Daniel's Forum Replies
The nomination has been posted in the Hall of Judgement.
These nominations have been passed.
This nomination has been passed.
This nomination has been passed.
I don't have a middle name as I find them to be unsophisticated.
"Mental Funeral" is Autopsy's finest work in my opinion. I'm possibly not as big an Autopsy fan as most extreme metal nuts are as I tend to favour a more sophisticated brand of death metal but they really hit a sweet spot with this record as well as the "Retribution For The Dead" E.P. from the same year, both of which I found to be a clear step up from "Severed Survival" (3.5/5) which I've always found to be overrated. The enhanced doom component was certainly most welcome.
4/5
Dokken - "Back For The Attack" (1987)
Following on from last week’s disappointing investigation of Los Angeles glam metal legends Dokken’s 1985 third album “Under Lock & Key”, I thought it would be worth me reassessing the record that first drew me to the band (& more specifically their wonderful guitarist George Lynch) iback in the late 1980's in order to see whether my positivity around 1987’s “Back For The Attack” (Dokken’s highest selling record) was more about teen nostalgia than it was genuine merit. The unpolished hard rock of Don Dokken’s 1981 debut album “Breakin’ The Chains” didn’t do much for me when I checked it out during my Metal Academy podcast research many years ago now but it’s 1984 follow-up “Tooth & Nail” was much more metal & subsequently fit in closer to my taste profile so my experience with arguably the band’s most highly regarded release (i.e. “Under Lock & Key”) was a touch underwhelming. This saw me going into “Back For The Attack” a little tentatively but with high hopes of a glam metal revival.
The first thing I noticed about “Back For The Attack” was the production with Lynch’s guitar tone being absolutely shredding. It’s very easy to see why people will want to lump Dokken in with your classic heavy metal sound based on that element alone, especially when you consider that Lynch’s performance is the clear highlight of the album. In fact, I think this is really where George comes of age because I’d found myself doubting myself a little while listening to the first three records. He was certainly pretty special but nothing like as mind-blowing as he is here. This right here is what placed him in my top few guitar influences & I can’t fully express how impressive his tone & phrasing are here, not to mention the dazzling technique. Don puts in possibly his best performance to date too with several of the chorus hooks drawing me in when the overall aesthetics of the song-writing sees me wanting to pull away. This wasn’t the case with “Under Lock & Key” which was simply too poppy & commercialized me for but “Back For The Attack” has a metal edge & stronger, more mature song-writing that allows the highlight tracks to more than compensate for the cheesier glam metal numbers like “So Many Tears”, “Burning Like A Flame” & the particularly poor “Stop Fighting Love”.
Dokken have never sounded tighter & more cohesive than they do on “Back For The Attack” &, when combined with an attractive album cover, it’s not hard to see why it might have been such a commercial success for the band. I particularly enjoy the gritty hard rock of “Heaven Sent”, the energetic glam metal of “Sleepless Night” & the clear album highlight “Mr. Scary” which sees Lynch being allowed to stand alone in the spotlight & show us all what he’s really capable of in what must surely be one of the greatest instrumental guitar displays of all time. “Breakin’ The Chains” & “Under Lock & Key” simply sound watered down compared to the best material on this record with some of the transitions hitting with a weightier crunch than Dokken had previously achieved to the time. I guess this begs the question of whether “Back For The Attack” is a genuine heavy metal record or not which I think is a really interesting question because, much like “Under Lock & Key”, the guitars sit very much in metal territory. I think the answer depends on the listener’s position on whether glam metal is a hard rock subgenre or a metal one. Here at Metal Academy we’ve generally taking the stance that it’s more rock than metal &, that being the case, I would have to suggest that this album sits outside of our scope. Sure, there are a few metal tunes included amongst the thirteen songs on the tracklisting but I don’t think that’s enough to compete with the lop-sided result of its battle with glam metal extravagance here. The chorus hooks, hard rock beats & gang vocals are simply too easy on the ear for this to be regarded as a genuine metal release in my opinion. Songs like “Kiss Of Death”, “Standing In The Shadows”, “Mr. Scary” & “Lost Behind The Wall” should offer heavy metal fans a fair bit of encouragement nonetheless though.
Overall, I’d suggest that “Back For The Attack” is the best of Dokken’s four 1980’s studio albums with it just pipping out “Tooth & Nail”. It may not be as sophisticated as I remember it being as a kid but it’s presented in an undeniably attractive package that may have a thick layer of icing sugar on the outside but also has a deliciously gooey centre that tastes bloody great at times.
3.5/5
P.S. I think I'm comfortable with where this release sits in the top ten list I posted earlier in this thread. No changes required.
Here's my Top Ten Metal Releases of 1986 list:
01. Slayer - "Reign In Blood"
02. Metallica - "Master of Puppets"
03. Iron Maiden - "Somewhere In Time"
04. Kreator - "Pleasure To Kill"
05. Megadeth - "Peace Sells... But Who's Buying?"
06. Kreator - "Flag of Hate" E.P.
07. Agent Steel - "Mad Locust Rising" E.P.
08. Dark Angel - "Darkness Descends"
09. Crimson Glory - "Crimson Glory"
10. Saint Vitus - "Born Too Late"
https://metal.academy/lists/single/213
This would have to be in the running for the greatest year in all of metal. I mean "Epicus Doomicus Metallicus" didn't even make my list!
Iron Maiden - "Maiden England" (1994)
English heavy metal heavy-weights Iron Maiden & I have travelled a life-long journey together that’s been full of mind-blowing peaks as well as a few devastatingly low troughs but I’ve found their huge quantity of live releases to generally be pretty reliable over the years. Whether it’s their all-time classic 1985 double album “Live After Death”, 2002’s very solid “Rock In Rio”, their highly regarded underground bootleg “Beast Over Hammersmith” or their early Paul Dianno-fronted EP’s like “Maiden Japan” or “Live!! +One”, Maiden have invariably managed to reproduce the rollicking good time their obsessive fan base experiences at every show & is no doubt helped by the ridiculously large quantity of metal anthems they have access to in their back catalogue. I’d not heard 1994’s “Maiden England” double album before though & was feeling like some familiar tunes to rock out to while running some errands over the last few days so it fit the bill perfectly.
“Maiden England” is yet another double album/video package that has been remastered & re-released with the inclusion of a hefty amount of bonus material in recent years but I’ve opted to review the original version only for this exercise. On paper it really should be something utterly amazing too, at least for someone like myself whose favourite heavy metal releases of all time are Maiden’s more progressive late 80’s albums because “Maiden England” was recorded at the National Exhibition Centre in Birmingham, England on 27th & 28th November 1988 on the tour for the “Seventh Son Of A Seventh Son” record. The tracklisting is everything you could want from such a show too in that it includes a bunch of the big tracks from “Somewhere In Time” & “Seventh Son Of A Seventh Son” along with a selection of old classics, a couple of which seem to have been intentionally selected as tracks that weren’t included on “Live After Death” in “Still Life” & “The Prisoner”. So the scene was certainly set for a truly transcendent live release from one of the best in the business & there’s no doubt that it’s delivered a worthwhile outcome but there are a couple of obstacles here that prevent “Maiden England” from being held up on the same sort of pedestals as some of the other releases I mentioned above.
