CHAOS. Shit, this is one of the most chaotic albums I've ever heard and I like bestial black metal. A rightful classic of its genre, although I couldn't care less about the struggles that Bannon howls about, this is a damn near perfect modern hardcore album.
Although Converge's cathartic style that would become their trademark hadn't really come through on this, it's still a good album, although not really one for most metal fans I'm sure, due to the heavy similarities it bears with both screamo and... emoviolence (although I'm not sure the latter is the correct term).
Although I was 1 year old when this was released, I feel like my travels within the realms of heavy metal mean that I am able to pass judgement on this controversial classic - I fucking love it. This is melodeath done perfectly, with just enough bite to it to keep it interesting.
Another Swedeath classic from At The Gates - although I'm skipping Terminal Spirit Disease this time around, I do honestly believe that every single one of their releases is brilliant, even though I'm not a huge fan of melodeath.
Before At The Gates spawned a whole series of crap imitators with Slaughter Of The Soul, they released several classics of the Swedeath genre. This is one of them, and shouldn't be passed up, whatever the fuck the artwork is supposed to be.
The final album in The Cure's "trilogy", Bloodflowers, to put it bluntly, wasn't all that well received when it came out for a reason I can't quite fathom as I think this album stands tall with the other two albums in the trilogy.
So I am back. Not sure why I even left, but I did. Anyway, I felt compelled to return to share with you all a legit Album of the Year contender from Chilean Bestial Black Thrashers Hades Archer.
I'm not sure whether I prefer this or Hammerheart out of Bathory's legendary Viking trilogy, but both are fantastic. This is certainly closer to the first-wave BM of Quorthon's first three, and I wouldn't have the album any other way. Irrefutably a classic. Get it, savour it, love it.
The cover art is intriguing, just like the music on offer here. Two pioneering Japanese artists collaborate here, as they have done many times before. This is mainly Boris-style, with a bit of Masami Akita mixed in. I'll admit I'm not a fan of much of Boris' output, particularly this year's, but this is good.
I still remember the day I bought and first listened to Disintegration - it was a dank, cold, rainy day - how fitting for such an album! As the 80s neared their end The Cure had become a renowned group putting out successful singles and impressive videos with an almost poppy, dare I say it, cheerful atmosphere. Once again The Cure change with another daring career move.
Just one post from me again today - one problem I forgot to mention in my earlier post is that I've run out of hard disk space, which means I'm getting rid of all the shitty albums, so they will never be posted.
Now this has been a long time coming so sorry for the delay. I will be posting all of the The Cure's "trilogy" albums (Pornography, Disintegration and Bloodflowers) - so named after the live DVD in which all these albums were played in their entirety. For me, this album is The Cure's first true goth rock album, as opposed to the earlier melancholic post-punk sound, the constricting sterile production replaced with powerful percussive drums, resonating bass lines and dense atmospheric guitar work. Another large feature on this album (and most Cure albums to be honest) is Robert Smith's distinctive voice which on this release manages to pierce right through all the layers of music (as well as your skull if it's on loud enough) to convey the somewhat twisted nature of the sound of this album. Highlights of this album are 'One Hundred Years', 'The Hanging Garden' and 'The Figurehead'. This line up of the band didn't last much longer and The Cure broke up after the conclusion of the following tour and by the time The Cure returned this post-punky gothic rock was no longer the focus and a new age of The Cure's sound was ushered in. Oh yeah, I bought this album with its bonus disc which includes demos of many of these songs (they sound kinda like the album would have sounded if it was still very post-punky) and some live material from this album which has varying degrees of quality. 
The last part of Bathory's famed black metal trilogy, and it's rightly seen as one of the best BM albums of all time. Over the years, other bands have imitated, but never matched Quorthon's first-wave style; this gave rise to many of the second wave, even if they deny it.
There is debate as to whether this was an EP or a demo - I'll tag it as both. It is a good piece of Swedeath; not as good as (the forthcoming) The Red In The Sky Is Ours, and Lindberg hadn't yet developed his trademark howl, but great stuff nonetheless.
