Time for some results, because the longer I think about it the less sure I am.
This was a great round and I found myself really enjoying going through the playlist, which I did sometimes 3 times in one day. There was something to like about each track.
10. Saga - On the LooseSent by jingle.boy
So… this is not like the 10s from the previous two rounds, where I really just didn’t like them. The song is maybe a little too, bouncy? for my tastes and the chorus goes along with that. Having said that, I started to like it more as the week went on. It’s not something that makes me think I’d become a fan of this band, but it was cool to listen to. For some reason, when he sings the word “conclusion,” I think of Geddy Lee; not that his voice sounds like him. The vocals are good though.
9. Sigur Ros - HoppipollaSent by Sacul
For some reason, this songs sounds the way the its name sounds - not the meaning of the word, which I don’t know if it’s real and haven’t looked up, but just the way it sounds. I like it, I’m just not too sure about the singing. But it kind of has this bittersweetness to it which is really nice - kind of sad and triumphant at the same time, especially towards the end. I’d be curious to hear more from this band to see if anything else might strike me.
8. Stratovarius - Out of the ShadowsSent by Firewings
After reading that write up, how could I possibly not have accepted this submission? It doesn’t have the same affect on me as it does on you, but it is a very cool track nonetheless. If your goal was to win the round, there were just too many heavy hitters for that to happen. But if your goal was for me to listen to and appreciate something I otherwise would not have, you were successful. I didn’t have negative feelings about the old albums, but I just never thought to listen to them and assumed that Timo Tolki’s vocals probably wouldn’t have been so swift. Obviously he’s not Kotipelto, but I was very surprised by how good he sounds. I can hear what the band was growing into with this track, and the vocal melody is really nice and uplifting.
7. Heart of Cygnus - Sailing NorthSent by TAC
I was expecting a very Rushy track, and I wasn’t disappointed. This is one of the tracks I was having a hard time ranking. I hate not putting this one higher, but I had to come up with something. The “whoa” vocals are what brought it down from a higher position. They're just a bit too sing-songy for my tastes and tend to get on my nerves. The rest of the song however is so good, and so Rush-like, from the vocals to the guitar playing. And that solo!!! Wow; obviously very inspired by Alex Lifeson and very well done. Probably half of the time I listened to this song, I went back and replayed the last couple minutes once or twice before moving on to the next song.
6. Noel Gallagher's High Flying Birds - A Simple Game of GeniusSent by Stadler
I’ve heard Oasis before and found the vocals to be kind of irritating. The singing on this is much less annoying than I expected. In fact, it’s not really annoying at all. This song sounds so good right from the beginning; I like the mood that it sets. Really nice intro and I actually wish that part was a little longer. This track is way better than I was expecting it to be.
5. IQ - The Road of BonesSent by Evermind
I feel like a bad prog fan both for not having listened to this before now, and also for not ranking it higher. I heard some IQ tracks a long time ago, and always categorized this band as “sleepy” prog, which is where I also put Marillion and Pink Floyd, two bands who have some songs that I really like, but mostly don’t do it for me like they do everyone else. Still, I wanted to hear this because The Road of Bones was spoken of so highly when it came out, and I always meant to one day get around to it. I’m glad you sent it. This song takes its sweet time to get going, but when it does... it really does. I like it a lot, even though the “almost, but not quite” style vocals through a large part of the track are well, almost but not quite for me. The guy can sing though - I really like when he kicks into high gear. I’m going to check out this album for real now, so even though it’s not at the top, this was a great submission. The last 3 minutes or so are stellar and the beginning is quite nice, although I wish the balance was the opposite way around.
4. Obsidian Kingdom - Last of the LightSent by Elite
Hmm. This track is really cool. The harsh vocals almost last long enough to be an issue for me… but then they don’t. The middle part is totally cool and interesting. It’s not just the trumpet, but all of the other stuff going on as well. I wonder what the rest of the album sounds like, and if I could enjoy the whole thing or if it would start to wear me down. This song along with 5-7 were all close in the rankings but it edged out the others as of the final writing of this list. I may wake up tomorrow and think it should have been IQ again.
