From the inbox:

Escapist Records (This Time Next Year, Crucified) is pleased to announce the signing and plans to release the new EP from Kent, OH’s LIGHT YEARS. Just Between Us will be available in both vinyl and digital form in early 2012 through the Cleveland-based label. The new EP follows up the band’s debut offering This Will Come Back to Haunt Me, which the band self-released in 2010. All vinyl of Just Between Us will come packaged with digital versions of both EPs. More details on the release will be announced in the near future.

The songs “To Live and Die” and “Scavengers” from the five-song EP can be streamed via Bandcamp.

The band will be kicking off a full U.S. tour with PENTIMENTO (Panic Records) on December 27th to promote the upcoming EP with SOUVENIRS and MAKER (6131 Records) appearing on select dates. Following the completion of the tour, the two bands will head overseas for a European run.

- Give those songs a listen, this is gooooood!

This year without question changed my life forever. The music I listened to had to reflect that. It had to fight like hell with me. I think that one of the things we love most about music is that it travels with us; it is our one true everlasting companion. This music traveled with me to places I never expected to go; to weddings, births and to far too many funerals. It traveled to new opportunities and gut-wrenching defeats. It traveled by car, by train and by foot. Some days it did not travel at all. Thankfully a lot of beautiful music came out this year and I think this is a wonderfully awkward collection of that. Cheers!

 1. BON IVER – Bon Iver (Jagjaguwar)

Sometimes I sit alone in my room with all the lights off drinking wine while I watch all those hallucinogenic videos that Bon Iver released to go along with each song on this record. I stare at all the colors; I ain’t ashamed!

Lyric: “…and at once I knew I was not magnificent.”

More after the jump…

From the inbox:

THE LAST STAND have signed with the new Kansas City, MO based indie label American Enemy Records. The Last Stand will be entering Nova Studios in Staten Island, New York to begin recording our debut full length (title forthcoming) in late February 2012 with producer Jerry Farley for a late spring/early summer 2012 release in the USA. This release will be on CD, LP and iTunes and see worldwide distribution. TLS wants to say THANK YOU to all who all who support us and we look forward to a great 2012!!!! HARDCORE LIVES!!!

- The group previously released a 7″ on 1124 Records.

This year’s list has been expanded to 30 entries and does away with numerical rankings. I hope everyone will survive without knowing how much more I liked BALANCE AND COMPOSURE’s Separation over SKELETONWITCH’s Forever Abomination. This year’s list is heavy on metal and pop-punk and a bit light on hardcore. There’s only one entry for [...]

NARROWS Absolute Betrayer by deathwishinc

- Painted hits stores on February 28th via Deathwish Inc. The new material has been described as “[the] marriage of primal metallic hardcore with the effects-laden art rock”.

From the inbox:

Mediaskare Records is proud to announce that California’s own LIONHEART will be entering the studio in January with producers Matt Hyde (Hatebreed, Slayer, Terror) and Nick Jett (Terror). They will be recording at The Sunset Lodge in Silverlake, CA.

The follow up to 2011’s Built On Struggle is slated for an early 2012 release. “It’s an exciting opportunity to be able to work with Matt Hyde and Nick Jett on this album,” says Lionheart vocalist Rob Watson. “Matt Hyde’s resume speaks for itself, and we know Nick from previous tours done together so it will be awesome to work together on something like this. We’ve been working on this record since the release of Built On Struggle, and we can’t wait to start recording it. It’s heavier, harder, and more pissed than anything we’ve done to date.”

You can catch the band on the upcoming Persistence Tour in Europe with Suicidal Tendencies, Biohazard, Terror, etc. and on the first day of this year’s New England Metal and Hardcore Festival with The Black Dahlia Murder.

- The Great Fire is due on January 31st, via Rise Records. It will be the band’s sixth full-length, and second for Rise.