Disc 1- Tracks 1, 4, and 14 from "Transylvanian Hunger", Tracks 5 and 11 from "A blaze in the northern sky", tracks 6 and 10 from "Soulside journey", tracks 9 and 13 from "Under a Funeral Moon" track 2 from "A New Dimension" demo 1988, Track 3 from "Thulcandra" demo 1989, Tracks 7 and 8 recorded live in Oslo 1989, track 15 from "Cromlech" demo 1989
Review- Good selection of songs off of their LP releases, along with some nice demo and live songs (Snowfall, 9:04 instrumental, is the highlight of the disc IMO) The live and demo songs have decent production, nothing painful to the ears.
Disc 2-Tracks 1 and 2 from "Thulcandra" demo 1989, tracks 3-5 from "Cromlech" demo 1989, Track 6 from "Goatlord" session 1990, tracks 7-10 from "A Blaze in the Northern Sky" rehearsal 1991, tracks 11-13 from "Under a Funeral Moon" rehearsal 1992.
more demos, along with rehearsal tracks, The rehearsal tracks for "A blaze in the northen sky" are instrumental, and the "Under a Funeral Moon" rehearsals have vocals, but the production isn't that well on them, the drums sound...different, and loud next to the guitar. When listening to Under a Funeral Moon, be sure to turn down the volume at around 1:26, I dunno who done what but there is a deafening ringing that happens for around 6 or 7 seconds, then goes away.
Disc 3-Live performances from Oslo and Finland, plus interviews and picture gallery.
I haven't watched all of the live footage, some of it is good, some of it is...ehh. The interviews, correct me if i'm wrong, were released in parts on the digipak re-releases of the darkthrone albums, and the gallery has a couple of nice photos.
I wouldn't prefer this to any newcomer to Darkthrone, instead get the older albums (Under a Funeral Moon, Blaze in the Northern Sky, etc.) but to fans this is a really nice set, even the booklet has some nice info in it.
I am sure everyone will agree that Darkthrone's finest compositions are included here. However, the most annoying thing is production. While we can get used to listening to a badly produced CD to feel more evil (HA!),getting used to songs from 4 differently produced albums really reduces the entertainment value. In fact, it becomes outright annoying to keep adjusting your stereo to different production levels. This is what reduces the rating from 5 stars (for songs) to 3 stars (for extremely annoying production).
I would give this a miss and just go for all of darkthrone's albums instead and listen to them individually.
I bought this album out of curiousity for some of the earlier work. I've gave it a listen a couple times and its just alright nothing more nothing less. I probably shouldn't have bought this along with Immortals Sons of Northern Darkness because that stayed in my cd player much longer and is much better than Preparing for for. If you want a good Darkthrone just get Transilvanian Hunger and be happy.
