC BCT two tapes.

BCT #15 - V/A - Tropical Viruses #2

From 1984. 18 Bands. 27 Songs.

BCT #15

Chris BCT Says:
Same story as 14. This sleeve was by Carrie from the greater Los Angeles area. We also released a comic zine of her's.

BCT #14 - V/A - Tropical Viruses #1

From 1984. 7 Bands. 41 Songs.

BCT #14

Day Off - For The Lovers

BCT #13 - Stazione Suicida + Putrid Fever - 100% Italian HC Split

From 1984. 19 Songs.

BCT #13

Chris BCT Says:
Only split release on BCT. We did try to jam fill the 60 and 90 minute comp tapes. One of the big advantages of tape over lp and 7", more music. We tried to be totally open about the tapes on our catalog. Here's what we said about 13: 'Weak recording for most of Stazione Suicida, and the music slows occasionally. Putrid Fever has clean studio sound and a strong live recording.' The live is from the LWC gig, their full set. If you show 19 songs does that mean there's 19 trax? I still haven't heard a note from these. Sometimes when we made cdr's of BCT tapes either the machine made each track unique or it was side A and B like the tape, a 2 track cdr. This drawing isn't exactly what I'm into but we farmed out our art work to whomever asked to help us who had art skills. J. Yarbrough from somewhere like MO did most of our sleeves and laid out our catalog, something we (lst me and Dave then in mid 84 me and Christopher) had no skills at doing. Still don't.

BCT #12 - V/A - Hideous Freaks Search For Happiness

From 1984. 19 Bands. 48 Songs.

BCT #12

Chris BCT Says:
I forget who, a hand full of punx, wrote us during our heyday and asked us how to do punk tape comps. And most of them went on to do some. I said to come up with a tape name look at the supermarket tabloid headlines, among other things, to find possible titles. That's what I did for this tape. I didn't wanna be totally plageristic so I modified the headline which was about the one freak's search. Plus we had a one time only flurry of tape names all at once so we heaped them all onto this tape: Break Slamming; May Cause Dependence on Laxatives; Not a Bunch of Love Songs; Squeezing the Green $ Weenie; You Make Me Feel Ookie; Pure Erotic Fluff; I'm Taking a Drug--It's Coming From These Speakers. One of my favorite bands is the Hates. We may actually have asked them for a contribution cuz of that and got these few trax. Christian saw the Sex Pistols in Houston in 78 and was never the same, formed the Hates and they're still in existence. Possibly the least known ongoing punk band in the history of the world cuz they never tour outside of Houston area cept once in 2002 when I set up a 10 city Southwest tour for them. Check 'em out. UPS I called ultra core back then, faster than most other bands of the day. I foolishly thought of our best of lp as only tapes 1 to 11 but there was only 32 minutes. i could have gone into #12 here and gotten 8 more and it would have been mostly UPS. You may find this to be true also, whenever i show non punx band names or record or tape titles they find some of them to be funny or thought provoking etc. Plenty of that all thru BCT and punk generally. Our friends Psycho kept showin' up on various BCT tapes cuz they sent us like 4 different tapes from 83 to 86 or so all with some good stuff and eventually they came out here to San Diego from Boston and did a gig. I don't even know if it was a tour or a vacation but they became addicted to real taco shop burritos, of course. This is the tape with a band that as soon as we got the tape there was a slight shuffle of paper and, boom, we misplaced who they were. There was nothing on the cassette itself to indicate who it was so we actually have a band here called '?' cuz we have no idea who they are. It's one song which usually meant of whatever songs the band sent, we found just one. I don't think we ever didn't use a single song of a band so maybe on a few with just one song it might be a bit just ok vs raging. Come 1986 literally, the last 30 tapes we got all sucked bad. Pop: the end of BCT and, officially, it seemed, the end of the classic period of the 80's worldwide HC explosion. Ok, not officially but I keep having a lotta trouble finding great HC bands post 86. While during 83 to 86, especially with bands just sending us tapes in the mail, the quality stuff just came flyin' outta the sky for 3 straight years. I don't even know what's in MRR since 1986. I've found like 6 bands I like post '86 and that's trying. It just works like that. 50's music explosion. 60's music explosion. 80's HC explosion. Disco came and went maybe in the 80's. Whatever other booms that have come and gone. The difference is that no one keeps making new 50's music (of course rockabilly and psychobilly boom and that's totally alive) but punk keeps it up, partly cuz it stayed in our hands, not in the hands of big music business. So if we wanted it to live, it lives. And, it lives. Now, thanks to Dr Drunk (he helped me with a boil. But it hurt) and a buncha punx I keep both meeting and re-meeting on my chris bct facebook page, and velved and social napalm who keep making BCT tapes (I hear social napalm is stopping tho?), it stays alive. Cuz it is. If art doesn't get lost, if it was any good, it lives throughout the ages. And, baby, this stuff lives.

