Mordy's Metal Listening Club - New Albums Every Monday

I heard Nymphetamine when it was new and it didn't do much for me. No CoF album has, other than Damnation and a Day, and even then I prefer Dimmu Borgir when I'm gonna listen to bombastic, John Williams-esque black metal. But I'll revisit.

The Fates Warning disc (which has just been reissued by Metal Blade with a second disc of liveage and demos, and a DVD with videos and more - different - liveage) is okay so far, but way too Queensrÿche-y in its power metal for me. I think I may need to dip into their earlier, proggier stuff.

I have almost no experience with HIM, don't think I've even ever heard a whole song. Interested to check it out.

And note, in case it doesn't go without saying, that I didn't pick HIM because I thought everyone would like them, but because I thought it would be interesting to hear what people thought.

Nymphetamine was the last Cradle of Filth album that sort of worked. They've got a really spotty discography.

Liv Kristine makes the title track worth listening to, that's for sure.

this is def going to be a prejudice challenging week for me

Listened to Fate's Warning to start my day. I think I've heard "Eye To Eye" before but the rest was new to me. I don't have a problem with this era of prog metal - I was a big King's X fan, and had the first couple of Queensryche records back then - and Parallels is perfectly fine, but I don't really want to listen to Journey/Iron Maiden hybrids anymore. Is this a touchstone record for the genre or artist? I'm incredibly ignorant of that particular sub-genre.

On to Cradle of Filth. First thought - this guys cackling voice sounds like the Salacious Crumb muppet from Return Of The Jedi. Second thought - there are some short moments of joyous riffing within these songs, but wow is this not my thing.

Okay, got to the title track and I just can't listen without laughing. That duet...

Even chanting for Cthulhu in "Mother Of Abominations" can't save this for me. Another point - this album is way too long.

god this cradle of filth album is just unlistenable. Sorry glenn

Argh! I'm falling behind already. I listened to a few YouTubes of the Kyuss and Entombed from last week. I can get why some people said that Kyuss is not metal. I guess it's kind of cross-over metal. It reminds me of some other similar things that were going on in the early '90s - that kind of almost minimalist riff-driven songs with the drop-D tuning - stuff like early Soundgarden and the first Smashing Pumpkins album. I like it, but to me it kind of sounds like background music - not enough going on to really grab me - at least on the songs I played. The Entombed was okay too, but also didn't really grab me. I'm not sure why. I do like some later bands that took that direction but kind of went a bit more mathy, like Meshuggah, although even that can get a bit monotonous because of the shouty vocals.

OK, "unlistenable" seems like about the only thing you're not supposed to say in a Listening Club.

The voice is really interesting actually. I'm used to grating/obtuse metal voices taking the form of the death metal growl. This is frantic almost, insane, gibbering. It sounds like he's using his tongue a bunch in pronunciation (as opposed to his throat).

just squeezed the kyuss album into week #1 last night while cooking. as expected, I love the music but the vocals and lyrics still grate.

I love "green machine" tho. brought back fond memories of staying up late to watch (mostly horrible) videos on headbanger's ball.

and maybe this is just because I wasn't stoned to the bone, but the album really overstays its welcome, huh?

also, lol:

this is def going to be a prejudice challenging week for me

― HOT DISH THYME MACHINE (jjjusten), Monday, April 19, 2010 4:27 AM (11 hours ago) Bookmark

You guys wanna keep this on one thread? Gonna make it harder for search. Let me know on this thread if you wanna spin off or just keep renaming it.
Gonna try the cradle of filth.

now that I'm seeing this in action, it does seem to make sense to break it up each week, yeah.

yes, but mordy says he wants it all on one thread with the weeks albums added to the thread title.

We can do whatever the majority of people want. I'm just balking at the idea of having 52 metal listening threads this year. We can start a new thread when this one starts having trouble loading, but we only have 308 posts right now. It shouldn't be too hard to ctrl+f the thread atm.

how about something like 5 weeks per thread, append the bands to the title when we hit the fifth week?

dunno. I don't really care too much either way, honestly.

I also like the idea of people being able to chat about previous bands in the thread that the current discussion is occurring in. I'm not into saying that because the week is over that means those albums are done for discussion.

How about changing the thread on the first monday of each month if people dont want to load full threads?

So I'm kinda digging the Cradle of Filth album so far. The guy's voice is distinctive (at the very least), but I actually think it suits the music (the dueling guitars, the gothy tone). I can't imagine really falling in love with this album -- it's not really my kind of music -- but it has its moments (really enjoyed "Absinthe with Faust," specifically, also "Gilded Cunt"). I guess this is the kind of music that The Used and My Chemical Romance got their shtick off of?

