Dark Tranquillity - Through Smudged Lenses

peak DT

Steel Inferno - First Strike

This is a flawless song. Pure fucking energy!

Metallica - "Wherever We May Roam"
Bonus live disc from recent Black Album reissue.

Necrot - Shadows and Light

Death metal is alive and well in the 2020's thanks to new blood like Necrot!

Destroyer 666 - Never Surrender

Spinning the album. This is pretty good. Loving the guitars so far.

Moonlight Sorcery - For Thy Light Is Ice

Good stuff, new Ep coming out in January!

Slaughter Lord - Thrash 'til Death 86-87
Destruction - Bestial Invasion Of Hell
Desaster - Hellfire's Dominion

This Sat morning playlist for the daily quizzes, wordle, global, framed etc etc.

Unholy Cadaver - Unholy Cadaver

This was the band that became Hammers Of Misfortune and even has a 14min long song called Hammers Of Misfortune. The lineup features John, Mike and Chewy, with Erika (Sanhedrin) guesting on it. Pretty wild and interesting ride from this album to the new HOM album, even if I didn't particularly like the albums post Bastard.
This one's a super cool mix of trad, black, death, doom and prog. Full of variety and never boring. I would've loved it if they did more in this style but alas it was not to be. Nevermind, if you haven't heard this album before do yourself a favor and give it a go.

Motorhead - Iron Fist. Picked up the double disc reissue this year. Cool to hear early demo recordings of these songs. The live disc is good as well.

Bal-Sagoth - The Voyagers Beneath the Mare Imbrium

I love how unabashedly dorky this band is.
Very fun stuff!

Annihilator - Metal II

Unpopular opinion time: I dig this album.
It's a whole lotta fun and very headbangable. Getting Stu in on vocals was a great move. Loses points coz it's a re-recording but glad they did and I hope they record more as this lineup. 3/5

Ares Kingdom - In Darkness At Last

Such a wicked album! Chucks riffs are just godly and Alex's vocals are killer, but it's the songs that really matter and they have been masterfully crafted. 5/5
Easy top 10 album, it's just a matter of whether it can take out the top spot or not.

Autopsy - Morbidity Triumphant

I'd have to say this is their best since Acts Of The Unspeakable. Nothing really new to hear here but it's just so damn good to hear them in top form. Autopsy are one of my all time favorites and my heart is telling me 5 but the brains saying 4. Brain wins today so it's 4/5.

Hammers of Misfortune - Overtaker
Slough Feg - The Animal Spirits
Rush - Signals
Threshold - Dividing Lines
The Rolling Stones - Let It Bleed

Playlist this morning...

Abysmal Lord - Disciples of the Inferno cassette.

I like this first album by this band much more than say the most recent EP. I am however curious to hear their new album that comes out in the near future. The lone track I heard was an improvement. Members of this band were in Grave Ritual, which was more death metal, and Meathole Infection, death metal with a little grind. Really like MI and GR.

Bolt Thrower - "Realm of Chaos"
Never fails to kick my azz, all these years later.

Cryptae - Salt

Weird, off-kilter black/death with all sorts of things going on, industrial/electronic elements too. The album opens with a Slipknot-style riff. The whole thing's cool as fuck.

Torsofuck - Erotic Diarrhea Fantasy

why not

Blind Guardian - The God Machine

This album is a real grower. The songs are sinking in and they're all really good, some are great. Again we've heard it all before but it's just so damn good and when they're one of your faves...well it's these sorta albums that are gonna be tuff to rank. 4/5

Cauldron Born - Cold Steel For The Necromancer

I'm still in the early in the early stages of ranking my 2022 albums but I'm making the call now, this is my album of the year. Everything I want from a album. Metal as fuck! 5/5

NP: Burial Invocation - Abiogenesis

This is such a strong album. It's too bad this band's activity has been so sporadic. It seems like they debuted to early and returned too late to get the recognition they deserve during Dark Descent's rise.

Burzum - Det Som Engang Var

Let’s not kid ourselves, while this is a classic of the Norwegian scene, varg (aside from being a terrible person) is also a pretty shitty vocalist, fucking hell…

Battle Beast - Russian Roulette

I'm still surprised at how solid "Circus of Doom" is since its predecessor was abysmal. I'd assumed this band was done, but I was wrong, lol.


