markm

Lucky where I live in MD west of 95 and Baltimore we got just a dusting....you guys up north are going to F'ng nailed. Hope everyone keeps their power.

I enjoy the "world music" aspect of metal and really all music-the universal language and so on. But it's cool to get a little bit of a country's culture whether it may native language or ethnic folk instrumentation...thinking of Romania's Dodreduh/Har off the top of my head as it came out last year. So many others. A lot of BM does that. Come to think of it, I'm aware of little ethnic or non English DM compared to black.

Agreed Castevet comes to mind.

Seems a number of so called New York or Brooklyn BM bands straddle the line between experimental, black and hardcore/punk. I can see why purists don't consider them "actual" BM. And then you got those old school dudes like Gahl or even Daniel Rosten that go on about the only purpose of BM is the glorification of Satan LOL

I have to credit you for urging me to try rye. Back when I was looking into whiskey you and Navy gave me a bunch of recos and you kept going on about rye. It's definitely worth dabbling. I think Redemption that Navy just posted was the first one you posted and I've enjoyed that one. Knob Creek makes a nice one I've had all winter.

Kayaking in Nepal-whoa! That sounds amazing. My local runs are on the Potomac in and around Washington D.C, Maryland and Virginia. I've done a fair amount of sea kayaking mostly on the Chesapeake Bay which is a differerent kind of experience. More about the journey and the experience of touring an area going from A to B and enjoying the beauty versus whitewater which is what I do these days. Nothing insane. I like to have fun and work on skills without scaring the living shit out of myself. A lot of class III with some class IV. Teaching wise, mostly beginners on flat water (strokes and rolling) and in class II current. I'm taking a certification WW class this winter. My cert is in SK but I can use it to teach WW. Also beginner flat water trips which are a breeze. On the whiskey front, seems like rye's are having a moment. Overall, I'm more of a traditional bourbon guy but I've been dabling in rye. Just splurged big time. and picked up a bottle of Jefferson's straight rye whisky finished in cognac casks single barrel. It's a select pick from my liquor store. Man, it's good. They say least nine months (but up to 19) resting in ex-Cognac casks. The finish is supposed to add some sweetness to the spice and heat of the rye. The cognac finish is really nice. There's a touch of orange in the finish. And grabbed a seasonal Southern Tier Irish Cream stout.

I've always thought USBM covers a pretty wide range from more traditional sounding BM to pretty experimental boundary pushing material from the New York avant-garde kind of (Krallice, Imperial Triumphant) to Cascadian stuff like WITR to atmoblack (Panopticon, Ash Borer) to post black/gaze kind stuff plain weird BM. A lot of these bands obviously look to nature and pagan and themes of madness, depravity etc. vs the good ole horned one or "evil". And of course tons of under the radar bands popping up that a lot of you find and share. At least that's my general sense as a voyeur.

Navy, you mentioned Xasthur. I used to enjoy Subliminal Genocide, Nocturnal Poisoning and The Funeral of Being....well "enjoyed" might not be the right word, but yeah....spend quality depressive time with....

I regret the comments I made in jest. I completely underestimated her fragility. Clearly there are a host of other issues, baggage trauma or what have you for the level of reactiveness she displayed. Like GG said, a number of us are middle aged and in all likelihood predominantly middle class guys who were engaging with a young woman of unknown background (I mean, on some level none of us know anything about each other except those that have met IRL) and I probably go into online dialogs with expectations of shared values or assumptions of the rules of the road or "code of conduct" I shouldn't. Live and learn lesson for me going forward......

Daiena, you're English is very good considering you weren't taught in school. I was just joking earlier in my post with The Cookie Monster. I'm sorry if I hurt your feelings. Later in life if you ever take an English class and read Shakespeare, there is a very famous line from the play, Hamlet. It goes like this,

Bust luck weathering the storm Killa! Hang in there.

No, no not at all, I was just being silly. I'm very happy you are on the forums. We like to joke around. Don't take me seriously. I was making fun of the extreme metal vocals. Because they are ridiculous. But like Mick Jagger said, It's only rock and roll but I like it. But on the subject of death metal vocals, I think this may be the first growled vocals way back to 1966 with The Who.

And don't forget Daiena, that since English is not your first language, the original cookie monster is a great tool to learn English vocabulary by letter. Accept no substitutes. These are the only real cookie monster vocals. But I'm not sure if this is black metal? It doesn't sound very evil. Can someone please tell me what era this falls into? I'm really confused.

I don't like to spend more than $12 for a six pack of craft beer there are exceptions.