The first issue is the production which, despite not being inherently bad in any way, is a bit lacking. The guitars are sitting a little too far back in the mix with the rhythm section being more prominent & Steve Harris’ bass guitar sounding very jangly indeed which sees some of these songs lacking the punch of their cleaner studio counterparts. But the main issue here is front man Bruce Dickinson’s vocal performance which is patchy to say that least. He gets the job done just fine on more than half of the tracklisting but there are a few tracks where he’s noticeably pitchy, particularly struggling to reach the higher notes. This sees undeniable classics like “Wasted Years” being reduced to just solid inclusions which is a real shame as there was so much potential in this tracklisting, even though those deeper cuts I mentioned earlier were never classics to begin with. It also needs to be mentioned that I’ve never liked Iron Maiden’s title track which closes out this release. It’s always lacked sophistication to my ears so it wasn’t the best way to finish things up in my opinion.
While “Maiden England” may not be Maiden’s best live release, fans of the band are unlikely to be left disappointed as it still ticks so many of the required boxes, especially in the tracklisting. The execution isn’t perfect but it’s very hard to be too critical of a band that stands out there on their own in the world of classic heavy metal. Put this release on at a party & you’ll inevitably have a bunch of drunken dickheads poorly singing along to every word after a couple of tracks & I’d no doubt be one of them.
4/5
Here's my Top Ten Metal Releases of 1985 list:
01. Exodus - "Bonded By Blood"
02. Anthrax - "Spreading The Disease"
03. Iron Maiden - "Live After Death"
04. Pentagram - "Pentagram"
05.Anthrax - "Armed & Dangerous" E.P.
06. Slayer - "Hell Awaits"
07. Celtic Frost - "To Mega Therion"
08. S.O.D. - "Speak English Or Die"
09. Fates Warning - "The Spectre Within"
10. Exciter - "Long Live The Loud"
It's worth noting that Slaughter's "Surrender Or Die" demo would have made the list at number 7 if it had of been on our database though.
Don't forget to vote on the other Hall entry for this release too Andi.
Here's my updated Top ten Groove Metal Releases of All Time list after checking out Gojira's "Magma" album over the last couple of days & being well impressed:
01. Coroner – “Grin” (1993)
02. Grip Inc. – “Nemesis” (1997)
03. Exhorder – “The Law” (1992)
04. Gojira - "Magma" (2016)
05. Pantera – “Vulgar Display Of Power” (1992)
06. Pantera – “Cowboys From Hell” (1990)
07. Sepultura – “Chaos A.D.” (1993)
08. Pantera – “The Great Southern Trendkill” (1996)
09. Pantera – “Far Beyond Driven” (1994)
10. Anthrax – “Sound Of White Noise” (1993)
https://metal.academy/lists/single/175
Gojira - "Magma" (2016)
I came into the Gojira game a lot later than some of you might have as I was still on my metal sabbatical when 2005’s classic “From Mars To Sirius” third album dropped. It wouldn’t be for another four years that Ben would finally bring it to my attention & needless to say that it made an immediate impact on me. I’d quickly investigate the rest of Gojira’s back catalogue including their highly praised 2008 fourth album “The Way Of All Flesh” which I found to be very solid. When 2012’s “L’enfant sauvage” was released I was well a truly salivating for more Gojira & tended to heaps giant amounts of praise on it as a result, a position I’ve since reassessed & now regard it pretty similarly to its predecessor. Strangely though, that’s where the Gojira story has stagnated for me as I’ve not investigated their two subsequent full-lengths for one reason or another. Let’s rectify that oversight now by taking a look at Gojira’s 2016 sixth album “Magma”.
The “L’enfant sauvage” album had seen Gojira dropping their death metal roots for the first time in order focus on a groovier progressive metal sound &, despite what you might read, “Magma” is very much the next logical step in that evolution. Perhaps “Magma” might not be as overtly technical as previous efforts however this is still a progressive metal record at its core with djenty Meshuggah-style staccato riffage still being an important component of their sound. The final hints at death metal that were still evident on “L’enfant sauvage” are no longer visible on “Magma” with tracks like “The Cell”, “Stranded”, “Pray” & “Only Pain” pushing the groove metal associations to greater levels than ever before & “Chaos AD”-era Sepultura being an obvious point of reference in not only the heavier material but also the stripped back & casual folk closer “Liberation”. Interestingly, there are a couple of tracks that push out into doomier territory with stunning progressive sludge opener “The Shooting Star” sounding more like Mastodon than anyone else & outstanding interlude “Yellow Stone” sitting in post-sludge territory. I’m sure most listeners will also be left thinking of Fear Factory at times due to the brilliantly executed rhythmic precision in some of the riffage & perhaps even a little Korn in the few nu metal-ish moments but the main point of reference with “Magma” is definitely Devin Townsend/Strapping Young Lad in my opinion with Joe Duplantier’s vocal delivery reminding me a lot of Devin’s & the general style of the music falling into similar spaces as well.
This is a more restrained & controlled Gojira than we’ve ever heard before. There’s a newly found maturity in the way they milk every last drop out of each riff with great attention to detail having been placed on not over-playing their hands. When combined with a shorter run time (both for the individual tracks & the album as a whole) this makes for a fairly accessible metal record that was always going to promote crossover appeal & commercial success. Perhaps this has been to Gojira’s detriment with their more underground fan base but a good metal record is a good metal record as far as I’m concerned, particularly one as well produced as this one. I love the moodier parts of the album with the sludgier tracks & some amazingly well thought-out transitions being amongst the key elements that “Magma” has to offer along with some very consistent & mature song-writing. Joe’s vocals don’t suffer for the lack of death growls either as he’s got enough emotion & variation in his repertoire to captivate listeners who are open to the idea.
“Magma” may not be one of Gojira’s more intense releases but it is one of their most atmospheric & engaging & I for one am totally onboard with their new direction. In fact, I’d go so far as to say that this might be the band’s best album since “From Mars To Sirius” which is a pretty big call when you consider how highly regarded “The Way Of All Flesh” & “L’enfant sauvage” are. Perhaps it’s time to see what 2021’s ill-fated “Fortitude” record has to offer.
4/5
Here's my Top Ten Metal Releases of 1984 list too:
01. Metallica - "Ride The Lightning"
02. Iron Maiden - "Powerslave"
03. Slayer - "Live Undead" E.P.
04. Slayer - "Haunting The Chapel" E.P.
05. Medieval Steel - "Medieval Steel" E.P.
06. Paul Chain Violet Theatre - "Detaching From Satan" E.P.
07. Judas Priest - "Defenders Of The Faith"
08. Saint Vitus - "Saint Vitus"
09. Queensryche - "The Warning"
10. Trouble - "Psalm 9"
Deep Purple & Guns 'n' Roses have been added to the database as Non-Metal purely because Rex intends to raise Hall entries for a few releases to have them added to The Guardians. As is Ben's usual process, he's added only the proposed metal releases & the ones released in between them.
