Overkill - !!!Fuck You!!! (1987) 12" EP Megaforce Worldwide

Overkill was a band on the periphery of my thrash favorites back in 1987 and one that my friends liked a bit more than I back in the day, especially as I started to tend towards raw sounds and more of a skate/thrash esthetic. Truth be told, the vocals took some getting use to with the high pitched squeals and soaring upper register, something I never truely dug back in the day.

That being said, Overkill is considered today one of the better thrash acts of the late 1980's and their back catalog is stocked with solid albums, with 1985's Feeling the Fire and 1988's Under The Influence being true classics of the genre.




!!!Fuck You!!! was  an EP released back in 1987 with the title song actually a cover of the Subhumans and the remaining four songs all from a live recording that sale year at The Phantasy Theatre in Cleveland, OH. It's tight and fast and once you get use to the vocals, its an excellent EP. It has been reissued with one extra track on CD (a live version of 'Fuck You') and its a great place to start if you want to check out one of the more operatic and fast bands to have graced the thrash scene from day one.

Extra Hot Sauce - Taco Of Death (1988) LP Peaceville Records

When I have a bummer day at work, this is one of the few records I liked to put on at work (via you tube) and listen to. It never fails to make me smile. Extra Hot Sauce is a thrash/crossover/grindcore band with a damn good sense of humor. They only released this album from what I can tell and were notable for their drummer, Dan Liker, who would later play bass with the fabled Nuclear Assault.

Pretty much every song here is offensive in a late-1980's kinda way, like the lyriks for AIDS which go:

AIDS/Who fucking cares?



Which is funny if you are into offensive and massively irreverant humor, but no so much if you are thin-skinned.



They also cover a slew of songs, most notably 'Communication Breakdown' by Zeppelin - in a bit over a minute. It's pretty much unreconizable, but its still damn funny and I laugh ever time I hear it. Their cover of Sabbath's 'Paranoid' is way less thrashy and fast - at least for the intro. Then it speeds up with blast beats and its just awesome.

This was a record I really had to argue myself into getting as I tend to stay away from this kind of fringe joke band stuff, especially hard-to-find records that command big money. This was found on the cheap on eBay and I snagged it happily. It's an interesting release in the pantheon of late 1980's thrash and one that you could easily see inspiring modern thrash bands like Municipal Waste.

Iron Maiden - In Concert - 773 (1993) LP BBC Transcription Service

My understanding of this LP is that the BBC makes its archived recordings available to buy for other commercial radio stations. Iron Maiden has two such recordings from what I can find, this, the 773 disc, and an earlier 669 recording. I picked it up from Reckless here in Chicago and its looks legit enough to me, but the music is what really matters.

It's an awesome live show, recorded in Holland and from what I can tell, during the "Fear Of The Dark Tour" in 1992, Bruce Dickenson's second to last tour with Maiden. The set list is amazing, comprising the best of the later part of Maiden's catalog, including "Bring Your Daughter To The Slaughter," "Can I Play With Madness?," "Heaven Can Wait" and "Fear Of The Dark."

I'm a huge Maiden fan and have listened to the entire Dickenson catalog many, many times. I haven't posted anything up here as I only have cassettes and CD's of the catalog, save for this lone, LP release.

And its a killer one at that. This was probably Bruce's last great tour with the band as the 1993 tour saw him having already announced his leaving the band. Those dates had to be bittersweet for all involved, especially as bassist Steve Harris said he thought Dickenson was phoning it in on more than a few occasions.

What blew me away here is the relentless energy Maiden has live, how crushingly they perform every song. Totally professional at every turn. The mix is damn near perfect - way better than the Rock in Rio live release which has the guitars way back in the mix and the bass up front.

As far as I can tell, there is no other official release of these recordings beyond what I have here, which is a bit of a bummer as this LP is fantastic. I've had it on the turntable for the past month at least once a day.

Reckless is in the process of tracking down a copy of the 669 recording for me and I'll hopefully post about that when it arrives. As it is, there doesn't seem to be any youtube clips of the music from this one, so here is "Sanctuary" from another date in 1992. Long live Maiden!

Destruction - Live Without Sense (1989) LP Noise International

The first time I heard 'Mad Butcher', I was pretty blown away and that set one track sold me on their entire catalog. Back in 1989, I bought this live record (on cassette, which has been lost to the ravages of time) and couldn't listen to it enough.

In the late 1980's, thrash and metal records had a tendency to be very, very treble heavy and bass seemed relegated to the way background. Most Destruction records suffered from this pretty badly, though the highlight of the band has always been the technical guitar playing anyway. This live record has a fantastic mix and the bass comes out, giving this release a punch lacking in a lot of their studio LP's.



