General Chat

1983 wasn't such a bad year, but in retrospect it feels like a year that was waiting for something big to happen. I know I was - I was shit broke and still working nightshifts in a factory making frozen pies, so some of these records really helped make that shit easier to live with.

Anyway, here's my top dozen for that year.

https://metal.academy/lists/single/346

1. Mercyful Fate - "Melissa"

2. Iron Maiden - "Piece of Mind"

3. Slayer - "Show No Mercy"

4. Satan - "Court in the Act"

5. Metallica - "Kill 'Em All"

6. Dio - "Holy Diver"

7. Raven - "All For One"

8. Motörhead - "Another Perfect Day"

9. Thin Lizzy - "Thunder and Lightning"

10. Acid - "Maniac"

11. Anvil - "Forged in Fire"

12. Battleaxe - "Burn This Town"

Just re-reading Fahrenheit 451 and I am truly stunned at how prophetic it was. The inanity of a lot of modern entertainment and uncritical modes of thinking are predicted from almost 70 years ago.

I can’t respond right now, but these writings def resonate with me. Thank you for sharing so honestly.

Time for the nerdy spreadsheet output for March's features. A tie for top spot this month with the psych-doom of Saturnalia Temple and the brutal core of Converge both getting 4.5 scores.  I have abstained from voting for The Gateway, Sphere and Infinite releases as I just found them too alienating for my tastes. 

I just finished watching the final season of "The Walking Dead" & it was a much better series than season 10 & a fitting ending for the show (even if there is about a thousand spin-off shows to consume if I ever feel the need). I got pretty emotional at times during the final episode which is always a good sign.

Oh man. That f--in sucks. RIP.

I have been interested in this sort of genre popularity data for a while. Obviously the number of total metal releases has greatly increased over the years so I think the best indicator of genre trends would be when compared as a percentage of total metal releases, thus better reflecting what metalheads are listening to. Earlier years, such as the very early '80s would be almost 100% heavy metal which would then decline as each new genre assumes its presence and increases. This  would also show if a particular genre enjoys a renaissance or resurgence within the overallcmetal community.

I checked into the above bands (some I was familiar with prior), but nothing took off for me. Weirdly enough I found myself super into Yngwie Malmsteen out of nowhere-I had been aware of him of course. I been playing Tokyo Xtreme Racer '25 and it pairs really nice with Malmsteen's flamboyant guitar. I listened my way through his a good chunk of his discography. Parabellum is killer, and I might write something out for that one. I also got my music room set up in my house, been chipping away at my lessons and having good ol time.

The fact that the Aussies have performed very poorly in the T20 World Cup has been more than made up for by the fact that my Detroit Pistons are now the number 1 ranked NBA team & the Sydney Kings have taken out the minor premiership in the NBL. Fucking loving my basketball right now, especially Pistons point guard Cade Cunningham who is absolutely sensational.

I really enjoyed listening to this playlist this afternoon. The latest tracklisting is as follows:

