SEE'S THE LIGHT OF DAY

Here's an odd one - a collection of stray tracks from Black Widow, spanning from 1969 to 1971. The collection leads off with the original demos - female vocals intact - for the Sacrifice album, previously released separately as Return To the Sabbat, and this is probably the best part of the package. Then there's a clutch of stray studio tracks which are OK but nothng to write home about, and then a live set from 1971 rounds out the package.

It's the live set which drags the rating down here - because the sound quality is absolutely horrid. It seems very likely it was taken from an audience tape rather than a more official source, and the mix is just terrible; I swear there's points that the vocals are quieter than the chatter from the audience!

I suppose if you really wanted to hear Return To the Sabbat and had no other option, the rest of this collection could be taken as bonus tracks and duly ignored. Otherwise, this compilaton has been rendered redundant by the expansive Sabbat Days boxed set, which includes Return To the Sabbat on its own disk with the cover art restored and delegates the rest of this stuff to bonus tracks here and there.

As is so often the case with bonus tracks, I suspect many listeners will skip over them entirely; they won't be missing a whole lot. Other than the Sacrifice demo, this is scraping the bottom of the barrel. There's some acts I'll go so far as to listen to any cutting room floor leftovers they happen to have lying around, but Black Widow ain't one of them.