N.M.E's album "Unholy Death" finally re-released on Picture LP format (unofficially). Throw your CD away because this contains the original recording released only on LP. Imported from the United Kingdom. At the time of its release, this album represented the ultimate in raw, truly EVIL black Metal. The type of music that would send posers running and screaming back into the closet to listen to those Sheena Easton and Duran Duran albums (or slap on a Judas Priest record so they could at least PRETEND to be heavy.) But I can think of no other band at this time that was as truly malevolent and evil sounding as these guys were. A lot of people have compared this to Venom, and certainly those comparisons are valid. Both bands share a similar songwriting style and image. NME weren’t really a speed or thrash band in the sense that, say, Bathory, Slayer and Possessed were. Rather, much like Venom and Hellhammer, they relied on a series of mid-paced, malevolent grinding riffs and allowed the overall heaviness, atmosphere and distortion to carry the sound. However, the guitar sounds on here are far darker and more corrosive and sinister than Venom ever were; its actually somewhat indescribable: eerie and heavy at the same time. The playing is none too complex, but there is more going on than just the simple riffs. The guitar has way more reverb and distortion on it than Venom or Hellhammer, and the guitarist deliberately channels the feedback to accentuate the playing. The overall effect is one of simplicity and power, getting the most power out of each single note, mimimalism at its best. And the production values are none too pretty either but that’s the point, you just don’t want them to be. The raw minimalist production actually suits this music perfectly; everything cranked up to ten. The whole thing is paradoxically beautiful in its very rawness and ugliness. Mentioning individual tracks on here is pointless because to be honest, I would recommend just about every single one of them. This album represents what "True Black Metal" was before it came to be irrevocably changed by the Scandanavian bands of the early 90s; before Black Metal became about tremolo-picked riffs, hypnotic drumming, cackly-shrieky vocals, and quasi-melodic chord progressions based on major/minor third intervals. Before all of that, THIS was the formula- what people would nowadays toss terms like “True” or “Cult” at, except those terms didn’t even exist back then. And with the possible exception of Hellhammer and a tiny handful of obscure bands, almost nobody captured that sonic malevolence better than these guys did on this record.