#Papa Roach is still the fucking best life band to me

[lordprettyflackotara]

Hitchhiker SFW & NSFW Headcannon’s:

a/n: getting my wisdom teeth out in like ten minutes so imma be offline and recovering for a few days. enjoy these head cannons until i get back <3

Tim | SFW:

-lives off of coffee & cigarettes. half the time can’t digest regular food & ends up throwing it up from stress :( poor bby

-despite being a proxy for years, still has reoccurring nightmares that keep him up at night. certain things trigger ptsd episodes, specifically memories of jay or brian (who brian used to be before the operator came along)

-rough exterior, doesn’t believe he’s even worthy of being in your presence or anyone else’s. firmly believes that anyone he interacts with The Operator could and would kill just to fuck with him

-major anger issues that he mainly keeps under wraps, masky’s the one who REALLY shows that side of him

-memory is spotty, but he puts more of an effort to remember things since meeting you

-drinks straight black coffee, absolutely despises cream & sugar. its a miracle this man has any water intake at all

-overly protective, to an intense degree

-enjoys bands like the smiths, the neighbourhood (idc bite me), and cigarettes after sex

Tim | NSFW under the cut:

-tim wants to absolutely worship you. a shameless munch who wants to do nothing more than make you cum on his face

-prefers missionary, wants to bury his face into your neck as he pounds into you

-This man loves nothing more than to hear your pretty noises

‘Fuck, keep moaning my name princess’

-doesn’t care too much about receiving head, would rather please you

-ADORES watching your facial expressions as you cum on his fingers. the little o shape your mouth makes drives him feral

‘Yeah? Gonna cum on my fingers?’

-best after care on the PLANET. baths, snacks, cuddles. whatever you want he’s got it ready for you.

Brian || SFW:

-vegetarian (loves tomato soup because it reminds him of what his mom used to make him when he was sick)

-distrusting; even though he tries to attempt from speaking his mind is absolute madness

-lots of ptsd, genuinely fears what happened to him will happen to you

-depressive tendencies. allows hoodie to front when he starts getting too upset

-he doesn’t allow himself to have too many interest or too much of a personality. he lives in constant fear anything he may grow to like or show interest in will be destroyed by the operator

-you instill an unknowingly amount of happiness into his life. an amount so much that he fears he may be beginning to claw his way out of the trenches of despair

-enjoys bands like linkin park, papa roach, and green day

Brian || NSFW

-a TEASE

-this mf wants you to beg for his touch just to turn around & give you what you want & more

-adores the feeling of your nails digging into his back. he gets so turned on by it, it’s borderline nauseating for him

-praise to the absolute MAX

-‘you can take it pretty girl, such a good girl for me’

-possessive & determined to make you feel better then anyone else, especially in group activities

-‘go on, tell tim how good i make you feel’

-loves to overstimulate you to the point of no return. if you aren’t a squirming mess on the brink of passing out from pleasure, he feels like he didn’t do his job right

-wants to manhandle you. something about picking you up as if you weighed nothing to readjust you into the position he wants you in is so addicting to him

-good aftercare, thinks more about cleaning you up than anything else

Masky || SFW

-he’s so tired of being the ‘leader’

-like seriously, he’s sick of it

-firm believer since Hoodie came around first he should be forced to lead the band of misfit toys but he digresses

-thinks tim is a big softie and borderline pathetic, but after he saves you, he thinks more highly of his decision making skills

-when fronting he is absolutely not sleeping. real life is terrifying enough. the last thing he needs is the creativity of nightmares haunting him too

-carries wads of cash in case he’s in a bind. will just throw them at people before storming out of where ever he is

-did i mention anger issues? like to an unhealthy concerning degree? masky believes in punching or shooting his way out of any situation that pisses him off

-delusional but in the best way, imagines you and him to eventually become a bonnie and clyde like duo

-enjoys more edgy bands like three days grace, skillet, and hollywood undead

Masky || NSFW

-there is not a submissive bone in this man’s body

-spitting, spanking, slapping, and choking you really gets him going

-humiliating you and degrading you turns him on so much it’s unbelievable

-‘Fuckin slut. Get yourself off on my tongue. Get on with it before I change my mind’

-Either overstimulation or orgasm denial. No in between

-Gun play. I said what I said. You giving him head while he points a loaded gun at your head drives him feral

-‘Suck it harder or i’ll pull the trigger. Dont think I won’t. You’re not special’

-if you’re into it as much as he is, he’d like to fuck you with his gun🫣

-Lowkey is kinda cruel, enjoy the idea of putting his cigarettes out on you but won’t since he shares you (he doesn’t want to argue with toby/hoodie/brian/tim)

-leaving you covered with bruises in particular is satisfying to him. the shapes of his fingers digging into your waist being there the next day make him hard all over again

-decent aftercare. if we’re being honest you’ll be too dazed to remember most of it. he won’t necessarily cuddle you but he’ll at least clean you with a washcloth before putting you to bed

Hoodie || SFW

-silent but aggressive

-doesn’t enjoy fronting unless it’s to complete a mission or task for the operator

-enjoys stalking his victims just to see what they’re doing before they’re killed🙈

-that ski mask? yeah prefers that mf to stay ON. things that involve you are the only exception he’ll make once he grows fond of you

-him & brian are in an agreement having any real interest is too much risk. of course, they combat this narrative once you come along

-will tell you he doesn’t like music but secretly enjoys shinedown, breaking benjamin, and seether

Hoodie || NSFW

-sadist

-orgasm denial. the sight of you squirming beneath him while begging to cum? euphoric.

-cnc (sorry mom)

-‘shut up and take it. pathetic whore’

-breath play. likes choking but he’d prefer to have you on all fours with a belt around your throat if he’s being honest

-loves recording you. not only to watch back later, but to threaten you with the blackmail

-‘you better behave or i’ll show everyone how much of a slut you actually are’

-hair pulling. whether you pull his hair or he pulls yours. the whimpers that come from it are like heroin

-bondage. if hoodie could have it his way he’d have you tied up and spread out like a starfish on a bed so he could play with you until you break

-probably the worst aftercare out of everyone on this list. doesn’t care for it, thinks it’s your problem. at most will just tell you to pee

Toby || SFW

-toby is pretty much your loyal guard dog. he’s at your disposal and you don’t even realize it

-he never really got an opportunity to be a teenager. now that he’s roughly 21-23, you make him feel like the flustered horny teenager he never got to be

-before you he’s extremely unhinged. toby didn’t have a lot of motivation besides the thrill of a kill. now that you’re around and practically a ball of sunshine, you make him feel something other than blood lust or boredom

-has nice curls but never knows how to take care of them so they always turn out straight since he immediately brushes his hair after a shower

-out of the three proxies he’s the most content with the situation. he views tim and brian as his best friends, even if they don’t feel the same way

-don’t let any of the fluff headcannons deceive you though, there’s a reason he’s a proxy. the unknown strength this man has is concerning. chopping up bodies doesn’t tire him

-enjoys russian roulette. masky and hoodie will play with him on special occasions

-likes to play with fire. if he has an opportunity he will commit massive amounts of arson

-his music taste bounces around everywhere, similar to his personality. top three is violent vira, grimes, and bones

Toby || NSFW

-hardcore switch leaning towards sub

-toby has his dominate moments, most of them just enjoying seeing you blush from his teasing

-‘you like m-me fucking y-you huh? such a p-perfect pussy’

-likes to see you take control.

-i’m sorry but despite being a sub he’s very vanilla, minus a few very specific kinks

-hickies. wants tim and brian to see you’re just as much as his as you are theirs

-cream pies. not even necessarily contributing to a breeding kink, he just likes to watch his cum drip down your abused cunt

-pulling his hair drives him feral. he can’t necessarily feel pain but he feels your eagerness and that’s enough for him

-considering toby can’t feel things his sex drive is extremely high considering it’s one of the few things he can’t actually feel

-one of his fantasies is fucking you with the handle of his axe

-aftercare is peak. he’s just as exhausted as you, but will wait on you hand and foot to ensure you’re taken care of

Nova || SFW

-her dad was a detective, she simply followed in his footsteps

-her parents were very academic driven. praise and affection was only shown to her when she excelled academically

-bi sexual. leans more towards women

-protective, blunt, and head strong

-working in a field that’s pro dominantly men, she ensures to be full of bark AND bite to make sure she’s taken seriously

-became a detective to help people. despite her tough exterior, she genuinely just wants to bring people peace through her work

-obsessive tendencies. once she starts a case she has to finish it. will not rest properly until it’s done

-has a fantastic memory. memorizes all the little details of anyone and everything

-out of the three proxies she likes tim the most, but will never admit she likes any of them

-enjoys hozier, asap rocky, and adeline troutman

Nova || NSFW

-THE BIGGEST SWITCH TO EVER EXIST

-either wants to be called mommy or a good cum dump

-an absolute freak in the bed

-this woman has a chest of sex toys at home of all varieties and sorts

-pegs men

-‘your whimpers are so cute baby boy’

-either wants to put YOU in handcuffs or have you put handcuffs on HER. either way she wants them involved

-doesn’t believe in vanilla sex. if she’s fucking she’s going all in. no lovey dovey shit. just pure feral behavior

-on the other end of the spectrum, loves being fucked into the mattress until she’s dizzy

-‘please keep going, fuck, i’m so close’

-has attended several bdsm sex parties on the down low

-aftercare is peak. she doesn’t gaf ab herself. you’re the star of the show

[safety-pin-punk]

Sorry to be in your asks again about this 😭 but I love your posts and the resources you've got

How the fuck do you cope with not feeling punk enough as a disabled person

Not having the capabilities to actually go out and get involved in your local community and scene, not having the coordination to fix up or make your own clothes

I know it's mostly about philosophy and not (entirely) how you dress or what concerts you can go to, but it's so hard to not feel like I'm failing at being punk when I can't make my own battle jacket or go volunteer with how exhausted I am just from existing 😭😭😭

First, don’t be sorry! I love getting asks (I actually have a lot that I need to get through 😬)

I feel like in order for my answer to have any real meaning, you need some background on me and my life, so I’m going to put a cut so this isnt the longest post known to man lol

Okay, for anyone new, I need to point out here that I approach all of this from a chronically ill perspective. I’m not physically disabled, but I’m certainly not fully functioning by any means. Okay on to the actual answer:

You ask how I cope with not feeling punk enough without being able to get involved in a local scene and dealing with the realities of chronic illness.

When I was in highschool (mind you this was like 7 years ago), I was just starting to get into punk. I was enamored by it. But I grew up country. I was the kid that wore jeans and a flannel every day. To this day I own cowboy boots and a few hats. I still listen to country music when Im sad. So I was a country kid who wanted to be a punk rocker.

My friend group in school thought that was absurd. I was 16 when it first came to my attention that maybe I couldn’t be punk enough. At this point I hadnt even learned the first thing about what punk really means besides ‘sticking it to the man’. My friends, no my best friend at the time, she looked at me and said ‘You arent punk.’ Then she scoffed and went on her merry way. I was sad, I was hurt, but more so I was angry.

I actually stayed friends with her until about a year and a half ago. During that time, I learned everything I could about what it meant to be punk. I cut my hair off, I had a jacket with a few pins on it, I listened mostly to alternative music. But I could never really sew (Im still shit at it and stab myself every time I make an attempt at it), I never listened to the right bands, I never word the right clothes, I didnt go to the right school. Nothing I ever did was going to be ‘punk enough’ for her. Through out most of that time, I was a baby punk who had never met another person in the punk scene. And through out all of that time my supposed best friend never thought I was punk enough. (God this person is honestly a story in and of itself)

But when I went to college, I met new people. And to these people, I was the epitome of punk (mind you their experience with alternative people was basically zero because I went to a christian school). That was a new experience for me and gave me a lot of confidence. I still wasnt around punks, but the girls in my dorm would hear me playing Papa Roach or Falling in Reverse and see me in a band shirt and either avoid me or tell me I was pretty cool. I still didn’t have an actual punk jacket. I didnt know how to sew. I just liked music and was wearing a nirvana shirt I got on sale at walmart.

I tell you this to point out that simply changing my environment, neither of which were full of alternative people, drastically altered my view of myself and if I was ‘punk enough’.

I’ll even give you another example to think about. Is a chemist still a chemist, even when they aren’t surrounded by or doing research with other chemists? If someone likes chemistry and knows a lot about it, but are surrounded by business people, are they not still a chemist, even if they arent the ‘perfect chemist’? I’ll go even further, making your own capillary tubes out of glass pipets is a very common and almost expected skill that most chemists have. I’ve never been successful at this once, does that make me less of a chemist?

You can still be a punk even if you aren’t surrounded by punks. You can still be a punk even if you cant do all the things that are typically expected of punks. Not all punks have the same skill set. Some can sew, some cant. Some can garden, some cant. Some can make graffiti stickers, some cant. Dont try to fit yourself into this box of what punk is ‘supposed’ to be. Punk is whatever you want it to be.

And I know, I know. Theres a difference between knowing that and feeling that. I completely understand. And thats part of why this blog has been so important to me. Like I said, I live in a very rural place. There are no punks. I know a grunge kid and a few teenagers who like to dye their hair. Sure, I live near Pittsburgh, but going into the city isnt a daily occurrence for me. But on tumblr, I’ve met some really amazing punks like @/polyamorouspunk and @/my-chemical-ratz. There is a pretty awesome online community of punks. These people have made me feel welcomed and included in this community, and I’m very thankful for that.

And even if you just want to look at the chronic illness/disabled perspective… your existence is punk. You are here, and you arent being quiet about it. Thats punk. “In the face of extermination say fuck you” may have been aimed at trans people, but it applies just as much to sick and disabled people. You are punk by default.

[dapandapod]

A fathers tears

Here is my second piece for the Bog Fluff Battle!  (Go give all entries a read! It’s lovely and oh so fluffy!)      This story Here on Ao3.

This story is about Geralt crying as little Ciri grows up. It is a alternate universe where Geralt is still a witcher and Jaskier a half elf, implied homophobia and evil headmasters are mentioned. I just wanted Geralt to be a soft and emotional father.

Prompt: I just want you to be happy.

Oh, and everyone is gay, as a treat, because fuck you evil laywer Calanthe. Please enjoy <3

It has been a long process.

So much paperwork, so many sleepless nights, so many phonecalls with the agency.

But finally, finally, they're about to sign the paper.

Geralt's heart feels like it’s three times too big, beating with fear and excitement.

He walks up the stairs, opens the door to the adoption agency. Finally, finally he and his partner are allowed to adopt.

Finally, finally, Geralt will be allowed to hold baby Cirilla in his arms.

