Ok, this time around, no teasing on the score - I know where things are standing.
11: bl5150 -
Silent Call / First to Know
An almost flawless blend of prog/melodic metal. I don't really have a lot of depth to go into in analyzing this. Vocal tone landed right in the sweet-spot; great guitar riffs and use of keyboards; a rhythm section that does more than keep the beat, but doesn't get too over-the-top. Melodic metal with a taste of progi-ness… very much in the realm of Thunderstone, Masterplan, and Cloudscape. Ok, maybe I did have some analyzing to do.
10: senecadawg2 -
Voodoo Circle / Broken Heart Syndrome
Right in my wheelhouse. Had all the right elements of a great melodic rock/metal song nice rhythm, with little guitar fills all over the place, a decent solo (nothing too flashy), and a fantastic vocalist - which I've heard before - cheater pants! Both you and Paul playing vocalists from my last two AOTY. Well, nothing wrong with cheating, in fact, I encourage it.
Good play.
9: Lowdz -
Abydos / Far Away From Heaven
You're a fuckin cheater too! Playing off my current man-love of Andy Kuntz's voice (boy I sure hope he pronounces that with a hard "U"
... actually, he'd be more badass if it's a soft "U"
). THIS is a killer power ballad. Everything about it was top notch. Slow build, dat scream at 3:20 that builds right into the climactic instrumental section
. Substituting sympnonic/orchestral elements where you'd normally have a guitar line was a nice little twist.
8: TAC -
UFO / Profession of Violence
With a nice blues-rock-ballad feel, this one doesn't do too much - until the outro. What a tremendous solo - emotion, passion, soul - to steal a line from RJ, it could stop a bar fight. This is when guitarists knew how to expertly craft, and put their heart and soul into a solo. This solo was probably the best part of the entire round.
7: Evermind -
Temperance / The Fourth Season
Really digging the instrumental section here - clearly there's a huge Nightwish influence in play. Vocally, there were some really nice melodies, but I liked it better when she wasn't going all operatic - she's good, but certainly no Floor or Tarja. Really love the rich guitar sound and symphonic accompaniment. Just a solid song all the way around.
6: jjrock88 -
Circle II Circle / Sentenced
It's no surprise I sometimes struggle with Savatage (mostly from a vocal perspective), so I wasn't sure how I was going to react with CIIC. What this song delivered though was excellent guitar work, and vocally, I was ok with it (which surprised me). But the key word is 'ok'. Normally Zak is a struggle for me to get through, but this was ok. Musically it kept me interested throughout. This would've done better last round, but suffers from a crop of really good tracks this round. Great metal solo without the need to over-shred things. Good variety of guitar melodies and riffs. I dug it.
5.5: jjrock88 -
Armoured Saint / Last Train Home
I wasn't overly impressed on first listen, but it rocked way better on listen #2 (and subsequent ones) with headphones. Pretty run-of-the-mill melodic rock, but it's still a pretty good mill. Everything about it was just right - good vocals, good composition, nice melodies - but nothing that wow’d me - so it’s a middle of the pack ranking. Ranking wise, it was virtual tie with CIIC, so you unfortunately gained nothing with your tag team - other than me putting another band on ‘The List'
5.5: senecadawg2 -
Unleash the Archers / Tonight We Ride
Four distinct vocal styles - clean were great; grunts... neither good nor bad; harsh vocals were ok - I can dig that - very reminiscent of Alissa's contributions in the last two Kamelot albums; screams - talented, for sure, but I find the use of high end wails like that to be good in moderation, and they were overused here for my liking (not that I disliked them though). The music was good; nice guitar solo/unison. Reminded me a lot of Reach out to the Light - especially the marching/power drum beat and drone of the rhythm guitar. Also a virtual tie with CIIC and Armoured Saint.
