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Metalhead Podcast, Metalhead Podcast, Go!

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You must listen.

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You must listen.

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You must listen.

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Now, here is the podcast, Metal Heads Podcast.

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Hello, and welcome to the Metal Heads Podcast.

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My name is George.

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This is Jay.

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This is John.

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This is Matt.

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This is Markisan.

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And we are joined today by Mark Deeks of ARTH.

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Welcome, Mark.

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Hi, how are you doing?

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All the way from the UK.

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Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Could I also wish a welcome to your copy of Witchfinder General album out there behind you? Good spot. Oh, wow. I see that down there in the corner. That's a really good spot. So, Mark, last month you released the first art album, full-length album, Take Up My Bones, on Prophecy Productions. Congratulations on that. Thank you very much. Much appreciated. We're going to talk about the album, but first I want to start by going back to your beginnings and then work up two.

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So I want to know how old were you when you first started playing music? I was five. So when I started playing piano, like a lot of people, I guess, you know, piano lessons when I was a kid and I wasn't forced into it. There was a piano in the house and my parents had both tried to play when they were younger and both sort of struggled with it. Neither of them were particularly sort of naturals at it, but the piano was there. And when I was a really small child, sort of like a lot of kids too, sort of reaching up and making a noise on it.

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So when I got to five, they said, let's see how he takes to a lesson. No pressure, no expectation. Found a local teacher. And here we are nearly four years later. Wow. That's great. I don't know too many people that started that early. Yeah. I mean, I guess I was really lucky though. There's, there are a lot of things I'm absolutely useless at, but piano playing just seems to come really naturally to me. So I had like, so we call them the grades in the UK and like qualifications.

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So I had my grade 8 when I was 12, which was pretty young. And then I discovered rock music, which was great, because that meant I didn't have to worry about having to set any more exams and let that get in the way of my love of rock music or football or girls. So the exams were already done. So then how old were you when you started listening to rock and metal music? I was about 14, I think. So kind of an average age, not too young, not too old.

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And yeah,

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I had a guy who was two doors away from me,

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who was like a year or two older than me.

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So I guess,

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you know,

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we often turn to friends who,

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who've discovered it a little bit before us or a relative or whatever,

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who,

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who's a little bit ahead of the curve on us.

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And yeah,

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so it was,

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I guess like a lot of early influences for a lot of people started playing me like Metallica and Megadeth and Anthrax and

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Ministry were an early band and Pantera and so I guess like a lot of the fairly standard bands first get a lot of people into music there was a library in the centre of the city where I'm from Newcastle upon time like a cassette library so you like you borrow tapes and so I had this guy a couple of doors away from me and a guy at school who was into rock music sort of saying oh you should get this out you should get this out so I just keep going to the library on the way home from school

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Boring Tapes.

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Because my parents weren't into rock and metal music at all.

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So I was on my own.

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In fact, you know, now some 30 years later,

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they still think it's a phase that I'm going to grow out of.

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Your parents think that about everything you do as you get older.

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He won't like that much longer.

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Like, I do it for a living.

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So my parents are at that acceptance phase where now they're like,

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oh, I saw this thing about heavy metal.

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And I thought you might be interested in this.

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And then it's something completely lame. That's the worst part. They're like, do you like that band? Slipknot. Do your parents listen to your stuff? Do they comment on it? So this is the strange thing. So like, they're super supportive parents. I couldn't have asked for any better parents. And they've always supported absolutely everything I do. But of course, they're used to supporting stuff that's fairly easy for them to support. So like professionally, I play piano for a living and conduct

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choirs for a living so that's pretty much within the remit of people in their 70s to be able to support quite naturally um but um i remember being in a band when i was a student um like not of any kind of size whatsoever but you know we got a gig and we were supporting um firebird the the side project of bill steer from yeah yeah we got this one gig which supporting so that was really cool you know so really nervously walking up to bill steer and going hi i'm mark he's like yeah i'm bill i'm like i know yeah so my

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My parents drove like two hours to come, which I realise in the States is around the corner, but in the UK that's a long drive. And they drove two hours to another city to come and see me play this gig. And I remember clearly looking down off the stage whilst I was trying to rock out with my guitar and seeing my mother with her fingers in her ears. And like sort of trying to nod her head, but like she just couldn't stand the noise. That was just too loud for her. But what's weird now with Arthur is I fully expected, in fact, I actively told my

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I run professionally, just don't check this out. Like, this is just not for you. And that's fine. Like, I'm totally comfortable for it. Because my choirs are full of lots of people in their 50s, 60s and 70s and older, you know, because, you know, that's what they do for a hobby. And I was just, I wanted to head it off at the pass. And because they're super supportive in the choirs, and they support anything Mark does. And I was like, please don't listen to this. This just is, this isn't for you. And that's okay. And they've been buying them. I asked them to sign their vinyl and stuff. I'm like, hmm.

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There's gotta be one that's a metalhead in that group. I'm not sure. I'm not sure that there are. Well, there's a guy who like was telling me the other week that he, you know, he was really into metal when he was younger. And if you'd sort of unpick that, it's Deep Purple, you know, and that's great. No, fantastic. Fair play. Yeah. People are getting into it who I would have expected not to, like literally in their seventies going, yeah. I really sort of think you're getting into, I think, I don't know if they feel like the religious aspect of it, which isn't a religious album, which I keep on point out to people, but there's something about it that,

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People of different sort of ilk seem to be able to access it, which is great.

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I was in Starbucks yesterday and I was wearing my Metalheads podcast shirt.

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And I was waiting for my drink and a guy walked by who had to be, you know, not a day under 70.

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And he looked over at me and he said, cool shirt.

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And I'm like, I don't know if he's like making fun of me or if he actually thought it was a cool shirt.

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because it's all, you know, metal lettering that you can't read and skulls and stuff.

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Well, let me throw this idea at you, right? So I spent a lot of years as a professional musician playing piano at weddings, right? So we all have to do something to pay the bills, right? And when I was younger, I remember, because part of being a piano player when you're playing sort of background music for a meal, I realize this isn't very metal, but bear with me. So it's reading the room, right?

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and looking at people and guessing what they're going to be into. And of course, you would look at people of a certain age and think, I'll play a Beatles tune. Do you know what I mean? You would like look at them and think, yeah, he's an older person, probably Beatles or something similar, a Motown tune or whatever, is probably a good guess. And as my wedding career sort of went on, I started to realise that of course, I would look at an old person and the genre of music that I had to play was changing. Because like 10 years later, the people who looked older now might have been into 70s stuff. Do you know what I mean?

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or then eventually 80s stuff and so on. So I think perhaps now being in Starbucks, having someone who looks like an older guy, feeling like they identify with metal, is now starting to get to the point where we're living in the era where that might not be so as ridiculous as it might have been. Yeah, I mean, could have been Lemmy, you know, or anybody from that era. You never know. Like we joke on the podcast that I'm the only guy who actually looks metal and everybody else looks like a suburban dad.

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We're all a bunch of old farts, except for Matt. Mark, have you ever played Ace of Spades on the piano at a wedding? I don't think so. I've played Metallica. I've played stuff like Rainbow or Death Leopard or ACDC. I don't think I've played that. I will say, you said that that part of the conversation wasn't very metal, but I will say,

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being able to read a room musically is completely metal.

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Yeah, it is a bit of a knack, like trying to guess what people are into. I mean, so judgmental.

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Did you ever work in anything for you yourself almost to be like a joke or to play a trick on people? Like in some Zeppelin or something like that?

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Yeah, absolutely. Because when people see a solo piano player, they immediately call it a genre, which is, and I quote, nice piano music. And loads of people just say, if I say to an average dual public, what kind of music do you want at your event? Eight times out of 10, I would just thought it'd be nice to have some nice piano music, like it's a genre. But of course it isn't, right? It's just a piano player playing,

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anything. So if I do a piano version of a Foo Fighters tune or a piano version of a Metallica tune next to a piano version of a Mortown tune, it still sounds like piano music, right? Still nice piano music. I used to work in a bookstore and we had a piano player and I got in big trouble one time because this woman came up to me and she said, excuse me, is this Chopin? And I said, no ma'am, this is just our piano player, Bruce. She went and complained to my manager. I've always been proud of that joke.

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Have you ever tried to read the room and you're like watching somebody and and what you're playing and and they like they like cringe or something so you segue into something else to see if that works? Yeah absolutely and what's what's weird is I remember playing one wedding where the bride had sent through all this request list and had loads of like Adele like really slow miserable piano music for a wedding yeah so I faithfully was playing what I'd been told to play play what I've been paid to play and the mother of the bride really angrily sent a message

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with one of the staff to say, you know, can you stop playing measurable music? I'm like, can your daughter stop requesting it? Yeah. So piano is your gig, but what other instruments do you play? It sounds like you play guitar too. Yeah. I mean, piano is the instrument I can play without thinking everything else I have to concentrate. So, um, yeah, I, I, I like a lot of young sort of kids who want to get into raw music. I tried to teach myself guitar when I was a kid and,

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I could sort of functionally play rhythm. I could play the chords and got so I could, I had like this battered old acoustic guitar, like a lot of kids. And yeah, but it never came naturally to me. I played viola when I was a kid for a lot of years, which is like a sort of big violin. And again, I got all right at it, but it just didn't feel natural to me. Piano was where I felt natural. But I've never ever, until the art album, played guitar on a record. You know, it's funny though. I think piano,

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At least this is my experience. I do think piano players are more commonly the type who can pick up another instrument and kind of sort it, figure it out. Like that's not true if you're a guitar player and you sit down at the piano and you're like, I'm fucking lost. But I find piano players like are intuitive with almost every other instrument, at least in a functional way, as you say. Yeah, it's because it's visually laid out so well. So you get like a pretty functional base level understanding of how music is fitting together. Whereas if you pick up guitar, and you can play

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the same note in four different places on the neck. I mean, that's just confusing. Who invented that system? Yeah. Yeah, piano, you've got one note in one place and it's left to right. I mean, great. So off we go. So yeah, piano does help with a pretty basic level of understanding of what's going on. What made you want to pick up the guitar for this album and do it for the first time as opposed to getting somebody else to play it? Well, so I can play functional rhythm guitar, but I'm no lead guitarist. So,

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I got Dan Capp to play lead guitar on it. So some of you will know Dan, the ex-league guitarist from Winterfellith, who I'm in, the band I'm in, and also he's got his Wolkinsman project. And, you know, we're one of my best mates and he's a great, great lead guitarist. So he played lead. I just really wanted to do as much on the album as I possibly could. And it's really slow, so I can do that. So I can play power chords really slow all day long. That's great.

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So how did this project come about? So the way I've explained it to a lot of people is I wanted for once in my life to be musically selfish. That's the best way I can describe it. Because, so I've been into rock and metal of all different kinds for 30 years and had never made a metal album that was my own. Yes, I've been in Winterfell for now, I don't know how many years, like eight years. And I love being in Winterfell.

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and I'm really proud of the records we do. It's a five-piece band, right? And it's a five-piece band where most fans don't know I exist. Because when they play live, I never play live unless it's the acoustic shows. So despite the fact I've now been on like four Winterfellers records, people still don't. I mean, they're just not paying attention. There's a big photo of me in the sleeve, but they haven't counted how many people are on the sleeve. So I'm like the fifth member of Winterfellers. And, you know, I'm in many ways the least important person in Winterfellers, and that's fine.

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because I help with the vocal arrangements and I help with some of the melodies and I pretty much wrote one of the songs on the last album but that was the first time I'd done that other than the acoustic album where I was like much more heavily involved. I do the string arrangements, I work out the harmonies but you know I don't play any of the songs from start to finish. I just like drop in here and there. So I'd never really sort of got to let out my creative sort of metal juices kind of thing in one place and as I say professionally I spent the best part of my life.

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of 30 years, fulfilling other people's musical desires. So I do music to order. I play piano. I arrange for choirs. I conduct choirs. I do orchestrations and arrangements and teach people to play songs that they love. None of that is for me. So I've been around music for a lifetime and never, ever got the final say on everything musically. So I thought it was about time I changed that. And so,

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To be honest, I give credit to Dan, Dan Kapp, who I mentioned before. He was really chivvying me. He said, like, you really should write an album. You really should write an album. You really should write an album. And I was like, well, you know, I'm pretty busy, you know, like a lot of musicians are. You have to do a lot of work to make a living. You know, it's not an easy industry to make a living as a working musician. So I just made every excuse under the sun for a couple of years. And Dan's like, I think you've got an album in you. I think you've got an album in you. And he was right. You know, once I

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I really, really enjoyed myself. But once I'd started, my personality came out, which was I'm having the last word on absolutely everything. If I'm going to do this, I'm going to be selfish for once in my life. I'm going to refuse advice until I'm blue in the face. This is going to come out as I want. And there were people more experienced than I telling me I should do once they started hearing things. We should really add that. You know, I can really hear this being added on top. And I was like, no, that's not the vision.

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Yeah, well, that worked out well, I think, because it's a great album. I mean, I don't mind telling you there was a label, a big metal label, when it was, so I finished the entire thing written, recorded, mastered, mixed, the full kit and caboodle, artwork, painting done for the cover, everything. Here's the finished product before I let any label hear it. And there was a pretty big label said, if you could just go back and add some extreme vocals, we'll find out. Some extra what? I was like, extreme vocals. Oh, extreme vocals.

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Yeah, I was like, nope. Wow. So how did you get hooked up with Prophecy? I saw Dan open that door as well. He's a very influential chap in my life recently. He knew the guys from Prophecy and I had people like four or five labels that I wanted to approach and I thought might be a reasonable, sensible home for it. Labels I'm a big fan of. And Prophecy was on that list, but I guess a lot of these things, you know, you need someone,

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who knows someone to kind of get you inside the door rather than just being another person emailing them. So yeah, Dan put me in contact with Martin, who's the boss of Prophecy, and said, you know, give this a listen. And they said it was Martin's said it was the fastest signing of Prophecy's history. Wow. In 25 years. Yeah, I want that. Do you want to sign a prophecy? Yeah, great. Awesome. I had a choice of two, two labels wanted to sign it. And which was amazing, you know,

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was it within two or three weeks. To have options is nice. Yeah, absolutely. It was really, really satisfying. Prophecy's a really good fit for the album. I don't think so. I'll be totally honest. Of course, I knew of Prophecy. I'm a big fan of some Prophecy bands. I'd never really, really dived deep into the Prophecy catalogue until the sort of conversation with Prophecy happened. And I knew they had a reputation for making sort of really sort of premium quality of physical merch. They really, attention to

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and ironically three weeks before i signed with them my wife had bought me um the falcon back box set on vinyl the prophecy had just bought out for christmas it's like all seven falcon back albums um and like three weeks later i signed for prophecy i'm looking at a prophecy logo on this box set going this is great one i'm now i'm just like a kid i don't mind admitting i'm kidding like a kid at christmas yeah just signed to one of the same labels one some of my favorite bands and yeah great why not that's awesome that's great

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So what inspired you to tell the story that you tell on this album? And please, you know, explain what that is. So I'm massively interested in bands that represent where they're from somehow. Nothing more groundbreaking than that. And of course, in the last 30 or 40 years, we can all probably easily roll off 20, 30 songs, sorry, 20, 30 artists who've tried to represent where they're from in some way. So I can say like Marcus Anstatton and Amorphous shirt. So, you know, if you look particularly

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particularly early amorphous material but certainly also throughout their career massive massive um influence from Finnish mythology and the Corellia and so on so um I'm just really interested in how and how different metal and rock bands have done that over the last 40 years so like Man of War and Bathory and Primordial and Druckt and all these different bands we can think of um and that's what I wrote my PhD on which is obviously like a super geeky thing to say but yeah so my PhD is in national identity in heavy metal music from North

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in Eastern Europe. Nice. So I wrote 85,000 words on metal. You are Dr. Metal. Yeah, literally. And like, I should really be called that more often, but I'm not. So it was, I sort of basically looked at how bands have started to use old paintings, like the old National Romantic paintings on the artwork, how different bands using mythology and poetry and history. And that's actually how I first got in contact with Winsfellith.

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because I sent a list of questions for my PhD to explain a lot of the Anglo-Saxon texts that they were using. So I just really wanted to represent where I'm from. So I'm from a region that was historically known as Northumbria and in modern languages known as Northumberland. And the old kingdom of Northumbria really spanned this huge area of the northeast of England. And it's where the Vikings first arrived in England at this island called Lindisfar.

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which is about an hour, an hour and a half up the coast from me. And so this area is really steeped in a lot of English history and really important characters and important stories. So I guess in the back of my mind, I was really conscious of bands like Vindia, who really sort of focused on their specific region rather than a whole national thing. And so I wanted to try and represent Northumbria in some way.

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And I'd made a couple of solo piano albums a few years ago where all the tracks were named in the old Northumbrian dialect. So from the Anglo-Saxon period, but there was a specific dialect in Northumbria that was sort of a variation of that. And I'd got like a linguistics expert to help me name these tracks. And they were all instrumental. It was just sort of a, I don't want to call it a gimmick, but it was like just a theme that was sort of running through. Are these under your name? Like are these available? Yeah, solo albums under Mark Deeks.

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going to be the name of the third Mark Dix solo album. Until I decided I wanted to make a Doom album instead. Well, I want to check that out. I'm always on the lookout for some nice piano music. Ah, well, yes. Who isn't? It's a joke, of course. That's fine. And Arth means native land, right? I think I read that somewhere. Yeah, that's right. Okay. So what's the story? I know it's St. Cuthbert. Yeah. So, yeah, St. Cuthbert was a really prominent,

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sort of figure in the Christian church around the late 600s, second half of the 7th century. He was, by all accounts, a bit of a hermit, a healer. You know, people would travel to be healed by him. And in his later years, he was based at this island, the Holy Island of Lindisfarne, off the coast of Northumbria. And he had, as the story goes,

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that what would happen to his body after death would become the subject of division, the subject of argument, because he was viewed upon as a very holy figure. And he basically, as I said, didn't want that to happen. So he wanted his followers rather than, you know, the line is, I would rather you took up my bones from this place than it become a subject of division in the church. So when he died,

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He was originally buried on Lindisfarne.

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And every so often, the followers would open the coffin and find that his body was incorrupt.

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It hadn't decomposed, as the story goes, because he was so holy.

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And this was seen to be why he should be called a saint, as these stories start.

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But then when the Vikings invaded, about a century later,

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What seems to have happened was the followers then decided that it was probably a good idea that they should start clearing out and take their most valued possessions with them. Of course, one of which was Cuthbert's body. So then the story goes that they spent 200 years transporting this coffin around the northeast of England to different locations to keep it safe and settling in different regions as they went. And the symbol of St. Cuthbert, the cross, St. Cuthbert's cross,

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became a sign of protection in the region. People would say they were followers of the saint and they would display a sort of curved cross symbol. It was taken as a sign of protection when going into battle. And so soldiers and kings or leaders would make sure they showed the symbol when they were going into battle, which is what one of the tracks Banner of the Saint is about on the album. And it is said that when they were

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trying to transport the coffin near what is a river that's called the Weir. A particular bend in the river, the coffin refused to move. And this was taken as a sign that this is where Cuthbert wanted to rest. And so the coffin is now in what we call the modern-day Durham Cathedral, which is one of the biggest cathedrals in England and one of the most famous cathedrals in England. And the remains of the coffin is there. But legend has it that only three monks ever really knew where the real

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the real remains were. And perhaps that isn't the real coffin. And so there's all kinds of legends and mysteries around it. And so that the last track on the album is called Only Three Shall Know. And that's where the sort of journey ends. So it's an unashamed concept album about a saint in a coffin being transported around a countryside for 200 years avoiding Vikings. Wow. That's pretty cool. Which on the surface is just the most doomed thing you could possibly think of, right? Yeah. It is. Yeah.

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Well, that's what I was going to ask. So knowing the story, was the story that inspired the music or were you writing the music first and then you came upon the story and then want to fit it in? How did each influence each other on the record? So I always write music first. I find it absolutely impossible to write lyrics unless there's music. So music is always the first and I write by improvising. So I just sit at the piano and record whatever comes out. I try to not put any thought into it.

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and I literally throw my hands on the keys and see what happens and just record it on my phone like nothing flasher than that and I might do it for 30 seconds or I might do it for 20 minutes and I just build up this folder of sketches and you know loads of it's rubbish and that's fine but every now and then it's like oh what was that and so you build up this folder of collections collection of recordings and then anything from months to a year or two

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later, you go, right, if I'm going to write this album, I should start listening to what I've got. And then the jigsaw puzzle starts, oh, well, that five notes over there could fit with this chord sequence over here. And then you start trying to piece it together. But yeah, it was music first. And I didn't, I didn't have the St. Cuthbert story at first. It was very much a case of, I knew it had to represent Northumberland. I knew I wanted a Northumberland story. Because, as I say, Arth was originally going to be,

00:27:51.740 --> 00:28:20.960
the name of the third Mark Dex album. And once I started, it was going to be, decided it was going to be its own entity. It made sense to me that it had to represent Northumbria in some way. And it wasn't until the music started to take shape. I started digging around for what's a really cool story from Northumbria. Well, of course, there's the St. Cuthbert story. Well, hang on a minute. Monk's carrying a coffin for 200 years. Perfect. So yeah, no, it was, it's always music first.

00:28:21.320 --> 00:28:50.580
And then to the point where there'll be like a completed piece of music. Like right now I need to write lyrics. Because at first I was like, I find writing lyrics a real challenge. That is by far the hardest thing for me. And I was really, so one of the bands that were a huge influence for me were Ten He, the Finnish band. And they have big straits of music which don't have any singing in. So I was like, well, if I'm going to have any singing, I want it to be as sparse as Ten He.

00:28:52.440 --> 00:29:20.940
So the lyrics definitely came last for sure because I find it impossible to write lyrics unless there's music. But once I get a few lines then the harmonies start and then the fun happens. It looks like the cover ties into the story. Who did the artwork? So he's called Gabriel. You can find him under Archangel Impressions. He's an American artist. And he was another contact of Dan.

00:29:23.860 --> 00:29:50.460
He's a big fan of Walkensman and Dan's graphic. Dan professionally is a graphic designer. And he does logos and artwork for bands and so on and signs merch. He's got a company called Bloodfire Merch. And he, I had a kind of vague idea. Dan has done graphic design for me professionally for years and he knows how my mind works. And I say things like,

00:29:51.320 --> 00:30:20.240
This idea, it's sort of this, and he knows that he's going to have to draw it or at least sketch it before I can even respond to it. I can't, I have got a really poor visual brain, so I can't respond to anything or tell you whether anything's going to be good or not unless I actually see it. So people go, right, so I, if someone said to me, I'm thinking I could draw this, I could draw this, and would you like that? I've got, I've no, I've no idea. I have to, I've got, I have to say it. So Gabriel bless him.

00:30:20.940 --> 00:30:50.420
got the rough end of this. I said right it's going to be about St Cuthbert and the cave on the cover is a real cave. It's known locally as Cuddy's Cave because Cuddy is like a local slang nickname for Cuthbert. Okay. And so that's a real cave where the monks allegedly stayed for quite a long time and that's on the mainland of Northumberland and so I said right I want that cave because that is the iconic location when people think of Cuthbert.

00:30:51.660 --> 00:31:20.920
I wanted to have that kind of feel of being old I wanted to look like an old painting that's sort of been discovered in a book or and bless him he was straight on like Google Earth getting getting satellite images and trying to get the lay of the land of what it looked like around it because of course he's like on the west coast of the US somewhere and he even was like sketching seeing the cave from different angles and like how the monks would lay out so he was really

00:31:20.960 --> 00:31:50.920
be patient with me because I had to see it in order to respond to him right I said I said I really struggle unless I see it so yeah he put in an inordinate amount of work into that um and once it was done I was like that it's just fantastic the detail in it when you look at oh yeah it really catches the eye and it's different I think I can't think of many album covers in metal that look like that it's not like it's I don't want to say it's unique but you know what I mean it's got it's a little different there's something quite different about it the detail that's gone into it

00:31:51.320 --> 00:32:20.560
And then what was great about it was, I said to him after that was done, you know, I want each song to have its own icon. So that in the, in the artwork, there can be a symbol that represents what each song is about. And then, you know, for the potential for like, you know, merch and stuff like that. So if you look at the artwork, you'll see each song's got its own graphic that represents the song as well. So it's a real sort of complete package. I can't wait to get the vinyl because I ordered that. So just to see it in that format, it's going to be a treat. It's really satisfying.

