Lifetime

Lifetime are a five-piece melodic hardcore/pop punk/emo band from New Jersey that formed in 1990 and broke up in 1997. They played a few reunion shows in 2005 and ended up staying together and putting out a new album in 2007. Since then, they've still been fairly active with sporadic shows an such. They were signed to Jade Tree Records and then Decaydance when they reformed. Their guitarist Dan Yemin was also in Kid Dynamite and sang for Paint It Black. Hopefully this band doesn't really need much more of an introduction, since they are absolutely quintessential for any fan of pop punk or the less intense side of hardcore. Lifetime basically mastered the two-minute catchy d-beat rhythm sound, and thus have ended up being enormously influential. Jersey's Best Dancers is an absolute classic, as well as its predecessor Hello Bastards. There's really no need to rant on about how good they are, it's essentially a redundant statement of fact at this point, so enjoy.

Dwell (1991)

1. Dwell

2. Find

3. Souvenir

4. Gone

Background (1993)

1. You

2. Pieces

3. Myself

4. Thanks

5. Up

6. Bedtime

7. Old Friend

8. Ghost

9. Alive

10. Background

Tinnitus (1994)

1. Isae Aldy Beausoleil

2. Ferret

3. Star Sixty-Nine

4. Ampersand

Hello Bastards (1995)

1. Daneurysm

2. Rodeo Clown

3. Anchor

4. I'm Not Calling You

5. Bobby Truck Tricks

6. (The Gym Is) Neutral Territory

7. I Like You Ok

8. It's Not Funny Anymore (Husker Du cover)

9. Irony Is For Suckers

10. What She Said

11. Knives, Bats, New Tats

12. Ostrichsized

The Boy's No Good (1996)

1. The Boy's No Good

2. Somewhere In The Swamps Of Jersey

Jersey's Best Dancers (1997)

1. Turnpike Gates

2. Young, Loud And Scotty

3. Francie Nolan

4. 25 Cent Giraffes

5. Hey Catrine

6. Bringin' It Backwards

7. How We Are

8. Theme Song For A New Brunswick Basement Show

9. Cut The Tension

10. The Truth About Lars

11. The Boy's No Good

12. The Verona Kings

Somewhere In The Swamps Of Jersey (2006)

Disc 1

1. Somewhere In The Swamps Of Jersey

2. Isae Aldy Beausoleil

3. Ferret

4. Starsixtynine

5. Ampersand

6. Secede

7. Young, Loud And Scotty

8. Bringin' It Backwards

9. Theme Song For A New Brunswick Basement Show

10. New England (Billy Bragg cover)

11. Money (Embrace cover)

12. You

13. Pieces

14. Myself

15. Thanks

16. Up

17. Bedtime

18. Old Friend

19. Ghost

20. Alive

21. Background

22. Dwell

23. Find

24. Souvenir

25. Gone

26. Tradition

Disc 2

1. You

2. Pieces

3. Myself

4. Thanks

5. Up

6. Bedtime

7. Old Friend

8. Ghost

9. Alive

10. Background

11. You (Live)

12. Ghost (Live)

Note: Missing the last few songs, all live tracks

Two Songs (2006)

1. Haircuts And T-Shirts

2. All Night Long

Lifetime (2007)

1. Northbound Breakdown

2. Airport Monday Morning

3. Just A Quiet Evening

4. Haircuts And T-Shirts

5. Can't Think About It Now

6. Spiders In The Garden

7. Yeems Song For Nothing

8. Try And Stay Awake

9. Song For Mel

10. All Night Long

11. Records At Nite

Thursday

Here's the perfect band to start off a jet black new year. They've been consistently requested over the years, which makes sense considering the massive amount of influence they've have on some bands on here, while still being a very well-known band in their own right.

Thursday were a six-piece post-hardcore band from New Brunswick, New Jersey that formed in 1997 and came to an end in 2011. They emerged just as popular post-hardcore/emo/alternative acts such as Taking Back Sunday, Thrice, and Alexisonfire hit it big in the early 2000's, a wave they became front-runners of very quickly. After releasing their debut album Waiting in 1999, their breakthrough album came in 2001 with Full Collapse, which spawned a ton of songs that have become staples of the band, such as "Understanding In A Car Crash", "Cross Out The Eyes", "Paris In Flames", and "Standing On The Edge Of Summer". They continued this success on their follow-up War All The Time, which was their heaviest material to date. It also showed a glimpse of them becoming the overtly political force they later would, in addition to the deeply personal lyrics they had gotten their start with. A City By The Light Divided showcased a band continue to experiment, but with a lot more melody this time around. On Common Existence they again did a double-take and released some of their most aggressive and straight-forward material. Their sixth and final album No Devolución broke apart from their origins by including tons of atmospheric and post-rock influence, which isn't surprising considering their collaboration with Envy a few years later and a staggering Sigur Rós cover even earlier on in their career.