BCT #11 - V/A - Brain Of Stone

From 1984. 23 Bands. 58 Songs. (2 Files)

BCT#11 pt 1

BCT #11 pt 2

Chris BCT Says:
I'm still amazed at some of the great bands that sent tapes to BCT, Razor Blades had a great discography style cd on Grand Theft Audio, course, the Accused, in their pre whatever metal flavored stage?, Cancerous Growth from around Boston, to us on the West Coast, like a partner in crime to Psycho and Vicious Circle from Australia. Someone found Youth Corps on this comp, if I understand it right, and made a 7" outta it, I think with the band's permission. Happy Flowers are one of the handful of bands on BCT that are outside the HC box. They have an amazing song, in fact, it's the only one we used of theirs, called Mom I Gave the Cat Some Acid (Don't Tell Dad). I looked for it on You Tube and only found other versions of it that I didn't care for. This version rocks. And it's like a punk band who took acid. For some reason we didn't stick by our usual goal of having tapes by countries and mixed in 5 other countries along with the U.S. bands. A local band, the Wallflowers were the only band for BCT (except for Quod Massacre in Yugoslavia who fervently asked us to be on the I've Got An Attitude Problem 7") who basically asked us could they be on the comps. Nice guys, local. The usual was that we only wanted songs we liked, that whipped us, on our comps. This comp we maybe got a little loosey goosey cuz there'd be a few songs that were on the fence, good HC but not classic, not spectacular. This was our 2nd of 2 90 minute tape comps and it would definitely be stronger if it was a 60. In the end, I found I got attached to all the songs on BCT (ok, not on 9 TK or 23 FO/G or the Finnish bands on 21. Interestingly, all 3 of those were selected by other people, more on that when 21 comes up). The tapes ended up being like our kids, yea, baby cassettes. Like a piece of art, something that didn't exist before, that great world HC woven together into a new configuration. And without links, computers, You Tube, bandcamp, it really was a main way to get music into the hands of punx around the world. Not only was tape cheaper for us to make and we only had to do one at a time rather than say pay for 500 lps or 7"s, but ya got more music for cheaper. A 7" would be maybe $2 for 14 minutes, an lp maybe 40 minutes for $6. We could sell a tape with 60 to 90 minutes, chock full of the same great HC music as on a 7" or lp, but a real bargain. And it was pretty common to find punx who had less rather than more money. We had a guy in some mid western state who did and re-did almost all our tape sleeves. This one and #22 and #2 weren't really to my liking theme wise. I prefer to not have cursing due to my trying to be a godly man (I find there's way more similarities between punx of those who believe in God and those who don't believe in Him. I talked with BGK for a coupla hours once and we ended up finding we had the exact same beliefs about life except for our belief or non belief in God). I get this tape sleeve, a cop. For some reason tho it just didn't come clear. We have an alt version in the BCT catalog (we mailed out maybe 1000's of 'em, we didn't ask for a stamp or a buck but about 1/3 of the time the punk would include it when they asked for one) of a drawing that's also not particularly exciting for me. One thing I like about BCT is we didn't just have a ton of skulls. Some punk recently commented to me on my chris bct fb page about the BCT graphics, how they were non standard for the HC world. I like that. 58 songs i 90 minutes. Ya know it's a punk tape. This tape comp is typical of what tape comps could do: make a buncha bands available to your ears that you might otherwise never hear. I look at the list of 23 bands and about 11 of them I never saw another release by them. Comps end up being a living audio and visual museum of some bands who just barely were around and sometimes, like the Accused, were not around long in that form (the good, HC form!). Yak.

