Novembre - Wish I Could Dream it Again [1994]

The production quality is what I'd expect for a first album. It's pretty interesting stuff. Really feels like they've stumbled onto a style while it was just beginning to break out. Just when everything felt like it was getting mundane, they break out with the ending section of "Novembre/its Blood" and redeem all of the interest that was lost. The Black Metal parts are wonderful. The singers pitch control is lacking to say the least, but I've heard worse and it somehow isn't that distracting. The album is a MONSTEROUS length, making it nearly impossible to listen to the whole thing in one sitting without falling asleep. Crop the songs a bit, take some singing lessons, and the material would be top notch.

Rating: 7.5

http://www.novembre.co.uk/

All ratings are out of 10. Rating may not be a whole number.

Genitorturers - Blackheart Revolution [2009]

Good start, it's nice and catchy but still hard-edged. "Kabangin' All Night" takes the swing approach. "Devil in a Bottle" starts off in stock-town with a very standard riff that I swear I've heard at least ten bands use. Rob Zombie has clearly been a huge influence for this album. "Falling Stars" is a nicer side of the band with a catchy chorus. This comes across as much more of a stock attempt at a Gothic Metal album than something that has darkness oozing from it. The production quality is as weak as it's ever been. However, it's much more clear this time around. I was hoping for some more heavy production, but this will work so long as the songs stay well-written. When all is said and done, "Revolution" and "Confessions of a Blackheart" are the only proper Genitorturers songs on here; the rest are lacking in darkness, originality, and passion. The album does get better towards the very end, but it's too little too late. Standouts are "Revolution", "Falling Stars", "Confessions of a Blackheart", and "Cum Junkie".

Rating: 6.5

http://www.genitorturers.com/

All ratings are out of 10. Rating may not be a whole number.

Genitorturers - Flesh is the Law [2002]

Quite stock, but also catchy, first track, "Lecher Bitch". "Public Enemy" is more up-beat and energetic with a bit more of a conventional Metal feel to it. Interesting middle-end section that ever so slightly breaks the rules. "Flesh is the Law" is more like what I was envisioning with a lot of industrial effects and dark mood. It\'s not bad at all despite the stock style and the Manson-worship.

Rating: 7

http://www.genitorturers.com/

All ratings are out of 10. Rating may not be a whole number.

Genitorturers - 120 Days of Geintorture [1993]

Not particularly engrossing first track. It's interesting, though, because it's a lot more Heavy Metal inspired than the more Industrial movement of the following albums. "Reality Check" is much more catchy with a significant amount of groove. "Velvet Dreams" gives a glimpse into the direction that they will be going with later material, but it's way too long and drags a lot. "Pleasure in Restraint" is quite long, but also very limp. In total, there are some nice and catchy songs with a good metal feel. The production isn't that good, but it IS the first album and it's from 1993 no less.

Rating: 6

http://www.genitorturers.com/

All ratings are out of 10. Rating may not be a whole number.

Genitorturers - Machine Love [2000]

"Stitch in Time" is brilliantly dark, brooding, and heavy. I've never really been a fan of remix/rearranged albums, but this one is tolerable if for no reasons other than "Stitch in Time" and "Touch Myself". There are a couple good remixes of Geni's songs, but most are much crappier than the originals.

Rating: 7

http://www.genitorturers.com/

All ratings are out of 10. Rating may not be a whole number.

Genitorturers - Sin City [1998]

Catchy and blood-pumping start to the album. "Terrorvision" brings a lot of evil to the horned throne. The production quality isn't so hot... there's a lot of punch and heaviness missing thanks to the lower mix-level of the guitars and the weak distortion. The drums could use some punch as well. Even with those major downfalls, this album is a trek through the graveyard on a chilly fall night... and I fucking love it. Catchy, bleak, and hammering at times. Fix the production issues and this could be one of the best gothic albums out there.

Rating: 8.25

http://www.genitorturers.com/

All ratings are out of 10. Rating may not be a whole number.

Coal Chamber - Dark Days [2002]

It's strange, they go from the great songwriting of Chamber Music to this, a fairly large step backwards to the days of the first album. It definitely feels like most of the "magic" is gone. There aren't many gems in this album, but at least a few songs are overall good (Fiend, Dark Days, One Step, Row Boat, Drove). One production quality failing I've noticed is that the two guitars are completely different types of distortion and tone, making them feel very uneven while listening through headphones.

Rating: 7

http://www.myspace.com/coalchambermusic

All ratings are out of 10. Rating may not be a whole number.

