Hey guys, surprisingly enough, I haven't died. I figured I'd give you a bit of an update of what I've been doing the past month or so that I haven't updated Sarcasmatron before charging right back into finishing up the Top 10. Basically, all I've been doing is laying in bed and puking my guts out. I'm not 100% sure what I got but it was basically the flu. Although I never had a fever or anything like that, I pretty much alternated between puking and having dizzying headaches and that was enough to lay me out for a good couple weeks. I didn't go to work (though I tried a few times and would start throwing up within an hour or two) and I didn't have the strength to do anything but lay in bed. And believe me, when you don't have the strength to freakin' sit in front of a computer and update a blog, you know it's bad. I tend to avoid care due to my lack of insurance and my general distrust of doctors, especially since I usually only get sick for a day or two at a time. But after a few weeks, I finally had to suck it up and get some blood work done at the ghetto cheap-ass clinic near my apartment that deals primarily with methadone addiction. The blood work didn't show much, basically that I had an infection but nothing serious enough to go to the hospital, or even require medicine. There was a little red flag raised at the Billirubin levels in my liver but if there was anything wrong with my liver, there would have been 5 or 6 other things that would've come up. So basically I just had to wait it out. And once I finally started feeling good enough to go to work and do things again, we got totally butt-blasted with snow last week. We were supposed to get a blizzard and people were already calling it Snowpocalypse 2011 but while we got a shit-ton of snow, I was a bit disappointed. Nevertheless, it was still enough for me to seclude my paranoid-driving self and stay in bed.
It sucks because for the past month or so, I've literally done nothing but lay in bed and watch movies. Save for watching the Royal Rumble a couple weeks ago with a friend (which ended up being pretty awesome BTW), I haven't seen my friends in all this time. I've been meaning to join up in some of their gaming sessions again but I'm still pretty disinterested and all this laying in bed doing nothing somehow hasn't given me any good character ideas. Except for the times I've gone to work, it feels like I've been cut off from civilization. Hell, I didn't even go to work today, not because I'm not feeling good but because business has been really slow and despite me being out for the past few weeks and getting backed up on some work, there's really no reason for me to be there right now. So I'm going to be scraping by in the money department, which will in turn cause me to stay secluded in my apartment even more. I haven't even played any video games since I don't want to be a dick and take my roommates' XBox 360 into my room. I've been meaning to do another playthrough of Fable III since I went straight through the story the first time and did little to no side missions. And I'm still not all that far into Fallout New Vegas either.
So instead, I've been watching a ton of movies. I thought about doing a Random Movie Roundup but with all the stuff I've watched over the course of this past month, but there's so much that I'm not even going to bother. First off, I went through Netflix and started watching a ton of TV shows, finishing off all the available episodes of Mythbusters I haven't seen yet. I moved onto American Pickers but I couldn't watch a whole season of two guys driving through the Midwest in a van going through piles of old people's crap without feeling wholly depressed about the situation. So then I watched the Robocop trilogy, which then resulted in me going into an 80's movie kick with stuff like Escape From New York, The Running Man and Howard The Duck. Then that turned into 80's wrestling where I watched a bunch of Hulk Hogan and Macho Man Randy Savage matches. Then I got tired of watching movies so I listened to a bunch of commentaries. That way, I could lay in bed and just listen instead of wearing myself out with the act of actually having my eyes open and paying attention to plot. And that brings me up to the current point, where I just finished going through Seasons 1-3 of The Venture Bros. backwards (meaning from Season 3 down to 1) with commentary, which then urged me to find and watch Season 4.5 that I missed at the end of last year. The whole thing reminded me that The Venture Bros. is indeed the best show on television today. Sorry, It's Always Sunny In Philadelphia. Though I will say that Always Sunny is the best live-action show with Community running a close second. Beyond that, I still don't watch much TV so I can't really comment on anything else
Anyway, enough with my rambling, it's time to finish up this Top 10. Forgive me if the remaining list seems a bit rushed. Honestly, I just want to get this done. Who the hell does Best of 2010 articles in February? And since I still have to go through my list of movies, it could be going on into March at this rate.
