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Showing posts from June, 2026

Out of Exile

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  Out of Exile was released in 2005 Track Listing: 1. Your Time Has Come 2. Out of Exile 3. Be Yourself 4. Doesn't Remind Me 5. Drown Me Slowly 6. Heaven's Dead 7. The Worm 8. Man or Animal 9. Yesterday to Tomorrow 10. Dandelion 11. #1 Zero 12. The Curse Genre: Hard Rock After their self titled 3 years prior, Audioslave decided they should make an album that was distinctive from their respective bands previous output.  This one isn't just RATM with Chris Cornell, it actually feels like they worked together to make something new. Cornell's instantly recognizable voice paired with Tom Morello's unique approach to guitar is such a good mix.  Unfortunately, they forgot to write anything interesting to use that combo with. Unfortunately, this album feels a little light on ideas.  Songs like Out of Exile and Heaven's Dead just feel like they go nowhere.  They all follow them same verse/chorus/verse/chorus/solo/outro pattern.  And after 8 or 8 songs Morello's co...

August Burns Red

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  August Burns Red is a metalcore band that formed in 2003. I don't recall when I first heard about August Burns Red, but I think a friend introduced me to them.  Either way Constellations was my 2009 soundtrack.  I saw them in concert once on the Constellations tour and it was a great show.  Unfortunately though we had to sit through Emmure, what a terrible band. Albums Owned: Thrill Seeker - Vinyl Messengers - CD Constellations - CD Albums Wanted: Leveler (maybe)

Audioslave

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Audioslave is a Hard Rock / Post Grunge band that formed in 200.  They're basically Rage Against the Machine with Chris Cornell instead of Zach de la Rocha. Cochise, Show Me How to Live and Like a Stone were constantly on the radio, so of course I bought Out of Exile from a CD club.  That's when I learned all of those songs were on their debut. Whoops. Albums I Own: Out of Exile - CD Albums I Want: Audioslave

The Lamb Lies Down on Broadway

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  The Lamb Lies Down on Broadway was released in 1974 Track Listing: 1. The Lamb Lies Down on Broadway 2. Fly on a Windshield 3. Broadway Melody of 1974 4. Cuckoo Cocoon 5. In the Cage 6. The Grand Parade of Lifeless Packaging 7. Back in N.Y.C. 8. Hairless Heart 9. Counting Out Time 10. The Carpet Crawlers 11. The Chamber of 32 Doors Disk 2 1. Lilywhite Lilith 2. The Waiting Room 3. Anyway 4. Here Comes the Supernatural Anaesthetist 5. The Lamia 6. Silent Sorrow in Empty Boats 7. The Colony of Slippermen 8. Ravine 9. The Light Dies Down on Broadway 10. Riding the Scree 11. In the Rapids 12. it . Here we have it, Peter Gabriel's final Genesis album, they one they went too far on.  Gabriel took the reins for story and lyrics and devised some wild concept about a guy in NY.  I dont know the story, I'm not a huge fan of rock operas so I'm not going to go in depth there.  The main problem here is the variety of this album.  I know its prog, but the best prog albums ...

The Sky, The Earth, and All Between

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  The Sky, The Earth, & All Between was released in 2025 Track Listing: 1. Elegy 2. Whiplash 3. Blackhole 4. Everything Ends 5. Brain Dead 6. Evil Eyes 7. Landmines 8. Judgement Day 9. Broken Mirror 10. Curse 11. Seeing Red 12. Chandelier Genre: Alternative Metal/Metalcore The latest from Architects, and absolutely one of my favorites.  Gone is Josh Middleton (who went back to Sylosis) which is a good thing.  You could see from interviews around the time of TCSOFBS that he didn't care of the style the band was moving into. Either way, the heaviness is back.  Not like All Our Gods or anything like that, they still clearly prefer a more radio friendly but they lean less on cleans here than on the last 2. And Sam sounds incredible here. Elegy might be his most impressive song ever.  Chandelier shows off his cleans, where he still is killing it.   My main complaint is that they can at times sound like a discount Bad Omens here.  Landmines sounds ...

The classic symptoms of a broken spirit

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  The classic symptoms of a broken spirit was released in 2022 Track Listing 1. Deep Fake 2. Tear Gas 3. Spit the Bone 4. Burn Down My House 5. Living Is Killing Us 6. When We Were Young 7. Doomscrolling 8. Born Again Pessimist 9. A New Moral Low Ground 10. All the Love in the World 11. Be Very Afraid Genre: Alternative Metal/Metalcore  Architects returns with what is easily their worst album since The Hear and Now.  This time they've take all the wrong lessons from FTTWTE and just fall somewhat flat. Now, this isnt a bad album, its just mediocre as hell.  They're still searching for a sound post-Tom and the definitely don't find it here. What interesting is their almost industrial approach here.  Check out Tear Gas's beat driven verse, or the electronics to start Deep Fake.  I like the idea, but the execution isn't great.  Its just too plodding of a pace for them to do well.  It comes across as simplistic and shallow. ...

