Round 7 Results:
jingle.boy: Daydream XI – The Circus of the Tattered and TornGrab your chickens and watch me sufferFirst impression: I kept waiting for the song to take a wrong turn, and it just never happened. This might be up there with the best songs I’ve got in this roulette.I don’t know where to begin with this, because most of coherent thoughts about this song are in the realm of intense adoration and bewilderment that I somehow didn’t know this album existed until you had to shove it down my throat—I remember you recommending it to me back in 2017, and what a fool was I to let the streaming platform I use stop me from delving into this. I don’t know if the album is of a similar quality at all, but this song is a top notch progressive metal number. It’s absolutely freaking fantastic.
I was very skeptical about this when I saw the sheer length of this song, but this doesn’t feel like 15 minutes at all, more like five. And the structure itself is pretty simple—two extremely adventurous verses, two choruses, a few instrumental sections, a spoken word in the end and the big ending wrapping up the story. But everything in this song feels like it took years of writing, because every note is just instinctively correct. I don’t know how they did it, but everything in this song is just right. It’s impressive as hell.
I also assume there is a couple of recurring melodies in this song from the rest of the album, seeing how this song performs as the ending to the whole story—and if so, they’re woven into this song exquisitely well, because they don’t ruin its flow and integrity at all. If I had to guess, it would’ve been the last vocal section that closes the story (because hey, that’s how a lot of concept albums are made), and also perhaps the chorus melody which is also played on guitar several times throughout the song (I would guess it’s featured somewhere in the intro). I obviously don’t know if that’s the case, but you can be sure I’m going to find out pretty soon—this album is now very high on my list to check out.
This song essentially does what The Perfect Element and Beyond the Pale do for Pain of Salvation albums, what Finally Free does for SFAM, what Orvam and Hegaiamas do for Need albums, what Memento Mori does for The Black Halo—you get what I mean. This song is incredible. I don’t know if you’re going to make it, but even if you’re eliminated, you went with the biggest band I can imagine.
9.5/10Kattelox: Equilibrium - UnbesiegtBlow that number, okay, byeFirst impression: This was pretty much on the level with my expectations, which were moderately high. Saved the best for the last, did you?This was a somewhat safe pick, although I’m not sure you knew that at the moment—and holy shit, does that round brings back some of the memories of my teenage years. My best friend was really into that kind of music, intense instrumental sections and growls—Equilibrium, Children of Bodom, Ensiferum and so on. I didn’t really get into both Equilibrium and Children of Bodom—the growls were too much for me—and with Ensiferum, I’ve never got into them too, until I went to their live gig I think five years ago, which kinda changed my opinion on them. But I distinctly remember liking Mana, a song from this very band, because it had no vocals.
Well guess what, apparently tastes change, and I find myself smiling at the sheer energy and fun this song projects. Unlike a few others in this round, this feels like a celebratory song of sorts, the cheerful keyboards give it this ring of epicness and wackiness, and while the guy is screaming over it all, the song never loses that cheerful sense. I can easily imagine crowds dancing a roundelay to this. This is like folk songs sung at the campfire, death metal version—someone probably sat on the minstrel’s lute and he’s pissed, singing this instead.
You were stumbling like a blind man in this roulette, and I find it ironic that you finally find your ground with this song in the last round before the elimination—but this was pretty great.
8.5/10 + 1 for winning the round themeTAC: Euphoreon - MirrorsEuphoreon singer delivers the final line of Mirrors, live, 2019First impression: I’m fairly sure this is the top contender for this round’s bonus point for now—but the competition is fairly tough up here. You guys sure know some fantastic growly songs.First off, this song, while similar to the Equilibrium one, has a completely different atmosphere. Unbesiegt was exultant, celebrating in its feeling; this one is contemplative and way more serious. The instrumental work here is fantastic, and so is the vocal work; it’s obvious that a lot of time and vocal tracks went into this song. The singer uses a curious approach to his vocals: not only his growls are very clear and easy to understand, but it appears that he’s recording each line or two separately and then mixes them into the song—kinda like Hansi Kursch does his vocals for Blind Guardian. This, in turn, adds a nice touch to the song, giving the listener a feeling that the growls never end, that the singer is always there—where in truth, he’s just launching his next line when the growl from his previous line hasn’t died yet.
This song is like a train on a full speed, it just goes on and on and on, never stopping, never slowing, never changing its pace—and I like it, I like it a lot. I think I like it just a bit less than Unbesiegt, but this is still great. I’m still amazed how good the singer is at enunciating things—I’m way worse with my usual speech patterns—and he’s growling those subtle, intricate lyrics like nobody’s business. On that note, I also liked the lyrics a lot. This is such a well-rounded submission.
8.5/10Luoto: Wormwood – The Universe is DyingYou die! Blue sea of my waiter! TOOTHY MAW!First impression: Alright, after all the super-high-intensity-growl songs this was refreshing, and hey, I was sure this round won’t be a problem for you of all people.Okay, Mr. Expert on the Growly Songs Evermind Will Surely Like, I get it, I get it. You’re fucking good at this. I’m sure you will get past the elimination point, and I’m curious as hell what you’ve got prepared for me, because I think you’re the only one who hasn’t missed the mark even once in this roulette. Each one of your submissions was at least decent, and this one isn’t an exception—in fact, it’s damn good.