As aforementioned, Thursday took a break in 2011. Their hiatus was officially declared as a breakup in 2013, though the band's future is still in the air. Vocalist Geoff Rickly remains quite active, most notably as a member of United Nations, who got their start in the middle of Thursday's career. He also started another band called No Devotion, which released their debut album last year. Regardless, it's Thursday's legacy we're talking about here, so below is their discography. Let me know if you have anything I'm missing by them, and enjoy.

1999 Summer Tour EP (1999)

1. Ian Curtis

2. Porcelain

3. This Side of Brightness

4. Wind-Up

5. Dying In New Brunswick

6. Mass As Shadows

Waiting (1999)

1. Porcelain

2. This Side Of Brightness

3. Ian Curtis

4. Introduction

5. Streaks In The Sky

6. In Transmission

7. Dying In New Brunswick

8. The Dotted Line

9. Where The Circle Ends

Full Collapse (2001)

1. A0001

2. Understanding In A Car Crash

3. Concealer

4. Autobiography Of A Nation

5. A Hole In The World

6. Cross Out The Eyes

7. Paris in Flames

8. I Am The Killer

9. Standing On The Edge of Summer

10. Wind-Up

11. How Long Is The Night?

Five Stories Falling (2002)

1. Autobiography Of A Nation (Live)

2. Understanding In A Car Crash (Live)

3. Standing On The Edge of Summer (Live)

4. Paris In Flames (Live)

5. Jet Black New Year

War All The Time (2003)

1. For The Workforce, Drowning

2. Between Rupture and Rapture

3. Division St.

4. Signals Over The Air

5. Marches And Maneuvers

6. Asleep In The Chapel

7. This Song Brought To You By A Falling Bomb

8. Steps Ascending

9. War All The Time

10. M. Shepard

11. Tomorrow I'll Be You

12. Ný Batterí (Sigur Rós cover) [Japanese Bonus Track]

Tony Hawk's American Wasteland Soundtrack (2005)

12. Ever Fallen In Love (With Someone You Shouldn't've) [The Buzzcocks cover]

A City By The Light Divided (2006)

1. The Other Side Of The Crash/Over And Out (Of Control)

2. Counting 5-4-3-2-1

3. Sugar In The Sacrament

4. At This Velocity

5. We Will Overcome

6. Arc-Lamps, Signal Flares, A Shower Of White (The Light)

7. Running From The Rain

8. Telegraph Avenue Kiss

9. The Lovesong Writer

10. Into The Blinding Light

11. Autumn Leaves Revisited

Kill The House Lights (2007)

1. Ladies And Gentlemen: My Brother, The Failure

2. Dead Songs

3. Voices On A String

4. Signals Over The Air (Live At Starland Ballroom)

5. How Long Is The Night (Original Intro)

6. A Sketch For Time's Arrow

7. Panic On The Streets Of Health Care City

8. The Roar Of Far Off Black Jets

9. Paris In Flames (Demo)

10. Telegraph Avenue Kiss (Rich Costey Mix)

11. Wind Up (Demo)

12. Music From Kill The House Lights (Demo)

Thursday/Envy (2008)

1. Thursday - As He Climbed The Dark Mountain

2. Thursday - In Silence

3. Thursday - An Absurd And Unrealistic Dream Of Peace

4. Thursday - Appeared And Was Gone

5. Envy - An Umbrella Fallen Into Fiction

6. Envy - Isolation Of A Light Source

7. Envy - Pure Birth And Loneliness

Common Existence (2009)

1. Resuscitation Of A Dead Man

2. Last Call

3. As He Climbed The Dark Mountain

4. Friends In The Armed Forces

5. Beyond The Visible Spectrum

6. Times Arrow

7. Unintended Long Term Effects

8. Circuits Of Fever

9. Subway Funeral

10. Love Has Led Us Astray

11. You Were The Cancer

No Devolución (2011)

