(Rated this album with 10 out of 10) Reviewed by
godzillafan36
from Earth
This along with my Live Metallica box may be the best purchase I ever made as far as CDs are concerned. This box set is IE's demo, teir first three albums remixed and remastered, and an album of cover songs called Tribute to the Gods. The demo tape has really bad sound quality and the songs are played ridiculously slow, so this is more for collector's same than anything else. But the studio albums sound SO MUCH BETTER. Iced Earth had audible drums and guitars that crunch, but there's still no way to improve on Gene Adams. Blecch. Anyway, Night of the Stormrider, while it may not be their best album, still benefits greatly from the recent technologies. Sounds better, overall better quality. And, as seems to be popular opinion, Burnt Offerings sounds the best out of all of them. The vocals sound really really awesome, Matt Barlow kicks most vocalists off of their high horse and into the depths of Hell. Jon Schaffer's riffs are just as fast as they ever were or have been since, some beautiful drumming and good lead guitar work. A Tribute to the Gods is absolutely spectacular EXCEPT for their Black Sabbath cover. I dunno what Jon was thinking, but man the rhythm section he added into the outro is bad and out of sync. Oh well. Other than that, the whole CD is great. AC/DC's songs are morphed into heavy metal classics, and Iced Earth does a better job playing AC/DC songs than AC/DC! There is no way to miss in purchasing this boxed set, believe me. I have been an Iced Earth fan for only about 6-7 months now, but I own almost ALL of their releases and not a one of them is bad. Buy this if you love heavy metal in the form of Maiden, Slayer, and old Metallica. Iced Earth has risen, nature will fall.