BCT #10 - V/A - I'm Buck Naked

From 1984. 13 Bands. 56 Songs.

BCT #10

Chris BCT Says:
I've been able to hear Music on Fire from the remaster Enormous Door did. Still shows tape wear but I can't stop, pretty much. I'm stunned how intense and amazing the music is. I'm not sure I've heard 60 minutes of this caliber of HC made since 1986. For I'm Buck Naked the name came from a SNL skit some guy flashes his coat open with his back to us, "I'm buck naked!" We generally stayed by countries but still had Akutt Innleggelse and Raw Power. Mostly cuz the tapes from bands came in as they came in. Detention is one of those bands that's a bit flat on studio releases but kills live and this is a 5 song live set that, if the world was right, some songs would be killa hits and Dead Rock n Rollers would definitely be one of them (along with Mom, I Think I Gave the Cat Some Acid and F. Authority and Raw Power and Mass Media, well you get the idea). Eat the Rich was on 2 comps, they sent us two different tapes at two different times. Psycho almost became a house band ending up on maybe 3 comps and on I've Got An Attitude Problem. When enterruption re-issued the best of this along with the best of #3 Eat Me, on cd, they edited the radio show of the Psycho tracks and basically wham bammed 'em with no inter song talk per se and it really tightened up the set. We were surprised when White Pride sent us a tape. I don't remember if we'd heard of them before. We were in a quagmire. What to do?  
We referenced the DK's inner lp sleeve of a bunch of male genitals and I sure wasn't into that but considered it in terms of free speech which, btw, is what radical Muslims get upset about the Western world, they see our willingness to allow free speech and, thus, tons of porn and other over the line stuff, as endorsing them but really it's tolerating it in the name of free speech. So we wrote them back and said, ya know, yer dealing with a Mexican and a liberal and whatever else we were that racists would hate. They sent back a note that was fine. We didn't use one song cuz the racism was just too stupid. We loved one song which wasn't racist. There is one racist song but we figured anyone could figure out that it's stupid. When we did the Raw Power tour in '84 Jello was speaking with punx in the front of the Adams Avenue Theater and he asked to speak with BCT about WP bring on our tape. Basically, we told him it was in the name of free speech which, ya know, that's what free speech is, allowing someone who's opinion you detest to holler at the top of their lungs their nonsense while you do the same (see the American President, Michael Douglas, best president speech in the movies ever). Looking back over 30 years I still can't decide what the right thing to do was but we had to make a decision and reluctantly made this one. Velved sells the BCT tapes but has simply edited out the WP trax as they will have nothing to do with racism. We don't either and still used these trax. A real dilemma. I love Akutt I. Classic non Finnish Scandinavian HC sound. Love Canal and the Drills (Seattle) also are on 2 BCT comps, again cuz they sent 2 different tapes. We used a 4 second song by Suburban Decay on our lst lp, We Can Do Whatever We Want. It was the only song by them we used. Great tiny song too. I remember we didn't have quite enough music to make the full 60 minutes so we took another Raw Power song from some source that we'd not previously used and used that one track to fill it out. We released this 6/84 and did the Raw Power and Riistetyt tour from July to September '84, 2 of the first non UK HC bands to ever tour the U.S. BGK also toured for the first time that same summer. The one show we did together was that lst International HC gig at the Olympic Auditorium, 5,000 punx, 5 slam pits. Some kid bashed into Jello and he got a cast on his leg outta it and kids were swarming the stage when RP was on the whole time. Totally memorable. I still can't believe we did a tour and then after I lost $5,000 doing that my next BCT partner, Christopher, convinced me to do the Indigesti tour in '86. We broke even cuz we didn't rent any vehicles cuz Follow Fashion Monkeys had a van! Stiv of T.V.O.R., one of the greatest zines in the world, from Italy, was also on that tour. Man, these tapes are bringin' back the memories. And I have yet to hear one cuz I can't figure out how to download 'em but Doc is gonna hep me out. Meanwhile, it's clear to me that me and Dave just happened to decide to do BCT in about 1982 and finally got off our discussing it butts and started doing it in 1983 while thru 1986 the explosion of awesome HC from around the mostly Western world exploded all around us. And we happened to catch this stuff outta the HC sky and ended up keeping it for posterity. I'm glad we made it a point to try hard to not use any songs that sucked cuz then it made the comps stronger and better lasting over the years. Thanks again Doc. Cool.

