High on Fire vs. Om vs. Sleep

HoF

Asbestos Death

High On Fire without question or hesitation. Ditching those two lumps was the best decision Matt Pike ever made.

I would agree that The Art of Self Defense is the best single album any of these folks has made.

i like jerusalem and the first two om albums. i never listen to high on fire. they kinda bore me. want to love every album. never do. soooo, i guess i vote for sleep? i dunno, whatever.

Sleep is the only one I'm familiar with from Sleep's Holy Mountain, which is an awesome album, so them.

Ditching those two lumps was the best decision Matt Pike ever made.

I mean... really??

he hates om--it is on the recent om thread.

i thought holy mountain was pretty boring too. even om are kinda boring, but when i'm in the right mood those albums can sound cool to me.

OM trio (with Lichens) is giving me new hope for them.

Sleep by a very, very slim margin over High On Fire. I enjoy High On Fire when I hear them, but I never put on an album and listen. Still like to pull out Jerusalem/Dopesmoker now and again. Early Sleep is sub-par Sabbath, and Om is sub-par "Set The Controls For The Heart Of The Sun."

Om is sub-par "Set The Controls For The Heart Of The Sun."

You've got this one backwards...

Nope. Floyd did it first and better. Especially live - check out clips from Pompeii.

how is that even possible? would a time machine be involved?

High on Fire, definitely.

Maybe if you smoked enough dope...

x-post

I'm really not being contrary when I say Asbestos Death is the most solid of the bunch.

Om for sure. Sleep is the most boring shit I've ever heard, and I tried so hard to like HoF (I believe I own all of their full lengths), but they just bore me. My brain doesn't hear any hooks at all, and their singer sounds like he gargles dust to warm up.

Love em all. But HoF def kicked it up a notch

not om.

gets a lot harder from there tho

I've only recently started to warm to Om. I wore the grooves to dust on my copy of Holy Mountain, but Dopesmoker bores me. Most of the songs on HoF albums tend to blur together.

So Sleep I guess? This is weird, I feel like my rationale makes me sound like I don't really like any of these bands when I'm really a fan of all 3 to some degree.

All three bands have slayed me live but Om also bored me once so I guess maybe they are lagging behind. Sleep are definitely the only ones who might have been a game changer in terms of my musical taste

om for sure. i haven't heard that much HoF tho. dopesmoker is 'epic' sure, the cover is simply awesome, the concept and all is great, but i never make it past the 20-minute mark. sleep's 'holy mountain' is good tho.

but i love the first three om albums. i'm working on the fourth.

for people feeling lukewarm wrt om, i'd advise checking out 'unitive knowledge of the godhead' from pilgrimage, i think this is the best thing they've ever done. shows everything great about them, distilled into about 5 minutes

High on Fire by a very, very wide margin here. Blessed Black Wings is my favorite record of the decade.

i like jerusalem and the first two om albums. i never listen to high on fire. they kinda bore me. want to love every album. never do. soooo, i guess i vote for sleep? i dunno, whatever.

― scott seward, Monday, September 21, 2009 8:59 PM

^^ every hof song i've heard had chugging mid-tempo tribal drumming. i'll take boring stoner rock over that any day

High on Fire because their singer sounds like he gargles dust to warm up and every song has chugging mid-tempo tribal drumming. Also, ]Blessed Black Wings is album of the decade, or at least is in contention alongside Blood Visions and A-Frames.

yeah, BBW (unfortunate acronym duders) is an absolutely great album. think i'm voting HoF.

Pike and company are Big Beautiful Warlocks.

Sleep live was almost as good as original line-up Sabbath. so they win.

Sleep.

too hard

Automatic thread bump. This poll is closing tomorrow.

Love all three of these acts but I'm going with Om, personal favorite.

Automatic thread bump. This poll's results are now in.

Wow, I always thought HoF were incredibly overrated. Which they are, but apparently not on ILM. Winner = correct.

OM-NOM-NOM-NOM-NOM!

i've always found HOF to be kinda unlistenable. (but then again, i may have confused them with Pig Destroyer or some such.)

Yeah I wouldn't say they were ~~extreme~~ in the grand scheme of things... they're just a olde tyme heavy metal band really, with sludgier production I guess

is Sleep Volume One worth getting???

yes

but dont pay ebay prices

does it go for a lot? i don't see it often IRL but when i do it's usually in the $4-10 range.

ok come on guys let's be realistic here. i'm clearly not gonna pay for it

well then... just download the fucking thing.

sleep volume 2 with a cover of "lord of this world" is the shit

really needs to be a nice, remastered reissue of vol 1 w/vol 2 as bonus tracks.

^this.

But yeah, Volume 1 is my favorite Sleep album. It's not produced as well as Holy Mountain or as boring as Dopesmoker.

While you're at it, grab that Asbestosdeath ep. It's ace.

High on Fire. plus they are the best live band I've ever seen. their show last year in O-town was probably the best show I've ever taken in

fury whip!

they opened with that omg

some of the heaviest music ever. last time i saw them matt pike was shirtless, wearing a necklace of teeth of some sort, total conan style

he always plays shirtless. I met him at the second show and clapped him on the back in congratulatory fashion and it was caked in slimy sweat which led me to purse my lips in a JB Smoove 'ew' face.

and then I realized I just met Matt Pike and all was well again.

was also the 'loudest' show I've been to which didn't actively hurt my eardrums. Like there's one club in Orlando that gets off on making things so loud to where the band sounds like a mass of indiscernible noise and sans ear plugs, you're going deaf...but it wasn't like that. It was loud with lots of clarity but not too loud to where it hurt. like they achieved optimal decibels.

Pike's guitar sounded like a goddamn chainsaw.

Can't believe I missed this thread the first time around. Would have added one more vote for HoF. Nate C otm way back when:

I would agree that The Art of Self Defense is the best single album any of these folks has made.

Not to slight what came after: "Thraft of Canaan", "Silverback", "Cometh Down Hessian", "Fury Whip", etc. And consistently one of the best live bands I've ever seen. Love Sleep, love at least the first couple Om records (though they're a very different proposition). But the choice is clear, high, and decisively charred.

Also, BBW is an excellent acronym.

http://www.metalsucks.net/2010/09/16/matt-pikes-top-ten-t-shirts/

Blessed Black Wings is prob the best album of 2005. The first two are amazing as well

What I like about Pike is that since he quit drinking, his gut has swelled up like he swallowed a basketball, but he still plays shirtless. (Also, seriously one of the nicest dudes on earth.)

of this lot i only have pilgramage by om but damn i love it - proper headphone perfection.

do sleep hit the same level of sonic gorgeousness ?

and why oh why is dopesmoker £25 at fopp !!?

is it rare, or, are they just taking the piss ?

Dopesmoker on vinyl or cd? cos on cd that shit is def still in print (my local indie carries it for normal prices), but no idea on the vinyl

yeah Pike is a nice guy. and my god do his leads sound penetrating live.

and why oh why is dopesmoker £25 at fopp !!?

US import maybe? We sell it for $30, I could easily see it going for almost $40 or more as an import.

fopp : cd edition

nothing special about it.

oh, monsieur fopp, you're really ruining us

is there maybe a baggie of weed included

who would you vote for now? any change?

Om released Advaitic Songs after this poll, HOF have released five albums since, and Sleep have one

This is still so tough. HoF has released more quality albums, but I love Sleep and Om so much.

all are special but HoF's track record is one of the wonders of the world

This is tough but I think Om.