GREATEST METAL ALBUM CUP - Winner: Iron Maiden - Seventh Son of a Seventh Son!

LooseCannon

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Welcome to the Greatest Metal Album Cup!

The purpose of this game is to determine, in no way definitively, in no way completely, and in no way fairly, the greatest metal album of all time. This game will consist of 18 League rounds. The first league round will consist of 8 games, played 4 at a time. The following league rounds will consist of 32 games, played 4 at a time. Once all 18 leagues are played through (in a fairly lengthy process), the final surviving 32 will face off in a round of 32, 16, quarter finals, semi-finals, and then a final. After this process is complete, one album will be able to wield the title of Greatest Metal Album. A hastily photoshopped victory trophy will be tweeted at the official band account for the winning band.

Seeding was determined from multiple sources, listed here:
Rolling Stone Top 100 Metal Albums
Loudwire Top 50 Metal Albums
Metal Rules Top 100 Metal Albums
Metal Storm Top 100 Heavy Metal Albums
DigitalDreamDoor Top 100 Metal Albums
Metal Kingdom Top 100 Metal Albums (first page only)
Maidenfans.com Greatest Metal Cup Nominees
(please note some lists are dynamic)

Albums were seeded based on the number of times they appeared in the eight different lists (with Maidenfans.com nominations counting twice), with the position on all lists averaged to form a ladder. If there were ties, those ties were randomized before being added to the Leagues. Leagues were formed in order from bottom to top, then their seeding inside the League randomized again. This game is more about fate than anything.

Rules
  • All matches will run for 48 hours. Winners will advance to the next set of brackets. Losers go home in disgrace.
  • You may choose who to vote for on any qualification. You can love the band, hate the singer, hate the video, love the vocalist, hate the vocalist, hate the hairstyle, love the drummer's dog. All votes are valid. Please explain your reasoning.
  • Please vote no matter what. I don't want to see this bullshit "I don't like either band" excuse. That's not metal. Metal is picking a side and voting for it based on whether or not you like the singer's hairstyle.
  • Own goals count. Fuck up a vote? Too bad, Jamie Pollock.
  • If a tie occurs at the end of 48 hours, we will move to a 24 hour extra time where votes are reset.
    • If, following extra time we are still tied, we will move to kicks. In kicks, the first band to get three different posters call out the band in the thread will win. I will not participate in the kicks in order to avoid bias.
  • As we near the end of the League round, I will provide a playlist of the upcoming bands in alphabetical order on Spotify and Youtube.
  • Your favourite album is in here and it will probably lose somewhere along the way. Be prepared to cry.
CLICK HERE TO VIEW THE CURRENT TOURNAMENT TREE

CLICK HERE FOR THE LEAGUE 12 SPOTIFY PLAYLIST!

CLICK HERE FOR THE LEAGUE 12 YOUTUBE PLAYLIST!

CLICK HERE FOR THE LEAGUE 13 SPOTIFY PLAYLIST!
CLICK HERE FOR THE LEAGUE 13 YOUTUBE PLAYLIST!

CLICK HERE FOR THE LEAGUE 14 SPOTIFY PLAYLIST!

CLICK HERE FOR THE LEAGUE 14 YOUTUBE PLAYLIST!

CLICK HERE FOR THE LEAGUE 15 SPOTIFY PLAYLIST!

CLICK HERE FOR THE LEAGUE 15 YOUTUBE PLAYLIST!

CLICK HERE FOR THE LEAGUE 16 SPOTIFY PLAYLIST!

CLICK HERE FOR THE LEAGUE 16 YOUTUBE PLAYLIST!

