Havok V

I really enjoyed the last Havok record, Conformicide from 2017, but honestly, I only listened to it a handful of times and haven't really felt any great pull to go back and revisit it. I like the modern thrash bands, and dig it when their records are spinning, but when I'm in the mood to listen to newer thrash, I'll just pull the latest Overkill or Testament albums from the shelf. So when I saw that Havok were releasing a new album this year, I didn't feel any rush to check it out.

The album had been out for a little while when I saw a video review for the album on youtube. The reviewer talked highly of the latest Havok album, and it kind of of piqued my curiosity. I gave it a quick spin on Spotify and immediately knew that I needed a copy. Sadly, by the time I tried to track down the album, it seemed that the colored vinyl options had sold out. Record stores were still closed at the time, but I did find that my local Bull Moose store had the option to buy the Indie Retail Store exclusive pressing through their online store. Score! Sea glass colored vinyl limited to 300 copies.

This record is a thrashing good time. Havok really are one of the best newer thrash bands, and this album had me banging my head like a maniac. Relentless energy. I'll easily be listening to this new album more than the last one.

Japan Double Dealer

I've been on a Deep Purple kick lately. The band have a new album coming out next month, and while I haven't generally been that interested in newer Deep Purple albums, for some reason this one has me curious. On top of that, I've really been digging in with the first few albums with the Mark I line up featuring Rod Evans on vocals. Then, I've also been heavily obsessing over the Mark III Coverdale albums. Needless to say, I've been listening to a lot of Purple this year. Combine that with my interest in singles and Japanese pressing and it was inevitable that they were all going to converge.

Man, I've been loving anything Coverdale lately, including Whitesnake and his albums with Deep Purple. When I was obsessing over singles earlier this year, I stumbled upon a few eBay auctions from a Japanese seller and there were a few Deep Purple 7 inches that caught my eye. Damn, these things looked cool, and since I was feeling pretty loose with my money, I threw a winning bid on this single for Lady Double Dealer. There is just something about those 7 inch picture sleeve covers that capture my attention, and this one from 1974 looks great.

I actually ordered this Deep Purple single from Japan back in March, and like the AC/DC record that I'd ordered from Australia around that time, the COVID-19 pandemic put international shipments on hold so this 7 inch sat in Japanese customs for two months before it even started to make its way over to the US. This record didn't come close the price tag on that AC/DC album, but it was still a relief when it finally arrived.

Picking up this Highway Star single was much easier from a US seller on Discogs. The price was very reasonable and it was delivered within a week.

Highway Star was originally released as a single back in '72. For some reason, Japan reissued the single in '76 with a different cover and changed out the b-side track to Strange Kind Of Woman. Love the clean pink layout for this one, but I'm going to need the original single cover as well at some point.

Gillan Nightmare

I've been so obsessed with collecting singles lately, and I decided to share that love affair with my friend, Jeff. His birthday was coming up, and being a huge Alice Cooper fan, I wanted to track down a cool picture sleeve single for him. I found a good looking French pressing of the Billion Dollar Babies single, and while I was picking that record up for him I grabbed a cheap Gillan single for myself.

A few years ago I bought a few Gillan singles as my introduction to the band. I had obviously loved his stuff with Deep Purple and Black Sabbath, so I figured it was time to finally check out what he had done with the Gillan band in the late 70's and early 80's. I had a great time with those few singles and I told myself that I was going to have to track down the albums from the band as well. Almost three years later and I've made zero progress on that front...but hey, here I am buying another single.

The a-side song, Nightmare, comes from the 1981 album Double Trouble, and it is another cool track. Man, I need to dig into the Gillan stuff more often, because I seem to enjoy everything I hear. Good stuff!

Fear The Blood Star

I'm usually reluctant when people make recommendations for me to check out new bands. There are a small handful of people that I trust completely, and if they think that I'll like it, chances are they will be right...but for the most part I tend to be a bit skeptical when someone suggests that I check something out.

When my friend, Jeff, sent me a link to listen to a band called Blood Star, I didn't have high expectations. Now Jeff has great taste when it comes to 70's and early 80's metal, but he doesn't really bother with new bands, so I didn't expect much with this EP.

Holy shit. Blood Star are straight up traditional heavy metal, and I can't get enough of these two songs. Featuring one of the guitarists from Visigoth and a female singer, this EP is catchy as hell, and Tortured Earth may be my favorite song of this year.

The packaging for this 7 inch looks great. The cover artwork, colored vinyl and the OBI strip are all fantastic. "Tortured Galaxy" colored vinyl is limited to 500.

