Introducing...

Matt has already written a more than adequate battle cry outlining our fundamental objectives in maintaining a blog, so I won't bore you (are there even any of you?) with a regurgitation of his post. I figure this short list will serve as a good introduction to both the blog and to me personally.

Without further ado:

Ten records I wish I could hear for the first time again.........in no particular order

I posted this a few months ago in my livejournal after giving it a lot of thought. After a couple of hours I had a list of 49 albums, so narrowing it down to ten wasn't easy.

The reviews we'll be posting will obviously have more substance that the few sentences in this list. I guess "review" isn't really the right word because our connection with the music we love is deeply personal and I don't feel like trying to go piece by piece through each album and rating it or anything like that. Ratings are stupid anyway. I will write about records that I love and why I love them. I'm not opposed to reviewing albums--there are a lot I wish I would've read before dropping $20+ on a mediocre record, but I don't feel like taking up webspace writing about records I don't like. There you have it.



Black Sabbath - Black Sabbath

I wish I could remember the first time I heard the rain at the beginning of "Black Sabbath." Sadly, I never will because there has never been a time in my life where Sabbath didn't exist. As one of my dad's two or three favorite bands, I grew up running around my house in a Batman costume screaming the lyrics to Sabbath, Zeppelin, and Alice Cooper songs. I can't begin to count the reasons why I love Black Sabbath, so I'll narrow it down to three: Tony Iommi (master of the riff), they are the undisputed originators of Heavy Metal, and after all my musical explorations I still find them brain-rattlingly heavy.

Black Sabbath isn't my favorite Sabbath record, that honor is bestowed on any given day to either Master of Reality or Sabbath Bloody Sabbath, but I've chosen it for this list because it is their first. What better way to make your stamp on the world than with the opening track? The rain, thunder, and bells began the storm of heavy metal, still raging after 40 years. Sabbath doesn't pull any punches, and I'd give a lot to hear the crush of opening for the first time.

When Ozzy belts out the first line, "What is this that stands before me?" the pointing figure in black is heavy metal.


Led Zeppelin - Physical Graffiti

Another band that has been with me for as long as I can remember. For my 5th birthday I got a tape player and my dad gave me taped copy of Physical Graffiti and I can only remember two things...1)"In My Time of Dyin'" was my favorite song and I sang the lyrics a lot, but I had no idea Robert Plant was saying "Oh my Jesus" so I kept saying "Oh my Teela" which was kind of fitting because I loved He-Man...2) I got into an argument with my kindergarten teacher when she told me she liked the Rolling Stones, but didn't like Led Zeppelin.

The debate about Led Zeppelin could go on forever, are they heavy metal or hard rock? Classic rock? What? It ain't metal, that's for sure, but it's certainly heavy. I figure I don't need to write much about Led Zeppelin, so I'll be moving on...


Misfits - "collection"

I bought this CD the summer before 8th grade (or sometime around then) and listened to it 4 times in a row when I got home. I don't remember why I bought a Misfits album in the first place...the cover art maybe? Either way, the Misfits soon became my "thing" because no one I knew (which wasn't many people) liked or had even heard them. Short songs full of energy and horror lyrics enforced my "outsider" status (somewhat self-imposed...I remember getting pulled out of gym class..shortly after Columbine...to talk with the guidance counselor. I'm certain it was because I wore boots, army pants/jackets, and shirts with skulls on them. Anyway...his first question was "So, Zach, do you like girls?" to which I responded "None of the ones at this school." The rest of the meeting progressed in similar fashion). While I find punk in general to be hollow, pre '83 Misfits will always contain the power and emotion I look for in music.


Bathory - Blood, Fire, Death

Ultimate power is all I felt during and after listening to this record for the first time. I still want to stand up and scream at the top of my lungs whenever I play it. A perfect blend of harsh, thrashing power and majestic heathen power that will never be attained again, ever.


Hawkwind - Warrior on the Edge of Time

It's safe to say that whenever I put this album on I'll immediately be transported to some strange world of cosmic phenomena and motorcycles. There isn't a song I don't like, and I think of all bands to ever exist Hawkwind may be the one I'd choose to be in if you held a gun to my head and forced me to pick.