Yes I was aware of that. Was just looking for an opportunity to share that example of blatant plagiarism.
I can't imagine Lars would ever have sanctioned ripping off another band's work!!
Quoted Sonny
Underground NWOBHM outfit Bleak House disagree. "Welcome Home (Sanitarium)" anyone?
In regard to Satan, I've always really dug the riffage & lead guitar work which was particularly metal for the time but I find Brian Ross' vocals to be pretty flat with a lack of quality hooks to be honest. He's generally placed on a pedestal by most metalheads so it appears to just be me.
Fields Of The Nephilim - "Elizium" (1990)
Gothic rock from Hertfordshire, England.
I quite like the Satan, Ritual & Black Sabbath records you listed Sonny but it's probably a reflection of how strong a year it was that none of them were ever really in the running for inclusion in my top ten. I'm afraid to say that Raven & I don't get on at all though. We have a long history of not seeing eye to eye.
Out of interest, if you take another listen to Ritual's "Rebecca", do you think it's possible that Metallica copped the main riff to "For Whom The Bell Tolls" from that song? It's obviously a much rawer, messier version of it but I'd suggest that they did personally. What do you think?
While I agree that "Forged In Fire" was certainly the best of Anvil's first three records, they'll forever be a band that's simply not for me. 3/5
What a year for metal!
Daniel's Top Ten Metal Releases of 1983
01. Slayer - "Show No Mercy"
02. Manowar - "Into Glory Ride"
03. Iron Maiden - "Piece Of Mind"
04. Dio - "Holy Diver"
05. Metallica - "Kill 'Em All"
06. Mercyful Fate - "Melissa"
07. Saxon - "Power & The Glory"
08. High Power - "High Power"
09. Acid - "Maniac"
10. Queensryche - "Queensryche" E.P.
Nice review Morpheus. It's good to have you back onboard.
Vinnie Moore - "Mind's Eye" (1986)
Delaware-based guitar virtuoso Vinnie Moore was a major influence on me as a young musician. I picked up his 1986 debut album “Mind’s Eye” on CD through my father who had spotted it for cheap in a second-hand store & thought I might like it some time in the very early 1990’s & I then followed it up by purchasing Vinnie’s 1991 third album “Meltdown” shortly afterwards, both proving to be important players in the shaping of who I wanted to be as a guitarist. Swedish icon Yngwie J. Malmsteen had already opened my eyes to the possibilities in regard to super-high velocity, ultra-technique-heavy instrumental guitar music but, despite the fact that Vinnie was clearly influenced by Yngwie, he offered something additional that gave him the edge over the great man in my opinion, at least from a compositional point of view. You see, Vinnie knew how to write great melodies & construct pieces that work as songs as well as they do demonstrations of his technical proficiencies. Yngwie wasn’t as adept in these areas & also tended to verge on the cheesy a lot more often. He also pushed the neoclassical component much further than Vinnie who used it more sparingly & subsequently gained maximum impact from it.
Vinnie was already very well connected when he recorded “Mind’s Eye” & you can see evidence of that in both the fact that the album was released on Mike Varney’s Shrapnel Records label (which would go on to become the premier label for this style of music shortly afterwards) & also in the amazing line-up of musicians he had supporting him. I would imagine that Mike had connected him with fellow Shrapnel shredder Tony MacAlpine who provides some amazingly accomplished keyboard work here for a multi-instrumentalist. Tony would release his debut solo album through Shrapnel the following year but his contribution to “Mind’s Eye” is the most significant of the supporting musicians with his performance leaving most full-time keyboardists in the dust. The rhythm section is no less well credentialled though with talented Dixie Dregs bassist Andy West & legendary Ozzy Osbourne/Thin Lizzy/Whitesnake drummer Tommy Aldridge ensuring that Vinnie had a rock-solid basis from which to showcase his astounding skills.
The purely instrumental tracklisting begins in a rich vein of form with the entire A side being very solid indeed & highlighted by the spectacular “Daydream” which is a genuine shred classic in my eyes (& as usual for me it’s the least popular track on the album – go figure). The way that Vinnie balances out some truly memorable melodies with extreme technique is remarkable & is a very rare talent in this niche marketplace. The B side isn’t quite as strong with the quality level dipping a touch on a few tracks & this is usually the result of melodies that edge towards the cheese line a little or licks & structures that take too much of a neoclassical route as I’ve never found that style of guitar playing to be as attractive as Vinnie’s more mysterious & exotic one. You see, regardless of the technique on display, it’s Vinnie’s ability to create spacey, moody atmospheres that’s the real differentiator from his peers & represents the main attraction for an album like “Mind’s Eye”.
It's interesting that “Mind’s Eye” is almost universally tossed into the neoclassical metal bucket alongside the Yngwies & Jason Beckers because there really isn’t all that much of a classical influence in the song structures & accompaniment here. It’s really just Vinnie’s use of similar lead guitar techniques to those guys (i.e. sweep-picking, strong use of pedal notes, etc.) that provides the link with classical music but that’s not enough for me to want to label “Mind’s Eye” as being inherently neoclassical & it’s perhaps this distinction as much as any that sees my favouring a record like “Mind’s Eye” over other highly regarded releases from the genre like “Rising Force” or “Perpetual Burn”. To my ears this album sits somewhere between your classic heavy metal sound & a more expansive progressive metal one with MacAlpine’s keyboard work being the main link to the progressive side of that equation.
Regardless of what you label it as though, there can be little doubt that “Mind’s Eye” is a magnificent example of instrumental guitar wizardry & it was always going to appeal to someone like myself who not only understands just how difficult it is to pull off a lot of this stuff but also lives for soaring lead guitar hooks. If any of you ever listen to my 1999 solo CD you’ll no doubt hear a strong Vinnie Moore influence in the opening track as I get the feeling that I might have taken a fair amount of inspiration from “Mind’s Eye”. If this is neoclassical metal then it’s the finest example I’ve ever heard & it should be essential listening for any budding young shredder. Just don’t take it too personally when you inevitably discover that you’ll never be half as good as this bloke because none of us will be. He’s nothing less than a total freak of nature.
4/5
I find this breakout of my ratings to be quite interesting too:
5 star 1.9%
4.5 star 11.3%
4 star 26.8%
3.5 star 30.6%
3 star 18.2%
2.5 star 7.7%
2 star 3.3%
1.5 star 1.5%
1 star 0.5%
0.5 star 0.2%
I'm comfortable with that spread to be honest. It shows that I save the 5/5 ratings for the elite of the elite & it also shows that I don't consciously go looking for music that's clearly not gonna fall anywhere near my wheelhouse all that often either.
