BravePicks 2019 - The Scribes Speak!
Greg Pratt

Top 20 of 2019
1) No One Knows What The Dead Think – No One Knows What The Dead Think (Willowtip)
2) Noctambulist – Atmospheres Of Desolation (Blood Harvest)
3) Wolves Like Us – Brittle Bones (Pelagic)
4) Cave In – Final Transmission (Hydra Head)
5) Norma Jean – All Hail (Solid State)
6) Coffins – Beyond The Circular Demise (Relapse)
7) Exhumed – Horror (Relapse)
8) Nile – Vile Nilotic Rites (Nuclear Blast)
9) Misery Index – Rituals Of Power (Season of Mist)
10) Sempiternal Dusk – Cenotaph Of Defectuous Creation (Dark Descent)
11) Gatecreeper – Deserted (Relapse)
12) Tomb Mold – Planetary Clairvoyance (20 Buck Spin)
13) Theories – Vessel (Corpse Flower)
14) Toxic Holocaust – Primal Future: 2019 (E1)
15) Sacred Reich – Awakening (Metal Blade)
16) Full Of Hell – Weeping Choir (Relapse)
17) Victims – The Horse And Sparrow Theory (Relapse)
18) Mithridatic – Tetanos Mystique (Xenocorp Records)
19) Abythic – Conjuring The Obscure (Xtreem Music)
20) Memoriam – Requiem For Mankind (Nuclear Blast)

For top spins visit polskie kasyno online.

Top 5 Brave Embarrassments

ENTOMBED - Clandestine Live (Threeman)
Yeah, I think we’ve been here before.

SAINT VITUS - Saint Vitus (Season Of Mist)
Man, I sure wanted to like this one, and sure found it inhospitable to my emotional demands. Ice cold, with just no reason to want to go back to it, even if maybe I kept trying, I would come around.

TAU CROSS - Messengers Of Deception (Relapse)
To be fair to Relapse, the label pulled the plug before this one came out. Still deserves a spot here though, because, damn.

AS I LAY DYING - Shaped By Fire (Nuclear Blast)
Again: damn.

OKILLY DOKILLY - Howdilly Twodilly (Independent)
It’s not that I have no sense of humour, I swear. But this, the banjo metal videos on my Facebook feed, the death metal vocalists on talent television shows, I just can’t, none of it, I just can’t. Stop giving people reasons to not take us seriously.

Thoughts On 2019

I love the diversity of sounds in my top five: completely batshit bonkers grindcore from No One Knows What The Dead Think; Noctambulist's cave-dwelling extreme death metal; Wolves Like Us' post-hardcore experimentation; Cave In's metallic space-rock; Norma Jean's melodic and chaotic metalcore. That right there is the sign of a great year, and when the top 10 is rounded out with heavies from Coffins, Exhumed, Nile, Misery Index, and Sempiternal Dusk, man, that's a good year. Kinda sad to see KISS and Slayer announce their final shows, not that either band is at the height of their powers anymore, but, still, respect where respect is due.

What/Who Needs To Stop In 2020

Both the pizza-party crossover and too-serious long-song thrash revival scenes could stand to take it back a few notches. Bands thinking they’re being edgy by singing about edgy things like being a “keyboard warrior” or “SJW” or whatever should probably reconsider and stop making us all look bad. The novelty shit—see my Brave Embarrassments—needs to stop. Again, let’s focus on making good art to show the world, not silly playtime videos. We can still have a good time, I promise.

Metal Predictions For 2020

1) The return of Brave Words & Bloody Knuckles in print. C’mon, a guy can dream. I know everyone wants it…

2) Call me crazy, but something interesting might happen with post-metal, if bands get courageous enough to combine it with bonkers sludge or apocalyptic grind or something. Wishful thinking, maybe, but I saw hints and suggestions of what could be this year.

3) About that Mötley Crüe tour: we all collectively shrug, grumble a bit and go to the concerts and have a great time anyway.

Check out our BravePicks 2019 countdown where Entombed A.D. took the top spot here.

More scribes speak:
Mark Gromen