With Pestilence on a new label over the last several years, Agonia Records, the label decided to do brand new reissues, sounds redundant, I know.  I only have the digital downloads of these and it appears there was no bonus material added to these reissues.  The main goal of Pestilence mainman, Patrick Mameli, for these new reissues, was to be able to go back to the source material in order to get the best possible sound out of these four original masterpieces.  The remastered sound significantly improves on the overall audio quality of past reissues. The remastering was done by Satanic Audio (Behemoth, Azarath).  So let me talk about each of these albums individually in brief spurts and I will go on record as saying the album which benefited the most from these new remasters is Spheres.

After a few demos Netherlands based act Pestilence, were signed to R/C Records and the debut album Malleus Maleficarum was released in 1988.  10 songs of pretty intense death/thrash metal that put the band on the map.  The Netherlands would become a hotbed for death metal with the likes of Gorefest, Asphyx, Thanatos, and many more, and is still one of my favorite areas for extreme metal.  This album really started the whole hybrid death/thrash movement, if you ask me.  The title track is a damn good instrumental which went right into “Antropomorphia”.  Newcomer to the vocal scene Martin v. Drunen had a quick snappy snarling vocal delivery and yes he sounded like Obituary’s John Tardy, or is it the other way around??  Hmmm, because this album dropped a year prior to Obit’s debut, Slowly We Rot.

Regardless the music displayed on this album, at times is unbridled, unrestrained, and a little sloppy, but this all added to the charm- “Extreme Unction” I am looking at you, ya bastid.  Many other songs were fleshed out more, such as “Bacterial Surgery”, with some excellent double bass drums, courtesy of Mr. Marco Foddis.  The guitar work of Patrick and Randy Meinhard was still impressive and the music goes perfectly with the torture driven album cover.  The remaster is louder, more in your face than past reissues and crisper.  Check out the power of the remaster, especially on the last track “Systematic Instruction”.  The song has speed, power and some mid-paced moments and the drums hit hard with the remaster, as does the vocals and instruments.

This album got Pestilence noticed and then a year later the proverbial atom bomb dropped with Consuming Impulse, the band’s second album.  Minhard was out and Patrick Uterwijk, a better guitarist, entered the picture and this album went full-throttle death metal and still is one of the heaviest death metal albums ever.  10 songs again and this was actually my introduction to Pestilence.  I was at a show in NY and a friend of mine had ripped it from a cd onto cassette and he let me hear some of it on his Walkman.  I was like holy crap this is heavy AF.  Then while going to a show my friend bought the album on cassette and we listened to it while going to the show.  The next day I purchased it on cd, then I found out a few weeks later about their debut album and picked that up a few months later.

This album is a perfect death metal album and “Dehydrated” wasted no time, as it marched out of the starting gates, with a heavier guitar sound, Martin using lower vocal registers and Pestilence adding some doom to the mix.  When the slow down happens with some of the best vocal patterns known to man – look out!: Vultures circling in the sky, Peeling the flesh from a corpse, Blankened bones are all that’s left, Dehydration as the death cause.  This is quoted from my memory and over 30 years later every fucking time I hear this part I pick up houses, curl them and then launch them into outer space.  This part is untouchable.  It’s not like the rest of the album did not kill as well, the next song “The Process of Suffocation” with the scorching opening drum patterns and varying tempo shifts to “Out of the Body”, which is still played live to this day, really Pestilence out did themselves on this and the album cover with the ants on the dudes face is still considered one of the most striking album covers.  The new remaster pushes the guitar sound to the front a bit more and the drums have an even more resonating deep bass sound to them.

Testimony of the Ancients dropped in 1991 and some line-up shifts took center stage with Van Drunen rolling out to Asphyx and Tony Choy entering in to take over the bass guitar duties and Patrick taking on the vocals, which he continues to present day.  I love all the Pestilence albums – ALL of them, but it seems like Testimony is considered, by many to be their finest album.  For me, with the shifts in line-up, the band progressing in their song writing and musical ability, this album was the natural progression for them and the shift they needed to make in order to stay relevant in the ever increasing and saturated death metal scene.  Going down to Florida’s legendary Morrisound Studios fleshed out a tighter and crisper Pestilence and Patrick’s vocals, maybe had a flair of Chuck Schuldiner to them, but also did not stray too far from Van Drunen.

