Get Out 'Wallet' for Massive McCarthy Reissue

No label tackles a reissue project with the gusto of Optic Nerve Recordings. If you bought the recent releases 'Pleasure' from Girls At Our Best or 'Unseen Ripples From a Pebble' from the Wolfhounds, then you know the look, feel and sound of the vinyl is matched only by the mountains of bonus material. The label's obvious labor of love continues with the 1987 debut full-length 'I Am a Wallet' by McCarthy. Even if you have an original album from September Records or the very well-done reissue Cherry Red released in 2007, you're still going to be tempted by this new-and-improved version.

The 2-LP set is pressed on red vinyl (Is this in honor of the band's leftist leanings? Ha!). Record one is the original. The second record eclipses Cherry Red's nine bonus songs by four (although a few from that previous reissue are missing) and includes all of the tracks from the band's four singles. So, yes, "Red Sleeping Beauty," "Frans Hals" and "In Purgatory" are there. Oh, and the first 250 copies include a reproduction of the three song "In Purgatory" 7" -- the one that started it all -- remastered from the original master tapes.

Imagine the rest of this in an over-the-top infomercial voice: That's not all! You also get an 8x10 black-and-white press photo, reproduction tour poster, "The Well Of Loneliness" promo poster (No. 45 on my UK indie singles countdown last year), giant poster of Georg Grosz' cover art and a McCarthy sticker. The 20 page 12x12 color booklet is chock full of photos, press clippings, lyrics, introduction by uberfan Nicky Wire of the Manic Street Preachers and a track-by-track commentary by Malcolm Eden. Preorder now... now... now... for a June release!

Tracklist for 'I Am a Wallet'

LP1
An MP Speaks
Monetaries
The International Narcotics Traffic
The Way Of The World
Antinature
Charles Windsor
The Vision Of Peregrine Worsthorne
The Well Of Loneliness
The Wicked Palace Revolution
God Made The Virus
The Funeral
A Child Soon In Chains
In The Dark Times
The Procession Of Popular Capitalism

LP2
In Purgatory
Comrade Era
Something Wrong Somewhere
Red Sleeping Beauty
From The Damned
For The Fat Lady
Frans Hals
Kill Kill Kill Kill
You're Alive
Bad Dreams
Someone Worse Off
Antiamericancretin
Unfortunately

Bonus 7" (first 250 orders)
In Purgatory
Comrade Era
Something Wrong Somewhere