Love Songs

As I have mentioned before, I am getting married next summer. As such, love has been on my mind a great deal. My fiancee and I have been talking about songs to play at the reception. Obviously, metal does not have a great deal of love songs, being a much more aggressive genre of music. Still there are a few. I'm just not sure how many are truly appropriate for a reception. Here's the list I have put together so far. I did not include songs about lost love, for the most part as that is a different emotion. As you can see, there are not many out there.

Amorphis: Silver Bride
CJSS: Thief of Hearts
Corrosion of Conformity: So Much Left Behind
Cradle of Filth: Nymphetamine
Demons & Wizards: Love's Tragedy Asunder
Dream Evil: Only for the Night
Firewind: Where Do We Go From Here?
Lacuna Coil: Entwined
Lacuna Coil: Devoted
Leaves' Eyes: Leaves' Eyes
Metallica: Nothing Else Matters
Motley Crue: Without You
Nightwish: Ever Dream
Nightwish: Feel for You
Queensryche: Jet City Woman
Queensryche: Another Rainy Night (Without You)
Scorpions: Still Loving You
The Sins of Thy Beloved: The Kiss
Type O Negative: Love You to Death

Halloween Playlist

It's Halloween! What am I listening to today, hmm?

NECROVORE: UNRELEASED EVIL
To start things off today, I picked Necrovore. Not a terribly frightening band or album, although it is extremely aggressive, powerful, and deals with death and the occult. Necrovore is the original Texas black metal band and has influenced countless other bands, including Thornspawn, Averse Sefira, Absu, and other gritty, dirty sounding bands from the state. The band also had a huge influence on the development of death metal and American black metal. Not bad for a band that only released one demo made up of four songs. This is a potentially unofficial bootleg of that demo and the band's rare recordings and live performance.

DANZIG: THRALL-DEMONSWEATLIVE
In my car, I have the EP from Danzig playing. Danzig has always been one of my favorite more ghoulish metal acts. The occultism in his lyrics is clear and the music is dark and forbidding. This EP featured the live version of "Mother" which turned out to be Danzig's biggest hit in mainstream music. It's not his best song, but it definitely won over a ton of fans. Many of whom remain fans today. Unfortunately, Danzig was never really able to match that success again and his music has declined a bit since his first three albums.

GWAR: RAGNAROK
Metal's ultimate costumed fiends. Gwar has built up quite a story behind their stage show and characters. The band even features frequent celebrity "executions" on stage, including Paris Hilton and Arnold Schwarzenegger. The band seldomly appears in public out of character. Good stuff.

MERCYFUL FATE: MELISSA
I had to get this one in, it had been awhile since I have had a chance to listen to it and it is one of the ultimate scary albums to listen to this time of year. I've written about it earlier this week, so I will refrain from going much further into it.

DANZIG II: LUCIFUGE
Again with Danzig. As mentioned earlier, this is pretty much perfect music for Halloween. Dark sounding with Danzig's trademarked vocals which sound like a demented, evil Elvis or Jim Morrison. Plus the occult lyrics fit in well.

FORCE OF EVIL: BLACK EMPIRE
This was discussed at length on Sunday. The horror movie references are too much to pass up.

MAYHEM: DE MYSTERIIS DOM SATHANAS
This was also discussed last weekend in my post on frightening albums.

THORNAFIRE: VOREX DECONSTRUCCION
This one's new. Death metal the way it should fucking be. Thornafire is one of my favorite newer bands and they play old school death metal in the vein of Morbid Angel, Incantation, Immolation, and Death. The dark atmosphere and frightening album cover make this a must-play on Halloween.

Thunderstorm Playlist

Well I'm sitting in the house with my girlfriend listening to the sound of the rain and thunder outside. I decided to see what songs in my personal collection are about rain, thunder, and storms just for the pure hell of it. That's right: PURE hell of it.

1. 3 Inches of Blood: Lord of the Storm
2. Aeternus: Midnatt Storm
3. Amon Amarth: An Ancient Sign of Coming Storm
4. Amon Amarth: North Sea Storm
5. Angelcorpse: Stormgods Unbound
6. Bathory: Through Blood by Thunder
7. Bestial Warlust: Within the Storm
8. Blind Guardian: Into the Storm
9. Cradle of Filth: Godspeed on the Devil's Thunder
10. Dark Tranquillity: Inside the Particle Storm
11. Dekapitator: The Storm Before the Calm
12. Dekapitator: Eye of the Storm
13. Destruktor: Nuclear Storm
14. Dissection: Storm of the Light's Bane
15. Domine: Thunderstorm
16. Eluveitie: Calling the Rain
17. God Forbid: The Rain
18. Grave Digger: Stormrider
19. Hellhammer: Metallic Storm
20. Hellhammer: The Third of the Storms
21. Hirax: Lightning Thunder
22. Immortal: Throned by Blackstorms
23. Immortal: Unsilent Storms in the North Abyss
24. In Flames: Artifacts of the Black Rain
25. King's X: Sunshine Rain
26. Lament Configuration: Storm Winds of Ancient Evil
27. Mastodon: Blood and Thunder
28. Mayhem: Key to the Storms
29. Moonspell: Made of Storm
30. Mors Principium Est: Cleansing Rain
31. Night in Gales: Thunderbeast
32. Novembers Doom: Rain
33. Ozzy Osbourne: Thunder Underground
34. Paradise Lost: Colossal Rains
35. Paths of Possession: Ash is Falling Rain
36. Queensryche: Before the Storm
37. Queensryche: Another Rainy Night (Without You)
38. Rotting Christ: Among Two Storms
39. Shadows Fall: Stormwinds
40. Slayer: Raining Blood
41. Watain: Storm of the Antichrist
42. White Zombie: Thunder Kiss '65
43. Zyklon: Storm Detonation