They had to fight every bit of the way, him and Jaskier, against the lawyer Calanthe.

She's is still against same sex marrige, still against their adoption, still against interracial couples. She hates elves with a passion, and Jaskier being a half elf didn’t help in the least.

But they won. They finally, finally won.

Jaskier holds his hand while they sign, the pen shaking in his grip. Jaskier holds him close when they sit in the waiting room, his support and love the only thing keeping Geralt in place.

When the social worker comes in, Geralt can’t move.

Ciri is so tiny, just a little bundle of blankets in the carrier, fast asleep.

Jaskier is the one who finally stands, who finally takes their daughter's carrier. They loathe to wake her up, so silently, ever so silently, they carry her out.

Carry her home.

Only when they are safe within their home, only when they are standing by the crib they placed by the wall, Geralt feels brave enough.

Jaskier has been cradling her, rocking her and petting her soft, light hair.

Now Geralt reaches for her, holds a hand under her small head and pulls her to his chest.

She makes a small noise, a small snuffling sound, but calms. Her small baby hand comes up to her lips, sucking on her fingers as she burrows closer in Geralt's shirt.

Jaskier walks behind Geralt, wraps his arms around his waist, and rests his head on his shoulder.

“She is our daughter now.” He whispers, and finally something breaks in Geralt.

He draws in a shuddering breath, hot tears rolling down his cheeks like they haven’t for years. Jaskier kisses his neck, all three of them rocking gently back and forth to soothe each other.

They go about their new daily routine.

Bottle feeding, naps, changing diapers, kissing away tears. Jaskier is taking a bath before bedtime, after his very first dose of baby puke, and Geralt lies alone in bed with Ciri.

His daughter.

Geralt is laying on his side, just watching her. She is fighting sleep, scrunching up her tiny nose, opening and closing her tiny fists.

“Daughter,” Geralt says out loud, not for the first time. “You are my daughter and I’m… I’m your… dad….”

The tears are creeping up on him again, and he follows Ciris example, scrunching his nose and blinking hard.

“You are my world now, little one. I will love you as well as I can. Keep you safe in the world. I hope to bring you joy, daughter mine.”

Geralt speaks softly, quietly, testing out the words. He speaks them like a secret, like a confession in the darkness. Not even in front of Jaskier will he be able to speak these truths.

“I just want you to be happy, little one.” He says, stroking her soft cheek.

Her hands catch his fingers, squeezing them, and then putting them in her mouth. He smiles, letting her chew on him. She doesn’t have teeth yet, but when she does, he bets she will be fierce.

When Jaskier walks in the room, he finds their daughter fast asleep, Geralt's big hand in a tight grip.

The first time Ciri calls Geralt ‘dad’, her eyes sparkling and small white teeth in a grin, it’s a near thing again. They decided Jaskier will be ‘papa’ and Geralt ‘dad’, for simplicity.

“Daaa!” she yells, throwing herself in Geralt's arms with the shrieking kind of giggle only a toddler can pull off, trusting Geralt to catch her.

He always does, and he always will.

“Little one.” He smiles, scooping her up and twirls them around in a tight circle. He peppers her snotty little face in kisses, the baby smell soft and warm and full of comfort.

“I love it when you are happy.” He whispers in her hair, but she doesn’t have time for that. She wriggles and twists and turns, so he puts her down, and she makes her wobbly way over to Jaskier.

“Papaaa!” She yells, and this time it is Jaskiers turn to catch. He is sitting on the the couch with his arms wide and waiting.

Next to him sits Roach, a stray cat Jaskier decided they simply had to adopt, despite cats reluctance to witchers.

Roach watches Ciri, blinking slowly at her with her tail twitching, and then Ciri is all caught up in Jaskiers arms and hoisted high. This is Ciris favorite game, and Geralt can feel the sting in his eyes when he watches the three favorite beings in his entire world.

A scabby cat, a small magical baby and a half elf, the man of his dreams.

“Daa sad?” Ciri asks, twisting in Jaskiers arms to watch Geralt.

Jaskier presses a kiss to the side of her face.

“I think dad is happy, darling.” Jaskier tells her.

Their little one is growing up so fast.

Her magic acted up early, and earned her a place at Aretusa, a school with teachers specialized in handling magic and it’s dealings.

Geralt was sceptical at first, but when Ciri came home, bubbling with energy and happiness and telling them all about her new best friend Dara, favorite teachers Triss and Yenna, and they are married, dads!! Married!

And all doubts melt away. The world around them has come a long way.

When Jaskier tucks her in that night, she asks Jaskier why he and Geralt aren’t married yet.

And Geralt cries silently in the hallways when Jaskier kisses her and whisper conspiratorially.

“Maybe you should help me ask him, hm?”

Ciri wants to work as a witcher, and Geralt's heart breaks.

He tells her no, please, little one, choose something else, anything else. They have a big fight, Geralt's words failing him when Ciri’s own tears fall.

“I am already accepted in Kaer Morhen, dad.” She yells. “I just wanted you to be proud of me.”

“I am, cub. I always am.” He says quietly, and they stare at each other.

Jaskier says she takes after him, and Geralt can see it now. She is so stubborn and fierce. He’d like to think that she took the best of them both, and he thinks she did.

“I just want you to be happy.” He whispers, wiping the tears from his stubbled and scarred cheeks. “I don’t want you to end up like me.”

“Aren’t you happy, dad?” She asks, voice wavering and fists clenched at her sides.

“I am now.” he says. “With you, Jaskier, and even that wretched cat in my life. But Kaer Morhen-”

“-It’s not the same as 90 years ago. No mutagens. No experiments or forced orphans. I looked into it. Vesemir runs it now, and they have changed the ways to be a witcher.”

He pulls his little one close. Hugs her small frame, kisses the top of his head. He never told her about those days, but she is a big girl now. Intelligent and independent and strong. She must have googled the horrors of Kaer Morhen, seen his drawn face whenever the old principal Stregobor was shown on Tv.

“I trust you, cub.” He whispers in her hair, and she sniffles into his shirt. “I just don’t want you to be as broken as me. I want you safe, and happy.”

“You taught me love like no one else, daa.” She says, and they cry together in the tiny, worn kitchen, sun shining in through dirty windows.

Jaskier holds his hand when they walk up the stairs. Holds him close when they sit in the first row in the temple.

Ciri stands by the altar, her eyes bright and nervous, her usually wild hair pulled up in a neat braid, fitting for the Skellige isles. Her dress is creamy white, flowing, and she is no longer the little girl that used to play dress up in their living room.

A grown woman stands there, a single flower in rich blue in her hand.

Everybody stands when the door opens behind them. Warriors on all sides raise their spears in salute, creating an arch for their queen to walk through.

Cerys appears in the doorway, every bit as regal as last he saw her, dress a rich blue and furs thrown over her shoulders, a single flower in creamy white in her hand.

Maybe he should be watching the queen.

Maybe he should pay his respect, but Geralt has eyes for nothing but his girl.

Behind him, he can hear Triss muffle a sob, and Geralt feels his own resolve break.

Ciri is watching her queen. Her hands are shaking, her breath coming fast, feet squared as if for battle. But her eyes are filled with such devotion and happiness, and Geralt's tears are spilling over.

Jaskier lifts their joined hands to his lips, and presses a kiss over his scarred knuckles. A wedding band adorns Geralt's finger, a matching one on Jaskier.

Soon their little girl will wear one of her own.

Geralt leans over to Jaskier and whisper in his ear.

“I love you. With all of my heart.” he says, as Ciri says those exact words to Cerys in front of the altar. “I am so glad she is happy.”

[glumvillain]

GlumReviews #10

If you’re like me then the year 2001 was just a shitty year to be alive.  George Bush was president,  Now That’s What I Call Music was on it’s 7th volume, Freddy Got Fingered and Bridget Jones’ goddamn Diary.  The internet had transformed the landscape of music and the industry was pivoting to serve a customer base that no longer wanted to pay for the music they so enjoyed.  Pandora internet radio would not be a public option until 2005.  The ancient technology known as just the plain ol’ radio was a large factor in determining one’s career success.  Yes, you could spend years touring on underground circuits garnishing a cult following from small town to small town, but nothing quite beats a radio single that can be played simultaneously for an entire nation.  In other words, the general public still played a determining factor for your determined breakthrough.

It is with this in mind that I present to you the case for Nickelback’s 3rd studio album Silver Side Up.  One cannot deny the societal connotations that come with just mentioning this band, and in my opinion, that horse has just long been laid to rest and I invite you to open your mind musically for just one second, as I have forced myself to in this series of truly eye-opening reviews.  Taking the title as Canada’s most commercially successful band among many many other prestigious honors of a similar nature.  Surely an entire generation doesn’t consider this band laughable and just a shitty shitty representative of rock music, especially in the year of our forsaken lord 2001? 

Is Nickelback a prime example of male mediocrity failing upwards into superstardom? or is there a valid claim for their status as a “pussy band” (which sounds kinda cool to me tbh) among rock n roll aficionados and real cool dudes in the scene?  We plumb the depths of a road at least 10 million have previously plumbed.

1.  Never Again

I’m gonna have a difficult time saying this is a “shitty” band whenever their first song addresses something that (excuse the pun) hits so close to home.  As an intro track they open up with a pretty heavy song about domestic violence “He’s drunk again, it’s time to fight/ She must have done something wrong tonight/  The living room becomes a boxing ring”.  Told from the point of a view of a child growing up to see his mother abused at the hands of his drunken father.  It’s a heartbreaking song that has a satisfying ending for those of us who don’t like to dwell too much on the downsides of life. Especially if one chooses to escape through music, but sad music in sad times is a personal habit I partake in.  This is a great song, content wise.  Kinda weird to have it set to such an upbeat sounding song but I guess it goes to serve the rage of a child being helpless in the face of his abusive father.

2.  How You Remind Me

Does the lead single of this album really need a review? Yes, because this review is about taking a second look at shit you take for granted.  This song is just poetry.  In the fact that it’s just a perfectly executed song, lyrically.  Being non-cryptic and just flat out honest about ones feelings.  There’s thousands of songs about being down in the dumps or heartbroken and I can see why this is easily one of their biggest hits.  It’s a song that doesn’t care about your preconceived notions of masculinity or what rock music should or shouldn’t be.  Some people were put on this planet to make one song to connect the world to each other, and I think this is Nickelback’s song.

3.  Woke Up This Morning

Now I wouldn’t exactly call this metal, but it’s too heavy to be pop-rock.  But it easily straddles these fine picket fences of being almost too heavy for their own lyrics at times.  There’s noticeable flavors of southern rock sprinkled throughout the album which I can see having a blue collar/WWF crowd appeal.  Again another song consisting of being absolutely honest with the listener “I felt like shit when I woke up this morning, I’ve been a loser all my life I’m not about to change”.  

4.  Too Bad

With the events of Track 1 in mind, this song takes a remorseful shift into the story of the father.  Now racked with guilt, the song title lays it out pretty evenly.  It’s too bad.  It’s too late.  Despite the behavior of an antagonistic and toxic father, they made it out on their own without the breadwinner of the family.  At the expense of the mothers time and love, at least they still had clothes on their backs and food to eat.  Another heartbreaking but heartfelt song that is one of the first songs that I’ve reviewed in this series that actually gave me chills.  

5.  Just For

This is the typical male violent fantasy that could lean either way.  It’s either about a girl he lost to another man, or given the past material in the album being about his mom, it could be pertaining to his relationship with his father.  However you feel personally about this band, understand that lead singer Chad Kroger opened his soul up on a record which is rarely an experience put forth in an album.  Now arguably you could tell me that’s what all bands do, and yes I’m inclined to agree.  But it’s rare that it’s not wrapped up in sarcasm or a false sense of confidence.  Usually such displays of anger and torment are disguised with metaphor and mystery.  There’s none of that at play here.  And usually I’d call that dumb music for a monkey brain audience.  But this is just some of the most sincerest lyrics you could listen to.

6.  Hollywood

Now listen I know I said all that stuff about his lyrics being pretty straightforward?  Well I’ll eat my own words on this song, as I can’t really pickup the metaphor he’s laying down...correct me if I’m wrong but is this song about being in a mental hospital or going to a methadone clinic?  Don’t beat yourself up if this track isn’t your cup of tea, I didn’t really vibe with it like other tracks.

7.  Money Bought

Pretty straightforward song about a woman whose living off of her parents just being an all around Samantha .  Songs like this I could really do without, heavy strong riff but if there’s one production complaint I have is that alot of the mixes are too guitar heavy and the drums get washed out.

8.  Where Do I Hide

Feels like a continuation of the previous song with the too loud guitar mix, the lyrics themselves are pretty boring and not really worth going over as I can’t figure out if he’s making an outlaw fantasy song or something about his dad again. There’s a decent little guitar solo but I wouldn’t say to go out of your way to listen to this song.

9.  Hangnail

I’ll give them this, they can kick out some pretty good riffs.  But like good standard rock riffs.  I couldn’t tell you they have their own sound musically.  I think their sound is largely wrapped up in the lead singers voice.  You could convince me it was 3 different bands if 3 different singers sang their songs.  This song feels like a weak follow-up to “How You Remind Me”, and if that’s the case it really missed a mark in my opinion.

10.  Good Time’s Gone

Nothing says “album closer” like acoustic guitar strumming away into a swaying jam.  Definitely leaning more country western than most of their songs, but with a hard rock kick to it.  It’s a nice revamp of energy from the previous couple of songs that just felt to get a little weaker as the album progressed.  Kroger gives a powerful vocal performance to lead us out and I can’t help but think to myself, dear god I just listened to a Nickelback album several times today.

So where do you land on the spectrum of hate for Nickelback?  For me, personally I see absolutely no reason why Nickelback is more hated than say Three Days Grace or Papa Roach, both of which have garnished their own cult followings respectively.  No, I believe this to just be a meme that society has taken and ran with it by constantly making Nickelback be the butt of some non-existent joke.  Are they the best band ever? Fuck no.  Should people be mocked or made fun of for listening to bands they enjoy? Double fuck no.  Because music becomes your personal experience, and we should let others bask in what little, small things bring them joy.  Why gatekeep listening to music?  Music is supposed to connect others and bring about the feeling of belonging, the act of belittling others for their choice in music isn’t only pointless, it’s just downright disrespectful of a persons identity and personal choices.  And with that being said, Five Finger Death Punch is REAL garbage music.

