Sonny's Forum Replies

Hi Ben, I know I've still got a number of requests pending, but could you please add Spain's Saturno and their debut album Menhir (2020).

Hi Ben, please add Italy's Black / Doom outfit Nero or the Fall of Rome (also in The Fallen).

Also:

Old Corpse Road (UK)

Ayr (US)

The Infernal Sea (UK)

Disamara (Italy)

Czort (Poland)

Ben, I noticed that the drop down box of member's names is a list, not a searchable box. Whilst OK at the moment, would this not become difficult to navigate as the membership grew? If you had to search a list of hundreds, or even thousands of names it would become unusable wouldn't it? Other than that I really love the new listing features.

Ben could you please add:

Towards Atlantis Lights (Italy/UK)

Deathbell (France)

Angel of Damnation (Germany)

Leechfeast (Slovenia)

Faustcoven (Norway)

Barren Altar (US)

Alms (US)

Green Druid (US)

Ursa (US)

and the Mammoth Weed Wizard Bastard / Slomatics split album, Totems.

Unfortunately it isnt, it's just the corporate ravens feeding on the unseeing eyes of the corpse of a once mighty warrior ...Black Metal was his name!

Would it also be possible to sort by most recently made, so that you could view any newer lists first?

Yeah, I reckon so. So default to most likes, but allow for order of creation.

Yeah, sounds good, Ben.

Would it also be possible to sort by most recently made, so that you could view any newer lists first?

Hi Ben. I'm sorry for being thick, but I'm still not getting it. When you say you select, clan, genre and year do you mean via a function that has yet to be added or do we need to state all those things in the list title? I have begun another list but have not been asked to select any of those categories anywhere.

Sorry if I haven't been clear, but this is a design discussion. I haven't added the categories or filters yet. I just wanted to gather some feedback from the community before I go down that path. There could be a better way to configure things that I haven't thought of.

Right, Ben I'm with you now. That sounds great. As the number of lists increases there would definitely be a need to filter them I think. What about a way to "favourite" or "like" a particular list then within any given category allow them to be ordered by number of "likes" so presumably the more popular (and by inference, better or more useful) lists are shown first?

Works great Ben and I'm certain it will be very useful going forward. Although selecting to only show releases you've rated whilst at the same time excluding any releases you have already rated unsurprisingly yields zero returns!

Hi Ben. I'm sorry for being thick, but I'm still not getting it. When you say you select, clan, genre and year do you mean via a function that has yet to be added or do we need to state all those things in the list title? I have begun another list but have not been asked to select any of those categories anywhere.

Great playlist this month Daniel, one of the best yet. Sorry though Vinny, the Jute Gyte track went right over my head. Summoning are only really any good for table-top RPGing and I found the Ensiferum track a bit fromage-friendly! I was also wondering why the Deafheaven track was so crap until... Bam!! When it gets going it is amazing. Everything else was terrific and to be honest how can any playlist that features Immortal, Bathory and Darkthrone not be awesome? A few I need to check out further too, such as Wiegedood and Anorexia Nervosa (I remember not being impressed by them before, but their track on here is very good indeed).

Ha, Jute Gyte is a challenge alright.

Yeah, he sure is. I really enjoyed his Perdurance album, but I'm a bit too much of a literal person for the more avant-garde stuff. Still, he's obviously ridiculously talented, so good luck to him.

Great playlist this month Daniel, one of the best yet. Sorry though Vinny, the Jute Gyte track went right over my head. Summoning are only really any good for table-top RPGing and I found the Ensiferum track a bit fromage-friendly! I was also wondering why the Deafheaven track was so crap until... Bam!! When it gets going it is amazing. Everything else was terrific and to be honest how can any playlist that features Immortal, Bathory and Darkthrone not be awesome? A few I need to check out further too, such as Wiegedood and Anorexia Nervosa (I remember not being impressed by them before, but their track on here is very good indeed).

Hi Ben, I am a little unsure what you mean. Do you intend to have different sections within the list section to differentiate years, genres etc or do you mean to have a list section within each separate clan? The latter may help tidy things up for clan-specific lists leaving the main lists section for more generalised listings, such as "Greatest Albums of the 1990's" or other less genre-specific lists.

This is a tricky subject and conversation to have on a music website forum, to be honest. I agree with Daniel on a purely musical basis that for the vast majority of DSBM the differentiation is purely thematic and I also agree that a lot of it is self-pitying. However, I disagree that it doesn't fit in with the black metal aesthetic. BM has long been about negativity, misanthropy and hatred so surely the ultimate expression of that aesthetic is self-hatred and self-destruction. It's easy to hate something else, much more difficult to hate yourself.

