All this waifu (pillow) talk makes me think of Canada's recent legalization of inflatable doll brothels...

And here I though I was the creep for riding the Sky Train high as two kites, all the while fretting everybody everywhere I went was on to the salaciously ribald blue movie reeling in my galactic-nerved head!

Ah, life! (sorry for steering this forum off-topic somehow...promise to reign it in from now on (interpret as you wish!)...

Oh, but you have to hand it to those Japanese, eh? Where's there's money, there's kink, and vice-versa, you could say.

Back to business now (i.e. reviews discussion), I just noticed TheStormIRide innocuously, if not slyly, capped the mountainous 1000 mark (the honors went to Whipstrikah)...so congratulations! What a run! I can only hope/pray I get my addictions under control so, much like Victor Griffin (of Pentagram/Places of Skulls lore), I'm, ahem, "comme qu'on dit" (as they say), "late for an early grave". (In other, optimistic werds, stay alive long enough to hit such a mark and beyond...).

Also dug his sneaked in Fyre review during the Dimhea VRC challenge last month...Lucifer knows I've been struggling with getting around to that one, in light/spite of how strongly I took to the debut!

I like how this newcomer, eletrikk, is working his way through Lamb of God's discography but it seems that an eye for history is a lacking element while also failing to really indulge the spirit of a single representative song as opposed to being too general. Granted, I get too specific, and I know I need to tone it back because I can verge on track-by-track writing, but eletrikk does personalize his experience well enough while being altogether quite vague on the analytical front. From him, syntax work is definitely a necessary focus just to keep everything matching up, reading up on the band a bit more would help the writing, and some more specificity would work to make the reviews hit a bit harder, but I'm sure that from this and his 'As the Palaces Burn' reviews there will be some good stuff coming from this one.

Lamb of God recorded that first record in less than a week on a shoestring budget while shitfaced most of the time and, damn I can't believe it was almost a decade ago now, I took that into account back in 2009. Maybe that would influence a score from him, I don't know, either way there's some story to the music worth exploring as well as more exploration needed in the review to round it out.

The 'As the Palaces Burn' review shows the gradual improvement of a listener working out his writing, my main gripe there would be in naming the band members without recognizing their contributions better. Throwing out a list of names doesn't work when my brother goes on a tirade of who's at a party with people I've never seen and it doesn't work with writing about a band with whom you've never had a beer. They're trying to be professionals, maybe try to do them the same courtesy while knowing the audience isn't just made of die hard fans. I know, it's an inane gripe, but it still annoys me when my brother keeps name-dropping coworkers as though I somehow know them, their roles, and their abilities without ever having seen or heard hide nor hair of them. Why do that for a band when you're writing a piece that is as much opinion as it is showing a bit of knowledge of the content?

Also, the formulaic paragraphing makes for a very impersonal approach. Songwriting, production, lyrics, are these the only aspects of the album that you judge by while vaguely describing how similar they are to endless subgenres or are they the most obvious ones from a first listen that get your fingers moving? What gets your ass moving, your head nodding, your toes tapping? What sticks out that isn't in the subgenre splooge that so entices people planting metal trees across the universe to inhale a fresh bud?

It's nice to see a forthright newcomer like this one as opposed to the trolls who have popped up lately, keep it up eletrikk. "In the Absence of the Sacred" is still kicking my ass all these years later and 'New American Gospel' was one of the first albums I really went off on back when I could afford to stay "sick" from school just to crank up the stereo in an empty house while indulging in some Rome Total War. I miss having no responsibilities and taking advantage of days off just because I could.


Also, MutanClannfear's breakdown of Sloth's main mind is a good bit of comedy that I've only just come across. I don't think that band needs anymore admonition after that ass kicking, but man am I tempted to pile on. https://www.metal-archives.com/reviews/ ... ear/229331

Finally a review of the newest The Project Hate album... well written and obviously by someone familiar with their previous work. But as usual their newer (and IMO superior) albums are flying way above peoples heads. Few are we who see the greatness in them

IMO they peaked with In Hora Mortis Nostræ. I've been tempted to tackle the last two but I just haven't found them interesting enough to write a decent review for them. Neither of them is as bad as There Is No Earth I Will Leave Unscorched (Of Chaos and Carnal Pleasures had a number of strong tracks, even) but it's still some way short of The Cadaverous Retaliation Agenda, the last before Ellinor Asp joined. It's a high bar to try and match but they were so consistently good that you'd expect them to be there or thereabouts and they just haven't come close with the last three. Ellinor's arrival is mostly coincidental - the songwriting is certainly not at the same level it used to be - although personally I think she's not on Ruby Roque's level, let alone Jo Enckell.

