"A Lesson In Violence" is full of great riffs and very good solos, but it's also full of bad, barely melodic thrash vocals with lots of cringey squeals, and that's a pretty hard obstacle to climb over. "Among The Living" has a nice atmospheric opening and is full of good riffs and solid solos. Belladonna's vocals don't really fit here, and they're also barely melodic, with the few vocal melodies that
are there mostly sucking. I'm a little surprised by this result, but the better music and surprisingly not-much-worse vocals of
@Perun's nominee are able to squeak this one out.
Winner: Exodus - "A Lesson In Violence"
"Karma" has punchy rhythms, nice middle eastern melodies, and tasteful arrangement choices with the synths and backing vocals. The vocal lines are smooth and appealing, though they never take off enough to break orbit. The solos are great and the song is really well constructed in general. Great stuff. "The Dark Ride" starts off on the wrong foot with carnival music (yes, I understand it's thematically appropriate), but the stately harmonized guitars that follow it up are much better. The verse is pretty strong, but the half-whispered pre-chorus is iffy, and the chorus melody is unfortunately mediocre. There are also some bad phrasing choices peppered throughout the lyrics. The trilled guitar interlude just treads water, but the slower vocal bridge is quite nice and tastefully synth orchestrated. The spoken word bridge that follows isn't so hot, but the acoustic interlude and solos are great, as is the final vocal section. The second half of this song is great, and has higher highs than anything its competitor has to offer; but it also has a very rough first half, and sorry
@Poto, but overall
@MrKnickerbocker's nominee is more consistently enjoyable.
Winner: Kamelot - "Karma"
"Spiral Architect" has a nice acoustic opening and a surprisingly bright feel. The vocal lines through the verse are pretty good, though the chorus melodies are a little worse. The orchestrated part is surprising, but works well. Good stuff overall. "Rock Hard Ride Free" has a cool ominous opening, and nice soloing and harmonized guitar passages. The verse is punchy, the pre-chorus is pretty good, and the chorus is big and effective. The reprise of the intro with odd timing is pretty cool too. Very good overall. I enjoyed both songs, but congratulations
@srfc, your nominee was stronger.
Winner: Judas Priest - "Rock Hard Ride Free"
"Black Mass" has pretty good riffs, good solos, and good singing with solid vocal lines. The drums sound like they were recorded on a miniature kit inside a cereal box or something, but that's neither here nor there. The song runs on a bit longer than it needs to, and it never does anything particularly great, but it's still solidly good. "Bring Me His Head" has an appealing 70s energy to it with some nice lead work. The vocals are good through the verse and chorus, though the pre-chorus is a bit iffy. The juxtaposition of soft female vocals and a bouncy melody with morbid lyrics is pretty funny. Good stuff. This one's pretty close, but sorry
@____no5, I think
@Wogmidget's nominee had a little bit more charisma to it.
Winner: Lucifer - "Bring Me His Head"
"Rising From Ruins" is perhaps my favorite song from
Firepower, with a great epic feel, nice dynamics, strong riffs, great solos, and great melodies. Love the little mandolin bit they slipped in there, too. I really like how Priest incorporated some power metal sounds into their style here without going overboard with it -- power metal certainly incorporated lots of Priest into
their sound, so turnabout is fair play! Great song, great nomination. "Sirens" has an interesting acoustic opening and pretty solid guitar and vocal lines. I don't know WTF they were thinking with the effects on the "sirens" lyric, but whatever. The tolling bell interlude is interesting, the "ah! ahhhh!" bit less so. Well, that was different. Not bad, but
@Kalata's nominee still takes this one easily.
Winner: Judas Priest - "Rising From Ruins"
"The Mirror" has interesting rhythmic play, and it gets a bonus point for using pipe organ. LaBrie trying to sound tough is laughable, the vocal lines are uneven, and I'm not super fond of the nu-metal feel of the rhythm guitars, but the rest of the music is good. "Under The Red Cloud" has a classy piano and guitar opening and an appealing Celtic groove. The clean vocals have a pretty noticeable accent, but they aren't bad, and the melodies are good. The limited Cookie Monster stuff is annoying and feels completely out of place, and I look forward to a future remix that removes it. The synth and guitar solos are great, though, and the song is really well constructed minus the smattering of extreme vocals. You might think this would be an obvious choice for me, but congratulations
@Poto, your nominee is just a fundamentally better song in almost every way, and the extreme vocals are limited enough that they can't quite drag it down.
Winner: Amorphis - "Under The Red Cloud"
