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Hello again, #mastodon frens 😍
Apawlogies for being quiet lately - it's been a busy week! I hope you're all enjoying your weekends and finding a way to relax 😃
I know it's supposed to be #SilentSunday but I'm in a mischievous mood today, so there's no chance of peace and quiet 😂
Today's photo is me challenging Dad to another Champion of the Universe tug game. I won, of course 🐕
*snoot boops*
Koko ❤️ 🐶#Dog #Dogs #DogsOfMastodon #RescueDog #BorderCollie #AustralianKelpie #AdoptDontShop
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Good morning pals, and happy #Mondog 😍
I hope you all had fantastic #NewYear celebrations, and that you're keeping up with your #resolutions
This morning, mum and dad took me for a #sunrise walk in a #forest up on the hills - it was glorious! I got to #explore pathways and #trees and, of course, I got #MuddyPaws 🤣 🐾
I hope you get to do some of what you love today 🐕
*snoot boops*
Koko ❤️ 🐶#Dog #Dogs #DogsOfMastodon #RescueDog #BorderCollie #AustralianKelpie #AdoptDontShop
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Happy New Year's Eve, #fedifriends
It's been quite a year for everyone. Mum and dad say I've come a long way, and they promise to keep helping me live my best life and overcome the things I struggle with 😍
Thank you for your love, support and friendship in #2022 - I look forward to our exciting #adventures together in #2023 🐾
Today's pictures are "derpy" and "smiley"
*snoot boops*
Koko ❤️ 🐶#HappyNewYear
#Dog #Dogs #DogsOfMastodon #RescueDog #BorderCollie #AustralianKelpie #AdoptDontShop -
Hi there, #mastodon buddies ❤️
How are you today?
It's been very wet weather in the UK for the past few days, so when I went out #exploring, I found a floodwater #stream with a tiny #waterfall in it. I did get slightly muddy paws though 🐾 👀
What #adventures have you had recently? Just remember to stay #safe 🦺
Enjoy your day, wherever you are in the world, frens
*snoot boops*
Koko ❤️ 🐶#ThrowbackThursday
#Dog #Dogs #DogsOfMastodon #RescueDog #BorderCollie #AustralianKelpie #AdoptDontShop -
Hello again, #fedifriends
How was your weekend? I hope you had a great time ❤️
The weather in the UK has turned from seasonably cold to wet and windy, so walks are muddier and not as much fun for mum & dad (but I don't mind 🐶)
The picture is from a frosty weekend walk 🐾It's #Mondog again but it's feeling #festive on the #countdown to #Christmas now 🎅
Enjoy the rest of your day!
*snoot boops*
Koko#Dog #Dogs #DogsOfMastodon #RescueDog #BorderCollie #AustralianKelpie #AdoptDontShop #Barkour
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Blog Question Challenge Part Two: Technology Edition
I’ve often been asked over the years, how did you get interested in tech? Since I was just asked yesterday by someone, I decided what better way to answer that question than with a blog post. Even more, I figured I’d make this a blog post challenge similar to the one we did a few weeks ago back in mid January. You can see that post here: Blog Question Challenge 2025.
Since this is a challenge post, I’ll be tagging a few folks at the end of the post that I’d like to see follow suit and write up a blog post answering the same questions I have answered below.
When Did You First Get Interested In Technology?
I first got interested in tech at a very early age, likely around 4 or 5 years old. I was living in Houston, TX, as my parents moved there when I was between 2 and 3 years old. They moved there from Cocoa Beach, FL because of the oil boom that was just starting. Plus, it was a much bigger city than Cocoa Beach which they wanted mainly for job market stuff.
We were living on a 75 acre ranch at the time and I remember I had a 13-inch black and white Sony TV that I watched cartoons on. One day, out of the blue, my dad decided to hook up this machine to my TV called Pong. I had no idea what Pong was, but little did I know it would be the beginning of a new journey for me in life and one that would stick with me forever.
Once Pops got it hooked up, and tuned the TV to channel 3, as that’s how we played video games for many years back in the day, I heard this little set of intro beeps and noises, and I was instantly intrigued.
I remember I sat in front of my TV for hours upon hours that day, without eating, getting up and stretching or anything else. I was instantly addicted and little did I know I’d be addicted to this little thing called technology for the rest of my life, all thanks to those little beeps and boops.
What’s Your Favorite Piece Of Technology All-Time?
I remember someone asking me this a few years ago, and I have to admit, it’s very difficult for me to answer. Mainly because there are so many pieces of tech that I’ve owned over the years that really changed my life, did certain/special things or whatever that held my attention for years.
However, if I had to narrow it down to just one piece of tech to call my favorite of all-time, I’d have to go back to my roots of gaming. I’ll be 54 this year and still play video games on a very regular basis. It’s something I do because I love video games, but also to have “down time” and to just relax and enjoy the day or evening. I’ve been doing it almost daily since I Pops hooked up Pong to that little TV of mine and I don’t see that changing any time soon.
With that being said, I’ll expand on this a bit and mention that mobile phone devices of today are a very close second. Those little handheld devices allow us to do so many things in the palm of our hands such as calling anyone in the world, searching the internet, interacting with others on social media and of course, yep, video games!
What’s Your Favorite Piece Of Technology Right Now?
Again, very difficult question to answer, but I’ll say something different than video games even though they are still my favorite today. So I’ll mention computers, since I already mentioned mobile phones above.
Computers allow us to do most anything and everything. For me, my computers aren’t just pieces of tech I use to search the web, interact on social media, play video games and anything else, but it’s also used daily for my job since I work from home. I currently work for HSTPathways as a Customer Support Specialist and rely on a computer to do that job each and every day, just like many others of us in today’s world.
Name One New Cool Piece Of Technology We’ll Have In 25 Years!
What’s up with these super questions you’re asking? They are certainly tough, but very thought provoking. I’m not really sure here, as I can see so many things being so different in 25 years, but I’m not sure I can actually envision those things. Maybe if I could, I’d invent something and possibly become rich.
Drawing a real blank here, and the only thing that really comes to mind is flying cars. Seems silly and seems like a basic answer, and maybe “flying cars” isn’t the correct word. Why do we need flying cars when we have airplanes?
Let’s put the silly idea aside, and something I feel we’ll accomplish is to be able to live underwater. As in, we’ll have buildings or domes or similar structures that allow us to easily go underwater from our homes that we have today and live within the ocean. I don’t think it’s some long term solution to anything, but I feel it’s something that a lot of humans would like to see accomplished and maybe we’ll find a way to make it happen. I personally would love to live in a glass dome in the ocean and just watch the ocean life around me.
Final Thoughts
This was a random blog post idea that came to mind this morning while I was playing Eternal Strands on Steam and it really made me think about tech and how it all started for me and where I’m at with it today.
Now, I’d like to hear from the following people and would love to see them do a blog post answering the same questions as well. Feel free to add more questions if you’d like to explain your love, or hate, for technology a bit further.
So yeah, TAG, YOU’RE IT!
Kyle, Jason, Sam, Liz, Adam, Robb and OrbitalMartian let’s see what you got!
#Blog #BlogQuestions #Blogger #Blogging #Challenge #Computers #PC #Technology
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Blog Question Challenge Part Two: Technology Edition
I’ve often been asked over the years, how did you get interested in tech? Since I was just asked yesterday by someone, I decided what better way to answer that question than with a blog post. Even more, I figured I’d make this a blog post challenge similar to the one we did a few weeks ago back in mid January. You can see that post here: Blog Question Challenge 2025.
Since this is a challenge post, I’ll be tagging a few folks at the end of the post that I’d like to see follow suit and write up a blog post answering the same questions I have answered below.
When Did You First Get Interested In Technology?
I first got interested in tech at a very early age, likely around 4 or 5 years old. I was living in Houston, TX, as my parents moved there when I was between 2 and 3 years old. They moved there from Cocoa Beach, FL because of the oil boom that was just starting. Plus, it was a much bigger city than Cocoa Beach which they wanted mainly for job market stuff.
We were living on a 75 acre ranch at the time and I remember I had a 13-inch black and white Sony TV that I watched cartoons on. One day, out of the blue, my dad decided to hook up this machine to my TV called Pong. I had no idea what Pong was, but little did I know it would be the beginning of a new journey for me in life and one that would stick with me forever.
Once Pops got it hooked up, and tuned the TV to channel 3, as that’s how we played video games for many years back in the day, I heard this little set of intro beeps and noises, and I was instantly intrigued.
I remember I sat in front of my TV for hours upon hours that day, without eating, getting up and stretching or anything else. I was instantly addicted and little did I know I’d be addicted to this little thing called technology for the rest of my life, all thanks to those little beeps and boops.
What’s Your Favorite Piece Of Technology All-Time?
I remember someone asking me this a few years ago, and I have to admit, it’s very difficult for me to answer. Mainly because there are so many pieces of tech that I’ve owned over the years that really changed my life, did certain/special things or whatever that held my attention for years.
However, if I had to narrow it down to just one piece of tech to call my favorite of all-time, I’d have to go back to my roots of gaming. I’ll be 54 this year and still play video games on a very regular basis. It’s something I do because I love video games, but also to have “down time” and to just relax and enjoy the day or evening. I’ve been doing it almost daily since I Pops hooked up Pong to that little TV of mine and I don’t see that changing any time soon.
With that being said, I’ll expand on this a bit and mention that mobile phone devices of today are a very close second. Those little handheld devices allow us to do so many things in the palm of our hands such as calling anyone in the world, searching the internet, interacting with others on social media and of course, yep, video games!
What’s Your Favorite Piece Of Technology Right Now?
Again, very difficult question to answer, but I’ll say something different than video games even though they are still my favorite today. So I’ll mention computers, since I already mentioned mobile phones above.
Computers allow us to do most anything and everything. For me, my computers aren’t just pieces of tech I use to search the web, interact on social media, play video games and anything else, but it’s also used daily for my job since I work from home. I currently work for HSTPathways as a Customer Support Specialist and rely on a computer to do that job each and every day, just like many others of us in today’s world.
Name One New Cool Piece Of Technology We’ll Have In 25 Years!
What’s up with these super questions you’re asking? They are certainly tough, but very thought provoking. I’m not really sure here, as I can see so many things being so different in 25 years, but I’m not sure I can actually envision those things. Maybe if I could, I’d invent something and possibly become rich.
Drawing a real blank here, and the only thing that really comes to mind is flying cars. Seems silly and seems like a basic answer, and maybe “flying cars” isn’t the correct word. Why do we need flying cars when we have airplanes?
Let’s put the silly idea aside, and something I feel we’ll accomplish is to be able to live underwater. As in, we’ll have buildings or domes or similar structures that allow us to easily go underwater from our homes that we have today and live within the ocean. I don’t think it’s some long term solution to anything, but I feel it’s something that a lot of humans would like to see accomplished and maybe we’ll find a way to make it happen. I personally would love to live in a glass dome in the ocean and just watch the ocean life around me.
Final Thoughts
This was a random blog post idea that came to mind this morning while I was playing Eternal Strands on Steam and it really made me think about tech and how it all started for me and where I’m at with it today.
Now, I’d like to hear from the following people and would love to see them do a blog post answering the same questions as well. Feel free to add more questions if you’d like to explain your love, or hate, for technology a bit further.
So yeah, TAG, YOU’RE IT!
Kyle, Jason, Sam, Liz, Adam, Robb and OrbitalMartian let’s see what you got!
#Blog #BlogQuestions #Blogger #Blogging #Challenge #Computers #PC #Technology
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Blog Question Challenge Part Two: Technology Edition
I’ve often been asked over the years, how did you get interested in tech? Since I was just asked yesterday by someone, I decided what better way to answer that question than with a blog post. Even more, I figured I’d make this a blog post challenge similar to the one we did a few weeks ago back in mid January. You can see that post here: Blog Question Challenge 2025.
Since this is a challenge post, I’ll be tagging a few folks at the end of the post that I’d like to see follow suit and write up a blog post answering the same questions I have answered below.
When Did You First Get Interested In Technology?
I first got interested in tech at a very early age, likely around 4 or 5 years old. I was living in Houston, TX, as my parents moved there when I was between 2 and 3 years old. They moved there from Cocoa Beach, FL because of the oil boom that was just starting. Plus, it was a much bigger city than Cocoa Beach which they wanted mainly for job market stuff.
We were living on a 75 acre ranch at the time and I remember I had a 13-inch black and white Sony TV that I watched cartoons on. One day, out of the blue, my dad decided to hook up this machine to my TV called Pong. I had no idea what Pong was, but little did I know it would be the beginning of a new journey for me in life and one that would stick with me forever.
Once Pops got it hooked up, and tuned the TV to channel 3, as that’s how we played video games for many years back in the day, I heard this little set of intro beeps and noises, and I was instantly intrigued.
I remember I sat in front of my TV for hours upon hours that day, without eating, getting up and stretching or anything else. I was instantly addicted and little did I know I’d be addicted to this little thing called technology for the rest of my life, all thanks to those little beeps and boops.
What’s Your Favorite Piece Of Technology All-Time?
I remember someone asking me this a few years ago, and I have to admit, it’s very difficult for me to answer. Mainly because there are so many pieces of tech that I’ve owned over the years that really changed my life, did certain/special things or whatever that held my attention for years.
However, if I had to narrow it down to just one piece of tech to call my favorite of all-time, I’d have to go back to my roots of gaming. I’ll be 54 this year and still play video games on a very regular basis. It’s something I do because I love video games, but also to have “down time” and to just relax and enjoy the day or evening. I’ve been doing it almost daily since I Pops hooked up Pong to that little TV of mine and I don’t see that changing any time soon.
With that being said, I’ll expand on this a bit and mention that mobile phone devices of today are a very close second. Those little handheld devices allow us to do so many things in the palm of our hands such as calling anyone in the world, searching the internet, interacting with others on social media and of course, yep, video games!
What’s Your Favorite Piece Of Technology Right Now?
Again, very difficult question to answer, but I’ll say something different than video games even though they are still my favorite today. So I’ll mention computers, since I already mentioned mobile phones above.
Computers allow us to do most anything and everything. For me, my computers aren’t just pieces of tech I use to search the web, interact on social media, play video games and anything else, but it’s also used daily for my job since I work from home. I currently work for HSTPathways as a Customer Support Specialist and rely on a computer to do that job each and every day, just like many others of us in today’s world.
Name One New Cool Piece Of Technology We’ll Have In 25 Years!
What’s up with these super questions you’re asking? They are certainly tough, but very thought provoking. I’m not really sure here, as I can see so many things being so different in 25 years, but I’m not sure I can actually envision those things. Maybe if I could, I’d invent something and possibly become rich.
Drawing a real blank here, and the only thing that really comes to mind is flying cars. Seems silly and seems like a basic answer, and maybe “flying cars” isn’t the correct word. Why do we need flying cars when we have airplanes?
Let’s put the silly idea aside, and something I feel we’ll accomplish is to be able to live underwater. As in, we’ll have buildings or domes or similar structures that allow us to easily go underwater from our homes that we have today and live within the ocean. I don’t think it’s some long term solution to anything, but I feel it’s something that a lot of humans would like to see accomplished and maybe we’ll find a way to make it happen. I personally would love to live in a glass dome in the ocean and just watch the ocean life around me.
Final Thoughts
This was a random blog post idea that came to mind this morning while I was playing Eternal Strands on Steam and it really made me think about tech and how it all started for me and where I’m at with it today.
Now, I’d like to hear from the following people and would love to see them do a blog post answering the same questions as well. Feel free to add more questions if you’d like to explain your love, or hate, for technology a bit further.
So yeah, TAG, YOU’RE IT!
Kyle, Jason, Sam, Liz, Adam, Robb and OrbitalMartian let’s see what you got!
#Blog #BlogQuestions #Blogger #Blogging #Challenge #Computers #PC #Technology
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Blog Question Challenge Part Two: Technology Edition
I’ve often been asked over the years, how did you get interested in tech? Since I was just asked yesterday by someone, I decided what better way to answer that question than with a blog post. Even more, I figured I’d make this a blog post challenge similar to the one we did a few weeks ago back in mid January. You can see that post here: Blog Question Challenge 2025.
Since this is a challenge post, I’ll be tagging a few folks at the end of the post that I’d like to see follow suit and write up a blog post answering the same questions I have answered below.
When Did You First Get Interested In Technology?
I first got interested in tech at a very early age, likely around 4 or 5 years old. I was living in Houston, TX, as my parents moved there when I was between 2 and 3 years old. They moved there from Cocoa Beach, FL because of the oil boom that was just starting. Plus, it was a much bigger city than Cocoa Beach which they wanted mainly for job market stuff.
We were living on a 75 acre ranch at the time and I remember I had a 13-inch black and white Sony TV that I watched cartoons on. One day, out of the blue, my dad decided to hook up this machine to my TV called Pong. I had no idea what Pong was, but little did I know it would be the beginning of a new journey for me in life and one that would stick with me forever.
Once Pops got it hooked up, and tuned the TV to channel 3, as that’s how we played video games for many years back in the day, I heard this little set of intro beeps and noises, and I was instantly intrigued.
I remember I sat in front of my TV for hours upon hours that day, without eating, getting up and stretching or anything else. I was instantly addicted and little did I know I’d be addicted to this little thing called technology for the rest of my life, all thanks to those little beeps and boops.
What’s Your Favorite Piece Of Technology All-Time?
I remember someone asking me this a few years ago, and I have to admit, it’s very difficult for me to answer. Mainly because there are so many pieces of tech that I’ve owned over the years that really changed my life, did certain/special things or whatever that held my attention for years.
However, if I had to narrow it down to just one piece of tech to call my favorite of all-time, I’d have to go back to my roots of gaming. I’ll be 54 this year and still play video games on a very regular basis. It’s something I do because I love video games, but also to have “down time” and to just relax and enjoy the day or evening. I’ve been doing it almost daily since I Pops hooked up Pong to that little TV of mine and I don’t see that changing any time soon.
With that being said, I’ll expand on this a bit and mention that mobile phone devices of today are a very close second. Those little handheld devices allow us to do so many things in the palm of our hands such as calling anyone in the world, searching the internet, interacting with others on social media and of course, yep, video games!
What’s Your Favorite Piece Of Technology Right Now?
Again, very difficult question to answer, but I’ll say something different than video games even though they are still my favorite today. So I’ll mention computers, since I already mentioned mobile phones above.
Computers allow us to do most anything and everything. For me, my computers aren’t just pieces of tech I use to search the web, interact on social media, play video games and anything else, but it’s also used daily for my job since I work from home. I currently work for HSTPathways as a Customer Support Specialist and rely on a computer to do that job each and every day, just like many others of us in today’s world.
Name One New Cool Piece Of Technology We’ll Have In 25 Years!
What’s up with these super questions you’re asking? They are certainly tough, but very thought provoking. I’m not really sure here, as I can see so many things being so different in 25 years, but I’m not sure I can actually envision those things. Maybe if I could, I’d invent something and possibly become rich.
Drawing a real blank here, and the only thing that really comes to mind is flying cars. Seems silly and seems like a basic answer, and maybe “flying cars” isn’t the correct word. Why do we need flying cars when we have airplanes?
Let’s put the silly idea aside, and something I feel we’ll accomplish is to be able to live underwater. As in, we’ll have buildings or domes or similar structures that allow us to easily go underwater from our homes that we have today and live within the ocean. I don’t think it’s some long term solution to anything, but I feel it’s something that a lot of humans would like to see accomplished and maybe we’ll find a way to make it happen. I personally would love to live in a glass dome in the ocean and just watch the ocean life around me.
Final Thoughts
This was a random blog post idea that came to mind this morning while I was playing Eternal Strands on Steam and it really made me think about tech and how it all started for me and where I’m at with it today.
Now, I’d like to hear from the following people and would love to see them do a blog post answering the same questions as well. Feel free to add more questions if you’d like to explain your love, or hate, for technology a bit further.
So yeah, TAG, YOU’RE IT!
Kyle, Jason, Sam, Liz, Adam, Robb and OrbitalMartian let’s see what you got!
#Blog #BlogQuestions #Blogger #Blogging #Challenge #Computers #PC #Technology
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Blog Question Challenge Part Two: Technology Edition
I’ve often been asked over the years, how did you get interested in tech? Since I was just asked yesterday by someone, I decided what better way to answer that question than with a blog post. Even more, I figured I’d make this a blog post challenge similar to the one we did a few weeks ago back in mid January. You can see that post here: Blog Question Challenge 2025.