00:32:20.960 --> 00:32:50.880
when it arrived for sure. So talk to me about those beautifully layered vocals. You know, I mean, I don't see anybody else credited. So is that like you upon you upon you? What is that? Yeah, it's a lot of me and a lot of Dan. So Dan helped out with the, uh, the choral vocals. Um, so when, when we do Winterfell of vocals, historically, that's been me and Chris and Dan before, before he left the band. Um, and, uh, yeah, I'm obsessed by vocals.

00:32:53.520 --> 00:33:20.660
But ever since I can remember, whether it's Motown or whether it's, you know, metal or whatever it is, I just can't get enough of what vocal harmonies sound like. So I, I have to really rein myself in. Yeah. That is me. That is me reigning. So, cause I could just go forever like, Oh, we can put another one on top. Oh, another one on top. So, um, yeah, I'm, I'm the kind of person who like you will drive around and harmonize to what I'm listening to, like singing, but singing in harmony.

00:33:20.940 --> 00:33:50.340
Right. Because I just, I love harmonies. And I wanted to, I wanted to really sort of play on this monastic kind of feel. But to be honest, like the album, it's a specific album rather than a band. That was the biggest influence on that is a band called Funeral from Norway. I know them. And they had an album called From These Wounds, which is like this sort of mid-album, sorry, mid-career album that doesn't get enough credit.

00:33:50.400 --> 00:34:20.360
It's never come out on vinyl. If I could get any album on vinyl, it'd be that. Just press that on vinyl. I'll buy all the copies. It's really, as far as I'm concerned, it's a unique album vocally. I think it's just a really quirky album. It's a bizarre collision of sounds, but I love it. It's a real all-time album for me. And so when I was in the studio, I said to Chris Fielding, the producer, here is your reference point for the vocals. This, but bigger, with loads of reverb on, so it sounds like monks. But the harmonies, this is what

00:34:20.399 --> 00:34:49.440
I'm going for. And yeah, I just wanted to, I can't do extreme vocals. I physically can't do it. So I was, it was always going to have clean vocals and it was never just going to have one line. So yeah, it's lots of me and Dan doubling everything up as well. So like if there are three vocal lines, because Chris Fielding triple records everything. If there are three vocal lines on the page, that's nine of me and nine of Dan. Wow. That's, that's why it sounds so huge.

00:34:49.520 --> 00:35:19.480
I mean, it's massive and it's, I mean, I like that sort of thing anyway, but pairing that with metal as well. I was like, wow, I mean, this is, you know, there's not enough of this out there. And that's what, you know, initially on my first listen was the, you know, the, the, the needle scraping across the record that what I was like, what is going on here? And I was like, this is fucking awesome. Um, I appreciate it. It's what seems to have

00:35:19.500 --> 00:35:48.000
a lot of people's ear. And what's weird is to me, it seems unnatural to me to do that because that is how my brain works. And it wasn't until I was really getting into it, I was like, I can't think of another band that do this. I still can't really think of another band that do it quite the same. Not a few albums heading in that direction, but yeah, I mean, it's just, as I say, I wanted to be musically selfish for once. And if that meant, I said to my wife, I'm going to pay for all of this. If this is the most expensive set of MP3s I ever own, then I'm kind of really sorry.

00:35:49.080 --> 00:35:50.920
But I'm alright by it

00:35:51.120 --> 00:35:52.320
If no one ever else hears this

00:35:52.470 --> 00:35:53.300
I just want to make an album

00:35:53.980 --> 00:35:54.580
Like one of the

00:35:54.740 --> 00:35:55.900
What Dan kept saying to me was

00:35:56.020 --> 00:35:56.980
You want a legacy

00:35:57.290 --> 00:35:58.020
Like when you get old

00:35:58.620 --> 00:36:00.000
You want something that you can look back and go

00:36:00.340 --> 00:36:00.980
I did that

00:36:01.180 --> 00:36:02.280
This was exactly how I

00:36:02.720 --> 00:36:03.340
Sort of heard music

00:36:03.460 --> 00:36:04.260
And how I envisaged music

00:36:05.079 --> 00:36:05.780
And honestly

00:36:07.479 --> 00:36:08.540
I hate the cliche

00:36:08.650 --> 00:36:09.560
But you know when bands go

00:36:09.720 --> 00:36:11.320
Yeah like we really love our music

00:36:11.350 --> 00:36:12.200
And if anyone else likes it

00:36:12.240 --> 00:36:12.720
It's a bonus

00:36:13.960 --> 00:36:14.500
Absolutely true

00:36:14.840 --> 00:36:14.920
Yeah

00:36:15.000 --> 00:36:15.720
Absolutely true with this

00:36:15.820 --> 00:36:16.759
I really didn't give a shit

00:36:16.780 --> 00:36:46.400
This is exactly how I want to do it. And to the point of, like I was saying, turning that label down and saying, no, I'm not putting extreme vocals on this. It's too easy a card to play. I just didn't want to do it. That's your baby. Yeah, exactly. Well, it seems to have worked out because you're not the only one that likes it. It seems to be getting a lot of good press. Yeah, I mean, it sounds like I'm being flippant or humble about it. I can't believe the reviews. When this review started coming in and comments from people,

00:36:46.760 --> 00:37:16.720
Like, cause you know, you know, it's like, you can almost be a bit cynical if someone in a magazine goes, oh, this is, this is great. And you're like, yeah, but you know, whatever. But then when, when ordinary members of the public are taking photos of their vinyl and posting it on Instagram, artily placed next to a tree or something, this is great. They genuinely like it. Yeah. The one that made me do a real double take was when somebody put the artwork as their Facebook cover photo, which is, which is such a 21st century thing.

00:37:16.780 --> 00:37:46.740
to get excited about. I was like, all right, that is great. Yeah. Well, I'd be surprised if it wasn't on a lot of best of the year lists. I'm sure it'll be on mine. Yeah. I mean, that is really special. My wife keeps saying to me, people are saying this might be one of the best albums of the year. I'm like, I can't even bring myself to say that sentence. It just sounds really humbling. I'm just so, so satisfied. I'm really like quietly sort of patting myself

00:37:46.760 --> 00:38:16.700
on the back that I didn't bend to what anyone else said I had to do. It just feels satisfying. I don't want to, I'm not cocky about it. I just really, I'm just really pleased. Yeah. I'd say that that's a good thing that you didn't take that offer to change the vocals because it's a different kind of doom album. I don't know. And I listened to it today. It doesn't sound like other doom bands. So like when I think of older doom bands, like I'll think of say my dying bride, there's an anguish to their sound. You know,

00:38:16.760 --> 00:38:46.440
or if you listen to like early trouble, there's kind of a power behind it. And each kind of doom band has a different direction. And this is fairly unique. It's not a folk doom sound, but it kind of captures this area of where you're from and the history of it. So I think you made the right decision by not doing that because had you added, I think, harsh vocals, honestly, people might say, oh, yeah, we've heard that before. We've heard doom with harsh vocals. But like George was saying earlier,

00:38:46.900 --> 00:39:16.480
And hearing the monastic vocals, it kind of catches you by surprise. You double take and have to go back. I've listened three times in a row. And each time I've heard something new on the album. And I think that's a testament to what you captured. So I'm glad you didn't add harsh vocals because I like it more with each listen. Yeah. Thank you very much. I really appreciate it. Carrying off of what John said about My Dying Bride. That's like the only thing that like this reminds me of. And it's only just one little part. And that's the beginning of the first song.

00:39:16.760 --> 00:39:22.500
What's that burden foretold? The spoken part with the cello going on reminds me of some

00:39:22.880 --> 00:39:27.040
like Gods of the Sun, you know, where he's like, she's dark and filled with beauty.

00:39:27.840 --> 00:39:36.240
And there's like strings going on. And that was the other thing that drew me in, because that's one of my favorite My Dying Bride songs.

00:39:36.860 --> 00:39:43.600
And so I was like, hmm? And then the monastic vocals was just like, hooked me.

00:39:43.820 --> 00:40:13.640
But when you guys listen, I don't feel any dread in this at all, like some doom music. I feel like almost as if you're actually there going back to the late 600s, and you're on the hilltop looking down onto this world, and the music's playing, and it almost feels like that's it. Whereas I hear some doom bands, like the joke used to be when you listen to old Doomy Catatonia, they're like, man, don't have anything sharp near your wrists, because you get so depressed listening to the music. I don't feel any depression.

00:40:13.820 --> 00:40:43.200
or anguish in this. I don't want to use the word bombastic because that has a negative connotation, I think, sometimes in metal. But it has this grandiose feel when you listen. I think, John, I think there is some doom and dread in our deepest history. You know what I mean? Like there is something sad about that. Like it's just so it's almost forgotten or whatever it is. It's so far away. We can't truly experience it. So there is some sense of dread, if you ask me. I mean, I hear what you're saying. A hundred percent. Yeah, I guess the way it's. Sorry, Marcus. I guess.

00:40:43.280 --> 00:41:13.260
I was trying to get to it's like I think bands play off of that to make themselves sound even more metal-ish this sounds metal without trying to be metal yeah and I mean it is obviously but it's not like you're trying to up the ante you're not trying to give it like it's not like we're trying to put a post out there and somebody paid like a hundred bucks to get you know 500 more views on our post you know it's not like that we're trying to spice it up even more it has its own power behind it it's somber I would say

00:41:13.260 --> 00:41:19.120
Sorrow. It has an epic, sorrowful quality to it. It paints this

00:41:19.400 --> 00:41:24.180
canvas, this North Umbrian canvas. I feel like I'm in this land and I've never really experienced

00:41:24.560 --> 00:41:32.460
a music like that. You just said something that made me smile because that's the third American person to say North Umbrian.

00:41:33.400 --> 00:41:38.200
It's not North Umbrian.

00:41:39.280 --> 00:41:40.800
It's North-umbrian.

00:41:42.900 --> 00:42:10.720
Really? Interesting. Get it right. All of these things are unpronounceable. Sorry. Northumbrian. Who said to get this going on? Northumbrian. Okay. It's just Northumbria. Northumbria. It's not Northumbria. It's nor this nor that. It's Northumbria. Yeah. So the river is called, there's a river further down the course called the Humber. So Mark, if it's any consolation, Jay can attest to this. I can't tell you how many times.

00:42:26.700 --> 00:42:37.800
It's not a

00:42:42.440 --> 00:43:10.180
Yeah, we have a history of butchering names, so that just adds to our collection. We've all been there, right? We've all been there as metal fans. That's why I asked before we started how to pronounce the band name, because I remember when, I think probably one of my worst examples was when Wilderun came on, and I said, and we've got Evan from Wilderun. That's funny you mention that, because I actually met him at a show in Baltimore when he was playing with Immortal Bird,

00:43:10.420 --> 00:43:37.860
And I asked him that specific question. He's like, well, you can pretty much say whatever you want, but we kind of go with Wilderug. I was like, thank you. It's such a simple word when you see it. It catches out the best, right? So there's a Sodom album where the title is, well, in English, it's Epitome. E-P-I-T-O-M-E. That's the word epitome, right? But the title track of the album, he pronounces it Epitome.

00:43:39.460 --> 00:44:08.420
And it's repeated over and over and again. I'm like, mate, that's the name of your album. If you could just sing the word, at least actually know what the word is. There's a famous one, and I even heard somebody ask him about it, that King Diamond in one of his records refers to a sarcophagus as a sarcofagus. And somebody called him out about it one time, and he was like, what? No, sarcofagus, that's what it is. He wouldn't let it go. He's King Diamond, he can do what he wants, isn't he? He can do whatever the fuck he wants, that's for sure.

00:44:08.600 --> 00:44:38.160
I think we had that issue once with the Shape of Despair album title. Yes, we did. We asked friends of ours from the band Perihelium Ship who are from Finland about that and they actually pronounced it different than we would, which I thought was funny. I can't remember the title, George, again. I'm trying to think which. Monotony Fields. Monotony Fields, yeah. Oh yeah, Monotony Fields. Yeah. And was it Yanni that said that? I can't remember if it was him. He said Monotony Fields.

00:44:38.620 --> 00:45:07.940
It had happened with a band that we were interviewing. They had also said that. Yeah. Mono Tony Fields. Yeah. Only one Tony. Exactly. So do you have any interesting facts or stories about the album coming together? Anything that maybe you haven't talked about? I'm not sure about the album coming together.

00:45:08.600 --> 00:45:38.580
I think there was uh when we were recording the drums um so that's uh Callum from Atavist who plays drums on on the album and uh we when he started when he started tracking I kept I kept having to make him play less because it was uh so I mean obviously Atavist played like this crushing doom as well but I think he occasionally gets to throw in a big like big fill

00:45:38.580 --> 00:45:40.680
I was like no take it out

00:45:40.860 --> 00:45:42.580
no again just less

00:45:43.160 --> 00:45:44.320
just like less is more

00:45:45.000 --> 00:45:46.780
just paste it I want you to hit it

00:45:46.980 --> 00:45:48.800
hard but I want you to do less than

00:45:48.900 --> 00:45:50.860
that and he would like get to the end of like a verse

00:45:50.890 --> 00:45:52.220
and try and put a fill in I'm like no

00:45:55.259 --> 00:45:56.700
eventually I could see his

00:45:56.920 --> 00:45:58.620
rage rising I was like there you go just hit it

00:45:58.700 --> 00:46:00.540
harder you'll be fine I mean he

00:46:01.000 --> 00:46:02.700
really really hits these

00:46:02.740 --> 00:46:04.840
drums like he was practically taking

00:46:05.040 --> 00:46:05.840
off out of the stool

00:46:05.840 --> 00:46:32.880
But it was crashing down and he was bouncing up. So I remember doing that. I remember the end of, there's a track called Raise Them the Incorrupt Body, which is like this big sort of nine minute epic. And at the end of it, after this huge soaring section, it just all drops down to three cellos. So it's Joe Quill playing a cello, but obviously multiple times.

00:46:35.020 --> 00:47:00.460
I remember when I heard the three tracks played with a real cello for the first time, sort of back in the control room, and sort of got the shivers, and I was like, that is a symphony of Joe. Just like, how much Joe can one man take in one moment? It's just all these different interweaving cello lines, and that was really satisfying. It's really great to work with friends, you know, I've worked with these guys before, and it's just nice to be able to tell them what to do for a change.

00:47:01.880 --> 00:47:31.400
You're the boss. By the way, the instruction for the drummer is I want you to be John Bonham meets Bill Ward, but I want you to keep it all inside. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. Hey, Mark, that's funny you should say that. I saw an interview with David Bowie when I can't remember the album he did. It was Heathen, and he had Jordan Rudis guest on the album, and he knew about Jordan Rudis' obviously skill, and he said, now, Jordan, I don't want you to show off on this album. I just want you to play something nice.

00:47:31.860 --> 00:47:57.100
Which is really funny, because obviously I'm assuming you know who Jordan Rudis is. Oh yeah, absolutely. You know, Julliard trained in everything, and when you said that, it made me think of that story really as loud. You try so hard, but sometimes it's just in a musician's blood. They can't do anything about it. Yeah, absolutely. You don't need to fill every gap, right? Yeah, well, Jordan's the guy who could fill every gap plus the gaps that aren't there. Absolutely. So how did you get involved with Winter Fill It?

00:48:01.860 --> 00:48:30.580
questions for my PhD. Oh, that's right. That's right. You did say that. And we got chatting and it got on really well. But at the time, you know, it was just an email exchange or whatever, a Facebook exchange to help with my PhD. And it wasn't until there was another band from the northeast of England called Warden's Throne. I don't know if anyone's heard of Warden's Throne. Yeah, they made two albums. And a similar kind of sound to Winterfell kind of came around at the same time. And Rich,

00:48:31.860 --> 00:49:01.820
who was the guitarist in Warden's Throne, was an ex-student of mine, because I used to work as a music lecturer. And he was a guitarist in Warden's Throne. Warden's Throne's keyboard player couldn't make a gig, and they asked me to stand in on keys. And it was this festival called the Temples Fest in England. And so I played keys just as a one-off with Warden's Throne, and Winterfellith were on the same bill. And so that was the first time that we'd met, I think.

00:49:01.860 --> 00:49:29.900
or one of the first times that we met in person. And so they came up to me after the wardens were on set and said, you know, we're going in the studio soon. Could you kind of, we know that you're really into vocal harmonies. Can you come and help us with our vocal harmonies? Because obviously they'd had like these sort of woes and sort of clean vocal sections before in the earlier Winterfell's records. But, you know, by their own admission, that's not their comfort zone, really. They'd had to sort of think about it and work at it to improve at it.

00:49:31.860 --> 00:50:01.540
this, sing this, sing this, sing this, and that'll fit. So that was when they were about to record Divination of Antiquity, so the fourth Winterfelleth album. And that's why it was weird. I was almost like a consultant, like a choir master in the studio, which was a weird thing for a metal album, I guess. But when they were doing it, they sort of had these vague ideas of what the original line would be, but then by their own admission, they would have to sort of work out, well, if I sing this, does it fit? No. If I sing this, does it fit? No.

00:50:01.660 --> 00:50:30.220
If I sing this, you sing this, you sing this, go. And they were just laughing at how much time it was saving them. That would have taken us a day. You just did it in 10 minutes. So we just got on really, really well. And so from that point onwards, I wasn't an official member on that. I was on the album, but when it came to make The Dark Hereafter, they were like, we think of you as a member of the band, so let's make you a member of the band.

00:50:30.680 --> 00:50:59.880
Did you have any influence on the sound of the Halloween of Airdam? That sounds a little more, you know, like you than them. Was that them saying we want to do something like this? Or were you like, hey man, let's do some of this? No, absolutely. And so I remember when we were doing the acoustic dates, we did like, I don't know, seven or eight dates for the album. But there were a few people that said, you know, is this what happens to Winterfell when Mark Deeks gets left in charge?

00:51:02.320 --> 00:51:30.000
I'm sure you used to be a black metal band what is going on but no I mean obviously in the in the earlier Winterfellas albums they'd always had that kind of folk influence there'd been you know acoustic tracks or acoustic interludes and so know that Nick in particular who plays bass in Winterfellas but is a you know a really really good acoustic guitarist he's really into sort of finger-picking guitar and he's a huge fan of Musk Ox and so no Nick and

00:51:30.040 --> 00:52:00.000
had already started writing acoustic material. And they had, I think they had initially intended it to be just an EP maybe, or maybe not even released under the Winterfelleth name. They were just going to sort of, you know, have a little side project. But as they were sort of writing more and more material, they're like, well, this really just sounds like Winterfelleth acoustic tracks, except there's normally only like one and a half an album. And now we're writing loads of it. So no, they really wrote all the, a lot of the,

00:52:00.040 --> 00:52:30.000
of the chord progressions and the melodies and so on the instrumentally and then I was much more heavily involved than I would be normally because now it's like right here are the lyrics we need some melodies for these right now we need some harmonies and you know we're going to want loads of strings on it can you write all the string parts well yeah this is now my professional wheelhouse so yeah I wrote all the string parts and I'd say I had a hand in pretty much every harmony or certainly most of them you know between us we work in the studio and I would suggest

00:52:30.020 --> 00:53:00.000
and they'd say maybe it's not that one try this one kind of thing but yeah i i i was heavily involved in all the harmonies wrote all the string parts um and that was a lot of recording for those harmonies because that is a full album of lots of i mean some of that's five part harmony wow i remember the track uh the shepherd which is the first track on the album that just took hours and hours if you'd listen to how many layers are in that because that was me and chris and dan there's three of us doing them and as i said before chris fielding likes to triple

00:53:00.040 --> 00:53:29.960
track stuff. So yeah, that was a total of time. But no, I can't say that I influenced it, but once they gave me the style, I ran with it, yeah. Excellent. So I saw yesterday that you've got a mead pairing coming out with Lindisfarne Mead. We are fans of mead here, in fact. That's what I'm drinking right now. Oh, wow. So how'd that come about? So, I mean, that was really a sort of, well,

00:53:30.020 --> 00:53:59.640
Wouldn't it be cool if, but not really for a second thinking anyone would do it. I mean, it just seems so ludicrous. Not to us. I mean, we're friends with the Brimminghorn Meadery guys. Oh, right, great. And they do all kinds of pairings with bands. I think the thing, I think initially the idea was, so Gunnar, who is my PR guy at Prophecy, he's really into, as it happens, he's got like a master's in Anglo-Saxon history. So like,

00:54:00.040 --> 00:54:29.760
if I could have had anyone working on my album. So he's just been, I've been having to rein him in from writing big swathes of press releases and about the history of the region and everything. So he knows way more about it than I do. And he's German. And he, his initial idea, which was a really clever idea was, you know how the Norwegian government, when there was all that kind of, all this sort of drama around the black metal movement in the early nineties, you know, the murders and the killings and the church burnings and so on. And they could have tried to bury that news wise, right?

00:54:30.020 --> 00:54:59.800
Because that is not great press for a pretty historically Christian, well, I say historically Christian country, in modern history. Christian, not prior to that, obviously. So a pretty, you know, straight down the road, let's keep everything nice and happy kind of country. Church burnings weren't great press, right? But Norway did something really clever. They decided to make it into an alternative tourism. And they threw loads of money promoting it. Like, well, if people are getting into, you know,

00:55:00.360 --> 00:55:29.320
Norwegian Black Metal became this huge international export as a thing. Well, let's see if we can sort of get people to come and see where these bands are from, see where these tales are from, see where these events happened and so on. And I am an example. I've been to Bergen and Oslo to go and see that. I went to the Fantoft church that was famously burnt down and so on. But it became like a tourism thing, right? So people started to travel to go and see this thing. So Gunnar said, well, wouldn't it be great if you could get, you know, Northumbrian tourism,

00:55:29.920 --> 00:55:59.260
Tourism Information Involved, saying, right, here is an album that represents Northumbria. Can't we get some interest in bringing people to Northumbria to see where these stories, because it's a beautiful countryside, there's miles of sandy beaches and castles and cave, and it's like a great historical region. So I thought this was a great idea. So basically, I set about contacting as many people as I could that have anything to do with representing Northumbria. And of course, one of which is Lindisfar Mead and Annick Breweries.

00:55:59.840 --> 00:56:01.020
a town nearby.

00:56:01.860 --> 00:56:04.460
And they have a brewery and they're connected to making various beers.

00:56:04.720 --> 00:56:08.360
And they're part of the same sort of company as Lindisfar Mead.

00:56:09.000 --> 00:56:12.260
So I managed to get a hold of a guy at the brewery who I know.

00:56:12.760 --> 00:56:14.580
And he put me in contact with Lindisfar Mead.

00:56:14.800 --> 00:56:17.140
But I mean, I was almost laughing as I was asking.

00:56:18.900 --> 00:56:23.060
Because, you know, this isn't Iron Maiden talking about Trooper Beer Maid.

00:56:23.160 --> 00:56:25.880
I am a niche of a niche of a niche of a niche.

00:56:26.780 --> 00:56:28.220
Effectively unknown metal musician.

00:56:28.840 --> 00:56:58.700
saying, do you fancy making me some me please? And put my band logo on while you're on. I'm making this album about St. Cuthbert. And to my astonishment, they're like, yeah, it's a great idea. So they have made like, I don't know how many, I think it's like 100 bottles or something. But you know, 200 bottles, something like that. Like a limited run. And they said, all right, we want to make a gift set with the CD. And then they said, oh, we've got these cups that have got St. Cuthbert.

00:57:26.000 --> 00:57:28.800
I'm picturing

00:57:28.820 --> 00:57:28.980
Like,

00:57:28.980 --> 00:57:29.180
like,

00:57:29.180 --> 00:57:29.240
uh,

00:57:29.420 --> 00:57:30.200
Laurel and Hardy.

00:57:30.800 --> 00:57:31.120
Yeah.

00:57:33.839 --> 00:57:34.480
And second,

00:57:34.800 --> 00:57:34.960
um,

00:57:35.720 --> 00:57:36.620
do you have a bottle of it?

