Monday, September 28, 2015

100 Favorite Metal Songs - Part Five

20.  Blackened - Metallica

Almost every song that opens every album in the top ten of my 100 favorite metal albums list is on THIS list.  Which brings us to "Blackened".  For years before I stumbled on a version of ...And Justice for All that featured bass, I had no problem ignoring the daft production.  That's 'cause the drums finally don't have that reverberated '80s treatment, (and anything that makes Lars sound better = a good thing), but also because these jams are the best batch in Metallica's songbook.  "Blackened" is the only song Jason Newsted got credit on and go him.  Tight and complex as the rest of the album, but trashier than everything except "Dyers Eve", this is just about as good as Metallica ever got.

19.  Dying - Obituary

Superb Scott Burns production and fo sho one of the best death metal albums ever made, Obituary's sophomore effort Cause of Death naturally features the band's best song as well, the almost instrumental "Dying".  There's only four lines in this song and they don't come till almost the end.  Also meaning of course they come after killer riffs for days, including one of the dumbest and greatest chunk breakdowns in history.  I bought this album almost solely because of this song after I listened to it at a used CD store and had previously no idea who Obituary was as I was an overall noob to death metal.  Having acquired most of their albums since and generally always liking what I heard, (this is their third entry on my list after all), my ears are still most pleased by "Dying".

18.  Blood and Thunder - Mastodon

There seems to be a three-brilliant-album streak rule with many a metal band.  Remission was solid enough of a debut for Atlanta's Mastodon, but Leviathan, Blood Mountain, and especially Crack the Skye just bring the house down.  Skye is great for being a prog masterpiece far above a metal one and I could've easily picked something out from Mountain for inclusion here even though more oddball melodies and classic rock influences were creeping in amongst the progginess.  But "Blood and Thunder", (again an album opener), belongs on this list toweringly so above all other Mastodon cuts.  This opening riff is slamming as hell and as usual, Brann Dailor cannot at all control his drum-fill-gasms, making the whole song sound like an unhinged beast.  And Clutch's incredibly likable Neil Fallon is on it.  Least us forget.

17.  Blinded By Fear - At the Gates

Moooooore album openers still.  This one stemming from the best metal album of any kind, At the Gate's Slaughter of the Soul.  "Blinded By Fear" remains the most covered ATG song as it should.  This was yet another one that my first death metal band learned and another band I'm friends with also performed it live on an occasion or two.  So we did our part and contributed to the "most covered" record.  I first heard about this album in a Guitar Player magazine article from the late 90s which listed it as essential death metal to get.  Twenty years later, it's just as essential.  Every song on it could make any metal songs list and it would be perfectly fitting.  "Fear" was crafted by the band as the ultimate album opener and success by leaps and bounds did they achieve.  If you don't like this song, go sit in the corner.

16.  Dechristianize - Vital Remains

Thanks to Vital Remains, I can no longer hear the most epic piece of music ever composed, (Carl Orff's "O Fortuna"), without thinking about killing Christians.  These guys are both brilliant and assholes for starting Dechristianize off with that before I got a chance to with one of my albums in one of my bands.  But said Excalibur theme leading into Glen Benton proclaiming "Let the killing...begin!" and then of course the nearly nine minute piece of genius that is the title track was one of the greatest things I ever heard then and now.  My old guitar player picked this album up, said it was the best death metal he ever heard, and then played me this song.  At which point I came in my pants.  Everything here works from the brutal as spiked-balls riffs to the fastest blast beats ever committed to record to the no bullshit, best guitar harmony of all the times.

15.  Summoning Redemption - Morbid Angel

Speaking of blasphemous excellence, let's have some Morbid Angel!  The letter G ended up being the last great MA album at this writing as Heretic is flawed as shit and Illud Divinum Insanus, well, let's not even go there.  Eric Rutan was back on Gateways to Annihilation, Steve Tucker was throwing down most all the lyrics, Pete Sandoval's drum sound was triggered garbage, and the overall style of the music was more sluggish and oozing.  "Summoning Redemption" features all of these things as well as arguably the best extreme metal vocal performance there is by Tucker.  This song is just evil incarnate.  That main riff is demon summoning and Tucker's deity-defying demand to "...know the light of the promised land" gets me growling along every time.

14.  Bitter Peace - Slayer

Leave it to Jeff Hanneman to, sans one song, singlehandedly write the greatest Slayer album.  I know that only me and my former bandmates in my first death metal band Wretched Disciple think this but still, fuck ya'all, Diabolus in Musica is Slayer's masterpiece.  Rather than do what they've been doing since Christ Illusion, (trying to recapture older glory), Slayer cira-1998 was experimenting with their well defined style.  Hanneman wanted to change up his writing and Diabolus ended up being the band's stab at groove metal, though with some of the most complex arrangements in Slayer history.  Even if you're not a fan of the world's greatest thrash band making dem asses shake as well as banging heads, you need your hearing checked to not like "Bitter Peace".  The opening riff is infectious and it's overall just a brilliant piece, (get it?), of songwriting.

