Sacrificed For Saxon

One of the tools that has been feeding my Metal appetite is my discovery of Iron Fist. This UK Metal mag quickly sucked me in, seduced me into signing up for a subscription, and had me on the hunt for back issues shortly after checking out my first issue.

Issue number three featured Saxon on the front cover. The black, white and red Saxon logo with Biff rocking the mic...I love the look and feel of it. Soon I was jamming those early albums on my ipod and dreaming of adding original UK Carrere vinyl pressings to my record collection.

While checking Saxon vinyl on eBay, I stumbled across a listing of the new album with a $10 Buy It Now price tag. The last few Saxon albums have been great, and at this price, I didn't hesitate to finally pick up the newest one, Sacrifice.

I wasn't thrilled that the album was only pressed as a picture disc for the vinyl release, but I wasn't going to let something like that stop me from buying a copy.

No More Second Chances

Without a doubt, I've been in a Metal mood lately. Doom, Thrash, Rock...old shit...new shit...it has consumed me, and it is all I've been listening to. I've made no time for Hardcore recently. I still loved it. I just wasn't interested in listening to it. Today that all changed.

I have a rule with this blog...I've got to listen to the vinyl before I write up my post. Regardless of my Metal mood, I dropped the needle to my new Stick Together LP and started to brainstorm on what I would write about. As soon as the record starts playing, I'm reminded why I love this style of music so much. The power, the energy, the lyrics, no bullshit...Straight Edge Hardcore is the real deal. Suddenly, all that Metal that I'd been obsessing about was pushed aside as I queued up bands like Turning Point, Unbroken, True Colors, and even some G.B.H.. Oh man, I have missed this stuff, and didn't even realize it. Welcome back.

There isn't really anything new with No More Second Chances from Triple B. Okay, so there is a Cold World cover, but this is basically just both of the Stick Together 7 inches combined to the LP format. Solid.

300 on green vinyl, and 700 on black.

Iron Man Lives Again

I first heard of Iron Man late last year when Rise Above released their South Of The Earth LP. I could not get enough of that album, and before too long, Iron Man were one of my favorite new bands. Those riffs...that guitar tone...doom perfection.

I was surprised to find out that the band had been around in one form or another, and had a string of four albums already under their belts. One of the reasons that the band has struggled to receive any recognition has to be because of the continual rotation of band members, with the guitarist, being the only constant. With the changing line ups, I was hesitant to check out their earlier records. South Of The Earth was so good that I worried that changing that band chemistry wouldn't have the same strength and power. Still I was desperate for something more than that new album, so I took a tentative step back to 2009 and tried I Have Returned.

Oh damn! Even with a different singer, this Iron Man album rules just as much as their new one.

Vertigo Swirl Paranoid

After picking up a copy of Vol. 4 last year, it was only a matter of time before I expanded my Black Sabbath Vertigo swirl collection. With an upcoming bonus from work coming my way, the timing was right for me to start the search.

There were a stream of distractions that were trying to keep me from my prize, including a tempting offer for a No Tolerance test press, but I held firm to my mission...Vertigo swirl at any cost.

I spent a few weeks refreshing myself on the different pressing info, and following eBay listings...scouring over pictures to find records in the best of condition. This was a big deal, and I didn't want to cut any corners. I dropped decent bids on the first Black Sabbath record, as well as Master Of Reality, but I came up short on each of them. In the end, I probably paid more than I should have, but there was no sweeter win than grabbing this first press of Paranoid.

When I was looking for a copy of Paranoid, I was really hoping to grab a legit first pressing with the Jim Simpson/Big Bear credit on the inside of the gatefold sleeve. As soon as the album was issued, this line was immediately removed due to contractual disputes between Sabbath and Big Bear Management. This one line can cause the price to jump dramatically, and I've seen some of them sell on eBay for well over a grand. Thankfully, my copy was much cheaper than that.

How does a record that is 40 plus years old still manage to be in such great condition? Not a speck of ring wear to be found. Amazing.

It is always a tough call for me when picking my favorite Black Sabbath album...do I go with Paranoid or Master Of Reality? Right now, I'd have to go with Paranoid. Yeah, everyone gets tired of hearing "the hits", and Paranoid has three of them on Side A of this record...still, within the context of the full album War Pigs, Paranoid, and Iron Man are still amazing songs...and then to flip the vinyl over to find songs like Electric Funeral, Hand Of Doom, and Fairies Wear Boots....F U C K...absolute perfection.

Two down, two to go.

Survival Of The Splittest

A month or so ago, Lins posted a picture of an Outspoken 7 inch on instagram. What was this? A pressing of Survival on a transparent clear and orange split vinyl? Damn! I'd never seen that before!

