Customer Reviews

The Complete Radio One Sessions

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Already released once as "The Peel Sessions", four more tracks recorded in 1996 for the BBC Friday Rock Show have been tacked on as an added enticement. The primary raison d'etre of this package seems to be to give American fans a chance to pick up this material; the "Peel" disc was in fact an import, and even at it's moderate price was scarce in the US. That being said, there's little incentive for owners of that CD to pick up this new release. The artwork is as atrocious as that on it's foreign counterpart, and the vocals on the songs from '96 are mixed way back in the cheap seats. But fans discovering these versions for the first time will find a wealth of rage and hostility greeting them in the ultra-brief, ultra-violent forays into the band's early material.

For those unfamiliar with the John Peel program, guests on the show are given four hours of studio time to lay down takes of however many songs they can manage in that time period. These restrictions don't allow the bands the luxury of editing or post-producing the output, so basically it's set the knobs on the control board and let `er rip. What comes out is a jaw dropping maelstrom of malcontent, rendered in brief, concentrated bursts (the echo following Napalm's performance of "You Suffer Part 2" actually lasts about four times longer than the song itself). Aside from the last four tracks, everything else is from those first three pre-death metal grindcore albums, resembling a musical train wreck witnessed from an uncomfortably close position. Napalm Death have now moved on to greener pastures while preserving their integrity, but "The Complete Radio One Session" reminds us of the energetic fury which once came ripping from a nation's loudspeakers, and on public radio, no less. Only in Jolly Old England.

Personally,I liked their 'Bootlegged In Japan' CD better(see my review).But don't get me wrong,if you're a long-time Napalm fan,then you should get a lot from this sixteen track BBC compilation.If anything,it features a great song selection/mix of material from the band's entire back catalog.Just good grindcore for thrashers to thoroughly enjoy. Few of the cuts that I took a liking to were "The Kill / Prison Without Walls", "Moral Crusade / Worlds Apart" and "From Enslavement To Obliteration". A decent pick.

Pure adrenalin throughout the whole listening of this album. The band initially advocated by John Peel in 1987 gets a complete album to itself of all the songs they recorded at BBC studios throughout the years. Despite all the changes in personnel the band have managed to retain their awesome credibiltity by recording some amazing tunes, my favourites including 'Scum' and 'My Own Worse Enemy'. This is a classic album of pure thrash metal that should be in every Napalm fan's collection.

i find this to be napalm death's most consistent release, as the tracklist pulls songs from many different napalm albums, giving a sampler of napalm death's different stages - while managing to be superior to the orginals in both performance and production. the sounds here are not just grindcore, but a melding of pop group/lee perry styled dub play, peter brotzmann's free jazz fury, and big black's nihilism.

this album HAS to be in your collection.

This is a collection of 4 separate sessions separated by many years and featuring vastly disparate lineups:

1-4 Recorded for the John Peel show 9/13/87 Mick Harris (Vocals/Drums) - Shane Embry (Bass) - Bill Steer (Guitar) - Lee Dorian (Vocals).
5-8 Recorded for the John Peel Show 3/8/88 Mick Harris (Drums/Vocals) - Shane Embry (Bass) - Jesse Pintado (Guitar) - Mitch Harris (Guitar) - Lee Dorian (Lead Vocals).
9-12 Recorded for the John Peel show 8/12/1990 Mick Harris (Drums/Vocals) - Shane Embry (Bass) - Jesse Pintado (Guitar) - Mitch Harris (Guitar) - Barney Greenway (Lead Vocals).
12-16 Recorded for the Friday Rock Show March 1996 - Danny Herrera (Drums) - Shane Embry (Bass) - Jesse Pintado (Guitar) - Barney Greenway (Vocals)

If you are looking for classic Napalm Death (Lee Dorian, Mick Harris and Bill Steer), you've got it here. If you want later stuff (Barney and Mitch Harris), here it is. The later material is great and all, but there is something about that early stuff. Isn't there? Well, now there's more. These recordings feature alternate versions of songs we all love from the classic period. These recordings are very different. First of all, both the production and performances are sharper, quicker, and even more vicious then the recordings found on Scum and FETO. These certainly don't supplant those recordings, but they do shed a new light on some very vital material. Absolutely essential listening!!

Napalm Death are exactly as their name applies: harsh; brutal; scalding; and capable of murdering your eardrums! Yes, most of their songs are indistinguishable from the other, but so what? Their records are forthe pure aggression blood that runs in all of our veins! Listen to their power and feel the burn!