13.  Tornado of Souls - Megadeth

There are few finer riffs in all of metal than the ones in "Tornado of Souls".  Furthermore and once again, the breakdown here is just as good as music gets.  It's one of those "Everybody just shut up and headbang" moments when it comes on in a room with a group of people.  Or if it's just you in your car.  Easily one of the best parts to any song.  Rust In Peace is hard if at all to top in album form when it comes to metal and shit, pick your poison far as songs go.  I have another one on the way, so that shows ya right there how at least THIS metalhead digs the Dave Mustaine excellence.  There's a reason the two Daves, Nick Menza, and Marty Friedman are still regarded as the golden line-up of Megadeth.  Listen to this breakdown and just try not to bow down.

12.  One By One - Immortal

I picked up Sons of Northern Darkness on the blind at Rolling Stones Records after hearing the name "Immortal" thrown around a few times.  They looked like an evil version of Kiss with axes on the cover so I was in.  Then I played this in my car on the way to work, (in winter mind you, which is the ideal time to listen to anything black metal related, FYI), and needless to say it woke me up.  Rarely have I bought something I'd never heard and been so impressed, metal or not.  "One By One" was the song that jolted me to life that random morning at 3 AM and I love it as much now if not more.  Every riff in this song just keeps getting better and the production is astounding.  Horgh's drums in particular sound gargantuan.  It's on the short list as one of the heaviest songs of all time and easily Immortal's best.

11.  Immortally Insane - Pantera

Years as a Pantera fan, (to the point of them arguably being my favorite metal band), it's rather ludicrous that I didn't know that "Immortally Insane" existed until about maybe five years ago.  Well, it did show up originally on the Heavy Metal 2000 soundtrack which was both a soundtrack and movie that I completely ignored.  I was and remain an album guy, so b-sides and whatnot usually allude me for a spell.  Case in point here.  But alas, when my brother stumbled upon this and sent it to me by saying "This is the greatest Pantera riff of all  time", I was needless to say intrigued.  And he was right.  Clearly the band themselves knew this, as almost the entire song is that same riff played over and over again.  Because really, how can you fuck with this?  Dimebag is almost Tony Iommi in the riff department.  Exhibit A right goddamn here son.

10.  One - Metallica

As much of a cliche it may be to consider "One" the best Metallica song, I care not.  The best track off the band's best album has always held that distinction for me.  As well as many others.  I'm one of those Metallica fans that actually likes (The Black Album) and will make no apologies for doing so, but I also agree with most metal head friends of mine that everything else they've done since is garbage.  "One" on the other hand very much isn't.  The entire metalfied end of this song that Lars can't play live anymore is worthy of all the praise and the entire song as a whole shows off what Metallica was always best at, which was excellent arrangements.  "One" builds as good if not better than most epics ever have.

9.  Slaughter of the Soul - At the Gates

When At the Gates reunited and went on tour, they opened their set with the title track from the metal album that will never be topped, Slaughter of the Soul.  And me standing elbow to elbow with a bunch of other smelly, white, metalhead males proceeded to lose my goddamn mind and blow out my voice screaming along all evening.  I hardly remember actually WATCHING them live as I was far too busy headbanging.  "Slaughter" is the ultimate ATG song and perfectly encapsulates why this is the best extreme metal album of all time.  Every riff destroys, Tomas Lindberg rips his vocal chords, the breakdown is ridiculously awesome, the production is flawless, and it's heavy as a sack of heavy things.  The best thing to ever come out of Sweden right here.

8. Sothis - Vader

I think the only death metal album that my brother bought before I did was Vader's Live In Japan.  This is double odd since both of us almost always ignore live albums to begin with and my brother isn't that much of a death metal head.  But "Sothis" was the first track after the intro on said live album and after skimming it at Rolling Stones Records, c'mon now, how could you not be hooked?  This is arguably the best DM song of all time.  There's few examples of a song who's numerous riffs are so relentlessly headbanging.  Poland's Vader have always been excellent and "Sothis" originally stemmed from their second album De Profundis, which you guessed it, is solid as ever.  This song, which was my introduction to this band, has never ceased amazing me.

7. Unleashing the Bloodthirsty- Cannibal Corpse

And just beating out Vader by a hair in the "best death metal song ever" category, it's the closest thing the genre has to a household name, Cannibal Corpse.  It is rather fitting that these guys would come out on top.  Going as strong as ever still today, there's really only like two Corpse albums that aren't great and 1999's Bloodthirst may trump them all.  Much of this has to do with it being their only album that the mighty Colin Richardson produced, who should be required by law to be the only man allowed to produce every metal album made by anyone.  But of course another big part of the excellence is the almost title track "Unleashing the Bloodthirsty".  Alex Webster, (another mighty fellow), penned the music and lyrics and it's his masterpiece.  THEE Cannibal Corpse breakdown is in this song and the rest of the riffs could destroy Catholicism if given the chance.