This song, once again, capitalizes on the things that make this kind of songs work for me—solid, deep growls, amazing instrumental work including tremolo-guitar-sounds, mixing the heavier moments with the lighter, ambient ones, amazing artwork and freaking solid lead guitar line. There’s nothing that makes me go “wow, this is incredible”, but there’s also nothing to criticize in this song—it simply works, and works well. It may lack an edge to ascend into the “great” territory, but it’s certainly good.
7.5/10 senecadawg2: Jason Isbell and the 400 Unit – If We Were VampiresIt’s knowing that this can’t go on forever
Maybe we’ll get forty years togetherFirst impression: Uh… my expectations for this were probably a bit too high. Sounds nice enough, I guess.This is an interesting song. On one hand, it’s nice enough to draw my attention, and it certainly does its job; on the other hand, I don’t feel a connection with it, as I do with some other acoustic-guitar-driven singer-songwriter ballads. It’s pleasant enough, and the vocal melodies are pretty good, but there’s nothing that tugs at my heartstrings in it. The subject is nice, but—and honestly, that’s probably going to come out wrong—if you’re lucky to get forty years together with your beloved, then perhaps you’re in a pretty good place. Of course it would suck to live after one of you have died—that’s why they have that thing in fairytales where a couple lives happily ever after and dies together on the same day—but I don’t know. It’s an interesting point to raise, sure, but I can’t quite relate to it.
There’s not a lot to say about the song itself—it’s a nice guitar ballad that doesn’t quite grab me. The lyrics, however, are worth a few more sentences, especially since you used your Wordsmith ability for them. First off, the lyrics are pretty good for the subject they’re talking about, but it’s the subject itself that instills the doubt in me. Second, and this is totally my pet peeve, he uses the most overused rhyme in every love song ever: together / forever. This is an equivalent of a rhyme “blood (кровь) and love (любовь)” in Russian language, and it irritates me to no end. Whenever you use a together / forever (and, in some cases, never or ever) rhyme, your beautiful lyrics lose their beauty for me. I mean, it’s a legitimate rhyme, but because it’s such an overused one, I can’t really take it seriously anymore.
I guess it would be fair to say I didn’t quite connect with this song as much as you did. It was still a nice song, though.
6.5/10Puppies_On_Acid: Darkest Hour – TranquilLAW! HELLO! THE WHISPER IS BEHIND MYSELF!First impression: I feel this song suffers from the abundance of the full-on growly songs in this round—not quite as memorable as some of the other entries on the first listen. Great guitarwork though.This is a straight-forward death metal song without any additional twists like keyboards or layered vocals or anything else—this is pretty much speed death metal stripped down to the bone. Each fully-growled song in this round had its own distinctive feature—Equilibrium had that exultant mood, Euphoreon had the unique vocal performance, Wormwood had the slower pace and ambience, and this one has a superior guitar work. Seriously, while most of the song is your usual growly death metal, or at least it is for me, the guitar work here is excellent. Fabulous riffing during the parts with growls, and the ending takes it to another level entirely with almost no technical playing whatsoever—just some simple tricks to elevate the song.
So yeah, the song itself wasn’t great—nothing too bad, but kind of not that memorable—, but the guitar playing was—and due to the fact that said guitar playing plays (huh) such a huge part in this song, this ended up to be pretty good in the end. Definitely not up to the level of some other entries for this round, but still, this was serviceable.
6.5/10wolfking: Children of Bodom - Hatebreeder*instrumental intro* COCK! *instrumental intro continues*First impression: This was on par with my expectations. As far as this kind of songs goes, there are at least three songs in this round that seem to do the same job better.I am kind of familiar with this band—I tried to listen to them when I was 14. And also I was familiar with Silent Night, Bodom Night due to that misheard video, so I had a good idea what to expect from this album. This song met my expectations, and did not exceed them.
I might be wrong, but it feels to me that Children of Bodom—at least during those years—were trying to achieve edgy sound just for the sake of being edgy. This whole song sounds just a bit fake, it reeks just a bit of “trying too hard” attitude, especially in the moments when the singer goes with his “it’s so fucking hard”, suddenly switching from rip-ass screams to Metallica-inspired cleans even with the trademark Hetfield’s “yeah” in the end. The musicianship is there, of course, and there are some good moments too. It may seem I’m too harsh on this song here—I actually liked some of it. It’s just, compared with the other growl-fronted, high-intensity songs in this round, this one feels inadequate.
