| 4.5 superb |
| Arcturus Aspera Hiems Symfonia |
| AZ Doe or Die |
| AZ Pieces of a Man |
| Bal-Sagoth Starfire Burning Upon the Ice-Veiled Throne |
| Bolzer Aura |
| Caladan Brood Echoes Of Battle |
| Cradle of Filth Vempire or Dark Faerytales in Phallustei |
| Dark Funeral The Secrets of the Black Arts |
| Deathspell Omega Fas - Ite, Maledicti, In Ignem Aeternum |
| Deathspell Omega Paracletus |
| Dimmu Borgir Stormblåst |
| Dissection Storm of the Light's Bane |
| Emperor In the Nightside Eclipse |
| Hum You'd Prefer an Astronaut |
| Immolation Close to a World Below |
| King's X Out of the Silent Planet |
| Kvist For Kunsten Maa Vi Evig Vike |
| Lunar Aurora Of Stargates and Bloodstained Celestial Spheres |
| Lunar Aurora Hoagascht |
| Mayhem De Mysteriis Dom Sathanas |
| Mayhem Ordo ad Chao |
| Megadeth Peace Sells... But Who's Buying? |
| Megadeth Endgame |
| Misfits Famous Monsters |
| Misfits Walk Among Us |
| Nas Illmatic |
| Negative Plane Stained Glass Revelations |
| A near perfect clinic on all that is uniquely Black Metal. Anyone who calls this "hipster black metal" is a ^&*%ing moron, this is pure Black Metal, performed with no irony or pretension. |
| Nightbringer Ego Dominus Tuus |
A natural progression to the band's previous work. The production is flawless and the new drummer
brings a less polished, but more explosive presence to the compositions. This album is
aesthetically perfect.
This is one of the few BM bands out there that truly "gets it". They accomplish what many try and
fail: a visceral, living musical entity which offers a chilling, soul-altering glimpse into True
Darkness. This is music which affects one on levels deeper than merely emotionally, mentally, or
even psychically, but at the deepest root of one's existence (or experience thereof) and one's
knowledge of place within the universe.
Those who don't know better would assume that the American interpretation of Black Metal is the
current trend of tree-hugging, lo-fi "Cascadian" crap, but Nightbringer is the supreme
representation of True Black Metal in the US, and quite possibly the world at this point. |
| Nights Like These Sunlight at Secondhand |
| Nokturnal Mortum To the Gates of Blasphemous Fire |
| Pallbearer Sorrow And Extinction |
| Pallbearer Foundations of Burden |
| Puff Daddy No Way Out |
| Rahu The Quest for the Vajra of Shadows |
| Rush Moving Pictures |
| Shudder To Think Pony Express Record |
| Sorhin I det glimrande mörkrets djup |
| Vorde Vorde |
| Wodensthrone Loss |
| 4.0 excellent |
| ...and Oceans The Dynamic Gallery of Thoughts |
| ...and Oceans Cosmic World Mother |
| 1349 Demonoir |
| Abigor Supreme Immortal Art |
| Abigor's response to "Anthems to the Welkin at Dusk".....Possibly their most ambitious and most orchestrated album. Judged on it's own merits, it is a phenomenal album and sits somewhere among Opus IV and Nachthymnen as their best album. It's up to personal taste which of those three is their best album, but I think it's pretty well agreed upon that those are their best albums. Abigor have frequently shifted their sound in an attempt to remain relevant on almost all of their albums, but this particular album may be the most successful and rewarding example. Either way, they consistently proved time and time again that they were sonically unique, talented and perfectly deserving of their relevance amongst the elite in the second wave pantheon....they just consistently failed to be the "first" or "best" at anything...something you can't really blame them for considering the surplus of immense talent and incredibly fast evolution the genre experienced in the explosion of the internet age. If you haven't heard this album, definitely do yourself a favor and check it out. If you have heard it but not since the 90's, do yourself a favor and pull it out, relive it again. It won't change your life, but you'll definitely enjoy the experience of reliving a time when the genre was still new, exciting and full of quality. |
| Akhlys The Dreaming I |
| Anathema The Silent Enigma |
| Anthrax Persistence Of Time |
| Anthrax Worship Music |
| Arckanum ÞÞÞÞÞÞÞÞÞÞÞ |
| Blut Aus Nord Memoria Vetusta III - Saturnian Poetry |
The live drums on this recording REALLY improve the overall sound compared to Memoria Vetusta I
and II, but the melodies are a bit lacklustre by comparison. That is not to say they are bad, to
the contrary this is one of the best BM albums I've heard in a long time. It's just a testament to
how perfectly crafted the previous two albums in this series were.