01. Cruciform - "Gutter" (from "Paradox" demo, 1995)

02. Slipknot - "Birth of the Cruel" (from "We Are Not Your Kind", 2019)

03. Cryptopsy - "The Nimis Adoration" (from "An Insatiable Violence", 2025)

04. Bathory - "Sociopath" (from "Octagon", 1995)

05. Dream Theater - "The Great Debate" (from "Six Degrees of Inner Turbulence", 2002)

06. In Flames - "Behind Space '99" (from "Colony", 1999)

07. The Dillinger Escape Plan - "Panasonic Youth" (from "Miss Machine", 2004)

08. Mortician - "Apocalyptic Devastation" (from "Hacked Up For Barbeque", 1997)

09. Converge - "Under Duress" (from "The Dusk In Us", 2017)

10. Gojira - "Clone" (from "Terra Incognita", 2001)

11. Invocator - "Altar of Sacrifice" (from "Slatanic Slaughter Vol. 1", 1995)

12. Rammstein - "Weisses Fleisch" (from "Herzeleid", 1995)

13. Dying Fetus - "Blunt Force Trauma" (from "Purification Through Violence", 1996)

14. Damaged - "Internal Dismemberment Conflicts" (from "Passive Backseat Demon Engines" E.P., 1995)

15. Wolves in the Throne Room - "Face in a Night Time Mirror, Pt. 2" (from "Diadem of 12 Stars", 2006)

16. Orphanage - "Weltschmerz" (from "Oblivion", 1995)

17. Wintersun - "Beautiful Death" (from "Wintersun", 2004)

18. Nails - "Imposing Will" (from "Every Bridge Burning", 2024)

19. Black Lodge - "Dissonance" (from "Covet", 1995)

20. Summoning - "A Distant Flame Before The Sun" (from "Stronghold", 1999)

21. Six Feet Under - "Remains of You" (from "Haunted", 1995)

22. Dark Tranquillity - "Silence, & the Firmament Withdrew" (from "The Gallery", 1995)

I'm similar to Ben in that I quite like "Killers" but have always placed it behind the other classic-period Maiden albums. Similarly, I don't rate the Dianno-era anywhere near the Dickinson one but I'm also gonna suggest that "Killers" was a touched over-produced so I slightly prefer the rawer self-titled over it.

Continuing this for 2026:

Inspired by several members' allusions to their own spreadsheet lists, particularly Ben and Daniel, since new year I have been transferring all my ratings into spreadsheet form. I am about halfway through my 6500 or so RYM ratings and it has only now hit me exactly how much I listen to that I either actively dislike or which I find mediocre at best. So another new year resolution is to try to actively seek out better music to listen to and stop wasting my time on crap.

In addition to this, it has become apparent to me that some of my higher ratings, particularly ones I have had for a long time, are as much based on nostalgia, memories and emotion as much as on actual quality and I have forgiven flaws in some of these older albums that I wouldn't have to releases with lesser personal relevance. In the interests of fairness then, I intend to re-evaluate a lot of my long-standing higher ratings, based purely on musical quality and not emotional redolence, over the coming months, so expect to see a shift in the scores of some of my significant ratings soon.

I've decided to resurrect this thread, but this time only include albums that were out so far this century, inspired by this video:

So here are my top albums for each year of the new century (including the year 2000):

2000: Eighteen Visions - Until the Ink Runs Out

2001: Converge - Jane Doe

2002: Killswitch Engage - Alive or Just Breathing

2003: Kayo Dot - Choirs of the Eye

2004: Unearth - The Oncoming Storm

2005: Trivium - Ascendancy

2006: Mercenary - The Hours That Remain

2007: Becoming the Archetype - The Physics of Fire

2008: All That Remains - Overcome

2009: Trail of Tears - Bloodstained Endurance

2010: High on Fire - Snakes for the Divine

2011: Trivium - In Waves

2012: Make Them Suffer - Neverbloom

2013: Northlane - Singularity

2014: Beartooth - Disgusting

2015: Intronaut - The Direction of Last Things

2016: Insomnium - Winter's Gate

2017: Unleash the Archers - Apex

2018: Ice Nine Kills - The Silver Scream

2019: Shadow of Intent - Melancholy

2020: Code Orange - Underneath

2021: Trivium - In the Court of the Dragon

2022: Lorna Shore - Pain Remains

2023: Mutoid Man - Mutants

2024: Ryujin - Ryujin

2025: Lorna Shore - I Feel the Everblack Festering Within Me

For the record, it doesn't cost much at all to purchase legitimate non-AI artwork online. Artists are all competing for the opportunity to advertise their work on an album cover & will virtually give their work away. The Neuropath CD cover only cost the label around $100-$150 USD & the other one we were considering was under $100 USD. I'm assuming that the reason for using AI is to achieve total creative control over the image.

So, if it is reasonably cheap to buy decent artwork, why do so many bands go with such boring, non-descript efforts, such as the example in my post? Is this an actual aesthetic and if so, what are they trying to illustrate or communicate, because I don't really get it?

I do need to get around to reviewing and rating the rest of the Death discography, although I say that to myself everytime I look at one of these lists.

Out of curiosity, how many of them have you heard?  And if all of them, how long has it been since you last went back on them?

All of them (have them all on CD) but must be 12 months since I last listened to any one of them.

