Whether you discovered sunny Huntington Beach, California by way of icey New Haven, Connecticut’s Revelation Records from reverential New York Hardcore band Gorilla Biscuits or the incredible punk rock compilation (remember those?) “In-Flight Program: Revelation Records Collection ‘97,” it probably means you’re old now and your best days are in the rearview mirror. Anyway, RR was formed by then-Youth of Today vocalist Ray Cappo and Jordan Cooper just one year before George W. Bush’s father was elected President of the United States, and has put out over two hundred releases since. We listed ten underrated albums from the label below alphabetically, and EPs, compilations, re-releases, and bands like the aforementioned Gorilla Biscuits and Youth of Today (or any side project featuring Cappo), Inside Out, Rage Against the Machine’s precursor band with enigmatic vocalist Zach de la Rocha, Farrah Fawcett, and even New Found Glory are disqualified from entry below:
Elliott “U.S. Songs” (1998)
First of all, how badass is it that Elliott’s debut studio full-length album “U.S. Songs” has an instrumental song called “Intro,” AND it’s track two on the actual record? Whoa! That’s really heady. Anyway, the band’s sophomore LP “False Cathedrals” gets way more flowers than its predecessor, but without “U.S. Songs” there would be no false cathedrals, true synagogues, calvary songs, or Australian Vegemite Silverchair cover melodies. Louisville, Kentucky is more known for whiskey than emo, but hopefully more emo awareness can change that ever so slightly in Elliott’s emotional favor even though Bourbon is pretty good and tasty even if it isn’t either. Sadly the band split up approximately five years after “U.S. Songs” came out, but happily the band reformed in 2022, and played Birmingham, Alabama’s Furnace Fest that year with acts like Sunny Day Real Estate, Stretch Arm Strong, Poison The Well, and Nancy Sinatra.
Engine Kid “Angel Wings” (1995)
What the hell, world? Why does Seattle, Washington’s Engine Kid have only 572 monthly listeners on Spotify as of press time, AND why doesn’t the band have a freaking Wikipedia page, for Christ’s sake? These two stats prove beyond a shadow of a doubt that the band is the most underrated of the batch here, and we have you to blame! Yes, you. Want to fix this? Get each of your two friends to listen to “Angel Wings” and tell them to tell their two other friends to do the same. Math is fun. Engine Kid might be one of the harder to define acts here, but their hybrid multigenre sound truly needs your ears, hearts, time, and special goodness. We blame 1995’s incredible hard rock year with acts like Rancid, The Smashing Pumpkins, Foo Fighters, and KC and The Sunshine Band for stealing EK’s thunder.
Farside “The Monroe Doctrine” (1999)
Orange County, California’s melodic hardcore masterminds known as Farside, and not Far (who also kick a ton of ass but weren’t on Revelation Records) formed in 1989, and previously included Rage Against The Machine’s Zach de la Rocha like the aforementioned Inside Out from 1990-1991, just not on vocals, so they’re included here. The band released several EPs, LPs, and even a compilation before their swan song “The Monroe Doctrine,” and said LP closed out the ’90s in style. Fans of non-RR bands Seaweed, Lifetime, Samiam, and early-Debbie Gibson before she sold out will LOVE this record and its predecessors and so will you. The band split up in the year of our lord known as 2000, and we don’t foresee any reunion dates unless Riot Fest ponies up with a large Zelle deposit; there’s a light on in Chicago, so come now. We hope you’re happy.
Judge “Bringin’ It Down” (1989)
Not only is New York, New York’s Judge’s “Bringin’ It Down” the band’s hippest album title with the apostrophe to prove it, it is also the oldest LP referenced here with a late-1980s release date. In addition, the band is also easily the heaviest mentioned. But not in terms of mass, and proved said girth by being openly/militantly straight edge. Such ethos may turn off many a la Minor Threat, but we’re just happy that the band has such strong and literally sobering convictions; you can tell the band that they make no difference but at least they were (expletive deleted) trying. Even the band’s logo, their clobberin’ time “X” that rivals Burger King’s golden arches, is intimidating. The band released one more EP, “There Will Be Quiet…,” via Revelation Records before breaking up in 1991, the year that grunge infected the world, but reunited twenty-two years later.