I refrained from mentioning that this album was actually released on September 11th, 2001.  Not wanting that to factor into my writing but it’s at this point that I argue the case that Nickelback was a relic of a time before shit got worse in America.  Without 9/11 in the narrative of some of these tracks I feel like they don’t hit as hard and yeah, in some fucked up way I’m saying that if it wasn’t for 9/11 itself, I don’t think they would have had a breakthrough.  As audiences scrambled to tune into something different I’m sure the radio offered some form of escape from a world ravaged by national news.  I give the album:

⭐⭐⭐/5

This album begins pretty lively and begins to fizzle out about halfway with track #6, saved only by the ending track.  This was a decent album and if you’re curious to check it out, I recommend tracks 1-5, then just skip to 10, the album makes more sense that way. 

[happymetalgirl]

2019

Despite all the hubbub about year-end wrap-ups, and decade-end wrap-ups this year, it feels to me like as soon as the year is over and the next one starts people immediately stop caring about all the top tens and bottom tens.

I got really busy over this past December and, along with missing out on reviewing several albums I wanted to review, I totally missed writing the extensive year-end lists I had planned. Last year I had listed over 50 of my favorite albums and nearly 100 of my favorite songs, and I wanted to do lists this year that would follow 2018′s lists respectably. Unfortunately, time got the better of me, and it still has the better of me, but I feel like I still should at least offer some kind of closure on last year.

It’s not going to be nearly 150 entries, but I do want to very briefly give an abbreviated list of my favorite songs, my favorite metal albums, my favorite non-metal albums, my least favorite albums of 2019. I’ll be keeping the lists pretty short, but I’ll go numerically still, starting with the bad news first.

The Bottom 10 Albums of 2019:

Maybe it’s my being calloused to what’s awful, or just doing a better job of avoiding it, but I feel like I wasn’t as angry at my bottom ten this year (2019) as I was at the two that preceded it, and perhaps it’s because I feel like I got pretty much what I was expecting with most of what I heard here; not as many of these were tremendous letdowns like Bullet for My Valentine with Gravity or just horrendous beyond comprehension like Black Vale Brides’ Vale. But just because I expected the shit didn’t mean it necessarily went down any easier when I had to ingest it this year.

Like the two years before 2019 when I did worst-of lists, a lot of the worst of the genre came from obviously contrived mainstream playlist/radio bait projects from bands to which it comes as no surprise. This year didn’t include as much shitty political commentary (being that I could probably fill this list with NSBM if I actively sought that shit out) or nostalgic cash grabs as the past two years, but the staleness of the long-tired formulas by which these radio-aspiring bands adhere to in their pursuits of mainstream crossover (or maintenance) only grows more frustrating the older they get. And the amount of surrender by so many bands to Imagine Dragons’ way of dominating the rock charts has been similarly frustrating. Often cited as the new Nickelback, we now kind of look back on Nickelback with a little bit of rose-tinted hindsight with the realization that it was mostly their omnipresence that irritated us all, and the case is the same for Imagine Dragons, but I don’t remember quite as many bands trying to copy the very unoriginal Nickelback and replicate “Photograph” or “Rockstar”. But I have heard so many acts churn out knock-offs of “Radioactive”, and “Believer”, and “Whatever It Takes” in obvious attempts to get themselves into that band’s royal court on the rock charts. There was of course plenty of unimaginative atmospheric blackgaze and post-metal to be found, but even the worst of that was just ineffective and boring at worst and not so much torture upon the eardrums like the albums to follow are.

10. Bad Wolves - N.A.T.I.O.N.

We didn’t get a Five Finger Death Punch album this year, so Bad Wolves came to the rescue to fill that void in 2019, despite also releasing an album in 2018. Though I’ve seen already that FFDP are slated for a release in 2020, so, great... While I would say that N.A.T.I.O.N.’s few high points made it a slightly better project overall than the band’s debut, those highlights were not nearly enough to outweigh the bafflingly poorly arranged variety pack of trashy alt rock ballads and formulaic alt metal from ten years ago that made up the majority of this album. As erratic as its flow was, everything on this album was so predictable once you got a ten-second taste of any given song, a few too many of which reeked heavily of Nickelback (and I know I just got done saying not that many bands really copied them, but that’s how obsolete and dated this album sounds at times). It’s obvious trying to market to FFDP’s demographic and co-occupy that giant, lucrative SiriusXM niche with them, and I’m just not thrilled to have basically a clone of FFDP walking around, taking up space in the metal ecosystem to keep an eye on.

9. Municipal Waste - The Last Rager

It might seem mean to put an EP down here, but my god this was terrible. If it had gone on longer it would undoubtedly quickly make its way to the top (well, bottom) of this list. I feel like my negative review of Slime and Punishment and this EP could at face value be miscontrued as me just being a sourpuss and a way too self-serious critic or just having it out for Municipal Waste, but I love thrash, I love totally not serious music, and I wish there was more high-profile fresh thrash being released these days. I wish one of the few notable thrash releases I heard in 2019 wasn’t bottom-ten quality. But that is just where Municipal Waste are right now, lazy, run-of-the-mill party thrash that is so deficient in that real vibrant party energy that this style of music needs to work. Yeah, I get that it’s not supposed to be taken seriously, but it’s so clearly recycled that it’s not even fun, the one thing it’s supposed to be. It’s like the shit near the end of the human centipede.

8. King 810 - Suicide King

I really wasn’t expecting much from this album, and that’s pretty much what I got, with the added bonus of a weirdly amateurishly experimental flair to King 810′s usual street-cred chest-puffing brand of retro rap/nu metal. I imagine fans of the band enjoyed the added theatrics and the usual chug-backed struggle bars, but I found the whole thing to be just kind of ham-fisted and kooky. It wasn’t one of the more infuriating releases I heard all year, but I sure as hell won’t be eagerly returning to it.

7. Attila - Villain

This was another musically recycled album from a band that usually makes their appeal through fun, nasty bangers. While the music on the album was, sure, as derivative as Attila’s deathcore usually is, the primary issue with Villain was the soured attitude of the band’s usually charismatic frontman. Fronz went from being the life of the party (who, while oozing with fratboy energy that you really wouldn’t want to be around anywhere else except a crowded rager, you could at least count on to be cool and keep the party going) to that loud, overzealous asshole trying to turn up when it’s totally not the time and then getting pissy when met with resistance, making it about him and making everyone around him uncomfortable and totally. Fronz sounds like a drunk asshole challenging you everyone to chug faster than him at best and like a pushy frat bro at worst, embodying the title of the album way to much in a manner where it’s justified that he be viewed that way, if not generous given the term’s romanticized connotations. Silver lining: I listened to “It Is What It Is” during a workout the other day, and that track is a qualified banger.

6. Saint Vitus - Saint Vitus

I think this is the only doom metal album to reach a bottom ten spot for me at any point this decade, and I’m not surprised that it’s Saint Vitus doing it. The band’s self-titled record was so derivative and wholly unoriginal, it was like listening to a cheap Sabbath cosplay. It was so long ago that I listened to it in full that I honestly don’t remember anything specific about the album, but I sure remember how I felt while listening to it every time.

5. Steel Panther - Heavy Metal Rules

Probably the biggest letdown on this list, I actually really enjoyed the band’s 2017 effort, Lower the Bar; I felt like they had got a better handle on their comedic parody of 80′s glam metal than any of the three albums before it, despite it not getting as much attention as their debut, for instance. This one, however, captured the cringe and cheese of the 80′s just fine, but with the jokes falling flat or way too repetitive, it just sounded like a less subtly raunchy version of an actual hair metal album. It’s another album that’s just supposed to be fun, but wasn’t nearly the experience it set out to be, the difference being that this one’s failure seems to have come more from a bout of writer’s block than anything else, which is understandable, five albums in, to a project that specifically makes fun of one dead subgenre of metal.

4. Arch Enemy - Covered in Blood

This has to be one of the shittiest covers albums I’ve ever heard, with Arch Enemy earning record points for monotony on this one. The whole thing sounds like the band just tossed a hefty album’s worth into an Arch Enemy processor that just stripped away all the songs’ character and replaced it with low-effort growls and robotic melodeath guitar playing. At its best, the band offers up passable by-the-books rehashes of songs up their melodeath alley; at its worst they butcher songs they have no business putting so little effort into covering. And it’s fucking 70 minutes long! So they get points for the agonizing length too, as well as incompetence points (I’ve yet to hear a death-growled cover of an Iron Maiden song go well), and, yeah, laziness points too. So many of these were recorded already years ago as bonus tracks to past albums, yet the band couldn’t spare the effort to make the new recordings like a little bit exciting.

3. Papa Roach - Who Do You Trust?

I’m not even mad about this one; I knew it was gonna suck, my curiosity just got the best of me and I was treated to some of the most laughably amateurish lyricism and poorly dated rap rock and alt metal instrumentation I’ve heard since the Prophets of Rage album two years ago. Jacoby Shaddix is doing features these days with hit or miss results, but what the hell is Papa Roach going to be this coming decade? More of this? I just don’t know whose socks this is supposed to knock off. Who’s getting hyped for more Papa Roach in the 2020′s? Probably me, just to see how poorly this band continues to try to keep up with the already sluggish pace of radio rock trends as the signature style they feel obligated to keep a tether to ages poorly.

2. Skillet - Victorious

Now this one I was kind of mad about, and I was expecting it to be pretty bad too. Skillet sold their soul to the whim of pop rock radio early last decade and haven’t been interesting to listen to for a long time now, to the point where it’s so obvious that raspy frontman John Cooper started his own side outlet for his more passionate urges while he lets the winds of pop rock and Christian rock playlist curation steer his main project for little more than a paycheck. The band’s reputable touring work ethic is such a stark contrast to their transparent artistic laziness and spinelessness. Again, despite the formulaic broad-reaching rock radio fodder, embarrassingly cheesy ballads, the token heavy tune at the end for the long-time fans, and even the obviously contrived Imagine Dragons mimicry being totally predicted, it was still so frustrating how blatantly soulless and capital-motivated this thing was to hear.

1. Mark Morton - Anesthetic

I didn’t really have any expectations for this album, but my god was it the year’s quietest disaster of a collaboration project. I didn’t hear anyone else talking about this thing after it came out nearly as much as I did leading up to it, and thank god. The album is supposedly a solo project from the Lamb of God axeman, a distilled showcase of his creative voice, but the whole thing feels like it was in the hands of label execs the whole time and he was just the guy who recorded guitar tracks to all these songs. For some reason, a lot of these “star-studded”, compilation-album-feeling projects in the metal world don’t seem to come out so well, maybe because no one involved is bringing their A-game to a feature in a compilation album, and that is exactly what Anesthetic suffers from, and it suffers fucking hard, not just from the utter lack of cohesion and poor flow from track to track, but from the phoned-in performances of the guests on the variety of generic, underwritten, surface-level songs. Like, again, this is a project under Mark Morton’s name, one that’s supposed to be guided primarily by his artistic vision; you’re telling me, Spinefarm Records, that the Lamb of God guitarist’s vision of a solo album is various flavors of neutered rock/metal radio bait? And he was satisfied with everyone’s contributions to this thing? The whole thing feels like he was just along for the ride and the project was never even in his hands, like Spinefarm had the idea/opportunity to do a various artists comp. album but thought putting under Morton’s name would be more marketable or something. Maybe that hypothesis is totally off, but regardless, this album is a colossal failure on the performance and writing fronts, the worst thing I voluntarily heard in 2019.

My 20 Favorite Songs of 2019:

Okay! With the trash taken to the curb, I feel like it might be time to address before getting into my favorite songs that they might not resemble my favorite albums quite as much as previous years, one, because this is very abbreviated, and, two, because some songs really lend themselves to enjoyment outside the context of their album more than other songs. One band here lands three entries and probably would have landed a whole lot more on a slightly longer list simply because of how great of music their album this year was for me to work out to. But I tried to diversify this list a bit so that it wasn’t just my favorite additions to my workout playlist. The top albums, I promise, are a far better representation of the year in metal for me. But anyway...

20. Periphery - “Blood Eagle”

Periphery have pretty much crystallized their brand of djent now and spent much of this year’s album doing a little adventurousness with it, but the first single, “Blood Eagle”, was one of the more traditional, crushing, explosion tracks from the album, harnessing hardcore groove, punishing accents, tasty guitar tones, and emphatic vocals of both the coarse and soaring variety. The song isn’t anything new for Periphery, but it’s a tremendous example of how potent they are at their heaviest and how easy it is for them to disprove their detractors who lampoon them for Spencer’s clean singing.

19. Panopticon - “The Crescendo of Dusk”

Despite being a one-off piece kind of off the beaten path for Panopticon for a two-track EP recorded during the previous double-albums’ sessions, this song is a fantastic example of bold, cathartic blackgaze whose soulful choral climax is built up to and pays off phenomenally, and that’s not the side of atmospheric black metal Panopticon usually wanders too. It’s a gorgeous piece that is worth it for every moment of its 12-minute runtime.

18. Car Bomb - “Scattered Sprites”

Switching quickly to a much shorter and more jolting song, it was hard to pick a prime highlight on Car Bomb’s new album, but ultimately I found myself loving the tasty, effects-laden, Meshuggah-esque 8-string mathcore groove of “Scattered Sprites” and the rest of the song’s fascinating tonal jumps from Deftones-ish atmosphere to crushing distorted madness. It certainly represents very well the constantly transforming beast that the band’s fourth album was.

17. Spirit Adrift - “Angel & Abyss”

On yet another album full of songs that would have packed a longer list, Spirit Adrift’s standout moment on Divided by Darkness was, for me, the melodically soulful trad-doom power ballad of sorts, “Angel & Abyss”. The melodic guitar leads being the obvious driver of the song’s feels, the clean and rhythm backing and the seething vocal delivery are perhaps the underappreciated foundation for the extra emotive NWOBHM-influenced guitar leads to shine through.

16. Inter Arma - “The Atavist's Meridian”

Definitely the standout track from Sulphur English, “The Atavist’s Meridian” is a menacing mammoth of a song, twelve-and-a-half minutes of brooding, towering sludge and haunting echoed throat-gurgling growls. Even when the wall of sound gets less jagged, the lour does not let up as the band maintain their fearsome, ominous presence in the song’s more atmospheric middle section and burst back so satisfyingly to round it out. There are bands out there that stick to this form of sludgy, death-y doom metal much more exclusively and religiously than Inter Arma who wouldn’t be able to top this.

15. Opeth - “Charlatan” My favorite cut from Opeth’s most ambitious album this decade, the band actually sound energized and adventurous on this song rather than just playing 70’s prog dress-up. The Meshuggah-esque bass groove on here is of course right up my alley, but the whole song is full of actual progressive dynamic that keeps you fixated on it and it’s intriguing emotive journey.

