Rules & Announcements

There are two Stoner Metal challenges up in the Lists section. The guide for using them is contained within each challenge.

Man, there are a lot of bongs and breasts adorning stoner metal album covers.

Now that I've completed Tymell's epic request list (which I really enjoyed!), I'm turning my attention back to some label lists. I realised I hadn't done one for Earache, only to discover that there were only three bands I needed to add to the site to be able to complete it. I guess that shows how far the site has come since I started doing these!

Anyway, you can check out the first 100 metal releases on the Earache label here...

https://metal.academy/lists/single/59

Pretty awesome list actually, particularly when it comes to early death metal. I'm surprised I've only rated a quarter of the releases on it.

Cheers.  Ok, will have a flick through and see which one appeals.

Don't worry Ben. I got this. I've got a long list of poor quality, obscure, completely unknown demos & 7 inches that I wanted to add anyway. Most whose cover art is simply a hand-drawn picture of something ridiculously childish & offensive where the only online pics available are blurry photos that show someone's hand holding them up in front of an old Nokia cell phone in poor light. I'm sure you'll be fine with it.

Thanks guys!

Gonna take a break from the challenges for now and catch up on some new releases.

There's a Symphonic Metal challenge up in the Lists section. The guide for using it is contained within the challenge itself.

There's a Drone Metal challenge up in the Lists section. The guide for using it is contained within the challenge itself.

With a result of 14 yes to 1 No, Vektor's Black Future has been added to The Infinite and given the Progressive Metal genre.

A Spotify list for this challenge can be found below:

Groove Metal

Spotify lists for these challenges can be found below:

Folk Metal: The Early Days

Folk Metal: The Modern Era

Spotify lists for these challenges can be found below:

Avant-Garde Metal - The Early Days

Avant-Garde Metal - The Modern Era

The Spotify list for this challenge can be found below:

Industrial Metal

Spotify Lists for these challenges can be found below.

Grindcore - The Early Days

Grindcore - The Modern Era

Spotify Lists can be found below. The vast majority of releases are available on the service.

Power Metal - The Early Days

Power Metal - The Modern Era

Spotify Lists can be found below. The vast majority of releases are available on the service.

Gothic - The Early Days

Gothic - The Modern Era

I notice the minimum ratings for the charts has been increased to five now. Excellent!

Wow, Ben wasn't kidding when he said these were going to be a challenge!

However, I believe I have completed the Doom Metal - The Modern Era challenge at last.

Really enjoyed it, got back into some albums I've not played for a while and found some I've not heard before. I don't find writing reviews particularly easy and it can be quite mentally tiring, albeit very rewarding, so I think I'll take a break before embarking on my next challenge,  - The North and The Pit await...

Thanks folks.  Think I am gonna hit a Pit challenge over the coming weeks, rated a few already but never got around to reviews.

I have managed to use my downtime over Xmas and New Year well and appear to have completed the 2nd Decade challenge the day before I head back to work.

You have indeed! Congratulations mate! That was some festive season effort to get there. You are the very first Metal Academy Attendee to "lock in" one of your three chosen clans. You're a quarter of a way to gaining a much-desired 4th clan.

I will create a new thread to celebrate the occasion.

Spotify lists for the Progressive Metal challenges are below:

Progressive Metal - The 1st Decade

Progressive Metal - The 2nd Decade

Progressive Metal - The Modern Era

I don't consider myself to be a big fan of Prog Metal and yet these challenges are filled with some of my favourite albums. I think if anything that shows how diverse the genre actually is. I may not be attracted to the Dream Theater style of technical wizardry, but I sure love bands like Arcturus, Devin Townsend, Amorphis, Emperor, Enslaved, Gojira, Maudlin of the Well, Meshuggah, Nevermore, Anacrusis, Coroner, Cynic and, of course, Opeth.

Maybe I am a fan after all?!

Spotify playlists can be found below:

Alternative Metal - The Early Days

Alternative Metal - The Modern Era

This list is now complete up to 300. Will finish it off shortly.

Seems kinda lazy to me Ben. I would have thought you'd have been well over 100,000 by now. Just sayin'.

*fetches popcorn, sits back & waits for reaction*

I've added up to 150. Scrolling through the list, there's an obvious pattern that I think really shows that the clan system we've developed for Metal Academy is already working. In about 90% of cases, the Clan Rating for each release is higher than the Site Rating. This is exactly what we expected to happen, as fans of a genre will generally rate releases higher than those that don't consider the genre to be one of their favourites. I think this pattern will only become more prevalent as the site gains more traction.

The first 100 Hammerheart Records metal releases are now complete, so I'll step away from that list for a while.

Since no-one has suggested the next label I should focus on, I'm going to select one myself. I'm going to go with...

...Season of Mist.

Exposing my average ratings on classic Slayer/Bathory, I see how it is. 

Looks great, way more useful info at a glance. Awesome that you got this added so quickly!

I'm about to announce another big new feature too. Go to your profile for a neat surprise.

Yes, eventually I'll add a Bayesian algorithm. I reckon we need quite a few more ratings for that to be viable though. If you all help me spread the word, you'll get it quicker. 

This is all fantastic feedback Xephyr. I'll begin work on all of it and see what we can do.

While I was already pleased with the performance of the website, we were rapidly running out of disk space due to all the high res cover images I've used. I've upped the space considerably, with the added bonus that the site has also been given significant boost in speed.

I can add albums at twice the speed now, so expect even more metal goodness in the weeks / months to come!

Thank you very much for putting this list together. With everything I'm doing for the site, I've been wondering how I will find the time to hunt down non-metal anomalies. This list will be a great starting point. 

Thanks Strig!

It's difficult to attract members to a site like this, so we're just trusting that if we keep adding features that we personally find useful, the community will eventually come.

You can now send private messages to other Metal Academy members. Simply go to any member's profile and select Send PM. Previous conversations can be viewed indefinitely in the Messages section of your profile.

Metal Academy now has notification functionality. You can now receive an email notification when:

1. Someone comments on one of your reviews

2. Someone likes one of your reviews

3. Someone replies to a forum thread that you've subscribed to

4. Someone sends you a private message (private message feature will be available very soon)

You can change your notification settings in the Accounts section of your Metal Academy profile

Cheers,

Ben.