Under the Spell: 30th Anniversary Box

Wow, this package is absolutely amazing. We are talking ~40 songs plus a Bonus DVD of tons of live stuff. The founding member / guitarist Dan Watson wrote a booklet of the Hexx history - this booklet could pretty much be a complete book there is so much here. He must have been taking tons of notes or has a photographic memory of the 80's/90's and what they were doing and how they did it.Anyways, I only had the Hexx No Escape album on vinyl back in the 80's and it wasn't really that memorable of an album for me - I know this because it is one of the many LP's I threw away while moving between apartments. No Escape was just average Heavy Metal to me, nothing really unique for my taste.Now 30 years later and I was intrigued enough to purchase this Anniversary Box Set for nostalgia purposes and also considering the tons of material it has. The demo songs are well recorded and sound great. Even the live stuff sounds great. I am glad I made this purchase. After listening to these CD's and the No Escape songs I decided I probably should not have thrown that LP away years ago. Compared to music today I will gladly crank up Hexx and the songs on this box set and rock the block. If you are a fan of 80's Traditional Heavy Metal you have to check this box set out. I appreciate Hexx and the job they did with this box set.Highly recommended, tons of material here to relive the 80's Metal scene with.

Awesome album! For those who like old-school metal,check this out then........

As far as content, this is a nice collection of stuff from the band. I think it's a must have for any die-hard Hexx fan. For others (like me) who may be a fan but not exactly to the die-hard level, I still think it's a worthy item at least. I happen to like the 1st two albums the most though anyway. The included booklet does include information and photos of the band's career more in total though, and not just focusing the earlier material. I have high praise for Under the Spell and still like it today nearly as much as I did as a teenager when it came out in the 80s. I liked it even better than No Escape. However, I remember buying Morbid Reality later down the line and not being impressed much. I see in the booklet that they have a couple in between I might try to check out though.Okay, and now for my take on quality. The booklet is great. It's also neat to have early demo material. Being demos, the quality is what you might expect. What I was hoping for though, was better audio for No Escape and Under the Spell. Those were studio albums. Granted, studios didn't have the sophistication that is available now days, but the masters from back then obviously should be superior to the records that were pressed at the time. How much superior would depend on the gear the studio was equipped with, the skill of the audio engineer etc. So yeah, the hope was to get CDs now which are better able to capture more audio fidelity than was originally out on LPs. But, that's not what happened in my opinion. I would say these albums sound about on par with the original LPs. I wonder what was used as source material for these re-releases? Anyway, there is still something to be said for having a recording which is at least no worse, but being on a format which will retain its fidelity indefinitely (unlike records and tapes which wear out with use).

Awesome!

Super Aufmachung, Booklet mit allen Details der Band und Texten. 3 Stunden super Sound + 4 Stunden DVD von Livekonzertausschnitten. Hier wird für wenig Geld sehr viel geboten. Die Musik ist sehr guter Speed/Thrash Metal der 80er. Wer leicht technisch angehauchten Thrash mag ist hier genau richtig

Boxset completissimo dedicato a una band spesso bistrattata o dimenticata. Gli Hexx, seppur non conosciutissimi, hann scritto delle pagine importanti dello speed metal e questa raccolta consente di entrare in contatto con tutto il loro materiale "che conta". Acquisto immancabile.

素晴らしいの出来です。曲展開が良くギターも程よくテクニカルです。私は評価の高いUNDER THE SPELLを期待して購入しましたがNO ESCAPEの方がツボでした。アルバム二枚にボートラ、映像まで付いてこの値段。80年代正統派メタル好きな方は買いです。

One of the finest metal reissue packages ever!Included here are both Hexx albums from 1985/86, tons of bonus tracks, a dvd clocking at an incredible 250 minutes, and a big fat booklet. I can hardly believe I'm holding this, 31 years after buying Hexx' debut album No Escape. Since then we've had to live with reissues on dubious labels or terrible sounding downloads. No longer, thanks to Metal Blade we now have great sounding remasters of these underground classics!Disc 1 features the fantastic Under The Spell album; one of the finest power metal albums ever, right up there with Vicious Rumors' Soldiers of the Night and Chastain's Mystery of Illusion. The songs are excellent, raw but well-constructed, fast but certainly not speed or thrash. Singer Dan Bryant deserves special mention, with his powerful, scratching vocals that sit somewhere between Dio, David Wayne (Metal Church) and Tim Baker (Cirith Ungol). Unfortunately Bryant left for bigger things (he thought) because this Hexx line-up really killed. Bonus tracks are a live track from '86, a 9 track demo from '85 and 2 surprisingly strong new songs from the short-lived 2014 reunion with Bryant.Disc 2 consists of the great debut album No Escape. It's not as powerful as 'Spell' and singer Manzo's 'wailing' may not be to everyone's taste, but the song material is excellent throughout and the sound is dark, moody, eerie, and - thanks to Manzo - certainly unique. Bonuses here are the original 3 track demo from when the band were still called Paradox, a 2013 demo with Manzo (again, a short-lived reunion, and again featuring surprisingly strong new songs), and 4 live tracks with new singer Eddy Vega, who has no trouble with the challenging material.The dvd is fine if you regard it as an extra. Most welcome would be the 1986 footage with Bryant but as usual such ancient video recordings of obscure metal acts are almost murky and pretty much un-watchable. Later footage shows Hexx succumb to the pressures of the era and evolving into a mediocre thrash metal band. Best quality footage comes from the 2014 and 2015 reunion gigs with Manzo and Bryant. The first isn't very good, with guitarist and main Hexx man Dan Watson messing up his solo's, but the second gig is excellent - suddenly Watson can play again. But as said, the dvd is only a bonus; the main treasures here are the two original albums, as they are fine slabs of power metal that belong in every 80's metal collection.Finally, the booklet (or BOOK!) is stunning, featuring tons of crisp archive pics (including one from Kirk Hammett's bachelor party), the complete history of Hexx and countless entertaining anecdotes. From knowing virtually nothing of this Bay Area band, we suddenly know everything. Major labels could learn something from this reissue box. It's clearly a labour of love and - at this price - incredible value. I don't think I've ever been happier with a reissue. So if you're an 80's metalhead, do not hesitate any longer!