Spoiler: Here's what I thought
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===TIER: So I never thought I'd say this but apparently I really like Christmas music??
===TIER: Songs I affirmatively want to give points to
===TIER: Fighting over what's left
It's Blind Guardian, the self-proclaimed "bards of metal". If you've ever been a part of a d20 campaign and you haven't heard of these people, you have boring friends. This is an idiosyncratic band that knows exactly what they want to be and what they want their songs to be about, and they'll clue you in maybe never. But they sure do a lot of being exactly what they want to be and singing about exactly what they envision. My only real complaint about the band is that after listening to any given 20 minutes of them, some words that used to be cool ("doom" being one of them) kind of start to lose their meaning. Medieval high fantasy has ruined everything.
The song's pretty good. There are one or two bits in the beginning when the melodrama starts to get out of control, but it's almost certainly in the top half of the Song Contest metal I've witnessed. As it is, I think this only places well in the current contest if everyone else openly hates Christmas... which given this crowd is quite possible!
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===TIER: So I never thought I'd say this but apparently I really like Christmas music??
(12) POLAND -- Danny Gonzalez {I'm Gonna Kill Santa Claus}
-- So the autotune isn't clean, but... oh my god these lyrics are the absolute best. I can't not rate this top. I haven't felt this good listening to a song contest entry in a long time. Not only did I listen to this an extra time but I had to stop listening to things afterward because I was afraid I would be unduly prejudiced against them from this. Tim Allen what have you DONE. 5.2/6 and this is going to kill my sheeple score(10) SOVIET UNION -- Ёлка {Прованс}
-- Sassy groove is totally sassy. I feel like I might be overrating this song, but this song and video ooze class. This is the sort of material I join the Song Contest for. 5/6(8) DJIBOUTI -- August Burns Red {Winter Wilderness}
-- As someone who primarily listens to video game music, this feels better-than-familiar to me. I appreciate how smooth and varied it is, and I prefer the lack of lyrics anyway. It probably didn't need to be as long as it was. This is definitely top-tier rating material, although it's up against some tough competition this time. 4.7/6===TIER: Songs I affirmatively want to give points to
(7) GREENLAND -- L'Arc-en-Ciel {Hurry Xmas}
-- This was not what I was expecting when I clicked it, despite all the indications being there. One reasonably standard Christmas song in a contest everyone was afraid would be full of them? Cowards, the lot of you. Without the lyrics, this reminds me a lot of video game music - especially with that accordion sneaking around the back. This song is so smooth I could skate on it, although the vocalist starts overdoing it as it goes on. I think it's just cheesy enough that it doesn't get top marks from me, but again, in another contest this would score even more points than I'm giving this. 4.3/6(6) ICELAND -- Sufjan Stevens, Nico Muhly, Bryce Dessner & James McAlister {Jupiter}
-- I like how this feels; I'm a sucker for sky and space aesthetic. I don't really want to comment on what I think of it because this seems way better to shut your brain off to, and the distorted lyrics help with that. The super-autotuned bit in minute 4 was probably not necessary, and the rest of the song was not the better half. I can totally see this being excellent study music. Nice e-mail address :V 4.1/6(5) LIBYA -- Edison Glass {Let Go}
-- These are people who saw the "Everybody Have Fun Tonight" music video and thought "y'know, that's a great idea". The song is better than inoffensive; I appreciate the multiple textures and how it keeps mixing itself up. I don't feel a special attraction to it though. 4/6(4) SOLOMON ISLANDS -- Kaleidoscope {The Sky Children}
-- It feels like they had a melody and a poem, and they tried to make them fit together as well as they could. That's kind of a problem considering the melody has that big pitch jump that grabs your attention again and again (they ca~me to the VILlage) and they had to hunt around for a good way to throw it into every other line. With that said, this is pretty good background music. It probably didn't need to be eight minutes long but I think the band would disagree, and at least it has some variety in style. I might be overrating this. 3.6/6(3) USA -- Coletta {Blossom}
-- The 201 course isn't as good as the 101 was. I don't actually know what the yelling verses are supposed to do tbh. I liked it better on a second listen, as it's pretty smooth, but it might have gotten a better rating if it was just three minutes of the outro. 3.3/6===TIER: Fighting over what's left
(2) NORTH KOREA -- Blues Traveler {The Mountains Win Again}
-- Haaah someone ran a Mountainous Mafia with this name. Honestly I respect what it takes to make a song like this but I find it very nondescript. Admittedly, stuff like this was fairly common for me when I was growing up, so that might be influencing my thoughts. 2.85/6(1) CHAD -- Ed Schrader {Sermon}
-- ...This song has a place. It's someone's theme song. Hell if I know what else this can be (even after accounting for drugs). I'm kind of surprised I'm rating this as highly as I am. 2.6/6TURKEY -- The New Pornographers {The Jessica Numbers}
-- 2.2/6COSTA RICA -- Björk {The Gate}
-- Extremely fancy special effects; the video is more interesting than the music. 1.6/6GERMANY -- Blind Guardian {Doom}
-- As I said, I'm making it up to you all for last time. Not satanic, but definitely metal flavored with doom. Vi delivers! (eventually)It's Blind Guardian, the self-proclaimed "bards of metal". If you've ever been a part of a d20 campaign and you haven't heard of these people, you have boring friends. This is an idiosyncratic band that knows exactly what they want to be and what they want their songs to be about, and they'll clue you in maybe never. But they sure do a lot of being exactly what they want to be and singing about exactly what they envision. My only real complaint about the band is that after listening to any given 20 minutes of them, some words that used to be cool ("doom" being one of them) kind of start to lose their meaning. Medieval high fantasy has ruined everything.
The song's pretty good. There are one or two bits in the beginning when the melodrama starts to get out of control, but it's almost certainly in the top half of the Song Contest metal I've witnessed. As it is, I think this only places well in the current contest if everyone else openly hates Christmas... which given this crowd is quite possible!
