The Conversation: 2020 In Review

CHRIS C: Time is inevitable, but it's also a human construct. We cannot stop the inevitable march forward, but the way we divide it is entirely of our own creation. There is nothing special about one revolution around the sun that sets it apart from the others, but we use those markers to organize our memories, to note whether progress has drawn closer or pulled further away. Some of these chapters are more memorable than others, some are times in our lives we will never forget, no matter how much we may try to do so.

This year is one of those times. I don't need to recite chapter and verse as to why, but I think we can all agree 2020 will be one of the years we find ourselves talking about when we are older. Much as 2001 was a definitive year in our experience, so too will 2020 haunt our memories for the rest of time.

But will we remember the music of 2020? That's the question we sit down to answer now, or to at least ramble on for a while as we try to figure out our own thoughts. I don't want to get too deep into the weeds right off the bat, but I'll say this about 2020 in the music world; it was far more normal than I expected. When the world got sent into chaos, there was no telling what would happen, but the end result was entirely normal, at least in terms of albums. We'll get to talking about the concert business at some point, I'm sure.

In terms of albums, we did get many delayed as bands tried to wait out the pandemic before releasing new music (and some of those are still delayed at this moment). We addressed the wisdom of those decisions at the midpoint of the year, but we can revisit that as we see the unchanging situation now ready to stretch on far longer. That happened, but we also did get a steady stream of albums coming out, both to give us something to get us through these tough times, but also because music was being created in the meantime. The 'quarantine album' is a very real thing, for better and worse.

So what I find interesting about 2020 is if I look only at the roster of albums I listened to and/or reviewed this year, and the lists of the best and worst, it looks like any other year. Inside the music bubble, this year wasn't so different after all. That's a comforting thought.

D.M: I admit, I am torn here.  It's cliché to say it now, but that doesn't make it less true - 2020 has been one of the most upside-down, generally crappy years that anyone can remember.  I won't pile on, but there it is.  And you are absolutely correct in your assessment, that this is a year people will write books about.  How ironic that, to paraphrase the old joke, hindsight will be 2020.  I have tried to look on it with a certain degree of detached objectivity, but that becomes increasingly difficult as there are few other outlets for me.

That objectivity however, means I am personally a little torn.  The individual generally does not outweigh the many (I learned that from Spock in Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan,) but for me personally, it's been a pretty good year.  I've been afforded some professional opportunities that I never would have otherwise, and I've been granted the chance to reflect and reset the priority order of my obligations.  Of course, all of those opportunities have come at the expense of someone else's opportunity, and that feeling is difficult to rationalize.  And of course, my wife is an ICU nurse, and I don't wish the hell she went through (and may go through again,) on anyone.  Compared to her, my life has been positively a bowl of cherries.

I mentioned the limited number of outlets - one of the ones that's remained my constant companion, and in fact the reason we're here for this discussion, has been music.  I'm gonna go out on a limb, but I dare say 2020 has been a surprisingly outstanding musical year.  I won't give away any of the surprises here, but as I look at my prospective top albums of the year, several thoughts come to mind.  First of all, we're still in November as I write this, and I already have a pretty solid picture of what my final list will look like, where the last two or three years have taken me to the eleventh hour to scrape together enough albums to make a list.  Of the eleven records I currently have on paper (because it always goes to eleven,) by degrees there are three that I am enraptured by, three that I would be happy to go out with on my shield, three that I could easily and vociferously defend in an educated debate, and then two more that I feel strongly about.  And this is before I've done my final sweep of the last promos we've got in, and before I've had a chance to digest the new Killer Be Killed or the new Soilwork, neither of which is guaranteed to be great, but both of which come with some expectations.

I had to go back and take a journey through the part of my music catalogue that spans my entire career in music journalism (if I dare aspire to either of those appellations,) and 2020 is the best year I've had since 2014, which was headlined by Red Eleven, Destrage, Anti-Mortem (who's back now?) Red Dragon Cartel and Nim Vind.  (For the record, 2011 is still the gold standard for me, but I won't bore with the details.)

I will give one spoiler away - after seven or eight years of complaining about its absence, rap has made a return to my top albums!  And I have additional thoughts about that, too, but I'll save it until we get deeper into the reeds.  Let me also tease that I have some other thoughts which temper my enthusiasm for my list just the smallest bit.  But I am not letting them get in the way of my joy.

But it was more than that.  Each year, I keep a rudimentary flowchart of the albums that have made the first cut and that I can officially label "of interest."  Sidebar - I kinda hate it that I've become like the stereotype of a record executive, where I can gauge my interest in an album/band within about thirty seconds.  Anyway, as I go back through and render final judgements on each entrant, it can range from a straight "nope" to something more.  This year, more than any year in recent memory, a greater percentage of those notes say things like "really cool, but has one serious flaw," or "innovate, but doesn't click" or "went for it, next album will be better."  That in and of itself is an encouraging sign for the future.  Hell, even bands I've never liked such as Black Dahlia Murder and Seether (real opposites, there,) put out albums that made me tip my cap in respect.  

