It has been a long wait but with the release of “Shrine Of The Pentagram”, the whole discography of TREBLINKA is now finally officially released. Just like HELLHAMMER and NIHILIST, the demos of TREBLINKA circulated in the scene for many years in all forms of bootlegs. The least you can say is that Century Media did an excellent job. “Shrine Of The Pentagram” is released in the form of a nicely designed box – the same format in which they already re-released the demos of HELLHAMMER and MORBID – including three CDs. The first CD contains all the material that TREBLINKA has ever recorded in a chronological order. Even anno 2013, the first demo “Crawling In Vomits” still sounds extremely charming. We have to admit that the songs on this demo sound pretty simple and that you can hear a band that is still looking to find its way and that’s learning how to play its instruments. Nevertheless, songs like ‘Earwigs In Your Veins’ or ‘Hail To Cruelty’ haven’t lost anything of their charm and we still love to listen to these tunes. On “The Sign Of The Pentagram” – which surfaced only six months later – and “Severe Abomination”, TREBLINKA not only sounded already more experienced but also a lot more darker and evil. Not only on a lyrical level but also musically and with songs like ‘Nocturnal Funeral’ or ‘Mould In Hell’, TREBLINKA had a pretty strong Black Metal direction. You could definitely say that the band was ahead of its time. All these demos were recorded in decent studios back in the days and sound – thanks to a digital polishing – really better than ever before. All who already have these demos for many years through tapetrading will not believe their ears. Especially the drumming and the guitars on the first demo sound more clear than ever before. What follows are recordings of three gigs played in 1988 and 1989, some of the tapetraders out there will probably already be familiar with these for many years. The quality of these recordings never really surpasses the sound of a reasonable to ok bootleg which is not really surprising as these concerts were most likely recorded with an ordinary taperecorder. Nevertheless, they get the verdict ‘charming’ and are definitely listenable. As a final bonus you get recordings of rehearsals from 1989 and 2008 and instrumental outtakes when TREBLINKA was in the studio preparing for their first album. The whole package is completed with a nice booklet with previously unreleased photos, extensive liner-notes and interviews with Jörgen Thullberg and Stefan Lagergren among others. Vinyl collectors can also start rubbing their hands because this gem will also be released as an impressive box containing no less than five (!) LPs. "Shrine Of The Pentagram" is an important piece of Swedish underground history and for fans of the genre pretty much essential. It’s also a very nice addition to the previously released boxes of bands like NIHILIST, DISMEMBER, MORBID and GRAVE. Now, we only still have to wait for an official re-release of the old material of UNLEASHED and I guess all the most important cornerstones of the Stockholm-scene will be covered then. www.facebook.com/pages/treblinka/268915796572662, www.centurymedia.com