3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Another great Sanctuary NWOBHM anthology, April 20, 2007
If you're a fan of the celebrated New Wave of British Heavy Metal (NWOBHM) movement, you have to love what the Castle/Sanctuary label has done to bring the most obscure NWOBHM bands' material back to life. Smokin' Valves - the Holocaust Anthology is a perfect example. Here is a band whose sole claim to fame was that Metallica covered one of their songs (the Small Hours) for their Garage Days EP. Still, the band is worth checking out for far more than just that bit of metal trivia.
Holocaust was a band that totally captured the quintessential NWOBHM sound. Rather than trying to explain the hard charging guitars, denim and leather wardrobe, gloom and doom lyrics, and punk-like ferocity of the movement, you can just as easily hand someone a Holocaust album and let a song like "Heavy Metal Mania" do the talking. This is great vintage heavy metal, and it's a real shame the band never received the attention they deserved.
The good folks at Sanctuary have painstakingly compiled the best Holocaust recordings, cleaned up the sound considerably, and provided NWOBHM fans another must-have 2-disc anthology. You get a nice overview of the band's studio material (though I'd have preferred more from the Nightcomers album), plus live tracks, singles, and fittingly a cover of Metallica's "Master of Puppets", all digitally remastered, plus extensive liner notes, all for just a little more than the price of a single CD. Like all of the Sanctuary NWOBHM anthologies, it is well worth checking out, whether you're a die hard fan of that scene or you're just interested in checking out an overlooked piece of metal's history.
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