2015 POLL RESULTS COUNTDOWN - ILM Metal(ish) Albums of the Year

i am empowered by the mastodon groove.

this pleases me.

Akhlys album is really nice btw

I'm pretty stoked to be a Melvins tbh

I fall under the sign of Mastodon too

if you are all around and posting shall i start the rollout?

I'm around and ready to remain silent as Iron Maiden shows up

Upgrade Akhlys album to 'awesome' - it's that The Dreaming Eye song that did it - amazing

but what if it isnt iron maiden?

Would people be upset if Iron Maiden was too low or missed the poll completely?

ROLLOUT PLEASE

Listening to Sulphur Aeon. Not sure it's entirely my sort of thing but it is clearly very good.

60 Faith No More - Sol Invictus 249 Posts, 10 Votes
http://i.imgur.com/sw9nZLp.jpg

https://open.spotify.com/album/0pmOoQ16XaMwNeSxXAN7q1
spotify:album:0pmOoQ16XaMwNeSxXAN7q1

http://www.spin.com/2015/05/review-faith-no-more-sol-invictus/

SPIN Rating: 4 of 10
Release Date: May 21, 2015
Label: Ipecac / Reclamation
Dan Weiss // May 21, 2015

Mike Patton retains his cult for making a 25-year career of Doing Whatever He Wants, less in the Tom Waits model than a more slovenly one: He’s like a hometown school friend whom you can’t believe is still pressing CD-Rs. The crucial difference is obviously that the garage band who used to play at parties didn’t have a 1990 MTV megahit as Faith No More did with “Epic”; the guy whose parents went out of town didn’t commission a 30-piece orchestra to record an all-covers album of Italian pop songs. The breadth of his (lack of) taste is impressive — in Mr. Bungle he’d tackle lounge jazz, carnival calliope, and Zappa-style fusion-metal all in the span of one song. And even before he joined Faith No More in 1989, they were early adopters of hip-hop — 1985’s bizarro fusion “We Care a Lot” wasn’t just ahead of rap-metal’s time, it even beat regular-metal landmarks Master of Puppets and Reign in Blood to existing. And Patton was able and willing to snare Norah Jones for his 2006 one-off album as Peeping Tom. Admired by many, canonized by few, Patton’s usually good for a title or two: take “Jizzlobber” (that one’s from his best album, circa 1992) or “Cone of Shame” (from 2015’s Sol Invictus, keep reading) for two amusements of the English language you’re far more likely to remember than the songs attached to them.

There’s the rub: Faith No More’s first album in 18 years doesn’t especially provoke, offend, entrance, seduce, annoy. No skull-searing riffs, no particularly snaring turns of phrase, certainly no hooks — who do you think they are, Jane’s Addiction? Good musicianship is required for the hairpin turns of genre-into-genre, but there isn’t even good whiplash here. You’re better off with Patton’s four-song EP fronting the Dillinger Escape Plan, a fellow band of art-horror volume terrorists who at least helped push his extreme-circus-metal tendencies off a cliff.

Worse, it may send you on a trip down memory lane to recall what these guys did in the first place: slapping lots of bass and pounding lots of garish synth pads and whining lots of Patton’s bizarre whine on The Real Thing, over a funky crunch that we would come to recognize as the signature of clomping nü-metal down the road, fine-tuned into a zigzagging delight on 1992’s Angel Dust, the band’s token good album that has since been mythologized into a cult classic. Released in 1995, the more aerodynamic King for a Day…Fool for a Lifetime added a few post-punk riffs (“Get Out,” “The Gentle Art of Making Enemies”) to a more streamlined version of the sound that Incubus would soon take to the headlining stadium slot that Faith No More only encircled, but 1997’s rote Album of the Year was released after Bottum had already begun a much more artistically rewarding tenure in Imperial Teen (whose first four albums are all minor masterpieces of LGBTQ-themed chewing-gum pop), and thus began a hiatus that seemingly let the quintet all pursue the music they truly wanted to make without colliding into each other.

And here we are, two decades on with Sol Invictus (“unconquered sun” in Latin) continuing a sound that had no real beginning or end in the first place; Mr. Bungle sampled from David Lynch movies, and were thusly compared to the musical equivalent of those films. Mostly everything Patton touches turns out that way, utilizing a device that one sorely missed Goosebumps blog unfavorably referred to (in reference to R.L. Stine books, of course) as “Let’s just line up crazy things in a row from the beginning to the end.”

