Top Ten Albums

For you. What are they?
Go.

Blech.....I need to rethink this.

10 More Than You Think You Are - Matchbox Twenty
9 Weathered - Creed
8 Bleed American - Jimmy Eat World
7 All Killer, No Filler - Sum 41
6 The Reason - Hoobastank
5 Ocean Avenue - Yellowcard
4 The Better Life - 3 Doors Down
3 Tomorrow - SR-71
2 No Pads, No Helmets, Just Balls - Simple Plan

And finally:

1. Tie: Hybrid Theory, by Linkin Park, and Meteora, by Linkin Park

I really hope that list was made with satire.

As for me I'm not going to rank the albums because that would be useless. I'm going to do this in two posts because I have yet to solidify how I want to present a few albums to you. Here are the five I hold truly dear to my heart;

Empyrium - "Songs of Moors and Misty Fields" - When you listen to an album like this, you realize exactly how beautiful and emotional music can be. You realize that when you plaster riffs together and play them sloppily just for aesthetic value, it may sound good, but it is completely devoid of emotion. When you listen to an album like this, you are truly moved.

Agalloch - "Pale Folklore" - Your life improves if you own this album. That is all.

The Flaming Lips - "The Soft Bulletin" - One of the most important albums of the 90's. And you know, ever. It's got such a flow and so much innovation that it's insane.

The Dismemberment Plan - "Emergency & I" - Who said pop had to be all bad? Who said pop couldn't be experimental? Remember Pet Sounds? Yeah, this is like that, but for our generation. It was released in '99 and showed us what to expect from the new millenium. I remember hearing it and saying 'Bring on the new year!'

Converge - "Jane Doe" - Sounds like a wall of noise when you first hear it and then it starts to unravel. And you hear the emotion and truth behind everything in this album. It's about heartache, love, loss and life. And it is so sincere that it if you let it, it can make you feel what the music is conveying.

Picking my top ten is hard, because the whole album should be good rather than just a few songs. Also i listen to a hand full of bands that make excelent music rather than a bunch of bands with only a couple hit songs. So here goes....

10: Dimmu Borgir - Puritanical Eupohirc Misanthropia
While others feel the band sold out on this album (and before it) I feel it is one of the greater works in music in a long time. The synth strings and other synth effects add a very dark and heavy aura to the already phenominal guitar work and insane drumming. The key tracks on this album would be Blessings Upon the Throne of Tyranny, Kings of the Carnival Creation, and the industrial super heavy Puritania. I also rank the album Death Cult Armageddon up there with this but it wasnt as shocking to me as Puritanical Euphoric Misanthropia, however both albums and their earlier works are by far noteworthy.

9: In Flames - Whoracle
Mmmmm, Swedish Metal. I love this band, and this album was a turning point for them. Good melodic guitar, very much their own sound and diverse from other artists. Good tracks include Jotun, Gyroscope, and Episode 666.

8: Iced Earth - Night of the Stormrider
This band is awesome, hands down one of the best ive ever heard. This album is no different. It's the bands second offering from a while ago but it still is very awesome. The guitar is some of the fastest I've ever heard. Good tracks are pretty much all of it.

7: In Flames - Clayman
Just put the CD in and listen to it straight through, every song is awesome. Key tracks are Bullet Ride, Swim, Clayman, and Suburban Me. Like i said, whole album is good.

6: Metallica - Ride the Lightning
Classic Metallica here, whole album kicks ass, this needs no explanation. Fade to Black, For Whom the Bell Tolls, and Creeping Death are on this one.

5: Iced Earth - Something Wicked This Way Comes
Absoluteley phenominal, stunning actualy. This is one of the greatest works of our time in my oppinion. Whole album is good and is very well written and produced. The last 3 songs; Prophecy, Birth of the Wicked, and The Coming Curse, make up the "Something Wicked Trillogy" that tells the story of the coming of the antichrist. Superior work, listen and study.

