Genre: Trip Hop

For some reason there is a dearth of shitty trip hop in the world. Seriously every trip hop release I listen to is good. Emancipator is no exception. His beats and melodies are up there with some of my favourite electronic releases in recent memory.
This release is insanely pretty and catchy, but also has immense replay value.

In particular, the last few songs from "Lionheart" onwards just rule so hard.

Phones you should def check this one out.

Get

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Genre: black metal
Kriegish black metal with icy cold riffs and..

just kidding I don't think I could keep talking like that. Solid black metal from some country. I don't remember which one. Just pick a country. Estonia. Why not? Magnus needs something to be proud of anyway. Solid riffs and standard vox, what's there to complain about?

Nothing. It was a hypothetical question, jackass.

Get.

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Genre: Nu-Metal

So these guys are the best ever nu-metal band. The quirky, dark and sometimes very astute lyrical content is delivered by one of the best vocalists I've ever heard in Serj Tankian. His voice is often operatic and epic, but he also snarls, screams, raps and squeals lyrics.
The music ranges from brooding and atmospheric, to nonsensical and hilarious, to political and so on. The point is that you'll find so much awesome and different shit on these three releases that it's impossible to not like anything. Trust qwe.


trust qwe Selftitled. Their best. Totally crazy and intense. Vocals aren't as powerful, neither is the production, but the music is perfect. "Circus Thrash"

trUSTqwe Toxicity. Their most popular and an excellent album. Not as interesting as their debut but it has some better individual songs.

TRUST QWE!!! Steal This Album! Awesome collection of great songs. People call this a "b-sides" collection but I personally enjoy this more than Toxicity for its sheer variety and entertainment value.

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Genre: Black Metal

You want black metal? That's cool dude, good choice. Great genre for this time of night. Kick back with those icy cold riffs and chilling vocals and the shitty production that gives the music its fucking edge.

WHAT?

You want good production? You astronomical failure. I can't believe you're able to look such a hopeless piece of muck in the eye every morning when you brush your teeth. Just go. Get the fuck out.

Hey man. Hey.
Hey. I'm sorry. I got worked up. Stop cry-

look

Stop crying. Chill. I overreacted. I'm sorry, ok?

Here maybe this will change your mind about production in black metal. This is edgier than Keira Knightley in a dodecahedron factory.

She's still hot though.

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Genre: Indie

This band will put hair on your chest and it might give you those balls you've desperately been needing. Fuck Extenze and Rogaine and all that other shit; this band will do it just fine. Only for those who wish to be manly. Or enjoy good tunes.

Grow a pair.

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Genre: Hip-Hop

Fans of Deltron look no further.

This is one of the most hilariously weird rap albums ever. Dr. Octagon is one of rapper Kool Keith's (née Keith Thornton) many pseudonyms. Dr. Octagon is a time-travelling alien gynecologist/surgeon, whose history is described throughout the album through abstract lyrics complete with non-sequiturs and borderline pornographic content. He ain't such a great surgeon though, as most of his patients die. He's a pretty shit gynecologist too, and one of his favourite pastimes is pretending to be a female gynecologist then screwing his patients/nurses.

The beats and music itself is an amalgamation of electronica, trip-hop, psychadelic music and hip-hop

As weird as these lyrics and the concept may be, the album is pulled off with such a degree of flair that it doesn't matter. Who cares about how weird the lyrics are when they're this fucking good? I don't, which means you shouldn't either. Get this if you enjoy good music.

Which is here.

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Genre: Screamo

Blog needs more skramz. Euroskramz, that is. Pick it up, enjoy it. Or else. These guys were incredibly influential, and you can't call yourself a screamo fan if you haven't heard this. Well you can, but then I'd be forced to call you a phallus. And you don't want that. Have you ever been called a phallus? It hurts.

Get

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Genre: I have no fucking idea. Something metal.

Daughters are a grind/noise/whatever/something/idon'treallyknow metal band that play a spastic, energetic form of metal with a weird catch: the vocalist sings almost entirely in a sort of weird spoken-word drawl. Oh, and the bass sounds like it's going to end your existence. Really. It's that awesome. Hell Songs is their sophomore release; they just released a new album which you can find a stream for a couple of days (though, that link will die).

Get!

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Genre: Experimental

Weirdest music ever. This is like the Dirty Projectors, but not annoying as fuck.
I have no idea how to classify this music, so I'll describe it as eclectic freak-folk/electronica with liberal shades of psychadelic stirred in.

All the songs (bar one) are short too so they don't get boring. This be a COOOL album.

GET

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Here are some awesome EPs and demos for y'all to boogie down to. Except, some of this isn't really boogie material. Nonetheless these all rule and you need them. Extra music in this post to make up for my horrible lack of postage over the past week. Titles are the download links.

Agalloch - Of Stone, Wind and Pillor



EP; Genre: Black Metal, Folk, Post Rock

It's Agalloch, need I say more? Basically imagine taking a cold shower but you're dry. This music makes you shiver and squirm, but leaves you wanting more. Catchy buzzy black metal riffs surround beautiful folk interludes, and shades of post rock can be distinguished among the tracks. Texture is the focus of the EP, the band's affinity for such evident in their use of acoustic guitar over walls of distorted riffs and their complementing of strings with horns and resonating bass vocal drones.

Summer isn't coming; Arise, Arise
- Kneel To The Cross


Mayhem - Deathcrush



EP; Genre: Black Metal

Mayhem isn't the best black metal act around, but their releases are all varied and worth a listen in any case. Deathcrush is a short and sweet burst of intense, raw black metal and is probably the band's second best release after the classic De Mysteriis Dom Sathanas. Plus it has a song called Chainsaw Gutsfuck. Worth it just for that.