But Patton’s already trodden down his every edge to the point of blunt smoothness. Having already excised most of his weirdest impulses in Fantômas, Tomahawk, and dozens of side ventures and collaborations (notably with his fitful jazz counterpart John Zorn), without any interest in returning to the harmonically rich nuances and applicable jokes of Angel Dust, Patton now occupies the worst kind of middle ground. The funniest “hook” here is the threatening command to “Get the motherfucker on the phone,” (from “Motherfucker,” of course, an illustration of their creative downgrade from “Jizzlobber”) and it’s quickly relegated to a backing vocal that Patton lays a much dumber, mock-operatic chorus over. Other bits that stick out of the sludge — the inconsequential intro “I’ll be your leprechaun,” the continued exhortation “Leader of men / Get back in your cage” — struggle for a compelling reason to be.

“It’s it / What is it?” FNM once demanded on their best-known song. We’re supposed to admire the fact that 30 years after their debut album, they haven’t moved an inch closer to definability. But with weirder, funnier, more skillful, even pleasurable bands bearing Faith No More’s influence having cropped up since, the question of “What is it?” comes with a sadder follow-up: “Who is it for?”

http://www.rollingstone.com/music/albumreviews/faith-no-more-sol-invictus-20150519

Weird-metal guys show they're still nutty after all these years

When alt-metal pranksters Faith No More called it quits in the late Nineties, they were too weird for the headbangers and too heavy for Alternative Nation. Now, with indie rock and harder music crossing paths more frequently, the times have finally caught up with them. Sol Invictus, the band's first record since 1997's underrated Album of the Year, offers newer, better versions of Faith No More's formula: spaghetti-Western guitars ("Cone of Shame"), proggy keyboard drama ("Matador") and tons of vocal contortions from lead singer Mike Patton ("Rise of the Fall"). With the exception of one tune seemingly about Patton's breakfast ("Sunny Side Up"), it's as much a triumphant victory lap as it's a comeback record.

Points that should say obviously

Kinda wish it was Iron Maiden in retrospect.

I just hate pretty much everything involving Mike Patton, sorry.

I'm enjoying the roll-out so far, lots of stuff to explore, particularly given how little metal I have listened to this year (Goatsnake, Windhand, Myrkur, Chelsea Wolfe, FNM umm...)

don't think I have any interest in this but hatred of all things Patton makes me sad

comment on the spin review

Franco • 7 months ago

by reading this, even if you haven´t heard the album, you would think Patton fucked the reviewer´s girlfriend or something like that.

xp give me one album that will change my mind

torn between Suspended Animation and Disco Volante tbh

I have some interest in the FNM, but I'm more interested to see how it places in the RockaRolla EOY list

I'll go with the shorter one then

if you want 'the shorter one' then you'll probably want California tbh...but ok, Suspended Animation it is, enjoy lol

Angel Dust is some sort of masterpiece IMO

it is very good too but i reckon dinsdale might prefer the more out-there stuff

as long as out-there doesn't mean 'Patton does lots of weird noises with his mouth'

time to listen I guess...

uh oh lol

I just hate pretty much everything involving Mike Patton, sorry.

You're not alone.

Relistening to the Shining album. It's just such a shame. They used to be SO good. They'll never make anything as melodically complex and beautiful as 'In The Kingdom Of Kitsch...' (the song) again, will they? They just sound like, uh, Faith No More (with saxes) now lol

jesus christ this is insufferable

59 Fluisteraars - Luwte 250 Points, 8 Votes
http://i.imgur.com/uykPIEZ.jpg

https://open.spotify.com/album/6OnvbiyStRMxTwhk0amO0q
spotify:album:6OnvbiyStRMxTwhk0amO0q

Bandcamp http://records.eisenton.de/album/luwte

Even though much has been written and recorded when it comes to extreme metal, Fluisteraars are quite extraordinary in their way of arranging and presenting music. With vast influences concerning the ambience and atmospheric aspects of their craft the dutch trinity is not to be easily stuck in just one plain direction. The early on forged term "Windswept Black Metal" recalling imagery of rain, decay, bleakness and intoxication still to date embodies their own amalgamation of intriguing, atmospheric music.

The band's last year debut album titled "Dromers", was firmly rooted in the fertile soil cultivated by Drudkh, Primordial or even Agalloch, nevertheless built its own aura. Excellent reviews at the press, whilst also garnering end of year list entries and other critical accolades along the way, hailed Fluisteraars as one of the new potent stalwarts of dutch black metal.

