James "Sawyer" Ford |
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| CITAZIONE THE BEST METAL ALBUMS OF 2010, AS CHOSEN BY METAL MUSICIANS THEMSELVES — PART IV
AARON TURNER, HYDRA HEAD RECORDS, EX-ISIS
''Good things from 2010 (in no particular order):
Alcest, Écailles De Lune – Not many people can get away with black metal howls and pretty nylon string guitar passages. These guys are good at it though.
Bastard Noise, A Culture of Monsters – Social/political critique, low end pummel, and electronic squiggles all in one place. Masters of their craft.
Aluk Todolo, Finsternis — Determined. Deliberate. Scary. French. Slow. Dark. Yes.
RST, The Sunset Limited — The best driving-at-night-through-the-woods-when-it’s-raining CD I’ve heard all year. RST seems to only pop up every now and again, but it’s always a welcome return.
Krallice, Dimensional Bleedthrough – Shredding with emotion. Epic without being contrived or melodramatic. Most records this punishing are hard to make it through in one sitting. These guys make it a pleasure.
Sun Kill Moon, Admiral Feel Promises – Kozelek does it again, but this time with some flamenco flair. Sounds like a bad idea in theory, but is wonderful in actuality.
Eleh, Location Momentum – Says more with stark simplicity than most artists/bands can say with any amount of ideas/instruments/players/layers. Beauty in restrain and focus.
Horseback, The Invisible Mountain — The songs go on and on, but I think they could still go on a bit more. The second thing on this list to effectively combine black metal and krautrock.
Dead Fader, Corrupt My Examiner – Truly ugly beats. Good ugly. Big, gritty, and forbidding. The world seems to be getting darker. Revel in it or something.
Evan Caminiti, West Winds — I really like Earth and the Dead Man soundtrack and Barn Owl. Slow brooding guitars with beds of droning textures are cool, too. Apparently Evan is a master of combining all these things into one tremendous record. Thank you, Evan.'' |
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