First Impressions

The idea of this thread is to give us your initial evaluation of albums you are hearing for the first time, or if you're like me, albums that you have had for a while but never really became familiar with. Include a brief description of the music as well.

I am in the process of going through my whole collection, identifying CDs I have but am unfamiliar with, evaluating them, and making a decision about whether or not to keep them. I have actually pseudo-committed to not listening to anything I know I want to keep until I have gone through everything I am unsure about... and there are probably 100-200 or more that fall into that category for me. So I will be contributing to this thread regularly.

So tell us:
Did you have expectations? Were they met? Did they create possibly undue disappointment?
Was it immediately appealing?
Did it immediately suck?
Is it something you can see growing on you?
Whatever.

Come back later and see if your opinion changed.

I know this is a little like a review thread, and we have a review forum, but I am looking for just first impressions (including brief descriptions), and how they might change over time. If the mods think this is superfluous, feel free to move or delete it.


Go.

Interesting concept - I might have to bite on this one later!

Cool thread idea for sure

Coram Lethe - The Gates of Oblivion

2005

After one full spin, I am pretty impressed with this. I would
describe it as progressive death metal. There are odd time signatures
and time changes and killer passages/moments pretty consistently worked
into musical songs. The vocals are fine, and vary to some degree.

Recommended to fans of stuff like Gory Blister, Sceptic, Gorod and the like.

OK, I'll play. A guy here at work loaned me a couple of CDs today so they're all getting first spins ...

Tattooed Love Boys - BLEEDING HEARTS AND NEEDLE MARKS: pretty average glam/sleaze rock. Production is terrible, sounds more like a demo tape than a legit album release. The singer has a pretty cool, snarling punk delivery. This was released in 1989 on Metal Blade Records, surprisingly enough. Obviously it was an attempt to take a bite of the Guns N Roses mania that all the labels wanted a piece of at the time. Interesting but not essential.

Joan Jett, THE HIT LIST: Lord knows I love me some Joan Jett, but now I remember why I never bothered to pick this album up back in the day. I have no problem with any of songs she chose to cover on HIT LIST but unfortunately, rather than treat these classic tracks to the gritty, down and dirty throwdown treatment that we KNOW Joan is capable of, these covers are WAY too polished and sterile sounding. The covers of "Time Has Come Today" and "Have You Ever Seen the Rain?" are passable (though I prefer the Ramones' versions of both) but the rest is just blah. Disappointing. I mean, how the hell do you screw up "Dirty Deeds?" Whoever told her to add a saxophone (!) to that song deserves to be deep fried in oil.

I have a couple I will listen to for the first time soon, then I will post!

The first time I heard X-Factor by Maiden. I thought it was crap then, it's still crap now (imo). I don't like any of the songs on it, it sucks.

^I have not heard that album.

The Devin Townsend Project - Addicted

i picked this album up, purely for the fact that it features Anneke van Giersbergen as guest vocals. not that i don't like Townsend, i always appreciated SYL, just never got into his other projects. fact is this album would be a great listen even without Anneke. Devin has a knack for writing catchy songs with a pop like feel, all while retaining metal credibility. he's not a bad singer either when he wants to be. can't think of a single bad thing to say about this.

Anneke sounds as great as ever, of course.

She from The Gathering? I love Mandylion.

yep, that's the same gal.

I'm a major Anneke van Giersbergen fan! Good call MC!!

This thread topic is cool. I'll come back to it when I hear an album that qualifies.

A great example for me this year was Ensiferum - From Afar. After Victory Songs I was really gung ho on this one but after the first listen it left me feeling very lukewarm..

Listened to Limp Bizkit's Three Dollar Bill for the first time in what felt like years. The album released in 1997 already sounds dated and these frat boy rockers while having alot of energy seem to have left their brains at the door.

I bought this years ago and in the right mood it is entertaining here and there but overall after not listening to this album in forever, my first impression is how did Fred Durst and his lotin boys make it so big with material that is not all that impressive. When the best song is written by George Michael that really is saying something.

Of course these guys where one of the first bands to have grown listening and loving both rap and metal and combining to two seemed natural to them, Wes Borland is a very talented guitartist so maybe when this was released in 1997 I was already too old to really take in.

Myndsnare - Condition: Human

India, 2008

I am having trouble digesting this. I might call this slightly progressive extreme metal. Death vocals, varying speeds, always metal, interesting songs for the most part. At times it's really great, and at times it's just there. I have listened to it like 3 times, and some of it seems more familiar than it should. The production is not stellar, but not overly distracting. Totally listenable for me, but not totally great. I have a feeling that familiarity will overcome any problems I might have with it.

Iron Maiden - The X Factor

Initially, I thought "WHAT THE FUKE HAPPENED...?!" but then I actually sat down and listened to the album 2 or 3 times and realized it's actually an excellent album.
Defiantly not the Maiden from days of old, but excellent none-the-less.
More mature and darker song writing.
Defo, In my top 5 Maiden albums.

High On Fire - Death Is This Communion

I wasn't too keen on HOF's first couple of albums and kinda though Blessed Black Wings was OK so I wasn't really expecting much when I heard Death Is This Communion, but boy was I wrong.
This album kicked me square in the balls and didn't stopped kicking until I was screaming like a little smurfette for it to stop lol.
It was stupidly heavy and the song writing was catchy but still HOF.
Since the album has been released, I can honestly say that I have listened to it about 1-2 times a week and continue to do so.
Defo my #1 album of the decade so far, and it also made me appreciate the early albums I didn't really enjoy. Now I love all their albums and can't wait for the new one.

Paroxysm - Scars of the Art

2007, Canada

Listened like 1.37 times. This is pretty good death metal. It's the
kind that is pretty standard and could easily be boring, but it's well
done with some variation in the songs, so it's pretty good. I am no
death metal aficionado, but I believe I hear some influence from
Suffocation.