Baroque, Bleak, Brutal - Metal Blog About Heavy Metal

Seth's top 10 records of 2011

2011-12-08T13:01:00.002-05:00

Arch/Matheos "Sympathetic Resonance" - what's in a name? A *lot* apparently. This album should have been released as a Fate's Warning record. The record is a reunion of the original lineup and if they would have more aggressively promoted this album as such it would be on many more top 10 lists. If you like progressive metal this is the sleeper hit of the year. Simultaneously classic sounding and forward thinking, these long winding songs are all layered with incredible production.

All Pigs Must Die "God is War" - Something about the gigantic noisy production, sheer brutality and black metal flourishes really hits the spot. This is a perfect marriage of hardcore and metal which doesn't pander to "crossover" sensibilities.

Opeth "Heritage" - I love that Akerfeldt and company had the courage to jump straight down the rabbit hole and indulge all of the progressive tendencies they've been hinting at on their previous records. I love even more that the songs are so strong.

Metallica/Lou Reed "Lulu" - I'm curious as to how people will see this record in a few years from now. Too base and brutish for the art heads and too arty for the metal heads it lives in a weird rock and roll limbo. I listen to this record on a regular basis and it gets better every time. If we didn't live in the type of
gut reaction culture where people had made up their minds from a 30 second sample more people would have probably come to this with an open mind. I don't like it because I'm a contrarian, I like it because it is good and has musical value.

Future of the Left "Polymers are Forever" - It is unacceptable how much better this band gets with every release. Moving away from the documentary recording style of Steve Albini and into more "produced" territory FoTL have gotten bigger and more ambitious. Synths? Sure! Black Sabbath riffing? Why not? This EP has given me more joy than any other release this year.

Anthrax "Worship Music" - The energy and excitement may have been because of the addition of Dan Nelson and not Joey Belladonna, but the fact remains this is an inspired kick-ass Anthrax record no matter who is singing. The layering and more "rock" elements of the Bush era remain while the band made an effort to go
back to the thrashy chugging of the early days.

Noel Gallagher's High Flying Birds - the stronger of the two Gallagher brother releases this year, it is a more subdued effort than Oasis but these songs are always sticking in my head.

Amebix "Sonic Mass" - They're doing Killing Joke better than Killing Joke themselves right now. This is the best kind of bleak.

Trap Them "Darker Handcraft" - The sound of demons grabbing at you as you are being pulled into hell. After this record you will feel compelled to wash your hands. The music is so crusty and so technical it sounds like Voivod was living in a squat.

Wild Flag "s/t' - Good old fashioned kick ass music by female rock royalty. This band is truly deserving of all of their praise. It is too weird to be mainstream, too slick to be indie, and too catchy to be ignored.

Else

2010-12-22T00:04:00.000-05:00

2nd Best Record From Band I Did See

Disapointments

Immortal : All Shall Fall

Dimmu Borgir : Abbacab (fuck you for firing Mustis!)

Band that is disturbingly huge that i wish would disapear : Insane Clown Posse

Best Jesu Song About Christmas

Looking forward to 2011

PJ Harvey : Let England Shake
Pulp live Reunion

Record of the Year from a band that was in town when I was out of town.

2010-12-21T23:43:00.000-05:00

"Lawless Darkness"

Watian @Santoshouse Party

2010 Review- Emptyhell Edition

2010-12-21T23:39:00.000-05:00

Most Unexpected Comeback

Seth's top 10 Metal (and non-Metal) albums of 2010

2010-11-30T12:39:00.003-05:00

Important notes:
- The lists are numbered but *not* in any order. I never rank albums.
- Disappointments aren't random albums but ones I was specifically looking forward to.
-LCD Soundsystem and the Roots both put out two albums this year, both of which I really liked and wanted to include. I decided to give each band one slot on the list for both records. This way 40% of the list wouldn't be just two bands.

