Thoughts Without Words: Trifecta albums

Remember when I used to blog? Anyway, it has been awhile.

So I was thinking the other day about bands that released 3 albums in a row that are just "all killer, no filler". And as I thought about it more, I realized that making 3 great albums in a row is very hard. This post will look at some of my favorite bands and see if they every had a trifecta.


Metallica: definitely. I would say they hit 4 in a row. Their 1st 4 albums are all classics. But if you were to narrow it down to 3 I would say Ride the Lightning, Master of Puppets, and And Justice for All. 

Megadeth: Yes. They actually could lay claim that their first 5 albums are all classics. But I would also go with their 2nd half albums, The World Needs a Hero, The System has Failed, and United Abominations. 

Trivium: Nope. This hurts cause I love Trivium. Their debut and Ascendancy are good, but The Crusade ruins that run. Shogun and In Waves started it up again, only to be stopped by Vengeance Falls. And their last two albums aren't the beginning of a trifecta run either.

Shadows Fall: Yep. Of One Blood, The Art of Balance & The War Within. In fact, if not for Threads of Life, Shadows Fall could have had the perfect run.

Killswitch Engage: Nope. Alive or Just Breathing & End of Heartache are classics. As Daylight Dies kills that one though. ADD doesn't bring anything new to the game so to speak. And the songs, just don't compare. They almost did it again with Killswitch Engage II & Disarm the Descent, but Incarnate was just above average.

All That Remains:  Nope. Their debut & The Fall of Ideals are classics. Their sophomore album is just blah. Sounds too much like KsE. Overcome is ok, but For We are Many is the beginning of the end of this band.

Into Eternity: Nope. Buried in Oblivion and Scattering of Ashes are solid, but Incurable Tragedy is too short and Dead or Dreaming suffers from some poor production.

In Flames: Yes. Whoracle, Colony, and Clayman are classics in Swedish Death Metal. Come Clarity & Sounds of a Playground Fading are great as well, but unfortunately that middle album A Sense of Purpose is just mediocre.

Nevermore: Yes. Like Shadows Fall, they come close to running the table. Their debut is un-listenable to me. But Politics of Ecstasy through This Godless Endeavor are all great examples of modern thrash metal.


Those are basically most of the bands I listen to and you can see only 5 really have done it. If I went to rock I would say Aerosmith and Guns N Roses.

Who Decides: 2010 Albums of the Year

2010 was a bit of a down year. There wasn't that much to get excited about, but the albums that are in the top 10 are really good, sum will easily make the albums of the decade list in 8 years...if the blog is still up and running. I managed to review a few of these albums as the year wrapped up, so hopefully I won't have to talk about each album as much as I did in the past.

A couple of honorable mentions to Eluveitie with Everything Remains As It Never Was. It was a return to Slania-type folk/melodic death metal. In fact, they probably threw in more folk than before. If you liked Slania, check this one out. This is probably my favorite song off the album, but it's also the slowest.


And the God of War III EP. This thing had songs by Trivium, Killswitch Engage, Opeth, Dream Theater, and a couple others. The mentioned 4 band songs were awesome. Opeth going back to some 70's progressive feel and DT going instrumental. And what about Trivium? They kept going in the same direction that they started with Shogun. I couldn't include it because it was just an EP. But it is definitely one of the better releases this year.


10. Angelus Apatrida - Clockwork: This is retro thrash. It was between this band and another called Vindication. One sounds like Megadeth the other Testament. I went with the latter. Nothing really special here. It's classic bay area thrash with great solos and some early Testament style vocals. Like I said, solid, but definitely didn't break any new ground.


9. Pendulum - Immersion: Kind of the black sheep of the list. This band falls under the "drum & bass" genre. It's has that techno/trance/rave type feel to it at times. I found out the album from the song Self vs. Self which had In Flames on it.


To be honest it's an In Flames song on another album because the rest of the album sounds nothing like that. But that's ok. It's really not bad. It reminds me of 80's new wave at times in fact. Believe it or not, I have a soft spot for bands like Tears for Fears, Human League and the likes. Hopefully Pendulum will continue to push the lines of drum & bass to include more metal aspects.


8. Charred Walls of the Damned - Charred Walls of the Damned: I talked about their album HERE. Solid classic metal album. This is a must for Iced Earth fans as well, even if you are fans of Matt Barlow era Iced Earth.


7. As I Lay Dying - This Powerless Rise: there is nothing wrong with this album, it's just not close to being as good as their previous album. No surprises here. If you liked their last one, the same thing is going on here too. I can't complain about it.


6. Eye of the Enemy - Weight of Redemption: can't believe I never talked about this album. It is near perfect for a debut. The production is top notch. It's better than some veteran albums. Eye of the Enemy plays what I call modern thrash, think DevilDriver. The riffs are vicious and the drumming is intense. Vocals have that harder edge to them without going total death metal. There is some interesting use of techno elements, but nothing to write home about. It pops up once or twice and it doesn't take anything away from the song. This is a band to keep an eye on (no pun intended). How many bands can write an 8 minute song to close an album and make it feel like a typical 4 minute song? Not many. Just go to the 3:20 mark to hear some killer music.


5. Arcania - Sweet Angel Dust: Another new band. This band could have used the production that Eye of the Enemy had. That is probably the one downfall of this album. I reviewed it HERE.


4. Nevermore - The Obsidian Conspiracy: This was a bit of a disappointment at first because it wasn't close to The Godless Endeavor. Plus the solo albums from Jeff Loomis and Warrell Dane made the expectations really high. Well after I listened to it, I put it away thinking "this sucks", then I revisited it a couple of weeks later and was blown away by it. It reminds me a lot of Dead Heart in a Dead World because it isn't all thrash. It has some moments that are thrash, but others are that sort of mid-tempo memorable songs. Each song has a hook that grabs you right away and doesn't let go.


