How Could Hell Be Any Worse? is where Bad Religion started, and it already sounds like a band with a thesis. Released in January 1982 as their first full-length for Epitaph, the debut was financed partly by a $3,000 loan from Brett Gurewitz's father and cut at Track Record in North Hollywood across 1980 and 1981. It is faster and blunter than the polished Bad Religion of later years, fast SoCal hardcore with Greg Graffin already reaching for the vocabulary that set the band apart. It sold 10,000 copies inside a year and helped start a label. This 40th anniversary edition is pressed on limited clear with black smoke vinyl.