I figured that the New Age Records webstore would be a good place to grab one, but it seems like that entire site has been taken down. It never occurred to me to ask Lins where he might have gotten it, and instead I set out in a panic, desperate to find myself a copy. Not too long into my search, I was in the Irish Voodoo webstore, pulling some pressing info for my latest Done Dying post, and that's when I saw it...that mysterious clear/orange split pressing. It was listed that there was only one copy left in stock, so I scooped it up.

Irish Voodoo had it listed as a special pressing for Outspoken's European tour. Good lord, is this band still out touring without John Coyle?

I recently found out that this record is also available in the Outspoken bigcartel store, so go grab one there if you haven't done so yet.

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.

Thrashed And Violated

Around 2007, I started to make an active attempt to discover some new Metal bands. The Thrash revival was really picking up steam with bands like Bonded By Blood, Evile, Warbringer, and Gama Bomb, and of course, I gravitated to these new bands. I ate up anything related to that Thrash revival, and in my fit of downloading all that I could, I ended up checking out a great Brazilian band called Violator.

Last year, I was surprised to discover that they were still around, and had even released a brand new album, Scenes Of Brutality. One of the things that I really like about Violator, is that their lyrics aren't just the same old mindless violence and Satanic fare (not that there is anything wrong with that). Instead, they cover real world violence and oppression...the things they experience and see on the news each day. Lyrically they are a cool throwback to bands like Sacred Reich.

100 pressed on "cop carcass" blue vinyl from War On Music.

As a bonus, War On Music threw in a free copy of the Borrowed Time LP. This one has a bit more of a traditional Metal sound, but it fails to really grab me. I dig some of it, but either the songs just aren't terribly strong, or the rough production takes away from it. I probably won't spend a lot of time with this one, but I am interested to see if they can take this to the next level, because there is some potential here.

Ancient Chain Heads

There is something about young kids playing Straight Edge Hardcore that still gets my blood pumping. Some things never get old.

Ancient Heads are one of those bands keeping that spirit alive. They aren't breaking down any barriers, and they aren't reinventing the wheel. They are just playing solid, bare bones, youth crew inspired straight edge hardcore with passion and sincerity. That's all I need.

Only 50 pressed for both the black and green vinyl.

Ancient Heads wear their influences on their sleeves. With this second pressing of their demo 7 inch, they complete their tribute to Chain Of Strength, matching the pressing for True Till Death. Silver sleeve. Clear vinyl. Green vinyl. Black vinyl. Job well done!

Worst Test Press Post Ever

My attempt to follow in Marcus' footsteps for the Test Press Challenge, and ending the year with 52 test pressings, has always been a joke. Still, I have managed to pick up a fair amount this year, and while I really have no hope of getting to the end goal, I did get a bit of Test Press Fever. After scoring my sixth test last month, with the Winds Of Change comp, I found myself on the hunt for another. When I saw a chance to grab a cheap test from the Nemesis Records catalog, I quickly threw in my winning bid.

While a $5 test press from Nemesis might sound like a great deal, it really isn't that impressive when the band is Fishwife. Honestly, I'd never heard this band before, but since it was on Nemesis, I figured that I'd roll the dice and take the chance. Terrible idea. Nemesis, what were you thinking?

Test press count for 2014 is now at seven.

Saint Vitus 'Die Healing'

A few years ago, when I first start to heavily get into doom metal, there was a guy at the local Newbury Comics that would scoff at me for not being very familiar with some of the classics...mainly Saint Vitus. I'd downloaded their early albums, Hallow's Victim and Born Too Late, but they never grabbed me out of the gate, so I didn't spend much time with them.

The Bravewords site has a thing called Knuckle Tracks, where they feature new songs from bands, and since I know so little about the Saint Vitus catalog, when they posted the song One Mind on their radio, I assumed the band had a new album coming out. I figured that I'd check it out, and was surprisingly knocked on my ass with how good it was. After some research, I discovered that the song was from their 1995 album, Die Healing. I love discovering buried treasures like this!

The entire album is heavy doom brilliance. It seems like everyone associates Saint Vitus with singer Wino, but this reunion LP with their original singer, Scott Reagers, is by far may favorite. "Beware...here comes the sloth"!

There wasn't a whole lot of vinyl being pressed when this album was originally released in 1995. In fact, Die Healing didn't finally get the vinyl treatment until 2010. This copy is from the 2013 reissue. Limited to 300 on this bright, transparent yellow vinyl.

Sealed Seaweed

I love reading record collector blogs. I love checking out pictures of new and old vinyl, and reading what people have to say. Every once in a while, someone will write something so well, I will feel compelled to check out a band that I would have otherwise ignored. In this case it was a Seaweed test press post from Marcus. This wasn't his first Seaweed post, but test pressings make me sit up and take notice.

