#British thrash metal scene

[kb-p2730]

[sendmyresignation]

hii if u don't mind, any metal bands you'd recommend for someone wanting to get into slightly more obscure stuff but doesn't know where to start digging? any subgenre/time period idc. asking u this bc i trust ur knowledge

i truly truly love getting asks like this, thank you for trusting me and it's awesome to hear you want to dig deeper!!

it's hard for me to give specific recs because i don't know what you've vibed with so ill meet you half way and give you a list as well as some places to learn more just in case i end up in the wrong direction.

these are some bands that clicked for me when i was first exploring outside my comfort zone, as well as some stuff from my aoty from the last few years:

Possessed - Seven Churches; this one is the least obscure but i feel like possessed are easy to miss. important band bridging the gap between thrash and death metal. love crazy maniac shit like this

Satan- Court in the Act; classic new wave of british heavy metal with a bit of edit. type of band that had enormous pull in underground power and speed metal scenes- this is a blueprint for a lot of great obscure heavy metal with the soaring vocals and the tappy solos. i love chastain (american, mid/late 80s response) if you want to see that lineage in effect

Mystifier - Goetia; brazilian metal is a huge huge historically important metal phenomenon. sepultura are more well-known and sarcofago are cult classic black metal pioneers (seriously, inri is one of the greats) but mystifier is a band that opened up the scene for me a little more and is incredible in their own right

Autopsy - Metal Funeral; slow, gripping death metal carnage!! also one of the few legacy bands continuing to release actual good music which is fun. also, if you like the autopsy you'll love derketa, dream death, mythic, winter, all of whom make their own twist on a similar crushing brand of doomy death metal goodness

Sabbat- Envenom; long-running old-school japanese black metal. has that thrashy-punk first wave flavor along the lines of celtic frost, root, bulldozer (also sarcofago) and sodom at their most brutal.

Sacrilege- Behind the Realms of Madness; crusty thrash that had a huge influence on early bolt thrower. good if you're into punk already and want more of that in the metal (their later records lose the crust but gain doom- I almost like them more. killer band)

Vastum. any of their records seriously maybe the best active band on the planet rn.

Warning- Watching from a Distance; if you got to metal through my mcr blog then i think you can handle the whiny vocals on this and get a legit transformative experience out of Warning. seriously love this album, delightfully heavy doom in an emotional package. and doom is easy to rec, satisfying and not to extreme: Pentagram, Candlemass, Trouble, and Saint Vitus are all must must listens

Chevalier- Destiny Calls; combination of speed and power i really love in the classic heavy metal fantasy and knights vein. newer band too with a lot of similar listening to bigger bands in that scene. and if you like this style at all manilla road (the band) is a requirement if you aren't already familar

Some eclectic newer stuff I've enjoyed lately: Vicious Blade, Tyrann, Reverend Bizarre, Nekromantheon, Firmament, Svalbard, Vampirska, Ares Kingdom, Messa

but i really recommend checking out r/metal- their essentials is good for a beginner but they also have a ton of primers that can give you overviews of niche genres. the fenriz metal spotify playlist is also fuckin killer. For new music, look into reviews from sites like angrymetalguy, no clean singing, heavy blog is heavy, invisible oranges. helpful to know how your taste aligns with the writing staff (like i know if angrymetalguy dislikes something, im almost guaranteed to like it). shreddit has a release tracker on spotify; there's also a constant update of new releases on the metal archive!

[explosionshark]

do u have any metal bands/songs recs?? ive been wanting to get into metal but idk where to start

the ONLY thing that makes this tough is that there are legitimately so many different subgenres and sounds within metal that it's hard to pick some stuff any random person might like. i usually ask folks a bit about what music they DO like before i offer up some recs. but okay - i'lll suggest a couple of my faves from across the board - see if anything sticks

(this got really long so i put it under a cut)

"the number of the beast" by iron maiden (heavy metal) - CLASSIC. maiden are def my all-time fave from the New Wave of British Heavy Metal scene of the 80s. this song typifies everything that makes them such a good band. a strong narrative in the lyrics, KILLER riffs, steve harris' galloping bass playing, bruce dickinson's acrobatic vocal style.

"clayman" by in flames (melodic death metal) - life changing shit for me. melo-death was my first love. the combination of harsh vocals with catchy choruses and really strong guitar harmonies opened a lot of doors for me. this was my jumping off into other styles of metal. i still really love it.

"electric crown" by testament (thrash metal) - slayer and metallica might be the biggest thrash bands in the world, but testament has always been my favorite. really good riffs, great shredding flourishes and solos from alex skolnick and a typically killer vocal performance from chuck billy. tbh this album is divisive among the fanbase for being less thrash and more heavy metal than their usual fare, but that's part of what i like about it. testament are a band not afraid to try stuff out or evolve - it's why they've stayed consistently good while their contemporaries have floundered in their 30 - 40 year careers.

"snap your fingers, snap your neck" by prong (groove metal) - groove is absolute 90s shit. incredible hook, pissed off lyrics, a rhythm you can really headbang to. great for blasting in the car on a drive to or from work.

"apocalypse" by lacuna coil (gothic metal) - i'm biased with these guys. cristina scabbia was a formative crush. their last two albums have been great, but their breakout record was comalies (2002) which cemented their style - dramatic, sweeping instrumentals paired with clean female vocals and a harsher male vocal counterpart. REALLY fun, catchy stuff to listen to, but still with a bit of edge.

"so you die" by bloodbath (death metal) - this is just a nasty, gross death metal song in the classic swedish style. killer buzzsaw guitars, low death growl vocals, a rhythm section that just won't quit. i heard this on a metal compilation CD i got for free at my local record store when i was like 14. literally reshaped my brain.

"matriarch" by unleash the archers (power metal) - POWER METAL. the real nerdy shit (affectionate). this isn't my favorite subgenre, but there's some great musicianship and many talented bands in this arena. you get a lot of fast, complicated guitar parts and soaring, higher pitched vocals. lyrical themes are usually fantasy or sci-fi themed, so often not as dark as some of the other subgenres.

"wretched abyss" by noctule (black metal) - okay, black metal is a big complicated mess. this is the subgenre where i'd say you have to be most careful of running into fascists (they have a whole subgenre of their own - national socialist black metal (NSBM). there's a whole history around this stuff that ties into that but that's another essay and you're here for tunes. black metal means lots of fast tremolo picking and blast beats on the drums, usually with higher pitched screaming vocals. noctule is a recent band, the side project of serena cherry (more on her in a minute). all the songs on this record are skyrim themed. fun!

"listen to someone" by svalbard (blackgaze) - another serena cherry band. this is a style that's fairly new - the combination of black metal elements and shoegaze. typically you get a lot of really pretty atmospheric wall of sound stuff punctuated by harsh bursts of black metal (or vice versa). great if you like songs with a lot of build up.

"they fear us" by ithaca (metalcore) - okay so metalcore is kind of a convoluted term because it can be applied to lots of bands with a variation of sounds, but what it literally comes from is the intersection of metal and hardcore. typically i'd say you can expect a combination of harsh and clean vocals, chuggy guitars, and hopefully a good breakdown.

"woodbine" by windhand (doom / stoner metal) - BIG FUCK OFF RIFF HELL YES. doom tends to be a littler slower than i like - firmly mid tempo, songs on the longer side, and big BIG riffs like this. it's a stlye that plays well with others, you'll see it blending with other subgenres fairly often. this song rips. this whole album tbh. i love windhand.

"invasion" by haken (progressive metal) - like when shit is really technical and trippy but not super into harsh vocals? check out prog! there's lots of stuff in weird time signatures and there's plenty of other subgenres prog bleeds into but i'm trying to keep things simple.

"death to the holy" by zeal and ardor (progressive? blues? black metal?) - there's really no one else in league with this project. inspired by crossing delta blues with different metal styles. tbh most of this list is me trying to present a big, vast subgenre and give an example so you can find out what you like but this shit is singular and it just rules. check it out.

"rotoscope" by spiritbox (prog / metalcore / nu metal) - big spiritbox fan tbh. i've followed the members of this band through a bunch of projects, but that's neither here nor there. this song has a really strong nu metal influence, though i'd say this band usually keeps things in the "djent" progressive metalcore scene. GREAT grooves though and a really fun riff. killer vocals. one of my fave songs of the year.

