Year end lists...who's got time to read 'em, let alone write 'em? Do you follow The Long Way Home yet? No? What the fuck is WRONG with you? Homeboy assembled the most comprehensive metal year-end list ever. It's funny, insightful, and encyclopedic. Fucking mandatory reading.
Your humble writer, on the other hand, mustered a measly top five. This is attributable to holiday-onset ennui (fuck Christmas obviously), business (fuck the end of the fiscal year AMIRITE?), and the fact other year-end lists out there (see above) already destroy mine.
Here's to 2011 I GUESS. It was an OK year for metal.
Not posting links. You've got Google on your computer too.
5) Obscura - Omnivium (apogee of modern tech DM)
4) Mournful Congregation - Book of Kings (see this)
3) Absu - Abzu (all that is Good in one concise, perfect package)
2) Obsequiae - Suspended in the Brume of Eos (no surprise considering the pedigree. reinventing BM is no small feat in an oversaturated market)
1) Atriarch - Forever the End (Atriarch destined for world domination #realtalk)
BONUS: Top 5 albums on everyone's list I didn't get.
5) Autopsy - Macabre Eternal (mandatory pot-stirring selection - return to form? not hearing it)
4) Tombs - Path of Totality (i mean yeah it's good but really everyone?)
3) The Atlas Moth - An Ache for the Distance (ima pro-lo fanboy as much as the next dude but sorry this is just weeeeeeeak)
2) Disma - Towards the Megalith (i count at least 5 records that did the Swedish DM revival thing better than them)
1) Krallice - Diotima (nothing worked for me on this release, not the least of which was the vocals, extra-ugh)
5) Autopsy - Macabre Eternal (mandatory pot-stirring selection - return to form? not hearing it)
4) Tombs - Path of Totality (i mean yeah it's good but really everyone?)
3) The Atlas Moth - An Ache for the Distance (ima pro-lo fanboy as much as the next dude but sorry this is just weeeeeeeak)
2) Disma - Towards the Megalith (i count at least 5 records that did the Swedish DM revival thing better than them)
1) Krallice - Diotima (nothing worked for me on this release, not the least of which was the vocals, extra-ugh)
SEASONS GREETINGS
JOSÉ is the most epic dude ever... he's like an actual professional connoisseur of metal, and his blog should have a bazillion followers by now.
ReplyDeleteAlso, you are crazy because that Disma record SLAYS, but I agree that the Atlas Moth or whatever the fuck is total bullshit.
You're right JGD, they probably don't deserve to be on that list. They were just sort of an easy target b/c they were the flagship new wave of old school swedish death metal outfit of 2011 and NWOOSSDM is getting dangerously close to jumping the shark.
ReplyDeleteAgree with the Tombs album. So booooooring.
ReplyDeleteThanks for calling out Disma.
ReplyDeleteBOOOOOOOORING
aside from the guitar tone, does Disma really count as Swedish death metal worship? I hear more New York than Stockholm in there.
ReplyDeleteobscura is the best new band in a long time. and the guys love to play. I saw them in the shittiest backwoods venue, they played in front of like 15 people, played every song from omnivium, and a few oldies too. then hung around took pictures with everybody!(even though you could tell they struggled with English) they were so excited to be in america on tour. which is the whole point of music to me, the badassness of the music transcends culture and language.
ReplyDeletei hear no swede revival when i listen to disma. no sunlight studios guitar tone, no d-beat drums...i think a swede may have done the artwork, however...
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ReplyDeletePerhaps this is instructive?
ReplyDeleteI'd never heard LOL Nazi before but I plan to make liberal use of it starting now. Cory, I'm in your debt.
http://www.blameitonthevoices.com/2009/08/nazi-lol-tattoo.html
Disma doesn't exactly hide their influences, do they? It's a pretty even split between Incantation and Nihilist. It doesn't take a pro to put that together.
ReplyDeletei duno im not that invested in the gossip but i read this which kinda seems like hiding your influences:
ReplyDelete"And their singer, Craig Pillard, had a side-project called Stormfuhrer and if you click his name back there, the link is to an interview where he talks about the greatness of Hitler and the wickedness of the Jews. The album, by my understanding — I opted not to listen to it! — features a bunch of samples from speeches by Nazi leaders, and the CD is definitely decked out in swastikas.
But wait, you say, that interview is from 2002, and he changed the name of Stormfuhrer to Methadrone a few years ago! And while it is true that people are capable of having deeply troubling pasts, while also changing and becoming good people, there’s no evidence that Pillard has done so, aside from the fact that he’s playing in a non-Nazi band right now that made a good record.
But he did re-issue the Stormfuhrer record last summer, and — in an absurdly cowardly gesture — opted to keep his name off of it on the Internet, while putting his name literally on it by signing each copy by hand. Not, typically, the move of someone who is ashamed of his Nazi past.
Instead, it’s the move of someone who is flirting with mainstream success who doesn’t want to jeopardize it, but who also declined to be interviewed about his background for the CultureMap story, and who clearly is proud enough of his Nazi past that he’ll sign his Nazi record."
Erm, I was talking about their musical influences in response to Frank Zito and anonymous internet commenter.
ReplyDeleteI just assume 40% of what's on my iPod is by Nazis. I hate to be blase about it but that's the way it is. I like Aesop's approach which, as far as I can tell, is basically fuck politics, let's rock. That works for me.
Oh Haha
ReplyDelete