3. All That Remains - For We Are Many: I didn't get a chance to review this album during the year, but here is a quick summary. Better than Overcome, but not The Fall of Ideals. It's a solid album. They took the hooks of Overcome and tried to bring in a little bit heavier feel to the album, but it didn't get all the way to The Fall of Ideals. Out of their 5 albums, it is probably their 3rd best, behind The Fall of Ideals and their debut.


2. Bullet For My Valentine - Fever: I reviewed it HERE. Did I say Nevermore had hooks, this thing is like a bait shop...that's a horrible joke, but the point is every song is great. This is a band that I truly thought I would never like, now after their last two albums, I am actually looking forward to see what they can do next.


1. Blaze Bayley - Promise and Terror: I reviewed it HERE. Great throw back to classic metal. No death metal vocals, no breakdowns, just classic heavy metal. Great album. Check out that riff at the 2:40 mark.


That's it. I have mentioned it already, but 2011 looks really good. I think it will be one of the better years for music.

Music Non Stop: New All That Remains samples

Disclaimer: this is a pretty bad year for music. Nothing has gotten my attention and I'm not sure anything will. I can only name at most 5 above average albums. I have been doing my top 10 lists for a few years and this is going to be a tough year to fill up 10 spots. With that said...

The new All That Remains album, For We Are Many, will definitely be in the top 10. Heck, I should just give it the number one spot now. Overcome messed with the vocals a little bit and this one sounds like it is more in line with The Fall of Ideals, their best album. I know you can't tell much from samples, but compared to everything else I have heard this year, this is promising.



Like I said, it's just samples, Nevermore's samples were great and the album was so-so. Oh well. Wait and see.

Music Non Stop: Nevermore & As I Lay Dying new audio samples

I think by now everyone knows how excited I am for the new Nevermore. They released another teaser trailer featuring every song on the album.

Sounds pretty solid. I am loving the title track right now and really can't wait for this one.

If that wasn't good enough news, I read that 30 sec clips of the new As I Lay Dying album, The Powerless Rise, was online. I actually had a chance to listen to them before they were taken down. They have one song up on their site for the new album HERE.

They were both just 30 second clips of the songs, but they sound good. The As I Lay Dying tracks sounded just like their last album. I wasn't too worried they would change their sound, but now my expectation are high for this one again.

Music Non Stop: Nevermore

Ok, I have already talked about Nevermore's new album, The Obsidian Conspiracy, coming out. Yesterday, they released a teaser trailer for it. All I can say is that this is definitely looking like it will be my first big album of the year. Enjoy.

Music Non Stop: Nevermore, Limp Bizkit samples online

Title pretty much says it all. Some samples came out this week of 2 albums I am interested in hearing. First up Nevermore.

Sounds very promising. I am a huge fan of Nevermore. I really don't think they have one bad album in their entire discography. This Godless Endeavor was a great album, but I was worried about the loss of Steve Smyth on guitars, but this sets my mind at ease a lot. I would have to put The Obsidian Conspiracy at the top of my looking forward to albums.

Next up Limp Bizkit. I have talked about Limp Bizkit before so I won't rehash much of it. They are who they are. Their last album, The Unquestionable Truth part 1 was pretty good. Sure Fred tried to sound like Rage Against the Machine, but for me it worked. It was better than some of their other albums, I'm looking at you Results May Vary, and there wasn't much filler on it.

So this brings us to Gold Cobra. Fred decided to post 3 quick samples of some songs. It sounds very promising. Musically, it's Limp Bizkit. Lyrically...well that's where opinions come in. Either you like Fred Durst or you don't. Personally, these samples have me looking forward to this album too. Check them out.





Not bad...not bad at all. I just want some albums to come out that are going to make me stop listening to older albums. Something that "grabs" me.

Spotlight: Nevermore

Ahhh Nevermore, one of my favorite bands...ever, period end of story. Nevermore is a classic thrash metal band with progressive tendencies. Here's what I like best about Nevermore, they haven't put out a bad album yet...6 albums and 1 EP all classics.

I guess if I had to describe them, I would say the speed of old school Megadeth with solos to match, the heaviness of Vulgar Display era Pantera and the vocals of Geoff Tate of Queensryche. There is no death vocals on these albums.

There debut was more power metal than the rest of their material, but still a solid debut. After that it is required thrash material though. Politics of Ectasy, Dreaming Neon Black, Dead Heart in a Dead World, Enemies of Reality, and This Godless Endeavor.

Now I have already told you what I thought about This Godless Endeavor. How are the others? I would probably say Dead Heart in a Dead World is my 2nd favorite followed closely by Dreaming Neon Black. I would say most fans would agree that those are their top 3 albums. Now eventhough Politics and Enemies of Reality aren't in my top 3, those albums actually have some of my favorite Nevermore songs. Take 42147 or This Sacrament from Politics are two great examples of what Nevermore are like. Or Seed Awakening from Enemies has one of the sickest guitar riffs ever.

Nevermore is just one of those bands that you can't go wrong with when trying to pick out an album to buy. It's all good.

Playlist for the week;
Monday: Lost, This Sacrament, 42147 from Politics of Ecstasy
Tuesday/Wednesday: Seed Awakening, I, Voyager, Matricide from Enemies of Reality & EP
Thursday: Beyond Within, The Death of Passion, Fault of the Flesh from Dreaming Neon Black
Friday: The River Dragon has Come, Believe in Nothing, The Heart Collector from Dead Heart in a Dead World.