Unleash The Archers: Awakening
Oden Ogen: come with me to the other side
Amon Amarth
Serious question: how do I learn to like bands like Amon Amarth?
I mostly listen to power metal. Powerwolf, Sabaton, like that.
I have never had an appreciation for… Vocal fry? Is that the right term even? When the vocals just kinda sound like growling and are mostly incomprehensible.
I hear people rave about certain bands but when I try them out and their vocals sound like angry screaming and bear noises it just turns me right off, and I’m not sure if that’s a me problem or what.
Hah. I’m not sure you do! It’s the same reason I can’t like bands with maroon 5 sounding singers.
I do love instrumental tracks for this reason.
Maybe some opera metal or similar? Nightwish, Tarja, Within Temptation, Epica, Delain, Apocalyptica, maYan, Xandria, Dark Sarah, Metalwings
Gotta give a shoutout to the End of Year lists from Angry Metal Guy blog. They have a pretty good balance of popular and underground metal from a bunch of different writers with different genre preferences.
They introduced me to Warcrab and Xoth this year, at least.
A link for the lazy: https://www.angrymetalguy.com/one-list-to-debase-them-all-angrymetal-guy-coms-aggregated-top-20-of-2023/
Second AMG (I wrote an AMG Bot for this community that I can’t get working due to some instances being behind cloudflare). They’ve exposed me to a lot of smaller bands that I wouldn’t have known about otherwise. They’re particularly helpful if you enjoy non-cvlt Black Metal, Death Metal and Doom Metal.
Side note OP: I love your posts. Many’s the time I’ve seen something I haven’t listened to in years and have a good couple of hours going through their back catalogue.
I’m gonna third AMG! It’s one of the few review sites that I think has consistently good reviews of a decently wide array of metal. And I’m not just saying that because I agree with them…I’m saying that because they introduced me to Blood Incantation. Which anyone unfamiliar should absolutely give a listen!
I recommend checking out Creative Commons metal at openmetalcast.com
The podcast finished in 2019 but there are 1000s of bands to checkout.
Like this one: Carthasy
Amaranthe The Halo Effect Scar Symmetry Dethklok Shadows Fall
Sorry if you’ve already posted these.
Unironically you could check out some of Poppy’s stuff, notably her EAT (NXT Soundtrack) single.
Mascara’s Cameo Blue Estate if you’re interested in metalgaze. Strapping Young Lad / Devin Townsend of course, Vildhjarta, Persefone, Spiritbox, Knocked Loose, Agalloch, In Reverence, Uada, Satariel, Igorrr, Body and Soul by Orthodox
Fluisteraars :) I really like to listen to immortal in the winter time
Demon Hunter, Red, Disciple, For Honor, Fit for a King, Thousand Foot Krutch, just to name a few.
Necrophobic, Dezperadoz (sic!), Chrome Division
Check out Becoming the Archetypes new album
I find that a Wikipedia rabbit hole can find a LOT of new bands and genres of metal. I always start here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heavy_metal_genres
Then I try to listen to the bands on youtube.
Ice Nine Kills, Bullet for my Valentine and early Avenged Sevenfold (IE, Waking the Fallen) all sound fairly similar to me in style and they all are all incredibly epic.
I really think everyone should give The Silver Scream II: Welcome to Horrorwood a shot (by Ice Nine Kills). The Silver Scream I is also good, but not as good in my opinion. My favorite songs off of Silver Scream II are Funeral Derangements and Take Your Pick, but Rash Decision, The Shower Scene and Rainy Day are also bangers.
I also highly recommend The Poison by Bullet for my Valentine and Waking the Fallen by Avenged Sevenfold. Both are CLASSICS and should be heard at least once.
Links:
Silver Scream II by INK https://music.youtube.com/playlist?list=OLAK5uy_ksa-aLyvqwqBIFSao96Hx5-s7Fg6FL3X0&si=Z-H9vTrPGshitAZp
The Poison by BFMV (I tried to find the deluxe edition but failed) https://music.youtube.com/playlist?list=OLAK5uy_nktBaPBXCSo9pyb9lcYbhUFWcb-FbhhdE&si=9uRoA7Ifn5BVn9Sg
Waking the Fallen: Resurrected by Avenged Sevenfold https://music.youtube.com/playlist?list=OLAK5uy_m3_i_ynVyKIbLURhTaN_U5Yp4HlJ-wiWs&si=UIk-c9ty7v_dA7F_
Unprocessed for some beedely beedely noise!
Give Every Noise At Once a try. You type in the name of a band you already like, it’ll show you the genre(s) they are part of as links. Click the link and it’ll give you a load of suggestions on a kind of heat map page. You can then click the band name to get a short sample of their stuff.
If you’ve never listened to Kevin Sherwood’s songs for Call of Duty Zombies, they’re fantastic. The lyrics are borderline gibberish since they’re supposed to tie in with a story that’s nonsensical and chaotic, but that doesn’t change how good the music and the featured vocalists are. Songs: Beauty of Annihilation 115 Abracadavre Pareidolia Coming Home Carrion We All Fall Down Always Running Archangel Dead Again (my personal favorite) Dead Flowers Dead Ended The Gift Shockwave I Am the Well Stormbound Mystery A Light From the Shore