"the end to a brief moment of lasting intimacy" by seeyouspacecowboy (screamo/mathcore) - yeah i know the subgenres are getting sillier and sillier. idk what to tell you. the "math" in mathcore refers to when bands fuck around with time signatures in a way that generally produces a lot of chaotic sounds (though tbh you don't get a ton of that in this song - check out the bands carbomb, or frontierers for better examples). BUT what we lack in math here, you get back with some great emo hooks and sick instrumentals.

"alkaline" by sleep token (??? idk. prog. who cares) - these guys are fun. anonymous little collective - they perform in masks and stuff, their identities are a big mystery. there's a fun, goofy mythos to the whole band you can dig into if you're curious. mostly, i put them here bc they fuck hard. vessel has a great voice, the riffs are catchy and heavy, but there's a strong pop sensibility to it all. great stuff, if you're looking for something a little less extreme to help you get into the genre.

"无双" by black kirin (folk metal) - so what you've GOTTA know about folk metal is that it can actually sound like a lot of different things. the thing that puts the "folk" in folk metal is the use of traditional instruments from the native culture of the band. black kirin is a chinese band that uses traditional chinese instruments combined with a black metal style. european folk metal bands tend to go in harder on the power metal style + flutes and hurdy-gurdy or what the fuck ever. latin american folk metal sees... well, also a lot of flutes. there are some SICK mongolian folk metal bands (the hu, tengger cavalry) which utilize tuvan throat singing to really cool effect. you gotta shop around to see what's interesting for you.

i could literally keep going and going. there are SO many cool metal bands out there all over the world, making all kinds of sick music in different styles. tbh, that's one of my favorite things about metal - it's a big, big tent.

look, it's not a perfect community - there are problems with elitism, gatekeeping, the fact that the US and European metal scenes are very white male dominated. BUT - this is the shit that saved my life. it's something i've loved for years and years, it's enabled some of the deepest connections i've ever had with people. it keeps me going. for me, getting into metal was a truly empowering and fulfilling experience and many, many people i've met in the scene feel the same way.

try these songs out! feel free to come back and let me know what you like! i'll offer more recs, if you ever need them

[jwowwsboobs]

im not super caught up w artry lore give me the cliffnotez

artery is a FICTIONAL (sadly) all-female southern californian thrash band from the early to mid-80s that i made up and am now obsessed w...under the cut i have a summary of their history but some "incidents" that r not mentioned but r classics to know. there r more ofc but these r my 5 favorites

slayer incident (kerry king was invited to a practice cuz ronnie wanted to fuck him. he stole one of jacks songs. jack tried to kill him but was pulled off b4 she did. jack talked shit abt slayer until her death)

ronnie's 20th birthday party (her parents got her a pink mustang ('83 not '68 which is (one of) her dream cars). jack made fun of her. she ran jack over with it. jack did not die)

laundromat pizza incident (on tour for total annihilation. went into a laundromat to do laundry, ordered a pizza. jack was drunk n high off her ass, put the pizza in the washer with the clothes. it was very gross but so funny. only time jack like. actually cried not from laughing) 

the pussy cast (max broke her arm at the end of their '83 tour, jack and gale drew vaginas and boobs all over it. ronnie still has it somewhere)

pig guts incident (august '82. jack wanted to have a photoshoot with blood. darcy's uncle knew a guy who owned a pig farm. they drove to his farm n picked up like 2 barrels (200 liters) of pig blood n took it back to their house. started w jack making everyone dip their hands in the blood. darcy took pictures but jack thought it would be funny to throw some at her, turning it into a fight. there was no winner, only a loser (ronnie, who got so grossed out she threw up.) there r like 3 pictures from that shoot cuz the blood like. got into the camera n fucked up the negatives <\3)

Inspired by the emerging NWOBHM and the rapid growth of punk and hardcore in southern California, Maxine “Max” Kennedy (guitar, vocals) and Ronnie Young (drums) formed Artery in early 1981. The pair met at school when Young noticed Kennedy wearing a tee shirt for the British heavy metal/punk band Motorhead and bonded over their appreciation for Black Sabbath, Angel Witch, and the aforementioned Motorhead. Schoolmate Gale Barker was recruited into the band two weeks later, after the pair saw a performance with Barker’s then-band, “Bitch” where Barker played a bass solo and destroyed a drum kit, amplifier, and, as legend has it, an extra-large pizza supplied by Kennedy and Young after the show. 

During the summer of ‘81, Artery had great difficulty finding a lead guitarist, mostly playing and practicing as a trio. Barker met Jacqueline “Jack” Walsh in a record store and Walsh’s aggressive, confrontational playing style melded perfectly with Kennedy, Barker, and Young’s. She was brought on board immediately and Artery’s lineup was finalized.

Their demo “Dig Yr Grave” (recorded December 1981) took the underground scene by storm and in the following months, a follow-up ("Spitfire," recorded June 1982) was written and released. 

They were picked up by Metal Blade to record an EP in the summer of ‘82. During these recording sessions, Artery actually had so much material prepared that they elected to abandon the EP and record an LP. “No Mercy... No Peace” was released on February 11th, 1983 to great enthusiasm and acclaim in the underground metal community. Artery set off on a modest (but successful!) American tour in the spring and summer of 1983, and upon returning to California, recorded their 2nd LP, “Total Annihilation,” released January, 1984. More touring and another round of recording followed, and their 3rd LP, “Death,” was released in May 1985. This would be Artery’s last official release, as Walsh passed away on November 3rd, 1985, during the 2nd American leg of the supporting tour.   

The band broke up soon after. Young went on to found Armageddon Inc., a label specializing in the extreme metal emerging in the late 80s; Barker became a visual artist and played in various California-based punk bands. Kennedy disappeared from public life entirely and has not been seen or heard from in 30 years. Whether she is alive or not is subject to much speculation. Kennedy is not mentioned in any interviews given by Barker or Young after Artery’s dissolution. 

[loveandscience]

1, 2, 7, and 9 for the ask game?

Thanks so much, this is fun! :-D 1. What is your most popular fic? Weirdly enough, the most popular one in terms of 'hits' (9051) on Ao3 is one of the very few I never finished. It's this Mycroft/Lestrade fic from when I was into Sherlock, called "And Goodnight to the British Government Whispering Hush." I started it when my kid was a baby and so at the time I was really into babies (babies like, have to be the greatest thing ever, when you're taking care of one. It's the only way to escape that period of life without losing your mind lol). But then I ended up really disliking Benedict Cumberbatch with some of the crap he was saying, and it just ruined the series for me. In the TF fandom, it's "Cause and Effect." which is one I'm actually proud of. Soundwave dealing with grief and crisis of conscience was really personally meaningful to me to write and marked a point where I actively began to use writing on purpose as a way to process my own 'stuff.' 2. What fanfic do you wish you got more response on? Hm, "My Mind is No Longer Mine" got to me in a big way, because I got to write out the recovery and therapy processes for Shockwave. I loved taking someone so on-paper irredeemable and having him suddenly have to deal with having emotions again, and what that could do to someone. I liked exploring the idea that not only can people be traumatized by what's done to them and what they've seen, but also by the things they've done, and how someone could possibly recover from something so difficult. The biggest thing with this fic was that like, while I objectively never did anything so awful, when my depression was at its strongest (a long long time ago) I did hate myself AS IF I had done that kind of horrible stuff. It was very irrational, of course, but there's something healing in seeing meaning being made after coming out of that even if in real life I'd not be having the same reaction as I did for Shockwave in writing this fic. It's not that this fic didn't get a 'good enough' response or anything, I just have such a love for it that I want more excuses to talk about it with more people. There's so much to say about it. Plus, I want more Shockwave/Cosmos shippers, I am literally carrying that entire tag on Ao3, lol! Last thing before I force myself to stop writing about this fic: it was really great to write how a toxic romantic relationship can become healthy through therapy. I enjoy working with couples as a therapist and don't get to do it enough. It was fun to draw from some really old tendencies I had like back in high school for Cosmos and Shockwave, and amplify those to create their mess of a relationship, and then to work through it. 7. What’s a trope you love to write? I'm a huge sucker for characters that are basically breaking down or broken down, and then the other one comes in and gives them so much love and tenderness (romantic or not, tbh) that they realize they deserve to heal. 9. What’s your favorite line(s) or scene(s) that you have written? One from "Cause and Effect" that I go back to read time and time again:

Soundwave’s cables lashed out, smashing against test tubes and the deactivated computer, thrashing about the room. Fury raged in his spark and the destruction wasn’t enough, no, it just took the edge off. Shattered glass flurried across the room, slashing him as he continued to rip apart everything, a tornado of grief and shame and pain.