Since this is a challenge post, I’ll be tagging a few folks at the end of the post that I’d like to see follow suit and write up a blog post answering the same questions I have answered below.
When Did You First Get Interested In Technology?
I first got interested in tech at a very early age, likely around 4 or 5 years old. I was living in Houston, TX, as my parents moved there when I was between 2 and 3 years old. They moved there from Cocoa Beach, FL because of the oil boom that was just starting. Plus, it was a much bigger city than Cocoa Beach which they wanted mainly for job market stuff.
We were living on a 75 acre ranch at the time and I remember I had a 13-inch black and white Sony TV that I watched cartoons on. One day, out of the blue, my dad decided to hook up this machine to my TV called Pong. I had no idea what Pong was, but little did I know it would be the beginning of a new journey for me in life and one that would stick with me forever.
Once Pops got it hooked up, and tuned the TV to channel 3, as that’s how we played video games for many years back in the day, I heard this little set of intro beeps and noises, and I was instantly intrigued.
I remember I sat in front of my TV for hours upon hours that day, without eating, getting up and stretching or anything else. I was instantly addicted and little did I know I’d be addicted to this little thing called technology for the rest of my life, all thanks to those little beeps and boops.
What’s Your Favorite Piece Of Technology All-Time?
I remember someone asking me this a few years ago, and I have to admit, it’s very difficult for me to answer. Mainly because there are so many pieces of tech that I’ve owned over the years that really changed my life, did certain/special things or whatever that held my attention for years.
However, if I had to narrow it down to just one piece of tech to call my favorite of all-time, I’d have to go back to my roots of gaming. I’ll be 54 this year and still play video games on a very regular basis. It’s something I do because I love video games, but also to have “down time” and to just relax and enjoy the day or evening. I’ve been doing it almost daily since I Pops hooked up Pong to that little TV of mine and I don’t see that changing any time soon.
With that being said, I’ll expand on this a bit and mention that mobile phone devices of today are a very close second. Those little handheld devices allow us to do so many things in the palm of our hands such as calling anyone in the world, searching the internet, interacting with others on social media and of course, yep, video games!
What’s Your Favorite Piece Of Technology Right Now?
Again, very difficult question to answer, but I’ll say something different than video games even though they are still my favorite today. So I’ll mention computers, since I already mentioned mobile phones above.
Computers allow us to do most anything and everything. For me, my computers aren’t just pieces of tech I use to search the web, interact on social media, play video games and anything else, but it’s also used daily for my job since I work from home. I currently work for HSTPathways as a Customer Support Specialist and rely on a computer to do that job each and every day, just like many others of us in today’s world.
Name One New Cool Piece Of Technology We’ll Have In 25 Years!
What’s up with these super questions you’re asking? They are certainly tough, but very thought provoking. I’m not really sure here, as I can see so many things being so different in 25 years, but I’m not sure I can actually envision those things. Maybe if I could, I’d invent something and possibly become rich.
Drawing a real blank here, and the only thing that really comes to mind is flying cars. Seems silly and seems like a basic answer, and maybe “flying cars” isn’t the correct word. Why do we need flying cars when we have airplanes?
Let’s put the silly idea aside, and something I feel we’ll accomplish is to be able to live underwater. As in, we’ll have buildings or domes or similar structures that allow us to easily go underwater from our homes that we have today and live within the ocean. I don’t think it’s some long term solution to anything, but I feel it’s something that a lot of humans would like to see accomplished and maybe we’ll find a way to make it happen. I personally would love to live in a glass dome in the ocean and just watch the ocean life around me.
Final Thoughts
This was a random blog post idea that came to mind this morning while I was playing Eternal Strands on Steam and it really made me think about tech and how it all started for me and where I’m at with it today.
Now, I’d like to hear from the following people and would love to see them do a blog post answering the same questions as well. Feel free to add more questions if you’d like to explain your love, or hate, for technology a bit further.
So yeah, TAG, YOU’RE IT!
Kyle, Jason, Sam, Liz, Adam, Robb and OrbitalMartian let’s see what you got!
#Blog #BlogQuestions #Blogger #Blogging #Challenge #Computers #PC #Technology
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Hmm 🤔 I noticed that PyRadio got more picky about what characters are allowed in the stations.csv file. Before it just didn't cared about "/", and "'" symbols used in the station's name. I first noticed that the icons for some of the stations stooped displaying, but the stations connected and started to play normally.
I still could continue to use my old stations file without the icons displaying in the notification for the affected stations but I like to have them displayed.
As how I discovered that some of the symbols could be the culprit was that I had stations that didn't contained the slash "/" and "'" symbols, those stations icons displayed while the stations that contained the slash "/" and/or "'" symbols in their names didn't displayed their icons in the notification.
I don't think this behavior is a bug, it's just an interesting thing that I discovered by chance and I don't think it is documented in the very detailed documentation of PyRadio's GitHub page.
After I changed those characters or stooped using them altogether the icons where displayed as they should. I used the "/" symbol for separating the different genres in the first portion of the station name to be more readable and for categorizing reasons, now I use "|" symbol for that purpose.
I made a test csv file for the stations for illustration purpose where I put two good examples of the station naming problem that I encountered, the first one is fine since it didn't congaing any of the two symbols that causing the problem in the first place, the second one is originally contained both symbols and for a fix I have to remove those symbols from the name of station.
As I mentioned before the "/" symbol is used in second stations name as one of the genres describing the station "W/beats", the other symbols "'" was only used in the very same stations name as one of the genres describing the same station, namely "Blips'n'beeps". I edited both of them "W/beats" become "Wbeats" and "Blips'n'beeps" now is "Blips and Boops". These simple changes fixed the not displaying some of the station's icons in the notification. 😁 -
Hmm 🤔 I noticed that PyRadio got more picky about what characters are allowed in the stations.csv file. Before it just didn't cared about "/", and "'" symbols used in the station's name. I first noticed that the icons for some of the stations stooped displaying, but the stations connected and started to play normally.
I still could continue to use my old stations file without the icons displaying in the notification for the affected stations but I like to have them displayed.
As how I discovered that some of the symbols could be the culprit was that I had stations that didn't contained the slash "/" and "'" symbols, those stations icons displayed while the stations that contained the slash "/" and/or "'" symbols in their names didn't displayed their icons in the notification.
I don't think this behavior is a bug, it's just an interesting thing that I discovered by chance and I don't think it is documented in the very detailed documentation of PyRadio's GitHub page.
After I changed those characters or stooped using them altogether the icons where displayed as they should. I used the "/" symbol for separating the different genres in the first portion of the station name to be more readable and for categorizing reasons, now I use "|" symbol for that purpose.
I made a test csv file for the stations for illustration purpose where I put two good examples of the station naming problem that I encountered, the first one is fine since it didn't congaing any of the two symbols that causing the problem in the first place, the second one is originally contained both symbols and for a fix I have to remove those symbols from the name of station.
As I mentioned before the "/" symbol is used in second stations name as one of the genres describing the station "W/beats", the other symbols "'" was only used in the very same stations name as one of the genres describing the same station, namely "Blips'n'beeps". I edited both of them "W/beats" become "Wbeats" and "Blips'n'beeps" now is "Blips and Boops". These simple changes fixed the not displaying some of the station's icons in the notification. 😁 -
Hmm 🤔 I noticed that PyRadio got more picky about what characters are allowed in the stations.csv file. Before it just didn't cared about "/", and "'" symbols used in the station's name. I first noticed that the icons for some of the stations stooped displaying, but the stations connected and started to play normally.
I still could continue to use my old stations file without the icons displaying in the notification for the affected stations but I like to have them displayed.
As how I discovered that some of the symbols could be the culprit was that I had stations that didn't contained the slash "/" and "'" symbols, those stations icons displayed while the stations that contained the slash "/" and/or "'" symbols in their names didn't displayed their icons in the notification.
I don't think this behavior is a bug, it's just an interesting thing that I discovered by chance and I don't think it is documented in the very detailed documentation of PyRadio's GitHub page.
After I changed those characters or stooped using them altogether the icons where displayed as they should. I used the "/" symbol for separating the different genres in the first portion of the station name to be more readable and for categorizing reasons, now I use "|" symbol for that purpose.
I made a test csv file for the stations for illustration purpose where I put two good examples of the station naming problem that I encountered, the first one is fine since it didn't congaing any of the two symbols that causing the problem in the first place, the second one is originally contained both symbols and for a fix I have to remove those symbols from the name of station.
As I mentioned before the "/" symbol is used in second stations name as one of the genres describing the station "W/beats", the other symbols "'" was only used in the very same stations name as one of the genres describing the same station, namely "Blips'n'beeps". I edited both of them "W/beats" become "Wbeats" and "Blips'n'beeps" now is "Blips and Boops". These simple changes fixed the not displaying some of the station's icons in the notification. 😁 -
Hmm 🤔 I noticed that PyRadio got more picky about what characters are allowed in the stations.csv file. Before it just didn't cared about "/", and "'" symbols used in the station's name. I first noticed that the icons for some of the stations stooped displaying, but the stations connected and started to play normally.
I still could continue to use my old stations file without the icons displaying in the notification for the affected stations but I like to have them displayed.
As how I discovered that some of the symbols could be the culprit was that I had stations that didn't contained the slash "/" and "'" symbols, those stations icons displayed while the stations that contained the slash "/" and/or "'" symbols in their names didn't displayed their icons in the notification.
I don't think this behavior is a bug, it's just an interesting thing that I discovered by chance and I don't think it is documented in the very detailed documentation of PyRadio's GitHub page.
After I changed those characters or stooped using them altogether the icons where displayed as they should. I used the "/" symbol for separating the different genres in the first portion of the station name to be more readable and for categorizing reasons, now I use "|" symbol for that purpose.
I made a test csv file for the stations for illustration purpose where I put two good examples of the station naming problem that I encountered, the first one is fine since it didn't congaing any of the two symbols that causing the problem in the first place, the second one is originally contained both symbols and for a fix I have to remove those symbols from the name of station.
As I mentioned before the "/" symbol is used in second stations name as one of the genres describing the station "W/beats", the other symbols "'" was only used in the very same stations name as one of the genres describing the same station, namely "Blips'n'beeps". I edited both of them "W/beats" become "Wbeats" and "Blips'n'beeps" now is "Blips and Boops". These simple changes fixed the not displaying some of the station's icons in the notification. 😁 -
Hmm 🤔 I noticed that PyRadio got more picky about what characters are allowed in the stations.csv file. Before it just didn't cared about "/", and "'" symbols used in the station's name. I first noticed that the icons for some of the stations stooped displaying, but the stations connected and started to play normally.
I still could continue to use my old stations file without the icons displaying in the notification for the affected stations but I like to have them displayed.
As how I discovered that some of the symbols could be the culprit was that I had stations that didn't contained the slash "/" and "'" symbols, those stations icons displayed while the stations that contained the slash "/" and/or "'" symbols in their names didn't displayed their icons in the notification.
I don't think this behavior is a bug, it's just an interesting thing that I discovered by chance and I don't think it is documented in the very detailed documentation of PyRadio's GitHub page.
After I changed those characters or stooped using them altogether the icons where displayed as they should. I used the "/" symbol for separating the different genres in the first portion of the station name to be more readable and for categorizing reasons, now I use "|" symbol for that purpose.
I made a test csv file for the stations for illustration purpose where I put two good examples of the station naming problem that I encountered, the first one is fine since it didn't congaing any of the two symbols that causing the problem in the first place, the second one is originally contained both symbols and for a fix I have to remove those symbols from the name of station.
As I mentioned before the "/" symbol is used in second stations name as one of the genres describing the station "W/beats", the other symbols "'" was only used in the very same stations name as one of the genres describing the same station, namely "Blips'n'beeps". I edited both of them "W/beats" become "Wbeats" and "Blips'n'beeps" now is "Blips and Boops". These simple changes fixed the not displaying some of the station's icons in the notification. 😁 -
Imperia – Dark Paradise Review
By GardensTale
You all know this is corsetcore. You saw the computer-generated snake and apple, read the album title. The only thing that could make it more obvious would be the heavily airbrushed and photoshopped vocalist in Victorian dress. Alas, you’ll have to make do with a woman who’s been turned into a tree instead. Imperia is not a household name like Nightwish, but don’t count them out just yet. Helena Iren Michaelsen helped found both Epica and Trail of Tears, and has been hammering at the road with this particular outfit for 2 decades, with Dark Paradise the 7th attempt to claim the spotlight. Dear Doom in his probationary period did not approve of their prior output,1 so does the new one fair better?
Well… Somewhat. In my experience with corsetcore, the genre itself is not usually the problem. A nu-metal band would have to actively skirt the archetypes of the genre to be any good. Corsetcore, on the other hand, could easily take a similar position as power metal, a lighthearted, grand, and fun experience with a lot of room for variety and identity. Its purveyors just seem to stumble on a wide variety of obvious obstacles, over and over and over again. Grating electronics awkwardly crammed into the composition? “Better Place” starts the album with them and “Reflection” kills its verses with them. Mawkish balladry? The album finishes with not one but two, of which “Lost Souls” is the grandstanding variety and “The Demons’ Fireplace” the small and melancholic. The lead vocals suddenly adopting the voice of Snow White’s evil stepmother in her old crone disguise while still singing opera? I must admit, that one was new, but “Void of Emptiness” takes a hard right into unintentional comedy with it.
But amongst everything embarrassing, there’s a lot of decent material. When Michaelsen eschews the opera, her voice is strong, warm and clear, and the songwriting has plenty of solid hooks, both vocal and instrumental. “Better Place” has a rousing chorus that makes it easier to forget the misplaced synth beep-boops, and “Soldiers of Hell” uses MENA scales and actual growls to paint an effective picture of an army marching through the desert. “Reach My Tears” is probably the strongest track here though, with an infectious tin whistle melody that recalls the better works of Eluveitie. Whereas Doom complained about Imperia’s lack of restraint with its orchestrations, Dark Paradise is a more balanced affair, where the guitars get to do more than dull background chuggery and the canned symphonics don’t blow everything else out of the water.
And yet, the overall impression I walk away with is ‘messy.’ Variety is the spice of life, but Imperia doesn’t seem to know when to use which spice. When Michaelsen does employ her operatic vocals, it feels arbitrary more often than not. From awkward mismatches between phrasing and meter to perfunctory instrumentation that distracts and detracts from the flow, Imperia leaves few opportunities to throw a wrench in its own works. Even the better tracks aren’t free from this over-embellishment; enjoying “Reach My Tears” to its fullest requires ignoring a hard tonal clash in the pre-chorus when the vocals go from melodious build-up to a poorly contrasted yell before slipping back into harmonization.
It’s frustrating because all the elements are here for Imperia to make a really solid symphonic power metal album. Michaelsen has an excellent voice, the stronger compositions have some solid, banging choruses, and there’s plenty of variation and imaginative songwriting. Even the production is a step up from the average of its contemporaries, who frequently crush the orchestra to glue. When this band’s on fire, it has the potential to join the top of the genre. But with 100 toys at their disposal, Imperia feels the need to use at least 99 of them, whether well-advised or not. Dark Paradise is a lurching journey with many bumps along the road, and by the end, my stomach feels more shaken than my heart does stirred. But if you have a soft spot for this stuff, do give it a whirl, because you’re sure to pick up a few tracks for your NightWithinEpiDelAranthe playlist.
Rating: 2.0/5.0
DR: 7 | Format Reviewed: 320 kb/s mp3
Label: Massacre Records
Websites: imperiaband.com | facebook.com/imperiaband
Releases Worldwide: July 26th, 2024#20 #2024 #DarkParadise #Eluveitie #Epica #Imperia #InternationalMetal #Jul24 #MassacreRecords #Nightwish #PowerMetal #Review #Reviews #SymphonicMetal #TrailOfTears
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Imperia – Dark Paradise Review
By GardensTale
You all know this is corsetcore. You saw the computer-generated snake and apple, read the album title. The only thing that could make it more obvious would be the heavily airbrushed and photoshopped vocalist in Victorian dress. Alas, you’ll have to make do with a woman who’s been turned into a tree instead. Imperia is not a household name like Nightwish, but don’t count them out just yet. Helena Iren Michaelsen helped found both Epica and Trail of Tears, and has been hammering at the road with this particular outfit for 2 decades, with Dark Paradise the 7th attempt to claim the spotlight. Dear Doom in his probationary period did not approve of their prior output,1 so does the new one fair better?
Well… Somewhat. In my experience with corsetcore, the genre itself is not usually the problem. A nu-metal band would have to actively skirt the archetypes of the genre to be any good. Corsetcore, on the other hand, could easily take a similar position as power metal, a lighthearted, grand, and fun experience with a lot of room for variety and identity. Its purveyors just seem to stumble on a wide variety of obvious obstacles, over and over and over again. Grating electronics awkwardly crammed into the composition? “Better Place” starts the album with them and “Reflection” kills its verses with them. Mawkish balladry? The album finishes with not one but two, of which “Lost Souls” is the grandstanding variety and “The Demons’ Fireplace” the small and melancholic. The lead vocals suddenly adopting the voice of Snow White’s evil stepmother in her old crone disguise while still singing opera? I must admit, that one was new, but “Void of Emptiness” takes a hard right into unintentional comedy with it.
But amongst everything embarrassing, there’s a lot of decent material. When Michaelsen eschews the opera, her voice is strong, warm and clear, and the songwriting has plenty of solid hooks, both vocal and instrumental. “Better Place” has a rousing chorus that makes it easier to forget the misplaced synth beep-boops, and “Soldiers of Hell” uses MENA scales and actual growls to paint an effective picture of an army marching through the desert. “Reach My Tears” is probably the strongest track here though, with an infectious tin whistle melody that recalls the better works of Eluveitie. Whereas Doom complained about Imperia’s lack of restraint with its orchestrations, Dark Paradise is a more balanced affair, where the guitars get to do more than dull background chuggery and the canned symphonics don’t blow everything else out of the water.
And yet, the overall impression I walk away with is ‘messy.’ Variety is the spice of life, but Imperia doesn’t seem to know when to use which spice. When Michaelsen does employ her operatic vocals, it feels arbitrary more often than not. From awkward mismatches between phrasing and meter to perfunctory instrumentation that distracts and detracts from the flow, Imperia leaves few opportunities to throw a wrench in its own works. Even the better tracks aren’t free from this over-embellishment; enjoying “Reach My Tears” to its fullest requires ignoring a hard tonal clash in the pre-chorus when the vocals go from melodious build-up to a poorly contrasted yell before slipping back into harmonization.
It’s frustrating because all the elements are here for Imperia to make a really solid symphonic power metal album. Michaelsen has an excellent voice, the stronger compositions have some solid, banging choruses, and there’s plenty of variation and imaginative songwriting. Even the production is a step up from the average of its contemporaries, who frequently crush the orchestra to glue. When this band’s on fire, it has the potential to join the top of the genre. But with 100 toys at their disposal, Imperia feels the need to use at least 99 of them, whether well-advised or not. Dark Paradise is a lurching journey with many bumps along the road, and by the end, my stomach feels more shaken than my heart does stirred. But if you have a soft spot for this stuff, do give it a whirl, because you’re sure to pick up a few tracks for your NightWithinEpiDelAranthe playlist.
Rating: 2.0/5.0
DR: 7 | Format Reviewed: 320 kb/s mp3
Label: Massacre Records
Websites: imperiaband.com | facebook.com/imperiaband
Releases Worldwide: July 26th, 2024#20 #2024 #DarkParadise #Eluveitie #Epica #Imperia #InternationalMetal #Jul24 #MassacreRecords #Nightwish #PowerMetal #Review #Reviews #SymphonicMetal #TrailOfTears
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The Best Video Game Soundtracks of All Time 🎶🎼🎵
In a musical mood, we decided to round up the best video game soundtracks of all time.
Or… the best ones we’ve heard in our near 40 years of playing video games. This is a very subjective list, of course, and isn’t supposed to be definitive or anything. Sorry if we missed any you love! Yet, at the very least, we hope you discover some lovely new music to listen to and coo appreciatively.
The Best Game Music Ever (in our humble opinion)
Here we go then! A big old traditional list article with some excellent music in the mix. We’ve not put anything in any real specific order, it’s more this is a bunch of great music from very talented composers. Enjoy.
A Plague Tale: Requiem
The work of French composer Olivier Derivière, A Plague Tale: Requiem (2022) offers an often brilliant score. There are Medieval moments, folk, and a big orchestral sweep for dramatic moments. It’s not a classic game, but a good enough one, and yet we feel the score doesn’t get the recognition it deserves.