And of course, all this overflow of musical genius came in a year when I (and I think everyone,) spent the great bulk of it stressed out, overwhelmed and slowly losing my mind.  So this music must be really good.

What did you like?


CHRIS C: I'm not sure if I would go so far as to say this has been a great year for music, not so much because of the number of good albums, but because of something I was planning to get to a bit later. First, let me just say again that I am absolutely terrible with dates, so when such questions pop up, I cannot quickly recall entire lists and tell you which years were great and which were not. Other than my top album each year, and maybe one more than that, I rarely remember which year certain things came out. In fact, I was just starting to think if there are any albums celebrating anniversaries next year I will need to talk about, and I drew an almost complete blank. I guess that's my way of saying this year has been good, but maybe not entirely great. So, at least musically, it was very much like most years.

I do not have any rap on my list, but I do have a surprise of my own. As uncool as it might make me to say, I really found myself enjoying Taylor Swift's quarantine album. It strips away the veneer of modern pop, and lets the songs stand out. As a songwriter myself, it really showcases she is talented, when you put aside the image and tabloid stories.

Like you, I can also criticize the albums on my list. In fact, I did just that when I posted my mid-year favorites. I get a lot of flak (a lot of it) from a certain community I participate in, because I say such things. I don't see the problem with seeing and acknowledging faults. Just because I don't fawn over things, and heap rapturous praise on every detail, so what? You can love something that is flawed, and constructive criticism is how we learn and improve. It doesn't help anyone, myself included, to pretend shortcomings don't exist. We seem to be at a point in time where everything has become hyper-sensitive, and people who are fans of something consider any negative talk to be heresy. I don't get it. Then again, I've never understood complete veneration.

What you're describing, which I feel applies to me most of the time as well, says two things about us; 1)We know what we like, and 2)We're experienced enough to be good judges. I take it as a badge of honor that I don't need to spend huge amounts of time with a record to know if it's terrible, or if it has some promise. Sheryl Crow once wrote, "good is good and bad is bad". We overcomplicate things sometimes, all because we want to think there's something more to this whole endeavor than that.

To get to the point I mentioned earlier, what I found interesting about music this year was my own reaction to it. Whether it was entirely my own mind, or the circumstances of the year pushing me in that direction, I was drawn to music that made me feel better. I wanted music that lifted my spirits, or gave me words of inspiration. There's an album from the band Spanish Love Songs that received a host of critical acclaim, and for good reason. It's a great record.... but the lyrics are all about crushing despair, the hopelessness of American life, and things such as watching your father shoot up heroin. I'm sorry, but I can't relate in any way to the themes and messages of the record. I know a lot of people do, and that's great if it helps them, but it keeps me at arm's length. The same thing happens with, for instance, power metal. I've gotten to the point where all the songs about knights and battle feel so hollow. They don't relate to my life in any way, so I feel like a bit of a putz singing along in my head.

We've talked about this phenomenon before, but hearing someone else's misery in music doesn't make my own feelings any better. Two wrongs don't make a right, so to speak. So I think the music on my list is both boosted and hobbled by all of this. The albums that made me feel better are the ones that found their way onto the list, but many of them are also hampered by choices and details that make them harder to love.

So maybe this year isn't one where you find the silver linings in the clouds, but rather one where you remember the silver lining is only there because it's cloudy. What say you?


D.M:  First off, oh no, you don't - I will not allow us to get sidetracked onto a Taylor Swift conversation like we do every year.  How does this keep happening to us?  I don't think I can personally name more than three of her songs, and somehow I pen an essay about her in this conversation each December.  NonononoNO!

Since you mentioned the anniversaries next year, I'm putting this out there in a public forum - 2021 will be the thirtieth anniversary of both the greatest music what-if? in my lifetime (what if Soundgarden had released "Badmotorfinger" before Nirvana released "Nevermind"?) AND the debut of perhaps the most successful and simultaneously most divisive album in metal history - Metallica's Black Album.  I've written somewhat extensively about the former, but I think you and I should deep dive on the latter at some point next year.  That album is a big deal (which is a criminal understatement.)

