Shadowdoom9 (Andi)'s Forum Replies

December 2022

01. Animals as Leaders - "Gordian Naught" (from Parrhesia)

02. Cult of Luna - "Blood Upon Stone" (from The Long Road North)

03. Persefone - "Merkabah" (from Metanoia)

04. Seventh Wonder - "Invincible" (from The Testament)

05. Voivod - "Synchro Anarchy" (from Synchro Anarchy)

06. An Abstract Illusion - "In The Heavens Above, You Will Become A Monster" (from Woe)

07. Dreadnought - "Liminal Veil" (from The Endless)

08. Wilderun - "Passenger" (from Epigone)

09. Ibaraki - "Ronin" (from Rashomon)

10. Rolo Tomassi - "Drip" (from Where Myth Becomes Memory)

11. Holy Fawn - "Death is a Relief" (from Dimensional Bleed)

12. Astronoid - "Eyes" (from Radiant Bloom)

13. Fallujah - "Radiant Ascension" (from Empyrean)

December 2022

01. Coldrain - "Boys and Girls" (from Nonnegative)

02. Architects - "Burn Down My House" (from The Classic Symptoms of a Broken Spirit)

03. Cave In - "Blood Spiller" (from Heavy Pendulum)

04. DIR EN GREY - "The Perfume of Sins" (from PHALARIS)

05. I Prevail - "Bad Things" (from TRUE POWER)

06. Memphis May Fire - "Only Human" (from Remade in Misery)

07. Motionless in White - "Masterpiece" (from Scoring the End of the World)

08. Northlane - "Is This a Test?" (from Obsidian)

09. Parkway Drive - "Soul Bleach" (from Darker Still)

10. Alter Bridge - "Sin After Sin" (from Pawns & Kings)

11. Slipknot - "Hive Mind" (from The End, So Far)

12. Alexisonfire - "Committed to the Con" (from Otherness)

13. Thornhill - "Casanova" (from Heroine)

14. Bloodywood - "Zanjeero Se" (from Rakshak)

15. Bad Omens - "Nowhere to Go" (from THE DEATH OF PEACE OF MIND)

16. Dog Fashion Disco - "Grand Experiment" (from Cult Classic)

17. Fit for a King - "Reaper" (from The Hell We Create)

18. Nova Twins - "Antagonist" (from Supernova)

19. Tallah - "Telescope" (from The Generation of Danger)

20. Moon Tooth - "The Conduit" (from Phototroph)

21. Disturbed - "Unstoppable" (from Divisive)

22. Halestorm - "Back From the Dead" (from Back From the Dead)

23. NOTHING MORE - "TIRED OF WINNING" (from SPIRITS)

Here are my thoughts on some tracks:

Animals as Leaders - "Gordian Naught" (from Parrhesia)

4.5/5. Animals as Leaders is a band with some of the most technical-playing musicians in humankind, though I prefer progressive metal slightly more with vocal flavor. There's even a rare blast beat from drummer Matt Garstka.

Cult of Luna - "Blood Upon Stone" (from The Long Road North)

5/5. Too early for an apocalyptic climax, but never mind that, this is a perfect epic! The guitarists from the band Phoenix join in, Christian Mazzalai and Laurent Brancowitz.

Persefone - "Merkabah" (from Metanoia)

4.5/5. This one is the right choice for all those pattern structures to decipher. The near-end breakdown is more straight than everything else. The keyboardist/clean vocalist sings a sincerely catchy chorus.

Seventh Wonder - "Invincible" (from The Testament)

5/5. One of my favorite tracks from the new Seventh Wonder album The Testament besides "The Light"! It's far more than just a cheesy anthem, the mind-blowing melody is awesome, and what keeps me hooked is vocalist Tommy Karevik who's also in Kamelot, one of two power metal bands I still have time for (the other being DragonForce). Besides those angelic vocals, the band performs an impressive blend of fast guitar/bass riffs, complex drumming, and single-handed keyboarding.

Voivod - "Synchro Anarchy" (from Synchro Anarchy)

4.5/5. Still doing great while aging, I see! Guitarist Daniel Mongrain can do the skills to the late Piggy justice while staying fresh. Their earlier albums from the 80s are still bad-a** though. Rock on!

