Cherry Red [Release date 27.01.23]

Carrying the NWOBHM torch in Scotland since 1977, Edinburgh’s Holocaust are the genre’s archetypal survivors.

They are almost literally the definition of “Metal bands who’ve flown under the radar their whole career”.

Arguably, it was the championing of the band by Metallica that allowed for their rise to relative fame, and gained them a stubborn, hard won foothold. Thanks to only surviving founder member, John Mortimer, the band are still releasing quality material…the Elder Gods album (2019) being the most recent of a so far 12 album career.

This 6 CD boxset is named for the band’s debut single in 1980, ‘Heavy Metal Mania’. It was followed by another wonderfully titled, headbanging single later that year, ‘Smokin Valves’.

These two gritty, powerful pieces of NWOBHM formed the core of the band’s debut album, The Nightcomers (CD1).

In an interesting departure from your normal boxset approach, this set compresses all of the band’s output during 1980 and the four years that followed. This includes a live recording of their famous 1981 gig at Edinburgh’s Nite Club, titled Hot Curry And Wine (CD2).

An ambitious 80 minute “video version” of the gig went up for sale soon after.

You’d be lucky to get your hands on the resulting “soundtrack” version for less than £50 nowadays. It’s here in all its estimable glory (CD4).

Done live, the band’s music, raw, raucous and heavy as a heavy thing, radiates its own heat … you can taste the sweat as it drips from the venue’s ceiling.

The dark notes and industrial clamour of standouts ‘Bridge of Impressions’ and ‘Out My Book’ are as good an approximation of the band’s career making music as you can get. But it’s ‘The Small Hours’ that is considered the classic track, famously covered by Metallica. It makes it’s debut on this recording.

CD6, Heavy Metal Mania, adds b-sides and singles to the original 3 track EP (from 1980)… an unquestionably powerful beginning. Those 3 riff heavy tracks, ‘Heavy Metal Mania’, ‘Loves’s Power’ and ‘Only As Young As You Feel’ formed the template which shaped the band’s music for the next 30 years.

In a bizarre move (though one in the spirit of including every recording from that period), CD3 features the album Steal The Stars (1983), from the band Hologram, formed by ex Holocaust member, Ed Dudley.

CD5 : After a short hiatus, Mortimer reformed the band and recorded some newly written material, titling the resulting album No Man’s Land (1984).

At worst, it’s a perfunctory, half hearted run through familiar Holocaust tropes.

At best it’s confirmation that it was time for a break.

Still, 5 CDs out of 6 ain’t bad. CDs 1, 2 and 4 are worth the admission price themselves.

Long may they run. ****

Review by Brian McGowan

Featured Artist: JOSH TAERK

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Power Plays w/c 1 December 2025

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