Coal Chamber - Chamber Music [1999]

A thousand times better than their self-titled debut. The song writing is wonderfully refined and the production is better, though I don't agree with the type of guitar distortion. Songs don't over-stay their welcome, catchy writing, unique style, essentially gothic, and energetic. This is one of those albums that you feel more than listen. The lyrics strike the perfect balance between being direct and being obtuse. It may not be pushing the envelope, but it's consistently great all the way through.

Rating: 8

http://www.myspace.com/coalchambermusic

All ratings are out of 10. Rating may not be a whole number.

Nightwish - Dark Passion Play [2007]

The first track of this album and let's not fuck around, the music is epic. However, it only takes the very first vocal line to make me miss Tarja. Sure, the new broad is a good singer, but she sings mostly in a pop style, which comes across as out of place and obnoxiously bitchy. Some of the transitions in the middle of the song feel a bit lazy as well. "Bye Bye Beautiful" is a throw-away song, but then "Amaranth" is a great popcorn song that's catchy and displays some of the better sides of the new girl's voice. "Cadence of Her Last Breath" has a pretty catchy chorus. Whereas "Master Passion Greed" is a waste of some good guitar riffs ruined by the vocals, an awful chorus, and piss-poor lyrics. "Eva" is a nice and beautiful song where the vocal stylings of Anette actually make sense. Overall, the music on this album is quite good. It doesn't have the feel and emotion of "Once", but it's still fairly proficient song writing. However, there are still quite a few fillers and more than a few riffs that just sound like they were thrown in there to lengthen the song. The lyrics throughout the album are just bad, though, and Anette's vocals are quite unwelcomed in my ears. You get the feeling that she is quite proficient in classical singing, but rarely uses it. Lower score for almost ruining the music with crap vocals and lyrics.

Rating: 7.5

http://www.nightwish.com/

All ratings are out of 10. Rating may not be a whole number.

Septic Flesh - Communion [2008]

It's clear from the first 40 seconds of "Lovecraft's Death" that the orchestra writing and integration has hit a new level of greatness. Possibly the best use of orchestra in metal thus far. "Babel's Gate" reinforces the epic songwriting and new-found variability in the music, even if the flow is sacrificed in the process. The dynamics are interesting since they use a lot of empty "middle-space" during high-energy moments to create suspense... it's very effective. Sure a decent amount of the guitar riffs are really just backing for the epic orchestra, but shit, I really don't care about that with the rest of the material being so great. This is the same leap from Sumerian Daemons that SD was from Revolution DNA.

Rating: 8.5

http://www.myspace.com/septicfleshband

All ratings are out of 10. Rating may not be a whole number.

Dimmu Borgir - Abrahadabra [2010]

AWESOME intro track, if the rest of the album doesn't live up to this, I'll be pissed. And we're off to a really shitty start in "Born Treacherous". The production isn't very heavy at all, pretty disappointing; the guitars are much more buried than previously and they also fell a bit unbalanced. "Gateways" starts out much more promising, but then takes the opposite route of "Born Treacherous" and gets a bit crappy and the melodic harmonized guitars can go right into a closet and fuck themselves. It gets really catchy and beautiful towards the end, though; shame it wasn't that good all the way through. Finally, a decent song can be found in "Ritualist". I suppose I should be a little more forgiving since this is a very different style for Dimmu. The reduced guitars are the price they pay for trying to make the orchestra stand out more. I like the addition of the choir, though, and the orchestra is much more heavily integrated into the songs than previously. Dimmu was never a band that would put out a grind-fest album, but this is even less so than normal. Much of the excitement in this album comes in short spurts and it feels like there are way too many filler riffs thrown in the mix. This is definitely a step away from the Black Metal that I would expect Dimmu to put out. All the songs have the same problem of having very unexciting riffs that drag the listener down in between really good and catchy sections. "Dimmu Borgir" sounds identical to Nightwish's style of writing. So, the bite of Black Metal is completely gone, it's not brutal in the slightest, the guitars are too wussy, and there are way too many crappy riffs. Even so, props for trying to change things up, the orchestra and choir are extremely effective, and the riffs that are good are great. If I can approach this album as if it didn't come from Dimmu and as a Gothic Metal album with no pretentions to Black Metal, this would be a decent album (probably get a score of 7). However, I just can't ignore the fact that this is a large disappointment coming from Dimmu.

Rating: 6

http://www.dimmu-borgir.com/

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Nightwish - Once [2004]

For the most part, this album could not be more different from Century Child. Epic songwriting and the best of their entire career (including Dark Passion Play). This is the proper way to integrate Orchestra and Metal to create a masterpiece. There is much less of the gimmicky songwriting that I hated from CC. The writing of the orchestra parts has finally become respectable on a Classical level as well. However, it's quite a long album with a decent amount of fillers in between the amazing songs.

