The Orchard Accessories - Rarities and B-Sides [VINYL]

An astounding compilation of rarities by The Gathering. Features all tracks from EPs and singles from the band's golden metal days 1995-2000, plus a heap of material entirely unavailable elsewhere. Pressed on three 180 gram LPs and presented in a special die cut slipcase. This 140 plus minutes and 27 songs long triple album is a bit all over the place, mixing works-in-progress demos, the odd cover song or alternative version plus occasional unreleased or live material. Yet, while in terms of years it covers a quite short period (1995-2001), it is one essential release that takes you right at the very core of their creative growth at a time when they were rapidly evolving, both on a human and musical level. "The main idea behind it was pretty simple, to make available to our fans all those B-sides, unreleased tracks and versions that had been sitting on the shelves for too long. Everything. And before we knew it, we ended up with a double album with a lot of things on it! It's quite a mish-mash but I also think it's a nice bouquet so to speak of everything we had done", comments Hans Rutten from the band. The first half of Accessories gathers 14 tracks from the band's singles between 1995 and 2001. None of these songs are available on other albums. The second half contains two sessions which remained unreleased until Accessories - the first being a studio session with krautrock legend Eroc, who the band wanted as their producer, and the second session the uncompromised result of the band being locked in a small analog studio for a week with nothing or nobody to restrict their creativity.