Can't say I agree with that New Tattoo review. It's described decently but I actually thought that album was pretty bad, and that Generation Swine was the last Crue album worth much. Which reminds me, I never did finish that discography....

^ Well, Crüe never were too deep with their stuff anyway...

I simply found it a rocking album, thoroughly. Rather good at that, too. Not at the time when it came out, but later. Not a classic, for sure, but better than any regular rock platter.

AME & In Hora was my favorites by them before they upped their game with TCRA. Everything from the songwriting, production, female vocals ect have taken a leap forward IMO. The last 4 have been more demanding and in many ways more exhausting to diggest but they are much more rewarding.

Thanks man! Once I hit the mark I figured I'd fade into obscurity, review-wise, as I've decided to stop reviewing for the immediate future. I'll still come back for the review challenges, hopefully, but there's no way I can continue to do 100+ reviews a year anymore.

Oh certainly, the descriptions of the album were spot on, I just thought it was a total snooze fest. If it does something for you than more power to ya!

Congrats on the 1000 Mr Storm! But sad to hear that we'll be seeing less of you...

Yes, indeed, no one will blame you for taking the part-time, occasional route, Storm!

I wonder now what the official "Iron Man" record (streak) is here at Metal Archives, that is, a Joe Dimaggio kind of "hitting" streak where instead of scoring hits, one reviews minimum one (1) album a day every day for as long as possible

(I think I nailed ten or so days in a row last year...I'd be cool to write 100 in 100 days, no?)

Now that is a curious thought. I've barely done more than 10 days on the trot myself, but we should probably have a look at the very regular people who've reviewed a lot. I suppose Bayern and Felix have had long streams of reviews day after day, as might Autothrall and Hells_unicorn if anyone can be bothered to look closely...

Here's one of the more awkward review score vs review body discrepancies I've seen:


https://www.metal-archives.com/reviews/ ... eGay/16533

The new Virgin Steele review looks like it was written by a robot. What the hell?

That guy must have accidentally had a copy of Marriage I or II with the song titles from the new one mislabeled over the tracks.

Oh man, that VS review was actually physically painful to read. "The album starts off with a track that is destined to be a Steele classic..." That's the cringiest line I've read in a long, long time.

This pretty much says it all.

On that new VS album...




They say the truth is somewhere in the middle. They also say people are stupid.

Quick note to Ezra on his recent 3IoB review: They have two vocalists, so it's just Cam doing his shrieky clean thing and just Jaime doing the raspy screaming.

Though it was fun to get a nice throwback to the time when this album was released when drum production across the metal spectrum all got terrible at the same time and seemingly everybody forgot that like 90% of all metal drums are triggered and "triggered" doesn't mean "programmed".

In a bid to avoid another couple of decades of ignorance, I've gotta ask: what distinction should we make between "triggered" and "programmed"?

Another one to Ezrablumenfeld: I don't have an issue with what he said because it's the general zeitgeist of the milieu, but I still think that album is a proper endcap to a storied career. Ending the album with the same sound as the first, capping off what had been unloaded throughout the career by regressing, it just seemed so beautifully done on an album that showed Sabbath as holding strong to its roots and ready to keep steady to its rock. I've had that album rolling around in my car for the past five months since changing jobs and it doesn't seem contrived to me more that Sabbath is as much remembering itself as it is remaining even forty some-odd years later after all the tumult around it. It is showing that Sabbath is and will, it is the ouroborus that is heavy metal in that it branches and eats itself, the reality that is so many bands that blow up and eat themselves.

I like that album, I've grown to love it and maybe the Stockholm syndrome of it being the sound I hear going into and out of seeing strife in dying people makes it for me, but I feel as though it was a fitting end to a band that expanded so far and then fell back into its singularity, one that exploded a universe of music. I'll put it into a review someday and maybe shift that average a couple of points but the average of Sabbath is still a solid sound worthy of mention to me. I'm glad they didn't reinvent themselves for their final chapter, I'm glad they stuck to what they did well and reprised it so tastefully, unfortunately it does come across as contrived to so many.

Still, Ezra laid out a good amount of the gripes as many have. The album wasn't Sabbath at its best. '13' was a nostalgia piece and it does it for this metalhead who has been banging to them since he was 12 and got 'Paranoid' as a Christmas present with a boombox and a Zeppelin compilation from the coolest parents he could have imagined.

