The Greatest Metal Song Cup - Part II, Round 4, Matches 82-87

What is your favourite song in each match? Vote in all six matchups!

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  • Total voters
    8
  • Poll closed .
Thanks for nominating 7 Gates of Hell @Magnus . My brother and I were actually just talking about that being Venoms most evil sounding song, and I LOVE that riff under the verse (and I just saw Venom Inc play it live a couple weeks ago, very atmospheric!). Very tough round again. I don’t envision myself voting against Pentagram. I may just end up going Venom though against Razor but it is close!

Pentagram for me is one of the greatest doom metal bands ever, and I don’t think their sound can ever properly be replicated. There’s such a distinct 70’s hard rock/blues based hard rock sound mixed in with that dingy doom sound, it’s so unique. And Bobby Liebling, who I’ve had the honor of meeting twice, TRULY is a relic from another era, and he is A LEGEND of underground heavy metal music. Fantastic round of songs.
 
Badlands is a solid little epic. It’s a bit rough around the edges and the melodies are kind of clunky, but overall it’s pretty good. Deliver Us From Evil, though, what a song! So goofy and catchy and melodic. I love this song. Can’t believe Ghost hasn’t covered it yet.

World Eater sure is crunchy. It does absolutely nothing for me. I actually prefer the more classic death metal of Morbid Angel here.

I have no idea who Sanctuary are, but what another awesome surprise this song is! The Year The Sun Died is doomy, melodic and powerful as hell. Slayer is Slayer and, as usual, I won’t be voting for them. The guitar solos here are surprisingly coherent for Slayer, though.

Embrace The Endless Ocean is a stellar epic from Amon Amarth that showcases everything they do well: melodic, heavy riffing, brutal and accessible songwriting, syncopated groove sections, harmonies…it’s awesome from start to finish. The melodic leads that end the song are perfectly restrained. The section at 1:29 hits so hard. At The Gates have a groovy, head-nodding song, but the talking is ineffective and the lyrics are striving too hard to be intellectual. No contest here, Amon Amarth all the way.

Ah, there’s the potato recording! Thanks, Pentagram. It’s surprisingly catchier than I expected. The recording sucks, but the song is solid. I’ve heard some Solitude Aeturnus before and this is not as good as what I remember, but the music is light years better than Death Row. If the song never picked up and I was voting based solely off the first half, I’d go Pentagram, but the latter half of Destiny Falls To Ruin kicks serious ass. Both decent tunes for what they are.

7 Gates of Hell has rawness I’m not in love with, but there’s a magic to the darkness of it. Razor sounds like thrash metal Motörhead and I don’t really care for it.

Really great round!
 
"Badlands" seems to continue the trend of Metal Church songs to have nice clean parts and complex song structures, but merely OK vocals and not very memorable vocal melodies. The chorus here is better than what I've generally heard from them so far, but it's still not great. I hear a lot of early Queensrÿche elements in their sound, but it's from the same time period, so who knows who was influencing whom. Ew, that guitar solo wasn't very good, but I liked the harmonized rhythm part underneath it. The harmonization in the outro sounds sickly and bad, though. Hmm. "Deliver Us From Evil" has a nice medieval acoustic intro and a solid Celtic-flavored main riff. The singer is fine, though the vocal phrasing is pretty bad, and I'm not really on board with the nursery rhyme lyrics. The drumming is great, as expected from Zonder. I like the extended solo a lot, too. Well, both of these songs are OK overall, but have some obvious flaws. In the end I think @Perun's nominee holds together a little bit better than its competitor. Winner: Warlord - "Deliver Us From Evil"

"World Eater" is very crunchy, very repetitive, and has a bit of a garage band sound to it. The Cookie Monster vocals and pot-banging sections are terrible, as expected, though the vocals are toward the less annoying end of the spectrum. There were a couple of decent guitar ideas in here, but that's about it. "Immortal Rites" has overly busy riffage and vocals somewhere between bad non-melodic thrash and very tame Cookie Monster, but at least it keeps new musical ideas coming at a decent pace. Not a fan of either song, but @KiDDo's nominee was less annoying. Winner: Morbid Angel - "Immortal Rites"

