Rexorcist's Forum Replies

I'm gonna get through the rest of the Slayer albums for this one.  Halfway through Christ Illusion and I gotta say, I'm really bothered by the fact that the entire first half is just copying the impressive opener.

What the fuck.  This is insane.  It's like J-speed-power-hardcore punk with a bitchin' female singer.  I mean these chicks are good what what the unholy fuck.

EDIT: Never mind, this one's better.

It’s also worth noting that the last track is a bonus track so half of the tracklisting falls under metal-related subgenres.

That's a little subjective.  For me, an album needs to be at least half of a genre rather than 4/9.  But even so, I don't see why RYM uses "rock" on its own and never "metal."  So I would classify it under stoner rock and metal if 5/9 were metal.  Otherwise it would just look like this if I were genre-tagging it on RYM myself:

Primary: Stoner Rock

Secondary, Heavy Psych, Stoner Metal

And then I might call the album out for some inconsistency in the last two tracks.

Huh.  I wouldn't vote it stoner metal if only 3 of the 9 songs fit the bill.  In fact, it looks like stoner rock and heavy psych are the more appropriate genres.

This is actually one I have a little interest in.  I'm slowly working on a "stoner doom metal" list and so far the bands are limited.  If this is indeed stoner metal then it's going on.  Unfortunately, this would be a pure Fallen hall, so I can't partake.  But thanks for bringing this album to my attention.

As long as it's clearly stated, I'm not going to be pedantic about how or where. I understand that including the text in the image itself might be too intrusive. In the description if there is one, or as a directly associated comment etc. is fine.

Thanks for explaining.  Btw, I've got the outline for the first pic half done.  I'm gonna do one for each clan first in order of their appearance on the clans section of MA, so the first to get a poster is The Fallen.

Rex, let me be frank with you. Whatever your grievances with the Metalforum moderators are (& for the record I don't blame them for feeling that it's inappropriate to be promoting a competitor on a subject-matter specific website), Ben & I are on a mission to make Metal Academy the most safe & inclusive metal website on the web. We hate the elitist/judgmental bullshit that goes on at other sites & want everyone to be able to express themselves openly here, safe in the knowledge that they can be themselves without fear of reprisal. With that in mind, I have to ask that you (& all of our other members) steer well clear of aggressive &/or attacking posts on the Metal Academy forums. Don't get me wrong, I really appreciate your passion for the site & are really hoping you'll contribute more regularly than you have as we value your input but it can't be at the expense of anyone else's comfort. Please feel free to continue this conversation with me over private message if you feel the need to.

Thanks.  I just needed to vent a little.  I'm done now.

So yesterday, the admin of Metalforum got it in his head that just because I was answering questions about this site on a forum where MULTIPLE metal websites came up, he thought I was "promoting this website" and locked the thread, which happened to be my reviews thread.  I asked him in a PM, "Did you have to lock the thread?  Why not just delete the sub-conversation comments?"  And he banned me.  Yeah, not happening.  The only reason his site has more people on it than Metal Academy is becasue the site's name is more likely to be googled.  So I'm gonna work on posting about this website on other non-metal websites.  Macabre didn't wanted promotion, now he's getting it.  I mean he literally raised no complaints when I told Metalforum, "Hey I wrote a book!" and posted my LITERAL BOOK COVER, with the name, my real name and everything, onto that same thread.  He didn't give me warning points.  And get this, he told me "my lack of self-reflection was astonishing."

Now I'ma rant.

Let's reflect then, Macabre, wherever you are, you are the first moderator in the eleven years Ive been on forums to flat out perma-ban me for anything, let alone punish me for questioning a mod's methods, even for saying worse things than that.  You raised no objection when I posted my book cover, so don't get all "promotion" on me.  You're smart enough to realize that disagreeing with you on your own website isn't gonna get people possessed, and you know that people have the right to be angry with your crazy decisions, so grow up before this anger issue eats you alive.  I used to be a guy like you and thank God I'm not anymore.  Now I don't even care that you invited me to Metal Academy.  I never see you here and you clearly aren't using it, so yeah, I'm gonna ACTUALLY promote this place.  Because unlike some simple forums that don't even have an album database, let alone unique features, this place deserves to be the most popular metal website.  And I've been on quite a few metal forums.