Ibaraki - "Ronin" (from Rashomon)

4/5. Alongside wanting to find a song in the playlist for me to listen to besides the ones I've requested, I've heard of Trivium frontman Matt Heafy's progressive black metal side-project Ibaraki and thought of checking it out at some point. Now's the right chance! A major motion picture should have this track as part of the soundtrack, it's quite excellent. And wow, who knew My Chemical Romance's Gerard Way can be a kick-A black metal shrieker?! Still I prefer Matt Heafy performing with the metalcore power of Trivium, but maybe I'll someday check out more of this side-project Ibaraki....

Here are my thoughts on some tracks:

Coldrain - "Boys and Girls" (from Nonnegative)

3.5/5. Interesting start for this playlist, a nice beautiful rock ballad. It's different from the rest of the playlist and the song's original album, yet a nice emo tune that flashbacks to 10 years ago when the band also made a few ballads.

Architects - "Burn Down My House" (from The Classic Symptoms of a Broken Spirit)

4/5. Another mid-tempo ballad-ish song though with a dark turn in the instrumentation. The more poppy aspects that appear in this song and much of its album end up giving Architects more in common with a band like Falling in Reverse.

Cave In - "Blood Spiller" (from Heavy Pendulum)

4.5/5. Cave In really should've been more popular than they really are, not just for their mainstream early-2000s sh*t, but also for d*mn beautiful pieces like this that just smell an Oscar for the band. Caleb Scofield would've been proud. RIP

DIR EN GREY - "The Perfume of Sins" (from PHALARIS)

5/5. I love this album's beautiful dynamic mix of heaviness and melody. This is one of my favorite songs here, both in the album and the band, with some of the wildest blackened death blast beats performed by their drummer Shinya.

I Prevail - "Bad Things" (from TRUE POWER)

4.5/5. Another d*mn good mix of heavy and melodic, only softer and less extreme. I first heard of bands I Prevail and Bad Wolves around 2018 when my brother was (and still is) listening to those bands. This is one of the best mixes of metal, pop, and rap since what you might find from the year 2001 in the nu metal age! A bad-a** song for anyone battling addiction, and a tearful polar opposite from a heavier song like "Body Bag". There are a few songs that my brother plays in the car, and he could drive twice the legal speed limit if he wanted to, but he wouldn't. He's a good law-abiding driver. Excellent lyrics, alongside the Linkin Park vibe in the music!

Memphis May Fire - "Only Human" (from Remade in Misery)

4/5. Sweet lyrics, interesting vocals including rapping, enough said.

Motionless in White - "Masterpiece" (from Scoring the End of the World)

4.5/5. Great tune from Motionless in White recent near-masterpiece album. I should recommend this one to my brother!

Northlane - "Is This a Test?" (from Obsidian)

4/5. Yes, this is a test! A test of 90s nostalgia. You can for sure understand when I say that this would fit well in the soundtrack for the rave scene of an action-thriller movie set in the 90s. When you listen, you can hear the palate being cleansed with fresh ideas. There's certainly never any filler, though the tempo change seems too calm for one.

Parkway Drive - "Soul Bleach" (from Darker Still)

3.5/5. This one puts us back on track with rapid pacing in the riffs.

Disturbed - "Unstoppable" (from Divisive)

4/5. F***ing throwing back to Disturbed's earlier days of 20 years ago, hard-hitting like a b***h!

Halestorm - "Back From the Dead" (from Back From the Dead)

4.5/5. I haven't heard of Halestorm (don't confuse them with Alestorm) in a long while, I mean the last time I heard a few songs was from my brother listening to them 5 years ago. This band really is back from the dead, with a heavy as f*** vengeance! This would be great for a wrestler's comeback into their career. The vocals would sound interesting when the band perform this live. I really should be thankful for my brother listening to bands like Halestorm and Skillet that set my eventual path to metal.

NOTHING MORE - "TIRED OF WINNING" (from SPIRITS)

4/5. Holy sh*t, this one I thought about recommending it to my brother, but then upon closer listen, I realized that this is a song he has already been listening to lately! I've been searching for it for a couple months! Thanks Saxy for the help even though it wasn't intended. What a way to end this playlist, with an unexpected realization.

