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This one’s a record NO ONE remembers, unless they’re from Deleware circa ‘89: Infection “Legal Limit” lp. I found this in some dust covered bin about a year ago, and bought it for a few bucks just to check out. I was a little uncertain about potential sketchy politics based on the cover looking like some bogus white power record, but later confirmed that Infection never dabbled in such garbage (in fact there’s even a bonus rap track on here).

When I popped this on, I found it was a nice forgotten slab of metallic, would-be-NYHC, with the right amount of ineptitude and attitude. This has the familiar feel of all the classic In Effect releases like Brightside, Liberty and Justice, Blood Sweat and No Tears, with some Warzone and Breakdown vibes in there too. Hardheaded HARDcore, with metal guitars and everything dripped in cheap reverb. If it were a NY band I think they would have had no trouble being an accepted part of that scene, but Delaware is a hundred miles away, and though Philly is close by, it’s just not the same.

The record opens with a good galloping intro (a pit starter), before going into Same Set Of Eyes. Their singer immediately reminds me of an imitation of Roger Miret and Raybeez. I guess he doesn’t get originality points but he does it pretty well. The song has a nice chunky mosh beat for the main riff almost like Altercation or something. United is your standard punks and skins vs. society anthem that could be a late 80’s Warzone outtake. Most of the rest of the record touches on all the things you’d expect, but also with a lot of love for drinking/being drunk (hence the title). Actually what probably hurt Infection’s popularity more than being Delawarians, is that they were adamantly No-Edge (that’s 80’s slang for anti-Straight Edge if you’re a little slow on the come up). While this might fly just fine nowadays, it seems like a risky proposition in ‘89/’90 at the absolute height of Straight Edge when your sound will basically only appeal to angry suburban boys with pent up frustrations. With the exception of legit agitators like Sheer Terror, or fun kinda bands like Murphy’s Law, most of the big non-edge bands seemed to not rip into it too much - i.e. Agnostic Front sending out Strength “to the sxe kids”. Maybe in NY you could build a following being a No-Edge band, but for a fairly generic sounding band from Delaware, with a ghetto looking lp sleeve, well, forget about it.

So, really though, this is a pretty good album, and if you like this style I think you’re bound to enjoy it. It’s definitely better than a lot of the also-rans of the time like Fit Of Anger or Gut Instinct. There’s also a previous 7″ with a different singer, and of course some demos, but I think I like this album the best. $30 is a lot to pay for it but maybe you just want it nowand don’t want to wait around (we call that a convenience fee). When they pop up for sale at stores they’re nearly always $6 or less because no store actually knows what it is. Unfortunatly if you try to find one online pretty much any dealer will price it at $20 or higher just because it’s on a small label and it’s late 80’s hc.

Mosh it up.