Suicidal Tendencies: Join the Army (180g) [MUSIC ON VINYL]

Why you'll love it

Music On Vinyl presses Join the Army on 180g vinyl in the Netherlands, with an insert of lyrics and photos. It is the album where Mike Muir's Venice Beach band fused hardcore punk with metal riffs, and "Possessed to Skate" became a skate park anthem.

This edition

• 180g vinyl
• Lyrics and photo insert
• Pressed in the Netherlands

About the album

Four years is a long time in hardcore, and Suicidal Tendencies used them well. After the 1983 debut, Mike Muir kept pushing, and when the band went back into the studio in January 1987 the songs had grown heavier, longer and more tuneful, without losing the speed that made their name.

Producer and engineer Lester Claypool helped the band shape the sound, and the guitars now carry real metal weight, with Rocky George's leads cutting through. "Suicidal Maniac" kicks the door in, the title track is a rallying call, and "War Inside My Head" and "The Prisoner" pair crunching riffs with Muir's fast-talking delivery. "Possessed to Skate" is the one everyone knows, a love letter to skateboarding, while "Two Wrongs Don't Make a Right (But They Make Me Feel a Whole Lot Better)" wins the album's prize for longest title by a distance.

The band thought enough of these songs to re-record two of them for Still Cyco After All These Years in 1993. A whole generation learned to ollie to it, which, as further education goes, beats night school.

Also at Kops: more Suicidal Tendencies on vinyl · browse Punk

Tracklist

Listen

On Music On Vinyl (cat# MOVLP3083), a reissue of the 1987 album.