I went to the releases tag and put together a chart for the highest-rated Swedish albums with a 5 vote minimum.

https://metal.academy/releases?releasesFilters=1&releaseCountry%5B%5D=211&releaseSort=releases.overall_rating&releaseSortType=DESC&releasesCountRating=5&fromYear=&toYear=

Candlemass is the clear winner.  Everything else is a bit scattered.  I'm surprised Blackwater Park is so low, though.

My own Spotify playlist based on my list, from 10 to 1: https://open.spotify.com/playlist/4uZGrg1oM7C6xf3Zkhis40

Oh these cover art coincidences just never end! The cover arts for that The Devil Wears Prada demo and that The Arbitrary Method EP both have a close-up of a woman's face behind an abstract pattern. Though the latter is definitely more futuristic, just like the EP itself.

I don't think metalheads have gone anywhere.

Metal has always been music for outsiders and delinquents (not in a bad way obviously). Aren't a lot of the early metal albums heavily influential in the punk scene dominated by The Sex Pistols and Misfits during the mid/late 70s? It isn't that metal isn't popular, it just requires some deep exploration to find, unlike the milquetoast soft rock and pop music that gets tons of airplay. Where I live, we have at least four top 40 radio stations, which seems absurdly high.

And yeah they'll be crossover into the mainstream on occasion; using RIAA certification (which itself is a rather old technique) Back in Black has reported 50 million units sold since 1980. Both Metallica's self titled album and Linkin Park's Hybrid Theory are diamond certified in the US. Clearly, people are listening to metal when its marketed well.

Could it be that metal fans don't only listen to metal anymore? With a lot of metal music itself playing around with outside genres, and a few popular genres being more accessible in general, perhaps the average metal fan isn't as "metal or nothing" as they used to be?

Parroting off what Ben said, this idea that metal music has to be just Mayhem, Cannibal Corpse and Slayer is an old and tired. Old time jazz musicians like Wynton Marsalis are notorious for having declared everything released beyond 1965 as "not real jazz" because it incorporates fusion. At the end of the day, that fusion stuff is used by many to lure an audience in and then they can transition to more of the genre's roots. I like Bad Omens, but they are an outlier in my typical listening consisting of Opeth, Mastodon, Katatonia, and The Mars Volta. And even then, I feel the old man creeping out when I say that because all of those bands have been around since the 1990s and sound nothing like modern metal. This genre has evolved over time and Rick Beato is old enough to realize this. The fact that he doesn't proves his ignorance on the social aspect of a trend.

I'm sure in a decades time, there will be a new band like Sleep Token or Poppy that old timers will not stand, while young, impressionable teens will ooh and ahh over the hybrid of downtuned guitars, demon shrieks and glitchy electronic percussion. And it'll be up to us to either welcome them into the metal community or gatekeep them out.

So, I've decided to start a new monthly playlist that provides people with a surprise mix of metal material that doesn't focus on any particular clan. It's essentially just a selection of the best material from all of the releases I've listened to enough to rate in recent weeks & I've called it "Metal Academy Radio's Metal Party Mix Tape" for the time being. I think my listening habits are broad enough to give it the desired amount of variety & have intentionally left the programming really random so that you never know what's coming next but also because I have no time to spend on programming these days. It'll be continually evolving as I listen to my next release with the longer-term inclusions giving way to the more recent experiences. I've been really enjoying this playlist over the last couple of weeks. See what you think.

https://open.spotify.com/playlist/2JhEdPqjMqaMjnqIYKSwlq?si=abbc65cf26dc4c67

I originally posted this in the "Release Lists" thread, but ultimately I decided to move it to its own. And that idea is...the best albums of (almost) every metal genre, inspired by this Metal Trenches video:

Here's mine:

Thrash metal: Annihilator - Alice in Hell (1989)

Groove metal: Orbit Culture - Death Above Life (2025)

Death metal: Dark Sermon - The Oracle (2015)

Melodic death metal: The Halo Effect - Days of the Lost (2022)

Blackened death metal: Shade Empire - Omega Arcane (2013)

Black metal: Samael - Blood Ritual (1992)

Nu metal: Cane Hill - Smile (2016)

Doom metal: October Tide - Rain Without End (1997)

Power metal: DragonForce - Inhuman Rampage (2006)

