Tribute Albums

[Zephyrus]

Discuss your favorite tribute albums, those that should be avoided, and bands that deserve a tribute album.

Of the few tributes I've heard, my favorite has to be Originators of the Northern Darkness: A Tribute to Mayhem. I love how each band, mostly big-leaguers in the black metal and death metal scene, applies their own sound to Mayhem's many classics. Not to mention that every song from DMDS is covered on this album. The only drawback I could say would be that some of the artists try too hard to mimic Attila's signature vocals. I would have preferred they use their own style (Abbath and Ihsahn especially).

Here's the tracklisting to give you an idea of how heavy the hitters are...

1. Immortal - "From The Dark Past"
2. Dark Funeral - "Pagan Fears"
3. Vader - "Freezing Moon"
4. Emperor - "Funeral Fog"
5. Behemoth - "Carnage"
6. Limbonic Art - "De Mysteriis Dom Sathanas"
7. Keep Of Kalessin - "Buried By Time And Dust"
8. Gorgoroth - "Life Eternal"
9. Carpathian Forest - "Ghoul"
10. Seth - "Into Thy Labyrinth"
11. Gehenna - "Cursed In Eternity"
12. Absu - "Deathcrush"




On the topic of bands that deserve tribute albums, I'd like to see an effort to put together an Emperor tribute, preferably on the scale of this Mayhem tribute. So far I've only found a couple Emperor covers (by Crionics and Sirius).

 

[The Ozzman]

Pagan Fears has such an awesome opening riff.

 

[Zephyrus]

I know Burzum has a few tribute albums out there. Which is the best?

 

[AchrisK]

I like the two Overload tributes to Metallica. They are not 100% great, but have many good covers. One of the more notable covers is Solarisis doing Nothing Else Matters. I don't even like the original, but they made it pretty awesome.

 

[False Joe]

I believe there's a tribute album to Possessed - Seven Churches (which arrived yesterday. Killer death metal album) out there.

 

[ramses]

The Rush tribute musically is the best..the first one "Working Man" It has many great musicians on it Billy Sheehan, James Murphy, Mike Portnoy, Shadow Gallery, Michael Romeo..Lemur Voice, Steve Morse...and quite a few others.

 

[skeptik]

I don't really care for tribute albums.

 

[Manic Ferocity]

I don't see the point of them.

 

[General Zaroff]

I might have to check this out.

I never heard Keep Of Kalessin's version of Buried By Time And Dust.

 

[Up the Irons]

I don't really care for tribute albums.

They can be hit or miss.

A few of the better ones:

Ledgends of Metal Vol 1 and 2 - Judas Priest tributes
Nativity in Black 1 - Black Sabbath tribute

A few of the worst ones:

A Call to Irons 1 and 2 - Iron Maiden tributes

 

[circle master]

I don't see the point of them.

.

 

[Zephyrus]

I'm a big fan of cover songs. I like how different bands bring their own approach to performing another band's music. It's just as refreshing as hearing familiar songs played on a live CD. Because who wants to hear the same version of one song over and over?

 

[waif]

Apocalyptica did a tribute to Metallica that was interesting, but ultimately not worth buying (oops).

The "In Conspiracy With Satan: A Tribute To Bathory" album is pretty good. The Emperor version of Fine Day To Die sounds exactly like the original, though...cool thing is that hearing the old school bathory songs covered with solid production values makes them sound good (for example, War. The original sucks, the cover is great...).

 

[Zephyrus]

Does that include the covers Dark Funeral did for "Call from the Grave" and "Equimanthorn"?

 

[AchrisK]

When I think about it, I am not sure of the point either, but I do like some of them. As far as alternate versions of familiar songs, I may like tributes better than live albums.

I like some of the songs on A Call To Irons. Possession did a great job on Revelations (or whatever they did).

 

[CAIRATH]

I don't really care for tribute albums.

Same. Like remix albums, I've always seen tribute albums as having some kind of inherent off-putting cheapness to them.

 

[Mentok]

The only "tribute" I dig is Iced Earth's "Tribute to the Gods" which as you know is just Iced Earth covering a variety of songs. Other than that I dont usually listen to tributes because usually there is a cover that ruins one of my favorites. Then everytime after that when i want to listen to the original I hear the shitty one in the back of my head.

 

[SouthernTrendkill]

I've only ever bought 2 tribute albums, an alternative rock tribute to Neil Young with a bunch of big names and a metal tribute to Led Zeppelin called Dead Zeppelin. I found both of them to be unsatisfying.

One of my problems with tribute albums is that it's a bunch of different bands. I don't listen to multiple bands at once, I listen to one band at a time (no radio for me). I think one band doing a tribute album of just one band's songs would be awesome.

I don't imagine myself going out and getting any tribute albums any time soon but I'd be interested if I ever see a death metal tribute to Nirvana or a folk tribute to any death metal band... other than Opeth, because that's just too easy.

 

[Mentok]

I think one band doing a tribute album of just one band's songs would be awesome.

Six Feet Under did AC/DC's whole Back in Black cd

 

[SouthernTrendkill]

Six Feet Under did AC/DC's whole Back in Black cd

Hehe, that's interesting... which brings me to a point that I didn't realize. I actually don't like it when a band covers a whole album straight up and releases it on a CD, like Les Claypool did with Animals. Unless they totally change the albums genre and style then it seems excessive to release an album that already exists by the original artist.

But I do think it's awesome when a band will do a whole disc of songs in tribute to one particular band, provided that it's not all from one album.