And if you are in fact here under a different username, tough.  It's your own fault that you were too overprotective to have a discussion.

Given how difficult it has been to attract a larger audience to the site (which I genuinely believe it deserves), I can't say I'd oppose anyone wanting to advertise its existence. That said, I'm very particular when it comes to the branding of Metal Academy. I worked with a fantastic artist in the Ukraine to get the exact feel and visual style that I wanted. So yes, feel free to use the logo and clan images, but I do need to ask that you include the following in fine print.

"This content is inspired by, yet not officially connected to, the Metal Academy website. Logo and clan images used with permission."

Please don't take this as me not being appreciative of any efforts you make to spread the word. It just feels like a good precedent to set.

Do I use that in the actual pictures themselves or in the comments when I upload them to social media?

I'm sure the genre is not for all metalheads, but I'm certainly attracted to it, if only as background music. Thanks for the recommendations, as I haven't delved into it as much as I probably should have. Just listening to Old Sorcery now.

Lemme know what you think when/if you feel like you've got a good amount of them down.

Adding the Genghis to this thread, huh?  I don't blame you, as they're one of the most justifiably certifiable bands on Earth.

It snowed last night at my house.  So I went out there this morning, played some of "Withstand the Fall of Time..." and now I'm sitting inside with the live album "A Very Lonely Solstice" by Fleet Foxes.

Hey there, Rexorcist. I saw your complete list in Metalforum, and it looks awesome! A solid list of metal classics and favorites. Do you plan on sharing it here, whether it's the full list or just the links?

Thanks a bunch for checking out the list.  I want to make it, but there's still one album missing from the database.  It's really difficult to get this one added, and I don't wanna replace it with number #101.  But I honestly believe that it's one of the very first "metal" albums.

Looms like I got everything I need except the one Deep Purple album, and its beyond me why RYM hasn't voted it metal yet.

As for more blatantly metal albums, Ascension released their second album... after a goddamn eleven year period.  I stumbled on a video like on Reddit on pure luck.  Could you please add Ascension's Under the Veil of Madness under symphonic and power metal?

EDIT: Their debut and two EP's aren't here either.  Sorry.

You know, it's more than experimental enough for a punk metal album to say it, so I vote yes.

Awesome poster, Rex!

Thanks.

Knock 'em dead, Xeph.

As for what I came in here to post, I just finished another poster during my two-day break from my major reading binge (getting through the Inheritance series).  I've been speed-reading 200 pages a day at the very minimum, so I took a break.  But since I haven't been selling very well, I used the opportunity to practice mountains and clouds on Gimp, while also discovering the lighting techniques that can be used.

https://www.deviantart.com/mythbutton/art/Wings-of-Nialoca-Poster-950462579

I found this album to be monotonous as well.  I have difficulty giving high ratings to monotonous albums, even short 20-minute ones.  This and the "Brutal Autonomy" EP are both good examples of how monotony can hurt a rating for me, as I didn't care for either.

YES!  Genghis fucking TRON! Excellent choice for a new genre.

50% or no go for me.

I just put together a custom neoclassical challenge chart

1. Symphony X – Twilight in Olympus
2. Yngwie Malmsteen's Rising Force – Rising Force
3. Marty Friedman – Dragon's Kiss
4. Galneryus – Under the Force of Courage
5. Vinnie Moore – Mind's Eye
6. Iron Mask – Hordes of the Brave
7. Magic Kingdom – Symphony of War
8. Space Odyssey – Embrace the Galaxy
9. Tony MacAlpine – Maximum Security
10. Concerto Moon – Rain Forest
11. Jason Becker – Perpetual Burn
12. Narnia - Awakening
13. Cacaphony – Speed Metal Symphony
14. Ring of Fire – The Oracle
15. Evil Masquerade – Welcome to the Show
16. Exmortus – Ride Forth
17. Impellitteeri – Stand in Line
18. Time Requiem – Time Requiem
19. Apocrypha – The Forgotten Scroll
20. Warmen – Beyond Abilities
21. Joey Trafolla – Out of the Sun
22. Majestric – Trinity Overture
23. Wolf Hoffman – Classical
24. Kenziker – The Prophecies
25. Patrick Rondat - Amphibia

Mostly punk-infused like mine.