4: Slayer - Soundtrack to the Apocolypse: Box Set
Contains all the good tracks from the orrigional albums, and then it has a live album. Totaly spectacular. There's DVD's and rare stuff and stuff never released before in it too. Tons of neato stuff. I only mention the box set because i love a lot of slayer but it was hard to choose albums for them (also i ran out of room on my list). So this one is awesome because it has everything and then some.

3: Metallica - ...And Justice For All
Dont crucify me because i rated it higher than Ride the Lightning. It's well produced and the sound is heavy and on target. Very good album, there's no song on it that I dont like.

2: Metallica - Master of Puppets
Legendary album, very good. The writing is superb but the production lacks a bit because it was made in the 80's. However all tracks are good. This one's got Battery, Master of Puppets, and a whole bunch more, how can anyone not like it?

1: Metallica - Metallica (Black Album)
VH-1 obviously thinks it's awesome and I'll have to agree. When it comes to the way you should write, produce, mix, master, edit, and sell an album, this is the architype for absolute superiority. This album has the greatest sound ive ever heard. I try to model my own tone after the guitars to achieve the "wall of guitar" sound. If you havent heard anything off of this album you live in either a hole or a cave in the middle of nowhere where you have no radio or CD's or stores to buy CD's at. Enter Sandamn, Sad But True, The Unforgiven... this album is the best there is in my book.


~GSD~

P.S. Can you tell I like Metallica?

Nice choices there though I think it's wrong to have Master of Puppets listed with out Rust in Peace which was essentially Megadeth's "Master of Puppets". I suppose I never understood the hype surrounding Metallica. While I agree they made some kick ass albums, they weren't nearly as influential as some would have you believe.

Haha I really hope you were joking about Metallica's "...And Justice For All" being well produced though. That album would be so much better if there was, you know, bass. I suppose remastering would help, but I'm too gr1m for remasters.

Stormblast > Purintanical Eurphoric Misanthropia though I'm not a fan of Dimmu so much. I think they have the wrong guy doing lead vocals. My main problem with PEM and the latter, DCA, is that it's well written and well played. But that's all it is. It's great form with no substance. Stormblast may not be as produced or as precisely executed as PEM and it's latter DCA but when people listened to it, it moved them.

I never did "get" Episode 666. But I suppose that's not something for me to argue. I enjoy Whoracle and In Flames. But My favorite would have to be Lunar Strain//Subterranean or The Jester Race. Even though I consider The Jester Race to be something highly over-rated.

Night of the Stormrider was so kick ass. It would be even more kick ass with Barlow on vocals. I love listening to Alive in Athens and hearing him sing Angel's Holocaust.

Slayer, there was a band of influence. Pioneering the use of dissonant intervals in metal which gave way to an entire sub-genre. And if you've ever heard Raining Blood then, good God, you know what I'm talking about when I say "energy".

Over all I enjoy your choices, they are all exceptional albums to say the least, save for maybe The Black Album. But that's something that's going to be aruged til the end of time. Or of metal.

From a guitarists standpoint Justice was well produced, bwahahahaha. What I really meant to say is that the tone was there. I love the Justice guitar sound and the EQ on the drums is awesome. I know that Stormblast is a really good album, but for some reason or another I couldnt quite take Puritanical Euphoric Misanthropia away.... it's just far more diverse from other music and it appeals to me. Metallica in my oppinion is music genious, if you want me reasons I will list them but you wouldnt understand. Look at my name, and then wonder about the Slayer. I also believe that slayer is music genious because of their use of tritones as well as lots of modes to make it evil. They also use 4ths rather frequently and most untrained guitarists play them as 5ths... ignorant souls. I could go on and on for days but theyre my albums, I like them because I draw influence from them, and because I love listening to them.


~GSD~

P.S. My writing is like Metallica, Mixed with In Flames, seasoned with Iced Earth, and sauted with evil to make it "Slayeresque"

I agree the tone is there but you have to admit the production on that album is horrendous.