00:57:37.760 --> 00:57:38.540
I don't have it here,

00:57:38.680 --> 00:57:39.520
but I'm waiting for my,

00:57:39.620 --> 00:57:40.500
my bottles to arrive,

00:57:40.700 --> 00:57:40.760
but,

00:57:41.520 --> 00:57:41.600
um,

00:57:42.300 --> 00:57:42.540
the,

00:57:42.680 --> 00:57:42.780
uh,

00:57:43.180 --> 00:57:43.280
yeah.

00:57:43.420 --> 00:57:43.620
So I,

00:57:43.980 --> 00:57:44.280
I said,

00:57:44.420 --> 00:57:44.760
just to be,

00:57:44.820 --> 00:57:46.620
I just didn't want them to have any false expectations.

00:57:46.900 --> 00:57:47.860
Like this is a real,

00:57:49.480 --> 00:57:52.440
like sub genre of a sub genre on yes,

00:57:52.520 --> 00:57:53.700
a well-known label,

00:57:53.860 --> 00:57:54.220
but like,

00:57:54.320 --> 00:57:55.760
please don't think you're going to sell thousands of this.

00:57:56.260 --> 00:57:56.600
So I was really,

00:57:57.000 --> 00:57:57.700
really transparent with it.

00:57:57.700 --> 00:57:58.760
I didn't want them to get false expectations.

00:57:58.820 --> 00:58:27.100
They're like, no, we think it's great. And their angle was that their shop in Annick is called the Taste of Northumbria. And so they thought that if they had this mead sat there with the music that's telling the tale, they just thought they get quite a lot of passing trade. And apparently they get quite a lot of sort of tourist parties who've been to the island and then come to the shop. And so this is, you know, great. I think it's great. And, you know, I've had the mick taking out of me quite a lot, but I went to Fuleth because they all think it's ridiculous. And I understand why.

00:58:28.800 --> 00:58:57.840
But I genuinely thought it was just, why not? I've got a three-month-old baby daughter, and I thought, wouldn't it be great just to show this is what Daddy did when he was younger kind of thing. He had his own mead. Daddy drank a lot. Lots of people can release music, not everybody can have their own mead. Yeah, exactly. And it came out yesterday, and four people had bought it already. I was like, well, that's more than I expected for a start. Brilliant.

00:58:58.800 --> 00:59:27.040
So the guy from the brewery was like, yeah, we sold four last night. Oh, wow. And then I had like four or five people on Facebook going, hey, I want a bottle of that. I've just ordered it. Wow, maybe we might sell 100. I don't know. But I mean, what? It's kind of egotistical, but I'm so transparent about the fact I have no expectations for it. Then I think it's, I'm just, when I saw the promo photo of it that they'd taken, I'm like, that's hilarious. Brilliant. Why don't? Mark, I think it's safe to say that you're not Gene Simmons here.

00:59:27.400 --> 00:59:57.020
And you're not just slapping your name on a Gene Simmons gin. I've never drank gin in my life, but I'm selling it. It's not like that or anything. So I think you're okay. No, not at all. I can assure you there's not going to be like an aft pencil case or anything like that. Pez dispenser. Our other colleague, Will, was a brewer for years, and he used to brew beers for bands all the time. So we know a little bit about it, so we get it. That's great. Yeah. I'm going to see if I can. It's just, again, another satisfying thing, you know.

00:59:57.420 --> 01:00:26.920
Yeah, why not? I'm going to see if there's any way I can finagle it. I'm in Maryland where you can't generally ship things. However, Birmingham can ship here. We should see if Will or I can get it and then we could just put it all together. Yeah, we could do that too. It's weird because I can't order beer here, but I can get wine and mead. Yeah, every state in the U.S. is different for how alcohol is distributed. Yeah, I'll look. The brewery is set up for UK and for Europe.

01:00:27.400 --> 01:00:57.080
But I've already had three or four people from the US and Canada say I'd like a bottle of that. So I've said, you know, please contact the brewery directly. And if they can help you, they will. I'm literally not making a penny out of it. I just think it's great. Cool. I think that happened when Opeth, there was an English brewery that made some beer for them and you couldn't get them in the US. It was hard. You had to go through a different distributor because they were not allowed to distribute themselves to the US. So it had to be a middle man or middle company somewhere in there. So that might be the case for this too. Cool.

01:00:58.500 --> 01:01:26.000
All right, so this is my last question, and that's, what's next? Are you going to do another album, or are you like, well, I did it, and I did what I set out to do, or is there more to come? No, there's more to come. I mean, Prophecy gave me a multi-album deal, so I'm going to have to write some more. So obviously it was on the case of that the first one wasn't a complete failure, but I think we can safely say there'll be more.

01:01:26.040 --> 01:01:55.240
I certainly want to do more and yeah the intention is for there to be more and it will always tell the tale of Northumberland in somehow in some way and yeah now that I feel like I've really sort of found my feet with with what what art is because I feel like I was kind of figuring that out as I went because as I said at first the the musical starting points were 10 here in Cowan so quite piano led sparse atmospheric stuff

01:01:56.040 --> 01:02:24.140
And it was only when I started writing more. I remember clearly the day where it sort of, I had a real penny drop moment. It sounds weird, but I was listening to Morning Beloved for a few hours. I was on holiday. I was sat reading a book, listening to Morning Beloved. I was like, I love this kind of music. I wonder what would happen if I combine this with like Tenny stuff. And then I started putting loads of harmonies on top and then I got carried away. Mark, do you have other stories in mind to tell for future albums?

01:02:25.500 --> 01:02:29.260
I got one or two ideas yeah I mean Northumbria is a pretty rich historical

01:02:30.060 --> 01:02:37.780
region um and I guess you know I don't position myself in any way as any kind of like historical

01:02:38.300 --> 01:02:44.180
expert you know I I when it came to writing my PhD I had I read what I needed to read kind of thing so it

01:02:44.660 --> 01:02:55.480
wasn't like it was just coming naturally you know it was a music PhD that music side of it is what came naturally to it um but yeah there's there are a lot of tales that that could be told

01:02:55.480 --> 01:02:59.540
You know not least of which the Vikings arrive in not least of which

01:03:01.180 --> 01:03:03.420
something called the Lindisfarne Gospels which are

01:03:03.900 --> 01:03:05.800
one of the most important books in the history of England

01:03:07.740 --> 01:03:08.060
and

01:03:09.600 --> 01:03:11.260
coincidentally the Lindisfarne Gospels

01:03:12.000 --> 01:03:15.360
they're one of these artifacts that tend to get moved around

01:03:15.390 --> 01:03:17.140
from museum to museum is like a national treasure

01:03:18.680 --> 01:03:22.200
and they're coming to Newcastle later this year

01:03:22.720 --> 01:03:25.460
for a few months at a big gallery

01:03:25.920 --> 01:03:55.440
and they've got a whole series of spin-off projects that are going on and they've got this website hub of any projects that are related to the subject and Arth's had its listing on there as well because Cuthbert is connected to the Gospels and so on so there are all kinds of other stories that could be could be told yeah. But I'm picturing you like 15 records into your career and like maybe something about the local council arguing over a roundabout or something like that's probably what you want to wrap it up if you get to that point. Well let me tell you Jay I tell you this I'll tell you this one

01:03:55.580 --> 01:04:25.440
So when we started approaching local organisations to say right we want to promote Northumberland we want to bring people's interest about you know to come and visit and see where these tales happened and we I spoke to it's called Visit Northumberland which is the tourist information company and I it took some chasing I emailed them and emailed and phoned them and try and get a response out of these people and eventually I got a response that said and the quote was we cannot see that there is a strong enough connection

01:04:25.500 --> 01:04:55.440
with what you're doing and they'll talk about it. Wow. I hate metal. Well, that's fucked up, man, because it is sort of like, hey, I drew a map and they're like, yeah, we don't see how a map relates to us in any way, even though it's like, what we were offering to do, by the way, was every press release, because they were like the three promo tracks, every promo track had its own press release. And there was an introduction video as well. So the four press releases going out and we offered to put any, any organization that wanted

01:04:55.480 --> 01:05:24.960
They would get involved. We would put their logo on the bottom of every press release. We would put their link on the Prophecy website. And so this was going to be, and I think the mailing list is like, I think Prophecy said it was like 30,000 people or something, plus 1,500 metal press all over the world. We're going to get all this information. And visit Northumberland said, we cannot see a strong enough connection. Nothing like free press, huh? Yeah. That's such a great idea. Don't you hate it when that stuff goes awry? Unbelievable.

01:05:25.460 --> 01:05:53.140
So, are you going to try and play this live at all? So, it wasn't initially conceived as something that would happen live because with all those layers. But you work with choirs, right? Yeah, I do. So, you could conceivably put something together. I could, but it would need a lot of people. It was initially conceived to be studio only. However, when I was talking to Prophecy, they're like, if the opportunity arose, would you consider doing something live? And I said, yes.

01:05:54.360 --> 01:06:24.320
But it would need a lot of people to make it sound like the album. But one of the alternatives is, you know, the music was originally written on piano. So there's nothing stopping me. I could easily do a version of the album on my own or with a cello or maybe added an acoustic guitar. You know, the music could be, I mean, I literally reinterpret music for a living. So I could present it in lots of different ways. And there's already been a few sort of conversations with one or two possibilities about presenting it live in one way or another way.

01:06:24.360 --> 01:06:54.060
the other. So I think I'm probably 80 to 90% confident that it will happen live in some form or other this year. Nudge, nudge, wink, wink, say no more. Just make sure Dan's involved because clearly he's the unsung hero of ours. Cheers, Dan. Cheers to Dan. Anybody else have any other questions? I don't have a question. I have a comment.

01:06:54.340 --> 01:07:23.980
Mark, I would not rule out a career in spoken word because I could listen to you talk for about 14 days in a row. And then you'll notice Matt. I have that written down too. Audiobooks. Like you should do. Honestly, if you could just take everything I need to listen to and just say it with your voice, I would, my life would be so much better. Wait, I'll tell my wife that. Yeah. So if anybody's telling you to do extreme vocals, be like, you know what? Matt says not. He just wants Mark as Mark. So.

01:07:24.360 --> 01:07:54.320
We can't damage these cords. No, they're perfect. Cheers, bro. This is Hannes Grossman, and you're listening to the Metal Hats podcast. All right. Why don't we do our t-shirt and beer check? This is something we do every episode to see what everybody's wearing and what they are drinking. Metal and beer go hand in hand, and there's a lot of metal breweries, so we like to share what we're up to. And as the guest, Mark, I see you've been consuming

01:07:54.360 --> 01:08:24.200
What do you have? Oh, it's not very spectacular. I have to confess. It's just a bottle of regular Staropramen. I'm not a big lager drinker, but I do think that Staropramen is quite a decent one. So yeah, I've got a bottle of Staropramen. And do I do my t-shirt at the same time? Yeah, yeah. Like, what are you wearing? So I've got an Imperium shirt on. Oh, nice. Fellow Prophecy band. Right on. Markisan, what about you? Yeah, I'm wearing an Amorphous shirt, Mark pointed it out. So from my new album.

01:08:24.359 --> 01:08:53.480
Halo, which I love. And I just finished, I'm drinking mead. I just finished a Brimminghorn's Wild Hunt, which was a mead with red grape, cinnamon, nutmeg, cardamom, cloves, ginger, juniper berries, black pepper and allspice. Wow, that was a lot more than. And now I've moved on. I don't know what Mark's talking about because clearly anybody can make a mead because I did one for my comic. Hey! Brimminghorn.

01:08:58.740 --> 01:09:24.240
So yeah, I'm drinking my by the horns mead that I had a hand in making. So it's dragon fruit with vanilla mead. So cheers. Right on. Yeah, Mark. Marcus San is a comic book writer. Among other things. One of his many skills. Yeah, I mean, this is the best. I mean, I know exactly what Mark's talking about because I was like, should I?

01:09:25.620 --> 01:09:54.060
I'm a comic writer. I'm known, but not that known. You know what I mean? And they were all over it. And it's good stuff. Of course, we have a relationship with Brimminghorn, but yeah, it was really fun to do. Matt. Okie doke. I am wearing Crip Sermon t-shirt. Making purple metal again. Damn right. I started the afternoon with a beer called Double Shot Double Black, which is from a brewery.

01:09:54.360 --> 01:10:23.920
from my hometown of Duluth. It's a bourbon barrel aged dark ale and the variant I was drinking was from 2017. The last one I had was fabulous. And right now I'm drinking a beer called Hell and that is from Wayfinder. That's what I know. John. Nice. So my shirt, I may have worn this before in here and I can't remember. At some point you cycle through your shirts. I'm wearing Cats in Space from Devin Townsend. It's from the Empath album. Anything.

01:10:24.360 --> 01:10:53.300
But Devin Townsend and Katz, I'm going to buy. Because he's the only one who's got balls to do it. My first beer was Hopgnosis from Firestone Walker. Big fan of Firestone Walker in California. They just make outstanding beers. They do no wrong. No, they don't. And they are one of the best barrel agers in the country, as far as I'm concerned. My cat's in that box back there. He's been there the whole time. I keep waiting for it to come out.

01:10:54.420 --> 01:11:24.300
Your next meet's got to have something to do with a cat in a box then, Marcus. I'm the cat in the box. It's weird because I unpack that box, right? And of course he went in it and I just have to leave it up there and I have to keep that tower up there of comics just so we can lay in it. Yeah. Now I'm going to be looking at the back of your head to see like a tails like above your head the whole time. His mohawk is moving. So-so should get up. I moved on to a second beer from Allagash Brewing Curio. I think it's how you say it.

01:11:28.320 --> 01:11:53.940
It's a barrel-aged triple. I'm a huge fan of Belgian beers, and Allagash is one of the better breweries in America for making Belgian beers. John, I just had this triple called Agare. Have you ever had this? Holy fuck. That was the best I've ever had. I'd never give a five on untapped. From which brewery? De Brower.

01:11:55.360 --> 01:12:23.620
I'll take a look at your check-ins. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, I got it here in Chicago. Yeah, you have a beer temple there. Yeah, the beer temple. And I just asked them, because I don't see a lot of Belgian triples that often, you know. I said, what's the best Belgian triple you have? I had a lot. And they gave me this one. I'm like, we don't get this very often, but it's the best one I ever had. Well, yeah, usually in the U.S., you know, if you're going to get any kind of a Belgian-style beer, it's from a Belgian brewery. But we do have a few.

01:12:24.340 --> 01:12:54.320
American breweries that do outstanding work. Not many, but we do a few. You know, I understand that a Belgian triple is completely different than a triple IPA, but that just reminded me of... And it's spelled different too. I know. But it reminded me of the other day at the beer store, I saw that Flying Dog had a triple IPA and it was 18 plus percent. Yeah. I was like, holy crap. That's like, you know, that's like, it looks over at wine and it says, pussy. Yeah. You know, it's like, I was like, that's going to be

01:12:54.340 --> 01:13:24.320
way too sweet so I went with the double that was only like 12 but yeah I mean you're you're gonna get some um some hop explosions on your tongue when you get to those triple IPAs yeah it says a Broward Van Steenberg I'm no I'm butchering that but uh okay I'll take a look Marcus when did you check it in recently yesterday oh yeah I probably just toasted you like an hour ago you did test it you know so Mark what we're talking about we have a

01:13:24.340 --> 01:13:54.220
an app called untapped and you can check in your beers yeah i'm familiar with it so yeah okay good the guys in winter philip are really into craft beer um but i i took a long time to be convinced so i've only dabbled a little i'm not as much of an aficionado as you guys well it's fun because uh one i can't remember what i drink all the time but i i do pay attention to what my friends drink and so marcus alma knows this and matt knows this yeah um i haven't seen george or jan there not for a while that's a not for a while that's okay what i'll do is i won't

01:13:54.320 --> 01:14:23.160
for about four or five days. And then when I finally have a beer, I go and I'm like, oh, for fuck's sake. And so I'm literally toasting every beer. So all these guys are getting like multiple pop-ups on the screen. And I'm just like, at one point, I'm like, fuck these guys, man. I'm going to nail their ass right now. And I'll do like 10 of them in a row. Patrick's every minute though. He's posting like every minute. Totally. So it's things like, you know, like TR. I've met TR twice in my life. But when I met, when I saw him at Metalhead, the Decibel Fest this year,

01:14:23.780 --> 01:14:52.980
I felt like a note of my whole life because we're constantly and John, you included. We're constantly, you know, but I talked to you on the podcast, like we're constantly toasting each other, seeing what each other's drinking. Yeah, it's almost, you know, like having a beer together. Yeah, exactly. Then I'm like, well, they're drinking. I guess I might as well drink. Yeah, enablers. Exactly. But find that to bar. That's freaking I will. I will. Mark, do you have not to interrupt, but do you have something? Do you have a specific type of style of beer you like to drink or?

01:14:58.100 --> 01:15:23.720
I do tend to like the IPAs. That kind of ballpark. It took me a while. So I used to drink quite sort of boring standards, as the guys in Winterfell call them brown ales. Newcastle? No shit. Supermarket brownie ales kind of thing, or lagers. And it was only really two or three years ago, the guys constantly harry, like, you really should drink coffee, you really should drink coffee.

01:15:23.780 --> 01:15:53.740
I was like right I'm gonna get some and just you know like you do there's there are a million different ones and you just start picking names you like like betting on a horse right yeah oh that sounds like a good name of course it could be a shit beer but yes you just pick a random selection and it took me about a month I've never to be honest I'm not a huge drinker so I'll happily have a couple on a weekend two or three times that's enough for me and uh but it was um about a month later I went I think my

01:15:53.780 --> 01:16:23.100
my taste buds have really changed. I'm really enjoying these sort of like tastier beers. And my wife had popped to the supermarket and she bought me like, I've got you a beer that I know you like. And I can't remember what it was, but it was the kind of beer that I used to drink. And it just tasted like water. Wow. Like in only a month, only a month or so, my taste buds have completely changed. And I haven't really gone back. Like I said before, I don't really drink a lot of lager, but if I do have an occasional lager, it tends to be one of the sort of stronger, tastier ones like Star of Parma.

01:16:23.120 --> 01:16:50.880
So yeah, my taste buds have definitely changed for sure. Hey Mark, it's changed a lot though, hasn't it, in England, craft beer, because I was last there in 2015, I was in London, and we went to a couple places that were like beer bars, and they were saying how the last couple of years, things have really changed a lot, that there were more craft breweries in England, and when we were there, I was with TR, the Metalheads Butler, who's one of our extended... Metalheads Butler! Metalheads Butler!

01:16:53.120 --> 01:17:23.040
A lot of the breweries in England were pairing up with breweries in America, kind of like this friendship thing, and they were working with each other, and it seemed like the industry was really starting to explode there. And it was fun because I was like, man, I've never heard of these breweries. Let's get in. Let's drink some of these things here. Has that been the case? I mean... Yeah, I mean, hugely popular, like in just regular supermarkets, there'll be little sort of crafty beer, kind of like, you know, they all come in like these pretty cans. Of course, yeah.

01:17:23.120 --> 01:17:53.060
Crazy Logos. So I tend to just randomly pick two or three if I'm in the supermarket and see how I get on. And I've also joined, it's called Honest Brew in this country, which is like a subscription. So they just automatically take £10 from your account every month. And then when you remember that you've got some credit, you then just go and buy a selection of beer randomly and deliver them to the house. So a few times a year, I'll just order, you know, like 10 bottles of something or a random selection.

01:17:53.100 --> 01:18:23.080
of cams that look good. So I'm not aficionado, but I do really enjoy it for sure. That's great. It's fun to explore and try things. Jay, what kind of coffee are you drinking right now? I just said peanut butter sandwich, so I'm drinking water. Too early for coffee. In honor of Mark, I think there should actually be a craft beer called Like Bending on a Horse, by the way. So just to throw that out there. And then my t-shirt today is the

01:18:23.900 --> 01:18:25.120
The Lumion Short Shorts.

01:18:28.160 --> 01:18:30.040
Do you have a Slayer hoodie on, right?

01:18:30.100 --> 01:18:33.260
And I believe he is drinking a Corona, so if that counts, I don't know.

01:18:34.140 --> 01:18:38.140
Hey, Jay, you saw his interview when they asked him about those short shorts, right?

01:18:38.420 --> 01:18:38.540
Yeah.

01:18:38.870 --> 01:18:40.740
He said, why would you wear shorts that come down here?

01:18:40.750 --> 01:18:41.440
Those aren't shorts.

01:18:41.570 --> 01:18:43.080
Those are just cut off pants.

01:18:43.500 --> 01:18:44.200
These are shorts.

01:18:44.460 --> 01:18:47.080
And you're looking, you're like, whoa, that's pretty close.

01:18:47.960 --> 01:18:49.480
Yeah, he had balls, man.

01:18:49.980 --> 01:18:50.580
You can see.

01:18:50.610 --> 01:18:51.160
You can see that.

01:18:55.380 --> 01:18:56.180
All right.

01:18:57.400 --> 01:19:05.400
Well, I started with Brimming Horns Black Cherry Piment, which only has honey, black cherry, grape, and grape wine.

01:19:05.520 --> 01:19:05.660
Sorry.

01:19:07.200 --> 01:19:08.440
But that was quite tasty.

01:19:09.540 --> 01:19:15.600
And I've moved on to Spellbound, which is from Old Mother Brewing here in Frederick.

01:19:16.520 --> 01:19:43.980
And it is the official beer of Maryland Doomfest. I bought it because of that. Maryland Doomfest is actually about 10-15 minutes from here at a place called Cafe 611, which is quite possibly the worst venue in the world. So I'm betting that the beer was better than the show. Not to detract from the bands that played it, but the sound at that place is awful. That's not good. So I'll drink the beer.

01:19:44.020 --> 01:20:13.540
I actually have to also honor whoever it just was that comes in. Yes, I do have a Slayer hoodie on. Yeah. Even the zipper is fucking cool on this thing. Oh, wow. The inside of the hoodie is red. I mean, that's. It's the cover of Hello Wates. Oh, wow. Demons from Hello Wates on it. Nice. Hello Wates on the inside of the hood, man. That's bad. It keeps you extra warm. Yeah. He did with Hellfire. And in honor.

01:20:14.600 --> 01:20:43.980
In honor of next week's anniversary show at Adroit Theory Brewing in Percival, Virginia that Will is also putting on, I'm wearing my Adroit Theory shirt. So next weekend, John and I will be with Will seeing Loud Night, who have been on the podcast, Local Boys Genocide Pact, and Full of Hell. So looking forward to that. I just realized I can order Adroit Theory again because I'm getting

01:20:44.920 --> 01:21:13.940
So Mark, I lived in Hawaii for two years and I moved back to Chicago. I lived in Chicago for 20 years. So I could order from Adroit Theory when I was in Hawaii early in the pandemic and they stopped doing it. So now I just realized I can order beers from them again. I'm going to do that. I love their beer. Adroit Theory is a brewery that specializes in heavy octane beers with a heavy metal influence. And I'm not saying heavy metal.

01:21:14.020 --> 01:21:43.980
I mean a heavy space metal influence it's they're very metal adjacent yeah yeah the owner Mark Osborne's a metalhead a lot of skulls which if you're a metalhead who doesn't love a skull right exactly so who doesn't love a monk carrying a coffin exactly nobody does not like yeah can I step back to Jay's hoodie for one second I just realized that like so many times people ask me a

01:21:44.040 --> 01:22:13.180
And really, my answer to them should be, well, hello waits. We should probably all use that phrase more. That's right. Yeah, good call. Mine's going to be monk carrying a coffin. Well, also, by the way, monk carrying a coffin, another good name for a craft brew. Mark's just named wrong today. Yeah. Yeah. And those are pronounceable, which is awesome. Always helps. Yeah. Hello waits. Yeah.

