This is how I feel about lots of symphonic power metal bands. They cram so much artificial sounding stuff that it becomes a chore to sit through it. I can point to Rhapsody, whose first few I like. Some of their stuff though just sounds ways too overblown, as do their peers.

I'll extend this to 1998 and agree. But for me, it's partly because I just don't find the songwriting all that good. There are a handful of gems (most of them on NIME, but some on ANATO), but compare to the old stuff, it isn't as memorable or interesting. The only exception is their newest album, which took many listens to click but I do actually like better than anything else since Imaginations.

St. Anger rightfully has a reputation of being nearly impossible to get through. All their other "bad albums" are bloated/overlong with weak songs and too much repetition, but they all still remain somewhat engaging enough to at least listen to them from start to end. St. Anger is an album I think isn't actually that bad for the first couple of songs, but the fact that song after song after songs the songs are so much alike, and the ideas contained within them are so much alike, it just exercises your patience to the maximum at some point.

Oddly enough I agree completely with you. That almost never happens with the two of us.

Hardwired, Death Magnetic, and St. Anger, are for me, briefly "engaging", but how can I put it; they're like "diet coke", left open for a month, and a cats pissed in it. That probably applies to the Load series as well. I don't know what's worse; St. Anger or Hardwired.

One trick ponies can be hard to get through because they can get boring real quickly. I either change bands or hope that the band experiments a little bit on future album.

I haven't heard Hardwired (and I doubt I'll bother) but I can't imagine it being WORSE than st anger. that was one of the worst pieces of shit I've ever heard! Utterly, 100% terrible.

'St. Anger' was odd, but it felt more genuine than their last two albums, thought Metallica was playing something they really enjoy. And not just pandering. Death Magnetic was so utterly bland, it was like they were cranking out riffs from a machine. Anyway, tastes are always subjective.

the problem with metallica is that every modern album is four hours long. it's fucking ridiculous. as far as stuff or me, anything by Jute Gyte takes a really long time to get into - when your most "accessible" album is an album like Old Ways you're playing with fire.

This has been just noise to me so far & I'm into some weird stuff. Challenge accepted it seems.

I still don't like that new Deathspell Omega album, I tried it many times and usually can't make it through the whole thing. I prefer something like this that actually has riffs

Cultes Des Ghoules is another band that I like, but have never been as excited about as some people. Some of the songs just feel like i'm waiting around forever.

Acherontas, even less known, but everytime I try it I end up skipping songs trying to find something good.

edit: oh and Nightbringer too, their last album was a lot better and hopefully the new one finally gets me hooked.

It took me, what, at least a little more than a year to get into Severed Survival? Thought it was horribly un-heavy, the riffs were forgettable, the drumming annoying and the vocals were like a poor attempt at imitating John Tardy. Yet near the end of last year everything started to make sense and now I love it. I actually prefer it to Mental Funeral now.

good luck! I've listened to literally every album so if you want recs lemme know.

Sure! *lets you know*

uhh ok JUTE GYTE RANKINGS IN NO ORDER:

Old Ways
Ship of Theseus
Verstiegenheit
Young Eagle
Impermanence

for ambient/noise stuff

Ghost Sickness
Andreyev's "Lazarus"
Noctis Labyrinthus
Dialectics

I'll get back to you after a while. Thanks a bunch!

Man, the last three Opeth albums were extremely difficult for me to get through (Heritage, Pale Communion, Sorceress). I'm sure all of you have heard this before. I've always really liked Opeth, and I appreciate the new direction they went in, but pre-Heritage it was easier to sit through 7-11 minute songs because they switched flavors throughout the composition (prog death metal parts going into acoustic interludes going into prog-rock keyboard parts etc.) Now it's straight up Yes-influenced prog rock. And there's nothing wrong with that, they do it well and still put an Opeth twist on it, but if I'm going to listen to that sort of prog I'm going to listen to Jethro Tull, Camel or even Paladin. Opeth is still figuring it out I feel.

Portal took me a long time to get into. My friend started me out with their album Swarth. I absolutely fucking hated it at first and thought it was nothing but cacophonous dribble, but after many listens to Swarth and Outre I get the inhuman feel they're trying to convey and now I think it's almost genius. It sounds like metal from a completely different realm, nothing a mere mortal could ever conjure, Outre especially. It's not supposed to make sense to humans.