5: wolfking -
Angel Dust / Fly Away
Vocally it reminded me of Anders Endberg of Speaking to Stones. Loved the slow roll on the opening, but the remainder of the song wasn't much more than slightly above average. Nice guitar work, but I didn't hear what you heard. Not a lot to say, I wasn't impressed, nor was I disappointed - which lands you pretty much in the middle of this group of tunes.
4: Zook -
CHVRCHES / Clearest Blue
Electronica pop - fun tune, and enjoyable… not something I'd turn to on my own. This feels more like a guilty pleasure to me. I'd like to rank this higher, but I know that this just isn't a song I'll proactively go out and reach for - but like Zydar's Mando Daio submission in my first roulette, I'll enjoy the fuck out of this everytime I spin it. Is it 'better' than other songs this round? Perhaps... but by my definition of 'better', not really. This will unfortunately suffer from being so far outside my normal comfort zone that I can't rate it too high.
3: Bolsters -
Odd Logic / Perfect Day
This is a pretty complex prog-metal track, that works well in the beginning, and the end... but the instrumental wankery in between just didn't click. It was tantamount to how I feel about the intro of Lost Not Forgotten - wankfests suck when they don't connect with the rest of the song, and it seems like the band is doing it either just because they can, or because they've got some written material they're trying to shove somewhere - the piano seque into the instrumental section was good, but then went sideways - most of which really turned had me scratching my head... the guitar riffs sounded like one big grunt. Luckily the final 90 seconds kinda brought it back around to normalcy.
2: Big Hath -
Kevin Gilbert / Certifiable #1 Smash
Different from anything else. Probably the most fun song of the round, and musically it was the tits. Lyrically and vocally, it didn't quite live up to the billing in the song title. I can dig the kinds of songs that are as much parody as anything, and the spoken vocal style isn't something I think works very often (George Thorogood is the only one I can think of where it works for me). The almost 2 minute 'description of the video' section dragged on far too long. Overtime, I may come to appreciate and get a bigger kick out of this than I could over the course of a Roulette round. 'twas a good song, and I'll enjoy it whenever I play my roulette playlist, but it didn't keep up with the rest of the group this round.
1: Mystery Machine -
Lizzy Borden / Me Against The World
Nothing wrong with this tune either - some solid hair-metal. This kind of tune would've definitely floated my boat 25 years ago - and likely in a very big way. Nowadays, this is just a little too pedestrian for my liking. It was enjoyable, but enjoyable this round didn't cut it. This was definitely your "Final Frontier". Looking forward to The Undiscovered Country.
0.5 Bolsters -
Shineback / Rise Up Forgotten, Return Destroyed
This one has some really wanky guitar work - I'm really not sure what to make of the guitar effect, and have no words to describe it - literally I've been searching for the right word for a few days, but can't find it. Squeeky?? … like the guitar strings are made of elastic rubber, and not conductive metal?? That's about as good a description I can come up with. Vocally very nice, but that squeeky-ness of the main melodies didn't click - really didn't click. Good production, good drum work, and 'normal' guitar sound was nice. Solo/instrumental wankfest was enjoyable, but the whole thing had me put off by that weird guitar effect.
Jay is even money with his tag team option; Bolsters gains 2 points, and Seneca jumps up 5 points - even with 2 very good songs.
Standings:
bl5150 - 25
wolfking - 24
Evermind - 21
Lowdz - 21
TAC - 19
senecadawg2 - 18
Big Hath - 16
jjrock88 - 16
Bolsters - 13 (keeps a bonus point for honesty)
Mystery Machine - 13
Zook - 13
And, as evidenced by the change in rankings, one bad round can have a serious impact. Put together a couple of stellar rounds, and you can be right up there.
Also, I know I said I was gonna add some spice into this round, but my idea ended up getting a little to convoluted, and I vowed to keep this roulette simple. So just send me some more great music.
Listening for round 4 - the hump round - starts Friday morning. I am yet again traveling for the next two days.
Topic: The jingle Roulette Trilogy - Final Results - no more mind games (Read 80897 times)