01:22:15.940 --> 01:22:43.980
All right, let's move on to the news. Initially, there wasn't really going to be much of anything because Russia invading Ukraine is pretty much all you hear about anywhere all the time. And honestly, you know, it's so fucked up that

01:22:45.540 --> 01:23:13.980
I don't know. I mean, what can you say? You know, we talked about this a little bit last time. It's fucked up. It's ridiculous that this is still going on. And I hope it ends soon. Can I give you a Sergei update? Yes, please. Okay, because just some of them is someone. Well, first off, his wife is doing free art classes for Ukrainian children. They are Ukrainian, by the way. Yeah, yeah. Both Sergei and his wife are Ukrainian. Let Mark know who Sergei is, though, Jay. Oh, he's

01:23:14.000 --> 01:23:16.140
He's a bass player of the band I plan and he's

01:23:17.120 --> 01:23:19.880
he's he emigrated to America maybe

01:23:21.020 --> 01:23:24.340
maybe eight years ago became a citizen recently still totally Ukrainian

01:23:25.620 --> 01:23:30.180
as is his wife and his mother and her mother are both still in Ukraine

01:23:30.580 --> 01:23:35.040
his wife is very talented artist and she is doing art classes every night

01:23:35.840 --> 01:23:39.920
at midnight which is whatever time it is in Ukraine and it's overloaded every night

01:23:40.040 --> 01:23:43.240
she's running out of zoom play spots all these Ukrainian children in Ukraine

01:23:43.420 --> 01:24:13.120
are joining her for art. So that happens every day. I asked Sergei, what's his mom, how's his mom and his wife's mom coming? And this is how Eastern European they are. And that has, both of them were like, ah, they want them to come over. And they're like, yeah, we'd come over, but who will take care of my tomatoes in the spring? Like that's how, that is how like, you know, second nature, really this kind of constant ongoing disaster.

01:24:13.260 --> 01:24:41.900
Tragedy is. So, and he was just like, whatever, dudes, you know, so, but they are working on green cards for his parents, for his mom and her mom and, and whatever. And they're still pretty safe. His, both of their parents are in the middle of the country. Yeah. So not currently being shelled or anything, but right. Yeah. And he's doing okay. His wife, his wife's more stressed out than he is, but he doesn't tend to stress out. He's, he lived through all that shit. So, so far, so good. All right. Well,

01:24:43.240 --> 01:25:13.220
I know it's serious and if anybody gets a chance to watch Arnold Schwarzenegger's little video he made about Ukraine watch it I was gonna bring that up Jay because I just watched it last night it's kind of fucking moving it is well he appeals to the people of Russia to let them know that you know they've been getting all this propaganda and a lot of it is lies and what's happening is not really what's happening I thought that was it was pretty moving and well he does it he does it under the guise of two things though one is this

01:25:13.220 --> 01:25:43.200
He's a Russian hero he had when he was a child when he first became a weightlifter and then also which was long known about his dad that his dad was a Nazi was in the Nazi army and that's always been kind of hush-hush and he comes up talks about it in this video and yeah well he's hugely popular in Russia in fact he was almost named ambassador to Russia is that right yeah because he has such ties there oh it's just I actually did not know that I know I mean I know what he said in the video but I thought that was such a nice video he's turned out to be such a nice

01:25:43.340 --> 01:26:12.960
guy. I actually follow him on Facebook and he has like these two miniature ponies that he just loves to death and he feeds them at his table and stuff. He's fun to watch his videos on Facebook. And he had this to say about us. You're listening to the Mental Heads podcast. If you don't listen, then to hell with you. Hey, Jay, I'll say this real quick. If you want to know anything about him as a person, just watch the documentary Pumping Iron. Yeah.

01:26:13.200 --> 01:26:43.140
Yeah, I've seen it. Yeah. But the juice. Yeah. He was young. To be fair, he was a young man. He was, but it just gives you insight into his, how his mind works a little bit. So. Yeah. He, the only other thing I'll mention in this is not like the Schwarzenegger love fest or something, but was when he is also very much on the side of truth and science with the pandemic and stuff. And I loved when he got his shot. Cause he got his shot. He was in his car. He did it in a drive-thru thing. And whoever was filming it, then he looked right at the camera and said, come with me. If you want to.

01:26:44.820 --> 01:27:13.160
Which is fucking awesome, dude. Never one to not pass up the moment, right? Yeah. Pretty much the only Republican I like. Yeah, well, I sent you that meme the other day, right? It was Stallone going, hey, guys, I'm going to do a movie about composers. I'm going to be Mozart. And Van Damme was like, oh, I'll be Beethoven. And Arnold was like,

01:27:13.220 --> 01:27:43.140
Guys, I'm not going to say it. Of course, they wanted him to, I'll be back. I got it. Wow. That was a new low here in this podcast. Wow. Sorry. It was from a dad joke thing on Facebook. Yeah, it was a dad joke here. All right. So we do have actually two news items that were last minute, so only I have them on my list. One of them is the fact that today is the 40th anniversary of the death of Randy Rose.

01:27:43.700 --> 01:28:13.120
So we wanted to note that. Wow. 40 years. He was only 25 years old. He'd be 65 now. That's crazy. Yeah. I sent that to George because I saw that today and I was like, damn it. Okay. So I've actually was around when that, meaning like I remember that news broke and I actually was, I had tickets to go see Ozzy on the Diary of Mamet tour and he passed away. So I got Brad Gillis from Night Ranger, which he was awesome.

01:28:13.200 --> 01:28:40.580
But obviously I would have preferred to see Randy Rhoads. So, and I know I talk about it the most and I know people make comments like, oh, you guys are so obsessed with Randy Rhoads. He really was that influential. I don't even play guitar. He was just that influential as a musician to me growing up that this little tiny guy could sound so big and was only in the spotlight for, he was in Quiet Riot, obviously, but before Quiet Riot became popular. But it was only with Ozzy for a couple of years.

01:28:41.100 --> 01:29:11.040
And his myth gets bigger and bigger every year. And it should. It should. My only regret with him personally is that he didn't have, I don't even know if he had a longer career, we could have judged better. But what he did was amazing in that short amount of time. He was a groundbreaker. And it's just the reason people don't get it, John, where like younger than us is because so many guys came in after him and were so shreddy and stuff. But at the time, the guy was, and still is actually, if you ask me, if you listen to him,

01:29:13.120 --> 01:29:41.000
He's one of the great rock guitarists ever. I just read a little bit about him again. I already knew all this, but just hearing how he was going to quit Ozzy's band because they had fired Bob Daisley and Lee Kerslake. He was like, I'm not playing anymore with you. He was that loyal to those guys. He was only 25, and you would think at that point you'd be more worried about your career. He was more worried about letting his friends down. He wanted to go do classical stuff, too. He was already in that phase.

01:29:41.080 --> 01:30:10.800
So who knows what he would have done. If he would have gone that route, obviously I think his chops would have gotten even better. Yeah. Yeah. I also, since we're talking about him, ran an interesting interview. I found some old interview with him recently. And he was really disappointed in Diary of a Madman because, but he was disappointed in himself. He was like, we had all this time with Blizzard of Oz and we had like two weeks on that one. And I, and he said, there's like three parts of it where I play that I'm like really proud of it. He said, the rest is just me doing, he really, he,

01:30:11.100 --> 01:30:39.000
We want time to innovate. Which to me is very innovative. So whatever. I know. Yeah. The other news item. We rail against the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame a lot because of, well, there's all kinds of reasons to rail against them. And the other day, Dolly Parton declined to be nominated for the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame because she said she didn't think she belonged there.

01:30:41.080 --> 01:31:10.100
I don't know if her reasoning is the same as ours in that, well, she's a country music person and that's not technically rock and roll. But regardless of what her reason was, it was a pretty interesting and kind of a cool thing for her to do. However, the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, being the asshats that they are, declined to decline. What? They said, no, no, we're keeping you on the ballot. Yeah. Even though she said she doesn't want to go in, which is shitty because.

01:31:11.100 --> 01:31:41.060
I don't know what her reason is for it other than I do I read her statement go ahead John and I'll tell you what she said right I mean I'm assuming she doesn't think she's rock and roll but I also think there's more to it I'm wondering if she's seeing there's other artists on there that should be in that's exactly before her I'm thinking and I'm not playing identity politics here but I'll just I will for this one particular thing Pat Benatar is not in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame whether you like her or not she's not in and I can't imagine someone like Dolly Parton who plays country is saying wow I

01:31:41.100 --> 01:32:11.060
being before her. Well, her statement was even more graceful. Well, yeah, it's been extremely graceful. Well, what she said, what she said, though, was something to the effect of, I'm not a rock musician, but then she goes on to say, but I love rock music. I've always wanted to make a rock record. And this makes me think I should probably get around to making that rock record. But in the meantime, I'd sooner step out of the way and let somebody who really deserves this have it. Exactly. I mean, I'm not just making reference to the fact that the Hall's always trying

01:32:11.780 --> 01:32:40.960
to kind of make themselves look like the better place by including all these people in it. Well, they should just change the name to the like Music Hall of Fame or something, you know? Then nobody would give a shit anymore. Exactly. All right. I don't even think we should ever cover them because they always make bad choices. Iron Maiden is not in the Rockwell Hall of Fame. Well, it's not that, Marcus. You know what I think it is? For me, it's more, it's for the fans that have supported these bands. To them, it gives them the acknowledgement because, let's be honest, mainstream media is just basically thumbed metal for years.

01:32:42.080 --> 01:33:11.020
They thumbed progressive rock for years at Rolling Stone until they realized Rush was cool to put on their cover. And then they made a buck off of them, you know? So it's more just for the fans to finally say, see, we did listen to cool music. We know that already. We know. We don't care about the hall, but you want to see your heroes get in. We need to start our metal hall of fame. I know. I know. There is one, actually. Yeah, there is one. But they put too many of those 80s hard rock bands in there that I don't like. But there is one.

01:33:11.080 --> 01:33:38.160
There is actually a hard rock and heavy metal hall of fame now. Eddie Trunk's involved with it. Yeah. So let's move on to new releases then. First up, we have the new album from Black Fucking Cancer. So, you know, nice piano music. Create for weddings.

01:33:41.520 --> 01:34:10.840
They're from San Jose and they are unsurprisingly a black metal band. I liked this album and I know Jay's been a big fan of them in the past. I don't know if you have any comment, Jay. Yeah, I love it. I think there's some creative element in this band and I don't know. I actually met one of the guys by accident one time. I was at a Blair Witch show and he and he was wearing a black fucking cancer shirt. I was like, hey, where'd you get that fucking shirt, man? He goes, well, I'm in a band. So anyway, long story short, I,

01:34:11.060 --> 01:34:39.640
I honestly thought that was going to be a one-off, the first one, so I'm glad to hear there was a second record. I think it's great. And I love the first one. I think there's a little something extra with these guys. Yeah, I only got through it once, but by the time I was done, I was definitely digging it. This is the first time I've heard it, but it's a wall of nihilistic destruction. Yeah. It's non-stop. I should have started with that. It's heavy as fuck. I should have mentioned that. I would go back and listen to the first one, too. The first one is totally up your alley, for sure. Okay.

01:34:41.080 --> 01:35:11.040
I like to point out, because Will's not here, that the track Obscene Lusting Dagger could possibly be his theme song. All right. Next up, we have the new album from Glossin. I don't know if that's how you pronounce it or not, but it's called The Rift. It's their second album, and they're a Swedish sludge post-metal band. We've talked about them on here before. John's not sitting in his chair right now, but I know he's liked them in the past, and I don't know if anybody else has listened to this one, but it's pretty cool.

01:35:11.060 --> 01:35:41.000
It consumed my day yesterday. Yeah, it's pretty good. That was solid. Yeah, it's big, sludgy post-metal. You know, I love the drums on the record, which I'm sure John probably likes too. So yeah, it was a good record. We're going to get through all of these while John's gone, and they're all like, John, damn it. Mark, did you listen to any of these or no? So I can look at this list of six and say I've only ever heard of two of the bands. Okay. And I haven't heard either of the records. You know what?

01:35:41.060 --> 01:36:09.780
I'm going to take a guess and say one of them is Hath. Have you heard of Hath? Is that probably one? No. Okay, because I thought they were English. Coulomb and Laxo, I'm a big fan of, and I haven't heard the new record yet, but I've got it on, I've had it on pre-order for vinyl for months. The vinyl's going to, the vinyl. It's Adele's fault. Yeah. But what a, what an impressive non-stumbly pronunciation. I know, you're totally going to be pronouncing that when we get to it. Yeah, we'll play. You just pronounce everything for us. Exactly.

01:36:11.080 --> 01:36:39.840
John, do you have any comments on the Glossin record? I have to admit, sorry, I had to get a beer. I had to dispense of a beer and I had to get a beer. So you could do the math on that one. I have not heard the Black fucking Cancer yet and I have not heard the Glossin yet. I'm sorry. Okay. Well, what about the Hath record? All That Was Promised? Their second album, New Jersey, Prague, Black Death. Oh, they're from New Jersey. I love it. I think the last one was good too. Hath is a band to watch for the future. I'm telling you, these guys are going somewhere.

01:36:40.740 --> 01:37:10.720
I know Markisan you like this last I'll let you go first. I think it's one of the best albums I've heard this year and that's saying something considering how many records have already come out it's just a darkly ferocious blast of black and death and has razor sharp execution on it I thought I liked the last album but it meandered a little bit for me this one is just really focused it's great. Yeah I know Jay of course Jay leaves I was going to mention him I know Jay mentioned

01:37:10.720 --> 01:37:40.700
that when he talked about half a while back he mentioned that he heard a lot of opeth in them and i didn't hear that with uh the debut album but i guess on the ep there is a little bit and it's almost a little too much um not that that's a bad thing but you know you're starting out people are going to right away start pigeonholing you and i think they added this more kind of blackened sound to their to their style of death metal progressive death metal i should say mind you it's not straight up death metal and i think that

01:37:40.720 --> 01:38:10.640
They've done that with the last two albums. Their debut in this one. I like this one a lot, too. I'm not a huge black and death fan. I don't know why you think I would like it, because I like both sub-genres, but I do like them. They got a killer album cover. It just slays what they did with it. And I believe my friend Serge, who sometimes posts on our New Music Fridays, you see him post on there. I think he might know someone from the band, actually.

01:38:10.720 --> 01:38:40.400
because they're from Jersey and he lives in New Brunswick, New Jersey. Or in that area, I should say. Right. It's cool. That's a really good record. So next we have the new Convent album, Convent with a K, Call Down the Sun. This is their second album. They're a Death Doom band from Denmark. I liked the first one. I gotta say I wasn't as thrilled with this one. Oh, I disagree with that one. I liked the last one, but I felt it was a little too basic and one-dimensional for me.

01:38:40.700 --> 01:38:41.020
So,

01:38:41.020 --> 01:38:41.260
so,

01:38:41.580 --> 01:38:42.320
called on the sun,

01:38:42.420 --> 01:38:43.380
it's heavy as fuck.

01:38:43.380 --> 01:38:46.040
And there's just more meat on the bones of this one.

01:38:46.080 --> 01:38:48.780
So I think it's a pretty strong followup.

01:38:50.020 --> 01:38:51.920
I love the singer.

01:38:51.940 --> 01:38:53.540
I think her name is Ricky Emily.

01:38:54.320 --> 01:38:55.300
Her vocals are great.

01:38:55.800 --> 01:38:59.380
So it's got a couple of repeat spins from me,

01:38:59.720 --> 01:39:02.280
but so I liked this one quite a bit more than the last one.

01:39:02.360 --> 01:39:02.620
Last one,

01:39:02.620 --> 01:39:05.180
I think I spent a couple of times this one more into.

01:39:05.760 --> 01:39:05.840
Cool.

01:39:07.340 --> 01:39:10.680
So next we have an album or rather a band that I'm going to

01:39:13.200 --> 01:39:18.320
I'm not a Finnish aficionado, but I believe it's Koolam and Lakso.

01:39:19.120 --> 01:39:23.220
That sounds right to me. Do you want to hazard the album title too?

01:39:24.040 --> 01:39:24.160
No.

01:39:26.600 --> 01:39:30.600
But in Finnish, they always put an emphasis on the first syllable.

01:39:31.280 --> 01:39:35.600
So as in English, you might have assumed it might be Koolam and Lakso.

01:39:37.100 --> 01:39:39.900
I think you'll have to say Koolam and Lakso.

01:39:40.360 --> 01:40:10.340
They always emphasize the first solo. So then the album might be Kusumu? Kusumu, I would think. I don't know. So out of the bands on this list, which I must confess I feel like I'm not contributing to very much, this is a band that I've previously been really into. Primarily because of the singer. From Swallow the Sun. I'm a huge Swallow the Sun fan. Yeah, there we go. So yeah, the first two records I've been really into, although they made a third

01:40:13.180 --> 01:40:37.860
I seem to remember it was originally intended to be some kind of spin-off project by the guitarist and it ended up coming out under the Coulomb and Laxon name. But no, I've had this album on pre-order for some months. The vinyl is not yet out, but Spark Records, being a great label, sent a download code the other day to the people who had pre-ordered the vinyl as an apology.

01:40:39.100 --> 01:41:09.040
I'm looking forward to hearing that very soon. And do you like the new album? I thought it was pretty good. He hasn't listened to it yet. Oh, you haven't listened? Oh, I'm sorry. I apologize. No, no, I haven't heard it yet, but I really like the first two records. So that's why I've had that on pre-order. Well, I will say that they did comment. We do a thing on Fridays called New Music Friday. And I listed them as one of the albums I was listening to because I usually post it and I put my list in and everyone posts after that. And somebody had said, I can't remember, somebody here can correct me,

01:41:09.100 --> 01:41:39.060
me that they didn't know it or hadn't heard it and someone from the band just responded and said we're awesome yeah that's all they said i was like well if that's not enough reason for you to listen to them then yeah i can't help you from there i listened to it i remember i did see the video for the first track they released like a preview track and i wasn't sure it sounded like their sound had changed somewhat but i'd rather wait until i hear the full thing right on yeah i enjoyed it all right last

01:41:39.080 --> 01:41:45.520
new release the new album from midnight let there be witchery it's their fourth album they're a

01:41:45.680 --> 01:41:51.460
cleveland black speed band we just saw them back in september at the decibel metal and beer fest

01:41:52.160 --> 01:42:00.120
what a show put they put on um i think i like them better live than i do uh on album but uh you know

01:42:00.180 --> 01:42:04.280
i feel like we've seen them a lot recently well they played for the shows that we've gone to

01:42:04.280 --> 01:42:34.140
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I think if Will was here, he'd be much more of a all over this, but to me, I'm like, I've already got Motorhead. I don't need midnight. And Motorhead doesn't wear any masks. I feel like they translated the live energy to this studio album more so than the other ones. I mean, it's not that I don't like it.

01:42:34.280 --> 01:42:37.260
But it just hits me better live

01:42:38.100 --> 01:42:39.680
Yeah I mean they're a great live band

01:42:39.680 --> 01:42:40.600
But I think this one

01:42:41.100 --> 01:42:43.360
It gets that energy going in the album

01:42:43.480 --> 01:42:44.760
More so than the ones in the past

01:42:45.000 --> 01:42:46.060
I really like this one

01:42:46.880 --> 01:42:48.240
Now is this one dude

01:42:48.760 --> 01:42:50.600
Because I see all the new press stuff

01:42:50.660 --> 01:42:52.080
It just has one guy they're showing

01:42:52.680 --> 01:42:54.540
Or is it actually a band of

01:42:54.800 --> 01:42:55.840
They're all equal members

01:42:56.020 --> 01:42:56.600
Does anyone know?

01:42:57.100 --> 01:42:59.380
Well they have videos with a bunch of people

01:42:59.680 --> 01:43:00.200
Yeah because

01:43:03.300 --> 01:43:04.260
Go ahead

01:43:04.260 --> 01:43:34.200
the one guy on the cover. So I wasn't sure if... Yeah, it must be the mastermind. I'm not sure if it's one guy. Or it could have just been anybody with the mask on, you know. Hey, put a black hood on and say it's midnight, you know. Yeah, I wasn't sure if that's what it was, you know, if he wrote the music. I wasn't sure if it was Ghost, you know, where it's like 87 different band members and one dude, you know, who plays the Pope on every different album, so... No, I think they're a band, but it's the one guy that writes the music. Okay, got it. Cool. Fair enough. All right.

01:43:34.280 --> 01:43:36.680
All right, let's move on to what we are listening to.

01:44:00.800 --> 01:44:03.360
Mark, what have you been listening to lately?

01:44:03.880 --> 01:44:32.920
It can be, you know, a number of things. Sometimes we only have a couple. Sometimes I have been known to have 30, you know, so. Yeah, I listen to a lot of music. I tend to be a real sort of, I go through periods of only listening to one thing. I'm like a really obsessive listener. So I'd like only listen to Doom for like nine months. And then suddenly without warning, I'd be only listening to black metal for a year. It's weird. It's unexplainable. I do that too. I have periods.

01:44:35.760 --> 01:45:02.740
I went through about 18 months without hearing a black metal record. It was weird. I come in and out of moods and then really obsessively rabbit war and go down to the nth of that genre and start researching bands. I'm just obsessive compulsive. It's the only way to put it. So I'm in a real black metal phase at the moment. I haven't heard any black metal for ages and I've been obsessed the last few weeks. So I've been listening to a lot of Deathspell Amiga. I've been listening to a lot of Bloodhouse Nord.

01:45:02.740 --> 01:45:32.560
I've been listening to a lot of Druck and Kroda, some of the Ukrainian bands, and a lot of Roman from Druck's other projects like Winswept and Blood of Kingu and Precambrian. So I've been on a really ferocious black metal. I mean, I've been going to sleep to Deathspell Omega the last few nights. Both Deathspell Omega and Bluedouse Nord have new albums out imminently. Yeah, I just pre-ordered both yesterday.

01:45:33.560 --> 01:46:02.100
Did you hear the new song from the Blue Dust of Nord yet? Yes, just once yesterday. Just once, yeah. It's interesting, isn't it? It was hypnotic. I find both of those bands, you really have to be in the right mood. So like the early Deathspell Amiga album, C Monumentum Circumspice or whatever it's called, it's just like an instant smash hit. But all those last sort of five or six records they've made are so sort of gnarly and dissonant.

01:46:03.440 --> 01:46:32.260
I find I think of Death Spell Amiga in the same way as I think of Ulcerate, the Death Battle band. Are they from New Zealand? New Zealand, yeah. In that if you just listen to it in passing, it's just like throwing a band down the stairs. Do you know what I mean? It's just this weird sort of cacophony of noise. But when you give it some repeat plays, like I've seen Ulcerate live, and it's just ridiculously ferocious. I mean, it's extraordinary. So yeah, Death Spell Amiga.

01:46:32.760 --> 01:47:02.120
I think I slightly had dismissed their later records and in the last few weeks I've given them some heavy spin and I'm like these are great ones what a great really unusual bands and yeah Bloodhouse Nord can make so many different sounds can't they what a huge catalogue what a huge catalogue and sometimes it's pure 90s Norwegian black metal and it's really easy to get into and really enjoyable and sometimes it's almost dissonant industrial and you've got to almost work for it but yeah they're two great bands but you have to be in the right mood for them for sure.

01:47:02.180 --> 01:47:31.480
Definitely. Great. Yeah. Anything else you want to mention? I checked out the new Ghost album this week. Ghosts are a band that I kind of really don't want to love as much as I perhaps do. Guilty pleasure. Yeah, I feel like a guilty pleasure. But I've got a lot of friends who are really, really obsessed. Like Marco, who runs the merch department, the merch store for Prophecy, is a ghost obsessive.

01:47:31.500 --> 01:48:01.480
He's ordered like 10 different pressings of this new album. Wow. And I have to say that when they released the three promo tracks for the album, I really thought the first two were great. And I thought the third one was utterly shit. The worst track they've ever released. I've heard that from a lot of people. 20s, the track, it's called 20s. It's just awful. I mean, it's just shit. Like had a new metal band released it, you'd be like, get away with you. But in the context of the album, it kind of makes a

01:48:01.520 --> 01:48:08.160
a bit more sense, but I would say it's currently my least favorite ghost record, but I know some people are loving it.