Here' mine which is heavily impacted by the years that Ben & I spent doing the Metal Academy podcast (i.e. The Guardians being at the top):
The Guardians 20.5%
The Horde 18.9%
The Pit 15.8%
The North 13.6%
The Fallen 11.7%
The Infinite 10.1%
The Revolution 4.0%
The Gateway 3.2%
The Sphere 2.1%
If this was reflective of the reality across my life then my 90's tape trading years would see my four clans being much further out in front.
Unfortunately not Sonny. It's a real shame because I'd suggest that that stuff was amongst the material I'm most proud of as a composer.
Once Neuropath disbanded I quickly joined a doom/death band from Penrith called Elysium for about six months as I was writing some really great harmonized melodic stuff similar to Anathema & Katatonia in my spare time & was keen to get it out there. I was really starting to get disillusioned with the scene by that stage though & it was more about the people & their continuous focus on image & talking shit about other people that eventually saw me removing myself completely, along with my relationship issues that were playing out in full view of the Sydney scene. I then did an instrumental guitar shred solo project which amounted to one CD called "My Ebony Tomorrows" which was released in 1999. Think Joe Satriani & Steve Vai & you won't be far off the mark. I wrote & played all of the instruments on that one & it was a more rewarding exercise for it but was also immensely draining at the same time. At that point I discovered techno & house music & my next decade changed significantly.
Out of interest, Elysium would later become Stone Wings who would release their "Bird of Stone Wings" album in 2003. Elysium included a virtual who's-who of Sydney extreme metal at the time I was involved with them with vocalist Jamie Marsh (ex-Lord Kaos/ex-Crucible of Agony/ex-Isaacaron), guitarist Stuart Prickett (Horrisonous, Illimitable Dolor, The Slow Death, ex-Backyard Mortuary, ex-Bludgeoner, ex-Broken Anatomy, ex-Decayed Divinity, ex-Of Grief Everlasting, ex-Mournful Congregation (live)), bassist Beau Dyer (Lord Kaos, ex-Across the Scarlet Moat, ex-Innsmouth, ex-Pogrom, ex-Grenade) & drummer Lachlan Donaldson (ex-Of Grief Everlasting, ex-Lycanthia) all being a part of it at that point.
I completely agree with your assessment here Sonny. "The Cage" is simply a hard rock record as far as I can see & not a very good one either it has to be said. It should never have been drawn in under the NWOBHM banner in the first place in my opinion.
This nomination has been posted in the Hall of Judgement.
I completely agree with your assessment here Sonny. "Firepower" is a combination of progressive rock & hard rock as far as I can see & it should never have been drawn in under the NWOBHM banner in the first place. I do quite like it though.
This nomination has been posted in the Hall of Judgement.
Some of you may recall me mentioning that a record label called Sphere of Apparition was interested in mastering & re-releasing the two mid-1990's demo tapes from my old brutal death metal band Neuropath. Well, things have been progressing nicely since I last provided an update. The mastering has been completed & both tapes sound as good as it's possible to get them. The CD cover layout is almost finalized. Options for the front cover artwork are being explored at the moment too. I'd guess that the final release date will be some time in the middle of the year depending on how quickly we can get the cover art signed off. It'll be starting in a CD only format but there's potential to expand on that depending on demand. There may be t-shirts too. It's very exciting stuff for an ol' metalhead like myself.
Alcest - "Les voyages de l'âme" (2012)
I’ve undergone quite the transformation with French blackgaze godfathers Alcest over the last couple of years. I’d previously struggled with their whispy positivity & dreamy atmospheres but I’ve finally come to grips with them in my old age & now tend to find a lot of enjoyment in the majority of their releases. It’s been a good decade since I’ve heard their 2012 third album “Les voyages de l'âme” though & my recollections are that it was another record that I found to be too lightweight for my taste at the time but, given my newly found affection for Alcest, I won’t be surprised if this record is yet another one that sees me awarding one of my more respectable ratings in retrospect.
I’ve enjoyed both of Alcest’s first two albums in recent times, particularly the blackgaze of their 2007 debut “Souvenirs d'un autre monde” which offered less of a post-rock influence than 2010’s “Écailles de lune”. “Souvenirs d'un autre monde” ended up being more a post-blackgaze effort & I didn’t connect with it on quite the same level. With “Les voyages de l'âme” we see Alcest pushing their shoegaze sound a little harder again which sees it being the primary genre here. The black metal component is certainly still relevant though with songs like “Là où naissent les couleurs Nouvelles”, “Beings of Light” & “Faiseurs de mondes” offering enough black metal characteristics to justify a dual blackgaze tag. The strong post-rock elements that played such a strong role on “Écailles de lune” have been eased off a bit here & I don’t think “Les voyages de l'âme” justifies a place in The Infinite. If you were a fan of Alcest’s previous material then I don’t think you’ll be terribly surprised with what you hear as this record essentially pulls together all of the elements that were already at play on past releases & presents them in a highly professional way that sees the listener taking a deep breath, recoiling back within themselves & returning to joyous times of youthful adventure.
It’s blatantly clear that Alcest are a class act thoughout the 50 minute runtime. The effortlessness with which they create their nostalgic, dreamlike soundscapes is impressive with Neige’s dream pop-style vocals washing over the listener with a child-like feeling of comfort. Tracks like the title track & closer “Summer's Glory” sit far more in the My Bloody Valentine camp than in anything Metal Academy covers while the gorgeous two-minute post-rock instrumental “Havens” is perhaps the best moment on the album with its ambient sophistication removing any sort of stress from my limbs & torso. I don’t think it’s surprising that the more aggressive black metal influenced material is more appealing to my ears than the straight up shoegaze stuff though & it’s the wonderful use of sweeping tremolo-picked riffs that gets me going more than the occasional blast beats or blackened shrieks.
“Les voyages de l'âme” is another very strong Alcest record in my opinion. Most metalheads seem to have a strong preference for the band’s first two albums (perhaps due to their greater black metal component) but I’m a bit unusual (I know, a big shock, hey?) in that I prefer their later material with 2016’s “Kodama” (an album that I don’t regard as being a metal release) still being my favourite Alcest full-length. “Les voyages de l'âme” has done really well to just edge out “Souvenirs d'un autre monde” for second place & I’ve very much enjoyed the experience. Perhaps it might be worth me taking a return visit to Alcest’s 2014 follow-up “Swelter” (an album that I’ve previously had no time for) now to see if my feelings have changed there too. In an analogy that seems strangely apt for a band like this one, it’s been really exciting to finally discover the gooey centre at the heart of the Alcest donut.
4/5
P.S. "Hello, is this Alcest? Yes, hi there. It's Opeth calling from Sweden. I can see that you've borrowed our album cover. Would you mind returning it immediately?"
Strangely, neither "Like An Ever Flowing Stream" (3.5/5) or "Left Hand Path" (3.5/5) have ever struck me as being anything terribly special & I came into both in real time. If pushed I'd probably take "Like An Ever Flowing Stream" over "Left Hand Path" by a slim margin but I find "Clandestine" (4.5/5) to be miles ahead of both.
