It’s not the Chris Reifert enhanced Scream Bloody Gore, or the technically proficient (if structurally and aesthetically hollow) Human, but Relapse Records has remastered Leprosy and made it available on YouTube. Whether or not this digital remaster does the album any justice, it’s still a boost in visibility for what’s arguably the strongest era of Death’s career. Leprosy doesn’t bring the structural improvements that would’ve kept “Chuck Schuldiner was a Christian who died of AIDS” from becoming a favorite slogan on the old DLA, but its good production and apparent lack of pretensions towards being high art (compare to Death post-1991) make it difficult to hate. I feel the same way about Spiritual Healing, which is mostly cut from the same cloth and also receives a similar instrumental skill boost from James Murphy.

Tags: 1988, death, death metal, leprosy, reissue, relapse records, remaster