Devil Doll (lost unreleased recordings from Italian/Slovenian band; 1990s)

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MrDoctor.jpeg

An image of Mr. Doctor.

Status: Lost

Formed by the mysterious Mr. Doctor, Devil Doll is an Italian-Slovenian band, known for their works of epic lengths, blending experimental rock, progressive rock, art rock, gothic rock, symphonic rock, and heavy metal.

Five albums were officially released: The Girl Who Was... Death, Eliogabulus, Sacrilegium, The Sacrilege of Fatal Arms and Dies Irae. There is, however, a whole lot more unreleased and/or lost recordings.

Unreleased Recordings

In one of the few interviews given by Mr. Doctor himself, he said that The Girl Who Was... Death, their first released album, was actually the second recorded by the band. The first one, titled The Mark of the Beast, had only one vinyl copy pressed, which is in possession of Mr. Doctor himself. It's said that parts of this piece have made "cameos" in other albums. He also mentioned that the original Devil Doll set had five songs, one of which was The Mark..., and that the other four were recorded on a 4-track recorder. The titles of these pieces are unknown, and they aren't any of the ones released on later records.

Eliogabalus was originally a 60-minute piece, which was being worked along with The Black Holes of My Mind, a 45 minute one. Due to budget limitations, however, both compositions had to be cut and released on a single vinyl, The Black Holes... renamed to Mr. Doctor, with 20-ish minutes and Eliogabalus with almost 25 minutes. It's unknown if a recording of the full compositions was ever made.

Mr. Doctor Sings Hanns Eisler, a cover album, was recorded and it's said that some test prints were made, but the album was cancelled at the last minute due to copyright issues.

The recording of Dies Irae, their final (released) album, was very problematic: of the first sessions, only a tape of unmixed music survived and copies were given to the musicians. All the rest was lost in an explosion at the studio. In total, after recording the whole album from scratch, they had over 700 minutes of music recorded, yet only about 50 made to the final album.

Film Soundtracks

Along with Devil Doll, Mr. Doctor produced silent films. For those films, he'd produce the soundtrack himself. The first one, The Sacrilege of Fatal Arms, a remixed version of the previous Devil Doll album, was released in 1993. The Day of Wrath, the second one, using 90 minutes of the sessions from Dies Irae, had a planned release in 1997, but never saw the light of day. Probably around the same time, Mr. Doctor was commissioned to do the soundtrack for the silent movie The Fall of the House of Usher, from 1928; the said soundtrack is also unreleased because Mr. Doctor had cut ties with the group who commissioned it.

More Unreleased Albums

Mr. Doctor said that, to this day, he still records Devil Doll music, but has lost interest in releasing it. The Carnival of Souls and Five Murderous Suites are the names of two of these unreleased albums.

Slovenian TV Appearance

On March 8th, 1992, a Slovenian television show showed parts of the performance of Sacrilegium. Due to the performance and an interview given by Mr. Doctor being heavily censored, he refused for a long time to give new interviews. As far as it's known, nothing of this performance has appeared.

External Link