Next will be the much-anticipated sophomore album from Red Scare hunks, Elway. Their record is called… drum roll… Leavetaking and it’s coming out in June. It was recorded at Atlas Studio in Chicago with the help of Matt Allison and approximately 510 cans of Busch Light. This is a big release for us and rumors of Elway’s inclusion on this Summer’s “Red Scare Across America” tour are possibly true. Allegedly, if you get my drift. This much we know for sure: you’ll be hearing a lot of great things from Elway in 2013.

And finally we come to the newest addition to the Red Scare family: Milwaukee’s Direct Hit! You’ve heard of “Minnesota Nice”? Well, these kids are a product of “Wisconsin Awesome”. Their upcoming Red Scare debut (set for July) is gonna be called Brainless God and it’s being produced by AAR axeman and world-renowned nice guy, Mike Kennerty. There’s lotsa weird shit and wild concepts happening with this record and you’ll hear about ‘em in the coming weeks. Trust us on this one, this’ll be the next Red Scare band you get stoked on, and these charming dirtballs will be touring their asses off this year too. Check out this rad and bizarro video to see what DH! is all about:

In completely unrelated news, we’re pressing up some LPs this Fall and wanted y’all to know about it first. We don’t typically offer vinyl through mailorder because the Red Scare hovel/HQ is too small, but we’re gonna try it because we have some new 12″s: The Holy Mess Cande, Nothington Borrowed Time, and Elway Delusions. We’re also working on the Masked Intruder LP and a re-stock of The Copyrights Learn The Hard Way LP that has been outta stock for a while. As you probably know, vinyl is expensive to manufacture, package, and ship, but if you’re a record nerd you can head over to the Red Scare Store and fulfill your fantasies. And speaking of fantasies, how ’bout we wrap this up with a pic of our new friend, Sam Russo:

Up next in the month of August, we’ll have new full-length albums from Masked Intruder and those famous Philly fuck-ups, The Holy Mess. Good records, and both produced by our cheeky chum, Matt Allison at Atlas Studios. So yeah, August = stoked. To hold you over until then, we’re releasing another one of our teaser singles for The Holy Mess called Cold Goodbyes, which will offer 3 new songs for real cheap, so look for that thing on iTunes and shit on June 26th. Red Scare nerds will get a kick out of the third track on this, we promise! Pics or it didn’t happen:

The first one comes to us in the form of a split 7″ for tour. Yep, one song from Dan Andriano and one from Brendan Kelly. Those two old chums are doing a tour of Europe together in June/July and they claim to be traveling by train, so stock up the Bar Car. We know that jaunt is gonna end in disaster, but fuck it, at least we all get a sweet new 7″ to check out. We’ve heard the songs and can confirm their awesomeness: Danny’s swaying lullaby is reminiscent of last year’s amazing Hurricane Season, while Brendan gives us another one of his deviant rock songs that we’ve come to expect from the Wandering Birds. We will save some for mailorder, so you won’t have to attend a show in order to pick one of these up, but I hear Vienna is wonderful in the Summertime. Just sezzin’.

Also coming out this Summer in time for a tour will be a new 4-song 7″/EP from our favorite Mountain Mongos, Elway. Those dudes will be doing some touring with Teenage Bottlerocket in July and we’ll have the EP out by then. It’s their first new material since their breakout record, Delusions, and we think you’re gonna be just as stoked. Soon there will be more info, song samples, pre-order shit, etc etc.

Lastly, we’ll be doing a split 7″ that will pair up Red Scare ruffians The Brokedowns and Minneapolis mofos, The Slow Death. Heard some of the music, and I guess they’re somehow doing THREE songs on each side. Might need to add an extra inch on to that one, eh? It’ll be good though, we love both of these bands and it’s about time they give the world some new songs. We’ll keep ya posted on that and all these other 7″s too; just follow us on Twitter and watch the details unfold. Shit yeah.

