I was pretty floored when I saw this drum solo for the first time…. I think I may have actually peed a little. Stevie is an incredible drummer. Several times throughout this solo Stevie bursts into raw death metal blast beats!!! Talk about a talented man
Link fixed… use this one: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4SCZv7786KY
Pure brutality from none other than Bert and Ernie! The music is by goregrind band Last Days Of Humanity, and the song is “A Divine Proclamation To End The Present Existence” from their 2006 release entitled “Putrefaction In Progress”… SICK!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Some folks emailed me with suggestions . Although these albums don’t compare to those in my original Best Metal Albums of 2007 post, they certainly warrant being mentioned here.
Job for a Cowboy - Genesis
Jesu - Conqueror
Dysrhythmia - Barriers and Passages (technically released in 2006, but the Vinyl LP came out in 2007 so there 
O hai Hevy Devy! I love you. Not in a homosexual way, or some creepy stalker way. Nay, I would defend thee against a thousand creepy stalkers, and if homosexuals weren’t so merry and non-threatening I would surely ward off the short shorts, glitter, dance music, and sexual acts that are technically illegal in my home state of Virginia (yeah, I’m serious, it’s illegal here, even for the opposite sex to enjoy).
I can’t stop listening to your music. It’s a problem. Seriously. My wife constantly protests “MastaG, pleeeeeeeeease, I can’t listen to another over-the-top operatic metal album about a 4th dimensional alien who wishes to consume the entirety of the Earth’s coffee supply.” I return with “WHAT?! We’ve only listened to Ziltoid the Omniscient five times on this car trip, and I need at least twelve repeats of this CD before I can even consider listening to the next Devin Townsend album,” and then she usually counterblasts something like “Ok, MastaG, I’m going to make this perfectly clear; I will suffocate you in your sleep if I have to listen to one more double kick drum.” Then I usually switch to Terria or Ocean Machine-Biomech because she can actually endure those albums without contemplating murdering me in some horrible fashion.
In fall of 2006, you and your wife were blessed with a son! Allow me to offer my congratulations on your first born! You will surely be awesome parents. Understandably, you quit touring to spend time with your family. It was the noblest course of action any new father could have made.
Despite quitting live shows, you released a solo album entitled Ziltoid The Omniscient, which was recorded and produced in your basement, and you used software called The Drum Kit From Hell for percussion (the “drums” sounded awesome, by the way). This hilarious yet heavy and harmonic metal album merely acted further as causation for the adoration I feel towards your music, and has thus enraged my wife by rehearing the same album over, and over, and over, and over again. If this trend continues, I guarantee that within the first year of my marriage to the lovely Intergalactic Hustler, I will be maimed, tortured, and possibly “suicided”, or worse! I like being alive, it’s pretty cool. So PLEASE continue to make music. A variety of new basement-produced Devin Townsend albums could help dull the pain that my wife currently feels, and thus save my life.
If you ever play another show again, with any band, I will travel across the omniverse to witness the act. My wife has an interdimensional space craft that I can hitch a ride on. In fact, she’s currently on a space mission to save cuddly space creatures… no doubt NOT listening to any Devin Townsend records on her voyage.
Love (again, not in a gay way),
MastaG
Open Letters are posted every Thursday morning. For more, click Open Letters under Categories on the right.
There are certainly more albums that deserve to be on this list, but these are the ones that really stand out for me. I can’t stop listening to them, and even after I’m done listening they stick in my head for hours. Think I forgot one? It’s very possible I didn’t even hear the album you’re thinking of (hey, I’m not made of $$$), so email me because I’d love to hear some new bands!
Honorable mentions, but for various reasons they just don’t end up on my stereo as often as the others:
Between the Buried and Me - Colors
Dillinger Escape Plan - Ire Works
Pig Destroyer - Phantom Limb
9. Dethklok - The Dethalbum
It’s hard to believe a fake death metal band could debut at #21 on the Billboard 200 chart (and become the highest charting death metal album of all time), but Brendon Small made something of a classic here. I’m a big fan of Metalocalypse, so naturally I was attracted to this album for the gag factor, but I didn’t dream it would actually be half decent metal. Aiding Brendan Small was Ulrich Wild’s superior metal production skills, and Gene “The Machine” Hoglan’s insane drums (my favorite drummer of all time, by the way).
8. Alcest - Souvenirs D’un Autre Monde
The first time I listened to this CD I was in a rushed, hasty mood, and I didn’t give it the respect it truly deserves. It only took one car ride with my attention focused on the music that I became addicted. This one man act is driven by a French dude named Neige who originally created this band as a 3 man black metal outfit, but with the release of Le Secret in 2005 he turned the band into a solo act with a complete different, almost too pleasant, direction. This album is deeply harmonic and beautiful, with more than enough heavy guitars to keep most metal fans interested, but even non-metal fans will enjoy this one.
7. The Red Chord - Prey For Eyes
These guys started off on a high note with their debut album Fused Together in Revolving Doors, yet continued to bring originality and skill with each successor. Prey For Eyes is yet another delicious mix of grind, hardcore, and death metal, leaning heavier on the death metal side this time. The album progresses in such an unpredictable manner that I still find myself noticing little twists where I think to myself “Whoa, I don’t remember that part from the last time I listened to this…. Sick!”
6. Nile – Ithyphallic
It’s all about speed. No, not methamphetamine, I’m talking about some of the fastest death metal on the planet. Nile brings turns up the metronome a little bit with each album, and Ithyphallic is no exception. They also went back to some of their early roots and included some weird Egyptian and Mesopotamian instruments.