14. Sermon - “The Preacher”

Being the second-to-last song on the album, “The Preacher” kind of goes hand-in-hand with “The Rise of the Desiderata” as part of the album’s climactic ending, and it’s as meticulous and calculated as every track on the album with its small, this song being a standout for its particular dynamic between is louder and softer sections, making it such a thriller of a track that serves its role as part of the album’s climax beautifully.

13. Misery Index - “New Salem”

I’ve loved Rituals of Power all year and there have been several standout tracks for me, but “New Salem”, with its gruff refrain and relentless powerviolence aggression, has been my favorite from the album this year, one of them top workout playlist tracks for me this past year. It’s a pretty straightforward, fast, brutal track, but god is it effective.

12. Korn - “You’ll Never Find Me”

From the irksome guitar wails from Munky and the thick and tasty seven-string accents from Head, to Jonathan Davis’ volatile vocal delivery, “You’ll Never Find Me”, is one of the (several) prime examples of Korn’s committed return to their old-school sound on this album that really fucking stuck the landing and impressed. That build-up to that fucking intense headbanging crash at the bridge is exactly what made me such a fan of Korn’s early work in the first place, and this song is one of, again, several that shows why more than twenty years down the road while all their imitators have come and gone, Korn have been the dedicated champions of nu metal.

11. Cattle Decapitation - “Time’s Cruel Curtain”

It was honestly hard picking a favorite from Death Atlas, but I felt like this song captured the album’s lyrics’ overall dread and gloom in the musical sense pretty well through the dissonant clean guitars and Travis Ryan’s melodic snarling, which is particularly gut-wrenching on the chorus. And it’s as fierce, fast, and disgustingly brutal as we’ve come to expect of Cattle Decapitation now.

10. Motionless in White - “Thoughts & Prayers”

One of the many vibrant, tasty alternative metalcore bangers from the band’s fifth LP that dominated my workout playlist this year, “Thoughts and Prayers” is undoubtedly the most blasphemously in-your-face, Slipknot-influenced cut that highlights the highs of metalcore heaviness the band have no trouble reaching. The defiant attitude of the melodic chorus’ refusing of prayers for help, and really the whole song’s self-sufficient denial of religion over some of the band’s most potent metalcore to date, got me past a lot of physical thresholds this year.

9. Babymetal - “Arkadia”

Babymetal on their first two albums for me have been a project trying to iron out their vision of J-pop metal fusion in real time with the first and second albums’ primordial experiments producing the odd hit among many more misses, but this year’s Metal Galaxy was far more consistent, less stylistically clumsy, and packed full of hits. And if this list was longer, there wold be several bops and bangers from that record here. And while circumstance had just one song in my top 20 this year, what a tremendous entry it is. The album’s closing track, “Arkadia” starts out like a basic-ass Dragonforce cut, but the triumphant melodies quickly lead into higher and higher echelons of catharsis with the guitar vocalist Su-metal delivering the most powerfully soaring performance of the band’s career. It’s like a Dragonforce song that blows most (if not all) Dragonforce songs out of the water through its sheer unashamed passion. And while I know there are many in that camp who stiff-arm Babymetal and would wretch and rage-quit upon simply hearing Su-metal’s voice come in, I imagine they would have a hard time denying this song’s power if tricked into listening to a guy’s vocal cover over the instrumental.

8. Rammstein - “Puppe”

While Cattle Decapitation’s “With All Disrespect” is certainly a gut-punchingly grim outlook on humanity’s self-destruction, this standout cut from the German industrial metal juggernauts’ self-titled album is undoubtedly the most chilling cut on this list, and quite possibly Rammstein’s entire catalog. Till Lindemann’s poetic narration of the song’s dark story is expertly timed and laid out, but his gripping, manic, wholly unsettling vocal performance, coupled with the rest of the band’s brilliantly scored instrumental tracking, is what paralyzes you in terrified awe of the song.

7. Motionless in White - “Disguise”

Another alt-metal banger that dominated my workouts this year, the opening title track to the band’s fifth album isn’t really doing anything all that revolutionary or stylistically original, yet it’s somehow distinctly Motionless in White and it succeeds and makes it here simply because its execution of such a straightforward, yet often fucked-up style is so on-point.

6. Sermon - “The Rise of the Desiderata”

The grand finish to one of the subtlest, yet most magnificent progressive metal albums of the decade (spoiler I guess), “The Rise of the Desiderata”, even outside the context of the album building up to it, is a tremendous work of patient, well-measured progressive metal that exemplifies so magnificently what that band did with such a small musical arsenal on Birth of the Marvelous. The slow, brooding build-up to the absolutely orgasmic finish is hardly a mere waiting game, with not a dull second of the song, and the thematic climax of “rise! rise!” chants the song finishes on is, for me, the kind of representative of rewarding and immersive journey prog metal is all about!

5. Motionless in White - “Holding on to Smoke”

This one was the sleeper hit (in my eyes) for the band this year; in the album’s marginally weaker second half after the slew of bangers that occupied the first, “Holding on to Smoke” is the perseverant anthem among anthems that almost single-handedly lifts that second half. But outside the context of the album, “Holding on to Smoke” is not excessively heavy like “Thoughts & Prayers”, not even as catchy as the bouncy “<c/ode>”, and not even as sick in the breakdown department as “Disguise”, but it more than makes up for it in sheer performative passion and the compositional consistency that characterizes the whole album and strings the determination teeming throughout the song together into a hugely triumphant banger of a track.

4. Periphery - “Satellites”

Periphery really outdid themselves on the grand, ethereally cathartic closing track to their fourth (and best) self-titled album. Unlike the directly aggressive “Blood Eagle”, “Satellites” is a much longer, more multi-staged, moodier piece that gradually builds up from bright, somber reverb-driven ambiance into several tremendously heartfelt and instrumentally full-bodied crescendos, with the band timing their bursts of heavy energy perfectly. Spencer wildly outdoes himself in particular with his gloriously high-flying vocal performance during the song’s cathartic climax. It’s such a great ending to a great album, and such a great picture of Periphery’s constant perfecting of their sound.

3. As I Lay Dying - “My Own Grave”

It was released in 2018, but I included it here instead of that year’s list because I had the hunch at the time that it would be part of an As I Lay Dying album, and it was. But the first song the band released after their unlikely reunion was always going to be a contentious one given the situation with Tim Lambesis, and being that the song was released at a time when Tim would have still have almost two years in prison to go if he had done his full original sentence of six years, the importance of the band’s first release since that whole terrible situation transpired is hard to overstate. Everyone else in the band had to justify linking back up with a convicted felon and reentering the fold of music again, and “My Own Grave” is exactly the statement they needed to make. During his trial and after his early release, Tim had kept pretty quiet, but from the one somber video exposition he gave before entering prison, it was pretty clear he knew and finally accepted how badly he fucked up, and that awareness of his own terrible failure, succumbing to evil, and his understanding that he still has a lot to do to make things right is what makes this song so vitally confessional and the determination expressed so powerful. And this all comes through not just in the lyrics, but in the passionate performances from everyone on the song as well. It’s an emphatic triumph in classic metalcore fashion through (higher, more real-life stakes than usual for the genre) the worst of one’s own faults.

2. Demon Hunter - “Peace”

This one is kind of the enigma of this list, a more subtle, hard rock track than the rest of the heavy, boisterous bangers here, but what an excellent song it is from the mellower of the sister albums the band released in 2019. Ryan Clark’s smooth, baritone subtlety serves as a veneer of calmness in the face of collapse as he sings a tearful welcoming of the peace from the pain of a sin-ridden world that finally comes with death. There’s almost a suicidal angle to the song, but it might be more representative of one’s readiness to be taken into a divinely peaceful afterlife after a lifetime of struggle, which is pretty insightful from Ryan Clark and captures that feeling in a tangible way even for people with (ideally) many years ahead of them like me, I must say. Either way, it’s a much more sober pondering on one’s own mortality and the temporariness of everything around us than its upbeat rock tempo initially lets on, the kind of meditation that gives people hope and faith in a heavenly afterlife.

1. Rammstein - “Deutschland”

Simultaneously subtle and directly expressive, Rammstein’s lead single from their self-titled 2019 album may not have been as musically outrageous as its grand, ambitious video was, but the song itself sure stands on its own just fine as a tense, conflicted song of pleading heartbreak to a nation and its history, and who better in metal to write a threnody for a Germany caught in the middle of the rest of Europe’s refugee crisis and its own version of many nations’ recent fights against a resurgence of right-wing extremism than Till Lindemann. The tone of the song is so mournful and heartbroken, as though it’s a song about leaving a lover you still want to love, yet stern and firm in its principle.

5 Outside Albums of 2019:

I’ve made a point the past two years to highlight the music I enjoyed outside the metal sphere, usually keeping it to a few mini-reviews of five “outside” albums, and this year it was certainly hard to narrow down the immense amount of quality hip hop, indie rock, experimental rock, especially jazz (Jesus, there was so much good jazz this year), and even some respectable pop music I heard this year. The paragraphs are going to be shorter this time around, but I still wanted to show my appreciation for these albums.

Purple Mountains - Purple Mountains

Formed by David Berman, the former frontman of Silver Jews (who helped pioneer the flavor of indie rock/alt country in the 90′s and early 2000′s that got me more into indie music) ten years after the termination of Silver Jews, his short-lived return from retirement from music through Purple Mountains’ sole eponymous album only became more tragic after Berman committed suicide less than a month after the record’s release. The subject matter was as confessional and depressive as anything from Silver Jews, my favorite song from the record immediately after its release, “Nights That Won’t Happen” (a song very clearly indicating Berman grappling with the guilt of his suicidal mindset), being an even more bleak song in the posthumous context. Upon learning that Berman had come back to music, formed this project, and made this record full of emotionally retching expositions of his mental state in an effort to pay down a crippling mass of debt (which I’m sure had a significant impact on his decision to end his own life), it makes the album all the more devastating and my feeling toward it much more complicated. Much like David Bowie’s Blackstar, Purple Mountains takes on a different light in the aftermath of its creator’s death so soon after its release, the songs on Purple Mountains pretty much as prophetic as those on Blackstar, though Berman’s foreseeing of having to take his death into his own hands as opposed to Bowie’s waiting for the inevitability of the progression of his cancer gives this album a much less celebratory, commemorative feeling than that of Blackstar, though listening back through it now with 20/20 hindsight really puts the similar element of inevitability into perspective too, and it makes it hard to really enjoy this album in a sense similar to how I enjoy most of my metal and most other music. Knowing that this album was secondarily a last ditch effort by Berman to lessen the burden of the tremendous anxiety caused by his poor financial state, and primarily a means of talking himself through his decision to end his life in the likely event that the album and its touring cycle didn’t make that burden bearable enough, it’s very hard to listen to and be thankful for this album that kind of indirectly killed its creator. The existential dread of crippling debt is no light weight, however, and the art Berman made and was proud of should not bear the brunt of the blame for what the procedures of a heartless and oppressive economic system at least catalyzed, if not caused. Purple Mountains is a hard album to listen to, but its tragic surroundings aside, it is a welcome return of one of indie music’s most brilliant and influential voices, even if just for a moment.

Denzel Curry - ZUU

On a much different note, Denzel Curry made a quick return to the studio after creatively upping his game yet again on his 2018 album, TA13OO. And while not as ambitiously conceptual or dense as TA13OO, ZUU was yet another banger-packed display of pure rapping prowess. It’s been stated that good form is just that, temporary, and a mere snapshot of an artist’s trajectory, and that it takes time and consistency to prove class. Well Curry is undoubtedly in very good form right now, and has been for the past five or six years and has been making the most of it, only getting better and better across his main projects and his consistently fire guest appearances. And sure it’s arguable that he’s just making the most of his hot streak by putting out as much as possible while he’s one fire, but it’s at the point where if this was a flash in the pan it would have been over by now, and Curry’s still going. The dude put out a megamix of spare verses already this year, and it’s killer! The man at this point, in my eyes, is class, and definitely one of hip hop’s most exceptional forces now that he’s finally getting his long-deserved acclaim. As far as ZUU goes, yeah it’s quick and more about tight bars and emphatic delivery than any grand concept, but to reduce assessment of this to as if it mere turn-up music would be improper, as Curry uses this album to jump at the opportunity given to him by the traction of TA13OO to elevate his hometown and pay tribute to his friends and family who have been with him throughout his journey, and shed light on the roughness of the reality of life for the people he cares about in Carol City, Florida. And he pays tribute to those who got him here with such passion and splendor that it’s tangible and invigorating even from far outside.

Angel Olsen - All Mirrors

I saw a fair amount of people (mostly outside her fanbase) complaining about Angel Olsen’s handling of her more instrumentally dense fourth LP, which I don’t get at all. Olsen had tread the ground of minimal indie folk thoroughly on her early work and she proved she could handle a bigger instrumental pallet on 2016′s My Woman, of which All Mirrors is a well-executed expansion on that bolsters Olsen’s emphatic sonic presence without suffocating her out of her own songs, which I never had any worries about with the raw vocal power she’s showcased convincingly before. And Olsen remains at her open, heartfelt best in terms of lyricism and songwriting on the album, no drop-off in emotional potency or sonic beauty, so I’m a little confused with some of the griping over this album. I love it and highly recommend it.

Christian Scott aTunde Adjuah - Ancestral Recall

It was hard to pick a from the several great jazz records this past year (so much great afro-percussion-driven stuff coming from the UK lately that has been scratching my itch like crazy), The Comet Is Coming had an LP and a similarly impressive follow-up EP both in 2019 that made thrilling use of electronics amid the energetic jazz madness and Matana Roberts had put out an intriguing spoken-word concept album tied together with some of the most eccentric avant-garde jazz instrumentation I heard all year. But I ultimately went with the dynamic and delicious Ancestral Recall from Christian Scott, whose impressively holistic weaving together of traditional jazz elements with hip hop and modern jazz atmosphere, despite not being as quite up my violent jazz alley as other records this year, I could not deny the magnificence and accomplishments of. The electronics are kept to a minimum and used only to highlight the work of the piano, horns, and percussion typically associated with the genre, but none of it feels at all unnatural or clashing, rather a cooperative interplay between old and new that elevates both and shows what they can achieve in harmony. And yes, there are plenty of boisterous trumpet performances from the main man to quench that thirst. But it’s an album about respect for the foundational work of the genres incorporated and expanding on it rather than demolishing and rebuilding it.

clipping. - There Existed an Addiction to Blood

My favorite non-metal album of the year, clipping. really took the campy genre of horrorcore to far more cinematic and tangible realms through their signature noisy/industrial approach. And There Existed and Addiction to Blood is a project where after hearing it, it left me with a sense of “well, duh”. Of course clipping. would absolutely nail an actually immersive and not totally laughable horrorcore album. The members’ experiences in cinema serve as a tremendous asset to this album as William Hutson and Jonathan Snipes produce an industrially enhanced horror score to soundtrack Daveed Diggs’ gripping rapped storytelling, which takes so many of the genres tropes and breathes fresh air into them to make them far more vital and consequential in this day and age. And the songs (many of which are serious bangers) are immersive, cinematic, and intense in a way that I could see a lot of metalheads enjoying. I could seriously go on about the chilling bursts of distortion on the twisted club turn-up track, “Club Down”, or the cold swagger of Diggs’ delivery on the industrially tense “All in Your Head”, or the suspense of the more instrumentally traditional house-hideout cut “Nothing Is Safe”, but I would be going on for paragraphs, and I said one. If there’s one album for people reading this section to check out, it’s this one.