For Those That Wish To Exist at Abby

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  For Those That Wish to Exist at Abby was released in 2022 Track Listing: 1. Do You Dream of Armageddon? 2. Black Lungs 3. Giving Blood 4. Discourse Is Dead 5. Dead Butterflies 6. An Ordinary Extinction 7. Impermanence 8. Flight Without Feathers 9. Little Wonder 10. Animals 11. Libertine 12. Goliath 13. Demi God 14. Meteor 15. Dying Is Absolutely Safe Genre: Alternative Metal/Metalcore  I'm not sure what this band was doing in 2022.  They had 3 releases, February saw Live At the Royal Albert Hall (which was recorded in 2020 with no audience because of covid), March they put out this and in October they released a new studio album. The even worse part is both live albums have essentially the same cover, this one is a run through of FTTWTE, Albert Hall has 2 songs from FTTWTE and a smattering of others from the the 3 prior.  I'm not even sure HOW they did FTTWTE songs on Albert Hall since that was recorded before the album was released.  They must have had the so...

Selling England by the Pound

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  Selling England by the Pound was released in 1973. Track Listing: 1. Dancing with the Moonlit Knight 2. I Know What I Like (In Your Wardrobe) 3. Firth of Fifth 4. More Fool Me 5. The Battle of Epping Forest 6. After the Ordeal 7. The Cinema Show 8. Aisle of Plenty Genre: Progressive Rock And here we have it, the peak of Genesis's prog rock era.  Yes I know The Lamb Lies Down on Broadway is next.  I said what I said. This one feels like a natural progression of Foxtrot/Nursery Cryme.  They've kept a lot of the heaviness from Foxtrot and interspersed some of the stupid shit  whimsy from Nursery Cryme.  The start of I Know What I Like and the middle of Thr Battle of Epping Forest are great examples of that. Unfortunately, their penchant for nap time music is still there.  Parts of I Know What I Like and the entirety of More Fool To Me are just boring.  I'm glad they keep Gabriel in the forefront, that helps a bit, but they still bring the flow of ...

For Those That Wish to Exist

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  For Those That Wish to Exist was released in 2021 Track Listing: 1. Do You Dream of Armageddon? 2. Black Lungs 3. Giving Blood 4. Discourse Is Dead 5. Dead Butterflies 6. An Ordinary Extinction 7. Impermanence 8. Flight Without Feathers 9. Little Wonder 10. Animals 11. Libertine 12. Goliath 13. Demi God 14. Meteor 15. Dying Is Absolutely Safe Genre: Alternative Metal / Metalcore After Holy Hell it was clear the band needed to shift gears, they couldn't keep copying their success from the past few albums.  So they decided to go in a more radio friendly alt metal route.  Simpler riffs (check out what they did in Animals), slower songs, but, it works well.  They decided to make the theme of this album climate change / environmental damage (which they explored a bit on AOGHAU).   What really stands out is how good Sam Carter sounds.  He relies less on the heavy screams of the past and centers more on a raspy shout, which complements the new sound well....

Holy Hell

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  Holy Hell was released in 2018 Track Listing: 1. Death Is Not Defeat 2. Hereafter 3. Mortal After All 4. Holy Hell 5. Damnation 6. Royal Beggars 7. Modern Misery 8. Dying to Heal 9. The Seventh Circle 10. Doomsday 11. A Wasted Hymn Genre: Metalcore This is an incredibly painful album.  Obviously coming just 2 years after Tom's death, they managed to turn a tragedy into a masterpiece.  A lot more optimistic than AOGHAU, a but less heavy and the addition of more electronics really set this apart. Now, I went though some very tough times right around when this came out, a lot of personal loss so this album resonates too closely with me.  I'm not an emotional person, anyone close to me would be able to attest to that, but I cannot list to this album without getting emotional. The lyrics here an the absolute best part of the album, you can hear the pain in almost every line.  Screams like "I wasn't ready for the rapture" in Hereafter and "Holy hell I've go...

