Encyclopaedia Metallum: The Metal Archives :: View topic - Bands whose first album is their best

Darkthrone is a useless choice for this thread; it doesn't say anything at all about the band, just your genre preferences.

Vintersorrow wrote:

Setherial - Nord

Have to agree with this one. I really dig the atmosphere on Nord, sort of reminds me of In The Nightside Eclipse. But after.... just norsecore rubbish

Rild wrote:

Darkthrone is a useless choice for this thread; it doesn't say anything at all about the band, just your genre preferences.

Does it need to? I find the pure black metal albums to be quite boring to be perfectly honest; and yeah while Darkthrone being the band they are is all due to those albums, I still don't like them.

Also going to nominate Dismember and Entombed here, they've never topped their first albums far as I'm concerned. People who say Clandestine is better are deluded.

Cirith Ungol - Frost and Fire

Cirith Ungol - Frost and Fire
Tokyo Blade - s/t ( many nwobhm bands fall in this category)
Celtic Frost - Morbid Tales
Forest - s/t
Gorguts - Considered Dead
Morbid Angel - Altars of Madness
Reverend Bizarre - In the Rectory of the Bizarre Reverend
Annihilator - Alice in Hell

Rild wrote:

Darkthrone is a useless choice for this thread; it doesn't say anything at all about the band, just your genre preferences.

Pretty much, It just those people real into black metal who hate darkthrone's new stuff since theyve changed to a more heavy metal/punk type sound.

And for sure Death 'Scream Bloody Gore'

Success is the enemy of pure expression, which is not saying anything new but Metallica is exhibit A to make the point.

And for sure Death 'Scream Bloody Gore'

Epicus Doomicus Metallicus by Candlemass. Almost everything else they've released has been similarly excellent, but there's something about Epicus that makes it rise above even albums like Nightfall.

I also like Falconer's s/t debut better than anything they did after.

StillDeath wrote:

Success is the enemy of pure expression, which is not saying anything new but Metallica is exhibit A to make the point.

Bullshit point...

Are you saying that success has no influence on the band's music? Especially on Metallica's well known evolution as a band?

What do you guys think?

It's not very metal but....I'm tempted to say Guns N' Roses. Appetite for Destruction is arguably their best album, although personally I prefer Use your Illusion...after that though it was all fucking downhill.

Chinese Democracy really made me think that GNR should have gotten out good with a tragic plane crash or OD incident...

Suffocation - Effigy of the Forgotten
Morbid Angel - Altars of Madness
The Faceless - Akeldama
Deicide - Deicide
Gorguts - Considered Dead
Grave - Into the Grave
Animosity - Shut It Down
Decapitated - Winds of Creation
The Red Chord - Fused Together in Revolving Doors
Sinister - Cross the Styx
Entombed - Left Hand Path
Dio - Holy Diver

Zushakon wrote:

What do you guys think?

Most bands' first album is their best because it's the one they spend most time on creating, not thinking about how they're going to sell it, or explain it in interviews. They just make it. If they make it to the fourth album, they usually revisit the older material with new technical skills and come up with something more interesting but not as passionate.

I'll also second Exodus - Bonded by Blood... easily their best...

I guess they're a rather unpopular band around these circles, but All That Remains debut "Behind Silence and Solitude" was some serious excellent, slightly hardcore incluenced melodic death metal. But they went downhill after that... fast...

Author:	skwid79 [ Wed Feb 13, 2013 1:03 pm ]
Post subject:	Re: Bands whose first album is their best
Rild wrote: Darkthrone is a useless choice for this thread; it doesn't say anything at all about the band, just your genre preferences. Pretty much, It just those people real into black metal who hate darkthrone's new stuff since theyve changed to a more heavy metal/punk type sound.

Author:	metalfan55555 [ Wed Feb 13, 2013 5:55 pm ]
Post subject:	Re: Bands whose first album is their best
Agalloch - Pale Folklore Exodus - Bonded By Blood Mercyful Fate - Melissa Morbid Angel - Altars of Madness Vintersorg - Till Fjälls

Author:	Morrigan [ Thu Feb 14, 2013 4:56 pm ]
Post subject:	Re: Bands whose first album is their best
Lists are frowned upon here. You might want to put some more thought in your post.

Author:	Jackoroth [ Thu Feb 14, 2013 5:25 pm ]
Post subject:	Re: Bands whose first album is their best
Angel Witch's S/T, as much as they try to out do that, they'll never even scrape the surface. It's a NWOBHM classic and they are more or less a touring band now.

