note to self: if you come for the king, you best not miss
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Iâm no king. Barely a prince. Maybe a jester?
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I got a chance to listen all the way through The Mandrake Project and I really liked it! Sometimes itâs hard to take Bruce out of Maiden because heâs such a part of their sound and will forever be associated with them, which is not a bad thing, so I have to admit I went in a bit with that mentality. I was glad to be proven wrong! I really like how it ended up going all over the place with the songs. He could have gone to what heâs done before and just been Maiden Gaiden but he didnât and thatâs great.
It did get stronger as it went - I felt the first three songs he played a bit safe and went with classic metal, but after Resurrection Men it really went everywhere. You donât get many Spaghetti Western/Black Sabbath mashups but that was the best Iâve ever heard (maybe the only, so still counts).
It isnât exciting but itâs interesting, which is a good. If Iâd have just stopped after the first few I would have missed out on how the record grew, and the last song Sonata (Immortal Beloved) really stood out as well.
He is still and always will be very 
Thanks for the recommendation @Moh!
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Oh man I havenât listened to Killswitch in so long. I kinda fell off when Jesse rejoined, but that was also around the time I was moving away from metalcore in general. They really do write some banger choruses too.
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I listened to their new stuff when he rejoined, but Howardâs voice is just so strong itâs hard to compete. He can handle the growl and the melodic so well (reminds me of Burton C. Bell from Fear Factory) that when he left the songs from those album live didnât sound as good. I donât really listen to Metalcore as a genre, but I do like some of the bands in it - I more discover something I like there than seek out new ones.
Speaking of a chorus that bangs:
(Could be my favourite screenshot to use to promote a video that one!)
Banger of an album from last year I just checked out. Clocks in at an easy 31 minutes. Catchy melodies, punky riffs, itâs got heart.
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Looking for some recommendations on cathartic or perhaps even joyful sections in heavy music you like. The last minute and a half of this song jumps out at me when I think of this prompt.
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that conifere band is cool thanks for sharing - for anyone else reading, i also recommend following that rites of pestilence YT channel. have found many a cool band that way.
for cathartic and/or joyful, i have to admit the first that came to mind was this deafheaven song:
this was the first deafheaven song i ever listened to in earnest and made me realize i had unfairly dismissed them prior. big fan now.
other things on top of mind for cathartic would be this wittr song:
any drudkh tbh but particularly this song:
not heavy exactly but this song always brings a smile to my face:
and of course how could i forget the goats catharsis:
i donât really listen to them myself @Kuro_b , but i would also recommend checking out bands like sadness or lantlos (assuming you havenât already). those âpost-bmâ bands seem to do that sort of joyful catharsis thing quite often!:
the sad realization of being an old head when youâre linking songs uploaded in 64 kbps
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Ooowee! Taking these in order:
That Deafheaven track is great. I legitimately did not enjoy Sunbather when it came out and have not tried listening since. I like that track a lot though, so I should definitely check out their discography as well.
Good WITTR. That chord progression in the middle reminds me of something Earth might play.
Drudkh is the perfect answer to my question for sure. Especially that track; one of the best.
Iâm a pretty big Boris fan, I try to catch them live whenever they come to town, but Iâve never heard that track. Totally rocks. Love how they just put out whatever they feel like. Super dynamic band.
Catharsis has a good sound. Will be listening to them. Was thinking of Katharsis when I hit play.
Sadness song didnât really do much for me until the vocals hit. Quite the surprise. Sounds like a choir of children, I dig it.
I should have put a âno post-black metalâ caveat in the question because I feel like their whole thing is often a joyous/cathartic take on black metal. When itâs your whole thing, to me it just becomes the new base line and I get bored of it quickly. Saw that band Agriculture live a couple years ago and their self-label is âecstaticâ black metal. Theyâre great live musicians, but it sort of loses that ecstatic quality after a couple songs.
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deafheaven: âbig fanâ was overstating itâi like that ordinary corrupt record (still havenât listened to sunbather actually), and i found that granite album from last year to be interesting. their new bm single is what i would describe as âserviceable.â
you sum up my feelings on the genre perfectly. i donât hate it but it feels inauthentic when that the whole shtick. i much prefer bands or songs that arrive at those moments incidentally or organically. a good example might be a band like sargeist. they want to be âevilâ but end up sounding the opposite sometimes, which creates an interesting tension.
THAT SAID, the person behind sadness does a lot of stuff, i think their most active project right now is trha. itâs a little too much for me to dive into completely, but the stuff iâve heard is genuinely interesting and avant-garde, definitely of the grausemkeit weirdo flavor:
thinking about your question a bit more, i think i gravitate towards the heavy metal side of the spectrum when i want music that feels that way. so with that in mind here are my favorites, starting with one of my all-timers:
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Good point re: Sargeist as an example, that tension is what I enjoy too but didnât adequately express. I will definitely check out TrhĂ€ (Iâm pronouncing it like Turok without the k). Iâve seen that name and that album cover around a lot lately but have put off listening to it. Good to hear itâs weirdo shit.
I think youâre right though and some classic heavy metal is what the doctor ordered for today. Great track selection. That Demon Bitch song is sweet, Iâve never heard of the band. The vocalist has that classic heavy metal theatricality cranked up to comical levels and I love it.
Some more songs that came to mind to fit the playlist. Ending of Infinite Dreams especially
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Le Grand Hyver rips. Iâm enjoying the album so far. The punk adjacent riffs remind me of very early Rise Against, or The Killing Tree.
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did metal-archives ever get their 2024 poll fully tallied up? I havenât checked back since they said thereâd be a delay, and then the guy doing it threw his arms up and said he is so over-swamped he canât do it. I think.
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no, but someone did tally up all the public votes in an unofficial poll. unsurprisingly, blood incantation won. i ran that album through a few times when it came out but havenât gone back to it.
@Kuro_b hell yeahâLOVE seventh son. also glad to hear you dig demon bitch, one of the best bands going rn imo. their first album is def worth a spin, might even be my preferred:
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I donât know man. I stopped listening to death metal in the mid 90s but I still break out Deicide once in a while.
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Canât beat the classics
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Even back then itâs like cartoon music to me. Not literally but like the loony tunes of music. I love it but man all those headbangers have gotta be stimming autistic kids
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lol i know what you mean. a seminal moment for me was laughing the first time i heard the âwhisper in the windâ in this banger:
and also yeah i love rocking back and forth or tapping my toe or what have you when iâm listening to music
The classic era meth-fueled Florida death metal scene being the loony toons of music is fitting and awesome
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