1. Fast To The End

2. No Answers

3. A Darker Forest

4. Sparks Against The Sun

5. Open Quotes

6. Past And Future Ruins

7. Magnets Caught in A Metal Heart

8. Empty Glass

9. A Gun In The First Act

10. Millimeter

11. Turnpike Divides

12. Stay True

In Utero, In Tribute, In Entirety (2014)

4. Rape Me (Nirvana cover)

Neil Perry

I've noticed a surprising amount of requests for this band, which is really nice to see. Taking their name from the Dead Poets Society character, Neil Perry were a four-piece screamo/post-hardcore band from New Jersey They formed in 1998 and broke up in 2002. They were signed to Level Plane, which put them in the same category as bands like Saetia and pg.99, who we all know and love. Neil Perry played in the same vein as them, keeping things very dark and very chaotic, and calling it quits before that got too old.

Despite that, they did have a fairly prolific tenure (for bands in their genre), since they released quite a few splits, a handful of EP's, and made numerous compilation appearances in their four years. All of their released material, plus some new stuff, was released on the compilation Lineage Situation in 2003. It contained two discs, the first being all audio and the second being all video. Only the audio is posted here. Lineage Situation is really all you need from the band, since it contains all their recorded material and more, but I included their splits and such because they worked with some amazing bands (Joshua Fit For Battle, Usurp Synapse, etc.) that are worth having both sides of the split for.

Neil Perry are also noted for having members that were involved in a ton of other great bands. When they formed, they contained members from You And I and Red All Over, and when they broke up, members split off into other bands including Hot Cross, Joshua Fit For Battle, Welcome The Plague Year, A Life Once Lost, The Now, Get Fucked, and Superstitions Of The Sky. Now that is a fucking impressive résumé. Enjoy.

Neil Perry (1999)

1. The Last Sip Is 90% Spit

2. Short-Haired Metal

3. Oh Shit

4. Catalyst

5. Moira

6. Elvis (Wears Nike)

7. Fuck You

8. There Was Definitely A Point When The Victim Passed Out... Then The Killer Kicked Him

9. I'm Sad For You

Neil Perry/A Satellite Crash (2000)

1. Neil Perry - There Will Come Soft Rains

2. Neil Perry - You Can't Fight Jose Cuervo And Win

3. Neil Perry - Don't Even Try To Start A Honda Accord While It's In Drive

4. Neil Perry - Bluebook Bedtime Story

5. Neil Perry - Trips To Baltimore

6. Neil Perry - Friends That Fuck

7. Neil Perry - Luc Fucked The Prom Queen

8. Neil Perry - When My Favorite Sports Team Loses It Makes Me Want To Hit My Girlfriend

9. Neil Perry - If This Is A Show About God, I'm Going To Kill U Mauro

10. A Satellite Crash - El Chupacabras

11. A Satellite Crash - I Renounce My Citizenship

12. A Satellite Crash - Spectre Of Monroe

13. A Satellite Crash - Love Song For J. Alfred Prufrock

14. A Satellite Crash - Native Son

15. A Satellite Crash - New Domino Theory

The Chilling Tales Of Usurp Synapse As Told By Neil Perry (2000)

1. Usurp Synapse - Come And Get It Mole

 2. Usurp Synapse - Doin' The Backwards

 3. Usurp Synapse - We Shoot From The Hip

4. Usurp Synapse - Live It! Live It!

5. Usurp Synapse - Here's $100 Seniorita

 6. Usurp Synapse - Keith Sweat

 7. Neil Perry - Sept 15, City Lights And The Clouds That Suck Them Dry

8. Neil Perry - I Bought This Southern Rap Compilation And All I Got Was This Lousy Hight Hat

9. Neil Perry - Josh's Dream Party: Beer, Girls, And A Computer

Brothers From Different Mothers (2001)

1. Neil Perry - Millions Lost At The Penny Arcade

2. Neil Perry - I Wanna Talk To Samson

3. Neil Perry - Yes Officer My Name Is Mister Hermitowich And I Did Sell These Boys A Gazebo (AKA Beijon Dip Song)

4. Neil Perry - Improve Jam 1: Take 1

5. Neil Perry - Shit Blows Up... Its So Good

6. Joshua Fit For Battle - To Bring Our Own End

7. Joshua Fit For Battle - Soldiers Of Psychological Warfare

8. Joshua Fit For Battle - Dedication (12 Clicks)

9. Joshua Fit For Battle - All Hail King Majority

10. Joshua Fit For Battle - Destroying From The Inside Out Kinda Like Cancer

11. Joshua Fit For Battle - Ode To Jack Kevorkian

Neil Perry/Kaospilot (2002)

