Blackspot – Discography?!

This is a weird post, mostly because I have absolutely no info about Blackspot beyond what you can find out yourself with 2 clicks of your mouse (check out their MySpace page). Even more damaging to my credibility as a hardcore nerd is the fact that until relatively recently I did not even know that Blackspot existed. So why do I feel the need to share this with you, you ask? Well, the short and obvious answer is that Blackspot are pretty awesome.

The somewhat longer answer is that I am a big fan of all the bands that came out on Workshed Records in the late 80s and early 90s. This fact might be pretty obvious to you already if you read my posts on Headfirst and 411 below. However, the Workshed catalog is incredibly small (only a total of 10 releases) and when they were still around I never consciously sought out their releases, cross-referencing band- or label-mates. I did stuff like that with “larger” labels like Revelation or Dischord, which quickly built up rather sizable catalogs (or in the case of Dischord had already been around for quite a while before I got into hardcore). In the case of Workshed I just happened to like the bands and I noticed that they were on the same label, but I never really knew anything about the label per se (I am learning about all that stuff just now, and it is really very much internet-filtered, second-hand info). Anyway, when I did the Headfirst post below I also searched for info about Workshed and in that context found a complete list of their small catalog (as I said, 10 releases total, 2 of which were labeled as Workshed #8, because they could not decide which record to release first…). I noticed with some sense of satisfaction that I had all of the records listed there, except for Blackspot’s 7” “Check out the helmet”. In fact, I had never even heard of Blackspot before. As I said, I did not follow Workshed’s releases religiously as I did with other labels, but even if I had, in the dark days before the internet I probably would have never noticed a gap in my collection, because Blackspot’s 7” is one of those 2 records that both are listed as Workshed #8 (damn those hippies…).

Anyway, I spent some time searching for this single and I got real lucky. Someone had posted not only that Workshed 7”, but a lot of (all of?) their other stuff as well. And this is what I am reposting here. I’d like to give due credits, but I honestly could not figure out anymore where I got this from. So, sorry awesome unknown blogger!

The reason why I am posting this now –again, apart from the obvious reason that they rock- is that Blend77 over on “Zen and the Art of Face Punching” just did a post about Hard Stance’s “Face Reality”, which was Workshed #1. And in that context someone casually mentioned that “someone” should do a complete Workshed post, maybe the poor man’s hardcore equivalent of the Hoover-Genealogy, which slowly unfolds on “Hardcore for Nerds”. After I had posted 411 and Headfirst I briefly had that exact thought, with “someone” being me of course. So, although I don’t know whether that actually will ever happen, with this Blackspot post, we are almost one-third of the way already.

You wonder what the music sounds like?
Like the OCHC stuff that Workshed released back in the days; you know, Headfirst, Hard Stance, 411, stuff like that…

And oh yeah, finally, one of the songs is a bold cover of Motorhead’s “Ace of Spades”. Messing with a classic like this usually never works out, but this is surprisingly good. “Ace of spades” appeared on the “Guilty by Association” sampler and the band is listed as “Collateral damage” there As far as I can tell the 2 bands only share one member, but on Blackspot’s MySpace page they even list it as a Blackspot song, so what do I know… nothing. However, if YOU have any more information and anecdotes about this great band, please drop me a line.

Enjoy

Blackspot