Yngwie J. Malmsteen - "Trilogy" (1986)
I think it’s fair to say that Swedish guitar virtuoso Yngwie J. Malmsteen played a significant role in my teenage years. I can’t say that his brand of neoclassically inclined metal music ever really crossed over with my taste profile particularly but his dazzling chops were pretty much unequalled at the time & that was enough to keep this budding young shredder interested. I’d first come across him in 1989 when I discovered the track “Heaven Tonight” on the cover CD for the first edition of a monthly Australian metal magazine called Hot Metal. It left my jaw sitting on the floor to such an extent that I found myself purchasing the 1988 “Odyssey” album on cassette a short time later & followed it up by exploring all three of Yngwie’s previous albums, the last of which would be his 1986 third album “Trilogy”. I’d also invest in the guitar tablature books for all of those albums & would continue to follow Yngwie’s solo work religiously until 1995’s “Magnum Opus” when I’d decide that I had enough Yngwie in my life & moved on. It’s been many years since I’ve listened to “Trilogy” now though & I think it’s about time that I gave it a rating.
Yngwie’s 1984 “Rising Force” debut album was historically the one that I spent the most time with which was mainly due to the fact that I preferred a purely instrumental brand of guitar shred music at the time but several decades have seen my enjoyment of the neoclassical structures Yngwie employed earlier on waning a bit & I’ve eventually come to the realisation that I regard 1985’s “Marching Out” sophomore album as Yngwie’s best work these days. It saw him opting for a much greater ratio of vocal tracks & is more of a classic heavy metal album with neoclassical guitar solos than it is a genuine neoclassical metal album. “Trilogy” saw him taking that concept a little further by adding a touch more commercial accessibility with an all new line-up. Front man Jeff Scott Soto & bassist Marcel Jacob had both departed with Yngwie taking on the bass duties himself & future Ring Of Fire & Royal Hunt vocalist Mark Boals taking over the microphone. (Note: Scott Soto & Jacob would form hard rock outfit Talisman a few years later while Jacob would also pop up with progressive metallers Space Odyssey in the early 2000’s.) The Johansson brothers are still onboard & provide their usual high-class contributions with their jazz fusion-influenced styles providing a wonderful foil for Yngwie’s neoclassicisms, whether that be through Andres’ creative use of ride cymbal or Jens’ spectacular keyboard solo trade-offs with his band leader.
As with “Marching Out”, I struggle with the idea of labelling “Trilogy” as a “neoclassical metal” release as I don’t think it possesses anything particularly classical in the song & riff structures. It’s really just Yngwie’s solos that provide the neoclassical links & I don’t think that constitutes any need for its own distinct genre when the majority of the album is made up of traditional heavy metal song-writing. Lengthy instrumental closer “Trilogy Suite: Op 5” is the clear exception & it sounds quite similar to the material that made Yngwie an instant star with the “Rising Force” album. The other instrumental track “Crying” takes more of a new age approach that reminds me heavily of Marty Friedmann’s early 90’s albums before heading into a neoclassical hard rock direction during the second half. Neither of these instrumental tracks do much for me to be honest. They’re both very high on technique but quite low on musical substance. There are a couple of genuine power metal tunes on offer too in the fast-paced “Liar” & “Fury” & they provide further proof of just how influential Yngwie was on the early European power metal movement. The remaining five songs all fall into the heavy metal bucket & this is where I feel “Trilogy” is at its strongest with anthemic opener “You Don’t Remember, I Never Forget” & doomy Dio-era Black Sabbath sound of “Dark Ages” being the clear highlights of a tracklisting that’s not without blemish but where the wins comfortably outweigh the losses.
You won’t have to spend too much time guessing which decade “Trilogy” hails from because it sounds very much of its time. Yngwie’s thin rhythm guitar sound isn’t amazing while the drums have that distinctly artificial 80’s timbre & the keyboard work can sound pretty naff when used for atmospheric accompaniment. Boals’ vocal performance is excellent throughout & you can easily see why Malmsteen liked him given his lifelong obsession with Rainbow as Mark’s tone is very similar to Ronnie James Dio’s. Yngwie’s lead solos don’t offer anything drastically different from what we’d heard on his earlier releases however here we see him taking his trademark runs & signature arpeggios & combining them into ridiculously technical hybrids that see him jumping from one technique to another very quickly & with seamless efficiency. I often like to imagine Jason Becker, Marty Friedmann & Vinnie Moore sitting in one of their bedrooms getting high while listening to each new Malmsteen record. I picture them all & rolling on the floor in fits of laughter at the mind-blowing new level’s Yngwie was taking lead guitar to with each subsequent release.
“Trilogy” is another more than decent Malmsteen record but I do think of it as the weakest of his 1980’s solo albums. It was certainly a step down from the very strong “Marching Out” but compares more favourably when placed alongside “Rising Force” although it contains a little more filler & probably doesn’t include as many highlights either. I’d suggest that most fans would have jumped onboard regardless though & I don’t think “Trilogy” was done any harm by the attractive fantasy cover artwork as it was certainly a drawcard for geeky teenage shred wannabes. There will undoubtedly be those that hate on “Trilogy” for being too accessible but most of those people probably had no business checking out an Yngwie record in the first place in my opinion.
3.5/5
Accept - "Staying A Life" (1990)
German heavy metal stalwarts Accept & I have had a funny relationship over the years. I’m not a fan of their first two albums but have invariably found appeal in the subsequent string of four records that took them from 1981’s “Breaker” through to 1985’s “Metal Heart”. That isn’t really an unusual comment given that this is generally regarded as Accept’s classic era however the thing that sets me apart from other metalheads is that I can’t quite seem to push my appreciation dial up from the “quite like” setting to the “really enjoy” one with each of the four records achieving a respectable 3.5 star rating from me. It’s likely for this reason that I’ve never explored Accept’s discography any further, even after the band’s apparent return to form in the 2010’s. I recently found myself browsing the tracklisting from 1990’s “Staying A Life” double live album though & it struck me that I knew literally every track which surprised me as I’d always assumed that it would include material from Accept’s late 80’s albums. Upon further investigation I discovered that it was actually recorded at a show in Osaka, Japan on the tour for “Metal Heart” in 1986 & includes only tracks from the four albums that I enjoy which left me feeling hope that my chances of finding an Accept release that I genuinely love were still alive. I quickly added it to my March playlist & looked forward to seeing what “Staying A Life” had to offer.
“Staying A Life” includes fifteen tracks & spans 73 minutes, presumably so that it’d fit onto a single CD. The production is pretty good as it presents Accept in warts & all fashion & manages to capture the guitar crunch they’ve built their careers on pretty well with Peter Baltes’ bass lines providing plenty of weight. Udo Dirkschneider’s signature growl is in full effect &, while he’s not always on the money as far as pitch goes, you’re unlikely to be disappointed if you’re a fan of his powerful, gravel-throated shrieks which are always the centre of attention. Lead guitarist Wolf Hoffmann has the opportunity to contribute a four minute guitar solo section which starts off in exciting fashion before descending into mere crowd-interaction during the second half which seems like a missed opportunity.
