rsmurphy wrote: Did Hell Awaits ever get a remastering? I can understand a desire for clarity and aggression, but the low-fi sound makes it otherworldly..

Metal Blade remastered it for the digipack version in 2004 - it's louder and little clearer but they were smart enough to not mess w/ the mix too much. I agree that the atmosphere is a big part of the power of that record - these labyrinthine riffs, piled together into this intense and (almost) malicious sounding concoction - esp 'At Dawn They Sleep', that's a blood boiler.

rsmurphy wrote:I fell off after SFSGSW. Don't even know Rust in Peace which word on the street has as the best one. WRONG.

MoreSpaceEcho wrote: Mon Aug 01, 2022 7:37 pm Rust in Peace is a great record, their last good one IMO, but it just sounds so....We Have Recorded All Our Parts With Professional Accuracy And Mixed Them Competently In Accordance With Industry Standards. If you know what I mean. There's no real energy, nothing dangerous. Notable exception being Marty Friedman's solos, which are awesome.

I kinda get this. but IMO Rust In Peace is def a career highlight. It came out when the second wave of thrash bands blew up (Testament, Forbidden, Annihilator, Sadus, etc), all of whom were pursuing the music on a technical tip - impressive, but often soulless and forgettable. Megadeth not only outplayed everyone, but wrote great songs and added a melodic edge that wasn't cheese-laden. It's a great record, really worth your time, and I'm not a fan.

Addressing the question - v. tough for me, as I think the remastered KIMB...ABIG is really good (not that the original was unlistenable, but it was very cheap sounding), but what Mustaine did to the cover of 'These Boots' is atrocious. I guess the original mix just gets my vote.

M.H wrote: Tue Aug 02, 2022 5:16 am

Addressing the question - v. tough for me, as I think the remastered KIMB...ABIG is really good (not that the original was unlistenable, but it was very cheap sounding), but what Mustaine did to the cover of 'These Boots' is atrocious. I guess the original mix just gets my vote.

Apparently Hazelwood pressed the issue such that Mustain beeped out any lyrics that weren't true to the song in subsequent repressings, and then re-recorded the vocals with the original Hazelwood lyrics. Lee eventually complained and the song was dropped entirely, but not before he received about 10 years worth of royalties.

Krev wrote: Mon Aug 01, 2022 7:42 pm I love to play KIMB on the guitar. That first pre-chorus riff is a pain in the ass. You really couldn't fuck with Mustaine and Poland.

I have the tabs for all the KIMB songs, this one is gonna be the first one I attempt. Is that first pre-chorus riff the one where the band drops out? Cause that shit is completely bonkers.

The thing that Dave did so well on those first two records, besides write crazy, innovative riffs, is he put all those almost nursery rhyme vocal melodies on top. Pretty much every song on KIMB and Peace Sells have super catchy verses and choruses, shit really sticks in your head. The songwriting is what really sets early Megadeth and Metallica apart from the competition IMO.

I have an original Noise cassette copy of Coroner's R.I.P., and it has more low end than a trap record. I just saw reissues of their early records advertised.

rsmurphy wrote:I fell off after SFSGSW. Don't even know Rust in Peace which word on the street has as the best one. WRONG.

MoreSpaceEcho wrote: Mon Aug 01, 2022 7:37 pm Rust in Peace is a great record, their last good one IMO, but it just sounds so....We Have Recorded All Our Parts With Professional Accuracy And Mixed Them Competently In Accordance With Industry Standards. If you know what I mean. There's no real energy, nothing dangerous. Notable exception being Marty Friedman's solos, which are awesome.

I kinda get this. but IMO Rust In Peace is def a career highlight. It came out when the second wave of thrash bands blew up (Testament, Forbidden, Annihilator, Sadus, etc), all of whom were pursuing the music on a technical tip - impressive, but often soulless and forgettable. Megadeth not only outplayed everyone, but wrote great songs and added a melodic edge that wasn't cheese-laden. It's a great record, really worth your time, and I'm not a fan.

Addressing the question - v. tough for me, as I think the remastered KIMB...ABIG is really good (not that the original was unlistenable, but it was very cheap sounding), but what Mustaine did to the cover of 'These Boots' is atrocious. I guess the original mix just gets my vote.

Rust in peace is a great album but a bit too fancypants thrash for my tastes; "Peace sells..." will always be my fave followed by the debut. SFSGSW is a seriously half-assed, underwritten record with a piss-poor, 80s nightmare of a production (for the record, the remaster that removes all the 80s reverb only sounds empty and limp; you can't remove the reverb from records where I suspect it was planned to be part part of the sound from the beginning); that's about an EPs worth of material there (=Set the world on fire, In my darkest hour, Liar and Hook in mouth. Oh yeah, the intro is cool I guess but goes on for too long and hardly qualifies as a "song" IMO).

Also, for a classic thrash album, ""Rust..." is seriously lacking in trash content, of the 8 songs, I think "Hangar 18, Tornado of souls and Lucretia sound more like US power-metal than thrash with blatant Maiden vibes and even some Van Halen on Lucretia. Also, Poison was the cure sounds more like old school *speed* metal to me after the intro, like a more technical/fingertwisting Exciter or even Motörhead. I like that tune though and they always had tracks like this on their records, just saying that it's hardly crunchy, state of the art thrash.

Anyway, I can recognize it as a great *metal* album but when I'm in the mood for thrash in general and Megadeth in particular, it's not something I will put on. Meanwhile, when I'm in the mood for more traditional metal, I'd rather reach for some old NWOBHM, Mercyful Fate or Aceept or (*insert something that doesn't sound so slick, polished and technical*) than "Rust..." so it has no real *function* for me, it's more like a pristine object that you can admire from a distance for its "craftmanship" than something I find musically engaging as a whole. The solos are some of my favourite wank ever though and "Holy Wars" is a top 3 Megadeth tune to me.