Saturday, November 15, 2008

Posted by xjustinx |
So much can be said of Downcast. They played a major role in the San Diego area scene along with bands like Amenity and Struggle. A lot has been made of them being the "P.C. police", and that they became anti-moshing at shows, but one thing can't be denied, and it's that Downcast wrote some great metallic hardcore songs. I tend to have a great love for bands that are heavily political, and Downcast fit into that quite nicely. They did a US tour with Born Against and Rorschach, and from what I've read, they played Portland, but that was a year or two before I really started going to shows.

The self titled 7" from Downcast was also the first release from Ebullition Records, and accompanied issues of the No Answers fanzine that was put out by Kent McClard, who later went onto do the HeartattaCk fanzine as well. After the first 3,000 issues, the 7" and zine were separated into their own autonomous products. In an interesting not about Ebullition #1, I pulled this from Wikipedia:
"Los Angeles hardcore band Inside Out was meant to record an LP as the first Ebullition release. However, Revelation Records asked them to release a 7" instead, and the band chose the more established label."

Downcast
self titled 7" [Ebullition Records 1990]
http://www.mediafire.com/?1wtotzyztmh

Downcast then released a full length on Ebullition as well, followed by a tour of Europe. This is the first version of the LP (Ebullition #3). After the first pressing (3,000 copies) the LP was re-mixed and re-mastered. The re-mixed and re-mastered version was released as Ebullition #6. If I come across a copy of the re-mixed version someday, I'll rip that and upload it as well.

Downcast
self titled LP [Ebullition Records 1991]
http://www.mediafire.com/?kkrdynwdgmi

After Downcast broke up, the various members went on to form Not For The Lack of Trying, Jara, and Born & Raised. Ebullition was touting the release of a Downcast discography around 2004/2005, but nothing has materialized as of yet.

4 comments:

blend77 said...

great great band. one of my favorites from back then..

ryan posted Manumission over at Mostly Blue Skies Above Us... you should check that out..

David Agranoff said...

One thing Justin Downcast were from santa Barbra not San Diego I think.

Downcast was awesome, everlast a chicago pre-race traitor band used to do a killer cover of Downcast. Same song as 7 Gen.

Danny said...

So, the drummer of Downcast, Chris, was murdered in his girlfriends house in '96, but what's the story? did they find the killer(s)?
It's so sad, and i couldn't find any info online.
Not to bring up sad thoughts but I was just curious. He was a great drummer.

John said...

Thanks for posting the links! Been looking for these albums since they were taken from me about 15 years ago.