As with most live albums, you’ll find that some tracks manage to surpass their studio counterparts while others struggle to keep up with them. I’ve always found “Son Of A Bitch” & AC/DC-worshipping “Dogs On Leads” to be nothing more than filler on their respective albums but here they seem to offer me more appeal. Light-weight Van Halen clone “Screaming For A Love Bite”, hard rocker “Up To The Limit” & an over-extended version of Accept’s calling card “Balls To The Wall” fall on the other side of the equation by not quite doing their studio versions justice, even though “Balls To The Wall” still represents one of the highlight tracks thanks to that energizing pre-chorus. The real highlight of “Staying A Life” wasn’t a surprise to me though as “Princess Of The Dawn” has always been one of my favourite heavy rock tracks with it’s tension & dynamics never failing to capture me. Strong renditions of “Restless & Wild”, “Love Child” & “Flash Rockin’ Man” are also high on my list.
Accept’s sound has always kept one foot in the world of heavy metal with the other ensuring that they never quite let go of their hard rock roots & “Staying A Life” is a perfect showcase of that approach with the tracklisting being very much a hybrid of the two apart from a couple of pumping speed metal pumpers in “Breaker” & “Fast As A Shark”. That’s not an issue as the band are good exponents of all of those three sounds, even if they’re often guilty of tip-toing along the plagiarism line at times. As with NWOBHM icons Saxon, Accept have built up their back catalogue by harnessing the qualities of Judas Priest, AC/DC & (to a lesser extent) Van Halen & they generally do it pretty well even though they rarely surpass their idols. Their albums are inevitably a little inconsistent in my opinion & some of that can be put down to their tendency to jump between those sounds which happens again here. “Screaming For A Love Bite” & “Living For Tonite” don’t do much for me at all & tarnish an other pretty decent tracklisting while other songs do some great build-up work only to drop the ball a bit with a disappointing chorus & that pretty much sums up why I’ve never managed to worship Accept like so many others do.
In saying that though, I find Accept to be a pretty good mixtape band in that they have some really high-quality songs but rarely stretch that out to consistently high quality albums. “Staying A Life” benefits from this by grouping many of the band’s best tracks together & for this reason I find it to be the strongest Accept release I’ve heard, just slipping past 1982’s “Restless & Wild” to take the title. I still can’t say that I see Accept as being an elite heavy metal band & I may never get there but it's nice to see them getting closer to the bar so this exercise has been worthwhile.
3.5/5
To be clear, I wasn't suggesting that every release on my list wasn't metal. Just that they at least deserve a dual tag with glam metal. The WASP, Twisted Sister & Motley Crue releases on my list are all metal releases as well in my opinion.
Also, "Pyromania" would have made my list but I made the decision not to consider it as glam metal.
Dokken - "Under Lock & Key" (1985)
Los Angeles hard rockers Dokken made quite an impact on me back in the late 80’s/early 90’s, mainly due to my obsession with guitar virtuoso George Lynch who represents one of my biggest inspirations as a musician. I first discovered Dokken through their 1987 “Back For The Attack” album which I ripped from a school mate’s older brother & it would lead me to investigate George’s 1990 “Wicked Sensation” debut album from the Lynch Mob project he’d begin after leaving the band in 1989. Lynch’s tone & style were pretty much identical to my own preferences in shredding lead guitar so the fact that both bands were a bit more commercially accessible than I’d usually go for became much less of an issue. However, my commitment to more extreme forms of music would see my interest drifting away from bands like Dokken & I’d only find myself returning to them during my research for the Metal Academy podcast in the mid-2010’s. It was there that I first heard their 1981 debut album “Breaking The Chains” & 1984 sophomore effort “Tooth & Nail” but I’d only just started digging my teeth into 1985’s “Under Lock & Key” when we’d decide to end of 3.5 year run of shows so I never got the chance to properly develop a firm position on its qualities. This week I decided it was time to rectify that.
Dokken’s sound has always bled across a few related subgenres. “Breaking The Chains” was an immature blend of glam metal & heavy metal that I struggled with while “Tooth & Nail” saw them concentrating on the heavier side of their sound which would appeal to me a lot more. With “Under Lock & Key” we see Dokken finally breaking out into the US mainstream radio circuit in a big way with a sound that’s dominated by the poppy choruses & straight forward beats of the LA Sunset Strip. Around 80% of the tracklisting falls into glam metal territory with Lynch’s spectacular metal guitar work being combined with a commercial hard rock rhythm section & simple melodic vocal hooks that take away most of the band’s edge. That can be a problem for me at times & around half of the tracklisting is a bit of a struggle for this particular extreme metal devotee. The other half includes some high quality hooks though with the couple of genuine heavy metal tracks being amongst the strongest on the album (see wonderful album highlight “Lightnin’ Strikes Again” & respectable closer “Til The Livin’ End”).
Don Dokken may be the band leader but his vocals do tend to be one of the components that leads Dokken astray at times as he can sound pretty bubblegum on occasion, along with the use of cowbell & some easy-listening backing vocals. Ironically the album’s two most iconic songs “In My Dreams” & “Unchain The Night” fall into this category & do very little for me while the ballad “Slippin’ Away” is simply awful. Thankfully the band manage to come up with some of the more respectable glam metal tunes you’ll find to offset those misfires a bit (see “The Hunter”, “It’s Not Love” & particularly the very solid “Will The Sun Rise”) but you probably need to be able to accept a more radio-friendly brand of hard rock & heavy metal (think WASP, Scorpions, Motley Crue, etc.) if you’re any chance of falling in love with Dokken’s third album. “Under Lock & & Key” may be Dokken’s most highly regarded release these days but it’s certainly not my personal favourite. “Tooth & Nail” is a much more palatable & enjoyable listen for me personally & it’s got me wondering what I’ll think of “Back For The Attack” these days. I think I’ll pull it out over the coming month & see.
3/5
Amorphis - "Tales From The Thousand Lakes" (1994)
It’s been many years since I’ve revisited the highly regarded 1994 sophomore album from Finland’s Amorphis. “Tales From The Thousand Lakes” was a very big record in my household back in the day but I recall it being a much more important release for my younger brother Ben than it was for myself. I certainly rmember finding it to be a very creative & inventive effort (particularly melodically) however I don’t think I was the target audience Amorphis had in mind when they wrote it, despite my being quite fond of their earlier work which was closer to your classic death metal model. If I had to guess at what score I’d end up awarding it though I would have been pretty confident of it being a 4/5 so I went into this re-evaluation exercise with the expectation of a rewarding outcome.
“Tales From The Thousand Lakes” kicks off with a beautifully executed darkwave piece by the name of “Thousand Lakes” which I really enjoy & it sets the scene nicely for what’s to come. The more melodic end of death metal has been something that I’ve had a rocky relationship with over the years though & it took me a few tracks to find my feet once the metal material kicked off to tell you the truth. I had no trouble recalling just about every note of the album once I got my teeth into it as the hooks entrenched themselves in me from a relatively young age but I think I’d forgotten that I didn’t buy into Amorphis as much as the metalheads around me did, at least not at that point in their evolution. Thankfully things start to really get cracking as we approach the middle of the record with the one-two punch of “First Doom” & album highlight “Black Winter Day” which saw my attention being fully engaged for the first time but despite the fact that there’s only one track of the ten on the tracklisting that I don’t get much out of (ironically one of the more popular tracks in the folky “The Castaway”) I’d be lying if I said that I ever find myself kneeling at the altar of Amorphis’ here.