Foxtrot

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  Foxtrot was released in 1972 Track Listing: 1. Watcher of the Skies 2. Time Table 3. Get 'Em Out by Friday 4. Can-Utility and the Coastliners 5.     Horizons 6.      Supper's Ready Foxtrot is an improvement on the sounds the developed on Nursery Cryme.  Watcher of the Skies is FINALLY a quality opener (no idea how it took them 4 albums to figure out how to write a good starting track but it somehow did) One of the things that stands out to me is that they've stopped burying Gabriel in the mix during the slower songs.  Time Table would have sounded like shit if it were on Nursery Cryme, here its decent (the second half rips though) Here is also where Gabriel starts doing different voices for different characters, you can hear distinct voices during Get Em Out By Friday.  This works well here, before he takes it to far on subsequent albums.  They've mostly got rid of the nap time music, Can-Utility has some moments as does ...

All Our Gods Have Abandoned Us

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  All Our Gods Have Abandoned Us was released in 2016 Track Listing: 1. Nihilist 2. Deathwish 3. Phantom Fear 4. Downfall 5. Gone with the Wind 6. The Empty Hourglass 7. A Match Made in Heaven 8. Gravity 9. All Love Is Lost 10. From the Wilderness 11. Memento Mori Genre: Metalcore I first listened to AOGHAU shortly after it came out in 2016 and it quickly became the theme of my summer.  The band really hit their stride on their last album (Lost Together // Lost Forever) but they perfected it here. Nihilist - No doubt here what this album is going to be about.  The lyrics are a bit cringe but man is this song ferocious Deathwish - A lot going on here and if meshes together so well.  Sam's vocals are a real standout here Phantom Fear - A bit slower song, more space to build the atmosphere.  That chuggy breakdown is right up my alley.  And of course Tom's riffs are the standout here Downfall - Metalcore is built on the mesh of clean and heavy.  Usually f...

Nursery Cryme

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  Nursery Cryme  came our in 1971 Track Listing 1. The Musical Box 2. For Absent Friends 3. The Return of the Giant Hogweed 4. Seven Stones 5. Harold the Barrel 6. Harlequin 7. The Fountain of Salmacis Genre - Progressive Rock And the classic lineup is here.  This group would go on to release 4 albums before Peter Gabriel called it quits.  I'm not super familiar with this album so mostly going in blind here.  I dont have super high hopes since my main complaint about Tresspass is how it feels like bedtime music and this one's name is a play on words for nursery rhyme. The Musical Box - Starts off sleepy, the guitar work is immaculate, just boring.  We finally pick up around the 4 minute mark and it gets much faster paced.  They chose to do a back and forth fade with the guitar solo which I dont like, but overall its excellent.  Cut the first 3 minutes off and this might be my favorite Genesis song so far.  For Absent Friends - I think this em...

Architects

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  Architects are a metal core band from the UK.  The first song I heard from them was Buried at Sea off of their 2007 album Ruin.  I was super impressed so I downloaded their latest album All Our Gods Have Abandoned Us.  A much different album, but so good.   I planned on buying tickets to see them in concert, but before I had the chance the show got canceled, their guitarist and main songwriter Tom Serle died. Somehow they continued on and have since become one of my absolute favorite bands.  Sam Carter is one of the best vocalists in the genre, instantly recognizable and so full of emotion. Albums I Own All Our Gods Have Abandonded Us - Vinyl Holy Hell - Vinyl For Those Who Wish To Exist - Vinyl For Those Who Wish To Exist At Abby - Vinyl The Classic Symptoms of a Broken Spirit - Vinyl The Sky, The Earth, and All Between - Vinyl Albums I Want Ruin Hollow Crown The Here and Now Daybreaker Lost Forever // Lost Together (This is a glaring omissio...

Blood Dynasty

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  Blood Dynasty was released in 2025 Track Listing: 1. Dream Stealer 2. Illuminate the Path 3. March of the Miscreants 4. A Million Suns 5. Don't Look Down 6. Presage 7. Blood Dynasty 8. Paper Tiger 9. Vivre Libre (Blaspheme cover) 10. The Pendulum 11. Liars & Thieves Genre: Melodic death metal After Gossow left to be just the bands manager, they hired Alissa White-Gluz to fill her shoes.  Her first War Eternal was excellent, the band felt rejuvenated.  Then they put out Will to Power which sucked, Deceivers which was decent but played it very safe.  Finally they put out Blood Dynasty, their last with White-Gluz.   Overall White-Gluz feels like a discount Gossow.  She can hit the notes but doesn't have the same feel.  She can do cleans better but I think it was a slight downgrade. I bought Blood Dynasty because Deceivers was pretty good (I didn't listen to War Eternal or Will to Power until later) and they had some stupid blood filled versio...

