Shock Treatment: So Gabriele, tell me about how you first got into punk music? Gabriele: When I was young, I started out listening to hard rock, then moved on to heavy metal and thrash metal. Around the age of 18, I met Marco Sigismondi: he sang in a local hardcore punk band called Digos Goat and also ran a fanzine called Road To Ruin. That really opened my eyes to a world I didn’t know: the DIY hardcore punk scene—black-and-white covers, self-published zines, fixed prices for records and fanzines—a completely different way of doing things that I wasn’t familiar with, partly because I was born and live in a small town in central-southern Italy. But hardcore punk made its way there too, albeit a little late, and from that moment on, things were never the same. Shock Treatment: So What made you decide to want to start the record label instead of playing in a band? Gabriele: Because back then, as a kid, I didn’t play any musical instruments and it had never even crossed my mind; some of m...

In case you don’t know Vinyl Dog Records, here is the quick history: it was a Southern California label from the mid-90s to the mid-2010s, run by the head stitch himself, Michael Lohrman. (Aside from running the label, he fronts one of the absolute best active punk bands in the land! With the killer news that Michael is officially reactivating the label, I’m here doing a retrospective of my top 10 Vinyl Dog records. While the original catalog wasn't huge, I realized I’ve owned pretty much all of it. And yes, that includes the elusive U.S. Bombs 2x7" and the Exploding Fuck Dolls 7". I let them go for cash when times were tight years ago, and man, do I regret it today. Here's to a long, prosperous second coming for Vinyl Dog Records—because the world needs all the punk rock it can get right now! 10. Sensitive Side - Moon Kids 7" EP VD-019 (2011) You get a value packed 6 songs of pretty great anxiety riddled, abrasive, yet melodic post punk here on this one. As far...