Rites of Spring (album)

Last updated
Rites of Spring
Rites of Springalbum.jpg
Studio album by
ReleasedJune 1985
RecordedFebruary 1985
Genre
Length37:32
Label Dischord
Producer Ian MacKaye
Rites of Spring chronology
Rites of Spring
(1985)
All Through a Life
(1987)

Rites of Spring is the only studio album by American post-hardcore band Rites of Spring. It was recorded at Inner Ear Studios in February 1985 and released on vinyl in June 1985 as Dischord Records #16. The album was produced by Ian MacKaye and contains twelve songs.

Contents

The album was re-released on CD and cassette in 1987, with an additional track from the same session, "Other Way Around", as well as the four songs from the Rites' follow-up EP, All Through a Life (track 14–17), recorded January 1986 and released in 1987 (Dischord #22). End on End features the same cover as the debut album.

Production

Guy Picciotto has said of the recording process for the album:

"That record was way closer to the live experience than the first demo. It was recorded with all four of us in one tiny room facing each other with no separation at all. We tracked all the music live in one take in the dark with a strobe going. Later on, I recorded all the vocals for the 13 songs in one take as well, one after the other. There are barely any overdubs at all — just some backups, a few bits of percussion and maybe a guitar part here and there. We played the improv ending on the last song, ‘End On End,’ until the tape ran out and rolled off the reels." [1]

Music

Influenced by The Faith, Rites of Spring continued to combine desperate introspective lyrics with angry melody-tinged songwriting that moved even further from the hardcore punk formula. [2]

Reception

Professional ratings
Review scores
SourceRating
AllMusic Star full.svgStar full.svgStar full.svgStar full.svgStar half.svg [3]

The album was listed at number 30 on Kurt Cobain's top 50 favorite albums. [4] [5] Pitchfork online magazine ranked it number 96 on its list of the Top 100 Albums of the 1980s. [6] It has appeared on various best-of emo album lists by Consequence of Sound , [7] Kerrang! , [8] LA Weekly , [9] and Rolling Stone , [10] as well as by journalists Leslie Simon and Trevor Kelley in their book Everybody Hurts: An Essential Guide to Emo Culture (2007). [11] Metal Hammer named the album in their list of "the 10 essential post-hardcore albums." [12]

Kelefa Sanneh described it as, "The first emo album, and still one of the greatest. It was a volatile album, with Picciotto screaming lyrics that a different singer may have chosen to whisper. [13]

Track listing

All songs written by Rites of Spring.

Side one

  1. "Spring" – 2:09
  2. "Deeper Than Inside" – 2:17
  3. "For Want Of" – 3:09
  4. "Hain's Point" – 2:08
  5. "All There Is" – 2:54
  6. "Drink Deep" – 4:54

Side two

  1. "Theme" – 2:19
  2. "By Design" – 2:38
  3. "Remainder" – 2:30
  4. "Persistent Vision" – 2:21
  5. "Nudes" – 2:48
  6. "End On End" – 7:23

Personnel

Rites of Spring

Additional performers

Production

Related Research Articles

Emo is a rock music genre characterized by emotional, often confessional lyrics. It emerged as a style of hardcore punk and post-hardcore from the mid-1980s Washington, D.C. hardcore scene, where it was known as emotional hardcore or emocore. The bands Rites of Spring and Embrace, among others, pioneered the genre. In the early and mid 1990s, emo was adopted and reinvented by alternative rock, indie rock, punk rock, and pop-punk bands, including Sunny Day Real Estate, Jawbreaker, Cap'n Jazz, and Jimmy Eat World. By the mid-1990s, Braid, the Promise Ring, and the Get Up Kids emerged from Midwest emo, and several independent record labels began to specialize in the genre. Meanwhile, screamo, a more aggressive style of emo using screamed vocals, also emerged, pioneered by the San Diego bands Heroin and Antioch Arrow. Screamo achieved mainstream success in the 2000s with bands like Hawthorne Heights, Silverstein, Story of the Year, Thursday, the Used, and Underoath.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Fugazi</span> American punk band

Fugazi was an American punk rock band formed in Washington, D.C., in 1986. The band consisted of guitarists and vocalists Ian MacKaye and Guy Picciotto, bassist Joe Lally, and drummer Brendan Canty. They were noted for their style-transcending music, DIY ethical stance, manner of business practice, and contempt for the music industry.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Rites of Spring</span> American punk rock band

Rites of Spring was an American punk rock band from Washington, D.C., formed in late 1983. Along with Embrace, and Beefeater, they were one of the mainstay acts of the 1985 Revolution Summer movement which took place within the Washington, D.C. hardcore punk scene.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Guy Picciotto</span> Musical artist

Guy Charles Picciotto is an American songwriter, musician, and record producer from Washington, D.C.