Amon Düül II - Yeti

I'd give almost as much to hear the intro to "Soap Shop Rock" as I'd give to hear "Black Sabbath" for the first time. And even more for the rest of the album. Yeti has been such a huge record in my life I've written essays about it, some of which may find there way on here eventually. This record opened so many musical doors; the floodgates of krautrock, the ability to utterly lose myself in the near perfection of sound, and the fueling of an already burning fire for more music.

"Losing myself" isn't a good phrase because I'm more "found" when listening to Yeti or any great album because my mind is working on so many levels. Listening to Yeti is like looking at satellite photos of earth...I realize how cosmically small and insignificant I am in the infinite expanse of the universe. That's certainly a sobering thought, but not a depressing one as I take a sort of comfort in knowing I'm a speck in the galaxy, so to speak.


Kebnekajse - Resa Mot Okänt Mål

Here's that Swedish Psych Matt was talking about. It's been two years since I first heard Kebnekajse, but this record still blows my mind every time I listen to it. I remember sitting on the edge of my bed repeating to myself over and over again "holy shit" and "what the fuck?!?" for the entire 40 minutes...sometimes with less space in between (like during "Förberedelser Till Fest" which was pretty much one long "fuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuck"). Kenny Håkansson's guitar playing in unbelievable in it's dexterity and utter beauty.


Sorcery - Sinister Soldiers

Heavy and catchy as hell. Sure that sums it up, but to leave it at that would be a travesty. There isn't a song on the album I don't like, my favorite being the opener, "Arachnid (The Dark King)." It was released in 1979, though it sounds like it should've/could've been released five years earlier. I don't mean that in a negative way AT ALL, because just like 70s Pentagram, it will remain timeless to my ears until it makes me deaf.


Cirith Ungol - King of the Dead

So heavy and loaded with full-out anthems. As soon as "Atom Smasher" started I knew I'd found a new favorite. By the time I got to "Master of the Pit" I needed no convincing. This album has everything that makes Heavy Metal important to me: speed, heaviness, hooks, honesty, power, and emotion. While I'd say without hesitation that Frost and Fire is my favorite Cirith Ungol record, KotD makes the list because I heard it first and it's what caused me seek out F&F. The glory of metal is evident from beginning to end, but I'll focus only on the lyrics to "Atom Smasher" to save some space.

The lyrics:

Welcome to the brave new world
The Future's here, or haven't you heard?
The sons of man have fell from grace
Till the Smasher comes to save his race

Here it comes, there it goes
Just a flash in the sky
Atom smasher, here he comes
Better run for your lives

He is the hero of the atom age
Born in a test tube raised in a cage
A reaver King his throne defiled
Roaming the streets to the call of the wild

As upstarts strive to rule the world
Against them Chaos legions hurled
The Smashers force has swept the land
Again begins the Dawn of Man

I've tried for a long time to put my love for heavy metal into words, but it's difficult. If these lyrics mean anything to you, you probably have an idea of what heavy metal means to me. The Smasher, like Conan and Elric, is the epitome of the outcast/loner individual who takes hold of life to forge his own destiny. He may be unwillingly forced into situations or out into them through no fault of his own (like the Smasher born into and from an age of atomic despair), or have to battle forces over which he has no control, but succeeds because he has the strength and will to make it happen.


Manilla Road - Crystal Logic

While on the subject of heavy metal's glory...

Manilla Road, for the past two years, has been a staple of my daily listening. A day doesn't go by where I don't blast at least one song and revel in it's sheer greatness. More often than not, that song (if it's not a full album) ends up being "Necropolis," a killer riff, Mark "The Shark" Shelton's unique and thoroughly awesome vocals, and of course the great lyrics that accompany most Manilla Road songs.

Each and every time I play Crystal Logic from beginning to end I find myself wondering two things: how did anyone record such an amazing bit of music, and will I ever even come close matching the greatness of it. If anything, it will definitely foster the creative drive to attempt it.


Honorable mentions:
Pentagram - First Daze Here (a compilation, I know)
Pagan Altar - Volume 1
Alice Cooper - Love it to Death
Uriah Heep - Demons & Wizards
Budgie - Bandolier (try picking ONE Budgie album)
Thin Lizzy - Live & Dangerous (it's a live album, deal with it)
Death in June - Brown Book
Black Widow - Sacrifice
Bodkin - Bodkin
Pugh Rogefeldt - Pugish
The Band - Music from the Big Pink
Yes - Close to the Edge

Only some from the original list of 49.


Expect more substance in future posts, this is merely to give a hint of what I/we will be writing about.

Zach