I recently went through old piles of papers and found a copy of a photocopied old HeartFirst mailorder list. I used to send those out every other month in the 80s and 90s.
Between 1986 and 1992, my mailorder wasn’t called HeartFirst but Distrybutje Bonzki (pseudo-Russian I guess) because this was the old name from before the label started. I had helped a bit with the Bonzen Records label in the late 1980s. So this flyer was the first one after the name change. But I kept the old logo.
This list has some really cool Japanese records and was probably one of the most solid selections I ever had. BASTARD – “Wind of Pain” 12”, BLAZE 7”, and the self-released first HAKUCHI 7”.
Also in this list were some of the best Japanese compilations of the early 1990s, including the great “Starving Dog Eats Master” LP on Bloodsucker. That one has my favorite artwork by my friend Sugi.
I was lucky to get batches of those releases for distro. But those records were comparatively expensive for the DIY world, so many punks didn’t want or simply couldn’t spend that money for them.
Luckily, in the year 2021, the impossible to find Blaze EP got a re-release with extra songs on 12” on General Speech. Same goes for HAKUCHI who have a re-release LP out on Black Water. So now you can check out those great bands again.