Here's my review summary:

This album is as dark as the title would suggest! Apparently, the theme is confront a destructive event and standing up against it with your beliefs as you make your journey through this dark world. In other words, instead of living in nightmarish misery, let this metal tale motivate you to rise in resistance against what life has to threaten you. There are anthems to expect from this album, filled with heavy defiance and epic balladry, as you make a journey through Hell that you can pleasantly battle through and come out with as many scars as the band had making this powerful offering. The songs with the most strength come from the first half, though a couple ones in the second half are great too. All part of this test of promised survival....

4/5

Recommended tracks: "Ground Zero", "Glitch", "The Greatest Fear", "Darker Still", "From the Heart of the Darkness"

For fans of: Bad Wolves, Five Finger Death Punch, Disturbed

Daniel, do you have a good Revolution track you wanna submit? I plan to start working on the January playlist later this week.

December 2022

1. Gothminister - "Gothic Anthem" (from Gothic Electronic Anthems, 2003) [submitted by Shadowdoom9 (Andi)]

2. Rob Zombie - "Dragula" (from Hellbilly Deluxe, 1998)

3. Nine Inch Nails - "Wish" (from Broken, 1992)

4. Static X - "All These Years" (from Project Regeneration, Vol. 1, 2020)

5. Lard - "Generation Execute" (from Pure Chewing Satisfaction, 1997)

6. Marilyn Manson - "The Reflective God" (from Antichrist Superstar, 1996)

7. Killing Joke - "Pandemonium" (from Pandemonium, 1994)

8. White Zombie - "Blood, Milk and Sky" (from Astro-Creep: 2000 – Songs of Love, Destruction and Other Synthetic Delusions of the Electric Head, 1995)

9. Fear Factory - "Disruptor" (from Aggression Continuum, 2021)

10. Samael - "Rite of Renewal" (from Hegemony, 2017) [submitted by Shadowdoom9 (Andi)]

11. Godflesh - "Anthem" (from Hymns, 2001) [submitted by Daniel]

12. Author and Punisher - "Kruller" (from Kruller, 2022)

13. Morgoth - "Watch the Fortune Wheel" (from Feel Sorry for the Fanatic, 1996)

14. Mnemic - "Mechanical Spin Phenomenon" (from Mechanical Spin Phenomena, 2003) [submitted by Shadowdoom9 (Andi)]

15. Blue Stahli - "Anchor" (from Quartz, 2020)

16. Viral Millennium - "Vomitosis" (from Vomitosis, 2014)

17. Seecrees - "New Dawn" (from Genesis, 2012)

18. THE SIN:DECAY - "We Are All Slaves" (from Rehabilitation, 2007)

19. Psyclon Nine - "Crwn Thy Frnicatr" (from Crwn Thy Frnicatr, 2006) [submitted by Shadowdoom9 (Andi)]

20. Andrew Hulshult - "Dusk" (from DUSK (Original Game Soundtrack), 2019)

21. Dawn of Ashes - "Carnal Consummation in the Empty Space (To Mega Therion Mix)" (from Farewell to the Flesh, 2012) [submitted by Shadowdoom9 (Andi)]