I've never gotten the complete veneration, either.  Life is rarely an all-or-nothing proposition, and anyone who speaks solely in ultimatums either isn't very bright or is totally missing the point.  To drill down into it, I think what I truly understand is the automatic veneration.  Like, in my darkened corner of the musical world, you're hard pressed to find a metal journalist who is willing to cede that Behemoth has ever written a song that is less than perfect.  It's almost like a joke on a late-night show: "who's your favorite metal band, and why is it Behemoth?"  Full disclosure; I'm not a fan of Behemoth and never have been, but I find it objectively difficult to believe that the band has been batting a thousand for 3 plus decades.  No artist has thrown a perfect game for their entire career.  Not the Beatles or the Stones of any of the other cliche' old names that get dragged around.  Even AC/DC and Motorhead, forever the paragons of consistency, have songs that suck (blasphemy, I know, but outside of the title track, AC/DC's entire "For Those About to Rock" album isn't in any way compelling, never mind just about everything that happened between "Who Made Who" and "Razor's Edge.")  But to go onto a metal forum of any kind and try to speak ill of Behemoth is to invite a mob to draw and quarter you in the town square.  And no disrespect to Behemoth from me, I'm merely positing them as the most prevalent example.  I mean, to throw another one out there, Mike Patton practically has his own cult, and have you heard the "Lovage" album he did?  it's awful.

It seems like, psychologically, there's a point of inversion where if you are devoted to an idea for a long enough time, it's not that you support the idea, but rather that the idea sustains you.  I'll use a personal analogy, although I admit that the allegory applies on a much deeper level than the superficial story I'm going to tell.  There was a period of probably fifteen years or so when I only bought Nike sneakers.  It started in my late teen years when, for the first time in my life, I could afford them.  And they make a great shoe!  So the next time I needed sneakers, I bought Nike again, because I knew they made a product I enjoyed.  Pretty soon, I was only buying Nikes, and never even looked at other shoe companies.  I was tied to the brand.  Same concept with music and art and politics and whatever else - there's a tunnel vision that develops with fandom.

The concept you mentioned of consciously looking for a silver lining is an interesting one.  The idea that in the recesses of our agonizing brains, we want there to be something to like this year, a touchstone to remind us of the things we haven't been able to do.  I certainly don't need more reasons to feel bad, and you and I have always been on the same page about that - knowing other people feel bad doesn't make me feel better.  I think, in that case, you're supposed to internalize the music and make it about you, but I've never been able to put myself in the center of music and hear my own voice like that.  I invariably hear someone singing to me, rather than the music being a projection of myself.  

We've both talked about having a knock on our favorite albums this year - you go first while I collect my thoughts


CHRIS C: Sorry, I didn't mean to distract us from the serious topics with T-Swizzle. I'll let it be, although I do find the story of what's happening with her career's work to be rather interesting. I would switch gears to our annual Springsteen joke, but that's going to come up naturally in a paragraph or two.

I am certainly up for a discussion of "The Black Album" at some point. It truly might be the most important metal album of all time (in the mainstream sense), so there's plenty to talk about, I'm sure. My favorite wrinkle about that album is how it actually produced two hit singles out of the same song. "Enter Sandman" is an all-timer, but let's not forget "King Nothing" off of "Load" is the same damn song re-written, and it was also a huge hit on the rock charts. As for your 'what if', I don't think much would have been different. From my perspective, it wasn't grunge that was popular, thereby making all those bands huge. It was Nirvana being so massive it made grunge popular. So far removed from the moment, I'm not sure we correctly remember just how insanely big "Smells Like Teen Spirit" was, especially since no rock song could ever hope to do that today. Grunge was never going to get as big as it did without Nirvana leading the way. That's not a slight on Soundgarden, by the way. They just weren't the ones with THE song.

You're absolutely right that many outlets are reflexive in their praise of certain bands. Once they do something great, it's treated as an insult to say anything that comes after isn't as good. I'm sorry, but it usually isn't. I don't read Rolling Stone's reviews, but I see bits here and there, and I know they've practically given every Bob Dylan and Bruce Springsteen album for the last twenty years almost perfect scores. That is unfathomable, even without hearing a note. Now, I have heard a few of them, and there's no chance in hell they all deserve that kind of praise. Both of them put out albums this year, and I heard at least one song from each. They were both mediocre at best, and yet I still hear many people saying they're geniuses still at the top of their game. But it's weird how it only works for a select few. Elton John is also a legend, but his late-career work doesn't receive a fraction of that reaction. I would say that "Peachtree Road" and "The Captain & The Kid" are better than many of his 'classic' records, but try to find anyone in print say that.

I've always wondered if studying philosophy has something to do with my critical eye. Since that entailed dissecting arguments and finding the flaws in the logic, I can't help but look at everything critically. I can rattle off criticisms of my favorite artists without giving it a second thought. Meat Loaf? His voice was shot in the 80s, he embarrassed himself by singing a lyric about his dick being too big to fit in his pants, and his last album was so terribly sung it never should have been let out of the studio. Elvis Costello? Even by his own admission, some of his records are pure tripe. And he's not as good at experimenting with different genres as he thinks he is. You get the point. It doesn't diminish the good to point out the less than. All it really does is expose who is and isn't honest. We don't get paid enough, or at all, to lie about this stuff.

