Record Reviews

In the fifth installment on our Heavy Meta series, metal journalists Jeff Wagner, Ula Gehret, Joseph Schafer, Daniel Lake and Adem Tepedelen return for another round of heavy metal record review questioning.

Napalm Death frontman Barney Greenway discusses the mechanics and ethics of a heavy metal record review.

You put so much of yourself into the record that of course you’re crushed when someone dismisses it. It’s the most human reaction. If you had a new baby you couldn’t fathom someone typing on Facebook that “Eh, it doesn’t really do anything interesting and that goo goo ga ga junk is derivative of other, much cuter babies.”

Music criticism, and the reviewing of musical pieces in general, is not obsolete. You’d be forgiven for thinking so, though.