We got a date.


https://7htarget.bandcamp.com/album/yantra-creating

February 24.  I've been waiting over a year for news about their fourth album, and now I only have to wait three weeks for the release.

Out of interest, why is black noise excluded from qualification?

Feels way too much like general noise music with a black atmosphere than other kinds of metal, like the metal was sucked out to make room for more Merzbow.  Obviously this isn't true for all black noise albums, but most of the ones I've heard don't make the cut.

Not counting black noise.

1. Kitties of Death - Valley of the Dead

2. Sete Star Sept - Live Atrocity

3. Hello Kitty Suicide Club - ^_^

4. Tamagotchi Seppuku - Discography

5. Thrash Queen - Ashes to Ashes

6. Hello Kitty Suicide Club - o_O (EP)

7. Egon's - Auf einem Bein kann man nicht stehen!

8. Assück - Necro Salvation (EP)

9. Sete Star Sept - Gero Me (EP)

10. Attila - Fallacy

These are all in my bottom 50 albums.

Well this sucks.  I've been so busy the last four days that I didn't even notice two major editing errors on the book cover.  The background under the dragon's leg and arm are not there, and Nula's wing is improperly shaded due to a Gimp problem.  Fixed now.

That's quite awesome, Rex! I look forward to checking out that book.

And on that note, the next book I'll make is a spin-off to my main series, centered around the golden age of classic metal genres (the 80s).

Cool.  What's the series called?

That's quite an achievement Rex. Congratulations on completing such an ambitious undertaking. Is the book being published? You may be interested to know that we have another published author in our community in Andi who I believe has several children's books to his name thus far.

Thanks!  It's on Kindle right now.  There's the free promotional read-on-Kindle for the next three months, and then there's the paid download. It's only available for digital for the time being.

Sorry I haven't been on here very often recently.  I've been a little busy writing movie reviews... and a book inspired by power metal.

Consider the theme song "Imaginations from the Other Side."

January 20, 2023...

So now we got a winter theme, crystalline mountains in the middle of a forest, a dragon all "yo man these chains mean shit, King Kong aint got these biceps" and a knight going, "Whoa wait a minute!  Where's my phone?  I need this pic."  Coolest cover they've got so far.

Didn't think I'd win this.  Still, I got the message and discussion out, and that's good enough for me.

Found the worst folk artist in history: m_AJ_ik.  I heard his album "Wai Guo La" back in 2014.  He tagged the damn thing as gunge, metal and punk, but it's really avant-folk.  Just rediscovered his bandcamp page, and he's been busy.

The Story of a Colorblind Painter (2006)

The playing has a nice and dark mood to it that occasionally sounds like darkwave, but the playing can be very monotonous and occasionally really dull.  Still, while it was very flawed, it wasn't unlistenable.

Wai Guo La (2014)

This was the album I discovered him on.  There are a few more efforts to experiment and try out some new sounds, but the production and the voice still sucks.

precarious/vicarious: winter nocturnes (2018)

This is the worst folk album I've ever heard.  This was four years after Wai Guo La and he hadn't recorded anything in between.  How did he end up with such a downgrade?  Every song is drawn out way longer than it needs to be, even the four minute songs, and one of the four songs is EIGHT.  Ugh.  The guitar playing is all over the place, repetitive, ugly and annoying, as if this joker just decided that experimenting was all it took to impress the experimental audience.  If this guy wants to be as good as Natural Snow Buildings or Comus, he's gotta actually write songs.

Cephas & Wiggins - Bluesmen (1993)

Genres: Piedmont Blues

Since I've got quite a bit of freetime today, I have time for a longer album.  This is a 70-minute blues album.  So far, it's not very spectacular.  Let's see if they have anything new to add.  Otherwise, it looks like 1993 just wasn't the best year for blues...

Dude!

The Flaming Lips - "The Soft Bulletin" (1999)

Some poppy neo-psychedelia to keep me interested while I play with the kids & do some housework on my Sunday morning. It's not really my thing as it's a little too quirky & happy for my taste & is more of a pleasant background distraction than being genuinely engaging but fans of this sort of thing will no doubt love the shit out of it.

For fans of MGMT, Dorgas & Animal Collective.

My top neo-psych album is Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots.  It takes the poppiness of Soft Bulletin and combines it with the experimentation that would later dominate another brilliant album by Flaming Lips: Embryonic.

