Metal Reviews

When we are not in the mood to listen to some of the more progressive albums of our collections, sometimes the next best thing is to go for some of our simpler albums. When switching from Gordian Knot to the likes of Venom or something, whatever your unique taste maybe, what are some simple albums you enjoy regardless of genre. Is it decidedly minimalistic or just employs amateurish musicianship due to youth or lack of ability, what is the albums charm?

haha, too many to list.

Carpathian Forest - Bloodlust And Perversion
VON - Satanic Blood
Venom - Welcome To Hell
Hellhammer - Apocalyptic Raids
Tenebrae In Perpetuum - The Black Flame's Age
Sargeist - Tyranny Returns


no way I'm typing all of them, I'll be here all day, especially since often times demos (though lacking in production and finesse) possess better execution than the full-length versions.

Plenty of grind, esp. old Carcass and Napalm Death. Punk's a pretty obvious choice too... like COTB says, lots to choose from.

I don't know what you mean. I have dozens of albums that I could easily learn the material, even though it sounds very difficult, despite my mediocre technical knowledge of guitar.

Morifade comes to mind. It sounds demanding, but the chords are are all simple and the leads never go off into ridiculous directions.

I'd say most Power Metal falls into that cat for me, as far as the stringed instruments.

I remember playing Satanic blood at practice with a friend of mine, and the expression on his face was like: "Are these guys seriously even trying"? Good times

Archgoat rules!

Ildjarn
Ildjarn
Ildjarn
Ildjarn

None. A couple bands I listen to have off key vocals or pretty simple musicianship but they all do this alongside more thoughtful/complicated stuff. eg The Paper Chase, whose rhythm section is dead simple and singer is off key but have intriguing chord progressions, recurring musical ideas throughout an album, and use lots of different/interesting sounds in the music, like knives being sharpened and doors slamming.

Oh the humanity.

Guttural Engorgement and Early Darkthrone FUCK

Pretentioussssssssssss

I don't think it's possible to say that without sounding pretentious! I thought of writing "why would you want to listen to crappy musicians?" but then people might've thought I was just joking or being a jerk.

Angelslaying Black Fucking Metal!!!!

But yeah, like others have said there are probably too many to name. A lot of early black metal, death metal and thrash metal is pretty primitive and I love a great deal of it.

Some people have already mentioned a few good one's like Hellhammer, Darkthrone, Ildjarn, VON and Archgoat.

To add to those: Beherit's Drawing Down the Moon, Sarcofago's INRI, Mayhem's Deathcrush, Burzum's S/T and Aske, Morbid Scream's demos and Necromantia's first two albums are probably some of the best raw, primitive stuff out there.

Tyrant and Trench Hell are two newer black/thrash or raw thrash bands out there that have a great raw style and sound.

Haven't heard Tyrant or Trench Hell... must check them out.
Black / thrash when done well is aces.

Just a note, the Tyrant I mentioned is the Swedish one (Daniel Ekeroth's black/thrash band, not the black metal Tyrant who are also from Sweden), just so there aren't any mix ups. I think they only have one album anyways: Reclaim the Flame, which I enjoyed a lot.

That's the one I checked out on MA.
Sounds pretty tasty.

I wish I could listen to Archgoat withoult laughing, horrible band horrible band

siding with steve on this. so boring.

Venom
Bathory's early stuff
Celtic Frost
early Carcass
early Bolt Thrower
early Slayer

Maybe not as primitive as some of the Black Metal mentioned but still primal and raw!