Search - Judge :: What It Meant: Complete Discography

Buy it only if you don't have their CDs already

Alex Faber | Northern NJ United States | 08/08/2005

(4 out of 5 stars)

"Judge was a groundbreaking hardcore band, taking the standard 87 style sound and coupling it with metal riffs and tempos years before the metalcore sound was prominent in the scene. If you've never heard the band before, or lost all your vinyl copies years ago, you should get this now.



However, if you already own the "Bringin It Down" CD and "The Storm," there's no need to get this. As far as I know, the recording isn't remastered, the unreleased song "Holding On" is already available on the Rev Rarities CD, and the main selling point, the inclusion of the "Chung King Can Suck It" LP (the original recording of "Bringin' It Down"), isn't worth it. The Chung King material may be good to listen to once, but isn't something I would find myself playing repeatedly. Actually, the biggest surprise is the sound quality of the Chung King LP. Despite the group's well-documented dissatisfaction with it, if you listen to contemporaneous hardcore albums like Bold's "Speak Out" or Misfits' "Earth AD" for comparison purposes, the sound really isn't that bad.



Finally, the layout leaves something to be desired. It's full of photos and has decent liner notes, but could have included more photos and art from the original releases, and the CD itself looks pretty bad: just a picture of a speaker or something with double-exposure of an image of an X-ed up hand on part of it ... something like that. I know the design won't matter to everyone, but if you're going to do a discography, memories and, subsequently, photos and images, become more important. Rev should've followed the example of similar CDs, such as Turning Point's discography, or Mad Parade's "Reissues" CD as far as including artwork from the past releases.



Overall, this is a great package, and it's nice to have everything in one place, but if you already have most of this, it's far from essential, and you should spend your money elsewhere."

Classic

KH | United States | 08/22/2007

(4 out of 5 stars)

"Judge was one of those bands whose reputation preceded them. Their shows in the late 80's were often tense, unpredictably explosive events; complete with floor clearing brawls and crews battling for supremacy. What none of us knew then was just how influential Judge would end up becoming. Along with Sick Of It All, Judge (who never got enough credit) really did introduce a more metallic musical style to hardcore, a style that still influences hardcore to this day. In an era when punk was the musical anchor for hardcore, Judge took their guitar sound and made it bigger, crunchier and harder. Every track on this release is hard n heavy. The music still stands, even if some of the sentiment seems a bit foreign to kids in today's more commercialized scene."

Awesome

Michael J. Schaub | 08/10/2006

(5 out of 5 stars)

"What really makes this disc resonate is reading the liner notes. Once you read about Mike Judge's crusade to send a pissed off message to the straight edge community that was dwindling and saw many of it's staple members leave the scene, you understand his frustration and appreciate the context that these songs were written in. Judge truly was a wake-up call to the straight edge scene, and crucial to the development of metallic harcore bands like Hatebreed, Terror, and Madball. As you learn from the liner notes, an unfortunate side effect of this new feat was a wave of violence at shows. Still, I'm glad Mike Judge was pissed enough to do this for the scene. The man, and the band, do not get enough credit for their influence, and every harcore fan should own this disc."