Saturday, April 25, 2026

SLAYER "SHOW NO MERCY" ALBUM AD (THE HEADBANGER #7, 1983)

CRIMSON GLORY (METAL HAMMER VOL.6 #12, 1991)

THE RUNAWAYS (W.P.T.B, SPRING 1976)

TOMMY BOLIN "THE ULTIMATE DOCUMENTARY" (1989)

Tommy Bolin - "The Ultimate" Music Link Documentary 
Aired: December 15, 1989, KUBD CH 59 Denver CO


From the YouTube Uploader: I recorded this excellent documentary, put together by Mike Drumm, about the amazing Tommy Bolin, when it first aired on December 15, 1989, in conjunction with the release of the Tommy Bolin "The Ultimate" box set. There was ALOT of buzz around this release in Denver at the time, with a very in depth article in Westword appearing in the October 11-17, 1989 issue of that local newspaper and I have included scans of that article at the end of this video. In addition, KDHT 92.5 aired a previously rarely heard Tommy show from Ebbets Field in 1974 (subsequently released through the Tommy Bolin Archives).

As a huge Tommy Bolin fan since high school (1975) this was an AWESOME, very exciting time! Unfortunately the box set didn't sell well and Geffen was done with new Bolin releases. Thank goodness the Tommy Bolin Archives came into fruition and released numerous excellent CDs and Vinyl over the next few decades, and continues to keep his legacy alive on Facebook.

I wanted to transfer this to digital, as I know it is first generation and recorded in SP mode on VHS. This documentary does appear elsewhere on YouTube, broken into segments, although it doesn't seem to be complete. This is the complete show, as broadcast, including the commercials (I enjoy seeing the commercials of the time, particularly on independent stations). Albums On The Hill was my go to store when I went to CU. 

A Huge Thanks to Mike Drumm for putting this together way back then. 

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PAUL SPECKMANN OF MASTER (1988)



DISSECTION IN THE U.S (1996)




 

EDDIE VAN HALEN 'ERUPTION GUITAR SOLO' (LIVE IN NEW HAVEN 1986)

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ANNIHILATOR (1989)




 

DORO (METAL HAMMER VOL.6 #12, 1991)


KING DIAMOND ”CHANCE THEATER, POUGHKEEPSIE, NY (SEPTEMBER 16, 1988)

 Courtesy of Mark Kurtzner









VADER "STUDIO TVP KRZEMIONKI, KRAKÓW, POLAND" (OCTOBER 8TH, 2002)


SETLIST:
1 Intro / Epitaph 5:47
2 Torch Of War 2:20
3 Xeper 4:41
4 Carnal 2:24
5 Reign Forever World 3:57
6 Intro 2 / Breath Of Centuries 5:56
7 Silent Empire 4:07
8 Black To The Blind 4:05
9 Intro 3 / Revelations Of Black Moses 8:47
10 North 2:01
11 Nomad 4:55
12 Sothis 4:38
13 Raining Blood (Slayer Cover) 4:44

The main part of the "Night of the Apocalypse" DVD  release from 2004.

GENE SIMMONS SON MEET HIS PARENTS ... IN THE THRIFT STORE 😅



Friday, April 24, 2026

CHECK OUT OUR YOUTUBE CHANNEL ...

 … https://www.youtube.com/@DefendersofMetal

METALLICA (1982)


 

TIRANT SIN (US/NY) (PRE-CANNIBAL CORPSE)

The legendary Pre-Cannibal Corpse band that was originally called Satan's Angel and consisted of Chris Barnes (vocals), Paul Mazurkiewicz (drums), Rich Ziegler (bass), and Bob Rusay (guitars) while they were still in high school. One show was played under this moniker in December 1985, where they performed covers of Accept's "Balls to the Wall" and Celtic Frost's "Dethroned Emperor". They would soon change their name to Tirant Sin.

In 1986, Barnes left to join Leviathan. Mazurkiewicz, Ziegler, and Rusay moved up to Absolute Storage. Practicing with a handful of singers only brought them disappointment. They eventually secured guitarist Cam V. and, in February 1987, vocalist Dennis John Glinski. By the summer, Cam had left and was replaced by guitarist Joe Morelli.

In late 1988, Mazurkiewicz, Barnes, and Rusay got together with Alex Webster and Jack Owen to form Cannibal Corpse. In 1989, Glinski, Zeigler, and Morelli formed Mayhemesis with drummer Jim Link and guitarist Phil Frost.

The lineup of Glinski, Ziegler, Mazurkiewicz, and live members Rob Barrett and Jim Nickles reunited on January 7th and 8th, 2012 for a two-date benefit show to raise money for Sons of Azrael guitarist Tony Lorenzo's medical treatment. Beyond Death, another pre-Cannibal Corpse band, also played.

The bands 3:rd demo tape with Chris Barnes on vocals.


PATREON MEMBERS
As a support Patreon member you can download the bands
3 demo tapes by clicking the logo down below.

