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These are my favorite Heresy releases. The Never Healed flexi, and split lp w/ Concrete Sox. Heresy are well known as being part of the britcore explosion that happened in the mid 80’s with bands like Napalm Death, Ripcord… extremely fast bands that were as influenced by USHC as they were by British bands.

Heresy started off ripping things up pretty raw around ‘85 (I think), they had a lot in common with the sound of early SSD, Minor Threat, even the first Youth Of Today record, but rawer recordings, and an unmistakably British sounding vocalist. There’s also something like an early Cryptic Slaughter vibe going on which I guess accounts for how much speed and blasting the songs have and the touch of metal as well. ‘86 saw their first vinyl release, the Never Healed flexi. The sound on this one is a total mess and I love it. Hi-hats and snare are clipping into the red right from the get-go, the guitars sound a bit clean, but have a little bit of echo added and together with the distorted drums give things a big sound, which is emphasized even more by the vocals being a bit buried in the mix. Deathbiter has awesome frantic energy with tons of start/stop cymbal chokes and guitar noise that leads up to a good metallic skank part. At this point the band were a three-piece with their guitar player providing vocals and I have to say, I think they never sounded better than on this record.

In ‘87 their first hard vinyl release came in the form of a split 12″ w/ fellow thrashers Concrete Sox. While they still are ripping pretty hard on this one, the more professional recording is something of a detriment to their sound. The drums have a muscular gated-reverb type sound, the guitars and bass are clear, and the vocals are much more audible, which all goes to make the band sound a bit more ordinary. Also at this point they became a four-piece, adding a stand-alone vocalist into the mix. While he does hold it down pretty well on this recording, I feel this move did contribute to the band’s diminishing returns in the future. This is also the last time they had their original guitarist and I think that ultimately had something to do with it as well. Nonetheless, this is still pretty good straight ahead thrashing hardcore. There’s more in common with the likes of Cryptic Slaughter and DRI at this point, and less straight up hardcore,  but things still move along pretty well, though at nearly 5 minutes, the song Nausea could have used some trimming. BTW I always have liked the colorful sleeve on this record, not exactly sure why, I just think it looks pretty cool.

Following the split lp Heresy did a couple full albums and some E.P.s and comp appearances too, but I honestly just don’t think that stuff has the same power as these earlier recordings. Some of these guys are playing in Geriatric Unit now, a current band based in the UK, which deserves a tip of the hat for sure.