Saturday, September 19, 2009

Negative Gain - 1985-1986 Discography



Killer thrash hardcore from Toronto, Ontario. Fast and aggressive but with a dark edge at times. Classic stuff that was unfortunately never re-issued or released on CD. This collection compiles the band's 1986 "Back From the Dead" LP on Pusmort Records, and the band's self-released demo tape from 1985. Excellent quality on both recordings, and i boosted the demo to match the volume of the LP. Sounds great. Enjoy.

Negative Gain: 1985-1986

Peter Warner - vocals

Grant C. Slavin - guitar
Steve Currie - bass
Andrew Mosely - drums

Band History (by Grant Slavin):
Negative Gain was founded in Toronto, Ontario by Peter Warner who wrote all of the lyrics and provided rehearsal space in his basement. Filling out the lineup was Grant C. Slavin on guitar, Steve Currie on bass, and Andrew Mosely on drums. All members were in their mid-teens at the time. Their influences included Minor Threat, Millions of Dead Cops, the Misfits, and the Dead Kennedys, as well as local TO bands Direct Action and Sudden Impact.
Negative Gain got their first break in '83 when we were asked by local Toronto promoter Jill Heath to open for Jodie Fosters Army at the city's legendary punk club The Turning Point. After the show Pete and Grant went skateboarding with JFA. The evening was documented in a subsequent issue of Thrasher as JFA's guitarist Don Pendelton was writing a column for the rag documenting their tour. Other memorable Negative Gain gigs around this time include warming up for bands like the Circle Jerks, Gang Green, the Descendents and 7 Seconds. The young thrash band soon went from listening to their favorite bands' records on a daily basis to hanging out with them backstage and stealing their beer rider!
More help from Jill Heath came when the promoter sent Negative Gain's 1985 demo tape, Attack of the Killer Bears, to Pushead for review. Pushead evidently like the tape so much that he offered to release a full-length LP for the band. Negative Gain recorded their album in Oakville, Ontario in about five hours on a Saturday afternoon, as studio time was limited to what the young band could afford to spend on the recording. The session was produced by Brian Taylor of the Toronto band Youth Youth Youth.
Sadly, Pete Warner committed suicide not too long after the recording was completed, and never lived to see its release. His last gig with the band was with Toronto's Bunchofuckingoofs. Negative Gain continued on as a three-piece for about two more years, before splitting in the late 1980s.

Info taken from the Kill From the Heart site. Go here for more info and lyrics to the "Back From
the Dead" LP.

19 comments:

  1. Thanks Bro - this was an underrated band for sure!

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  2. thanx, I'd like to check this out.

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  3. Thank you soooo much. What a great band, my "Attack of.." demo is like three gens+, very low recording...I put this band up there with The Arizonian Jerryz Kidz "counting calories" demo as far as "wish it was better quality, what a shame, etc..." lol So thanx again, love the posts awesome selections, its really, really, appreciated >>>JuggHead

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  4. this band rips for sure! any chance for a Direct Action post? i would love to hear a good quality recording of their demo...

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  5. Direct Action sounds familiar. Another band to add to the list.

    Jugghead, wait til you hear the quality of the demo. Loud and full, no hiss... it's as good as the album. I'll have to check out that "Counting Calories" demo.

    Vin

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  6. Thanks for posting this. I've been looking for this LP for the last two years and haven't had any luck.
    -alex warhead

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  7. Just checked 'em out. Sound great. Really fast and manic. Just how I like it!

    Thanks

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  8. wow. wasn't expecting this on the blog. i got this lp after reading about them in threasher's puszone. didn't know about the singer. that's really sad. i came across 3 songs of the demo on soulseek, but i'm looking forward to hearing the whole thing. great post!

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  9. Brief report back: Wow you weren't kiddin' Thank you once again. I've had some time to mull around your blog-and for what I've downed so far is Amazing quality selections...pound for pound, anyone would be hard pressed to find an equal>>>JH

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  10. great stuff....thanks

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  11. i gre up to bands like the sons of ishmael,bfg`s,guilt parade,and many more we where very blessed in swouthern ontario to have such a wide variety of killer bands,the 80`s where the best years for me!!it was a real bad blow when peter killed himself,,i still would like too know what was going on with him that it was so bad he had to end his life!

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  12. I just heard from a member of negative Gain (chuck) he wanted to find out where he could find his record im sending him your link Thanks Great Work you do here !!!!

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  13. I would like to check what you used as cover for this,looks pretty cool, was it one of the albums cover or just a random image that has a cool feeling to it? I insist that the work you do repairing the tracks is awesome.

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  14. The image i used for the cover is the actual "Back From the Dead" album cover, lightened to make the logo stand out, and to be able to overlay the song titles.

    Thanks for the compliment.

    Vin

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  15. what happened to the download
    you got me all excited
    and it says the file has been removed by the user
    what the fuck
    i really wanna hear this stuff..........

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  16. thanks.. again!

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  17. what happened to this link its not downloading..

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  18. This is was one of my favorite bands when I was a teenager. Such a sad story about the singer.

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