"Walk" Playlist

Well I'm back from the mountains of Colorado. I didn't get a lot of chances to check out any music stores, so I didn't come back with anything obscure and new. Not a big deal. The only store we stopped in didn't really have anything my favorite store didn't.

On the ride back, my girlfriend put a CD into my car sponsored by either the American Heart Association or Cancer Society, can't remember which. Anyway, all of the songs on the album had the word "walk" in the title. I was heckling her asking if some metal songs with the word were on that. Sure enough, no go. Oh well. Here's what I would have included:

1. Abysmal Dawn: Walk the Path of Fire
2. Black Sabbath: Walk Away
3. Cannibal Corpse: Death Walking Terror
4. Cryptopsy: The Pestilence that Walketh in Darkness
5. Defleshed: Walking the Moons of Mars
6. Deicide: Walk with the Devil in Dreams You Behold
7. Down: Nothing in Return (Walk Away)
8. God Forbid: Walk Alone
9. Iced Earth: I Walk Alone
10. Ihsahn: And He Shall Walk in Empty Places
11. Lamb of God: Walk With Me in Hell
12. Liege Lord: Walking Fire
13. Megadeth: Never Walk Alone...A Call to Arms
14. Megadeth: Sleepwalker
15. Moonspell: Firewalking
16. Moonspell: A Walk on the Darkside
17. Norther: Midnight Walker
18. Ozzy Osbourne: Walk on Water
19. Pantera: Walk
20. Soilwork: Brickwalker
21. Swallow the Sun: Doomed to Walk the Earth

The Reaper Playlist

I don't say much about my personal life, but decided it was time for something. My girlfriend and I have a blue heeler puppy. Due to his ferocious personality, he has been named Reaper, or better yet, The Reaper. Out of pure lack of anything better to do one afternoon, I scoured the Metal Archives for some of the best songs with The Reaper's name in it. Just to put together his own personal playlist or soundtrack. I have not heard all of these songs, the only criteria was that the name of the song had to include "Reaper". So without further ado, the terrifying soundtrack to The Reaper:

1. Angus McDeth: Fresh Corpse for the Reaper: The Reaper hasn't quite figured out he's a carnivore at this point, although he has been a constant headache for the cats and the other dogs.
2. Anticosm: Here Comes the Reaper: Cover your face, he tends to go for it and he can jump.
3. As Dusk Unfolds: Behold, the Reaper: And all of his smelly, horrible glory!
4. Autumnal Reaper: March of the Reaper: He doesn't march so much as trot.
5. Children of Bodom: Follow the Reaper: It's best to keep your eyes on him at all times in order to avoid him launching himself into your crotch.
6. Crucified Mortals: The Reaper’s Blade: Thankfully, The Reaper is not armed.
7. Dark Illusion: Reaper of Souls: Your soul will belong to The Reaper.
8. Dissection: Soulreaper: See above.
9. Hell-Born: We Bring the Reaper: Hopefully we leave him with you so he will leave us alone.
10. Hellhammer: Reaper: Simple, direct, Hellhammer.
11. Helvetets Port: Killed by a Reaper: It's a long, slow, painful death.
12. Horrid Corpse: Grim is the Reaper: Actually, happy and stupid is The Reaper.
13. Key of Mythras: Hail the Reaper: It's best not to do so, he already has a massive ego.
14. Loudness: Call of the Reaper: It's a shrill, high-pitched bark, not difficult to miss.
15. Mendeed: The Reaper Waits: Hopefully for food.
16. Mr. Jumbo: The Reaper was Faster: Damn straight. Running does no good.
17. Nifelheim: Storm of the Reaper: More of a pout than a storm.
18. Onward: Feast for the Reaper: Ah, puppy food.
19. Psilocybin: Reaper Attack!: Thankfully we have not taught him this command, he picked i up on his own.
20. Reapers Domain: Domain of the Reaper: It's a small kennel, occasionally with blankets that he likes to destroy.
21. Runemagick: Return of the Reaper: Damnit.
22. Sabbat: Possession of the Reaper: Probably already done, not sure though.
23. Satani Infernalis: The Reaper’s Stare: He's not great at maintaining eye contact, he is a puppy.
24. Six Feet Under: Shadow of the Reaper: He's about a foot and a half high, so it's not much of a shadow.
25. Soulreaper: Godless Reaper of Souls: See #8.
26. Sweet Sorrow: The Solitary Reaper: He's only solitary because he pisses all the other animals off all the time.
27. Wolf: (Don’t Fear) The Reaper: BOC cover, but still. You should fear The Reaper.