#5) Ov Hell - The Underground Regime
Though I have much love for the genre of Black Metal, there are so many bands out there that I don't get a chance to listen to. So while I might not be true or "kvlt" enough for some people (the fact that I put both Dimmu Borgir and Cradle of Filth's newest albums on this list is possibly blasphemous enough), it goes without saying that The Underground Regime is the "truest" Black Metal album I've listened to this year. Sure, I missed out on recent releases from 1349 (one of my personal faves), Nachmystium and Watain (who I've heard tons of good things about), you can't really go wrong with a Black Metal supergroup containing the likes of Dimmu Borgir's Shagrath, King ov Hell (formerly ov Gorgoroth) and Frost (famed drummer for Satyricon and 1349). Some purists might balk at the inclusion of Shagrath, and I will admit that his over-produced "robot" voice doesn't quite belong at times, but you can't deny that this is great old school Black Metal. Not ground-breaking but definitely worth a listen.
#4) Bleeding Through - Bleeding Through
After a brutal split with their record label and some member replacements, I have to say that I expected a lot from Bleeding Through's new album, hoping they'd change such negatives into a brutally positive album. And in some ways, the self-titled album is a new beginning for the band. With a slightly heavier sound, the band has drifted away from the broken-relationship-and-heartache lyrical content that they made their mark with. Though it's nice that they're changing pace, I can't help but feel that the change has kinda stripped away the soul and emotion that made their previous albums resonate with me. There's some good heavy songs on this new album, but I'm a bit disappointed that it didn't connect with me so much.
#3) The Sword - Warp Riders
I must admit, I haven't really listened to this album as much as I would've liked. On the surface, The Sword aren't really one of my favorite bands and thus I don't automatically go to them first whenever I want to listen to something new and fresh. But I can't deny these guys' chops and their ability to write a catchy groove. I said it before when I originally got this album but this really is the best description I can think of: listening to The Sword is like playing D&D with Lynyrd Skynyrd. And after just now finding their video for Tres Brujas, I must say that it's one of the more epic metal videos I've seen since probably Mastodon's "Divinations" last year. Anime-styled swordfights with skinny armed music geeks vs a guitar shredding caveman, I'd say that's a pretty even match.
#2) HIM - Screamworks: Love In Theory And Practice Chapters 1-13
After experimenting with Sabbath-esque doom and sludge with "Venus Doom", I didn't really feel like that particular album had as much staying power as its predecessors. To me, HIM's brand of "love metal" works best when it leans towards the pop side of the spectrum. So imagine my giddiness and glee when they released a press statement saying their new album would lean more towards an '80s style new wave sound. And though it's not very heavy, it works rather well and has its moments. So far, it's the HIM album I've listened to more regularly since "Razorblade Romance", which is the most glowing compliment I can think of. Oh, and writing this just reminded me that the band released a remix album that I really need to get my hands on soon.
#1) Dillinger Escape Plan - Option Paralysis
DEP's latest magnum opus has plenty in common with my #1 pick last year, Mastodon's "Crack The Skye". First of all, both albums came out early in the year, meaning that anything that came out afterwards had to somehow top this. And though I'm sure somewhere out there are a ton of great albums that I haven't listened to, nothing I've heard was able to top Option Paralysis. And to me, much like Mastodon did last year, the album is so good that I don't even know if DEP can even top it themselves. Option Paralysis is the culmination of the band's entire career, incorporating the insanity of "Calculating Infinity" that made them post-hardcore legends to some of the more poppier songs from "Miss Machine" and "Ire Works" and making them gel into one cohesive unit. To me, this is the Dillinger Escape Plan at their peak, but I'm willing to see what they'll come up with next.
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Very nice read, dude. Glad to see you updating again. Good stuff.
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