When his cables had nothing left to hit as they whipped around, and he couldn’t tell what pieces went where anymore, Soundwave sank to the floor. Exhausted. His spark that had felt like it was spinning wildly finally seemed to slow, and he stared at the ground in front of him.

Hours seemed to pass, but then again, he didn’t have the energy to check his chronometer. His helm whipped around at the sound of pedesteps crunching over glass and metal bits, to see First Aid walking toward him with nothing but worry in his optics. Not even judgment, which he deserved.

First Aid kneeled down beside him and drew him into a tight hug that Soundwave didn’t want to let go of. How had First Aid found him?

“You sent me your frequency,” First Aid said softly, answering the question he hadn’t asked yet. “That means you wanted me to find you.”

What? When had he done that? He realized he was clutching the doctor like he was desperate, and maybe he was. He noticed his frame was slightly shaking.

First Aid pulled back and Soundwave let him, wondering if he would finally understand the severity of what Soundwave had done. But he was still holding on to him as he inspected the parts of Soundwave leaking energon, the dozens of small cuts and embedded shards of glass. “ Can you come with me so I can clean you up?” he asked, and Soundwave didn’t think he had the strength to decline anything First Aid asked of him right now. He let himself be led into an adjacent room, where First Aid patted a counter for Soundwave to sit on.

As Soundwave sat, too tired to even wince when First Aid dislodged bits of glass from all along his cables, he decided that the doctor deserved some kind of explanation. So he detailed his culpability, his guilt and shame, without giving away what the mini-cons were. He told him about his failure and not being good enough, and that he would understand if First Aid didn’t want to be around him anymore, knowing these things about him.

First Aid read the messages quietly as he worked, until Soundwave had finished. He set aside the latest shard of glass to reach up to Soundwave’s visor and take it off, carefully placing it on the counter. First Aid rest his servos on either side of Soundwave’s face, and placed their helms gently together. “This, what happened to those mini-cons, was not your fault,” he said seriously. “It just wasn’t. If you had known about them, you would have stopped it, you said so yourself. This was deliberately hidden from you precisely because of that fact. Maybe you could have pretended to be more unethical—what would that have cost? You would have had to allow other things slide to have learned about this, and who knows what that would have led to? Yes, there were other things you ignored because you thought that was for the greater good, but you always had good in mind. Look, I also know you did some bad things in the war, but this? This was not one of them. And I don’t for one nanoklik think you deserve any of the shame or guilt you’re putting on yourself.”

First Aid gave a sharp, short intake as Soundwave’s servos landed on either side of his faceplate and Soundwave started to lean his lips closer. First Aid pulled his helm away. This wasn’t the right time, not when Soundwave was hurting and not thinking clearly. He couldn’t tell if Soundwave was disappointed or relieved, but they each dropped their hands and First Aid stepped back to continue removing bits of glass. But maybe a part of him, despite the situation, was a little bit thrilled at the idea that one day, if Soundwave still wanted to, they might possibly kiss.

[thisaintascenereviews]

Metallica - Kill ‘Em All Metallica’s debut album, 1983′s Kill ‘Em All, might be their most underrated album, at least as their 80s output is concerned. I love their 80s material, especially 1988′s And Justice For All (don’t worry, I’ll review it, too; I’m reviewing all of their 80s albums in order, starting with this one), but I’ve always thought that their debut is the most underrated out of the bunch. 1986′s Master Of Puppets and 1984′s Ride The Lightning get a lot of love, and for good reason -- they’re both great. I just feel like Kill ‘Em All doesn’t get the same amount of love, but a part of me understands why. Context matters when it comes to certain albums, especially within a band’s discography, and the context with Kill ‘Am All is very interesting. I don’t think I need to talk about it very much, because most fans of Metallica know all about it, but future Megadeth guitarist / frontman Dave Mustaine was part of Metallica in its inception. He helped form the band with James Hetfield, Lars Ulrich, and Cliff Burton, only to be replaced mid-recording by Kirk Hammett, and there was a lot of messy drama that went along with his firing from the band, but a lot of the reason this album is the way it is, well, is because of Mustaine. He helped to write a few songs on this record, and because this was the first thrash album released in the US, it had a huge influence on the burgeoning thrash scene in the US (especially in California, where thrash metal reigned king). The reason I think this album is their most underrated is simply because it’s their debut, and it’s also their most “simplistic” album, at least in terms of the albums people like. I’m not talking about Load, Reload, Death Magnetic, St. Anger, and all that garbage from the 90s and early 00s, but I’m speaking merely within their 80s output (in other words, their peak, although 1991′s The Black Album is pretty solid, too, and that’s more or less a traditional heavy metal / hard-rock album). It’s not the most progressive, ambitious, or unique album, at least when you look at the thrash scene at large. At the time, it was very much of a unique album, since thrash hadn’t taken off here yet, and albums from Slayer,. Testament, Anthrax, and all of those bands wouldn’t release records until later that same year or within the next couple of years. Hell, just a year before this record came out, that’s when The Number Of The Beast by Iron Maiden was released, or Screaming For Vengeance by Judas Priest. That’s what metal was like, mainly comprised of the New Wave Of British Heavy Metal, or bands like Dio (who formed after Ronnie James Dio left Black Sabbath in the early 80s), Black Sabbath, Van Halen, or Motley Crue (hair metal was just starting to come into fruition) were ruling the metal / rock world. Anything “heavier” wasn’t thought of, but bands like Slayer and Metallica would prove that a heavier kind of metal could certainly exist. That’s why I love Kill ‘Em All, since it doesn’t want to be anything more than a kickass thrash / speed metal album. It doesn’t try to be anything else, and it doesn’t want to be anything else, either; songs like “Jump In The Fire,” “Seek & Destroy,” and “Hit The Lights” absolutely rule. They’re in your face, fast, loud, brutal, and best of all, fun. This is such a fun album, but that’s not to say that the rest of their 80s albums aren’t fun, either. They definitely are, but this one is unapologetically fun. Their other albums within their 80s output have more to say, as well as more that they’re trying to do, musically speaking. Ride The Lightning dips its toes in more progressive textures, longer song lengths, and more unorthodox song structures. Master Of Puppets really leans into that, but also making one of the best metal albums in the process. And Justice For All goes for broke and has a really weird sound (not just for it having no bass at all, but we’ll get to that one later), yet it still manages to be a kickass progressive-ish thrash record. Kill ‘Em All, however, is just loud and fast, nothing more and nothing less, but I love it for that. At 51 minutes, it’s a nice burst of thrash / speed metal that will definitely get you pumped, and with that said, if you haven’t heard this album yet, I’d say go for it. It’s my personal second favorite album from them, even if I can acknowledge it’s not their best album, and in fact, it’s easily the weakest of their 80s material, but I still gravitate to this one all the time. I always listen to this one, because it’s the most accessible and the most fun to listen to. When I think of thrash, this is the perfect album that comes to mind, even though Master Of Puppets and Ride The Lightning do, too, this is just unapologetically catchy, heavy, and fun for all the best reasons.

[metalshockfinland]

MIDNITE HELLION Release New Single 'Army Of The Dead' from Upcoming Album

Ever asked yourself, what it would sound like if British legend Witchfinder General got lost high on shrooms within the wonderfully weird New Jersey thrash metal scene? Don’t worry, you’re not alone: US-thrashers MIDNITE HELLION somehow seemed to have woken up to just the same question some day. And while psilos aren’t on their diet, NWOBHM – from Blitzkrieg fast to slow and heavy – certainly…

[qudachuk]

Unlike their American peers, British thrash metallers never hit the big time – but over 30 years on, their scene is thriving‘It wasn’t an easy time in the UK, the 1980s,” says Damon Maddison, bassist with Brighton thrash metal...