Edit for Gasmask: "Triggered" means that every kick, no matter how weak, is cycled through a machine to make its sound and makes that sound so you can barely tap enough to make the drum sound, usually used for double bass like in All that Remains. "Programmed" means that the drums are just that, a computer makes all the drum noise and there is no other imput from anyone but organizing how the sound comes out. Triggering double bass has been common for a long while, programming is usually for a release by bands that end up with a real drummer doing half of what was initially programmed. Mortician had "programmed" drums, All that Remains "triggers" its double bass. (I know, BastardHead doesn't like the work "kick" associated to a bass drum, but kick sounds better than stomp)

"Six" by All that Remains (triggered): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M0pYWGjECLE

"Axe" by Mortician (programmed): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qcmxwMs-KIs

These are the most obvious examples I can provide. This is shit George Kollias nearly died doing while making a Nile album yet the workarounds are so much easier for average and middling bands, let alone plenty of slam garbage and mainstream A Day to Remember hardcore that slow blow.

I see Five Nails got to it in that monolith of text, but to put it simply, from the understanding of a non-drummer like myself, is that triggers just ensure that you get the same sound every single time you hit the head. You can hit a snare drum in six different spots and get six slightly different sounds, or you can attach a trigger to it and guarantee that no matter where you hit it, no matter how HARD you hit it, you'll get the exact same tone. Think of it kinda like playing a snare drum sample every time you actually play that snare drum. Basically every metal album you've listened to since the 90s does this, and you'll know if they don't because they'll be real fuckin smug about it (see: Dan Zimmerman). It sacrifices some feel for precision, basically.

I think a combination of really terrible and mechanical sounding triggers and insane tech death bands playing seemingly inhumanely fast and precise drums utilizing those awful triggers led to a widespread misunderstanding that triggered drums was a euphemism for a drum machine. There's a massive difference between hooking up a module to your drumset to ensure every hit sounds identical and just plugging a bunch of numbers into a computer and spitting out blastbeats at six trillion BPM.

Triggering doesn't have to mean that every snare and every bass drum hit sounds the exact same. It's possible to blend the sample with the live sound to maintain some feeling of nuance, but give it a more consistently strong feel.

I remember there was a band that asked for a review about a decade ago from Skagganauk Abyss, a band made up of one Russian dude, as though that's some new thing. Still, at the time it was new to me to be asked to write a review.

I know I reviewed the album, 'The Ferocious Blizzard Enthroned', but I can't find it in my files and it's not on the archives. Either way, another reviewer, 'oneyoudontknow', someone with over 600 reviews reviewed it and claimed that it wasn't made with real instruments. I remember that I took mine down because I was basing it on the sound rather than the reality of the instruments but honestly, part of me doesn't really mind anymore whether or not the musician is a "real" musician. So many one-man black metal bands are not Varg, even fewer are even close to what he did and I've said what I have about his ideology but I truly love his music.

The reality is, is it really terrible that "all this machinery making modern music can still be open-hearted?" Isn't it "merely just a question of your honesty?"

These "glittering prizes and endless compromises" truly do "shatter the illusion of integrity" by the reality is that they have become fewer and farther between in this digital age of getting what you want to hear now and only being "there" at the show for the other "there" that is a selfie or instagram for the internet to too many.

I cherish my few live experiences seeing bands I love and if maybe Mike Smith shook a foundation with his bass drum at the sound check by way of a computer, it made my analog mind enjoy the shattering, let alone the total eradication that was that show to my Dolby 5.1 listening self. The reality is that a genuine artist can do his best with what he has but plenty of pretenders can do the same even easier, does it mean that one has to suffer to make art or does it mean that a listener can realize the art behind the suffering?

I'd say that the reality of today's media frenzies show that suffering for your art is no necessary component to prosperity and, the reality is, it never was in the first place. Popularity can be as manufactured on the surface as it can be in the underground.

We're listening to a world of suffering in metal music, but the reality is that plenty of people who I've listened to suffer make shitty art and plenty of pretenders make for far more enjoyable art. I'd say it's as much up to the listener as it is the creator but the best we can say of all of this bullshit is that it's not the latest "insert X hated mainstream artist of the day here" because at least it shows that maybe someone is willing to look in the nooks and crannies to find something different that someone wants to show and maybe a review can highlight it if possible.

Triggering is a way out to a "normie" for a "purist", but if I were a purist of music, I'd have at least learned to drum. Instead, I'm a douche who tries to say smart things about bands that I don't personally know based on the sound they etch into a drive or disc. The best I can do for all their effort is try to understand what they have to say before I pan or praise them.

We're not special, none of what we do is, plenty will fill our places in the long run. The least we can do is not put on airs while trying to put our thoughts into a review and maybe to try to match the creativity of our writing to that of those who are actual content creators.

Granted, I'm not a creative person, so a critic I am. It's a shit way to think of it, to spot tropes and say "I can do better" while having no better to provide. I'm a cunt, we all are, it just depends on the level of cunt that we are when it comes down to it. At least I'm trying to practice being a cunt to the point of making my cuntitude seem less cunty. Still, I love the exercise because it's far more enjoyable than getting off my ass and being part of the real world.

