At All Cost - NYHC (1987 - 1991)

For my first post in the Rockland County hardcore (RCH) section I had to go with the first and most successful of the RCH bands At All Cost.

The origins of At All Cost begin in early 1987 when a group of 15 year old high school friends somehow discovered the NY Hardcore scene and decided to form their own band. This original incarnation of At All Cost consisted of Darin Galgano (drums) , Charlie Oberle (vocals) , Chris Scott (bass) and Wade Babcock (guitar) and went by the name Violent Youth who basically functioned as a hardcore cover band who played a few shows locally covering bands like Warzone, Agnostic Front and various other NY Hardcore bands of the time.

At some point in 1987 Violent Youth added Mike Iovino on vocals and moved Charlie to bass, however Mike's time in the band was short lived as he was quickly replaced by Jeff Guzman, and At All Cost was born. At this point the band began writing original material and playing out locally. It was also with this line up that At All Cost recorded and released the first At All Cost demo tape in 1988.



After a short time of playing with this solidified line up At All Cost made two final personnel moves when Charlie Oberle left the band to be replaced by Brian Getkin on bass, and Chris Scott also left the band to be replaced by Mark Calimbus. This line up of Darin,Brian,Mark, Jeff and Wade would become the final line up for At All Cost and also the most cohesive and powerful line up to date. I believe it was with this final line up that At All Cost played their biggest shows with the likes of Raw Deal, Cro-mags, Destruction etc.



In 1989/90 At All Cost went into the studio for one final time and as a result of this studio session a final demo was released in 1990 which featured the bands strongest material to date, but like so many young bands the wheels started to fall off the wagon after the release of the 1990 demo. The trouble began with a record deal that went bust, and the final straw that broke the camels back was the departure of vocalist Jeff Guzman. After Jeff's departure At All Cost auditioned vocalist but could never find the right fit for the band, which is unfortunate because the new music the band was working on at the time was probably their best to date, unfortunately these new songs were never properly recorded and only exist to this day on a practice tape that is in the possession of one of the band members.

After The break up of At All Cost Mark C went on to form Atlas Shrugged who had a very successful career releasing multiple 7" and full length releases on Rockland County based label Trip Machine Laboratories. Darin and Brian went on to form Dahlia Seed with Chris Skelly who was a member of Rockland County thrashers Selective Outrage. Dahlia seed went on to become one of the more influential Emo bands of the 90's releasing multiple 7 " singles and full length albums over their 5 year career. In the near future Individual posts for both Atlas Shrugged and Dahlia Seed will be forthcoming on Suburbia Suburbia SUBURBIA! ... Dave G.



Download ... Demo 1988 and 1990

Download ... CBGB 10/15/1989

Download ... WNYU Radio 10/25/1990





Our Friend Dan over at Old-Fast-and-Loud was kind enough to cut up the AAC live shows ... boost the levels and make a nice cdr cover for everything. Here are Links to Dan's files and please check out his excellent blog as well.

At All Cost - CDR

CDR covers