CLICK HERE FOR THE LEAGUE 17 SPOTIFY PLAYLIST

CLICK HERE FOR THE LEAGUE 17 YOUTUBE PLAYLIST

CLICK HERE FOR THE LEAGUE 18 SPOTIFY PLAYLIST

CLICK HERE FOR THE LEAGUE 18 YOUTUBE PLAYLIST

Soundgarden - Louder Than Love (12)
Boohwal - II: Remember (12)
Riot - Fire Down Under (11, 48%)
Accept - Blood of the Nations (11, 41%)
Darkthrone - Under a Funeral Moon (10)
Sonata Arctica - Ecliptica (10)
HammerFall - Legacy of Kings (10)
Manowar - Hail to England (10, 45%)
Twisted Sister - Under the Blade (9)
Cradle of Filth - Cruelty and the Beast (9)
Saxon - Wheels of Steel (9)
Heavens Gate - Livin' In Hysteria (9)
Burzum - Filosofem (9)
Destruction - Eternal Devastation (8)
High on Fire - Blessed Black Wings (8)
Morbid Angel - Covenant (8)
Ophelia - 당신의 환상을 동정하라 (7, 30%)
Deafheaven - New Bermuda (7, 29%)
Body Count - Body Count (7)
Avantasia - Moonglow (7)
Lamb of God - As the Palaces Burn (6, 23%)
Evanescence - Fallen (6, 21%)
Ministry - Psalm 69: The Way to Succeed and the Way to Suck Eggs (5)
Aria - Герой Асфальта (5)
Deicide - Legion (5)
Eyehategod - Take as Needed For Pain (4)
Heavenly - Dust to Dust (4)
Aria - Игра С Огнём (3)
Atheist - Unquestionable Presence (3)
Pig Destroyer - Terrifyer (3)
Naked City - Torture Garden (2, 10%)
Korn - Follow the Leader (2, 7%)
577. Sunn O))) - Monoliths & Dimensions (14)
T-578. Heavens Gate - Planet Earth (11, 48%)
T-578. Gorgoroth - Antichrist (11, 48%)
580. Nevermore - Dreaming Neon Black (11, 46%)
581. Morbid Angel - Blessed Are the Sick (10)
582. Kvertelak - Meir (9, 39%)
583. X Japan - Blue Blood (9, 31%)
584. Deafheaven - Sunbather (2)

Now without further ado, your contenders:

Monoliths_%26_Dimensions.jpg

Sunn O))) - Monoliths & Dimensions (2009)

How it got here

List entries: Rolling Stone 98
League 18 - Match 1vs.
Korn_follow_the_leader.jpg

Korn - Follow the Leader (1998)

How it got here

List entries: DigitalDreamDoor 100
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Deafheaven_-_Sunbather_2013.png

Deafheaven - Sunbather (2013)

How it got here

List entries: Rolling Stone 94
League 18 - Match 2vs.
DeathSOP-1998.jpg

Death - The Sound of Perseverance (1998)

How it got here

List entries: Metal Kingdom 94
 
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X_Japan_-_Blue_Blood.jpg

X Japan - Blue Blood (1989)

How it got here

List entries: Metal Kingdom 100
League 18 - Match 3vs.
EvFallencover01.jpg

Evanescence - Fallen (2003)

How it got here

List entries: Rolling Stone 99

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Accept_Blood_of_the_Nations_cover.jpg

Accept - Blood of the Nations (2010)

How it got here

List entries: Metal Storm 99
League 18 - Match 4vs.
BlessedAreTheSick.jpg

Morbid Angel - Blessed are the Sick (1991)

How it got here

List entries: DigitalDreamDoor 94
 
Sunn O))) is barely music. Korn is super shit, but at least they try.

Never liked Deafheaven and they go against a classic band and song. No chance for them here.

X-Japan is cheesy af. I always skip that Evanescence song when listening to that album, because it's very cringy, but it's a childhood classic still.

Also, Morbid Angel are a legendary band but I could never really get into them. Same goes for Kalataccept, except I didn't mind that album when it came out.
 
I like this idea but there’s no way I’m going to be able to vote in 48 hour rounds. I’ve heard two albums on this list and would like to listen to each at least once before voting. Any chance we can do longer rounds?
 
I like this idea but there’s no way I’m going to be able to vote in 48 hour rounds. I’ve heard two albums on this list and would like to listen to each at least once before voting. Any chance we can do longer rounds?
Yeah. I was just about to say the same thing. 48 hours doesn't seem to be nearly enough time to listen to 8 full albums.
 
Never heard of Sunn O))). Sounds like what canned background elevator music must be like in Blade Runner era Los Angeles. Inoffensive, but no hooks and pretty forgettable.
Korn is generally not my thing - the Phlegmy hiccup scat-vocal stuff is annoying - but, like NP said, at least they’re trying. Easy winner here.
 
I like this idea but there’s no way I’m going to be able to vote in 48 hour rounds. I’ve heard two albums on this list and would like to listen to each at least once before voting. Any chance we can do longer rounds?
Sure, if you want this game to move into the Iced Earth length of things.
 
I just voted off the video in the first one and am comfortable doing this with bands/albums that aren’t really my thing, or where one is clearly more in my wheelhouse than the other. I’ll dive deeper whenever something grabs me, or the vote requires.
 
I just voted off the video in the first one and am comfortable doing this with bands/albums that aren’t really my thing, or where one is clearly more in my wheelhouse than the other. I’ll dive deeper whenever something grabs me, or the vote requires.
This is kinda the intent, yes. Expose to new things, vote on whatever feels right.
 
Maidenfans.com Greatest Metal Cup Nominees
This is pretty interesting, seeing who nominated what, and the total nominations for each album.