Hang Your West Coast Head

I'm pretty random when it comes to collecting Foundation records. I mean, I'm not really actively working on attempting to buy every pressing from the band, yet I somehow have still managed to amass 15 records from them. I've got a couple of their cool special pressings on my Discogs want list, but whenever one shows up, I usually just ignore it as prices are typically much higher than I'd care to pay...seriously, the Final Show pressing of Turncoat would be sweet to collect, but that price seems to hold steady and there are other records that I'd rather drop $100 on.

I've had the West Coast tour pressing of Hang Your Head on my Discogs want list for four years, and when I recently saw one become available recently at a decent price, I figured that I'd finally make my move. Damn, I love the look of this special tour cover.

I've been listening to a lot of 90's hardcore lately, and while Foundation was from the late 2000's, they definitely fall in line with that 90's sound, so it seemed to be the right time to finally cross this one off the want list.

Number 41 out of 200 pressed.

Japan Shook Me

I've had a few things circling around in my head lately. AC/DC. Singles. Japanese pressings. I've been obsessing over each of these things lately, and they all happened to converge for this post.

Since picking up AC/DC's Touch Too Much single last month, and knowing that I had the first pressing of High Voltage on the way from Australia, I was itching for more from the band. I started randomly checking to see what was available from US sellers, and when I happened to catch someone with a Japanese 7 inch for You Shook Me All Night Long, I jumped on it...and while the $25 price tab seemed a little high at first glance, the sales history shows that the record typically goes for twice that, so I was fucking stoked to grab this.

I don't know man. There is just something cool about Japanese pressings and singles. I first got the bug when Doug went to Japan last year, and he started texting me photos of Dokken singles that he was picking up. Shit looked so great, and I wanted some of that action myself. Doug was a selfish motherfucker and filled his suitcase with records for himself instead of saving some room for me, but the fuse was lit, and since then I've been toying with the idea of hunting down some of those Japanese singles for myself. It feels good to take this first step.

Moment Of Truth

There had been a challenge going around on Facebook recently where people would post ten albums that had an impact on them. I usually avoid those kind of things, as I know that the majority of my Facebook friends do not share the same musical tastes as me, so what would be the point...but after being tagged to join the challenge by a handful of people, I decided to participate even if no one was going to care...hey, at the very least it would be interesting to see the posts pop up in my FB memories years down the road.

While most people were just posting album cover images they pulled from the internet, I wanted to use actual photos of records from my collection. I made the challenge a kind of musical timeline as we moved from the first album I remember buying for myself, and then as I progressed into Heavy Metal and then got into Hardcore. When I got to the point in the timeline when I first connected with Straight Edge, I ended up using a Minor Threat record, but really, that was only because I didn't own a single piece of Slapshot vinyl.

While I loved Minor Threat when I started to get into Hardcore around 1990, Slapshot were probably a much bigger influence. I was travelling to The Channel in Boston for a lot of Metal shows at the time, and somewhere along the way I started crossing over from Death Angel and Testament shows to Slapshot and Sick Of It All. Slapshot were angry and apologetically Straight Edge, and I gravitated to them. They had just released Sudden Death Overtime, and it feels like I must have seen them once a month for about a year...playing with Meliah Rage, Sam Black Church or Maelstrom. It was an amazing time.

Doing that Facebook challenge pushed me to finally hunt down some Slapshot vinyl. I didn't care if it was Back On The Map or Step On It...I just needed something. In the end, Back On The Map turned out to be the easier target, and I managed to pull a copy from eBay at a decent price. It had been a while since I'd listened to this record, but man, this thing is a classic. It is just absolutely fierce. Glad to finally add this important record to my collection.

Blue Roo Voltage

One of my priorities for the past few years has been to collect Australian first pressings for the Bon Scott era of AC/DC. These things don't come cheap, so each year I dedicate a portion of my annual bonus from work to the hunt, and I check another one from the list. This year, the band's first album, High Voltage, from 1975 was my target.

When it comes to the first few AC/DC albums, things can get confusing when comparing the original Australian releases to what the rest of the world saw from the band. Different cover art. Different track listings. Shit gets messy. In the case of High Voltage, things get extra sticky.

High Voltage, released in 1975, was AC/DC's first album and only available in Australia and New Zealand. When the international release of High Voltage was released to the rest of the world in 1976, the majority of that album contained songs from AC/DC's second Australia record, T.N.T., and only two songs from the original High Voltage album. So basically, AC/DC has two different albums named High Voltage.

