Fri 14 Aug – Progressive Nation 2009

I got bloody jipped, that's what happened. I've never really been dissapointed on the whole with a gig, but in this case I was. This may come as a surprise to some readers, but I grew tired of Dream Theater only months after highly lauding Systematic Chaos myself. In fact, I boasted for a good month that it was one of their best works since Awake. But, upon careful perusal of the audio abomination they like to call Black Clouds & Silver Linings, I took to fleeing their music altogether. I'd already stopped…

Tue 17 Feb – Meshuggah, Cynic, The Faceless

What can I say? I'll keep this short.

I wasn't expecting much from The Faceless, but they played a spot on set. Not really my sort of music, but they had some cool clean sections and solos. But at the end of the day, you realize they're a one trick pony and the music gets old quickly. They also just stood there, which sucked. The guitarist on the left side using the Ibanez seemed bored; same with the wanker using the green guitar.

Cynic - amazing. I can't believe I saw…

I'll just mention some of the bands that I've seen in order from best live band to worst and then talk about some of the highlights of the last few concerts I've been to.

Opeth - 9.6/10
3 - 9.5/10
Dream Theater - 9.4/10 (this is only 9.4 because I didn't get to see them very close, so this didn't feel personal like small venues do. But, they were incredibly spot on including LaBrie)
Symphony X (seen twice) - 9.2/10 (shitty venues and a lack of energy in comparison to other bands didn't make one of my favourite bands the…

July 18th, 2007 @ The Opera House

First off, Echoes of Eternity started up, and I hadn't given them a listen before, but the female frontwoman gave it her all and you could feel it. As well they had LOADS of headbang-worthy riffs and the double bass could be heard very well over her vocals (which should have been turned up a little). They had a decent set with a mellow song in there so I was happy.

Then on came Sanctity who I had already heard and was not impressed with. But, they gave it their all, and that's…

I was supposed to go to a festival and a gig, first on the 23rd of December, called Black Xmas (Woods of Ypres were headlining and the support included Deathmarch, Green Evening Requiem, Wolven Ancestry and another band I believe). Green Evening Requiem had difficulty getting past the border and spent 10 hours in a car just getting to Toronto. According to some people on the forums, some people flew in for the show from Mexico, and I'm sure people flew in to see Quo Vadis as well. However, me and 3 other guys spent 6 hours…

I thought that the MusicBrainz software was usually spot on about the songs it tagged, but Dream Theater's I Walk Beside You was tagged improperly. I thought I liked that song, so I looked up the lyrics and thought I got the wrong title. I looked it up and MusicBrainz was wrong, so I had to retag it as James LaBrie's Invisible. Well, I downloaded another I Walk Beside You and it was once again Invisible by James LaBrie. The download after though proved to be more succesful as I got the real song from Octavarium. Firstly, after…

Name your top 10 most played bands on Last.fm:
1. Symphony X
2. Testament
3. Opeth
4. Death
5. Nile
6. Carcass
7. Nevermore
8. Morbid Angel
9. Necrophagist
10. Cryptopsy

Now answer the questions according to the numbers:

What was the first song you ever heard by 6?

Buried Dreams

What is your favourite album of 2?

The New Order

What is your favourite lyric that 5 has sung?

"The doom of Ra is upon you,
Lashed to the Slave Stick,
Abata ankh t khet,
Lashed to the Slave Stick,
Neba t steb tcha"

How many times have you…

Find the number of listeners for each of your top 10 artists and add them up and divide by 10 to get the average.

1) Testament (25,215 listeners)

2) Opeth (47,490 listeners)

3) Symphony X (12,635 listeners)

4) Nile (19,716 listeners)

5) Nevermore (24,227 listeners)

6) Carcass (21,271 listeners)

7) Death (30,706 listeners)

8) Necrophagist (5,861 listeners)

9) Pestilence (3,434 listeners)

10) Cryptopsy (13,981 listeners)

My total score comes to (rounded down to the nearest whole number):
204,536 divided by 10 = 20,454

By way of contrast, if you listened to the same top 10 as all of Last.fm has,…

1 - How does the world see me?
Song: Out of the Ashes
Artist: Symphony X
Comments: In reality, I'd think the opposite of that.
2 - Will I have a happy life?
Song: Echoes of Death
Artist: Pestilence
Comments: blah, I knew there were rumours about me. Or maybe I'll die of an epidemic. Meh.

3 - What do my friends really think of me?
Song: Home
Artist: Dream Theater
Comments: Good to know. I like to think so.

4 - Do people secretly lust after me?
Song: Dark Age
Artist: Vader
Comments: Damn right it's the dark age,…

I'm sure you've come upon these people who claim they can't stand the "screaming" in your death/black/viking/whatever other metal you listen to. Sometimes it's just that they think it takes no talent. "Normal singing with talent would work much better". Then they scowl and claim that listening to death metal makes you more lenient to kill somebody. I'm past the point where I'm surprised to hear it, I'm quite used to it really. But how about rap or emo? Those same people are friends with emo kids and the rap kids. What's their music about? Depression, Drugs, Murder, and Bling?…