Cheers man. Unfortunately, "I never knew you could shape excrement into this form" doesn't fit in the review title bar But yeah, that one's probably too long and rambling if I'm honest. Working on a couple more reviews now.

Just a plain and simple "No" fit so well for that pile of crap album.

I'm looking forward to them! Strangely your writing style seems pretty close to my old review writing, just a lot more thought-out and more polished and . . . well yeah. Any hints on what's coming down the pipe?

I've got three but they're all pretty fragmentary - Serenity's War of Ages, Metalforce's s/t and Blood Stain Child's Idolator. Not sure what scores to give yet, but I really like War of Ages and the other two are pretty middling.

Tony's Borrowed Time review is a good read. Bashing Detroit is something I am not fond of, but the Lidstrom reference was great, put a smile on my face. Also, the Lions aren't good.

Sweet review though, Borrowed Time is rad.

Haha thanks man! Not a fan of football, I asked Nightgaunt and Failsafeman about the Lions and they told they weren't bad (their record this year is 6-5 so I guess that's not abysmal). I'm currently on a forced break since I'm busy with school but I'll be back in mid December with 5 or 10 reviews including my 100th!

http://www.metal-archives.com/reviews/R ... lotreblame

Really dug Blunchblackofblotreblame's first review (that's an awesome screenname btw) of the new Rhapsody album. An interesting re-contextualization of the band for me what with the conjecture about the two lead songwriters' differing styles.

Came here to say the same thing. Damn good review. His description of Rhapsody's sound is perfect.

Colour me interested in seeing more reviews from him in the future. His style is analytical without being dry and intelligent without being full of himself.

I don't know how I ended up reading a Skylark review, of all the things in the world, but this one was actually one of the most enjoyable readings I've had in a long time. Way to bash an idol with style.

http://www.metal-archives.com/reviews/S ... ht/390455/

Saw TrooperofSteel's review for Crescent Shield's The Stars of Never Seen, and while it's not awful (apart from the fact that the guy has awful taste), this statement in particular was a head-scratcher:



Lack aggression, emotion and conviction? Hardly any guitar solos? Are we listening to the same album? Also, how does he see causality between the two? If you don't have aggression or emotion you're automatically going to lower the number of guitar solos? Doesn't make a lot of sense to me.

I have to admit, as much as I fucking hate that band and never agree with anything Metal_Grail says, that's a good review, you're right.

I love Skylark bashing, but that review doesn't describe the music much. You can argue that for a compilation that may not be the most necessary prerequisite, but for a review on this site it probably should be. I should edit that note about the album being "All tracks were re-recorded." if that's false.

It's a funny little commentary about the nature of the compilation, but it doesn't give me even the vaguest idea of what the music sounds like.

I know what the rules are for reviews, the musical description and all, but are those actually necessary for a compilation with (apparently) no new material? If it had new or unreleased material that wasn't present any place else I'd say describe it, but I don't think a compilation without any new material needs much musical description at all. But then again I don't make the rules, although I think these cases could very well be exceptions to the rule.

This is the reason I accepted it. It's a well articulated bashing of a group he likes. It's not really about what the music is, it's about what it isn't in this case.

'Bout time someone reviewed Virgin Sails. Good work, Jesuscop.

Thanks! I was trying to finish up some of my top 20 albums for the year and that one definitely needed some love.

Anyone else confused as hell by Metal_Thrasher 90's "Every classic rock album gets 100, except Thin Lizzy's discography, all of which gets below a 75 for no reason" rating system?

Especially Crazy World. That is one of my least favorite Scorpions albums of all time.

Not to mention Thin Lizzy's better than most classic rock, in my opinion. I really, really think (and I've said it before) that people with ludicrous rating systems like that, which are based solely on some kind of personal vendetta against a band/genre, shouldn't get their stuff published, but oh well, that's why I'm not a mod.

Not really, he's a "thrasher" born in 1990 who writes boring walls of text and is clearly in love with a couple bands but has a pretty narrow range of stuff that he actually cares about. His 100% reviews include eight for Raven, seven for Deep Purple, four for Scorpions, and four others for three bands. I suppose I do agree with your point, I'm just not confused because it seems that he has a narrow view and little credibility.

I'm more impressed that he's done 25 reviews (out of 127) for a band he clearly doesn't care for, surely after a dozen you'd think you'd have covered your gripes pretty well.

Oh I get that much, it's just such a strange way to be narrow minded. I'd expect someone like that to give 100s to Darkness Descends, Morbid Saint, Demolition Hammer and maybe some old Priest and Maiden albums, but he tries to present himself as an old school classic rocker. The very specific thing he has against Thin Lizzy is the confusing part to me. It's like you could take the same ratings and gripes and apply them to any other classic rock band and have it totally fit; just change the band name and song titles. Like he picked a band at random to criticize because, hey, he doesn't want to be TOO positive.

Total "shit" count for lord_ghengis's new Agalloch review: 11. Good review, despite the ass-backwards opinion on the album.

Hey the review is like 2700 words long, so my shit-to-general-content ratio isn't too different to normal haha.

I stopped reading when I got to this line, because nothing can top that line. Holy shit, that line alone would have earned 8 points from me.

