General Dicer

Hey steve! Nice to have you aboard! If you want to hear some suggestions from my own 2740 song playlist, feel free to ask.

Uh, yeah. The Dark Saga is one of the best vocal albums ever recorded, if anything an improvement over Burnt Offerings vocally. As for Glorious Burden, yep Tim is an animal. An animal that can shriek at the top of his lungs and not much else. Sorry dude, but Ripper just isn't in the same weight class as Barlow.

After the Load/Reload/St. Anger days, I think Death Magnetic was a breath of fresh air for the band. Overall I consider it one of their best albums, but that might just be the ones it's surrounded by talking. Sure, the production sounds pretty bad, but the quality of the songs is awesome and, personally, I think Hetfield still has a good voice.

We agree to diagree there. Ripper is good at what he does, but he was a very poor choice for Iced Earth. Barlow outdoes him in every way. If you like Ripper's style but want Barlow, listen to the song 'Dracula' off Horror Show. It's Barlow singing high like Ripper, but much clearer and cleaner. Nothing against Ripper, but Barlow just has so much more attitude to his vocals. Given the choice, it's Barlow for me every time.

Iced Earth is awesome! Schaffer is a completely underrated guitar player and it's nice to see someone else taking note of his riffs. I agree with most of your choices, but here are some others that should also be mentioned. The Coming Curse - Something Wicked... Last December - Burnt Offerings Come What May - The Crucible of Man Boiling Point - Dystopia Frankenstein - Horror Show Some are old, some are new, all are awesome.

First off, I personally consider Iced Earth more of a thrash band than power metal. Just because some of the songs have high vocals doesn't make them power metal. But, that's just my opinion. Regarding their best albums, I can sum it up in 2 words; Matt Barlow. Not only is the guy one of the best singers ever, but the albums he's on are the best musically too. My personal favorites are Burnt Offerings, Something Wicked This Way Comes, and The Dark Saga. Horror Show is great too and their newest album with singer Stu Block is pretty good. In my book, Ripper Owens doesn't compare to Barlow or Block, so personally I would avoid those albums.

I've got to say The End is Where We Begin, by Thousand Foot Krutch. Ordinarily, their albums are pretty good, but this one is a freakin' disaster. The best song on it is mediocre at best, and the other 15 odd songs devolved into rap and easy listening. Their other stuff is kinda cheesy from time to time, but at least it was usually metal. On a scale of 1 to 10, this album ranks a 0 in my world.

I agree with metalhead_101. Star Wars is awesome, but a little out of place. Maybe something like 'Journeyman Metalhead' would fit better (no Iron Maiden pun intended).

I can think of about 10,000 of them I'd like to say, but I'll just stick with a few: Metallica - Master of Puppets Slayer - Killing Fields Nevermore - This Godless Endeavor Megadeth - Symphony of Destruction Bullet for My Valentine - The Poison (the one about 15 seconds after the solo) As I Lay Dying - Nothing Left Overkill - Spiritual Void Iced Earth - The Coming Curse (the one after the solo) Not necessarily in that order, but that'll do for now.

Sentenced is the best doom metal band I've come across. They're considered more gothic metal by critics, but to me, they can be doom/black/gothic, or anything like that. They are split up, but the singer's new band Poisonblack is pretty similar if you like the sound.

Hi! I'm actually a born and raised metalhead, but I'm new to Metal Forum. I'm from the midwest, where we get practically no heavy metal concert traffic, and I am personally into Baseball (Kansas City Royals) and Disc Golf. My music tastes are mostly aligned with traditional-style metal with clean/mostly clean vocals and a lot of emphasis on guitar riffs. Some of my favorite musicians are: James Hetfield (guitar/vocals for Metallica) Matt Barlow (vocals for Iced Earth and Pyramaze) Jeff Loomis (guitar for Nevermore and solo works) Dave Mustaine (guitarist extraordinaire for Megadeth... and also the vocalist) Chris Volz (guitar/vocals for Flaw, Five.Bolt.Main and solo works) Just to name a few. Feel free to contact me with any questions or comments! Until next time, LONG LIVE METAL! Sincerely, General Dicer