My 30 Favorite Metal Albums of 2019:

Yeah, 30 is keeping it really short here; I feel like I could have included a couple dozen other very praiseworthy metal albums here, but this post is massive enough and I don’t have time for that. As far as patterns or trends go, metal’s respective subgenres largely continued to mind their own business as the divergent evolution that the genre has been undergoing since the passing of its peak of mainstream limelight has progressed. The metallic hardcore revival is still going strong with a lot of bands outside that scene taking notice and influence from these vibrant younger bands (Code Orange being the obvious prominent example) and their ancestors. I heard a lot more hardcore-influenced breakdowns and noisy industrial-ish guitar work this year than usual, and even though it graced that shitty aforementioned Bad Wolves album, the metallic hardcore song was a highlight and most of the hardcore influence I’ve heard outside that scene has been implemented well. The year also saw a lot of big, storied names in metal releasing high-profile projects and really coming through and exceeding most realistic expectations (with one quite notable exception), so a good portion of this top 30 is going to contain your basic bitch, Loudwire-type picks, but, you know, those acts delivered and earned their way here in my eyes. This whole thing has gotten pretty out of hand, and what was planned as a quick year’s recap is now a gargantuan mega-post, so I’m going to TRY to make these quick.

30. Full of Hell - Weeping Choir

It’s hard to complain about a pretty continuous sequel to one of the most addictive deathgrind albums in years (Trumpeting Ecstasy); I’m sure not griping about it. Weeping Choir may not have as high of peaks as its predecessor, but it’s a similarly compact, dizzying, and forward-thinking release that definitely earned similar respect.

29. King Gizzard & the Lizard Wizard - Infest the Rats’ Nest

Thank god King Gizz released this, otherwise there wouldn’t be a bonafide thrash album in this top 30. Despite not really being a “thrash band” or even a “metal band”, King Gizzard’s adventurousness and versatility makes their adaptability to this style come as no real surprise. In fact the naturalness with which the band play shows that they have clearly always had a true reverence for the genre and have wanted to make this album for a long time. The album is as fuzzy as King Gizz usually is, taking on a very old-school vibe in tribute to the genre’s progenitors without being mere nostalgia. I doubt they’ll do it, but I can dream of more of this from the Gizz.

28. Knocked Loose - A Different Shade of Blue

Knocked Loose have quickly established themselves as one of the strongest forces in metallic hardcore these days, with each album improving significantly off the last, and A Different Shade of Blue being the latest in a string of stronger and stronger releases from them, embodying pure hardcore aggression with precision accuracy and efficiency.

27. Lord Mantis - Universal Death Church

Looking back through this band’s catalog (I hadn’t heard of them before this album), they’ve always taken a very sinister and esoteric approach to experimental black metal that makes them and Profound Lore a match made in heaven as a prime representation of the boundary-pushing ethos the label does well to curate, and Universal Death Church is a fine example of the band’s signature incredible capacity to make black metal nastier and more nightmarish than it already is.

26. Infant Annihilator - The Battle of Yaldabaoth

The Battle of Yaldabaoth is such a ridiculous album and such a treat for it, the unreal, gratuitous techdeath wankery so obscene, it’s impossible to take too seriously and not love for its absurdity. It’s a fun album and one that fast-forwards much of the increasingly fast and techy death metal straight to its next musical checkpoint.

25. Venom Prison - Samsara

A far more holistic death metal album than Infant Annihilator’s, Samsara is just teeming with performative power and calculated technicality. I had said at first that it wasn’t really much of a step up from Animus, but as I’ve listened to it more throughout the year, the band’s subtle maturation really began to show and the album grew on me more and more, so it’s definitely one of the year’s best death metal records.

24. Misery Index - Rituals of Power

Even more emphatic than Samsara was Misery Index’s reaching the pinnacle of their form of powerviolence on their best album to date, Rituals of Power, which suffers no loss of intensity in its incorporation of infectious (though still hardly melodic) hooks, and it puts them at the top of their league.

23. Demon Hunter - War

I had originally cited the more measured, hard-rock-driven partner album, Peace, as the better of the two records Demon Hunter had released this year, but over time, so many of the tracks on the intentionally heavier War that I thought might wane on me stayed strong and some of its other tracks grew on me. The album and its counterpart were such a refreshing pair of releases for the band that I hope revitalizes them going forward.

22. Opeth - In Cauda Venenum

And we’ve got the most basic pick of the list so far here, post-Watershed Opeth. That term has annoyed, frustrated, and infuriated so many within the band’s fanbase who have, at this point, given up (either out of acceptance or intolerance) on hopes of the band’s death metal sound ever returning to the progressive music they make, and I myself have found the band’s lack of ambition beyond simply eschewing growls and metallic elements on the band’s past three albums to be a bit underwhelming with the clear 70′s-prog LARPing finding them punching pretty below their weight. Wow, that was an annoyingly long sentence too. But Opeth finally came through with an album that did more than just imitate the likes of their prog idols like King Crimson, Styx, Yes, and Pink Floyd. In Cauda Venenum is a theatrically big album that puts the band in the kind of creative context in which they’ve proven to succeed in and established themselves in their career in it as the death metal pillar of the prog palace, and the band came through with a rewarding progressive rock album without needing to bring their death metal elements out of retirement.

21. Deadspace - Dirge

Dirge was not the album I expected from Deadspace, but it shifted them from their more somber atmospheric style of black metal into something so much more suffocatingly dark and sinister that they went on to produce another full-length album and an EP in the style of before the year’s end, and I have been loving the Australian band’s more menacing side since the transformation. The band’s first album in this newly terrifying style for them is a masterpiece of vile, demonic black metal that still features what has made Deadspace a worthwhile figure to follow in the worldwide atmospheric black metal scene, and I imagine there is plenty more to come from the tenacious Australian group and have been so proudly supportive of, which I am eagerly looking forward to.

20. Uboa - The Origin of My Depression

This is the first not-completely-bonafide-metal-album entry on this list, but it is a worthwhile and impressive one that I think a lot of fans of the kinds of experimental and black metal that incorporate dark ambiance, industrial elements, and harsh noise could get into. But it is an album as intensely depressive as its title suggests, a meditation on the turmoils associated with its creator’s gender dysphoria and the efforts to cope with and mitigate it that comes through in all shades of pain, from melancholic-ambiance-backed stone-faced recitations of doubt about self-worth to seething, agonized screams of torment for release from the hell of the creator’s condition over abrasive industrial noise. It is not by any means easy listening, and its lyrics demand a lot of emotional energy. Be advised. But also it’s really painfully cathartic and expresses an important and often quieted perspective for those not affected by gender dysphoria to hear.

19. Blood Incantation - Hidden History of the Human Race

I do like this album a lot, I really do, but it has to be the most overrated album on this whole list. So many people wetted their britches over this damn album and jumped to call it a perfect masterpiece of death metal. It’s a very very good death metal album, but it’s not beyond improvement. And, again, it’s good and I don’t want to be tempering the jubilee over this thing in this list where I’m supposed to be highlighting my appreciation for it, but it makes me wonder if this is how people who aren’t that into Meshuggah see the band’s adoring fans (like me). But Hidden History of the Human Race, mind-blown ancient aliens sci-fi concept aside, is a great continuation of the semi-psychedelic modern twist on early death metal that started on Starspawn, and the band’s progressive compositional abilities certainly do deserve a lot of praise, and I do hope that they continue building on this.

18. Inter Arma - Sulphur English

Another band making continual improvements on their sonic foundation, Inter Arma have never let their labels of death or sludge or doom or post-metal box them in or make them feel forced to pick one and stick with it, and Sulphur English is a fantastic example of how wide the band’s capabilities span, with elements of all the aforementioned subgenres mashed together in so many different configurations together and on their own, and it makes for such an overpowering record whose wall of sound really takes a lot of spins to withstand the continuous impact of.

17. Fit for an Autopsy - The Sea of Tragic Beasts

Okay, I’m gonna have to really start being shorter now, because now we’re getting into the top of the list, the cream of the crop of the cream of the crop. And I’ll be here until 2021 if I don’t slow down. Anyway, Fit for an Autopsy reinforced their melodic supplementation to their brand of deathcore on The Sea of Tragic Beasts, and clearly put the work into making sure it meshed well with their style. And the work paid off. While a lot of deathcore these days is kind of departing from that original “core” core that the genre’s early contributors established for more straight-up death metal and other progressive or techy styles (basically just retaining the affinity for breakdowns), albums like this are a fine example of how beneficial this evolution is for the genre.

16. Rammstein - Rammstein

It’s hard to be brief with an album ten years in the making, featuring the best song of the year, but I’ll try. Rammstein’s long-awaited follow-up to Liebe ist für alle da does very much pick up where the band left off in 2009, feeling like a natural successor rather than some contrived nostalgia trip to Sehnsucht or Mutter to appease fans for their patience. And for as much as I unpacked every song in detail in my review, the album as a whole is hard to sum up beyond simply a solid offering of Rammstein tracks, several of which have grown on me since my write-up, like the ballads “Diamant” and “Was ich Liebe”, and especially the whimsical “Ausländer”. Lindemann’s lyricism remains a strong point for the band, and the tight compositions another positive on the album. I just hope it’s not so long until the next one.

15. Slipknot - We Are Not Your Kind

Like I had said in my review, every new Slipknot album is one of the biggest events of the year for metal, if not the biggest, and aside from Tool’s underwhelming return to the studio with Fear Inoculum, We Are Not Your Kind was definitely the year’s biggest release. As has become kind of the norm for them now, Slipknot’s sixth album was steeped in its own turmoil, this time being the confusingly ugly departure of Chris Fehn. Nevertheless, the rest of the band pulled through with a solid album that did quite well to highlight the band’s various strengths and a good balance of classic Slipknot aggression with forward-thinking experimentation with their sound. Yet another big name delivering the goods this year.

14. Korn - The Nothing

And speaking of success from storied bands, Slipknot’s supposed nu metal rivals also really came through this year with one of their best albums in a long long time, and this is coming from someone who has been a fan of Korn’s later era, their untitled album, See You on the Other Side, etc., but the band’s increasingly more committed return to their old-school sound this decade, after the flop of The Path of Totality, has culminated magnificently on The Nothing, which essentially sounds like a modern-produced Untouchables or Issues. The songwriting is consistently well-measured and Jonathan Davis’ chilling performances in the wake of the loss of his wife especially give the album such a real sense of turmoil that heightens the intensity of everything around them. As therapeutic as music is in times of great pain and loss, and as great as this album is, I hope Jonathan’s grief wasn’t exploited or exacerbated for this art, and I hope he is doing okay.

13. Baroness - Gold & Grey

This album got a lot of flack for its indeed frustrating production, with a lot of critics not being able to get past the blown-out, fuzzy, lo-fi crackle that blurred a lot of the songs’ finer details away. And I agree that the band certainly could have put their sonic strengths in a better light with clearer production and probably should going forward. Nevertheless, underneath the hazy veneer of grainy mixing, Gold & Grey boasts great songwriting in the styles of Purple and Yellow & Green, as well as treading newly segue-heavy ground for them. And after a few listens getting used to (or getting over) the album’s production, the sharp-as-ever songwriting and booming-as-ever vocal performances from John Dyer Baizley really come through and are worth appreciating.

12. Pensées Nocturnes - Grand Guignol Orchestra

Arguably the weirdest album to come out of 2019, yet so much more than a novelty project, Grand Guignol Orchestra takes the creepiness of the often-mishandled dark carnival aesthetic and applies it to the band’s twisted brand of avant-garde black metal to make something truly weird and unsettling, yet fixating. The psychotic clown-like screams and wails across the album reinforce this aesthetic to the point of perhaps creating a new subgenre of metal: carnival metal perhaps.

11. Waste of Space Orchestra - Syntheosis

The work of two whole bands (Oranssi Pazuzu and Dark Buddha Rising) joining forces in their entirety, Syntheosis is a surprisingly cohesive and immersive project, as synth-driven as its name suggests and cinematic in its massive sound. It’s a weirdly atmospheric form of experimental, psychedelic black metal that is both serene and crushing; the artists involved clearly had this ambitious project in mind and they worked meticulously to make sure their vision was realized.

10. Spirit Adrift - Divided by Darkness

Again, really trying to keep it short here, but what an album from Spirit Adrift. Divided by Darkness is the album that sounds most like and reminds me most of the most recent perfect album I heard (2018′s Desolation by Khemmis), and the emotional potency bubbling up to the brim of this album’s doomy melodies and soaring vocals is similarly enriching, while not as ridiculously perfect as Khemmis’ latest release, Divided by Darkness takes Spirit Adrift to new heights and makes them one of modern doom-influenced melodic metal’s most promising figures.

9. Nile - Vile Nilotic Rites

The departure of longtime guitarist/vocalist Dallas Toler-Wade was arguably a blessing in disguise for Nile, with their ninth album, Vile Nilotic Rites, being a roaring comeback from the relative lull of their previous two albums, much of which is due to the reinvigorating performances of new guitarist/vocalist Brian Kingsland, whose more traditionally roaring growls breathe new life into and provide a fitting new angle to the band’s Egyptian-themed brand of extremely fast, technical old-school death metal. It’s great to have them back in such emboldened form.

