Rime of The Ancient Mariner is one of the best metal songs ever, but it would be better without that sleep-inducing ambient interlude.
The moment with acoustic guitars on Annihilator's Stonewall when the vocalist sings "it's time to listen, blahblahblah, it's time to listen". Sounds like something that came out of Picnic of Love.
And of course, that part on Diamond Head's Sucking My Love.

Non metal - the moment when weird random noises pop in in Blue Oyster Cult's Joan Crawford.

Disagree about Rime of the Ancient Mariner. That interlude really fits the feeling of the song, about being resigned to an unending cursed existence that makes the character tired of life.

The sing-along part toward the end of Mastodon's "Aunt Lisa" is so incredibly cringe worthy to me. Kills it.

The "Zeig Heil!" gang shouts in Flotsam & Jetsam's Der Führer shouldn't bother me since I know the song is not pro-nazi whatsoever, but I can't put the song on a shuffle since I just know it's inevitable that at work a bunch of co-workers would waltz into my lab just before that part kicks in. It's kind of an obnoxious inclusion anyway.

This actually happened to a fellow co-worker, who was listening to Floyd's The Wall when some young minorities (who never heard the album) walked in during the "Get 'em up against the wall!" part of In the Flesh, and they weren't amused. He tried to explain to them "It's a narrative story ark of a concept album! The band is against racism!"
Their response: "Yeah sure...enjoy your music" with a snarly tone.
Of course, no one else roamed in during the rest of the album.

Wanderlust does take an odd turn, but I don't think it ruins the song.

There is not a single second wrong with My Selene.


My contribution to the thread is Tiamat's Evilized. The blues breakdown is just so out of place.

Also those stupid acoustic intro/outro parts of every Iron Maiden song after 2003.

Yes, some of those recent IM intros are quite pointless. I think The Red and the Black just rules (the best song on the album), but those shouts in the middle of it seem so forced. "Stupid crowd, you sing along now."

The stop-start part of Paradise Lost "Falling Forever" followed by an unforgivably happy/bouncy riff at 01:00 just ruins this song for me.



And fully agreed about those spoken-word parts on the first Resurrection album. You really have to suffer through a few of them which seem to go on forever. It's the one thing that keeps me from buying that album on vinyl, since I can't easily skip past them.

No kidding! I love that part. Some serious ambience for metal in 1984. It struck me really hard when I first heard it at age 15. Not only is the ambience great and totally fitting, but it allows time for someone (Bruce?) to whisper out some of the Coleridge poem, which (putting aside the godly message) is some really eerie, sinister stuff. Sure, it might not be Richard Burton reciting or whatever, but it's still awesome.

I'm fine with the way Beauty of the Beast ends, but I will agree 100% on Song of Myself. I just skip the rest after 7 minutes because there is no point in continuing with it after that. I would also make the same case for Poet and the Pendulum going real strong up until the end when it takes a very slow, drawn out turn for the worst. I just pretend that the ending doesn't exist.