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Post your reviews of your favourite albums of 2006 that you think other people should listen to.

The albums I got this year that I think are fucking awesome:

Bal Sagoth - The Chthonic Chronicles - awesome, heavy, really well produced. Mystical, symphonic and uncompromisingly artistic.

Belphegor - Pestapokalypse - not listened to this that much yet, but seems like a decent behemoth-copying/inspired band to listen to while the actual Behemoth are busy writing new stuff.

Deicide - The Stench of Redemption - I think it's fuckin' awesome! Easily their best drumming to date and the riffs are all pretty good.

Grave - As Rapture Comes - more awesome stuff from these vastly underrated guys. Rifftacular, heavy, intense.

Misery Index - Discordia - This is the kind of Grind I can really enjoy. The focus is on the songwriting and not being your average wall of noise of your average grind album.

Kataklysm - The Road to Devastation - more quality stuff as they experiment more with melody while remaining pretty damn heavy.

Anaal Nathrakh - Eschaton - not out yet, but what I've heard is fucking awesome, will probably be my album of the year.

Zyklon - Disintegrate - death/black metal supergroup awesomeness, as you'd expect. Consistently good, though Aeon is their best album to date, in my humble opinion.

Napalm Death - Smear Campaign - not as good as The Code is Red, in my opinion, not enough focus on the slow riffs, but still pretty decent and worth listening to. A few religious points to make, as well as being generally politically aware as per usual, even if they do support PETA (ugh).

Honourable mentions: The new Cradle album, Thornography, didn't really catch me, outdone by an order of magnitude by Bal Sagoth, The Suffocation album was good, but I'm not a big fan of theirs, new cannibal corpse was a bit mediocre. They're not bad, exactly, but not as great as the above.

Blind Guardian - A Twist in The Myth: It's good, but sounds more like Somewhere Far Beyond than anything else.

Weird Al Yankovic - Straight Outta Lynwood: Just great, White and Nerdy is probably his best song in a very long time.

"Springtime can Kill You" by Jolie Holland - One of the best album of the summer, Jolie Holland produces the best traditional folk rock, with the possible exception of M. Ward. I think she's going to be very well-regarded henceforth. [Indie/Modern Folk-Rock]

"Post War" by M. Ward - M. Ward might be the most talented American musician right now. [Indie/Modern Folk-Rock]

"Silent Shout" by The Knife - Anyone who likes Bjork should check out these Swedish rockers. [Indie-Electronica]

"Fabriclive.26" by The Herbaliser - I think The Herbaliser is the last group left still producing good hip-hop, and this album is the best hip-hop party-cd to have this year. [Hip-Hop/Electronica]

"This is an Excercise" by Anna Oxygen - Anna Oxygen's sophomore album demonstrated how talented and creative she is. On this electronica album she laid down some tunes that are both haunting and groovy at the same time. Best low-fi synth I've heard from an American artist ever. [Indie- Synth-Pop]

"Curse your Little Heart" by Devotchka - No one's ever heard of these I bet, but I've seen them play twice (at Bonnaroo in June and Pittsburgh in July) and these musicians play the slickest gypsy-esque-sounding rock ever. Very, very unique sound. [Indie-Rock]

"Rather Ripped" by Sonic Youth - Sonic-FUCKING-Youth's best album since the '90's (at least in my opinion) These guys have been on the cutting edge for like a quarter century and they still do things no one else can.

"The Loon" by Tapes&Tapes- I was pleasantly surprised by this Indie Band from Minnesota(?!) The music is both reflective and upbeat sort of like The Shins and Clap Your Hands and Say Yeah. [Indie-Rock]

EDIT:

I almost forgot "Nine Times that Same Song" by Love is All : Another new Swedish band, these guys produced the best fun-sounding rock albums of the year. Anyone who likes good 'ole fashioned loud rock should check them out. [Indie-Rock/Indie-Pop]

The only album i bought so far this year has been Tool's 10,000 Days, and to be honest it was a bit of a let down.

I'm looking forward to Amon Amarth's new album, With Oden on Our Side!

The Black Waltz - Kalmah: Melodic, hard, heavy, and catchy as hell, it's my album of the year thus far. It has such great variety, balance, and ambiance.

Deaf to our Prayers - Heaven Shall Burn: A close second, this album saw HSB ditch the keyboards and clean vocals of "Antigone" to make a much more focused and brutal album. It is, I can't avoid the analogy, bone-crunching.

Blood Mountain - Mastodon: Sludgy, agressive, and highly technical "prog-metal". I really think these guys are getting ready to supplant Tool as the premier "weird prog-metal" band.

The Fall of Ideals - All that Remains: Some really good metalcore (don't laugh). There's almost as much singing as screaming on this one, but the drums and guitars have improved, and their sound has become much more distinct.

And I'm still waiting on a few...

Lord Pounder wrote:The only album i bought so far this year has been Tool's 10,000 Days, and to be honest it was a bit of a let down.

Seconded.

Hm. They don't make my kind of music anymore.

Unless you count compilation albums gathered together and made in 2006, in which case I'm sure I could find a few. I saw this nifty Black Sabbath package awhile ago, but I think it was '05...

I Choose Noise, by Hybrid. It's less experimental than say, Morning Sci-Fi, but it's probably the best out of the lot. There are really no bad tracks on it, so I was quite pleased.

I dissappointed by DJ Shadow's new offering, The Outsider. Compared to Entroducing, it was really quite ordinary; it has a few tracks which I really good, but other than that - nada.

Was the latest The Darkness one this year or last? I can never remember...

To be honest, they arnt to many bands I like at the moment, I'm hoping a half decent Rock band is around the corner...

Brother-Captain Gaius wrote:Hm. They don't make my kind of music anymore.

Unless you count compilation albums gathered together and made in 2006, in which case I'm sure I could find a few. I saw this nifty Black Sabbath package awhile ago, but I think it was '05...

I'm with Gaius, Johnny Cash is dead and unless he left some work yet to be compiled into an album there isn't much hope of new Cash CD's. Although I heard on the radio that Ozzy is working on a new album, that'll get my attention when it comes out.

Slight bump. I bought the Scissor Sisters new album Ta-dah today. It fucking owns. If this album doesn't make you smile and set you up for a good night out on the town you're a corpse. Even my dad who hates anything produced since the late 80's liked it.

Lord Pounder wrote:Slight bump. I bought the Scissor Sisters new album Ta-dah today. It fucking owns. If this album doesn't make you smile and set you up for a good night out on the town you're a corpse. Even my dad who hates anything produced since the late 80's liked it.

Ah you reccomend it then? My dad seems to be under the impression Ta Dah was going to suck for some reason....

I'd consider it to be one of the best albums i've heard in a long time. Kiss You Off & She's My Man stand out in perticular.