Trend That Must Stop: Bands Re-recording Their Own Music

Recently, the Swedish melodic death metal band Arch Enemy announced that it would be re-recording some of the band's favorite songs from the time when Johan Liiva was the vocalist. Currently, the band is noteworthy for featuring Angela Gossow as their vocalist, noteworthy because Gossow is able to perform the death growls and screaming that characterize death metal. They want to essentially change their history to reflect their current lineup and I have a major problem with it. I have not heard much of the material with Liiva, but changing your past irritates me to no end. Just stand by your old material.

Other bands have also re-recorded their old music, sometimes whole albums. Exodus decided to re-record Bonded by Blood, a major landmark in the thrash metal scene, and sometimes viewed as one of the greatest thrash albums of all time. They did this for the same reason Arch Enemy did, they have a new singer. The problem is that Rob Dukes is not really a thrash vocalist, he is more of a hardcore singer. Asking him to recreate the thrash yelps that former singer Paul Baloff (R.I.P.) perfected is a difficult task. Not to mention that it is disrespectful to the deceased Baloff.

Sodom re-recorded their In the Sign of Evil EP. That EP was one of their earlist recordings and it was sloppy and raw sounding. But that was the appeal of the thing. It was an ugly sounding album that helped launch death and black metal. Why clean it up? It's a classic for a reason.

Finally, Testament and Destruction also re-recorded songs for compilation albums. This doesn't bother me quite as much because those lineups were basically intact and the albums were released as Greatest Hits-type collections (the other three mentioned above were or are being released as new full lengths). This is an interesting way of providing the big songs in a new package.

The whole re-recording thing is a cash grab first and foremost. It is a lazy of trying to sell a few more albums. I would much rather see these bands concentrate their energy on creating new material than in resurrecting their past in a new form.