6.  Legions of the Dead - Testament

Now when it comes to "heavy", there is everything else and then there is "Legions of the Dead".  Amazingly Andy Sneap mixed Testament's greatest achievement The Gathering, the reason it amazes is because Sneap is one of the things that's wrong with modern metal as his sound-replaced, punched-in "every album sounds exactly the same" sound is utterly loathsome.  This album on the other wang sounds like glory.  Chuck Billy and Eric Peterson were kind of without a band when they cut The Gathering so, as the album title dictates, they simply gathered three A-listers to help out.  Dave Lombardo, James Murphy, and Steve DiGiorgio all appear and clearly this trick worked wonders.  "Legions of the Dead" destroys everything in it's path.  Billy's vocals are straight up cookie monster-esque and this is straight-up as ferocious as thrash metal has or will ever get.

5.  Angel of Death - Slayer

From this point on, all these songs appeared on my 100 favorite songs list so for the two people reading this who saw that one, the surprises are mostly over.  "Angel of Death" at any given time I can rightly consider the all time definitive metal song.  And as you can see, damn well the best.  This is the Slayer jam to rule them all, no question.  Public Enemy had the right mind to sample it brilliantly and who are you to talk shit about anything off It Takes a Nation of Millions to Hold Us Back?  Written about one of real life's most evil men, (Nazi physician Josef Mengele), and of course penned solo by the only Slayer guitarist that matters Jeff Hanneman, "Angel" is a classic and always will be.  It's impossible to imagine what the metal world would be like without this song's existence, so Mr. Hanneman, we salute thee!

4.  Neogenesis - Enslaved

The twelve minute closer to Enslaved's third masterpiece in a row, (2004's Isa), is the haunting, gorgeous, and of course still much heavy "Neogenesis".  This was my favorite Enslaved song after the first time I heard it as this entire album had me under it's trance willingly.  The eerie and melodic intro with those chanty, clean Viking vocals gives way to thrashy goodness and then bounces back with excellent guitar solos, more double bass, and keyboards soaring over it all.  And then at about the 8:40 mark, this song kicks into arguably my favorite thing in any song made by humans.  The three-plus minute slow as fuck stoner/classic rock riff that they play the shit out of to send it all home is what all music should be.  Plus Ivar Bjørnson's lead over it is as good as lead guitar playing gets.  If not more gooder.

3.  A Vampire Bit My Balls - Maggot Twat

Now we arrive at my five year old daughter's favorite song, Maggot Twat's "A Vampire Bit My Balls".  And just so you know, we call it "The Vampire Song" when my daughter routinely asks to listen to it every car ride.  Parenting done right.  But anyway, The Twat sadly is no longer with us as they decided to call it quits within the last year which did and still brings me a sad face like you wouldn't believe.  Thankfully, I saw this band numerous times live, each show ranking as the best I'd ever seen.  And each one ended with "The Vampire Song".  Everything I and everyone should love about this band is here, namely "how the hell is he doing that?" wammy riff awesomes and some of the most hilarious lyrics of all time.  Did Bob Dylan ever pen anything as brilliant as "Now my dick is all evil, it keeps me up all night long.  I can't go out in the daytime without a coffin on my shlong"?.  Exactly.

2.  Painkiller - Judas Priest

The only song from cow's around the world's least favorite metal band Judas Priest to appear on this list yes, but also, look how high.  Go team.  Priest's first album to feature former Racer X's skinsman Scott Travis opens with the title track "Painkiller" and you'd have to put a gun to my head to admit that anything else this band has or will ever do will top it.  There might not be a riff in the entire cosmos that kills more than this one.  Rob Halford, (who never ceases to amaze even into his 60s), has never been more impressive than he is on this one as well and Glenn Tipton and K.K. Downing likewise rip their most perfect dual lead.  It goes to show you that a band as great as Death can do a cover of this song on what I think is their best album and this would still end up being probably the best thing THEY ever did as well.  Can't fuck with the Priest or the "Painkiller".


For a change, I actually didn't know what was going to top one of my lists when I began making it.  I knew that "Holy Wars...the Punishment Due" was a contend-uh for sure, but I was a little pleasantly surprised that it ended as high as it did.  To label this song as my favorite in the history of metal just sounds right.  Rust In Peace could be my favorite metal album as well when the mood hits me right anyway, but the track that kicks off Megadeth's high watermark is utterly perfect.  A six and a half minute epic, two part suite with lyrics about both the Northern Ireland Conflict and the Punisher because sure why not, "Wars" also features Dave Mustaine's finest guitar solo.  Which I would go as far as to say is the best metal guitar solo ever played.  Sorry Dimebag.  Dave Mustaine seems to be on a quest to prove that he's one of the most impossible musicians on earth to work with and enough word blips to make him sound like Ted Nuggent's doppelganger, but credit where it is due, (huh, huh, puns); the man and his band knows how to do metal like goddamn bosses.

Saturday, September 26, 2015

100 Favorite Metal Songs - Part Four

40.  Mouth for War - Pantera

Groove metal's finest band, finally making an appearance on this list.  It would've been inconceivable to not include something off Vulgar Display of Power which could very well be the best metal album ever made.  "Mouth for War" is another in a seemingly endless long line of phenomenal opening tracks to metal albums.  Dimebag's guitar tone and Vinnie Paul's drum sound on this album are as good as it gets.  And Phil Ansemlo as usual lives up to his reputation as an extreme metal vocalist with hardly a peer.  Anytime Pantera thrashed it up was always good times and the end of this song is no exception.  Pit-worthy excellence.