METAL
1 Triptykon - Eparistera Daimones
2 Nachtmystium - Addicts
3 Accept - Blood of the Nations
4 Cathedral - The Guessing Game
5 1349 - Demonoir
6 Melvins - The Bride Screamed Murder
7 Ihsahn - After
8 Electric Wizard - Black Masses
9 Darkthrone - Circle the Wagons
10 Kylesa - Spiral Shadow

Disappointments:
Iron Maiden - Final Frontier
Dimmu Borgir - Abrahadabra
Halford - Made of Metal
Helloween - 7 Sinners
Gwar - Bloody Pit of Horror

NON-METAL
1 Superchunk - Majesty Shredding
2 Grinderman 2
3 Killing Joke - Absolute Dissent
4 Swans - My Father Will Guide Me up a Rope to the Sky
5 Roots - Wake Up!/How I Got Over
6 LCD Soundsystem - Everything is Happening/The London Sessions
7 Black Mountain - Wilderness Heart
8 Devo - Something for Everybody
9 Robyn - Body Talk
10 Off! - The First Four EPs

Disappointments:
Hold Steady - Heaven is Whenever
Foetus - Hide
Bad Religion - The Dissent of Man

Metal Method, Part 1 - Shipping

2010-11-24T22:37:00.000-05:00

This is what you can do when you are the only one posting

2010-10-26T23:40:00.000-04:00

Watain North American Tour 2010

2010-10-20T11:42:00.000-04:00

Of course I wont be in town for this one. (sigh). Eriks doing vocals only, wonder who'll be playing bass?
Tour Itinerary:

11/06/2010 Mr. Smalls - Pittsburgh, PA
11/07/2010 Reggie's - Chicago, IL
11/08/2010 Station 4 - St. Paul, MN
11/10/2010 Marquis Theatre - Denver, CO
11/11/2010 Club Vegas - Salt Lake City, UT
11/12/2010 Branx (Loveland) - Portland, OR
11/13/2010 Studio Seven - Seattle, WA
11/14/2010 TBA - Vancouver, BC
11/16/2010 Boardwalk - Orangevale, CA
11/17/2010 DNA Lounge - San Francisco, CA
11/18/2010 The Ruby Room - San Diego, CA
11/19/2010 The Whiskey - Hollywood, CA
11/20/2010 Clubhouse - Tempe, AZ
11/21/2010 Club 101 - El Paso, TX
11/22/2010 The Loft - Dallas, TX
11/23/2010 Emo's - Austin, TX
11/24/2010 Numbers - Houston, TX
11/26/2010 The Bar - New Orleans, LA
11/27/2010 Back Booth - Orlando, FL
11/29/2010 Masquerade - Atlanta, GA
11/30/2010 Sonar - Baltimore, MD
12/01/2010 Peabody's - Cleveland, OH
12/02/2010 Santo's New York, NY
12/03/2010 Les Foufounes Electriques - Montréal, QC
12/04/2010 Opera House - Toronto, ON

Drautran : Throne of the Depth

2010-09-18T02:29:00.000-04:00

Holy Fucking Shit Does This Record Sound Like This Picture
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bCe3XZSu_Cw

The Sword - "Warp Riders" due 8/24 Near Perfect Cover???

2010-08-21T01:44:00.000-04:00

Dave Lombardo Jamming with bee swarm

2010-08-08T19:03:00.000-04:00

from Cremaster 2

Dimmu Borgir : Abrahadabra

2010-07-12T16:34:00.001-04:00

Released on September 24, 2010 in Germany, September 27, 2010 for the rest of Europe, and October 12, 2010 in North America

"Abrahadabra", loosely translated as "I will create as I speak", was created by author Aleister Crowley in his work, Liber AL vel Legis, or The Book of the Law. This album is the second in the band's repertoire to deviate from the traditional three-word title. Silenoz explained, ""[It made] a lot of sense for us to move on from that. It has served its purpose. We are a band that's all about change and moving forward. An album title consisting of one word goes hand-in-hand with the new material." In addition, Silenoz referenced the changes in the band's "musical and lyrical content", as well as changes in the band's line-up playing a role.

