The Daily Procrastinator

LAMB OF GOD - WRATH

I am a huge fan of thrash metal.  There is just something about it that grabs you by the throat and won’t let you go.  The best metal of this sort has a “groove”:  riffs to kill for keeping time with hellaciously fast blastbeats, riding cymbals, and a pounding bass.   Back in the mid- to late 80s, there existed a sort of glory days of thrash.  This was exemplified by the four pillars of the genre (Anthrax, Slayer, Megadeth, and old Metallica) coupled with the “newcomers” Pantera.  Go ahead and throw in Prong (particularly Beg to Differ) and Testament as a couple of other favorites.

Lamb of God is today’s undisputed leader of the genre and is leading a renaissance of thrash.  Sure, Slayer and Metallica get the Grammys, but that is just a case of  name recognition on the part of the voters.  I was first turned on to LoG after hearing “Laid to Rest” from their album Ashes of the Wake, which was the first album I’d bought in a long time that simply ripped my face off.   And while I was never a huge fan of the “cookie monster”-style of vocal stylings, LoG just made it work for me.   Their follow-up, Sacrament, became a drop-date purchase for me, and it continued to impress.

But both albums have been eclipsed by the triumph that is Wrath.

Where do these guys get all of these wonderful riffs?  Seriously, if you don’t find yourself involuntarily headbanging during the bridge of “Dead Seeds,” you have no metal in your soul.   High points (as if there were low points) include “Set to Fail”, “Contractor” and “Choke Sermon”.    But my personal favorite is the closer, “Reclamation”:  the blues-based lick that provides the structure and, simply put, drive of this song is perfectly pieced together.  It is the juggernaut of the album.

Wrath is now the front-runner for album of the year.  It will be interesting to see what other bands are willing to put out this year in the face of this onslaught.

"We'd like to thank the Grammy voters' powers of name-recognition ..."

It seems Metallica received another nomination, this time for “My Apocalypse” under the “Best Metal Performance” category.

Of course Metallica got another nomination – I mean, they released an album, and that seems to be all it takes for Metallica to receive a nod. St. Anger proved beyond a doubt that the Grammys are based on name recognition solely — who actually listened to that phoned-in effort more than once before winging it out the car window like a frisbee? Meanwhile, Anthrax’s We’ve Come for You All was not even nominated.

Other proof? Slayer’s “Eyes of the Insane” winning over Lamb of God’s “Redneck” in 2007 and, the next year, Slayer’s winning with “Final Six” over Machine Head’s “Aesthetics of Hate”, both egregious errors. This is not to knock F*&KING SLAYER but their past couple albums just haven’t matched up to their earlier work. Meanwhile, Lamb of God’s albums are redefining metal and Machine Head’s The Blackening is stronger than any album either Metallica or Slayer put out in at least a decade (that would be since “… And Justice for All” in Metallica’s case).

It would actually be interesting to see what would happen if both Metallica and Slayer were nominated in the same year, but we all know that the more palatable Metallica would get the nod (barring a not-out-of-realm-of-possibility announcement of a “tie”). I guess when they start things off with Jethro Tull winning out over Metallica I shouldn’t expect much, though.

A band featuring a flutist beat Metallica. Seriously.

Here now are the also-rans for “Best Metal Performance” for 2009:

Dragonforce – “Heroes Of Our Time” (“Dragonforce” – snicker – if these guys win a Grammy it will be for “Most Annoying Music Accompanying an Anime Cartoon about Robots”)

Judas Priest – “Nostradamus” (name recognition got JP this nomination – how long has it been since they’ve been relevant?)

Ministry – “Under My Thumb” (always the bridesmaid, never the bride)

Slipknot – “Psychosocial” (they won in 2006 – Metallica and Slayer weren’t nominated)