6/10Sacul: The Flaming Lips – Do You Realize??Do you?First impression: This is the most vanilla song in this round. I expected more from such a, uh, famous band.The “uh, famous band” of course is the remark about how this band spawned the whole Six Roaming Owls thing, but honestly, this is the most vanilla ballad ever. It has this airy, dreamy feeling that’s executed well, the elated feeling which I suppose fits the song’s subject—but you know, the moments where you’re fully at peace don’t always make for the best song material, and while this ballad projects this feeling well, in the end it suffers for not being emotional enough. It’s just a very flat, very safe, very uninteresting song.
I know that sucks to hear, especially if you care about this song, or if it speaks to you on another emotional level—but this was just a nice short listen, a nice happy song, without anything else. It’s not very deep, and it fails at one thing the ballad should do—tug on any of your emotions. This song is just… there. There’s nothing else to it.
5.5/10Indiscipline: Cynic – How Could IFreedom and reason shine throughFirst impression: I considered turning this song off halfway into it, but there was too many people on the commute to comfortably reach for my phone, and besides, it improved in the second half.Look, if nothing else, I admire that you tried to stick with the themes, and while, clearly, the growls aren’t your strong suit, you actually went with it. I won’t lie—the first half sucks balls. The growls are pretty strong, but the way they’re written into this song, mixed with the clean, detached, robotic vocals… let’s just say this sucks balls, to put it mildly. The first two or three minutes of this song are honestly awful—but then it swiftly transforms into a different beast, letting the instruments guide it, and that’s when it gets good. The vocals are still there for some of that, but now they’re in the background instead of taking that front seat and driving the song; the guitars are driving the song instead, and the result is way better.
My one complaint about this song would be that the instrumental section ends too soon, I would’ve liked another minute or two of that. I mean, my main beef with this is that the growls suck, the clean vocals suck, but you’ve got to focus on the positive things, right? So I really liked the instrumental aspect of this song, and I positively dislike the first half—but huge props to you, and all folks who also did that, for sticking with the theme.
5/10LordCost: The Dillinger Escape Plan – Mouths of GhostsAction without beating anyone, go Frey!First impression: I don’t remember almost anything from this song, except that it had this nice instrumental break somewhere in the middle. I hope it’ll unfold with the subsequent listens.This one was actually quite alike Dreams and Bridges—there are some good moments drowned in mediocrity and sometimes even general unpleasantness of the rest of this song. I feel like this kind of songs is something you like, and there’s obviously nothing wrong with that, but for me it just mostly doesn’t work. The instrumental part is very good here, to be honest, with the ever-present bass line, fantastic frantic keyboards and very good drumming, keeping the tension on the level and never letting go—and honestly this is why this song is not going to get an awful score, the instrumental part pretty much makes this song, taking more than a half of it. It’s really good. The rest of the song, however, isn’t.
The heavier part occupying the last two minutes of this tune is, well, not atrocious, but not something I would willingly listen to. I don’t really like the singer’s voice, I don’t really like the melodies here, and I honestly don’t like anything about this section. It’s like it’s just on a different wavelength with my musical tastes, although I have to admit it does feature a few lines similar to growls in the end. The ending basically killed this song for me. This is something I don’t say very often—this song would’ve been better off as an instrumental.
5/10Tyrias: Converge – All We Love We Leave BehindWe’re about to align…
DOOR!
LAY LOW!First impression: This was quite good… until the vocals kicked in.With all the reputation Converge has on DTF, I expected to be truly atrocious and non-redeemable at all, but hey, this is, in fact, only partially atrocious. The instrumental part is actually pretty good. It’s technical, but it’s still atmospheric—at least during the verses. The vocals are horrible though, it’s like they just found a drunk homeless person around the corner and asked him to sing the lines while he was throwing up. They’re also buried in the mix, as if whoever mixed this thought “fuck, these vocals are bad, better mix them low enough”. The instrumental part also stops being good and descends into a shitshow on the chorus—complete with the grating vocals.
Why would you send this? I’m genuinely curious. I can’t believe that someone who sent me Solstafir and Oh Hiroshima also sends me this, but I guess that’s DTF, I should’ve anticipated how broad your tastes were. This fits the round theme—I guess I was really asking for this—but this doesn’t fit my tastes at all. And what really hurts, the beginning was actually quite promising. I can’t believe this song has 300000 views on YouTube—are they that popular? Because that mostly sounded like shit, the instrumental intro excluded.
4/10Stadler: Motorhead – One Track MindWhen you contemplate to go to a live concert on a Monday night but the venue is across the townFirst impression: Eh, the way the lyrics are written here was pretty much the only thing I liked about this.Not sure if the round theme is to blame, but this was definitely the worst song of the round, and probably your worst submission in the whole roulette. Not only it once again suffers from a plodding pace, but I’m not even sure if the singer here can indeed sing, he sounds more like he has a sore throat and just shouts his raspy vocal lines into the mic. It’s kind of like that Converge song I’ve got, only a bit more low-key and in the spirit of the older heavy metal.
And this is not bad per se, but it’s just too dull to make any lasting impression. And, well, alright, the vocals are pretty bad. The only thing that stood out to me is the lyrics—I liked how they were constructed to feature one, two and three as the song went on. Otherwise, this is something I don’t ever want to return to.
4/10