Some More About The Discordance

2010-06-28T16:30:00.002-04:00

A follow up on the last post about The Discordance: the most excellent Islander over at No Clean Singing was inspired enough by my statifying to do some digging of his own into Encyclopedia Metallicum's database, and did me one better by finding a feature that not only adds in population (by millions of people, rather than straight population statistics), but strips out inactive bands from the totals list for the country. The results are basically the same - Finland, Norway, and Sweden are still the places to go to get metal out the ass - but tiny places like Lichtenstein, Monaco, and Faroes Islands fall out of the list, removing the statistical oddities of my list. Good stuff. Gives me another reason to want to visit Iceland, too.

Geekery in The Discordance

2010-06-18T16:58:00.004-04:00

I've been playing with Encyclopedia Metallicum's The Discordance, which is pretty much a metal geek's wet dream: the site's database of information - genres, locations, release dates, etc. - presented in forms like grids, lists, maps...it's like they took two of my favorite things and smashed them together in a comprehensive if slow-moving package.

Long-time readers may remember my series of posts on the most metal country, mainly from a few years ago when I found out that Finland had most of Metallica's catalog in their top 40 chart. After clicking through for a few minutes, I realized The Discordance, with its totals of bands by country, could give me an answer. So I took that list, compared it to the list of population by country from Wikipedia, and came up with the number of bands per population total, only to find...

...that I knew the answer all along: Finland, with 0.00046 bands per person, is the most metal country on Earth. Scandinavia scores full top 10 representation, with Sweden at number 2, Norway at number 3, and Denmark at number 8. Germany, which has the second largest number of total bands, scores well at number 16. The United States has the highest number of bands, but also has the world's third-largest population, and falls to number 33 on my list. Want to see the whole list? I've made the spreadsheet available through Google Docs.

Alcest

2010-06-13T23:22:00.001-04:00

Its Spectral ShoegazeFrenchEmoBlack Metal for me and somedays thats exactly what i'm feeling. Sometimes.

Alcest is a French band created by Neige (also in Amesoeurs, Peste Noire and Forgotten Woods) in early 2000. ...The first chapter of this journey was Le Secret EP, which was released in 2005 by Drakkar Productions. In 2007, Neige agreed to a contract with the German label Prophecy Productions and released Alcest's debut album Souvenirs d'un autre monde the same year.

These two tracks taken from newest release Écailles De Lune.
ouvenirs d’un autre monde – Full Length [20uvenirs d’un autre monde – Full Length [2007]
Écailles De Lune (Part I)

Écailles De Lune (Part II)

June Metal Gleanings

2010-06-11T16:41:00.005-04:00

A quick rundown of what I've been churning through recently during my prime listening hours:

Keep of Kalessin - Reptilian. This album has completely lived up to its promise, becoming the disc with the sounds so infectious I have to limit myself to listening once a day. "The Awakening," with its bridge hook that begs to be shouted through one of those Swiss Alpine horns into a gale (seriously, go to 3:03 in this clip and check it out) has replaced early favorite "The Dragontower" as the song of choice, but the whole thing is an easy sell because it's brutal and catchy all at the same time.
Nachtmystium - Addicts: Black Meddle Pt II. Between this album and the Twilight disc I had a whole Blake Judd bloc yesterday afternoon, which was pretty fantastic. My first feelings after hearing the sequel to Assassins were of awe at Nachtmystium's ability to switch gears so easily from track to track. The overall aesthetic is still that fuzzy Nachtmystium we know and love, but an album that includes everything from a very poppy chorus in "Then Fires" to old school industrial touches in "Blood Trance Fusion" to a heavy dose of EBM in "Every Last Drop" offers a lot to explore. I'm psyched to be seeing these guys again tomorrow.
Odem Arcarum - Outrageous Reverie Above the Erosion of Barren Earth. As I've mentioned in the past, this album owes a great deal to Emperor's later work; there's a good bit of 1349, too, especially in the vocals. A bit derivative, perhaps, but these guys offer up so many textures in their 10 minute epics that there's still plenty to enjoy. Definitely take the whole album as one dose, though.
Nevermore - The Obsidian Conspiracy. Just got this one a few days ago, so I'm still forming impressions, but thus far the band's seventh album is in keeping with expectations: impressive musicianship, ear-bending vocal lines, and a broad mix of lyrical topics. "Your Poison Throne" seems like the most traditionally Nevermore track thus far, while "And the Maiden Spoke" stands out with a particularly challenging chorus.

