Iced Earth

Diesel 11 said:

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Definitely better than the live video I watched. The live vid you posted is good, the recorded one is super earnest cheese. I reckon that this guy is on the line between beautiful melancholy and cheesey piss take metal vocals and its a personal thing as to what side of the line he falls. For me, Im on the fence. Sometimes hes great and sometimes hes funny. Jurys out.
 
Alive In Athens and Burnt Offerings are all the Iced Earth you need. Every song on AiA is better than its studio counterpart, mostly because it lacks that overly polished sound and has a lot more energy. Burnt Offerings is fairly well represented on AiA, but it is worth checking out the rawer sound of the album and Barlow gives a great studio performance. Also some great songs that aren't on AiA.
 
Mosh said:
Alive In Athens and Burnt Offerings are all the Iced Earth you need. Every song on AiA is better than its studio counterpart, mostly because it lacks that overly polished sound and has a lot more energy. Burnt Offerings is fairly well represented on AiA, but it is worth checking out the rawer sound of the album and Barlow gives a great studio performance. Also some great songs that aren't on AiA.
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Alive In Athens will get a touch
 
Mosh said:
Alive In Athens and Burnt Offerings are all the Iced Earth you need. Every song on AiA is better than its studio counterpart, mostly because it lacks that overly polished sound and has a lot more energy. Burnt Offerings is fairly well represented on AiA, but it is worth checking out the rawer sound of the album and Barlow gives a great studio performance. Also some great songs that aren't on AiA.
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Alive In Athens is one of the greatest live records ever and it’s definitely a must listen, but it doesn’t replace the greatness of the original albums. Not to mention that Horror Show, their best album, came after AiA, as did “Gettysburg (1863)”. Also, Burnt Offerings is good, but not their best. “Dante’s Inferno” is a monster but a lot of the other songs don’t quite hit that peak.
 
Ah yes I forgot about Horror Show, definitely essential listening and my favorite post-Burnt Offerings album. For me, AiA does replace the original albums, especially the first two and Dark Saga.
 
Mosh said:
For me, AiA does replace the original albums, especially the first two.
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Yeah Barlow sounds way better on those songs, although the albums are still worth a run-through for the complete picture, I think. But I would never have understood the popularity of stuff like “Travel In Stygian” without hearing AiA.
 
Alright, I was wondering why this band was so popular here, so I decided to listen to The Dark Saga.

That was an excellent album!

I like how the style shifts with each song, going from ballads to standard rockers to full-on thrash. Barlow's a good singer; he sounds very American (for better or worse) and goes from crooning to shouting in an instant.
The back half of the album is better than the first half, with the exception of Violate, which is the sort of song Slayer would have written if they were actually good.
And the final song, A Question Of Heaven.
It's okay.
Then it gets good.
Then it gets far, far better!
By the time the ending rolled around and Barlow started screaming "Why won't you let me die?", I understood why it's been called the best Iced Earth song.

I want to hear more Iced Earth; where do I go from here? No recommending Alive In Athens, though - I'm only going to listen to that album once I've heard the studio versions of everything on it.
 
Midnight said:
Alright, I was wondering why this band was so popular here, so I decided to listen to The Dark Saga.

That was an excellent album!

I like how the style shifts with each song, going from ballads to standard rockers to full-on thrash. Barlow's a good singer; he sounds very American (for better or worse) and goes from crooning to shouting in an instant.
The back half of the album is better than the first half, with the exception of Violate, which is the sort of song Slayer would have written if they were actually good.
And the final song, A Question Of Heaven.
It's okay.
Then it gets good.
Then it gets far, far better!
By the time the ending rolled around and Barlow started screaming "Why won't you let me die?", I understood why it's been called the best Iced Earth song.

I want to hear more Iced Earth; where do I go from here? No recommending Alive In Athens, though - I'm only going to listen to that album once I've heard the studio versions of everything on it.
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1998's Something Wicked This Way Comes.
 
Something Wicked, Burnt Offerings, Night of the Stormrider. If you want modern-day IE, either of the last two are great.
 
Something Wicked This Way Comes is definitely next. Then Burnt Offerings. Then Horror Show. That's all the good Barlow-era IE. After that I recommend going back and listening to Night of the Stormrider and Iced Earth. Then Alive in Athens.
 
Midnight said:
Alright, I was wondering why this band was so popular here, so I decided to listen to The Dark Saga.

That was an excellent album!

I like how the style shifts with each song, going from ballads to standard rockers to full-on thrash. Barlow's a good singer; he sounds very American (for better or worse) and goes from crooning to shouting in an instant.
The back half of the album is better than the first half, with the exception of Violate, which is the sort of song Slayer would have written if they were actually good.
And the final song, A Question Of Heaven.
It's okay.
Then it gets good.
Then it gets far, far better!
By the time the ending rolled around and Barlow started screaming "Why won't you let me die?", I understood why it's been called the best Iced Earth song.

I want to hear more Iced Earth; where do I go from here? No recommending Alive In Athens, though - I'm only going to listen to that album once I've heard the studio versions of everything on it.
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Listening through the albums chronologically is also an option. It helped me come to appreciate Barlow way more after the shit singing on the first album and the weaker vocals on the second.
 
You shouldn’t need to hear subpar vocals to appreciate Barlow, but Iced Earth isn’t a bad chronological order band. Dark Saga is a great first pick though and I’d recommend working up to Horror Show and then everything else at your discretion.
 
After listening to the debut, I'd have to rate it a solid 6/10. Iced Earth and Life and Death were the only two songs I liked. As for the singer, he was... bad. Tuneless highs, disinterested lows, and an tolerable middle range.
 
Yep, that's Gene Adam for you. Although, they re-recorded some demo tape with him in 2018, and it turns out he learned how to sing in those 28 years that passed :D
 
Night Of The Stormrider sounds awful in my headphones for some reason. The drums are too loud, and everything else is too soft. None of the other albums have this problem.
Actually, Iced Earth in general seems to have a slightly washed-out guitar sound.
I'm going to flip a coin to decide whether to listen to Horror Show or Something Wicked This Way Comes.
 
You're probably listening to the original mix. Remix fixes the drum issue. I've only heard the original mix years after the remix so it never bothered me.
 
Midnight said:
I'm going to flip a coin to decide whether to listen to Horror Show or Something Wicked This Way Comes.
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This is what happens when you don't listen to me. Iced Earth and Stormrider are pretty much recorded in a basement by a crap producer, that's why the remixes are important.
 
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