According to what bassist and one-time frontman Jon Vesano told the audience the first time I saw Nile on stage, we all witnessed the very first live performance of "Unas Slayer of the Gods".  It was one of the legs of the In Their Darkened Shrines tour with these delightful chaps headlining.  And seeing all eleven minutes and forty-three seconds of this played note perfect was as impressive as all get out.  Just on a technical level as this is the ultimate Nile epic to rule them all.  It's also their best song.  The real Unas was the ninth pharaoh of the 5th Dynasty in the Old Kingdom and according to legend, as the song dictates, he ate hearts to attain godhood.  Can you say "brutal"?

38.  Deliverance - Opeth

Mo epicness abounds!  Deliverance may be an album that Mikael Åkerfeldt thinks could have turned out better if he wasn't simultaneously writing and recording it along with their mellow-only masterpiece Damnation.  But anyone would have to admit that the title track off the heavy album can do no wrong.  It's the best heavy Opeth song and all the trademarks are there.  Acoustic softness, bleak, dissonant metal riffs, proggy time-signatures and transitions, and Åkerfeld's always superb clean and extreme vocals.  All culminating with the last four minute riff sandwich that just goes on and on.  Which is the single best Opeth moment of all time.

37.  An Ode To Locksmiths - Type O Negative

And here we have all the proof we need that when Pete Steel wanted to channel his inner Black Sabbath, he was beyond fully capable of offering up some goddamn mighty fine riffage.  For whatever reason, on Type O Negative's ultimate swan song Dead Again, Steele must've hooked Tony Iommi's DNA straight to his veins as it's frontloaded with killer stoner riffs almost on every song.  Type O only before would occasionally dabble in such things, always excellently mind you, but this album is another story.  The penultimate track "An Ode To Locksmiths" wacks you right in the groin with that goddamn riff, but then ends with yet another one with the "You ain't going NOwhere!" part. Whatta way for a band to go out.

36.  Redneck - Lamb of God

Speaking of riffs that make my pee-pee tingle, holy christ how bout this one?  "Redneck" was leaked first when Lamb of God's fifth and best album Sacrament was on the way and I certainly wasn't expecting this.  Not that I wasn't expecting something awesome as LoG had been offering up nothing but greatness for the last several years and once again Machine was back producing who has the uncanny ability to routinely capture or at least sound replace the greatest drum sound of all time.  But a riff this tasty, southern, and slamming is pretty much what I'm always hoping to hear.  A dash of the blues can often spice up your metal meal I suppose.  These guys have always remained consistent, though it'd be just mean to expect them to tear it up quite to this level ever again.

35.  Caught In a Mosh - Anthrax

This is probably Anthrax' "Raining Blood".  It's played live always and really, with a song titled "Caught In A Mosh", it's pretty much tailor made to make the room it's being played in instantaneously erupt into a pit of slam dancing bonkersness.  Though oddly I must say when I saw them live, "Indians" had the biggest pic I'd ever seen in all my days.  All that aside, Among the Living is Anthrax' masterpiece and "Mosh" is impossible not to love.  That main riff that begins with bass and slams into thrash pudding proves this.  Joey Belladonna's vocals are and have always been perfect as has Charlie Benante's drum sound and performance.  Fist clenched, shouting, and of course moshing perfection up in here.

34.  Redneck Stomp - Obituary

Yes I'm aware I almost put two songs with the word "redneck" in them right next to each other.  Thank you Anthrax for making it not so.  But this here one with the word "stomp" after it opens up Obituary's back from the dead reunion album, oddly not titled back from the dead, but instead Frozen In Time.  Tis a solid offering and one that I caught live during the touring cycle, (where Allen West stood motionless like a robot who couldn't wait to not be there anymore the entire show, btw).  My pick for the best instrumental song in all of metal simply because all of these riffs are ridiculously heavy meat awesome.  Obituary sans John Tardy just destroys it here.

33.  Ontogomy of Behavior - Cephalic Carnage

When I got into Denver, Colorado's Cephalic Carnage, it was with the Anomalies album.  And this was the album where the band spiced shit up with a slew of sludge, stoner, and even metalcore parodying moments.  And clean singing and guest vocalists.  The album's final song "Ontogomy of Behavior" is the sole, darkly melodic entry and shit, nine minutes and fifty-seconds simply isn't long enough.  I always wanna hear this album as it's excellent front to back, but I'd be lying if I said I always can't wait for it to get to this song.  "Behavior" slowly builds and builds, getting heavier and heavier, and eventually blowing up your speakers with a "My freakin ears hurt" distortion effect.  Fantasmicgasm stuff.

