Savatage - Sirens LP Blue Vinyl,Private pressing Avatar

	£		160
	$		191

SAVATAGE -Sirens LP,BLUE vinyl private pressing on Par records.

I have been buying ,selling and collecting records for 30 + years so you can trust my gradings / descriptions.Check my feedback and bid with confidence.

I am selling this record for a friend who has a killer rock collection but no pc!

I didnt know much about the band myself but after checking some websites and previous sales,this is the holy grail of American heavy metal collecting and is very rarely listed for sale.Its the first album by Savatage on the ultra limited first pressing in blue vinyl from Par records(catalogue number is PAR 1050).This private pressing,NWOBHM - influenced power metal from florida 1983 is a fantastic album.

The cover is mainly in excellent condition with no ring wear or major flaws apart from wear to the spine and a small piece of tape attached to the lower right. (this could probably be carefully removed without damage) see photo.The vinyl is excellent.

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A breif early history of the band is copied below from their website.

The history of Savatage starts somewhere around 1975 when the two brothers Jon ( 15, leadguitar ) ,and Criss ( 12, bass ) Oliva formed the coverband Black Diamond. The material exists , as the name shows, of Kiss-covers, with some Black Sabbath-songs. It won't take long before they stop this, because in 1976 the Oliva Family moves to <?xml:namespace prefix = st1 ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:smarttags" />Florida. In Palm Harbor, a small town at the Westcoast of Florida, the two start again. A chicken-shed is rebuilt into a practice-room (The Pit) and the new band is called Metropolis. They got to record a single "Let's Get Rowdy", which is being launched by an admirer of the band, Steve Wacholz. Yes, the same person who would take place behind the drum-kit with drumsticks the size of broomsticks! When Jon finishes highschool he quits Metropolis and takes place in a professional coverband. Steve and Criss form an other highschool band.<?xml:namespace prefix = o ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office" />

The threesome meets again in Avatar and in the first instance plays music inspired by Rush. The Avatar-songs "Rock Me" and "Minus Love" are put on a compilation of the local radio-station YMF in 1980, and that music has little to do with Rush anymore. In Keith Collins they find a new bassist in 1982. Jon about the choice:"Keith had his business on the right tracks; he even had his own PA and four-track recorder. We couldn't care less that he was way older than us and actually played guitar!" Not much later, Avatar, including Keith, performs on a free, much frequented festival in the parking lot of a supermarket. A certain Dan Johnson got so impressed by the band that he offered them a contract. The guys in Avatar laughed him in the face, but signed it eventually on Johnson's Par Records. The name Dan Johnson will is pretty well known, from Crimson Glory or Death records for example.

Because another band has the exclusive rights of the name Avatar, another name needs to be chosen before the release of this record.
Jon Oliva:"While the cover of 'Sirens' was already at the printers' we had to come up with something new. We didn't want to change a thing a came up with Savatar. But because that reminded us of some kind of monster in a bad Japanese horror movie, we eventually chose for Savatage. Which is actually a mixture of Avatar and Sabotage"

During a two days-marathon session in the newly opened Morrisound Studios in Tampa they record sixteen songs, of which only nine are being pressed on the "Sirens"-LP. The record is released in October 1983 and only gets good recensions. It's  for the time being, very hard record, on which the band distinguishes itself from it's contemporaries by beautiful and sinister interludes. For the mix Dan Johnson only has one day available. Taking these circumstances into consideration, this debut is certainly a mark of an enormous amount of talent that this band has! The Par-edition of "Sirens" is very difficult to get in Europe (Especially the blue vinyl-edition, only one thousand!) and this contributes to the cult status of this new hard rock phenomenon from Florida. Slowly the big record companies get interested in the new band and in the end they sign with Atlantic in 1984. In Europe "Sirens" is being released some time later by Music for Nations with a different cover. There are two different covers: the rare Par one with a sail ship running over into a woman’s face and the well known 'Killer Children'-cover. All official CD's have the 'Killer Children'-cover.