BCT #9 - Terveet Kädet - Knock Out

From 1984. LOTS of Songs!

BCT #9

Chris BCT Says:
Our second tape that we actually asked the band for and we got this from TK. This tape is dedicated to their drummer, Walde, who died in January, 1984. Contains studio and live cuts from 1982 to 1984. The band made both the tape and the sleeve art. We used 7 songs from it adding them onto the cd re-issue of I Thrash, Therefore I Am in 2002. Other than those songs, I don't really care for the rest of this tape in terms of musical quality. Oddly, to me, I've had more than one punk tell me over the years how great this tape is so, I dunno, to each his own. Basically, we felt a little sheepish when they sent the tape, like, we'd asked them for whatever they wanted to send us and didn't really wanna edit it up. If we had, it'd a been about 10 minutes and we figured that wasn't enough for a full tape release. So, here it is. Maybe I should listen to it again.

BCT #8 - Rattus - Finnish Hardcore

From 1984. 34 Songs.

BCT #8

Chris BCT Says:
This came out 3/84. We decided to ask 3 of our favorite bands if they'd send us something for a tape, Rattus, Terveet Kadet and Funeral Oration. This tape was completely made by Rattus. It includes demos from 12/81, '82 and '83 for 32 songs and 2 live songs from '83. Over the years I've seen the occasional list of Rattus releases and this tape is rarely listed on such discographies. It is excellent. We had an alternative cover, way better than this country one, of Rattus in big letters over an a bomb cloud and a guy with his back of his head to the explosion drawn by Jason Treager. At least we used it in our BCT catalog. We were working with Vote Vasko, the main punk connection for Finnish punk with the rest of the punk world, to have Rattus on the Raw Power summer '84 tour. However, at sorta the last minute they couldn't make it and instead he asked if Riistetyt could come instead. We said sure cuz they were also musically great. Turned out on the tour they changed their musical style to more like Lords of the New Church, Jr., but, what the heck. So a few of the flyers from that tour show Rattus on the flyer tho they were never here in '84. I think they first toured the U.S. in 2002 if I'm not mistaken.