I was expecting to go deep for an Australian first press of High Voltage. To find one in great condition, you can expect to go over $300, and I was ready to step up. As it turned out, I jumped on an eBay auction from an Australian seller just as the Covid pandemic was fucking exploding across the globe, and as a result, bidding was practically non-existent as I walked away winning the auction for half of what I expected to pay. Good deal. Of course, the downside was that Covid also ground international deliveries to a halt, and my record sat in the Australian customs office for about two months before it finally caught a plane for the States. Worth the wait!

This copy of High Voltage completes my collection of Blue Roo Australian first pressings for AC/DC. I still have a few more records to pick up for those Bon Scott years, and they still have high price tags, but at least I no longer have to look for that kangaroo on the label.

Snapcase Starburst

I really loved Snapcase back in the 90's, but at some point I shoved them aside and forgot all about them. I've been in a mood to listen to a bunch of 90's hardcore bands lately, and there have been a number of records that I've dusted off and have been surprised with how much I still love them in 2020. One of those bands has been Snapcase.

Not only was I surprised with how much I was digging Snapcase, I was amazed at how much I was enjoying the band's third album, Designs For Automotion. I mean, Lookinglasself and Progression Through Unlearning are obviously gold standard for 90's hardcore, but I'd completely forgotten that Designs For Automotion easily measures up to those first two records. It has been a blast rediscovering this album over recent months.

I only owned this album on CD, and was desperate to add a vinyl copy to my collection...however, I was torn on which copy I should chase down. I was tempted to go for an original colored vinyl pressing on either blue, orange or white vinyl...and they seem relatively easy to pick up at a decent price...but I was seriously tempted by the "starburst" colored vinyl that was an exclusive pressing for Newbury Comics last year.

The colored vinyl for that pressing looks insane, and I wanted to see one in real life, so that was the one that I grabbed off eBay. Stupidly, it actually cost more than an original pressing, but damnit, I wanted this starburst color...and don't get me started on how badly I'm tempted to rush out and buy other pressings for all the Snapcase stuff.

Must. Resist. Temptation.

Freeways Bearings

That demo that Freeways released back in 2017 blew me away with how great it was, so when I saw that the band was finally releasing their first album this year, I was stoked.

Out of the Great White North of Canada, Freeways play an excellent style of 70's rock, and that first demo sounded heavily influenced by Thin Lizzy. That inspiration isn't as obvious on the new album, True Bearings, but this record still hooks me hard.

True Bearings was one of my more anticipated releases this year, and it does not disappoint in the least. The riffs are heavy and the melodies smooth...I've been giving this album repeat spins since it has arrived.

When I preordered the record back in February, I went for the Die Hard pressing that included a patch and keychain because I love little collectibles like this.

150 pressed for the Die Hard edition on beige colored vinyl.

Kill The Pain

Earlier this year, Night Demon released the Empires Fall single. I loved that 7 inch, I hoped that it was a preview of what was to come. When the band announced they had a second 7 inch single on the way, I jumped on it.

Once again, the Night Demon 7 inch single gives us one new song and a b-side cover.

The track for this single, Kill The Pain, is another great one from the band. They got to record in the same studio where Metallica did Master Of Puppets, and work with the same producer, Flemming Rasmussen, so all the ingredients are here for a spectacular song, and Night Demon just nail it. I hope the band keeps delivering new songs, because they are on fire with these singles.

The b-side cover is just killer as Night Demon tackle Cirith Ungol's 100 MPH. They enlist Tim Baker from Cirith Ungol to help with some guest vocals, and they make this one of the rare instances where I'll be revisiting this cover song repeatedly.

One of the cool things that Night Demon has done with these singles is they have been capturing the recording experience on video and posting them up to YouTube. It is a great behind the scenes view into the songs, and it makes me appreciate the band all the more because of it. Like the video Night Demon did for Empire Falls, the one posted for Kill The Pain is a good time.

Back Against City Walls

War Records love their limited pressings. I'm not really in the game to collect everything I see these days, but some of the things this label releases is tempting as fuck...seriously, I'm so bummed that I missed out on those Strife gold editions.

While I was extremely hesitant to check out Berthold City when I started to see their name pop up a couple years ago, I've since grown to put my preconceived notions aside and after checking out the band, I found that I really enjoy them. War Records have released a number of different limited pressings for the Berthold City 7 inches, and that shit seems to sell out quick. When it was announced that they were releasing a lathe cut 7 inch of a cover of Circle Jerks Back Against The Wall, I knew that I had to make sure that I jumped when they went on sale. There were only 50 pressed, so if you took your eye off the prize, you missed out.

Overall, this record seems kind of pointless. I mean, I'm sure the band had a blast recording this song, and it sounds okay, but really, I'm not going to need to listen to this very often. Still, since it is so limited, and I really like this band, this record is kind of cool to own.

Harder Faster

I don't generally get too excited about live albums, and to be honest I'd kind of forgotten all about W.A.S.P.'s Live...In The Raw album. However, when I came across the record from a Discogs seller that I was recently shopping from, and I started looking at the songs on it, I suddenly needed to have it.

Back in the 80's, W.A.S.P. were known for their wild and entertaining live shows. I saw them open for Black Sabbath on Easter Sunday in 1987, but I remember being disappointed since W.A.S.P. didn't play the song Fuck Like A Beast. Besides that one live experience, I did remember that Live...In The Raw delivered the goods as a live album. I originally owned it as a cassette, and listening to it again 30+ years later, this thing still holds up. Not only does it give us classic W.A.S.P. songs from the Electric Circus tour, but there are two live songs, Harder Faster and The Manimal, that I don't think the band recorded studio versions for, plus there is the song Scream Until You Like It from the Ghoulies II soundtrack.

I'd forgotten all about about this record, but revisiting it now, I'd say that this is a crucial 80's metal record.

It's An Election Year

I'm not the biggest Gameface fan, but I do really love their early records. I was really having a good time giving their first album, Good, a spin recently, and I figured that maybe I should look into finally buying a vinyl copy.

I listened to both this album and Three To Get Ready so many times through the mid-90's, that I wore them out and put them on a shelf for years. Man, I'd forgotten just how great this stuff is.

I was tempted to chase down an original pressing on Network Sound, but the more that I looked at the reissue that Smartpunk did a few years back, the more I wanted one of those instead...and finding a copy on Discogs for just over $10 helped make it an easy decision as well.

There were four art prints from from frontman Jeff Caudill with the reissue, with two of them being included with the red vinyl, and the other two included with the black vinyl pressing. I love the look of the red vinyl to match the Radio Flyer from the front cover.

200 pressed on red.

The whole packaging is top notch, from the gatefold cover featuring photos and flyers from that era, to the lyric sheet. Everything looks amazing.

Double Rust

As Friends Rust have a new record due out soon. It has been nearly 20 years since the band's last record, so while I am approaching their new 7 inch with caution, I've been having a blast going back and dusting off their back catalog.

As I was revisiting the older As Friends Rust material, it dawned on me that I didn't own a single piece of vinyl from the band. Seeing how much I was currently enjoying them, I knew that I needed to fix this situation as soon as possible.

As much as I was enjoying revisiting As Friends Rust, I didn't expect that their records would be too difficult to track down. I assumed that I could jump on Discogs and grab their entire collection at dirt cheap prices...I assumed wrong. Their records aren't going to break the bank, but it was tougher than I thought it would be as there just aren't a lot of sellers with As Friends Rust records available...and if they are available, they are from overseas sellers.

It isn't an immediate crisis to pick up these records right now, so it looks like I will have to play the waiting game for most of them, however I did find one US seller with a copy of the God Hour double 7 inch available. God Hour? What the fuck is God Hour? I'd never heard of this before...but upon closer inspection, I can see that it is just a repackaged Euro pressing of the self titled EP on Doghouse.

I have no idea why this is titled God Hour, as those words don't show up anywhere printed on the record or the packaging...either way, I love these songs. This record is probably tied with the Young Trophy Band record as my favorite As Friends Rust release. Both of them have been seeing a lot of time on my daily playlists lately, so I'm looking forward to the new 7 inch from the band, to see if they can still deliver.

500 pressed on the blue and green colored vinyl.

Call Of The Master

No doubt, 2020 has been the year of Savage Master for me. I was introduced to the band at the the very end of 2019 with their Myth, Magic And Steel album, and at the time I said that it "may not be the "best" metal record of 2019, but it is certainly the one that I keep reaching for"...well fuck that noise because I've become so obsessed with the record that at this point, I'm calling it my favorite metal release of 2019.

I haven't been able to get enough Savage Master, and before we were too deep into 2020 I'd picked up both the band's debut album, Mask Of The Devil, and their 12 inch EP, Creature Of The Flames, plus their Black Hooves 7 inch. That left only the With Whips And Chains album left for me to pick up to complete the collection, so without delaying it any further, I grabbed that one too.

I don't know what it is about this band, but I love them so fucking much. Every album is metal perfection, and a fantastic throwback to the early 80's when straight forward heavy metal was king. With Whips And Chains is Savage Master's second album, and I can't get enough of it. Man, I'm really bummed that their show with Midnight in Boston was cancelled due to COVID-19 earlier this year...that shit would have been a blast.

200 pressed on transparent purple vinyl with a giant poster for the second pressing.

Legions Arise

Cirith Ungol were a metal band out of California in the 80's. They truly had a unique sound, and one that I didn't full appreciate when I picked up their One Foot In Hell cassette back in '86/'87. I liked it well enough at the time, but it definitely takes some time to get used to the singer's voice. I love the band these days, and I keep telling myself that I've got to get to work on collecting their 80's output, but the job just keeps getting pushed out. While I am procrastinating on those original Metal Blade pressings, I didn't hesitate to jump and order the new Cirith Ungol album when preorders opened up earlier this year.

Cirith Ungol released their last album back in 1991, so the band has been out of the game for nearly three decades. We got a teaser of things to come back in 2018, when the band released the Witch's Game single. Man, that one song was brilliant, and it left me wanting more. Thankfully the band deliver a full length album in 2020, and it does not disappoint.

Forever Black nails that doomy traditional metal sound. I am loving this record right now, so it will be interesting to see how it stacks up with some of the other heavy hitters for my Top 10 list at the end of the year.

Limited to 500 for this grey/black marbled colored vinyl pressing.

Orange Vinyl 9mm

I completely missed out on Orange 9mm when they were around in the mid-90's. It is strange because when I look back at what I was listening to during '94 and '95, Orange 9mm would have fit perfectly into what I was into. Yet, for some reason I avoided them. I remember being aware of the Burn connection, but I think that I just didn't trust Revelation Records at the time. They were releasing stuff like Iceburn, Engine Kid, Whirlpool and the Mike Judge record, and none of that stuff interested me. When Rev released the Orange 9mm EP in '94, I just skipped it.

It was recently announced that Rev was reissuing that first Orange 9mm EP, and I was feeling surprisingly open minded and figured that I'd check it out.

Much to my surprise, I discovered that I not only loved that first EP, but I also checked out their first full length, Driver Not Included, and found that I loved that one as well. I can't believe that I've gone the past 25 years without somehow hearing this band.

I've got my order in for the Orange 9mm EP reissue with Revelation, but I also wanted to get my hands on the Driver Not Included album. I was torn if I should get the original pressing from 1995, which was available only on black vinyl, or if I should go for the colored vinyl option that Music On Vinyl did last year. Colored vinyl wins!

Man, I can't get over how much I am enjoying this record. There are some solid grooves here that have me bouncing, just like I did to those Shift and Sparkmarker records back in the day. Great stuff.

Numbered out of 1,000 pressed on "flame" colored vinyl.

Touch Too Much

Last year I picked up a grip of AC/DC singles, and it was a lot of fun to chase them down and add them to my collection. I still have a lot of holes in the record collection when it comes to AC/DC studio albums, so it feels weird to prioritize singles, but I've been obsessing over these 12 and 7 inches lately and I just let my heart lead the way when record shopping.

I've been itching to pick up some more singles lately, and with AC/DC on my mind, I dove into the Discogs marketplace to see what I could dig up.

Of course all the best looking singles came out of Europe and Japan, and usually all we got here in the US was the 7 inch packaged in a boring dust sleeve. Other countries packaged this shit right, with a nice looking picture sleeve. I mean look at the cover for this French pressing of the Touch Too Much single. That live shot on the front is fire.

Even the back cover photo is cool!

Thankfully I found a US seller that had this 12 inch available, and I scooped it up at a decent price.

Say Cheese

Earlier this year, there was a lot of hype around the newest Big Cheese record, Punishment Park. Triple B was pushing them hard and it seemed that everyone was onboard. I wasn't feeling it. I picked up their Don't Forget To Tell The World record at the end of 2019, but it failed to move me. I could see the potential, and Big Cheese played a style of hardcore that I love, but something about that first record just didn't click with me.

I had hopes that Punishment Park would be the record to sell me on the band. The album cover looked incredible, and I really wanted to like them, but I'm still up in the air on them. The songs are fast and powerful, but there just aren't any hooks that make me want to come back to it. Maybe it will take some repeat listens, and I'll appreciate it more as the year continues. We'll have wait and see.

300 pressed on orange vinyl.