A lot of DSBM however sounds disingenious and is made by people who have probably just latched on to the themes with no real understanding of depression and mental illness, like a majority of black metal bands who sing about Satanism aren't actually Satanists. For me, this is why albums like V-Halmstad and Death Pierce Me are so affecting, because they get under the skin of those issues and through their music a listener who suffers from those same issues can connect more deeply. Sure to those never affected by those same issues they may sound lame or inexplicable and if that's the case then I'm made up for you, but those records can also mean a lot on a personal level to others for their ability to show a certain type of listener that they are not alone in their thoughts and feelings. Also no one would ever kill themselves because of a record, despite what Tipper Gore and Mary Whitehouse would have had people believe in the 80s. I know many will probably scoff at these comments, but frankly I don't give a shit!

New York thrash metal at its finest.

...yes it is!

Ben, could you please add Aphonic Threnody.

Hi Ben could you please add Portugal's Onirik.

Interesting that you mention Silencer there at the end, Daniel. Now, just for the record, I am not a massive fan of DSBM particularly, but V-Halmstad and Silencer's Death Pierce Me are two of the most interesting and emotionally resonant black metal releases I have ever heard. Although it is true that Silencer divide opinion, especially with respect to the vocals, personally I love that album. Considering BM can be so hokey at times with it's satanic and evil  imagery (and don't get me wrong, I'm not knocking it) these are two albums that actually seem to mean something deeper and I find I connect with on another level. Again, great choice.

Have been giving the new lists option a go and, well Ben, you've really gone and done it now!!

Awesome...

Excellent work Ben. Really stoked that the charts have been expanded, now they are no longer just the tip of the iceberg!

Great to see the charts expanded. I don't know if it's just me, but there seems to be a problem. When I went onto page two of The Pit chart, it shows the second page of the chart for the combined clans, not just for The Pit releases. Oh, and for The North.

According to RYM the sub-genres of doom metal are death doom, funeral doom and so-called traditional doom. So if it's not death or funeral doom it's traditional. In other words it is JUST FUCKIN' DOOM!!!! 

New single from Green Druid's upcoming album, At the Maw of Ruin due out 4th December.

Suggestions for December:

Slaughter - Incinerator - Surrender or Die EP (1985). Unfortunately the version from Strappado isn't available on Spotify.

Sacrilege B.C. - Fun With Napalm - Party With God (1986)

Razor - Deathrace - Executioner's Song (1985)

Playlist suggestions for December:

Gorgoroth - Om kristen og jödisk tru - Destroyer: Or About How to Philosophize With the Hammer (1998)

Varathron -  Under the Sight of Horus - Walpurgisnacht (1995)

Mayhem -  Fall of Seraphs - Wolf's Lair Abyss EP (1997)

So, Daniel, when you say the quota for death doom is full, do you mean gothic death doom or old-school death doom? Another annoying sub-genre is traditional doom metal, a genre that has become so misused on RYM I now ignore it and actively vote against it whenever possible.

Anyway, playlist suggestions for next month:

Monolord - Died A Million Times - Vaenir (2015) - Doom Metal

The Lumberjack Feedback - New Order (of the Ages) Part II  - Mere Mortals  (2019) - Atmospheric Sludge Metal

Robots of the Ancient World - High & Drive - Cosmic Riders (2019) - Stoner Metal

I am completely with you there Ben. If you are well-fitted to any particular clan as a fan, then I think you will have a feel for whether an album is a "fit" for that clan or not rather than getting bogged down in genre and descriptor minutiae, particularly as we seem to be leaning heavily on RYM which is notorious for mis-labelling metal genres.

Just as an aside, I don't have any kind of downer of CoF, I quite like a couple of their earlier albums, but I just can't picture them as a Fallen band I'm afraid.

While I take your point, I'm sorry Daniel but I must disagree on one thing and that is that death doom is inherently gothic. Sure, a certain style of death doom is such, the My Dying Bride / Paradise Lost branch, but what about bands like Winter, Autopsy, Cianide, Ceremonium, Asphyx, Atavisma, Void Rot and the likes who have no gothic leanings whatsoever, but a much stronger death metal influence and a filthy, cavernous sound? In fact I sometimes wonder how some of these gothic death doom albums get tagged as death doom at all, having virtually no death metal DNA in them. Maybe these are actually gothic metal releases rather than death doom. Like I say, I am no expert as I find the whole gothic metal style tedious, so I am not advocating one way or another, but I do know what I hear and what I don't!

