Once upon a time, kids traded bubblegum-scented baseball cards as if they were gold bullion, flipping and swapping them for players whose faces were as familiar as family. I never made it into that league, but playing in punk and new wave bands in the ’70s and ’80s put me in another one entirely, and recently turned me into a modern-day trading card.

Joshua Hurst is the creator of a vast and fascinating project called Hard Core Legends Trading Cards—a digital collection of musicians spanning from the 1970s to today. So far, he’s made 785 cards, each one researched, designed, and posted to his Instagram page, which now boasts more than 23,000 followers.

The first two questions I asked him were obvious: What inspired you to make digital trading cards of musicians? And why pick me?

“It started as a joke… not you,” he told me, laughing. “I used to make cards of my friends from the comic shop I hang out at on Saturdays. I’d post them on Facebook, and everyone got a kick out of it. Then I made some of a friend’s band and thought it would be funny to do cards of punk and hardcore musicians I like.”

He liked my bands, Comateens and Dizzy and the Romilars, so much that there are now three trading cards with my mug on them—cards not physically traded but digitally admired.

From those humble beginnings, Hurst’s project evolved. A friend suggested he add stats and trivia to the backs, like old baseball cards, and that’s when things took off. He launched Hard Core Legends on Instagram, and fans of punk, hardcore, and underground music scenes around the world began following.

“What keeps me going,” he said, “is the positive feedback. Musicians I grew up admiring actually enjoy seeing themselves on these cards. That’s wild to me.”

Hurst chooses who gets a card mostly by passion and instinct. The early ones featured members of Black Flag, Bad Brains, Circle Jerks, and Dead Kennedys. Later, he began including lesser-known artists—friends, local musicians, and anyone whose story deserved to be told. “Sometimes I’ll just see a musician follow the page, and that’s enough to inspire me to make them a card,” he said.

The process is surprisingly meticulous. When he decides on an artist, he digs deep, researching every band, guest spot, and side project they’ve ever been part of. “If I can’t find everything online, I’ll read or watch interviews, or ask other fans,” he said. “When all else fails, I go straight to the source, but I like it best when the card’s a surprise.”

Each card begins with a photo, usually a recent one. “LEGEND should go hand in hand with LONGEVITY,” he said. Using Photoshop, he assembles each design in a layout inspired by 1979 and 1982 Topps baseball cards. The backs are filled with stats, trivia, and fun facts. “Even if someone only played in a high school band that never recorded,” he said, “I’ll include that. Every detail counts.”

Over time, he’s created themed series, entire sets devoted to famous and even fictional bands from TV and movies. There’s a Straight Edge series and an LGBTQ+ Musicians series. He’s even printed a few special editions, including a six-card Sick of It All pack that raised over $5,000 for lead singer Lou Koller’s cancer treatment.

When I asked if he worked with a team, Hurst laughed. “Nope, it’s just me. Research, design, posting—it’s all a one-man show.” His tools? Photoshop, a phone note app, and the internet.

What struck me most wasn’t the scale of the project but the heart behind it. “It started as fun,” he said, “but now I think of it as a kind of musical archive—a digital museum of the underground.”

My card, #786, along with hundreds of others including Ramones, Misfits, and Sex Pistols, can be viewed on Instagram at @hard_core_legends_trading_cards or at www.HardCoreLegendsTradingCards.com.