Cruciamentum - Convocation of Crawling Chaos



Demo; Genre: Blackened Death Metal

Cruciamentum means "torture" in latin. Fuck yeah. This is an awesome slab of old school death metal with some black metal aesthetics. The drumming is absolutely mind-blowing and the production is murky and claustrophobic. Three bestial songs. 18 minutes. No bad parts at all.

Immolation - Hope and Horror



EP; Genre: Death Metal

Immolation proved this year that they were still one of the world's greatest death metal bands with the stellar Majesty and Decay, and fans applaud liberally the classic Close to a World Below but there is an oft-forgotten EP from 2007 which is very listenable indeed. Although the record it preceded was, by the band's standards, nothing special, this extended play is unexpectedly good. However it does lack the massive production from Close to a World Below, tending to come off as more tinny sounding.

The Dillinger Escape Plan - Irony Is A Dead Scene


EP; Genre: Mathcore

Best Dillinger release ever. Seriously. Vocals kick ass (Mike Patton), instrumentation kicks ass, music doesn't ever bore. Quirky, insane, jazz-influenced mathcore. Fucking yes.

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In late 2008, a little game was released known as Mirror's Edge. A lot of critics found the story lack and the gameplay somewhat forced; others found the parkour inspired first person action and responsive, intuitive controls refreshing and rewarding. I happen to be one of the people who fall into the second category; I absolutely loved this game for reasons that are beyond me, though my best guess is that it's the first game that makes me feel like the character I'm playing isn't retarded (think of how in a lot of games, you can't swim, or like... in Guild Wars, you can't jump). Basically, given any situation in the game, I always felt like I had the necessary abilities to do it. I loved the game for it's unique visual style, which had a mostly white palette with a heavy emphasis on primary colors for direction.

In addition to all this, however, Mirror's Edge had an absolutely fantastic soundtrack. Ambient and Low-Fi composed by the one man group Solar Fields (with the last two tracks composed by Lisa Miskovsky). The last song, Still Alive, is completely unrelated to the similarly named infamous song from Portal. All in all, the tracks combine city evocative ambience to pulse-
pounding techno, all wrapped up in a crisp, clean production.

Getttttttttt (it's big).

Also, you should play the game.

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Genre - Indie, Experimental

Bill Callahan is brilliant. Starting out as an artist whose music had a very experimental aspect to it, he recorded a lo-fi brand of mostly intstrumental music. After about 1993 his music increased significantly in sound quality. He is also now much more lyrically focused and possesses a baritone voice, singing without emotion. The lack of emotion in his voice is not a detriment to the music, rather it enhances the sense of singularity his music already has. His lyrics are also fantastic. Callahan utilizes repetition of simple melodies, chord progressions and so forth in his songs, tending to avoid the typical verse-chorus-verse structure. The tracks are quite sparse, but you'll hear occasional bursts of lushness, which helps keep the music from becoming uninteresting. The song "No Dancing" is a good example of this, laced with guitar fuzz, horns and violins.

Basically this rules and you should get it.

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Genre: Indie, Post Punk

There are lots of good singers in the world. Beyonce has a good voice, as does Chris Cornell. Jesse Lacey and Justin Vernon are also individuals to which this label applies (in my superior opinion).

To me, it's pretty special when a vocalist comes along who is truly great. Morrissey is one of them. Blessed with a voice possessing a sort of creamy quality and phrasing to match, his brilliant lyrics soar over the catchy and ingenious jangly guitar lines of Johnny Marr in a songwriting partnership that is extraordinarily hard to find fault with. It manages to s ound deliciously raw, but polished at the same time. People say that The Queen is Dead is The Smith's best. I agree. Everyone needs to hear this album. It's as close as you can get to post punk/indie rock perfection. The atmospheres and melodies contained within this are just beautiful, and you cannot help but be immersed in this record. Seriously man.

Seriously.

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Genre: Indie

Hot chip are an dance-y indie alt-rock band that have been making some waves for the past few years with their lovable melodic songs. A fuzzy tone gives them a dreamy, smooth sound that goes down easy, Infectious melodies and catchy lyrics give them an amicable sound that's easy to like but sometimes can be rather hard to take seriously. Lots of fun and rather relaxing, worth a listen over their allegedly average new material.

Get me nau!

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Genre: Black Metal, Crust

Darkthrone are one of the pioneering bands of the second wave of black metal. With three incredibly good albums (Transilvanian Hunger, A Blaze In The Northern Sky and Under a Funeral Moon) they helped shape the face of black metal to come. Wait why the hell am I telling you this. If you follow this blog of course you know who Darkthrone are.
Their later catalogue is sadly nowhere near as good as those three albums, however there are a few gems buried among the relative crap. A worthy ambassador of these oft-ignored records is The Cult Is Alive. At this time the band was combining black metal with liberal amounts of crust punk, which was always a fun listen. If you're not looking for anything deep or inaccessible, try this out. It's a great, catchy crusty black metal album because fuck you black metal elitists. Seriously this is such a cool combination. Black Metal-flavoured punk music with typical Darkthrone vocals is an imperious blend. If you thought black metal was already tongue-in-cheek in general, just check this out.

Also, lyrics are hilariously shit:

All right!
(I) first saw you at the graveyard
nice rack n' all
Creepy & lost in a fucked up head
aftershock dark woods and blurry lights
-"Graveyard Slut"
THRONE OF DARK

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