Nevertheless, I was a first day buyer of this cd and I was like hot damn Patrick has a set of pipes, damnit.  The band included multiple intrumentals/interludes on the album with a whopping 16 tracks, which was pretty much unheard of in the death metal community, at the time.  The interludes were short and the album’s run time at 43 minutes was perfect.   “The Secrecies of Horror” crushing right out of the starting gates and the band becoming even catchier with their song writing and the main opening riff and Patrick’s growl before getting right into the song, is pure classic and set the stage that Patrick loved this band and with the shifts in line-ups was not about to have the band fold.  He was a man with a mission and there is so much genius on this album, with the ethereal guitar soloing on “Twisted Truth” or the crushing opening of “Prophetic Revelations”, almost a little poly-rhythmic in nature, this opening is one of the most memorable moments in death metal, I feel.  Every song rules and “Stigmatized” is still one of the best Pestilence songs ever recorded.  The album cover went towards a more spacey feeling and away from the typical death metal covers, at the time, and was perfect with the new and improved technical sound of Pestilence.  This remaster makes the crispness of the original recording even more biting, much louder and the solos, which were already upped in the original mix, will decapitate anyone within a 2 inch radius of a speaker.

Spheres dropped in 1993 and the Pestilence fanbase became torn as Patrick went into a more hybrid mix of technical jazz fusion death metal.  I will go on record as saying I did not like this album when it was released.  Maybe it was due to the raw production, but my brother, who was a guitarist, loved the album.  To be perfectly honest with you it took me 10 years to finally appreciate the genius of this album.  In 2003, I have no idea why, I flipped on the album and it clicked, so for the last 20 years I have made up for that 10 year span I did not listen to Spheres, 100 fold, trust me.  Jeroen Paul Thesseling entered as the new bassist and Pestilence disbanded in 1994 because the public was so hyper critical of the album, in reviews and the fans as well.  The guitar synths really benefit from this new remaster.  Listen to the opener “Mind Reflections” to hear them buzzing through your speakers.  A thing of beauty.

The music on Spheres is still energetic and fast, but also mellower moments.  “Personal Energy” with the spacey feeling and emotive atmosphere is actually a beautiful musical piece with varying vocal tones.  Listen to this song in the summertime, at night and gaze up at the stars, if it’s a clear sky.  I have done this multiple times in the last 2 decades and you will see what I mean when I say this is a beautiful musical piece with some of the most intricate drumming by Marco Foddis and from the melodies, vocal patterns, synths, the musical landscape, of this track, makes this a top 10 Pestilence song for me.  The original artwork, by Dan Seagrave, was rejected by the band, but made its way as the cover for the MetalMind gold disc remaster in 2007.  I like the original cover, but it was a little too cartoony, and the eventual cover the band went with, for me, was the way to go.  As I stated earlier Spheres sounds crushing with this remaster and there are so many nuances and sounds that just cut through so much more now.  I was so thrilled when Pestilence burst back onto the scene in 2008 and the 2009 reunion album Resurrection Macabre was a crushing album and destroyed everything in the solar system.

So there you have it.  If you do not own the Hammerheart deluxe reissues, you may not want these new remasters.  I am not here to tell you how to spend your money with these albums, which have been reissued several times in the past.  What I can definitively tell you is these first four legendary Pestilence albums never sounded better and hopefully this does not become a George Lucas type of thing where Lucas seems to always tinker with the original Star Wars Trilogy.  These are landmark death metal albums and each album is different from the next.  Great band and great sounding reissues!

This out of print classic is once again available as a remastered slim digipak through Burning Dogma Records – who have done a nice job with the reissue.  Omnipotence is 8 songs in 46 minutes and the songs were longer than average death metal tunes, especially for that time period.  Opener “Thoughts” is still one of my fave songs from that time period.  Opening with a monstrous blast beat with Dying Fetus influenced vocals especially the low end Gallagher type of vocals.  After the brutal blast the song gets into a super cool slow down with awesome plucky bass guitar plucking all over the place.  The song approach gets into some more technical moments with some poly-rhythms, then the song picks up pace and right into the ferocious blasting with awesome vocal tones and growls.  Still one of my favorite death metal songs of all time.  The band unafraid of tossing in a guitar solo as well, with one getting tossed in, just to lop your stinking head off for good measure.