Shadow of the Colossus
Shadow of the Colossus is considered one of the best games ever. It launched on PS2 back in late 2005. The music was by Japanese composer Kow Otani who created an incredible landscape of dynamic, gallant pieces to create a sense of magnitude. And with Swift Horse as an example above, you can hear the grand scope of Otani’s vision. Pelting!
Witcher 3: Wild Hunt
It feels a bit weird now, but Witcher 3: Wild Hunt launched in 2015. It’s 11 years old! Two composers worked on the score: Marcin Przybyłowicz and Mikolai Stroinski.
The game is by Polish developer CD Projekt, so Old Slavic melodies drive the music along. Witcher 3 has a strong Medieval vibe and the result is always dramatic, but we particularly like some of the yearning melodic quieter numbers.
World of Warcraft
Our memories of WoW from 2009 involved us journeying around the MMORPG and getting lost in its glorious world. Composer Jason Hayes handled the soundtrack, which has impressive depth.
The game launched in 2004 at a time when game music was stepping things up several levels and WoW (enormously popular as it was back then) was a big contributor to what video game music could be.
The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim
The Skyrim soundtrack is astonishing from start to finish, a phenomenal work of (frankly) regular genius by American composer Jeremy Soule.
The reason we haven’t done a full feature on the Skyrim score is because Soule was accused of sexual harassment in August 2019. He denied the claim, hasn’t been charged with anything, but has disappeared from public life. It’s unclear if he’ll ever work in music again.
The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time
The N64’s Ocarina of Time (1998) is legendary for so many reasons. The company’s composer, Koji Kondo, worked his wonders here for what’s been classed as leitmotif in reverse. Short pieces that introduce stationary environments as the player approaches them, rather than announcing an entering character (Mario game style).
It’s a landmark work in gaming and, alongside FFVII from the year before, helped define what a game soundtrack could be for the new era of 3D gaming.
The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild
One of the best games of all time (if not the best), Breath of the Wild (2017) also includes an amazing soundtrack. The score was handled by Manaka Kataoka, Yasuaki Iwata, and Hajime Wakai to cover the extensive nature of it (there are dozens of pieces).
As you explore the vast world of Hyrule, these various pieces crop up to create a sense of awe and scale. It’s also often so uplifting, too, and brings Breath of the Wild to life.
Super Mario Galaxy
The Mario Galaxy soundtrack (2007) was composed by Mahito Yokota and Koji Kondo. The latter is Nintendo’s long-term resident composer, famous for all those Mario bleeps and boops!
Galaxy was different as the team approached an orchestral vision for the music, moving away from the traditional Mario level music. It worked so well and was so popular with the public this style has remained in place since. Good! It’s great.
The Curse of Monkey Island
The Monkey Island series has amazing music, but for us the best of the lot is from Curse of Monkey Island (1997). It’s the work of American composer Michael Land for the LucasArts developer.
He really channels Caribbean vibes alongside a great sense of fun, adventure, and mischief. It’s all rather glorious.
Spiritfarer
Max LL’s gorgeous Spiritfarer (2020) score is beautiful, inspired, and uplifting. The game is a kind of death management simulation, where you look after spirits before they’re ready to journey into the afterlife.
It’s a tricky subject to get right, but indie dev Thunder Lotus Games delivers everything with great care and compassion, driven along by the orchestral sweep of Max LL.
Deservedly, Spiritfarer got an in-concert Cadogan Hall special in late 2025 we attended. Every bit as good live as in recording, even if the composer wasn’t present (which was a shame).
Owlboy
Owlboy is a 10/10 game from us and Johnathan Geer’s Owlboy score carries the work impressively. It’s orchestral, sweet-natured, uplifting, and frequently beautiful.
It’s like engaging in a Studio Ghibli film, with Geer’s ability to somehow conjure up the right theme for every area of the game remaining a real treat.
Donkey Kong Country 2: Diddy’s Kong Quest
Our memories of Rare’s Donkey Kong Country 2 (1995) include playing through a fantastic 2D platformer, just also whilst in awe at the music.
The work of unassuming British composer David Wise, it’s arguably the best Super Nintendo score. Even with the technical limitations of the system, Wise used all his guile and skillset to craft this thing. A score of great emotional power that transform a goofy game with monkeys into something genuinely profound.
Donkey Kong Country: Tropical Freeze
David Wise returned to the DK series in 2014 for Retro Studio’s Tropical Freeze outing for the Wii U. The game received a port to the Switch in 2019, too. The game is a masterpiece and the music complements that in classic Wise fashion.
It’s just brilliant. Previously, we’ve flagged the Grassland Groove level as our favourite. It’s flat out when of the best gaming levels in history! A total joy to play.
Secret of Mana
The Secret of Mana (1994) soundtrack was by young Japanese composer Hiroki Kukuta. He completed it in an intensive short period, locking himself in solitude to get the compositions down.
It was very important for Squaresoft as the game developer, too, as the music defined how they’d approach their future Final Fantasy series. And that resulted in the amazing FFVII score.
Final Fantasy VII
We covered the sprawling FFVII soundtrack (1997) recently as it received a 2020 overhaul for the Remake game. It’s an emotive work, driven by the main characters’ search for justice in a deeply unjust world.
Nobuo Uematsu was responsible for the 1997 original, with Masashi Hamauzu and Mitsuto Suzuki overhauling his pieces for the 2020 Remake. The results were all very spectacular.
Hollow Knight Silksong
Launching in late 2025, Hollow Knight Silksong brought with it an incredible score. The work of Australian composer Christopher Larkin, it’s a sprawling work of neoclassical excellence.
Samorost 3
The work of Czech genius Floex (aka Tomáš Dvořák), his body of work is vast at this point and it’s difficult to pinpoint his best piece. But the Samorost 3 (2016) soundtrack is something else, showing off his skills across electronic ambience, jazz, classical, and everything else.
Rayman Origins
The work of French composer Christophe Héral, the Rayman Origins soundtrack (2011) covers a huge breadth of genres with relentless inventiveness. He’s an energetic, quirky guy and it really shines through in his work.
It’s difficult to even define what genre the work falls into. It’s an uplifting mix of orchestral, jazz, world music, with whimsical melodies, Latin influences, and just whatever else Héral came up with. All of it mixed together in remarkable fashion that it lifts the game to the level of an all-time great.
Ori and the Will of the Wisps
Last but not least is Gareth Coker’s Ori and the Will of the Wisps (2020) soundtrack, which we’d argue is very possibly the greatest game soundtrack of all time.
It’s a masterpiece with so many beautiful compositions it seems quite ridiculous one man can come up with it all. It has a melancholic, life-affirming quality where the main character Ori is constantly facing life-or-death struggles in a brutal world.
Through it all little Ori is able to rise above it and fight in with compassion and integrity. That’s what this music represents.
#Composers #Creativity #Culture #gameMusic #gameSoundtracks #gaming #Lifestyle #Music #Soundtracks #uplifting #videoGameMusic #videoGameSoundtracks #worldMusic -
Arduino and AY-3-8910
I’ve had some AY-3-8910 programmable sound generators for a while and planned to do something with them, but they’ve sat in the “to think about” box for a while. But recently getting hold of the WhyEm sound card for the RC2014 has re-awakened my interest.
This is some “first looks” experiments with the AY-3-8910 and an Arduino.
- Part 1 – Getting started and looking at playing YM files.
- Part 2 – Adding basic MIDI control.
- Part 3 – Basic experiments with direct digital synthesis.
- Part 4 – Using the AY-3-8910 as a 4-bit DAC for Mozzi.
- Part 5 – Driving four AY-3-8910s using my AY-3-8910 Experimenter PCB.
https://makertube.net/w/26yAj7wAzZwCsFoBkJpZs2
Warning! I strongly recommend using old or second hand equipment for your experiments. I am not responsible for any damage to expensive instruments!
These are the key tutorials for the main concepts used in this project:
- Arduino AY3891x Library: https://github.com/Andy4495/AY3891x
- Arduino Nano AY-3-8910 PCB: https://github.com/GadgetReboot/AY-3-8910
If you are new to Arduino, see the Getting Started pages.
Parts list
- Arduino Uno
- AY-3-8910 chip
- Either GadgetReboot’s PCB or patch using solderless breadboard or prototyping boards.
The AY-3-8910 PSG
The AY-3-8910 programmable sound generator is quite an iconic chip of its time. Not as popular maybe as the SID used in the Commodore 64, but still pretty widespread use in 8-bit computers of the time and apparently a number of arcade machines too.
There are a number of “compatible” chips, including the Yamaha YM2149. There is also the AY-3-8912 which is the same as the 8910 but without one of the general purpose IO ports, which take no part in the sound generation.
I’m not going to go into the details of the device itself, for that I’ll refer to the following resources:
- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_Instrument_AY-3-8910
- https://www.vgmpf.com/Wiki/index.php/AY-3-8910
- https://rc2014.co.uk/modules/why-em-ulator-sound-module/
- http://blog.tynemouthsoftware.co.uk/2023/01/driving-ay-3-8910-ym2149-from-8-bit.html
The summary of the specification though is as follows:
- Three square wave output channels.
- Global AD envelope generator, with a selection of fixed envelopes.
- Noise generator an option on the channels.
- Mixer.
There is an 8-bit data register interface to the chip along with three control signals (BDIR, BC1 and BC2).
Sourcing AY-3-8910 Chips
I should point out that it isn’t possible to buy new AY-3-8910 or YM2419 chips these days, so any that can be found online are almost certainly reclaimed from older hardware. These may or may not work reliably, but it will be a bit of a lottery.
There is a lot of discussion about the issue here: http://blog.tynemouthsoftware.co.uk/2023/01/testing-ay-3-8910-ym2149-sound-card-for-rc2014-and-minstrel-4D.html
Some more here: https://maidavale.org/blog/remarked-chips-from-ebay/
This is why RC2014 eventually went with the “Why Emulator” approach: https://rc2014.co.uk/modules/why-em-ulator-sound-module/
My own experience is that you can get them on ebay pretty cheaply. They are often described as “new” but really they will be pulled from older hardware and be cleaned up to look new again.
Usually this means re-tinning the pins with solder, sanding down the original markings, and re-etching the text and logos. I guess they do this to be able to claim “as new”, but personally I’d rather they just let them be sold as reclaimed/recycled. The prices always reflect a reclaimed level of quality to me anyway.
Here is a photo of a recent batch of 10 bought as a pack from the same ebay seller.
Notice how, whilst the text and logos seem to essentially be the same, there are many differences between the actual devices:
- Depth, position, size of the molding marks.
- Depth, position, size of the pin 1 marker.
- Colour of the final finish.
- They also all have very different under-side markings and appearance (not shown).
I’ve also never seen one yet that doesn’t claim to be a Microchip device, whereas in reality most original devices I suspect would be either Yamaha YM2419 or GI AY-3-8910, so are being re-etched.
It is possible to tell if the device is a YM or AY as they respond slightly differently when the 4-bit registers get written to and read. If the value 31 is written to one of the 4-bit registers then a YM will read back 31 but an AY device will read back 15.
Full details here: http://blog.tynemouthsoftware.co.uk/2023/01/testing-ay-3-8910-ym2149-sound-card-for-rc2014-and-minstrel-4D.html
The Arduino AY3891x library includes a sketch to check and print the result (see below).
Hardware
For once, I’m using someone else’s design for my initial messing about. There is a schematic and some hardware built on a protoboard shown in the Arduino YM3891x library here: https://github.com/Andy4495/AY3891x/tree/main/extras/hardware
But there is a PCB that was designed by GadgetReboot here: https://github.com/GadgetReboot/AY-3-8910. This can be ordered directly from PCBWay and so that is what I’ve used.
The only thing to watch out for, is that D2/D3 are reversed compared to the protoboard hardware. So whilst all other pin definitions in the library examples are fine, D2 and D3 need to be swapped to use them with the PCB.
I also didn’t bother to add the power LED (and R5), the toggle switch or the additional header pins.
The full pinout interface from the Arduino to the AY-3-8910 is as follows:
AY-3-8910ArduinoDA0-DA7D2-D8, A3BC1A0BC2A1BDIRA2CLOCKD9/RESETA4 (not used in the library)The most critical one from a re-use point of view is the clock as the code uses the ATmega328P hardware Timer 1 to output a 50% duty cycle PWM signal on output OC1A (D9) to generate the 1MHz clock required by the AY-3-8910.
Using a different microcontroller will mean re-writing this part of the code for a suitable replacement timer.
The PCB also has the following Arduino GPIO pin use:
- D0/D1 – UART pin header
- D10-D13 – SD card pin header
- A4 – /RESET of the AY-3-8910 but doesn’t appear to be required to use the library.
The AY-3-8910 is powered from the +5V from the Arduino. VIN for the Arduino is not connected, so USB power is assumed.
The Code
Taking the “AY3891x_EX3_Simple_Tone” example as a starting point, the following line needs updating as shown below:
// Original line
AY3891x psg( 17, 8, 7, 6, 5, 4, 2, 3, 16, 15, 14);
// Required for use with the PCB
AY3891x psg( 17, 8, 7, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, 16, 15, 14);This is using the “lesser number of pins” constructor, which assumes that the A8, A9, /RESET and CLOCK pins of the AY-3-8910 are not managed by the library. There is a more complete constructor to define the additional pins if required. There is a good description of how the AY-3-8910 interface works in the main source code: https://github.com/Andy4495/AY3891x/blob/main/src/AY3891x.cpp
I also switched any Serial.begin() statements to use 9600 baud for preference too.
With these changes, the simple tone example just works, as does the “AY3891x_EX8_Check_Orig_or_Clone”, which tells me I have an AY-3-8910 rather than a YM2149.
But what I really wanted was to play one of the tunes from a game I remembered. My first introduction to AY-3-8910 music was the 128K Spectrum version of The Neverending Story. This was one of the two games that came bundled with the original machine, and for someone used to the 48K beeps and boops it was an amazing upgrade.
Unfortunately I don’t seem able at present to find a “YM” file version of that tune to play, so instead I turned to a David Whittaker classic – “Glider Rider”. The “YM Jukebox” GitHub repository has a whole pile of YM files ready to use here: https://github.com/nguillaumin/ym-jukebox/tree/master/data/David%20Whittaker
There are (I believe) two key ways to get “chiptunes” for the AY-3-8910. A YM file is a stream of the register values sent to the chip to direct the sound generation. With one of these files, it is simply a case of turning these values into a C array and it can be included in an Arduino sketch (there are several steps required, see below, but it is all doable).
Another common way to get tunes is an “AY” file. As I understand things these are the actual Z80 assembler instructions required to drive the AY-3-8910 chip, so extracting the required data for use on another system is not so easy. These are really designed to be used on the original systems or via emulation.
To produce an Arduino source code file from a YM file requires the following steps (described here: https://github.com/Andy4495/AY3891x/tree/main/extras/tools):
- Find and download the desired YM file.
- Decode it using: https://github.com/eqy/ymduino/blob/master/decoder.py – the force_interlacing parameter is required to correctly unpick everything.
python decoder.py GliderRider.ym force_interleaved
- Turn the resulting binary outputfile (it is always called that after using the decoder.py script) into a C structure using: https://github.com/Andy4495/AY3891x/blob/main/extras/tools/bin2c14.py
python bin2c14.py outputfile > chiptunes.h
- Take the resulting const PROGMEM structure into the “chiptunes.h” file of the “AY3891x_EX6_Chiptunes_Flash” example sketch.
Note that due to the memory limitations of the Arduino Nano, the resulting C structure for the tune will have to be cut-off at around 2000 lines, but be sure to leave the termnating part of the structure:
const byte PROGMEM psg_data[] = {
0x6C,0x07,0x7C,0x07,0x7C,0x07,0x17,0x31,0x0F,0x00,0x00,0x00,0x00,0x20,
0x6C,0x07,0x7C,0x07,0x7C,0x07,0x1F,0x31,0x0D,0x00,0x00,0x00,0x00,0x00,
....
0x7C,0x07,0xBE,0x03,0x58,0x02,0x01,0x31,0x09,0x0E,0x00,0x00,0x00,0x00,
};If there are build errors, then it might be because the structure is still too long. 2000 lines fits for me using around 97% of the programme memory of the Arduino Nano.
If full (longer) tunes are required, then the PCB has the option to hook up to an SD card and longer files can be stored there.
YM Files
Here is a little more detail about the above process required to get a YM file into C code, mostly for my own reference (the above links all talk about it pretty well tbh).
Step 1: A downloaded YM File is usually actually compressed using LHA. 7Zip can open these files and save the extracted version ready for step 2.
Here is the difference of the start of the files shown using a hex editor. Notice the “-lh5-” header near the start showing that this is a LHA compressed file, and a filename associated with the uncompressed version, in this case glrider.ym.
Uncompressed:
We can now clearly see he header information including the file identifier “YM5!” along with title, author and copyright information in comment fields.
The AU3891x library goes on to explain: “This uncompressed binary file has the audio programming registers stored in a non-interleaved format for more efficient compression. These values now need to be interleaved for more efficient playback.”
We can find more details of the YM file format here, in the words of the creator of the format, Arnaud Carré, directly: https://www.lynn3686.com/ym3456_tidy.html
A music-file is composed of YM2149 registers generated by the
original play-routine for each 50th seconds. As the YM2149 has 14 registers 8 bits each, that means 14 bytes for 1/50 second, so 700 bytes for one second of soundchip.
When I convert an ATARI music, I play the music on the ATARI, and I
store YM2149 registers set each 1/50sec (Vertical Blank time, VBL) in a big file as follow:
VBL1:
store reg0,reg1,reg2,...,reg12,reg13 (14 regs)
VBL2:
store reg0,reg1,reg2,...,reg12,reg13 (14 regs)
...
VBLn:
store reg0,reg1,reg2,...,reg12,reg13 (14 regs)
The problem is that is takes a lot of disk-space. Just count: A 10
minutes song will take 420000 bytes on disk. But don't panic, the music are compressed with LHARC method (using LHA program from Haruyasu Yoshizaki). To reach best compression ratio, I store registers in a different order:
VBL1 reg0, VBL2 reg0, VBL3 reg0 .... VBLn reg0
VBL1 reg1, VBL2 reg1, VBL3 reg1 .... VBLn reg1
...
VBL1 reg14,VBL2 reg14,VBL3 reg14.... VBLn reg14Hence the “interleaved” format discussed previously. So looking at the file itself, specifically for YM5 it has the following format:
Offset Size Type Comment
0 4 DWORD ID of YM5 format. ('YM5!')
4 8 string[8] Check String ('LeOnArD!')
12 4 DWORD Nb of valid VBL of the file.
16 4 DWORD Song attributes (see below)
20 2 WORD Nb of digi-drum sample (can be 0)
22 4 DWORD YM2149 External frequency in Hz (ex:2000000 for ATARI-ST version, 1000000 for AMSTRAD CPC)
26 2 WORD Player frequency in Hz (Ex: 50Hz for almost player)
28 4 DWORD Vbl number to loop the song. (0 is default)
32 2 WORD Size (in bytes) of futur additinal data. (must be 0 for the moment)So we can see this playing out from the above file:
00000: 59 4D 35 21 = "YM5!"
00004: 4C 65 4F 6E 41 72 44 21 = "LeOnArD!"
0000C: 00 00 13 60 = Number of frames: 4960
00010: 00 00 00 01 = Attributes:
b0: Set if Interleaved data block.
b1: Set if the digi-drum samples are signed data.
b2: Set if the digidrum is already in ST 4 bits format.
00014: 00 00 = No digidrum samples
00016: 00 0F 42 40 = External frequency 1MHz
0001A: 00 32 = Player frequency 50Hz
0001C: 00 00 00 00 = Number of loops for the song: 0
00020: 00 00This header is then followed by:
For each digidrum sample:
4 DWORD sample size
nnnn BYTES sample data (8bits per sample)
NT-String Name of the song.
NT-String Name of the author.
NT-String Comments (YM file converter ?!)
All YM2149 registers.
4 DWORD End-File check. ('End!')Which again we can now see in the uncompressed file:
(no digidrum samples)
00022: 476C6964657220526964657200 = "Glider Rider"
0002E: 4461766964205768697474616B657200 = "David Whittaker"
0003E: 2863293139383620517569636B73696C766100 = "(c)1986 Quicksilva"
00052: 6C6C7C8C... = 4960 values for reg0
013B2: 07070707... = 4960 values for reg1
...