[wintbuffalo]

Def leppard 80s

Rex, Mott the Hoople and almost Queen," Collen said. "I'd done this song 'Kick,' which really kind of sounded like something from the early '70s, like Bowie, T. Collen and Elliott worked on pieces from their homes. The writing occurred organically as the COVID-19 pandemic began rolling and was not immediately earmarked for Def Leppard, Collen said, but rather as a celebration of songwriting in general. More: Mötley Crüe, All IN fest and more: 10 big late-summer shows around Indianapolis It's the lifeblood, I think, and so we've done that."ĭef Leppard's latest album, "Diamond Star Halos," was inspired by the '70s glam rock that motivated Collen and vocalist Joe Elliott to get into music. They keep going, and they always put new music out. Unfortunately, they'll still have to sit through Poison to get to it."But we're not a nostalgia act, obviously," he continued. The band's recent collaborations with Tim McGraw and Taylor Swift are simply inexcusable.įortunately, set lists from recent shows have stuck mostly to the band's early catalog, which should come as welcome news for longtime Def Leppard fans. "Let's Get Rocked," the first single from the band's 1992 album Adrenalize, featured lyrics as trite as the worst Poison song and marked the beginning of Def Leppard's decline. Some fans were put off but the pop sheen of 1987's Hysteria, even as it went on to sell more than 20 million copies worldwide. That's not to say that Def Leppard haven't had their musical missteps. The combination of Def Leppard's songwriting chops and Lange's layered, meticulous production spawned such classic hard-rock staples as "Photograph," "Foolin'," and "Bringin' On The Heartbreak." Def Leppard's 1980 debut, On Through the Night, fit nicely into the NWOBHM mold, but it was a partnership with producer Robert John "Mutt" Lange that produced a pair of bona fide masterpieces in 1981's High 'n' Dry and 1983's Pyromania. It may come as a shock to some younger fans who associate the band with the strip club staple "Pour Some Sugar on Me," but Def Leppard was once at the forefront (along with Iron Maiden and Judas Priest) of the "new wave of British heavy metal" during the late '70s and early '80s. Instead, the band's primary focus, at least for the first decade or so of its career, was solely on its music. Aside from a penchant for sleeveless T-shirts and short shorts emblazoned with the Union Jack, Def Leppard never appeared to put much thought into their image. Songs like "Talk Dirty to Me," "Nothin' but a Good Time," and "Unskinny Bop" set the bar so low that a host of similarly hackneyed, second-generation hair-metal bands inevitably followed in Poison's footsteps.ĭef Leppard, on the other hand, were really never a hair-metal band at all. While the androgynous cover photos from Poison's debut album, Look What the Cat Dragged In, might have inadvertently caused countless adolescent boys to confront uncomfortable questions about their own sexuality, the band's music posed no such deep, philosophical quandaries. From the moment they broke onto the national scene in 1986, Poison was the embodiment of everything that was wrong with heavy metal in the 1980s: simplistic, derivative song structures, inane lyrics, lipstick, eyeliner, and, of course, ridiculous hair. The two most common terms for the style of the pop-inflected metal that proliferated in the '80s are "hair metal" and "glam metal." It's significant that those terms specifically refer to the genre's image, whereas labels for other genres described (go figure) the actual sound of the music - such as "thrash metal," "speed metal," and even "grunge." The average hair-metal band's popularity was frequently defined by how much Aqua Net, spandex, and mascara they employed, as opposed to the music they produced.įew bands epitomize hair metal's reliance on style over substance as thoroughly as Poison. But upon closer examination, Def Leppard and Poison represent nearly opposite ends of the '80s metal spectrum. After all, they're two of the most successful bands of the 1980s and, no doubt, they probably share a significant number of fans, which should bode well for this tour. At first glance, a bill featuring Def Leppard and Poison seems a natural fit.

[dustedmagazine]

Oxygen Destroyer — Sinister Monstrosities Spawned by the Unfathomable Ignorance of Humankind (Redefining Darkness Records)

Sinister Monstrosities Spawned By the Unfathomable Ignorance of Humankind by Oxygen Destroyer

Some of you already know (no need to raise hands), but: Oxygen Destroyer’s bandname refers to a fictional weapon deployed at the climax of Gojira (1954), a movie likely better known to readers of Dusted in its Americanized version, Godzilla, King of the Monsters! (1956, with the clunky, added-on scenes of Raymond Burr milling about and grimly delivering exposition). This reviewer knew, and he also knows that stringing together words like “Kaiju,” “thrash” and “death metal” will send many readers racing for the exits. Fair enough. The dork factor in that combination is pretty strong. But Sinister Monstrosities Spawned by the Unfathomable Ignorance of Humankind (a Kaiju-scaled title, to be sure) has a number of qualities that redeem it from the status of novelty act or winking prank. It knows exactly what it is: a record for folks who like thrashy death metal as much as they like classic horror movies about really, really big monsters. The songs? They hit an appealing sweet spot, between hotly enthused geekdom and ripping, snarling eruptions of noise. Sort of like a good Godzilla movie.

Sinister Monstrosities… is Oxygen Destroyer’s second LP, and the Seattle-based band has been releasing songs like “Summoning the Moth of Divinity” and “Vanquished by the Unrelenting Devastation of the Celestial Behemoth” over a run of splits and EPs since 2015. This new record presents a modest innovation, in that Oxygen Destroyer has moved beyond the Toho Studios canon to create songs based on British and American movies: The Beast from 20,000 Fathoms (1953), The Giant Claw (1957) and Gorgo (1961). Sometimes the songs’ subjects are pretty clear, and sometimes it takes a particular sort of proficiency to recognize them. “Enduring the Maternal Rage of the Amphibious Monstrosity” doesn’t quite identify its titular “monstrosity,” but if you are familiar with the narrative of Gorgo, you can see the pissed-off mama beast coming from some distance away. She is certainly big enough. 

Some folks will hear only silliness, a superficial lite-ness in those musical antics, which might issue in summary judgment on Oxygen Destroyer. The source material doesn’t always help. As Toho Studios cranked out Godzilla movie after Godzilla movie, the proceedings got increasingly goofy: the pint-sized sirens in the Mothra movies, the appearance of Minilla in Son of Godzilla (1967) and Destroy All Monsters (1968) and so on. One answer to that ludicrousness is Oxygen Destroyer’s music, which is tightly written and executed, and bursting with aggressivity. The band glories in the excesses of Kaiju mythos, but the songs don’t play around. They’re loud, thrashy and excoriating. And we should recall that the culture that created Gojira, featuring a city-burning creature birthed by nuclear radiation, was fewer than ten years removed from the horrors of Hiroshima, and of Nagasaki. Unfathomable ignorance of humankind? The reverberations of the explosions of Fat Man and Little Boy are always embedded somewhere in Godzilla’s roar — and they’re somewhere in these songs, too. 

Jonathan Shaw

[kb-p2730]

Re-Animator

[freshprincesofsheffield]

So LONG and no new posts. What you are in these days? Music, fashion, lockdown lifestyles...

meee?? Well, I've fully drifted away from the British alt rock scene. This happened pre-lockdown but yeah... You'll catch me mostly listening to death, thrash & black metal. A big life change that happened during lockdown though is that I've become a teacher! so that's cool haha.

What's going on with y'all?? I miss you.

[witch-of-the-west-country]

I was tagged by @hellyjumper

rules: write your 10 favourite female characters from 10 different fandoms and tag 10 people.