"The Year The Sun Died" has a very atmospheric clean intro that flows nicely into the verse. I like the riffs, the solo, and most of the vocal lines here, though the chorus could be stronger. Good stuff. "Divine Intervention" is another Slayer song with the same general pros and cons as the rest -- interesting riffs, bad vocals (more annoying than usual here, with lots of nonmelodic screaming), and generally bad, directionless solos. There are a couple of atmospheric sections that are nice, but that can't salvage the rest. Easy call for @Confeos's nominee here. Winner: Sanctuary - "The Year The Sun Died"

"Embrace The Endless Ocean" has a nice tapped intro that flows into a similar evolving riff. The vocals are awful Cookie Monster garbage, but I like the melodic guitar leads. Great atmosphere in general. If this song had clean vocals I'd probably like it a lot, but alas, it doesn't. "Cosmic Pessimism" has a bouncy 90s alt-rock feel. Can't really get into the spoken word vocals, but at least they're not actively annoying like the throaty stuff in the chorus. The song doesn't really go anywhere until the guitars take a darker twist toward the end, and then there's a hard left turn into atmospheric clean guitar and strings. Well, the songwriting in the Amon Amarth song is much better, but the vocals in the At The Gates song are a bit less annoying overall. Congratusorrylations, @Night Prowler, but I'm going to reward the better-written song here. Winner: Amon Amarth - "Embrace The Endless Ocean"

"Death Row" has OK riffage, terrible production, and lame half-sung vocals. The solo's pretty decent, at least. Started checking the clock at the 3.5 minute mark. Not a fan. "Destiny Falls To Ruin" sets an effective mood, has interesting-enough guitars, and the vocals and melodies are pretty good. I like the uptempo bridge that leads into the first solo, though the solo itself is merely OK. The second solo is much better. The track didn't wow me, but it was pretty decent overall -- and sorry @DJ James, but that's more than enough for @MindRuler's nominee to take this match. Winner: Solitude Aeturnus - "Destiny Falls To Ruin"

"The Seven Gates Of Hell" has a nice atmospheric intro and pretty good riffs. The singer isn't good, and he's only half-singing here, but I've heard much worse. There are some interesting eastern elements to the solo, but the guitar is buried in the mix there for some reason. I'm also not sure why they bothered to do the fade-out fake-out, only to do an abrupt fade-out again after the song comes back. Weird. A not-very-good song with some good ideas in it, I suppose. "Instant Death" has great riffs, but the half-Lemmy vocalist isn't the best, and the vocal melodies aren't memorable. The solo and the following section also feel way too rushed, but the screams there actually work pretty well. Not thrilled with either track, but sorry @Magnus, I found more to like in @DJ James's nominee. Winner: Razor - "Instant Death"
 
Tough first round. Neither of these songs are great but they both have aspects I like. "Badlands" has some strong guitar work, but lackluster verses and a barely-chorus. "Deliver Us From Evil" is a bit too twee but I like the groove of the nursery rhyme bits. Ah well, Metal Church are currently losing so I'll go with them.

Also a tough second round, but this time it's because I like both songs. "World Eater" is chunky as hell; I don't know that the whole album blows me away but a four minute song scratches the itch certainly. Meanwhile "Immortal Rites" is the classic opener to Morbid Angel's iconic Altars of Madness, and I really like it. Not as much as I did some years ago but the intro - with the reversed riff sliding by before a drum hit switches the track to forwards - is still awesome. Guess I'll go with Bolt Thrower cuz they're losing and are no doubt about to be savaged.

I didn't hate "Divine Intervention", it actually has some interesting bits in it that I don't really expect from Slayer. But it's not one of their best by any means. "The Year the Sun Died" is also not mind-blowing, but I guess is more interesting. Sanctuary it is.

Well, the songwriting in the Amon Amarth song is much better, but the vocals in the At The Gates song are a bit less annoying overall.
Are you just talking about the harsh vocals or are you factoring in the spoken verses too? Cuz lord the harsh vocals in that ATG song sucked. Meanwhile, Amon Amarth's are super strong, and powerful in a very Norse fashion. I don't know how many people know of this, but there's actually a theory from historians that the chanting/singing that Vikings would do may have been done with harsh vocals. This makes a Scandinavian band singing about Viking shit with death growls a lot more interesting, personally. Pretty epic song overall, gotta vote for Amon Amarth.

