Man, in no version of reality am I going to say no to a 2003 recording of Trouble live, featuring Eric Wagner on vocals, blasting through a bunch of their greatest songs ever, and now Hammerheart has given me just that. 

This 75-minute set opens with “R.I.P.”, a fantastic way to get things going, then blasts right into rifftastic glory with “Come Touch The Sky”. And just when you think it can't get any better, they drop “End Of My Daze” for an opening trilogy for the doom/rock gods. And on and on it goes, classic doom cut after classic doom cut, “Fear”, “Memory's Garden”, “Psalm 9”, “Run To The Light” (with a killer Sab nod), the older, doomier material getting along quite well with the Def American-era rockier doom material (which is where I've always hung my hat), Wagner's voice sounding in fine form, the production levels all where they should be, everything about this more or less what I could want from a live Trouble record. 

I mean, the reality is I'll reach for the studio platters over this 9 times out of 10, but on that rare occasion when I want things a bit more raw and real, when I don't want to know what's coming next, when I want to have a couple cold ones mixed in and listen to Trouble for 75 minutes, I'm going to go back to this record. At their best, they were untouchable, so it's great to have monuments to the mighty Trouble like this out there in circulation.