22. Dolor - "Metamorphosis" (Tanz der Schatten (Der Clown), 2010)

23. Treibhaus - "Kodex" (from Feinbild, 2006)

24. Motionless in White - "Final Dictvm" (from Reincarnate, 2014) [submitted by Shadowdoom9 (Andi)]

25. Ministry - "Amerikka" (from Amerikkkant, 2018)

December 2022

1. Make Them Suffer - "Doomswitch" (from Doomswitch, 2022)

2. Bring Me the Horizon - "Can You Feel My Heart" (from Sempiternal, 2013) [submitted by Shadowdoom9 (Andi)]

3. We Came as Romans - "To Plant a Seed" (from To Plant a Seed, 2009) [submitted by Shadowdoom9 (Andi)]

4. Caliban - "Arena of Concealment" (from A Small Boy and a Grey Heaven, 1999)

5. Abnegation - "When the Smoke Clears" (from Verses of the Bleeding, 1998)

6. Annisokay - "Like a Parasite" (from Aurora, 2021)

7. ERRA - "Divisionary" (from ERRA, 2021) [submitted by Shadowdoom9 (Andi)]

8. Any Given Day - "Savior" (from Overpower, 2019)

9. August Burns Red - "What Child is This (Greensleeves)" (from Winter Wilderness, 2018)

10. Trivium - "Betrayer" (from The Sin and the Sentence, 2017) [submitted by Shadowdoom9 (Andi)]

11. Embodyment - "Embrace" (from Embrace the Eternal, 1998)

12. Lorna Shore - "Cursed to Die" (from Pain Remains, 2022)

13. From Here On - "Further Away" (from Hope for a Bleeding Sky, 2000)

14. Converge - "Dead" (from Petitioning the Empty Sky, 1996)

15. Deadguy - "Doom Patrol" (from Fixation on a Co-Worker, 1995)

16. Bleeding Through - "Buried" (from Love Will Kill All, 2018) [submitted by Daniel]

17. Parkway Drive - "The Sound of Violence" (from Ire, 2015) [submitted by Shadowdoom9 (Andi)]

18. Rorschach - "Drawn and Quartered" (from Protestant, 1993)

19. Unbroken - "In the Name of Progression" (from Life. Love. Regret, 1994)

20. After the Burial - "Deluge" (from Dig Deep, 2016)

21. Shadows Fall - "The First Noble Truth" (from Of One Blood, 2000) [submitted by Shadowdoom9 (Andi)]

22. Bad Omens - "Exit Wounds" (from Bad Omens, 2016)

23. Wage War - "Circle the Drain" (from Manic, 2021)

24. Coalesce - "Harvest of Maturity" (from In Tongues We Speak, 1996)

25. My Enemies & I - "Carbon Copy" (from Sick World, 2015)

26. Attila - "Jumanji" (from Rage, 2010) [submitted by Shadowdoom9 (Andi)]

27. Convictions - "The Price of Grace" (from I Won't Survive, 2021)

28. Everyone Dies in Utah - "Planetary" (from Supra, 2021)

29. The Number Twelve Looks Like You - "I'll Make My Own Hours" (from Worse Than Alone, 2009)

30. Like Moths to Flames - "Spiritual Eclipse" (from No Eternity in Gold, 2020)

My time with progressive/avant-garde/post-metal has been rather turbulent this year while still staying in my position in The Infinite, so I didn't find as many new Infinite albums that would stick with me long as I thought I would, but I can do a top 5:

1. Seventh Wonder - The Testament

2. Dir En Grey - Phalaris

3. Voivod - Synchro Anarchy

4. Persefone - Metanoia

5. Meshuggah - Immutable

One honorable mention is the new In The Woods... album Diversum that I really enjoy, but I would need to give it more listening before it can end up somewhere in my list.

This is the first part of the Marriage of Heaven and Hell saga that would continue with Part II then end with Invictus. I haven't listened to this band and album since I moved out of the classic heavy/power metal sound I was burned out of, but maybe I can someday make my return trip to those metal genres and give good Guardians releases like this one another chance...

Here's my top 10:

1. Northlane - Obsidian

2. Dir En Grey - Phalaris

3. Cave In - Heavy Pendulum

4. Motionless in White - Scoring the End of the World

5. Coldrain - Nonnegative

6. Parkway Drive - Darker Still

7. I Prevail - True Power

8. Memphis May Fire - Remade in Misery

9. Disturbed - Divisive

10. Five Finger Death Punch - AfterLife

An honorable mention is Demon Hunter's Exile, but I plan to give that album a little more listening and wait for it to appear in the site before adding it somewhere in my list.

Hmm... It's mentioned as a CD or CD-R. If it is just a demo that can't be accepted, that's OK. I still would like the other releases I've requested added here when possible please.

