A Metal Hurricane, Vol. 1 (A compilation of some of my favorite songs)

Genre: See each song description... Mostly Hard Rock/Heavy Metal though.
Run-Time: 01:13:53.
About: Ever wondered what my favorite songs are? No? Well **** you! Here they are anyway, well some of them. Consider it a taste of my taste in music. I'm quite open minded (and you should be too! :D) so it varies between genres. So... the title of the compilation is a bit misleading, but oh well. I'll write a little shpiel about each one too. And I hope you like my amazing MS paint talent, I spent at least 5 minutes on that.

1. Lunar Aurora - Black Aureole. I hesitated to put a raw black metal as track one because it will probably tun away the 1 person that was semi-interested in downloading this. But in my view this is just the most perfect song I have ever heard. Great keyboard intro accompanied by an equal length ambient outro, and the pacing of the song just seems perfect. The ambient interludes come at a time that feels appropriate for the song, and then my favorite part is at about 1:45 where the drum fades in and intensifies and then the song explodes with that epic melodic black riff. And in case you don't know, Aureole simply means a ring, like if there is hazy and you see a ring of light around the sun... or a ring of light around a buddha's head... but in this case it is of course Black, not yellow.

2. Mr. Big - Shine. My favorite ballad of all time (Kicks "To Be With You"'s @ss, btw), and a good juxtaposition to the previous song. It's just so beautiful and light while at the same time still feeling like a hard rock song. Richie Kotzen's songwriting really shines (hah, unintentional pun).

3. Mägo de Oz - La Voz Dormida. To this date, still my favorite Power Metal song. From the get-go, your face is melted off with Heavy and intense Power, and it just does not let up for 10 minutes. The main melody/chorus is just so awesome, and the duet with that chick from Nexx (massively underrated Spanish melodic rock band, check them out here). And of course, I cannot put into words the epic four minute solo. YES FOUR MINUTES.

4. Saint Deamon - Pandeamonium. Time for another ballad. If you don't know, I am a sucker for ballads, and I have been collecting them in a playlist for a potential future compilation on here. Anyway, this is a unique song in that it a driving hard-rock type beat. But it has the long held guitar chords like a ballad. Then, the song skips a beat and you are thrown into this melodic chorus with powerful lyrics. I have high regard for this vocalist too, he has a nice grit to his voice, but he can hit the high notes with the best of them.

5. Big L - Married To Marijuana. This isn't even a song from an album, it's a mix created posthumously by a DJ (information here), with passages by the rapper and new beats/music.
I just had to put this in here, because he is one of the greatest rappers that ever lived and he is so underrated. But what makes it unique and what really grabs me is the background music. There is this aggressive angry rapping in the foreground, but in the background is an acoustic guitar, then for the other part there is an indian-sounding melody. Eh... if you don't like it just delete it, but I love it so it's here.

6. Rhapsody of Fire - Power Of The Dragonflame. Well, this is my favorite album from them because it is so agressive. While at the same time each song has a nice melody at the chorus, even if the verses are just screaming or gritty vocals (which Fabio Lione does quite well, actually). Then there is this chorus. Epic epicness of epic proportions. It makes me want to get on a horse with a sword and slice through a field full of monsters. Or go on a Viking ship and get drunk then set a town on fire. Or... well you get the idea.

7. Angra - Paradise. I don't know what is wrong with people, because Fireworks (1998) is their least popular album on last.fm. But if you have two functioning ears on your head, you will hear that every song on this album is a gem. There is just this happy yet somewhat melancholic atmosphere created with the songs on this album. It makes me reflect to "the good old days" and be happy I had them but sad because I miss them. Every song on this album is so solid in fact, that I am still typing just to stall for time because I cannot pick a favorite. You got the Cheese Metal songs like Wings of Reality and Metal Icarus, the more Progressive songs like Fireworks and Speed, then a Pop-like Rainy Nights, and the intense Paradise. Yes, I'll pick that last one, it really captures the atmosphere I feel this album has and the feelings it brings out of me.