Rise of the Tyrant

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Rise of the Tyrant was released in 2007 Track Listing: 1. Blood on Your Hands 2. The Last Enemy 3. I Will Live Again 4. In This Shallow Grave 5. Revolution Begins 6. Rise of the Tyrant 7. The Day You Died 8. Intermezzo Liberté 9. Night Falls Fast 10. The Great Darkness 11. Vultures Genre: Melodic Death Metal The final Gossow album (that I own) and probably the one I listened to the most.  I burned a copy and played it in my car nearly constantly.  The songs all had this weird beeping noise underneath.  When I finally bought a legit copy years later it was weird missing that. Blood on your Hands - Not messing around this time just all power jumping right in.  They stripped back the effects on Gossows vocals and they really shine here.  One of their best songs The Last Enemy - Massive chorus on this one.  Verses are pummeling.  Solo is also fun.  Very shreddy, almost Megadeth-esque then a bunch of tapping.  The little slow break is great too I...

Doomsday Machine

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  Doomsday Machine was released in 2005 Track Listing: 1.    Enter the Machine 2.    Taking Back My Soul 3.    Nemesis 4.    My Apocalypse 5.   Carry the Cross 6.   I Am Legend/Out for Blood 7.   Skeleton Dance 8.   Hybrids of Steel 9.    Mechanic God Creation 10. Machtkampf 11. Slaves of Yesterday Genre: Melodic Death Metal After listening to Anthems to death I picked up a copy of Doomsday Machine and loved it as much if not more than Anthems.  I even got a 2nd copy to get signed when I saw them for the first time at The Rave.  The band continues to get clearer production, which isn't a problem yet but starts to get grating on their next one. This was one of my favorite albums for years and its still a great one. Enter the Machine - Intro track, really sets the stage for the album.   Probably their best intro track up to this point in their career Taking Back My Soul - Th...

Anthems of Rebellion

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  Anthems of Rebellion was released in 2003 Track Listing: 1. Tear Down the Walls 2. Silent Wars 3. We Will Rise 4. Dead Eyes See No Future 5. Instinct 6. Leader of the Rats 7. Exist to Exit 8. Marching on a Dead End Road 9.  Despicable Heroes 10. End of the Line 11. Dehumanization 12. Anthem 13. Saints and Sinners Genre: Melodic Death Metal This was my intro into Arch Enemy and melodeath as a whole.  I was trying go find heavier music and bought "Metal for the Masses II" from Hot-topic and it included a lot of Arch Enemy (We Will Rise was track 2).  From there I bought Anthems and loved every second of it.  Im pretty sure I made my mom play it in the car everytime we went anywhere for months.  I even had my MySpace page's custom link set to lyrics from this album.  Let's see how it holds up Tears Down the Walls - Intro track, ties in well Silent Wars - This is the start of the super clean production they'll go to in later albums.  Its not bad ye...

Wages of Sin

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  Wages of Sin was released in 2002 Track Listing: Disk 1: 1.    Enemy Within 2.    Burning Angel 3.   Heart of Darkness 4.    Ravenous 5.   Savage Messiah 6.   Dead Bury Their Dead 7.   Web of Lies 8.   The First Deadly Sin 9.    Behind the Smile 10. Snow Bound 11. Shadows and Dust 12. Lament of a Mortal Soul Disk 2 (Rare Tracks): 1. Starbreaker (Judas Priest cover) 2. Aces High (Iron Maiden cover) 3. Scream of Anger (Europe cover) 4. Diva Satanica 5. Fields of Desolation '99 6. Damnation's Way 7. Hydra Genre: Melodic Death Metal  Out with Liiva and in with Gossow.  From what I gather he was let go because his vocals were one dimensional and his live show was meh.  I agree with the former, his vocals sucked at times but he was getting better with each release.  Burning Bridges he was actually real good.  But, it was the right choice because Gossow blows him out of t...

Stigmata

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  Stigmata was released in 1998 Track Listing: 1. Beast of Man 2. Stigmata 3. Sinister Mephisto 4. Dark of the Sun 5. Let the Killing Begin 6. Black Earth 7. Tears of the Dead 8. Vox Stellarum 9. Bridge of Destiny Genre: Melodic Death Metal Stigmata is Arch Enemy's second album and is a natural progression from Black Earth.  I bought the vinly copy of this when I got Black Earth.  Probably my least favorite of the Liiva albums but its excellent.  That artwork though is atrocious. Beast of Man - All around great song.  Liiva has stepped it up and sounds so much better.  Classic Amott guitar really complement the vocals, and an awesome solo. Great opener. Stigmata - Instrumental pretty early here which feels like an odd choice.  The song it self is decent, its so much more complex than the solos on Black Earth but I can't help but feel like it was a bad sequencing choice right after Beast of Man, kind of destroys the momentum the album was building Sini...