MetalMennonite
- Aquilus - Bellum I: black metal, neo-folk
- Boys Noize - +/-: techno, industrial
- clipping. - Wriggle (Expanded): hip-hop, industrial hip-hop, horror
- Dave Quam - Greasemania Vol 3: experimental, electronic
- Dawn of Ashes - Blood of Titans (Remixes): industrial, aggrotech
- Drumcorps - For the Living: breakcore, experimental
- Faderhead - Years of the Serpent: industrial, ebm
- Gelassenheit - Gelassenheit: black metal, christian
- Gelassenheit - โฆDon Thyself in the Armor ov God: black metal, christian
- Hollywood Burns - The Age of Saucers: soundtrack (to nothing), synth
- Heliocentric - Ishmael: metalcore, djent
- Keygen Church - โโโโโโโโโโโโ: electronic, black metal
- Noise Unit - Deviator: ebm
- Spiritbox - Eternal Blue: metalcore, djent
- TesseracT - Portals: progressive metal, prog rock
- Thou - Hightower: sludge, doom
- Violence - Opus I: industrial, metal, crossover
- Virtual Terrorist - Gutter Mixes Vol 2: industrial, noise
- Between the Buried and Me - Colors II: progressive metal, jazz metal
- Note: some of their music is on bandcamp, but not this album, yet. Likely a problem with their current label
- Bo Burnham - Inside: humor, satire
- Note: I also referenced the special in my 2021 Watching Recommendations
- Demon Hunter - Songs of Death and Resurrection: non-metal-versions-of-their-metal-tracks
- For King & Country - Burn the Ships Deluxe Edition: gospel, pop
- Silent Planet - Iridescent: metalcore, homework core
- The Ezra Klein Show: deep conversations on topics of the political economy
- Just Plain Wrong: hilarious reviews of Amish fiction, from 3 Mennonite librarians
- The Peter Attia Drive: health science interviews and deep dives, I am a paid subscriber
- Risky Business: cybersecurity news
- Wait WaitโฆDonโt Tell Me!: a comedic game show about the weekโs news
- clipping.
- Zao
- Front Line Assembly
- Circle of Dust
- Living Sacrifice
- Juno Reactor
- Killswitch Engage
- August Burns Red
๐ถ I like to create a playlist (from my own music collection) of the artists Iโll be seeing at a concert, so I can listen to it in prep for the event.
Can you see why Iโm excited about Furnace Fest? #MetalMennonite #FF23
๐ถ just sayin'….
๐ถ๐๏ธ๐ Itโs that time of year when I get to enjoy my favorite #MetalMennonite song as much as I want.
2021 Recommendations - Listening ๐ถ๐
As I mentioned in my 2021 Product & Service Recommendations, I primarily use Plex + Plexamp for listening to music (and Marvis Pro on the go), and track listens in Last.fm. I listen to podcasts in Overcast.fm.
Iโll cover a little bit about my listening habits, then share top albums and top podcasts.
Music Overview
Hereโs a rough map of my top genres over the year:
If none of those genres are of interest to you, you may just want to skip down to podcasts, otherwise youโre going to be scratching your head (or even recoiling) at a bunch of โweird musicโ.
And here were the top 20 artists:
Thanks to last.fm and tuneR, I can see that three bands were new to my top 20 this year: clipping., Silent Planet, and Joyhauser.
I got tuned in to clipping. via a friend on Bandcamp, but as I mentioned in my 2021 Watching recommendations, became a fan after watching their NPR (actually!) Tiny Desk Concert. If you start to watch the video and are like โwait, I know himโ, then youโre probably right. Hamilton, Snowpiercer, and Central Park are just a few of Daveed Diggsโs major credits.
Silent Planet has been a fave of mine for a while, so Iโm surprised this was the first time they broke the top 20. In addition to making great music, frontman Garrett Russell is a brilliant lyricist, delving passionately and intelligently into political and spiritual themes. (You may remember Iโm slowly working on a readthrough of all the books referenced in just one of their tracks.)
Joyhauser is simply great thumping beats for when you need to focus or keep moving.
Albums
Unlike my other reviews, I restricted my specific album recommendations to ones that were released this year, so as to not have an overwhelming list.
On Bandcamp
Honorable Mentions that are not on Bandcamp (boo!)
Podcasts
๐ถ Speaking of streaming services still playing Christmas musicโฆ
This is becoming my top fave, even surpassing the August Burns Red versions.
You know you need a booming black metalcore Christmas carol. #MetalMennonite
๐ถ Just found out about Dying Wish. My favorite kind of hardcore. #MetalMennonite
H/T to Silent Planet
๐ถ you can tell this is an awesome track based on what Plex thinks is “sonically similar”
๐ถ Listening lately.
๐ถ Hereโs another goodie from todayโs releases: Between the Buried and Me - Stare into the Abyss #MetalMennonite #BTBAM
Lots of good releases today. ๐ถ Maybe Iโll make a playlist later.
Hereโs Silent Planet - Panopticon ๐ #MetalMennonite
๐ถ Top artists the last 90 days, via last.fm
Clipping. is the new one, the rest are mainstays. (and some of you may recognize 3 bands in the second row are all projects from the same person.) #MetalMennonite
๐ถ Another trip down memory lane
As rumors of Demon Hunter were starting, my friend and I ran into Jesse Smith (of Zao) at Cornerstone and asked him what he knew about it. He had some mischievous grins and vague answers. ๐ #MetalMennonite
๐ถ Fun to hear about August Burns Redโs drummer getting into the scene with Embodyment - One Less Addiction. That was (and is) one of my faves, too. #MetalMennonite
Sometimes you need multiple copies/versions of something. #MetalMennonite ๐ถ