I've always gravitated towards Mercyful Fate's pre-album output; I love the mLP (and by extension The Beginning) as well as most of the material on the Return of the Vampire compilation, and somewhat prefer them to Melissa overall (I was never able to get into Don't Break the Oath that much beyond a few songs, but that's a story for another time). Make no mistake though, "Evil" is one of my favorite MF songs ever. "Satan's Fall" and the title track are also undoubtedly top tier. I've gradually learned to appreciate the album as a whole more than I once did, and while the remaining songs are fairly good, nothing ever rose to a "Corpse Without Soul" or "Doomed by the Living Dead" level for me.
Was happy to upgrade my old BMG club copy to a retail version of the 1997 remaster, although I've never been a fan of the modernized fonts (and some of the wonky layout choices) used for the Mercyful Fate/King Diamond remasters (and which unfortunately persisted on subsequent CD pressings). Of course, the real travesty is the wonderful Thomas Holm cover being darkened and oversaturated into oblivion, although that's a flaw hardly exclusive to this version. I remember thinking the darkened cover of later pressings was actually how the album was supposed to look--it was shocking to see the amount of detail on the teeth and horns the first time I saw an original Megaforce LP!
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