Yes, the concept of brand loyalty. It can be rather strange at times, and it works both ways. I'll use golf as my example. There are a lot of people who are tied to one brand of golf ball. I see a lot of guys who can't hit it to save their lives who are still spending $50 on a dozen Titleist Pro-V1s every other round, because they have convinced themselves the ball will make a difference. Maybe I'm the weird one, but while I have certain models i prefer more than others, I really don't care which stamp is on the side of it. Loyalty is the sort of thing that should go both ways. Companies never give us loyalty, and really, how many bands do either?

Maybe the thing about the silver lining comes down to the relationship we have with music, in terms of how we outwardly express it, not just how we internalize it. Since I am a songwriter, and someone who has to sing in order to bring those songs to life, I likely process a song and push it back out through my own voice more than you do. That might explain some of the gap between our experiences. We have a different relationship with a song when we learn it, when we give it our own voice. It's another example of how we don't always realize the ways in which we all hear the same thing differently.

As for this year, most of the albums on my favorites list have issues I would have corrected had I been in the producer's chair. Again, this doesn't stop me from thinking they're still great, but I don't see how ignoring the flaws does anyone any good. They range from a mix that's too hot for the dynamics to shine through at all, to being a carbon-copy of a previous album, to a lyrical focus so narrow it will exclude the life experience of most listeners (myself included). But the one that bothers me the most is how the album Russell Allen and Anette Olzon made is credited to the both of them, but they only sing together on half the songs. Not only does it make the record a bit disjointed to swing from one, to both, to the other, but it misses out on so many opportunities to do vocal blending that I found almost magical. I would guess it's because they got paid per song, and that saved money, but damn if I don't wish it had been done differently. That's my biggest one.

D.M:  Okay, I've successfully bullet-pointed all my thoughts for my ensuing diatribe about the state of music in 2020.

A brief aside - remember when I said I had my end of year list locked?  I am a filthy liar.  In my final sweeps to go over things I never had time to sit down with, and my reaching back for albums I may have missed, I now have nineteen contenders for four spots.  Uh-oh.  I clearly have a lot of listening to do over the holiday weekend.

Oh, and Happy Thanksgiving, by the way.  I hope you and your family are safe and enjoy some quiet time.

I want to open up to a larger question based on something you said in passing.  We've brushed on this before, but I don't know that we've ever really gotten two feet in on it.  You mentioned that companies and musical groups have never shown us any particular loyalty.  In the latter case - do bands owe us that?  While it's disappointing that they sometimes thumb their nose at their own fans in order to escape record contracts or whatever, I'm not sure that an artist should be terribly concerned with staying on message, or whatever the cliche is.  Particularly when looked at through the veins of other art mediums.  There can be no doubt that there were devoted fans of Picasso's Blue Period, but was he thinking of their possible reaction when he switched to Rose, and then ultimately to Cubism?  And what would the art world have missed out on if he had?  From the artist perspective, I find it more appropriate to think "this is the journey my talent is taking me on, you can come with me or don't."  Now, whether or not that's a good decision is a separate issue, but I wouldn't think it's our place as fans to dictate that path.  If Bruce Springsteen decided to suddenly do, well.....anything else at all, besides the same boilerplate rock over and over, it would be up to his fans to follow or not (count it!)

Alright, I promised I would have all my thoughts lined up, and here I go (in no order):

Let me take a couple hundred words to talk about rap.  I've lamented for years that rap hasn't found any new artists who speak to me, and while I appreciate the great artists I grew up with, this is a genre that thrives on youthful exuberance, so I haven't really been in a mindset to have forty year-olds rap at me (even as I rapidly hurtle inexorably toward being forty myself.)  So it was with great joy that I stumbled across a cadre of youthful rappers, not all of whom struck my particular taste, but all of whom presented an enticing image of an underground movement in rap.  It's well past time that rap gave the impression it was a genre of substance again, and here we....well, may be, at the very least.  Too soon to tell.  I won't give away the rap album that will appear in my top eleven but I will announce that there now might be two as I put the finishing locks on my list.