8. Lingua Ignota - Caligula

This is the album that just got me. Very much in a similar, yet more neoclassically-inspired vein of industrial darkwave as Uboa’s album, Kristen Hayter herself has said that Caligula is also not a metal album, and she’s right, but holy shit does it hit harder than a lot of metal tries so hard to hit. I had been trying for months to write a review for this album, but it never came, partly because the subject matter from which the album is pulled is tender and not easy at all. But it’s incredibly important to talk about, and I want to give Caligula some of the written attention it deserves from me. Sure if I just put the album on for unassuming listeners, they probably wouldn’t immediately pick up on the manically shrieked and operatically wailed languishing and biblically proportioned defiance being curses of the project’s creator toward her sexual abuser, but the resilience she puts forth into these proclamations of insubmissive survival is certainly tangible even without knowledge of the heartbreaking history that birthed it. And while it makes tremendous compositional strides from All Bitches Die and Let the Evil of His Lips Cover Him, Caligula, like the two albums before it, is such an enigmatic album that feels wrong to consume in the conventional sense or without anything other than pure undivided attention and empathy for what Hayter is so courageously pouring out of her mind and body for the music. It feels wrong to just put music on as a background for room-cleaning or even working out that comprises real, unbridled emotion about its creator’s rape. Yet I know that everything about Caligula and Lingua Ignota has been about surviving that and overcoming that suffering, so it certainly deserves to be listened to and respected; I would posit, though, that if you’re going to enjoy the sounds borne from Kristen Hayter’s subjection to sexual abuse, its candid portrayal of its aftermath should at least serve as further deterrent from committing such abuse to another person, if not convicting you to stop doing so if you are or actively seeking to prevent it where you know you can.

7. Periphery - Periphery IV: HAIL STAN

Periphery have been a band who I have gradually come to realize I quite respect and rate very highly. Their Juggernaut double-album in 2015 was the major catalyst in this and has become one of my favorite albums in djent (if not my favorite if you don’t count Meshuggah’s music as djent). And while I wasnt as into their 2016 album, Periphery III: Select Difficulty, I have definitely seen this band’s continuous improvement and strong upward trend that their fourth self-titled record has continued. The band went for more than just thick, tasty djent on this album, though the thick tasty djent that is here (like “Chvrch Bvrner” and the aforementioned “Blood Eagle”) is some of their thickest and tastiest. But the band expanded their sound to more ethereal corners that produced impressively cathartic results (such as the aforementioned “Satellites”, and the swaggering “Crush”, and the bright “Garden in the Bones”). Major respect to this band that keeps getting better and making it harder on their stubborn detractors.

6. As I Lay Dying - Shaped by Fire

To say this album was controversial would be an understatement, and to point out that it was important that As I Lay Dying  come through in several big ways would be as well. Yet for every bit of vocal disapproval and expression of how irredeemable Tim Lambesis was there seemed equal rejoicing about the metalcore legends’ return. It was important, though, that the band come through with and album the showed their understanding of the heaviness of the context and didn’t come across as trying to bypass it or sweep things under the rug, and they did a tremendous job of rising to the occasion. The band continued where they left off before their disbandment as the strongest force in metalcore, sounding even more impassioned and vital upon their return, clearly enriched by the real-life consequentiality of their music. And while it certainly looks even more impressive given the withering state of NWOAHM metalcore in 2019, let that not detract from the incredible power of the genre’s juggernauts’ return to and improvement upon their best form of themselves before their disbandment.

5. Motionless in White - Disguise

When this album came out I honestly didn’t have a lot of hope invested in it. I had hoped that the band would expand on the best tracks from their previous album, Graveyard Shift, the alternative metal bangers, and focus on what worked well for those songs, and to my surprise that’s actually what the band did on Disguise. I had initially said that the high points on Disguise were not as high as the peaks on Graveyard Shift but after listening to Disguise so much this year, it’s shown itself to me to be such a ln impressive improvement on the direction that Motionless in White we’re heading in, and to put it any lower on this list for the sheer fact that it’s not a particularly critic-friendly album would be dishonest. But after getting more into their catalogue I think that this band are one of the best in their field, and sure, they’re very much an amalgamation of their influences, but goddamn do they channel those influences so effectively into so many flavors of delicious, nu metal, gothy, metalcore bangers. And it’s totally accessible too, I wish more of the bands who are trying to achieve more mainstream success would take the approach Motionless in White are taking, because this shit is actually really fucking enjoyable and full of soul.

4. Numenorean - Adore

Making strides from their debut full-length, Numenorean’s sophomore album is a great example of atmospheric blackgaze at its best without resorting to cheap Deafheaven imitation. Numenorean have found their own way to harness the power of blackgaze into emotionally vibrant compositions that come through triumphantly. I just hope the band can keep this up and expand on what they did here.

3. Car Bomb - Mordial

I had this as the number one album for a hot minute, and even teased about it maybe being a perfect release in my eyes as well, and even though it’s neither of those things, Car Bomb’s deeper foray into melodic and slightly atmospheric territory with their Meshuggah-esque brand of technical mathcore produced some seriously impressive results that I can’t wait to hear more of in the coming years.

2. Sermon - Birth of the Marvelous

I already said so much about this debut album, and it was so close to clinching that top spot, but Sermon deserve to be basking in so much more acclaim than I have seen for them, as this album is a nearly perfect prog metal example of how to do a lot with relatively little. I had expressed my disappointment in Soen’s and Tool’s albums this year, but I think this album really fits nicely into that cleaner section of progressive metal and knocks it out of the park. I know I’m repeating myself a lot from my review, but every little detail and accent is expertly calculated to make as positive of an impact as possible on the album, every note is arranged with both microscopic precision and with the grander scheme in mind, and I cannot get over how mind-blowingly well done this album is with so few bells and whistles or shortcuts. This is THE new band to keep an eye on.

1. Cattle Decapitation - Death Atlas

I don’t know if I like giving the top spot to such a grim, hopeless album, but fuck have Cattle Decapitation earned it, and I can’t blame them for their pessimism either. After aptly applying the disgustingness of goregrind to commentary on human mistreatment of animals and the ugly underbelly of the food industry, Cattle Decapitation turned their sound and their scope to even grander proportions, expanding the boundaries of deathgrind and the possibilities of dirty vocal technique to criticize humankind’s fucking up of the entire planet and foretelling the catastrophe that science has long foreseen. Despite their already bleak outlook on Monolith of Inhumanity and The Anthropocene Extinction, Cattle Decapitation somehow sound even more hopeless in Death Atlas, and Travis Ryan’s greater expansion of his melodic vocal application helps facilitate this, and the band takes their ever-furious rapid grinding battery through so many channels to enhance its epic scope. I should probably try my best not the just regurgitate my very long review of this album, but the band are essentially reading humanity its eulogy in advance and beckoning the end of our species in no romantic fashion, beckoning the universe to ruthlessly purge the species they refer to as a shit stain and move on like we never even happened. This is obviously an exaggeration of their frustration at the inaction and denial of many of the consequences our actions are inviting into our future, but it’s so fitting for the grave circumstances at hand. If there’s any band whose lyrics and sound represent humankind’s self-inflicted ecological apocalypse, it’s Cattle Decapitation, and of there’s any album that paints an adequately dismal picture in fittingly horrifying bluntness of where the world is headed that needs to be understood, it’s Death Atlas. The best and most important album of the year.

And that’s it. 2019, great as always for a genre that refuses to go quietly into the night. A lot of people have been doing decade-summarizing lists, but seeing how long this was, I don’t think I’ll be doing that. Maybe I’ll just post a quick tribute to a few of my favorite albums of the decade that I didn’t get to write about before. But for now, 2019 is over, here’s to 2020, it’s going to be a big year, and I have a few things about that I need to say about that, so that’ll be coming soon too.

[thatpapsmearrrrr]

germojugs

Ode to Germolene. So basically I sit here whilst Belle and Sebastian are playing the background on 6 music and I think back to them long shitty days of the year of 2001with half a pinch of misery and half a pinch of Gemma’s dad’s weed listening to tunes they only play on 6 music at 4am all the John Peel show stuff around that era didn’t really know what it was Gemma loved muse we met at a party in a field through a girl named Mary then met abruptly when me and loads of folk crashed her house after this sleazy guys’ birthday party you know the kind of party £10 in the tin for a stripper who was possibly or actually a vulnerable woman barely scraping by to get her kids the newest PlayStation game a horrible and nasty way to make a living it was Christmas and Gemma latched on to my mate rob she thought he looked like Matt the guy from muse rob was a sun reading racist wanker and had greasy hair, and I will write a bit more about him in some more personal journal type blog posts rob was far removed from Matt the muse singer blokey the year 2001 will be a haze of nu metal old idiot friends and shit mental health where my life was concerned but Gemma helped me through this her younger sister became infatuated with greasy robs mate the curtained haired ironic Justin who was 19 or older and was dating a 14 year old who then dated a guy who was at least late 30s sick as fuck as this was happening I had to leave that group of fuck headed wank twats .there was an incident were I was high on ecstacy and I told this paedo who was dating ironic Justin’s jail bait ex that he will burn in hell and that he was a vile shit he gave me a beer and cried to me saying he loved a 14-year-old girl fucking sketchy cunt I think I punched him and gave him a nose bleed …fuck it that was so Papa roach of me !!!(off topic I found a Papa roach shirt in my wardrobe last Thursday creepy as fuck.) any way I started going to Gemma’s a lot and weaned her away from the badness of greasy rob whom she didn’t care for much as her younger sister started to hang round more with ironic Justin Gemma’s dad had the best cannabis it was f****** amazing like f****** amazing I haven’t smoked weed for almost five years now but even thinking of Gemma’s dad’s weed makes me want to eat a tube of Pringles and listen to the greatest hits of the stones laying on the floor in a striped jumper in coronation Street (that’s the name of the street they lived in) it had no Rita Kevin or ken just me and Gemma’s dad and a record player I will get to the end of this story as I have to as I need to for what happened…you the reader of this will understand when it ends in the last paragraph or whatever Gemma shared my passion with the smiths we listened to them in her electric pink bedroom with black varnished floor boards she didn’t care much for smoking weed or such I got her into the smiths I heard she loved the fact that it was me who got her into them as she got me into radiohead among other bands soulwax and mad capsule markets along the way around this time Danny became her lover he of blink 182 songs and a twatty mate named Andrew who in all honesty was a berk who led Danny on a road to petty crime and other such shit….my depression became deeper I grinded my teeth stayed out for days even went to London to meet a female I met online ( this wasn’t in the the days of tinder it was 2001 it was msn chat I stayed with her in her mother’s house her step dad was younger than me it was fucked up another story for another day I guess ) Bob Dylan’s playing in the background as I type back to the electric pink bedroom house in coronation Street and I’m blurred the fuck out by good weed and Gemma’s dad telling me how in the sixties he traveled to Woodstock and attended the festival ( this was true he showed me photos) but the greatest thing about Gemma’s dad wasn’t the weed wich was the best I’d ever smoked or the tales of Woodstock or how he once walked around London to find where Jagger and Richards were partying, or he’s garden or even how him and Belinda weren’t married and had been and still are together they didn’t believe in marriage radical man!! Total legends the greatest thing John ever told me was that when he was a hairdresser in that London he cut wait for it he cut Trevor McDonald’s hair that story alone had me fucking hooked  (Trevor McDonald was a newsreader) I love the news… Getting back into shit Danny dumped he’s mate Andrew who seriously fucked up Alex a girl who along with Gemma helped me to realize maybe my bad feelings and emotions were mental health problems to which was a major fuck yeah moment I, for now, will stop writing this and post another part of this when I can be arsed …As you were…

[rubymixes-blog]

2019-03-13

Fuck. I did not pass. About an hour ago I received an email reading “Dear Ruby, I’m sorry to tell you that you have not passed your exam in differentiating psychology.” Fuck. Just when I believed that my horrors of being kept in a university building were over, I get thrown right back again. Well, as it turns out, I will have to partake in two final courses instead of one towards my final semester at the University of Regensburg. This is not bad at all, to be plain honest, still it never takes away the waves of “I am a fuck-up that is going to be homeless” in my mind. Especially when the mail drops, I already get half a panic attack just by looking at the sender’s address. But my system also begins to panic when I am exposed to all the exhibitions of a news feed on social media, re-enforcing my notion of feeling like a failure especially since everyone on those platforms seems to be so colorfully engaged in their fruitful, happy lives. I have nothing against people giving insights into their private lives but watching the super-edits on a screen filled with stats and comments, drives the living hell out me. I get overwhelmed. I get anxious. I get suicidal. Luckily, it’s only in my head. Still, chopping it off does not seem a viable solution to my never-ending imposter syndrome. Facts check: last Thursday I handed in my thesis on the negotiation of transgender identities. With a couple of punk rock songs by Gainesville-based band “Against Me!” I looked into constellations of power and language while exploring the rather recent coming-of-age of transgender identities. That day, I walked out of the office that would cheerfully accept the print-out of my very final paper in American Studies, and I went to a higher ground at the university campus. High as a kite within the ten minutes of sunshine that this day was offering, thoughts kept creeping up saying “What the fuck is my next thing to do?” I realized that I want to get onto my own feet. Make a little more money than I used to in order to do the things I love to do most. Make music, go places, get tattooed. To eat, to laugh, to kiss, to fuck. You name it. We’re not that different after all.

           My whole life, I have been drawn to music. The PC game “Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 2” got me interested in music, punk rock and heavy music in particular. It brought me closer to bands like Papa Roach, Bad Religion, Millencolin, Swingin’ Utters, Rage Against the Machine. (Fun fact: Infest by Papa Roach was my very first rock recording that I still listen to this day.)  Way before then, I got acquainted to a musical instrument known as the keyboard. While there is a high-8 video recording of me at the age of 6 months pounding a Phantom of the Opera-esque plateau into a Yamaha PortaSound PS-200, it wasn’t until 1997 that I had developed a serious interest for music. My father, by then, had upgraded to a Yamaha PSR-510 with 60 keys and a built-in sequencer. When I was not in the playground playing with and beating up other kids, I would obsess about everything this device had to offer. After a while, I developed perfect pitch, a great sense for melody and the skill to learn and play an instrument by just barely looking at it.

           Here come waves of fear: Fear to expose myself. Fear to expose my music. Fear of bad criticism because I fucked up. Fears all related to my own expectations. I hate this kind of perfectionism. It numbs me and my senses because whatever I get into I give 120 percent to make it the best I fuckin’ can. That’s why I enjoy offers like: “Hey, we’re playing a show in 4 days. Here is a list of 90 songs to learn.” And of course, when we hit the stage for the very first time, the ball is rolling, the crowd is having fun, the evening is a success. And the idea never leaves me that “I am just a fake. I am a loser. Who the fuck are you, anyway?” I don’t have nightmares often but, on a daily basis, this is one ugly bitch of a nightmare. I wake up to it every single day to keep me from slacking around, being sharp, ambitious. Still, I believe I need to work on and re-assess my personal expectations related to my work. I do not enjoy the fact that I am a nervous wreck while I try to give my very best every single day.