Author:	Erosion of Humanity [ Thu Feb 14, 2013 10:38 pm ]
Post subject:	Re: Bands whose first album is their best
I would have to say Sanctifica for sure. Now they only had two releases but the difference between them is huge to say the least, on the first CD, Spirit of Purity they play a really good Black/Death metal that is just relentless. Then on Negative B they switch to I don't even really know, it's listed as Avant-garde Death Metal but its just nothing compared to the first Cd. Albeit there is a few good tracks but it just fails in comparison to Spirit of Purity. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aWuuKfIOmYA Spirit of Purity from Spirit of Purity. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Es8-rBn_wJw Lavender from Negative B

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Author:	GuardAwakening [ Tue Feb 26, 2013 5:42 am ]
Post subject:	Re: Bands whose first album is their best
Oddly enough, I constantly found myself saying that some bands are their best on their debuts. Whitechapel's first album is easily their best and is forever a part of my teenage years. I've heard that record more than 80 times. Also not to mention the first time I listened to Nile around the time at when I was 15, their first album Amongst the Catacombs of Nephren-Ka, I've said numerous times is their best one and they still have never surpassed it. Something about its ambiance or something just easily makes it their best record, not to mention it's about 40 times more brutal to my ears than anything they've done since. Heck I could go on; Ingested, Pathology, Sepultura, Meshuggah, Suffokate, Mololov Solution, Mercyful Fate Periphery and Impending Doom are all easily the best on their first full-lengths. And I would also say the same for Opeth considering Orchid is such an amazing and almost perfect record.... but due to the fact that they later released an album titled My Arms, Your Hearse years afterward, I can't.

Author:	gravemaster [ Tue Feb 26, 2013 5:50 am ]
Post subject:	Re: Bands whose first album is their best
king of asgard- fi'mbulwintr

Author:	shwartzheim [ Tue Feb 26, 2013 6:05 am ]
Post subject:	Re: Bands whose first album is their best
LifeDemise wrote: Vintersorrow wrote: Setherial - Nord Have to agree with this one. I really dig the atmosphere on Nord, sort of reminds me of In The Nightside Eclipse. But after.... just norsecore rubbish Also agree. Hircine wrote: Rild wrote: Darkthrone is a useless choice for this thread; it doesn't say anything at all about the band, just your genre preferences. Does it need to? I find the pure black metal albums to be quite boring to be perfectly honest; and yeah while Darkthrone being the band they are is all due to those albums, I still don't like them. Also going to nominate Dismember and Entombed here, they've never topped their first albums far as I'm concerned. People who say Clandestine is better are deluded. Yes I am deluded but that doesn't change the fact that Clandestine is better than Left Hand Path and is my pick for greatest DM album of all time.

Author:	severzhavnost [ Wed Feb 27, 2013 4:08 pm ]
Post subject:	Re: Bands whose first album is their best
Cirith Ungol - Frost and Fire Tokyo Blade - s/t ( many nwobhm bands fall in this category) Celtic Frost - Morbid Tales Forest - s/t Gorguts - Considered Dead Morbid Angel - Altars of Madness Reverend Bizarre - In the Rectory of the Bizarre Reverend Annihilator - Alice in Hell

Author:	inhumanist [ Wed Feb 27, 2013 7:57 pm ]
Post subject:	Re: Bands whose first album is their best
severzhavnost wrote: Cirith Ungol - Frost and Fire WHAT? Really? How come?

Author:	Oxenkiller [ Wed Feb 27, 2013 8:40 pm ]
Post subject:	Re: Bands whose first album is their best
severzhavnost wrote: Cirith Ungol - Frost and Fire Tokyo Blade - s/t ( many nwobhm bands fall in this category) Celtic Frost - Morbid Tales Forest - s/t Gorguts - Considered Dead Morbid Angel - Altars of Madness Reverend Bizarre - In the Rectory of the Bizarre Reverend Annihilator - Alice in Hell Cirith Ungol- "Frost and Fire" had that great progressive rock/Rush feel to it which I really dug. Early heavy rock with that sense of adventure and exiting feel to it. So I like it the best, but that may be because I was a big Rush fan at the time. Their other stuff was more "HEAVY METAL" and still good in it's own way, so I can't say if it was truely better or worse. Tokyo Blade- Good point; I agree that MANY but not all NWOBHM bands fall into the category of their first being their best. A lot of them seemed to succomb to the pressure to "DefLeppardize" their sound, i.e. become more commercial and have more songs about love and women and partying n' shit. I thoght "To Mega Therion" was the definitive Celtic Frost release but that is in no way a disrespect to "Morbid Tales." Forest I'm not familiar with, and Gorguts were good but fairly standard death metal that blended in with all the other similar releases of that time period. So even if their first album may have been their best, it wasnt really good enough to stand out among the rest of the bands from that era such as... ....Morbid Angel, whose debut album was, I agree, their best. Faster, thrashier, angrier and more vicious than their later albums, which tended to focus more on heaviness and atmosphere. I like pretty much every record Reverend Bizarre has done, but find that all their albums have songs that tend to drag, while others soar to levels of epic greatness. That's true of the debut and honestly, it's a common pitfall of bands that play that style of down-tempo, epic heavy metal. Annihilator- probably yeah, I'd agree there, too. A lot of their stuff just sounds bland and processed to me but that's just me being jaded.