0FC32: 02000000... = 4960 values for reg13
10F92: 00000000... = 2x4960 additional sets of values
13652: 45 6E 64 21 = "End!"Curiously there seems to be data for 16 registers, which I guess would allow the inclusion of the two GPIO ports as well as the sound generation registers.
So to turn this into a stream of register values to send to the AY-3-8910 at a rate of 50Hz requires take the same “VBL” value for each register in turn and de-interleaving it.
This is the output from the decoder.py file as it processes the above:
Attempting to read file at glrider.ym...
YM5! format file detected based on first four bytes of file...
4960
File is interleaved...
Song title: Glider Rider
Author: David Whittaker
Comments: (c)1986 Quicksilva
Data length is 79360 bytes...
Song length is 4960 frames...
Deinterleaving...
Register 0: 0x6c 01101100
Register 1: 0x07 00000111
Register 2: 0x7c 01111100
Register 3: 0x07 00000111
Register 4: 0x7c 01111100
Register 5: 0x07 00000111
Register 6: 0x17 00010111
Register 7: 0x31 00110001
Register 8: 0x0f 00001111
Register 9: 0x00 00000000
Register 10: 0x00 00000000
Register 11: 0x00 00000000
Register 12: 0x00 00000000
Register 13: 0x20 00100000
==Frame#00000/04959======
Register 0: 0x6c 01101100
Register 1: 0x07 00000111
Register 2: 0x7c 01111100
Register 3: 0x07 00000111
Register 4: 0x7c 01111100
Register 5: 0x07 00000111
Register 6: 0x1f 00011111
Register 7: 0x31 00110001
Register 8: 0x0d 00001101
Register 9: 0x00 00000000
Register 10: 0x00 00000000
Register 11: 0x00 00000000
Register 12: 0x00 00000000
Register 13: 0x00 00000000
==Frame#00001/04959======
...
Register 0: 0x7c 01111100
Register 1: 0x07 00000111
Register 2: 0x54 01010100
Register 3: 0x00 00000000
Register 4: 0x0f 00001111
Register 5: 0x03 00000011
Register 6: 0x01 00000001
Register 7: 0x31 00110001
Register 8: 0x07 00000111
Register 9: 0x0c 00001100
Register 10: 0x0d 00001101
Register 11: 0x00 00000000
Register 12: 0x00 00000000
Register 13: 0x00 00000000
==Frame#04959/04959======Notice that this is only pulling out the 14 sound generating registers. We can see this in the resultant de-interleaved file.
We can see tha tthe first two values correspond to the first items for reg0 and reg1: 6C and 07 and finish the 14 values with 20 before starting on the new set of 14 register values (again starting with 6C and 07 in this case).
The final step turns the above data stream into a C header file mentioned above.
To play the file thus requires the following algorithm:
Every 50Hz:
Read the next 14 register values from the data
Write all 14 register values out to the AY-3-8910Closing Thoughts
I’ve really not done very much myself this time. The PCB was from GadgetReboot. The library from Andy4495. The tune data provided by the YM jukebox and all other scripts and bits of the process were available online.
Now I need to decide what I’d like to do with all this.
Kevin
-
Arduino and AY-3-8910
I’ve had some AY-3-8910 programmable sound generators for a while and planned to do something with them, but they’ve sat in the “to think about” box for a while. But recently getting hold of the WhyEm sound card for the RC2014 has re-awakened my interest.
This is some “first looks” experiments with the AY-3-8910 and an Arduino.
- Part 1 – Getting started and looking at playing YM files.
- Part 2 – Adding basic MIDI control.
- Part 3 – Basic experiments with direct digital synthesis.
- Part 4 – Using the AY-3-8910 as a 4-bit DAC for Mozzi.
- Part 5 – Driving four AY-3-8910s using my AY-3-8910 Experimenter PCB.
https://makertube.net/w/26yAj7wAzZwCsFoBkJpZs2
Warning! I strongly recommend using old or second hand equipment for your experiments. I am not responsible for any damage to expensive instruments!
These are the key tutorials for the main concepts used in this project:
- Arduino AY3891x Library: https://github.com/Andy4495/AY3891x
- Arduino Nano AY-3-8910 PCB: https://github.com/GadgetReboot/AY-3-8910
If you are new to Arduino, see the Getting Started pages.
Parts list
- Arduino Uno
- AY-3-8910 chip
- Either GadgetReboot’s PCB or patch using solderless breadboard or prototyping boards.
The AY-3-8910 PSG
The AY-3-8910 programmable sound generator is quite an iconic chip of its time. Not as popular maybe as the SID used in the Commodore 64, but still pretty widespread use in 8-bit computers of the time and apparently a number of arcade machines too.
There are a number of “compatible” chips, including the Yamaha YM2149. There is also the AY-3-8912 which is the same as the 8910 but without one of the general purpose IO ports, which take no part in the sound generation.
I’m not going to go into the details of the device itself, for that I’ll refer to the following resources:
- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_Instrument_AY-3-8910
- https://www.vgmpf.com/Wiki/index.php/AY-3-8910
- https://rc2014.co.uk/modules/why-em-ulator-sound-module/
- http://blog.tynemouthsoftware.co.uk/2023/01/driving-ay-3-8910-ym2149-from-8-bit.html
The summary of the specification though is as follows:
- Three square wave output channels.
- Global AD envelope generator, with a selection of fixed envelopes.
- Noise generator an option on the channels.
- Mixer.
There is an 8-bit data register interface to the chip along with three control signals (BDIR, BC1 and BC2).
Sourcing AY-3-8910 Chips
I should point out that it isn’t possible to buy new AY-3-8910 or YM2419 chips these days, so any that can be found online are almost certainly reclaimed from older hardware. These may or may not work reliably, but it will be a bit of a lottery.
There is a lot of discussion about the issue here: http://blog.tynemouthsoftware.co.uk/2023/01/testing-ay-3-8910-ym2149-sound-card-for-rc2014-and-minstrel-4D.html
Some more here: https://maidavale.org/blog/remarked-chips-from-ebay/
This is why RC2014 eventually went with the “Why Emulator” approach: https://rc2014.co.uk/modules/why-em-ulator-sound-module/
My own experience is that you can get them on ebay pretty cheaply. They are often described as “new” but really they will be pulled from older hardware and be cleaned up to look new again.
Usually this means re-tinning the pins with solder, sanding down the original markings, and re-etching the text and logos. I guess they do this to be able to claim “as new”, but personally I’d rather they just let them be sold as reclaimed/recycled. The prices always reflect a reclaimed level of quality to me anyway.
Here is a photo of a recent batch of 10 bought as a pack from the same ebay seller.
Notice how, whilst the text and logos seem to essentially be the same, there are many differences between the actual devices:
- Depth, position, size of the molding marks.
- Depth, position, size of the pin 1 marker.
- Colour of the final finish.
- They also all have very different under-side markings and appearance (not shown).
I’ve also never seen one yet that doesn’t claim to be a Microchip device, whereas in reality most original devices I suspect would be either Yamaha YM2419 or GI AY-3-8910, so are being re-etched.
It is possible to tell if the device is a YM or AY as they respond slightly differently when the 4-bit registers get written to and read. If the value 31 is written to one of the 4-bit registers then a YM will read back 31 but an AY device will read back 15.
Full details here: http://blog.tynemouthsoftware.co.uk/2023/01/testing-ay-3-8910-ym2149-sound-card-for-rc2014-and-minstrel-4D.html
The Arduino AY3891x library includes a sketch to check and print the result (see below).
Hardware
For once, I’m using someone else’s design for my initial messing about. There is a schematic and some hardware built on a protoboard shown in the Arduino YM3891x library here: https://github.com/Andy4495/AY3891x/tree/main/extras/hardware
But there is a PCB that was designed by GadgetReboot here: https://github.com/GadgetReboot/AY-3-8910. This can be ordered directly from PCBWay and so that is what I’ve used.
The only thing to watch out for, is that D2/D3 are reversed compared to the protoboard hardware. So whilst all other pin definitions in the library examples are fine, D2 and D3 need to be swapped to use them with the PCB.
I also didn’t bother to add the power LED (and R5), the toggle switch or the additional header pins.
The full pinout interface from the Arduino to the AY-3-8910 is as follows:
AY-3-8910ArduinoDA0-DA7D2-D8, A3BC1A0BC2A1BDIRA2CLOCKD9/RESETA4 (not used in the library)The most critical one from a re-use point of view is the clock as the code uses the ATmega328P hardware Timer 1 to output a 50% duty cycle PWM signal on output OC1A (D9) to generate the 1MHz clock required by the AY-3-8910.
Using a different microcontroller will mean re-writing this part of the code for a suitable replacement timer.
The PCB also has the following Arduino GPIO pin use:
- D0/D1 – UART pin header
- D10-D13 – SD card pin header
- A4 – /RESET of the AY-3-8910 but doesn’t appear to be required to use the library.
The AY-3-8910 is powered from the +5V from the Arduino. VIN for the Arduino is not connected, so USB power is assumed.
The Code
Taking the “AY3891x_EX3_Simple_Tone” example as a starting point, the following line needs updating as shown below:
// Original line
AY3891x psg( 17, 8, 7, 6, 5, 4, 2, 3, 16, 15, 14);
// Required for use with the PCB
AY3891x psg( 17, 8, 7, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, 16, 15, 14);This is using the “lesser number of pins” constructor, which assumes that the A8, A9, /RESET and CLOCK pins of the AY-3-8910 are not managed by the library. There is a more complete constructor to define the additional pins if required. There is a good description of how the AY-3-8910 interface works in the main source code: https://github.com/Andy4495/AY3891x/blob/main/src/AY3891x.cpp
I also switched any Serial.begin() statements to use 9600 baud for preference too.
With these changes, the simple tone example just works, as does the “AY3891x_EX8_Check_Orig_or_Clone”, which tells me I have an AY-3-8910 rather than a YM2149.
But what I really wanted was to play one of the tunes from a game I remembered. My first introduction to AY-3-8910 music was the 128K Spectrum version of The Neverending Story. This was one of the two games that came bundled with the original machine, and for someone used to the 48K beeps and boops it was an amazing upgrade.
Unfortunately I don’t seem able at present to find a “YM” file version of that tune to play, so instead I turned to a David Whittaker classic – “Glider Rider”. The “YM Jukebox” GitHub repository has a whole pile of YM files ready to use here: https://github.com/nguillaumin/ym-jukebox/tree/master/data/David%20Whittaker
There are (I believe) two key ways to get “chiptunes” for the AY-3-8910. A YM file is a stream of the register values sent to the chip to direct the sound generation. With one of these files, it is simply a case of turning these values into a C array and it can be included in an Arduino sketch (there are several steps required, see below, but it is all doable).
Another common way to get tunes is an “AY” file. As I understand things these are the actual Z80 assembler instructions required to drive the AY-3-8910 chip, so extracting the required data for use on another system is not so easy. These are really designed to be used on the original systems or via emulation.
To produce an Arduino source code file from a YM file requires the following steps (described here: https://github.com/Andy4495/AY3891x/tree/main/extras/tools):
- Find and download the desired YM file.
- Decode it using: https://github.com/eqy/ymduino/blob/master/decoder.py – the force_interlacing parameter is required to correctly unpick everything.
python decoder.py GliderRider.ym force_interleaved
- Turn the resulting binary outputfile (it is always called that after using the decoder.py script) into a C structure using: https://github.com/Andy4495/AY3891x/blob/main/extras/tools/bin2c14.py
python bin2c14.py outputfile > chiptunes.h
- Take the resulting const PROGMEM structure into the “chiptunes.h” file of the “AY3891x_EX6_Chiptunes_Flash” example sketch.
Note that due to the memory limitations of the Arduino Nano, the resulting C structure for the tune will have to be cut-off at around 2000 lines, but be sure to leave the termnating part of the structure:
const byte PROGMEM psg_data[] = {
0x6C,0x07,0x7C,0x07,0x7C,0x07,0x17,0x31,0x0F,0x00,0x00,0x00,0x00,0x20,
0x6C,0x07,0x7C,0x07,0x7C,0x07,0x1F,0x31,0x0D,0x00,0x00,0x00,0x00,0x00,
....
0x7C,0x07,0xBE,0x03,0x58,0x02,0x01,0x31,0x09,0x0E,0x00,0x00,0x00,0x00,
};If there are build errors, then it might be because the structure is still too long. 2000 lines fits for me using around 97% of the programme memory of the Arduino Nano.
If full (longer) tunes are required, then the PCB has the option to hook up to an SD card and longer files can be stored there.
YM Files
Here is a little more detail about the above process required to get a YM file into C code, mostly for my own reference (the above links all talk about it pretty well tbh).
Step 1: A downloaded YM File is usually actually compressed using LHA. 7Zip can open these files and save the extracted version ready for step 2.
Here is the difference of the start of the files shown using a hex editor. Notice the “-lh5-” header near the start showing that this is a LHA compressed file, and a filename associated with the uncompressed version, in this case glrider.ym.
Uncompressed:
We can now clearly see he header information including the file identifier “YM5!” along with title, author and copyright information in comment fields.
The AU3891x library goes on to explain: “This uncompressed binary file has the audio programming registers stored in a non-interleaved format for more efficient compression. These values now need to be interleaved for more efficient playback.”
We can find more details of the YM file format here, in the words of the creator of the format, Arnaud Carré, directly: https://www.lynn3686.com/ym3456_tidy.html
A music-file is composed of YM2149 registers generated by the
original play-routine for each 50th seconds. As the YM2149 has 14 registers 8 bits each, that means 14 bytes for 1/50 second, so 700 bytes for one second of soundchip.
When I convert an ATARI music, I play the music on the ATARI, and I
store YM2149 registers set each 1/50sec (Vertical Blank time, VBL) in a big file as follow:
VBL1:
store reg0,reg1,reg2,...,reg12,reg13 (14 regs)
VBL2:
store reg0,reg1,reg2,...,reg12,reg13 (14 regs)
...
VBLn:
store reg0,reg1,reg2,...,reg12,reg13 (14 regs)
The problem is that is takes a lot of disk-space. Just count: A 10
minutes song will take 420000 bytes on disk. But don't panic, the music are compressed with LHARC method (using LHA program from Haruyasu Yoshizaki). To reach best compression ratio, I store registers in a different order:
VBL1 reg0, VBL2 reg0, VBL3 reg0 .... VBLn reg0
VBL1 reg1, VBL2 reg1, VBL3 reg1 .... VBLn reg1
...
VBL1 reg14,VBL2 reg14,VBL3 reg14.... VBLn reg14Hence the “interleaved” format discussed previously. So looking at the file itself, specifically for YM5 it has the following format:
Offset Size Type Comment
0 4 DWORD ID of YM5 format. ('YM5!')
4 8 string[8] Check String ('LeOnArD!')
12 4 DWORD Nb of valid VBL of the file.
16 4 DWORD Song attributes (see below)
20 2 WORD Nb of digi-drum sample (can be 0)
22 4 DWORD YM2149 External frequency in Hz (ex:2000000 for ATARI-ST version, 1000000 for AMSTRAD CPC)
26 2 WORD Player frequency in Hz (Ex: 50Hz for almost player)
28 4 DWORD Vbl number to loop the song. (0 is default)
32 2 WORD Size (in bytes) of futur additinal data. (must be 0 for the moment)So we can see this playing out from the above file:
00000: 59 4D 35 21 = "YM5!"
00004: 4C 65 4F 6E 41 72 44 21 = "LeOnArD!"
0000C: 00 00 13 60 = Number of frames: 4960
00010: 00 00 00 01 = Attributes:
b0: Set if Interleaved data block.
b1: Set if the digi-drum samples are signed data.
b2: Set if the digidrum is already in ST 4 bits format.
00014: 00 00 = No digidrum samples
00016: 00 0F 42 40 = External frequency 1MHz
0001A: 00 32 = Player frequency 50Hz
0001C: 00 00 00 00 = Number of loops for the song: 0
00020: 00 00This header is then followed by:
For each digidrum sample:
4 DWORD sample size
nnnn BYTES sample data (8bits per sample)
NT-String Name of the song.
NT-String Name of the author.
NT-String Comments (YM file converter ?!)
All YM2149 registers.
4 DWORD End-File check. ('End!')Which again we can now see in the uncompressed file:
(no digidrum samples)
00022: 476C6964657220526964657200 = "Glider Rider"
0002E: 4461766964205768697474616B657200 = "David Whittaker"
0003E: 2863293139383620517569636B73696C766100 = "(c)1986 Quicksilva"
00052: 6C6C7C8C... = 4960 values for reg0
013B2: 07070707... = 4960 values for reg1
...
0FC32: 02000000... = 4960 values for reg13
10F92: 00000000... = 2x4960 additional sets of values
13652: 45 6E 64 21 = "End!"Curiously there seems to be data for 16 registers, which I guess would allow the inclusion of the two GPIO ports as well as the sound generation registers.
So to turn this into a stream of register values to send to the AY-3-8910 at a rate of 50Hz requires take the same “VBL” value for each register in turn and de-interleaving it.
This is the output from the decoder.py file as it processes the above:
Attempting to read file at glrider.ym...
YM5! format file detected based on first four bytes of file...
4960
File is interleaved...
Song title: Glider Rider
Author: David Whittaker
Comments: (c)1986 Quicksilva
Data length is 79360 bytes...
Song length is 4960 frames...
Deinterleaving...
Register 0: 0x6c 01101100
Register 1: 0x07 00000111
Register 2: 0x7c 01111100
Register 3: 0x07 00000111
Register 4: 0x7c 01111100
Register 5: 0x07 00000111
Register 6: 0x17 00010111
Register 7: 0x31 00110001
Register 8: 0x0f 00001111
Register 9: 0x00 00000000
Register 10: 0x00 00000000
Register 11: 0x00 00000000
Register 12: 0x00 00000000
Register 13: 0x20 00100000
==Frame#00000/04959======
Register 0: 0x6c 01101100
Register 1: 0x07 00000111
Register 2: 0x7c 01111100
Register 3: 0x07 00000111
Register 4: 0x7c 01111100
Register 5: 0x07 00000111
Register 6: 0x1f 00011111
Register 7: 0x31 00110001
Register 8: 0x0d 00001101
Register 9: 0x00 00000000
Register 10: 0x00 00000000
Register 11: 0x00 00000000
Register 12: 0x00 00000000
Register 13: 0x00 00000000
==Frame#00001/04959======
...
Register 0: 0x7c 01111100
Register 1: 0x07 00000111
Register 2: 0x54 01010100
Register 3: 0x00 00000000
Register 4: 0x0f 00001111
Register 5: 0x03 00000011
Register 6: 0x01 00000001
Register 7: 0x31 00110001
Register 8: 0x07 00000111
Register 9: 0x0c 00001100
Register 10: 0x0d 00001101
Register 11: 0x00 00000000
Register 12: 0x00 00000000
Register 13: 0x00 00000000
==Frame#04959/04959======Notice that this is only pulling out the 14 sound generating registers. We can see this in the resultant de-interleaved file.
We can see tha tthe first two values correspond to the first items for reg0 and reg1: 6C and 07 and finish the 14 values with 20 before starting on the new set of 14 register values (again starting with 6C and 07 in this case).
The final step turns the above data stream into a C header file mentioned above.
To play the file thus requires the following algorithm:
Every 50Hz:
Read the next 14 register values from the data
Write all 14 register values out to the AY-3-8910Closing Thoughts
I’ve really not done very much myself this time. The PCB was from GadgetReboot. The library from Andy4495. The tune data provided by the YM jukebox and all other scripts and bits of the process were available online.
Now I need to decide what I’d like to do with all this.
Kevin
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AMG Turns 15: Senior VPs Speak
By Carcharodon
15 years ago, on May 19, 2009, Angry Metal Guy spoke. For the very first time as AMG. And he had opinions: Very Important Opinions™. The post attracted relatively little attention at the time, but times change and, over the decade and a half since then, AMG Industries has grown into the blog you know today. Now with a staff of around 25 overrating overwriters (and an entirely non-suspicious graveyard for writers on permanent, all-expenses-paid sabbaticals), we have written more than 9,100 posts, comprising over seven million words. Over the site’s lifetime, we’ve had more than 107 million visits and now achieve well over a million hits each and every month. Through this, we’ve built up a fantastic community of readers drawn from every corner of the globe, whom we have (mostly) loved getting to know in the more than 360,000 comments posted on the site.