01:48:08.380 --> 01:48:31.280
They just, uh, were they on Jimmy Fallon the other night? I mean, they just, I think it was the other Jimmy television. Yeah. Huge. Playing big places, man. Um, they just show up in like my YouTube feed and it's people dropping, you know, videos on there and they're playing, they're playing fuck everything else. Yeah. They're doing that tour of Volbeat. I feel like. Oh, yeah. Well, that's going to be huge. Yeah. Oh,

01:48:31.520 --> 01:49:01.200
Oh, it's not. That's not what's going on right now. Do you mean that's forthcoming? I think so. I don't think it's true. They're in Europe currently. They're about to play the UK. They're touring with a band called Uncle Acid and the Deadbeats. Oh, yeah. That's another shit. Yeah. They're a good band. They're going to be just getting, keep getting bigger no matter what they play, whether you like them or not. They're just going to keep getting bigger. They might be friendly, too, because I feel like I saw Ghost with that band one time, I think. Anyway, whatever. I've seen them so many times. They always,

01:49:02.160 --> 01:49:31.320
They opened for King Diamond. No. That's what I said. Yeah. I wouldn't. No, he's the VIP. Yeah. We need the VIP. Actually, that would be kind of funny to see them open for King Diamond. They come out and do their shtick, and then he just comes out, and he would just be able to just stand there and say, I'm taking over now. That's why I don't remember the map, because I was standing in line for the VIP. Yeah. It was Idle Hands, which is now onto others, and then Uncle Acid, and then King Diamond.

01:49:31.500 --> 01:50:01.400
Wow. Yeah. I missed. Wow. That's a big lineup. Yeah. I saw the idle hands missed uncle acid and then. I was in line for VIP. Yeah. Got to, got to meet King. Do it. A King. Yeah. Yeah. All right. Markisan, what are you listening to? Yeah. The first thing on my list is a cult burial disorder. It's a single independently released. I've spun the new cult barrel single a lot. It's a,

01:50:01.520 --> 01:50:30.120
It's a death metal hurricane banger with a macabre vibe to it. I really like this band. I was pretty high on their album from 2020. And then they put out an EP last year called Oblivion. And that was actually number two on my top five EPs list, even though we didn't actually count down our EPs on the podcast. So Disorder is a one-off track, but I'm told the Cult Barrel has more on the way, which is exciting for me.

01:50:30.520 --> 01:51:00.420
Because this year is crazy. I am one of the few occult burial huge fans. I fucking love these guys. This first record is my favorite one so far. But I'm totally looking forward to the news. Is it occult burial? Because this is occult burial. Oh, okay. Maybe it's a different band. Occult occult. I'm going to check that out too. Awesome. Next one is Vemence Orderlies on Antique.

01:51:00.560 --> 01:51:29.080
And this is a really great melodic atmospheric black metal album with a heavy medieval component to it. There's different kinds of instrumentation on it like flutes and cello and choirs, but it, but it feels a lot more focused to me than the last album. It also delivers more of a traditional medieval storytelling vibe to me than, than a band like Stormkeep, which plays like a role for initiative dragon metal type stuff.

01:51:31.140 --> 01:52:00.480
Yeah, that's really cool. I really like the Viam Mints record. Idle of Fear, Trespasser on Somnolence Productions. It's a brooding, dark black metal with a bit of ambient experimentation thrown in. Just really killer slow burn metal. Digging that one a lot. Mesa, Close on Svart Records. I think Mark just mentioned Svart, actually. They do a lot of good things. This is beautifully crafted ritual sacrament.

01:52:01.000 --> 01:52:30.500
So if you're into late night witchcraft metal with stunning vocals, I think you'll probably be into this one. It's me leaving this world, leaving it all behind on satanic royalty records is it's atmospheric progressive black metal kind of feels like a voyage into a fantasy realm. I liked the last record a lot and it toyed with making my list, but the production wasn't good. And then they got a new producer come in and

01:52:30.540 --> 01:53:00.380
And that album, I think it's like the slings of our arrows or something, was a great record when it had a good producer on it. And this one kind of picks up where that one left off. So I'm digging it. Let's see. Iron Mountain of Flesh and Bone. It's big, rolling, doomy stoner metal with elements of death to it. Dig that. I'm not really as much into stoner metal, but this one's pretty good. And then the last one,

01:53:00.540 --> 01:53:30.460
My List is on Norna. Star is Weiwei is I on Vinter Records. The other day I was re-listening to this great, brutal post-metal band that John might know actually called The Old Wind. They put out an album in 2016 and then they did a collaboration EP with Cult of Luna that same year. But I hadn't seen anything from them since. And then I found out that the guitarist slash vocalist formed this new band called Norna.

01:53:30.540 --> 01:53:59.620
And their debut came out in February. And I completely missed it. But I love this record. It's dark, hypnotic, doom sludge. And it's heavy, man. It's freaking heavy. It's like mercury sealed in concrete heavy. That's how heavy it is. So I really like that one. So I've been spinning that one a ton lately because I just found it a couple days ago. And that's what I got. All right.

01:54:00.520 --> 01:54:30.500
So my favorite grindcore band or one of them, Warm Rot from Singapore, just kicked out a new track called Behind Closed Doors. They have a new album out. Well, they have a new album coming. It's called Hiss. I think it's July 8th via Earache. It's a little bit thrashier than a lot of other stuff, but so far I dig it. My favorite French one metal or one piece black metal band, Esau Trillium, released a couple tracks. As mentioned, the new Blue Door Snorting

01:54:30.520 --> 01:54:33.440
track. Definitely looking forward to the whole album coming out.

01:54:35.000 --> 01:54:37.280
We got the promo for Falls of Rowers,

01:54:38.400 --> 01:54:39.680
the key to a vanishing future.

01:54:41.100 --> 01:54:41.760
And I'm rich.

01:54:42.500 --> 01:54:45.020
I need to hear that. I need to hear that immediately.

01:54:46.280 --> 01:54:51.840
Like the best way I can describe this album is like,

01:54:51.980 --> 01:54:55.200
it's, it's fucking gorgeous. It's beautiful. Like,

01:54:55.280 --> 01:54:57.200
and I don't normally use those words as black model,

01:54:57.320 --> 01:54:59.160
but it is fucking beautiful. I mean,

01:54:59.340 --> 01:55:29.300
I think they're a band that yeah I think they're a band who real sort of old school black metal aficionados will try to pretend aren't great they're a really creative band they're a really creative band I've got a lot of time for Falls of Aurora and for me it's like moody it's emotional and for someone who labels themselves bitchy like I love it it's so good well it's also I think it's their heaviest record too yes it's my favorite record by far and I love all their other records

01:55:29.320 --> 01:55:59.280
This record blows the other records away, I think. It's great. We should send it to Mark, actually. Yeah, totally. Also, in Aphelion, the album was called Moribund. Really digging that album. The new Hoth, like, shit, that is so good. All That Was Promised, like, literally is All That Was Promised. It's that good. And also, Glosson, The Rift. Outside of that, I finished a book called

01:55:59.300 --> 01:56:29.240
The Last Days of John Lennon, I think it was. Ironically, it was written by James Patterson, who I don't think of that genre. He just wrote a book with Dolly Parton. Oh, no shit. Also, ironically, it was not The Last Days of John Lennon. It was kind of this parallel stories of a real brief overview of his life. And then Mark David Chapman as he's traveling from Hawaii to New York to kill him. So a little bit of a true crime element, which makes sense.

01:56:29.320 --> 01:56:56.440
James Patterson Goodread, but also got me into spinning more beetles. And then I always find myself periodically going back to dying fetus, more specifically killing on adrenaline and destroy the opposition. That's it for me. And good calling that false auroras. I should have had that on my list because I have been spinning that a ton. That's so good. Pretty high on my list right now. John. All right. I just have a few.

01:57:00.140 --> 01:57:27.560
They're from France. They are a death doom band. Their second album just kind of like dropped out of nowhere. That's the beauty of Bandcamp. I think you can announce things and control when and how you release stuff if you do it independently. But they apparently announced the album and I listened to whatever was released. I liked it and I bought it and I got the whole album even though it doesn't come out for a month. And then all of a sudden they're like, well, the digital's now available.

01:57:29.340 --> 01:57:34.460
copies will come out a month later so i was like cool they uh make like 20 minute death doom

01:57:34.680 --> 01:57:38.260
songs which you would think they're like oh that's exhausting but for some reason they work

01:57:38.900 --> 01:57:44.160
uh so i like them a lot but i listened to that i listened to the first one actually because you put

01:57:44.220 --> 01:57:49.200
that on your friday list and and i really liked it and i can't listen to the second because you can't

01:57:49.300 --> 01:57:53.500
get it digitally you have to like buy the the disc or something so i'm listening to one song let me know

01:57:53.800 --> 01:57:58.760
i'll put it on the box can you throw it in the box yeah of course i didn't know i figured

01:57:58.760 --> 01:58:28.740
because maybe it's showing up because I bought it and that's why I can see it. You bought the CD and so you can get it but you can't actually buy it digitally it's so frustrating. Oh yeah okay. Like number one because it's called number two. Yes you get number one you know. Oh I thought it was out there. I'll give it number two. Remind me I'll give it to you today. Yeah okay thanks. Definitely. Second one also I've listened to the Falls Aurora's keys or key to a vanishing feature. I would say and Markisan pointed this out earlier I think this is by far their more

01:58:29.300 --> 01:58:58.720
I think it's fairly progressive in their sound but I wouldn't say they're progressive black metal I think they they have some new sounds that like the opening track is when I first heard that I was like wait this isn't an atmospheric black metal band what's going on here and then it kicks in and you're like all right it's very progressive yeah but it's very cool and it's heavy but it's good and the songs are not super long they're all what roughly between six and eight minutes I think all of them which is you know nice I mean

01:58:58.760 --> 01:59:28.100
I don't like short songs. I don't like, you know, I don't want to have 15 songs on an album, but six or seven songs that are a good length is good for me. Next album, Matt and I, we bond on a few things, but we definitely bond on the sax core. We have a side podcast called Sax in the City. Sax in the City. And I sent him a message and they said, dude, if you checked out this band, I feel like we missed them. And the band is Fractal Universe. Is that how you say it? The Impassible Horizon.

01:59:28.760 --> 01:59:57.560
I checked this out. I was like, fuck, this is, it's good. It's there. I hate this expression is tech death bands, but they're really not a technical death band per se. There's a lot of proggy elements, a lot of slower movements. Usually when you're tech death, you think it's just massive blast beats and crazy playing. And it's not, it's, there's a lot of melody. And I was very surprised when I heard this and I am digging this and it's sax core. There's sax in there. Yeah. So if you like your sax, get on that. Yeah. That's solid.

01:59:58.760 --> 02:00:28.400
We mentioned Hath already. I don't know what more I can say about it. I like it. It's good. And then TR, the Metalheads Butler and I recently went to a show. We saw The Ocean. And this is only the second time I've seen them. And they're awesome. I love them. And they did the Fanner's Oak one and two. They did songs from those two albums. They opened for Leprous. I used to be a huge Leprous fan, but then Leprous became a different band. So I only liked their first few albums. So we stuck around mainly for The Ocean.

02:00:28.740 --> 02:00:57.940
and just saw a little bit of lepros, but the ocean were awesome. So if you like that kind of post-medally proggy sound, then that's all I got. Awesome. Jay. Okay. People, George and I run late in the list. So it's always kind of some repeat stuff here about the half record I was listening to. I dig that. The black fucking cancer I spun a couple of times. Mentioned a couple episodes back.

02:00:58.000 --> 02:01:27.420
I still think that new Scorpion's record is a lot of fun so I've been listening to that. Been listening to a lot of various Richie Blackmore iterations, Deep Purple Rainbow, stuff like that, kind of going through Richie Blackmore phase. And I listened to a bunch of records that ended up on my opening tracks top five. All right. Say no more. Yeah, you know, that was harder than it should have been. So in any case, that about covers it.

02:01:28.000 --> 02:01:29.020
and everything else.

02:01:30.220 --> 02:01:30.340
Right.

02:01:31.380 --> 02:01:33.000
I don't have too many, but

02:01:35.200 --> 02:01:39.460
the new Archaic album, which is A-R-K-A-I-K,

02:01:40.700 --> 02:01:43.180
Labyrinth of Hungry Ghosts, their sixth album,

02:01:43.340 --> 02:01:44.840
they're a California Tech Death band.

02:01:46.660 --> 02:01:47.820
It's not too Tech Death.

02:01:47.960 --> 02:01:49.920
It's just the right amount of Tech Death.

02:01:51.600 --> 02:01:53.540
Also listen to the Falls of Roros album.

02:01:55.000 --> 02:01:56.460
You know, it's good.

02:01:56.620 --> 02:01:57.120
What are you going to do?

02:01:57.680 --> 02:02:26.700
I listened to the ghost album. Can I just say, George, have we established that I'm now the only person who has not heard it? Yes, yes. And every time we bring it up, I can just feel the hatred coming through going, fuck you guys, you've heard it, I haven't heard it. And also, I have to say that whilst you were talking about the Falls Aurora's album for about the fifth time, I went on to the web store for Isenton to pre-order the Falls Aurora's album because it reminded me I had not yet pre-ordered it yet.

02:02:26.720 --> 02:02:55.860
only to find that they're refusing to accept pre-orders at this moment because they don't yet have a 100% solid delivery date. So all I can do is enter my email address to be notified. I'm even further away. I'm even further away from hearing the Falls Aurora's album than I thought I was at the beginning. They haven't even made the vinyl available to Warner yet that's going to be down the road. They haven't even done the paperwork to get the vinyl yet. Nobody has a pen.

02:02:55.940 --> 02:03:25.660
Well, we've listened to it, so yes. Yeah. Well, I'm not a huge ghost. I was going to send it to him, but maybe we should not send it to him. I really like Falls of Roars. Please, can I hear it? I will wait patiently in the queue. It's fine. Otherwise, we could FaceTime and I'll display the background. Yeah, I could just pull it up over our head like John Cusack. Mark, this is me listening to Falls of Roars. You are now listening to Falls of Roars. With Matt. Exactly.

02:03:25.960 --> 02:03:26.280
Yeah.

02:03:27.050 --> 02:03:55.340
So I'm not a big ghost fan these days. I did really like the first album a lot. And I've been, I don't know if indifferent is probably a little too dismissive, but I do check out every album and I thought it was all right. You know, it is what it is. It's interesting when a band is popular enough to have this kind of level of popularity and also, you know, saying about Satan and stuff. So bringing Satan to the children is an interesting concept.

02:03:55.520 --> 02:04:25.140
I think their journey is more interesting than their music. Yeah. Nobody mentioned this one yet, I don't think, but I, and this one's not coming up for months yet, so hopefully you're not a fan, Mark. The new Nachachwin album, Kanawha Black, it's their fourth album, their folk black metal band, and this really rips. I really liked this a lot. Next up, the new Sabaton album,

02:04:25.520 --> 02:04:32.980
I like some power metal and they're the kind of power metal I like that's more power

02:04:33.280 --> 02:04:40.140
than like you know he's a little more they're more US power metal don't you think a little bit

02:04:40.940 --> 02:04:46.040
kind of a little yeah I mean like it's like it's like running wild I love running wild and

02:04:46.660 --> 02:04:53.300
yeah but that's pirate metal splitting hairs but whatever it's not gang singing and like all this like

02:04:54.440 --> 02:05:23.280
Swords in the Air and all that. I mean, even like Rhapsody. I like Rhapsody, but it's just like some stuff's a little too cheesy. Yeah, I guess. But anyway. Is it good? Do you like it? I thought it was all right. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I like it live. Yeah. I don't listen to every album that comes out, but everything I listen to by them, I'm like, I dig it. Next up, I didn't expect to even

02:05:23.300 --> 02:05:28.380
I don't list this one let alone listen to it but uh stabbing westwards album chasing ghosts

02:05:29.120 --> 02:05:35.380
it's their first album in 21 years and isn't that crazy I I liked their first album ungod that came out in

02:05:35.430 --> 02:05:41.300
like I don't know 1995 or something uh and you know they're they're they're like a nine inch nail

02:05:41.580 --> 02:05:48.699
spinoff kind of uh industrial rock band uh but I I was listening to this and I I really got into it so I was like

02:05:48.700 --> 02:06:18.680
I'll list it. And lastly, the new album from Vanier, Sagas. It's their sixth album, and they're like a Viking metal band. I didn't list where they were from, though, unfortunately. But, you know, Vanier. Of course, it's Viking. Nice. All right, so let's move on real quick to the results from last episode's Metal Thunderdome. Mark, you're going to have an opportunity to weigh in on this, although it's

02:06:18.720 --> 02:06:48.120
will be unlikely to change the outcome. Last time, Marcasson pitted Opeth's Damnation album against Catatonia's Discouraged Ones. We each had a vote, which was, you know, the results of which were on the last episode. However, we put it up online for the listeners to vote, and we have a winner. Before I announce that, would you like to cast a vote for one of those albums? Surely it's Opeth.

02:06:48.720 --> 02:07:13.540
And it is 72% to 28% Opeth crushed Catatonia. Oof. So, you are on the winning side. I wouldn't have said that. I wouldn't have voted that way if every Opeth album had been individually weighed against every Catatonia album. There are some Catatonia albums that are far better than some Opeth albums, but that one, it was a clear one, surely. Fair enough. All right, let's do our top five.

02:07:38.400 --> 02:07:39.500
So this time,

02:07:40.640 --> 02:07:43.800
we're going to do the top five album opening songs.

02:07:44.310 --> 02:07:45.380
So songs that,

02:07:45.910 --> 02:07:46.420
you know,

02:07:46.520 --> 02:08:16.500
kick off an album and you're just like wow you know that's a way to start the album and mark and i had a conversation about this which mark is on disagrees with but uh mark was like well what if the first track on an album is an intro and the second song is what you want to use and i'm i agree with that that's what i did on my list mark is on thinks i'm an idiot i don't think you're an idiot i think it's a cheat because you're a cheater cheater and decides to put that track on an

02:08:16.920 --> 02:08:46.500
That's what they choose as their opener. Right. But especially if it's not even a song. It doesn't matter. It's still their opening song. It's the first thing that you hear on the album. Well. So, I mean, if you want to do it, go ahead. I'm going to be pure. I'm going to do it. I'm going to do it right. I'm going to do it right. Mark wants to cheat. That's up to him. I

02:08:46.540 --> 02:09:15.940
Again, as a guest, Mark, you're going to go first. Can you give us your number five song? Number five is a track called Savior by Imperium. It's from the album The Turn of Tides. It's just beautiful. It's cyclical, recurring, beautiful vocal that gradually gets bigger and bigger and bigger with loads of harmonies. It's glorious. It's just beautifully produced.

02:09:17.300 --> 02:09:46.420
Layering, there's a beautiful piano in it. I realize that you don't want me to keep using the word beautiful, but it's just gorgeous. Yeah, it's gorgeous. Saviour by Imperium is just a stunning opening track. Right on. Now, is this the cheat one or not the cheat one? That is not the cheat one. Good job, good job. All right. Well, Markisan, what is your totally not cheating number five? Yeah, my number five is Death Flattening of Emotions.

02:09:46.540 --> 02:10:15.620
The Album. So this is my favorite death album and this happens to be my favorite track from the record. I think the whole song is a fantastic. I absolutely love the guitar solo and the aggressiveness on this track, but it's those, uh, that fade in tribal drumming at the beginning that it instantly gets me going every time I start that album. Oh, I Markisan that was on my long list. Yes. Yes. Cause that's,

02:10:17.180 --> 02:10:46.420
Oh yeah, that's also my favorite death album. Uh, and I was just like, Oh man, how do I, how do I not put this on here? So. Yeah, I know it was tough, John. I caught a lot of stuff that I also wanted to get in the top five, but you know, you could change any day. I feel like. Oh, of course. All right, Matt. Um, I will preface the start of my top five with the fact that this was a really killer top five. Like this was a good idea. This is fucking hard. And I actually played,

02:10:46.540 --> 02:11:16.000
It's super safe. My number five is the song Moonchild. Some of you may have heard of this band. They're called Iron Maiden and the album is Seventh Son of the Seventh Son. Good choice. Cool album. She actually sent me that record, the vinyl. So I spent a ton last year. Gian. Right. My list ended up being kind of boring, meaning there's some usual suspects on here. My probably honorable mentions is more interesting.

02:11:16.540 --> 02:11:45.400
But I did try to find songs that I thought represented something that I thought was cool about them being opening tracks. And my first one here is from the rush of thrash metal. Maybe only George knows who this boy might be referring to because I think I said it once before. But my number five is the song Die by My Hand off the album No More Color by Coroner. I just love how that opens. It just comes in so ferocious.

02:11:45.740 --> 02:12:15.540
And it's literally three dudes. I have something about power bands that are only three musicians that sound like they're bigger than eight musicians on stage. And they're one of those bands that does that for me. And that just kicks off a killer album from start to finish. We're just looking forward to seeing them. MDF, right? They're at MDF. They're actually coming here in Chicago, too, and I'm debating whether I should go to that show. And I feel like they're kind of a forgotten band from that period because they were more technical.

02:12:15.760 --> 02:12:45.720
They were proggier at some point than some of those other thrash bands, but extremely talented band, I think. Yeah. All right, Jay. I approached mine in a lot of different ways. Some of them are just kind of kick-ass opening tracks that mean a lot to me, and some of them have a little more meaning, like this particular one, which is if you were sitting around in 1979, early 1980, thinking, man, it's a shame what's happened to Black Sabbath, but then you got your

02:12:45.760 --> 02:13:14.200
copy down at the store and walked home and put on heaven and hell and neon nights came out of the fucking speakers you were like you know what everything's gonna be okay for at least the next couple of years neon nights is a fucking badass opening track and you guys have all heard it a thousand times need no no more description i mean i considered it right there fuck yeah i got the original original print i got the new edition that just came out oh last year i actually have that one too

02:13:16.200 --> 02:13:44.040
This is what original print gets you for your inside. A little shitty cover. You know what I love? Can you hold up the back of it, John? Because that looks like... Rainbow. Rainbow, yeah. That calls the mind Rainbow. And look at Bill Ward in that. He looks like a professor or something in that. Is he also Dr. Metal? There can be only one Dr. Metal. Yes, that's right. Come on. Hey, Jay, how much?

02:13:44.240 --> 02:14:14.120
How Longer is Geezer looking this picture compared to the picture you sent us today? Geezer's aged, man. Geezer is officially a geezer. All right, George. All right, so all of mine, except for my number five, I played them all pretty safe with classic stuff. But I chose them based on how amped up they got me when I would put on this album and kicked off with this song. So that said, my number five is Cannibal Corpse, The Time to Kill,

02:14:14.220 --> 02:14:41.500
is now from kill because that song just it's like you hit play and your head just gets ripped right off of your body so and if if will was here he would appreciate that because he's a huge cannibal corpse fan i mean that's kind of um brave because i i would think that most people would go with hammer smash face so you're going with something a little different i prefer corpse grinder so or did you hear the stunned silence when that declaration happened there

02:14:43.980 --> 02:15:11.420
Did you hear that? There was just like tumbleweed blowing across the podcast. I pray for Cole Scryner. Silence. Trust me. I don't think you're wrong. We've all heard tumbleweeds on this podcast more than once each. Trust me. Yeah. Time to Killers Now is a great chart though. Yeah. Thank you. All right. Well, what's your number four, Mark? Sometimes in the Winterfellith group chart,

02:15:11.520 --> 02:15:41.480
We debate just what is the best album by a particular band and some bands it is impossible to reach a satisfactory conclusion. We've tried with Dark Throne but it's just not possible because they've just knocked out so many great records. There are different vibes for different moods. If you want the great classic Norwegian 90 sound

02:15:41.500 --> 02:16:11.420
Then you've got the early great trilogy. If you want their death metal record, you've got Soulside Journey. If you want what they've become in more recent years, that are more like Celtic Frost kind of influence, you've got all their great later Dark Throne records. They, for me, are clearly just one of the greats, and it's impossible to pick a favourite. But sometimes when put over a barrel, I go for Panzerfaust, because I think it's just after that classic early trilogy period, but it just,

02:16:11.500 --> 02:16:14.000
has such a great set of songs.

02:16:14.450 --> 02:16:17.720
And the opening song is called Enfind Av Song.

02:16:18.010 --> 02:16:22.740
It is instant, grim Norwegian black metal sound.

02:16:22.740 --> 02:16:27.580
It sounds like it was produced in the back of a cardboard box in a cupboard.

02:16:28.700 --> 02:16:30.560
But it's just fucking great.

