Of those early metal albums, on casual listens Sir Lord Baltimore was an odd duck. It always seemed to me to be just as firmly in the genre as Black Sabbath, yet it's presence was far less talked about than arguably less important bands like Deep Purple and Rush.
Paying attention to things this time, I can kind of see the reason now. I think occasionally we metalheads forget that non-metal (and non-punk) bands can be frantic and aggressive too. This isn't to say there aren't ... read more

Xandria is a weird band. There was one album of theirs I really liked, whose name escapes me and whose quality is unlike the band. Because Xandria, despite existing for the past two decades aping Nightwish and Within Temptation and anyone you might remember more, has changed vocalists and styles every album. At least as much as one can while still remaining a symphonic metal band. This one is special because everyone except founding member Marco Heubaum left since the last album. Some of those ... read more

When I fired up this bad boy, it had been far too long since I last heard Nasty Savage, remembering their '80s stuff as some surprisingly dirty-sounding power/thrash. Sleaze thrash would be an apt descriptor. But bands rarely sound the same after nearly forty years and a nearly complete lineup change, what would be the difference?
They've definitely gone for a more straight thrash sound, and it's very different, but it's still Nasty Savage. Gone is the sleaze and instead we ... read more

Let's see if I can say something unique about this one. Probably not. I've been trying to get back into playing the guitar, which I generally can't make as intelligent observations about my own skill or lackthereof outside of stuff like "how the fuck do you play that chord?" or "made that note high-pitched". Every skill from guitar to language learning has observations you can make as an amateur and observations you can only make if you actually know what ... read more