We want more. More reissues. More records. More classics. More noise. But just because these are reissues doesn’t mean labels have to stop mailing promo releases. Not at all. More of a reason to send the real package to the press, that makes sense now, doesn’t it? Unless of course the reissue in question is a crappier version than the original packed with 0 extras, no bonus tracks, no liner notes, no shit. All those below, pack what they should. Check ‘em out.

Unseen Force may not have gotten much attention during their lifetime, and sure as shit ain’t going to jump to frontpage coverage with this reissue, but every self-respecting hardcore and crossover fan would be wise to pick up a copy of In Search of the Truth.  This is a reissue of the only official release by this Virginia band (1986, Turbulent) and as a bonus includes an entire live set from a 1986 show plus their 2000 Maniacs demo from 1984. All in all, these are thirty-three tracks of seminal 80’s hardcore, where the songs last barely over a minute and run the gamut of fast and violent and always disheveled and where the bass volume is as virulent as that of the guitars and the vocals are spewed in tone deaf fashion.  Kudos for the great work to the folks at Grave Mistake Records and Vicious Circle Records (the vinyl version is out via No Way Records) who have also assembled a nice booklet with plenty of pictures, a collage of posters and liner notes. The sound of the live show is shitty, but what do you expect? It adds to the charm, that’s for sure. 

This next album has been winking at me for a while. I was first in awe of the artwork. The whole thing was so intriguing I couldn’t begin to imagine what it would sound like and once I decided to give it a spin I was completely sold on it. Nagelfar was an excellent German black metal band that lasted less than a decade.  Their sound is absolutely nefarious and quite sophisticated and considering how many crappy black metal bands get recognition it is a fucking crime for them to be so overlooked. Adding to the punch their delivery packs, is the excellent production work of Virus West (2001, Ars Metalli); Nagelfar were wise enough to know that featuring the thin ass production values of many Satanic bands could only take away from the violence, and in Virus West their sound is fat and professional evoking a sort of glossy mayhem. That’s a service to the flawless musicality featured through long tracks that never for one second let up in decibels.    

The remasterization of Brutality’s debut effort Screams of Anguish has truly given new life to this 1993 recording. Most reissues sound like just that; same old recording, newer package, updated prices, but this one makes Brutality sound as if they had just recorded it in the last couple of years. I know recording at Tampa’s Morrisound studios was every metalhead’s wet dream back in the day, but to me, most of the albums registered there during the heyday of the Florida death metal scene sound tepid. Not this one though. Better yet, the technical death metal (in the context of its release date) of Brutality sounds as vital today as it did back in the day. So why is it that with material as solid as this Brutality was so overlooked? Simple; instead of benefiting from the rise of the genre during the early 90’s and riding the wave, Brutality was overshadowed by their homeboys of Cannibal Corpse, Obituary and Deicide. Come to think about it, those three bands were led by very charismatic individuals.  The nice folks from Brutality were perhaps too much of that; too nice.  Screams of Anguish is for a debut album, surprisingly professional. No wonder, Brutality had been together in one form or another since 1986 and it was only after six demos that they got signed by Nuclear Blast Records. Two albums later in 1997 Brutality called it quits. 

Metal Mind’s double reissue of Impulse Manslaughter’s 1987 LP He Who Laughs Last…Laughs Alone and 1988’s Logical End really hits the nail on its head. Maybe I was too much of a young puppy at the time these two came out, plus apparently Impulse Manslaughter was nothing but a memory by the end of 1992, but still I am impressed and saddened by how Impulse Manslaughter got forgotten so quickly. Then again, the albums were released by Nuclear Blast; at the time just a tiny extreme German label most likely financially unable to provide real support. But Impulse Manslaughter delivered, and Logical End, which was released second but is placed first, is a fantastic proof of that. Impulse Manslaughter’s brutal metallic hardcore music is really engaging. It features a somewhat muddy sound and a totally hardcore vocal approach. This band delivers upbeat hardcore and goes as far as covering the Rolling Stone’s “Gimme Shelter” and Motorhead’s “Stone Dead Forever” to great results.  He Who Laughs Last…Laughs Alone has the band playing a more violent and straight ahead brand of hardcore. “Vomitheads” is brutal, fast and relentless, but it also lacks the more personal sounds of Logical End. The same could be said about the fifteen other tracks that follow it.  This is perfect music to beat each other up.  