Seaweed were around in the early to mid-90′s, right when I first started obsessing about Hardcore/Punk, but somehow, this band never showed up on my radar. I’m not sure if it was because they were on a big label, and I was too cool for that…or maybe it was because I always associated Sub Pop with Nirvana/Grunge and had no interest in that sound. Whatever it was, I’d never bothered to check them out. When Marcus posted the test pressing for Seaweed’s second album, Four, on his blog…and spoke so highly of it, I figured that I’d humor him and check it out. Much to my surprise, it blew me away. I couldn’t get enough of it, and I found myself listening to it 2 or 3 times in a day.

I knew that I needed it on vinyl, and assumed it would be an easy find on eBay. I mean, it was released by Sub Pop, and pressed only on black vinyl…how hard could it be to track one down? Turns out it wasn’t as easy as I thought. The few copies that would pop up on eBay, seemed to always have some ridiculous Buy It Now price. While I desperately wanted a copy, I wasn’t going to blow my load prematurely. Patience was the name of the game, and after waiting it out for a month or so, I received an email from eBay, alerting me that one was available. The price was still a bit high, but it was a dead mint sealed copy, so I pulled the trigger. Easily one of my favorite surprises this year.

I Serve... Metal

Metal seems to consume me lately. It dominates my daily playlists. My time on eBay is spent searching for original Metal pressings. I've subscribed to Iron Fist magazine, and I'm downloading tons of new and old Metal bands to check out. I'm obsessed.

I recently stopped by my local Bull Moose record store to just look around and kill some time. Walking out empty handed was an impossible mission once I started flipping through the Metal vinyl.

I really like all the Toxic Holocaust stuff, and last years Chemistry Of Consciousness LP continues Joel Grind's full on Thrash attack. It's probably not as good as 2011's killer Conjure And Command, but this is still some solid Metal. Fast, buzz-saw guitar riffs and shredded vocals from start to finish.

Sometimes I really try to track down the limited color vinyl pressing for Metal releases. However, after spending a couple of weeks on eBay looking at nothing but original black vinyl pressings from the 80's, the vinyl color didn't seem that important as I was standing in the store with the physical record in my hand.

Losing My Grippe

"I'm no longer going to buy needless reissues". I've repeated those words over and over countless times. I'm going to avoid getting sucked into a trap of endless vinyl repressings for bands that I don't care enough about to collect. I'm going to save my money and put it towards something a bit more useful. I have the best of intentions...

I like Jawbox. LIKE. I've never lost my mind over them. They were good enough for me to buy their two Dischord LPs back in the day, but these days I rarely gave them much of a thought.

Then Marcus posted about Dischord's recent repress of the Grippe LP. That was when my resolve started to show cracks.

His picture of that purple vinyl...goddamn it...it looked so good. I suddenly felt the desire to not only give the album a spin, but to also buy this good looking repress.

After dusting off my original Dischord press of Grippe, I found that I had to do the same with their second LP, Novelty. Amazing. I found myself listening to both of these albums repeatedly, and I was surprised by how much I was loving this band.

Shortly after Jawbox released Novelty in 1992, they moved to Atlantic Records...and being on a major label at that time was a kiss of death for me. I never bothered with anything the band released from 1993 forward.

Being on this big Jawbox kick, I felt adventurous, and decided to give 1994's For Your Own Special Sweetheart a try. Damn! I love finding surprises like this, and being proven wrong. What a great album, and not much of a departure from what they'd been doing with Dischord. Since I couldn't immediately find a vinyl copy of this LP available, I decided to grab the Motorist / Jackpot Plus 7 inch single instead. Both of these songs would end up on For Your Own Special Sweetheart, but I didn't mind spending a couple bucks for this record.

My last cheap Jawbox grab was for a split that the band did with Crackerbash. The Jawbox song, Falk, is only an instrumental, and I don't really care about the other band, so this was a bit of a throw away, but I'm still glad that I can tuck this in with my other 7 inches.

Satan Worship

Satan were a big name in the New Wave Of British Heavy Metal scene 30 years ago. After releasing Court In The Act back in 1983, the line up was back together to release a brand new album in 2013. Damn, is it possible for bands to still put something worthwhile together after that many years? In this case, the answer is yes.

I was a bit hesitant at first. I downloaded the album and gave it a few listens, but I wasn't really paying much attention it. It sat on my ipod, pretty much ignored through out last year. Around October, I was hanging out on the Bravewords messageboard, and dudes were really talking up this album. I'll admit it, the hype they were generating had me going back to give it another listen. I'm glad that I did, because this record is fucking solid...sounds like it would have been a perfect follow up for the band to release in '84 or '85. Just what I want from a Metal band in 2013.

Of course the vinyl was only available overseas, so when I was placing a recent order with Nuclear Blast Germany, I took the opportunity to grab a copy on white vinyl.