“A Level Higher” is a great example of some of the off the wall type of shit I spoke about at the beginning.  Opening with a slow heavy riff and then the drums come in with some weird vocals tones.  More of a spoken word/crooning style.  It’s downright odd.  The musicianship is excellent, the song heavy, but the weird vocals patterns – at the time seemed out of place.  Still to this day, the tones are odd-but original as all hell.  Then more of the dual Dying Fetus vocal style comes in and it’s excellent.  The song has excellent atmospheric guitar riffing and then the crooning vocal style is dropped in over the double bass, and then the lower gutturals take center stage and are just flawless.  More guitar soloing, tricky signature time changes.  This song sums up the all over the place style of Wicked Innocence.  “The Greys” opens with a Human Remains vibe with the weird guitar sounds, then into the double bass and those guttural vocals come on in and the song gradually picks up the pace with stop n start blast beats, drum rolls, solos, atmospherics and brutal technical precision.

The remastering is excellent.  Louder and clearer.  The guitar sound and drums punches the gut harder and the bass guitar sound sounds better than before.  The digipak folds out nice and is super glossy.  Nice graphics with pictures and most of all – lyrics.  This is certainly a welcome addition.  Super nice reissue Burning Dogma Records!  One of the weirdest and most original albums is finally back in print.  Wicked Innocence’s Omnipotence is just an incredible listening experience which stretches the listener’s ears to the max and this is an essential classic.

Here we are a year on and we have their latest album. Just kidding. It’s a reissue of their first ep, entitled Hive. It’s remastered and also includes a bonus track called “Arctopus.” We couldn’t be that fortunate to have a new full length this soon.

The first track is called “Apparition,” which includes a very brief intro, then right into a sludgy groove. The death metal roar kicks in shortly after that and we’re off and running. The underlying guitar verse sounds a lot like death metal by Mastodon. “Mastodeath,” if you will (but you don’t have to). About halfway through, there’s a clean guitar break, which doesn’t last long before going back into the blasting. When “Give in to the dark one” is screamed, I think it’s in your best interest to listen.

“Apparition” segues well into track 2, “Replicated,” which sounds more like a straight-ahead death metal song after that introductory “UGH!” It doesn’t take long to transition into another solid groove, which still maintains a Mastodon quality with an old school death metal vibe. That is, of course before going into the flamenco-like (ish) section a little less than 3 minutes in. This section turns into a strong sense of foreboding before another “UGH” gets us back into the death metal.

To end it all, we have two tracks which could be known as the “closer.” However, the original closer would have been “Hive,” which is a steady banger with a repeatable hook. It’s clear with about a minute left, as the rest of the music fades out, the guitar is left, then it fades into a short piano burst, this was definitely the correct choice to close it out. The last track is the bonus track, “Arctopus.” I must say, this would have been a pretty good closer, too, which, in this case, it is.

Overall, having not heard the original, I can say the master on this pops from the speakers. “Arctopus” is a little bit louder, which is noticeable, but it otherwise fits in with the rest of the EP. Personally, I agree with the band and am glad this is being released in a physical format. If you’re into their LP, I would recommend strongly picking this up. I know I will be doing the same.

Anyway, Beneath the Remains had the bands cleanest production to date and thus became the partnership between the band and Scott Burns and to this day the album is still outstanding.  I actually saw the band live, on this tour. The tour was the S.O.S. tour.  Sepultura/Obituary/Sadus.  Insane show.  I met all of Sepultura and had my BTR vinyl signed by the band and they were super cool  I hung with the drummer, Igor, for a bit and his English limited, proved to be an interesting conversation.  I asked him if they were going to be playing “To the Wall”, one of my favorite songs.  He said No, I don’t’ think the song is in our set.  But they did play it and I went out of my mind.

Take any of the songs, from the song title opener, which is pure brutal bliss to “Inner Self”-with the massive double bass drums that Burns was able to really capture on this album.  They’re all perfect.  The band made a video for the song and it was a frequent video on Headbanger’s Ball.  I know this album backwards and forwards in terms of music and lyrics.  Hell, in my High School yearbook, next to my picture, my quote are lyrics from “Primitive Future”.  This album was Sepultura’s game changer.  Great songwriting, production and decent lyrics.  Although I prefer Schizophrenia to this, BTR, is almost tied.  The band blew up once this was released, and at the time-really deserved it.

