In alphabetic order ...
Big Hath -
Myrath / Sour Sigh
Really excellent groove with a lot of good diversity in the vocal delivery. Accompany that with the guitar riffs (which overall, there was a nice rich guitar tone without sounding too djent-y), and some nice added bridges from the keys and symphony this worked. Upon looking back at my Roulette v2 results, it was Elite who sent Madness. I liked it as I recalled, but I never dug deeper into them. Thanks for forcing me to revisit.
bl5150 -
Triaxis / Dying Sun
Brent is moving on to the chicks. Very good, but every song in this round was at least "very good". Good voice - but not by any stretch anything I'd put top 10 when it comes to the ladies - rock, metal or symphonic. The rhythm section, while fairly straightforward, added a few nice effects. I liked the guitar harmonies and melodies plenty. Reminded me a bit of Mindmaze, and I love Mindmaze.
Bolsters -
Arcane / Promise (Part 2)
Liked the start, but the next section was a weird kind of mellow, and just meh with the haunting/echoing vocal delivery. Perhaps I had high expectations since two of ya sent this within 45 minutes of each other. It’s one thing to get the same band from two people, but to send the exact same song!?!? Guess I figured this was going to wow me. Sadly, it didn’t. When the band came back in at the 2.5 minute mark, that's when the song really caught my attention though, but there was something odd about the start/stop feel in transitioning from heavy to soft.
Evermind -
Galahad / Empires Never Last
I got a little worried with the intro, and that Mr. Roboto-like vocal effect. But, the ship got righted pretty quick. This was another tune that is neither too heavy or too proggy, but just the right amount of each. We'll call this style 'Goldilocks'.
Tasty bass intro (and reprise in the extended outro accompanied by a great melodic guitar solo), time changes, pace changes, lots of different guitar sounds. Great vocal sound. Lots of diversity in the guitar riffs and atmosphere provided by the keyboards. The main chorus melody became quite an earworm - Always remember ….
jjrock88 -
Racer-X / Sunlit Nights
Solid rock, but then again, what else should any of us expect from Naitch? Production is very dated, and I tried very hard to listen past that. I wouldn’t have pegged this as a ballad initially, so it’s a good thing you called it out as such. Doesn’t have the typical feel of an 80s ballad, because it rocks so hard while following the typical formula. And Paul Gilbert… I mean, c’mon. God tier riffing and solo. Every. Single. Time. It was a bit of a tease at 3.5 minutes.
Lowdz -
Thunder / Loved Walked In
Excellent Power Ballad. Nice acoustic intro, and vocally this had all the right pieces. I don't want to disclose too much about what I liked/didn't, so as to give future ballads any advantage. Can't say I was floored with this, but (like Brent's), this was very good in a sea of very good songs - ergo it really didn't stand out from the crowd... though it improved with the final couple of listens, and moved up a spot.
Mystery Machine -
Empyrios / Domino
You got some set of balls to go quasi-growlie AND crunchy guitar (considering I just put a bullet in RJ for pretty much that) This was a good track, right on the line of getting too close to some kind of death-metal sound - I suspect this band is very much like Borealis, and I'd probably love most of their stuff, but this fell into the realm of 'like' at the outset. Great solo, great clean vocals, and it improved with each listen, and when I was able to dedicate my attention to it. Most of it was great, but overall, there were just a couple of pieces to this that prevented it from being great on the whole.
TAC -
Fastaway / Far Far From Home
"Should appeal to my Zeppelin side". Dya think??? Holy hell is this guy channeling Bobby Plant! I love the blues-rock vibe. If you thought this was a ballad, I’d have to say you better reload. Otherwise, there ain’t much to say about this other than imitation is the sincerest form of flattery. Even lyrically it was a tribute to Zeppelin and 70s blues rock as a whole. And it worked.
senecadawg2 -
Sylvan / Not Far From The Sky
Pure ballad that was simply beautiful. Lovely piano melody, but vocally it didn't do much for me. Not sure why, there was nothing wrong with him, but it didn’t impress me much... until the symphony kicked in. It's kinda the same problem Tim had last time around with his solo Kiske submission - I recognize the beauty and talent on the mic for sure, but I just wasn't wow'd. The mix with the symphony really had me struggling to even hear the vocals. Very good song none-the-less.
wolfking -
W.A.S.P. / Arena of Pleasure
So, there are these old bands that were just off my radar, and when people try to introduce me to them, some click, some don't, and some fall in between and are just ok. Then I listened to this track. Mother of God, what did I just listen to? Wow, just wow. But not in a good way... in a GREAT way. Vocally was just on the perfect edge of harsh, but not growlie; killer solo - wait... solos; nasty little drum riffs throughout ... this quickly invoked all the feelings of awe the first time I ever heard Run To The Hills as a 16 year old. Knocked my socks off. Kade dropped the mic on ya'll.
Zook -
HolyHell / The Fall
Nice little piano intro. I was totally expecting the hammer to fall at that first pause. Dude, do you have any male vocalists in your library? Who cares, if you can keep submitting tracks like this. Nice cascading buildup, and this was a fantastic vocal performance. There’s not a lot to say on this one either, it was just a terrific ballad.
Rankings:
You might be able to guess who's on top based on the above, but beyond that, I'm still fiddling with a couple of rankings. And given how much every point counts, I want to make sure I get it right.
Plus,
Topic: The jingle Roulette Trilogy - Final Results - no more mind games (Read 81455 times)