Solid blend of metalcore and pop punk:

Ben, alongside the A Day to Remember albums I've requested above, please also add these albums:

Fear, and Loathing in Las Vegas - Cocoon for the Golden Future

Chelsea Grin - Suffer in Hell

Dead to Fall - For the Memories

Ben, please add these new albums:

In the Woods... - Diversum

Voivod - Ultraman (EP)

Ben, please add these new albums:

Demon Hunter - Exile

Saint Asonia - Extrovert

I've given that Saint Asonia EP some listening and, to be honest, it's kind of like a heavier Three Days Grace (frontman Adam Gontier's previous band) in almost a similar vein to Fight the Fury. I consider the EP a mix of alt-rock/metal and post-grunge, and I've voted in those genres for the EP in RYM. However, whether or not Extrovert can be added to Metal Academy depends on if the EP's Alternative Metal tag gets more FOR or AGAINST votes.

Thanks, Daniel. In my country, a COVID victim has to isolate in their room at home, or if it's really bad, in a hospital. So far for me, it's only been the former.

Bad news: I have COVID. Passed down from my grandmother, then grandfather, then brother, then me. Please wish me the best of luck that I survive and recover within the next week or two. And maybe then I'll be better enough to comment on next month's clan playlists and feature releases, and work on January's feature releases and Revolution and Sphere playlists.

Sneak peek for the December Sphere monthly playlist premiering next week, another killer track from Burton C. Bell's final album with Fear Factory before leaving the band:

The 16-year drought from new Sadus material is over, thrash fans! Sadus is back with a taste of their classic thrash/tech-thrash to get you pumped up for their next album:

The scattered interludes really killed the intense energy of this Spread the Disease album, and this one is a poor ending for this band's career, consisting of just prank calls:

Two of the most awesome late 90s extreme metal/deathcore songs I've heard, working better as a couple separate tracks instead of an album littered in useless interludes:

Ben, please add the A Day to Remember album Old Record, and their non-metal albums before Bad Vibrations to bridge the gap.

A nearly 8-minute metalcore epic from Ryan Clark's pre-Demon Hunter band sharing the same EP as Zao:

I thought there would never be a remix as atrocious as that Dawn of Ashes stinker above, but I was wrong:

Two highlights from the second and final album from KMFDM side-project Excessive Force:

Excellent deathly industrial metal, though sounding closer to Godflesh than the more deathly Dead World:

An amazing highlight of metallic hardcore fury, with a few prominent guests including the Deftones vocalist:

To be honest, I wasn't sure about giving this Strife album In This Defiance a listen and a review because their debut One Truth wasn't all that great and I even thought it was too hardcore to be metal, hence that judgement submission. But when I put this album on play, boy was I blown away! This is a higher, more metallic step from their debut, and it has just what I'm looking for from this band. Everything is at the right tone for Strife. This is a full tight metallic hardcore sound with brisk tempos. Rick Rodney has his hardcore bellowing skills that are often hard to understand, but at the same time, so compelling, all in 10 songs of metal/hardcore fury. There are a few prominent guests assisting in the action; ex-Sepultura drummer Igor Cavalera, Fear Factory guitarist Igor Cavalera, and most notably, Deftones vocalist Chino Moreno. The two other tracks each from separate ends of the album are just horror movie sound effects that almost makes the album a soundtrack for such a film, though those pointless interludes don't affect the rest of this album perfection that makes In This Defiance an astonishing stunner. This is standard E-tuned thrashy metal/hardcore at its best. I'm glad to find the greatness of Strife!

5/5

And that's the last of these albums that I had planned for this metalcore rediscovery voyage. Once again, I'm gonna try discovering a few extra releases from those times to add more year variety in later Revolution playlists, and that would be a different small journey that isn't part of this thread. Anyway...that's all in this thread, folks!

Moving to an entirely different sound away from one that they're tired of, while having a bit of the old-school rhythm, if you know what I mean:

If there's one album that sealed the deal for a band's stylistic direction, it would be 1997's stunning brutal metalcore in Living Sacrifice's career, Reborn! The cathartic power of this genre was shining for the band ever since guitarist Bruce Fitzhugh started doing growling vocals. Apparently, the band wanted to make an album with a unique sound unlike any other bands. The band released 3 albums before this with original vocalist Darren Johnson, the Big 4-inspired thrash self-titled debut and two Malevolent Creation-esque death metal albums Nonexistent and Inhabit. Reborn can indeed be considered Living Sacrifice's rebirth, taking on strong metalcore with a bit of their earlier thrash rhythm. With lots of heavy and empowering tracks, Living Sacrifice should really has much fame as P.O.D., and this album Reborn is the reason!