As always I am a stickler with reissues.  I expect a certain quality that certain labels bring, while others drop the ball.  This new re, reissue falls in the middle of that.  In 1998 Roadrunner reissued this and it was remastered on a gold disc, which I own.  The sound was and still is awesome.  Crisper, loud and the packaging excellent.  Bonus features were isolated drum tracks for 2 songs and a cover of Os Mutantes-“A Hora E A Vez Do Cabelo Nascer”.  So when Roadrunner announced some of these recent 2cd Sepultura remasters I was skeptical, since 2018.  The Chaos A.D. one is most excellent, Roots and Arise were ok, but still similar to earlier remasters that I own.  The Beneath the Remains 2cd remaster again has the sticker all new 2020 remaster.  Hmmmm, really?  I did a side by side comparison of the 1998 remaster and the 2020, on multiple devices and no sound difference, whatsoever.  The cover song is on the new reissue, along with the drum tracks from the first reissue.  Then there are just instrumental versions of some of the songs, on the first cd.  The second cd has rough mixes of songs.  I am not a big fan of rough cuts of songs and especially instrumental versions or drum tracks are filler to me.  I am never going to listen to them ever again.  The second cd, main focal point is an audio live set, from Germany, in 1989 when Sepultura opened for Sodom.  That must have been a super cool tour to see.  Anyway the live recording is excellent and captures their true live energy.  The cd booklet has lyrics and a cool recollection of that time period.

If you have the 1998 gold remaster and are not really a fan of live shows, there is no need to buy this new reissue.  Since the 1998 remaster is long oop, then I am sure this 2cd reissue will sell quite well.  Since I also have the original gold remasters of Schizophrenia and Morbid Visions/Bestial Devastation, if Roadrunner reissues those again, unless they are screaming with killer bonus content (c’mon you stoolbags-throw in a live DVD, from that time period), then I will pass on those reissues.  At the end of the day Beneath the Remains is still one of the finest death/thrash metal albums ever released and if you have no prior reissues, of this, then I would recommend this.

I remember getting this on vinyl as a Christmas present in ’86.  Just flat out ferocious speed with lots of melody.  The band were extremely talented on their instruments and when Riders of Doom was unleashed it was met with favorable reviews.  Whether it was the doomy, slow burning opening instrumental of “Winds of Death” or the burning death thrash of the title track or “Spider Attack”-constant headbanging was to ensue.  The band brought the melody and lots of it on the instrumental “Hell’s Ascent” and “Dark Tales”-which has a lot of emotive melodious parts.  The band would eventually drop their darker early death metal leanings and expand more on the thrash metal sounds with Raging Steel, released in 1987.

Raging Steel, while continuing to retain the same line-up as their raging debut, is really just as good as Riders of Doom, just with added melody.  The opening title track proves this as it’s just as fast as anything off Riders of Doom and certainly just as catchy.  The band continuing with some of their Slayer influence, however just as their debut, Deathrow helped shape the German thrash metal scene with albums that were, in my opinion, eclipsing, some of the US bands.  Deathrow experimented with some longer songs with some epic qualities, which as we all know, back in the 80’s was a huge European thing, still kinda is today, when you think about it.  But songs like “Dragon’s Blood” and “The Thing Within” really adding different nuances with melodic thrash riffing, but still retaining the speed one would come to expect from German thrash metal.  While Riders of Doom had darker thematic lyrics, Raging Steel’s lyrics were more fantasy inspired.

The Noise/BMG partnership did a wonderful job with these reissues.  I first want to point out that I did not review the third Deathrow reissue, Noise did, with Deception Ignored.  An amazing album, however Divebomb Records already reissued it in a stunning remaster some years back and the bonus content etc. is the same as the Noise reissue.  While I had cd reissues of both Riders of Doom and Raging Steel, they were not remastered.  The long sought after Listenable Records remasters have been oop and fetching for stupid sums of $$ on Ebay.  The Riders of Doom reissue has excellent additional bonus content including their Samhain (Deathrow’s original band name) demo and a rehearsal from 1985.  Raging Steel has just as great bonus songs.  The Eternal Death demo and a live track.