And so I say, as better said by another:

Triggers basically mean you glue an electric drumkit on a real drumkit because it looks cooler than having an electric drumkit.

Fenriz has also made clear his disdain for triggers. There are two guys who've earned the right to be smug about their drumming.

I know triggers are common practice and many of my favorite albums contain them. Doesn't the dislike of them come from the dislike of modern, polished productions in general, in which everything is made to sound perfect with any flaws removed?

Personally, I'm not familiar enough with the technical end of things to spot every triggered drum, but when it's real obvious it irks me. It seems to mostly come down to the sample used. Really unnatural sounding ones are grating, and in the case of really powerful kick drums, does come off as "cheating". And I'll never understand why the sound of a hyperactive typist came to be associated with brutality.

I know what I meant when I said the drums sounded triggered. I didn't mean programmed, I just meant their samples sounded really shit.

They are wrong in this case and you know you can trust me.

Yeah. That album is a steaming pile of dog shit at its best. It seriously sounds like DeFeis bought a case of wine, got loaded (like utterly shit-faced, unable to stand loaded) and played with a My First Casio keyboard for an hour and put the results to tape. It’s two things (neither of which are good): (1) laughable at how downright bad it is; and (2) heartbreakingly sad that DeFeis is mentally unstable and deluded enough to think that any of this was worthy of being released.

As for Black Sabbath, the lead single was a cover of Danzig's "Pain in the World" poorly redressed as their own creation, that's really all you need to know about the creative energy that went into the album.

"The much hated Bark at the Moon album..." begins Superchard, reviewing an album with a 75% average rating and only a few truly negative scores.

From my experience, it's not the hipsters who love the Jake E Lee era so much as the old farts who grew up with it. And me, I enjoy me some Jake E Lee.

Dug the latest by EdwardSackbauer for Tytus' Rain Before The Drought (or something like that); notably the following:

"Singer Markey has a perfectly fitting voice for that kind of music. Staying in mid-register most of the time his powerful soaring helps raising the intensity level up a notch when needed. His tone reminds me a bit of the well-respected Joe Liszt whose bands Ancient Empire and Shadowkiller are fishing in the same pond of potential listeners with a similar combination of NWOBHM harmonies and US influenced Power Metal chops."

It's definitely a fresh and original release, with a lot of upbeat, albeit unorthodox, super spring-y riffing where the bass is highly prevalent as well...

Thinking of giving 'er a go myself, review wise...

Yeah that's kind of an odd statement on Bark at the Moon, though I would say he's sort of on the right track. I don't think Bark at the Moon is even capable of being widely hated because in reality it's just totally forgotten with the exception of the excellent title track... uh... Now You See It? I think Jake E. Lee kinda got the short end of the stick when it comes to Ozzy's guitarists but at the same time his era produced precisely two lasting hits while Rhoads managed like ten in the same amount of time.

I just realized that in my Sabbath review I accidentally ended a paragraph with a semicolon. Should I edit it or just leave it?

Yup, and some people might think this is exaggerated, but that is literally 100% what this sounds like.

Probably wouldn't hurt to edit that. Also 13 isn't Sabbath's thirteenth album, it's their nineteenth (Twenty if you count The Devil You Know. I count The Devil You Know). I'm not sure why they called it that but I think it has more to do with the year it came out than its place in the discography. Unless it's the band's way of saying that it is the thirteenth album that they will acknowledge as canon, which just raises further questions. Obviously such a canon would include the eight Ozzy and the three Dio albums, but what would the twelfth album be? Is it Born Again? Is it The Devil You Know?

It's totally The Devil You Know.

Ezra B. duly swung the hammer, er, "mallet", on the gavel with his compact yet right-on-the-$ write-up for ...And Justice 4 All. That's exactly how I feel about it, although I'd have left it with a 90% instead of 92%...

It's certainly the most "eldritch" and classically antiquated Metallica album, for sure...(although - and not to start a big debate here once again - we've had our fill! - I prefer Mustaine's indelible riff work on Kill 'Em All)

Kill 'Em All is still my favorite, I just think that Justice is a higher quality album if that makes sense.

Absolutely! So true...actually, it's no secret my 2nd favorite album of theirs is Death Magnetic...

I just noticed SweetLeaf95 "rained" on E.Sackbauer's "parade" i.e. enthused write-up for the new Tytus album, Rain 'Fore Draught. He sure knows how to light a fyre under my feet, or rather, ruffle/pluck feathers out of (quivering) hides! Bah! 70% is still a decent score.

Nevertheless, it's time for a sagacious albeit polite riposte, I'm afraid...