02:16:31.060 --> 02:16:38.900
And so I accidentally, I'd got some MP3s, which I used for digital listening,

02:16:38.980 --> 02:17:08.860
And I didn't realise that I had... One of these bands who've made different pressings of their albums where they do like a commentary, where Fenris is doing a commentary about his thoughts and memories of recording the album over the top of the record playing. You can't even listen to the record playing, because every now and then Fenris' voice just comes raking over the top. And track two on the album is called Triumphant Gleam. And the riff starts, and you just hear this Norwegian voice,

02:17:12.638 --> 02:17:38.960
I almost now can't hear triumphant gleam without expecting this voice to come right at the top but yeah the opening track and Vind of Sorg from the Panzerfaust by Dark Throne which today is my favorite Dark Throne album but tomorrow it could be another one yeah they've got a really great catalog and don't dismiss their new records like their new record like the latest record that came out by Eternal Hails it's just great they just have so many great records and I

02:17:38.980 --> 02:18:07.900
I think they are embraced by all or most of us. Yeah, I, I, everyone that comes out, I buy it and I'm, and I'm never like this sucks. I mean, they always do something cool, you know? I mean, yeah. I like a Nocturno's other band, uh, Sark. Yeah. A bet, bet. I like them more than I expected to. I, to be honest, I was listening to some of them this, just this week, actually the earliest arc records more than the more recent ones, but yeah, they're interesting. I would call them an interesting band rather than a great button, but yeah, that's fun. They're enjoy, they're enjoyable. Yeah.

02:18:09.000 --> 02:18:10.519
All right, Mark's on.

02:18:13.080 --> 02:18:18.880
Yeah, my number four is another hard-to-pronounce fucking name.

02:18:20.540 --> 02:18:27.099
Goisha by Trypticon from the album Peristera Diamonis.

02:18:27.540 --> 02:18:30.760
And this is a song that kicked off the band's debut,

02:18:31.490 --> 02:18:33.400
and it just felt like a statement to me.

02:18:33.540 --> 02:18:41.880
It instantly proved that this old metal vet still had a lot more life left in him. So I love all Tom G.

02:18:42.099 --> 02:19:03.219
Warrior's projects, but I think he tinkered with his sound a lot through the years until he perfected it with Trypticon. That's my favorite incarnation of his musicianship. So for me, this band is the apex of the warrior craft and Goetia is the demonic fueled introduction to that.

02:19:05.319 --> 02:19:32.960
I was really hoping we were getting a new Trypticon album this year, but I haven't heard anything. It's over. Fucking do is all fuck. Every once in a while, he'll post something and sort of say, imply something's happening. But he's also, as you know, playing a few festivals and things. So yeah. Not that that should stop him. Right. Kitty. There he goes. Tom takes his fucking time. That's for sure, dude. Yeah. All right, Matt. So consciously,

02:19:33.240 --> 02:20:02.040
This is not my favorite death album, but subconsciously it might be for the amount that I talk about it. I'm going with the song Living Monstrosity off of Spiritual Healing. It's angry, it's raw, and I like it. The double death daily. Nice. Gian. Right. My number four. This song is only three minutes and 43 seconds long.

02:20:03.240 --> 02:20:32.480
It's absolutely a ripper. It's got an unbelievable intro riff and it's got like this huge ending. And again, it's under four minutes long. And it sets the tone for an album that while I may not be a fan of the band that much anymore, I still think this album is one of the best from the 2000, you know, from 2000 to 2009. And that is Blood and Thunder off of Macedon's Leviathan. It's just an absolute ripping song. And it just for that less than four minutes,

02:20:33.240 --> 02:21:03.200
just sets the tone for the whole album and it does have this massive ending and you're like when do they have time to do all this this song it's not that long so and it's got a killer clown in the video which is cool nice you know it's funny john because i i often think about that record in general that's that record is 45 minutes long that's it and one song is 12 minutes long and that's the same because it feels like so much happens in general in that record yeah it's so funny how much we talk about old mastodon you know

02:21:03.220 --> 02:21:31.300
We really love Mastodon. We just don't like New Mastodon. It's because you don't want to talk about New Mastodon. The old Mastodon comes up a lot. We are so hurt. And Gojira. The old Gojira, old Mastodon. I like the new Mastodon. They're very hurt. March of the Fire Ants. Those first three albums are just killer. March of the Fire Ants. March of the Fire Ants. Off remission. The drumming in the last minute of that is just outrageous.

02:21:33.220 --> 02:21:34.860
created these massive sounds.

02:21:35.440 --> 02:21:39.100
When you watch them on stage, it's not like they're doing a whole ton, but it just sounds huge.

02:21:39.540 --> 02:21:39.680
Yeah.

02:21:39.980 --> 02:21:43.500
Can I tell you my very brief Mastodon story?

02:21:43.720 --> 02:21:44.160
Absolutely.

02:21:44.480 --> 02:21:48.480
I saw them on the tour for, I think it was probably around the tour of Leviathan.

02:21:49.060 --> 02:21:51.140
So they were still playing quite a lot of stuff on remission.

02:21:53.100 --> 02:21:57.040
And I don't know if this joke's going to fall flat on its arse because you're not going to know the accent.

02:21:57.300 --> 02:22:00.400
But essentially, so where I'm from is a place called Newcastle upon Tyne.

02:22:01.159 --> 02:22:03.120
And people from Newcastle are called Geordie's.

02:22:03.220 --> 02:22:31.120
And whilst I kind of rein my accent in when I'm talking to people who aren't from Newcastle, we're known for having a very strong accent, people from Newcastle. Like Brian Johnson. He's like, yeah, man, I read how you're doing. Anyway, so when Masterdom were playing Newcastle, in between songs, when there was silence, someone from the back shouted, yeah, man, I like your beard. And that was it.

02:22:34.999 --> 02:23:00.740
I like your beard. Everyone, everyone laughed except mustard. No idea what was going on. My beer? What? That's awesome. That's pretty good. Was it you that shouted that? It was not, but I wish I had. We should have a top five heckle. Yeah, that'd be awesome.

02:23:03.220 --> 02:23:33.000
I've seen some great heckles. So I've got one that I'm going to share since we're doing this. And that was the first time I, the first time Opeth played a headline thing in the States, a headline tour in the States. They played here in San Francisco and I went some and, and the buzz was huge. I mean, people already kind of did love them, but they, they were still a lot of people didn't really know what Opeth was. And, um, they did, um, and it was a song of, um, deliverance. And it's the one where it kind of gets really quiet. Yeah. Okay.

02:23:33.220 --> 02:24:03.140
It doesn't help. But anyway, and then he says something, something, and then the music stops and he says the word here. You know what I'm talking about, John? No, not here. And I can't remember what it was. Well, anyway, they played this beautiful rendition of the song. They get up to that perfect point. Fair judgment. Fair judgment. It fades out and the room is dead silence and some guy in the back of the audience yells, here, and the fucking band laughed and the crowd laughed and then they just launched into the rest of the song.

02:24:03.200 --> 02:24:33.180
It was fucking magic, dude. It was just like... Hey, Jay, that's their Black Sabbath moment at the end of that song. It's very... It's a doomy sound. It was so good. That's really funny. Well, what other stories do you have, Mark? Of Heckles. That's a broad question. The other one that stands out was I saw a gig. I can't remember who the main band was. It might have been Unleashed, maybe, but whoever...

02:24:33.220 --> 02:25:03.180
The support band were Cataclysm, that Canadian band, who I'm not a fan of, I'll be entirely honest. I like the early stuff, but then they just kind of... The singer really fancies himself as being a real sort of hard man of metal. And he was doing the whole posturing. Yeah, it's really fucking great to be here, man. It's really... We've never fucking played your town. And when he said that, someone said, yes, you did. You played Damnation, which is the

02:25:03.220 --> 02:25:33.180
name of the festival in the same town yeah you played damnation and he was stunned because he was trying to say that was the first time they'd been in the town so he then found himself having to have this conversation with a heckler it's like man that was here no it was another venue down the road everything you say is wrong it's just not coming back from that his hard man posturing just went down yeah i know

02:25:33.200 --> 02:26:03.180
I know who they were supporting. They were supporting Christian, the Brazilian bug. Oh, yeah. I like them. Yeah. I would like if they've gotten deeper into like, you know, directions to like, it's by the kebab place. Get a good curry there. I've derailed your top five. I do apologize. Perfect. It's all right. We expect this. We take tangents all the time. That's why we're like five hours long, usually. That's why you're here. But I'm glad that you did derail it because I had

02:26:03.200 --> 02:26:33.180
I wanted to ask you, and my next selection is key to this, or is related to this, and I wanted to ask you, what the fuck's in the water in Newcastle, dude? Like, so many good metal bands have come out in Newcastle. It's ridiculous. Yeah, it's a very working-class area historically, and I think that's probably played a part of it, and yeah, obviously, I guess Venom are probably the big export in terms of extreme stuff, and... So let's get to my number four, then, since

02:26:33.200 --> 02:27:02.540
you mentioned the band Venom from Newcastle on time. I really believe this is a killer album opener, but I also think it's a genre opener. And that would be Sons of Satan from Welcome to Hell. You know, I just, it was sort of like before that, there was kind of like, there were some other things happening, but there was like Motorhead and everybody was like, Motorhead was the dirtiest thing out there kind of, yeah, there were probably some other things that were creeping up. And then you put the fucking vinyl, the needle down on Welcome to Hell.

02:27:02.600 --> 02:27:31.000
and out come Sons of Satan, which is like such a great opener, which they're playing twice as fast at the end of the song as they are at the beginning of the song. Pick up your needle and set it down and you'll see I'm telling the truth. But definitely my very favorite opener, a band whose career I love up through, well, the live album until they basically split apart. But an opening to a career, an opening to a genre, and a kick-ass opening to a record. Right on.

02:27:32.620 --> 02:28:01.880
My number four off the album Hail to England, Manowar's Blood of My Enemies. You know, that, I don't listen to a lot of Manowar anymore. Why? Because of their last guitar player. Oh, okay. But I, for the most of my existence, I have been a huge Manowar fan. Yeah. And we even had,

02:28:03.899 --> 02:28:06.360
Ross the boss on for an interview once.

02:28:07.000 --> 02:28:07.400
Great.

02:28:08.020 --> 02:28:11.100
And, you know, anything from his period.

02:28:11.880 --> 02:28:15.180
I do like some of the later stuff too.

02:28:16.859 --> 02:28:21.640
But just that whole ordeal just kind of made me not want to listen to him right now.

02:28:22.640 --> 02:28:28.020
But those first, I don't know, five, six albums are just amazing to me.

02:28:28.040 --> 02:28:32.440
I mean, they were like metal to me in the 80s and 90s.

02:28:33.020 --> 02:29:02.220
And Blood of My Enemies, that is just a fist-pounding, head-banging, you know, fun time. So, yeah, can't argue with that. Can't argue with that. I also love the title track of that record. Oh, there's actually aren't any bad songs on that record. No, no, that's one of my favorite albums by them. That and Son of the Hammer, actually. And I, initially, I, like, my knee-jerk reaction when I came up, I think actually Markazan came up with it, but when I decided on it for this episode,

02:29:02.480 --> 02:29:31.140
I was like I'm going with Fightin' the World. I mean, because that's just a banger, you know. But I was like, this is just, yeah. So, I mean, yeah. Anyway, number three, Mark. I've gone with the opening track of the album that had anyone ask me what my favorite album was of all time for about 20 years. I would have said this one.

02:29:31.760 --> 02:30:01.740
It's Alice in Chains from Dirt. Nice! The track is Them Bones. Oh, I was going to put that on my list. Fuck yes! We love Alice in Chains. One of the first bands I got into as a teenager, really absolutely obsessed by them for most of my life. I think that, you know, I didn't see them with Lane Staley. It's probably one of my biggest regrets. I did. Same. I think when people

02:30:03.119 --> 02:30:30.520
I think there are a few more unique than Lane Staley. Just instantly identifiable as soon as he opens his mouth or as soon as he opened his mouth. Just a tragic, tragic story. And what would they have been had he always been there? And when they returned with the new singer, I didn't want to like them, but I gave them a chance. I went to see them on the first tour with the new singer.

02:30:30.580 --> 02:31:00.240
and it was impossible to deny what a great job he was doing. It was great life. Like impossible to be any better. Do you know what I mean? In the circumstances of trying to replace such a unique voice, he couldn't be any better. I don't think it's all that great musically. It's all right. Like it's, it's, it's decent. It's enjoyable, but those first House and Chains records, there is no, they never committed a weak note to tape with Lynn Staley for me. And yeah,

02:31:00.600 --> 02:31:29.960
It could have been any of them. It could have been Grind from the self-titled. It could have been The Owner from Facelift. And so metal, too. They get lumped into that grunge category. But they're not. They're an alt-metal band. I agree, Mark. Them Bones is just a smash-up. Mark, you have a great choice. Go ahead, Mark. I would even say, John, they're not even an alt-metal band. They're just a 90s metal band. Yeah. Well, I call it the alt because the sound at that time. Matt, I don't want to cut you off.

02:31:30.600 --> 02:32:00.340
If anyone agrees, not only is that a great opener, maybe possibly the best second song on an album ever with Damn That River. It's just boom, boom, right in the face. I mean, all the tracks. And a best third song, and a best fourth song. Best song about Vietnam and Rooster, which actually is probably true. And can I say, it's a great pull for another reason, and that is it's the 30th anniversary of that album. Yeah, it is, man. I wish they would put out another vinyl. Maybe they still will. I want an anniversary vinyl.

02:32:00.420 --> 02:32:02.000
on 180 gram.

02:32:03.100 --> 02:32:08.300
My go-to Alice in Chains story is that I saw them on the dirt tour on Lollapalooza.

02:32:09.620 --> 02:32:11.020
And it was an outdoor show.

02:32:12.561 --> 02:32:19.620
And the show, their set was interrupted by a thunderstorm that came through.

02:32:20.260 --> 02:32:23.660
So they had to stop and wait like 20 minutes and come back.

02:32:23.940 --> 02:32:26.420
And they came back and played Rain When I Die.

02:32:28.240 --> 02:32:29.260
Fuck, yeah.

02:32:33.500 --> 02:32:58.700
The first time I saw them, they opened with that song. And I was just like, that's balls. That's one of my favorite Alice in Chains songs. That is a great one. The live DVD or video or VHS that it was of, is it live at the Fillmore? Which was really early in their career where they're just playing the songs pretty much on the first album. And it's like a black and white short video. Oh yeah, yeah. I've seen that.

02:32:59.400 --> 02:33:28.460
The performance of Love, Hate, Love on that is when he hits the high note to the end, he was such a talent. And also I'll tell you this, when I used to be a music lecturer, one of my responsibilities was like the tutor of the kids was to sort of try and keep them on the straight and narrow. And I used to show them the video of Alice in Chains playing MTV Unplugged to say, if you ever need a demonstration for why you shouldn't take drugs, here is it.

02:33:29.380 --> 02:33:57.360
True. True. Because he couldn't remember his own lyrics. No. He looked rough. He took his shades off a couple of songs. His eyes were bloodshot. Yeah. And yet he was barely opening his mouth and that sound was still coming out. And he looked like, yeah, just emaciated. Awful. Awful. He was like 90 pounds when he died. Yeah. Yeah. You know what? Go ahead, John. No, go ahead, John. No, I was going to say, Mark, you know what that video for MTV showed you?

02:33:59.400 --> 02:34:29.360
Jerry Cantrell really is. He also sang, but he's the main driving force of that band. It just proved how good he was during all that that they were dealing with. Just all great players. Great musicians. That's my number three. Mark, how do you, I just want to ask, how did you feel about Mad Season? Really great. It's really great. In a different way, you can just sort of lose yourself in the

02:34:29.540 --> 02:34:31.080
the space of it.

02:34:32.540 --> 02:34:32.920
Yeah, I mean,

02:34:33.880 --> 02:34:35.520
Lin Staley could do no wrong for me, for sure.

02:34:36.159 --> 02:34:37.320
I, you know, I'm not,

02:34:37.420 --> 02:34:38.740
I'm not a diehard live album guy,

02:34:38.810 --> 02:34:39.260
but I didn't,

02:34:39.560 --> 02:34:42.620
and I didn't realize until recently there was a live Mad Season album.

02:34:42.920 --> 02:34:43.260
On vinyl.

02:34:43.660 --> 02:34:46.200
And like, just to listen to him talking between songs,

02:34:46.330 --> 02:34:46.820
I was like,

02:34:47.060 --> 02:34:49.080
oh God, don't ever destroy this recording.

02:34:49.390 --> 02:34:49.820
Like, let's.

02:34:49.920 --> 02:34:51.440
Oh, I've never, I've never heard that.

02:34:51.720 --> 02:34:52.500
Yeah, I've got it on vinyl.

02:34:52.720 --> 02:34:53.120
It's out there.

02:34:53.440 --> 02:34:53.560
Yeah.

02:34:53.920 --> 02:34:54.720
Definitely check it out.

02:34:54.990 --> 02:34:56.200
His, just, I mean,

02:34:56.659 --> 02:35:25.380
And the reality is like, it's nothing like mind blowing when it's like, oh God, Layne Staley's talking in between songs. Like this is fucking amazing. And he's in a better space in that than he is on the, on the plot. Oh, totally. Totally. And what's weird to me is in the same way people talk about where they were when they found out when like John Lennon died or something. I remember where I was when I found out Layne Staley died. Me too. Cause he was my, he was like my favorite musician. Yeah. Wow. Yeah. I still, I still, I still remember where I was in the outside lane of a motorway doing 70 miles an hour when my friend called me.

02:35:26.780 --> 02:35:56.020
Yeah, really, like tearing up. I was in my bedroom and a friend told me. That's called Live at the Moor, by the way, the Mad Season album. Yeah. You know, Matt, super nice pull on Mad Season because hardly anyone ever talks about that. I absolutely love that album. I do too. I have all that stuff. Yeah. That's my favorite from the 90s. It's, I would say it's even less.

02:35:56.260 --> 02:36:25.800
than what people would describe Alice in Chains, but it's super powerful. It's super like, it just sucks you. Like if you let it, it will suck you in. And I mean, just, yeah, it's awesome. Nice. Wow. All right. All right. Wow. Marcus, number three. Shake it off. Shake it off. That's the point of this. Yeah, yeah, no, it's awesome. And I wouldn't have, I guess I just didn't expect that. We talked about when you look at somebody or you kind of know somebody,

02:36:25.860 --> 02:36:55.700
you expect a certain thing. I wouldn't expect Mark to pull Alice and Jane's out. I obviously don't know. Oh, really? Loved it. Yeah, they were my favorite band for 20 years. Yeah, I wouldn't have expected that. It's fantastic. Okay, so yeah, I'm going with another kind of like an alt-metal band from around that time too. And it's The Grudge from Tool. Oh, yeah. That is an album opener. Yeah, right? I mean, that was my, we've done our top 50 metal albums.

02:36:55.880 --> 02:37:25.840
the last 50 years, when it was at 50. And this was my number one. That was rough. I need to lie down for that one. This is one of the best progressive metal songs I've ever heard. And this is on an album where there's a lot of great songs on it. And this album ruled the early 2000s for me. It's heavy. It's a dynamic eight and a half minute track that perfectly Voltrons together the best elements of Tool at the height

02:37:25.860 --> 02:37:55.760
of their alt-metal powers. Rid of verb Voltron. Yeah, right? Chunky riff towers that just get lodged in your head. Ritualistic drumming. I love the gorgeous ebbs and rhythmic flows of this song. And Maynard showcases just an intense range of possessed vocals. You've got croons, barks, rasps, darkened screams.

02:37:55.860 --> 02:38:25.000
And that long note. And that long note at the end of the grudge. Right. That long note where he's just screaming. Oh my God. It feels like he's going on for a minute. It's breathtaking. And it's an amazing opening track. I think it's their best opening track of any other albums. And this is definitely their best album in my opinion. Which is saying a lot because Stinkfest opens a record. But that is, I agree with you though. And I saw them on that tour maybe three times.

02:38:25.100 --> 02:38:53.780
And the first time I saw him was in Kansas City. And this was, you have to remember, Tool was kind of not, they were down and out for a little while because they had some legal trouble and blah, blah, blah. And I saw him very early in that tour and I was on an arena in Kansas City. And I was on the floor sort of foolishly and the lights went down and the grudge started. And I was pushed in a wave of people into a crush that it took me the rest of that song to get the fuck out of. But it was great, dude. It was fucking awesome. Because Tool was back, you know what I mean?

02:38:55.560 --> 02:39:23.280
The only time I saw them was on Undertow, same day as the Alice in Chains show. Oh, wow. And that is a Mike Troff. Matt, you're following that. And good night. Follow that, Matt. So Pearl Jam was on that too, right? No, that was the Soundgarden one. That was Soundgarden, Pearl Jam.

02:39:23.840 --> 02:39:24.840
Chili Peppers or something.

02:39:25.240 --> 02:39:25.320
Hello.

02:39:25.690 --> 02:39:26.180
But Rage.

02:39:26.400 --> 02:39:27.680
Rage Against the Machine was on that one?

02:39:28.620 --> 02:39:28.760
No.

02:39:29.080 --> 02:39:29.880
You talking about mine?

02:39:30.560 --> 02:39:30.640
Yeah.

02:39:30.720 --> 02:39:31.480
The Lollapalooza?

02:39:31.720 --> 02:39:31.820
Yeah.

02:39:31.960 --> 02:39:33.000
I think Rage.

02:39:33.160 --> 02:39:33.240
Yeah.

02:39:33.320 --> 02:39:33.760
Fishbone.

02:39:34.899 --> 02:39:35.620
Front 242.

02:39:35.760 --> 02:39:36.500
Front 242.

02:39:36.610 --> 02:39:36.700
Yeah.

02:39:36.920 --> 02:39:37.580
Dinosaur Jr.

02:39:37.840 --> 02:39:42.800
And going back to Mad Season, Mike McCready's guitar playing on Mad Season is my favorite.

02:39:42.900 --> 02:39:43.140
Yes.

02:39:43.280 --> 02:39:43.600
He's done.

02:39:43.780 --> 02:39:44.880
And I like Pearl Jam.

02:39:45.110 --> 02:39:45.200
So.

02:39:46.760 --> 02:39:47.120
Anyways.

02:39:48.780 --> 02:39:50.260
I have two tattoos in there.

02:39:50.460 --> 02:39:51.820
Both artwork drawn by Lynn Staley.

02:39:52.140 --> 02:39:52.820
I love how we're just.

02:39:54.020 --> 02:40:23.120
Let's just turn this into the Alice in Chains podcast. And welcome to the Alice in Chains podcast. All right. My number three. Metallica. Fight Fire with Fire. It's a gimme, but son of a bitch. I love this. I can't believe you'd go with Metallica. Yeah, I know. And so that album to me, I learned in like retrospect. I didn't, I wasn't aware of it in real time. And so Justice was my

02:40:24.260 --> 02:40:52.880
I had to go and learn in retrospect. And I mean, Master of Puppets is always a gimme, but there was just something about Ride the Lightning that always struck a chord with me. And I mean, Fight Fire with Fire really melted my face. This is plastic surgery to get it back to this, but it literally was... As long as it's not give me fire, give me that. So just a historical callback then, because of one of George's previous ones.

02:40:52.920 --> 02:41:21.880
I was on vacation. I was with my parents who were going to some weird trade show or something in Atlanta when that record came out. And I bought that and into Gloria Wright on the same day, George. Nice. In a record store in Atlanta. Yeah. And listen to them all the way home. All right, John. Right. So first I want to answer Mark's question. I have an awesome in-between song banter. It was also an opus show. It was in Washington, D.C. And I was with my good friend, Lisa. We are at the show.

02:41:22.540 --> 02:41:52.120
And I can't remember what tour it was on because I've seen Opeth more than a few times. A lot. Understatement. Yeah, very much an understatement. And it was at the 930 Club. So George knows this place. Great venue that no longer plays any cool shows there anymore. It's all kind of hipster, douchey music. But it got real quiet in this venue. It holds about 1,000 to 1,300 depending on how they configure it. And in between songs, it got just dead silent.

02:41:52.540 --> 02:42:22.380
And some dude yells out, literally audible to everyone in the venue. Yeah, Satan! Like that really loud. I nearly pissed myself. I ended up getting that bootleg and I played that over so many times just to hear that guy yelling. To this day, my friend Lisa will say, hey, remember that dude at the open show that yelled, yeah, Satan between songs? Just perfect. I mean, dead silent in the venue, which doesn't happen often. Right. All right. So my next three picks, they're boring because the bands we know really well.

