NONSTOP, NOT FULL STOP: SICK OF IT ALL’S RE-RECORDING CONUNDRUM
So then, considerable baggage in tow, comes the arrival of Sick Of It All’s Nonstop. Culling from two-and-a-half decades of material, the NYHC heroes rejigger twenty of their tracks in their current metal-tinged sound, abetted by producer Tue Madsen. The sticker slapped on the cover of the “deluxe” import edition boasts: “MAXIMIZED AND IMPROVED NEW RECORDINGS OF SOIA CLASSICS.” This sort of revisionism can provide disastrous in many cases. There are ethical and even existential questions in play. In a hardcore scene obsessed with multi-colored first pressings, the threat intensifies. Is it right for some kid to hear the 2011 version of “It’s Clobbering Time” before or instead of the original?
Gorilla Biscuits, Agnostic Front, Sick Of It All, Terror, Absolution, Antidote, Maximum Penalty, Backtrack, Down To Nothing, No Turning Back, Take Offense and Bottom Out. Every single one of these bands i scheduled to play what is arguably the best damn daylong hardcore event of 2011: 
Hardcore has been through a considerable evolution since the emblematic 1980s, with most of the contemporary acts operating under that banner sounding poles apart from progenitors like Black Flag or Minor Threat. So it’s a testament to the state of this music that Queens, New York natives Sick Of It All has managed to stay together–recording and touring–for twenty-five long years without stagnating. Though considered part of a “second wave” of NYHC that followed Agnostic Front and Cro-Mags, the quartet’s discography touches on punky, metallic, and even poppy iterations of hardcore, which has lent to their continued appeal to an inter-generational fanbase, visible and vocal at this hometown 25th anniversary celebration, held at a predictably sold-out Webster Hall.
Longevity in hardcore is a rare thing. Black Flag and Minor Threat have been broken up for decades, while groups like Cro-Mags and Dead Kennedys have sporadically revived with curious and even dueling lineups over the years. So last year, when H2O celebrated their fifteenth anniversary, it was a pretty big deal. Yet fellow NYHC figures 
If you’re one of those people who read this site every day (God bless you, you fucking masochists!), you may have noticed a lack of premium content from yours truly these past couple of weeks. That’s because I’ve been in Japan soaking in neon, dining on fresh sushi, and recoiling in horror at the perverse underbelly of otaku. I did manage to hit up a few rock bars in Osaka (Rock Rock — 
The thorny history of New York hardcore pioneers Cro-Mags can’t be done justice in a pithy blog post, what with myriad lineup changes and squabbles that fortunately haven’t harmed the band’s legacy as much as, say, L.A. Guns. The current incarnation of Cro-Mags now playing gigs features Age Of Quarrel-era vocalist John Joseph and drummer Mackie Jayson, yet excludes guitarist Parris Mayhew and bassist/Best Wishes vocalist Harley Flanagan. In 
