Those killer Realm re-issues that came in to the shop aren't the only prog-thrash obscurities from Metal Mind that I've been blasting lately. The label has been dusting off all sorts of other cool, but largely forgotten thrash metal albums from the dawn of the 90's, right when the thrash metal scene was reaching critical mass with third-rate knockoffs coming out of the wazoo and the whole thing was beginning to decline. In the midst of all of that, there were some interesting, experimental albums that ended up lost in the shuffle, albums that didn't set the world on fire but which are nevertheless worth investigating for fans of the sort of idiosyncratic thrash metal that I'm such a big fan of.

A perfect example is the third album Beyond Recognition from San Francisco thrashers Defiance, which Metal Mind reissued a few years ago but is still in print from the label. This 1992 full length followed a pair of solid but generic Bay Area thrash records (Void Terra Firma and Product of Society) that I bought back when they first came out; both were enjoyable enough, but not too memorable. With Beyond Recogition, however, Defiance made an attempt to redefine their sound a bit, ending up with an interesting (if inconsistent) prog-thrash album. Where the earlier records were firmly entrenched in the late 80's Bay Area thrash of Exodus and Testament, this saw the band going for a quirkier sound that combined slower, angular riffs with their thrash, unpredictable song arrangements and time signature changes, and some rad offbeat shredding that often evokes a weird jazz fusion feel. The vocals also took on a new cast, with the singer breaking into a dark, soulful croon on a couple of songs that vaguely sounds like Alice In Chains. A few songs on Beyond Recognition also flirt ever so slightly with the then-popular funk/thrash of bands like Mordred, especially the song "Power Trip". There's no mistaking when and where this album came from; it has San Francisco circa 1992 written all over it, but the eccentric songwriting and vaguely proggy riffage teams up with a blazing thrash offensive that I think was a lot more interesting than much of what came out of the faltering thrash scene around that time. Recommended to fans of classic tech/prog thrash. The Metal Mind reissue of Beyond Recognition also includes four demo tracks and three live recordings, and comes in a full color digipack (dig that Ed Repka cover art!) with an eight-page full color booklet in a machine numbered edition of 2000 copies.