In addition, for the metal fans out there, there's a wave of rap that appeals on multiple levels.  I don't know entirely what to call it - industrial rap seems as good a label as any, though I dare not go farther for the risk of creating a pseudo-genre that doesn't really exist.  (Side note to this point: there's an album in my top ten that is being sold as "progressive deathcore."  For the record, that's not a thing.)  Industrial rap, or whatever we decide to call it, is the niche where he find young artists like Ghostemane.  And he gets it.  Scarlxrd gets it, too, but he's not there yet.  Jasiah is trying, but I'm not sure he's matured into the artist he wants to be yet.  The point is this - these guys are making music that is new and different and never before heard.  I don't know what the lifespan of this splinter is, or even where it goes from here.  I already have concerns that we may be seeing the finished product and there's no evolution to come.  But in this moment, this is, to my mind, on the bleeding edge of musical innovation.

Last part of my rap diatribe.  The genre seems to be moving to shorter songs, which might normally feel like a cop out, but I think is to the genre's benefit.  Rap for so long has lived in a space of moments - individual verses or even single rhyme couplets that demonstrate an attitude or particular wordplay.  To move to shorter songs may prevent some longer-form storytelling in the vein of Wu-Tang, but I don't know that there's anyone really doing that right now anyway.  Cutting out the fat is a good step that keeps the music crisp and concise and impactful.

Okay, back to the main subject at hand, which is the knocks on my favorite records of the year.  It really comes down to this: with one exception, which is (spoiler) Master Boot Record's "Floppy Disk Overdrive," the great majority of albums I love this year all sound like an album I loved at some point in the past.  Now, that's not a bad thing in and of itself, it's not even really a criticism, but as the years go by on this musical journey of existence, I am perpetually drawn to things that I can point to and say "I've never heard that before."  Turisas and Destrage and The Sword and Shawn James & The Shapeshifters were all bands that captured a particular sliver of attention because they were doing something new.  2020 hasn't had that same kind of innovation (the aforementioned rap not included.)  We talked about this offline when we were comparing notes on Blues Pills "Holy Moly!"  An incredible achievement and remarkable album to be certain, but kind of sounds like Blues Pills looked at Graveyard and said "we could do that."  I listened to the new Midnight album all the way back in January (a lifetime ago, it feels like,) and thought it was cool, but still just a dude who wanted to make a Venom record.

Most curious among these is the EP "Operation Take Over" from teen-girl metal group Gold, Frankincense and Myrrh.  On the one hand, it was fun and easy to listen to, and struck some of same chords as Falling in Reverse, but without the moral ambiguity and gut punch of at least passively endorsing Ronnie Radke.  On the other hand, it still leaves a slightly dirty taste in the mouth, because something about the presentation seems over-produced.  It's the same feeling I got the first time I really dug into Greta Van Fleet (they're back, right?  Did I see a single from them or something?) where my media-trained brained immediately wanted to know who was really pulling the strings here.

Anyway, that's a lot to digest.  I'll give you a chance to respond.  In the meantime, let's move on to stuff we did like - go!


CHRIS C: Do bands owe us loyalty? I'm going to say no, but I want to expand on that. By no means do I think bands owe it to us to make the music we want from them, nor do they owe it to us to release music on our schedule, nor to play 'the hits' in concerts. When it comes to the creative process, no, bands don't owe us anything. However, there have always been two things I do believe bands owe the fans; honesty and effort. Whatever creative route the band wants to take is fine, but they need to be giving it their all, and they need to be up front with the audience. Few things in music tick me off more than when a band obscures what they're actually doing/thinking. Tool didn't release an album for over a decade, but they did tell people they had a legal issue holding things up, and then they just flat-out work slow. That's honest, and I can respect that. I suppose I also respect when Michael Sweet tells us he only spends a week writing each Stryper and solo album.

But that gets to my second bit. Bands owe us their best effort. Does Michael Sweet give that to us when he spends so little time on a record? Judging the results, I would say no, but he also might not be capable of doing better anyway. This year, we got that illustrated by Green Day. You mentioned contracts, and all indications are that their record was to finish out theirs, but "Father Of All..." is a half-assed effort if I've ever heard one. And yes, even though I am not a big Green Day fan (I'm a weirdo whose favorite album is "Warning"), it pissed me off. I know streaming is the thing of the day, but they have fans who spent money buying copies of that record, and for it to not be a good faith effort I think is an insult from a band to their audience. Why would any fan ever be loyal to a band that treats them like that? I know I wouldn't.

Ok, I'm not loyal to any artists, other than the ones I have personally come to know as friends. I don't quite get how loyalty comes from hearing music, but I know my wiring is a bit abnormal. You know that thing about rooting for laundry, in sports? Yeah, I do that. I do find myself being drawn more to teams that look great, and I definitely pulled back on being a Buccaneers fan when they went to those god-awful alarm clock uniforms. Stupid, I know.