32.  Curse You All Men! - Emperor

When I bought IX: Equilibrium, I had no idea what black metal was.  Let alone symphonic black metal.  I just listened to it a bit in a used CD store and thought it sounded like death metal with keyboards and screaming instead of cookie monster vocals.  Ah, virgin ears.  Thankfully these days and for many days previously now, I have been well informed and aware of what black metal and Emperor is/are.  Of course meaning they are the finest black metal band of all times.  Equilibrium's opener "Curse You All Men!" is a pristine example of why.  It's Ihsahn, Samoth, and Trym at their most brutal, with the later just cruising on the kit and the former two multi-layering riff on top of riff, all of them killer.

31.  My Curse - Killswitch Engage

Metalcore, (or "girl metal" as some of us snobs like to call it for a hoot), has admittingly produced a number of solid bands.  Shadows Fall, Chimera, and the golden poster boys Massachusetts's Killswitch Engage.  Both this band's singers were and are excellent, but I've always preferred Howard Jones soulful croon and it's on full display in "My Curse".  Easily one of the prettiest metal songs of all time, "Curse" is basically a pop song with guitar harmonies, tons of chunk, and at least one bouncy and memorable riff.  Killswitch in general are several cuts above all the other bands in their field and in this case, their popular dominance in the sub-genre is wholly justified.

30.  Mein Herz Brennt - Rammstein

We've now come to my favorite Rammstein jammie jammie jammie and it's fittingly off my favorite Rammstein album Mutter.  "Mein Herz Brennt opens that album as it did that tour and also got a creepy, piano version music video long after originally being released.  And worry not, the regular video of the song is plenty creepy as well, (see link).  This song can do no wrong as every audio and visual representation of it is glorious.  The orchestral section is oh so good and when shit gets heavy, it ushered in at the time the first steps the band would take in a more loose and primitive direction with their riffs as they'd continue till presently.


How I miss White Zombie.  Long before Rob Zombie started routinely making bad movies and bad music on his lonesome, his band White Zombie was delivering the groove metal goods with a side of  horror and b-movie schtick.  "Welcome to Planet Motherfucker/Psychoholic Slag" is the first track on La Sexorcisto: Devil Music, Vol. 1 and it's the reason this band was awesome.  J and Sean Yseult's riffs are as fantastically slamming throughout this entire album as Rob Zombie's lyrics and vocals are obsolete.  Rob ultimately doesn't even need to be here as these songs could thrive instrumentally just as well if not better.  The samples should stay though.

28.  Where You Come From - Pantera

It's interesting to think, what if Pantera didn't bother with the whole live album idea and instead when they went in the studio to cut "Where You Come From" and "I Can't Hide" for said album, they just took the time to slam together an entire full length?  Because these two songs are goddamn fantastic and one can only assume an entire album with the band firing on these cylinders would've been a masterpiece.  This was my favorite Pantera riff for years until I caught wind of another song that's still on the way on this list, but christ could Dimebag bust out some ridiculously good shit when the whiskey was flowing just right.

27.  White Walls - Between the Buried & Me

Colors by North Carolina's Between the Buried & Me is the best progressive metal album not made my Dream Theater.  And in fact it's far, far better than the last several Dream Theater outings as well.  Colors is all over the place and is nearly impossible to predict even after hearing it several times as musical genres are thrown into a blender and served up with brutal blast beats, ridiculously complex guitar leads/riffs, and Tommy Giles Rogers vocals that cover as much ground as the music.  Closing it all out is "White Walls" which is fourteen minutes of better-than-anything-you've-ever-heard.  Every song on earth should end exactly like this one does.

26.  Raining Blood - Slayer

If you're a drummer or just knocking on a door, it is physically impossible NOT to at least at some or every point bang out the tom intro to "Raining Blood".  If we could all agree that only one song on earth qualifies as "metal", this would undoubtedly be it.  The breakdown to destroy all breakdowns is in this one, as is the chaotic ending to end all endings.  And the opening riff here is definite Slayer and ergo again, definitive metal.  As much as a cliche as this song has become over the decades, it has done zero to diminish it's powers and not including it in this list here would be like not putting Citizen Kane in a greatest films ever made list.

25.  The Trooper - Iron Maiden

And another metal classic.  Just as "Raining Blood" is what thrash metal is all about, "The Trooper" is what old school heavy metal looks, tastes, and smells like.   Iron Maiden has one of the most impressive laundry lists of iconic songs, ("Number of the Beast", "Run to the Hills", "Hallowed Be Thy Name", "Aces High", etc).  And Piece of Mind's "Trooper" obviously belongs on this list for all the Maiden staples that need be there.  Galloping, ass-kicking drums, sing-along everything, the harmonized riff to rule them all, and lyrics about epic battle.  Also for what it's worth, this has the best guitar solo Dave Murray and Adrian Smith ever dueled out.

24.  Psycho Man - Black Sabbath

When I saw Black Sabbath full original line-up at the 1999 Ozzfest and they didn't play their new single "Psycho Man", part of me died inside.  It was one of the only times I can remember seeing a classic rock era band and actually wanted them to play their new stuff.  Sadly I wasn't too impressed with three-fourths of this line-up's 2013 album cleverly titled 13, but when the full four reunited in the late-90s, holy mother of Satan did they kill it with this song.  The first three minutes of pure, doom awesomeness leads into a riff so amazing that Tony Iommi must've been channeling Tony Iommi to come up with it.  How I wish classic Sabbath was always this heavy.