OZZY OSBOURNE'S 'DIARY OF A MADMAN' TOUR PREMIER (1981)

Photographer Harald Oimoen: First date of the Diary of a Madman Tour at The Palace of Fine Cows !!! The electricity in the air was palpable & it was one of those wild crazy shows were your feet weren't even touching the ground and the crowd would move you 5-10 feet in a random direction !! I took two or three rolls of film but only got maybe 10 shots in focus !! One of the wildest crowds I EVER experienced




PROTECTOR (GER) (NECRONOMICON #2, 1988)


 

BIFF BYFORD ABOUT THE STORY OF THE COVER OF "INNOCENCE IS NO EXCUSE"

Sweden Rock Magazine (SRM) is a brilliant Swedish metal magazine founded in 2001 and publish 11 issues per year. They write about the current scene, but never forget its roots and publish a lot of amazing stuff from the 80's.

The magazine is written in Swedish, but here is an article translated to English for you.

SAXON

You can hardly imagine a sharper contrast than that between what Saxon singer Biff Byford points out as the band's two most talked-about album covers. On the one hand, »Crusader« (1984), a painting laden with medieval battlefield romance: bald knights, bloody corpses and a fluttering banner. On the other hand, the sequel »Innocence is no excuse« (1985) with its on-paper, directly tame studio photo. Yet the image appears strangely provocative through the undercurrent of oral-fixated lolita sensualism. An odd, even startling aesthetic for a heavy metal band of the time.

– The idea itself was to try something different, says Biff. All metal, especially British metal, had lost popularity so we looked at several new presentation ideas. We could have done something more heavy metal-like, a bondage cover with heroes and slave girls in the spirit of Manowar. Instead, we went from heavy metal to something that I guess was more pretentious. We all liked this idea, simply.

An idea that, by the way, did not come from any of the Saxon members.

– Our manager at the time, Nigel Thomas, had been involved in some daring album covers, for example one with Tubes where toothpaste was sprayed over a girl's chest. He was the one who came up with the spread with the girl and the apple. Nigel himself went over to the modeling agency to check out possible girls. He chose one who I think was only 18 years old and had just started working professionally.

To carry out the actual photo shoot, Gered Mankowitz was engaged, a versatile photographer who had previously created covers for Jam and Gary Moore, among others. This particular request took him by surprise, however.

– I'm not a heavy metal fan, but I knew of Saxon as a famous band in the genre, says Gered. Unlike my friend Ross Halfin, I didn't photograph many hard rock bands. Creatively, I found it quite unsatisfactory, as I couldn't relate to the aesthetics. I was much more specialized in studio portraits, which few hard rockers asked for. However, this assignment came from EMI, who were one of my regular clients. The reason they asked me was probably because I was quite established as a fashion photographer and they wanted something striking and a little challenging. I didn't think much about how heavy metal or not the cover appeared. When I look at the image now, it literally screams advertising billboard.

The photo session itself was completed quickly and generated about twenty images that are now, according to Gered, gathering dust in EMI's archives. Incidentally, the image that now adorns the cover exudes a much more subtle eroticism than the image that Saxon originally chose.

- In the original image, white apple juice ran down the girl's chin, says Biff. The record company didn't like it, because it was too suggestive. I liked it, however.

– We tried all sorts of variations, Gered recalls. With juice, without juice, showing more of her teeth or the whites of her eyes – anything we thought would work.

The connection between the cover motif and the album title is so striking that no one seemed to understand the underlying point of the phrase »Innocence is no excuse«, Biff notes.

– We were in the middle of a lawsuit with our previous record label Carrere, who had sued us for breach of contract. Our innocence was apparently no excuse. That is the explanation for the title and the s from our logo, which can be seen on the apple. The girl taking a bite of Saxon is another example of symbolism.

EMI also failed to get their intended point across. The group's new record label wanted people to understand that the girl was a murderer by looking at the album cover and the black and white photos that Gered then took for various editions of the single »Back on the streets«. Few people made this connection, however, because it is very difficult to recognize her in the single images.

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– It was a strange session in the park of Hampstead Heath, not far from my studio, says Gered. It was the first and only time I met Biff. I never met the other band members. The picture I took of the girl walking along a brick wall was quite sadistic. She was wearing a very tight, metal-plated, goth-like dress and gloves in black. Very sexy, but she was dragging a man in a suit with a paper bag over his head and an apple falling out of his hand. On the back of the single there was a color picture of the apple, with the Saxon s: bitten off. Another picture was apparently supposed to be a Wilhelm Tell paraphrase. The same man was tied to a tree with an arrow in his skull and the girl was chewing on the apple – she had shot him instead. Finally, there was a rural scene with a picnic in the green, but the man was lying dead on the canvas with a butcher knife in his back. I don't remember who came up with all these ideas. In fact, I hardly know what I was thinking that made me agree to shoot them. The scope of what you can do is of course very large in the music industry and that's why it's such an attractive sphere. This is also a commercial job. Someone presents a concept to us and we will make a plan for how it will be implemented, is responsible for the props and gives the artist – in this case Biff – everything they need to get the campaign together.