02:42:22.520 --> 02:42:52.440
But it's hard not to go with these. And my next two of the three picks are because of the live versions that I picked these songs, even though they open the albums that they're on. And it's no secret. I go on and on about this guitarist all the fucking time. I'm a huge Randy Rhoads fan. And I just had a hard time not including I don't know off of Blizzard of Oz. And it's because of the live version more than anything else. If you listen to the tribute album, it's Oh Fortuna, Open,

02:42:52.540 --> 02:43:22.500
it up and as to play music in the background and it's just classical buildup and Ozzy oh we love you fuck yeah he come out and all that stuff and he just yells yeah rock and roll and then Randy Rhodes just rolls right in the beginning of I don't know and it's just there's something about that song that I've always loved it's just powerful even though it sounds like shit on the original album because it's a horrible recording but um so I got into Carl Orff man Carmina Biorana the Ozzy with the uh

02:43:24.020 --> 02:43:26.400
So was it the live one that really

02:43:27.160 --> 02:43:28.480
got you with that song, John?

02:43:28.960 --> 02:43:30.800
Did you like it on the original album?

02:43:31.520 --> 02:43:32.860
Of course I loved the original album.

02:43:33.480 --> 02:43:34.540
The production's not great.

02:43:34.740 --> 02:43:38.240
No, it's the live version put it in that godly status for me.

02:43:38.240 --> 02:43:38.620
Right, okay.

02:43:39.280 --> 02:43:41.940
Yeah, it's just that live version sounds terrible.

02:43:42.180 --> 02:43:43.740
I mean, they all sound like shit on that.

02:43:44.120 --> 02:43:45.340
It's a horrible recording.

02:43:45.880 --> 02:43:48.040
It was never a properly done album

02:43:49.039 --> 02:43:51.560
because Sharon Osbourne's involved at some point.

02:43:54.680 --> 02:44:21.120
But it's the idea that he created this little tiny 5'7 guy who apparently only weighed like 100 pounds. His guitar probably weighed more than him. Just created such an amazing sound. And it just always stood out for me. When I first heard that as a kid, I was just like, what the fuck? I was only 12 when that came out. Only 12 back then, I imagine. I love the idea that the live version of it is what really put it over the top for you. That's pretty cool, John.

02:44:21.620 --> 02:44:50.460
Yeah. Because most live versions of songs are. Or they're amazing. There's no in-betweens. My number one is a live version. Yeah, hold my beer, Marcus. Oh, yeah. Oh, I got another one coming up. Don't worry. Well, that's a good book end to the heaven and hell, too, because people were sitting there also wondering what was going on with that other fucking guy. And then when you put the needle on the wax, the first thing you heard was, I don'T know. And you're like, Oh, okay. So, everything turned on. Jay, that's what's crazy is that two new bands,

02:44:51.000 --> 02:44:53.840
all connected to awesome albums,

02:44:54.320 --> 02:44:55.420
to incredible openers,

02:44:55.740 --> 02:44:55.900
you know,

02:44:56.080 --> 02:44:56.140
so.

02:44:57.100 --> 02:44:59.320
And they both went on to make an awesome second record too.

02:44:59.520 --> 02:44:59.980
yes,

02:45:00.220 --> 02:45:00.540
I agree.

02:45:00.840 --> 02:45:00.960
Yeah.

02:45:03.000 --> 02:45:03.180
I,

02:45:03.540 --> 02:45:04.680
this one's for you and me,

02:45:04.800 --> 02:45:04.960
John.

02:45:05.200 --> 02:45:05.700
And it was,

02:45:05.880 --> 02:45:09.140
the reason this one's on my list is because when I heard it,

02:45:09.160 --> 02:45:09.460
I was,

02:45:09.640 --> 02:45:10.080
this was like,

02:45:10.080 --> 02:45:13.300
I was in a deep open phase and I was really trying to find other

02:45:13.520 --> 02:45:16.000
bands that could kind of join in with that.

02:45:16.140 --> 02:45:16.280
And,

02:45:17.100 --> 02:45:17.460
and,

02:45:18.260 --> 02:45:20.160
and the aggressive black thing,

02:45:21.140 --> 02:45:50.200
whatever you want to say about Opeth or what you should really call them. But anyway, and then I found a band who was doing progressive black right and it opened up with a song called and fire swept clean the air. Such a fucking good opening track, dude. Enslaved, you know, just really, I must have fucking listened to those first three songs on the record 10 times. I mean, you know, in a row when I first got it, the whole record's great, but just such an opening. That riff is so good and so,

02:45:51.939 --> 02:46:19.460
So it falls off a cliff. Exciting stuff. And fire swept clean the earth. I had a couple. I don't have enslaved in my top five, but I, it was tough because I, there's a, there's a few songs that I think could, uh, they call off high. So. Um, you know, if I was going to choose another enslaved, I might've chosen the one that opens not E, but the album before that. Axiomo. Axiomo.

02:46:20.300 --> 02:46:49.820
No, In Times. Whatever that song was. Anyway, Enslaved, you can't go wrong. So many good modern records, but that was the beginning of the real upswing on the Enslaved catalog. Georgie. So my number three is the opening song on an album that launched like a million bands. This was one of those albums that I remember vividly first hearing.

02:46:50.280 --> 02:47:19.540
in the car with my mom driving from the mall with my Walkman on, put it on, clicked play and changed my life. And I was kidding when I was making fun of Matt because this is Metallica and Battery from Master of Puppets. That song just changed my world in 1986, you know. But yet it's only number three. Right. I think Metallica was on your list.

02:47:19.620 --> 02:47:48.620
What was that, Mark? Can I share a quick battery story? Of course. Of course. I was not old enough. Well, I wasn't, you know, pretty young when that came out. So it was before my sort of metal time. So my first Metallica album that came out when I was conscious of rock music was the Black Album. So then I had to do the sort of the homework as you do. And so the second Metallica album I heard was Master of Puppets. And my mate had like this copy of a copy of a copy cassette.

02:47:48.700 --> 02:48:16.800
And all I'd heard was the Black Album. So you can imagine my reaction when he said, oh, they've also made this. And press play on a cassette of Master of Fuffets, which, of course, the first thing I heard was Battery. And I remember clear as day sitting in his lounge in his house before his parents got in from work on this grubby little cassette recorder, Battery came out of the speakers.

02:48:17.220 --> 02:48:45.220
And I remember the first words out of my mouth being, is that playing at the right speed? Well, wait until you get to Damage Incorporated. Oh, shit. Oh, yeah, exactly. Because I had no reference point, right? I'd just go into rock music, and I was used to like, sad but true, or whatever. And then battery started, like, what? The fuck is this? Yeah, exactly. Speaking of the cassette dub of a dub of a dub thing, my first Metallica was Ride the Lightning.

02:48:46.220 --> 02:49:16.040
It was one of those 120-minute tapes that had Ride the Lightning on one side and Merciful Fates Don't Break the Oath on the other side. I love Ride the Lightning. It's definitely my second favorite Metallica album. But Master of Puppets just changed everything. For a lot of people. I was the same way, George. I remember. I'd heard things that heavy by then, for sure. Maybe not that heavy.

02:49:16.100 --> 02:49:45.880
They were the first ones to use those Mesa boogie amps too, that Mark 4 amps. There was a new level of crunch to those. But I do remember just thinking, fuck, this is all I'm doing for the next six months. Literally, Master of Puppets was the only thing I listened to that entire summer. I was just that over and over and over and over. Flipping the tape. Flipping the tape. Yep. Yeah. Those were good times. I knew that would be on your list, George. It was on my honorable mention, by the way. I've got a couple. All right, Mark, number two.

02:49:47.279 --> 02:50:16.060
So Marcus Allen's going to be upset now. Here's my cheat track. Yeah. Because it technically comes after an intro track, which is only short and isn't, there are no vocals and it's just a, well, it's an intro. The first song, the first song proper by a band called Necrophobic, Swedish band. The album is called the third, the third Antichrist. And the first track is called the third of arrival.

02:50:17.261 --> 02:50:40.440
And I've always loved this track. It's my favourite necrophobic tune. But as well as thinking it's an absolutely ripping heads down black metal tune with a great production, it just rages. It also gets an honourable mention for the first lyric of the album, which is 666, we vomit on the crucifix.

02:50:43.920 --> 02:51:12.080
Which, as a method of setting your stall out, is fairly of there. Six, six, six, we vomited the crucifix. Yes, brilliant. See, you can do harsh vocals. No, come. I was going to read the first line from Welcome to Hell, too, because it reads like a manifesto, but I would instead, I'll give you the first words from the Vam album, which is Grandma, Welcome Home. The greatest metal.

02:51:15.880 --> 02:51:43.140
Well, the song that also has the immortal metal line in it, we're going to repaint the front door soon. So I would encourage everyone to give four minutes of your time to the third of arrivals by Necrophobic. And when it gets to the first line, give yourself a smile. Will do. I'll give it a spin even though it's a cheat. All right, Marcus, what do you got then?

02:51:43.920 --> 02:52:13.600
My number two is, I think John will appreciate this one, Veil of Maya by Cynic, the album Focus. I had never heard anything like Cynic when I put this album on in 1993, I think it came out. I remember being stunned by it. I was blown away by the musicality, the cosmic mystery of it, the progressive death.

02:52:13.900 --> 02:52:43.860
fucking starship that this album was. The weird vocal effect. The jazzy breakdown, the Transformer-esque vocals, the fucking brilliant drumming on it. And even after all these years, it's still one of the most unique album openers I've ever heard, metal or otherwise. So it had a huge effect on me. And when I listened to Cynic, then I wanted to seek out other bands that, you know, tried different things and metal. So, fail of mine.

02:52:43.920 --> 02:53:13.340
A Cynic. Cool. Interesting thing about that album is that that was delayed, I think, like a year and a half from release. It should have came out in 91. But the hurricane that hit Florida had set it back, you know, for them finishing all the work on the album. So they would have been out. And 91 was what? Death and Atheist had massive albums and not to mention a gazillion other bands. But at that time in Florida that were big, that came out. So that's a great pick.

02:53:14.300 --> 02:53:16.660
Thanks, John. Matt A.

02:53:17.820 --> 02:53:25.740
All right, my number two. So for this band, a while back, I had realized, like, I don't have a camp, right? Everybody was-

02:53:25.740 --> 02:53:27.600
You have a band camp?

02:53:27.600 --> 02:53:30.820
I have a band camp, but I didn't have a blank camp.

02:53:30.820 --> 02:53:32.520
Sax camp.

02:53:32.700 --> 02:53:33.700
Oh, God.

02:53:33.700 --> 02:53:36.360
I'll be there this summer.

02:53:36.360 --> 02:53:40.000
People are like, hey, this is my album by them, or this is my album by them.

02:53:40.000 --> 02:53:41.580
I was like, man, I don't have a camp.

02:53:41.580 --> 02:53:42.680
So I did my research, right?

02:53:42.680 --> 02:53:43.260
And I started listening.

02:53:43.580 --> 02:54:11.580
I started from day one and worked my way forward. I really liked the older stuff and I dug the middle stuff and then I got to this album that I knew of and it was probably the first album I knew of by this band and that album is called Painkiller and it kicked off with a song called Painkiller and it rips and well I think it's unlike any of the prior, I mean not unlike, but I mean I think it just is different than a lot of the older stuff.

02:54:11.820 --> 02:54:40.820
I really gravitated to it like hard. Still loving the older thing, still really liking the middle stuff, but Painkiller was my jam, as was the song Painkiller. You know, last night before I was wandering off to bed, I was watching some thing or whatever, and then I like exited Netflix or something, and it was on VH1, and I shit you not, the Painkiller video came on. Have you ever watched it? No, not recently. I'm not going to say anything, just watch it.

02:54:41.700 --> 02:55:11.660
No spoilers. Oh, yeah. I've seen that, Jay. Yeah. I mean, Rob's a maniac in it, but it's a very 80s video. Nice. Even though it came out in 1990. Oh, true enough. Yeah, but the 80s were still... The 80s had not left. You're right, George. Yes. They were still there. Yeah. All right, John. All right. So my number two is an obvious choice band. It's hard not to take this band off.

02:55:11.680 --> 02:55:39.960
for a song because they probably got about 10 great openers. But again, to reiterate something Markisan asked earlier, the live version is the version that sold me on making this a great song. And I've been fortunate enough to see this song twice live as an opener. And both times it wasn't the opening song because the opening song was a speech beforehand about going to war.

02:55:40.800 --> 02:56:10.120
And then the song starts and you wait for the band to come because you know it's building up. And then once the band comes on, the whole venue fucking explodes every time. And that song is Ace is High by Iron Maiden. There is no opening song like that live that I've ever seen, where you hear the speech, you know, Winston Churchill talking. We shall defend our island. You know what's coming. And then you know they're not going to play the opening part of the song. That they're going to actually play that over.

02:56:10.800 --> 02:56:40.280
the PA. You know that's going to happen. And you're waiting for Nico to come in with the drum part to start the song. And then they all come running out. And then Bruce comes flying and jumps like 50 feet in the air and everything. You're like, how's that dude still doing at a 55? Fuck. I hurt my back sitting down at this show. You know, so. And to think that that song to this day is still one of their better openers. And they've got a slew of them. It is one of their better openers. You're right, John. I call it top two.

02:56:40.400 --> 02:56:40.860
For sure.

02:56:41.399 --> 02:56:42.560
Where Eagles Day would be close.

02:56:43.320 --> 02:56:43.580
Yes.

02:56:44.100 --> 02:56:47.500
But there's just something about the buildup that they did on Live After Death.

02:56:47.940 --> 02:56:50.520
You know, especially if you watch the video, the spandex video.

02:56:51.180 --> 02:56:51.600
You know, so.

02:56:52.000 --> 02:56:53.160
I still watch it every once in a while.

02:56:53.440 --> 02:56:54.900
Stream for me, Long Beach.

02:56:56.100 --> 02:57:00.300
Yeah, where they played like, what, five or four or five nights at Long Beach alone on that tour?

02:57:00.700 --> 02:57:00.880
Yeah.

02:57:01.060 --> 02:57:01.940
Just, yeah.

02:57:02.760 --> 02:57:04.520
So it's a cliche pick, but.

02:57:04.640 --> 02:57:05.100
No, it's not.

02:57:05.200 --> 02:57:06.040
I mean, you can't do it.

02:57:06.160 --> 02:57:06.900
Made and did.

02:57:07.320 --> 02:57:10.260
I mean, when we saw them, when George and I saw them, they had the big airplane come out.

02:57:11.100 --> 02:57:39.680
And that was cool. And then they shit the bed the next song during where he was there. You know, the band kept playing, but Bruce apparently had to go to the bathroom. Had better things to do. And you could see them laughing on stage. You're like, I don't think it's funny. I waited 35 years to see this live. He got there eventually. That wound runs deep for you, John. Clearly. It's so fucking long to see that. I know, buddy. I feel you.

02:57:40.320 --> 02:58:10.200
But the version you've got is unique. I'm glad somebody mentioned Where Eagles Dare because Where Eagles Dare ties into my first song. Okay, mine, I'm going to give you the first line. And if you're not as obsessed with this band as I am, it won't jump to your head like it would if you said it to me. But the line is, I was born in the cemetery. I was born. I know this. You're on it, George. You're there. You have the right meter.

02:58:11.399 --> 02:58:39.760
Under the Sign of the Moon, Raised from My Grave, Evil, Merciful Fate. First song on Melissa. Yes, yes. Truly my favorite metal record of all time, just period. There's other things that have kind of touched it every once in a while, but Melissa still to this day is my favorite. And I still remember when I first heard that record and I bought it because it said black metal from Denmark. They called it black metal at the time. Right. That was like in Metal Forces magazine or something.

02:58:41.859 --> 02:59:10.280
And this is the dumbest reaction ever, but my first reaction was, this guy sings higher than Rob Halford. And then it just goes on to be its own fucking messy thing. And that record, by the way, really is kind of a tribute to 70s Priest, if you ask me. I mean, the vocals are absolutely a little different. Yeah, it was rough the first time I heard King Diamond sing. I was like, oh, this is not for me. But then, much like my first sip of beer, where I was like, ew, now it is an acquired taste that I

02:59:10.320 --> 02:59:40.040
I cannot live without. Yeah, I didn't love it the first time either. It took me, I think I put it down for a week and then was like, I should try that again. And I was like, okay, I get it. But it was a little off for me. That brings us to you, George. My number two is a song that inspires thrashing madness, even when the band isn't playing it. This is the opening song from Rain and Blood, Angel of Death by Slayer.

02:59:40.300 --> 03:00:10.280
I knew someone would pick that yeah oh yeah yeah I mean that song is just banging and I tell the story over and over again when I saw Testament on the practice what you preach tour while they were setting up for Testament they played that song but you know between sets while they were setting up and the fucking place just you'd think the band was playing there was everybody was just losing their shit so much mosh and to the angel of death that's sort of like war pigs at this point you know you put on war

03:00:10.280 --> 03:00:37.900
before any metal show and everyone's going to be like, yeah! So I'd like to suggest, if you guys don't mind, everybody must have had some honorable mentions. If you could rattle those off before you give us your last one, does that be alright? You want to do it before the number one? Well, yeah, well, like Mark will do his and then do his number one and then on down the line. Like, I mean, read them fast. Just get through them unless you've got four because I've got a 12. I've got four.

03:00:40.280 --> 03:01:09.460
Well, do it however you like. Actually, it doesn't matter. But in any case... Yeah, we can. We don't have to go back around again for that. So if you have any, Mark... I can honestly tell you, like, I didn't go into honorable mentions because I think I wanted to be all day. We didn't tell you to. Yeah, all day. But I think had I done so, then probably the first one on my list would have been Battery. Yeah. It's so difficult to argue with. But yeah, there could be so many, but I'll go with Battery. All right. And then your... And then your actual number one.

03:01:10.300 --> 03:01:39.740
Oh, my actual number one. Okay. So I think looking at it now, I've had a pretty varied top five. I had everything from Dark Throne and Necrophobic to Alton Chains and Empyrean. But my number one contains one of my all-time favorite riffs and gets to my number one on the strength of that alone, I think, which is from the album Sonic Excess in its purest form.

03:01:40.739 --> 03:02:09.040
Crowbars, The Lasting Doors. Wow. Crowbars, wow. Yeah, you dug in there for that one. Right on, dude. It is an absolutely colossal riff. If you are familiar with the track, you will almost certainly know what the riff is. It happens a few times during the song at the end of the chorus. It's just fat. And I use that, and that is not a term that I use. Fat with a PH. Yeah, yeah.

03:02:09.160 --> 03:02:39.140
I remember I've seen Crowbar Live just once I think I was lucky enough to briefly sort of get a chance to meet Kirk in the crowd and I was like what a great down to earth every time you see him speak on any kind of social media or videos he just really is proper salt of the earth character that's how he always comes across just loves what he does loves his craft I play guitar I drink beer knock out these tunes and he's a

03:02:39.180 --> 03:03:09.140
just one of the great riff writers for me. I'm a huge crowbar fan and for me The Lasting Dose is just a great album opener. Yeah I got to meet him at that club that I was dissing earlier the Cafe 611 they played there and I got to meet him and talk to him and yeah he was really nice. Yeah it's just I think you sometimes just get a feel for the musicians that you love don't you that whether they're really in it for the right reasons or

03:03:09.180 --> 03:03:36.560
where they're just putting on an act. He just is what he is. And I've got a lot of respect for him. And some crowbar albums in more recent years have not been as great as some of the other ones. But I just almost don't mind because he just is Kirk. He does crowbar and this is great. And also as a side note, he was part of Down, obviously, another great band.

03:03:36.560 --> 03:04:06.540
And Down's record, my daughter's called Nola, which was obviously nothing to do with the Down's first record, because we have no connections in New Orleans. But quite a few people have said to me, did you name Nola after Down's first record? I'm like, no, but it was a great bonus. Awesome. Nice. Did he rejoin Down recently too? Yeah, I think so. Really? I haven't heard that. Are Down still operational? I mean, are they doing

03:04:07.080 --> 03:04:36.520
Well, no, I think they did a... Was it just like a limited tour? What did they do? He was definitely there, man. I'm trying to remember what was going on. If it was a one-off thing or... Mark, have you heard the new Crowbar album? Have you listened to it? I've heard just two or three tracks. I haven't heard it all yet. Also, a waiting vinyl. Yeah, that's pretty good. Yeah, I like it. I need more time with it, but it's pretty good. It's heavy as fuck, that's for sure. Just a great riff right out for me.

03:04:36.560 --> 03:05:06.520
Great Riff, yeah. Yeah, I'm in love with riffs. Every album. All right, well, so Jay wants us to do honorables. So I had a death song on my list, but I had another one, and that was Infernal Death from Scream Bloody Glore. Nice. High on Fire's Fury Whip from Death Is This Communion. I'm a really big fan of that one. Hunt the Buffalo on Slope.

03:05:06.600 --> 03:05:36.000
Oh, forever. From cobalt. Yeah. And I think I mentioned this one too. Axioma, Ethica, Odini by Enslaved on the album. That's the same title. I had more, but I cut them out of this list because I didn't want to look at them because it was so hard to choose. Yeah. My number one, a lot of the masses, a lot of people like George will pick Angel of Death as the standout for Slayer track.

03:05:36.100 --> 03:06:06.080
But not me. My number one is South of Heaven by Slayer. And the album South of Heaven. I fucking love it. That sinister intro guitar on that opener is incredibly compelling. A lot more so to me than Angel of Death. And it's just one of the most memorable opening riffs ever, in my opinion. I love...

03:06:06.100 --> 03:06:36.080
Yeah, no, it's perfectly reasonable. I'm just giving you the business, George. Stop giving me the business. I love to. Yeah, I just, I love how this song, South of Heaven, also crushes, but at the same time, it lets you know that this isn't just Slayer on thrash autopilot. You know, they slow things down on this record, and I don't think people expected that. They let you wade in a river of hot hellfire before

03:06:36.120 --> 03:07:06.080
they shove your face underneath it and that to me is fucking metal and it's because hell awaits exactly i like this mark dekes he's sharp he is he's on top of that i just i just i just had a really dark moment in my mind that i've just suddenly remembered one of the tracks i was going to include my top five but i was driving when i thought of it and then forgot to write it down and i'm now really kicking myself i forgot to include it so it's going to have to be an honorary

03:07:06.120 --> 03:07:35.660
It would have absolutely made my top five. Throw it out. Enchantment by Paradise Lost, the first track. Oh! Yes! Yeah. First track on Draconian Times. Yes! It was the first Paradise Lost song I ever heard. When Draconian Times came out, I was getting into rock music, and I remember exactly where I was in a big record store in Newcastle. They were playing it on the radio, like the in-store radio, as it were. And I stopped in my tracks. I was on my way home from school. I'm like, what?

03:07:36.100 --> 03:08:05.100
What is that? Bought the album instantly and I've been a huge Parallax Lost fan. So for your list, all you need is a simple reminder. You should host a metal podcast. That was a pull. You got to give me credit for that. That was a pull. That was really good, George. That was good. I also forgot one too on my Honorable Mentions and it's a Moral Eclipse by Kaven.

03:08:06.140 --> 03:08:34.860
until your heart stops. So they just announced a new album in 12 years. First album in like 12 years, I think. And that's really good news to me. And it came at a time when I was combing through my top five candidates for this list. But that band has gone down through a lot of different musical paths in their career, but that album was their heaviest and most metal. And it's just a vicious opening track that hooked me. And I've been a big fan of theirs ever since.

03:08:35.020 --> 03:08:36.360
So cool.

03:08:39.040 --> 03:08:39.320
Matty.

03:08:41.400 --> 03:08:41.740
Let's see.

03:08:41.750 --> 03:08:43.500
Of what I wrote down for honorable mentions,

03:08:44.170 --> 03:08:45.440
the last two mold album,

03:08:46.040 --> 03:08:50.160
the song beg for life really was a killer intro track.

03:08:50.870 --> 03:08:52.400
The exorcist by possessed.

03:08:52.960 --> 03:08:53.120
Nice.

03:08:53.610 --> 03:08:54.720
Battery by Metallica.

03:08:56.640 --> 03:08:57.860
Angel of death by Slayer.