Heavy metal: Enforcer - Zenith (2019)

Symphonic metal: Avantasia - Ghostlights (2016)

Progressive metal: Ne Obliviscaris - Portal of I (2012)

Metalcore: Trivium - In Waves (2011)

Mathcore: The Dillinger Escape Plan - Calculating Infinity (1999)

Deathcore: Lorna Shore - I Feel the Everblack Festering Within Me (2025)

Post-metal: Rolo Tomassi - Where Myth Becomes Memory (2022)

Sludge metal: Will Haven - WHVN (1999)

Industrial metal: Godflesh - Streetcleaner (1989)

Grindcore: N/A

Folk metal: N/A (for now)

So what are some of your best albums of every metal genre? Discuss!

Just put in a pre-order for the "Watching From A Distance" 4x LP boxset 20th Anniversary edition. It's a bit pricey, but some things are worth it!

I recently got back in the BC thang after a hiatus.  Daniel has covered most of what I was going to say, however I like it stillas a platform for all music and have made some good idscoveries over the years by browsing other users collections.  My collection can be located below.

https://bandcamp.com/stiffncold

Quoted Vinny

Yeah, I have had a bit of a hiatus from BC for a while too and have only just got back into using it. It isn't just the "ethical" side of it, I do actually like it as a music platform. The only real bugbear is that browsing your collection if it is of any size, particularly on a tablet, can be awfully time consuming. Of course there is always the search function, but sometimes I like to just spool through and pick something out on a whim.

This weekend I have bought:

Raphael Weinroth-Browne - "Lifeblood" CD

Abduction - "Existentialismus" vinyl LP

Arkhaaik - "Uihtis" CD (postage from Germany made the vinyl LP £45, so I ended up going for the cheaper alternative because I ain't made of money).

In saying that, I don't believe that metal is less conducive to absolute garbage than other genres. In fact, the bottom end of my ratings database if littered with metal filth, most of it being far worse than Justin Bieber. 

Me as well.   I've got quite a few metal albums ranked at 0/100, including Attila's Fallacy and the two Thrash Queen albums.  Metal's some incredible stuff, but sometimes somebody puts out something that only manages to be an embarrassment to it's genre.  Hell, that's the only reason to check out Psycho Synner or Keydragon.

Good photo, Sonny! That can also double as a potential Spotify blackgaze playlist image.

The automated bots don't succeed in actually creating an account here as it would have to select clans during the process. We've only ever had a small amount of successful fake users created and I'm convinced it's done manually (as in a person actually bothered the manually create the account for the purpose). Anyway, I've deleted the user and review. It just takes a bit to disappear off the front page.

Thanks Ben. Once more your dedication is admirable.

Hmm, I didn't notice that, I'll have to see if I think that when the next one comes around. Cornell sounds more like Robert Plant to me, albeit with a grunge tint, whereas Tice didn't really remind me much of anyone.

A couple more of my favorite metal YouTubers I've been watching lately include Steve Terreberry (definitely in the "funny" category) and Jared Dines. For the latter, Jared hosted a contest for vocalists to write their own chorus to perform for a song he wrote for his project with Howard Jones (ex-Killswitch Engage, Light the Torch), Sion. The winner would have their chorus added to the final product. NO, I didn't participate. I may be good at clean/harsh vocals, but I'm so not ready for the spotlight. Still I had a blast listening to around 150 vocalists sing and scream their hearts out. However, that's not all of them. It's only around 5% of the total, because Jared had actually received 3000 ENTRIES!!! Wow! This proves that there are still so many vocalists with confident passion this year besides the professionals out there. And it might just be the biggest metal vocalist contest in YouTube history! Anyway, the contest is over, and while the winner has gotten what he earned, we can still appreciate what other people have submitted, 100 of whom can be found in this video (quite a long one, so you don't have to watch it all if it's too much):

Here's a list of all the singers I enjoy from that video (consider this a list of who I would recommend listening to if you can't sit through the whole thing):

1:23 JOHHNY CIARDULLO (known for his Lorna Shore clean-sung covers, I enjoy his melody towards the end)

3:18 SPENCER (DAMAGEJOY) (quite some killer vocals here)