I find myself in the same boat as you, but not by any means intentionally. Many of the albums I have loved the most in recent years tread some ground I haven't always been a fan of, and yet those are the ones that stand out among the myriad albums that sound like everything else. It isn't something I'm trying to seek out, but I find it inevitable that we grow tired of hearing the same old thing again and again. I can only hear so many melodic rock and metal albums before they all blend into one another, and I want to listen to the ones that got to me before my brain turned into a jukebox mush. I don't penalize bands for sounding too much like what I've already heard, but it does up the requirements when it comes to songwriting. It might be unfair, but there is balance between quality and originality that grades on a curve.

Before I get to what I did like this year, let me start off with one thing I really didn't like; Witchcraft released an 'acoustic' album. It's terrible, but that's not the point I want to talk about. What really annoyed me is the way the entire nature of their music changed with the different instrumentation. There are a lot of rock people who don't seem to understand what the acoustic guitar is actually all about. It strikes me they used the instrument as an excuse for why the music was so dour and tuneless. You well know I play acoustic primarily, and there is absolutely no reason why acoustic music can't be everything rock already is, but simply with a more resonant and organic sound. It's a remarkably expressive instrument, if you bother learning how to use it. Witchcraft didn't, and I felt insulted they positioned the record to blame the guitar.

A further point; it also baffles me how often I've heard commentators of the rock and metal community who don't know the difference between an acoustic guitar and a clean electric guitar. They are very different, whether your average rock fan knows it or not. Going back just a bit, Opeth released an album called "Damnation", which is their purely soft record. I have heard it described as their 'acoustic' album before, even though there is barely one on the entire record. But I bring that up to reiterate my point about Witchcraft. Opeth changed up the sound of their instrumentation, and tread the same ground Witchcraft was going for, but their record was still engaging and tuneful. It can be done, if you want to do it right.

So what did I like this year? I liked that this year was an odd one. I not only found myself liking some things outside of my usual wheelhouse, such as Creeper's art/glam "Sex, Death, & The Infinite Void" and Spanish Love Songs' "Brave Faces Everyone", but also that the old stand-by genres delivered more than usual. I got some great power metal from Allen/Olzon and the best Serenity album (for me, not you it seems) yet. Let me take a minute here to also say there were some albums that won't wind up on my list, that nonetheless shifted my thinking a bit. I'm thinking of albums from The Birthday Massacre (far more synth-heavy than I usually like my music) and The Bombpops (when did I ever like Cali-punk?). I might have been lacking a bit on the top end of the spectrum, but the depth of the year was quite good. There are a lot of those second-tier albums that filled up the year with solid listening time.

What did you like and dislike most?


D.M: There are two off-the-wall, not-publicly acceptable places where you and I have always been on the same page.  First, and this came up recently in your review, we prefer the John Bush years of Anthrax to the Joey Belladonna years.  Second, we both think "Warning" is Green Day's best album.

Tangential to your acoustic point - I've never really cared one way or the other if a band does an acoustic record, even if it's outside their idiom.  But it bothers me when no thought it put into its execution.  Like, you can't just take the same stack of songs that made you famous and assume they work if you simply unplug.  A few years back, the Sick Puppies pooped out an acoustic EP, and it was just awful, because it was the same presentation, but with no fangs.  Nevermind that "So What I Lied" only half-works as an acoustic song, it's made worse by the fact that the profanity was removed, so now the lyrical cadence has these awful gaps in it. (That song in particular was the Wal-Mart exclusive bonus song, so maybe that was the problem right there, as that companies involuntary edits are well-known.)  When Nirvana and Alice in Chains recorded their now-classic MTV Unplugged records, they didn't do "Breed" or "Them Bones," because it wouldn't have made any sense.

Before I dive too deep into the reeds of my likes and dislikes, I want to take a moment and stress one point you made in relation to Opeth and Witchcraft.  You and I talk on these pages, seemingly all the time, about creativity.  And I don't want to confuse that with originality.  Too often, I think, the two are considered interchangeable, and I just don't know that that's the case.  It is, as you pointed out, entirely possible and indeed laudable to be creative without being original.  Originality is a very nice bonus, but isn't necessary to making great and compelling music, and I grant that there's a lot of overlap in that Venn diagram, but there is space on the margins to re-package the familiar in a new way.  Furthermore, the inclination by many would be to call that measure of creativity a lesser skill, but I view them more as equal abilities.  Hell, in some ways, throwing your own paint at the wall and running with it is easier than building off a template and making it your own.

What did I like?  I don't want to spoil too much of my upcoming year-end list, so let me talk about somethings I enjoyed that were outside of the best-of-the-best scope.  Can we talk about Carcass for a minute?  I don't think either of us would ever identify as fans of Carcass, but their talent as musicians is evident.  I remember we had this conversation about their "Surgical Steel" album seven years ago.  This is a situation where as a journalist, I am forced to say "I am not a fan of this band personally, but I recognize their artistic merit and value."  In extreme metal in particular, it's difficult to really stand out as apex musicians, and Carcass have found that appropriate balane again this year with their "Despicable" EP (which of course foreshadows their upcoming "Torn Arteries" album.)