1. Ellen Ripley from the Alien series

2. Harley Quinn in Birds of Prey

3. Huntress in Birds of Prey

4&5. Nanny Ogg and Granny Weatherwax from Terry Pratchett's Discworld series

6. Violet Baudelaire from A Series of Unfortunate Events

7. Blind Mag from Repo! The Genetic Opera

8. Pamela Fitzgerald, the mother from the movie Ginger Snaps

9. Elisa Esposito from The Shape of Water

It wouldn't let me add number 10, maybe because I am on mobile? Anyway, I'm gonna choose Sherri Squibbles from Monsters University, just because of the scene in which she is waiting in the car and listens to thrash metal

Tagging @skarmazenuk @kittenstorm @cool-kink-bro @sfh-amf @onemoore @flowisaconstruct @afieldinengland @grace-the-writing-ace @british-men-can-get-it @brimbrimbrimbrim

If you don't want to do it don't worry :)

[metalsongoftheday]

Tuesday, December 22: D.A.M., “House of Cards”

British metal’s fall from dominance was never fully explained or understood, as the blockbuster global success of Iron Maiden, Def Leppard and Judas Priest obscured the dearth of younger homegrown talent in the back half of the ‘80s and ultimately left ample runway for America, Germany and Sweden to take over.  One factor in the decline of metal in the U.K. had to be the country’s slowness to embrace thrash: although the Big 4 did gangbusters business in England even before they broke out in America, it took several years before an actual British thrash scene came to fruition, resulting in a lot of ‘80s-style trashers putting out their first records in the early ‘90s.  D.A.M. (Destruction and Mayhem) unfortunately fell into that category, putting out two records on Noise that were more counterparts to what Combat and Relativity were putting out in 1987 than what was actually going on in metal circa 1991.  As a result, something like “House of Cards”, while enjoyable in its own right, also felt immediately dated, especially since all of the major thrash bands had already evolved considerably (even Slayer, for all their talk about never changing, had grown significantly as writers).  Perhaps D.A.M. sensed this, since they broke up after “House of Cards” and the rest of Inside Out fizzled commercially, with guitarist Dave Pugh moving on the much more inventive Skyclad.

[martianarctic]

Devin’s Playlist -2010s Part 1

This is an unfinished retrospective look at what I listened to during the 2010s. This decade was exceptional for me, as it was the first decade where, for almost all of it, I was not a musician myself. 

Being a musician forces you to listen to music like a musician, and being free of that, and able to listen as a listener alone, really made this a spectacular decade for me. I found dozens of incredible albums that were released during the decade, many of which received no significant recognition.

This was a very large project, and I did not finish it. I made it through Retrowave, Shoegaze, and Post punk. If anybody cares, I will finish the entire project, which will add Dreampop (the largest category), Vaporwave, and Dark Ambient.

Retrowave: Retrowave is electronic music that, at first listen, sounds like it may be from the 80s or 90s, mostly because the synths it uses to generate the music are either retro-inspired or literally retro equipment in some of the more extreme cases. It generally features original compositions, often, but not always, is instrumental. Rough vocals would impede the tightness and angularity of the music, so when vocals are used they are often pop produced and highly melodic. This genre gained significant exposure from Nicolas Winding Refn’s 2011 masterpiece, “Drive”.

Galactic Melt (2011) Com Truise

Electronic artist Com Truise rose to prominence off of this fantastic record, which rallies around the undeniable electro anthem of 2012, “Brokendate”. Starting with some found audio (chopped and screwed found audio becomes a big deal later on in Vaporwave) and then dropping in an absolutely thick beat we’re met with a song that eventually, as layers are dropped on, ends up being meditative, romantic, and melancholy. Emotions to that point, not well associated with dance music, but definitely would come to color the entire decade.

Era Extraña (2011) Neon Indian

Electronic solo bedroom pop was pretty cool at the end of the 00s being pushed hard by guys like Twin Shadow. I am not sure how I got ahold of Neon Indian but this album was, in a lot of ways, the true start of my musical decade. I had not been so excited and enthusiastic about a record since I had retired from making music. It really gives you a new perspective to not feel like you’re in competition with everything and trying to learn from everything- just as a listener, I was enthralled with this entire record.

Visitors (2012) Lazerhawk

I did not get into dark retrowave until after 2013 and thus discovered Lazerhawk and this record after the fact. Visitors is, in my opinion, the best dark retrowave album ever made, more consistent and listenable than competitors such as mega drive or carpenter brut. Also. This album absolutely sticks the landing with the street-strutting powerhouse “Arrival”.

I am the Night (2012) Perturbator

Made famous by soundtracking the indie game hit Hotline Miami (one of the best games of the decade), Perturbator carved a niche for himself with fast, brutal, high energy dark electronic music and absolutely bonkers live shows. Perturbator has a large catalog of content- I am the Night is definitely the starter kit. Starting off with a thick minor chord, a church bell, and a sample of Peter Finch’s speech from “Network” you immediately know what’s in store- dark, dystopian and undeniably French electronic dance music, complete with breathtaking beat breaks, big bass synths, and complex compositions.

Innerworld (2014) Electric Youth

I had mentioned that Drive was a major popularizer of retrowave- and one song in particular, a collaboration between another retrowave artist named College, who created the low fi, catchy bassline for the song “A Real Hero”, and the vocals and lyrics, created by an artist called Electric Youth. Their record, 2014’s “Innerworld”, is one of the best retrowave efforts, with the second track, “Runaway”, even better than the song that made them famous. The pop chorus “Maybe we could just run away for good/cuz we’re both mis understood” soaring over thick, atmospheric synth pads will have you slapping the roof of your car, as you race through the freeways of LA at 3AM.

Atlas (2016) FM-84

Speaking of roof-slapping bangers, “Running in the Night” is probably retrowave’s most popular anthem, boasting one of my absolute favorite vocal performances of the decade. A group claiming rock and roll city San Francisco as their home base (despite being both British), FM-84’s Atlas is absolutely packed with a mixture of the atmospheric instrumental Miami Vice type music suggested by the red and purple setting sun cover as well as vocal driven pop songs such as the single mentioned above.

Hardwired (2018) Mitch Murder

Mitch Murder is a retrowave institution, having made the soundtrack to the viral youtube movie Kung Fury, and also, I suspect, the original music used by twitch personality Dr. Disrespect. However, he almost entirely releases 3-5 song Eps, making it tough to pick out a standout. However that all changed in 2018 with the release of Hardwired, the most accomplished mitch murder release to date. Starting off with the Jan Hammer style “Altered State”, it stays on brand throughout but tells a very unified instrumental story of cyberpunk dystopian adventure. Vangelis-style synths bring in the closer track, “Revision Control”, one of Mitch Murder’s greatest tracks. Evolving through different moods, different scenes, we can imagine the “human” protagonist confronting his cyborg nemesis he has been tasked to execute.

Retrowave Album of the Decade:

Dark All Day (2018) Gunship

As the decade wore on, retro wave slowed down for me. I thought it might be over but- without warning, Gunship, an artist I had listened to but not been completely impressed by, released what is probably the most accomplished album in the genre. Spanning various tempos and musical themes, utilizing several guest vocalists, the scope of “Dark All Day” keeps you listening to the record again and again. This record represents an evolution in a format that was at risk of being just a fad. “Come on lost boys, lets stay alive” over a ripping saxophone lead suggests mere 80s fetishism, but there is more substance than just that. The following track, “When you Grow Up, Your Heart Dies”, takes an upbeat electro jam, and really goes for emotional impact with a series of samples of characters from pop culture saying inspirational things, my favorite being “Everything worth doing is hard” which I think is just Teddy Roosevelt. My favorite track of the record, the slow ballad “Artemis & Parzival”, begins with swooning, Vangelis-style pads and then into guest vocalist Stella Le Page’s gorgeous vocals. This track definitely belongs on anybody’s make out playlist. “Were all gonna die that’s just how it is, there’s no escaping the future, nobody gets what they want in this world, even for you and me” is one of the greatest lyrics of the decade.

 Nugaze/Shoegaze-Adjacent: Shoegaze is a genre of music that features highly layered guitar effects (often run through 10 or more effects, creating a signature “vacuum cleaner” sound with a ton of distortion and white noise) and breathy vocals. Relying heavily on the depth of character of the sound, shoegaze guitar tone and production is a major creative point and almost all of these records are self-produced. Vocal themes are usually depression-inspired and lovelorn meditations, the music sounds, to most, dull and dreary, but to some, it speaks deeply to their feelings about the past and future. Shoegaze is often mixed with other guitar genres on this list, from Post Hardcore(Nothing, Title Fight), Black Metal(Deafheaven), and Thrash Metal (Astronoid).

