Baroness – Blue Record

Over the last few years it has somehow become hip and cool to like metal bands again despite metal being and inherently uncool genre. Sure, there’s lots of shredding and Guitar Hero idolization associated with metal acts, but these bands still sing about dragons and mythical fantasy lands or wear tight leather pants and too much guyliner. Savannah, Georgia’s Baroness is not one of “those” metal bands. At its core, their latest album, Blue Record, is a sludge-metal masterpiece, but even more melodic and clear than anything the band has done before. It almost comes across as what metal would sound like if it was played by hardcore punks even though you couldn’t call it anything resembling metalcore. Yeah, there’s some Medieval sounding parts, galloping rhythms, harmonized guitar solos, and song titles that couldn’t come from any genre but metal. Really, though, I should just let the music speak for itself. With Blue Record Baroness has firmly planted themselves at the top of the metal mountain and (sorry Mastodon) released the best metal album of 2009, if not the best album period.