That recent Finsterforst review. The guy disqualifies the band because of Moonsorrow worship down to 40%. Really? They did it better than Moonsorrow themselves.

My favorite review in a while now.

I just read KFD's review of Lugubrum's De Vette Cuecken and I'm surprised. I never felt that the album's production was a major issue against it, other than when I first tried listening to it in a car on the highway and it was too hissy but that happens to a fair amount of music for me. I really like the album, a lot, so clearly I also disagree with the overall assessment, but it was still nice to read another take. I'll give it another spin while focusing on the drumming to see how I feel about the "boring" comment.

http://www.metal-archives.com/reviews/Lugubrum/De_Vette_Cuecken/40836/KFD

You know, I don't get the new !T.O.O.H.! review... The band removes every aspect that made them sound like they did, so they must clearly sound different now, but the songwriting style is still the same as before, so they must clearly sound the same now, just different. Is that it?! Wait, but they're just playing "abstract progressive rock", so it mustn't sound like the band I know right? On the other hand it's just your old acquainted band without the guitar distortion, "manual drumming" and demented vocal technique. So what, at heart !T.O.O.H.! have never been metal?!

I know I'm blowing this out of proportion but that review reads way too much as a fanboy's apologetic statement of confidence in the band's value. "No sir, they can't fuck up. They just do it so differently but in the end it sounds just like them. But different.". And when that's not enough the trump card is the "open-minded argument"? On a !T.O.O.H.! review, seriously? Who other than "open minded" people actually listens to that damn band?

I will say, that has got to be the most confusing (or not, maybe, I don't know) attempt to defend a band I've witnessed in a long time.

I was trying to be kind of tongue-in-cheek about the "open-minded" thing because I realized while writing the review how annoying my point must have sounded so I just sarcastically ran with it. My basic point was that it's obviously a !T.O.O.H.! album in terms of melodies, build-ups, and mood but in a brand new set of skin in the form of the guitar tone, drumming and vocals; and while I understand why it was a disappointment to most people, I think it turned off at least a few more people than it probably should have considering the core of the music is still intact.

Also: I don't think anybody would attempt to argue that bands and albums on the borderlines of the metal/rock dichotomy become significantly less metal once the guitar tone is swapped out. If Ghost's guitar tone were heavier, their metal influence would be called into question maybe 10% as often as people do now.

My head is so fucked up right now that I can't seem to voice a proper response. I'll still try though. You made me listen to Democratic Solution again, and I hate you for that!

Anyway, I know you probably weren't playing it serious with the "open minded" statement. But the fact is that if you read the review from an outsider's point of view you just can't tell if you're being sarcastic or not. You lead a very ambiguous speech all the time and you leave it for the reader to decide on which end you sit. The same ambiguous duality is present in the whole "they still sound like !T.O.O.H.! but not anymore", which again I say makes it sound even more awkward. As if you were constantly agreeing with yourself and contradicting yourself at the same time. It's not that I don't actually agree with much of what you said, since I've listened to it again for nearly 20 minutes (gah...) and I can see your point. But the way you put it forth makes it very confusing for the reader. That's actually why the review reads as a confusing mess to me. It has more to do with how you expressed your point of view towards the album rather than the POV itself.

I think I may be feverish now... I hate being sick... Let me know if what I wrote makes any sense whatsoever.

I can see what you mean now, yes. I guess it's kind of hard to put what I meant into words that make sense, and the fact that I wrote that review in two separate sessions probably didn't help. I wrote the first half of it while extremely exhausted, so I guess I was just sort of rambling on without thinking about the connotations of my words. I'll go back to that review in just a second and try to polish up the wording I used so it's a bit less myopic. Thanks for pointing that out.

I know what you mean. It's like right now, I'm trying to write a decent sentence when all I can think is "BED".

Finally finished my series of Disfiguring the Goddess reviews. Honestly, I don't know how you guys manage the endurance to get through a band's entire discography like that; writing just six thoroughly pooped me out. Thank god most of the bands I choose to review are young and haven't had time to churn out a dozen full-lengths yet...

...Someone needs to pick up the slack for Senmuth after ConorFynes got bored.

I dunno, I got bored after listening to about 1/2 of his discography so I can imagine any reviewer would go insane trying to review all of it. It's all largely pretty good, but I can't imagine there's much to be said after the 30th album or so.

He's only had about 4 or 5 good albums post-2010, anyway.

That said, his 2014 album is apparently industrial metal with vocals, which he hasn't done in quite a while (2009, I think?) Excited to see how it turns out.

http://www.metal-archives.com/albums/Go ... _Hell/2333

I can understand giving low ratings for the remake of Under The Sign of Hell just because what an incredible display of squandered greatness it is. Giving the good old, original UTSOH that kind of a score, apparently because the snare is too loud and the vocals are bad, could be understandable from someone who isn't particularly into black metal, but this guy claims to be a black metal fan. I could understand criticism of the album by a black metal fan if said person had perfectly valid reasoning (though obviously, from my point of view, that would make that person's taste rather questionable), but for a self-claimed black metal fan, those are some of the worst reasons I've heard.




Now I get it.