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LifestreamJust like last year I’m gonna revisit the metal scene and do a retroactive sweep to see what came through and what I might have missed.
And just like last year, I’m using the excellent best of 2003 staff poll over at Metal-Rules.com. I’ve been scouting around a bit and their list is as good as it is gonna get. While you might have personal favorites, their list is a result of the opinions of professional columnists, DJs and .. well .. metal heads. Even if you can bicker about the individual order of albums, few would question the legitimacy for being on the list.
I cannot convey how pleased I am to see that people find Iron Maiden’s Dance of Death so fulfilling. I myself was blown away last year by it. I expected nothing that interesting from Maiden after all these years. The last album (Brave New World) was very good but hardly interesting. And the days of Virtual XI were almost bad. Almost but never truly bad of course. I don’t know of many other bands that are as dependable as Iron Maiden. Even in the midst of musical indignation they manage to stay clear of releasing the horrid “album fillers” that many other bands make a living out of. But it was nevertheless many years since Maiden was this good. 1986-1987 probably. And it is a remarkable thing to be able to rise again from the ashes of musical boredom and oblivion to once again virtually dominate the scene as they did in the 80s. As for the success here in Sweden I can only say that it was pure joy to watch how Iron Maiden kicked around and humiliated far more mainstream and indigenous bands.
#2. King Diamond - The Puppet Master [CHECK!]
#3. Helloween - Rabbit Don’t Come Easy [CHECK!]
#4. Grave Digger - Rheingold [CHECK!]
#5. Black Label Society - The Blessed Hellride [CHECK!]
#6. Cage - Darker Than Black [CHECK!]
#7. Dimmu Borgir - Death Cult Armageddon [CHECK!]
#8. Arch Enemy - Anthems of Rebellion [CHECK!]
#9. Nevermore - Enemies of Reality [CHECK!]
#10. Usurper - Twilight Dominion [CHECK!]
A great many bands that are new to me. At least in the bottom half of the list. I’ll do my best to get those albums pronto and brush up on my metal portfolio.
As for the rest of the list it goes something like this …
#12. Sonata Arctica - Winterheart’s Guild [CHECK!]
#13. Alice Cooper - Eyes Of Alice Cooper [CHECK!]
#14. Children Of Bodom - Hate Crew Deathroll
#15. Dream Evil - Evilized
#16. Tarot - Suffer Our Pleasure
#17. Overkill - Killbox 13
#18. Rage - Soundchaser
#19. Anthrax - We’ve Come For You All
#20. Masterplan - S/T [CHECK!]
#21. Moonsorrow - Kivenkantaja
#22. Poisonblack - Escapexstacy
#23. Seven Witches - Passage To The Other Side
#24. Morbid Angel - Heretic
#25. Lynch Pilson - Wicked Underground
#26. Lost Horizon - A Flame to the Ground Beneath [CHECK!]
#27. Bathory - Nordland II
#28. Brainstorm - Soul Temptation
#29. Nightrage - Sweet Vengeance
#30. Evergrey - Recreation Day [CHECK!]
I’ll update this item continously as I complete the collection, just like last year. At the moment I haven’t got that much to say because obviously I missed out on tons of albums.
<Edit>
Ok, so I’ve got my hands on the top ten albums at least. Not that I’ve listened to much of it …
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