Neither Gered nor Biff can remember the name of the apple-munching girl, even though the singer ended up meeting her again.

– We had her on stage with us. We invited her when we were in Birmingham, where she lived, and then took her to the Hammersmith Odeon. It went down very well with the male part of the audience. She got on in a very short miniskirt and I introduced her with the words »this is my wife«. The audience went crazy and I continued »okay, she is not my wife«. She didn't want to be, Biff concludes with a sad tone of voice.

Like the music on »Innocence is no excuse«, the cover has been the subject of strong emotions from the beginning. It is found on top lists of both the best and worst album covers in history, depending on whose website you visit. Biff has subsequently joined those who dislike the image, just as he dislikes so much else connected to ex-manager Nigel Thomas (who, incidentally, died of a heart attack in 1993).

So what does Gered Mankowitz himself think of his creation? Well, he is primarily surprised that the cover for »Innocence is no excuse« would have any buzz factor at all. For him, it just represents a job assignment, and one that he has not had reason to give a thought to in the past quarter of a century.

– I have never received any response to it and I do not have the faintest idea how high it ranks among Saxon's album covers.

As I said, the latter depends on who you ask. However, the fact that the cover is and remains Saxon's most discussed is a fact.

ERIK THOMPSON

GRAVE DIGGER (GER)


 

Thursday, April 23, 2026

MERCY (SWE) (1984)

From Top to Bottom: Messiah Marcolin, Paul Gustafsson, Magnus Klintö, Andrija Veljacas

 

VARATHRON (THE OATH #2, 1993)

ALICE COOPER "MONSTER OF ROCK, SAO PAOLO, BRAZIL" (1995)

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SETLIST
Under My Wheels 
Billion Dollar Babies  
No More Mr. Nice Guy  
Sideshow   
Desperado  
Gutter Cat Us. The Jets  
Feed My Frankenstein  
Ballad of Dwight Frye   
School´s Out  
Elected


 

WITCH (US/CA) (1983)


 

MERCYFUL FATE "TEATRO PROVIDENCIA, SANTIAGO, CHILE (AUGUST 15, 1999)

On August 15, 1999, the "9 Tour" hit South America, and first out was this show in Chile. They also did Argentina and Brazil before flying to Europe and the 1999 Wacken Open Air festival.

Unfortunately the picture is pretty bad, but the audience audio sound is really good so I usually listen to it instead of watching it.

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SETLIST
Evil
Doomed by the Living Dead
Nightmare
Desecration of Souls
Burn in Hell
The Oath
Melissa
Last Rites
Satan's Fall
A Dangerous Meeting
Black Funeral
Come to the Sabbath
 

EXODUS (MIDWEST MILITIA #2, 1984)

Wednesday, April 22, 2026

QUORTHON ... PAINTED IN BLOOD

Quorthon from Bathory, painted with my blood (2016) / Maxime Taccardi (Artworks)

HEXENHAUS (SWE)


 

MAYHEM (NOR) (NECRONOMICON #2, 1988)


 

CJSS "THE FIRST CONCERT" A CLASSIC MOMENT IN 80'S US METAL

CJSS formed in late 1984 and played their first concert soon thereafter. Formed from the 2 biggest local bands, Spike and Prizoner. David T Chastain- guitar, Mike Skimmerhorn- bass & vocals and Les Sharp- drums came from Spike. Vocalist/guitarist Russell Jinkens came from Prizoner. While we are not 100% sure this is the first concert we have judged it is or one of the first from the lack of Marshall Cabinets on stage and the songlist which features numerous songs from Spike and pre-Chastain songs. In reality there are only 2 songs in this concert that made it to the first CJSS album "World Gone Mad." This was a fan video or a friend of the band's video shot on Beta. Audio gets a little better as the video goes on. Obviously the quality is not up today's standards but it is a "Classic Moment in Metal."

Unfortunately this YouTube channel have made sharing through
other websites restricted, but you can watch it on YouTube here!


SETLIST
00:01 Ready For Action
02:57 Caught You Red Handed
05:36 Locomotive Breath (Jethro Tull Cover)
09:30 Thief of Hearts
13:35 Destiny
18:57 Ready For War
24:00 We Shall Overcome
28:26 Mystery of Illusion
32:56 Welcome To Damnation
37:25 Les Sharp Drum Solo
40:30 Lady Your Mine
44:00 The Black Knight
46:39 When The Battle's Over
51:00 Hellbound
54:45 The More You Get
57:30 Bloodlust
1:02:01 Radar Love (Golden Earring Cover)

Official site: http://www.LeviathanRecords.com
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/Leviathan-Records-566645503778515