Author:	shwartzheim [ Wed Feb 27, 2013 9:43 pm ]
Post subject:	Re: Bands whose first album is their best
Borknagar. Lost interest pretty much straight after.

Author:	Dark_Gnat [ Tue Mar 26, 2013 10:57 pm ]
Post subject:	Re: Bands whose first album is their best
skwid79 wrote: Rild wrote: Darkthrone is a useless choice for this thread; it doesn't say anything at all about the band, just your genre preferences. Pretty much, It just those people real into black metal who hate darkthrone's new stuff since theyve changed to a more heavy metal/punk type sound. Actually, I was thinking of Soulside Journey. It's far too often overlooked in favor of their blackmetal phase.

Author:	BreedingtheSpawn [ Tue Mar 26, 2013 11:37 pm ]
Post subject:	Re: Bands whose first album is their best
Sacramentum's first album Far Away from the Sun.

Author:	Celtic Frosted Flakes [ Sun Mar 31, 2013 2:46 pm ]
Post subject:	Re: Bands whose first album is their best
Exodus, Candlemass, Dimmu Borgir, Entombed, Burzum, Mayhem (Deathcrush), And I am tempted to say Megadeth but Rust in Peace is just so brilliant. EDIT: Bathory and Slayer, also.

Author:	katatonia47 [ Wed Mar 27, 2013 2:03 am ]
Post subject:	Re: Bands whose first album is their best
I'm not sure if anyone else has said this, but I'm gonna go with Peste Noire. The riffs on that album speak for themselves.

Author:	The Lions Den [ Wed Mar 27, 2013 4:12 am ]
Post subject:	Re: Bands whose first album is their best
Deicide debut it's the first who came in mind.

Author:	MetalHealth30 [ Wed Mar 27, 2013 9:50 pm ]
Post subject:	Re: Bands whose first album is their best
Ensiferum came to mind. Not in a landslide but it's the album that I enjoy the most.

Author:	maidenpriestmanic [ Wed Mar 27, 2013 11:57 pm ]
Post subject:	Re: Bands whose first album is their best
Lets see, Death Angel, Helloween, Stratovarius, Slayer, Emperor, Testament, Exodus, Angel Witch, Opeth, Angra, and Diamond head are all bands who I think there first albums is their best, they all had amazing debuts, though some of them I only like their debut but thats only some of them.

Author:	gestapothrash [ Thu Mar 28, 2013 12:40 am ]
Post subject:	Re: Bands whose first album is their best
Iron Maiden Their debut is by far their rawest, hardest and no-bullshit record that gives me a particular "put on my boots and stomp some holes in the wall" feeling that I just can't achieve with anything else they did

Author:	The Lions Den [ Thu Mar 28, 2013 5:48 am ]
Post subject:	Re: Bands whose first album is their best
And for sure Death 'Scream Bloody Gore'

Author:	Peroy [ Thu Mar 28, 2013 6:08 am ]
Post subject:	Re: Bands whose first album is their best
The Lions Den wrote: And for sure Death 'Scream Bloody Gore' For sure not, as Leprosy would like to have a word with that...

Author:	Peroy [ Thu Mar 28, 2013 7:06 am ]
Post subject:	Re: Bands whose first album is their best
I'll also second Exodus - Bonded by Blood... easily their best... I guess they're a rather unpopular band around these circles, but All That Remains debut "Behind Silence and Solitude" was some serious excellent, slightly hardcore incluenced melodic death metal. But they went downhill after that... fast...

Author:	StillDeath [ Thu Mar 28, 2013 8:19 am ]
Post subject:	Re: Bands whose first album is their best
Metallica's debut is an unassuming proclamation of a new genre. But besides that, the cover art is their best. The individual songs are their best, they bring a destructive attitude which has been toned down in later albums. Their most genuine album, this is Metallica putting out the songs they gambled their youth on to play, nothing else, and for the last time nothing more. Success is the enemy of pure expression, which is not saying anything new but Metallica is exhibit A to make the point.

