Tiamat's "Clouds" should have Gothic Metal added to it
Although 'Clouds' is generally touted as being a doom/death release, I’ve never agreed with that sentiment. As a death metal musician myself, I can tell you that there’s bugger-all genuine death metal on the album. Even the vocals of rhythm guitarist Johan Edlund don’t come close to anything particularly deathly, instead taking the form of an awkward hybrid of clean & growly styles. There’s not much that resembles death metal in the instrumentation either other than some sporadic up-tempo parts that seem to have been haphazardly inserted into the tracklisting at random intervals, a feature that I regard as the clear weakness of 'Clouds' as an album. On the other hand, the gothic sound that would become a permanent fixture for Tiamat releases moving forwards is already well & truly in effect & may in fact be the most prominent attribute of the album so I'd like to see 'Clouds' added to the Gothic Metal genre on top of its existing Doom Metal one. That would leave it sitting as a Gothic Doom Metal release which I feel is a much more appropriate representation of its overall sound.
This nomination has now been posted in the Hall of Judgement.