There are a ton of highlights to this record - "Curse The Gods" and "Thrash Attack" being my favorties, but "Mad Butcher" is awesome here with a long into and crowd going nuts - you can almost feel the air cycling out of the pit way back in '89.



Considered one of the best technical metal bands back in the day along side Kreator, Destruction is two parts thrash to one part technical virtuosity and the later really makes the thrash part hit hard. I wouldn't consider them a technical band, more a thrash band with some really good guitar work. The vocals can be a hit or miss for some with the high-pitched squeals on "Curse..." and others. But really, if you listen to "Mad Butcher" and don't dig the band totally, the vocals won't change your mind one way or other other.

There are so many great early thrash bands, but Destruction still seems a cut above the rest, a rare treat for fans of technical metal and thrash.

Toxic Holocaust - Hell On Earth (2005) LP Relapse Records

Toxic Holocaust are one of the few recent thrash bands who get it right - stripped down, immediate thrash, without bells and whistles, without anything added to the mix. It's not modern thrash - it's late 1980's thrash made in 2005.

I saw Toxic Holocaust open for The Possessed and by the time their set was over, I was rushing to the merch booth to pick stuff up - only to find they had packed it up as nothing was selling. I think if they stayed open for longer, they would have found a lot of new fans clamoring for gear.

After the show, I bought every one of their records and was blown away to find that Toxic Holocaust is one guy - Joel Grind, who, at least on the first few records, played all the instruments and recorded the album by himself.




Every song on Hell On Earth is great - raw, unfettered thrash. No pretense. If you like this one track, you'll like the whole catalog of what Joel and Toxic Holocaust has done, I absolutely guarantee it. Plus, cover art by Ed Repka? You know this has to be good.

Return To Forever - Hymn Of The Seventh Galaxy (1973) LP Polydor

I grew up with a lot of Jazz-Fusion in the house - Jeff Lorber et al - and as a youngster into '80's pop and then '80's hip-hop and late '80's metal, the Jazz-Fusion thing didn't really take my by storm. As it was, it was my dad's music and our relationship when I was a kid was strained. I was a difficult kid and my dad was a difficult guy and we were naturally adversarial. It wasn't until my mid-twenties that we started to reconnect - after I had done a good bit of growing up.

He bought me The Jeff Lorber Collection on CD and so many of the tracks brought back memories of a comfortable house and what I have come to call 'cerebral Sundays' - ones you spend reflecting and thinking rather than late brunch and drinking. Not that its a religion or anything, but I like Sundays to be about chilling hard and reflecting. And West Wing episodes at night.

I bought quite a few Jeff Lorber and Westher Report records over the years and only recently started listening to fusion on Sundays again with Linda when we are zipping around town doing errands and drinking coffee.

Chick Corea featured on some Lorber recordings (most notably Soft Space) and was the main reason I started to look at Return To Forever. I picked up a few records, but this, their third album has easily become my favorite.

It's more Jazz-Rock and Funk than true Fusion, but whatever you term it, it's fantastic. The songs are well-crafted and driving, moody without being too demanding like many Weather Report songs (heavy horn stabs, fast-paced solos) and have a cool kind of space-rock-jazz thing happening, like Hawkwind-meets-jazz.


The titular track is one of the best on the album and has a heavy prog element and tremendous playing. The tone and sound of the guitar and bass on this track have that late 1960's feel - fuzzy, heavy with that distinct electric organ pulse.

Most of the other tracks on the record are a bit more laid back and mello, especially the last two on the record, 'Space Circus Parts 1 & 2' and 'The Game Maker', which does pick up at the end.

Like most Jazz-Fusion, this record can be found on the cheap and this one was bought at Dusty Groove here in Chicago, along with quite a few other fusion records on the same trip. Get some coffee and chill hard with this one.

Spirit Caravan - So Mortal Be/Undone Mind (2002) 45 Tolotta Records

Wino has fronted some damn good bands - the legendary Saint Vitus, stoner/desert rock supergroup Shrinebuilder, The Obsessed and this, probably my favorite project of his, Spirit Caravan.

Spirit Caravan is a bit more heavy and laid back than Saint Vitus and The Obsessed and are more about simple riffs and heavy tone than any of his other projects - at least that's how I think of them.


This 45 is awesomely heavy, with the opening riff of 'So Mortal Be' just laying down the perfect stoner vibe with Scott's distinctive vocals soaring over the music. It's rare that a good heavy stoner vibe comes off without being too slow or too heavy - Spirit Caravan seems to get this balance just right.

'Undone Mind' is a bit heavier and more gruff, but definitely has the same vibe and tone and almost the same feel to the riff, but it gets your head nodding just the same.

Both tracks are available on The Last Embrace, a compilation of a bunch of Spirit Caravan's records and a great starting place for those interested in the band. This 45 was an impulse buy at Zion's Gate last time I was in Seattle.