1. Neil Perry - Breathing With One Bad Lung

2. Neil Perry - There's A Fine Line Between Thrift Store And White Trash

3. Neil Perry - A Friend Is A Lesson To Be Learned

4. Kaospilot - 16.6.2000

5. Kaospilot - The Noise From The Bell Killed Me

Picture Disc (2002)

1. Becoming What You Hate

2. Another Trip To Baltimore

3. Igor, My Girlfriend Dumped Me, Let's Write Sad Songs

4. Tom Cruise Turns To Me And Says...

5. Improv Jam 2: Take 1

A Days Refrain/Neil Perry (2002)

1. A Days Refrain - Forces of Habit

2. A Days Refrain - District Eleven

3. A Days Refrain - Don't Fake The Funk

4. Neil Perry - Looking Back At How You Want To Be In The Future

5. Neil Perry - Fading Away Like The Rest Of Them 

6. Neil Perry - Sorry For The Misunderstanding, Mr. Watts. It Won't Happen Again

Lineage Situation (2003)

1. Nine Minutes Of Non-Fiction

2. Kicked

3. Seeping Through The Cracks

4. What Is In The Making

5. Looking Back On The Way You Want To Be In The Future

6. Fading Away Like The Rest Of Them

7. Sorry For The Misunderstanding Mr. Watts...

8. Millions Lost At The Penny Arcade

9. I Wanna Talk To Samson

10. Yes Officer My Name Is Mr. Hermitiowitch...

11. Shit Blows Up...It's So Good

12. Becoming What You Hate

13. Another Trip To Baltimore

14. Igor, My Girlfriend Dumped Me... Let's Write Sad Songs

15. So Tom Cruise Turns To Me And Says

16. Breathing With One Bad Lung

17. There's A Fine Line Between Thrift Store And White Trash

18. A Friend Is A Lesson To Be Learned

19. September 15th, City Lights, And The Clouds That Suck Them Dry

20. I Bought This Southern Rap Compilation And All I Got Was This Lousy Hi-Hat

21. Josh's Dream Party: Beer, Girls, And A Computer

22. Memoirs Of An Illiterate Penpal

23. There Will Come Soft Rains

24. You Can't Fight Jose Cuervo And Win

25. Don't Even Try To Start A Honda Accord If It's In Drive

26. Bluebook Bedtime Story

27. Trips To Baltimore

28. Friends That Fuck

29. Luc Fucked The Prom Queen

30. When My Favorite Sports Team Loses, It Makes Me Want To Hit My Girlfriend

31. If This Is A Show About God, I'm Going To Kill U Mauro

32. The Last Sip Is 90% Spit

33. Short-Haired Metal

34. Oh Shit

35. Catalyst

36. Moira

37. Elvis Wears Nikes

38. Fuck You

39. There Was Definitely A Point When The Victim...

40. I'm Sad For You

Penfold

Penfold were a four-piece emo/indie/post-hardcore band from North Jersey that formed somewhere between 1996 and 1997. Their sound is in the same vein as bands like The Promise Ring and Mineral, which are obvious staples for anyone interested in emo/indie in that era. Penfold's main active years came just after bands like that were at their peak, so in a way they sound like a culmination of what had been going on in emo throughout the 90's, and put it all together right around the turn of the century. Though Penfold never got the amount of attention the aforementioned bands did, they were arguably just as good and pumped out some classic songs such as "I'll Take You Everywhere" and "June". Though they're not genre-defining or revolutionary, they put out some amazing material in the time they were around. They broke up in 2003, though have played a handful of reunion shows throughout the years, so perhaps they're not completely done yet. Enjoy.

Your Eyes Have All The Answers (1997)

1. I'm Never Coming Home

2. Perfect

Amateurs And Professionals (1999)

1. June

2. M

3. I'll Take You Everywhere

4. Tuesday

5. Traveling Theory

6. Breathing Lessons

7. Amateur Standing

Chapter 3: The Moment Of Truth (1999)

3. Microchip

Our First Taste Of Escape (2001)

1. The Opportune Moment

2. Fate, Confidence And An Encounter

3. The Secret Nine

4. Human Drama

5. Sea Of Crisis

6. Our First Taste Of Escape

7. May I Have This Dance

8. The Sound of Jazz

9. Brilliance

10. Kissing The Nightmare

11. Reflexivity

12. Early Morning, Mauldin Street

Maxwell's in Hoboken, NJ 09.17.11 (2011)