Blending the welcoming, epic affair of their debut with more harsh and biting effort's more reminiscent of 90s black metal, Luwte captures the band from a slightly different, yet none less qualitative angle. While the band had already shown their effective vigor with time stretching melodic and edgy grandeur, this second album is very much the more ferocious finished extension to it. An unpolished yet elaborate production with final mastering duties taken over by Patrick W. Engel at TEMPLE OF DISHARMONY perfectly suits the dynamic, intelligent nature of the music.

Sealing the deal the band adds: Fluisteraars takes you on a journey through the mind. A journey where they build the roads, to create the landscapes through which they travel and where they call the seasons. Their strength is drawn from the compelling nature of their music, which captivates you to the point of hypnosis. Leading you unnoticed to the inevitable end of the road, emptiness…

released September 25, 2015

(I gave up)

(I figured)

(Disco Volante now!)

(kidding)

no comments on Fluisteraars ? another album ive not heard

siegbran metal?

I do know that track "de doornen" from fluisteraars which is savage

I like them, not sure if I voted for this one though, maybe in the lower spots as I found it good but not *that* good

Listening to Tyranny now and enjoying them a good deal. Shame I have to leave the house really soon. Wish I didn't.

you did vote for it at #15

seems about right

Fluisteraars is awesome. Previous album was a mix of Moonsorrow/Agalloch, this one is a bit edgier and reminds me most of Trelldom (Gaahls old band). "Windswept Black Metal" is pretty spot-on yeah. Endless songs with excellent drumming, and a great up-close, jam-like sound.

Not that far from Wolves In The Throne Room conceptually, but their sound is a lot less washed out.

58 AEVANGELIST - Enthrall to the Void of Bliss 255 Points, 8 Votes
http://i.imgur.com/VTN7FV7.jpg

https://open.spotify.com/album/1NKhSrQIRDRF4sVJ4H26Bq
spotify:album:1NKhSrQIRDRF4sVJ4H26Bq

http://listen.20buckspin.com/album/enthrall-to-the-void-of-bliss

The 4th gate of the Aevangelist has opened within the physical dimension. Witness cataclysmic Black Death Metal force in which slithering arcane horrors conjoined with bizarre mysticism spawn a suffocating cacophonous sprawl. Having unleashed previous (and future) documentation via the French Debemur Morti label, ‘Enthrall To The Void Of Bliss’ represents the initial Aevangelist transmutation for 20 Buck Spin; the American based band’s first scripture to fully release domestically in the United States.

Cycling through recent years Aevangelist have mercilessly assaulted listeners via audial deformation and twisting sepulchral composition. 2013’s Omen Ex Simulacra brutalized with punishingly dense yet accessible riffs in the Murk, and this specter looms large on ‘Enthrall…’, whilst layer upon layer of ghoulish keys and madness-stricken vocals act as flesh bricks to shape a hellish tower of the damned. Smeared with a warm, wet production, the inherent chaos of ‘Enthrall…’ becomes omnipresent.

The curtain has been pulled back to reveal the grotesquery summoned by the Aevangelist synod and once stirred cannot easily be shut again. 20 Buck Spin is pleased to bequeath this vulgar contortion of occult rancor upon the human race. Virulently presented on CD, LP and Digital torments.
credits
released October 9, 2015

http://consequenceofsound.net/2015/10/album-review-aevangelist-enthrall-to-the-void-of-bliss/

Black metal outfit Aevangelist actively defies comprehension. Their creations exist on a plane of sonic nihilism and dark dada. Every note, every instrument, every gurgling growl and hideous shriek, is texturally equal, creating a vacuum of depraved noise that’s truly unprecedented, defying all expectations of recorded vibration. On its fourth full-length, Enthrall to the Void of Bliss, it’s as if Aevangelist sought to defy its own humanity by creating an album so demented, so dissonant, and so brutal that it couldn’t have been made by humans, but rather trans-dimensional soundscapists set on breaking the very idea of what a song can be.

Rarely does music so instantly and totally affront the listener. Even by the standards of black metal, a genre unafraid to dabble in the weird and weirder, Enthrall lives in a harsh and unearthly world all its own. “Arcanæ Manifestia” opens the album with an entangled arrangement of standard instrumentation (blast beats, sludgy speed guitar) and a variety of other, unorthodox tonalities not easily identifiable. Emanating from the right channel comes a demented harp; played haphazardly, it stops, starts, and stutters, sometimes (but not always) falling in with the chord progression, an independent force separate from the other instruments. It is the most discernable and memorable aspect of Enthrall because the harp never leaves, instead haunting the right speaker for the duration of the record.