Victory for the forces of DARKNESS.

2010-06-10T14:31:00.001-04:00

Watain's "Lawless Darkness", released June 7th, is the musical equivalent of the Gulf spill. Totally relentless, life killing, and a thing you can see from space.

Its got chops, atmosphere, songs, hooks! In other words, another victory for the forces of DARKNESS.

This is the kind of metal in the lineage of Venom and Bathory. Its ferocious, breathes fire and blood.

I didn't think it was possible for them to best 2007's "Sworn To the Dark".

They have, and you may too.

"Reaping Death"

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IrOfvhFiq6E

Kicking Ass on the Final Frontier

2010-06-08T15:16:00.005-04:00

Above is the cover for the first single - and man, do I feel like I should putting quotes around both of those terms - from Iron Maiden's upcoming album, The Final Frontier, as offered - along with a download of the song - on the band's website. It is fantastic: the pulp theme and the representation of evil-looking, puppetmaster Eddie mesh perfectly with the song's straightforward story of greed and the album's (presumed) sci-fi theme. Really, every band should do artwork like this piece - and by "artwork like this piece" I mean art that kicks ass - for every pre-release single, because even though the song itself loses steam midway through, I'm still excited to hear the rest of The Final Frontier when it comes out in August. Of course, the bonus release of the album cover artwork doesn't hurt:

Look at that shit. That's fucking giant Space Eddie doing some weird-ass shit to alien astronauts with a big glowing key. That painting is precisely what I want out of my Iron Maiden art.

Remembering Hear 'N Aid

2010-06-02T22:45:00.003-04:00

Yet another of Dio's many contributions:

"Hear 'N Aid : The Sessions" documents the making of a record, a very special record called "Stars", that will raise for famine relief. It is a behind the scenes journey through the process of rock 'n roll record-making, from the basic tracks through vocal solos and chorus to performances by 11 stellar guitarists that form A SINGLE GUITAR SOLO (my emphasis)".

"40 artists from the hard rock music community and hundreds of volunteers donated their time and talent over four months to make Hear ' N Aid a reality. "Stars" is a plea for unity in the fight against world hunger."

Dennis Hopper, Counter-Culture Icon Dead At 74 -- Signs of the Times News

2010-05-30T02:20:00.001-04:00

Dennis Hopper, Counter-Culture Icon Dead At 74 -- Signs of the Times News

Outlaws and Viking Metal

2010-05-28T15:54:00.004-04:00

I've been making my way through Robert Ferguson's book on the Viking period in European history, which talks about the common legal custom of turning people convicted of murder into outlaws. Being an outlaw in this case didn't mean you were put into a prison; instead, you were expected to leave the area for a certain period of time, and during that time, the relatives of the person you killed were allowed to hunt you down and kill you without being outlawed themselves. This view on enforcement led to some pretty interesting situations, where men who had been outlawed in one area became colonists somewhere else...and sometimes moved on to a third area, because they'd killed someone else.

To bring it back to the metal - because it's all about the metal - Erik the Red, the guy who led the European settlement of Greenland, was one such person; he had to leave Norway because of some killings, and settled in Iceland. Later on, he was outlawed in Iceland for killing a few other people in various disputes, and took the opportunity to set up a colony in Greenland while fleeing for his life. After reading about his journeys, I had to give Tyr's Eric the Red a listen, and that brought the story full circle back to violence with the song "Raymund Hin Unge," about a bad ass named Young Raymond who cares not for fancy garb and kills giants all by his lonesome:

Raymond walked along the salty beach
There he saw seven giants standing
“I will take Raymond on my smallest hand.
And throw him far offshore”
“You will not do that alone,” said Raymond
“You must come all seven of you,” said the young
Raymond

Raymond took his dear sword
The one he called the red Dimling
He hew the seven giants simultaneously
So that they bled to death
“There they lie, all seven of them,” said Raymond
“And I still stand here,” said the young Raymond

"But Don't Send Me Jesus..."

