Warthur

MMA Metal Reviewer · Metal Reviewer
Registered more than 2 years ago · Last visit 3 days ago

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1834 reviews/ratings
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THE STOOGES - Fun House Proto-Metal | review permalink
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KISS - Alive! Hard Rock | review permalink
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MOTÖRHEAD - Ace of Spades Heavy Metal | review permalink
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IRON MAIDEN - The Number Of The Beast NWoBHM | review permalink
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METALLICA - Ride the Lightning Thrash Metal | review permalink
IRON MAIDEN - Powerslave NWoBHM | review permalink
METALLICA - Master of Puppets Thrash Metal | review permalink
CANDLEMASS - Epicus Doomicus Metallicus Traditional Doom Metal | review permalink
SLAYER - Reign in Blood Thrash Metal | review permalink
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Metal Genre Nb. Rated Avg. rating
1 Non-Metal 176 3.76
2 Progressive Metal 157 3.68
3 Heavy Metal 149 3.65
4 Black Metal 124 3.80
5 Hard Rock 118 3.52
6 Metal Related 90 3.67
7 Thrash Metal 81 3.76
8 Power Metal 79 3.41
9 Proto-Metal 68 3.68
10 Atmospheric Black Metal 64 3.86
11 Gothic Metal 58 3.38
12 Doom Metal 57 3.78
13 Death Metal 55 3.92
14 Traditional Doom Metal 45 3.87
15 US Power Metal 41 3.46
16 Stoner Metal 38 3.78
17 Avant-garde Metal 38 3.78
18 Industrial Metal 33 3.44
19 Symphonic Black Metal 30 3.20
20 Technical Death Metal 25 3.84
21 Melodic Death Metal 25 3.94
22 Death-Doom Metal 23 4.13
23 Melodic Black Metal 22 3.91
24 Atmospheric Sludge Metal 20 3.98
25 Hardcore Punk 19 4.21
26 Heavy Psych 16 4.06
27 Funeral Doom Metal 15 3.70
28 Folk Metal 14 3.32
29 Symphonic Metal 14 3.04
30 NWoBHM 13 4.23
31 Alternative Metal 12 3.25
32 Technical Thrash Metal 12 4.13
33 Sludge Metal 11 3.95
34 Speed Metal 11 3.73
35 Depressive Black Metal 10 3.75
36 Drone Metal 9 4.00
37 Funk Metal 9 3.78
38 Groove Metal 8 3.63
39 Viking Metal 8 3.63
40 Crust Punk 7 2.93
41 Brutal Death Metal 5 3.70
42 Grindcore 5 4.10
43 Death 'n' Roll 4 4.50
44 Crossover Thrash 2 4.50
45 Glam Metal 2 2.50
46 Pagan Black Metal 2 3.50
47 Nu Metal 2 4.00
48 War Metal 2 3.00
49 Stoner Rock 2 3.50
50 Metalcore 1 3.00
51 Neoclassical metal 1 4.00
52 Heavy Alternative Rock 1 3.00
53 Mathcore 1 3.00

Latest Albums Reviews

KING CRIMSON The Road To Red

Boxset / Compilation · 2013 · Proto-Metal
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When it comes to the monster King Crimson boxed sets I've covered so far, I'd put The Road to Red on a tier above Sailors' Tales and the Larks' Tongues box, but below that of Starless.

In terms of sound quality, whilst it's a bit less consistent than the Starless box, it's nonetheless streets ahead of most of the material on Sailors' Tales and Larks' Tongues. In terms of the live sets presented on the box, there's obviously a lot of fantastic performances here, but I'd say that by and large the performances on the Starless box have the edge on them, with some exceptions.

In addition, there's a more nuanced reason why I think Starless is a five-star set whilst The Road to Red is more four- and-a-half stars. On the European tours covered in Starless, King Crimson were typically the headliners, with set lengths giving them space to sprawl. Conversely, in many of the US dates chronicled here, their improvisations where greatly curtailed due to the fact that they were working as a support act. Consistently, the better gigs here are the longer concerts where they were headlining and had the space to really get into it.

It's still a fantastic collection for anyone who loves mid-1970s King Crimson (and the new mix of Red is great), but I just don't think it hits five stars.

KING CRIMSON Larks' Tongues In Aspic: The Complete Recordings

Boxset / Compilation · 2012 · Proto-Metal
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As well as providing the album itself in its original mix and in the updated mix by Steven Wilson and Robert Fripp (a fairly tasteful, light update which doesn't mess too much with perfection), this continues the run of Crimson boxed sets which come stuffed with live sets from the relevant lineup.