5. Behemoth - The Apostasy
Behemoth has changed drastically over time. Their early raw black metal albums, such as From The Pagan Vastlands, aren’t really to my liking (sorry, raw black metal fans). Starting with their 1999 album, Satanica, they took on a newer and more produced death metal sound, while sticking with their black metal lyrical roots, that agreed more with my metal pallet. The Apostasy is the next mutation in the evolution of Behemoth, and I FREAKING LOVE IT!!!!!! Blast beats galore, ridiculously fast guitars, and the throaty vocals of this album will simply not get out of my head.
4. Beneath The Massacre - Mechanics Of Dysfunction
Sometimes death metal just gets monotonous and uninteresting, but occasionally a band like Beneath The Massacre breaks that barrier and adds something that no other band can replicate. This album gushes with technicality while keeping things very tight. I hope to see more of these insane Canucks.
3. Behold…The Arctopus – Skullgrid
I happened upon these guys by chance while surfing Wikipedia for mathcore bands. Sometimes this is exactly what I need; no vocals, just pure 100% insane American technical metal! My teeth uncontrollably clench at certain parts of this album!!!
2. Baroness - Red Album
As I stated in a previous post, two of my cousins are in this band, so you might think I’m biased. Well… maybe a little… but this album would have caught me by surprise no matter who was in the band. It’s rare that bands can pull off a heavy sound, yet retain an element of beauty. Baroness have held true to their sludge roots, but have fused a harmonic element into their latest concoction that has truly breathed some new life into the tired metal scene. Red Album was chosen as Album of the Year by Revolver magazine, and they deserve it!
***drumroll***
1. Devin Townsend - Ziltoid the Omniscient
There is nothing in this world more musically soothing to me than a screaming Canadian skullet man with double kick drums rolling, harmonic guitars blazing, and over the top keyboards synchronizing the entire event. This album is an operatic metal musical focusing on Ziltoid, a 4th dimensional alien in search of black coffee, the only fuel that can power his time traveling interdimensional space craft. This is the probably the silliest metal album ever created (even more so than The Dethalbum), yet Devin managed to combine all the best musical elements of every band he’s ever been in. My wife, the lovely Intergalactic Hustler, is ready to murder me because I have forced her to listen to it so many times… this CD literally did not leave my car stereo for about a month after it came out. I’m so happy with this album that I could shit out of my nostrils.
Allow me to preface my review of this video before continuing; two of my cousins are in this band. Now, that being said, Baroness is farking awesome. They are so badass that every time they play, a giant swarm of monkey sized flesh eating bats encircles the stage to protect them from the massive hordes of ladies wishing to copulate with the band members. Every once in a while a horny lady slips through the monkey-bat-barrier, and she is instantly vaporized by lasers embedded in each of the band member’s eyes. That’s how dedicated these musicians are to playing good metal. They will destroy anyone who could potentially ruin the deep, thunderous, throaty, harmonic metal sounds of Baroness.
Surely you may say that I’m biased, but considering this video debuted on Headbanger’s Ball a few nights ago, clearly I’m not! They signed with Relapse Records to make their latest album, “Red Album”, and it’s been a huge success! This video is insanely weird, but beautiful, and I don’t really understand it yet…. but related to me or not, you gotta admit, this band is the shizbang mangalang
Personally I’m not a fan of the band ‘Between The Buried And Me’, as their music generally fluctuates from metal by numbers to bad hardcore. However, I stumbled upon this blog posting while searching for a clip of a Rush cover song by Devin Townsend. I gotta say, this cover of Queen’s “Bicycle Race” is better than any I’ve ever heard. Enjoy!
listen to the song, it’s in mp3 format at the end of the blog posting.
Quite easily the best show ever created, Adult Swim’s Metalocaplyse closes it’s first season (click to watch the season finale of Metalocaplyse) with more needless gore and death! Just what the fans wanted! Never heard of the TV show Metalocaplyse? Maybe it’s time you did!!! You can watch it for free on Adult Swim FIX, or checkout some Metalocalypse clips on Youtube. There is no official release date for the first season DVD yet.
The membsers of Dethklock, the fake death metal band that this show is based on, bare a striking resemblance to some real-life metal heads. Although the producers have never officially acknowledged the character’s affinity, many fans have speculated their archetypes. I hunted around Google Images to find some pictures of their alleged real-life counterparts so I could see just how similar they are. Take a yander at what I found & photoshopped together:
Please note, this is an early sketch of the characters done by Brendon Small and Tommy Blacha, in which Pickles the Drummer has a much stronger resemblence to Devin Townsend than he does in the production version of Metalocaplyse
Text for the visually impaired:
Toki Wartooth (guitars) = Fredrik Thordendal (of Meshuggah)
Pickles the Drummer (drums) = Devin Townsend (of Devin Townsend Band, Strapping Young Lad)
Nathan Explosion (vocals) = George “CorpseGrinder” Fisher (of Cannibal Corpse)
William Murderface (bass) = Geezer Butler (of Black Sabbath)
Skwisgaar Skwigelf (lead guitar) = Alexei Laiho (of Children of Bodom)
I love metal, especially The Devin Townsend Band. But what you see on Headbanger’s Ball these days is no longer metal, it’s screamo genericore garbage built for angsty brats who think listening to metal makes them different and cool. This putrid excuse for metal has been perfectly captured by Brian Posehn, a brilliant comedian, in a video produced by Relapse Records!