23.  Green Machine - Kyuss

Stoner-rock/metal is a genre I certainly enjoy, though it's ended up that Kyuss is the only such band to fall into these ranks that I'm including here.  There version of Sabbath's "Into the Void" made my 100 favorite songs list, but I chose not to include covers on this one which meant "Green Machine" was gonna be here.  Most definitely so.  Written by drummer Brant Bjork, "Machine" is the second track on Blues for the Red Sun, this band's best album offering.  But as good as said full-length is, I have bumped just this song about seven hundred more times than anything else on it.   Josh Homme's de-tuned, bass amp amplified guitar is technically heavier than all the other songs appearing here.

22.  Athanati Este - Rotting Christ

I had been a fan of Rotting Christ for a few years when I got their current album Sanctus Diavolos in 2004 like a good metal consumer.  But it transcended all expectations, as good as much of their previous material was.  This is a top ten metal album for me and absolutely always will be.  It's also one of the oddest, which contributes both to it's uniqueness and excellence.  I've heard it described by my friends as both Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom metal and Damien metal.  The later has to do with the fact that much of the lyrics are in Latin and it heavily features a evil as fuck sounding real choir.  "Athanati Este" is the ultimate track on it that I'm including and if the opening riff to this doesn't immediately make your privates tingle, then you should see a doctor.

21.  Pierced from Within - Suffocation

Pierced from Within, (besides being solid front to back and containing superb production), is the definitive album from Long Island's technical death metal masters Suffocation.  Even though Mike Smith isn't on it, sad to say.  I've seen these guys three times, (ironically with Mike Smith behind the kit), and the opening track to this album was played always.  They were also three of the most brutal performances ever, Frank Mullen's karate-chop hand gestures supplying the comic relief.  My first death metal band learned this song and it took me an hour to get the first twenty seconds down.  My guitar players likewise spent about two hours per riff.  So yeah, either we suck or this band rules.  Little from column A, little from column B.

Thursday, September 24, 2015

100 Favorite Metal Songs - Part Three


According to a quick wikipedia check, jinn are mythological beings that come in various forms of fire and tentacles and pretty much sound like the perfect thing to write a metal song about.  Karl Sanders knows what's what.  This is the best song out of many off Amogst the Catacombs of Nephren-Ka, which is actually titled off a Lovecraft reference.  The female scream sample that comes halfway through may be my favorite non-funny sample any band has ever used as it intensifies the already existing brutality of the song tenfold.  Elsewhere, "Jinn" is just two and a half minutes of linear riffs that kick all the ass, proving that even when not hammering down the ten minute epics, Nile was just as powerful.

59.  Not Unlike the Waves - Agalloch

Portland Oregon's finest black-folk-post-Ulver worshiping metal band Agalloch had two outstanding albums behind them already when they dropped Ashes Against the Grain in 2006.  Though it's certainly strong, it had a hell of a time following up The Mantle which is simply brilliant.  That album and Pale Folklore even before it both streamed together as one long song more or less.  So picking out a stand alone favorite for this list was tricky.  Also both albums had way more folk elements than Grain, which is a heavier beast overall.  Regardless, my favorite of this band's individual songs is "Not Unlike the Waves", which is nine gloriously epic minutes of everything these chaps do oh so well.  Heaviness, wretched screaming, chanted singing, and melodic beauty all bashing it out.

58.  War Ensemble - Slayer

More Jeff Hanneman representation.  He and Tom Araya both slammed out the lyrics to Seasons In the Abyss' opener "War Ensemble" which is my earliest memory of hearing Slayer.  I bought this and South of Heaven because those are two albums everyone needs when I had only heard the name Slayer any and everywhere.  So when this came on and that opening riff and Dave Lombardo's ferociousness hit me square in the wang, I knew I hadn't made a foolish purchase.  Slayer was in the blood apparently.   A blitzkrieg anthem that's both textbook Slayer and simply thrash metal done goddamn right.  There's a reason these guys negate any gay activity.

57.  Du Riechst So Gut - Rammsteim

Fitting that Rammstein's first appearance on this list is also their first single and music video off their first album.  This band is one of my favorite things that ever happened to ever and all of their albums are good if not ballsmazing.  I bought Herzeleid after having already acquired Sehnsucht, as most U.S. Rammstein fans did once "Du Hast" came out and put them on us people's with taste's radar.  "Du Riechst So Gut", (which is "You smell so good" to us I-Merican speakin' folk), is as simple, dancy, hooky, and heavy as this band gets.  The main and awesome riff is just two frets right next to each other bounced back and forth.  Hooray for cheating!

