Four demos between 1986 and 1990, recorded by four different lineups in three studios, two of them engineered by Vinnie Paul and one of them paid for with a boat. No album until 2025.
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Sixteen remastered tracks spanning all four original demos, released by vicRecords in the Netherlands — the first proper record in forty years.
Listen → · Red vinyl → · Splatter vinyl → · Matching tee →
All four tapes in order, remastered by Allen Crider and released on the band’s own F**k It Records. Hand-numbered and signed, capped at 100; 300 pressed in total, all of them gone.
Who played on what, where it was cut, and what happened to it. Taken from the band’s own credit sheets.
Pantego Sound Studio, spring 1986 · engineered by Jerry Abbott, credited on the tape as “The Elder”
Walter Trachsler — guitar & bass · John Perez — lead guitar · Dave Gryder — drums · Jim “Moe” Mulqueen — vocals
The one that got out. Mailed to fanzines on four continents and, by the band’s own account, never badly reviewed at home. Mulqueen’s vocal on it has been compared directly to Exodus’s Paul Baloff.
Pantego Sound Studio, summer 1987 · engineered by Vinnie Paul
Walter Trachsler — guitars & vocals · Steve Murphy — bass · Louie Carrisalez — drums
Cut by a three-piece that had been playing together roughly a month, after the founding lineup came apart that spring. Trachsler sings from here on.
Pantego Sound Studio, 1988 · engineered by Vinnie Paul · paid for with a boat
Walter Trachsler — guitars & vocals · Randy “Gribb” Cook — drums and bass · Luke Brewer — leads
About four hours in the room, never mixed, never intended for release. The band cut several other songs the same day — including AC/DC’s “Walk All Over You” — but only these two survived in usable shape, with fresh leads added later by Luke Brewer. The boat sank on a local lake.
Elephant Track Studios, San Antonio — January 13th–14th, 1990 · engineered by Eugene Ng
Walter Trachsler — guitars & vocals · Steve Murphy — bass · Dave Gryder — drums and howls · Scott Shelby (Gammacide) — guitar leads
The longest the band ever spent in a studio and the one several members rate highest. Devastation’s Rodney Dunsmore planned to press 500 copies on vinyl; it never happened, and nobody involved can now remember why. Shelby played the leads without ever attending a practice or a show.
Recorded in about two weeks north of San Francisco in 1984, held back by a nervous label until 1985, and still the record people mean when they say Bay Area thrash.
A birthday-party gig, a hurricane, a Fort Worth club, two months at Pantego Sound and roughly 300 nights on the road: the making of Pantera’s major-label debut.
A Gulf Coast band that cut its own debut, signed to Combat, made one of the heaviest records of 1991 at Morrisound, and called off its European tour before it began.