BCT #7 - V/A - Last White Christmas #2

From 1984. 3 Bands. 32 Songs

BCT #7

Chris BCT Says:
I wrote a list of all my favorite albums and a few 7"s and called this my favorite album of all time at chrisbct2.blogspot.com. Originally a 60 minute tape, re-issued in 2002 as a 72 minute cd, 500 copies. When we were originally making it Antonio is sayin', 'No, not this track.' due to some perceived imperfection of the performance for this song or that one. Me and Dave are like flummoxed, cuz every song ruled. He was the bassist so we did what he wanted. I still disagree. Every song CCM did and, oddly, strangely, every song of the entire gig rules. I've always loved split releases and this works to perfection as a 3 split release. Most bands fall into the either they're great in the studio and not so great live or the opposite. Only a few blast in both. CCM has some great releases particularly their split cassette release with IRI! Permanent Scar. It was re-issued shorter on lp. They've done other albums and 7"s but nothing compares to their live set and this one is their finest. Period. They do many maybe even all the songs from the PS release. There's something about their intensity. I had a punk friend and his punk friend in the back of my parent's big car in S.F. maybe in 2002 and we're crusin' in the night and I'm blastin' this thing and as every CCM song comes on I'm askin' 'em if that's tearin' their heads off and they're laughin' and shouting how it is and then the next song comes on and it was just a frenzy. CCM only toured the U.S. once, 1986. They honored us by driving all the way down from Utah or somewhere to do our San Diego show then back up to S.F. It was one of the great shows I ever saw. Virtually exactly as amazing as this one. Oddly, the S.F. show was video taped and it is flat. I don't know why. Some folks say CCM is the Italian Germs. I can see it. I saw both bands and there's no question that CCM is band they are only with some overlap with the Germs. Really what they are, particularly on this live tape, is the greatest live recorded HC set ever. When the 2002 cd came out I was communicating with Syd, the singer and he suggested that all the music be made free. It's what's instigated me to do so onto the Internet once I get the BCT tapes remastered. These on Dr Drunk are a great way to start tho I have yet to successfully hear a note of any of the tapes cuz of downloading issues. IRI! is a completely unique HC band. I still don't know what they have besides some keyboard. They have a song where there's an explosion. It's 1983. How did they do that? No computers. I generally dislike keyboard. Pere Ubu does it cuz they're so off kilter about it and the Doors and Elvis Costello seem to do it. But in a HC band, I just don't get it but it totally works. The singer visited us in the mid 80's with his gf. They vacationed in Mexico and he came back and showed us a 7 layer deep burn in the middle of his chest. Traumatic was, at the time, folding. But, apparently they came back in to be in this gig. It's tight and total 60's punk. Italy has a very unique musical fabric and Traumatic (and Juggernaut) give us a connection to the 60's punk but still very flavorful of the classic 80's Italian HC. Like Walter Brennan said in an old b&w movie: no brag, just fact.
 At the end of this vol ll we chose a Christmas song and speeded it up. Antonio wrote a manifesto type statement and attempted to say it in Italian but failed spectacularly so, of course, we included it. Then I said it in English but got overly excited and loud so the last sentence is missed which is something like, 'against cops, no matter what uniform they wear.' It's the only time on a BCT tape that we added our own thing.

BCT #6 - V/A - Last White Christmas #1

From 1984. 9 Bands. 56 Songs

BCT #6

Chris BCT Says:
We had, literally, 80 punx from around the world, Canada, the UK, Italy, Germany, Australia, Mexico, Finland, Japan and maybe a coupla other countries, come to the house in the 80's. In the snail mail days it was all arranged by, well, snail mail and maybe the rare expensive long distance call. They were all comin' out anyway but we made it a point to hang. The first visitor was Antonio, the bassist of Cheetah Chrome Motherf..'s and his non English speaking friend (whose smiling face is on the LWC tape sleeves). He arrived 12/11/83, a week after the LWC gig. And he not only had the tapes of the gig but also permission and request from GDHC Gran Ducato HC, a collective of punx in Italy and their label Cessophena Records, for BCT to release this show. All BCT tapes had been 60 minute comps. But there was about 5 hours of music here and it all ripped. I still consider it the finest recorded HC gig of all time. Antonio, his friend and my lst BCT partner, Dave, and I went to work creating the 2 volumes. Antonio was quite firm about what he did and didn't want particularly for the CCM trax. One day I hope to post the entire unedited gig online somewhere. It really is awesome all the way through. War Dogs had given Antonio their demo tape to give to us to release however we thought to, which was the BCT part, taking music sent to us and then choosing the great stuff. We also edited out like down live time between songs, again tho, never editing a song itself. We finally released it 2/84. It shows ya how much time it took to make one of these. Back in our first year or two we also included a booklet. Fortunately, I still have a copy of each of them which is whatever paperwork any band sent with their tape. We stopped including the booklets at some point cuz of the cost given that BCT never made any money. This tape was re-issued on cd in 2002 by a consortium of enterruption, Human Stench and Schizophrenic Records and BCT, 500 copies. This is a classic case of, well, on this tape of course you go on to hear of Raw Power but all the other 8 didn't make a lotta awareness over the years tho Juggernaut did do a cd album. They and Traumatic on vol ll are a 60's sorta HC band. There was a nice 'outside the HC box' from some bands.

