Everyone reading these pages knows MOTÖRHEAD, right? If not, go ahead and listen to them, as they were one of the best bands that ever existed. So I spare the details here and jump forward to “The Manticore Tapes”. And this is the newest treasure that was found in some old, dusty archives and gets to see the light of day now. Let’s go back to the year 1976: It’s just a few weeks that MOTÖRHEAD were together in their now legendary line-up. Philthy Animal Taylor has taken over the drums from Lucas Fox and Fast Eddie Clarke just joined the band as guitar player, replacing Larry Wallis who quit after only one rehearsal with a double axe attack. Founder, bass player and singer Lemmy Kilmister took the band to the Manticore Studios of EMERSON, LAKE & PALMER in order to record some material, live on tape. Eight songs were laid down, some of them in different takes, but never officially released. Until now, that is. “The Manticore Tapes” features eight songs from the earliest days of MOTÖRHEAD, half of them cover tunes, practically. ‘The Watcher’ and ‘Motörhead’ were songs Lemmy originally wrote for his former band HAWKWIND, ‘Leavin’ Here’ was written by Eddie Holland in 1963 and ‘Witch Doctor’ was a song the British Blues legend John Mayall composed. The choice of the cover tunes perfectly shows that MOTÖRHEAD are deeply rooted in Rock’n’Roll and Blues Rock especially in their early days and Lemmy’s old band HAWKWIND also still had an impact on the sound of the band. It took them about two more years to develop the sound they became famous for after these recordings. Thus “The Manticore Tapes” should be enjoyed with care if you are only familiar with the iconic MOTÖRHEAD stuff, yet it is a delight for any fan of good music nevertheless. After the instrumental ‘Intro’, a variation on ‘Instro’ from the “Beer Drinkers” EP (and some compilations), we get some rockin’ tunes with ‘Leavin’ Here’ and ‘Vibrator’, one of the most unusual original MOTÖRHEAD songs with Lemmy’s voice sounding quite clean and thus unusual. After an improvised version of ‘Help Keep Us On The Road’, it’s time for Fast Eddie Clarke to shine, as ‘The Watcher’ has room for great guitar parts. A cool version of ‘Motörhead’, of course not played as hard as it was later on, leads the way to the more or less instrumental section, as ‘Witch Doctor’ and ‘Iron Horse / Born To Lose’, one of my all time favourites from MOTÖRHEAD, only have fragmentary vocal parts. That’s quite a pity, since especially the latter comes along in a cool version. As an extra, we get alternate takes of ‘Leavin’ Here’, ‘Vibrator’ and ‘The Watcher’. In sum, we have a historical recording that features nothing new but appears to be a nice extra for any fan of MOTÖRHEAD. It’s up to you to decide whether this is worth your money. For additional info, visit www.imotorhead.com or www.bmg.com