Two of my old time favourite albums.

Which is better?

I prefer Metal Church: heavier, rawer

Love 'em both, but I tend to listen to the debut more. However, Ton of Bricks is one of my favorite Metal Church songs, which is why Ultimatum did a cover of that particular song.

Both are great albums but the debut is one of my all time faves so it gets the nod.

BTW Gilbert, hope you don't mind I added a poll to your thread.

I gave the nod to the debut one of best metal debut albums of the 80's IMO

Both are awesome recordings but I had to lean toward the debut. It's just slightly the better of the two.

I was fairly dissapointed with The Dark when it initially came out, it just didn't have that same spontaneous energy the debut had.

I listened to it about a year ago, it's a good enough record, but still doesn't inspire.

I went with the debut. I like it just a little bit better than The Dark.

Love them both from one of my favorite bands but the S/T by a slight edge.

like them both, but the debut is my fave MC.

The Dark is great, but I prefer the self titled debut.

The self titled debut all the way!!

Both are great albums but I went with The Dark because it was my first.

I love the first album, it is up there near the top of the mid 80's thrash ( or whatever you wanna call it, I lump it in with the other bands during the mid 80's underground American thrash metal movement) debut albums.
However, I like The Dark slightly better. It is sharper and faster and the band is tighter and the songs are much more developed and written better musically. David Wayne is at his prime here, too.

I personally prefer The Dark. I love every song very much and David Wayne just sounds great.

The self-titled is great as well, but I don't listen as much. I will say that Beyond the Black/Metal Church are pretty much the two coolest opening songs to an album ever, and it's impossible to listen to one without the other. I also really love (My Favorite)Nightmare, but the rest of the material just isn't quite on the level of The Dark for me.

But as far as I'm concerned, either of those two albums or Blessing in Disguise can blow away almost any other album released ever.

S/T for me, raw and aggressive. Somewhere between thrash and power metal is a good place to be!

Listened to both last night and my choice still stands. The Dark contains two of my favorite songs; Ton Of Bricks and Watch The Children Pray.

I go with Metal Church.

The S/T title is my fave, but both the Wayne fronted Metal Church albums are classics. Even Masterpeice is a good album and the Wayne-Metal Church record is quintescential.

LOVE the Metal Church!!!

The self-titled has a superior production. To me, "The Dark" has a couple of classics, "watch" and "ton of bricks" with the rest being mostly filler. The debut even has a better album cover. I also thought that "Masterpeace" was horrible, while "Hanging in the Balance" was an underated claasic, the best of the Mike Howe era.

Metal Church all the way. The Dark is good, but it doesn't even come close to the greatness of the debut album.

The s/t is totally on a level with few peers. I do enjoy the Metal Church catalog, especially the first four, but the first one is the one for me. Could be a lot of nostalgia going along with my feelings.
I did catch them on "The Dark" tour opening up for Metallica who were on their Master Of Puppets tour; and then a year later with Howe on the "Blessing..." tour as a headliner.