We have done this under the careful (if sternly authoritarian) stewardship of our eponymous leader Angry Metal Guy and his iron enforcer, Steel Druhm, while adhering to strict editorial policies and principles. We have done this by simply offering honest (and occasionally brutal) takes, and without running a single advert or taking a single cent from anyone. Ever. Mistakes have undoubtedly been made and we may be a laughing stock in the eyes of music intellectuals, socialites and critics everywhere but we are incredibly proud of what AMG Industries represents. In fact, we believe it may be the best metal blog, with the best community of readers, on the internet.
Now join us as the people responsible for making AMG a reality reflect on what the site means to them and why they would willingly work for a blog that pays in the currency of deadlines, abuse, and hobo wine. Welcome to the 15th Birthdaynalia.
Thou Shalt Have No Other Blogs!
El Cuervo
AMG and me
When I reflect on what really matters at the end of each year, AMG.com always comes up trumps.1 Its benefits are many, its failings few, and I struggle to imagine my life had I never joined its crew a decade ago. Surprising though this may be to those familiar with my pride, AMG could be an unread blog and it wouldn’t matter. It represents a creative outlet, exercises my brain differently from my corporate career, rewards me with high-quality listening material, and even introduced some individuals that I now consider strong friends. Serving a not-for-profit organization operated by nerds for nerds, with a combined love for their esoteric interest grants me balance and perspective I would otherwise miss in my rigidly structured professional life. Even after thousands of hours of unpaid servitude, it energizes and excites me.
Sure, it satisfies my ego that Angry Metal Guy also attracts thousands of unique readers per article, and has sizable clout in the underground and mid-tier of heavy metal media. I love the bump bands experience following our praise, and even the incendiary comments when we criticize something popular. But these are just the cherry on the top of everything else it affords me. This site nourishes my soul; through creativity, community, and hubris.2
AMG gave to me …
Cormorant // Dwellings – In 2011, I was still relatively new to extreme metal but I already knew that Opeth was one of my favorite bands. A simple Opeth name-drop by AMG in his review was all it took to pique my interest. Shortly thereafter, Cormorant—especially their first two records, 2009’s Metzoa and this—became some of my favorite music too. So much so that a slice of the art from this second record is prominently tattooed on my body. Dwellings is an expansive, unpredictable treasure map of a record. It’s littered with dozens of obvious paths and landmarks, but also subtler trinkets you’ll miss until your tenth listen. There’s so much to admire here, from the burly riff and thunderous vocals opening “Junta,” to the wandering, shredding guitars narrating Kevin Rudd’s apology to Australia’s indigenous population (“The First Man”) and the beautifully delicate interludes on “Funambulist.” Dwellings is the earliest example of many albums introduced to me via AMG.com that have had a lasting impact on either my listening tastes or life generally.
Moonsorrow // Varjoina Kuljemme Kuolleiden Maassa – Although I’d already breached the realms of death metal prior to discovering AMG (via Opeth and In Flames, naturally), black metal had eluded me. It was a gap about which I was concerned, given my moves towards heavier music. Happily for me, the review of Moonsorrow’s sixth full-length blew that door wide open. Varjoina Kuljemme Kuolleiden Maassa is hardly entry-grade material, featuring a bleak atmosphere, alien vocals, and four main tracks each exceeding eleven minutes. But the grand melodies, sharp riffs, folksy slant, and EPIC song-writing scope offered the necessary bait for me. It basically ruined atmospheric and folksy metal for me from the outset; almost no other bands successfully write engrossing, long-form black metal like these guys, despite most of them trying. Listening to VKKM is less like hearing music and more like slowly wandering towards a freezing death in the Nordic wilderness. But in a good way! While the band has arguably produced other, stronger records—the mythological curiosity of Verisäkeet and monolithic Hävitetty are also exemplary—VKKM holds a special importance to me for opening up an entire genre.
Steven Wilson // Hand. Cannot. Erase. – At the age of 22/23, I would describe 2016 as the year that my childhood ended and adulthood began. I was preparing to enter employment at the end of my further education and went through a difficult break-up with a long-term partner. Although Hand. Cannot. Erase. released in 2015, I spent far more time with it the following year. Along with a few other artists outside my typical territory of prog and metal, it narrated that period for me. Progressive rock sits comfortably within my bailiwick3 but the mournful strains of pop found on the title track and “Perfect Life” are what stand H.C.E. apart from everything else. AMG‘s AotY summary was absolutely right in saying that “the emotional engagement that Wilson and co. are able to evoke in me is precisely what makes this album more than the sum of its parts.” It’s my emotional response to the music here that makes this record what it is. Even in the numerous ways my life has changed in the subsequent eight years, I find it a little difficult to return to this one. It’s a landmark album in my life.
I wish I had written …
Avantasia – The Wicked Symphony Review. This album represents not only the vehicle through which I discovered AMG but also one of my favorite albums from the 2010s. It’s the most raucous, overblown and catchy fusion of hard rock and symphonic metal I’ve heard. But my first listen also represented a turning point in my life. Pre-Wicked Symphony, so much of my listening was rooted in bands introduced to me by my dad. Post-Wicked Symphony, these roles were reversed and I now feed him new releases I think he’ll enjoy. I would have loved the contemporaneous opportunity to describe this phenomenon in relation to Avantasia.
I wish more people had read …
Geoff Tate – Kings and Thieves Review. The great Dr. Fisting is the most incisive, humorous writer to ever sit in our ranks, and his review of Kings and Thieves forms his best output. Framed as a letter, Fisting delivers a savage, but wholly reasonable, takedown of a problematic, wayward Mr Tate. The line “hearing you sing about getting laid is about as sexy as walking in on my parents” delighted me at the time and still delights me now. Read this.
Grymm
AMG and me
In all my years of listening to metal prior to writing about it, I was searching long and hard for anything that would come close to the magic that the late, great Metal Maniacs magazine brought to the world. Once I encountered Dr. Fisting‘s immortal(ly brutal) review of Kings and Thieves by ex-Queensryche vocalist Geoff Tate, I knew I had found it. Little did I know that I would call this place home for over a decade. To say this site is special to me, is to understate the impact it’s had on my life, my writing, and how I approach all music nowadays. The fact that I made a second family here among the staff and readers makes this all the sweeter. I don’t regret the time, energy, and tears spent here.
As I’ve said many times, onward…
AMG gave to me …
Reverend Kristin Michael Hayter // Saved! – The most recent and jarring album that I discovered since joining up here, the former Lingua Ignota took all the pain she experienced through abuse, and turned it into a religious, lo-fi cleansing, that was equal parts beautiful, stirring, and brutally uncomfortable. I often waver between experiencing this album to purge, and never wanting to touch it again because it’s that raw. When an album makes you feel those things, you know the artist(s) who crafted it did something right.
Lorna Shore // Pain Remains – I’ll admit, I’m not the biggest fan of deathcore out there, and it doesn’t help that I (unfairly, in hindsight) avoided New Jersey’s Lorna Shore due to the actions of their prior vocalist. What I didn’t know was that they gave said asshole the boot almost immediately after Immortal’s release, and were blessed with the golden throat of one Will Ramos. The rest, as they say, is history. Since then, they’ve been on a majestic ascent that many bands would give everything for, and they rightfully deserve all the success in the world that they’ve achieved.
Darkest Era // Severence – One of the earliest albums I discovered via another writer here at AMG, Irish minstrels Darkest Era deserve far, far more love than they’re currently getting … and from what I’ve heard, they’re getting some well-deserved love lately from all the metalheads. Rightfully so. For, as good as their debut The Last Caress of Light was, Severence saw a major improvement in terms of musicianship and songwriting, seeing them surpass many of their inspirations by leaps and bounds.
I wish I had written …
Any of Cherd‘s Christmas posts, especially the Tarja Christmas album. Sometimes, you’re feeling the Spirit of Christmas4 and you want to spread joy. Sometimes, you just can’t stand the fucking holidays, and just want to laugh your ass off at some damn good (piss)takes on the commercialized, uber-capitalistic holidays, and our holiday cheer-spreader has spent the last few years making us hurt our ribcages from ugly-laughing so damn much to his reviews of Christmas albums, and Tarja’s over-the-top Christmas album was beyond ripe for the taking. I wish I had his propensity for pain humor.
I wish I could do over …
Grymm Comments: On Coming Out and Acceptance in the Metalverse… Again. – Don’t get this twisted; everything I said in my second coming-out piece still needed to be said and, sadly, nothing’s changed. But if you knew even half of the bullshit I endured once it was published, you would too lose all motivation to support the very music that has people in it that want to see you either removed from the scene, or outright dead. My desire to write pretty much died after this went live…
I wish more people had read …
Grymm Comments: On Coming Out and Acceptance in the Metalverse… Again. …but I’m not at all sorry I did it. Metal, for all its acceptance of its wayward misfits, miscreants, and outcasts, still has a colossal problem in terms of racism and homophobia, and it’s only gotten more emboldened over the last decade or so. It’s heartening to see pushback against it though and if that means someone else will pick up the baton, after I laid it down, to call out that bullshit, then all the better. None of the other major players have the fortitude to do so, but there are those who can and will.
Kronos
AMG and me
Look, I don’t write here anymore; I’ve left that to the more capable. But when I did, the reason for it all was that someone gave a fuck whether I was capable or not. When someone first commented to say, “Hey, this is some bad prose” on a Kronos review, that was when I decided that I was going to keep writing for AMG. For all our sins as a website, we did—and those currently writing here still do—care to make what you read here good, and care to connect you with art that is good. The commentariat’s demand for quality pushed me as a writer to produce both the best criticism and the most entertaining writing I could muster, even when I didn’t have much to say. But there came a point when I found I had too little to say to keep saying anything. Seeing the rest of the staff continue to dish thoughtful commentary even on thoughtless art, made bowing out easy. I’m proud to have been a piece of the project for so long.
I hope it keeps going another fifteen years. That way, when I’m a Steel-level fogie and Defeated Sanity are as neolithic as Metal Church, I can return and correct Generation Alpha’s horrible taste.
AMG gave to me …
Dodecahedron // Dodecahedron – If I had never heard Dodecahedron’s opening chords, I may have had a very different life than I do now. Knowing that those sounds exist completely reshaped my relationship with music, shifting my interest from the technical to the visceral. Never before had I felt my stomach turn from sound alone. If there’s any overarching theme in my music writing, it’s the failure to completely capture this sensation in words, to properly express the importance of art that sparks the neurons below the neck.
Melted Bodies // Enjoy Yourself – Well, don’t mind if I do. I thought this sounded OK from GardensTale‘s review and didn’t get around to it until I’d turned in my year-end list for 2020 (after all, I know best, so why bother listening to what these bozos tell me is good). Then I spent 2021 listening to Enjoy Yourself on a weekly basis. Melted Bodies’ sardonic seapunk-infused thrash proved the perfect artistic vehicle to deliver a treatise on hypernormalization and the misery, and seediness of American culture. Far from being just a metal record with a political bent, Enjoy Yourself is more directly a political document printed with a gaudy mix of guitars, synthesizer boops, and blast beats, in which every annoying, hokey lyrical delivery hisses out through a rot-toothed sneer.
billy woods // Hiding Places5 – While I was actively writing, I pretty much knew if I’d like a new metal record well before the review came out. The writers look out for each other, you know? And few were more persistent and reliable gauges of my interest than Kenstrosity, who somehow just knew I’d love this album. Hiding Places carries more than a whiff of the care and crypsis of a great art-house death metal record without being anything close to one. Muted instrumentals creak and twinkle around woods, whose tangled lyrics squint suspiciously at love and belonging, paranoid from decades of imperial violence. Gloomy but electric, woods delivers his piece with a mix of resignation and reprehension that hooks me in every time. It’s not metal, but it is really fucking angry.
Dr. Wvrm
AMG and me
I’ve asked myself what AMG means to me far too often over the last few years. As I’ve fallen out, in and back out of love with metal, with reviewing, and with arguing with “writers” about the finer points of comma usage. As I’ve watched better and more dedicated reviewers slip away to the far side of the hourglass, I’ve wondered what my useless ass is still doing here.
I don’t write; no time, no drive. I don’t read the articles, but then again, who does? I stay in touch with current releases (mostly because Kenneth or Dolphin Fucker or Eldritch shove things they know I’ll like in my face) but am no longer a voracious consumer and cataloguer. My fixations have moved on to other equally meaningless pursuits. Yet here I stay, despite the guilt of missed deadlines and the shame of another broken promise of regular reviews, doing just enough to avoid unceremonious defenestration from The Hall, because I love these people.
This site, those who read it, and particularly those who staff it, are the only people I have ever had in my life who see what I see in this awful music; who understand the ways this awful music can take on a life of its own, suffusing relationships and memories like little else can; who have connected with me and supported me and been so good to me, simply because of this awful, this god-awful music.
AMG, more than anything else, means community, and I consider myself lucky to have found a place at its table.
AMG gave to me …
Wilderun // Sleep at the Edge of the Earth6 – Sleep is (a) an entirely unoriginal selection, (b) the first 5.0/5.0 record to which this site introduced me, and (c) the only metal record my father has ever appreciated. This is a man who once made me turn off Billy Joel.7 After 20 years of musical repartee boiling down to me blasting Cryptopsy’s “Crown of Horns” for laughs, Wilderun managed to bridge our gap. It surely has to do with the literal Berklee grads orchestrating a symphonic masterpiece more than anything heavy about the record, but if I’ve learned anything in this life, it’s to shut up and take your win. The image of the two of us listening to “Hope and Shadow” while driving through the hills of Pennsylvania Dutch Country is vivid in the way those special moments always are, even years later. I’m sure if asked, he couldn’t recall that afternoon. The memory is fine just the same.
The Night Flight Orchestra // Amber Galactic – As Sleep was to my father, so was Amber Galactic to my mother. In many ways, I owe my metal worship to her; if not for a childhood raised on nothing but soft rock, I likely wouldn’t search out the ugliest music humanly possible. While she was never as repulsed by my musical predilections as my father,8 she was also not the audience for Slayer or Children of Bodom, just as I was not the audience for Shania Twain, Rod Stewart or Seal.9 Our tastes diverged for good in the year 2004, leaving little but tussles over the radio knob, and eventually everything else. Our fights were, and are, legendary among our friends and family, which was a badge of honor as an asshole teenager and is now a marker of shame as an asshole adult. I don’t remember how she got wise to Amber Galactic – maybe through me, accidentally. But for the first time in the long-time search for a ceasefire, she was as into “Gemini,” “Domino”, and “Josephine” as I was. It was a good time. That detente didn’t last long, of course, but as a wise man once said, “Shut up and take your win.”
Amorphis // Under the Red Cloud – Under the Red Cloud topped the very first Top Ten I put together, in 2015, still a pre-staff wannabe. Even then, I wanted to foist my awful opinions on the world, and in many ways, that was the first step to my eventual membership here. That isn’t why this review matters to me though. I had no idea who Amorphis was before AMG Himself‘s review of Under the Red Cloud. In the years since, I’ve been grateful for their constant companionship, in the summer sun and on lonely nights like the one on which I write this. I reached for them on a January morning, as the last throes of a Nor’easter snowed me into the maternity ward. I’m passing the hours between bottles by staring out at crystalline whorls as “Enigma” plays. It’s one of my very favorites, in their catalog, in all of music, and I can’t help but share it. I turn the volume down and pass the headphones from my ears to my son’s. It’s only for a moment, and who knows how well you can hear less than a day removed from in vitro, but it’s our moment. It’s this moment, all these moments, that I want to flash before my eyes when my bell finally tolls, and I hope someone turns the speaker up to 11 when they do.
Eldritch Elitist
AMG and me
I’m not sure if any of my colleagues know this, but I have done most of my writing in my nearly 8 year tenure at Angry Metal Guy on my cell phone. I submitted my application to AMG on May 24th, 2016; exactly two weeks later, my first and only child was born. He was a particularly clingy baby, so for months when I’d arrive home from work, he was essentially glued to my arm for hours on end. When Steel Druhm and Madam X graciously brought me on as a probationary writer, I begrudgingly adapted to writing on a stupid-ass, tiny-ass screen with my stupid-ass, big-ass thumbs. The process has been second nature to me ever since.
Let me be perfectly clear: If I was doing this for a shot at writing for any other blog, I would have bailed immediately. But I owed Angry Metal Guy for singlehandedly revitalizing my passion for metal, after my interest in the genre had waned over a half decade of post-high school life. No other outlet compared when it came to treating melodic metal with the same respect and professional level of writing quality afforded to so-called “trailblazers” in the scene. Having the kind of music that made me fall in love with the genre in the first place legitimized by such a talented crew was revelatory. I can only hope my contributions in this space have resonated similarly with others like me.
AMG gave to me …
Beaten to Death // Unplugged – I’m not a grindcore fan. The number of grindcore albums I’ve listened to in full likely ranks in the single digits. I also think that Beaten to Death’s Unplugged is one of the coolest, catchiest, and most compulsively listenable records of the last decade. Part of what makes Unplugged a special record for me is that—aside from its sheer kinetic brilliance—discovering this record through AMG is what made me want to write for this blog in the first place. Jean-Luc Ricard’s spot-on piece wisely zeroed in on this record’s decidedly un-grindy eccentricities, which was vital for enticing genre tourists like myself. Mirroring that review’s impact has been my mission with every positive review I’ve ever penned. For all the self-proclaimed power metal haters who thanked me in the comments for making them one-off converts to records like The Saberlight Chronicles: Thanks for the free dopamine!
Khemmis // Hunted – I used to be a casual appreciator of doom metal. That is, before Steel Druhm reviewed Khemmis’s 2016 opus Hunted, which more or less put me off the genre for good. Hunted is a perfect encapsulation of everything I enjoy in a doom metal record. So perfect, in fact, that everything I’ve heard in the realm of traditional doom metal since has failed to elicit a response stronger than “this is good, but I wish I was listening to Hunted.” This album excels through sheer simplicity and masterful melodic handling, filling any semblance of dead air in a genre where most compositions feel like a waste of space. The tragedy here is that Khemmis’ formula is so effective as to feel effortless in its construction, yet no other band has been able to match these heights, despite the formula for success sounding so obvious to my ears. Were it not for Steel Druhm’s rightfully glowing (if underscored) review, I might have never heard my favorite doom metal album at all.
Xoth // Invasion of the Tentacube – Much like Wilderun before them, I’m not sure Xoth’s recent underground success would have resulted in as strong of word-of-mouth had Angry Metal Guy not been hyping them up since their 2017 debut. Our staff’s collective enthusiasm for promoting unsigned gems like Invasion of the Tentacube is, at least in my eyes, unmatched in getting bands like Xoth the early attention they deserve. Sure, there are many examples of self-released albums that fit these qualifiers, but Invasion of the Tentacube might be my personal favorite. It’s also worth mentioning this record as a reminder for people to revisit Xoth’s early material. Though a bit unrefined (as Akerblogger pointed out in his otherwise glowing review), this album is every bit as entertaining as Xoth’s subsequent LPs, and a neat little time capsule that captures all of Xoth’s ambitions in a charmingly adolescent package.
I wish I had written …
Frostbite Orckings – The Orcish Eclipse Review. I maintain that it was a wise decision to retire the 0.0/5.0 score from our rating system, but for Frostbite Orckings, I should have lobbied to reinstate it for one last hurrah. Ideally, we wouldn’t have given this insulting crap the time of day to begin with10, but the only value this garbage could have had was as a warning example after I pilloried it to fucking death. AI art, whether visual or aural, is not art, and should have no place where real artists struggle to thrive. Oh, and Unleash the Archers can go to hell.
I wish I could do over …
Dunnock – Little Stories Told by Ghosts Review. Speaking of 0.0 scores… I was in a bad space mentally when I wrote this review, and I take full responsibility for giving Dunnock a platform as my personal punching bag. It didn’t feel good to write this, and it didn’t feel good to have people validating my scoring decision in the comments. If nothing else, writing this review changed my philosophy on writing negative reviews for the better. My tastes should have dictated that I had no business reviewing this record, which I’m sure has its fans. Somewhere. I still think it sucks.
I wish more people had read …
Tales of Gaia – Hypernova Review. While the comments section indicates many people read this review, I simply cannot allow this gem to be lost to time. Hypernova left me crying and borderline suffocating from laughter. I have amazing memories of subjecting friends to this record and watching them crumple into a state of helpless hysteria. Unless Tales of Gaia makes another record with the same singer11, you will never hear anything else like this in your life.
