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I have a dilemma, I only really enjoy a small niche of music. I haven't added many albums to my collection in the past decade because of that.  I have started a quest to try and track down music that fits my personal preference.  So, I'm asking the community.  My favorite albums are:

Children of Bodom:  Follow The Reaper

Megadeth:  Rust In Peace

Wintersun:  Wintersun

Dark Tranquility:  Gallery

The Crown:  Crowned In Terror

 

What I am looking for is more music that is similar to these albums.  A type of melodic, symphonic type of metal. But not diverging from this type.  I also like The Black Dahlia Murder and At The Gates is ok.  I don't know if they really belong on this list.  I recently looked at a website that listed the top melodic death metal bands, I made it to 17 and listened to every one, except the few I already knew and hated them all.  I'm very picky about the type of music I listen to. Certain types of vocals irritate me, I demand that the band be genuinely talented.  I play guitar myself, if the guitarist isn't better than me then I find the music boring.

It's sad to say, but it almost seems to me that this type of music just isn't being created anymore.  I don't have anyone to discuss this with personally.  In my home town, if you listen to anything other than country or rap then you're a freak.  So I would appreciate any replies on this subject, and will follow up with all of them.  Thanks.

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I don't know that this is exactly the right place for this thread, but I can't think of another place at the moment, so be aware that this may be moved.

Anyway, it looks like you're in the market for the more melodic/virtuoso side of metal, and that does span a few genres. First and foremost, I believe that Kalmah would be a shoe in for you, as they're a bit like a more frantic Children of Bodom, but win a similar penchant for protracted guitar solos and Finnish melodies. Ensiferum is also similar, but with a more folky predilection like Wintersun (Jari of Wintersun was an early member of Ensiferum). You're right though, there aren't a ton of bands playing in that style these days, but you may also find Catamenia to your liking.

As for Megadeth's Rust in Piece, it's a thrash metal album that doesn't skimp on melody or precision. For similarly complex and melodious listens, I would suggest checking out Artillery (maybe not the super early stuff), Vektor, Watchtower, Realm, and perhaps Annihilator's debut album. Heavier and more intricate power/speed metal from the likes of Agent Steel, Liege Lord, Savatage (80'S releases), Helstar (especially A Distant Thunder and Nosferatu), Jag Panzer, Running Wild, and Blind Guardian might also scratch that itch.

Regarding the last two that you mentioned, those are on the more guitar centric side of melodic death metal, and most of what internet lists will call melodic death metal don't have any death metal in their sound at all. However, what you mentioned is the side of melodic death metal that I care the most about, so I can provide some help. I would suggest checking out Arghoslent (if you don't mind some xenophobic lyrics), Garden of Shadows, Enforsaken, Black Harvest, In Flames (but only up through The Jester Race), Arch Enemy (but only up through Burning Bridges), Darkane (especially Layers of Lies), Demonoid, Hollenthon, Soilwork (but only through Steelbath Suicide), Sentenced's North From Here, Cenotaph's Riding Our Black Oceans, At the Gates (up through With Fear I Kiss the Burning Darkness), Centinex, and early Amon Amarth for the viking side of that sound. You could also check out melodic black/death metal bands like Dissection, Sacramentum, Unanimated, Dawn, etc..., or bands that fuse melodic death metal and doom, like October Tide, Atten Ash, Daylight Dies, Ablaze in Hatred, Rapture, etc...

Hopefully you find something among those that suits your fancy. Feel free to check back with what you enjoyed versus what you didn't, and I can try to come up with some others.

Sent from my HTC6535LVW using Tapatalk

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On top of BAN's list you might also enjoy Testament, Dimmu Borgir, Cradle Of Filth, Fleshgod Apocalypse, and perhaps Insomnium. Not sure if you're familiar with those bands or not and I certainly don't like all of them myself (in fact I only dig Testament through Souls of Black and CoF through Cruelty And The Beast) but that's all I could think of.

 

PS: I feel this thread fits better in the General Chat subforum.

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Thanks for the replies.  That covers a heck of a lot of ground, and it's far more in depth than I anticipated :) 

Kalmah eh?  I do have access to one of their albums, well two I guess.  Swamp Lord/They Will Return.  Since it's a two fer one, I'm guessing that must be some of their earlier stuff.

Ensiferium, I have access to their Self Titled, One Man Army and Victory Songs.