<i>The Argument</i> (Fugazi album) 2001 studio album by Fugazi

The Argument is the sixth and most recent studio album from the post-hardcore band Fugazi released on October 16, 2001, through Dischord Records. It was recorded at Don Zientara's Inner Ear Studios in Arlington, VA and the Dischord House between January and April 2001. It was the band's last release before going on hiatus in 2003, until the release of First Demo over thirteen years later.

Dag Nasty is an American hardcore punk band from Washington D.C., formed in 1985 by guitarist Brian Baker of Minor Threat, drummer Colin Sears and bassist Roger Marbury, both of Bloody Mannequin Orchestra, and vocalist Shawn Brown. Their style of less aggressive, melodic hardcore was influential to post-hardcore; their sound was partly influenced by The Faith and their 1983 EP Subject to Change. Other influences include Descendents, Buzzcocks, and The Clash.

Post-hardcore is a punk rock music genre that maintains the aggression and intensity of hardcore punk but emphasizes a greater degree of creative expression. Like the term "post-punk", the term "post-hardcore" has been applied to a broad constellation of groups. Initially taking inspiration from post-punk and noise rock, post-hardcore began in the 1980s with bands like Hüsker Dü and Minutemen. The genre expanded in the 1980s and 1990s with releases by bands from cities that had established hardcore scenes, such as Fugazi from Washington, D.C. as well as groups such as Big Black, Jawbox, Quicksand, and Shellac that stuck closer to post-hardcore's noise rock roots. Dischord Records became a major nexus of post-hardcore during this period. The genre also began to incorporate more dense, complex, and atmospheric instrumentals with bands like Slint and Unwound, and also experienced some crossover from indie rock with bands like The Dismemberment Plan. In the early- and mid-2000s, post-hardcore achieved mainstream success with the popularity of bands like At the Drive-In, My Chemical Romance, Dance Gavin Dance, AFI, Underoath, Hawthorne Heights, Silverstein, the Used, Saosin, Alexisonfire, and Senses Fail. In the 2010s, bands like Sleeping with Sirens and Pierce the Veil achieved mainstream success under the post-hardcore label. Meanwhile, bands like Title Fight and La Dispute experienced underground popularity playing music that bore a closer resemblance to the post-hardcore bands of the 1980s and 1990s.

State of Alert was an American hardcore punk group formed in Washington, D.C., in October 1980, and active till July 1981. S.O.A. was fronted by Henry Rollins, then using his original surname Garfield.

<i>Steady Diet of Nothing</i> 1991 studio album by Fugazi

Steady Diet of Nothing is the second studio album by American post-hardcore band Fugazi, released in July 1991 by Dischord Records. Although a persistent rumor alleges that the title is an allusion to a quote by the late American stand-up comedian Bill Hicks, the album title predates the Hicks quote by several years and was actually thought up by bassist Joe Lally.

Happy Go Licky was an American post-hardcore band formed in the spring of 1987, and which broke up after their final show at Washington, D.C.'s 9:30 Club on New Year's Day in 1988. The group was a short-lived reunion of the renowned D.C. hardcore band Rites of Spring.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Washington, D.C. hardcore</span> Hardcore punk scene of Washington, D.C.

Washington, D.C. hardcore, commonly referred to as D.C. hardcore, sometimes styled in writing as harDCore, is the hardcore punk scene of Washington, D.C. Emerging in late 1979, it is considered one of the first and most influential punk scenes in the United States.

One Last Wish was a short-lived post-hardcore band from Washington, D.C. It was formed in May 1986 by members of Rites of Spring, and split up in January 1987.

<i>In on the Kill Taker</i> 1993 studio album by Fugazi

In on the Kill Taker is the third full-length studio album by the American post-hardcore band Fugazi. It was released on June 30, 1993, through Dischord Records and was recorded at Inner Ear Studios and produced by Ted Niceley and Don Zientara. In on the Kill Taker captured the aggressiveness of the band's earlier releases while displaying a more diverse range of influences.

