I’ve been playing this while writing some communications on here and I don’t think I’ve really listened to this album. I don’t recognise any of the songs. This is bad, I think. I’ve seen Therapy? and I really enjoyed the gig.
Sehnsucht – Rammstein
Look, you know what you are getting with a Rammstein album. Excellent, hard German industrial metal – or whatever genre the posh people think it is – which I’ve just checked and it is Neue Deutsche Härte apparently. This is Rammstein’s second album. I first heard this band in the early 2000s when a friend, Sara, gave me two albums because she had to many and she thought I would like it. I mean, she wasn’t wrong. This band is one of my all time favourites.
What you need to know is that you should have all the Rammstein albums and you should play them regularly. Don’t think too much about the lyrics, I’ve found it’s best not to know. This band is amazing.
This album has Engel, Du Hast, and Bück dich all massive songs with excellent live performances.
It would appear that many very good albums begin with an S. Or it’s that many decent album titles just happen to begin with an S. I’ve found in life it’s often helpful to think about the direction of causality.
Second Toughest In The Infants – Underworld
I bought this album on the back of the brilliance of Born Slippy which I had on the Trainspotting soundtrack. It’s an amazing song but cutting it short is a sin. I really love the ten minute build up once the main section is over. I can remember being at a wedding at the Weald Of Kent Golf Course and after imbibing rather too much alcohol I got a little angry with the DJ when he cut short Born Slippy. He did then go on to play the rest of the track and I loved it. Not sure anyone else did.
This album is a good chill out album I think. I haven’t played it in ages and I seem to remember it lacked the brutality that I wanted.
Seasons In The Abyss – Slayer
It’s been too long since I last wrote a review on this topic, I’d actually forgotten I had done some of the “S” albums. To have Seasons In The Abyss as a resumption of service is great. This album is absolutely fantastic. It’s hard, heavy, powerful and will smash you apart. I’m not a megafan of Slayer I have seen them twice I think and I enjoyed the shows. They are one of the big four and so deserve their place in history. Every now and then the music of Slayer is a requirement because it’s just right. Make no mistake this is thrash metal and a perfect example.
War Ensemble – fast, powerful, lasting lyrics, what’s not to like? I remember Slayer at the Clash Of The Titans concert in Wembley arena announcing that they were going to record the music video to this song and were going to play along to a backing track – that did not go down well with the crowd – so they played it live.
Expendable Youth – Very good song. I do like some heavy cymbal use.
Dead Skin Mask – creepy and scary. This song messed me up the first time I heard it. I bought this album on music cassette [tape] and was playing it while walking from the record shop. Towards the end of this song a girl’s voice comes on asking for help. I hadn’t realised it was part of the song and thought it was someone behind me asking. Pooped myself.
Hallowed Point – see below lyrics, need I say more?
High velocity bullet at close range
Slayer – Hallowed Point
Can damage the mind
Shattering the skull shredding the brain
Severing the spine
Seasons In The Abyss – a tour-de-force of a song. Absolutely amazing. Calming, heavy, spooky. All of that.
I know I haven’t written about every song and there are times when I do. I think the biggest endorsement I can give this album is that I don’t skip any of the songs and love the whole thing. It’s a well rounded collection of songs.
For Health
A while back I gave up my Spotify subscription. My reasons were partly that I just kept listening to the same songs over and over and I also thought the payment that the artist receives was paltry. At that time I decided I would buy albums of artists I liked and own the music. I think this is the morally correct thing to do. There are a number of artists I really listen a lot to and they don’t make masses of money. I’m not talking about mega-bands like Metallica or Maiden, I’m talking here about bands I regularly play in 500 seat theatres. I say theatres but they are more the loveliest dives in London.
I saw the band/singer/artist Leaether Strip at M’era Luna a few years ago and I loved it. I thought he was great. Such a nice chap with excellent music. His husband was playing the keyboards for him and it was clear there was such love between the two of them. Now, I’m not really a “meet your heroes” type of person. I’ve heard enough stories about famous people being, well, people and assholes so I’m happy to leave the artists alone and let them get on and I’ll enjoy what they do. Some music I don’t listen to anymore because of the behaviour of the artist – LostProphets.
