Customer Reviews

What It Meant: Complete Discography

5 star:		(6)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

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.

There is not a weak track on this CD. Judge where one of the best 'metal' sounding hardcore bands of the time. Tracks that stand out are Where it went, Bringin' it down and like you but realy, there is nothing you can say against any of the tracks on this CD. Even their cover of Warriors by Blitz is better than the original. The big bonus of this CD is that it is a complete discography of all of Judge's stuff so you need not get ripped off buying 'rare' albums on e-bay etc.

Nice little biography of the band also included along with some pointless pictures (well you have to complain about something)

Anyone who likes Sick of it All, Madball, Suicidal Tendencies (first 3 albums) or any late 80s hardcore needs to buy this CD.

A classic.

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.

A great discovery, Judge was a New York straight edge band that played from 1987 to 1991. They played angry, metallic hardcore that sounds a lot like Suicidal Tendencies from the" Join The Army" era. Practically all of the songs are very good, with the possible exception of the Led Zeppelin cover, "When The Levee Breaks", which isn't so great. Standouts are "The Storm", "New York Crew", "I've Lost", the OI! band Blitz cover "Warriors", and nearly every other song on this album. I only heard about this group when it came up on some sort of a search of Amazon for bands, and I'm glad that it did. Some great lyrics, mostly against drugs: on "Fed Up" it's "Smoking that butt, it makes you mature/ A slave to sex and you tell me you're pure/ You slam that beer, it makes you a man/ I'll try to keep my cool but you better understand"; on "In My Way" it's "Those drugs are gonna kill you if I don't get to you first"; on "Bringin' It Down" it's "A beer, a joint like a gun at your head/ The price that you pay is the blood that you bled/ The needle, the track mark, youu're scarred for life; You're weak and you're hurt and you're gonna lose this fight/ You drink it and you smoke it and you say you feel fine/ And you snort it and you shoot it and now it's melted your mind". "Like You", with its cool arpeggios intro, and the raw emotion of "I've Lost...". A song like the second version of "Take Me Away" is not so great, with its tinny drums failing to impress where others have been so strong. There are two versions of "Bringing It Down", one with really bad drums. This CD represents every recording the band ever made. Some of the tracks appear twice, because they were re-recorded for an ultra-rare EP called "Chung King Can Suck It", of which only 110 copies were made.

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.

judge is one of those bands that they stick out from the rest.great groudbreaking style, fans of bold,uppercut,youth of today,chain of strength/sick of it all,killing time,& warzone will like judge.they were very stong in their lyrics& veiw but the music was pretty well accepted but most fans in the hardcore scene not just straight edgers.

This is a true original. I grew up listening to this in my bro's Jeep, tearing it up to this group. Allout mosh hardcore music, ruthless. Buy this! Every song is insane. Great Price to.

did you ever want straight edge to be harderand heavier than chain of stength,gorilla bicuts,bold, turning point,shelter and youth of today not border on nu-metal(snapcase,EC,and alot of victory bands)too death metal and not meathead hardcore like throwdown, or hatebreed's (on again off the wagon again)hardcore meets slayer. WELL JUDGE WAS IT !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
If you weren't there you can still buy it and enjoy.this cd is you best chance to have most everything they did I think you miss 3-4 song from ep's and 7 inches but this is the 97% of the judge movement of hardcore.
thi band was a short run of a life span 2-3 years tops but brutal music to brutal for the bands liking too,fights and violence sort of ended their career by their choice too much fighting and conflict at their shows no doubt some drwn for their no BS hardline straight edge lyrics and the bands attitude of this way or no way ethics.the had one hell of a following nd a great rise to the top of the heep till they pulled the plug!great riffs excellent lyrics and amazing breakdowns, pure strait forward hardcore with a bit of metal crunch.