Meanwhile, vocalist Ascaris uses his throat in unhealthy ways. At the end of the first track, he holds a single guttural note for a minute straight in an impressive feat of circular breathing. On “Emanation”, he channels a man whose esophagus is being ripped out. You hear the gasping for air, the hacks and hurls, and the wet slosh of his vocal cords straining to maintain this sickening putridity. It’s slightly comical, but mostly terrifying. Ascaris even sings on occasion, his distant croon sounding like a cross between Martin Gore and the whispering wind on a strange winter night. The outlier here, “Alchemy”, with its deep electro pulse and airy atmosphere, helps to stagger the record’s repetition. “Souls like water, souls like water,” Ascaris sings. For a moment, Aevangelist offer a reprieve. Then it’s back to the brutality.

Melodies and typical song structures are introduced throughout the album before being quickly buried under chaos. The songs beg to be discerned: Once you acclimate to the layers of noise and overdubs (the percussion is stacked to cacophonous levels), peculiar details peer out. At their root level, “Cloister of the Temple of Death” and “Gatekeepers Scroll” are chord-based guitar songs with verses and solos. However, the dense recordings are full of intricacies in the guitarwork and vocals that are otherwise disguised in the fray. Multi-instrumentalist Matron Thorn is the master behind this orchestrated madness. His tasteful harmonic guitar licks, notably on “Cloister” and lengthy closer “Meditation of Transcendental Evil”, can only be picked up by a keen ear.

Enthrall to the Void of Bliss is perhaps best approached like a noise record. It doesn’t offer hooks, its riffs are lost in murk, and the morbid non sequitur lyrics are rarely discernible. The experience is in the totality of the sonic chaos and the act of making sense of it. In this way, Aevangelist are black metal impressionists. This is not a pleasant album to listen to in the traditional sense; yet, it remains endlessly affecting.

Essential Tracks: “Arcanæ Manifestia”, “Meditation of Transcendental Evil”

xpost (I mean, WITTR is more washed out than Fluisteraars)

another album ive not heard

57 Lightning Bolt - Fantasy Empire 265 Points, 9 Votes
http://i.imgur.com/YgPS33u.jpg
https://open.spotify.com/album/1HN2Y71apfstJXoWxDPTJO
spotify:album:1HN2Y71apfstJXoWxDPTJO

https://thrilljockeyrecords.bandcamp.com/album/fantasy-empire

Over the course of its two-decade existence, Lightning Bolt has revolutionized underground rock in immeasurable ways. The duo broke the barrier between stage and audience by setting themselves up on the floor in the midst of the crowd. Their momentous live performances and the mania they inspired paved the way for similar tactics used by Dan Deacon and literally hundreds of others. Similarly, the band’s recordings have always been chaotic, roaring, blown out documents that sound like they could destroy even the toughest set of speakers. Fantasy Empire, Lightning Bolt’s sixth album and first in five years, is a fresh take from a band intent on pushing themselves musically and sonically while maintaining the aesthetic that has defined not only them, but an entire generation of noisemakers. It marks many firsts, most notably their first recordings made using hi-fi recording equipment at the famed Machines With Magnets, and their first album for Thrill Jockey. More than any previous album, Fantasy Empire sounds like drummer Brian Chippendale and bassist Brian Gibson are playing just a few feet away, using the clarity afforded by the studio to amplify the intensity they project. Every frantic drum hit, every fuzzed-out riff, sounds more present and tangible than ever before.

Fantasy Empire is ferocious, consuming, and is a more accurate translation of their live experience. It also shows Lightning Bolt embracing new ways to make their music even stranger. More than any previous record, Chippendale and Gibson make use of live loops and complete separation of the instruments during recording to maximize the sonic pandemonium and power. Gibson worked with Machines very carefully to get a clear yet still distorted and intense bass sound, allowing listeners to truly absorb the detail and dynamic range he displays, from the heaviest thud to the subtle melodic embellishments. Some of these songs have been in the band’s live repertoire since as early as 2010, and have been refined in front of audiences for maximum impact. This is heavy, turbulent music, but it is executed with the precision of musicians that have spent years learning how to create impactful noise through the use of dynamics, melody, and rhythm.

