Recent content by Talking Meat

I'll be the old fogey and mention Savatage (Gutter Ballet & Streets), and second Queensryche (Rage for Order & Mindcrime). Back in the day those were always the first two responses you'd get to "progressive metal?".

The world clearly needs more Secret Chiefs 3.

Do people hate on Awake? Pretty amazing album and the only DT I like to listen to. There are some guitar (and keyboard) sounds during "Voices" and "Mirror" that absolutely dominate. I think my favorite metal sound may be on Isis - Panopticon, where they got that monolithic wall of sound, yet...

Rachmaninov's Concerto #2 is the one that destroys, but 1 - 3 are all almost necessities. Others: Pat Metheny - San Lorenzo (Yeah its a Metheny song but Mays kind of takes the song over) Grateful Dead - Silver Apples of the Moon (one-off dual-piano piece with Bruce Hornsby that is out of this...

I think that St Anger was karma coming back to bite Ulrich and Hetfield in the ass for what they did to Jason on AJFA You mean like hiring him out of obscurity and making him a very rich man that can spend the rest of his life doing whatever the hell he wants? What a-holes.

APC never caught my ear. Tool is pretty damn good but I don't have them anywhere near hallowed status. I've never been a huge fan, but I did see them open for Primus in about 1996. It was before I was listening to too much serious metal, and I was there on a head full of crazy acid, with...

Zappa? When I think of him I think of two things - a true intellectual genius, and a theoretical music knowledge that allowed him to compose legit symphonies. I see what you're talking about, but its a bit too early to say he's a force of nature like FZ.

However inconsistent his stuff is (never terrible, just sometimes iffy), I always love the effort and passion he puts into it. And when he hits it, it can be uniquely brilliant. Just picked up Zeltoid last week, didn't think I'd like the wackiness, but actually loved the album. Says "sober" a...

Secret Chiefs is doing stuff that, as long as the dude is being serious when he talks about it, way farther out than most of this other far-out stuff. He's talked about reading ancient mysticism scripts to find strange geometries and patterns he uses to build melodies. Most of their stuff...

All kinds of Danny Elfman, really. The Batman soundtrack has some of the best music I've ever heard on it. Also with Stravinsky - The Firebird Suite, some dynamic sh*t.

I've never understood the whole Comfortably Numb thing....I mean, when I was 16 it was terrific but there's so much more music out there......... Buckethead - Vladmir Pockets' Incredible Slunk Show (the one right toward the end), an auditory roller coaster ride For a long time I thought the...

I think Beck was pretty great up through around Sea Change, but his stuff since then has been really bland. Heard the new one is good but I'm not all juiced about checking it out.

Ratatat? They're grounded in indie pop, but their sound has a lot of meat on its bones. Pretty great band. http://www.myspace.com/ratatatmusic

I've always found Kraftwerk a bit boring. As far as Boards of Canada, I would think your average Opeth fan will really prefer Geogaddi, with its terrificly dense and layered compositions.

Good smooth jazz = early Pat Metheny, like his self-titled album. A rare bird no doubt though. For another good recommendation, Charlie Hunter has loads of good work out there, esp. his first couple Charlie Hunter Trio albums.