Hey there my friends, and welcome to “April Fool’s Day” 2014;  So rather than get fake posts up about band reunions that didn’t happen or insane statements that were never said by certain musicians about certain topics I figured that I would take some real life observed absurdity and share it with you.   So what am I talking about here you might be wondering. Well, the other day I wandered into a neighborhood Best Buy as I had a couple of gift cards to use and there were some Metal releases that I wanted to add to my collection.  These days the media servicing that we get at the PiercingMetal Command HQ is primarily digital so getting a good old fashioned CD from folks is a thing of the past.  That being said I headed over to the “Rock” section because the store does not have a “Heavy Metal” section of its own and that surprises me a little since there are both “Rap” and “R&B” sections in the place. Sometimes the “Rap” sections even say “Hip Hop” but there’s no delineation on “Metal” section and yet they do have some Metal releases.  Many of the Metal issues are listed as being “Hard Rock” and here are some of my picks for these coupons.  Clearly Metal and no where near Hard Rock.  Case in point the latest from Immolation.  Brutalizing Death Metal for sure.

I’ve been enjoying tuning into the Hard Rock styling of Carcass ever since the serviced download came to my system.  It was too good to not lay that Gift Certificate coupon love upon it.  In reality this is a blend of Grindcore and Death Metal as opposed to Hard Rock.

In some sense the Volbeat stuff is on the Hard Rock fan or perhaps its better classified as “Rockabilly Metal”.  This bands overall popularity has amazed me.  I like them for sure, but am just stunned at their rapid rise.  I’ve seen them a few times already and am blown away by their reception in the fans eyes.  Kudos guys.

I think this one amused me the most as being cited as Hard Rock of the whole batch I was picking up today.  Perhaps more like being hit in the face with a hard rock but Behemoth’s “Satanist” is probably one of the most bone-crushing releases in recent memory and this Blackened Death Metal is not for the squeamish at all.  Behemoth is headlining the Metal Alliance Tour this year and its going to be monstrous for sure.

The devastation grade level of power on this most recent Amon Amarth CD was also amusing to see under Hard Rock because this hits you like the swing of strong Viking broadsword when it all comes down to it.  While looking like warrior Vikings on the stage they don’t play “Viking Metal” and instead strike hard with a dose of mythologically themed Death Metal.  Great in concert and solid on album.  I think you would enjoy them if you still need to.

Closing this little bit of fun I’ll add the most recent Black Sabbath live CD/DVD set “Gathered In Their Masses” which I guess by today’s standards could actually fall under Hard Rock even though they are the Godfathers Of Heavy Metal and its primary influence.  I missed the tour unfortunately so this would have to suffice for me.  For now at least.  There were plenty more of course but I only used the ones that I purchased for this fun.

There were a lot more with this same labeling premise but I was only picking up these select few today.  Now this post would not be effective if we didn’t include the links to the albums in this post so you readers are directed to them.  Now back to the normal presentations 🙂