56.  Future Breed Machine - Meshuggah

And now for the complete opposite technically from Rammstein, it's Swedish math-metal definers Meshuggah's "Future Breed Machine".  I'm only a borderline fan of this band as most of their stuff gets old quick.  Monotone robot screaming and open guitar chunk, (no matter how my-brain-hurts-wobbly the multiple time signatures are), is usually cool for a bit if the mood sits me right though.  That said, Destroy Erase Improve is the one Meshuggah album that I'd call a certified masterpiece and this be the song it opens with.  Tomas Haake's drumming is unreal and Fredrik Thordendal's calculator solos are head-scratchingly awesome.

55.  The Dead Stare - Enslaved

My first delectable taste of Norway's Viking/black/prog metal giants Enslaved was "The Dead Stare" which I somehow heard before buying Below the Lights which it stems from, though I don't remember where exactly.  I do know that I played the shit out of this song when it was the only Enslaved I had on me and if your ears work, you should be able to see why.  The rock riff they, well, rock the shit out of at the 'round three-minute mark till the end is whoop-ass as all get out.  It's also just as get out weird, with the swirling prog synths, organ, and gargled whispers going on over it.  Needless to say, my relationship with this band was off to a fantastic start with this one.

54.  Te Quiero Puta! - Rammstein 

The half, left-over-from-Reise, Reise album Rosenrot is easily Rammstein's weakest, but it's also still considerably better than most albums most bands routinely put out.  And it's certainly worth owning for "Te Quiero Puta!" alone, arguably the greatest Rammstein song of all time.  If not that, it's easily the funniest.  The first time I heard this and the horns kicked in at the beginning I said to myself "Oh hell no, did they do a mariachi song?".  Then the horns stayed past the intro and by the time they joined the dumb/heavy as hell main riff, I almost crashed my car.  One of the many reasons this band should all be president is because they clearly take themselves not at all seriously.  Any look at virtually any of their brilliant music videos will tell you this.  As will bumping this song.  Loudly.  Through a Hispanic neighborhood.

53.  Kaimadalthas Nedstigning - Burzum

Speaking of comedic geniuses, on to Varg!  For sure the most notorious black metal musician that will probably, (and hopefully), ever emerge, Varg Vikernes besides all the murder, church burning, racism, and tips for dating women has actually produced a number of excellent albums before and after serving in prison.  His first two, Burzum and Det Som Engang Var, are essential early Norwegian black metal and are as good as said sub-genre gets.  Then once he gained his freedom back after a nearly fifteen years stint in prison for murdering Mayhem founder Øystein "Euronymous" Aarseth, he surprised many by not only returning to black metal after publicly declaring it derivative of "nigger music", but also by releasing what I think is his best album yet, Belus.  "Kaimadalthas Nedstigning" is both oddly beautiful and creepy, as well as primitive as ever.

52.  Like This with the Devil - Entombed

As far as pretentious album titles go, Entombed's  DCLXVI: To Ride Shoot Straight and Speak the Truth certainly qualifies.  Sadly it's also the death 'n' roll pioneers' last good album.  A step down obviously from the proceeding Wolverine Blues of course, but a chosen few metal albums of any kind can stand up to that if at all.  My favorite of all of these Swedish chaps songs stems not from Blues, but from Shoot Straight and it be "Like This with the Devil".  And this is because this riff could reinvent the cosmos.  The rest of this song could be the sound of Donald Trump barfing and I would still rank it this high.

51.  Trapped In A Corner - Death

What just may be the best Death album appropriately features their best song "Trapped In A Corner".  I sadly had more Death written down for this list that ultimately found the way of the cutting room floor.  I certainly thought they'd have more than one entry.  But alas, tis what happened.  "Trapped" had no prayer of NOT being on here though.  For one it has the best riff I believe Chuck Schuldiner ever wrote which of course shows up in the breakdown.  For his last four Death albums, (or five counting Control Denied's debut), Chuck was offering up some of the best metal the world will ever see, with a slew of bandmembers that have continued to deserve their exalted reputations.

50.  Moonchild - Iron Maiden

Can't rank no metal without Maiden showing up.  Arguably the greatest metal act of the '80s, the Iron Maiden has become an institution now that still fills soccer stadiums and arenas.  And will until they're dead in the cold, cold ground I reckon.  Seventh Son of a Seventh Son opens with the Aleister Crowley ode "Moonchild" and at various times through various years, I have considered it my favorite Maiden jam.    The "Seven deadly sins" folk intro, main keyboard riff, and straight-up heaviness once the drums slam into groove form suite me most fine.  It helps that Son is Maiden's peak in album form and I always feel like hearing it/this song.  It's the band at their progiest and most collaborative and ergo best.

49.  Fuel for Hatred - Satyricon

Fuckin-hell right the opening riff to this song is goddamn awesome.  This right there guarantees that "Fuel for Hatred" has gotten bumped on a regular basis by me since I acquired it.  It also features probably THEE dumbest riff of all time, if sliding up the fretboard in a slow, rhythmic fashion and nothing else counts as a "riff".  Me and my previous death metal band Wretched Disciple certainly had a hoot while playing it live many moons ago.  Pretty sure it made my Paul Stanley wig fall off.  Long story.  But anyway, I haven't been much into the last three Satyyricon albums since Volcano, the album "Fuel" is the highlight on.  No matter since they have plenty of good before and even if they only recorded this song and broke up, it'd still be here.