Saunders
AMG and me
Various circumstances have conspired to fuck with my 2024 so far, leaving me scrambling as whips are cracked to contribute to this momentous occasion. 15 goddamn years, hey? And going stronger than ever… I am forever grateful and humbled to be a long-term servant to this mighty blog since joining the team during the latter half of 2014. My fading memory cannot quite pinpoint the timeline when I stumbled onto the pages of Angry Metal Guy. However, I remember being struck by the positive and passionate community vibes, the quality, insightful writing, and the no-bullshit rating system. I rapidly became an avid reader and, when opportunity came knocking, I jumped aboard. It’s been an awesome journey to see the incredible growth and expansion over the years.
Initially, I struggled as I adapted to a tight operation and steep learning curve with my then awful formatting skills (surprised I didn’t get the axe right there). Yet it was the professional standards, the support networks, set processes and the ongoing inspiration of the outstanding writing talent adorning these pages over the years that has kept me on my toes, and pushed me to become a better, more rounded writer. I am grateful for the exceptional (occasionally intimidating) writing standards and creative flair that each writer brings, which keeps me honest and inspires me. Not to mention the ridiculous amount of great music I’ve been alerted to over the years.
Writing for AngryMetalGuy.com means the world to me and has been my rock since stumbling across these pages roughly a decade ago. Although I don’t write as much as I would like to, daily visits to the blog remain a steadfast routine. Also, the one-of-a-kind community kicks arse and my writing buddies and colleagues are an awesome bunch of people and an absolute pleasure to work alongside. Here’s to many more great years ahead.
AMG gave to me …
Soen // Tellurian – Just months after I joined the staff, Angry Metal Guy Himself reviewed the sophomore album from Swedish progressive metal band Soen. I had overlooked their debut, and it was the impassioned piece of fine critical writing and subsequent lofty rating that piqued my interest. Being a prog enthusiast and big Opeth and Tool fan (no, not one of those Tool fans), Soen’s emotive, melancholic, chunky, complex and infectious brand of prog metal touched my heart and gripped my soul. It wrapping up top honors on my first year-end list writing here in 2014. It began a love affair with Soen, especially through their golden stretch from Tellurian to 2019’s exemplary Lotus album. Furthermore, Tellurian opened my eyes more and more to the many wondrous bands operating in the modern progressive metal field. A decade later and Tellurian continues to resonate strongly and remains one of my treasured early discoveries on this blog.
Mutoid Man // War Moans – Mutoid Man’s 2017 album War Moans dropped at a challenging period in my life, where I was navigating a career change and plunging into the unknown. Shit got pretty hectic; thus, certain albums took on extra significance in my life. The much-missed Dr Fisting wrote a typically cool review of the zany supergroup’s sophomore album, inspiring me to dip into the crazy world of Mutoid Man and their ridiculously catchy, wild concoction of influences. War Moans quickly ascended to become a go-to album and modern favorite, igniting my rabid fandom of the band to this day. Mutoid Man transcend simple labels, skilfully meshing elements of metal, rock, prog, punk, math and hardcore into cohesive, speedy, rollicking jams. They possess massive crossover appeal, punching out A-grade tuneage with plenty of zip, technical skill, and a knack of cranking the fun factor, and embellishing their batshit, hyperactive formula with wickedly addictive earworm gems.
Bathory // Hammerheart – I am a big metal feature nerd and, though the reviewing game takes precedent, some of my favorite moments are the various feature pieces and passionate write-ups of classic albums. When the curmudgeonly Doc Grier wrote a Yer Metal Is Olde piece on Bathory’s 1990 album Hammerheart, my curiosity was sparked. Although I was a fan of Enslaved and had dabbled in Borknagar, Bathory’s much-adored Viking metal legacy was largely untouched in my historic metal explorations. Branching out of my comfort zone and exploring other styles and genres is an ongoing thrill as a metalhead. This piece triggered me to open my horizons and delve more fully into the battle-hardened, epic realms of Viking metal and associated styles. Hammerheart is a fucking epic monster of a classic opus, that opened further doors for me and broadened my appreciation of not only Viking metal, but certain overlooked black metal gems, including Bathory’s own early classics.
I wish I had written …
For shits and giggles, I could easily go to Dr Fisting‘s Indefensible Positions takedown of Slaughter of the Soul, just for the sheer ballsyness, despite disagreeing with the sentiment. In the end, Grymm‘s killer Yer Metal Is Olde write-up of Acid Bath’s underground classic When the Kite String Pops stands out. This album (and this band) is an all timer for me and Grymm did an outstanding job of conveying why this album is so special and unique. It’s a classic YMIO entry that I occasionally go back to read, giving me the warm nostalgic feels and reminding me why I fell in love with this album back in the day, and why it still holds a place in my heart.
I wish more people had read …
AMG Goes Ranking – Dying Fetus. The Dying Fetus Ranking piece was a special moment in my decade-long career writing on this blog. A long-time favorite and pivotal band in opening my ears to the wonders of the more brutal, slammy realms of death metal, this ranking feature was a proud moment. Despite the collective efforts of my comrades Maddog and Dolphin Whisperer, fewer than thirty comments at time of writing was a little disappointing for a band of Dying Fetus’ stature. I don’t know how many actual clicks it got but I was certainly expecting / hoping for more rabble, agreements, and fiery debates than what occurred.
#2024 #AcidBath #AMGGoesRanking #AMGTurns15 #Amorphis #Avantasia #Bathory #billyWoods #BlogPost #BlogPosts #ComingOut #Cormorant #DarkestEra #Dodecahedron #DyingFetus #GeoffTate #GrymmCommentsOn #LornaShore #MeltedBodies #Moonsorrow #MutoidMan #ReverendKristinMichaelHayter #Soen #StevenWilson #TarjaTurunen #TheNightFlightOrchestra #Wilderun
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AMG Turns 15: Senior VPs Speak
By Carcharodon
15 years ago, on May 19, 2009, Angry Metal Guy spoke. For the very first time as AMG. And he had opinions: Very Important Opinions™. The post attracted relatively little attention at the time, but times change and, over the decade and a half since then, AMG Industries has grown into the blog you know today. Now with a staff of around 25 overrating overwriters (and an entirely non-suspicious graveyard for writers on permanent, all-expenses-paid sabbaticals), we have written more than 9,100 posts, comprising over seven million words. Over the site’s lifetime, we’ve had more than 107 million visits and now achieve well over a million hits each and every month. Through this, we’ve built up a fantastic community of readers drawn from every corner of the globe, whom we have (mostly) loved getting to know in the more than 360,000 comments posted on the site.
We have done this under the careful (if sternly authoritarian) stewardship of our eponymous leader Angry Metal Guy and his iron enforcer, Steel Druhm, while adhering to strict editorial policies and principles. We have done this by simply offering honest (and occasionally brutal) takes, and without running a single advert or taking a single cent from anyone. Ever. Mistakes have undoubtedly been made and we may be a laughing stock in the eyes of music intellectuals, socialites and critics everywhere but we are incredibly proud of what AMG Industries represents. In fact, we believe it may be the best metal blog, with the best community of readers, on the internet.
Now join us as the people responsible for making AMG a reality reflect on what the site means to them and why they would willingly work for a blog that pays in the currency of deadlines, abuse, and hobo wine. Welcome to the 15th Birthdaynalia.
Thou Shalt Have No Other Blogs!
El Cuervo
AMG and me
When I reflect on what really matters at the end of each year, AMG.com always comes up trumps.1 Its benefits are many, its failings few, and I struggle to imagine my life had I never joined its crew a decade ago. Surprising though this may be to those familiar with my pride, AMG could be an unread blog and it wouldn’t matter. It represents a creative outlet, exercises my brain differently from my corporate career, rewards me with high-quality listening material, and even introduced some individuals that I now consider strong friends. Serving a not-for-profit organization operated by nerds for nerds, with a combined love for their esoteric interest grants me balance and perspective I would otherwise miss in my rigidly structured professional life. Even after thousands of hours of unpaid servitude, it energizes and excites me.
Sure, it satisfies my ego that Angry Metal Guy also attracts thousands of unique readers per article, and has sizable clout in the underground and mid-tier of heavy metal media. I love the bump bands experience following our praise, and even the incendiary comments when we criticize something popular. But these are just the cherry on the top of everything else it affords me. This site nourishes my soul; through creativity, community, and hubris.2
AMG gave to me …
Cormorant // Dwellings – In 2011, I was still relatively new to extreme metal but I already knew that Opeth was one of my favorite bands. A simple Opeth name-drop by AMG in his review was all it took to pique my interest. Shortly thereafter, Cormorant—especially their first two records, 2009’s Metzoa and this—became some of my favorite music too. So much so that a slice of the art from this second record is prominently tattooed on my body. Dwellings is an expansive, unpredictable treasure map of a record. It’s littered with dozens of obvious paths and landmarks, but also subtler trinkets you’ll miss until your tenth listen. There’s so much to admire here, from the burly riff and thunderous vocals opening “Junta,” to the wandering, shredding guitars narrating Kevin Rudd’s apology to Australia’s indigenous population (“The First Man”) and the beautifully delicate interludes on “Funambulist.” Dwellings is the earliest example of many albums introduced to me via AMG.com that have had a lasting impact on either my listening tastes or life generally.
Moonsorrow // Varjoina Kuljemme Kuolleiden Maassa – Although I’d already breached the realms of death metal prior to discovering AMG (via Opeth and In Flames, naturally), black metal had eluded me. It was a gap about which I was concerned, given my moves towards heavier music. Happily for me, the review of Moonsorrow’s sixth full-length blew that door wide open. Varjoina Kuljemme Kuolleiden Maassa is hardly entry-grade material, featuring a bleak atmosphere, alien vocals, and four main tracks each exceeding eleven minutes. But the grand melodies, sharp riffs, folksy slant, and EPIC song-writing scope offered the necessary bait for me. It basically ruined atmospheric and folksy metal for me from the outset; almost no other bands successfully write engrossing, long-form black metal like these guys, despite most of them trying. Listening to VKKM is less like hearing music and more like slowly wandering towards a freezing death in the Nordic wilderness. But in a good way! While the band has arguably produced other, stronger records—the mythological curiosity of Verisäkeet and monolithic Hävitetty are also exemplary—VKKM holds a special importance to me for opening up an entire genre.
Steven Wilson // Hand. Cannot. Erase. – At the age of 22/23, I would describe 2016 as the year that my childhood ended and adulthood began. I was preparing to enter employment at the end of my further education and went through a difficult break-up with a long-term partner. Although Hand. Cannot. Erase. released in 2015, I spent far more time with it the following year. Along with a few other artists outside my typical territory of prog and metal, it narrated that period for me. Progressive rock sits comfortably within my bailiwick3 but the mournful strains of pop found on the title track and “Perfect Life” are what stand H.C.E. apart from everything else. AMG‘s AotY summary was absolutely right in saying that “the emotional engagement that Wilson and co. are able to evoke in me is precisely what makes this album more than the sum of its parts.” It’s my emotional response to the music here that makes this record what it is. Even in the numerous ways my life has changed in the subsequent eight years, I find it a little difficult to return to this one. It’s a landmark album in my life.
I wish I had written …
Avantasia – The Wicked Symphony Review. This album represents not only the vehicle through which I discovered AMG but also one of my favorite albums from the 2010s. It’s the most raucous, overblown and catchy fusion of hard rock and symphonic metal I’ve heard. But my first listen also represented a turning point in my life. Pre-Wicked Symphony, so much of my listening was rooted in bands introduced to me by my dad. Post-Wicked Symphony, these roles were reversed and I now feed him new releases I think he’ll enjoy. I would have loved the contemporaneous opportunity to describe this phenomenon in relation to Avantasia.
I wish more people had read …
Geoff Tate – Kings and Thieves Review. The great Dr. Fisting is the most incisive, humorous writer to ever sit in our ranks, and his review of Kings and Thieves forms his best output. Framed as a letter, Fisting delivers a savage, but wholly reasonable, takedown of a problematic, wayward Mr Tate. The line “hearing you sing about getting laid is about as sexy as walking in on my parents” delighted me at the time and still delights me now. Read this.
Grymm
AMG and me
In all my years of listening to metal prior to writing about it, I was searching long and hard for anything that would come close to the magic that the late, great Metal Maniacs magazine brought to the world. Once I encountered Dr. Fisting‘s immortal(ly brutal) review of Kings and Thieves by ex-Queensryche vocalist Geoff Tate, I knew I had found it. Little did I know that I would call this place home for over a decade. To say this site is special to me, is to understate the impact it’s had on my life, my writing, and how I approach all music nowadays. The fact that I made a second family here among the staff and readers makes this all the sweeter. I don’t regret the time, energy, and tears spent here.
As I’ve said many times, onward…
AMG gave to me …
Reverend Kristin Michael Hayter // Saved! – The most recent and jarring album that I discovered since joining up here, the former Lingua Ignota took all the pain she experienced through abuse, and turned it into a religious, lo-fi cleansing, that was equal parts beautiful, stirring, and brutally uncomfortable. I often waver between experiencing this album to purge, and never wanting to touch it again because it’s that raw. When an album makes you feel those things, you know the artist(s) who crafted it did something right.
Lorna Shore // Pain Remains – I’ll admit, I’m not the biggest fan of deathcore out there, and it doesn’t help that I (unfairly, in hindsight) avoided New Jersey’s Lorna Shore due to the actions of their prior vocalist. What I didn’t know was that they gave said asshole the boot almost immediately after Immortal’s release, and were blessed with the golden throat of one Will Ramos. The rest, as they say, is history. Since then, they’ve been on a majestic ascent that many bands would give everything for, and they rightfully deserve all the success in the world that they’ve achieved.
Darkest Era // Severence – One of the earliest albums I discovered via another writer here at AMG, Irish minstrels Darkest Era deserve far, far more love than they’re currently getting … and from what I’ve heard, they’re getting some well-deserved love lately from all the metalheads. Rightfully so. For, as good as their debut The Last Caress of Light was, Severence saw a major improvement in terms of musicianship and songwriting, seeing them surpass many of their inspirations by leaps and bounds.
I wish I had written …
Any of Cherd‘s Christmas posts, especially the Tarja Christmas album. Sometimes, you’re feeling the Spirit of Christmas4 and you want to spread joy. Sometimes, you just can’t stand the fucking holidays, and just want to laugh your ass off at some damn good (piss)takes on the commercialized, uber-capitalistic holidays, and our holiday cheer-spreader has spent the last few years making us hurt our ribcages from ugly-laughing so damn much to his reviews of Christmas albums, and Tarja’s over-the-top Christmas album was beyond ripe for the taking. I wish I had his propensity for pain humor.
I wish I could do over …
Grymm Comments: On Coming Out and Acceptance in the Metalverse… Again. – Don’t get this twisted; everything I said in my second coming-out piece still needed to be said and, sadly, nothing’s changed. But if you knew even half of the bullshit I endured once it was published, you would too lose all motivation to support the very music that has people in it that want to see you either removed from the scene, or outright dead. My desire to write pretty much died after this went live…
I wish more people had read …
Grymm Comments: On Coming Out and Acceptance in the Metalverse… Again. …but I’m not at all sorry I did it. Metal, for all its acceptance of its wayward misfits, miscreants, and outcasts, still has a colossal problem in terms of racism and homophobia, and it’s only gotten more emboldened over the last decade or so. It’s heartening to see pushback against it though and if that means someone else will pick up the baton, after I laid it down, to call out that bullshit, then all the better. None of the other major players have the fortitude to do so, but there are those who can and will.
Kronos
AMG and me
Look, I don’t write here anymore; I’ve left that to the more capable. But when I did, the reason for it all was that someone gave a fuck whether I was capable or not. When someone first commented to say, “Hey, this is some bad prose” on a Kronos review, that was when I decided that I was going to keep writing for AMG. For all our sins as a website, we did—and those currently writing here still do—care to make what you read here good, and care to connect you with art that is good. The commentariat’s demand for quality pushed me as a writer to produce both the best criticism and the most entertaining writing I could muster, even when I didn’t have much to say. But there came a point when I found I had too little to say to keep saying anything. Seeing the rest of the staff continue to dish thoughtful commentary even on thoughtless art, made bowing out easy. I’m proud to have been a piece of the project for so long.
I hope it keeps going another fifteen years. That way, when I’m a Steel-level fogie and Defeated Sanity are as neolithic as Metal Church, I can return and correct Generation Alpha’s horrible taste.
AMG gave to me …
Dodecahedron // Dodecahedron – If I had never heard Dodecahedron’s opening chords, I may have had a very different life than I do now. Knowing that those sounds exist completely reshaped my relationship with music, shifting my interest from the technical to the visceral. Never before had I felt my stomach turn from sound alone. If there’s any overarching theme in my music writing, it’s the failure to completely capture this sensation in words, to properly express the importance of art that sparks the neurons below the neck.
Melted Bodies // Enjoy Yourself – Well, don’t mind if I do. I thought this sounded OK from GardensTale‘s review and didn’t get around to it until I’d turned in my year-end list for 2020 (after all, I know best, so why bother listening to what these bozos tell me is good). Then I spent 2021 listening to Enjoy Yourself on a weekly basis. Melted Bodies’ sardonic seapunk-infused thrash proved the perfect artistic vehicle to deliver a treatise on hypernormalization and the misery, and seediness of American culture. Far from being just a metal record with a political bent, Enjoy Yourself is more directly a political document printed with a gaudy mix of guitars, synthesizer boops, and blast beats, in which every annoying, hokey lyrical delivery hisses out through a rot-toothed sneer.
billy woods // Hiding Places5 – While I was actively writing, I pretty much knew if I’d like a new metal record well before the review came out. The writers look out for each other, you know? And few were more persistent and reliable gauges of my interest than Kenstrosity, who somehow just knew I’d love this album. Hiding Places carries more than a whiff of the care and crypsis of a great art-house death metal record without being anything close to one. Muted instrumentals creak and twinkle around woods, whose tangled lyrics squint suspiciously at love and belonging, paranoid from decades of imperial violence. Gloomy but electric, woods delivers his piece with a mix of resignation and reprehension that hooks me in every time. It’s not metal, but it is really fucking angry.
Dr. Wvrm
AMG and me
I’ve asked myself what AMG means to me far too often over the last few years. As I’ve fallen out, in and back out of love with metal, with reviewing, and with arguing with “writers” about the finer points of comma usage. As I’ve watched better and more dedicated reviewers slip away to the far side of the hourglass, I’ve wondered what my useless ass is still doing here.
I don’t write; no time, no drive. I don’t read the articles, but then again, who does? I stay in touch with current releases (mostly because Kenneth or Dolphin Fucker or Eldritch shove things they know I’ll like in my face) but am no longer a voracious consumer and cataloguer. My fixations have moved on to other equally meaningless pursuits. Yet here I stay, despite the guilt of missed deadlines and the shame of another broken promise of regular reviews, doing just enough to avoid unceremonious defenestration from The Hall, because I love these people.
This site, those who read it, and particularly those who staff it, are the only people I have ever had in my life who see what I see in this awful music; who understand the ways this awful music can take on a life of its own, suffusing relationships and memories like little else can; who have connected with me and supported me and been so good to me, simply because of this awful, this god-awful music.
AMG, more than anything else, means community, and I consider myself lucky to have found a place at its table.
AMG gave to me …
Wilderun // Sleep at the Edge of the Earth6 – Sleep is (a) an entirely unoriginal selection, (b) the first 5.0/5.0 record to which this site introduced me, and (c) the only metal record my father has ever appreciated. This is a man who once made me turn off Billy Joel.7 After 20 years of musical repartee boiling down to me blasting Cryptopsy’s “Crown of Horns” for laughs, Wilderun managed to bridge our gap. It surely has to do with the literal Berklee grads orchestrating a symphonic masterpiece more than anything heavy about the record, but if I’ve learned anything in this life, it’s to shut up and take your win. The image of the two of us listening to “Hope and Shadow” while driving through the hills of Pennsylvania Dutch Country is vivid in the way those special moments always are, even years later. I’m sure if asked, he couldn’t recall that afternoon. The memory is fine just the same.