03:08:58.520 --> 03:09:00.100
Obviously dope smoker by sleep.

03:09:01.880 --> 03:09:02.840
First and last track.

03:09:03.170 --> 03:09:03.380
Yeah.

03:09:04.640 --> 03:09:34.400
A Better Intro Than The Entire Album. My number one was the first song I ever heard by this band. I feel like I'm kind of completing the trilogy when I say this, but it is War Ensemble off of the album Seasons in the Abyss by Slay. Wow, you did. All right. Slay or Patrick. You sent it huge on this list. Well, three records in a row, too, as you said. Yeah, yeah, yeah. In my sixth grade live, I mean, just listening to that last beat, I was literally blown away.

03:09:34.660 --> 03:10:03.580
and I still am to this day. So we're on Sable. Nice. John. Slayer! Slayer! No, it's fucking Slayer. No. All right. So my honorable mentions, I actually also had in Slaves, Ethica Odina, which is the opening track from the album. A track that I had unbelievable amounts of enjoyment watching Jay's face change when I played it for him for the first time. Yeah, I know what you're going to say.

03:10:07.299 --> 03:10:31.560
We got pizza and beer and hung out in his house and listened to fucking vinyl. That was one of the best nights I had in ages. Just sitting here talking music and drinking beers and playing with his cat. Yes, we had fun. But I played for him the opening track from Aronti Pazuzu's, I cannot pronounce the album, so I'm not going to try. Mark can do it. He's good on the finish.

03:10:33.920 --> 03:11:03.480
And I remember saying to Jay, I said, have you heard this yet? And he said, no. And I played it for him. He's like, fuck, I got to go buy that now. I mean, we were all into the newest one at that time. And you were like, yeah, but dude, have you heard this? And that still is. It's just, if you've ever seen them live when they play that, it's just like, what the fuck? They're really interesting, aren't they? They are. They're really interesting. And on stage, it's even, it's even more crazy and insane and atmospheric and wild. And they go, so many,

03:11:03.720 --> 03:11:32.440
And I've seen them. I saw them once with George at MDF. And they were awesome there. And then I saw them with Warren, our good friend Warren, when they played with Horrendous, an insect arc in this small little club in Baltimore. Both times, just crazy. A few more songs for my honorable mentions. I'm not a big stoner metal fan, but I do love Spiritual Beggars. And they have a song called Left Brain Ambassadors, which is amazing. Off the Ad Astra album. Just really great stuff.

03:11:34.659 --> 03:12:02.440
Yeah, and I'm a bigger fan of the earlier stuff. It's a little more grittier. It's not as, you know, Swedish metal. Love goes a lot towards that kind of bluesy sound after a while. Some of the musicians love that kind of Richie Blackmore sound, and I like the earlier stuff. It's a little grittier, but they're a great band. I tried to pick a Devon Townsend song. I couldn't pick one, so I just went with Addicted because

03:12:02.480 --> 03:12:32.420
How Do You Not Like Devin Townsend? I love them. All right. So leading into my number one, Jay mentioned Where Eagles Dare. I am a former drummer. I don't play anymore, but any song that opens with drums catches me. So Where Eagles Dare, the very first album with Nico, what do they do? They have a drum fill to open up the album. Sounds awesome. Rush, they disappear for six years. The band's pretty much broken up after Neil Peart's all his issues he's had with his family, his wife, and his daughter dying. So what do they do for their next album that they come back?

03:12:32.720 --> 03:13:01.340
They have Neil Peart open up with an amazing drum fill on One Little Victory. So this leads me into my final song. I'm going to say just a few words to describe it. This guy's been in the band for 33 years. He's a fucking member. He's not a fucking villain. Okay, people get over it. This is the painkiller. What a way to fucking open an album after you put out two shitty fucking albums prior to that.

03:13:01.380 --> 03:13:30.960
You came back with all balls. The dude's a band member. Get over it. You know, I was thinking about this the other day, John, and Priest are the masters at being revitalized by New Blood. Because Pain Cleaning was his first record, and I personally think Redeemer of Souls is great, but Firepower is great, too, and those are the Richie records. Yeah, I know. I have high hopes for this next Priest record. I hope so, yeah. I mean, and it's kind of weird.

03:13:31.380 --> 03:14:01.360
Like Glenn has been coming out for a number of shows this tour. So. He made some comments about it too. He said it's going to be every priest's fans dream. That's there's some proggy 70s style stuff on this one. That's what he said. The only thing. The last record was great. So. Proggy is not the word for it, but you know what I mean. Well, they, they touched a little bit on it. At the time, at the time they were proggy, if you ask me, they were proggy. I will say one last thing, Jay, I saw your set lists from your show and while it was great that you got to see Glenn, it kind of sucked that they killed him.

03:14:01.400 --> 03:14:31.360
killed invader in the set list to bring glenn out that's the first time i've ever seen desert plains though so that was kind of cool i saw that in 82 when they played that and screaming for vengeance yeah i was really i was definitely one of my bucket list ones with them um it wasn't it wasn't it wasn't the best i've ever seen set list though not by them i thought the loud the firepower tool was pretty fucking good oh the the show that georgian i saw was yeah crazy but they well well you had saints in hell too so fuck yeah

03:14:31.380 --> 03:15:01.260
Saints in Hell. A bunch of my honorable mentions have already been mentioned, so I'm going to just read them fast, but they were all here, so I think we all have similar ways of thinking about things. Fury Whip, Free Will Burning, by the way. I think it's such a fucking killer album opener, and I know there's three Priest albums in a row here, but Exciter and Rapid Fire. Yes. And you can take Exciter off either live record or Stay in Class. It was a little more shocking when it was Stay in Class, but sounds better on Unleashed.

03:15:01.400 --> 03:15:03.420
the East Battery is on my list.

03:15:03.700 --> 03:15:05.280
Where Eagles Dare is on my list.

03:15:05.580 --> 03:15:07.760
Assault Attack by Michael Schenker is on my list.

03:15:08.620 --> 03:15:10.520
Overkill by Motorhead is on my list.

03:15:12.260 --> 03:15:12.860
Tom Sawyer.

03:15:13.440 --> 03:15:15.300
I mean, that's fucking an amazing,

03:15:15.620 --> 03:15:17.140
cool fucking keyboard entry to that.

03:15:17.920 --> 03:15:18.680
Angel of Death.

03:15:19.200 --> 03:15:23.260
And then finally, with a nod to the British stuff I love,

03:15:23.500 --> 03:15:25.740
Princess of the Night is a great fucking...

03:15:25.740 --> 03:15:26.820
Oh, yeah.

03:15:27.300 --> 03:15:27.880
Saxon record.

03:15:28.220 --> 03:15:29.100
What's the name of that band again?

03:15:29.960 --> 03:15:30.440
Saxon.

03:15:30.500 --> 03:16:00.480
And I've been listening to a lot of sax. Is that your one or your last honorable? Last honorable. Well, the new sax now is really good. Sax on. Sax on, sax off. I don't care. I'm going to mispronounce everything. I've given Jay shit. I finally carried myself on that for years. I used to say sax on. What did I say, John? Sax on. Sax on, sax off. Sax on, sax off. I know. Yeah. Well, by the way, I've fallen back down into the sax and

03:16:00.500 --> 03:16:28.780
You know, fucking hole, which I do from time to time. And Matt is always sax on. Yeah. Oh. So. Sax core. My number one is a live rendition of a song, so it opens a live album, but it also actually opens the album that it was originally on, for which this album was the tour. It's one of my favorite records of all time. I honestly think these guys nail it on a regular basis with OK tracks, or at least did back when they were highly and fully operational.

03:16:31.260 --> 03:16:57.000
"Highway Star" on Made in Japan. It kind of creeps to life a little bit because they all kind of tune up for a minute and blah blah blah blah blah blah and then it just fucking bangs you over the head and it's got amazing Richie Blackmore guitar solo in it. You get to hear Ian Gillen sing. You're always having a good afternoon if you get to hear Ian Gillen sing. "Highway Star" definitely on this album. It really sets the fucking tone for this fucking record.

03:17:00.320 --> 03:17:27.680
So and for those of you educated Deep Purple fans, it is the opening track on Machine Head, which is what this album tour was for. So yeah, and that's a fine version too. But whoo man, this is a fucking motherfucker. All right. So I have four honorable mentions. Only one of them has been mentioned. And just now by Jay, Freewheel Burning from Judas Priest, Defenders of the Faith. That's a ripper.

03:17:30.340 --> 03:17:58.740
Bonded by Blood. It's my favorite Exodus album. I don't care what you say, Jay. It's a killer song. Bang your head against the stage and metal takes its place. Bonded by Blood. Go fuck yourself. Going a little bit further back, Kiss, Detroit Rock City, Opening Destroyer. Nice call. That's, you know, if you're seeing Kiss, as someone from Michigan originally,

03:18:00.340 --> 03:18:30.300
is just it's like you know get up you know uh get down and my my final honorable mention uh which i i thought might have been said at some point uh and and it's sort of a cheater because it's it's like such a massive part of this album but rush 2112 because you could even just say the first two minutes of it if you wanted to no it's not a cheat at all yeah um but yeah i mean come on look at all the rush love i'm the i'm the big rush fan i didn't mention one

03:18:30.320 --> 03:19:00.080
Rush song. Well, I sort of did, but that's awesome. My number one, with honorable mentions, we've had a few overlaps, but I don't think on our list itself we've had any overlaps. Just one, Painkiller. Oh, right. Okay. Well, this is the other one. We shall defend our island, whatever the cost may be. Iron Maiden, Aces High, with the Churchill speech. Which is why I wanted the track two, Marcus, on, because track one is just Churchill talking.

03:19:00.560 --> 03:19:30.180
No, but I don't, on the CD and perhaps on the album, I don't think there's any space between the two. Ah, then. It's actually part of the track. Fair enough. You know, it's interesting, Jay. On the original, I wonder if it was all one. So here's the weird thing for you, too, about that record, is that if you listen to the CD or MP3 version, the intro to Power Slave is tacked onto the end of Back in the Village. Yeah. So that, so that if you listen to Back in the Village, then you hear, you know, the whole kind of boom, boom, boom, boom. And then all of a sudden you're into whatever next song.

03:19:32.859 --> 03:19:33.880
I'll allow it.

03:19:35.020 --> 03:19:37.160
I was listening to that record just the other day.

03:19:37.880 --> 03:19:41.020
And I'm telling you, dude, that part at the end of Rhyme of the Ancient Mariner,

03:19:41.880 --> 03:19:44.500
it honestly brings tears to my eyes when it spills over.

03:19:45.240 --> 03:19:46.380
Rhyme of the Ancient Mariner?

03:19:46.580 --> 03:19:47.340
From Live After Death?

03:19:48.800 --> 03:19:50.860
No, no, just the album version.

03:19:51.380 --> 03:19:54.420
The curse, the dawn in their eyes, the mariner, he wished they'd died.

03:19:54.560 --> 03:19:54.880
He died.

03:19:55.360 --> 03:19:55.960
That whole thing.

03:19:56.040 --> 03:19:58.000
And then down in Falls comes the rain.

03:19:58.260 --> 03:19:59.700
No, that's the part that, yeah.

03:19:59.960 --> 03:20:01.820
That's the get you right here

03:20:02.400 --> 03:20:03.800
But then you hear the

03:20:04.180 --> 03:20:06.180
waves after that and the guitars spill over

03:20:06.440 --> 03:20:07.840
It never fails to get me

03:20:07.980 --> 03:20:10.160
I can't listen to it every day but if I listen to it once

03:20:10.240 --> 03:20:11.980
every five months or one year

03:20:12.160 --> 03:20:13.320
it'll bring tears to my eyes

03:20:14.940 --> 03:20:15.540
Go ahead George

03:20:16.920 --> 03:20:18.040
I was going to say, I'm sorry

03:20:18.180 --> 03:20:19.800
The original

03:20:20.260 --> 03:20:22.280
not the original but this is the one that has the three bonus

03:20:22.440 --> 03:20:24.040
tracks from when they recorded

03:20:24.240 --> 03:20:26.340
in England, it's one song

03:20:26.460 --> 03:20:27.620
Ace is high in the

03:20:28.140 --> 03:20:57.560
speech. And then on the reissue is when they separate them. That's the live album though. What is it on Power Slave? It's not on Power Slave. It's only on the live album. Oh god. It's been a while since I've fucking paid attention to that apparently. Yeah. Yeah like as soon as we decided on this like first thing I thought of was Ace's High because because you know I mean that was my first maiden album in 1984? 85? Whatever it was.

03:20:58.680 --> 03:21:24.860
And it was just like, wow. You know, up to this point, I've been listening to ACDC and some Black Sabbath and Ozzy and all of a sudden, boom, Iron Maiden, Ace's Eye. That was like, whoa. Okay, so that was automatically my first thought. But then nothing like stirs you up to like, you know, fist pumping metal madness than hearing the Churchill speech before that. I mean, because that's just, it's just so inspiring.

03:21:24.940 --> 03:21:29.180
I'm actually curious, Mark, what do you think of Iron Maiden? Because you haven't said anything about

03:21:30.119 --> 03:21:30.520
Batman.

03:21:31.040 --> 03:21:32.780
Oh, don't put me on the spot.

03:21:33.520 --> 03:21:34.520
I did. You did it.

03:21:35.300 --> 03:21:35.600
Too late.

03:21:35.600 --> 03:21:36.820
You wouldn't be the first, trust me.

03:21:37.000 --> 03:21:38.580
So here is the true story.

03:21:38.780 --> 03:21:43.960
So Nick and Winterfell is a huge Iron Maiden fan.

03:21:44.180 --> 03:21:47.240
Like really, really ginousine of Iron Maiden fan.

03:21:47.460 --> 03:21:51.840
And it's a style of metal that I've never been into.

03:21:52.640 --> 03:22:20.180
And so I was the one, I was always the contrarian on Iron Maiden. I never, ever, ever liked Iron Maiden. Wow. Interesting. Until literally about three months ago. What changed your mind? And I'd been listening to loads of, I'd been listening to quite a lot of sort of Melodic Doom stuff, like sort of Candlemas kind of stuff, which I really like.

03:22:22.640 --> 03:22:48.240
I set about listening to different stuff. And sometimes pennies drop with me with bands. And after years, years and years. And so I said to Nick one day, do you know what it is? I'm going to give Iron Maiden one more go. And by the way, this is not me saying I thought they were shit or anything. Nothing of the sort. I just didn't get it. I didn't feel it. Yeah, it wasn't your shit.

03:22:52.640 --> 03:23:22.600
the entire Iron Maiden catalogue. Wow. In order, because I realised I'd never heard an Iron Maiden album all the way through. Wow. And so I'd only ever heard, like, you know, the hits. Of course I'd heard all Run to the Hills and whatever a million times. But I'd never heard a complete album. So I thought, I wonder what would happen if I'd just sit down and listen to a complete Iron Maiden album. So I started at the beginning of the catalogue, and I only played them once each, and I wanted to see where I thought, like, just my, is it almost like trying to recreate a

03:23:22.640 --> 03:23:51.060
As if I was there. Do you know what I mean? One album, one play each. And I got to about nine albums in when I was thinking, yeah, I'm starting to sort of, my interest is starting to wane a bit now. But that kind of run of album, like three to six or whatever, like where all the sort of Summer and Time and Power Slave and all this kind of stuff. Yeah. Yeah, I suddenly really got it. And I bought about four Iron Maid albums on vinyl. Nice.

03:23:51.180 --> 03:24:21.100
And so I don't think they'll ever be one of my favourite bands, but I, it's weird. Do you know what it is? It happened, it's happened with other bands over the years where I suddenly, like the guys in Winterfell are big hate forest fans, the Ukrainian band. And I've been always been like, I don't get it. I don't get it. I don't get it. And then recently it's happened with them as well. I'm like, oh yeah. I don't know. My, my, your taste changed, don't you? As you get older. Oh yeah. Your beer tastes change. There you go. Well, I'm glad I asked that question.

03:24:21.160 --> 03:24:21.900
But also,

03:24:22.320 --> 03:24:22.800
for what it's worth,

03:24:23.110 --> 03:24:26.280
from the confessional side of things,

03:24:26.310 --> 03:24:27.860
and I think I did mention this once before,

03:24:28.200 --> 03:24:32.340
but I went through the first 40 plus years of my life,

03:24:32.420 --> 03:24:33.700
not being able to stand Megadeth.

03:24:35.359 --> 03:24:36.980
And everybody I knew liked Megadeth,

03:24:36.990 --> 03:24:37.640
and I didn't get it.

03:24:37.900 --> 03:24:38.860
And now I do get them,

03:24:39.020 --> 03:24:41.940
and I would say I hold them like you old Maiden.

03:24:41.970 --> 03:24:42.260
I'm like,

03:24:42.360 --> 03:24:42.420
yeah,

03:24:42.720 --> 03:24:42.860
you know,

03:24:43.200 --> 03:24:43.500
they're good.

03:24:43.860 --> 03:24:44.000
Like,

03:24:44.010 --> 03:24:44.540
I get it now.

03:24:45.420 --> 03:24:46.320
I'm not crazy about them.

03:24:46.380 --> 03:24:49.040
I still but I just couldn't fucking stand Meganeth so

03:24:49.560 --> 03:24:51.280
there are bands like that man what are you gonna do

03:24:51.720 --> 03:24:53.480
hey what did you think of that last Candlemas

03:24:53.540 --> 03:24:53.960
record though

03:24:55.010 --> 03:24:55.920
yeah they're a great band

03:24:56.680 --> 03:24:58.620
I just think they're a great band

03:24:59.320 --> 03:25:01.480
they're working on a new one right now and they've still

03:25:01.540 --> 03:25:03.480
got Johannes or whatever the singer's name is with

03:25:03.520 --> 03:25:03.820
them so

03:25:05.179 --> 03:25:07.160
the early records are just obviously

03:25:07.960 --> 03:25:08.400
amazing

03:25:09.340 --> 03:25:11.080
they've sort of got that mid career

03:25:11.720 --> 03:25:12.780
bit of dip but then

03:25:13.160 --> 03:25:15.280
you know Psalm of the Dead and Death Magic

03:25:15.410 --> 03:25:16.360
Doom and

03:25:16.380 --> 03:25:45.260
The Self-Title Record. Honestly, King of the Grey Islands, I think, is fucking great, too. I like King of the Grey Islands, but the new one, I thought it was one of the best things they've done in a long time. Yeah. Cool. Nice. All right. One last thing before we're done. And we're not even at four hours yet. This is good. We're moving along. I think Will is the one that brings us down here, you know? This floating head in the background, just disembodied head.

03:25:46.380 --> 03:26:16.260
So we need our album of the episode. Of everything that anybody's mentioned today. What is the obviously Leviathan has been mentioned so we know Matt. You do. But Mark. There's no sax on it though. Of everything that you've mentioned or any of us have mentioned what what album would you say it was probably the one that like stood out to you the most that you like the most. So like from all of the old classics as well as the new stuff. Anything that. Anything we've said too. Anything that.

03:26:16.380 --> 03:26:45.820
Anyone has mentioned is fair game as to... Oh, Jesus. Yeah. Probably should explain that to you better. I mean, probably Dirt by Alston Chains. Yeah, makes sense. Makes sense. All right. Mark is on. I'm going to go with Dirt from Alston Chains. Because holy shit, that was a really cool discussion that we had with Mark. I didn't expect him to pull that out of there. And they're just one of my all-time favorite bands.

03:26:46.380 --> 03:27:16.320
So going with that as well. All right. Well, as mentioned, I am contractually obligated to make Leviathan by Mastodon, my album of the episode. Every time it's mentioned, I am also a suburban dad. Thank you. All right, John. Oh, man, this is tough now. And stop going so fast because I still haven't picked mine yet. All right. So I actually,

03:27:16.380 --> 03:27:46.340
put an album down that I didn't mention because I didn't pay attention to reading what we're supposed to do this time I got confused I've been feeling well awake so I have to choose between Dirt and Leviathan and I will tell you this Dirt already has two selections and I'm not going to leave my sex core buddy out there by himself so I'm going to go with Leviathan just because and if they put sex on that album I'd like it even more reissue sex when I die

03:27:46.480 --> 03:27:47.980
battle for the best album.

03:27:48.260 --> 03:27:48.640
Yeah, exactly.

03:27:49.220 --> 03:27:49.600
It is.

03:27:49.980 --> 03:27:50.780
It's two and two.

03:27:51.040 --> 03:27:51.760
What do you got, Jay?

03:27:51.800 --> 03:27:53.120
Levi's with sax.

03:27:54.939 --> 03:27:55.380
Remix.

03:27:56.900 --> 03:27:58.020
This has never happened before.

03:27:58.660 --> 03:27:59.840
The Kenny G remix.

03:28:00.640 --> 03:28:01.500
It's hard, too.

03:28:01.620 --> 03:28:02.280
I get on.

03:28:02.620 --> 03:28:03.100
Shit.

03:28:04.260 --> 03:28:08.920
You know, I'm going to say Heaven and Hell, since I brought up Neon Knights.

03:28:09.040 --> 03:28:11.760
With saxophone.

03:28:12.260 --> 03:28:12.460
Really?

03:28:14.720 --> 03:28:15.960
That's such a classic record, dude.

03:28:17.220 --> 03:28:20.340
I'm going to go for a walk after this pod and I'm probably going to listen to that record.

03:28:20.660 --> 03:28:21.600
Yeah. Nice.

03:28:23.240 --> 03:28:26.880
Well, you know, I was initially thinking that I was going to go with the Nacochwin album.

03:28:27.460 --> 03:28:29.260
That hasn't even been released yet.

03:28:30.979 --> 03:28:31.860
And Dirt.

03:28:34.960 --> 03:28:37.660
Now that it's come up, I'm like, well, duh.

03:28:38.430 --> 03:28:39.480
I mean, come on.

03:28:40.110 --> 03:28:43.700
You cannot possibly rate the Nacochwin album higher than Dirt.

03:28:44.220 --> 03:28:44.660
Exactly.

03:28:45.540 --> 03:28:45.780
Exactly.

03:28:47.079 --> 03:29:15.640
I'm contractually obligated to go with Dirt. So that's what I'll do. And like, that's probably the only time we've ever had anybody had more than one vote for this too. Usually everybody's like, ah, this or that. Everybody has a different album. Victory. Way to unite us, Mark. All right, well, here we are. We're at the end. Mark, thank you so much for coming on and for sticking around and hanging out with us.

03:29:16.319 --> 03:29:44.620
It's been a blast, man. Thank you so much for having me. I've really, really enjoyed myself. So I hope we can stay in touch. Of course. Of course. You're welcome back anytime. New album or not. If you're like, hey, I just want to hang out and drink some beer and talk with you guys, you let us know. You're welcome. And, you know, no lip service required. Your album, take up... I can't speak. What's it called? I can't even pronounce the English words.

03:29:45.840 --> 03:30:15.780
I can't even speak period. Take up my bones. I love it. Fantastic record. It's absolutely going to be on my mid-year, end-year-end list. It's such a unique listen that, you know, when my friend Derek said, hey, I know Mark, I was like, oh, well, shit, you know, I should see about getting him on because, you know, it's just one of those albums that touches you.

03:30:15.840 --> 03:30:42.540
changes you, moves you, and I really appreciate what you've done here. Thank you so much. I look forward to hearing more. Yeah, I mean, I really, I still can't believe that people are responding like that to the music I've made, but I love it, and I'm really, really grateful. Thank you. You're welcome. And we, sir, are grateful for your time. Wait, Mark, before you go, Jay, do you want to say what you want to say to Mark before we leave? Mark, you're the best guest we've ever had. Hey!

03:30:45.860 --> 03:31:02.940
That's that to everyone. Yeah. Yeah. Sorry. And I just. Even better than Ross the boss. I'll say that. Way better than Ross the boss. Yeah. Well, yeah, we can do that. Awesome. All right, guys. Thanks, guys. Thanks, Mark. We'll be in touch. All right, guys. Talk to you later. Have a good one. Bye. Bye, friends.

03:31:46.700 --> 03:32:03.580
What up? Reason 42, I never got into metal. For the love of God, I cannot read the band names. Are you kidding me? They are magic eye puzzles. Come on, get your branding right so we can understand who the hell you are.