So why is that? I certainly admire the record from a creative point of view as it sounded so unlike anything else that was around at the time & seems to succeed in most of its more expansive musical endeavours. I think it’s that some of those endeavours take Amorphis into more accessible territories that have me hesitating to jump on the train as it’s moving slowly out from the station though. You see, while “Tales From The Thousand Lakes” is generally tagged as melodic death metal, there are a lot more elements at play here. The doom/death metal sound of Paradise Lost is the most obvious point of reference & I really enjoy the more crushing doom sections. There are a few crunchy Swedish death metal moments too which can’t be a bad thing but there are also some less imposing influences on display. I really enjoy the clean vocals & think they add greatly to the infectiousness of Amorphis’ sound here. The prog rock influences are generally refreshing too but are a little hit & miss in their execution, particularly in the use of keyboards which can bounce from being a masterstroke to being a touch underwhelming in fairly quick time. Perhaps unsurprisingly though, the incorporation of folk melodies in several of the songs is something that I find a little difficult to stomach as folk metal has never been my bag. Tomi Koivusaari’s death growls aren’t particularly interesting either. In fact, I’m tempted to suggest that they sound pretty generic which perhaps goes a fair way to explaining why I enjoy the clean vocals so much.
Amorphis would go on to move away from death metal entirely over the next couple of records by focusing their attention on a more progressive sound. Their 1996 third album “Elegy” would be somewhat of a transition album in that regard but I’ve always remembered it as being a step up from “Tales From The Thousand Lakes” from a creative point of view. Perhaps that’s simply a case of misguided nostalgia & I might make a point of revisiting that album some time soon so as to see how it compares but there can be no doubt that its predecessor was a resounding success in its own right. It’s perhaps a touch too melodic for my taste but “Tales From The Thousand Lakes” certainly compares very well with other prominent melodeath releases & would still make my all-time top ten for the subgenre overall at this point.
3.5/5
And here's my updated Top Ten Melodic Death Metal Releases of All Time list:
01. At The Gates – “Slaughter Of The Soul” (1995)
02. Carcass – “Heartwork” (1993)
03. Dark Tranquillity – “The Gallery” (1995)
04. Merciless – “Unbound” (1994)
05. Sentenced – “North From Here” (1993)
06. In Mourning – “The Weight Of Oceans” (2012)
07. The Breathing Process - “Odyssey (un)Dead” (2010)
08. Amorphis - "Tales From The Thousand Lakes" (1994)
09. The Chasm - "The Spell Of Retribution" (2004)
10. Edge Of Sanity – “Crimson” (1996)
https://metal.academy/lists/single/147
They’re both doing great thanks Vinny. We’re very pleased with our beautiful little girl.
Just arrived at the hospital for the birth of my third child today. Pumped to meet her!
I've always loved "Violent Restitution" so there's not much point in me returning to it at this stage as we're already well acquainted. I quite like all of Razor's earlier full-lengths (I found the speed/heavy metal of their 1984 "Armed and Dangerous" E.P. to be a bit flat) but this was the album that continually drew me back for more. It may well have benefited from being my entry point to the band back in my late teenage years but I tend to think it's the impressive consistency & gnarly energy that really connects with me at a primal level. I'd suggest that this is still Razor's best work.
4/5
Kamelot - "One Cold Winter's Night" (2006)
I thought I'd give this double live album a crack given that Kamelot's 2005 "The Black Halo" album is my all-time favourite power metal release & this was recorded on the tour for that particular record. The recorded gig took place in Oslo, Norway which is the home of front man Roy Khan who puts in a lovely performance for his home crowd too with his operatic James LaBrie (Dream Theater) style vocals. Unsurprisingly, it's the tracks from the darker "The Black Halo" album that are by far & away the highlights of the release with several of the fluffier earlier tracks failing to connect with me at all (see "Center of the Universe", "Nights of Arabia", "Forever", "Karma"). I do quite like the previous record "Epica" but there's really no comparison with it's older sibling in terms of appeal for me personally. A lot of that is due to the fact that I'm less inclined towards the symphonic power metal material with my strong preference being for the more progressive, Dream Theater-inspired stuff of which there's a lot on offer here. In fact, I'd go so far as to suggest that this should be regarded as a progressive power metal release & should probably have a dual clan & genre tagging.
Everyone here is probably aware that power metal isn't a genre that I have a lot of tolerance for but this is live release is definitely one of the better power metal releases I've heard & has done well enough to just slip into my all-time top ten power metal releases.
3.5/5
Here's my new Top Ten Power Metal Releases of All Time list with Eternity's End's 2021 "Embers of War" album being the unlucky record to slip out:
01. Kamelot - "The Black Halo" (2005)
02. Iced Earth - "Alive In Athens" (1999)
03. Unleash The Archers - "Apex" (2017)
04. Lost Horizon - "Awakening The World" (2001)
05. Blind Guardian - "Imaginations From The Other Side" (1995)
06. Lost Horizon - "A Flame To The Ground Beneath" (2003)
07. Blind Guardian - "Nightfall In Middle-Earth" (1998)
08. Blind Guardian - "Live" (2003)
09. Blind Guardian - "Somewhere Far Beyond" (1992)
10. Kamelot - "One Cold Winter's Night" (2006)
https://metal.academy/lists/single/139
Slipknot - "Slipknot" (1999)
To tell you the truth, I had only ever heard one Slipknot song before deciding that I'd finally take the plunge & see what they are all about this week. It was "Eyeless" from their self-titled 1999 debut album & it didn't sound too bad although wasn't strong enough to lure me into further exploration at the time. I've actually been surprised by what I've heard over the last couple of days though to be honest, not because Slipknot are better or worse than I was expecting but more because of the fact that it's a glaringly flawed yet still generally satisfactory metal album. Saxy's review summarizes the faults very nicely. The inconsistent production is very ordinary with the drum sound being grossly inadequate (particularly the awful snare sound) while the use of DJ scratching & clean vocals are total misfires. But then on the positive there are some pretty cool groove metal style riffs included on this album along with some suitably aggressive vocals & a decent amount of energy. The Korn influence is obvious throughout & you'll never be in doubt about the album's nu metal credentials. There's certainly worse metal records out there but I can't say that I can see why Slipknot blew up off the back of this record. It's got slightly more wins than losses but it's really left to the lengthy "Scissors" (my clear album highlight) to step up at the end of the tracklisting & ensure that my rating finishes a little on the positive side of my enjoyment line rather than on the negative one.