1. Intro/Chapter 2

2. Traveling Theory

3. Sea Of Crisis

4. M

5. The Sound Of Jazz

6. Fate, Confidence And An Encounter

7. The Secret Nine

8. Microchip

9. Brilliance

10. Kissing The Nightmare

11. Our First Taste Of Escape

12. Amateur Standing

13. Encore Break

14. June

15. Reflexivity

16. I'll Take You Everywhere

Note: This isn't an official release, just audio from one of the reunion shows, so thank you to whoever ripped and uploaded it

Samhain

Well, it's almost Halloween, so I figured I'd add a band who are literally named after the holiday. Samhain (pronounced sah-WIN) was a Celtic holiday celebrating the end of the harvest and a festival for the dead of some sort, but that's about all I know about it. Regardless, it's believed that Halloween had its origins in Samhain, so that's the connection. Thus the reason for posting this band. Not only does the name embody the holiday, but the music is the perfect soundtrack for it (except perhaps for John Carpenter).

Samhain got started just as Glenn Danzig's old band, The Misfits ended (side note, regardless of what became of them and such, Danzig-era Misfits are one of the greatest bands ever). Samhain would also eventually evolve into heavy metal/blues band Danzig, who are still active today. The career Samhain had is quite unique, since they got started as one thing and ended as another. The punk sound mixed with horror themes was carried over by Glenn, as well as the devilock and love for gore (of course). Samhain even recorded a handful of Misfits songs ("Horror Business", "All Hell Breaks Loose", "Halloween II", "Death Comes Ripping", "London Dungeon"). On the tail end of things, Samhain's final album included two songs that would eventually be re-recorded for Danzig's debut album ("Twist of Cain" and "Possession").

I don't mean to make them sound like they basically began as a re-incarnated Misfits and end as Danzig (though the latter is literally true). Samhain were quite experimental, even from their first album. It's a lot darker and slower than what Danzig was doing before, and some really unique sounds are created here that make these songs sound sinister. Their second full-length November-Coming-Fire is probably their best known album, since it's quite cohesive and is just filled with some amazing songs. Their final album wasn't released until 1990, and it consisted of songs from a session that was intended to be the next Samhain album before they became Danzig. It basically sounds like Danzig, and a few songs even feature the classic Danzig line-up of Eerie Von (who was a permanent member in Samhain), John Christ, and Chuck Biscuits, both of which had just joined.

Samhain have done a few reunion shows since they ended in 1987. The first one was in 1999, as a celebration of the Box Set that would be released a year later. It compiled all their material, as well as a great live album that featured a lot of their studio material with a lot more rawness. I didn't include the Box Set below because it's literally everything here anyway. Their next reunions were in 2011 and 2012, where they were a part of the Danzig Legacy tour. The reunited again in 2014 to play a few shows, and that's the last thing they've done to date. Happy Halloween, and enjoy.

Initium (1984)

1. Initium/Samhain

2. Black Dream

3. All Murder, All Guts, All Fun

4. Macabre

5. He-Who-Cannot-Be-Named

6. Horror Biz

7. The Shift

8. The Howl

9. Archangel

Unholy Passion (1985)

1. Unholy Passion

2. All Hell

3. Moribound

4. The Hungry End

5. Misery Tomb

6. I Am Misery

November-Coming-Fire (1986)

1. Diabolos '88

2. In My Grip

3. Mother Of Mercy

4. Birthright

5. To Walk The Night

6. Let The Day Begin

7. Halloween II

8. November's Fire

9. Kiss of Steel

10. Unbridled

11. Human Pony Girl

Final Descent (1990)

1. Night Chill

2. Descent

3. Death...In It's Arms

4. Lords of the Left Hand

5. The Birthing

6. Twist of Cain

7. Possession

8. Trouble

9. Lords of the Left Hand (2nd Version)

Live '85-'86 (2001)

1. All Hell

2. Samhain

3. The Shift

4. The Howl

5. Unholy Passion

6. All Murder, All Guts, All Fun

7. I Am Misery

8. The Hungry End

9. Horror Biz

10. He-Who-Can-Not-Be-Named

11. Black Dream

12. Death Comes Ripping

13. Mother Of Mercy

14. To Walk The Night

15. Halloween II

16. In My Grip

17. London Dungeon

18. Archangel