Wilkes-Barre has spawned a wave of great Hardcore bands in the last couple of years. Aside from the established bands such as Cold World and War Hungry, there’s also the up-and-coming bands such as Bad Seed, Title Fight, Pegasus and Gypsy. I’m not from W-B so I didn’t witness the rise of this scene from the beginning, but I think it’s safe to say that to the outside world Cold World can be seen as the originators of this scene, and they are definitely my favourite band to come out of Wilkes-Barre.
Anyone that has seen Cold World will agree with me that they are an incredible powerhouse live and know how to turn every venue into a battlefield. I have seen them play pretty sloppy shows (ssup Partyboy!) and still blow away friend or foe! On a sidenote I will go on record and say that I am the only person in the world that has been at every single Cold World show that they played on the European continent. Except for Dan Mills and Derek Scace, but they are in the band so....
Anyway, this week's quote is lifted from the lyrics to the title track of Cold World's Dedicated To Babies Who Came Feet First. This is their first and so far only full-length and expectations were high for this album. Cold World came out in 2004 with their self-titled EP and it wasn't before 2008 that they finally released a full-length record. During this 4-year gap they did release theIce Grillz EP, their split with War Hungry and a couple of songs on compilations, and all of the previously mentioned recordings were put on the No Omega LP, but needless to say that a popular band not releasing a full-length during the first four years of their career creates a lot of anticipation among their followers. I guess it was hard for Cold World to live up to these expectations and the multiple line-up changes didn't really help.
Dedicated To Babies Who Came Feet First was received by varying opinions, but personally I loved and still do. When it first came out I listened to this record on repeat when running and I never got bored of it. In fact, just thinking of this makes me want to strap my Nike Structures and go for a run right now!
I like all the songs on this record (that was named after a line from a song on my favourite Raekwon-record) equally, except for maybe one featuring Warrior Queen but I understand it's kind of a big deal having her do a guest appearance on your record so I still think that's pretty cool. In each song there's a couple of riffs, lines, breaks or details that I really like, yet I had no problem picking one song to quote on here. From the beginning this part in the title song of the record particulary spoke to me. I used to listen to the Dedicated To Babies... demo recordings all the time before the actual record came out, the ones with Nick Woj singing and this part always stood out. I got so used to listening to these songs with Woj on vocals that I started to wonder whether the final recordings for the LP were gonna live up to my expectations, and whether Dan Mills was gonna be able to live up to the high standards Woj set for this particular verse. So when I finally received the actual record i was anxious to hear its title song, not knowing what to expect of it. Upon first listen I was surprised to hear George Hirsch of Blacklisted sing my favourite part, and I literally got goose bumps when this verse came up!
"Still ill after all these years.
I feel at ease around my peers,
but there's a difference between them and me:
I can't run away from my fears.
Times have changed,
times are strange,
but I know I've seen the worst.
Someone must know how I feel,
this is dedicated to babies who came feet first."
Cold World - 'dedicated to babies who came feet first' - Dedicated To Babies Who Came Feet First - 2008
That's my favorite part of the record as well. So good.
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