The Movielife “This Time Next Year” (2000)
One of two releases listed here from the 2000s, Long Island, New York’s The Movielife has had their fair share of drama through the years, but with a statement like the nearly thirty minute sophomore one-off full-length studio album “This Time Next Year” for Revelation Records, does it matter? We. Think. Not. The band eventually signed to Drive-Thru Records and rode their storm shortly afterwards with a sick EP and even sicker album, but surprisingly is forever underrated with both fans and mainstream appeal, and certainly got far less love than DTR superstars New Found Glory, The Starting Line, Hellogoodbye, and The Pointer Sisters. Despite what you may think, we don’t hope that you die soon, we do wish that you weren’t ten seconds or more too late, and that you donated more of your precious time to this band’s DSPs and upped their streams/sales.
On the Might of Princes “Sirens” (2003)
Another underrated Long Island band that never got mainstream adoration, easily even more so than the aforementioned The Movielife, is forever marred with tragedy in every sense of the word with the way-too-soon loss of vocalist/guitarist Jason Rosenthal just ten years after the release of the newest Revelation Records entry here, “Sirens.” Sadly the band hung their hats just one year after “Sirens” was released, and came back for random shows here/there until Rosenthal passed away. Happily the band reunited late last year with Rachel Rubino of Bridge & Tunnel (a fun Long Island reference) on vocals. Hopefully they will record new music together, but at least we’ll always have “Sirens.” If you have the chance, and we know that you do, check out the remastered version of this LP which also came out in 2023, twenty years after its initial release.
Sense Field “Building” (1996)
Southern California’s Sense Field’s perfect album “Building” has the distinction of being our favorite LP here, which combined with six dollars and fifty cents can buy you a cup of coffee in Los Angeles, but like On the Might of Princes, forever has a sad asterisk attached to their legacy with the death of vocalist Jon Bunch twenty years after its release. In the light of things, a solid post-hardcore blueprint for kids of all ages, “Building” succeeded at making both sensitivity rock hard and rock more endearingly sensitive. The band would have a minor hit with “Save Yourself” from their non-RR Nettwerk Records 2001 record “Tonight and Forever,” but tragically Bunch’s demons didn’t work in saving himself; perfect dream outlives the man. If you had a chance to go to one of the benefit shows for Bunch’s son Jack, you who witnessed some insane vocal features.
Shades Apart “Seeing Things” (1997)
Most certainly one of the better and more underrated punk rock records of the ’90s, Shades Apart’s “Seeing Things” unknowingly overcame their blatant DSP in its album title typo years later with their second Revelation Records LP release. Shades Apart often doesn’t get discussed with the same reverence as others in the oversaturated and many times meh genre, and we’re here to change it for you and everyone that you know. An effective power trio from extremely ineffective New Jersey, SA rode under the radar but did so in a noteworthy fashion, and eventually won the suits over at Universal Records. We’ll never know what could have and would have happened had “Seeing Things” been a major label release, but that’s what makes horse racing. Also, track two, “Fearless,” is a standout song from the already standout aforementioned “In-Flight Program: Revelation Records Collection ‘97” label compilation.
Texas Is The Reason “Do You Know Who You Are?” (1996)
New York, New York’s Texas Is The Reason as an entity and their literal lone full-length studio effort, “Do You Know Who You Are?” which is potentially named after the last words that John Lennon heard after being viciously executed by Mark David Chapman, both may not be underrated to you, the extremely educated and always objectively and subjectively correct reader with impeccable taste, but if you ask an average pedestrian if they’ve heard of this band, you’ll likely hear crickets or some derivative low hanging fruit joke about San Antonio or El Paso. Sadly Texas Is The Reason imploded shortly after they started, and we know that if they stuck around despite internal conflicts, they would’ve had at least 1996 more songs by now, and may have been spoken in the same sentence in terms of impact as peers Jimmy Eat World.
Whirlpool “Liquid Glass” (1996)
Let’s end this piece with a more than welcome female spin in a typically overly male dominated rock genre: Southern California’s Whirlpool, formed as a rock and roll side project from the previously mentioned Sense Field’s Rodney Sellars, is easily the second most underappreciated band listed here next to Engine Kid, and “Liquid Glass,” the band’s second and final full-length, has cool cover art and even radder songs. Anyway, how this act didn’t rise to the fellow femme heights of contemporaries The Breeders, that dog., The Juliana Hatfield Three, and Robert Johnson is a question that we will forever ask ourselves. Please don’t confuse the band for Chicago, Illinois’ Whirlpool, a jazz trio that is cool in their own right, but way less post-hardcore, pre-hardcore, or nardcore. Trouble!