From the outside GGT Records may appear an extravagantly humble enterprise — “headquartered in a basement and at a kitchen table,” as the website notes — exceedingly few labels have launched out of the corner with such a powerful, exhilarating one-two punch of releases.
“The driving force behind GGT is the desire of two old buddies to put out great hardcore without allegiance to a particular look or subgenre,” Adam Barone, who co-founded the label with his former Raise Up bandmate Elbert Aull, tells Decibel. “Just good, timeless hardcore.”
First up is the Noble Ambitions seven-inch courtesy Mean Jesus, melodic hardcore punk from Virginia featuring ex-members of Converge — drummer John Digiorgio played on the just-reissued Poacher Diaries — Canephora, Bad Korea, Invaluable, and others — with what Barone aptly describes as a “Paint it Black, Silent Majority, and (at times) Propaghandi feel.”
Next — and, if you (like your humble correspondent) were previously unaware of this, it will blow your mind — is Leave With What You Came For, an insanely amazing hardcore/post-hardcore supergroup release from forgive/forget, which not only boasts members of Battery, Ashes, Youth of Today, Judge and Six Going on Seven, but rises to that lofty legacy level. (This time capsule, originally recorded in 1998, should’ve been an scene-reconfiguring atom bomb.)
This summer GGT will dip its toe in the metallic hardcore waters with a release from Heavy is the Head, a Richmond quintet that “mix early Hope Con with modern thrash and actually manage to pull it off.”
It’s a hat trick of releases which makes it seem extremely likely that this passion project will outlive and outshine its pandemic origins. Support!
