Archives & Artifacts

I love Death Angel. Always have. That's what makes their boxset "Archives & Artifacts" a dissapointment. First, the positives. "Ultraviolence" and "Frolic" have been remastered, which basically means you don't have to turn up the volume as high compared to the original pressings. The DVD is interesting, with some unreleased interviews, and live performances. Well, that's it for the positive attributes. The biggest negative about this boxset isn't the shoddy packaging or the lack of lyrics- it's disc 3, the "B-sides & Rarities". This is unreleased music from their basement from 82-89. Horrible, just horrible stuff. Most of it is mid-tempo sludge and not much thrash other than a few songs. D.A. were very wise to have never released this stuff on any of their albums proper. Now I know why these songs ended up in a box in the basement. "The Morrows Memoirs" is passable, as is "Frolic through the Park" (the song) which suffers from poor production. None of the other unreleased songs on disc 2 (Frolic) are very memorable, and the "Kill as One" demo at the end of Disc 1(Ultraviolence) is disapointing as well. Points must be taken away for the cheap, flimsy, cardboard slipcase it comes in. I would have liked to see some cool raparound artwork on the slipcase, instead of the generic black and grey "design" it displays. If you don't have The Ultra- Violence or Frolic through the Park, you MIGHT want to spring the 45 dollars this costs. Even if you are a HUGE Death Angel fanatic,I'm not sure you can justify purchasing this, exspecially if you already have the albums. I ,for one, can not recommened this. except for die-hards only.
(The 65 rating is for the boxset as a whole.The rating for the unreleased stuff is about a 25!)