Reviewed: October, 2022
Released: 2022, Cherry Red / HNE
Rating: 4/5
Reviewer: JP
Sometimes I think Cherry Red/Hear No Evil are single-handed keeping the NWOBHM alive. Their catalogue is so deep and they are so committed to bringing these bands, bands like Blitzkrieg, to the CD buying public at a reasonable price, they have to be commended.
A while back, Michael Hann wrote a book about the NWOBHM called DENIM & LEATHER. In that the author as very honest and said, (paraphrased) There were a ton of NWOBHM bands and most of them were not very good. I have to agree. (As a quick side note, that book is being reissued in North America by the good people at Bazillion Points Publishing in early 2023 so watch for that! That whole musical movement, while exciting and prolific, can be divided into three tiers. The top 3% of bands who ‘made’ it, you know the names, (the Maidens and Saxons of the world) …a small handful, a dozen maybe. Then you have 87% of the band never made it. Literally of the 500 NWOBHM bands, over 400 acts never went anywhere. That leaves us with that last 10% or so, those few bands, a few dozen, survivors to this day, who never made it big but are still with us. Blitzkrieg is among the most prominent of these.
Blitzkrieg is still going with a new studio album (their 9th) as late as 2018. This new retrospective box-set is maybe a couple years too late for a 40th anniversary celebration but it is no less appreciated.
INFERNO is a fine looking five CD set housed in a clam-shell box. The discs are housed in wallets and there is a 20-page full, colour booklet with a very informative essay by NWOBHM expert John Tucker. The whole Blitzkrieg, Satan, Avenger, LoneWolf soup was interesting to read about and wrap my head around. The band’s discography is a bit confusing but not unmanageable to comprehend. There had a few demo’s EP’s splits, and demo tracks almost all which appear here as a generous 15 bonus tracks. Try finding that stuff today on vinyl! Good luck! The band sort of had a few false starts but enough courage to re-invent themselves, reissue a few things and keep going. The core of this as the sub-title suggests is the first three or four albums (depends on your opinion of TEN) and a live album and all those awesome bonus tracks.
This is the complete package, everything you could want. The title suggests a Part 2 (2002-2018) which would be cool, because I have lost track of the band and have not heard most of their albums over the past two decades. Until then, this superb collection will satisfy fans old and new!
Tracklisting:
DISC ONE
A TIME OF CHANGES (1985)
1 Ragnarok (Instrumental Inferno)
2 Inferno
3 Blitzkrieg
4 Pull The Trigger
5 Armageddon
6 Take A Look Around
7 Hell To Pay
8 Vikings
9 A Time Of Changes
10 Saviour
BONUS TRACKS
11 Blitzkrieg (Demo Tape 1980)
12 Inferno (Demo Tape 1980)
13 Armageddon (Demo Tape 1980)
14 Buried Alive (Buried Alive Single 1980)
15 Blitzkrieg (Buried Alive Single 1980)
16 Inferno (Lead Weight Neat Sampler 1981)
DISC TWO
BLITZED ALIVE CASSETTE (1980)
1 Intro
2 Inferno
3 Take A Look Around
4 Armageddon
5 Blitzkrieg
6 Highway Star
7 Saviour
UNELEASED TRACKS (1980)
8 Calming The Savage Beast
9 Santa
10 Buried Alive
11 Vikings
12 Too Wild To Tame
13 Hell To Pay
14 A Time Of Changes
15 Tocatta
16 Sweeney / Rock & Roll
DISC THREE
UNHOLY TRINITY (1995)
1 Hair Trigger (Pull The Trigger Part 2)
2 Struck By Lightning
3 Taking Care Of Business
4 Field Of Dreams
5 Take A Look Around
6 After Dark
7 Crazy For You
8 Zip
9 Unholy Trinity
10 Calming The Savage Beast
11 The Wraith
12 Easy Way Out
13 All Hallows Eve
14 Countess Bathory
15 Jealous Love
16 House Of Pleasure
17 Return Of The Zip
DISC FOUR
TEN (1996)
1 Cavo D’Oro
2 Fighting All The Way To The Top
3 Buried Alive
4 The Sentinel
5 The Power Of The King
6 Night Howl
7 I’m Not Insane
8 Court In The Act
9 Blitzkrieg ’96
10 Nocturnal Vision
THE MISTS OF AVALON (1998)
1 The Legend
I. Crimson Dawn (3:12)
II. Nations Divided (4:47)
III. Camelot (4:47)
IV. Stryngs (0:51)
V. Arthur the Once and Future King (6:01)
2 Tranquil State
3 I Am The Doctor (Who Are You?)
4 Deceiver
5 Princess For The World
6 The Mighty
“A” (Instrumental)
7 Smell Of Roses
8 Love’s Too Late
9 Anasazi (Instrumental)
10 Yesterdays (Hope For The Future)
11 Another Interview?
12 Vicious Rumors
13 I Was Having A Great Time And Stayed Longer Than I Should, So When I Got To The Railway Station, The Last Train Had Gone!
www.cherryred.co.uk/product/blitzkrieg-complete-recordings-vol-1-1980-1998-5cd-box-set/