5:07 SAM POWER

6:22 ZSANI

7:36 MARIJE

8:51 HEAVY HOLDEN

9:31 YULIYA

11:32 DRYSTAN BARNETT (some of the most natural vocals here)

12:45 LAUREN

15:20 BENNY MARSON KHONGWIR (from delicate air to deathly fire)

17:32 SPRING HOLLOW

18:10 KURT WONDRELY

18:47 KOTTI (despite not winning, he had some potential)

19:23 LINUS

23:50 DANNY CHAVIS

27:03 NICOLAS GONZALEZ

30:05 JEREMY GRAHAM (such an impressive vocal range)

33:43 DAN ROHDE (Bring Your Pet Dog to a Vocal Contest Day)

39:27 MATTEO MAGAZZINI

42:26 PATRICK RUSSEL (that metal synthwave guy)

43:03 CHRIS HUFF

50:03 ASTRID CAROLINA (beautiful voice and beautiful hair, my personal favorite in the female category)

50:46 BOGDAN HASAS

51:24 BRANDON RENEGADE (probably the closest sounding to Howard Jones here)

52:00 BRYCE GARLAND

52:37 CAM HESSELBROCK

53:16 CAM WALCH

54:37 BEING HUMAN

56:41 CURTIS BLAND

57:28 DOOMICK THE PANCAKE

58:03 THE STEPMOMS (interesting band name)

58:40 EMIL SKOLD

59:20 EMIR BEKBOLOTOV (my personal favorite in the heavy category)

59:59 FELIPE QUEIROZ

1:04:50 JORDAN HOUGHTON (the most pop-ish one here)

1:06:40 KASEY KARLSEN

1:08:04 LINUS (SAWCON) (the German lyrics really pack a punch)

1:08:41 LOGAN GAMESON

1:16:31 NIGHTFARER (reminds me a bit of Issues)

1:17:49 PETER MITCHELL

1:22:45 LEO KRACK (amazing blackened-ish screaming, but hard to hear the song)

1:26:55 YELLOWSTAR

1:28:58 ZOKZO (my personal favorite in the melodic category)

1:29:39 DARIO SAVINO

1:30:55 SOHEIL AVAKH (my personal favorite in the category that blends heavy and melodic)

1:31:30 ADAM R

1:40:42 JOEL DICKSON (excellent, but why did he only do the first half?)

1:43:48 CHRISTIAN O'NEAL (impressive highs, close to post-hardcore category)

As much as all those vocalists deserve their time to shine, of course, there could only be one winner. I won't spoil who won, but I'll say he's easily one of my top 10 in the list. If you'd like to know the winner, see this video at 15:40, 21:20, and 23:40:

Good list, Rex! I enjoy the opening tracks for those Neurosis and Killing Joke albums as well.

It's just a bit disappointing when there literally doesn't appear to be anything beyond a blurry 150 x 150 image that's cropped badly anywhere on the internet, which happens from time to time.

Sounds awesome. I can't wait to get this release into my Walkman so I can reach a level of superiority that sits above literally everyone while fantasizing about moving out of mum & dad's place & finally losing my virginity.

My death metal band Neuropath was originally called Coprophagia which is the condition you have if you eat feces.

Looks like I'll be active in the Sports Countdown on MoFo as well.  Right now I'm on Pride of the Yankees.  So far, the only flaws I can see are that the direction isn't "amazing" but works well enough, and that Cooper's a bit too old for the younger Lou Gherig.  I'm really liking the character drama.  Everyone bounces off each other beautifully.

This is based on the number of their albums in my top 100.

1. Guardians (29) - This was the metal spirit that introduced me to the genre as well as the world.  Songs like Dazed and Confused would influence many later songs that lured me in, oftentimes by bands such as Scorpions or Metallica or Dio.  And then you add the symphonic stuff, much akin to the artist that my father introduced to me at 15: Meat Loaf, changing my world, and suddenly you've got the perfect clan for me.

2. The Fallen (23) - I feel like the Fallen has a bit of an unfair advantage with so many subgenres under its belt, but taking influence from the Sabbath side of things can in fact go a long way.  There's metal that sends lightning through your veins, and then there's the stuff that crushes your soul.  I can't deny that Neurosis had a big say on expanding my metallic horizons.

