Amorphis - Live Tavastia, Finland 22.4.1995

Amorphis - Live at Tavastia, Helsinki Finland 22nd April 1995
1) Intro
2) Better Unborn
3) Into Hiding
4) The Castaway
5) Against Widows
6) Magic and Mayhem

No link atm

Some live recordings for change, this one from Amorphis, on the heels of the classic "Tales of the Thousand Lakes" album, before the recording of "Elegy." The first two songs of the latter are actually performed here, if not for the first time, then for one of the first times. Sound quality at Tavastia seems to have been quite good. Unfortunately, the recording is not good: the idiot recording the show chooses to engage in inane conversation with other primates which is really annoying. To be honest, the gig itself isn't very good either. "Humour", quasi-proge and typically dumb speeches abound and the crowd reaction doesn't seem too stellar either. It's a pretty short set to boot (was it part of some event?) so I guess I can really recommend it mostly for its historical value. Obviously Amorphis-fans will want to check this out as well.

Blessed In Sin - A Tribute To Euronymous/Odes Obscures

Blessed In Sin - A Tribute to Euronymous / Odes Obscures tape 1998A Tribute to Euronymous - Live 20-01-95
1) Finis Gloria Dei
2) Genochristiancide
3) Desecrated Altar
4) Gloria In Excelsis Lucifero
5) Beyond The Black Lake
6) Necromancy (Bathory cover)
7) Goetia
8) Purify By Fire
Odes Obscures demo 1995
9) Enter Into The Vaginal Temple Of The Night Queen
10) Infernal Ceremony In The Antique Dolmens For The Dark Victory
11) En Mon Âme Et Conscience
12) Purify By Fire
13) Northern Nightmare (A Tribute To The Kings)
14) Ode Obscure Á La Dame Noire
15) Outro

Reuploaded

This tape released by Blessed In Sin in 1998 combines two of their demos (though "A Tribute..." is a live recording) on single cassette. I ordered this probably from Pakana distro in 1998/1999 and ripped it for personal use some time ago. The live recording has a surprisingly good sound and "Odes..." side, while mostly rehearsal recordings, is very much audible too. Good underground sound, no overproduced and polished shit here. Music is melodic and takes clues both from the Nordic and Mediterranean styles of black metal. I could survive without the quite bizarre track 11 though. Not going to bother with a lenghtier sales pitch here, just grab it if you don't have these demos already.

UPDATE: Reuploaded 13-12-11. Since I had lost the original rip (along with a load of others) recently, I ripped this again. Perhaps with a bit better result I might add.

Usva - Seitsemät Siivet demo 1999

Usva - Seitsemät Siivet demo 1999
1) Seitsemät Siivet
2) Syysmyrskyt
3) Vaults Of Sin
4) From Another Dimension
5) Yön Sylissä

New / Old

I took a look at a bunch of old CD-R's burned for me by my friend 10 years (and more) ago and noticed that one of them had this demo on it. I then realised I'd never heard or read much of this band and decided to rip it just for the heck of it. I don't know where he got this back in the day but according to Metal Archives, who are also the source for the sorry image of the cover you see below, this was released on tape and apparently was the band's sole release using this name.

Whatever the band's story might be, this is a demo with good studio sound, 5 tracks of melodic dark metal (I refuse to call 'em black metal even though the demo cover sports a pentagram) which isn't bad. Try it.

UPDATE: I recently got another rip of this from master Henri Sorvali, thanks again, at higher bitrate (320) made directly from a tape and including cover scans. That's the link up there that says "New rip" - click it. Do it now.
UPDATE II:
The old, actually slightly better rip is gone. Someone decided to report it to 4share four years after initial uploading and I'm not going to bother reupping it. It's not worth the hassle. 

Barathrum - Witchmaster demo 1991

Barathrum - Witchmaster demo 1991
1) Demon Est Deus Inversus
2) Deep From The Depths
3) Into Maze Of Nightmares
4) Gate To Jetblack Desires
5) Witchmaster
6) Black Flames And Blood
7) Winter Of The Black Snow

Reuploaded


Another Barathrum tape, this is the first demo (if you don't count the rehearsal demo and Darkfeast material) from 1991. Very old school material, doomy and ritualistic in nature, comparable more to early Necromantia and Samael than other Finns like Beherit or Impaled Nazarene. I think just about all of these songs have been later re-recorded for the full-lenght albums but naturally they sound here quite different. Sound is clear and the rip came out pretty good too so I decided to share it. I got a dub of this demo from Sova around 1995 and he included a version of the cover, it differs in few places from the original. Scanned and included. No more to say, recommended.