The Night Flight Orchestra // Amber Galactic – As Sleep was to my father, so was Amber Galactic to my mother. In many ways, I owe my metal worship to her; if not for a childhood raised on nothing but soft rock, I likely wouldn’t search out the ugliest music humanly possible. While she was never as repulsed by my musical predilections as my father,8 she was also not the audience for Slayer or Children of Bodom, just as I was not the audience for Shania Twain, Rod Stewart or Seal.9 Our tastes diverged for good in the year 2004, leaving little but tussles over the radio knob, and eventually everything else. Our fights were, and are, legendary among our friends and family, which was a badge of honor as an asshole teenager and is now a marker of shame as an asshole adult. I don’t remember how she got wise to Amber Galactic – maybe through me, accidentally. But for the first time in the long-time search for a ceasefire, she was as into “Gemini,” “Domino”, and “Josephine” as I was. It was a good time. That detente didn’t last long, of course, but as a wise man once said, “Shut up and take your win.”
Amorphis // Under the Red Cloud – Under the Red Cloud topped the very first Top Ten I put together, in 2015, still a pre-staff wannabe. Even then, I wanted to foist my awful opinions on the world, and in many ways, that was the first step to my eventual membership here. That isn’t why this review matters to me though. I had no idea who Amorphis was before AMG Himself‘s review of Under the Red Cloud. In the years since, I’ve been grateful for their constant companionship, in the summer sun and on lonely nights like the one on which I write this. I reached for them on a January morning, as the last throes of a Nor’easter snowed me into the maternity ward. I’m passing the hours between bottles by staring out at crystalline whorls as “Enigma” plays. It’s one of my very favorites, in their catalog, in all of music, and I can’t help but share it. I turn the volume down and pass the headphones from my ears to my son’s. It’s only for a moment, and who knows how well you can hear less than a day removed from in vitro, but it’s our moment. It’s this moment, all these moments, that I want to flash before my eyes when my bell finally tolls, and I hope someone turns the speaker up to 11 when they do.
Eldritch Elitist
AMG and me
I’m not sure if any of my colleagues know this, but I have done most of my writing in my nearly 8 year tenure at Angry Metal Guy on my cell phone. I submitted my application to AMG on May 24th, 2016; exactly two weeks later, my first and only child was born. He was a particularly clingy baby, so for months when I’d arrive home from work, he was essentially glued to my arm for hours on end. When Steel Druhm and Madam X graciously brought me on as a probationary writer, I begrudgingly adapted to writing on a stupid-ass, tiny-ass screen with my stupid-ass, big-ass thumbs. The process has been second nature to me ever since.
Let me be perfectly clear: If I was doing this for a shot at writing for any other blog, I would have bailed immediately. But I owed Angry Metal Guy for singlehandedly revitalizing my passion for metal, after my interest in the genre had waned over a half decade of post-high school life. No other outlet compared when it came to treating melodic metal with the same respect and professional level of writing quality afforded to so-called “trailblazers” in the scene. Having the kind of music that made me fall in love with the genre in the first place legitimized by such a talented crew was revelatory. I can only hope my contributions in this space have resonated similarly with others like me.
AMG gave to me …
Beaten to Death // Unplugged – I’m not a grindcore fan. The number of grindcore albums I’ve listened to in full likely ranks in the single digits. I also think that Beaten to Death’s Unplugged is one of the coolest, catchiest, and most compulsively listenable records of the last decade. Part of what makes Unplugged a special record for me is that—aside from its sheer kinetic brilliance—discovering this record through AMG is what made me want to write for this blog in the first place. Jean-Luc Ricard’s spot-on piece wisely zeroed in on this record’s decidedly un-grindy eccentricities, which was vital for enticing genre tourists like myself. Mirroring that review’s impact has been my mission with every positive review I’ve ever penned. For all the self-proclaimed power metal haters who thanked me in the comments for making them one-off converts to records like The Saberlight Chronicles: Thanks for the free dopamine!
Khemmis // Hunted – I used to be a casual appreciator of doom metal. That is, before Steel Druhm reviewed Khemmis’s 2016 opus Hunted, which more or less put me off the genre for good. Hunted is a perfect encapsulation of everything I enjoy in a doom metal record. So perfect, in fact, that everything I’ve heard in the realm of traditional doom metal since has failed to elicit a response stronger than “this is good, but I wish I was listening to Hunted.” This album excels through sheer simplicity and masterful melodic handling, filling any semblance of dead air in a genre where most compositions feel like a waste of space. The tragedy here is that Khemmis’ formula is so effective as to feel effortless in its construction, yet no other band has been able to match these heights, despite the formula for success sounding so obvious to my ears. Were it not for Steel Druhm’s rightfully glowing (if underscored) review, I might have never heard my favorite doom metal album at all.
Xoth // Invasion of the Tentacube – Much like Wilderun before them, I’m not sure Xoth’s recent underground success would have resulted in as strong of word-of-mouth had Angry Metal Guy not been hyping them up since their 2017 debut. Our staff’s collective enthusiasm for promoting unsigned gems like Invasion of the Tentacube is, at least in my eyes, unmatched in getting bands like Xoth the early attention they deserve. Sure, there are many examples of self-released albums that fit these qualifiers, but Invasion of the Tentacube might be my personal favorite. It’s also worth mentioning this record as a reminder for people to revisit Xoth’s early material. Though a bit unrefined (as Akerblogger pointed out in his otherwise glowing review), this album is every bit as entertaining as Xoth’s subsequent LPs, and a neat little time capsule that captures all of Xoth’s ambitions in a charmingly adolescent package.
I wish I had written …
Frostbite Orckings – The Orcish Eclipse Review. I maintain that it was a wise decision to retire the 0.0/5.0 score from our rating system, but for Frostbite Orckings, I should have lobbied to reinstate it for one last hurrah. Ideally, we wouldn’t have given this insulting crap the time of day to begin with10, but the only value this garbage could have had was as a warning example after I pilloried it to fucking death. AI art, whether visual or aural, is not art, and should have no place where real artists struggle to thrive. Oh, and Unleash the Archers can go to hell.
I wish I could do over …
Dunnock – Little Stories Told by Ghosts Review. Speaking of 0.0 scores… I was in a bad space mentally when I wrote this review, and I take full responsibility for giving Dunnock a platform as my personal punching bag. It didn’t feel good to write this, and it didn’t feel good to have people validating my scoring decision in the comments. If nothing else, writing this review changed my philosophy on writing negative reviews for the better. My tastes should have dictated that I had no business reviewing this record, which I’m sure has its fans. Somewhere. I still think it sucks.
I wish more people had read …
Tales of Gaia – Hypernova Review. While the comments section indicates many people read this review, I simply cannot allow this gem to be lost to time. Hypernova left me crying and borderline suffocating from laughter. I have amazing memories of subjecting friends to this record and watching them crumple into a state of helpless hysteria. Unless Tales of Gaia makes another record with the same singer11, you will never hear anything else like this in your life.
Saunders
AMG and me
Various circumstances have conspired to fuck with my 2024 so far, leaving me scrambling as whips are cracked to contribute to this momentous occasion. 15 goddamn years, hey? And going stronger than ever… I am forever grateful and humbled to be a long-term servant to this mighty blog since joining the team during the latter half of 2014. My fading memory cannot quite pinpoint the timeline when I stumbled onto the pages of Angry Metal Guy. However, I remember being struck by the positive and passionate community vibes, the quality, insightful writing, and the no-bullshit rating system. I rapidly became an avid reader and, when opportunity came knocking, I jumped aboard. It’s been an awesome journey to see the incredible growth and expansion over the years.
Initially, I struggled as I adapted to a tight operation and steep learning curve with my then awful formatting skills (surprised I didn’t get the axe right there). Yet it was the professional standards, the support networks, set processes and the ongoing inspiration of the outstanding writing talent adorning these pages over the years that has kept me on my toes, and pushed me to become a better, more rounded writer. I am grateful for the exceptional (occasionally intimidating) writing standards and creative flair that each writer brings, which keeps me honest and inspires me. Not to mention the ridiculous amount of great music I’ve been alerted to over the years.
Writing for AngryMetalGuy.com means the world to me and has been my rock since stumbling across these pages roughly a decade ago. Although I don’t write as much as I would like to, daily visits to the blog remain a steadfast routine. Also, the one-of-a-kind community kicks arse and my writing buddies and colleagues are an awesome bunch of people and an absolute pleasure to work alongside. Here’s to many more great years ahead.
AMG gave to me …
Soen // Tellurian – Just months after I joined the staff, Angry Metal Guy Himself reviewed the sophomore album from Swedish progressive metal band Soen. I had overlooked their debut, and it was the impassioned piece of fine critical writing and subsequent lofty rating that piqued my interest. Being a prog enthusiast and big Opeth and Tool fan (no, not one of those Tool fans), Soen’s emotive, melancholic, chunky, complex and infectious brand of prog metal touched my heart and gripped my soul. It wrapping up top honors on my first year-end list writing here in 2014. It began a love affair with Soen, especially through their golden stretch from Tellurian to 2019’s exemplary Lotus album. Furthermore, Tellurian opened my eyes more and more to the many wondrous bands operating in the modern progressive metal field. A decade later and Tellurian continues to resonate strongly and remains one of my treasured early discoveries on this blog.
Mutoid Man // War Moans – Mutoid Man’s 2017 album War Moans dropped at a challenging period in my life, where I was navigating a career change and plunging into the unknown. Shit got pretty hectic; thus, certain albums took on extra significance in my life. The much-missed Dr Fisting wrote a typically cool review of the zany supergroup’s sophomore album, inspiring me to dip into the crazy world of Mutoid Man and their ridiculously catchy, wild concoction of influences. War Moans quickly ascended to become a go-to album and modern favorite, igniting my rabid fandom of the band to this day. Mutoid Man transcend simple labels, skilfully meshing elements of metal, rock, prog, punk, math and hardcore into cohesive, speedy, rollicking jams. They possess massive crossover appeal, punching out A-grade tuneage with plenty of zip, technical skill, and a knack of cranking the fun factor, and embellishing their batshit, hyperactive formula with wickedly addictive earworm gems.
Bathory // Hammerheart – I am a big metal feature nerd and, though the reviewing game takes precedent, some of my favorite moments are the various feature pieces and passionate write-ups of classic albums. When the curmudgeonly Doc Grier wrote a Yer Metal Is Olde piece on Bathory’s 1990 album Hammerheart, my curiosity was sparked. Although I was a fan of Enslaved and had dabbled in Borknagar, Bathory’s much-adored Viking metal legacy was largely untouched in my historic metal explorations. Branching out of my comfort zone and exploring other styles and genres is an ongoing thrill as a metalhead. This piece triggered me to open my horizons and delve more fully into the battle-hardened, epic realms of Viking metal and associated styles. Hammerheart is a fucking epic monster of a classic opus, that opened further doors for me and broadened my appreciation of not only Viking metal, but certain overlooked black metal gems, including Bathory’s own early classics.
I wish I had written …
For shits and giggles, I could easily go to Dr Fisting‘s Indefensible Positions takedown of Slaughter of the Soul, just for the sheer ballsyness, despite disagreeing with the sentiment. In the end, Grymm‘s killer Yer Metal Is Olde write-up of Acid Bath’s underground classic When the Kite String Pops stands out. This album (and this band) is an all timer for me and Grymm did an outstanding job of conveying why this album is so special and unique. It’s a classic YMIO entry that I occasionally go back to read, giving me the warm nostalgic feels and reminding me why I fell in love with this album back in the day, and why it still holds a place in my heart.
I wish more people had read …
AMG Goes Ranking – Dying Fetus. The Dying Fetus Ranking piece was a special moment in my decade-long career writing on this blog. A long-time favorite and pivotal band in opening my ears to the wonders of the more brutal, slammy realms of death metal, this ranking feature was a proud moment. Despite the collective efforts of my comrades Maddog and Dolphin Whisperer, fewer than thirty comments at time of writing was a little disappointing for a band of Dying Fetus’ stature. I don’t know how many actual clicks it got but I was certainly expecting / hoping for more rabble, agreements, and fiery debates than what occurred.
#2024 #AcidBath #AMGGoesRanking #AMGTurns15 #Amorphis #Avantasia #Bathory #billyWoods #BlogPost #BlogPosts #ComingOut #Cormorant #DarkestEra #Dodecahedron #DyingFetus #GeoffTate #GrymmCommentsOn #LornaShore #MeltedBodies #Moonsorrow #MutoidMan #ReverendKristinMichaelHayter #Soen #StevenWilson #TarjaTurunen #TheNightFlightOrchestra #Wilderun
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AMG Turns 15: Senior VPs Speak
By Carcharodon
15 years ago, on May 19, 2009, Angry Metal Guy spoke. For the very first time as AMG. And he had opinions: Very Important Opinions™. The post attracted relatively little attention at the time, but times change and, over the decade and a half since then, AMG Industries has grown into the blog you know today. Now with a staff of around 25 overrating overwriters (and an entirely non-suspicious graveyard for writers on permanent, all-expenses-paid sabbaticals), we have written more than 9,100 posts, comprising over seven million words. Over the site’s lifetime, we’ve had more than 107 million visits and now achieve well over a million hits each and every month. Through this, we’ve built up a fantastic community of readers drawn from every corner of the globe, whom we have (mostly) loved getting to know in the more than 360,000 comments posted on the site.
We have done this under the careful (if sternly authoritarian) stewardship of our eponymous leader Angry Metal Guy and his iron enforcer, Steel Druhm, while adhering to strict editorial policies and principles. We have done this by simply offering honest (and occasionally brutal) takes, and without running a single advert or taking a single cent from anyone. Ever. Mistakes have undoubtedly been made and we may be a laughing stock in the eyes of music intellectuals, socialites and critics everywhere but we are incredibly proud of what AMG Industries represents. In fact, we believe it may be the best metal blog, with the best community of readers, on the internet.
Now join us as the people responsible for making AMG a reality reflect on what the site means to them and why they would willingly work for a blog that pays in the currency of deadlines, abuse, and hobo wine. Welcome to the 15th Birthdaynalia.
Thou Shalt Have No Other Blogs!
El Cuervo
AMG and me
When I reflect on what really matters at the end of each year, AMG.com always comes up trumps.1 Its benefits are many, its failings few, and I struggle to imagine my life had I never joined its crew a decade ago. Surprising though this may be to those familiar with my pride, AMG could be an unread blog and it wouldn’t matter. It represents a creative outlet, exercises my brain differently from my corporate career, rewards me with high-quality listening material, and even introduced some individuals that I now consider strong friends. Serving a not-for-profit organization operated by nerds for nerds, with a combined love for their esoteric interest grants me balance and perspective I would otherwise miss in my rigidly structured professional life. Even after thousands of hours of unpaid servitude, it energizes and excites me.
Sure, it satisfies my ego that Angry Metal Guy also attracts thousands of unique readers per article, and has sizable clout in the underground and mid-tier of heavy metal media. I love the bump bands experience following our praise, and even the incendiary comments when we criticize something popular. But these are just the cherry on the top of everything else it affords me. This site nourishes my soul; through creativity, community, and hubris.2
AMG gave to me …
Cormorant // Dwellings – In 2011, I was still relatively new to extreme metal but I already knew that Opeth was one of my favorite bands. A simple Opeth name-drop by AMG in his review was all it took to pique my interest. Shortly thereafter, Cormorant—especially their first two records, 2009’s Metzoa and this—became some of my favorite music too. So much so that a slice of the art from this second record is prominently tattooed on my body. Dwellings is an expansive, unpredictable treasure map of a record. It’s littered with dozens of obvious paths and landmarks, but also subtler trinkets you’ll miss until your tenth listen. There’s so much to admire here, from the burly riff and thunderous vocals opening “Junta,” to the wandering, shredding guitars narrating Kevin Rudd’s apology to Australia’s indigenous population (“The First Man”) and the beautifully delicate interludes on “Funambulist.” Dwellings is the earliest example of many albums introduced to me via AMG.com that have had a lasting impact on either my listening tastes or life generally.
Moonsorrow // Varjoina Kuljemme Kuolleiden Maassa – Although I’d already breached the realms of death metal prior to discovering AMG (via Opeth and In Flames, naturally), black metal had eluded me. It was a gap about which I was concerned, given my moves towards heavier music. Happily for me, the review of Moonsorrow’s sixth full-length blew that door wide open. Varjoina Kuljemme Kuolleiden Maassa is hardly entry-grade material, featuring a bleak atmosphere, alien vocals, and four main tracks each exceeding eleven minutes. But the grand melodies, sharp riffs, folksy slant, and EPIC song-writing scope offered the necessary bait for me. It basically ruined atmospheric and folksy metal for me from the outset; almost no other bands successfully write engrossing, long-form black metal like these guys, despite most of them trying. Listening to VKKM is less like hearing music and more like slowly wandering towards a freezing death in the Nordic wilderness. But in a good way! While the band has arguably produced other, stronger records—the mythological curiosity of Verisäkeet and monolithic Hävitetty are also exemplary—VKKM holds a special importance to me for opening up an entire genre.
Steven Wilson // Hand. Cannot. Erase. – At the age of 22/23, I would describe 2016 as the year that my childhood ended and adulthood began. I was preparing to enter employment at the end of my further education and went through a difficult break-up with a long-term partner. Although Hand. Cannot. Erase. released in 2015, I spent far more time with it the following year. Along with a few other artists outside my typical territory of prog and metal, it narrated that period for me. Progressive rock sits comfortably within my bailiwick3 but the mournful strains of pop found on the title track and “Perfect Life” are what stand H.C.E. apart from everything else. AMG‘s AotY summary was absolutely right in saying that “the emotional engagement that Wilson and co. are able to evoke in me is precisely what makes this album more than the sum of its parts.” It’s my emotional response to the music here that makes this record what it is. Even in the numerous ways my life has changed in the subsequent eight years, I find it a little difficult to return to this one. It’s a landmark album in my life.
I wish I had written …
Avantasia – The Wicked Symphony Review. This album represents not only the vehicle through which I discovered AMG but also one of my favorite albums from the 2010s. It’s the most raucous, overblown and catchy fusion of hard rock and symphonic metal I’ve heard. But my first listen also represented a turning point in my life. Pre-Wicked Symphony, so much of my listening was rooted in bands introduced to me by my dad. Post-Wicked Symphony, these roles were reversed and I now feed him new releases I think he’ll enjoy. I would have loved the contemporaneous opportunity to describe this phenomenon in relation to Avantasia.
I wish more people had read …
Geoff Tate – Kings and Thieves Review. The great Dr. Fisting is the most incisive, humorous writer to ever sit in our ranks, and his review of Kings and Thieves forms his best output. Framed as a letter, Fisting delivers a savage, but wholly reasonable, takedown of a problematic, wayward Mr Tate. The line “hearing you sing about getting laid is about as sexy as walking in on my parents” delighted me at the time and still delights me now. Read this.
Grymm
AMG and me
In all my years of listening to metal prior to writing about it, I was searching long and hard for anything that would come close to the magic that the late, great Metal Maniacs magazine brought to the world. Once I encountered Dr. Fisting‘s immortal(ly brutal) review of Kings and Thieves by ex-Queensryche vocalist Geoff Tate, I knew I had found it. Little did I know that I would call this place home for over a decade. To say this site is special to me, is to understate the impact it’s had on my life, my writing, and how I approach all music nowadays. The fact that I made a second family here among the staff and readers makes this all the sweeter. I don’t regret the time, energy, and tears spent here.
As I’ve said many times, onward…
AMG gave to me …
Reverend Kristin Michael Hayter // Saved! – The most recent and jarring album that I discovered since joining up here, the former Lingua Ignota took all the pain she experienced through abuse, and turned it into a religious, lo-fi cleansing, that was equal parts beautiful, stirring, and brutally uncomfortable. I often waver between experiencing this album to purge, and never wanting to touch it again because it’s that raw. When an album makes you feel those things, you know the artist(s) who crafted it did something right.
Lorna Shore // Pain Remains – I’ll admit, I’m not the biggest fan of deathcore out there, and it doesn’t help that I (unfairly, in hindsight) avoided New Jersey’s Lorna Shore due to the actions of their prior vocalist. What I didn’t know was that they gave said asshole the boot almost immediately after Immortal’s release, and were blessed with the golden throat of one Will Ramos. The rest, as they say, is history. Since then, they’ve been on a majestic ascent that many bands would give everything for, and they rightfully deserve all the success in the world that they’ve achieved.
Darkest Era // Severence – One of the earliest albums I discovered via another writer here at AMG, Irish minstrels Darkest Era deserve far, far more love than they’re currently getting … and from what I’ve heard, they’re getting some well-deserved love lately from all the metalheads. Rightfully so. For, as good as their debut The Last Caress of Light was, Severence saw a major improvement in terms of musicianship and songwriting, seeing them surpass many of their inspirations by leaps and bounds.