<i>Red Medicine</i> 1995 studio album by Fugazi

Red Medicine is the fourth studio album by the American post-hardcore band Fugazi, released on June 12, 1995, by Dischord Records. It is the band's most commercially successful album, peaking at number 126 on the U.S. Billboard 200 and number 18 on the UK Albums Chart.

<i>Fugazi</i> (EP) 1988 EP by Fugazi

Fugazi, also known as the EP 7 Songs, is the debut eponymous release by the American post-hardcore band Fugazi. As with subsequent release Margin Walker, Guy Picciotto did not contribute guitar to this record; all guitar was performed by Ian MacKaye. It was originally recorded in June 1988 and released in November 1988 on vinyl and again in 1989 on the compilation release 13 Songs along with the following EP Margin Walker. The photo used for the album cover was taken on June 30, 1988 at Maxwell's in Hoboken, New Jersey.

<i>Margin Walker</i> 1989 EP by Fugazi

Margin Walker is the second EP by the American post-hardcore band Fugazi. It was originally released in June 1989 on vinyl and again in the same year on the compilation release 13 Songs along with the debut EP Fugazi. The 12" vinyl went out of print, but was remastered and reissued by Dischord Records in October 2009.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">The Faith (American band)</span> American hardcore punk band

The Faith was an early American hardcore punk band, from Washington D.C., with strong connections to the scene centered on the Dischord label. Along with Minor Threat, the Faith were key players in the early development of hardcore, with a (later) melodic approach that would influence not just associated acts like Rites of Spring, Embrace and Fugazi, but also a subsequent generation of bands such as Nirvana, whose Kurt Cobain was a vocal fan.

The Untouchables were an American hardcore punk band that arose from the Washington, D.C. hardcore punk scene of the late 1970s and early 1980s. The band existed from October 1979 until January 1981 and released four tracks.

<i>End on End</i> 1991 compilation album by Rites of Spring

End on End is a compilation album by American punk rock band Rites of Spring. It was released in 1991 on Dischord. The album consists of the group's first album Rites of Spring and its EP All Through a Life, along with an extra studio track.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Michael Hampton (punk musician)</span> Musical artist

Michael Hampton is a guitarist in the Washington, D.C., hardcore punk scene.

References

Citations

  1. Dugan, John (November 3, 2008). "End on End: RITES OF SPRING: Highlights from The DC Issue". STOPSMILING. Archived from the original on December 28, 2010. Retrieved October 17, 2023.
  2. "Subject to Change 12" EP". Kill from the Heart. Archived from the original on December 17, 2014. Retrieved August 11, 2012.
  3. Kantor, Matt. "End on End - Rites of Spring | Songs, Reviews, Credits". AllMusic . Retrieved December 17, 2020.
  4. "Top 50 by Nirvana [MIXTAPE]". Archived from the original on October 18, 2014. Retrieved March 24, 2016.
  5. Cross, Charles; Gaar, Gillian G.; Gendron, Bob; Yarm, Mark; Martens, Todd (2013). Nirvana: The Complete Illustrated History. Voyageur Press. p. 106. ISBN   978-0-7603-4521-4.
  6. "Top 100 Albums of the 1980s". Pitchfork . November 21, 2002. Retrieved November 5, 2011.
  7. Chelosky, Danielle (March 2, 2020). "10 Emo Albums Every Music Fan Should Own". Consequence of Sound . Archived from the original on March 8, 2020. Retrieved August 17, 2020.
  8. De Freitas, Ryan (May 12, 2020). "The 20 Best Pre-2000s Emo Albums". Kerrang! . Archived from the original on May 26, 2020. Retrieved July 5, 2020.
  9. "Top 20 Emo Albums in History: Complete List". LA Weekly . October 10, 2013. Archived from the original on June 26, 2020. Retrieved June 25, 2020.
  10. "40 Greatest Emo Albums of All Time". Rolling Stone . September 4, 2019. Archived from the original on April 15, 2019. Retrieved August 17, 2020.
  11. Simon; Kelley 2007, p. 167
  12. Johnston, Emma (September 28, 2016). "The 10 essential post-hardcore albums". Metal Hammer . Retrieved December 17, 2020.
  13. Kelefa Sanneh (2021). Major Labels. Canongate. p. 268. ISBN   9781838855932.

Sources