The highly influential hardcore band SSD has today announced the reissue details of their long out-of-print classic, The Kids Will Have Their Say. Long heralded as the first straight-edge album, this collection of songs captures a time and an era in the nascent hardcore scene before there were formulas and posturing. It’s an unfiltered artistic statement that’s singular in scope and vision.
The Boston act’s debut was extremely limited, never repressed and has gone on to have a life of its own despite the fact the only affordable way to listen to it has been low quality streams on YouTube. Now, after being out of print for 40 years, the album is going to be available on streaming services for the first time ever and will be released on vinyl by Trust Records. This deluxe version has been meticulously updated with remastered audio and a painstaking recreation of the iconic cover art, courtesy of Bryan Ray Turcotte.
“We only did one pressing of 1,900 copies and then I shut it down after the first pressing,” Barile explains. “Even back then within a couple of years if people wanted it they couldn’t get it, but I guess what surprises me is that people still want it. People on YouTube copy it all the time and put it up there and I never once complained to them about copyright violations or stuff like that.”
From the unbridled aggression of SSD’s “Boiling Point” to the stripped-down groove of “How Much Art,” the album was as reactionary as it was revolutionary and is an artistic statement that remains to be remarkably complex for a group of guys barely into adulthood. “Our first performances began in art galleries and that combined with an overabundance of post-punk art rock at every turn made ripe for a song which is about the avant-gardcore movement at the Gallery East in Boston in 1980,” Barile explains when asked about “How Much Art.”
Considered to be the first Straight Edge band, SSD formed in Boston in 1981. The band quickly gained notoriety within the local music scene for intense, charged performances and the provocative antics of their core group of followers, the Boston Crew. In 1982, they released their debut LP The Kids Will Have Their Say on their own XClaim and Ian MacKaye’s Dischord label. An estimated 1900 copies were pressed and quickly sold out – currently an original copy of the album sells for an average of $2,000 on Discogs.
SSD The Kids Will Have Their Say Deluxe Reissue sees its release across all digital retailers and vinyl on November 17, 2023. Trust has also worked with SSD to design an official merch line. The collection includes two new options of the classic SSD logo shirt and shorts. To shop and for more info, go here.