I am not actually advocating moving Gothic Metal out of The Fallen, as such. The problem with the genre, it seems to me, is that rather than being an out and out genre in and of itself, it seems more like a qualifier to other genres, in much the same way that "melodic metal" is and that doesn't have it's own genre does it? So, as such, we have gothic death doom, gothic black metal and so on in the same way we have melodic black metal, melo-death etc. I wouldn't even have a clue what a purely gothic metal release would sound like, or what would differentiate it from other metal genres other than aesthetically. Maybe those better qualified (I think I've made my disinterest in the genre apparent) could explain to me what makes a singular gothic metal release, rather than as a descriptor of the atmosphere of another genre? I know RYM and others treat it as a unique genre, but from my limited experience I think they are wrong and it should be used as a sub-genre of other, more definitive genres. If this was the case, releases would then reside under the clan of the relevant major genre.

This is all hypothetical if course, I don't expect or even want anything to change, but I think it's a point worth making.

I notice you haven't rated this one Sonny. It's a fucking strong release that more than holds its own with the big boys at the more extreme end of thrash.

Thanks once more Daniel for a quality rec. I think I've found my new favourite Sepultura album and I feel you have repaid me for causing me to listen to that fucking terrible Tainted Love cover!!

The only real anomaly that sticks out for me is The Sphere. Would Industrial Metal have been better served being incorporated into one of the other clans such as The Gateway or The Revolution? With a much lower membership count and being the only clan that encompasses just one genre it seems a bit underfed.

The other issue for me is that Gothic Metal being in The Fallen (and I CAN see why) means that bands like Cradle of Filth are included, when they don't really fit.

Other than that it's all good and an original way of creating talking points about the music we each love.

Thanks for the suggestions, I really should get to work on this soon!!!

Ben, please add Russian crusty death metallers Tarpan and their 2018 album Бездна (The Abyss).

To be honest, Daniel, my experience with Sepultura begins with Beneath the Remains and ends with Chaos A.D., both of which are firm favourites. I've never really considered their earlier releases, but I will check it out sometime this week.

Weirdly, despite being a massive fan of both thrash and punk, I've never really listened to that much crossover thrash. I guess if I want thrash I listen to thrash and if I want punk then I listen to punk. I do like Agnostic Front's punk material though, so maybe I'll give their album a listen. The problem I've had with crossover is that it always sounds less aggressive than my punk yardstick band, the mighty Discharge, so what's the point? By the way, Suicidal Tendencies hardcore debut destroys their thrashier albums in my opinion. Still I'm gonna spin some of your top 8 and see where we go!

OK, here we go...

1. Slayer - Reign in Blood (1986)

2. Metallica - Master of Puppets (1986)

3. Celtic Frost - To Mega Therion (1985)

4. Kreator - Coma of Souls (1990)

5. Sabbat - History of a Time to Come (1988)

6. Razor - Violent Restitution (1988)

7. Dark Angel - Darkness Descends (1986) 

8. Sacrilege - Behind the Realms of Madness (1985)

9. Kreator - Pleasure to Kill (1986)

10. Morbid Saint - Spectrum of Death (1990)

I guess my list only spans six years, but when you are talking about thrash is there really going to be much top ten material after 1991? This is a genre that definitely had a short(ish) classic era. Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying there isn't any decent thrash after'91, hell, I even dig some modern thrash albums, but all the above are 10/10's for me, in fact I had to leave some out: The Ultraviolence, Persecution Mania and Seven Churches to name but three. By the way, is there any genuine thrash-head who doesn't rate Reign in Blood as number one?

Sonny, this is an absolute no-brainer for you.

Fantastic.. it inhabits that dark, foetid zone between thrash and death metal that I love. Energetic and invigorating. Thanks for the rec.

I intend to write a review for this shortly, so I'll just post a quick reaction here for now. I've avoided Shining for years due to an adverse reaction to one of their earlier albums. However, I must send you my profuse thanks, Daniel,  for selecting this as this month's featured release because this has absolutely floored me and I would never have listened to it otherwise. It has got to be one of the most profoundly affecting releases I have heard in a good while and one I really found myself relating to, so great job with this month's selection.

Oh man, that is one horrible album cover... but it is a pretty amusing title all the same!