I truly urge you to dig deeper in metal if you think PEM is unique and innovative. As I said before it's very well-written. It's very well-played. It's very well-produced. And it's very safe. Stormblast was not as well produced, or well played, or not even as catchy as anything on that album or Death Cult or even Enthrone Darkness but it had emotion. It had a point. Putting Stormblast against any of the three releases mentioned here, Stormblast should be the clear winner. All i hear when I listen to anything from Enthrone to Death Cult is dead music. Albeit aesthetically pleasing, it does nothing to move me. It doesn't have anything to prove and has nothing to communicate. I consider it exactly the opposite of innovative and unique or diverse it's quite dumbed down and quite "by-the-books" if you will. I'd give it a 6/10.

As for Metallica being genious? I hardly consider Metallica as a Radiohead or a Today is the Day or a Neurosis or even an Empyrium or Lips. I do consider Metallica to be one of the better bands to come out of our generation from Kill 'Em All to ...And Justice, because after that things got watered down and they went for that safe "I want to be played on the radio" route. But influental, I cannot see. Bathory, Venom, Slayer, Ulver, these were bands of influence.

Haha Slayer is anything but evil. But I agree that they rule. But after 1986, it was all Kreator for me. You want evil? Listen to NeChrist by Nokturnal Mortum. Or perhaps In The Eyes of God by Today is the Day. Maybe even Things Viral by Khanate. Any of those albums would tear the nut hairs off of you one by one.

These aren't in any order, just they all are amazing in their own ways, I would have put more, but the thing says 10, so these are the ones I narrowed it down to, just found it hard to put them in any kind of order:
Cheap Trick - Cheap Trick at Budokan
Devo - Are we not men? We are devo.
AC/DC - Dirty Deeds Done Dirt Cheap
Led Zeppelin - IV
Pink Floyd - Dark Side of the Moon
The Beatles - Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band
Ramones - Brain Drain
Alice Cooper - Flush The Fashion
The Rolling Stones - Forty Licks
The Cars - Complete Greatest Hits

god, i love the rollign stones, i agreew ith u 100%.
my favorite albums are, in no specific order,...

Cake - Confort Eagle
The Clash - London Calling
Grateful Dead - American Beauty
Pink Floyd - Dark Side of the Moon
The Rolling Stones - Forty Licks
Pink Floyd - Dark Side of the Moon

You are trying to turn this subjective thread into an objective argument. It is futile to continue. As i said, this is what i likes for my top 10, maybe my tastes suck, maybe what I write sucks, maybe what I think is evil is really all puppies and kittens. All I know is that you cant get any more of an evil sound out of any instrument than a tritone. Other than that, I could write an essay on all of this going riff by riff with the theory in each of the songs on any or every album, but that would be boring and pointless. People like these albums, no doubt, I just put them in an order that i feel suits me best. So study and learn, grow and become great.


~GSD~

Said By God Send Death

You are trying to turn this subjective thread into an objective argument. It is futile to continue. As i said, this is what i likes for my top 10, maybe my tastes suck, maybe what I write sucks, maybe what I think is evil is really all puppies and kittens. All I know is that you cant get any more of an evil sound out of any instrument than a tritone. Other than that, I could write an essay on all of this going riff by riff with the theory in each of the songs on any or every album, but that would be boring and pointless. People like these albums, no doubt, I just put them in an order that i feel suits me best. So study and learn, grow and become great.


~GSD~

What I'm trying to show you is that music is not all about theory and that even though the writing on some of these albums may be great, there is no feeling, no emotion, nothing to prove. It's all form -- no substance.

But for the record, I only disputed your Dimmu pick, for the reason above.

I merely added opinions on the other albums because metal has been a big part of my life from a young age. And as for sounding evil, perhaps you should check out those albums I mentioned before. I believe Khanate would surprise you because as you said, you can't sound any more evil out of any instrument with out using a tritone, but Khanate uses silence to create tension and feedback to create uneasiness. You listen to "Things Viral" or it's predecessor and tell me that it's not one of the most evil entities ever put to music. Tore the nut hairs right off me one by one the first time I heard it.

But you're right, I guess it is futile to continue.