Looks like 16 out of the 25 albums I nominated were unique. I'm kind of surprised at some of them.
Collin didn't nominate any Tool albums. :eek:
Fear of the Dark is the only Maiden album that wasn't nominated.
Also, some of the numbers don't quite add up. For instance, Me and Ariana both nominated Ten by Pearl Jam, but it's only showing up as having 1 total nomination, and I also noticed that some of the albums nominated by Black Wizard are showing up as having 0 total nominations for some reason.
 
Listening to Sunn O))) is kind of like watching paint dry, but listening to Korn is like getting an icepick in the ear. Winner: Sunn O)))

Deafhaven is like two bad tastes that still don’t taste great together. Terrible vocals and often terrible music. Death’s vocals are also terrible, but less so, and the music is consistently interesting. Winner: Death

X Japan sounds like some weird garage band mash-up of early thrash and J-Pop. Not to my taste. Evanescence has the only album out of this set that I genuinely like. Winner: Evanescence

Accept is anachronistic cock rock with weird bursts of power metal, combined with vocals that I don’t care for. That said, they put together an album’s worth of coherent songs with some interesting parts. Morbid Angel is kind of an incoherent mess with even worse vocals. Winner: Accept
 
Sunn O))) takes the first matchup for me simply for being interesting. I understand what they’re going for and respect them even if it’s not exactly the best thing in the world. Korn’s okay when they come on but I respect them a lot less.

Deafheaven is some interesting black metal but Death has the only album I’ve heard in full from this whole lineup and it’s up there among my overall faves. Actually I’m surprised I didn’t nominate it, must’ve forgotten it.

X Japan is fine; Evanescence (aside from the dumb male vocals) is more exciting.

This one was closer. I love Morbid Angel’s debut, but it’s also about as much from the band as I like. Accept tipped the scale simply thanks to the chorus in that song LC posted.
 
None of this is really my cup of tea, bar Accept who I don't own anything post-Balls to the Wall and only a compilation of stuff from before it. I didn't manage to last a full track from any of them.

Sunn O))) = let it play for about a minute or so and heard 2 notes, skipped forward and it was still the same. Still better than Korn

Korn = worst band of all time in any genre of music. didn't listen to the track, but I was around in their heyday am aware of this as it was a hit. Absolute unwashable rubbish.

Deafheaven = band sounded ok might have let it play a bit more but singer and drummer seen to been playing a different track to the rest of the band. Can't stand extreme metal drumming and singing.

Death = listened to most of this, while obviously technically competent, it really was just a load of wanking with no hook or structure. Have a feeling I might have lasted longer with a different choice of track but doubt I'd have changed my opinion on Death, which is that they are not awful but not for me

X-Japan = listened to a bit, I like 80's Hair Metal but generally not the power ballads and what I listened to sounded like copying better bands

Evanescence = didn't listen to the song, obviously a huge hit that I'm well aware of. Not my cup of tea at all but the best track from those listed

Accept: lasted about a minute or so. Nothing original or worthwhile here, paint by numbers metal cliches.

Morbid Angel: lasted til the drumming. Blast beats just distract me from anything else happening in the song.

Obviously, I'm only judging the albums by the samples presented here but none of it awakened any curiosity into checking out the rest of the albums
 
I just voted off the video in the first one and am comfortable doing this with bands/albums that aren’t really my thing, or where one is clearly more in my wheelhouse than the other. I’ll dive deeper whenever something grabs me, or the vote requires.

Agreed.

Plus even if there was 2 weeks allowed between rounds I'm still never going to waste my time finishing listening to an album all the way through if it's clear that it's not for me.
 
I vote for Korn, Death, Evanescance and Morbid Angel.

Sorry if I missed this, but I can I see who nominated these albums? edit: just saw it, very interesting!

I also noticed that some of the albums nominated by Black Wizard are showing up as having 0 total nominations for some reason.
Yep. E.g. I noticed Night of the Stormrider has a nomination total of 1, while Black Wizard and yours truly nominated it.
I just saw all his nominations (votes) were not counted. The same goes for Ariana. The columns of these early alphabet members (D and E) were left out of the range. =AANTAL(F3:AAL3)
I am not an Excel expert but I don't get that A before AL, but I esteem that all other columns are counted.
@LooseCannon is there anything you could do about this, in this (early) stage of the game?

By the way, I was very strict in not selecting bands that were not on metal archives. It cost the nomination of some great records. Now I see Nirvana, Led Zeppelin and Pearl Jam are nominated. These bands are not on the site. (not the biggest deal, but it sort of deviates from what I expected; maybe I should have brought in my pick and it would have been tolerated)
 
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Sorry if I missed this, but I can I see who nominated these albums? edit: just saw it, very interesting!

Just seeing this now myself.

Note for Loose Cannon: AC/DC do not have an album called Flick of the Wrist, it's Flick of the Switch
 
Hate Korn, love Death, would've probably voted some 80s Accept album over Morbid Angel but not this one, tossed a coin for the remaining pair.
 
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