Road Eyes (2010) Amusement Parks on Fire

Around 2010, I was promoted at my job to a new role that would require a bunch of travel. I was not a big fan of riding on airplanes. Also around that time, my brother had moved into my apartment, then out of it, and I only had a few months left on the lease. My favorite shoegaze band of the 2000s, Amusement Parks on Fire, played a gig at 330 Ritch, a club in san Francisco. I had a fantastic time at the show, and particularly loved their new material, which made it onto a record they called Road Eyes. 2 months later I moved out of my apartment in San Francisco and never would go back to living as a single dude.

Anyways, the travelling. The opening and title track to the record came to symbolize change for me. And it also was the song I would listen to every time my plane would take off. It helped me deal with the fear that something might happen- no matter how insignificant the chance – and if it did, while that song was on, it would be okay. Indeed, this was, and I will warn you I am not qualified to treat mental illness, but this actually really made flying much easier for me and it is a ritual I continue to do to this day, whenever possible.

Pipe Dreams(2013), Sway(2014), Feels like You (2019) Whirr

San Francisco nugaze/dronegaze band Whirr, large and complex, problematic, aggressive, are behind some of my favorite music of the decade. Their three album career reflects to me upon the primary feelings of youth: euphoria, anger, and sadness.

Pipe Dreams is a blissful set of jams, meditative, energetic uptempo and with almost totally co-ed vocals. Noisy production casts a hydrocarbon haze over the songs, raw vocal melodies reach out of the fuzz and suck you in. “Junebouvier” and “Toss” capture the euphoric and  youthful energy of a summer in San Francisco: starting off with breakups May thru July, and hot hookups until September or October when people settle into relationships. Two hungry eyes emerging from straight-bangs to make eye contact with you, and hold it- the exhilaration of touching somebody new.

Sway, the band’s masterwork, starts off with a heavily muff-distorted major 7th chord suspending us until the massive drums, now a hallmark of the band’s sound, kick off the beat into the opening rocker Press. The band switches up rhythms between drums, guitars, and bass to bring rock and roll-type turnarounds and breaks that really keep you on your toes and engaged. The lead guitar is classic legato shoegaze, using delay to achieve a long, sustained scream. Compositions are key on this record- not following just simple A/B patterns there’s some thought to the structure of the songs and record. “Dry”, in particular, demonstrates some of these ideas. A/B sections, underscored with “Drown me everytime… Dry”, give way to breaks, ethereal echo guitar solos, giving a hint of the powerful ending. A 4 chord progression accented by breathtaking drum fills finaly flourishes into a screaming cymbal-laden guitar finish.

Feels like You, the bands purported final album, starts off with some quiet echo piano. The melancholy major 7 chords the band has leaned on throughout their music are laid bare as we press play on the record. Add guitar. At a little after 90 seconds the band jumps in after with a thick blanket of lonesome self-reflection and chemical depression. The bands penchant for composition remains to the end, with changes keeping you engaged as the noise soothes your heart. “Younger than You” is one of the band’s greatest tracks, starting with an almost Smashing Pumpkins/Silversun Pickups esque clean unison guitar/bass into distorted and layered noise, ending with a drum-guided, rock and roll style outro.

 Guilty of Everything (2014) Nothing

One of the things I mention in my preface to this is, for me, the 2010s were the first decade of my life that ended with me not being a musician. And it opened some doors for me, creatively, to be able to hear music and think about it purely as a listener and a person. Something others have frequently described to me, that I had never really done, was just spend an entire weekend listening to an album.

I saw Nothing on KEXP 5 years ago when Guilty of Everything was out and they were on tour. I’ve seen them twice in person since them and bought every one of their records. The weekend that I got Guilty, I was attending a close friend’s sisters wedding, and pretty much was in a hotel room drunk in overcast-as-fuck santa cruz all weekend. And you know what was being played through headphones at practically all times.

Nothing is mostly the musical project of a guy named Dominic Palermo, a punk from the Philly scene that had spent more than a year in prison for a stabbing. He isn’t much of a vocalist or guitarist, but he is a fantastic artist, writer, photographer, and visionary, and the creative force behind what is now a rotating cast of other musicians.

Guilty of Everything is definitely their best record, opening with the massive meditation Hymn to the Pillory, into the definitive single Bent Nail, a perfect marriage of hardcore punk and shoegaze elements, falling apart into the 90mph crash, into a wall, final outro chorus “If you feel like/letting go…” repeated over and over over pure drone guitars, seamlessly flowing into the romantic slow jam “Endlessly” The closing title track is one of the best closers of the decade, perfectly sticking the landing on this brilliant lyric: “My hands are up, I’m on my knees I don’t have a gun, you can search me please. I’ve given up, but you shoot me anyway, I’m guilty of everything. I’m guilty of everything”.

Hyperview (2015) Title Fight

Nothing wasn’t the only Pennsylvanian post-hardcore band to bend their sound a bit shoegaze. Title Fight also sneaks onto this list with their outstanding record Hyperview from 2015. Appealing compositions and melodies combine with harmonized vocals, even some 16 beats on the hats- things we expect from post hardcore, but slowed down and smeared out a bit into the shoegaze aesthetic. My favorite track from the record, “Hypernight”, combines some screamo hype man chorus, math rock inspired guitar and bass lines, and is just all in all one of the most unique tracks to come out of the decade. “I don’t want to see things differently, its what I am taught myself to believe”.

Grandfeathered (2016) Pinkshinyultrablast

I admit that I bounced off of Russian electro-shoegazers Pinkshinyultrablast the first time I listened to them a few years ago. There was just too much going on and I didn’t really have the inclination to jump in and grab on. Operatic female vocals, noisy djenty guitar, shimmery, clean guitar, all swirl together in what is undoubtably a great record for having a tinder date IF, and I say IF, you’re willing to run a musicological acid test on them.

Whether it was listening to a bunch more music, particularly ambient music, or just changing taste now I can’t get enough of this band. They do slam from idea to idea in a song, but it’s a controlled speed- it’s not pleasant to a lot of people, but once you get yourself situated, you’ll wonder how you ever missed this band to begin with, if you’re not one of the people reading this and thinking, naw dude, I got this shit RIGHT AWAY.

The compositions on the record are, in fact, carefully considered and composed, combining noise rock with clean ambience deftly and changing up styles repeatedly throughout each song and the record. Everybody knows we can no longer control dynamics via volume in today’s world of headphone/device listening,  ultramaximizing mastering, laptop speakers, etc. So Pinkshinyultrablast controls it with style. This record is definitely the more guitar-driven of the albums from this decade, with their release 2 years later being more electronic and vocal focused.

Slowdive (2017) Slowdive/My Bloody Valentine (2013) mbv

There are two bands that are credited with creating and or popularizing the Shoegaze movement during the late 80s and early 90s. Those bands are My Bloody Valentine, and Slowdive. Both of whom released albums during the 2010s. And frankly, both records are damn good for two bands that have been basically on hiatus for 20 years. Neither has really stood the test of time for me, although I listened to both exhaustively upon release. 

The opening tracks of both records are absolutely mesmerizing, this slow, sexy intro is clearly the part of them that became stronger with age. The manic rock energy of their more upbeat tracks however is absent or at least forced, and I think is what keeps these from being really what I’d call strong records. Nevertheless, both albums belong on any shoegazer’s playlists both for the quality of the music as well as the nod to the progenators of the genre we love so much.

Time n Place (2018) Kero Kero Bonito

KKB was already one of the biggest indie rock groups in the world when they released this their second full-length album. Making a big move sound-wise from super squeaky clean hip hop style production to sloppy shoegaze guitars and drums, they alienated a lot of fans with Time n Place, but I don’t see how. For me, coming in for Time n Place and then going back in the catalogue to Bonito Generation, I see it as a very natural progression. As the artists become more confident and mature, it’s natural they should explore some other emotions and moods.

That said I am not the usual KKB fan. Actually at their show in San Francisco in 2018 I was probably in the top 95 percentile of being an old fart. Around me, mostly twentysomethings on the first half decade, casually doing key bumps right on the show floor, something scared old gen Xers like me, still remembering their friend’s divorced dads in cigarette boats they sold for coke in the 80s, are still too paranoid to do. The crowd definitely starting pogo jumping at the chorus to “Only Acting” a grungy, poppy metaphor between acting on stage, and being young and in love.

