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[Album] Princess Xeroko's Top 5 Albums of All Time

In this post I will list and explain my 5 favorite albums of all time! Here we go...

V. Appetite for Destruction by Guns N' Roses
Guns N' Roses debut album is a definitive classic and in my opinion the one album on this list that I think appeals to everyone in some way. This album is home to many of GNR's most famous tracks, like Welcome to the Jungle and Sweet Child O' Mine as well as a whole set of songs that while not as famous are still loved and quite good. One of my favorite things about this album is just the whole sound of it, every song sounds like they had fun recording it, and it really shows in the style of the music. This is in my opinion the definitive hard rock album. Another great thing about this album is the pristine sound quality, it sounds flawless, which makes the experience all the more better. I mean let's be honest, horrible sound quality will bring down great albums *cough*Death Magnetic*cough*. This also a great album to listen to in the car, it's a load of fun to throw on and listen to the whole thing. My favorite tracks are probably Mr. Brownstone, Welcome to the Jungle, Sweet Child O' Mine and Paradise City.

IV. Project Chaos - OCRemix
I doubt you expected this to appear. For those who do not know, OCRemix is a wonderful sight where various musicians compose remixes/renditions of all sorts of video game music. Every so often a bunch of them get together and do a whole game's soundtrack. My favorite of theirs is the rendition of Sonic 3 & Knuckles' OST. This album covers just about every genre, there's straight up metal, jazz, piano, electronica and a whole mix of things, resulting in one of the most varied albums I've ever heard. They basically took the awesome OST of S3&K and maid it better. Considering that many of the tracks were maid with contributions from Michael Jackson himself (with some melodies and beats actually appearing in some of his later works) it's no surprise they already had some amazing music to work with. There's also a myriad of mood changes, from upbeat to solemn piano passages to fast paced metal tracks. Some of my favorites tracks are Beneath The Ashes, Walk on Water, Heat Blur, and The Doomsday. Honestly there isn't a bad song on this album, go listen to it while you read the rest of this blog.

III. Train of Thought - Dream Theater
Coming in third place is my personal favorite Dream Theater album as well as their heaviest. This albums is both defiant and self-reflective, and very tragic. Leading in from their previous album, As I Am is basically a song that says "I am who I am, whether you accept me or not", This Dying Soul is the second of a series of song's about the drummer's rise over alcoholism, Endless Sacriface seems to be a nod to Metallica's ballads and is about the hard life of touring with a band and how it can separate one from their family, Honor Thy Father is a big "Fuck you" to a seemingly terrible step-father, Vacant is a really solemn look at a child who's fallen terribly ill, Stream of Consciousness is a rather upbeat instrumental that shows off the band's impressive musicianship, and the closing track In The Name of God is about religious extremism. Needless to say this album covers a lot of heavy things, so know that this album shows a band pouring its heart and soul into their music, and is an album with real staying power. My favorite tracks are This Dying Soul and Stream of Consciousness.

II. Watershed - Opeth
This one will be brief as I reviewed it in my last blog post. Watershed is another album that covers many moods and subjects but at the same time it always bears a certain eerie and gloomy feel to it, making it a truly haunting record. In here you will find both advanced musical abilities as well as the best sounding record I've ever heard. Listening to this with good speakers or headphones will rock your world. This was a tough choice, but it comes out on top as my favorite Opeth album.

I. ...And Justice For All - Metallica
Here it is, my favorite album of all time, Metallica at their best. This album is both chilling and awe-inspiring, every track in this album is damn near perfect in my eyes. First we have Blackened, the wicked fast opener that tells of Earth after it is destroyed in a nuclear apocalypse, leaving nothing but blackened remains. Next is the title track, which tells of the injustice in society, as well as in some interpretations being about the late bassist of the band, Cliff Burton, who had died before the album came out. The third track, Eye of The Beholder, is about civil liberties being taken away, and while at first didn't like it eventually grew on my and is pretty catchy to. One is in my opinion the greatest song of all time and is probably the darkest song I'll ever hear. It is about a soldier who loses all his limbs and senses after stepping on a landmine and how he is forced to live inside his half dead body in a hospital as he's kept alive on life support, waiting to die. Needless to say this song is chilling, and the music video is downright scary. The machine gun part towards the end is definitely the most powerful moments on the whole album. The Shortest Straw is a really fast paced thrasher that retains the progressive feel of the rest of the album. Harvester of Sorrow is to me the weak point in the album, while it is a great song, I feel it doesn't stay well after many listens, but it still remains a solid track. The Frayed Ends of Sanity is a really underplayed song about a man losing his mind, it's got some really unique riffs in there. As for the last two tracks, the album takes a really personal turn. To Live is To Die is the most beautiful Metallica song and is a tribute to the late Cliff Burton, and it includes a poem written by him, read by the singer near the end of the song. The final track, Dyer's Eve is about the singer's relationship with his parents, which from what you hear, was not very good to put it lightly, this song is really sad and tragic and also the fastest track on the album. It also contains my favorite Metallica guitar solo. With all that, ...And Justice For All takes its place as my favorite album of all time.