For Insomnium I can get Above the Weeping World, Across the Dark, In the Halls of Waiting and Since The Day All Came Down.

Well, I can get some of the songs on those albums anyway, for free with Amazon Prime. So I'll start there.

As for Cradle of Filth, I used to love their music.  I even had my Jesus Is A Cunt T-shirt.  Ha ha.  But their music doesn't really appeal to me anymore.  At The Gates I do like two of their albums, Slaughter of the Soul and most of Terminal Spirit Disease.  I have listened to Dimmu Borgir before but it's been so long I can't recall what I thought of them.  Testament has some good stuff, but I don't really know any of it well.  I seem to remember that I liked some of Arch Enemy's earlier stuff. But as for Amon Amarth and In Flames, I've seen them in concert, which was pretty good.  Especially Amon Amarth.  But I really couldn't get in to their studio albums.  I think I saw them when I went to see Vital Remains in Cleveland after Dechristianize came out.  I went to so many concerts when I was younger that they're all a jumble in my head now.

If someone wants to move this thread, then go ahead.  I posted in Death Metal because it had the most activity and therefore would give me the best chance of getting some good info.

 

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We have recommendation threads with video links stickied at the top of most of the subgenre forums, as well as several other threads answering more specific versions of this question. The only metal band I think I've seen you post about is Metallica, so how about you start by telling us what else you're already into, and have a look through the thrash forum.

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Without at least some idea of the bands you enjoy it's impossible to accurately provide recommendations. As FA said we have many sub-genre specific threads devoted to helping answer that very question. This would turn into a very long post if I linked them all so I'll just tell you where to look. We have threads which will help with: black, death, doom, folk, gothic, power, progressive, and thrash metal. Some see more activity then others so by far our most in depth rec threads are black and death metal.

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3 hours ago, MetalheadFromBama said:

I'm kind of new to the metal community. What are some good bands or albums I should start with? 

three hours ago you posted this, in three hours you can check out a lot of metal if you resort to listening to videos on youtube that have titles like 20 best thrash metal bands. I'm not saying a video by that title exists, or that if it did than the bands would be the best bands, but you would hear 20 bits of twenty songs by twenty bands, and if you dug one of them especially than you could find the album it came from and listen to it. A classier option is to listen to a playlist that plays entire songs one after another for a few hours, and you'd cover lots of ground that way, and hopefully you would see lots of album art that way. 

 

I swear I didn't know about this video before I went looking for you, just to prove how easy it is to get metal into your ears...

According to my goggle plus account I already listened to this following video which I don't recall, but I am not surprised, because even though I don't really care for thrash I listen to shit tons of metal all the fucking time...

I personally have no concern that I'll ever get into any metal that is lame, because I have impeccable taste in metal, so if I enjoy something I hear I'm assured that it is excellent by virtue of my good taste. If it is good metal, but just not my kind of thing I'm still able to appreciate if not enjoy it. Only if you lack good taste will you need to be concerned about the possibility of being into metal that is lame.

 

And that, Metal Head From Bama, is how it is done.

The worst thing about this second video does not tell you who the bands are, which is unforgivable really. This one here is better with album art and names of bands...

This post is not meant to advocate thrash.

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19 hours ago, FatherAlabaster said:

We have recommendation threads with video links stickied at the top of most of the subgenre forums, as well as several other threads answering more specific versions of this question. The only metal band I think I've seen you post about is Metallica, so how about you start by telling us what else you're already into, and have a look through the thrash forum.

The 2 bands that I'm already into are Metallica and Black Sabbath. I'll make sure to look at the thrash forum when I have a lot of free time.

Everybody that has posted on this so far, thanks for posting and giving me information. I really appreciate it.

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I'm almost jealous, you have the whole wide world of metal ahead of you. If you look through old threads, you'll also find some of us talking about the bands that got us into metal in the first place. Some of my favorite albums from my first couple years of listening to metal have stuck with me over the years, like Sepultura's "Arise", Queensryche's "Operation: Mindcrime", Pantera's "Far Beyond Driven", Fear Factory's "Demanufacture", and Meshuggah's "Destroy Erase Improve". Everyone's going to have a different list though. Best thing to do is just start listening and see what sticks, and keep in mind that your taste will probably change a lot over the course of time - a lot of my favorite bands took me a while to get into. I love stuff I used to hate and vice versa. Give albums a few times through before you decide whether or not to put more time into them.