Changed the title.

Is Sarah Jezebel Deva the vocalist on Nymphetamine?

Nevermind, apparently it's Liv Kristine.

I hate to be this guy, but I don't hear any metal in HIM. I hear stuff like Thrice, or AFI, or The Used, and even like The Living End (one song actually sounded a lot like the Living End's "Read About It"), but def no metal in it.

i couldn't get past the 5th song, Sorry Glenn.

I listened to the whole thing. Mostly unmemorable to me, but if this had come out while I was in highschool I would've prob fallen for it big time. It sounds a lot like a lot of the music I was into in 11th grade.

listening to HIM now

Joined the party late, but I managed to listen to the Kyuss and Entombed this morning. Liked the Entombed quite a bit, the Kyuss not so much. I had not heard either before. I was already familiar with the Mastodon and love it. Listening to HIM now... hmm, not at all what I was expecting. Is this considered metal? I'm surprised.

No need to apologize, pfunkboy or anybody, but it's definitely more interesting if you try to say something descriptive about your listening experience, rather than just reporting when it ended!

I picked the HIM album as a deliberate compare-and-contrast to the Kyuss record from last week. Both are clearly in some borderland informed by metal, but maybe or maybe not metal themselves. But what determines this? Take HIM's "Shatter Me With Hope", for example. Crunchy, distorted guitars, stomping drums, some wailing lead bits, surging bass, empassioned and oft-breaking vocals. How is this not metal? Easy to point out particular kinds of metal it isn't, but how do you justify saying it's not metal at all? I don't mean that as a "how dare you?", but as a genuine inquiry. If you instinctively feel that this isn't metal, examine your instinct and see if you can explain what it arises from.

Likewise, how is "Disarm Me (With Your Loneliness)" not a classically structured metal power-ballad? How is it different, in nature, from Queensrÿche's "Silent Lucidity", say?

let's be straight for a sec--there is no way HIM would be considered metal if they were american, right?

this seems to essentially be mall-rock except these guys are total pros when it comes to writing hooks?

if there was anything remotely interesting about the production i could give this a positive review tbh

glenn, I guess I wonder by that measure (breaking voices, surging bass, crunchy guitars) that makes bands like Thursday, Thrice, Coheed + Cambria, My Chemical Romance, or The Used metal too. Obv genres are as useful as far as they help communicate, and I'm not trying to draw firm lines where this is metal and this isn't, but I wonder what the use is to call HIM metal when they seem to share a lot of commonalities with a band like Evanescence and less so with a band like Iron Maiden, or Black Sabbath (whether or not those are huge influences on them). And obv influences distill in weird ways and maybe in some ways a band like Thrice IS heavily influenced by metal. But what does it give us to call HIM metal outside making explicit that influence (that could otherwise be stated/acknowledged).

this actually seems to be of a piece with europe's boner for crunchy-but-melodic rock that i am tangentially familiar with, except it gets marketed to teenage girls too?

i'm on the 6th track--i mean, after a while you've reached your daily limit of sugary hooks, right?

Lacuna Coil-style

Turbonegro do it so so so much better

I was actually going to do Turbonegro - Apocalypse Dudes last week but I decided against it as I knew far too many would say it wasnt metal.

Wrapping up last week's right now with my 100th or so listen to Remission. Such an absolutely fantastic album and the first I turn to when I want Mastodon to pummel me instead of regaling me with prog tales of Rasputin and shit. "March of the Fire Ants", "Mother Puncher", "Ol'e Nessie", love 'em all.

I will give the HIM a fair shot, but I could never get the Spotify U.S. proxy thing to work right and it's not on Grooveshark, so unless I find another way I might skip it.

I guess the good news about weeks like this is that I don't have to worry someone will beat me to the albums I'm gonna pick.

it's on lala jon

actually that reminds me the fates warning is not on lala--any u.s. bros have any tips for hearing that?

Fates Warning is on Grooveshark.

Thanks for the lala tip.

ok word. will investigate.

"in the arms of rain" is my new favorite HIM track fyi

lol i'm probably gonna download that one track for the misc. section of my ipod

Seeing some of the band names tossed around, I guess I shouldn't be so dismissive of HIM. I mean, I have at one point or another heard and enjoyed album's by Thrice and Coheed and Cambria... so... glass houses and such.

i am liking it WAY more than i ever thought (tho it's still outside of something i would actually buy) so props glenn, i would have just ignorantly hated on this band without you.