Fantasy Empire has been in gestation for four years, with some songs having been recorded on lo-fi equipment before ultimately being scrapped. Since Earthly Delights was released, the band has collaborated with The Flaming Lips multiple times, and continued to tour relentlessly. 2013 saw the release of All My Relations by Black Pus, Chippendale’s solo outlet, which was followed by a split LP with Oozing Wound. Chippendale, an accomplished comic artist and illustrator, created the Fantasy Empire’s subtly ominous album art, and will release an upcoming book of his comics through respected imprint Drawn and Quarterly. Brian Gibson has been developing the new video game Thumper, with his own company, Drool, which will be released next year. And, of course, Lightning Bolt will be touring the US in 2015.
credits
released March 24, 2015

http://pitchfork.com/reviews/albums/20174-fantasy-empire/
8.0

Lightning Bolt have been around for close to two decades. In that time, they haven't really changed their basic formula: Brian Chippendale still bashes his drums with chaotic precision and bassist Brian Gibson manages to make four strings sound like many more. From the beginning, their mix of mayhem and heaviness brought to mind Harry Pussy and Black Sabbath playing at the same time. But they somehow showed up in big features in magazines that didn't normally care about noise, and in the record collections of people who felt pretty much the same.

The musical landscape around Lightning Bolt has shifted more than a few times during this period, but the duo continue full-throttle with the kind of triumphant blitz they served up when they first emerged from Providence, R.I. When Lightning Bolt started in 1994, future Black Dice member Hisham Bharoocha handled vocals and guitars for the band, and the difference between the two groups is instructive. Black Dice came out of the same punk/art-school world as Lightning Bolt but they chose a more winding path—from violent punks to noise mongrels to psychedelic noisemakers to gleeful DFA electronic tweakers. LB have remained tunnel-vision focused. The respect for the initial approach suggests an endless possibility in a few gestures, a sensibility that runs counter to the over-stuffed, ADD, and of-the-moment world we live in.

Fantasy Empire is their first LP in five years; it's also the first recorded in a proper studio—Pawtucket's Machines with Magnets—and you can tell. The sound is bigger and more defined; they haven't cleaned things up, exactly, it's just easier to figure out what's leveling you. You can make out deeper textures and striations, and the greater detail lends variety without shifting away from the blown-out repetition. There's also a larger dynamic range—just when you think a song's gotten as big as it possibly can, they pile on more sounds like live loops, synthesizers, tape constructions, and bass overdubs. Rather than serving as a compromise, the shifts that come with higher production values are positive.

Some of Lightning Bolt's mid-period albums grew dull after repeat listens, or made you think about how you'd rather see the music performed live. Wonderful Rainbow from 2003 had an almost pop catchiness to it, and you get that here, too. With a few listens, there's a feeling of anticipation for certain breaks or shifts or, as at the end of "Over the River and Through the Woods", head-bangs. And more than any of their records, if you play it loud, and close your eyes, it's very easy to imagine being in the same room as the Brians. (They've been doing some of the songs at their shows since 2010, and the album has a very broken-in feel to it.)

Unexpectedly, Chippendale's vocals have gotten stronger, as he's moved from the early chirps and howls to legit contact-mic crooning. His voice has typically been another strand of noise; here he feels like more of a proper singer, one who can compete with everything going on around him. At the start of "Over the River and Through the Woods" he clears his throat like Celtic Frost's Tom G. Warrior, and later in the song, he's a strangulated Ozzy. On "Horsepower", he approximates a swaggering demigod on the riff party, while "Runaway Train" sees him turn into a metal circus barker. The band's last full-length record, 2009's Earthly Delights, had a metal edge to it, and as the comparisons above suggest, Lightning Bolt go further in that direction on Fantasy. This is noise doom, more or less, the crystalline tone and soloing on "Dream Genie" is the stuff of Steve Vai heaven, and "Horsepower" brings to mind Geddy Lee howling into a maelstrom kicked up by Sleep. This is also their most flat-out rock'n'roll album to date, and their best since Wonderful Rainbow.

Most of the tracks have an anthemic forward march—these songs are built for speed. That's especially true of the massive 12-minute closer, "Snow White (& The 7 Dwarves Fans)", whose tongue-in-cheek title nails the essential Lightning Bolt aesthetic: part punk rock, part adult fairytale. They're still doing what they've always done, but Fantasy Empire is the best they've done it in a long time, and the new sheen makes everything seem magic again.

I don't think I had Ævangelist on my ballot but it's a great record.

Lightning Bolt have been around for close to two decades. In that time, they haven't really changed their basic formula

this was the only problem with this record

you didnt like it?

This poll is turning some infinite cataloguing at work into a pleasantly foresty endurance test.

My highlights so far (though I've still about ten left to try) are:
Black Cilice
Kylesa - Lovely shoegaze! The run from Falling to Growing Roots is especially effective.
Caïna - that one 'Orphan' track
Sannhet/Gannnet

Placed so far:
Nameless Coyote
KEN Mode
Thou & The Body
Akhlys
Mastery
Lightning Bolt