New music to check out and bands that suck in my opinion

Tranquillian said:
Some album recommendations:

Immortal - At the heart of Winter (fast and melodic black metal, a true masterpiece)
Dissection - Storm of the light's bane (A true masterpiece, you have to hear it)
At the gates - Slaughter of the soul (See above)
Kreator - Violent revolution (Perhaps the best mix of thrash and melody ever)

My recommendation for an Iced Earth album would be "Night of the stormrider", for Opeth "Still life".

This man knows his metal.
 
for Iced Earth, you need the remastered Burnt Offerings. Their best album, whether or not remastered, is this one. It was written during an angry time in their career, and Jon Schaffer is a fool to think it's their worst!

Another band I've recently discovered is Amon Amarth. These guys are great... Viking thrash death metal at it's finest. And I don't care much for death metal. However, vs. the World grabbed me by the balls and kicked my ass! I've gone back now and gotten their previous three albums.

And as far as Viking Metal goes, pick up Therion's Secret of the Runes. Therion is my fave band besides Nevermore and Overkill. But they take some getting used to if you aren't familiar with them. You may want to check them out on iMesh or some other file-share first. Or their website for that matter: www.megatherion.com

Speaking of Overkill... Killbox 13 is a must have. Angrier than that St. Anger shit, believe me. 'nuf said!

~Hoyt.
 
Another vote for Still Life from Opeth...runs from brutal to beautiful
Soilwork - Natural Born Chaos or Predator's Portrait
Arch Enemy - Wages of Sin is awesome...I just discovered it
Prong - Cleansing is pretty solid as far as groove metal...not very technical, but never stops moving
Into Eternity is a good up and coming band...still maturing, but ready for a breakthrough...much heavier live

My vote as far as a "classic" is Coroner....Mental Vortex or Grin has some of the best metal guitar playing from Tommy Vetterli