For the first time, I truly enjoyed an Alestorm record, and not just for its absurdity and humor (though that comes with the caveat that "Shit Boat (No Fans)" is probably the song I sent to the most people this year.)  I feel like Alestorm matured just a little - not enough to dramatically change their presentation or affect, but enough to make their music smoother and more well-rounded.  I liked the album early in the year from the one-man band Midnight - this was a guy who clearly wanted to make an old Venom record, and accomplished just that.  Not an earth-shattering revelation of an album, but a fun listen and a good ride through a crusty style that gets overlooked a lot now.

Two different approaches - I appreciate that Powerman 5000 just went for it and made a borderline electronic record.  Spider has been trending that way for a decade now, I'm glad to see him just give in and make the record he wanted to make.  PM5K is forever a band trapped by their previous success, so who knows if "The Noble Rot," is a smart career move or not, but he's being true to his instincts.  (Side note counter to that - why did they record a new version of "When Worlds Collide?"  And if that was the plan, why record it in the same basic sound?  Why not do an electro-pop version or something?  That was a misstep.)  On the flip side, I enjoyed Annihilator still doing Annihilator things.  The Canadian veterans get overlooked in the grand scheme of thrash history, but Jeff Waters has managed to keep his band sounding sharp without ever really falling off the rails, and not one of the Big 4 can lay claim to the same.  The only other band in that era who can throw their hat in the ring is Overkill, and they don't really hit their stride until '89 (Testament, for the record, is standing just outside the ring.)

I also like that this musical year was good enough that for a few months, that Annihilator album was in Top Eleven consideration, but ultimately enough great stuff came along that I had to reluctantly cut it out.  This is a good problem to have.

I ultimately didn't care for, but respected the crap out of the attempt by Bleakheart, to try and combine the worlds of lounge singing (with a female vocalist, no less,) and doom metal.  To the point above, this was both original and creative, it just didn't quite come together.  Their next effort could well be a show-stopper.  That was, for me, one of the recurring themes of the year - new or newer bands who are finding their way and haven't discovered the right alchemical formula just yet, but keep your eyes out because they just might.  It's an encouraging place to be.

As we talked about at the mid-year, I appreciated that so many artists just went for it.  The quarantine album, as you said, was a real thing, and whether that meant back-to-basics or a chance to try something totally off the wall, it gave artists an outlet to be themselves and follow their passions without all the static and noise that too often muddies the signal.  Take Nergal, who I passively threw shade on earlier - his album with Me And That Man this year was a cool demonstration of versatility and clearly a passion project.  It was a well done and to his credit, especially for being totally outside his norm.  Oh, and as a kicker, I realized that while I don't care for Freddie Gibbs as a solo artist, in collaboration he's not bad!

And, it goes without saying, we finally got the Blackguard album "Storm."  Predictable spoiler - I'll be talking about this record more later.

One thing I didn't like - I only wrote like, six reviews this year.  Not acceptable.  I gotta up my game.

The big thing I didn't like, honestly, was one thing over and over again - high profile bands, or at least bands that had piqued my interest with previous success, that fell some degree of flat.  Just a short who's who - Killer Be Killed, Fight the Fight, Nachtblut, Brave the Cold (too bad for Dirk Verbeuren,) Finntroll, Ascension of the Watchers, Elm and Warbringer.

And to close my dislikes - Nuclear Power Trio.  These guys are supremely talented and composing jazz fusion of any stripe is so far above my musical pay grade as to be laughable.  But it just felt like it was in poor taste.

Anyway, back on the bright side - what are you looking forward to?


CHRIS C: I will always stand up for "Warning". There's something about it no other Green Day album has, and maybe that's the secret, or maybe it's just that I hadn't been listening to "Dookie" when I first saw "Minority" come out on MTV. Being the first real exposure might explain all of this. However, Green Day is not the only band where I like a complete outlier record, even among punk bands. I am also incredibly fond of Bad Religion's "The Dissent Of Man", which falls into the same category of records that are far less punk, and have more pop and classic rock influences than their usual outings. That is probably a controversial take as well, but it comes up far less often. Still, I'm sticking with it.

