Till Death...

Last year, when Ron Brotherhood commented on my post for the No Tolerance 7 inch, he hinted that big things were coming in 2014.

Here we are, and Southern Lord follows up on the hype of their Bl'ast reissues with this one for Brotherhood. According to the Double Cross interview with Greg Anderson, the guy was never that thrilled with the Crucial Response release, so when the opportunity came to release that Brotherhood material on his own label, he ran with it.

Revelation Records exclusive on blue vinyl. Limited to 600.

My Brotherhood collection is rather weak, so I didn't hesitate to take this opportunity to beef it up, and I ordered every piece of colored vinyl that I could get my hands on.

300 pressed on Seahawks blue, green and gray vinyl.

There were two different options for the LP with a bonus No Tolerance 7 inch. One with the red vinyl LP and a blue vinyl 7 inch...

...And another red vinyl LP with a red 7 inch.

Honestly, two different red vinyl LP options felt a little...ahem...overkill. I could see maybe doing a couple different options, but you've got to change up the LP color at least. My only other complaint on this whole package is the 7 inch style booklet. The lyrics and photos are cool, but seriously, I couldn't have given a shit about Nate Mendel's essay. Christ, I didn't even know what he was trying to say. Go play with the Foo Fighters and drink your "animal beer"...pffft...not interested. I would have preferred to have something from Ron, or even Greg.

Nice touch from Southern Lord with the stickers.

So, I thought that I had all the pressings until someone reminded me that I never bought the black vinyl of this. Damn. All this, and it is still incomplete.

Bl'ast Of Power

Last year, Southern Lord and Dave Grohl cooked up a mighty slab of Bl'ast! with the release of Blood!. While I've had copies of the three Bl'ast! albums since the late 80's, that piece of vinyl really woke me up to how good they really were.

When I heard that Southern Lord was releasing some new recordings of The Power Of Expression sessions, I was quick to jump in and buy one.

Apparently Bl'ast! had three recording sessions in their attempt to capture the songs on tape. Is it overkill to release all three sessions across this triple LP set? Die hard fans may disagree with me here, but in this case, yes, this is too much. In my opinion, the final session that was used for the original album is really the only one worth spinning. While the songs from this last session sound amazing, I will not spend any more time listening to the band's first two attempts at recording their album. They just aren't anything that I need.

Still, the packaging for this is amazing, and makes this release worth owning. Crystal clear vinyl...heavy cardboard packaging...a nice play on the album title with The Expression Of Power...and the artwork is vastly superior to the original. Like the cover for Blood!, I love the dark, Sabbathy vibe for this release.

Again, this release from Southern Lord helped me really appreciate Bl'ast!. I wonder if they will make an attempt to turn me on to Take The Manic Ride with another reissue at some point.

The Blackest Breath

I had never heard of Black Breath back when their first LP, Heavy Breathing, was released back in 2010. By the time I figured out how great they were, I had missed the boat on the colored vinyl. I was not going to miss out this time around, and when I heard from Sandwell that a new album was available for pre-order through Southern Lord, I jumped on it.

Sentenced To Life isn't much of a deviation from Heavy Breathing, and that's okay with me. Black Breath keep raging with a full on Metal assault. Feast of the Damned, Forced Into Possession, Home of the Grave, Endless Corpse...damn...how Metal are those song titles??!?!

The whole thing is topped off with an amazing looking album cover that has the look and feel of the mid-80's scene. I don't know...it just really reminds me of the early Exciter records, and that's pretty cool in my book.

Red with black splatter vinyl for mailorder.