I would have liked to have known who is responsible for these remasters, because the sound is extraordinary.  To hear 2 of my favorite thrash albums sound this wonderful is thrilling for me.  Both releases are housed in thick digipaks complete with:  biographies, excerpts from the band, live photos, vintage band flyers and lyrics.  Truly top-shelf reissues.  If you’re wondering if Deathrow’s fourth and last album, from 1992, Life Beyond was ever reissued, it was.  A few years ago Divebomb obtained the rights and did a killer remaster.  Regardless, get these Deathrow reissues, they are well worth the extra money.

I opted for this new version and a few thoughts on the original album, my time era observations and this deluxe 3 cd reissue.  Master of Puppets, has some of the greatest thrash metal songs ever.  From opener, “Battery”, thrashing you all over the place to “Damage, Inc.” to everything in the middle, this is a perfect thrash album.  The band peaked at this album.  I remember my local record store, Slipped Disc Records posting their new releases in their window.  I had a turntable, but wanted the cassette.  After school I rushed to the store and the place was jam packed and I bought the cassette and threw it in my boom box and proceeded to walk around my neighborhood cranking the shit out of the cassette.  For that time period this was one of the best looking cassettes.  Multi-paneled outlay with lyrics and pictures.  This was the year record companies also started making clear, see through, cassettes-damn I still remember the plastic smell of these, when unwrapping the brand new cassettes.  I was in school when I found out about the passing of bassist Cliff Burton (RIP).  A bunch of us metalheads, began crying in class.  It was so tragic, but the band soldiered on.  Being a huge fan of the first Flotsam and Jetsam album-Doomsday for the Deceiver, Metallica getting Jason Newsted was a great choice.

Disc 1 is the original album newly remastered.  I have the 20 year old gold remaster and it’s probably worth some coin, but this new remaster is fuller.  “The Thing That Should Not Be”, always a heavy tune, is brought forth to such a heaving heaviness as you can hear the powerful rhythm section pummel the crap out of you.  A simplistic, yet fantastic song, sounds even heavier than before.  Really a great remastering job.  Disc 2 contains  demos, riffs, instrumentals of the songs eventually making their way onto the full-length.  These tracks are also remastered and honestly bore the piss out of me.  I really have no desire to go back to this disc again, since the final versions of the tunes are perfect and I really don’t want to hear isolated riffs, or instrumentals without vocals.  Although; Disc 2 has a 20 minute audio interview with Cliff Burton, while they were touring the US with Ozzy.  It is awesome.  The interviewer is quite young and sounds like he doesn’t know what the hell he is talking about as he constantly keeps mispronouncing the title for “Damage, Inc.” and Cliff continuously correcting him-it’s funny.   Disc 3 is made into a full 14-song concert.  Has Cliff for some of the live tracks and also Newsted for other tracks, when he replaced Cliff (RIP).  The tracks and song selections are great.  They could have thrown “Fight Fire With Fire”, on here, but whatever.  The sound is excellent.  Personally, I feel this should be disc 2 and disc 3 should have been a live dvd/blu-ray.  They dropped the ball on failing to do this.

The booklet is gorgeous.  Contains lyrics and tons of pictures and I remember a ton of the pics from magazines over 30 years ago.  Only gripe is no liners, from any of the band or anyone else for that matter.  Everything is housed in an ultra-chunky digipak.  The front cover is also embossed.  It’s a great reissue and shows that Master of Puppets is a timeless thrash metal classic.  Now the next remaster has to be …And Justice for All, and Metallica, put the bass guitar back in the fucking mix!

Like a phoenix Celtic Frost rose from the ashes of Hellhammer.  I bought Morbid Tales on vinyl and it came with a poster in 1984.  I would later get it on cassette, cd, cd reissue and now this beautiful mediabook edition.  The original album cover is back adorning the cover with the original logo, all missing from past reissues.  A perfect blend of angry and aggressive early death metal.  So brutal.  Every song catchier than the last.   The extra bonus musical content is a demo CF recorded before unleashing Morbid Tales. It’s awesome to hear and the remastering and it reduces the hiss to non-existent.  The booklet is swamped with lyrics, pictures and original pictures I remember from all those years ago.