Author:	Peroy [ Thu Mar 28, 2013 8:33 am ]
Post subject:	Re: Bands whose first album is their best
StillDeath wrote: Success is the enemy of pure expression, which is not saying anything new but Metallica is exhibit A to make the point. Bullshit point...

Author:	Misfit74 [ Thu Mar 28, 2013 7:00 pm ]
Post subject:	Re: Bands whose first album is their best
The Lions Den wrote: And for sure Death 'Scream Bloody Gore' That's my favorite of theirs, as well.

Author:	Cloud0129 [ Thu Mar 28, 2013 10:33 pm ]
Post subject:	Re: Bands whose first album is their best
Effigy of the Forgotten by Suffocation. Franks is at his best on that album. Plus, the raw, grim production made the album much heavier.

Author:	Ancient_Mariner [ Thu Mar 28, 2013 10:55 pm ]
Post subject:	Re: Bands whose first album is their best
Subrick wrote: Epicus Doomicus Metallicus by Candlemass. Almost everything else they've released has been similarly excellent, but there's something about Epicus that makes it rise above even albums like Nightfall. Yep. Its just got a Doom vibe I've never heard matched.

Author:	Menternor [ Thu Mar 28, 2013 11:28 pm ]
Post subject:	Re: Bands whose first album is their best
I feel pretty alone when I think most bands' first album isn't their best... Omen is one of the exceptions. The raw production combined with songs crammed full with really reallly fine riffs made every subsequent release to be slightly dissapointing, even if they still had good stuff. I also like Falconer's s/t debut better than anything they did after. It's the heaviest album by them I have listened with Blad on vocals, whom I vastly prefer, plus the riffs were never as infectious and catchy in subsequent releases, even though I think the follow-up is very close in quality. Hmm...I can't think of any other band whose debut I prefer over the rest of their discography and has more than 3 albums right now. It's kind of late...must be that.

Author:	Peroy [ Fri Mar 29, 2013 12:32 am ]
Post subject:	Re: Bands whose first album is their best
Menternor wrote: I also like Falconer's s/t debut better than anything they did after. Oh, yes, that one skipped my mind. Seconded (though I like Falconer's other stuff, too, but the debut was the best).

Author:	StillDeath [ Fri Mar 29, 2013 6:02 am ]
Post subject:	Re: Bands whose first album is their best
Peroy wrote: StillDeath wrote: Success is the enemy of pure expression, which is not saying anything new but Metallica is exhibit A to make the point. Bullshit point... Are you saying that success has no influence on the band's music? Especially on Metallica's well known evolution as a band?

Author:	Peroy [ Fri Mar 29, 2013 6:17 am ]
Post subject:	Re: Bands whose first album is their best
StillDeath wrote: Are you saying that success has no influence on the band's music? Especially on Metallica's well known evolution as a band? It's certainly not THE enemy...

Author:	LanceCriminal [ Sun Mar 31, 2013 8:27 am ]
Post subject:	Re: Bands whose first album is their best
It's not very metal but....I'm tempted to say Guns N' Roses. Appetite for Destruction is arguably their best album, although personally I prefer Use your Illusion...after that though it was all fucking downhill. Chinese Democracy really made me think that GNR should have gotten out good with a tragic plane crash or OD incident...

Author:	Conservationism [ Sun Mar 31, 2013 9:00 am ]
Post subject:	Re: Bands whose first album is their best
Zushakon wrote: What do you guys think? Most bands' first album is their best because it's the one they spend most time on creating, not thinking about how they're going to sell it, or explain it in interviews. They just make it. If they make it to the fourth album, they usually revisit the older material with new technical skills and come up with something more interesting but not as passionate.

Author:	~Guest 183305 [ Sun Mar 31, 2013 9:44 am ]
Post subject:	Re: Bands whose first album is their best
LanceCriminal wrote: It's not very metal but....I'm tempted to say Guns N' Roses. Appetite for Destruction is arguably their best album, although personally I prefer Use your Illusion...after that though it was all fucking downhill. Chinese Democracy really made me think that GNR should have gotten out good with a tragic plane crash or OD incident... Agree with you completely. Chinese Democracy is an album not worthy of the .99 cent bin. It's a sad testament for a band that had a lot of potential. They fizzled out as fast as they got huge. Although Chinese Democracy is really just W. Axl Rose and a bunch of hired guns. Its right up there with Belladonna's - Spells of Fear on the "makes a cooler beer coaster" list.