BCT #5 - Raw Power

From 1984. 40 Songs.

BCT #5

Chris BCT Says:
I notice we show 45 songs in the BCT catalog while you show 40 here. It's the Brown Studio '83 tracks. The band laughs when I mention that cuz they say it wasn't hardly a studio at all and then 3 demo songs from '84. Then the other side is their complete set from the 12/4/83 Last White Christmas gig in Pisa. It's when they had the amazing screaming vocalist for a few of their songs. He didn't make the U.S. tour in '84 so Davide took his place with a touch more metal flavor git and admirable scream replacement.

BCT #4 - V/A - Ahhh... Italian Punk!!

From 1984. 9 Bands. 29 Songs.

BCT #4

Chris BCT Says:
We got like 2 60's and a 90 of Italian HC from Roberto Schavio with the music that ended up being 2 Music on Fire and 4 Ahhh... Syd of CCM had seen a tiny ad we put in a sorta new wave Italian mag that we'd stumbled on, Rockerilla I think and asked Roberto to send us those tapes of, well, this music. Course, we went nuts. It's how we first got contact with Raw Power who told us they wanted to tour the U.S. and hadn't be4. No non UK HC band had till BGK, Raw Power and Riistetyt did in summer of '84. We'd never done anything like that but it was a tour of a lifetime for us.

BCT #3 - V/A - Eat Me

From 1983. 7 Bands. 39 Songs.

BCT #3

Chris BCT Says:
Our 2nd U.S. comp done in 12/83 after 1 First Strike which we called it that cuz by the time we did our first tape we were already working on a few more. Got to use our friends Solucion Mortal from TJ whom we'd met earlier in mid 83 in TJ at a show with like 9 bands, they were the only Mexican one and opened and they kept adding bands. X and Minutemen were supposed to end the show but the cops closed it at midnight. At a movie theatre, no problems either. I wish I knew who the amazing Tucson rockabilly band was. Awesome. It was great makin' HC comps in the mid 80's. Just a coincidence we'd decided to do it in the middle of the explosion of world classic HC.

BCT #2 - V/A - Music On Fire

From 1983. 7 Bands. 42 Songs.

BCT #2 

Chris BCT Says:
When we got those 2 60's and the 90 of Italian HC it just blew us up and the name of the tape just came naturally. Wretched continues to be one of the most amazing bands I've ever heard. This tape has the first BCT tape with Raw Power. We ended up doing 5 Raw Power, their live set at the Last White Christmas gig of 12/4/83 on 6 LWC vol l, 1 song on I'm Buck Naked and the 17 Raw Power live in the US '84 from tapes I made from that tour. and other live '84 trax from that tour on 18 I Thrash, Therefore I Am. As with every Italian punk we met in the 80's, all high quality guys. RIP Giuseppe Codellupi. We made it a point to only use songs we liked so most of our tapes still rip ya head off cuz quality travels time well.

BCT #1 - V/A - First Strike

From 1983. 9 Bands. 47 Songs.

BCT #1

Chris BCT Says:
We just put little ads in zines and then regularly in MRR including up to 1/2 a page on a few issues. I can't and we couldn't then believe that Clit Boys, Vatican Commandos and Mr Epp sent us tapes. Like some of the classic great U.S. HC of the day. It's one of the leveling element of punk. Ya find great bands, some known, some not, on all kinda punk comps. As time passed it has been interesting to see some were really rarely heard elsewhere cept on the bct tape comp they were on, least that I was able to see. My then girlfriend's little brother, well, I turned him onto HC, felt like I was turning him onto drugs. And he immediately formed Cultural Breakthrough. He did end up becoming an attorney just like he said and the one time I went to visit him in his office he had a CB t-shirt there to give me. Like 20 years later. This tape came out 10/83.

BCT Month!

That's right, February is Bad Compilation Tapes Month! I've finally been able to collect 1 through 27 and you're getting every last one of them! God Bless America!!