          Goals are important and the number one thing to have set out clearly when trying to deal with the sets of problems we encounter in our professional lives. I played with the thought of mapping out a sample day in a day of my life and testing this “schedule” for a while in order to find out if I would work more effectively. While my nutrition and workout plan is pretty tight, I need to improve on my perfectionism and my crazy screaming mind, in order to pull my dreams off. Cringing from this kind of self-assessment, I know that the pain I feel is necessary to grow and discover new frontiers, both personal and professional.

           A few days ago, somebody I know said “I would give a lot for a day in your crazy life.” I thanked him for the kind words and responded that in the end we’re not that different from each other. Have some food, some shelter, a place to wash and -ideally- somebody to make sweet love to. Suddenly everything outside becomes superficial. Non-existent if you will. Enabling you to burn 95 percent of all your possessions because they do not mean as much as you initially thought. This is the life I want to live. Be minimalist. Low maintenance. Easy to travel with. Collect more tattoos. Make a living by carrying a laptop in a backpack. Collect things and experiences that mean something to just me and the people I choose to connect and engage with. I wonder where the journey will lead to. If I can -in the long term- keep away from wanting to put a bullet into my head, I know I have everything it takes to make my visions come true. Back to work.

[sydswritings]

APMA’s - Part 2 (Chapter 28)

To avoid listening to Andy’s voice droning on, I let my eyes wander around the venue. I scanned from table to table, picking out people I knew, my friends, people I had never seen before, to the fans up in the stands. My eyes finally made it to the table to my right where Jacoby Shaddix and the rest of Papa Roach were supposed to be, only to find the table pretty vacant, even Kelly was gone. Where the hell did they all run off to? I shook my head, trying to clear it of my curiousity as I sipped on my drink, and continued on with my roamings, only to lock eyes with Shannon at the table to the left of us. His hazel green gaze shifted from surprise at being caught, to concern as he watched me down my sixth or seventh drink, I had honestly stopped counting at this point.

The burn of the liquor flipped in my stomach as I tried my best to look away. I hated that he looked at me like that. Didn’t he know I just wanted to forget about him? To forget that I was in love with him. To forget what it was like to finally kiss him and tell him how I felt just to have it end our friendship. I wanted more than anything to just sink into the oblivion that drinking offered. I wanted the pain to go away, any possible way. But I wouldn’t be the one to blink first, thankfully or not, I’m not sure which I feel right now, his girlfriend said something that had him finally breaking eye contact with me and looking over to the stage. The voices of Jack and Alex changed to that of Matt’s from Bullet for my Valentine and Alex from Atreyu as they presented Papa Roach’s performance.

    “Come on people!” Jacoby’s voice vibrated through the room, “I wanna see you up!”

The chords of Getting Away with Murder had the fans jumping up and down, screaming at the top of their lungs to each lyric. I watched as the ginger headed frontman of Memphis Mayfire, Matty Mullins joined the stage, singing the next verse before Jacoby joined back in. Bands all around the room joined the fans, standing, jumping and singing and to hell with it I was one of them. The song soon came to an end much to my sadness.

    “Wooo, AP how you livin’?” Jacoby laughed out as the crowd surrounding the stage yelled. “Everybody doin alright out there? I don’t know about you guys sitting on your asses over here,” he motioned to a couple of tables next to ours, “that shit ain’t rock-n-roll, what’s up! This ain’t television, come on!”

I laughed at the affronted looks at the bands behind us at being called out, before they finally rolled their eyes and stood up, half to join the rest of us and the other half to go get drinks at the bar. The opening of Scars started and I looked at Charlie, hand on my chest as we both started to belt the first verse. These were the songs we grew up on, the ones that made us want to pursue music in the first place. The frontwoman of Tonight Alive, Jenna McDougall joined Jacoby on stage, and the crowd went wild as she started the next verse. The girls and I sang at the top of our lungs until the very last chord.

    “We got some more surprises for you guys are you ready?” This man knew how to pump up a crowd.

I forgot we were honestly at an award show, it felt like all those years ago, concert jumping with my best friends.

    “Hey Papa Roach,” I looked around as the voice of Kelly blared out of the PA.

    “Are you kidding me?” Ace asked, exasperation clinging to her words.

I couldn’t help the laugh that jumped out of my throat as I looked over at her and Charlie, both not thrilled to see Kelly on stage, but as soon as he did the atmosphere changed to something almost electric. Brook and I leaned against each other, swaying and singing every lyric to MGK’s Til I Die. They finished up their set with Papa Roach’s Last Resort and I watched as Kelly jumped into the throng of people in front of the stage, moshing with the fans as he finished his lyrics.

    “He’s lost his damn mind.” I laughed out as Brook watched him crawl back on stage.

    “I don’t think he had one to lose in the first place,” She countered, that was probably true.

We waved the waitress down and ordered our next round of drinks as Twiggy Ramirez presented the Icon Award to Marilyn Manson. I zoned out, letting the haze of alcohol run its course, taking all my emotions and bottling them up. If I could get through this night without having an altercation with Andy and Juliet and another face to face with Shannon, I was going to drop to my knees and praise whoever was upstairs keeping them away from me. I hated that I felt that way about a man that I still considered one of my best friends, the man that I was head over heels in love with, but I couldn’t sit here and watch her fawn all over him. I couldn’t pretend that seeing them together didn’t hurt me, so to avoid it, I was going to drink my night away.

Soon Jack and Alex replaced Marilyn and Twiggy announcing Song of the Year. I clicked back into the award show as I watched Brendon and the rest of Panic! flashed across the screen followed by Vic and the guys from Pierce. I glanced over to Vic’s table giving him a thumbs up before turning back to the stage.

    “And the winner is,” Keaton Pierce, of Too Close To Touch, started, “Panic! at the Disco’s Hallelujah. Brendon and the rest of Panic! are actually on tour right now, but we do have a small video we’re going to show.”

Everyone’s eyes moved to the screen, where Brendon sat, grin plastered across his face as he accepted his award. I glanced at the girls who all grinned back, if you looked just close enough you could see Karah’s hand in the frame, I was glad she was there to celebrate this moment with him.

    “Wow guys, this is beyond awesome,” Brendon laughed, “I actually made a bet with myself that if I won this award I would do something I’ve been meaning to do for a few months now.”

Charlie grabbed my arm causing me to break my gaze from the screen, “what’s he doing?” She whispered, to no one in particular.

    “I don’t know brobo, keep watching like the rest of us and we might find out.” I whispered back.

The look she gave me wasn’t one of her nicests. We both turned our heads back to the screen to see Brendon grab Karah’s hand and pull her down next to him on the leather couch.

    “Everyone, this is Karah, my beautiful, amazing girlfriend and if it wasn’t for her I wouldn’t know what was up or down right now on this crazy tour.” We watched as he took a deep breath before dropping on one knee and pulling out a small ring box from his pocket, “Karah Rose, I’ve loved you since the day I met you. Would you do me the honor of being my wife?”

    “Holy. Shit.” I breathed out, eyes wide as I watched our manager nod her head up and down, tears streaming down her pale face.

    “Did that just happen?” Ace asked, as a wild applause broke through the venue.

    “I think so.” Brook finally joined in.

    “That little shit!” Charlie blurted out. We all turned our wide eyes to our guitarist, confused at her choice of words. “He didn’t even tell us!”

I couldn’t help the laughter that bubbled out of me at her outrage for Brendon not telling the four of us.

    “Well that was unexpected.” Alex announced as he stepped back out on the stage.

After Neck Deep’s performance, 3OH!3 took to the stage to present the award for Underground Band. My eyes blurred as the faces of the nominees flashed by, Too Close To Touch followed by Moose Blood, then Our Last Night, everyone at our table whooped and hollered as Matt, Trevor, Woody and Tim’s faces crossed the screen. Charlie leaned against Trevor, their hands intertwined as we waited with baited breath for Sean Foreman to announce the winner. The other half of 3OH!3, Nathaniel Motte, stepped up to the microphone.

    “The winner is,” he glanced back down at the paper, “OUR LAST NIGHT!”

Trevor sat in stunned disbelief as the rest of our table jumped up yelling. Charlie had to jostle him a bit before a wide grin painted his features as he stood up, sweeping her up into a full bodied hug and planting a kiss on her grinning lips. I stood next to Brook and Ace as we cheered on our friends, Trevor finally let Charlie go to join us as he ran to catch up with the boys, who were halfway to the stage. After accepting their award and giving their speech, which consisted of Trevor telling Charlie how much he loved her and the guys thanking the fans, they made their way back to our tables, where we proceeded to have another round of drinks. Halfway through Beartooth’s performance Jared, Shannon and Tomo disappeared, causing Ace to look around in confusion.

    “Hey I’m sure everything is fine.” I attempted to keep her calm.

    “He just knew that this category was a big deal, this is the one we really want.” Ace’s voice went up another octave.

    “I’m sure he has a good reason Ace, just take a deep breath.” Charlie said from Trevor’s side.

A good reason he did have, since at that moment they appeared on stage to present Breakthrough Band.

    “See good reason.” Brook laughed.

We watched as I Prevail, Knuckle Puck, Neck Deep, Set It Off and State Champs’ pictures flashed across the big screen followed by our picture from the big AP Warped Tour Edition spread ended the list of nominees. I reached beside me and grabbed Charlie’s hand before snatching Ace’s who was holding on to Brook’s for dear life. I don’t think I had ever felt this nervous or sick until this very moment. I could hear my heartbeat in my ears and my pulse quickened with adrenaline. Jared stepped up to the microphone as Shannon held the award and Tomo the envelope.

    “And the winner for Breakthrough Band is,” Jared paused dramatically.

    “I swear to god, I’m going to kill him,” Ace seethed through gritted teeth.

    “Just deny him sex for the next month.” I grumbled out.

    “Yeah but then she’s without it too.” Charlie argued.

    “Fuck! I wish he didn’t feel the need to be so damn aggravating.” Ace mumbled.

    “GRACE OF THE FALLEN!” The three of them announced together.

    “Wait, what?” I think my brain just broke. “Did they just say Grace?”

    “Holy! FUCK! We won!” Charlie exclaimed, jumping out of her seat screaming.

Trevor and Pete stood clapping as we managed to climb out of our seats. My legs felt like jelly as I stood away from the table. I don’t know how but my feet managed to get me to the stage and up the stairs to accept our award. I hugged Tomo while Jared kissed Ace and Brook took the offered award from Shannon’s hands.

    “Holy shit,” I sighed into the microphone. “I guess this is actually happening. Umm-we’d like to thank our fans, without you guys we wouldn’t be here right now.”

Ace moved from Jared’s side and took over the speech, “We’d also like to thank our label, Interscope, along with our friends, family and loved ones.”

With that we were ushered through the back to give an interview and then let back to the main floor to finish up the night. The rest of the show was honestly a blur, after winning I started slamming back shots in celebration followed by more Jack & Coke’s. The girls drank but at a slower pace and with more control. We watched Of Mice & Men’s performance followed Andy’s and then A Day to Remember closed out the night. In the end Jack won the mock presidential campaign, reigning supreme over Alex and then it was announced the after party would be held at Skully’s Music Dinner being hosted by Every Time I Die and Issues. I guess it was time to get the real party started.

Chapter 29

[patricksilvrrozartistry]

Current Music Obsessions: September 16 - 30, 2018

I'm super late on getting this up, but it's time for not only this past month's last CMO post, but the last one for the summer too. So let's see them honorable mentions.

Solborn - Arcane Shores Wolfheart - Breakwater Sleepthief - The Sandshaper feat. Kirsty Hawkshaw Astray Valley - Northlights Shadowrise - Evil Conductor Dark Sarah - The Gods Speak feat. Marco Hietala (Nightwish) and Zuberoa Aznarez (Diabulus in Musica, Tragul) Mechanical God Creation - Terror in the Air Diligent - Intervals DreamSlave - Flying to the Sun Ethernity - Grey Skies Evenfall - Rawish And Then She Came - Perfect As You Are Resonance - Lie The Weeknd - Call Out My Name Skies Collide - This Divide

And now for my favorite obsessions.

1. Sylvaine - Abeyance

This is their first single (I think) from their upcoming release and I adore it. If you like blackgaze, post metal, doom metal, and Myrkur's style of black metal, I would highly recommend these guys. This song is lovely and great to chill to thanks to their singer's soft and haunting voice.

2. Circles - Dream Sequence

This is some proggy goodness that you absolutely need to hear. Season of Mist is really turning me onto some amazing prog bands lately. I'm definitely am gonna check out more from these guys, because this is everything that any djenty person needs in their life.

3. Blaqk Audio - Waiting to be Told

I got turned onto this song when I tuned into one of Astrid's Instagram Lives one day and wound up falling in love with it. It's a really nice synth pop track that has an 80's new wave feel to it. I definitely jammed to this a lot. It's a really great song to just put on and jam to.

4. Elephant Gun Riot - Sword From Stone

This was a fun find on Spaceuntravel. It's a really simple rock/alternative metal track, but the chorus is what truly makes it. The chorus has this air and power about it that takes it to a different level. The singer really sells it.

5. Munro - Social Deconstruct

This is their second single (I think) from the album they're currently working on. The TesseracT vibes are very strong with this one. It's so atmospheric and ambient, but still nice and djenty. The video is shot and edited so beautifully; Jake really outdid himself with it. I'm really excited what greatness these guys bring in the future with the upcoming album, because I'm loving this new sound of theirs a lot.

6. Johari - Chemical

I got really excited to see a new single from these guys and they definitely delivered. This song is absolutely everything. It has those atmospheric bits, some great aggressive djenty bits, and gorgeous vocal lines. Their singer has such a beautiful voice and it's hard for me to find male singers that I can honestly say is beautiful.

7. Tears to Embers - Masquerade

I know I keep featuring songs I find through Spaceuntravel, but they share some amazing tracks, and you need to subscribe to them if you haven't already. This is a simple song, but the execution and production on it are what make it so good. And the singer has a really great voice.

8. Spiritbox - Perennial

This is their best song to date in my opinion. It's such a wild and amazing track and never lets up. The video is so pretty and is shot so well. My favorite part of the song is definitely the verse with the pitch-shift harmonies. More bands need to play around with them; they add such a fun and cool dimension. I need more from these guys.

9. Levinia - Liberation

I learned about these guys when one of their guitar players started following me on IG. Turns out they're a symphonic metal band from the States and are absolutely amazing. This track alone is absolutely gorgeous and such a great track to be your first to hear from them. And I love the djenty vibes going on with it too.