3.5/5
I was just thinking that this is something that’s gonna start happening more & more often now given that metal is now more than half a decade old & most of the classic exponents are reaching a reasonable vintage.
The drummer from Artillery died on the same day. Not a great one for thrash metal it has to be said.
Suffocation - "Souls to Deny" (2004)
Most people associated with Metal Academy for any sort of period will already be aware that New York brutal/technical death metal legends Suffocation are my favourite band & have been for many years. There are certainly releases from other bands that have matched or even surpassed the masters of muscular death metal extremity but there is no one whose style better fits my concept of what metal should aspire to be or who ticks all of my creative boxes as regularly. I was totally obsessed with the band from the very start of their career & throughout the 1990’s but Suffocation’s unfortunate demise after their classic 1998 “Despise The Sun” E.P. would signal the beginning of a six year hiatus that would come to an end during my own self-imposed decade-long exile from metal. You can bet your life that they were the first band I checked in on upon my return to metal in 2009 though but I have to admit to being a touch disappointed with 2004’s “Souls to Deny” fourth album at the time. It’s been many years since I’ve revisited it though so it’ll be interesting to see whether anything’s changed in that regard.
Upon pressing play on “Souls to Deny”, one of it’s Achilles Heals becomes immediately obvious. As with 1993’s heavily tarnished “Breeding The Spawn” sophomore album, the production gods have not been kind to Suffocation here although the impact is nowhere near as severe as it was with that unfortunate release. This time we get a noticeably bass-heavy mix where the rhythm section sounds full & beefy but the rhythm guitars are hamstrung by a muddy mix that lacks brightness & articulation. The guitar solos sound very thin too & struggle to cut through the mix while Frank Mullen’s monstrous vocals lack depth & power. The real winner in this battle is returned extreme metal drumming superhero Mike Smith who puts in a stellar performance with his light-speed blast-beats coming at you with the weight of a thousand giants. In fact, this may well be his best performance to the time which is saying something. The other thing that I feel may have limited my scoring in the past is the programming of the tracklisting with the album opening with what I consider to be its two most melodic & least intense tracks, both of which are pretty entertaining but lack the unbelievable intensity of Suffocation in their prime. Things pick up significantly after that though with the two best inclusions on the album hitting you in quick succession in the title track (my personal favourite & possibly the most brutal of the eight songs) & the very popular “Surgery of Impalement”. The B side is extremely solid & rarely puts a foot wrong but I think I’ve found it hard to look past those opening two tracks in the past which has caused me to score “Souls to Deny” a touch lower than it deserved.
At the end of the day this is another high-quality death metal release from a band whose class is unparalleled in the brutal death metal scene. The production issues certainly see this record being restricted to the also-rans of Suffocation’s back-catalogue but it’s by no means a failure. In fact, I found it to be really enjoyable & I think the fact that my listening habits don’t touch on brutal death metal as much as they used to helps to enable a record like this one to have the impact it rightfully deserves. There’s no doubt that Suffocation are guilty of a bit of self-plagiarism though. You shouldn’t go into one of their releases (or any BDM release for that matter) expecting them to reinvent the wheel but there are some pretty obvious references to past glories here & very few elements that you haven’t heard before. In fact, the more melodic approach to those first two tracks may well be the most significant change-up & I’ve already pooh-poohed that so maybe I’m a part of the problem.
At the end of the day I simply love Suffocation. I love their sound. I love their lyrics. I love their look. I love their girlfriends. I love their dirty socks. Yep, everything about them. So, while “Souls to Deny” may not compete with their best work, it certainly deserves credit for reigniting their flame in a scene that still had a big hole where this band used to sit. There’s only one Suffocation after all. Thousands have tried to match them & failed dismally over the years & brutal death metal MVP Terrence Hobbs puts them all to shame with very little effort here as he's the absolute master of the super-charged death metal riff, whether it be a fast & complex up-tempo blaster or a gutt-wrenchingly slow breakdown chugger. It’s just a shame that all of the hard work wasn’t rewarded with a more appropriate production job to better highlight how strong a death metal album “Souls to Deny” really is.
P.S. I'd never noticed that the final track fades out with the same riff that the opening track fades in with before now. It's kinda cool when you play the album multiple times back to back.
4/5
Well spotted Sonny. I wasn't aware of that myself. I look forward to hearing Ben's reasoning around that.
It sounds a little confusing so I'm not sure I completely understand but are open to contributing if I know the releases in question. My available time to fill in gaps is fairly limited with a new baby coming in five days time though so I'd agree with picking the biggest bands to begin with. If there were lesser known bands selected where I had to investigate several releases in a short period then I'd be unlikely to do that to be honest. Shall we just see how we go?
This nomination has been posted in the Hall of Judgement.
I have to admit that I did a bit of a double take when I saw the release date attached to this fairly underground E.P. as it certainly doesn't sound like it was released post-2000. In fact, if you came into it blind you'd probably suggest that it was released in the second half of the 1980's & I'm fairly sure that was the intention too as the production & performances have had all of their rough edges left in place in order to give Isen Torr a significant bump in authenticity & credibility. The performances on this 17 minute affair aren't wonderful with the lead guitar work lacking in subtlety & the Queensryche style operatic vocals being a little pitchy at times but these things also give "Mighty & Superior" an endearing quality & I can see why someone like Sonny might find it quite relatable, especially when combined with the links to a highly regarded member of the epic doom metal community in Solstice.
This is certainly one epic as fuck release, isn't it? So much so that it leaves me baffled as to how Isen Torr have avoided the power metal tag. There's obviously a crap-tonne of Iron Maiden worship going on here in the galloping rhythms & guitar harmonies but the consistently high tempos, epic atmosphere & metal-for-metals-sake attitude sit further towards power metal than they do traditional heavy metal in my opinion so there'll be a Hall of Judgement entry coming up. The consistent focus on epic lead guitar lines is quite unique & I feel that this element is probably Isen Torr's calling card because it sounds quite fresh even if the lead guitarists vibrato leaves a bit to be desired. I've quite enjoyed this brief hint at what could have been to be honest &, despite it's UK heritage, feel that it will very likely appeal to fans of US power metal acts like Slough Feg, Manilla Road & Cirith Ungol. It's the very definition of a 3.5/5 release in that I find myself getting a consistent level of enjoyment out of it without ever feeling like it'll become a record that I'll be returning to again & again.
3.5/5
System of a Down - "Hypnotize" (2005)
SOTD's most recent studio album doesn't offer anything all that different to what they'd offered previously. The nu metal influence that popped up occasionally on their early works is nowhere to be found & there's perhaps a stronger thrash metal & punk influence than on some of the band's previous releases but you won't find anything terribly surprising here. I quite like "Hypnotize" but it's not on the same level as SOTD's elite releases in "Toxicity" & this album's companion album from the same year "Mezmerize". It sits very much on par with the band's 1998 self-titled debut album in terms of quality in my opinion. In fact, I'd probably take this one over that more highly regarded release. "Hypnotize" is worth a couple of listens but I don't think it'll be one that SOAD are remembered for.
3.5/5