As usual, I grab way more albums at the end of the year/January of next and end up with 50-60 albums especially with non metal stuff and not even touching jazz and classical. I've lived with them long enough to separate the men from the boys and think I can rank them pretty well. Now's the fun part-they go into my 2021 playlist and that's what I'll be listening to for quite a while.

I'm fairly new to Whisky myself. I started picking up the odd bottle here and there when the pandemic hit. Actually got some good recommendations for GG and Navy and then started researching. I pretty much started looking for sales and grabbing the better known bottles first and eventually made it up to pricier offerings to see if I could taste the difference mostly from online reviews. I was working a lot with my kayaking side hustle and making good tips. Most of the more pricey bottles I've grabbed I've been pleased with with a few exceptions that I didn't think were worth it. I feel like I'm still developing my tastes. In my unrefined way, I'd day smooth and higher proof hit a sweet spot. Lately been checking out ryes. Some of these boutique bourbons are definitely too sweet for my preference. I like the Old Forester 1920 I mentioned but several of their other offerings are overly sweet for me. And Knob Creek is almost as good for less %. Knob Creek Rye small batch is tasty as hell. And they're 12 year is awesome. I liked Jefferson. Their aged at sea gets well reviewed but it's not that much better than their small batch or reserve to justify over $70. It's better but their reserve is pretty darn good as well. If I think I used some tip money from my summer gig for that one. I wouldn't mind picking up some more Four Roses that Navy mentioned-that one's pretty good. Uncle Nearest 1856 100 proof by Jack Daniels was good. Picked that one up on sale. They have a less expensive 1884 at 94 proof which was also a good pour. I've got a pretty good liquor store that gets a decent variety of whiskies and craft beer and they'll often hip to stuff-"hey we just got some _____ in that's a good buy"-that kind of thing. Oh yeah and good socks in the winter-primo! I use them for kayaking as well-Marino wool which dries quick-hit them up at R.E.I. when on sale all the time.

You might also want to check out Listmania 2021-that's where posters list their favorite albums from 2021:

Well yes, there is one explanation of religion that says, humans are the only animals aware of our mortality as far as we know-I just mean we know we are going to die-so we create religion to keep from going insane. Something like that-Freud I believe. It's all mythology Daiena. The only thing I know-is no one really knows. Until that day comes, we have metal-haha

No definitely not all. When I say the classics I just mean the original older albums and bands-Darkthrone, Bathory, Burzum Immortal, Enslaved, Satyricon, Gorgoroth etc. Many continue but have changed their sound. Most bands in all of metal start young and heavier and then get less heavy as they age. Some go more progressive and some stop playing metal and play more of a form of heavy rock. Some stay heavy but most change their style somewhat. But you know....new young bands come along every year. That's how it goes.

Some of the 2021 BM I've enjoyed would go in this order: Try Funeral Mist/Deiform paysage d'hiver/ geister Spectral Wound/A Diabolical Thirst Lamp of Murmor/Submission And Slavery Archgoat/Worship the Eternal Dark (blackened death metal) Plebeian Grandstand/Rien ne suffit-this one is very weird and experimental-you probably won't like this one. But it's good to know it's out there-"avant-garde" that often tries to create atmospheres of insanity, madness, mental illness, stuff like that... The rest of the guys will have a bunch more underground stuff. There was a lot of atmospheric black metal but it will probably have too much "pretty sounding" parts mixed in. Atmoblack is a big thing now has longer passages with folk, ambient, electronic, drone and epic cosmic sounds. But some of it can be be nasty and viscous as well.

Non metal listening alert: some viewers may find the subject material disturbing. Viewer discretion is advised. Low/HEY WHAT-one of my favorite non metal finds of the year Sufjan Stevens/A Beginners Mind-how did I miss this one? Love this guy. And the album is about horror movies so that's an interesting twist. Viagra Boys/Welfare Jazz-nearly forgot this early year grab-enjoyed coming back to his one-post punk white trash ne'er do well satirical blues by way of Sweden

Did you check out their 21 effort, Rotten Garden? I thought it was pretty good woodsy BlackMetal w/ enough aggression to keep me tuned.

Yep, remind us and I'll definitely check your new release!

Hey Daiena, before you write Metallica off, their earlier stuff is a lot better. Check out the album, Ride the Lightning. That's my favorite of theirs. You also might want to listen to some black metal that came out in 2021 if you haven't already. When I was getting into extreme metal, I found it good to see what was coming out in the current year as well as going back to the classics.

IT NEVER ENDS!!!! Samsara.