| Abysmal Dawn |
| Adramelech |
| Akercocke |
| Amon |
| Anaal Nathrakh |
| Anata |
| Anathema |
| Angelcorpse |
| Archgoat |
| Asphyx |
| At The Gates |
| Atheist |
| Autopsy |
| Avulsed |
| Bastard Priest |
| Behemoth |
| Belphegor |
| Benediction |
| Blasphemophagher |
| Bolt Thrower |
| Bonesaw |
| Burial Invocation |
| Cannibal Corpse |
| Carcariass |
| Carcass |
| Carnage |
| Cenotaph (Mex) |
| Cenotaph (Tur) |
| Chronocide |
| Convulse |
| Cosmic Atrophy |
| Cruciamentum |
| Cryptopsy |
| Cynic |
| Darkthrone |
| Death |
| Decrepitaph |
| Deicide |
| Demigod |
| Demilich |
| Devian |
| Devourment |
| diSEMBOWELMENT |
| Dismember |
| Dragged Into Sunlight |
| Dying Fetus |
| Edge Of Sanity |
| Entombed |
| Failed Humanity |
| Fist In Fetus |
| Fuck The Facts |
| Funebrarum |
| General Surgery |
| Gigan |
| Goatpenis |
| Gorefest |
| Gorerotted |
| Gorgasm |
| Gorguts |
| Grave |
| Grotesque |
| Hail Of Bullets |
| Hooded Menace |
| Immolation |
| Impaled |
| Imperator |
| Impetigo |
| Impiety |
| Imprecation |
| Incantation |
| Incubus |
| Infernal War |
| Insomnium |
| Intestine Baalism |
| Jumpin' Jesus |
| Katatonia |
| Krisiun |
| Lock Up |
| Luciferion |
| Lykathea Aflame |
| Malevolent Creation |
| Massacre |
| Master |
| Melechesh |
| Mitochondrion |
| Monstrosity |
| Morbid |
| Morbid Angel |
| Mortuous |
| My Dying Bride |
| Napalm Death |
| Necrophobic |
| Nile |
| Nirvana 2002 |
| Nocturnus |
| Nunslaughter |
| Obituary |
| Obscura |
| Opeth |
| Origin |
| Pan.Thy.Monium |
| Paradise Lost |
| Pestilence |
| Phlebotomized |
| Portal |
| Possessed |
| Prostitute Disfigurement |
| Pungent Stench |
| Sadistik Exekution |
| Sadomator |
| Shub Niggurath |
| Sinister |
| Slaughter |
| Slaughter Lord |
| Sonne Adam |
| Sorrow |
| Soulreaper |
| Suffocation |
| Swallow The Sun |
| Terrorizer |
| The Chasm |
| Timeghoul |
| Traumatic |
| Ulcerate |
| Unleashed |
| Vader |
| Vital Remains |
| Vulvectomy |
| Wormed |
Although not quite on the same level as Realm Of Chaos, War Master is another fantastic Bolt Thrower album - to me their second best. It's pretty hard to write about Bolt Thrower albums - you either know what to expect or you don't (but if you don't, I highly suggest you rectify that immediately).
And here it is, Bolt Thrower's true classic. Their style was in full swing by this time after a little bit of experimentation on In Battle There Is No Law, this was the first album, and indeed the pinnacle, of Bolt Thrower's predominant style that would dominate their music, at least until their most recent album - 2005's Those Once Loyal.
You couldn't be a Brum metal band in the late 80s without having some hardcore punk influence - and Bolt Thrower's shines through heavily here. Especially vocal-wise, this is more a hardcore release than a metal one, although some of the later crushery (pretend that's a word?) is still evident here. Good stuff.
The final part of this 'ere series, and I'm sure most of us are glad to see it finished, myself included (it's a lot more work than most posts). This is based on DM which takes influence from other genres (although this admittedly ended up as mainly grindcore, especially seeing as I already put Atheist in the progressive one).
And now to settle the balance - Black Witchery take influence from Blasphemy and their successors (like Conqueror, Proclamation and Revenge), and are thus kvlter-than-kvlt. Their earlier releases are more incoherent; this has a tiny bit more structure and a (very) subtle sense of melody, so is accessible. Provided you like Blasphemy.
If you didn't know it already, this should pretty much tell you - I am a massive, raging false (if you thought the answer was homo, I hate to disappoint you, but you're wrong). Thing is, this is pop done well - Lavigne spawned dozens of female copycats in her wake, but she takes influence herself from soul and pop-punk, and adds her trademark Canadian voice to it.
Some may call them 'third-tier', I call them 'unfairly forgotten' - this was loosely based around those death metal bands who never got the underground's attention, for whatever reason.
So I thought I'd post something a bit special to me to celebrate 500 posts. This album not only holds heavy nostalgic value, being one of the first extreme metal albums I heard (waaaay back in... 2006), aside from Breeding The Spawn by Suffocation, it's also still pretty much my favourite album overall. Although the thrash tendencies of earlier Frost material are all but gone, this is blackened and doomy metal with unapologetic nods to all different kinds of music (there's even a bit of David Bowie in there - although that's less of a surprise after their cover of 'Heroes' on Vanity/Nemesis).
Vikernes' final recording before his incarceration, and debatably his final classic, Filosofem finally brought the ambient influences to the front - unfortunately, this means a bloody 25 minute borefest of poorly done ambience within an otherwise excellent album. The album is nonetheless a personal favourite of mine.
On this, Burzum's sophomore release, Varg began to experiment a little more with other influences - one can hear strains of Bathory and Celtic Frost quite well in this. The cover's taken from Dungeons & Dragons, but we can't penalise the album too much for that, surely?