I remember picking up To Mega Therion in 1985 on tape and double gate fold vinyl.  Such a classic album with one of the greatest guitar tones to ever be recorded.  I was really sick in 1985, catching some flu bug that knocked me on my ass for over a week.  I remember the go to cassettes I brought in my parents room, to crank up:  Trouble–Psalm 9, Savatage–Sirens and Celtic Frost’s To Mega Therion.  I think I even had a Weird Al cassette too.  To Mega Therion took brutality to a whole new height adding in some avante-garde like sounds and it’s just a punishing album.  Previous reissues dropped the ball with including The Emperor’s Return demo and not the official ep from 1985.  Tom made sure that was corrected.  The official ep is so much more powerful and better played.  To have it hear on the remaster is incredible, but it also includes “Journey into Fear”.  It was recorded during the ep session but never released.  The song is punishing.  Super-fast and aggressive.  Guess the band felt it was not strong enough, but sandwiched between “Visual Aggression” and “Suicidal Winds” would have been awesome.  So happy to have this track, finally.  There’s also the “Visual Aggression” 1988 remix on here, which is super cool, but I much prefer the original.  The mediabook is stocked with lyrics, pictures and original artwork.

In 1987, I was still writing for my school paper and panned Into the Pandemonium.  I hated it, although it was catchy, I did not get the genius of this album.  I bought the double gatefold vinyl and was super confused as to the slower tone the band took, experimental passages and the avante-garde metal was all over the place.  While in college, some years later I came back from a break in 1992 and threw the record on my turntable because I had been humming “Mexican Radio” and “Sorrows of the Moon” in my head.  Maybe I grew up, got some college in me and while becoming more intelligent finally understood Into the Pandemonium.  I recorded it on a blank tape and took it back to college, when my winter break ended and from that point on this record became one of my favorite metal albums of all time.  Pure genius.  Unreal heaviness and I always loved the snare sound.  Tom’s experimental pained vocals are emotive and moving and work alongside the heavy music and some of his classic Warrior vocals.  The mediabook contains lyrics, pictures, and is awesome.  Unfortunately, other than changing around certain numbered tracks all the bonus songs are the same as the 1999 reissue, which are all great, with “The Inevitable Factor” and “In the Chapel in the Moonlight” cover, and others, but nothing else.

After the hairspray poser Cold Lake release Tom picked himself up by his bootstraps and in 1990 took Steve Priestly from the Morbid Tales days and said you’re drumming for us or else I’ll bite your head off.  Tom was not singing in his classic Warrior voice, but was still kind of aggressive.  I have never owned this album, but heard it in the past, glad to have it now.  Tom brought back Celtic Frost riffs, but the album is geared more towards a thrash audience with its clearer sound and no more avante-garde sounds.  But songs like “Wine in My Hand (Third From the Sun)” and “A Kiss or a Whisper” brought back a speed factor not heard since the To Mega Therion days.  Pretty kick ass, I guess the best way to sum Vanity/Nemesis is Celtic Frost gone thrash.  There are some slow songs and still experimental passages.  Tom tried to get Celtic Frost back in the hardcore metal fans good graces, but I believe fans did not welcome them back because of Cold Lake.  Regardless Vanity/Nemesis is a great album and glad the heaviness was brought back, although it was different.  We would not be greeted with another album until the Celtic Frost 2006 reformation album, Monotheist, crushed me and the world into oblivion.  The Vanity/Nemesis reissue contains the same bonus content as the ’99 reissue.  This mediabook is awesome with the pictures, lyrics and is again well put together.

So as you all can see, especially if you have the ’99 reissues, maybe some of the bonus content is negligible for you to buy again.  At least consider the sound is enhanced even more.  Long time Celtic Frost member bassist Martin E. Ain suddenly had a heart attack and passed away in October 2017.  So goddamned sad.  He was taken from us too soon.  RIP brother.