3. Ivar Bjørnson & Einar Selvik - SkussgjáSent by Train of Naught
We now all know about whole Vikings thing, which was really cool. I thought about it right away, but tried to tell myself it was probably a coincidence - maybe they were just influenced by old Norwegian music and the show was using the same elements - but no. It felt like I was watching the show. I was afraid that the excitement over this is making me rank the song higher than I should, but it's impossible to tell if that's the case.
So, besides the Vikings connection - I really like the way Norwegian sounds when sung; I don't know why, but I've heard songs in a bunch of different languages and this seems to be my favorite. If I had to describe the track in one word, it would be intense. I like how this track builds and builds and builds with the intensity and it feels like something is about to happen. Also, if someone is going to talk during a song, let it be like this; then the sung vocals come in, and it sounds really cool. I thoroughly enjoyed this track.
Tie for #1 this time. I played both of these songs a ton.
1. The Hirsch Effekt - AgitationSent by Parama
So… I really hope you didn't send me this song, which is incredible, just for me to find that the rest of their catalogue sounds like this:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fqRPBtXZSsE&feature=youtu.be&t=1m40sI don’t know if the singer on this track is the same guy who screams, but whatever the case, he has a great singing voice. You could listen to the surface level of this track, the really poignant vocal melodies and the sweeping keyboard (I assume) strings, and just enjoy it for that, which is what I did the first time I heard it, and what I generally do if I listen to it at work. But then you notice all of the great stuff going on beneath the surface as well, the drumming, the little guitar parts, and it’s fantastic to just sit there with headphones and pay attention to all of the details. Keep it coming!
1. Anesthesia - Type O NegativeSent by Puppies on Acid
Clearly, switching songs was a good move. 😊 Truth be told, I was 3/4 of the way through your original submission, wondering how on earth I was going to make it through those vocals for the next week, when I read your post asking to switch, and I couldn't type my response fast enough. 😊 Having said that - I do want to give that band a better try and if I could get the vocals to grow on me, there's a ton of great musicianship to enjoy. It would certainly not have ended up in this position, however.
So - I think I've managed to go without ever hearing anything by Type O Negative except their cover of Summer Breeze, which I don't think I really "got" at the time. I hadn't heard it for years, but when Kattelox suggested that you send Type O Negative, I did wonder if he was trying to set you up. I don't know why exactly - I didn't dislike that cover, but my memory of the vocals is worse than they actually are, if that makes sense. On first listen, I thought "come on man, don’t do this to me" - the vocals were like the polar opposite of the original submission and I thought if that's how it was going to be for the whole song… But then… the song became something else completely. Right at 50 seconds it just becomes, I dunno, perfect. Even the little things like the word "despair" just floating by you. I didn't know much about them but had this vague idea of what they were about, and whatever that was, is wrong. It didn't take long for me to enjoy the beginning either; maybe I just needed to hear it all in context to enjoy it. I really love the keyboards and how the vocal melodies work with them. It’s beautiful and intense and haunting and it sounds like there's anguish in some of those vocals. I definitely want to hear more of this album.
Parama: 5 + 1 + 1 = 7
Train of Naught: 3 + 4 + 3 = 10
Elite: 1 + 10 + 4 = 15
Stadler: 8 + 2 + 6 = 16
Puppies on Acid: 7 + 8 + 1 = 16
Evermind: 6 + 6 + 5 = 17
Kattlelox: 4 + 7 + 8 = 19
TAC: 9 + 3 + 7 = 19
jingle.boy: 2 + 9 + 10 = 21
Sacul: 10 + 5 + 9 = 24
Topic: Lethean's Laid Back Roulette (Final round results!!!) (Read 63577 times)