You've probably guessed by now, but I fucking love Burzum. Although this is somewhat more conventional for the time than his later material, it's wonderfully crafted, and often very melodic black metal. The album is worth it just for stand out track 'Ea, Lord Of The Depths'.
Okay, so this was the last part of the series I threw together (although there are still two more to come), and it lacks a common theme; I simply used what I had left that I wanted to include.
About a month ago, if I'd found myself uploading Dream Theater's most recent album, I would have asked myself just what exactly I was doing. But since then I've had a chance to listen to it properly a few more times (thank you cheap Amazon CD deals), and I must admit, it's grown on me.
Another album I happened upon in my dad's collection, which I was drawn to simply because I liked the artwork. But to my surprise, when I popped the album in my CD player and hit play, it turned out to be simply sublime.
This LP was brought to my attention when my Dad bought the CD of it about a year ago. He said he had it on vinyl years ago and he really enjoyed it. And since it was my dad who introduced me to The Jam (now one of my favourite bands), I decided to give it a listen.
Following "Fragile" and "Drama", this is my third favourite Yes album. Complete with the longer song structures that Yes were well known for, but not as ridiculously overblown as some of their prior efforts (I'm looking at you, "Tales From Topographic Oceans").
In his last post, Persona called me an "expert" on the whole OSDM Revival.
In case you weren't aware, there's been something of a resurgence in bands playing old-school style death metal recently, probably to counteract the soulless wankery that has taken precedent since the turn of the millenium. This is a compilation of some of my favourites from this scene. (I will note that my colleague HeySharpshooter is somewhat more of an expert than me; if you like the style, I highly recommend all of his posts).
Well, this is one of my favourite albums of this year. Why have I refrained from posting it thus far? Because I have seen a couple of blogs taken down just after posting it - admittedly a lot closer to the release date. What it is is pretty awesome post-black metal, not all atmosphere like Alcest and their kin, but with plenty of teeth to it too. At the risk of sounding pretentious, this album takes you on a real journey over the span of its four tracks.
Continuing the Japanese theme started by HeySharpshooter's last post, this is one of my favourite albums from there - and considering the consistently high quality of extreme music the country produces, that says a lot.
Autopsy are fucking awesome. Fact. This album is underrated. Fact. Although I won't be so irreverent as to claim it's on a par with Mental Funeral, the claim of its detractors that the production ruins the album are not true. Sure, it's not perfect, but it doesn't take that much away from a brilliant album.
Similarly to brutal death, technical death metal is not my favourite subgenre of death metal (and the two often cross over), but there are some parts of it which I like. This is largely formed of stuff which I like, and some which is passable, and including the classics of the genre:
Sorry for the size of the album picture, but I deleted my photo program thingy, and most of the other pictures are way too small. I am sure the owner of this blog will fix it. He is good at that stuff. (Persona 101: it's done)
The opening melody to this, one of the most highly praised, and indeed best, pieces of classical of music of all time, is one of the sounds of my childhood - whenever the TV adverts came on, it seemed that Messrs. Dolmio were using it to wax lyrical about their tomato sauce. Now, I'm sure Dolmio's sauce is very nice, but I'm sure it does not match up to the beauty here.
Fuck me I love Beherit. Their raw black metal with a filthy production really affirms the eros e thanatos theory - that is, that all human actions are taken either for the love of sexual thrills or fear of death. What I'm trying to say is that this is so dirty it has an innate sexual feeling to it.
Stealing a title from Asphyx may be one thing, but attempting to create a compilation on a sub-genre one is not particularly fond of is another. There are some brutal death bands I love (Suffocation, Demigod, Lykathea Aflame and Ulcerate are on this), but the majority of this part is formed of stuff I have downloaded on a whim.
So this may be a little bit controversial (and believe you me, this is not the most controversial release I have planned), due to their lack of popularity with the kvltists, but this is one of my favourite albums. Although I'm a little less enamored with it than I was when I first heard it, I believe that's due to the amount I've listened to it dulling its effect on me. Don't let the 'metalcore' tag put you off.
From the artwork to the music contained therein, this is essentially the genesis of the DSBM (depressive suicidal black metal) genre. Although it's not my favourite genre, I can easily appreciate the beauty (it's even uplifting at times) of this.
Although the artwork format looks kind of strained with that length of album title, I'd like to take another opportunity during a theme I've already described to thank Teekylee once again for its awesomeness. She won't be uploading herself, but it's nice to have a resident artist.
The reason why these seem to come in roughly alphabetical order is that I batch upload them. Moving on... A Forest Of Stars' second album is good, certainly - it's not one I'd herald among the greats of odd BM, but it comes at the request of another author of this blog. My only real criticisms, however, are that there is not enough time spent with the meat of the issue (i.e. the black metal), and the album is too long.
N.B. In case you hadn't guessed, this is not official artwork, of which there is none.
