This afternoon, we continue making our own lives that much more difficult with the ongoing practice of ranking the songs that comprise some of the greatest albums of all time

The metal fiends at independent film production company FreqsTV were cool enough to ask our editor-in-chief, Albert Mudrian, to participate in a pretty damn wide-reaching documentary short (for just a seven-minute run-time)!

Even though Gruesome “pays homage to death metal’s most celebrated founding American acts, Death” (according to a press release), the band’s tastes in the genre don’t stop and end there.  That shouldn’t come as much of a surprise given that the group features members of Exhumed (Deci-fav Matt Harvey), Possessed, Malevolent Creation and Derketa.  So while Savage Land, the quartet’s debut, may sound very Schuldiner-esque, guitarist Dan Gonzalez was kind enough to tell us about some other death metal bands. 

Coffins is a long-time dB favorite and we’re happy to bring you four tracks from the new collection Perpetual Penance. 

You can always depend on Cradle of Filth to deliver controversial videos, and “Right Wing of the Garden Triptych” is no exception. Don’t watch this while your boss is in the room.

Clouds Collide is the brainchild of multi-instrumentalist Chris Pandolfo of Allentown Pennsylvania, and has been steadily showing tremendous promise when it comes to the soaring, epic “metalgaze” pioneered by Alcest and made popular by Deafheaven. The great thing about Clouds Collide is that Pandolfo has used those influences in a constructive way rather then simply imitate, a great example being the 2013 debut full-length Until the Wind Stops Blowing…, a heartfelt tribute to his late mother that was equal parts agony, reflected in the searing black metal passages, and wistfulness, heard in moments that dared to approach the majesty of Ride.

Despite what the band photo would lead you to believe, this is not a black metal remake of the “Addicted to Love” video (as awesome as that would be). Still, Total Negation deliver eight minutes of atmospheric black metal goodness here.

In his equal parts bewitching and harrowing memoir Punk Elegies: True Tales of Death Trip Kids, Wrongful Sex, and Trial by Angel Dust former Slash Magazine mainstay Allan MacDonell delivers a gorgeous, iconoclastic, wonderfully actualized, deliciously literary encapsulation of the 1970s Hollywood punk scene. 

To celebrate the book’s release MacDonell was kind enough to send this exclusive playlist along to Decibel…

No, this doesn’t sound like Prong. Sometimes the (labored) headlines just write themselves around here. Vancouver progressive quartet Neck of the Woods mean business. Operative word: mean.

I’m going to give my editors the benefit of the doubt here and assume they meant Verify Your Awesome Taste. I mean, come on, everybody knows there’s no such thing as a shitty King Diamond record. Some might be less memorable than others based on your personal criteria and/or schlock tolerance, but I’ll be goddamned if King has ever had a “St. Anger” moment in the span of his career.