Labels: Level Plane
Review by: Zack Nelson
After all the Neil Perry records that came out it’s quite a suprise everything they did clocks in under an hour. But that’s the case on this double album. It kicks off with 4 new previously unreleased tracks. This is quite the shocker. The first track will have you wondering if this is really Neil Perry. There’s just as much melody as chaos, just as much singing as screaming, actually has a song structure, and clocks in at over 3 minutes and a half. And it doesn’t even have a song title that would make you chuckle. Not neccesarily bad, but a huge change from the sloppy, chaotic and emotional grind they used to play that you can hear later. I might even go as far to say it sounds like Thursday. A decent song nonethless. After that you get one instrumental and two more tracks in the vein of the first one. Up next though is their side of the A Day’s Refrain split, and now you can see that they actually were heading a new direction before breaking up. The songs here straddle the line between melody and chaos, much like ADR did. An interesting turn, but one you may not neccesarily like if you liked their old stuff.
Up next though is the old school Neil Perry sound. From the split LP with Joshua Fit For Battle, picture disc on Witching Hour, split 7″ with Kaospilot, split 7″ with Usurp Synapse, split LP with A Satellite Crash, and original 7″. Even here though, you can hear how their sound did develop as it slowly regresses and becomes more and more messy as the CD progresses. Whatever the case it’s far better picking this up than hunting down all those records.
And then the second disc. This is a CD-ROM which lets you view over a half hour some Neil Perry live and tour footage. While quite enjoyable, it is a little dissapointing in the brevity of each clip, I would hope for at least an entire set. But it is worth it for some added value.
Like the new stuff, like the old stuff, there’s something for everyone here. This is one release no Neil Perry fan should go without.