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Reading through some of the reviews on the site, I came across the following lines in the Danger Zone review...

'Imagine being this average, ignorant Metalhead who can't for 1 second understand why anyone would spend any time or money looking for rare and obscure old metal vinyls, when it's so much easier to listen to your old JUDAS PRIEST or IRON MAIDEN-platters for the umpfteenthousand time. Imagine being invited into my home, where we grab a few beers in front of the stereo and you say something silly like "so why ya doin' it DaN, collecting all this crap?". Now I need to prove to you with just 1 album that digging up this stuff is actually worthwhile and the obscene pricetags sometimes (sometimes) justified...To make a point we need a classic, topnotch PURE METAL gem of outstanding quality and scarcity, catchy and accessible enough for the most narrow-minded, grumpiest Metal-fan.'

What would you pick as THE obscure metal masterpiece?

Good but tricky question. Problem is defining the term "obscurity". In the old pre-internet days Heathens Rage and Slauter Xstroyes would be considered as metal obscurities. Nowadays, everyone who's slightly into the 80s sound knows and has heard both bands, one way or another. In addition, lots of practically unobtainable in the 80s and 90s rare metal albums have been rereleased or reissued, being no longer the holy grails that only a few people had the chance to listen to. By today's standards real obscurities for me are for example Far East and Metal Merchant. I have to think of it a bit...

I'll second you ION BRITTON. But on the other hand I think in these internetz/google generation days we still have OBSCURE bands.Bands like HOLOCAUST - Slay That Dragon or BATTLECHRYST - God's Warriors can be named as REAL Obscurities or some USA bands with 7" records. I mean if there's still NO MP3s freely available on Blogs/Youtube it's still OBSCURE Band/Record.

There will always be obscure bands than almost no one has ever heard of. That doesn't mean they'd be my pick for the title "obscure metal masterpiece", since frankly, many of the more obscure bands suck.

I'd pick Leather Nunn - Take The Night for sure.

Khnud wrote:many of the more obscure bands suck. .

Yeah !

EXODO - The New Babylon

Sure, everybody here knows this record. But for the average metalhead (Dan is talking about in his Danger Zone Review) this should be good, obscure and convincing enough.

A perfect record, if you ask me....

Agree with some of the above assessments of what constitutes genuine obscurity, still I'd pick EMERALD - Armed For Battle as a record to play

Opinions opinions, but the Leather Nun record never struck me as so amazing, too straightforward and samey

Prodigy - As Darkness Reigns untouchable USPM. It REIGNS over everything!

What if we just stick to vinyl?

daniel wrote:Opinions opinions, but the Leather Nun record never struck me as so amazing, too straightforward and samey

Yeah, that's why I picked it. If I were to play Spectral Incursion to someone who normally listens to Priest and Maiden, I'd probably just confirm his or her idea that chasing obscure albums is a waste of time. They'd never "get it".

Well, the DANGER ZONE record is up there, but I would also have to add the WILD PUSSY ep. Great riffs, strong vocal performance

I'd like to throw in EMERALD "Downtown".
Dunno if the vocals would make Priest-Maiden-Manowar-only listeners run...?

Yeah, there are different levels of obscurity. Today's average metal fan has never heard a lot of 80s/90s bands. For example, at a record show a year or two ago this guy really into power metal asked what Warlord sounded like. To him, 'Deliver Us' was obscure.

Then there's the average 80s metal crowd. They know the Warlords and Omens of the world just fine, but the stuff that was on private labels eludes most of them. They may have heard names like Slauter Xstroyes and Leather Nunn, but they may not have heard anything by them, and they've certainly never heard of stuff like Metal Merchant.
I call this the 'Lapland Metal crowd' because it reflects the crowd that used to post on that site. To them, SA Slayer is obscure.

Then there's 'the Corro Crowd'. Folks hereon know al the private label obscurities, demo-only releases, foreign releases, etc. Sure, there's stuff that even these folks haven't heard (Far East and Metal Merchant are the two most discussed ones around here), but this crowd still knows all about them. To these folks, it's hard to define obscure b/c they're digging up every scrap of info on every insignificant act they can. Private releases with small print runs and demos not on mp3 or reissues might qualify. To them, Critical Mass, Metal Merchant, White Lion, and Far East are obscure.

So what does the Corro Crowd play for the Lapland Crowd to try and get them to dig past Metal Blade and Roadrunner cut-outs? Those nominated above are good ideas (though personally I agree w/ daniel that Leather Nunn never won me over), especially Wild Pussy. I'd add a couple of other possibilities:
Hammer Witch- this is quality material in the classic METAL CHURCH vein, sure to catch the attention of the target audience.

Solar Eagle- This one seems to blow away a lot of folks when they first hear it, especially those who dig stuff like Agent Steel.

Salems Wych- This one also seems to appeal to a huge portion of folks who hear it. Yes, they're 'common' by Corro standards, but they aren't widely heard among the target audience.

Not to be a wet blanket, but in my experience it's pretty tough to get 'the lapland crowd' to listen to stuff that 'the corro crowd' is into. I used to maintain a sticky thread on LL that I'd update regularly with really cool but obscure tracks for folks to check out; if a song got even three comments it was a huge turnout. That crowd is pretty content playing 'The Spectre Within' and 'Rage for Order'; many of them have no real interest in digging deeper (which is fine of course, that means less competition for those of us still digging for the rare gems like Far East, 'City in Flames', and Odyssey).

Your last statement definitely describes my experience. For my "one" I would pick Black Knight - Master Of Disaster. I actually have turned some of the laplanders (not specifically from that site, but people like that) on to Black Knight. My next pick would have been Sacred Rite - Is Nothing Sacred, but I'm not sure if that is obscure enough for this purpose.

If I had to choose strictly non-reissued or shared rarities I would definately choose:

FULL TILT ''same'' MLP 1990 USA (Gondwanala)

PARAGON ''same'' MLP 1984 USA (Paragon)

PARAGON is a mixture of hard rock/ metal so I would pick FULL TILT as straight forward metal record that is better than FAR EAST, METAL MERCHANT, CRITICAL MASS and other obscurities.