3. Infinite (19) - While most post-metal hasn't had much of a say in my metal affairs, the progressive and avant-garde stuff is the kind of thing that really gets my brain pumping.  Starting with Dream Theater, I eventually moved to Tool, Symphony X and similar bands, and I especially love how it can move into practically any genre with ease, from power to death.

4. Horde (15) - As with many, my first venture into death metal came through Symbolic, and it wasn't long after until the heaviest shit imaginable was not but pussy to me.  Although there aren't very many death songs or albums I could call favorites, they keep managing to find my way to my top 100 albums

5. North (14) - Sometimes you need to just sit down and embrace the darkness, or the sadness, whichever you prefer.  Folk metal and viking metal are quite fun on their own, but the black metal easily outshines it on my charts.  Nevertheless, Moonsorrow, which encompasses all three, is one of the finest examples of each of the three as well.  It just sends you back in time the way LOTR does.

6. Pit (9) - Thrash was a pretty slow venture.  Believe it or not, when I first heard Master of Puppets and Ride the Lightning, I didn't really get into them beyond a couple songs.  But further ventures into heavy, power and death helped me to overcome that.  Master of Puppets and Ride the Lightning have both spent time as my number 1 metal album of all time, although speed metal struggles to keep up with thrash's output IMO.

7. Gateway (5) - There is very little alternative metal that I'm in love with.  The only example I can think of right now is Dirt by Alice in Chains because I went on many grunge binges in my early days online.  Otherwise, quality alt-metal is something I appreciate critically rather than being engrossed in personally.

8. Revolution (5) - I love almost all kinds of punk.  I went through various binges in a variety of punk genres, but metalcore isn't one of those that I've been able really grip beyond a few key bands.  Especially when the subgenres like deathcore kick in, metalcore's more of a guilty pleasure rather than a serious venture.  Still, I found that alt-metal can be much more imaginative in the whole, hence albums like Lateralus and White Pony.

9. Sphere (1) - Although I consider Killing Joke's Extremities an industrial metal album as well, there is extremely little industrial metal in my chart because much of it gets more monotonous than it needs to be, even the much better ones.

Alright so I even tried this:

1. Delete the whole review.
2. Past as Plain Text to Notepad
3. Put nonsense text in the review
4. Submit the nonsense.
5. Reopen the review, and resubmmit the original review as plain text.

Still in tiny ville. Not sure what's up. Gonna see if I can figure it out after work this afternoon. 

Check out for consultation my (AMM) All Metal Music! On Quora: A playlist designed to serve as a database of accessible audio of all metal genres. Very authentic and uncompromising! 

https://allmetalmusic.quora.com/

That's good to hear, Daniel. Hope things will continue working out well and you can stay healthy.

“Information is not knowledge.

Knowledge is not wisdom.

Wisdom is not truth.

Truth is not beauty.

Beauty is not love.

Love is not music.

Music is THE BEST.”

― Frank Zappa

This is one of those cases where an idealist has to have every little thing be perfect without realizing that "evil" itself is based in justifying a low opinion of a whole group by pointing out something they often do that may be perceived as "wrong."  There is no such thing as "perfectly evil" or "perfectly good," thus there's no merit to attacking a persona's musical abilities along with their beliefs in many cases.  He's doing the same thing that Burzum's doing, stereotyping.  Evil keeps placing blame and then justifying cruelty.  And zealousness is a form of cruelty, as it's built on drastically low opinions of people.  The way he's thinking, it's like saying "You can't say Hitler was good at strategy!  He's evil!"  But if he wasn't good at strategy, then he wouldn't have been a major dictator.  Basically, the lie that a person needs to either be good at everything or bad at everything is a disappointment, and I honestly believe people who think like that shouldn't even be allowed to vote...

I would say all of this to this person and then reply with, "and how do I know you don't support something evil?  Did it ever occur to you that someone you support could be doing something evil and hiding it?  Don't tell me you can confirm that none of your favorite artists do that."  Then I would block him.  People like that tend to focus on the last thing said, which will either make this person more mad or plant a seed in the head that might grow larger or both.

