THE CRUSADE OF EPICS: Results -> A Change Of Seasons wins!

I'm really not into Meat Loaf's style of music. I don't even like The Outlaw Torn that much, but there's no doubt it's better in this match up.
 
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Results of Round 54:
Meat Loaf - Bat Out Of Hell
Metallica - The Outlaw Torn

Ahab - Yet Another Raft Of The Medusa (Pollard's Weakness) (Nominated by @Diesel 11)
vs.
Insomnium - Lay Of The Autumn (Nominated by @Night Prowler)
 
Harmless happy synthy droning stuff with vocals that will probably annoy @Jer vs. epic melancholic stuff with lots of ideas, and vocals that will probably annoy @Jer even more?
I am genuinely sorry brate NP but it's Diesel's nomination all the way this time.
And a long way it is indeed...
 
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Reactions: Jer
The actual raft of La Meduse incident was dramatically violent and gory af, not melancholic. :D I find it hard to absorb a very doomy take on this, having been listening to another faster song about the same subject recently. With lots of happy synthy stuff and vocals that would annoy Jer still further. In French.


Insomnium's offering is bordering on genre-formulaic, but I'll take it, thanks.
 
The original Ahab embed didn’t work for me, but this one did:

 
This Ahab song has a great atmospheric opening and builds up a cool epic doom vibe…and then the power belching begins. No sir, don’t like it. The clean vocals that follow work much better and remind me of a less refined take on the Fvneral Fvkk sound. At this point I’m about 2/3 of the way through the song and not too much has actually happened. The drunken frat boy burping returns, then the song stumbles into some more lively percussion and distant melodic vocals which are far more appealing. Some more instrumental meandering leads into a nice atmospheric outro. There were some cool parts here, but the song plodded on way too long for its actual musical content, and I obviously wasn’t on board for the extreme vocals.

This Insomnium song has a nice folk metal vibe, and while the extreme vocals predictably stink, they’re buried a bit in the mix and are toward the less awful end of the spectrum for me. The clean harmonized vocals that follow are far superior and actually fit the music, so it’s a shame that they couldn’t have just gone with that approach throughout. The Cookie Monster nonsense reasserts itself for the rest of the song, but if I do my best to ignore it and focus on the music, there’s a lot to like here — a nice softer interlude, some proggier bits, and some unexpected synths that work surprisingly well. The harmonized guitar outro is great too. The song is never boring, and if it weren’t for the silly and distracting extreme vocals I’d probably say it was great overall.

No contest here. Sorry, @Diesel 11, but @Night Prowler ‘s nominee takes this one easily. Winner: Insomnium
 
“Sol Invictus” has questionable production, and at times it almost sounds like an iffy Geddy Lee impersonator fronting a Maiden cover band. It’s certainly listenable, but the lyrics sound like they’re being read live off a piece of paper rather than being an organic part of the song, and there are places where the guitars sound like they may be out of tune with each other. The songwriting is generally fine, and the song isn’t boring, but it’s not particularly inspiring either.

“Firth Of Fifth” has a nice proggy piano opener. I’m not very familiar with the Gabriel era of the band, so I’m surprised to hear Phil Collins singing this. Some cool moody bits with flute, a nice synth instrumental in the middle, and a pleasant hyper-extended guitar solo. In the end this is mostly an instrumental with some vocal bookends, and a lot of it has an improvisational feel, but it’s cohesive and enjoyable.

Neither one knocked it out of the park for me, but one nominee had more glaring weaknesses than the other, so sorry, @LooseCannon, but I’m going with TheFlashIsMyGuide’s choice here. Winner: Genesis
 
Even only the Firth of Fifth's particular approach to repetition with different instrumentation (the piano intro cascades later on with synth, the flute and the guitar solo), cheap as it is, but combined with the breathtaking melancholy of Hackett's work in particular would make me vote for it against a lot of tracks. I have moved on to other Gabriel-era albums since (and even on this album, I tend to prefer the Cinema Show nowadays), but this used to be one of my favourite records and I still hold it in very high regard.

And mind you, I really like Atlantean Kodex and The White Goddess is probably their most consistently enjoyable album for me, but this time it's personal, so my vote went to Genesis immediately.
 
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