Since I just reviewed Big Black (see my review of Big Black - Atomizer here ), I thought it would be appropriate to review another highly influential noise rock band, The Jesus Lizard. The Jesus Lizard is strongly influenced by Big Black, especially because Steve Albini, the ex frontman of Big Black, is their recording engineer. I think "recording engineer" is a title Albini made up, but it's basically the same thing as a producer. According to him, the difference is recording engineers solve problems in capturing sound, while letting the artist have complete control; on the other hand producers will often take control and ruin records. The Jesus Lizard's music often features a mix of low rolling guitars and bass, harsh shrieking guitars, slow drums, and weird shouted muffled vocals.         It's kind of hard to tell, but the cover of Goat is a naked woman with some image projected on her. To be honest, I'm not a fan of this cover, it's a bit bor

        The last few bands I've reviewed were somewhat obscure, but the next album I picked, "Blackwater Park" is by a famous progressive death metal band, Opeth. Progressive or prog metal is a very hard genre to define since it describes a certain sound that the music has. Prog is often marked by complicated riffs and solos, sudden changes in the melody, and weird, often changing timings and rhythms that give the listener a feeling like they are falling into the music, but I'd really recommend just listening to some prog, because this description doesn't quite do the genre justice.         One thing I really like is when a band picks a cover for an album that gives you a good idea what the music is going to sound like, and this album does just that. The picture appears to be of a dark foggy swamp with what appears to be human forms in the background, obscured by the fog. The album cover looks dark and gloomy, and that is exactly what the music sounds like. I al

        Man, this is an album I've been looking forward to for a long time. For those who don't know, I am a big Ghost fan, and I've been waiting to buy this album when it came out on June 1st (in case you are reading this in the future, it is currently 2018). I actually bought the deluxe edition of the album which included 2 extra songs, It's a Sin, and Avalanche, and a cool 3D cover (see pictures of the back and CD below. Sorry for the bad quality photos, I took them with my iPad which has a pretty crummy camera. Also, I didn't take a picture of the 3D cover because you wouldn't be able to see it anyway). The bonus songs were pretty good, but I won't be including them in this review, since I am only reviewing the standard edition of the album.         Ghost (or sometimes Ghost B.C. due to copyright reasons) is a metal/ hard rock band who's shtick is that they are a satanic cult. I know this isn't really an unheard of thing in metal, but this band

        Ok, here's Atomizer by Big Black. Big Black was a very influential band in the 80s, fronted by Steve Albini. This is a very hard band to put in any specific category, but I've seen the band called noise punk or post-hardcore. The band's music is fast, abrasive and tackles politically and culturally loaded topics like murder, rape, arson, child abuse, pedophilia, racism, and misogyny. The lyrics were written by Albini to purposely be controversial, but also to serve as commentary and criticism. These controversial themes were very unusual and shocking for the time, and had a huge influence on the lyrical themes of punk and similar bands of the time. Big black and Steve Albini also hated the rock bands and corporations of the mainstream music industry, and worked to separate themselves from it by playing their unique sound and by keeping complete control over all aspects of the band (refusing to sign contracts, paying for their own records, planning their own shows, e

        This ones for those who like more extreme stuff. Archgoat is one of my favorite black metal bands. For those who don't know, black metal is an extreme genre of music that features shrieking or snarling vocals, fast drums, heavy distorted guitars, and a bleak atmospheric sound. The genre started with bands such as Bathory and Celtic Frost, but it didn't really become black metal until Norwegian black metal bands like Mayhem and Emperor formed and finished developing its distinct sound. I kind of like the covers of Archgoat albums, not just this one, but all of them together. Almost every Archgoat album features a pure black background with a white image and red or grey text. The common design between all the albums gives them a nice aesthetic. With this particular album cover, the creepy angel along with the skeletons reflects the satanic themes in the album and gives a feeling of terrifying evil power, which goes well with the album's music.         This album fea