I agree with Daniel that Sabbath Bloody Sabbath is a better album than  Vol.4, except that I would probably go further and rate it as one of my all-time favourite heavy metal albums. Sabbath stretched out and expanded their sound into more progressive territory, even adding Rick Wakeman of Yes on keyboards to hammer the point home. Yet this is still fundamentally a heavy metal record and it is quite mind-boggling to realise that Sabbath were already taking the genre into a further dimension BEFORE ANYONE ELSE WAS EVEN PLAYING IT! It's almost as if everyone else was playing catch up even before they had started. Great songs abound: the title track, Sabbra Cadabra, Killing Yourself to Live, Spiral Architect and the amazing A National Acrobat (although after more than forty years I still don't know what that means - if you can enlighten me please do).

I honestly believe this is a hugely underrated album along with Sabotage, as Sabbath hit the sweet spot between the point where they had mastered their trade, particularly their songwriting and their coke-fuelled over-ambitious and sloppy phase that ultimately led to the mark one lineup's demise. Very few bands can match the Sab's run of albums from the debut to Sabotage and they made them all without following anyone else's template. I can't say for certain that Sabbath Bloody Sabbath is my favourite Sabbath album, but equally I can't say it's not!

Will get on it tomorrow...

Track by track commentary:

01.    Melvins – “Hag Me” (from “Houdini”, 1993)
I am seemingly one of the few who thinks that sometimes Melvins are extremely overrated. When they are good they are very good, however and this track is a pretty damn fine slab of sludgy, stoner-influenced doom metal. 8/10

02.    Funeral – “This Barren Skin” (from “From These Wounds”, 2006)
Gothic-led death doom that I’m sure appeals to the vast hordes of My Dying Bride fans, but I find most of this stuff outside a few of the more classy acts, insipid and bland, this included. 4.5/10

03.    Theatre Of Tragedy – “Venus” (from “Aegis”, 1998)
See above, add cheesy synths and Disney’s Beauty and the Beast-style vocals, then divide by ten - awful. The metal version of Jim Steinman. Luckily, Spotify played an ad after this and that was preferable! 1/10

04.    Katatonia – “Saw You Drown” (from “Discouraged Ones”, 1998)
..and so to the “mighty” Katatonia. I appreciate they are one of the darlings of the doom scene and indeed they do have their moments, but I really don’t rate them as all that. This would be a good track if the singer didn’t sound so fucking uninterested. 6/10

05.    Tiamat – “Cain” (from “Prey”, 2003)
Is this an outtake from Sisters of Mercy’s Vision Thing album? I’m sorry, but you’re losing me here, in fact I’m beginning to question if I’m actually listening to a metal playlist at all because most of this, up to this point, sounds like bands who would rather be playing anything but metal. 5/10

06.    Cult Of Luna – “Ghost Trail” (from “Eternal Kingdom”, 2008)
I like Cult of Luna very much and this is a nice builder of a track from an album I am unfamiliar with. 8/10

07.    Down – “Ghosts Along The Mississippi” (from “Down II: A Bustle In Your Hedgerow…”, 2002)
Loo-sianna-swamp-mud-thick grooves of southern fried stoner metal from the guy who used to be in that Pantera. 8/10

08.    Elder – “Release” (from “Spires Burn/Release” E.P., 2012)
A lengthy stoner jam from one of the great exponents of the form. 8/10

09.    Reverend Bizarre – “The Devil Rides Out” (from “II: Crush The Insects”, 2005) [Submitted by Sonny92]
I guess I’m biased as this is one of mine and I love Rev Biz anyway, but this is classic heavy metal-based trad doom with goofy Hammer-style horror lyrics. 9/10

10.    Saint Vitus – “Born Too Late” (from “Born Too Late”, 1986) [Submitted by Daniel]
Shit, I fuckin’ love that Wino guitar tone. A molasses-thick, crawling riff and Wino’s whiskey-soaked vocals that hints at smoky back rooms in seedy back alley bars. Outsider lyrics that hark back to a time when metal was still an outlaw brand of music instead of the corporate whore it sometimes appears to be nowadays.10/10

11.    Gore – “Extirpation” (from “Hart Gore”, 1986)
A band I must confess to being completely ignorant of prior to this, but this I like. 8/10

12.    Winter – “Servants Of The Warsmen” (from “Into Darkness”, 1990) [Submitted by Sonny92]
Now this is what I really call death doom, classic old-school shit that has more than a passing relationship with death metal. A true classic of death doom and an album every metalhead should own. 10/10