Thanks for reading, stay tuned for more updates, until next time, Clocks and Maids~ <3

[Album] Opeth - Watershed

Watershed is Opeth's ninth album and was released in 2008, bringing another amazing progressive death metal album to the world. At first this album was hard to get into for me, but I soon learned that was just indicator of how deep and good the music was for me.

Like many albums I listen to I'd usually only listen to maybe two or three tracks regularly. As I gave Watershed many listens I soon learned how good listening to an entire album can be, a habit I make sure I continue as I get new music. Watershed was around the time I made the transition from listening to a select few tracks by artists to a wider view where I listened to entire albums as one piece, and from there I never looked back.

The first track, Coil, is a soft acoustic piece featuring Mikael Åkerfeldt's soothing vocals as well as Opeth first, female vocals. These vocals were provided by Nathalie Lorichs. The meaning I gathered from this song was about some kind of relationship between a couple who had gone their separate ways. Their vocals play over a soothing composition of acoustic guitars. The intro to the song reminded me of a riff from Metallica's "The Call of Ktulu". After the guitars fade out we hear an ominous build up in the background that leads into...

Heir Apparent, the second song on the album. Right from the dissonant opening chord you know this going to be a song that rocks you. Heir Apparent is easily the heaviest track on the record, by far. This song is a heavy nine minutes of pure death metal mixed with eerie sounding acoustic interludes, as well as some downright wicked guitar solos played over some of the heaviest riffs I've ever heard. The song builds up to a climax that fades off into a two minute or so outro that ends with a creepy ringing sound, bringing us to our next song.

The third track, The Lotus Eater, opens with soft humming from the singer, which then blows up into a fast paced metal song with back and forth clean and growling vocals. This was the first song I really liked on this album. What really drew me were the catchy riffs as well as the vocals. The song soon goes into a raging frenzy and then cuts off into a mellow acoustic and keyboard interlude. This slowly builds up into an amazing keyboard solo, easily my favorite part in the song. The song goes on a little more and fades out to different groups of people talking with each other.

Burden, the fourth track, is a emotional song that bears no growling vocals, only Åkerfeldt's touching voice as well as the inspired music played by the band. This song is just brimming with emotion, building up into the song's two minute or so outro, which contains one of my favorite acoustic pieces of music. It begins as a beautiful acoustic track that slowly sounds more and more dissonant as the song reaches its end, where the ending guitar sounds almost nothing like it did when the outro began. Burden is a stellar song that everyone can enjoy, regardless of if they like metal or not.

The fifth track, Porcelain Heart, is another song without death metal vocals, but with a much heavier sound than Burden. It begins with heavy drum fill that leads into the songs driving riff, a piece made from a set of both heavy and full sounding chords. The song then alternates between it's mellow verses and then heavy riffs that connect them, eventually reaching it's eerie outro that slowly fades out. It's probably my least favorite or second least favorite track on the album, but it is still a very good song.

Track six, Hessian Peel, is the song that took me the longest to get into, but ended up being one of my favorite tracks on the album. It begins as soft acoustic song driven by heavy drums that eventually builds up into a heavy metal song filled with some of my favorite riffs on the album. The song itself illustrates a slow fade in from soft to heavy in the span of eleven and a half minutes, and it is not a time wasted. Hessian Peel is the biggest track on the album and can take a little bit to get into if you're like me, but it definitely is one of Opeth's finest works.

The Albums final track, Hex Omega, is another track without death metal vocals, and serves as a very nice outro to the album. It alternates between soft verses and heavy interludes kinda like Porcelain Heart. It is also one of my lesser favorites on the album, but it is a nice song in and of itself. It ends with a nice organ and guitar ringing out, bringing Watershed to a close.

Easily the most unifying feature of the record is just how eerie it all sounds. This is a dark album and Opeth's wicked music brings this feeling to life, by combining guitars, keyboards, and a wide variety of vocals. Watershed is definitely a good record to listen to if you want to get into Opeth, it has something for everyone, touching acoustic tracks as well as pure heavy death metal. It is easily one of my favorite albums of all time, and I recommend it to all of you.

And with that my first real blog post is done! I hope you all enjoyed it, stay tuned for my next update, where I will review the game Wet for the Xbox 360. Clocks and Maids~ <3

Welcome!

This is Princess Xeroko's Maidly Blog where I, Princess Xeroko, will review all sorts of games, movies, and albums by various artists (though I admit it may be skewed towards more metal artists). Anyway I hope everyone enjoys this. This will all be done with my Maidly touch of course. I also may be to doing a podcast called "Maidcast" which will be presented here if/when I start it. Clocks and Maids~ <3