2010-05-26T23:24:00.004-04:00

"...He's only a man."

I will have the pleasure of seeing the mighty GWAR again late next month in Massachusetts, courtesy of the gentleman who shared my first GWAR experience many moons ago. Earlier today one of his friends asked what GWAR was and beyond answering that GWAR was a state of mind, dammit, I felt I had to cast about YouTube to find a representative answer. Fortunately, some kind soul had posted the music video the band made for "Meat Sandwich," which showcases pretty much everything I love GWAR: ridiculous costumes, wanton violence, roving meat orgies, cannibalism, and - of course - a one on one basketball game between Oderus Urungus and Jesus. Ladies and gentlemen, "Meat Sandwich":

Into the Depths of Twilight

2010-05-24T16:30:00.003-04:00

I've been rocking out to a lot of black metal recently - the Odem Arcarum album I mentioned a few weeks ago, the Ludicra album everyone but me discovered three months ago, the new Keep of Kalessin - but the one that's been the biggest surprise success for me is Monuments to Time's End by the unfortunately-named Twilight. A black metal supergroup of sorts and fronted by Nachtmystium's Blake Judd, Twilight's been a surprise stalwart for me because it's so much of a throwback to the halcyon days of low-fi second wave black metal, a genre that I find more academically interesting than praiseworthy, in part because I am not a low-fi sort of guy. There's something different about Twilight, however and it's taken me a few listens to figure out why that difference appeals to me. After my first listen of Monument..., I felt like I had just been through an Experience (definitely with a capital E) that did not generate any specific positive or negative emotions, but was enough for me to give the album another try. On each additional listen something new has jumped out at me: a guitar line floating here, a dissonant chorus rising like a monolith in the background there, but the whole album remains a stormy sea of sounds that keeps calling me back to explore its depths. I embedded a track below for you to check out, but unlike the majority of my selections it's a random sample rather than a representative one. I'm going back in to see what else I can find.

Dio and Westboro

2010-05-22T15:17:00.004-04:00

Most of you are probably familiar with the Westboro Baptist Church: they like to hate gays and picket funerals and make signs about bitch burgers, all in the name of salvation. Basically, they're a group of cocks who love negative attention like a tick loves blood. They are most decidedly unmetal. I was trolling through Blabbermouth's RSS feed a few minutes ago and noticed Westboro's name in a headline and did a double take, because they've decided to take their traveling cock show to Dio's memorial service:

You know 67 year old, Satan-worshiping (or at least one of their enablers) Ronnie James Dio (of showing his devil horns to the world each time he goes in public) BLACK SABBATH fame is dead, right? We'll be there! Just because the chances of any of God's elect being amongst this group of heavy metal sycophants is slim to none does not mean they should not get some good words.

I'll be honest: I feel pretty gleeful about the whole thing, because if there was ever an opportunity for Westboro to get their deserved verbal comeuppance, it would be from those fans dedicated enough to attend a funeral for a metal god. Wendy Dio is urging people to turn the other cheek, but I disagree: if you're going to this event, make sure to tell the Westboro picketers exactly what you think of them and their preaching. It won't change anything, but I bet it'll make you feel pretty good afterward.

Hard-Hitting Dragon Iconography

2010-05-19T16:43:00.003-04:00

Getting my first real tastes of Keep of Kalessin's new release, Reptilian, and three-quarters of the way through the first song I'm already twice as excited as I was after hearing "The Dragontower" a few months ago. If "The Dragontower" was prog mixed with NWOBHM, "Dragon Iconography" is power metal mixed with the kind of brain-crushing heaviness that made me buy The Discipline of Fire & Demise after hearing thirty seconds of "Thorns on My Grave." If you've been on the fence about giving Keep of Kalessin a try in the past, this seems like it might be the album to start listening.