AnataFan4Life's Top Ten Modern Tech-Death Albums of the Past Decade

[jd091]

Cosmo is good, but I enjoyed Omnivium much more personally.

[AnataFan4Life]

4. Anata - Under a Stone With No Inscription

Look who decided to come back! Anata, the merchants of a much more passionate and emotive variant of progressive/technical death metal, hit a real home run with this one. By stepping up their songwriting, technique, and sheer creativity, Anata have managed to put out this quality piece of work that is difficult, and I mean DIFFICULT, to put down (I know it is for me).

Right from the abstract artwork, you know this album is gonna be something special from the get-go. There's just so much to enjoy on this album. Fredrik and Andreas really take it to the next level on this album. This album is just a neverending flow of awesome riff after motherfucking awesome riff. They really manage to pull off some awesome sounding stuff on this album, whether it be the smattering of awesome riffs on "Shackled to Guilt", the finger tapping section of "Entropy Within" (I warn you: once you hear this part, you will be doing a SHIT TON of rewinding), the flowing, melodic soloing of "Sewerages of the Mind", or the jarring, chaotic beauty of "The Drowning", they manage to pull off something in each song that makes it unique, and it doesn't always necessarily have to be a solo. Speaking of which, there really aren't that many of them on this album. Only about half of the songs have a proper guitar solo, but you won't really care or even notice, because they are doing so many awesome things on their guitar, but no matter what crazy things they may be doing, you can always tell that they are passionate about what they do. A lot of tech-death albums can be viewed as pretentious and overindulgent guitarwise, but this is not one of them. Even down to Fredrik's vocals, you can feel they put their hearts into this music, which is a very admirable quality to have in a genre like tech-death. Conny Petterson, holy shit did he step up his game. I love the way his drumming sounds. Every fill, every blastbeat, every pedal kick, just sounds so fluid and smooth. This guy really goes insane on this album, possibly moreso here than any other Anata album, but he never goes overboard and always manages to stay in the context of the song. He really knows how to lace these songs together perfectly with his jarring yet flowing skills behind that kit of his.

Holy fucking shitballs, this one hell of an album right here folks. Whether you are a guitar guy who wants to hear awesome riffs, a drum guy who want to hear some crazy drumming, or you just want tech-death that's fucking ENJOYABLE to listen to, you'd be hard pressed not to find it here. This is truly an achievement for the genre.

FIGHTING THE ENEMIES WITHIN, FIGHTING THE ENTROPY WITHIN

Examples:
Shackled to Guilt
A Problem Yet to Be Solved
Entropy Within
Sewerages of the Mind
The Drowning
Any Kind of Magic or Miracle

[jd091]

And if The Conductor's Departure isn't in the top 3, you're crazy.

[AnataFan4Life]

Anyone wanna take a crack at the top 3?

[GarageMetal468]

Origin, Decrepit Birth, and I'm guessing another Anata album

[Rocco44]

The Conductor's Departure, Gorod, Psycroptic

[jd091]

Originally Posted by Rocco44

The Conductor's Departure, Gorod, Psycroptic

Ah, that's true! I forgot about Psycroptic. I don't know if they're top 3 material, though. Top 10, for sure.

[AnataFan4Life]

I'll go ahead and say this: none of them are Psycroptic. Good band, but they don't really stand out when compared to some of the other big names in tech-death.

[jd091]

Originally Posted by AnataFan4Life

I'll go ahead and say this: none of them are Psycroptic. Good band, but they don't really stand out when compared to some of the other big names in tech-death.

More Decapitated, maybe? And you didn't rule out Gorod, so I'd say them, too.

[NecroRob]

The Faceless? Gorguts? Atheist? Demilich?