Mild Chaos Records is marking October 24th with a reissue that feels both overdue and perfectly timed — a first-ever vinyl pressing of Here to the End, the 2005 album by Hudson Valley’s own Trouble Bound.
The translucent purple-and-yellow splatter version arrives for the record’s twentieth anniversary, capturing the same blend of punk melody, working-class frustration, and restless storytelling that once made the band a regional staple.
Frontman Johnny No-Keys revisited each song, reflecting on what those moments meant then — and, in many ways, still mean now.
“32 Main” opens with a personal escape route — his sister’s apartment, a teenage refuge where he could ditch parental rules and schoolyard judgments. “A place where I felt I was free to be me,” he says, remembering skateboards, bad grades, and “funny clothes and hair.” The Ramones influence isn’t subtle here; it’s a celebration of punk as sanctuary.
In “No Control,” that energy hardens into panic. Written after a show in New York City just eleven days after 9/11, it channels the disorientation of that moment — “mass hysteria and panic that seemed to be everywhere.” The song races forward like a heartbeat still stuck in those days.
“Homeboys” narrows the frame: two friends, barely out of high school, struggling with loss and rejection. One mourning a friend gone too young, the other caught in heartbreak. It’s a quiet, human look at grief and friendship — the way punks hold each other up when the world turns heavy.
Then comes “Junkyard Visionary,” a piece of social commentary from the scraps. Johnny calls it “an observation… on the state of this country,” a daydream about unity born from frustration. Even from the junkyard, he insists on “hoping it will manifest itself if enough people wake up.”
“It Don’t Matter” drops back into personal territory — the familiar burnout of a one-sided relationship. “Finally deciding it’s time to walk away,” he says, after giving too much for too long.
“Kick Down” bites harder. A blast of defiance from a punk kid stuck in a narrow-minded town, raging at “corrupt governments, Nazi fucks, deceivers,” and everyone who looks at difference like a threat. “Wanting to kick them all down while taking the beating himself” — the line pretty much defines the album’s pulse.
“Hand-Me-Downs” swings with an Oi rhythm but takes aim at political rot. “Leaders kicking the can down the road,” Johnny says, knowing the next generation will “pay the piper.” It’s anger sharpened by awareness, not nihilism.
“Squares Beware” lightens the mood — a flash of 1950s rock’n’roll charm inspired by unrequited love and self-pep talks. “A taste of our early rock influence seeps through here,” he says, picturing a dance floor straight out of American Graffiti where “everything will be okay.”
The title track, “Here to the End,” has long been a crowd favorite — a working-class scream aimed at everyday assholes. Johnny wrote it while stuck in a factory job, surrounded by “primo personalities.” Instead of getting fired for swinging fists, he wrote the song to “scream in their faces” without landing in jail.
“Rolling with the Punches” speaks to endurance. Written unknowingly in sync with bandmate Dan, the song captures parallel struggles — “down on your luck and feeling like the world’s against you.” The fact that their verses matched perfectly without prior discussion says everything about their chemistry.
“Solitary Confinement” tears into racism’s absurdity. “An elaboration of our thoughts about it,” Johnny says. Written the day before recording, it’s what he calls the “winker” — a spontaneous, last-minute cut that showed just how tuned-in the band was at that time.
“Trouble Bound Blues” reaches back to one of the band’s earliest songs, written in the spirit of exhaustion and revolt. “Sick and tired of the same old routine,” Johnny lists his enemies — “dickhead cops, corrupt governments, shithead bosses.” It’s blues for the working class, filtered through punk distortion and backseat nostalgia.
“Bruises on the Skull” sounds like defiance through exhaustion — “waking up every day and taking your lumps from the world.” He laughs through the rage, telling it straight: “I see what you’re up to and you can fuck right off with that bullshit.”
“Work Whorse” returns to labor’s grind — “poison people, seeing them for who they are.” It’s a song about coming close to violence, recognizing that “it won’t get you anywhere except the oppression of a jail cell.” The lesson lands simple and hard: “Stay angry but stay free.”
“Trouble with Me” flips the script — a fantasy track about turning into a monster and tearing down the ones who push you too far, all over a bluesy punk riff.
And closing it out, “String Breaker” drifts into imagination — “an adventure in my head,” Johnny says, picturing himself in a 1950s movie, coping with heartbreak in a simpler time.
Here to the End remains what it always was — a working-class punk record with heart, sarcasm, and scars, built from the places and people that shaped it. For the first time, that sound gets pressed into vinyl — exactly twenty years later, still rolling with the punches.
