Diamond Head will release Lightning To The Nations (The White Album) on 30 September 2022 via Silver Lining Music. This 2021 remaster, from ¼-inch master tapes that Lars Ulrich helped Brian Tatler retrieve back in 1990, is sure to be known as the ultimate version of the ultimate album.
“In 1990, as a celebration of the tenth anniversary of the NWOBHM,” Brian Tatler said, “Lars Ulrich and Geoff Barton compiled the double album New Wave of British Heavy Metal ’79 Revisited, which came out on Phonogram Records. Lars made it his business to track down the original master tapes wherever possible because all he had were the old, often scratched singles.”
Lars told Brian that he would often call the bands that he wanted to feature on the compilation. “The confused guy on the other end of the phone would assume it was wind-up,” Brian laughed. “‘Who? Lars Ulrich? From Metallica? Fuck off!'”
The original Lightning To The Nations ¼-inch masters had not been seen since Diamond Head’s old manager sent them to a guy called Horgi at Woolfe Records years back. Horgi had not returned the tapes, so Lars dispatched someone from Metallica’s German label to “pay the guy a visit,” and thus, the tapes were duly returned.
The original tapes were first quite literally baked, allowing the degraded tape to be returned to playable quality. Once restored and digitized, Diamond Head frontman Rasmus ‘Ras’ Bom Andersen remastered the tracks, ending up with a pristine edition of the original recordings.
“After Phonogram had finished with them,” Brian says of the ¼-inch master tapes, “Lars made sure they came home to me. I still have them stored safely.”
Recently discovered alternative mixes of the tracks Lightning To The Nations, The Prince, Sucking My Love, Am I Evil? and Sweet And Innocent, never publicly released (or heard) before, are included on this 2021 remastered version.
“We wrote instinctively,” Brian says of those early Diamond Head days. “We had an undeniably unique sound. Four young lads, each with an element that, when combined, produced an alloy that was our own Heavy Metal sound.”
This new package is completed by a set of bonus tracks originally recorded in the ’80s, with a set of deep and detailed notes on both the era and each song by Brian Tatler.
“I don’t really know what inspired Lightning To The Nations”, Brian says in his notes. “I can’t think of any other song by any other band that sounds like it, and that’s a hell of a claim. Sean got the title from a painting he had seen in an art book and thought it would make a good title for a song. Once we had the song and it became track one, side one, it seemed like a good album title too. It’s still in the live set after forty years.”
Lightning To The Nations (The White Album) can be pre-ordered from https://lnk.to/LightningToTheNations21.
Diamond Head 1980:
Sean Harris: Vocals
Brian Tatler: Guitar
Duncan Scott: Drums
Colin Kimberley: Bass
Lightning To The Nations (The White Album)
Lightning to the Nations
The Prince
Sucking My Love
Am I Evil?
Sweet and Innocent
It’s Electric
Helpless
Lightning to the Nations (Lost Original Mix)
The Prince (Lost Original Mix)
Sucking My Love (Lost Original Mix)
Am I Evil? (Lost Original Mix)
Sweet and Innocent (Lost Original Mix)
Bonus Tracks:
Shoot Out the Lights
Streets of Gold
Play It Loud
Waited Too long
Diamond Lights
We Won’t Be Back
I Don’t Got