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There are tons. What genre are you interested in? Some bands I've put on recently who have prominent keyboard or piano parts in at least some of their songs are My Dying Bride, Type O Negative, Cradle Of Filth, Akercocke, Neurosis, Borknagar, Emperor, Faith No More, An Albatross. Enslaved has some great synth use. I'm not a fan of newer Opeth, but their keyboard player is sick. There's a lot more that I'm not calling to mind at the moment, and plenty of bands use keyboards more sparingly as backing parts.

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  • 3 weeks later...
On 9/6/2016 at 12:24 PM, FatherAlabaster said:

There are tons. What genre are you interested in? Some bands I've put on recently who have prominent keyboard or piano parts in at least some of their songs are My Dying Bride, Type O Negative, Cradle Of Filth, Akercocke, Neurosis, Borknagar, Emperor, Faith No More, An Albatross. Enslaved has some great synth use. I'm not a fan of newer Opeth, but their keyboard player is sick. There's a lot more that I'm not calling to mind at the moment, and plenty of bands use keyboards more sparingly as backing parts.

I'm mostly interested in classic metal (Black Sabbath, Metallica, Deep Purple, etc.), but I also like other kinds of metal. I’m exploring a bit of gothic metal at the moment, so I’ve been learning piano parts for some Type O Negative songs lately.

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  • 2 months later...
On 07/09/2016 at 2:48 AM, MetalheadFromBama said:

Are there any good metal songs with piano/keyboard parts? I was wondering, because I'm starting to learn how to play piano. The only one I can think of so far is Motley Crue's "Home Sweet Home".

The only metal song you can think of with keys is 'Home Sweet Home'? Really??

Arcturus, Children of Bodom, My Dying Bride, Anathema, Paradise Lost, Cradle of Filth, Emperor, Enslaved, Dimmu Borgir, Burzum, Satyricon, Fleshgod Apocalypse, Septic Flesh, Dark Tranquillity, Guns n Roses, Whitesnake, Deep Purple, Amorphis, Saturnus, Swallow the Sun, Rapture, Be'lakor, Insomnium, Rainshadow, Moonspell, Moonsorrow, Thyrfing, Ensiferum, Einherjer all have great songs with piano/keyboards from a range of genres and styles, and that's just off the top of my head!!

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On 12/20/2016 at 10:18 PM, Requiem said:

The only metal song you can think of with keys is 'Home Sweet Home'? Really??

Arcturus, Children of Bodom, My Dying Bride, Anathema, Paradise Lost, Cradle of Filth, Emperor, Enslaved, Dimmu Borgir, Burzum, Satyricon, Fleshgod Apocalypse, Septic Flesh, Dark Tranquillity, Guns n Roses, Whitesnake, Deep Purple, Amorphis, Saturnus, Swallow the Sun, Rapture, Be'lakor, Insomnium, Rainshadow, Moonspell, Moonsorrow, Thyrfing, Ensiferum, Einherjer all have great songs with piano/keyboards from a range of genres and styles, and that's just off the top of my head!!

I don't listen to a ton of metal like the people on here. Usually, I switch around on listening from metal to punk to jazz to classical, and so forth. But I will listen to some of these bands when I get a chance. Thanks for the reply.

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  • 1 month later...

hey there,

i don't know if i am in the right forum topic here, but i look for deep, meaningful metal ballads. i am not such a huge fan of these "classical" metal ballads, because i prefer deeper, chesty voices and often these well-known metal ballads (for example from judas priest etc) are a little bit too "high" for me, their voices feel a little bit screechy for me. this is of course no criticism, just my personal perception. so it's a little hard for me to find metal ballads that are not like that, i hope you have some proposals for me.

to show what kind of metal ballads i really love, here are some examples:

pantera - suicide note pt. 1 (this is one of my favorites, because his voice is so deep and has something rough in it, just a masterpiece, i also love "hollow")

korn - alone i break (also a kind of raw/rough, deep and groovy tune that i like very much)

alice in chains - nutshell

opeth, a lot of opeth ballads touch my heart very much because they are dark but soft, fluent and lyrical, complex, and not so overloaded

all ballads of testament

and so forth and so on.. i hope you got an impression of what i mean and i would be so happy if you have some new tracks for me!! just not so easy to find new ones because i have these special claims at voices and so on^^

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