Knocked Down

Back when I picked up those Worn Thin records from eBay's dollar bin, that same seller also had some other Youngblood vinyl that I had my eye on. In the end, I needed to open my wallet a bit wider for the Lights Out vinyl that I needed, and in my effort to get out as cheap as possible, I only walked away with one other record.

I really wasn't that familiar with Knockdown. I have their discography CD that Youngblood threw in for free with one of my orders a few years ago, but for one reason or another, I never spent much time listening to it. Still, we are talking Youngblood here, so when I saw the opportunity to grab this record for a dollar, I took it.

Money well spent, because I'm loving this 7 inch. A great blend of Negative Approach and Youth Of Today.

300 pressed on clear vinyl.

...Shall Be Judged and Reissued

When I was a kid, I collected Star Wars trading cards. I blew a lot of lawn mowing money on those things. I remember walking to the corner store, picking up a few packs, chewing on the cardboard flavored gum, and flipping through them to see which new ones I could add to the collection. One of my favorite things about collecting those cards was the checklist, where you could tick off each new one you recieved in your attempt to build a complete collection.

At this point, it would be really helpful if someone could put together one of those checklists for REV reissues. Seriously. I feel like I'm so lost at this point. What have I missed? And the question has to be asked...if I missed one, would I really be fussed to track it down and buy it at this point?

I still haven't stepped up to buy a pink vinyl copy of the Burn record, so every time I buy a reissue I feel guilty and inadequate. Still, this blue vinyl looks great. 487 pressed.

In an attempt to beef up my order, I was reviewing the latest vinyl from REV and discovered that Side By Side had been pressed on grey. I have no idea when this happened, but I'll gladly take a copy. Another REV release that I'll keep buying. Limited to 547 on grey.

A Grand Triumph

I know that we aren't even three months into the year, but it doesn't change my opinion that Grand Magus probably just released what will be my favorite Metal album for the year.

When Sandwell first introduced me to Grand Magus a couple of years ago, I wasn't really feeling it. Because I trust opinion on all things Metal, I didn't give up on it immediately, and over time they started to sink their claws into me. By the time I picked up The Hunt last year, I was full on hooked on what this band was doing.

When it was announced that a new album was due this year, I eagerly waited to hear what Grand Magus would deliver.

My expectations were set pretty high, and could not resist the urge to listen to a preview when the video for the title track was posted. I was a bit let down when the song initially started, but by the end of it I was completely sucked in...singing along to the chorus and throwing up the devil horns. Hail!

Now, I loved The Hunt, but Triumph And Power somehow improves on the Grand Magus sound. This album consumes me, and I can't get enough of it right now.

When it came time to order the new album, no expense was spared, and I made sure to grab the limited vinyl pressing from Nuclear Blast Germany. Hand numbered and limited to 250 on white vinyl.

Build To Break

I love Uniform Choice's Screaming For Change, yet until it was repressed on vinyl two years ago, I hadn't made any moves to obtain one. Even now, having four copies of the repressed vinyl, I still feel no great desire to chase an original pressing. I mean, I'd like to get them someday, but I guess I've just got my eye on other prizes right now.

This time around we get two new pressings...one on blue, and one on white. I guess that spending $12 for a repress is more attractive than spending a couple hundred dollars for an original, because I didn't hesitate to pick these two up.

It does bother me that there is no lyric sheet insert with these reissues. I feel like I'm being short changed. I guess if I do want one with a lyric sheet, maybe I'd better start thinking about one of those first pressings.

I actually had this post queued up to write early next week, but since Marcus posted about these records yesterday, I figured that I'd move mine to the top of the pile. The main reason being that the stickers on my copies are different than the colored vinyl stickers on the ones he received. I know...record collecting is pretty mind blowing stuff.

Getting Xtra Raw With RXR

Grabbed a few second pressings from REACT! recently.

The WarXgames 7 inch is a total ripper from start to finish. The first press was limited to only 500 pieces, so I'm not surprised to see another pressing for it.

Second press is limited to 150 on clear, 350 on red vinyl.

Man, I love the Angel Du$t 7 inch. I was listening to it the other day, and had to go back to my 2013 Top Ten list to see where I should have placed it in the year end ranking. This record is such a blast to listen to...I'd have to make room for it somewhere in there. Slam!

Second pressing is limited to 250 on blue, and 750 on yellow.

Admiral Sir Black Sheep

Despite the band's name being a mouthful, Admiral Sir Cloudesley Shovell released a fantastic debut LP back in 2012. I was excited to hear that they have a new full length due out this year, and when Rise Above put up preorders for a new 7 inch to whet our appetites, I jumped on it.

Man, this thing rules. The a-side, Black Sheep, is pretty cool, but the b-side, Elementary Man is kicking my ass. Holy shit, what a great song. I can't get enough. That new full length needs to drop soon!

Like most releases from Rise Above, there was a run of 100 on clear vinyl.