2019 Metal ’n’ Heavy Rock Poll: VOTING & CAMPAIGNING thread (open until the 21st of February)

another week to go so plenty of time but a good idea to start planning now if you havent

Has anyone seen seandalai?

A little last minute campaigning for Imprecation, which doesn't seem to get as much love as it should. If you have a taste for the slower end of old-school death metal, this is one worth checking out. This is a difficult style to pull off, you can't hide behind a blitzkrieg of riffs or pure speed. The songs have got to be there. Recommended for fans of Autopsy, Convulse, Asphyx, Disma, Serpentine Path.

Never got a chance to chime in on the DM vs BM thing because I was too busy, but I'm firmly in the DM camp. Came to it by way of thrash in the late 80s. Like many things I love, it did sort of unsettle or disturb me at first in kind of a: "Jesus... what kind of person makes music like this?" None of my friends were into it and it was kind of a personal shame that I listened to on headphones in private. I lived in TX at the time and they had this awesome radio show on Tuesday mornings on the public radio station - from like 1am - 5am. The knuckleheads who DJ'd that show framed the music well. This fondness for the relentless brutality, but also an appreciation for the comedy of it. I used to listen as much as I could, armed with blank tapes (of which I made many). I loved the Florida bands (First few Morbid Angel albums were huge favorites for years), was big into the European stuff on Earache, as well as the low budget local stuff that sounded the most demented: Muddy tape recordings of unhinged guys in a dank basement screaming/growling over indecipherable down-tuned guitars and drums that sounded like someone was banging on cardboard boxes at breakneck speeds with spatulas. Always an appreciation for the absurdity of it. But, it was the 80s, too, so the blatant satanism was still a bit shocking for a time when the PMRC was still going after guys like Alice Cooper and Ozzy.

I got bored of it in the 90s with so many new styles of music to explore. Every couple of years I'd go through a metal phase, but I think I'm a bigger metal fan now than I have been. I like a fair share of sludge, doom, and black metal, but a good DM album blows everything away. Probably my favorite albums of the last decade are Immolation's "Atonement", Gorguts' "Colored Sands", and Ulcerate's "Destroyers of All". I also love that strain of black metal with a hardcore influence; Castevet's "Obsian" one of my favorites of the decade.

As a BM guy, I love these three albums you mentioned. I was thinking about this DM/BM thing again yesterday while listening to the new Tomb Mold and came to two conclusions: I like the kind of DM that is best listened via headphones, and most of my favorite DM albums would probably be even better if the cookie monster vocals were replaced by maniacal high-pitched screaming.

As far as DM goes, I prefer the more human-sounding enraged roar over the more theatrical lower-pitched "demon" style. I really like the guy from Ulcerate (Paul Kallend). Though I prefer that style to pretty much any metal vocal style, I do think that BM vocals are more interesting as a whole; there's a lot more variety of styles in BM, and that BM leaves more opportunity for female vocalists as well. One of my all time favorite BM vocalists is Laurie Sue Shanaman. I also love Leviathan/Lurker of Chalice's vocals, and Mick Barr is pretty great - almost that death metal-esque roar at times. Would be fun to do a S&D thread or poll just on BM vocals.

A little last minute campaigning for Imprecation, which doesn't seem to get as much love as it should. If you have a taste for the slower end of old-school death metal, this is one worth checking out.

for real tho. best DM album of 2019 by far in my opinion.

This is going to sound completely idiotic but for me the coolest thing about Tomb Mold imo is the vox; singer manages to conform his voice to the exact timbre of a heavy cement lid scraping across a coffin. imo they're one of the latest in a long tradition throughout r'n'r history of great bands that are just perfectly named (like, say, Talking Heads , for instance)

Being Canadian they should know better than to omit the 'u', but I forgive them because two four-letter words in a row are inarguably more badass.

You weren't kidding about the Imprecation. I might have to tweak my ballot after all.

Shit, I have to get on the stick and do this.
It may be the last time I can.

Please do.

Speaking of which: I just voted.

Voted!

😎

ima do this now, enough pussyfooting around

Godspeed or this Cro-Magnon will club your ass.

it is complete.

part of my issue is anything released early in te year I barely remembered so I had to relisten

Wait, this Lingua Ignota album is awesome.

Yes it is.

Caligula snuck up on me too. At first I thought it was too slow and boring, then I found myself craving to hear it in the middle of the workday, after a fever dream at 3:00am, etc

isn't that always the way. tbf you do that with Mahler too

Have compiled a (quite short) ballot (god I really hate metal lol) but might try to add to it if I find anything deserving

Nero Di Marte album is 2020 you cheeky so and so :P it can wait

Ha! Good catch.

I've deleted it. It can and must indeed wait.

Anyone else here fucking with Jorge Elbrecht's Coral Cross project? I know tangenttangent at least (& LJ too?)(happy birthday btw) got some mileage from the also-great Gloss Coma album he released this year, but Coral Cross is special: another strand of that experimental BM syncretism I was talking about a while ago, but Elbrecht pairs his black metal with spectral keyboards, chanting vox, eerie sound efx, & even some influence from John Carpenter's soundtracks. The resultant hybrid sounds goth af:

https://jorgeelbrecht.bandcamp.com/track/fossils-unlocked-by-a-boiling-sea

https://jorgeelbrecht.bandcamp.com/track/all-flesh-must-be-removed

Yeah HB LJ! (couldn't find one thread among the dozens of ban lj threads, sheesh)

I'm def down for some BM w/ keys and chanting vox, will get on it!

Ohh LBI I have a feeling you'll dig this a lot!

Happy birthday LJ indeed! Also, that record sounds interesting.

Man, this Jorge Elbrecht rules. Had to check if it was the same guy who did some stuff with Ariel Pink (stuff I didn't care for), and it is. He's going all out here isn't he? Sounds... proggy as hell too?! This is my shit though, thanks for that DAM!

Roll-call

Who has all voted so far apart from Pom & I?

BlackIronPrison, gaudio, Tom Violence, LBI. Anyone else?

Not yet, will do.

I know Glenn voted

I have SOO much sorting and ranking and eliminating to do. But I WILL vote, of course.

Anyone else plan to vote?

I'll send a short unweighted ballot before the deadline.

I voted so long ago that I wondered for a second if this was a new one.

maybe you voted in the lifetime tracks poll and havent voted in this?

My ballot will be small but I will be voting

I'll vote. Still need to relisten and rank five-six albums.

Absolutely will submit a ballot, vote for cherubs

Voted!

I have a ballot with about 15 albums on it, and a ballot with about 5 albums on it, and I'm deciding between them. Obviously tt's ballot will be like 50 or whatever, she is much more metal than me

vote for multishiva

or don't, if you don't want

imago I recommend the 15-entry ballot, and lll am always ready to give suggestions if you want to fill it put a little more

Submitted a short ballot (15 entires)

Thanks to all those who have voted and to those who plan to vote.

Can anyone recommend any 2019 metal that's good to accompany an insane board game about birds? (imago says: 'not hatebeak')