We definitely don't need to worry about that now. Seems like RYM is aware of the scene/genre situation and will fix the issue in a later update. Here's what they had to say:

"For the moment Scene and Movement voting is still mixed in with genre voting on this page, even though they are now displayed separately. The voting UI for this will be improved at some point in the future.

"For Scenes and Movements the primary/secondary vote distinction is irrelevant, it is recommended to just vote them up in the Primary section but in the future the voting data for these will likely be combined. Again this is something that will be improved in future site updates."

Fuck Yes! Cheers!

This is extraordinarily difficult for me to find.  The only band of this example with more four albums that I can think of is Boston, and they aren't even metal.  Yes, each one did get gradually worse, and they only have six.

It's not a perfect process, but then there really isn't one. It's the one that I enjoy using and feel happiest with the results.

That's the only thing that matters.

I think the Ulcerate, Oranssi Pazuzu & Knocked Loose records were kinda no-brainers. I'm skeptical about the Critical Defiance one's claims but at the end of the day it comes down to how much the entire site has enjoyed a release which is always going to favour the more well-known artists.

I know I said I didn't know if any of the novels I read capture the metal spirit, but they do now! I was reading this graphic novel adaptation of Star Wars - Revenge of the Sith:

While listening to all the industrial/cyber metal tracks I've shared in this page of the Sphere Track of the Day thread: https://metal.academy/forum/15/thread/193?page=9

Star Wars can really capture my cyber metal spirit. I guess the most suitable metal genre for Star Wars would be Mechina-style epic symphonic progressive cyber metal.

Idea I've had for a minute. Spotify has a jam feature that lets you start playing music then other people can come in and add theirs. I see potentional in it for this site. It might be sloppy at first, but only way to refine it is to do it. 

So...

If you got nothing better to do hop in here, and put your tracks in: 
Spotify Jam 01.21.25 12:50 EST

I'm gonna try to have this up for the day, so jump in even if it's been a long time since it started.

In no particular order:

Motorhead - Overkill

Slayer - Raining Blood

Darkthrone - In the Shadow of the Horns

Black Sabbath - Black Sabbath

Diamond Head - Am I Evil?

Iron Maiden - Phantom of the Opera

Autopsy - In the Grip of Winter

Jurassic metal.  Sounds like a doom sludge hybrid with apocalyptic classical undertones and deep reptilian growls.  I like the idea.

I think the only major change is how much power metal played into writing my debut.  My second book had nothing to do with power metal, but as I was proofreading the final stages, I played Type O Negative's Paranoid a lot.

I think in little ways, the clan system got me interested in exploring other areas for conversational purposes, which is likely why I like TON so much now, as well as Septicflesh.

Just watched these videos and, sadly, I'm not really that surprised. So many people on social media wish to project an image of themselves that is duplicitous, why wouldn't it infect the extreme metal world too? Like the guys on the videos say, it's not that the drummers in question are poor musicians in the first place - I wish I was one tenth as talented - but society demands perfection whether in looks or ability, so dishonesty has become the norm. 95% is no longer good enough, 101% is the minimum requirement now that everyone is under the microscope. 

What is really sad is that knowing they are being duplicitous must have a detrimental effect on their esteem and mental well-being.

So I'm on the power metal Reddit, browsing through my various subreddits for something to do.  There's a discussion on Gloryhammer called, "Am I the only one who thinks Gloryhammer doesn’t actually embrace the 'cheese?'"  Part of the conversation pertains to Gloryhammer's later album.  My response to one guy criticizing the overall post, saying that it looks like the OP's trying to say that the older albums are better.  I reply to him saying:

"I do agree that the new album doesn't hold a candle to the first three (of course I've heard asstons of power metal so by this point it should come across as fairly unoriginal), but they know what they want to be. Bowes has always been a joker. Ever hear his original experimental stuff? Yikes. On top of that, they originally stole the logo font for the Dark Crystal for their own logo, and jagged it up (probably to avoid a lawsuit IMO). They know what they are, and they know who they want to be."

Apparently, the guy I replied to was Christopher Bowes.  And instead of letting this embarrass me, I'm gonna own this bit like a good bar story, because that's actually a hilarious and very cool thing that happened in my boring-ass life.