13.    My Dying Bride – “Catherine Blake” (from “Songs Of Darkness, Words Of Light”, 2004)
Classic-sounding MDB from one of their most popular albums, with a nod to gothic horror tales. 8/10

14.    Couch Slut – “I’m 14” (from “Take A Chance On Rock ‘n’ Roll”, 2020)
Genuine hardcore-derived sludge that shows it’s punk origins as much as it’s metal roots. 7/10

15.    Void Of Silence – “Opus II: With No Half-Measure” (from “Criteria ov 666” (2002) [Submitted by Ben]
More gothic metal-influenced doom, but at least this sounds a bit less polished being based on black metal rather than death metal and as such feels rawer and more vital than that tired old path. 7/10

16.    Boris – “Blackout” (Pink”, 2005) [Submitted by Daniel]
As a more recent convert to Boris I am probably still in a honeymoon phase with the band, but that said this is still a fantastic short droney crawl showcasing their own particular brand of noise metal.

17.    Esoteric – “Rotting In Dereliction” (from “A Pyrrhic Existence”, 2019) [Submitted by Sonny92]
The masters of funeral doom hit it out of the park with last year’s A Pyrrhic Existence and this is that album’s second best track. Bleak, hopeless, savage and anguished, it combines funeral and death doom in a crushing heavyweight of a track that strips away any pretentions and leaves a raw and exposed soul. 9/10

18.    Cult Leader – “Sympathetic” (from “Lightless Walk”, 2015)
Another band I’m unfamiliar with, but I like their angry-sounding, hardcore-derived sludge if this is typical of them. 7/10

Came close to binning this playlist by track five, to be honest. Fortunately it improved steeply after that point and I found a couple of new gems to explore.

Just got round to listening to Hexer's new album. Their combination of sludge and Autopsy/Winter-like death doom sets them apart from the slew of cookie cutter doom clones doing the rounds:

Hi Ben, could you add Ahab's Live Prey, Pallbearer's Forgotten Days and Hexer's Realm of the Feathered Serpent please.

Hi Ben please add Icelandic atmo-black project Auðn and Belarussian pagan black metallers Raven Throne's latest album Viartannie.

Sorry I've only just seen this thread.

Personally, as I have long since lost touch with any of my metal-loving friends and I love to talk metal, I enjoy the interaction of the forums immensely. However, it is sometimes difficult to sustain a prolonged discussion, probably due to the small number of active participants. The advantage of the forums here as opposed to those on RYM (where I don't really participate any more) is that MA forum users respect other's opinions whilst not necessarily agreeing with them and, consequently, don't have some smart arse jumping in with a smarmy comment deriding the music and it's fans every time anybody mentions the word "metal", like some deranged Pavlov's dog. Obviously I also love to rate and review music too and like to see what others think via their ratings and reviews. Incidentally, I don't know if it's just me but I seem unable to "like" reviews anymore as nothing happens when I press the button. Also love the playlists which is certainly a unique selling point, as is the Gallery.

I'm afraid I'm with MacabreEternal on the Hall of Judgement in that I have very little interest in it as I dislike the whole genre/micro-genre labelling fad that seems to have invaded metal.

My main gripe with the site is that it doesn't do much to promote new metal releases and sometimes feels like it exists in a bubble. I have no qualms at all with focussing on metal's glorious past, but a nod to the current and future would surely be welcome. How about an Album of the Month feature, maybe nominated by members and chosen from those nominations in similar vein to the playlists.

The lists feature seems to me to be something of a missed opportunity and is something I would like to see expanded, allowing other users to contribute because at the moment they are only a spectator sport for most of us, allowing us no participation and as a consequence a feature it is difficult to engage with. As you can probably tell from some of my forum threads I love a good list, but the forums are the only place we can post them.

Reading this back it sounds a little harsh in places and I have no wish to appear negative as I really do enjoy the site and thoroughly appreciate all the hard work both Ben and Daniel put in to provide something worthwhile and I'm sure their dedication will ultimately pay off.

I remember I gave it a couple of spins ages ago but don't recall it gripping me that much. I'll have to give it another go, maybe it'll resonate a bit more with me now.

As for the Sepultura version, is there even any point in commenting on these pointless covers any more? If Sepultura want to chase after Marilyn Manson fans than good luck to 'em, but count me out.

Ben, could you please add Kreator's 2020 live album London Apocalypticon - Live at the Roundhouse.

...which itself was a cover of the original 1965 B-side of Gloria Jones' My Bad Boy's Comin' Home which was a northern soul classic in it's own right back in the day.