Lionheart - Japan First Issue Pressing

This is easily my second favourite Japanese LP release. It has a pretty unique Obi-Strip which features full colour on the front and back. In fact, I believe this is the only Obi-Strip for any of Kate's Japanese LP releases to feature full colour artwork on both sides like this.

In many cases, the Obi-Strip has more value than the actual record itself - so never buy a Japanese album if the Obi-Strip is missing or badly damaged. As you can see mine does have minimal damage to it, so the value will be affected by that.

The packaging on this release is very interesting. In other countries where Lionheart was released as a gatefold, the Japanese release was issued in a single standard record jacket. What makes it even more interesting is that the printed lyrics and album photos are printed onto an inner record sleeve instead.

Unfortunately I could not get this to scan well and it was a complete mess trying to piece it back together - so I kept my original photos for this instead.

There's also an additional insert that comes with this and features some kind of a write up and the album's lyrics all in Japanese characters.

The record labels are fairly identical to the UK ones at the time. The only real differences are the catalogue number and the distribution information printed in red along the perimeter.