The reason for this communication is I bought an album by Leaether Strip and I know I like the music but I also know that the money helps the two men get on with their lives and especially to support Kurt as he’s been ill for a while and has had a kidney transplant. I get music I know I will like and they get a little bit of help for their lives. Seems a fair saw to me. I’m very happy for you to use the link in this paragraph to go and buy stuff also.
Seems Right
It’s a weird time I guess. I’ve been getting through the days partly because I’m used to having quite a lot of time at home – I get six weeks off in the summer – in fact I think there are only three summers I’ve ever worked through! The main difference between normal summers and now is I’m normally quite busy travelling around and doing things. At the moment I’m at home, which is OK. I’ve got some things I can do as a routine:
- Gran Turismo – a couple of races each day, trying to get better online.
- Laughingly trying to write music.
- Daily exercise.
- Getting through some TV shows.
- Watching movies.
- Reading a book.
- Actual work starts again in a couple of days.
- Trying other games on the PC or PS4.
- Food shopping once a week.
- Thinking about what to do or making plans of things to do in the house but probably not getting the motivation to do that.
Along with these things I’ve also been doing the right thing by following my pay-for-it policy. So, while I can and while I am in a position to still pay for things, I’ve been trying to pay for things. I’m very lucky that I have a state provided job. I’m going to assume the state will continue because if that fails we are all fucked and it’s not worth thinking about. So, for the next while I should be getting paid. Because I am able I will buy some more albums and I am also paying for podcasts I listen to because they delight me so much and they keep me settled. The amount I pay for them is pretty small compared to the benefits I get. Some people might ask why pay for this stuff if it’s free? Because it’s the right thing to do.
So, here are some things that I am currently paying for [which are also available for nothing]:
- God Awful Movies – podcast
- Citation Needed – podcast
- Faderhead – music producer
- The Scathing Atheist – podcast
- Cognitive Dissonance – podcast
Recent albums I’ve bought are:
- Another Piece Of The Action – S.P.O.C.K
- From Beer To Eternity – Ministry
- Amerikkkant – Ministry
- How Do You Feel Today – Rotersand
- Dawn – HORSKH
- Gate – HORSKH
- Nachright vom Feind – Jadu
I’ve also been involved in helping to fund a few books that I’ve been interested in. I’m currently hoping that a Hush-Kit book will be published and that’s through a website called Unbound.
There may be a time when I can’t pay for these things. If that comes then society is going to be in a really bad place and these little things won’t be enough to keep me happy anyway.
Screaming Symphony – Impellitteri
This is going to be a terrible review of this album. I’ll explain why in a moment. I wrote about Crunch much earlier on in this series of reviews and my gut instincts are still the same. At some point soon I will write about “Stand In Line” which is amazing – I love it. I was given a tape of this album in the late 80s and I have always enjoyed it.
I would describe this music as a cross between Yngwie J Malmsteen and Megadave. You have that speed melody and heavy crunching guitars at times. Sometimes the riffs sound almost Dio like, especially “Rat Race” and “You Are The Fire”.
This album is quite poor and derivative. It’s been done better elsewhere. I was listening to it while writing this but I am more looking forward to the next album review!!
Scream Aim Fire – Bullet For My Valentine
I got this album, I don’t know when. I have seen them live. But they are OK, just not really for me. I do like the heavy riff in the title track but other than that, I couldn’t tell you much about this album.
Scourge – Xentrix
I bought this because Xentrix were a band who I had listened to in the early 90s. I think I had a music cassette by them and it might have been a live album. I don’t think it was brilliant but it was ok. I’m not sure I’ve listened to this album although I did see Xentrix live two summers ago.
Schematic – Senser
Communication number 1668. Here’s what was happening in England during that year; lots of people were born and lots died, Newton created a reflecting telescope, the British East India Company took control of Bombay by “Royal Charter”, William Penn was imprisoned for writing a pamphlet attacking trinitarian doctrine.
Schematic is a decent album by Senser. It’s worth getting. Am I aware of any of the songs in particular? No. But this is worth owning if you like their particular brand of rock.