Speaking of Metallica, their double album S&M was impossible for me to sit through. To this day I still can't stand it. Michael Kamen was a super talented guy and I enjoy some of the soundtracks he did, but I don't know what he or the band were thinking here. The orchestra parts often are doing something completely different than Metallica's songs and it's totally jarring. Especially during the heavy songs. It's as if you're hearing two different songs going on at once and I just don't understand how either party thought it worked. If that wasn't bad enough, then they make it a live album that's not even mixed that well. I just hate it. I'd probably rather sit through St. Anger than hear S&M again.

85% of japanese metal. You'll see a vid on youtube and you are like: " Hmm, sounds cool, need to check them out". The next song is the complete opposite of the song you liked. I do understand the will / need to experiment, but when you are a power metal band, don't act like a hardrock band in another song and a poppy metal band in again another song. Try to be more cohesive. Strangely enough i really enjoy avant-garde bands ( diablo swing orchestra and the likes) but with these bands you KNOW to expect strange things in their music. I don' WANT this in a power metal band.

Anything that has a metal-core vibe, or melodic death metal bands that are too melodic to sound heavy. A lot of that stuff is weird for me because on one hand I still like it, it's fucking loud and there's guitars and shit. But on the other hand I can't stand that whiny -core shit. So hard for me to get through but I still can get down if someone puts on Unearth or God Forbid or some shit.

Also, Pantera, listening to them is like agony bringing back memories of a fucked up time in my life.

Unearth is the shit, if there is one metalcore band I'd rec anyone it would be them. Imho they never got the recognition that they deserved. No whiny cleans or radio friendly bs, amazing guitar work; driving & aggressive yet still melodic, fast thrash metal tempi with occasional blastbeats, great albums after album etc., the point being they are one of the best bands modern metalcore has to offer. /fanboy

Reverend Bizarre is hard to get into because of their neverending songs with that are generally really slow with a few interesting moments. That doesn't mean their music is bad by any means but when you get to So Long Suckers, you have to wonder if you can handle all those 2+ hours of their music.

So Long Suckers is decidedly padded out.
I always felt the first album and the Harbinger EP were their best releases.

This band has never clicked with. I get what they're doing. I'm just not blown away by it.

I enjoyed them from the start. However I always preferred his other group Paysage d'Hiver much more.

I love Ion Dissonance right now, but it took a lot of time to understand their acid/core/grind/brutal/crust and so on unique style of music.
Same goes for Portal, it's always a pleasure to play them but at the same time it's disturbing today like in the past

Ever heard of Swarþ? Well, to me their music is fascinating yet very hard to understand. I'm totally into their music right now, I hope the price for their first EP diminishes a little, I'd like to buy it

that said, the biggest difficult albums for me to start loving were "scum" and "from enslavement to obliteration" by Napalm Death, and "Reek of putrefaction" by Carcass too: I wasn't into metal since a long time in this distant past, I mainly listened to thrash and some death metal but I had been recommended of these revolutionary albums, bought them and seriously thought about selling them, to me they were untolerable. But as times passed by, I am very happy I never sold them. They are still a fist (well, a hard fist) in the face after all these years!

Khanate is number one on this subject for me. I HATED their first album with a passion, or so I thought. Maybe it was subconscious but I kept revisiting that album from time to time for some reason until it finally clicked one day, now they are one of my favorite bands ever, R.I.P.

My Dying Bride are also one of my favorites and every single one of their albums took me quite a few listens before I understood them. The lyrics tell a story of course but so does their music and the more I got to know the songs/albums the more rewarding it became.

seriously a revolutionary, unique and amazing album, but I can see why it's hard to appreciate fully at once. to all the scum connoisseurs: side A or B? tough question in my book.

Portal and Meshuggah for me. Only got through them when the right click came. Don't know how to explain.

A, if only for the production. Best thing in grindcore history, nothing comes close for me, unfortunately, outside of goregrind.

Definitely Meshuggah. Couldn't understand it when they first appeared and it really took some time to interiorize that shit.

I agree, A side is...well... more of a wall of sound. But it is so short that it's a record you listen all at once without gasping for air. The thunder's sound just after the lightning.

V8 - Luchando por el metal.

I saw it comes out often on NWN store and seems pretty weird that is just rare to find this type on metal enlisted, but since there is no information about its version and I was too lazy to ask, it just went away and besides the discogs and ebay overpriced I hadn't seen it on another place.

I think in some cases does not match the band music/content or aesthetic and is just pushed to pretend to be "True", with this been told, I really don't care if the band have a shitty or overproduced make up if they are playing some decent BM.