This box is hampered somewhat by two factors: Jamie Muir really wasn't in the band that long, disappearing shortly after the studio album was done, and the band didn't do many soundboard tapes during this era (the Guildford Civic Hall gig being a happy exception). That means that most of the live sets here hail from audience cassettes, which are somewhat varied in their quality as you might imagine.

Some of them are pretty good - with the Zoom Club and Hull Technical College tapes at least sounding better than Earthbound, and offering full sets. (It helps a lot that the chaotic music that Crimson presents here suffers less from a lo-fi presentation than, say, the material that the Islands-era lineup were performing.) And the Beat Club tape is a live-in-the-TV-studio affair, so that sounds great.

At the other end of the spectrum, the Glasgow Green's Playhouse and Portsmouth Guildhall tapes are really not good - to the point where even the high quality of the music itself couldn't save them as it did with some of the other audience tapes. Still, overall the good outweighs the bad in this collection, and it's well worth it if you love the Larks' Tongues material, want some really massive improvs featuring that lineup, and have a tolerance for sometimes dodgy sound quality.

KING CRIMSON Live In Zurich, 1973

Promos, fans club and other releases (no bootlegs) · 2009 · Proto-Metal
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This is one of the best-sounding live concerts available from the Starless & Bible Black era of King Crimson, thanks to being recorded using mobile studio facilities. Eight of these tracks were on the Great Deceiver boxed set, but here you get the entire set. The band are on top form and it all sounds very excellent; at the same time, it's worth noting that the set is also available as part of the Starless boxed set, which you're likely to at least be considering if you're keen enough on this period of King Crimson to delve into full concert recordings like this.

KING CRIMSON Live in New Haven, CT, 2003

Promos, fans club and other releases (no bootlegs) · 2011 · Non-Metal
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A decent live recording of the last date on King Crimson's 2003 US tour in support of the Power To Believe Album. Like most live sets that have been salvaged from this tour, the setlist is heavy on then-recent Crimson material - The Power To Believe, plus material from The ConstruKction of Light rendered more interesting thanks to extensive live refinement, plus a pinch of VROOOM. In addition, we get the encores here - a little Elephant Talk to remember the 1980s lineup of the band by, and a spot of Red to represent the band's original 1969-1974 run.

With more recent King Crimson live sets largely being exercises in exploring the band's entire back catalogue, Live In New Haven might represent King Crimson at the furthest extent of their musical experimentation into uncharted territory, prior to this (still valuable and interesting) round of exploration of their legacy that they've turned to in the intervening decade or so.

KING CRIMSON Live In Kassel, 1974

Promos, fans club and other releases (no bootlegs) · 2007 · Proto-Metal
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Right at the tail end of King Crimson's European tour of 1974 - followed by the grand slog through the USA which culminated in David Cross leaving the band and, shortly after, Robert Fripp dissolving the group following the recording of Red - this Kassel gig, captured on decent-quality soundboard tapes, finds the band in an aggressive mood, like they're roaring to see the finish line just up ahead. The set is incomplete - it cuts out partway through Fracture - but the quality of what you get is superb and it's only this incompleteness which stops it getting five stars. Then again, if you're digging this deep into this phase of the band's history, you may as well get the Starless boxed set - which includes this plus all the other surviving soundboard tapes from this tour.

Latest Forum Topic Posts

  • Posted 8 months ago in Scott Kelly (Neurosis) retires from music
    Coming to this late but echoing what other people have said: I don't trust Kelly's statement an inch.I've known people who've gotten into a cycle of regularly making big dramatic apologies for their behaviour and spurting all sorts of promises they're going to change... but actually, the apologies and promises are what they do instead of working on themselves. They just use them as a delaying tactic to convince people to give them a bit more time before writing them off entirely.Apparently, this isn't the first time Scott's done this particular dance - just the most public one - so it smells like a similar situation to me. If the band don't see any reason to back him up on this - and they might have been out of touch with him a while, but they surely know him better than me - I don't see any reason to differ.
  • Posted 1 year ago in A name for "progressive metal punk?"
    If most of the examples LightningRider's thinking of are usually described as some flavour of 'core, why not just go with "progcore"?
  • Posted more than 2 years ago in Sean Reinert R.I.P.
    An ugly coda to the story: despite strongly believing in organ donation, and despite the fact that he was clean of STDs, Sean's wish to donate his organs was denied simply because he was a gay man with a normal, active sex life:https://www.metalsucks.net/2020/02/11/sean-reinerts-organ-donor-request-was-denied-because-of-his-sexual-orientation/If any of us want to do some small thing in Sean's memory, I'd say making a monetary donation to a charity that supports transplant patients wouldn't be a terrible idea.

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Stephen wrote:
more than 2 years ago
agree, welcome to the site and please keep them coming friend
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more than 2 years ago
You write some really good quality reviews. I hope to see more from you in the future.

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