48.  Asche Zu Asche - Rammstein

Another single off Rammstein's debut Herzeleid, "Asche Zu Asche" features my all time favorite Rammstein riff.  And this is saying something as these Krouts don't slouch on the killer riff writing.  Hey Marge that rhymes and you know it rhymes, admit it!  It's basically not possible to put this song on and not start headbanging.  Yet actually, (just to be the goofy cut-ups they are I assume), I've seen footage of Richard and Paul at least standing like motionless robots when this song shows up in the set list live.  Which is odd yet comedically satisfying.  Nothing about this song isn't great and it's the best early-Rammstein moment when they were more dance driven and tight.

47.  Super Charger Heaven - White Zombie

It's always fun to pick out the samples in White Zombie songs, since they're almost always from classic horror movies that I at least almost always have seen.  "Super Charger Heaven" begins with a line from The Haunting and yes, that is Christopher Lee doing the Latin prayer during the jungle breakdown.  Both major label White Zombie albums are ones that I've adored since high school and this was my favorite of their songs for the longest of times.  Astro Creep is primarily driven by rhythmic non-riffage, (which is still awesome mind you), but the main riff in "SCH" is more traditionally wicked.  Plus most Rob Zombie lyrics I A) can't understand or B) could care less about, but the line "Suck the juice from a fallen angel" is brilliant, this I will give him.

46. By the Light - Obituary

The last Obituary album to be released when death metal was seemingly on it's way out and the band members would all go get real jobs for awhile before regrouping after six years had gone by, Back from the Dead was also their best since Cause of Death.  Florida's very best Celtic Frost worshipers had perfected their mid-paced meat and potatoes death metal by this point and groove monster "By the Light" soyently proves this.  The one-two punch of this and the proceeding "Threatening Skies" pretty much make this an album I can listen to anytime.  They're both likewise usually the only two they still play live, right next to each other as always.  This one bobs the neck nicely it does.

45.  Perpetual War - Monstrosity

I like how Karl Sanders put it that if you do really good in Monstrosity, you get to go on to join other bands.  At least two current Cannibal Corpse members were in or at least almost in Monstrosity at one point before Jim Carey's favorite death metal band made them a way better offer.  But thankfully, none of this deterred the Floridian Monstrosity from making a masterpiece in the world of extreme metal with In Dark Purity .  It was one of the first albums with cookie monster vocals and double bass that I ever bought and since the beginning, "Perpetual War" has been THEE motherfucker of a song on it.  Awesome chunk and a Mortal Kombat inspired riff?  You can't lose!

44.  Hallowed Be Thy Name - Iron Maiden

Abbath's favorite Maiden to sing whilst drunk, (and shit, probably many others favorite as well), "Hallowed Be Thy Name" is contestable as being the ultimate Iron Maiden song.  Even though it and The Number of the Beast features not the mighty skin slamming powers of Nicko McBrain, you'd have to be listening to another song instead of this one ever to not agree that it's sweet, glorious excellence.  Maiden has anthem upon anthem in their catalog with no shortage of songs they are required by law to perform live each and every show, but "Hallowed" gets the nod as the most all encompassingly epic.  It's just seven minutes of what heavy metal is supposed to sound like.

43.  Kill All the White People - Type O Negative

Pete Steele and Co are certainly one of my favorite bands that have ever been a band.  That said, most of their very finest songs are not necessarily ones that I would play when headbanging is a thing I want to happen to my person.  I listen to them when I wanna hear gorgeousness in song form with outstanding vocals.  And massive, cheap sounding distortion and creepy organs.  But there's metal and punk roots a float in Type O's music as well and occasionally they've produced some unquestionable heavy jams.  "Kill All the White People" is the riff fest on Bloody Kisses, one of the world's finest album.  It's also probably their funniest song, barely any lyrics to it or no.

42.  Ursvamp - Finntroll

The first time I heard this song, milk shot out my nose.  And I don't drink milk.  That's how goddamn funny it was.  I haven't kept up with Finntroll since my introduction to them with Nattfödd, so I've no idea if they still play up the comedy aspect naturally inherent in their music, but this don't matter to the Jesus.  Said album is both heavy and hilarious as balls.  Folk metal usually means acoustic passages and melodies mixed with distorted guitars and aggressive singing, but Finntroll's version basically means all the heaviness plus the extra addition of accordion sounds via keyboards.  Which then turns them into polka metal.  No other way to describe the brilliance on display here.

41.  Ripe for the Breaking - Napalm Death

I have always fancied Napalm Death's more groove oriented middle period.  One which sadly they mostly have been neglecting live for quite some time.  Boo-urns to that.  Fear, Emptiness, Despair I picked up on high recommendation and I reckon I'll always consider it their strongest album.  Only slightly less strong though even more groove oriented, the full-legth follow-up Diatribes features "Ripe for the Breaking" which has one of my all time favorite riffs appearing in it.  So good be it that I forced my brother to rip it off in my own band Gorphanage and also so good that this ultimately has ended up being my highest and only Napalm inclusion for this list.