Revelation
After six albums and twelve years of existence, any band is certain to
have a few songs which are just sort of sitting around in
the realm of the unreleased tracks. In 1995, Megadeth decided that it
was time to unearth these recordings and throw them all onto one album.
Even though Megadeth has a surprisingly low number of tracks which
could be put onto such an album ( if a song isn't going to be done, they
usually realize it before recording it seriously ) there were enough to
make this decision a good one to everyone except for collectors such as
myself who already had all the tracks and wanted to keep them rare.
The first track is from the pre-Rust In
Peace days when Megadeth was just three people ( Dave, Jr., and Nick ).
For the soundtrack to the film "Shocker," directed by Wes Craven ( the
Nightmare on Elmstreet guy ), the three of them recorded the Alice Cooper
song "No More Mr. Nice Guy," which was a big
hit so a single was released for it along with other songs from the
soundtrack; Demon Bell, preformed by Dangerous Toys, and Different Breed,
preformed by Dead On, neither of which is very good. The second track is
Breakpoint, from the soundtrack of the Super Mario Bros movie ( 1993 ).
This one was recorded in in the studio along with the rest of
Countdown To Extinction, but was not put onto the
album since it does not seem to fit with the rest of the songs. When the
movie was in production and Megadeth was approached by Hollywood Pictures
for that type of song, they conveniently already had one completely done.
Even though the third track came out before Breakpoint, it somehow managed
to take the 3rd position on the album. This one was
written in 1991 for an Orion movie which was origonally entitled "Bill and
Ted Go To Hell" but was then changed to "Bill and Ted's Bogus Journey." But
when told to write a song for Bill and Ted going to Hell, they went strait
to the point and wrote Go To Hell. This song is, in my mind, the hi-light
of the Hidden Treasures album. A video was made for the song as well, but
MTV most likely banned it for one reason or another. Both Breakpoint and
Go To Hell also appear on the Japanese release of Countdown To Extinction.
Angry Again is next; it was released in 1993 on the Columbia Pictures film
"Last Action Hero," with Arnold Schwarzenegger starring in it. The film
didn't do very well, but don't blame it on 'deth. An extremely edited
version of the song is all that appears, and is used as the intro to the
movie of Arnold's character. If you haven't seen the movie, this might not
make sense to you so just trust me, as Arnold would say. A promo for
the song was released as well, with fairly cheesy cover artwork as you can see
above. 
Track number 5 is from everybody's favorite freaks at MTV, Beavis and Butthead.
In 1993, MTV released a compilation, all of unreleased tracks, and called it
"The Beavis and Butthead Experience." And I must admit, it is a pretty good
experience. The track by Megadeth, "99 Ways To Die," is of course the
hi-light, but the rest isn't half bad. The song inspired a video and a promo,
and was nominated for a Grammy award or something like that, although they did
not win. When Columbia was looking for bands to preform on the compilation of
Black Sabbath songs they wanted to put together, Megadeth volunteered their
services and covered Paraniod in 1994. The 12-track long disc, Nativity In
Black: A Tribute To Black Sabbath, is quite excellent and should definately be
bought. Paraniod was nominated for a Grammy award as well, but it lost too.
It appears as track 6 on Hidden Treasures. 
Also in 1994, the first Tales From The Crypt
movie, Demon Knight, was released, and appropriately, Megadeth had the honor
of appearing on another soundtrack. The song which came out of this, Diadems,
apparently appears slightly differently on the soundtrack than the way it does
on Hidden Treasures; I personally think that they were mixed differently but
others say that the one on the soundtrack is a demo. Finally, in order to make
the whole EP worth it for collectors like me to buy, a completely unreleased song
was put on as the eighth and final track. Problems has an interesting story
behind it, which you can read in the So Far, So Good... So
What! section. It wasn't recorded until 1995 when the EP was released.
The European release date for the album was March 14th, while
we in America had to wait until July 17th to buy it
domestically; of course I'd already had it for about three months at about three
times the price. The English release came in a 2-CD set with Youthanasia and a
special card redeemable for an aftershow pass at any of the shows in England. The
Japanese version cames with the three demos from Countdown To Extinction and A Tout Le Monde for no particular reason.
Previous Album
Next Album
beadil@trend1.com jsimmons@compassnet.com