At The Gates - Live at Jaxx, Springfield VA 03.06.1996

At The Gates - Live at Jaxx, Springfield VA, USA 3rd June 1996
1) The Flames of the End
2) Slaughter of the Soul
3) Terminal Spirit Disease
4) Cold
5) The Swarm
6) Blinded by Fear
7) Suicide Nation
8) Under a Serpent Sun
9) Need

Reuploaded

Swedish death metallers At The Gates don't probably need much introducing. This here gig (3rd June or 6th March, I've never checked to be sure but I think 3rd June) in the States is a part of some tour (with Morbid Angel headlining) so they only had a bit over half an hour to play. Naturally this limited the amount of songs considerably and they play only tracks off the last album and 2 from "Terminal Spirit Disease" which is a minor issue, but perfectly understandable. As you might've guessed, I got this through tape trading.

You might wonder why I used the old At The Gates logo as they only play "new" songs? Well, simply enough the later logo looks extremely lame. Fortunately (to me at least) the material is still enjoyable. Comes with a good enough sound too so pick this up if you like At The Gates (expect if you're an "only old albums are real"-purist), (new wave of) Swedish death metal... oh well you know if you want this.

Horna - Unmixed Advance Tracks 1998

Horna - Unmixed Advance Tracks 1998
1) Yhdeksän Yö (Part I)
2) Yhdeksän Yö (Part II)
3) Kun Jumalan Sydän On Murskattu

Reuploaded

Horna should be a familiar name to those who listen to Finnish black metal. So without further ado here is a rip of the unmixed advance tracks for "Haudankylmyyden Mailla" album. This was not an official promo of any sort, I think the guys dubbed these to give some people a taste of the new material and that kind of spread out to the tape trading circuit. I got my dub of this from a Dutch friend of mine in 1998 or 1999, it was very good quality, possibly a 2nd generation dub or so. Maybe he even got it directly from the band, I never asked.

As you notice the song "Yhdeksän Yö" is here as two separate tracks. I like the sound on these versions actually better than the finished album, I wish I had the whole as an unmixed version. Recommended!

Mayhem - Live Baroeg, Rotterdam 17.04.1999

Mayhem (Norway) - Live at the Baroeg, Rotterdam Netherlands 17th April 1999
1) Intro Tape
2) I Am Thy Labyrinth
3) Freezing Moon
4) Intro to Carnage
5) Carnage
6) From the Dark Past
7) Symbols of Bloodswords
8) Drum solo / View from Nihil
9) Fall of Seraphs
10) Pure Fucking Armageddon
11) Silvester Anfang
12) Deathcrush

Reuploaded

Another Mayhem live bootleg from Maniac-era, but this one is a notable curio as it does not feature the man himself. I don't know who is filling in for him but as you can (barely) make out from the short speech titled here as "Intro to Carnage", he couldn't make it and well that's about what I could gather from that rant.

UPDATE: I've been informed that it is Necrobutcher talking in the aforementioned piece and Blasphemer is filling in for Maniac! Thanks for the info! Blasphemer does ok in my opinion, on some songs actually better than M, like on "Freezing Moon." He's not very talky overall which is not a big miss. As usual, "Pure Fucking Armageddon" is a fucking torso and this time "I Am Thy Labyrinth" gets the shortening treatment too.

After the introductions I'll move into the catch: the sound is pretty much shit. I remember that several of the old bootlegs I had from the Baroeg gigs of various bands suffered from poor sound so I believe the venue is "challenging" to put it nicely. The guitar is buried under the drums, often very overbearing bass and the vocals. Naturally the sound quality also changes a few times, probably due the person moving a bit. It's not the worst I've heard but takes certainly a hardened listener to bear and enjoy, your mileage will probably vary here. So consider yourself warned. For Mayhem-maniacs, black metal live collectors, historians and masochists.