8. Rapture - The Past Nightmares. Hell, why not roll with that feeling, since I am building this album from scratch and I am having a lot of difficulty widdling down all the songs I like to an album-length... the melancholic feeling that I love because it makes me think. This song is about witnessing a murder and fighting with the emotions that caused in the daytime and the nightmares keeping you awake at night. This song is just amazing, doom metal but there's a rather fast beat, and then no beat perhaps to simulate the mental torment. The lyrics are equally cryptic yet make just enough sense to make you think... And simply the best death vocals I have ever heard in any song, from about 2:30-3:00.

9. Tarja Turunen - The Reign. This is a really dark and sad yet beautiful song and gives me emotions that I can't even describe. So I won't.

10. HeimatAerde - Dark Dance (Medievalfloor). Another band I just had to put in because I like them so much. Another band it was really hard to pick just one song from. Another dark-themed song (obviously), starts with a midieval melody, and then breaks into music you might here at a German Rave and this music always just makes me want to do the robot.

11. Summoning - South Away. Summoning is quite simply the most epic band you will ever hear. I dare you to find me a more epic band (because I'd really like to hear it too). Again, really difficult to pick just one song, but my favorite albums come from the middle of their career (which you can get here). Earlier albums are a bit too rough and unstructured, later albums they are obviously completely full of themselves, releasing million dollar songs with full orchestras and 10 minute intros and not bothering to even keep fans updated on the new album they haven't been working on for the past 5 years... eh. Seriously, I don't get it. Some new artists can put out an album every year, even two in one year (as this band did in 1995), and be consistently good. But then once they get some money under their belt, they just do not give a crap. Play 5 stadium shows a year, same setlists every year, work on an album when they feel like it and don't care enough to put their heart in it... /rant. So I picked this song because it's so epic yet raw and agressive, and best suicide vocals I've heard, in this chorus. Very close second - "Where Hope And Daylight Die" from Stronghold, with the haunting female vocals by the Die Verbannten Kinder Evas singer.

12. Place Vendome - Follow Me. Time for happy music! Had to include something from my favorite clean singer (no screaming or gritty vocals... in fact in a 25 year career he hasn't once). This is a melodic rock band, this song is actually pretty hard, which I like. And of course, the vocals are just godly. The cover of this album really symbolizes the music well (An eagle in the foreground flying away from burning grecian syle pillars on the edge of a lake).

13. Herra Ylppö & Ihmiset - Sata Vuotta. This is an interesting one. When you take a step back and look at it, it's fairly straightforward melodic/hard rock. But it's just done so dam* well. The singer is clean here, but he can really growl if he wants (and does on other tracks in this album). The vocals just float over the melodies of the music, there's a driving beat, and it's just plain uplifting. Unfortunately, this album was somewhat of a one-off collaboration, but I do hope they get back together soon.

14. Dexter Freebish - Ghosts (2009 re-record). This is my favorite alt rock band, I first found out about them from Tiger Woods 2004, with this song. It's a really nice driving rock song with inspirational lyrics.

15. Freedom Call - Freedom Call. Figured I'd end this off with a classic. From their 2001 album "Crystal Empire", this band has been a big influence in the genre of Power Metal. Definitely a big influence on me as well, as whenever I need a smile on my face I just listen to this Happy Cheese Metal. I randomly found them... probably about 2001, with some songs on Limewire (back when that was "the thing" to do) that were mistagged as Rhapsody. Asked on a forum and discovered Freedom Call.

Well, I can only hope that if you read this far, or even just skipped it all to see the bottom line, that you can find a song you like that you never would have tried otherwise. Or you can leave now and keep being close minded. I definitely had fun making this as I have not heard some of these songs in a long time, and I love them so much. Even if no one downloads this, I have a nice playlist now and I will very likely have more of these in the future. Completely coincidentally (well I was aiming for it but I didn't think I'd get so close), this came out to almost exactly on the 74 minute mark, the standard for CDs. So you could burn it on a CD if you like. Cheers!

Mediafire Download - part 1
Mediafire Download - part 2

Oh man, this guy is grim. He would love my album.