Currently listening to a 90's blues album by Junior Wells: Better Off With the Blues.  The previous album was called "Undisputed Godfather of the Blues," but you wouldn't know it from this album.  I like blues enough, I've got a few blues albums in my top 500 excluding rock, including Muddy Watters, Wells himself, Etta James, Howlin' Wolf, B.B King and Albert King.  But this album is so standard, overlong and boring.  I'll finish it because I always do, but this has the makings of being the second worst non-rock blues album I've ever heard.

I didn't realize Michael Chapman died last year.

I GUESS Creatures of the Night falls under that category.

On the subject of GNR and Deep Purple, two of the three albums I specified are on my top 100 metal albums list, which I would like to add here.

Also, this begs a separate question: Should we have a list feature to exclude non metal from our charts?

Whoa.  Didn't expect to see ALL the Motley albums up there.  That was pretty generous.  Thanks!

I always felt that the classification was questionable.

La Lupe - Two Sides of La Lupe

I had a sudden urge to listen to obscure Latin soul.  No joke.

Not to sound parental, but if it's a small genre, you should at least listen to the highest rated albums in the genre (minimum saaaay 10?) before that level of certainty can be justified.

Gonna request some short discographies

MDMA, one album and one EP: https://www.metal-archives.com/bands/MDMA/3540426556

Ophiocordyceps, two albums: https://rateyourmusic.com/artist/ophiocordyceps

Brazen Bull, one album and two EP's: https://rateyourmusic.com/artist/brazen_bull

Cuff, five albums and three EP's: https://rateyourmusic.com/artist/cuff_f1

Blind Guardian - The God Machine (2022)

I have to admit that I'm not really siding with what the BG fan club says about this album: it's not a tiring rehash of the past with less originality.  Melody may have been sacrificed just a tad bit, but the truth is that the sacrifice made it possible for BG to focus on making what could be their heaviest album yet.  Not only that, but it doesn't just recreate the past and improve on the things they ignored for a while, but they add a new vibe with a couple of space-style songs with real progressive touches.  And let's be honest: Hansi Kursch has lost practically none of his vocal power and this is 25 years after the release of Imaginations from the Other Side.  I listened to it twice just so I could cement my final opinion, and the second time blew me away even more than the first time.

10/10

Robin Roelofs - Fulfillment

Genres: Pop Rock, Power Pop, Acoustic Rock

I'm currently focusing on both blues and artists I've checked out once or twice but haven't thoroughly explored, so indie artist Robin Roelofs is next.  He's got a lot of self-released albums.  He kinda reminds me of Billy Cobb, but with less self-parody.  So far this one's pretty good.  He slightly rings of different stuff, blues, Springsteen, a dash of Weezer, but he's got his own strong personality.  There aren't any really any standouts and the lyrics aren't that new, but it's a consistently fine piece with a lot of decent songs.  7/10.

For a country album that is a VERY metal album cover.

The second of the four Mississippi John Hurt studio albums, and based on what people say, the worst.  I wanna like the Piedmont stuff, but most of the artists play a bunch of songs that sound the same, and it gets tiring.  So far, the best I've heard is Roustabout by Charlie Parr and I just scratched the surfact of Piedmont blues.

I just posted a bout how two Metallica albums should also have the heavy metal tag and nobody bugs me about it.  I might've committed the worst sin possible here, so don't worry about looking like a fool 

However, the fact that it has 9 votes and is still active says I'm not alone.

As long as we're on this subject, anybody remember how King Crimson decided to be a metal band before they stopped working in the studio?  Because those two albums were pretty kickass.

Just gonna say it: Def DEFINITELY stopped being metal after the second, and stopped being glam metal after the third.  I don't know why RYM has Hysteria tagged as glam metal right now.  I've heard that album a million times and it does have a couple glam metal songs, but not enough for the whole damn thing.  It feels too poppy even for glam metal.

I think I'll wait on another Hall for that, but thank you.  Honestly, I didn't expect it to be so easy to get it added, so I'll take one more fucking crack at it, the only other hard rock / heavy metal albums I want added: Deep Purple's "Perfect Strangers" and "In Rock," and only the first GNR.  I doubt I'll get that far, but I usually test my limits.

And don't worry, my firm opinion is that Appetite is the only GNR album that fits that bill.