Fang – Rise Up!

Fang Rise Up! vinyl is the LP pressing of the Bay Area hardcore band’s Die Laughing Records release, with Sam McBride on vocals, Obadiah Bowling and Tommy Knox on guitars, Brandon Brown on bass, and Jamey Davison on drums, in the format that gives this band’s recordings their full physical weight.

Fang Rise Up! vinyl: The Band and the Format

Fang’s catalog was built on vinyl, and the LP format is where their recordings make the most sense. The Bay Area hardcore sound of the late seventies and eighties was vinyl-native, produced for and consumed on the format, and Rise Up pressed on LP returns the record to the medium that suits it best. Die Laughing Records pressed the vinyl edition understanding that the collectors who would seek out Fang material in this format were the same collectors who had been building the band’s catalog from the original pressings forward through each phase of the band’s activity. The pressing delivers the low end and guitar presence that the recordings need to come across properly.

The Lineup on This Record

The Sam McBride and Sammytown lineup on Rise Up connects this record to the band’s core identity across multiple decades and multiple configurations. The personnel listed here represents the band at a developed and settled stage, not a reunion of convenience or a partial lineup making do with what was available. The San Francisco Bay Area and Long Beach connection that the band maintained through various lineup changes gives Rise Up a consistency with the earlier catalog that a less stable version of the group would not have been able to produce.

Why This Pressing

Fang collectors completing the vinyl side of the catalog will want Rise Up alongside the earlier records. Bay Area hardcore archivists building a complete physical document of the scene will find this a necessary addition to the collection. The influence of Fang on bands that went on to much wider audiences is well documented and widely acknowledged, and the records they made across their various periods are worth having in the right format. Rise Up on LP from Die Laughing is the version that takes the recordings seriously and presents them in the format they deserve, and collectors who care about Fang’s full vinyl catalog will want this copy.