Did not get "Death Row". Solitude Aeternus was so subtle. I was okay through the first two verses/choruses, but then when they entered the faster section they really grabbed me. Very good song overall, very impressed.

Solid final match. Venom's track was more interesting, lots more meat musically than some of their offerings and there was a cinematic nature I appreciated. Razor's was short and to the point but not terribly interesting until it sped up a bit. Great screams at the end; still going with Venom though.
 
Best round so far.

Metal Church - Badlands vs Warlord - Deliver Us From Evil. Amazing duel. Metal Church is fantastic and at least a nice Popoff choice but Warlord is a top 3 favorite band and I'm thrilled to see a Warlord nomination here apart from mine.

Bolt Thrower - World Eater vs Morbid Angel - Immortal Rites. Jaw dropping songs from Bolt Thrower (haven't heard it before) and Morbid Angel, which wins on points.

Sanctuary - The Year the Sun Died vs Slayer - Divine Intervention. Also thrilled to see Sanctuary here, even a song with Loomis. Great!

Amon Amarth - Embrace of the Endless Ocean vs At the Gates - Cosmic Pessimism. Night Prowler vs Night Prowler. Both huge songs. Night Prowler wins, for introducing those beautiful songs. I have NP's Top 25 in my Apple Music Playlists, great collection of songs. Pity that those gems had to compete each other, Amon Amarth for the win but it was a tough one.

Pentagram - Death Row vs Solitude Aeturnus - Destiny Falls to Ruin. Again a tough choice, more compatible to my taste, Death Row is a great one though.

Venom - The Seven Gates of Hell vs Razor - Instant Death. Venom as the heavier and worship-able from both.

Great choices, all.
 
Badlands is my 25th most played track this year, other than that not a big fan of this round. It wasn't as bad as I was fearing though.

Metal Church
Bolt Thrower
Slayer
At the Gates
Pentagram
Razor
 
Badlands vs. Deliver Us From Evil - Both songs bored me. Went with Badlands, but honestly they are probably of the same quality.

World Eater vs. Immortal Rites - Not really a fan of death metal like this. Morbid Angel's song was slightly better, even though I generally prefer Bolt Thrower.

The Year the Sun Died vs. Divine Intervention - Not a fan of Lombardo-less Slayer and this Sanctuary song is pretty good.

Embrace of the Endless Ocean vs. Cosmic Pessimism - Embrace is one of Amon Amarth's best songs. Shame that nowadays they prefer playing stupid shit like Raise Your Horns instead.
Here's a rare live recording with one of the guys from Apocalyptica on cello:

Death Row vs. Destiny Falls to Ruin - Pentagram's vocals are awfully performed and awfully produced. Solitude Aeturnus is kinda boring, but much better than Pentagram.

The Seven Gates of Hell vs. Instant Death - Venom are fucking awful. Razor are only slightly better and more tolerable.
 
Not a lot of votes this round so far :(

Warlord for me was a lovely surprise. Excellent nomination from Perun, of course. I'll pick the immortal Bolt Thrower over a lacklustre Morbid Angel track. That Sanctuary track absolutely whips, I loved it. Amon Amarth but I didn't hate At the Gates either. I hate that Pentagram falls into the low-fi recording "thing", because they can play. And yeah, Venom.
 
Pretty good first round, Warlord.

Bolt Thrower is more my style.

Didn't like Divine Intervention at all. Killer Sanctuary song, actually sounds more like Nevermore than Sanctuary.

Amon Amarth have a good song and huge sound, but Cosmic Pessimism is quite unique so I give it the edge.

Destiny Falls to Ruin is great, love the singing. The Pentagram song was fun.

Instant Death is very tight and has a lot going for it, Venom more dynamic and evil. Strongest match here, going with Razor..?
 