When I say Slaughter? Please do not think “Fly to the Angels” or some shit like that. Slaughter was also the moniker of a Canadian thrash metal band that has gained cult status by being constantly championed by several old school metal enthusiasts (Fenriz anyone?) but mostly by unleashing a plethora of demos and the classic 1986 release Strappado (Diabolic Force). Metal Mind is releasing Nuclear Blast’s 2001 compilation Not Dead Yet/Paranormal which pulls tracks from Slaughter’s 1991 Not Dead Yet demo, 1998’s Paranormal demo and four live songs from 1988. Unlike most of MM’s reissues, this one doesn’t have extensive liner notes, instead the history of these Canadians is compressed into one very hard to read paragraph. The music though is god- damned, fucking good. This is first rate thrash metal, played with great inventiveness and delivered in such classic 80’s fashion. The fact that Slaughter was never signed to a big indie during the 80’s and 90’s gives us an idea of where the heads of all those A&R people were. Can we say ass?

Before there were any cinnamon girls in the world, there was a Brooklyn thrash band called Carnivore (pictured above). Led by a giant named Petrus T. Steele who clad in post-apocalyptic leather and spiked shinguards and swinging a pipe wrench along with drummer Louis Beatueaux and guitarist Keith Alexander issued two decent albums. Their first self-titled 1986 (Roadrunner) release presents a back to basics thrash metal approach. In other words, clear homage is paid to classic heavy metal bands of the late 70’s and early 80’s except Carnivore was clearly pushing the envelope. Yet, for an act playing brutal music there don’t seem to be any metal influences from early extreme acts like Bathory or even Venom. Even for thrash metal standards of the day, Carnivore played rather rudimentary music. Outside from the ballad-like passage in the middle of “Male Supremacy”, there is not one moment of sophistication here. And there doesn’t need to be. Steele himself sounds green around the edges. Yet to reach maturity he spews lines that hint at the dark humor from his latter days, ‘between my legs I’ve got what it takes to be called a man, fighting, feasting, fucking all I can.’

Las Vegas’ Righteous Pigs are mostly known because its guitarist was a young Mitch Harris who would later emigrate to the UK to play with genre shapers Napalm Death. Metal Mind is reissuing both of their full-lengths in a single digipack.  First up in the sequence is 1990’s Stress Related (Nuclear Blast), which shows the band playing an uneven hybrid of grindcore, punk and metal. Some of the songwriting is rather amateurish, even for grind standards, with the rhythmic base kinda crumbling and seemingly falling behind tempo in several occasions. This is mostly in evidence on the hectic beat kept by second drummer Alan Strong. 1989’s Live and Learn is even looser and way more fucked up. The production is horrible and not even Metal Mind’s masterization process has been capable of recovering some of those terribly wasted sounds. The guitars are drowned in the mix, which judging by how shitty they sound is actually a good thing. And the songs themselves are a super basic affair clearly more focused on short hardcore spawns than on metal music. By far the most distinguishable aspect of Righteous Pigs were the vocals of Joe Caper, who curiously enough sounds a hell of a lot like Henry Rollins. 

It’s good to know that Metal Mind is not only releasing classics from the Roadrunner and Nuclear Blast vaults. In an effort to cast the spotlight in their countrymen’s talent they are also releasing albums by Polish bands. One of the first to get the treatment is Warsaw’s brutal death metal quintet Pyorrhoea, whose 2004 debut Desire for Torment was initially issued by Empire Records and features some pretty intense songs via even more intense scathological lyrics like, ‘you excite me, I want to touch you, but first I want to eat excrement from your face.’  Hilarious indeed. What won’t make you laugh is the music (unless you can understand what vocalist Analripper is saying), which features blast beat filled drumming, super fast riffage and vocals that range from the standard guttural to a light weight pig squeal. If these dude’s would put more brains into their music, they could rule. Then again, they kinda do already.

Go to Metal Reissues Galore XI