Founding member, Chuck Schuldiner, had put together a new line-up and while I was still reeling from their debut Scream Bloody Gore, the year before, for me Leprosy is the best Death album of all time, in their outstanding catalog.  Let’s get to the drumming, boy o boy, Bill Andrews will never win any awards for being an outstanding drummer.  But the double bass was well done and although simplistic in nature the style fit this album.  Terry Butler had just joined the band, so his picture is in there, but Chuck layed down the bass guitar, following the drum patterns precisely, but the thumping bass sound created an extra bit of heaviness.  The dual guitars of Rick Rozz and and Chuck are incredible, creating one of the heaviest guitar tones of that time period.  Chuck had moved on from some of his past gore lyrics and talked about real life, like in the title track, ‘Left to Die’ (War) and ‘Pull the Plug’ (euthanization).  His vocals were more venomous and also very clearly pronounced as he growled each word, perfectly.  Every song is as catchy as the next one, and we all know the lyrics, hell I know this album backwards and forwards and never tire of it. I saw them 2x on the Leprosy tour.  The first time was opening for Dark Angel.  Both bands lit it up, but Death were the better band that night.  Than later that year, Death came through again as headliners blowing the place a part.  I spoke to Chuck and he was a super cool dude.  The show was insane, people slamming, stagediving and once Death opened with ‘Leprosy’ the place turned into a whirlwind circle slam pit.  Bouncers later on got rough with a stagediver and Chuck stopped the set and began to curse out the bouncer for roughing up the fan and threatened to pull the plug (I couldn’t resist), on their set if he did not allow the fans to have fun.  For the rest of the evening the bouncers layed back and let us all do our thing and had a blast!

So Relapse Records partnered with the Death foundation years ago to reissue all the Death material and some other goodies.  They will never get the rights to Symbolic though, as they have tried many times, but Roadrunner is not budging.  However Roadrunner did remaster Symbolic some years ago and it’s outstanding.  Anyway so Relapse has been reissuing the albums in 2 disc, 3 disc, vinyl, color vinyl you name it they are getting that Death name plastered on everything possible.  Also have your pick of the enormous package deals too, I always get the long sleeves and it would be nice if Relapse can at least throw a design on the back of the shirt, once in a while.  I always get the lmd 3cd edition, which is numbered out of 2000.  For this reissue all our orders were delayed.  Relapse received the 3 discs from the plant and they turned out to be data cds with the music missing from them and the merchandise was all messed up too.  So the plant went back to work to rectify the situation, which delayed everyone’s anticipation for this great reissue.

For Leprosy the source material is on disc 1, remastered by Alan Douches, who also remastered disc 2 & 3.  The sound is immense.  I performed a side by side comparison of the original cd and this one is thicker, heavier, but retains all the nuances of the original sound.  It’s louder and cranking this sucker up is fun for me all over again.  Disc 2 are Leprosy rehearsals, a mixed bag of sorts.  Some songs have vocals, others do not, it’s garage band quality.  Disc 3 is all live from the Leprosy tour and the setlist is like I remembered.  Highlights of course, most of Leprosy, ‘Zombie Ritual’ and ‘Mutilation’.  The sound quality is pretty good, but it’s not gonna win any live achievement awards any time soon and this is starting to get to be a little on the boring side regarding the Relapse reissues.  I am hoping for the Scream Bloody Gore reissue, last one to get the deluxe treatment, that Relapse throws in a vintage DVD as one of the 3 discs.  Let’s face it after 1 listen on the rehearsal crap, I never listen to them again and neither do you.

Now onto the deluxe packaging.  Coming in a thick digipak to house the 3 cds are spread across an 8 panel digi and the original album cover has been lightened up a bit and is embossed.  It’s beautiful to look at the classic Repka artwork.  The extra thick booklet contains photos, lyrics, and credits.  I love the way the reissues always have liner notes by members of Death, recalling either touring cycles, the recording and the experience back then.  They have all been outstanding up until this point.  No knock on Jeremy Wagner, from Broken Hope, who when I was in Internal Bleeding in the 90’s, we played shows with them and hanging out with him and Shaun Glass was always a hysterical time, however Jeremy was never in Death.  He recalls his experience with the classic album and Death, in general from the 80’s.  It’s a cool read, but why on earth did Relapse not get members from the Leprosy line-up or even Terry Butler who toured with Death, before he layed down his bass tracks on Spiritual Healing?  I think this would have been a much better recollection to add in the booklet, or at least keep Jeremy’s part, since he is a huge Death fan, but supplement it with the Leprosy line-up coming together to talk about the album in the booklet.

This is the album that put Death on the map as a force to be reckoned with and I think Relapse phoned this part in, I’m kinda pissed at this.  Anyway as reissues go pick this up.  Alan did a phenomenal job with the Leprosy source material and the packaging is elite as always.  Chuck (RIP) was a pioneer and a musical genius and Leprosy is a work of art, still to this day.  One of my top 5 death metal albums of all time and an album that is timeless.