I've noticed the new one's a grower for quite a few people but I honestly loved it immediately. I wouldn't consider it my all-time favorite, but I do think it might be my favorite album they've done since "Nightfall in Middle-Earth" if I'm being entirely honest.

Death - Symbolic CD.

Damn good album.

The Gates of Slumber - Conqueror

So many great riffs and vocal hooks. "Ice Worm" gets stuck in my head for days. This band has their own vibe that I can't really explain.

I think my favorite song has to be "The Doom of Aceldama" from Hymns of Blood and Thunder though. It's a killer epic from Judas's point of view.

That whole album is badass. It'll be in my year-end 10 for sure.

Kvaen- The Great Below

Re-listening to some of my list for the AotY poll. This might be the best black metal release of the year, or at least my favorite.

Spun

Bolt Thrower - Mercenary

This is an album that doesn't get a lot of talk and it fucking crushes. I think it will be in rotation for a while.

^^^ War Master is my favorite but Mercenary is up there.

Dissection - Reinkaos

A solid 80% album, easily. Has plenty of those infectious riffs and leads. Still hardly a competitor to The Somberlain or Storm...

So goddamn good.

Lalu - Atomic Ark

Still trying to make heads or tails of it. Weird album. Doesn't seem to have as many big hooks but there's some quite interesting, out of left field musicianship...

Helwetti - The Black Tempest

Great demo stuff from this Finnish band!

Cauldron Born - Cold Steel for the Necromancer

This really opens up even more with good headphones. So much intricacy and detail for this trad metal style. Great, unstoppable riffs and energy. I can't really see anything wrong with this.

Satanic Warmaster - Funeral Wolves

Great, really looking forward to the new album!

Fates Warning - Inside Out

Btw, anyone else think Fates Warning REALLY dropped the ball with Inside Out? I don't mean the quality of the album, it's a solid Parallels Pt. 2, but first off, it came out three years after Parallels to build off any of the commercial momentum they had with that album AND Images and Words had been released since then and they would have been primed to swoop in and do an album that was closer to that, albeit with the Fates sound. Something in between Parallels and Pleasant Shade, proggier than Parallels but with the catchy choruses. Could have been a big album. Generally, I feel like the Alder-era had a masterpiece album in them that they never made.

Heavy Load - Little Lies

Such a rocking band.
Great atmosphere.

These are good points.
But i've long felt that nearly all of the most successful bands of the very early 90s dropped the ball by waiting too long to capitalize on what was tremendous success. Had these bands released albums in '92 - '93, perhaps mainstream metal/hard rock wouldn't have fallen from grace so hard.

Ozzy - '91 No More Tears was his most successful album. Nothing new until '95.
Metallica - '91 Black Album. Nothing needs to be said here.
Queensryche - scored a huge hit on American radio in '91 with Silent Lucidity. Empire was a tremendous sales success. Nothing new until '94.
Slayer - Seasons in '90. Nothing again until '94
Skid Row - '91 Slave to the Grind was massive. Nothing new until '95.
Guns R Roses - '91 Illusion records were about as huge as the Black Album. A covers album dropped in '93 but then they fizzled out.
Motley Crue - a '91 'Best Of' saw the rerelease of "Home Sweet Home" and featured a new song or two that were all over MTV. Vince Neil left and nothing new until '94.
Van Halen - scored as massive hit in '91 with "Right Now". Nothing new until '95.
And Bruce and Rob leaving Maiden and Priest sure didn't help.

There are probably multiple others I'm overlooking.

It was such an odd time...

yep good point, and I guess grunge got even more of a stranglehold by '94 so once those bands came back from their long tours, they found the business had changed taste-wise.

Considering that Parallels was their most commercially successful album but didn't quite put the band out there, it's probably no surprise that it took the band a while to release that. Hell, it was a good return to something slightly heavier if you would ask me. I know that people see it as a logical successor, but Ray's lines are way better on that record and at least it has some quality riffs. Parallels is way too poppy and Queensryche-y for my taste.

NP: Torturer - Oppressed by the Force

What's the deal with Chilean bands kicking so much ass?

Trist - Hin

My biggest regret in life is not discovering this song sooner.

This is what I’ve spun today:

Depeche Mode - Songs of Faith and Devotion

This may be my favorite DM album, technically it’s not their best but the vocal performance is astonishing to say the least.

Abruptum - Evil Genius

This is the equivalent of 45 minutes in hell.

Mercyful Fate - Don’t Break the Oath