Reissues are just as popular now as they always have been, and given the fact that metalheads collect and buy more records than other forms of music, I’m never too surprised when an album ends up being pressed on different colored vinyl or reissued after a decade. While we were surprised that Iwrestledabearonce are reissuing It’s All Happening after only a year, we were even more surprised (and ecstatic) that Relapse Records will be reissuing the legendary Death catalogue as well as both projects of the late Chuck Schuldiner.

Relapse Records has announced a partnership with Perseverance Holdings Ltd. and the family of metal luminary Chuck Schuldiner to reissue the Death catalogue as well as Schuldiner’s early projects Control Denied and Mantas. For the first time ever, Death’s Scream Bloody Gore, Leprosy, Spiritual Healing, Human, Individual Thought Patterns, and The Sound Of Perseverance will be available for official digital release at this location. Relapse will also reissue an expanded version Control Denied’s debut album, The Fragile Art of Existence, in late 2010 as well as the first-ever collection by project Mantas. The expanded version of   Existence will include bonus tracks, extra band photography, expanded art and packaging and more. Basically, everything a Death fan could ask for.

I’ve been waiting for this announcement for a while as a die-hard Death fan. Having been in the right place at the right time as a recent Relapse intern, and personally held pieces of Death history (pictures of Chuck as a soccer player anyone?) I can easily say that Relapse has no intention of giving Death anything less than the proper treatment they deserve.