5/5

Man, this rediscovery journey has really gone up and down for me, with perfect masterpieces alternating with awful stinkers. I'm back into the perfect album zone with this band from Sweden that would later evolve through a more progressive direction:

In the 90s, Burst was in the metallic hardcore realm. The primal riff delivery laid the groundwork for the band's later sound. In a way, you can consider the band's 5 albums like the first 5 of Neurosis in terms of their stylistic evolution, starting hardcore before a more Infinite sound, except Burst's sound has a dissonant metalcore backbone throughout. This perfect offering stands out with a hardcore stampede of drumming, riffs, and shouts. Burst made grand progress in their debut with their songwriting and performing in unison. The quality is tight while in top-notch production, with solid crispy support of the bass and that metalcore backbone. Patrik Hultin might very well be a new favorite drummer of mine with his eclectic skills. His drumming is wilder than the guitars, in calculating alignment with the riff groove. The blazing fast, aggressive yet melodic short songs and one 5-minute monstrous epic are what made this album such a great beast, probably more metallic than Strife's debut. The enclosed tightness is dusted off by Burst in their most hardcore bloom!

5/5

Just when I thought the rediscovery journey would be back to greatness, it made another downward turn. In my 5 years of listening to metalcore, I never thought there would be a band that I find bad, like absolutely sh*tty stinker "can die in an acid volcano" bad. That is, until I found this band, perhaps the first Japanese metalcore band, State Craft. All 3 releases I've rated ranging from one to two stars. Of course, there are awesome metalcore bands from Japan like Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, Coldrain, Crossfaith, Crystal Lake, etc. But this band, State Craft? NAH. The quality is often too weak, and their only album To Celebrate the Forlorn Seasons has cheesy synth-orchestral sh*t that doesn't seem appropriate in most of metalcore. There are only 3 songs I like from that band, listed starting from the #1 best (or least bad):

1. "Season's End"

2. "Break the Cycle"

3. "After This Morning"

Here's the link to the band's releases. Beware the poor badness of the band: https://metal.academy/bands/7065

A six-minute epic of hope for the 90s metalcore scene in Florida:

Oh wow! This next release is a huge positive twist in my rediscovery journey. Let me give you a summary on this...

Morning Again are legends in the metal/hardcore scene. At that time, their frontman was Damien Moyal, a straight-edge vocalist who was also in Shai Hulud at that time. It's thanks to those two bands that the Floridian music scene has expanded to more than just death metal and *shudder* Backstreet Boys and Disney, paving the way for other metalcore bands like Trivium. Morning Again broke up after one official album, but they've since reunited multiple times and released a couple more EPs. However, Moyal moved on to melodic hardcore band As Friends Rust, and he remained vocalist for that band except for those 6 years when the other members performed as Salem. Anyway, Hand of Hope is a perfect compilation of demos from Morning Again, worth money from the buyer. There are 7 songs in 30 minutes, and I almost think of Hand of Hope as a full mini-album. So great with lots of heavy tracks! Props to Morning Again for this incredible work! If you enjoy Shai Hulud and other metallic hardcore, surely you wouldn't wanna miss this. It's an album of hardcore insanity!

5/5

I seem to currently have a bit of turbulence in my journey, with a couple demo EPs that turn out to be mostly stinkers for me. Here's the second one of those:

The Absolve EP sounds nice, but the production is jacked up in a bad way, which along with the overuse of samples in the beginning, doesn't make me up for it so much. "Bleeding" is the only highlight here, having a brutal Suffocation-like slam death metal breakdown. A f***ing crusher in a mostly f***ing bland trash-fest....

2/5

OK, so back to my rediscovery journey... This EP I've listened to and tried reviewing 6 months ago, but I didn't like it enough to do it. Having just given it another listen today, I've made a second attempt at a review, and well...