Missed the cut off for this but had listened to everything and written up everything except the last tie so may as well post it


Metal Church - Badlands vs. Warlord - Deliver Us From Evil (1983 Deliver Us EP Version)
Badlands solid enough second tier metal track, Deliver Us From Evil solid enough NWOBHM style track, not pushed either way, will give Warlord the win because Metal Church is such a terrible name Deliver Us from Evil

Bolt Thrower - World Eater vs. Morbid Angel - Immortal Rites

Neither of these tracks are anything I have any interest in, World Eater is Slayer riffs disguised by playing them in a lower tuning and the band and the drummer are just doing their own thing with no regard for the other. Immortal Rites is at least tight and clear. Immortal Rites

Sanctuary - The Year the Sun Died vs. Slayer - Divine Intervention

The Year the Sun Died is similar to songs by Iced Earth and a few others that have been in the game, in that, the stuff is recorded well and played well, but you're struggling to see what they bring to the table as a unique selling point, it's just metal by numbers. Divine Intervention was the last great Slayer album, and the title track is one of the better songs from it. Production is raw but works. Divine Intervention

Amon Amarth - Embrace of the Endless Ocean vs. At the Gates - Cosmic Pessimism

Both tracks decent enough, not quite what I'd be looking for but enjoyable in their own way. Amon Amarth had a bit more going on with the layered guitars Embrace of the Endless Ocean

Pentagram - Death Row vs. Solitude Aeturnus - Destiny Falls to Ruin

Both bands heavily influeced by Sabbath, but with Solitude Aeturnus it's an influence, Pentagram is downright theft, even the lyric about giving death a kiss (paraphrase) is taken from Hand of Doom. It doesn't mean that the track wasn't enjoyable enough but you have to reward the band that put more of their own stamp on things Destiny Falls to Ruin

Venom - The Seven Gates of Hell vs. Razor - Instant Death

Solid enough NWOBHM from both, not produced great. The fast part of Instant Death was the best from either track. Instant Death
 
I sadly missed this round, and I can't promise I'll do the next one either as I'm mostly away until Sunday, but my votes would probably have gone to Warlord, Bolt Thrower, Sanctuary, Amon Amarth and Solitude Aeturnus this time. I'm unsure about the last match.
 
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The metal church in the badlands could not deliver us from evil, and Warlord ends. Morbid Angel gives rites for the mighty Bolt Thrower. Slayer needs divine intervention as their sun has died against Sanctuary. Are you a cosmic pessimist, At the Gates? You ought to be, for you've drowned in Amon Amarth's endless ocean. Pentagram's destiny has turned to ruin as they remain on death row against Solitude Aeturnus. It's a Razor-thin win, but Venom banishes their opponents to instant death and eternity past the seven gates of hell.





Part I, Round 27, Matches 157-162


Play In Round
Match 157
Rod Smallwood Division​
Manowar - Thor (The Powerhead)
vs.
Riot - Outlaw​
@Kalata
Nominators
Popoff 500​
Youtube | Spotify | Amazon
Links

Play In Round
Match 158
Rod Smallwood Division​
Disturbed - Stricken
vs.
Drowning Pool - Bodies​
Best Music Art 100
Nominators
Youtube 50​
Youtube | Spotify | Amazon
Links

Play In Round
Match 159
Rod Smallwood Division​
Nile - Annihilation of the Wicked
vs.
Death - Overactive Imagination​
@Diesel 11
Nominators
Youtube | Spotify | Amazon
Links

Play In Round
Match 160
Futureal Division​
Candlemass - Demon's Gate
vs.
Solitude Aeturnus - Scent of Death​
@Confeos
Nominators
Youtube | Spotify | Amazon
Links

Play In Round
Match 161
Futureal Division​
Slayer - At Dawn They Sleep
vs.
Pantera - 5 Minutes Alone​
Popoff 500
Nominators
Popoff 500​
Youtube | Spotify | Amazon
Links

Play In Round
Match 162
Futureal Division​
Deep Purple - Stormbringer
vs.
Van Halen - Hot for Teacher​
Popoff 500
Nominators
Popoff 500​
Youtube | Spotify | Amazon
Links
 
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Solitude Aeturnus - Scent of Death
Woah. Different nominator too. Are those guys big in the doom scene? I was actually going to listen to this song because it seems to be their most popular song and Destiny Falls to Ruin really left an impression on me.
 
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