Music I Enjoy.html

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  16     <h1>Music I Enjoy</h1>
  17    <div class="contents">
  18 <dl>
  19 <dt>
  20 <a href="#sec1">The Bands I Like the Most</a>
  21 </dt>
  22 <dd>
  23 <dl>
  24 <dt>
  25 <a href="#sec2">Skyclad</a>
  26 </dt>
  27 <dt>
  28 <a href="#sec3">Kevin Moore</a>
  29 </dt>
  30 <dd>
  31 <dl>
  32 <dt>
  33 <a href="#sec4">Chroma Key</a>
  34 </dt>
  35 <dt>
  36 <a href="#sec5">OSI</a>
  37 </dt>
  38 </dl>
  39 </dd>
  40 </dl>
  41 </dd>
  42 </dl>
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  44
  45
  46 <!-- Page published by Emacs Muse begins here --><p>I have a <a href="http://www.last.fm/user/unknown_lamer/">last.fm</a> account.</p>
  47
  48 <h2><a name="sec1" id="sec1"></a>
  49 The Bands I Like the Most</h2>
  50
  51 <h3><a name="sec2" id="sec2"></a>
  52 Skyclad</h3>
  53
  54 <p class="first">Skyclad is incredible folk metal. The first two albums (<em>Wayward Sons
  55 of Mother Earth</em> and <em>Burnt Offerings for the Bone Idol</em>) are Testament
  56 style thrash with a bit of fiddle and keys and a heavy dose of
  57 NWOBHM. The third album, <em>Jonah's Ark</em>, blunts the edge of the guitars
  58 and adds a lot more fiddle and is really where the band goes from
  59 making good to incredible music.</p>
  60
  61 <p><em>Prince of the Poverty Line</em> is about as 'heavy' as the first two
  62 albums, but the the song structures are far more worked out and there
  63 is an interesting infusion of folk and power metal into the sound. The
  64 songs are mostly scathing social critiques of the state of society at
  65 the time. The follow up, <em>Silent Whales of Lunar Sea</em>, is a decent album
  66 but is scarred by terrible recording quality and mixing. It has
  67 listenable songs (with &quot;The Present Imperfect&quot; and &quot;Another Fine Mess&quot;
  68 standing out), and the only really noteable aspect is the slight
  69 change toward a much less thrashy riff structure.</p>
  70
  71 <p><em>Irrational Anthems</em> more than made up for <em>Silent Whales of Lunar
  72 Sea</em>. The less thrashy and slightly more punkish riffing structure
  73 takes over here and the songs are all fast paced with guitar and
  74 fiddle duels taking place often</p>
  75
  76 <p>The next two albums see the electric guitar deemphasized and the band
  77 making something more like heavy rock than heavy metal. The EP <em>Oui
  78 Avante Garde a Chance</em> starts out with a fast paced fiddle oriented
  79 song, moves into a nearly entirely fiddle and acoustic guitar song,
  80 and then goes into a few slow songs dominated by keys and fiddle. The
  81 albums picks up in intensity with <em>Bombjour</em>, and then has an acoustic
  82 version of a song from the previous album. The new material ends with
  83 the slow and intense <em>Badtime Story</em>. A couple of covers and an
  84 instrumental version of a song follow to pad the EP to album length.</p>
  85
  86 <p><em>The Answer Machine?</em> was once my favorite album in my entire
  87 collection. Most of the songs have a fuzzy electric guitar and an
  88 acoustic guitar going at the same time, and the album is music that I
  89 have found is listenable to people who don't like metal. The fiddle,
  90 violin, and piano dominate and are backed by interesting bass and just
  91 the right amount of guitar. The album is a pseudo-concept album; each
  92 song is about a different quest for the answer to life. Unfortunately,
  93 here is also where the influence of their producer can start to be
  94 felt&mdash;a lot of things seem to be done for the sake of <em>sensibility</em>.</p>
  95
  96 <p>The last two Skyclad albums with Martin Walkyier (the original singer)
  97 see a two step return to a more metal style, but this time something
  98 resembling <em>Powerslave</em> era Maiden with heavy folk overtones rather than
  99 Testament. Both albums are fairly strong, and have a few songs that
 100 are among the best Skyclad has ever done: &quot;Cancer of the Heart&quot; and
 101 &quot;Vintage Whine&quot; on <em>Vintage Whine</em>, and &quot;The Antibody Politic,&quot; &quot;The
 102 Disenchanted Forest,&quot; and &quot;Think Back and Lie of England&quot; on <em>Folkémon</em>.</p>
 103
 104 <p>Alas, after <em>Folkémon</em> Martin left, and the band seems to have lost its
 105 magic. It is much like At the Gates; the core members meshed quite
 106 well together and lost some magical chemistry upon a major component
 107 leaving. Skyclad's first album with the new singer was ok, and the
 108 followup was a bit better. Unfortunately Kevin Ridley appears unable
 109 to sing aggressively.</p>
 110
 111
 112 <h3><a name="sec3" id="sec3"></a>
 113 Kevin Moore</h3>
 114
 115 <p class="first">Kevin Moore is the first keyboardist of Dream Theater who left after
 116 <em>Awake</em>. His work since then has surpassed the quality of everything
 117 Dream Theater has produced since then for he posesses a unique
 118 songwriting style and wonderful artistic ability.</p>
 119
 120 <h4><a name="sec4" id="sec4"></a>
 121 Chroma Key</h4>
 122
 123 <p class="first">Chroma Key is (was?) Kevin Moore's primary project. It is mostly
 124 electronic and fairly mellow. Secretly I like it (don't tell anyone I
 125 listen to anything not metal).</p>
 126
 127
 128 <h4><a name="sec5" id="sec5"></a>
 129 OSI</h4>
 130
 131 <p class="first">OSI was originally a collaboration between Kevin Moore, Jim Matheos
 132 (guitarist of Fates Warning), Mike Portnoy (drummer of Dream Theater),
 133 and a few other prog rock/metal people. The first album, <em>Office of
 134 Strategic Influence</em> was a moderately heavy and good album that sounded
 135 quite similar to <em>Disconnected</em> Fates Warning with Kevin Moore on vocals
 136 and complicated drumming.</p>
 137
 138 <p><em>Free</em> followed three years later and is completely different from the
 139 first. This time the album was done with Kevin Moore and Jim Matheos
 140 alone, and it finds a much nicer balance between keyboard and
 141 guitar. The first OSI sounded too much like Fates Warning with more
 142 ambient keyboarding; this one has a sound of its own. My ears have
 143 heard this album many times, and will listen again many more.</p>
 144
 145 <p>I'm not really digging <em>Blood</em> that much, but it's not bad.</p>
 146
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 176 <p class="cke-footer">If nothing in the world can change our children will inherit nothing
 177 </p>
 178 <p class="cke-timestamp">Last Modified:
 179     February 26, 2012</p>
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