Absolutely, the execution of the music is of the utmost importance. Not every musical idea translates across every instrument with the same effectiveness, and it's the artist's responsibility to test these things out before they make asses of themselves. Case in point; Wes Scantlin of Puddle Of Mudd sang an acoustic Nirvana cover this year that went viral for how truly wretched it was. What was clear within a few seconds was that Wes' voice couldn't handle the song in the key he was playing, and that aggressive almost screaming vocal was a terrible fit for an acoustic performance. One would think someone like that would rehearse these things before putting them out into the world, just like one would think anyone with ears would have heard that and known it needed to be burned before anyone knew it existed. There was a way to do it... better, but no one took the time and effort to get it right. That could lead me back into my gripe about symphonic metal, but I don't feel like going through that yet again.

What you're talking about is another pet peeve of mine. I can't count how often I've grown frustrated hearing commenters praising this, that, or the other for doing something new. New is fine, but new can also be terrible. 'New Coke' was different and daring, but it also was terrible. I get that sense from a lot of music, where these days people are throwing stuff at the wall just to see what will stick. Poppy did that with her 'critically acclaimed' record, which was rather unique, but also god-awful. Quality is the only thing that should truly matter, but yet it doesn't. Much of the community would treat it as a stroke of genius if someone created the world's best feces cooker, without stopping to consider the idea itself never should have been thought up. Hugh Laurie and Stephen Fry did a bit years ago where they essentially threw random words together, stating it was a sentence no human had ever uttered before. They were right, and the irony is that these days I wonder if people would realize the comedy of the whole thing.

I don't listen to Carcass very much, even though I do think "Heartwork" is one of the best death metal albums ever made. The problem for me is that I saw a video of them playing the title track at Wacken, and Bill Steer's guitar was so out of tune, I have never been able to get the sound out of my head. It ruined that song for me.

One thing I didn't like: I felt like I wrote too much. There have been some times where, even as I have worked in more news and singles coverage, I still can't find anything interesting to say about a lot of albums. I'm getting burned out on mediocre music, and I'm not sure what steps I'll be taking next year about that.

I've found that pretty much every band is going to fall flat and disappoint me at some juncture. I was thinking about this recently, and there are almost no bands or artists out there who haven't had at least one of those moments. So I've learned to roll with it, and not get too disappointed in the inevitable. We can have this discussion sometime, but you can name almost every single band or artist I've ever listened to, and I can tell you where they disappointed me. But since I post a list of the most disappointing albums every year, I won't go into that right now.

I didn't listen to Nuclear Power Trio, specifically because it did look like it was in poor taste, and I knew I wouldn't have anything good to say about it. I almost had a similar moment early in the year, when The Bombpops put out the song "Notre Dame", where they compared a failing relationship to the tragic fire there. Was it in poor taste? Yes, it clearly was, but it wasn't crass, and it did feel punk, so I made peace with it. Not something I would have ever put into a song, but that's ok.

As for next year, there are a couple things I already know about I'm excited for. I already mentioned Soen will be putting out a new record, which isn't just something I'm looking forward to because I loved the last couple, but because it will be fascinating to me whether they can win three Album Of The Year awards in a row. Finding the point where familiarity breeds contempt is interesting. I'm also very much looking forward to the new Pale Waves record coming in February. Their debut was a perfect 'Daria rock' album, as I dubbed it, but they're talking about taking on more early 00s alternative/rock influences. A more rock version of the band sounds like it could be right up my alley. And even though I have my reservations about how Transatlantic is releasing their new album, they always create great things when they get together. There's always the rumor of new Iron Maiden possibly being on the horizon, and I know Emerson Hart is working on a new solo album (even though I'm growing less interested with each album further from Tonic he gets). The fun part is finding the stuff we didn't know was coming. Expectations only serve to get in the way.

What are you excited for in 2021, other than concerts possibly returning at some point?


D.M:  I am going through significant withdrawal because of the lack of live music.  I have not attended a live music recital since February.  My concert count for this year will be 1, which is a travesty.  But it's not the return of live music for live music's sake that I yearn for, it's the return to normalcy that that represents.  It's the hope that small, independent venues can hold out just a little longer until perhaps some cash can flow into their coffers again.  I have nothing against Bowery Presents venues or anything like that, some of them are favorites of mine, but the variety offered by St. Vitus and other small clubs is essential to the lifeblood of the scene at large.

Other than that, I think I might cop out a little here - I just want to see where 2021 takes us.  I want to see where some of these intriguing musical trends developed in the heart of quarantine end up going.  I want to see what some of these albums that got delayed end up sounding like.  In a curious way, the fact that 2020 was such a good musical year (for me,) begs the question of if I would have been exposed to all these records under normal circumstances?  To use the television term, how many of these albums were mid-season replacements?

That's what I'm looking forward to.  

As a closing thought from me - my wife is an ICU nurse.  She's essentially going through the pandemic for a second time, now.  Please, wear a mask.  It may be inconvenient, but it's important.