THE RITES

I have been wanting to do this post since i started this blog but unfortunately though i had ALL The Rites stuff on vinyl I had no rip of their final EP "Fuck Em If They Can't Take A Joke" so a discography post was not possible however just this morning I found that the label it was released on Six Feet under Records have a Bandcamp page and had it up for download! So what better way to return to my blog than with a post that's been on the cards since I started it!

So a bit of history there was a hardcore band called Dead Nation who did a few EP's and one album and broke up in 1999 this band evolved into Tear It Up who were hugely popular in the early millenium but during the time Tear It Up were around (2000-2003) various members were involved in 2 side bands, Cut The Shit and The Rites the history of the 3 bands is confusing it would appear that aside from the vocalist of Tear It Up every other member of Tear It Up was involved with either Cut The Shit or The Rites at some point and also various Cut The Shit and The Rites members that were not originally in Tear It Up also played on various Tear It Up releases! Plus Cut The Shit and The Rites both continued after Tear it Up broke up!!! Even with the aid of the inlays from all their various releases due to the penchant in hardcore for in-jokes and pseudonymns and minimal photos it's all very confusing however all 3 bands were ploughing the same thrash hardcore furrow!!! So onwards...

As I said The Rites were originally a side project of Tear It Up they released 3 EP's a 7",2 x 12 EP's and a live 1 sided album and they were gone! I have tried and tried but cannot find any information about what any of the band members are doing now however the last The Rites EP came out in 2006 so I'm assuming they have split!

Their debut EP "Your Last Rites" from 2002 is a raw blast of fast hardcore thrash that is not vastly different to what Tear It Up were doing, tight fast guitar lines, speedy drumming etc but the production is a bit rawer and the vocals to me are way better than Tear It Up they have more aggression and belligerence which i think is why i always felt they had a slight edge over the other bands playing this kind of music at the time 7 songs in barely 6 mins this is high speed hardcore fun at it's best!. However it's on the next two 12"s "The Rites" and "Wish You Never Knew" that where these guys really hit their stride! The production on both these 12"s is far superior to the EP the guitars are nice and thick (but not heavy) and everything is way clearer in the mix and here you can start to see them showing their influences a bit more, There's shades of Black Flag, Poison Idea and because of the high speed guitar lines it also reminds me of the early Boston hardcore sound (think Jerry's Kids and early Gang Green) and even a bit of chunky metal riffage here and there, this time round the songs are given a bit less of the raw feel of a new band and more of a sound that is big and loud and in your face! Also it's not all thrash although these guys are masters of flooring the accelerator pedal there's a lot of really great mid-paced and slower parts that shows they have their feet planted as much in hardcore PUNK territory as they do thrash see "Pissing On Your Grave" from the "Wish You Never Knew" 12" or "Asshole City..." from "The Rites" 12" for evidence of this! The thing I like about The Rites is that their songs while mainly fast and fairly short are totally memorable with great riffs and they really have worked hard to get a great sound for the band in both the writing and the sound of their instruments and above all these guys can really play they are VERY tight and never miss a beat!

The Rites were consistent throughout their short existence as far as the sound goes I can't say that any of their releases from "The Rites" 12" I mention above through to their last EP "Fuck Em..." are startlingly different from each other however with a sound as great as these guys had then why would you fuck with it? What i'm saying is if you like the sound of my description then you WILL like The Rites

I think unfortunately that bands like The Rites and their cohorts like Tear It Up and Cut The Shit are bands that were very popular that is, as far as popularity in hardcore goes, but were "of their time" so to speak, for example, when i got into these bands around 2002/3 and i tried to backtrack their records (when i still bought vinyl) as many of them are very limited the prices were sky high for example the debut Cut The Shit 1 -sided 7" had only been out 6 months when i got onto them and when i tried to buy it on vinyl it was priced around the £20/£30 mark, now you can pick it up for around £5 same goes for The Rites Their "Fuck Em..." EP  had 3 different pressings each with a different cover song on the B-side i have the most limited one which has a press of a mere 145 copies you'd think this would drive the price sky high? Nope you can pick it up for around £2.50! Their debut EP which has been out of print for 11 years goes for 83p for Black vinyl or £2 for green vinyl limited version Now while i think this is good that if you want the vinyl it's available at a reasonable price at he same time i think it's shocking that these brilliant records are so unwanted that they are dirt cheap, it also illustrates the fickle nature of Hardcore fans that a band as great as The Rites were and their records are in no demand at all and there's hardly any downloads available online either it seems no one is interested now

So there are 2 links below one contains all their 7"'s the other contains their 2 x 12"'s and the Live LP here's what you get...

Rites Sevens

"Your Last Rites" EP (2002)
"Pissing On Your Grave" 7" (2005)
"Death Of The Party" EP (2005)
"Fuck Em If They Can't Take A Joke" EP (2006)

Rites Twelves

"The Rites" 12" (2003)
"Wish they Never Knew" 12" (2004)
"There Shall Be No Encore (Live)" 1 -Sided LP (2006)

That's their full discography "Pissing..." 7" and "Death Of.." EP were both recorded at the same session but released seperately these and the Live LP are ripped from vinyl by me so are decent quality, the rest are ripped from my own CD's and "Fuck em..." EP is taken from a pay download so great quality also "Fuck Em..." contains all 3 covers songs they did for all 3 pressings of the 7" I mentioned above and a short bonus track so that's the whole session there!

So that's it a discography of one of the best kinda "lost" bands of hardcore no one i mention them to now has ever heard of them even though they toured the UK in 2005 ( I traveled to Liverpool to see them and turned up a day late and missed the show due to bogus info online) Unfortunately much as i love this music I really do lack knowledge as far as hardcore is concerned it's a genre that I have barely any interest in for me it was really exciting back in the 80's and again for a while in the early millenium but in the interim there seems to be a real lack of any kind of progression and most of it in fact nearly all hardcore really leaves me cold however occasionally if you follow it long enough you do get the odd gem unfortunately these are few and far between and I've yet to hear something since the early millenium that has really impressed me! So go check out some GREAT hardcore below as you know if it wasn't good it wouldn't be on this blog!

Here's your links Enjoy....

Rites Sevens - http://www.mediafire.com/download/z8adah5d75mci8r/RITES+SEVENS.rar

Rites Twelves - https://www.mediafire.com/download/ltnuxxequqv3uqx/RITES%20TWELVES.rar

Before i go I'd like to thank and credit a friend from back in the early millenium hardcore days a fella named Ellis who took the picture of The Rites playing live in Brighton UK at the top of this post I've lost touch with him now but if you happen to come across this post Ellis leave a comment, I have a full set of pictures he sent me of this night and after the show where the picture at the top of the post was taken The Rites went back to one of Ellis friends houses and played another set in their basement for the assembled crowd and Ellis band at the time also played, absolutely brilliant so here's some pics from the basement show too, wish I'd be there. Hope this post finally makes up for a lack of internet presence for this great band!