Rating: 8.5

http://www.nightwish.com/

All ratings are out of 10. Rating may not be a whole number.

Nightwish - Century Child [2002]

It's fairly catchy stuff. The production quality is mediocre, but the bass-drum sound is pretty much crap. My biggest problem with the album is that they use gimmicky song writing techniques rather than the respectable complexity that can be found on later albums. The songwriting is not really up to par for a Nightwish album. Mostly uninspired, campy, and fairly boring. The catchiness can only make up for so much.

Rating: 5

http://www.nightwish.com/

All ratings are out of 10. Rating may not be a whole number.

Septic Flesh - Sumerian Daemons [2003]

Jesus fuck, "unbeliever" starts the album off as a completely different animal than I had gotten used to on Revolution DNA; so fucking powerful it's scary. "Virtues of the Beast" puts all of my fears to rest by returning to the more sedate Gothic feel that they effectively captured on RDNA... and then "Faust" switches things back to the more brutal feel that "Unbeliever" had. Well, in the end, this album managed to come damn close to fixing one of the main issues I had with previous albums: the feeling of repetitiveness by the end of the album. There are a few songs in the middle that feel fairly similar, but the nearly constant switching back and forth between brutality and sedatives in between songs really kept the album interesting for me. The keyboard parts deserve special mention as they are flawlessly written and executed. The addition of choir really adds depth to the music as well. Overall, this album is a great step forward from RDNA.

Rating: 8

http://www.myspace.com/septicfleshband

All ratings are out of 10. Rating may not be a whole number.

Septic Flesh - A Fallen Temple [1998]

Still has a dark tone to it. Production isn't as polished as RDNA and the songs aren't as catchy. Still, good and unique Gothic Metal.

Rating: 7

http://www.myspace.com/septicfleshband

All ratings are out of 10. Rating may not be a whole number.

Tristania - Rubicon [2010]

"Year of the rat" is an extremely unimpressive beginning to the album. This album doesn't feel at all like a Tristania album. Perhaps it is the lineup changes. I definitely don't like the new female vocalist. I don't much care for her stock voice, nor do I care for her phrasing and (assumed) writing of the vocal parts. There are very few parts that feel like Tristania to me. On top of which, the songwriting feels like it's by the numbers. The songs aren't catchy. There's very little of the clean guitar parts that used to be all over the place. I just don't like the new style at all, and not only because it's different from the high standard that I'm used to with this band. This album wouldn't stand up alone if it weren't a Tristania album, so I don't see why it should stand up at all.

Rating: 3.5

http://www.tristania.com/

All ratings are out of 10. Rating may not be a whole number.

Tristania - Illumination [2007]

The classical elements of the keys have been mostly replaced with Gothic Rock keys and I must admit, I really like how it sounds. This definitely feels a lot more like "classic" Gothic Metal, but with more catchiness and more of an edge to it. The songs are beautiful and dark all the way through. The production has taken a very large step up and is now much more punchy and clear. Unlike previous albums, the heavy parts with distorted guitars actually have weight to them and really feel powerful. The album is, however, slightly over-compressed. It's equally as good as WoG, but for different reasons.

Rating: 8.5

http://www.tristania.com/

All ratings are out of 10. Rating may not be a whole number.

L'eprica - florence/3rd blood & pain [2008]

Much better production than some of the other albums. More to the standards of ST. Addition of keys is welcome. Intro riff sounds like a bit of a sell-out move, but after the first verse it definitely makes sense. Second track hearkens back to ST a bit in the verses.

Rating: 8

http://www.myspace.com/leprica

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L'eprica - Ideal Taste [2008]

Whoa, not what I was expecting at all. It's basically progressive thrash metal. Definitely catchy when it get's going. The production seems to be going a bit downhill, though. The vox are a bit overpowering at some parts. It's a different style for them, but it's a nice change-up from the previous stuff… just as long as they don't stray too long.

Rating: 7.5

http://www.myspace.com/leprica

All ratings are out of 10. Rating may not be a whole number.

L'eprica - rubble [2007]

Good beginning. Nice and calm. Drums are heavily equalized to sound like they're in the background (sounds like a drum machine, though). Pretty good overall, but definitely not their best. It lacks the catchiness of the previous stuff, but gains some atmosphere.

Rating: 7

http://www.myspace.com/leprica

All ratings are out of 10. Rating may not be a whole number.