Best Music of 2012

I have thought about this a bit, my favorite new music from 2012 has to be Van Halen, they really knocked it out of the park with A Different Kind of Truth
 
New Van Halen was awesome. Recording older songs was a great idea, hopefully they have more albums in them.
 
Good list, mckindog. I was surprised to see the Guns song on this list, and that KDH hadn't posted anything from that album -- then realized my surprise was because Chinese Democracy was released four years ago! (Can that possibly be?? God, time flies.) Still, I guess it was "new to you." Frankly, that album has grown on me over time. The A7 track was also great. But let's keep this to 2012 (or very late 2011) releases -- older songs can be posted on the Random Song Review thread (one of my favorites, needs more activity anyway).

KDH, thanks for posting the Carrie Underwood. Didn't love it, but I appreciate that it goes beyond the genres one would expect to see on this thread. That kind of eclectic taste should be encouraged.

Keep posting! This is a great way to discover music some of us hadn't noticed before.
 
Mosh said:
New Van Halen was awesome. Recording older songs was a great idea, hopefully they have more albums in them.
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I read on another forum that they have more songs in the can and may release them this coming year ... not 100% verified, so who knows. Beyond mixing older songs and newer ones, I really liked that they stopped overlaying the guitars and just had Eddie play over the bass and drums, which made the new songs have that classic feel. One review I read hit the nail on the head when it said the album was "like getting a "best of album", only with songs you never heard before"
 
bearfan said:
I have thought about this a bit, my favorite new music from 2012 has to be Van Halen, they really knocked it out of the park with A Different Kind of Truth
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I remember you being pumped about it when it came out.
I was disappointed with it. It sounded cool, but I found it really short on hooks.
I'll have to give it another try. Any recommendations to get me in the door?
 
Yea I read the same thing, also read that they're completely new songs, unlike the material on ADKOT. Agreed about the overlaying of guitars. I got a VHII/Women And Children First vibe with the playing.
mckindog said:
I remember you being pumped about it when it came out.
I was disappointed with it. It sounded cool, but I found it really short on hooks.
I'll have to give it another try. Any recommendations to get me in the door?
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Hearing the original demos of these songs made me like the album even more. Especially since the ADKOT versions were improvements. It's also cool to hear how those songs developed, like the middle section of Mean Street used to be part of She's The Woman.
 
My favorite albums released in 2012:

01. BORKNAGAR - Urd
02. PRIMAL ROCK REBELLION - Awoken Broken
03. WINTERSUN - Time I
04. SWALLOW THE SUN - Emerald Forest & The Blackbird
05. GOJIRA - L'Enfant Sauvage
06. TESTAMENT - Dark Roots Of Earth
07. KREATOR - Phantom Antichrist
08. ANAAL NATHRAKH - Vanitas
09. EPICA - Requiem For The Indifferent
10. VAN HALEN - A Different Kind Of Truth
 
mckindog said:
I remember you being pumped about it when it came out.
I was disappointed with it. It sounded cool, but I found it really short on hooks.
I'll have to give it another try. Any recommendations to get me in the door?
Click to expand...


My favorite tracks are As-Is, Outta Space, and She's The Woman (You and Your Blues and Stay Frosty not too far behind) ... I'd try those out.
 
Those would probably be my favorites too. I also liked Trouble With Never and Big River.
 
Trouble With Never is really good, I guess I would add Blood and Fire (the "I told you I'd be back" parts are classic DLR). IMO, the whole album is pretty stellar, Tattoo is probably the worse track and even that is pretty good.
 
Blood and Fire has a great chorus. I never understood the hate for Tattoo, I always thought it was a cool song. Maybe more 80's sounding than the rest of the album, probably because of the keyboards.
 
Great selections, mckindog. Especially #4. ;) Unlike the other bands we do survivors for, I do have a ranking of all Guns N' Roses songs, and TWAT actually places at #3.

And good to see you enjoyed the Carrie song. It's one of my favorite songs of hers, and she actually has a strong catalog.

I actually forgot Van Halen's album came out this year. I thought it came out last year. Time is going by too slowly. :p So for albums:

1. Rush - Clockwork Angels
I'm not sure if it's necessarily my favorite release (it's hard to tell since I actually stan really hard for Carrie Underwood; she's my favorite female singer), but I honestly believe it's the best release of the year. I love all the songs on it, it's creative, it's a great "comeback" album (I don't actually believe they've had an awful enough time period to call it a real comeback), and it's got some of the band's best tunes. The Garden alone propels this album into my top 2. Its only flaw is that it sounds a little muddy, but the songs themselves are good enough for me to overlook that.
2. Carrie Underwood - Blown Away
To be quite honest, I would've loved this album no matter what, but it really is a good album. Even though it's not filler-free like her first two albums, the highs on this album annihilate all of country music, especially the first six tracks. I placed it in the #2 spot because it has her most boring songs of all-time, but even with that, I think it's the best country album to come out this year. This also proves further that the Grammys are ignorant, but we already knew that.
3. Bob Dylan - Tempest
It's not his best work, but it's really solid, and a solid Bob Dylan album is still stronger than most albums.
4. Van Halen - A Different Kind of Truth
If there tattoo removal from an album existed, this would actually be my favorite album of theirs.
5. Little Big Town - Tornado
Their best album, and it's about time they started getting credit. The album only has one filler (the opening track), and it contains one of the best songs on the radio right now (the title track). It's their strongest effort to date, and I hope this propels them to country superstardom at last.

I also loved the Black Keys's album and Bruce Springsteen's album, but I'm not sure what year those came out and I'm too lazy to check Google or Wikipedia, so I'll just leave them here.
 
I think when they announced the new VH album, people were hoping for something more along the lines of the first 4 albums. Tattoo sounds more like from 1984 or the Van Hagar albums. I like the song, but I think there were better options for a lead single. Thinking about it, I probably like Honeybabysweetiedoll least on the album .. but still a good song.
 
Crimson Idol said:
Somehow I never noticed the Acronym before... ^^
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I think the acronym is why Axl selected it as the title of the song. :D

setlist-guns-2_large.jpg
 
bearfan said:
I think when they announced the new VH album, people were hoping for something more along the lines of the first 4 albums. Tattoo sounds more like from 1984 or the Van Hagar albums. I like the song, but I think there were better options for a lead single. Thinking about it, I probably like Honeybabysweetiedoll least on the album .. but still a good song.
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True. Maybe the popiness is what made them choose it for a lead single. It's definitely the oddball of the album though.

I liked the new Black Keys but Brothers was better I think.
 
I'm aghast that I omitted this video from my Best of 2012 list.
This is a rearranged version of the 2008 classic (the charming original version is here).

One of my favorite things about this video is Tosh's Gustavo Dudamel wig. The boys' choir is a classy touch too.
 
Here's my "Best Of 2012 Songs Mixtape", in two parts - I just couldn't decide on which songs to drop, doing it in two parts sounded much better :D
I didn't put artists or song titles, album covers are your only clue :p
There are 11 songs in part 1, and 11 songs in part 2.
I think I covered all genres I listen - black, death, thrash, doom, power, progressive, heavy, symphonic, gothic metal and hard, progressive rock, so there's something for everyone :)
Part 1 is more upbeat and heavy, part 2 is calmer and more atmospheric (at least IMO :p).
 
Thanks for posting NP, I'll give this a listen over the weekend. I feared I had killed my own thread with the "Smell Yo Dick" post (which was a joke, yet for the rest of the day I nevertheless couldn't get that song out of my head).

By the way, for the 2.3 people on this forum who might like R&B, the Frank Ocean album is also pretty good.
 
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