In other good Ramonesy news, we’re happy to announce that we’ll be doing something (kinda) new with our old friends, The Lillingtons. We’ve teamed up with those lovable hermits to bring you an updated version of their criminally-underrated album, The Backchannel Broadcast. It’s getting a major facelift: new artwork and an up-to-date mastering job by original producer, Mass Giorgini. That will also be available on iTunes/Spotify/Amazon on March 6th and we’re taking pre-orders for the CD now. It won’t be in stores until April-ish, but don’t let that stop you from peeping the new and improved cover art below:

New year means new releases, and we got three, count ‘em THREE singles coming your way. The first one comes from Brendan Kelly and the Wandering Birds; and Brendan, our long-time co-conspirator recently explained the project in great detail with Alt Press. The single, along with two B-sides are available NOW from iTunes for under 2 bucks. Full-length coming in March 2012.

Next up will be a 2-song 7″ from The Menzingers. They have a new full-length coming out February 21st and I think it’s tentatively titled, Album of the Year. Fuck yeah it is. The poor folks at Epitaph desperately needed our help in releasing this limited 7″, so we agreed, but only in exchange for the rights to their Coffin Break titles. Seriously people, Coffin Break ruled, just ask Kent. In any case, we’re taking pre-orders for this 7″ now, but it’ll be be at least a couple weeks before we ship this pig. The band will also have it available on their upcoming tour with Rise Against.

And finally, we have news from our beloved Sidekicks. Their new CD/LP will also be out on February 21st and it’s tentatively dubbed, Actually Better Than The Menzingers, If You Can Believe That, Asshole. Sounds like a working title or something we made up, BUT, we will have a 4-song digital single called Grace that hits iTunes on January 17th with a physical 45 RPM 7″ to follow shortly thereafter. You can place a pre-order now, but it will be at least 3 weeks before we see these things. Stay tuned for more deets regarding The Sidekicks upcoming record, or visit their FB BandPage to see upcoming tour dates and more.

A ton of great shit is happening with our new releases from The Copyrights and Nothington. The Copys are busy out playing shows on the West Coast at the moment, then they’ll head out East with Strike Anywhere. And just when we all thought that North Sentinel Island was the best record of 2011, along came Nothington with their Red Scare debut, Borrowed Time. That thing will be in stores soon, but is available available on iTunes now or from our webstore for a measly 9 bucks. Our comrades at Punknews are streaming a few songs from the album if you want to hear what all the fuss is about. We’re really excited about these new ones, and hope you’re enjoying ‘em too…

The other batch o’ bullshit that is going down over at the Red Scare HQ is our annual showcase: Red Oktoberfest! It’s always fun to see friends out at shows, and we promise to make it a real “fest” again one of these years, but for now you’ll have to settle for the usual Chicago shitholes. Oh, you love it. Now click here to RSVP for the shows. Read on for details on the lineup and shit…

FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 30th @ BEAT KITCHEN, 8:30pm

Cobra Skulls (new record on Fat, but we still love ‘em)
Nothington (debut full length out in September, old homies)
The Brokedowns (old faves, local yokels, we needed some lookers)
The Outsiders (from New Zealand, on Anchorless Recs)

For more show info, tix: http://beatkitchen.com/calendar.htm#0930

SATURDAY, OCTOBER 1st @ UNDERGROUND LOUNGE, 10pm

Special Guests (super secret band, you’ll be stoked)
Reaganomics (rad LP in 2011, hometown heroes, great hair)
TBA (not sure yet, hmmm…)

Nothington will also be heading out on a big-ass tour with those Fat Wreck sellouts, Cobra Skulls in September through November. Suffice it to say, these guys are gonna bust ass in support of Borrowed Time and will be touring the continent like a small herd o’ hobos. We’ll have more news regarding the album in the coming weeks, but until then you can take a peek at the tour poster to slake your thirst for what’s to come:

So in the immortal words of Cyrus, “Can you dig it?!?”

We’re once again teaming up with our comrades from It’s Alive Records to bring you The Copyrights vinyl. If you don’t know about IAR, you better get up to speed: They’re like our label but with better music, better packaging, and a lot less bullshit and shenanigans. They’ll be bringing you the North Sentinel Island 12″ and the Crutches 7″. Bitchin’, eh?

So that’s the big scoop with The Copyrights and their new album. They’ll be doing their first music video and some legit touring this Summer and Fall in support of all this stuff, so it’s an exciting time for those downstate hayseeds. There’s been a lot of chatter about this highly-anticipated release, so stay tuned as the details unfold. The Copyrights also just started their own Twitter account, so look into that if you’re interested in their unique brand of grammar and spelling.