morriscroy

Listening to Amaranthe's recent album "The Catalyst", released a few weeks ago by Nuclear Blast.

I never heard of them previously. This album sound like a pop band writing songs in a "Korn" or a "System of a Down" style, with three lead vocalists. (One vocalist is a lower pitched growler). Going through their previous albums on youtube, it sounds like the same style of writing.

(I didn't really listen to then-current metal bands in the mid-late 1990s or early 2000s. So I'm not really familiar with the styles which came about during these time periods around 25 years ago, other than what appeared on music channels like vh1, mtv, etc .... )

Doing some more googling, it appears Amaranthe was one of several bands who were kicked off and deleted from the metal-archives web site for not being "metal" enough (allegedly).

The Cow

^^ They've been around a while, they are hit and miss, but I like them. Their former clean male singer has a band called Cyhra that I kinda like (better live than record). Their current clean male singer is also in a band called Dyanzty that is a lot better than the band name , pretty solid. Elize Ryd the female singer pops up in collaborations with a lot of other bands (kind of like Alissa and Lzzy Hale do). I saw Kamelot with both Alissa and Elize singing with them a few years ago, that was pretty cool

I like the Amaranthe cover of Sabaton's "82nd all the way".

cultshock

I love the Metal Archives' "Is this metal or not?" gatekeeping.

Trout

They don’t even have Last Days of Humanity listed, but other bands like them are there.

morriscroy

Another similar case I encountered is a swedish metal band that is still on metal archives web site, but who sounds even "lighter" than Amaranthe. I first came across Metalite, before encountering Amaranthe. They sound sorta like an EDM trance artist writing speed metal tunes with a pop singer.

Back in the 1990s, I use to attend techno raves where "trance" music was played frequently. I haven't really come across many bands that sound like trance music played in a metal style.

morriscroy

Thanks for bringing up Dynazty.

I looked up Dynazty on youtube. (I haven't heard them before).

The singer sounds a lot more versatile than his performances on recent Amaranthe songs, with more traditional power metal type writing. Not as much keyboards compared to Amaranthe.

morriscroy

Did a recent deep dive into the back catalog of Visions of Atlantis. This is one wildly inconsistent band, where the primary songwriter changes frequently. The only consistent member is the drummer Thomas Caser, whose day job is working at Napalm Records where he is currently the CEO.

On the first two albums "Eternal Endless Infinity" (2002) and "Cast Away" (2004), it sounds like a "me too Nightwish". Not entirely clear who was the primary songwriter. On the second album, it appears the songwriting was mostly done by the keyboardist, guitarist, and the producer.

The third album "Trinity" (2007) sounds more like power metal and less "symphonic", where a different guitarist (Koch) appears to have been doing most of the songwriting (according to an old interview with the then-current singer Ferlaak).

The fourth "Delta" (2011) and fifth "Ethera" (2013) sounds more like pop music, with the keyboardist (Harb) doing most of the writing.


The recent incarnation with singer Clementine Delauney, were the sixth "Deep and The Dark" (2018) and seventh Wanderers (2019) where the primary songwriter appears to be the producer Pitters.

I thought the eighth album "Pirates" (2022) had much better songwriting than their previous albums, where a lot of it appears to have been written by the second lead singer Guaitoli and the producer (Heldt). Guaitoli happens to also be a lead singer and songwriter in Temperance.

Josh-da-man

Yes, Metal Archives, by all means, lets run the hot chicks away from the scene.

Speaking as an oldhead, we would have killed to have ladies like this in the scene back in the 1980s and 1990s.

morriscroy

Back in the day circa late 1980s / early 1990s before grunge became popular, the various punk rock concerts had plenty of women showing up.

Whether such women were "hot", was dependent on whether one had an interest in women who were: heavily tattooed, excessive piercings, unconventional wild hairstyles, etc ...

beavis69

I see more and more women at metal shows recently, so the scene seems to be more accepting (or just less douchbaggy about it).

One interesting experience I had was when I went to Tokyo and happened to catch a Decapitated show. Easily 60% of the people in the crowd were women and other than one other guy and me the pit was nothing but women. Was a really fun show. My wife had actually called the venue for me, as my Japanese is horrible, to find it if there were anymore tickets. She was given all the info and told me tickets would be available at the door. When I arrived (finally, couldn't find a sign and didn't realize it was in the basement of the building) the tickets were $100 USD. I thought that was crazy high for a 3 band bill but it was Japan and traveling was probably expensive. Also wanted to see a show in Japan. Show was great but since I spent so much on ticket I didn't buy merch or beer. Get back to her moms place and the next morning they are asking me how the show was. Told them how expensive it was and said that I ended up not drinking because of that. My wife then goes, oh crap I forgot to tell you that the ticket came with unlimited drinks. Thanks babe.

cultshock

Ouch! I've never been to a metal show in Japan yet, but really want to. And yes, I've noticed more women at shows as well, and it's a good thing.

morriscroy

I think I found the perfect background music for me, to play at home in a loop. I decided to order Metalite's past three cds, which came in the mail recently.

- Biomechanicals (2019)
- A Virtual World (2021)
- Expedition One (2024)

(Still waiting for the debut 2017 cd "Heroes In Time" to arrive in the mail).

Trout

Finally got the new Witch Vomit. Pretty good DM release, but nothing that treads new ground (I even think the last album sounded heavier, but still good nonetheless).