Right after that, “Flyaway“ is the upbeat shoegazey manic anthem that really got me sucked into the band to begin with. Combining fuzzy guitars that are more reminiscent of Japanese rock bands of the 00s than shoegaze with a crystalline clear melodic vocal line from Sarah, this is the track where I grab a handful of dirt from my dying hill, and say if you don’t like this song, you don’t like the band, the record, or my musical taste.

Miserable Miracles (2018) Pinkshinyultrablast

Reinventing themselves record by record, Pinkshinyultrablast keeps on the cutting edge and doesn’t make a habit of anything. Miserable Miracles is more electronics driven, lead and pad synthesizers bringing in the music with their trademark soaring, operatic vocals. Guitars are present as well, but heavily stretched with cathedral reverb and long delay. A smoother sound than Grandfeathered, but well-poised to issue a majestic, meditative prayer such as “Find your Saint”, my favorite track. Like walking into a Germanic church on Sunday, the vocals rise to the ceiling forcing you to look up at the light breaking in through stained glass synthesizers. At about 100 seconds, all of the pieces drop in together to lift you into wherever it is you are going. “I used to talk- about it” brings the heavenly outro to bear, one of the most powerful musical moments of the decade.

Astronoid (2019) Astronoid

I am part of a few music groups on Facebook, and one of them mentioned this band, calling them “Dream Thrash”- a combination of dreampop and thrash metal. I’d say its more thrashgaze, with heavy effects/djenty guitar and the more whispery vocals than are a hallmark of the shoegaze genre, not the clear pop produced vocals that are the hallmark of dreampop.

That out of the way, this is possibly my favorite record of 2019. The opening track, “A New Color”, brims with energy and hopeful optimism and replaced Road Eyes as my airplane take off song. Right around 3 minutes in, when the plane is airborne and gaining climbing u to cruise, when we’re often breaking through the clouds, comes in possibly my favorite guitar solo of all time. On this record, Astronoid are unquestionably uptempo metal yet somehow at the same time being slow-changing enough to carry the emotional weight of shoegaze. The second track, “Dream in Lines”, is an aggressive, more metal-informed rocker, and the third is a power ballad that absolutely sealed the deal for me in terms of loving this album.

Other high points include the uptempo thrash jam “Breathe” and “Water”. Again infusing the metal, djenty mute strum guitar with soaring vocals and heavy backing harmonics, this record continues again and again to deliver head-banging jams that touch and heal a deep sadness in the soul. “Water” is a darker exploration, starting with a heavy chunky two-guitar & bass instrumental, virtuous breaks, and expansive echo and reverb. The band sounds like they are playing in the middle of an interstellar arena, fists human and alien in the sky.

The album sticks the landing with the penultimate track “Beyond the Scope”. This incredible song starts slowly, but upon reaching a turn, goes double-time as the melody and music climbs in pitch at 100 seconds in. This transition takes us into a greater urgency, with sustained, over-flying guitar notes keeping the harmony rich and complex.

Then, the beat drops out and a single guitar chord rings- “My hands are on my ears/They won’t stop ringing” smashes into your brain and your heart. Then again, the building section- “Feeble-minded/I can not decide/in my world, now I know/there’s no such thing as dying/so leave with a goodbye” and into another build and back to the chorus-

“My hands are on my ears/they won’t stop ringing”. I don’t think any lyric can better express the decade than that. If it were somehow possible for this album to end on this song, it would be at the head of this category.

Everything Starts to Be a Reminder (2019) Echodrone

As a former musician, I have a lot of friends who are musicians. I am very brutally honest about my feelings in music and that can make it awkward to have to comment on a friend’s hard work. Echodrone’s latest record made this very easy- the record is simply amazing. Echodrone’s earlier records bounced off of me a bit, but this one has just the right mixture of drone-drenched empty space, ethereal vocals, emotional anguish and euphoria, and a strong connection to the last 10 years in my mind. The tracks are named after the four seasons, starting with Winter and ending with Autumn. Interestingly, the tracks do not really stand out as being separate in my mind, much like how you cannot easily separate a season from another season in the same year.

“Winter” explodes with an epic, cymbal-laden meditation, that continues to grow and grow and expand, then finally becomes quieter, more melodic, and less drony in the second half of the 18 ½ minute song.

“Spring” features a finger-pick echo guitar interspersed with a beautiful co-ed vocal line guiding us down a pathway of different melodic and harmonic ideas. It then enters into a several-minutes long jammy contemplation that is utterly ecstatic to me- synths layered with effects-laden bass and more echo guitar into a full stop.

The best song on the record, “Summer”, begins with a vocal sample into a more or less straight-ahead rock and roll jam. This gives way to a downtempo effects section, then at right after 4 ½ minutes, gives way to a sound I can only call Olympian in hugeness. Fuzz bass, echoing guitars, and multilayered female vocals create this trance-like atmosphere that is rarefied and deeply marked with potent and everchanging imagery at the same time, like cream on top of coffee.

The sound continues to change and becomes quiet again once again with echo guitars carrying the music through. Back to a rhythmic return at 12 ¾ minutes. A synth flute melody flies over the whispered vocals, complex drum patterns- an opine to the end of life’s summer, the bitter sweetness of being old enough to not be hurt anymore by unlikely things failing to fly.

 Shoegaze Album of the Decade:

Sunbather (2013) Deafheaven

A single distorted guitar chord progression holding several notes through the chords for changing harmonics, exploding into double kick and even more guitars, into black metal screaming- this is the unmistakable beginning of Sunbather by San Francisco black metal band Deafheaven.

Due to its downtempo sections, overall distorted and layered production, and emotional scope, this album is loved not just by black metal fans but also by shoegaze fans such as myself. It is a perfect example of a successful crossover- not anticipated or forced in any way by the creators- but it just happens to work on so many different levels.

There are really only four songs on this record, the tracks in between them are much needed interludes. Something all Deafheaven songs do very well is compositioning. These tracks play out, in a way, like classical pieces, with many different sections, transitions, themes, changes, openings, closings, callbacks- it’s so incredibly dense and accomplished that you can listen to this album for weeks on end and still be surprised.

“Dream House” is the blazing opener of the record and puts on display everything we love about every song on here. To make this song the first track is insane, simply because of how over-the-top insanely powerful it is. After a brief interlude of just picked echo guitar, a single chord strum, the entire band comes back in a beat later, and this isn’t even the most emotional part of the song. That’s going to be at 7 minutes, 20 seconds in “I watched/It die!!!” screeches the vocalist as a guitar ostinado plays over the key notes that have been presented throughout the song in brutal crystal clarity. Then at 8 minutes- the vocalist and guitar break down, screaming and double picking guitar notes. It is difficult not to cry at this ending- and this is only the first song on the record.

“Sunbather” is both the title track and the album’s dark heart. Thrumming with a complex beat from the start, the other instruments are layered over this like a tangle of vines across an iron fence. Skillful use of double kick and drum fills keeps the band on target as we get to the breaks and turnarounds. The cymbals and guitars swirl creating complex patterns. Listening to this song from far away with extremely poor speakers would sound like static- similar to how Jupiter looks like a pale gold smear- turn up the volume a little, get a little closer, and you see the rich, threatening complexity of the swirling clouds of music and emotion. The song ends with a slow section about ¾ of the way through the 10 minute piece. An unforgettable echo guitar line plays sparsely over drums- invoking a Cure-like gothic sensibility. Then the band comes back in, playing the same melody and expanding upon it, a lighting bolt magnified to a thousand forks and twists going in all directions. It is the melodies at the end of Sunbather that were stuck in my head, unforgettable, after listening to this record. Unlike Dream House, this song ends on a down note, a question- the rest of the album is to give an answer, and incredibly, you will not be disappointed.

“Vertigo” is the longest song on the record at 14 ½ minutes, a blazing, minor key rocker that is meant to emotionally drag us down as far as we can go after Sunbather. The ending of the song invokes the Beatles “She’s So Heavy” before heading into “Windows” an ambient and spoken word piece featuring a drug deal gone bad- unquestionably a node to The Tenderloin, one of the more drug-laden districts in San Francisco and likely location of the band’s rehearsal studios.