10. Within Temptation - The Reckoning feat. Jacoby Shaddix (Papa Roach)

HOMAHGAWD. THEY ARE FUCKING BACK WITH THIS INSANE TRACK. I know they talked about going in a different direction, but I didn't expect this kind of direction. It's so in your face and rather aggressive, but still has that Within Temptation feel that we all love. And don't get me started on that video. Gurl. Sharon looks HEAVENLY in that video and I need her outfit. Aesthetic goals af. Can't wait for the new album to come out.

11. Neverlight - In Darkness

This is their latest single and it's a powerhouse of a track. I absolutely adore the dark vibe of it. The video for it is an art film, which is really refreshing, and has such a dark and spooky vibe to carry out the dark feel for the song. I can't wait for these guys to release more. Such a great progressive symphonic metal band from the States.

And that's it for September! I'm *hopefully* am gonna be able to purge my watch later list A LOT this month, so there might be some long lists ahead, or at least for the honorable mentions. But we'll have to wait and see about that.

[dontstopkiwibea]

All the evens

[theworstbob]

yellin’ at songs, 4.14.2007 + 4.15.2017

the songs that debuted on the billboard chart this week and ten years ago this week. today: buttrock confessions

4.14.2007

40) "Ticks," Brad Paisley

So I watched the whole entire CMAs instead of Game 7 of the World Series and don't regret a single choice I made (the game went into extras, you don’t really have to watch baseball until the ninth inning tbh), and it struck me how much of a dorky theatre kid Brad Paisley was. He's objectively a great guitarist, like hokey as this song is and as little I know about music I think that's a dope fucking guitar line, but gosh darn, he was trying so hard the whole time at those CMAS! And that puts a song like this in perspective, because, like I said, it's hokey as fuck, but if you can just understand that Brad Paisley's sense of humor is that of someone who understands that being funny is a way to be Liked and is trying his best to be Liked, it sort of comes together and you can brush it off.

75) "We Takin' Over," DJ Khaled ft./T.I., Akon, Rick Ross, Fat Joe, Lil' Wayne, Baby

FUCK DUDE LIL' WAYNE USED TO BE GOOD. Like OK I think we all know I wanted to come here and be like "look at the humble beginnings of the meme man! He wasn't such a meme in these days!" but then there was a Lil' Wayne verse where he wasn't fucking around with Auto-tune, he was just rapping, and he was such a good fucking rapper that I'm actually angrier at the two "verses" he had on those Nicki Minaj songs a couple weeks back. It's not even one of his more notable verses, I don't think, it was just a normal 10-year-old Wayne verse, but I'm still here like, what a treat, a Lil' Wanye feature I don't mind! How lucky we were in 2007!

78) "Little Wonders," Rob Thomas

it is good to remember things that are nice! the lyric video i watched for this song ended with this message from the editor: "Believe in yourself, follow your dreams, and never, EVER give up =)." i would have much rather someone had just repeated those words over and over for three and a half minutes than listened to this song. DANNY ELFMAN?! fuck are you doing here, danny elfman? are you lost?

79) "Hey There Delilah," Plain White T's

There is nothing I could say about this song that would be worth saying.

82) "I Tried," Bone Thugs-N-Harmony ft./Akon

a'ight, see, now i feel better about bumping pink and jordan pruitt from the top 20, because it won't be some buttrock heroes what bumps 'em, it'll be a legit impressive, heartfelt song. i'm kinda surprised i don't remember this! now i just gotta contend with the fact most of both top 20s are gonna be dudes. but like most of these songs are dudes. this week is all dudes. next week is a 7:2 dude-to-lady ratio. last week was 2:1. maybe less dudes? idk, recency bias is doin' work, but at least two weeks from now, we're gonna get some dope tunes.

87) "Get Buck," Young Buck

HOLY SHIT THIS FUCKING BEAT THE TUBA HAS NEVER HAD A BETTER DAY IN ITS LIFE. OK, this is the first 2007 track I think has been unjustifiably forgotten by time. “Say OK” hit me, but I think that was just a moment for me. This is objectively a classic, this fucking beat, man. Young Buck doesn't add a ton to the proceedings, but he doesn't ruin anything, his gruff, shouty flow is perfect for the beat, and I'll admit, I got a dark chuckle out of the "I can serve Whitney Houston and Bobby Brown" line. This was fuckin' rad, y'all, the best "new to me" song I've heard so far. Seriously this beat, how have we not found a better home for it, how did no one else latch onto it. A strong silver medalist in the "Southern rap songs with the word 'buck' in the title" category.

89) "A Woman's Love," Alan Jackson

Alan Jackson, last seen walking out on Beyonce's performance at the CMAs, is here singing a jaunty tune about how one time he fucked.

91) "Love Today," MIKA

i mean it's just a good song, man, i dunno. i'm allowed to just say when a song is solid and something i can jam to, right, when i don't think i have anything to justify? it's low-rent scissor sisters. I'LL TAKE THAT ANY DAY OF THE WEEK. solid week.

95) "Forever," Papa Roach

...oh goddamnit i love this song. No, you don't... Lemme explain. I need to explain, so lemme. So, I listened to a lot of the local buttrock station in my teens, because that's what the radio at the auto shop where I worked was always tuned to, was 93X. And, I dunno, there's a lot of bullshit I forgot and a lot of shit too horrible to purge from the mind, I've heard the acoustic version of Staind's "Outside" more times than any man ever should, but there were some songs where the Stockholm Syndrome hit, and you were like, "Well, maybe Chevelle isn't ALL bad." This was definitely the point where I was like, "Hey, this is the one decent Papa Roach song!" I was legit angry when I realized this was that song, I forgot I ever loved a Papa Roach song, I was 10000% sure this was a cover because there was no way I was going to go anywhere but IN on this song, but no, this is a song I shouted in the shower at least five times. I'm so disappointed in myself right now, but... But, yeah, this is, I can’t quite place where they cribbed the verses from but they cribbed well, the chorus is shouty and fake-deep like all the great buttrock songs, and I love that ending, the “one last kiss” thing over that bass line, without reservation. We have to be true to who we were, and who we are is never fully removed from who we were. I hate this. I hate having to admit this. THE ONE PAPA ROACH SONG I FUCK WITH, AND IT HAS TO BE PART OF THIS PROJECT. I HAVE TO TALK ABOUT A KENDRICK LAMAR SONG SOON, AND HERE I AM, FUCKING WITH A PAPA ROACH SONG, THROWING MY CRITICAL AUTHORITY OUT WITH THE BATHWATER.

97) "Breath," Breaking Benjamin

I have less reservations about loving a Breaking Benjamin song, though, because Breaking Benjamin wasn't fake-deep like Papa Roach. ("My feelings for you are forever." God, that's stupid. I love a very stupid thing.) No, Breaking Benjamin was legit dark, they were a buttrock band I knew was OK because my friend who ended up going to a semi-prestigious art high school of some renown was into them. Is it the same song as "The Diary of Jane?" Yeah, kinda, there's more than a little resemblance, "THE DIARY OF JANE" IS A LEGIT GREAT SONG AND BITING THAT SONG IS A SMART MOVE.

At least Papa Roach couldn’t crack the Top 20. 2007: gaining strength! 20) "Get it Shawty," by Lloyd (3.31.2007) 19) "Break 'Em Off," by Paul Wall ft./Lil' KeKe (3.10.2007) 18) "My Oh My," by The Wreckers (1.27.2007) 17) "Mr. Jones," by Mike Jones (1.27.2007) 16) "Settlin'," by Sugarland (2.17.2007) 15) "I Tried," by Bone Thugs 'n Harmony (4.21.2007) 14) "Movin' On," by Elliott Yamin (3.17.2007) 13) "U + Ur Hand," by P!nk (1.13.2007) 12) "Doe Boy Fresh," by Three 6 Mafia ft./Chamillionaire (1.20.2007) 11) "Breath," by Breaking Benjamin (4.21.2007) 10) "Beautiful Liar," by Beyonce & Shakira (3.31.2007) 9) "Cupid's Chokehold," by Gym Class Heroes ft./Patrick Stump (1.13.2007) 8) "The River," by Good Charlotte ft./M. Shadows & Synyster Gates (2.10.2007) 7) "Say OK," by Vanessa Hudgens (2.17.2007) 6) "Alyssa Lies," by Jason Michael Carroll (1.13.2007) 5) "Get Buck," by Young Buck (4.21.2007) 4) "And I Am Telling You I'm Not Going," by Jennifer Hudson (1.13.2007) 3) "Candyman," by Christina Aguilera (1.13.2007) 2) "Because of You," by Ne-Yo (3.17.2007) 1) "Dashboard," by Modest Mouse (2.17.2007)

4.15.2017

22) "The Heart Part 4," by Kendrick Lamar

I mean, with the way I do this thing, everything that's been said about this song has been said, and I'm hella late to the party, trying to get another round of Pin the Tail on the Donkey started. "You didn't have fun without me, I'm about to have fun WITH you!" No Bob! we already played that game Bob!. "BLINDFOLD ME!" I think it's vitally important that Kendrick Lamar remind everyone that he's the best MC alive right now, because he is, and gosh, he just fucking raps for four minutes. Barely a hook, just Kendrick Lamar verses and flows for a solid four minutes, and I'm really curious how many rappers could sustain a song for four (mostly) uninterrupted minutes just on their own. Minimalist production, it's just your voice and your words. I'd put Danny Brown in that category, but it'd be a bleak-ass four minutes. I want to put Killer Mike in that category, but I have to think there's a reason he works best in a duo. I'd want to listen to what four minutes of undiulted Young Thug would sound like?, but more out of curiosity than belief in his ability. And I mean Kendrick's the only one in the popular consciousness who could do it, no fuckin’ question, there's no one in the mainstream rap world anywhere NEAR his level. (Kendrick Lamar is barely mainstream, of course, and that fact is a source of much consternation on this song, like there's no way the entire Kendrick album breaks the Hot 100 like the entire Drake album did, but he was in a Tay Tay song the one time and that's enough.) Just listening to Kendrick Lamar rap is one of the most thrilling songs I've heard for YAS 2017. Honestly, I'm ranking it too low in the Top 20, but only because I have to think better things are on their way and am wary of that recency bias wave.

49) "XO Tour Lif3," by Lil Uzi Vert

Congratulations on being the modern rap song which followed "The Heart Part 4!" You were always going to suffer in comparison, and while I regret that it happened to you, I hope you understand it had to happen to someone. I mean, this is a three-minute song, and at some point I got bored enough that I forgot I was supposed to be paying attention to come up with an observation and/or a joke and did other things. Not even shit I needed to take care of, I checked Facebook and thought about getting a glass of milk until he started saying all his friends are dead, like what?, oh okay I guess that's how this song ends then, OH FUCK well prolly not worth dipping back in if I got that distracted.

61) "Speak to a Girl," by Tim McGraw & Faith Hill

So over the last four weeks, only three women have had tracks debut on the Hot 100. That's pretty cool. One of the three dudes who wrote this song, about what a girl REALLY wants from a man, was also a co-writer on Jason Derulo's "Wiggle," which is, I mean, I'm going off Wikipedia, I'm hopeful this is too awful to be true, but if it isn't, how does that dude sleep at night? What does that dude believe in? Who is his god, just, to what moral authority is our man Joe London holding himself accountable? Do Not Trust Joe London. Another of the songwriters worked with a band called Confederate Railroad. Country music is the coolest. I'm so proud to like this genre.

66) "Still Got Time," by ZAYN ft./PARTYNEXTDOOR

First of all, we need to take a minute to discuss the sheer disrespect for the concept of caps lock expressed by ZAYN and PARTYNEXTDOOR. This is a mumblecore pop song, and I must insist these dudes cease using all capital letters until they prove they're capable of expressing excitement. Other than that gripe, though, I dunno, I didn't have a bad time! I enjoyed it about as much as I did "Running Back" a few weeks ago, it didn't light this Tuesday evening on fire, but it was a chill groove, and I appreciated the B+ to which all involved contributed. Also, new favorite Wikipedia line: "Shane Lindstrom, professionally known as Murda Beatz." One, professionally known. Two, imagine ever asking someone to call you Murda. Gosh, what a stupid fucking stage name. (Stage name? Backstage name? Why do you need an alias bro you're a fucking producer, you don't get to have a fake name, the fuck makes you think you can have a fake name. Even Swizz Beatz rapped sometimes, what is your goddamned problem Murda Beatz.)

2017′s Top 20! I lowered “Run Up” again. I miss it dearly but I can’t pretend I liked it more than “Green Light.” 20) "Swalla," by Jason Derulo ft./Nicki Minaj & Ty Dolla $ign (4.8) 19) "Light," by Big Sean ft./Jeremih (2.25) 18) "Everyday," by Ariana Grande ft./Future (3.4) 17) "Draco," by Future (3.11) 16) "Guys My Age," by Hey Violet (2.11) 15) "Good Drank," by 2 Chainz ft./Gucci Mane & Quavo (2.11) 14) "Yeah Boy," Kelsea Ballerini (3.4) 13) "Selfish," by Future ft./Rihanna (3.18) 12) "Slide," by Calvin Harris ft./Frank Ocean & Migos (3.18) 11) "It Ain't Me," by Kygo x Selena Gomez (3.4) 10) "Now & Later," by Sage the Gemini (2.25) 9) "Shape of You," by Ed Sheeran (1.28) 8) "That's What I Like," by Bruno Mars (3.4) 7) "The Heart Part 4," by Kendrick Lamar (4.15) 6) "Chanel," by Frank Ocean ft./A$AP Rocky (4.1) 5) "Run Up," by Major Lazer ft./PARTYNEXTDOOR & Nicki Minaj (2.18) 4) "Green Light," by Lorde (3.18) 3) "Despacito," by Luis Fonsi ft./Daddy Yankee (2.4) 2) "Issues," by Julia Michaels (2.11) 1) "iSpy," by KYLE ft./Lil Yachty (1.14) how the fuck did “swalla” make it two weeks Also, I know there was a new Iggy Azalea song, and I’m just gonna say, if having to listen to 21 Drake songs was the price I paid to not have to hear 1 Iggy Azalea song, I will have been glad to have paid the toll. That is a reasonable trade, one I would never say no to. Boy I hope it doesn’t debut next week! Also: “iSpy” in the for-real top five! That’s so dope! I’m happy for that song!

Who won the week?

2007 had the stronger showing this week, and let’s be real, I think it’s out-paced 2017 at this point. 2007′s at the point where “Get It Shawty” is hanging on by a thread while “Grace Kelly” and “Outside Looking In” are outside looking in. 2017 needs to step its game up. We’re two weeks from “Umbrella.” Is that so much to ask, is for just one instant classic era-defining monster jam that shatters the world? Come on, 2017! 2007: 2 2017: 1