The first time I listened to this album, I listened to it two times back to back in it's entirety
and was completely swept away to an ethereal, sonic other-world. This is one of those albums that,
once it's finished, you feel like you have returned from a great voyage or journey and the reality
of your waking world seems somehow distant and unfamiliar. Truly high calibre, finesse material
from start to finish, with virtually no filler or fluff.
Production is excellent and really captures the cold yet beautiful essence of the second wave of
Scandinavian Black Metal, when it was still new and exciting. The album's only flaw is that some
tracks are more memorable and less repetitive than others and some of the melodies are not quite
as striking as on this album's predecessors. I pick up hints of sonic and tonal similarities to
Lunar Aurora and Wodensthrone, in addition to the traditional Norwegian fare that this album
celebrates (particularly early Emperor). Perhaps not BAN's best material, but still an
unmistakable triumph that must be experienced by any true connoisseur of the genre. |
| Blut Aus Nord Memoria Vetusta II - Dialogue With The Stars |
| Bone Thugs-N-Harmony Creepin On Ah Come Up |
| Classixx Hanging Gardens |
| Clutch The Elephant Riders |
| Cradle of Filth Cruelty and the Beast |
| Crowbar Odd Fellows Rest |
| Dark Angel Darkness Descends |
| Deicide Once Upon the Cross |
| Emperor IX Equilibrium |
| Filter Short Bus |
| Frozen Shadows Hantises |
| Grave Miasma Odori Sepulcrorum |
| Hum Downward Is Heavenward |
| Hum Inlet |
| Hypnotize Camp Posse Three 6 Mafia Presents: Hypnotize Camp Posse |
| Immortal Pure Holocaust |
| Iron Maiden Somewhere In Time |
| Kampfar Profan |
| Kingpin Skinny Pimp King Of Da Playaz Ball |
| Kreator Coma Of Souls |
| Lunar Aurora Mond |
| Lunar Aurora Weltengänger |
| Marduk Opus Nocturne |
| Marilyn Manson Antichrist Superstar |
| Mase Welcome Back |
| Mase Harlem World |
| Mastodon Blood Mountain |
| Mastodon Crack The Skye |
| Mayhem Esoteric Warfare |
| Megadeth So Far, So Good... So What! |
| Morbid Angel Formulas Fatal to the Flesh |
| Morbid Angel Gateways to Annihilation |
| Mudvayne The End of All Things to Come |
| Negative Plane Et In Saecula Saeculorum |
| Nightbringer Death And The Black Work |
| Nightbringer Apocalypse Sun |
| Nightbringer Hierophany of the Open Grave |
| Nights Like These Old Youth Culture |
| Nile Ithyphallic |
| Obliteration Black Death Horizon |
| Odium (NOR) The Sad Realm of the Stars |
| Rush Fly By Night |
| Seance Fornever Laid to Rest |
| Seth The Howling Spirit |
| Setherial Hell Eternal |
| Shudder To Think Get Your Goat |
| Shudder To Think 50,000 B.C. |
| Summoning Old Mornings Dawn |
| Taake Nattestid Ser Porten Vid |
| The Cure Wild Mood Swings |
| "Wild Mood Swings" is an apt title, as this record does suffer from an identity crisis. It is a bit of a meandering affair: moving from morose and gloomy to vibrant and poppy, then back again, never really committing to one particular theme. That being said, this is an album that got a much worse rap than it deserved and, in fact, contains a handful of my favorite Cure tracks. The album gets off to a slow start, which I think was part of it's problem, as things don't really start to pick up until track 4. But, man, once the first notes of The 13th kick in, we are presented with a rock block of songs that stand up to any of their other great tracks and really remain strong through the close of the album. If you passed over this album back when it was newer, do yourself a favor and give it another spin. Like me, you may find this album to be the hidden gem it truly is, not to mention a plethora of wonderful songs that went sadly underappreciated. |
| The Damned Grave Disorder |
| Three 6 Mafia When the Smoke Clears |
| Tulus Pure Black Energy |
| Type O Negative Life Is Killing Me |
| Walknut Graveforests and Their Shadows |
| Winterfylleth The Threnody Of Triumph |
| Wolves in the Throne Room Black Cascade |