Into “The Pecan Tree”, a song that has an seemingly impossible task: To somehow stick the landing of an extremely powerful and emotional record. We are looking for something coming into this track, but we are not totally sure what it is. We need something, but we can only follow the lights. The song opens up with insane double-kick guitar madness, 2 step rhythm, and then at 1:20 we see a glimpse through the storm, a hole of blue, that we can make it to, if we keep on going. Keep on going. Keep on walking. Smashing, swirling guitars and screams return, our view obstructed. Everything seems to be going at maximum at the end of this first section of the song.

At just after 3 minutes, the sonic assault finally begins to slow down, a march tempo into double kick continuous cymbals, back to march tempo, then, at 4 minutes 19 seconds, only picked echo guitar heralds us into the second section. The star of this section is a piano ostinato combined with the echo guitar, with a second guitar playing playful melodies over it. This is the starry night we can now see that the storm has cleared- this is the most optimistic and life affirming music on the record. A found audio recording of a detuned radio signals the ending of this section.

Eventually, this music fades just before four metal beats brings us to the conclusion- an octave-fingering guitar line and screeching vocal that is in my view one of the most awesome emotional turnarounds that I have ever experienced musically. The remaining outro sums up the entire record- life is big, difficult, unknowable, chaotic. Great albums stick the landing- and this ending does so, with incredible energy, on a record that did not even need it. Sunbather. One of the greatest rock records of all time and one of the very few of those albums to come out now, just about half a century after the 60s.

Post Punk Revivalists: The king of indie rock genres in the 00s, post punk was largely set down at the end of the decade with the major acts of the decade releasing milquetoast or downright laughable fare (are we human, or are we dancer?). However, post punk exploded back onto the scene in 2012 with The Money Store by Death Grips. Some returning groups from the 00s did end up releasing fantastic records, Roma 79 and Daughters being my favorites.

Cardinal Star (2014) Roma 79

I discovered north San Francisco bay area band Roma 79 through their single from the 00s, “Gold”, a sort of heavy, post-punk rocker with a few-thousand views on Youtube. I was very surprised when they reunited and recorded this followup album, which was one of my favorite records of 2014. Featuring a good amount of synth and dreampoppy guitar lines, the main standouts are the vocals and the brilliant drumming, which is a hallmark of great post-punk records of the 00s such as Fever to Tell or Turn On the Bright Lights. The strongest single on the record, “Seventeen”, features a complex drum lines, interlaced with vocals and synths. The song slowly builds up in emotional intensity and drops in layers of vaguely Phil Collins-esque drums and backing vocals, blossoming into a powerful meditative love song. “I’ll wait for it with you.” The final song on the record, is almost an answer to this track, closing the record on a strong point.

You Won’t Get What You Want (2018) Daughters

Daughters is another post-punk band that returned to release a followup nearly 10 years later with 2018’s “You Won’t Get What You Want”. Like all great post punk records, there are a number of characters in this room, and they all can be heard, each having their moments in the spotlight and their moments in the shadows.

One such character is the drums. A crushing combination of live and multitracking effects create a rhythm that provides both the constant heartbeat required by driving rock and roll based music, but also the texture, the complexity, that we seek out in the genre. Lots of tom toms used to keep the beat as opposed to cymbals, practically no hat. Invoking Killing Joke, except when they don’t want to right away, but bring it in later.

Another character is the vocals. Spoken word/sing song type delivery, where the mood and the words and more important than the melody. Lyrics invoke isolation, depression, contraction, abandonment, decline. It would almost be enough with just that, these drums and vocals- but this will also be added by another character, the music. The music seems to be generated mostly by guitar and bass, but there are clearly some synthesizer elements as well, used sparingly and to great effect. I can’t really describe the guitar tone, I would say, it shimmers, but not in an enlightening way. It’s like flashes in the dark, disorienting more than illuminating. The sound is like wood coming off a circular saw. It’s definitely this guitar sound that draws people into this record. All elements are moody, dark, aggressive, but it’s the guitar that really lays down flashes over the blackness.

“Satan in the Wait”, one of the best single tracks on the record, features an off-balance drum beat, carried by toms, and an air-raid siren like guitar sound. A throbbing, distorted bassline in time with the kick drum. At 1:30 in we are given a guitar riff that is beautiful and invoking of a banjo, lending a sensation of urban, southern gothic emotions. Horror film soundtracks come to mind, a combination of unsettling ambience and clear, unforgettable melodies. “Their Bodies are open” the chorus goes, making me think of world-ending events, a transformational death as seen in Arthur C. Clarkes Childhood’s End.

Another of my favorite tracks, “Daughter”, begins with a “bela legosi is dead” kick and snare rim drum beat, possibly electronic, along with a shimmery, surf-rock toned guitar riff. As the song proceeds, more elements are dropped in, and the drums are of particular note here, at 1:23 or so, they drop into a complex beat involving toms, cymbals, and snare. At 2:05 they drop in a clear guitar riff on top of raw noise, building to a climax with the vocal “There’s a war!” At this point, the noise drops out, just a clear guitar riff reminiscent of “Satan in the Wait”, drums coming in at 3:15 or so are particularly impactful.

The final track, “Guest House”, opens on a nearly unbearable sonic assault, the lyrics invoking somebody trapped outside of a bomb shelter during an apocalypse. Once again the gap between unbearable noise and beautiful melody is bridged, as the final dissonant chords give way to deep, harmonic, peaceful orchestra swells.

Post Punk Album of the Decade:

The Money Store (2012) Death Grips

The first time somebody played “Get Got” for me, it was during a really chillwave phase in my music taste and I was completely lost, and didn’t really understand what people saw in Death Grips. I was intrigued enough though, and circled back on some tracks from Exmilitary, their prior record. The more laid back tone and empty space present in tracks such as “Culture Shock” kept me interested enough to give The Money Store another shot a year or so later.

As my interest in chillwave started to fade, and I sought more emotional substance to my music, I returned to the Money Store, and was hooked. Each track is a relentless blast of aggressive drum beats, synthesizer driven melodies, and of course the unmistakable rap vocals of MC Ride.

A strong comparison for me, is between this record, and Joy Division’s second and final record, “Closer”. Relentless beats, but never getting boring, always inventing new rhythms to cast a texture over the musical landscape. Short, fast songs, transitioning from one beat and tempo to the other, never giving you a chance to catch your breath.

The music is highly influenced by hip hop, appearing to be a chopped and cut style, with synthesizers combined with production on the vocals, adding vocals, filter sweeps, reverses, etc- so much energy and craft went into creating what is on its surface very simple music- drums, vocals, and production. Standout track “Hustle Bones” does a fantastic job of expressing what is so great about every song on this record. Everything barely makes sense, but then it all comes together in a singular moment that anybody can nod their head to.

MC Ride’s best is on display in the classic hit, “I’ve Seen Footage”. In his relentless, attacking rap style, he tells us the story of watching gore or wtf videos from reddit or 4chan (or Stile Project if you’re really old like me)-  describing what he’s seen, and then underscoring that with the chorus, “I stay noided”- the character Ride creates is deeply anxious and paranoid, while at the same time being insatiable in the quest for knowing more, something I believe is nearly universal to the experience of the internet-informed human, a phenomenon that would later in the decade lead to diseases thought dead brought back by anti-vax movements, and the election of conspiracy theorist and popularizer Donald Trump as president of the united states.

And that’s the formula to each track on Money Store- working around something more or less literal, Ride’s poetry brings us into the dark state the world was only beginning to enter at the start of the decade.

Closing track “Hacker” opens with a recording of Ride, yelling, presumably at a concert “No ins and outs!!! You come out, your shit is GONE”, then into a 4-on the floor dance beat to end the record on an absolute banger. The music, carried by the beat and Ride’s systematic delivery, is left to its own devices, with glitchy, cut-off synth arpeggios, everything getting out of the way of the beat. “Having conversations with your car alarm”, “you speak with us in certain circles, you will be dethroned or detained”, and “Gaga can’t handle this shit” are some of the lyrical gems that Ride has saved for last here, closing out a post punk record that stands alongside Closer or Turn on the Bright Lights as one of the best of all time.