LEGION (one of the eight US bands called LEGION) released two huge compilations of their works recorded in the 80's, Bible of Stone being the second one, coming shortly after Darkness. Both releases contain just over twenty songs, and total playtime of over an hour. The releases come hand in hand with the news of the band recording new material for the first time in quite a while. The cover art for Bible of Stone, just like the one for Darkness, is hand-drawn black and white, and does stand out a lot, amidst the mountains of generic computer-generated fantasy-themed low-grade wallpapers that bands tend to slap on their CDs lately. The image feels genuine and sets high expectations for the album, which almost immediately cuts them down to size.

Right of the start of the first song, the first thing that sticks out like a sore thumb is the horrid quality of the recording. Remember what playing an old de-magnetized cassette sounded like? This is worse, because the cassettes at least had low noise levels, even when degraded. The music can barely be heard, the instruments are muffled, everything is drowned in noise, and sometimes even the left or right channel of the stereo give out. This goes on for the most of the album, with only 2 songs out of 21 having decent, albeit still not good sound.

The music itself, from what I am able to gather, sounds good - it is immediately recognizable that a lot of effort and passion was put into writing and recording the songs. The vocals show promise as far as talent is concerned, however due to excessive use of screams and poor microphone technique, end up being annoying and unpleasant at times. Guitar work is great across the album, along with whatever can be heard of the drums and bass. Originality-wise not much can be said, the songs sound pretty interchangeable and lack any identity. Just by listening to the music without knowing who is playing, I could attribute it to any of the 500 young heavy/speed metal band playing local clubs in the 80's.

The titular opener "Bible of Stone" and the couple of tracks that follow, are decent heavy/speed metal songs with no flaws besides the sound quality and the questionable singing style. "Chalice" showcases impressive guitarwork and pleasant drumming. "Warrior" stands out with a bit better performed vocals and strong, inspired melody, overall reminiscent of early MANOWAR. "Welcome to the Storm" ends with a beautiful solo, followed by "Broken Pieces", which again shows great guitars and drums, and could have been quite a catchy tune, had it had a chance with a proper recording back in the 80's. Actually, this and a few other songs, are good enough to consider this quality of production to be a crime against art. It really ruined a very decent tune.

"T-total Destruction" is a nightmare of exceptionally low-quality sound, and exceptionally annoying sleazy singing. But that gets even worse in "The Keeper", where the vocals sound like a castrated weasel being involuntary violated by an autistic sasquatch.
"Monsters" brings us back on the "less bad" side of things with better sound quality, harsher vocals, and really good drums. "Tiny Acoustics" is a pleasant acoustic instrumental, followed by "Endless Nights" - the only song with bearable sound quality on the release, which unfortunately happens to be a horrible song in my eyes. The album closes on "No Place to Go", which is again a generic song buried beneath mountains of crapped out recording equipment.

The fact that this material was recorded in the 80's gives an interesting perspective. Because listening to it back then would have raised a few eyebrows, and would have had people arguing whether or not LEGION would attain the status of a legendary band in the future, as their music evolves. However, having the perspective of the years, it is obvious that LEGION's music was not given that change, and therefore falls victim to mediocrity. And although this record is old, there were bands releasing much more vivid and memorable material than this much earlier. For example, listening to Bible of Stone back to back with ACCEPT's Restless and Wild, which was released half a decade before the recording of LEGION's material, shows exactly the chasm that LEGION would have had to jump over in order to escape being generic. And that is compared to a band that was also dismissed as too generic at times! Comparing originality to less legendary old bands, like ICON, WARLORD, EXCITER, etc., is similarly unfavorable.

With LEGION's new material being recorded, I genuinely hope their music will have grown, and will be given a solid chance, as they are obviously talented folk, and have had thirty years to refine their style. Bible of Stone is very challenging to listen to, even for a fan of early speed metal. Despite that, LEGION are a solid band that may have greatness within its grasp. Not with this album though.