This EP is really old, and while I have no trouble with the metalcore oldies, which is why I'm doing my earlier metalcore rediscovery journey, it's the quality that matters. This EP is pretty difficult to listen to. In my opinion, most of the metalcore demos aren't exactly well-produced, with this one from Breach being one example. If you think I'm only up for the new complex style of metalcore, you would be wrong, I do like the rock-out hardcore songs, such as this EP's title track, a hard classic that's pretty much the only highlight here. However, there are much better releases than this poor sh*t, if you wanna please your metallic hardcore soul....

2.5/5

Ben, please the Split EP by Training for Utopia and Zao.

The YouTube commenter who recommended that I listen to Zao suggested the original demo version of "Skin Like Winter". Unfortunately, I honestly think it's a poorly done demo, and that the album version from Liberate Te Ex Inferis does better justice. There should've been some proper time and budget to work on this version in my opinion:

There are heavier and more humorous highlights in Dead to Fall's final album before this 10-year split, but this one's a mellow heart-toucher:

Another metalcore masterpiece concludes with what can be considered the "sludgy metalcore Crusade":

From hardcore to metallic, a new era began for this band, recommended for metalcore fans who love the music of Converge, Underoath, and As I Lay Dying:

A couple grand highlights from an album that made me remember the more melodic progressive fan I used to be:

Another YouTube commenter recommended that I listen to Zao, one of the earliest metalcore bands to still be active today. This incredible song that I've looked up has blown me away, and I look forward to checking out the rest of its album and the band:

After finding a recent comment for one of my videos, talking about a Ne Obliviscaris song giving the commenter Caligula's Horse vibes, I remembered a review I've made for one of the Caligula's Horse albums as part of The Infinite Progressive Metal Modern Era clan challenge nearly 3 years ago and decided to check out one of its highlights. This is a song for anyone who's into progressive rock/metal, and I might just find a bit of melodic light from this band that I want more of, while focusing on more extreme bands.

Although The Ocean is known for their blend of post-sludge and progressive metal, Pelagial is definitely a more progressive ocean. You can only find a small bit of ambience around the surface, and a couple sludgy tracks at the crushing bottom, with practically everything else in between being as progressive as progressive metal can be. So I agree with you on this one, Daniel.

1. Gateway playlist - 4.5/5 (number of songs commented: 9)

2. Revolution playlist - 4/5 (number of songs commented: ALL 29)

3. Sphere playlist - 4/5 (number of songs commented: ALL 26)

So far, I've only commented on 9 tracks in the Gateway playlist and skipped out on the Infinite playlist, but for the other 2 of my own clans I've listened to the entire playlists! I'm grateful to Saxy and Daniel for their playlist works. I really dig what I've listened to in the Gateway playlist made by Saxy, and I'm glad the Revolution and Sphere playlists made by me paid off. I recommend them to any fan of those respective genres and anyone who isn't into those genres but wants to get into a great start in enjoying them. Thanks, Daniel, for accepting these playlists, and good work all!

Here's what I've reviewed so far:

THE HORDE: Edge of Sanity - "Purgatory Afterglow" (1994) 4.5/5 (as I recall from the rating I had until last year)

THE INFINITE: The Ocean - "Pelagial" (2013) 5/5

THE REVOLUTION: Lorna Shore - "...And I Return to Nothingness" (2021) 5/5

THE SPHERE: OLD - "The Musical Dimensions of Sleastak" (1993) 5/5

Both of my feature release submissions; The Ocean's Pelagial and Lorna Shore's And I Return to Nothingness, plus Daniel's Sphere submission OLD's The Musical Dimensions of Sleastak, all each receive a perfect 5 stars, and I would recommend them to fans of their respective genres. I also commented on Daniel's Horde feature release submission that I haven't listened to in over a year, Edge of Sanity's Purgatory Afterglow, and I stand by my 4.5-star rating. It's been an awesome month so far. Keep up the good work on the feature releases, all! I look forward to more...

Despite being a decade later than Oceano and Whitechapel, and serious drama involving the band and their vocalist at the time, it's songs in this album like this that shall earn them immortality in the deathcore realm: