Category: Reviews – Audio
Glorious metal in all its earthly forms, compressed onto shiny plastic discs or into digital files. Which ones will become the soundtrack to your life?
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Tom Petty – Wildflowers & All The Rest 3LP
A deeper look at the grooves pressed into the Wildflowers & All The Rest 3LP reissue by Tom Petty. Author Rae Carson once wrote that, “Some people, the best ones, are motivated more by the chance to prove themselves than by a command to serve. It is the work itself that calls them onward, especially…
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Seized Up – Brace Yourself LP
A deeper look at the grooves pressed into Seized Up’s Brace Yourself LP. Ever heard an album which hits the mark brilliantly and causes you to remember why you like or got into one particular type of music or another, reader? Brace Yourself, the new album by Seized Up, hit me like that – about…
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Lenny Lashley’s Gang Of One – All Are Welcome LP
A deeper look at the grooves pressed into the All Are Welcome LP by Lenny Lasley’s Gang Of One. After the events which have taken place in the United States recently, one would have to ask if the album title and the image which adorns the cover of Lenny Lashley’s All Are Welcome LP is…
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Manowar – Black Wind, Fire & Steel: The Atlantic Albums (1987-1992)
One of the great cult metal bands of the 1980s, Manowar had four excellent albums under their belts before signing to Atlantic. This was the Manowar’s highest profile-era. Their Atlantic debut Fighting The World is one the greatest heavy metal albums, even featuring the great Orson Welles on Defender. One of the things that stands out…
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Death Angel – The Enigma Years (1987-1990)
Death Angel were one of the very best metal bands to come out of the 80’s (and that is no mean feat in the decade that gave us amazing music from bands like Sabbat, Metallica, Bathory, Slayer, Venom, Voivod, Soundgarden, Iron Maiden, and so many more). It was a magic time, different from this impersonal…
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The Germs – (MIA) The Complete Anthology
There’s a certain perfect irony about the fact that, upon opening my vinyl copy of The Germs’ (MIA) reissue [yes, The Germs’ single best-known album has been reissued during a pandemic – I know that’s ironic too –ed], I found that the sticker on the C-side of the album was mangled and torn in a…
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Neil Young – After the Gold Rush
It’s not easy to articulate what kind of mark a fiftieth anniversary represents. Those who remain married for fifty years call it their Golden anniversary (or Golden Jubilee) and, while it’s no uncommon to live longer in the twenty-first century, fifty years is still a pretty significant event – it is half a century, after…
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Jamie Wyatt – Neon Cross
After having watched all the sonic and stylistic directions in which the artists on New West’s roster have gone, it feels more than a little reassuring to see that at least SOME artists are signed to a country music label because they want to make country music – and not necessarily just make music which…
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Art Bergmann – Christo Fascists
It’s hard to know why Christo Fascists has been released as a standalone digital single – separate from a physical 7” or even as a track on a full length album. Something in me wants to contend that a song this good should have the widest distribution possible – as the standout song on a full-length…
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Serpents of Secrecy – Ave Vindicta
While Ave Vindicta is the band’s first album, Serpents of Secrecy are no strangers to the Maryland doom scene, featuring members of Sixty Watt Shaman, Borracho, King Giant and the late Jim Forrester, who was callously murdered in Baltimore in 2017. After his death, these tunes understandably sat on the shelf for a while, before…