I wish I had written …
Any of Cherd‘s Christmas posts, especially the Tarja Christmas album. Sometimes, you’re feeling the Spirit of Christmas4 and you want to spread joy. Sometimes, you just can’t stand the fucking holidays, and just want to laugh your ass off at some damn good (piss)takes on the commercialized, uber-capitalistic holidays, and our holiday cheer-spreader has spent the last few years making us hurt our ribcages from ugly-laughing so damn much to his reviews of Christmas albums, and Tarja’s over-the-top Christmas album was beyond ripe for the taking. I wish I had his propensity for pain humor.
I wish I could do over …
Grymm Comments: On Coming Out and Acceptance in the Metalverse… Again. – Don’t get this twisted; everything I said in my second coming-out piece still needed to be said and, sadly, nothing’s changed. But if you knew even half of the bullshit I endured once it was published, you would too lose all motivation to support the very music that has people in it that want to see you either removed from the scene, or outright dead. My desire to write pretty much died after this went live…
I wish more people had read …
Grymm Comments: On Coming Out and Acceptance in the Metalverse… Again. …but I’m not at all sorry I did it. Metal, for all its acceptance of its wayward misfits, miscreants, and outcasts, still has a colossal problem in terms of racism and homophobia, and it’s only gotten more emboldened over the last decade or so. It’s heartening to see pushback against it though and if that means someone else will pick up the baton, after I laid it down, to call out that bullshit, then all the better. None of the other major players have the fortitude to do so, but there are those who can and will.
Kronos
AMG and me
Look, I don’t write here anymore; I’ve left that to the more capable. But when I did, the reason for it all was that someone gave a fuck whether I was capable or not. When someone first commented to say, “Hey, this is some bad prose” on a Kronos review, that was when I decided that I was going to keep writing for AMG. For all our sins as a website, we did—and those currently writing here still do—care to make what you read here good, and care to connect you with art that is good. The commentariat’s demand for quality pushed me as a writer to produce both the best criticism and the most entertaining writing I could muster, even when I didn’t have much to say. But there came a point when I found I had too little to say to keep saying anything. Seeing the rest of the staff continue to dish thoughtful commentary even on thoughtless art, made bowing out easy. I’m proud to have been a piece of the project for so long.
I hope it keeps going another fifteen years. That way, when I’m a Steel-level fogie and Defeated Sanity are as neolithic as Metal Church, I can return and correct Generation Alpha’s horrible taste.
AMG gave to me …
Dodecahedron // Dodecahedron – If I had never heard Dodecahedron’s opening chords, I may have had a very different life than I do now. Knowing that those sounds exist completely reshaped my relationship with music, shifting my interest from the technical to the visceral. Never before had I felt my stomach turn from sound alone. If there’s any overarching theme in my music writing, it’s the failure to completely capture this sensation in words, to properly express the importance of art that sparks the neurons below the neck.
Melted Bodies // Enjoy Yourself – Well, don’t mind if I do. I thought this sounded OK from GardensTale‘s review and didn’t get around to it until I’d turned in my year-end list for 2020 (after all, I know best, so why bother listening to what these bozos tell me is good). Then I spent 2021 listening to Enjoy Yourself on a weekly basis. Melted Bodies’ sardonic seapunk-infused thrash proved the perfect artistic vehicle to deliver a treatise on hypernormalization and the misery, and seediness of American culture. Far from being just a metal record with a political bent, Enjoy Yourself is more directly a political document printed with a gaudy mix of guitars, synthesizer boops, and blast beats, in which every annoying, hokey lyrical delivery hisses out through a rot-toothed sneer.
billy woods // Hiding Places5 – While I was actively writing, I pretty much knew if I’d like a new metal record well before the review came out. The writers look out for each other, you know? And few were more persistent and reliable gauges of my interest than Kenstrosity, who somehow just knew I’d love this album. Hiding Places carries more than a whiff of the care and crypsis of a great art-house death metal record without being anything close to one. Muted instrumentals creak and twinkle around woods, whose tangled lyrics squint suspiciously at love and belonging, paranoid from decades of imperial violence. Gloomy but electric, woods delivers his piece with a mix of resignation and reprehension that hooks me in every time. It’s not metal, but it is really fucking angry.
Dr. Wvrm
AMG and me
I’ve asked myself what AMG means to me far too often over the last few years. As I’ve fallen out, in and back out of love with metal, with reviewing, and with arguing with “writers” about the finer points of comma usage. As I’ve watched better and more dedicated reviewers slip away to the far side of the hourglass, I’ve wondered what my useless ass is still doing here.
I don’t write; no time, no drive. I don’t read the articles, but then again, who does? I stay in touch with current releases (mostly because Kenneth or Dolphin Fucker or Eldritch shove things they know I’ll like in my face) but am no longer a voracious consumer and cataloguer. My fixations have moved on to other equally meaningless pursuits. Yet here I stay, despite the guilt of missed deadlines and the shame of another broken promise of regular reviews, doing just enough to avoid unceremonious defenestration from The Hall, because I love these people.
This site, those who read it, and particularly those who staff it, are the only people I have ever had in my life who see what I see in this awful music; who understand the ways this awful music can take on a life of its own, suffusing relationships and memories like little else can; who have connected with me and supported me and been so good to me, simply because of this awful, this god-awful music.
AMG, more than anything else, means community, and I consider myself lucky to have found a place at its table.
AMG gave to me …
Wilderun // Sleep at the Edge of the Earth6 – Sleep is (a) an entirely unoriginal selection, (b) the first 5.0/5.0 record to which this site introduced me, and (c) the only metal record my father has ever appreciated. This is a man who once made me turn off Billy Joel.7 After 20 years of musical repartee boiling down to me blasting Cryptopsy’s “Crown of Horns” for laughs, Wilderun managed to bridge our gap. It surely has to do with the literal Berklee grads orchestrating a symphonic masterpiece more than anything heavy about the record, but if I’ve learned anything in this life, it’s to shut up and take your win. The image of the two of us listening to “Hope and Shadow” while driving through the hills of Pennsylvania Dutch Country is vivid in the way those special moments always are, even years later. I’m sure if asked, he couldn’t recall that afternoon. The memory is fine just the same.
The Night Flight Orchestra // Amber Galactic – As Sleep was to my father, so was Amber Galactic to my mother. In many ways, I owe my metal worship to her; if not for a childhood raised on nothing but soft rock, I likely wouldn’t search out the ugliest music humanly possible. While she was never as repulsed by my musical predilections as my father,8 she was also not the audience for Slayer or Children of Bodom, just as I was not the audience for Shania Twain, Rod Stewart or Seal.9 Our tastes diverged for good in the year 2004, leaving little but tussles over the radio knob, and eventually everything else. Our fights were, and are, legendary among our friends and family, which was a badge of honor as an asshole teenager and is now a marker of shame as an asshole adult. I don’t remember how she got wise to Amber Galactic – maybe through me, accidentally. But for the first time in the long-time search for a ceasefire, she was as into “Gemini,” “Domino”, and “Josephine” as I was. It was a good time. That detente didn’t last long, of course, but as a wise man once said, “Shut up and take your win.”
Amorphis // Under the Red Cloud – Under the Red Cloud topped the very first Top Ten I put together, in 2015, still a pre-staff wannabe. Even then, I wanted to foist my awful opinions on the world, and in many ways, that was the first step to my eventual membership here. That isn’t why this review matters to me though. I had no idea who Amorphis was before AMG Himself‘s review of Under the Red Cloud. In the years since, I’ve been grateful for their constant companionship, in the summer sun and on lonely nights like the one on which I write this. I reached for them on a January morning, as the last throes of a Nor’easter snowed me into the maternity ward. I’m passing the hours between bottles by staring out at crystalline whorls as “Enigma” plays. It’s one of my very favorites, in their catalog, in all of music, and I can’t help but share it. I turn the volume down and pass the headphones from my ears to my son’s. It’s only for a moment, and who knows how well you can hear less than a day removed from in vitro, but it’s our moment. It’s this moment, all these moments, that I want to flash before my eyes when my bell finally tolls, and I hope someone turns the speaker up to 11 when they do.
Eldritch Elitist
AMG and me
I’m not sure if any of my colleagues know this, but I have done most of my writing in my nearly 8 year tenure at Angry Metal Guy on my cell phone. I submitted my application to AMG on May 24th, 2016; exactly two weeks later, my first and only child was born. He was a particularly clingy baby, so for months when I’d arrive home from work, he was essentially glued to my arm for hours on end. When Steel Druhm and Madam X graciously brought me on as a probationary writer, I begrudgingly adapted to writing on a stupid-ass, tiny-ass screen with my stupid-ass, big-ass thumbs. The process has been second nature to me ever since.
Let me be perfectly clear: If I was doing this for a shot at writing for any other blog, I would have bailed immediately. But I owed Angry Metal Guy for singlehandedly revitalizing my passion for metal, after my interest in the genre had waned over a half decade of post-high school life. No other outlet compared when it came to treating melodic metal with the same respect and professional level of writing quality afforded to so-called “trailblazers” in the scene. Having the kind of music that made me fall in love with the genre in the first place legitimized by such a talented crew was revelatory. I can only hope my contributions in this space have resonated similarly with others like me.
AMG gave to me …
Beaten to Death // Unplugged – I’m not a grindcore fan. The number of grindcore albums I’ve listened to in full likely ranks in the single digits. I also think that Beaten to Death’s Unplugged is one of the coolest, catchiest, and most compulsively listenable records of the last decade. Part of what makes Unplugged a special record for me is that—aside from its sheer kinetic brilliance—discovering this record through AMG is what made me want to write for this blog in the first place. Jean-Luc Ricard’s spot-on piece wisely zeroed in on this record’s decidedly un-grindy eccentricities, which was vital for enticing genre tourists like myself. Mirroring that review’s impact has been my mission with every positive review I’ve ever penned. For all the self-proclaimed power metal haters who thanked me in the comments for making them one-off converts to records like The Saberlight Chronicles: Thanks for the free dopamine!
Khemmis // Hunted – I used to be a casual appreciator of doom metal. That is, before Steel Druhm reviewed Khemmis’s 2016 opus Hunted, which more or less put me off the genre for good. Hunted is a perfect encapsulation of everything I enjoy in a doom metal record. So perfect, in fact, that everything I’ve heard in the realm of traditional doom metal since has failed to elicit a response stronger than “this is good, but I wish I was listening to Hunted.” This album excels through sheer simplicity and masterful melodic handling, filling any semblance of dead air in a genre where most compositions feel like a waste of space. The tragedy here is that Khemmis’ formula is so effective as to feel effortless in its construction, yet no other band has been able to match these heights, despite the formula for success sounding so obvious to my ears. Were it not for Steel Druhm’s rightfully glowing (if underscored) review, I might have never heard my favorite doom metal album at all.
Xoth // Invasion of the Tentacube – Much like Wilderun before them, I’m not sure Xoth’s recent underground success would have resulted in as strong of word-of-mouth had Angry Metal Guy not been hyping them up since their 2017 debut. Our staff’s collective enthusiasm for promoting unsigned gems like Invasion of the Tentacube is, at least in my eyes, unmatched in getting bands like Xoth the early attention they deserve. Sure, there are many examples of self-released albums that fit these qualifiers, but Invasion of the Tentacube might be my personal favorite. It’s also worth mentioning this record as a reminder for people to revisit Xoth’s early material. Though a bit unrefined (as Akerblogger pointed out in his otherwise glowing review), this album is every bit as entertaining as Xoth’s subsequent LPs, and a neat little time capsule that captures all of Xoth’s ambitions in a charmingly adolescent package.
I wish I had written …
Frostbite Orckings – The Orcish Eclipse Review. I maintain that it was a wise decision to retire the 0.0/5.0 score from our rating system, but for Frostbite Orckings, I should have lobbied to reinstate it for one last hurrah. Ideally, we wouldn’t have given this insulting crap the time of day to begin with10, but the only value this garbage could have had was as a warning example after I pilloried it to fucking death. AI art, whether visual or aural, is not art, and should have no place where real artists struggle to thrive. Oh, and Unleash the Archers can go to hell.
I wish I could do over …
Dunnock – Little Stories Told by Ghosts Review. Speaking of 0.0 scores… I was in a bad space mentally when I wrote this review, and I take full responsibility for giving Dunnock a platform as my personal punching bag. It didn’t feel good to write this, and it didn’t feel good to have people validating my scoring decision in the comments. If nothing else, writing this review changed my philosophy on writing negative reviews for the better. My tastes should have dictated that I had no business reviewing this record, which I’m sure has its fans. Somewhere. I still think it sucks.
I wish more people had read …
Tales of Gaia – Hypernova Review. While the comments section indicates many people read this review, I simply cannot allow this gem to be lost to time. Hypernova left me crying and borderline suffocating from laughter. I have amazing memories of subjecting friends to this record and watching them crumple into a state of helpless hysteria. Unless Tales of Gaia makes another record with the same singer11, you will never hear anything else like this in your life.
Saunders
AMG and me
Various circumstances have conspired to fuck with my 2024 so far, leaving me scrambling as whips are cracked to contribute to this momentous occasion. 15 goddamn years, hey? And going stronger than ever… I am forever grateful and humbled to be a long-term servant to this mighty blog since joining the team during the latter half of 2014. My fading memory cannot quite pinpoint the timeline when I stumbled onto the pages of Angry Metal Guy. However, I remember being struck by the positive and passionate community vibes, the quality, insightful writing, and the no-bullshit rating system. I rapidly became an avid reader and, when opportunity came knocking, I jumped aboard. It’s been an awesome journey to see the incredible growth and expansion over the years.
Initially, I struggled as I adapted to a tight operation and steep learning curve with my then awful formatting skills (surprised I didn’t get the axe right there). Yet it was the professional standards, the support networks, set processes and the ongoing inspiration of the outstanding writing talent adorning these pages over the years that has kept me on my toes, and pushed me to become a better, more rounded writer. I am grateful for the exceptional (occasionally intimidating) writing standards and creative flair that each writer brings, which keeps me honest and inspires me. Not to mention the ridiculous amount of great music I’ve been alerted to over the years.
Writing for AngryMetalGuy.com means the world to me and has been my rock since stumbling across these pages roughly a decade ago. Although I don’t write as much as I would like to, daily visits to the blog remain a steadfast routine. Also, the one-of-a-kind community kicks arse and my writing buddies and colleagues are an awesome bunch of people and an absolute pleasure to work alongside. Here’s to many more great years ahead.
AMG gave to me …
Soen // Tellurian – Just months after I joined the staff, Angry Metal Guy Himself reviewed the sophomore album from Swedish progressive metal band Soen. I had overlooked their debut, and it was the impassioned piece of fine critical writing and subsequent lofty rating that piqued my interest. Being a prog enthusiast and big Opeth and Tool fan (no, not one of those Tool fans), Soen’s emotive, melancholic, chunky, complex and infectious brand of prog metal touched my heart and gripped my soul. It wrapping up top honors on my first year-end list writing here in 2014. It began a love affair with Soen, especially through their golden stretch from Tellurian to 2019’s exemplary Lotus album. Furthermore, Tellurian opened my eyes more and more to the many wondrous bands operating in the modern progressive metal field. A decade later and Tellurian continues to resonate strongly and remains one of my treasured early discoveries on this blog.
Mutoid Man // War Moans – Mutoid Man’s 2017 album War Moans dropped at a challenging period in my life, where I was navigating a career change and plunging into the unknown. Shit got pretty hectic; thus, certain albums took on extra significance in my life. The much-missed Dr Fisting wrote a typically cool review of the zany supergroup’s sophomore album, inspiring me to dip into the crazy world of Mutoid Man and their ridiculously catchy, wild concoction of influences. War Moans quickly ascended to become a go-to album and modern favorite, igniting my rabid fandom of the band to this day. Mutoid Man transcend simple labels, skilfully meshing elements of metal, rock, prog, punk, math and hardcore into cohesive, speedy, rollicking jams. They possess massive crossover appeal, punching out A-grade tuneage with plenty of zip, technical skill, and a knack of cranking the fun factor, and embellishing their batshit, hyperactive formula with wickedly addictive earworm gems.
Bathory // Hammerheart – I am a big metal feature nerd and, though the reviewing game takes precedent, some of my favorite moments are the various feature pieces and passionate write-ups of classic albums. When the curmudgeonly Doc Grier wrote a Yer Metal Is Olde piece on Bathory’s 1990 album Hammerheart, my curiosity was sparked. Although I was a fan of Enslaved and had dabbled in Borknagar, Bathory’s much-adored Viking metal legacy was largely untouched in my historic metal explorations. Branching out of my comfort zone and exploring other styles and genres is an ongoing thrill as a metalhead. This piece triggered me to open my horizons and delve more fully into the battle-hardened, epic realms of Viking metal and associated styles. Hammerheart is a fucking epic monster of a classic opus, that opened further doors for me and broadened my appreciation of not only Viking metal, but certain overlooked black metal gems, including Bathory’s own early classics.
I wish I had written …
For shits and giggles, I could easily go to Dr Fisting‘s Indefensible Positions takedown of Slaughter of the Soul, just for the sheer ballsyness, despite disagreeing with the sentiment. In the end, Grymm‘s killer Yer Metal Is Olde write-up of Acid Bath’s underground classic When the Kite String Pops stands out. This album (and this band) is an all timer for me and Grymm did an outstanding job of conveying why this album is so special and unique. It’s a classic YMIO entry that I occasionally go back to read, giving me the warm nostalgic feels and reminding me why I fell in love with this album back in the day, and why it still holds a place in my heart.
I wish more people had read …
AMG Goes Ranking – Dying Fetus. The Dying Fetus Ranking piece was a special moment in my decade-long career writing on this blog. A long-time favorite and pivotal band in opening my ears to the wonders of the more brutal, slammy realms of death metal, this ranking feature was a proud moment. Despite the collective efforts of my comrades Maddog and Dolphin Whisperer, fewer than thirty comments at time of writing was a little disappointing for a band of Dying Fetus’ stature. I don’t know how many actual clicks it got but I was certainly expecting / hoping for more rabble, agreements, and fiery debates than what occurred.
#2024 #AcidBath #AMGGoesRanking #AMGTurns15 #Amorphis #Avantasia #Bathory #billyWoods #BlogPost #BlogPosts #ComingOut #Cormorant #DarkestEra #Dodecahedron #DyingFetus #GeoffTate #GrymmCommentsOn #LornaShore #MeltedBodies #Moonsorrow #MutoidMan #ReverendKristinMichaelHayter #Soen #StevenWilson #TarjaTurunen #TheNightFlightOrchestra #Wilderun
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reversing my midi notes by having python in my modular synth. this creates, in effect, a mirrored keyboard, which is fun to play on
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Today's #linguistic excursion is brought to you by Asianometry's video on the 45nm lithography process: The chinese idiom
亂七八糟 (luànqībāzāo)
- literally: unrest, 7, 8, another kind of unrest
- translated as "everything in disorder", or with the english idiom "at sixes and sevens"The historic speakers of chinese and english had sort of the same idea here, but ended up with slightly different numbers!
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Today's #linguistic excursion is brought to you by Asianometry's video on the 45nm lithography process: The chinese idiom
亂七八糟 (luànqībāzāo)
- literally: unrest, 7, 8, another kind of unrest
- translated as "everything in disorder", or with the english idiom "at sixes and sevens"The historic speakers of chinese and english had sort of the same idea here, but ended up with slightly different numbers!
-
Today's #linguistic excursion is brought to you by Asianometry's video on the 45nm lithography process: The chinese idiom
亂七八糟 (luànqībāzāo)
- literally: unrest, 7, 8, another kind of unrest
- translated as "everything in disorder", or with the english idiom "at sixes and sevens"The historic speakers of chinese and english had sort of the same idea here, but ended up with slightly different numbers!
-
Today's #linguistic excursion is brought to you by Asianometry's video on the 45nm lithography process: The chinese idiom
亂七八糟 (luànqībāzāo)
- literally: unrest, 7, 8, another kind of unrest
- translated as "everything in disorder", or with the english idiom "at sixes and sevens"The historic speakers of chinese and english had sort of the same idea here, but ended up with slightly different numbers!
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Today's #linguistic excursion is brought to you by Asianometry's video on the 45nm lithography process: The chinese idiom
亂七八糟 (luànqībāzāo)
- literally: unrest, 7, 8, another kind of unrest
- translated as "everything in disorder", or with the english idiom "at sixes and sevens"The historic speakers of chinese and english had sort of the same idea here, but ended up with slightly different numbers!