Monotheist is their masterwork. Every metalhead should listen to it. Maturity, excellence, modern super heavy production, darkness and all CF history revived. Incredible album.
UGH! Great ranking and review as usual. Morbid Tales - 8/10 To Mega Therion - 10/10 Into The Pandemonium - 9.5/10 Cold Lake - 3/10 Vanity/Nemesis - 7/10 Monotheist - 9/10 On a side note, Get Wicked into Hip Hop Jugend is Celtic Frost's crowning achievement and the greatest song sequence in the history of music. I'll explain myself later.
Great video dude!!!,Morbid Tales was my first Celtic Frost record and one of the firt Lps that i bought, and it will remain as my favorite Celtic Frost album forever; now you can think on making a reviewing every Bathory album video,cheers!!!
I'm in complete agreement with you on this. I got into music by first listening to hair metal bands, Cinderella, Ratt, Dokken, etc. Then one day I listened to the Tragic Serenades EP and that blew out all of the glam out of my system and I got into Celtic Frost and heavier music. They are still in my top 5 favorite bands today and will always be. The first time that I managed to see them live was on the Cold Lake tour on Mar 26, 1989 at the Empire Rock Club in Philadelphia and wow, that was not great. On one hand, it was amazing to see Tom Warrior play live but on the other hand, I think all they did was Cold Lake songs. Maybe one or two from other releases. Thankfully I was able to see them in 2006 for the Monotheist tour and that was amazing.
Celtic Frost were one of those bands that took me awhile to get into (as I was already a fan of much more extreme metal by the time I heard them), but once they clicked, they quickly became a favorite of mine. 1. Monotheist - Easily a top 5 metal record for me. Everything about this record is haunting and oppressive and dreary, but it’s so perfectly put together. The production is immense and crushing, but still raw and real sounding. The variety in styles is astounding too, with the album floating between thrash, gothic, doom, black, and death without ever sounding disjointed. And lyrically (and aesthetically) the entire record is just abysmal- to me Monotheist embodies this sort of indescribable darkness. It’s not self-pitying (or even really something that I feel I can relate to on a human level), but more so it scratches the itch for a primal, subconscious type of darkness. Years ago Coverkillernation described it as the soundtrack to being buried alive or sealed in a mausoleum, and that’s always resonated with me. 2. To Mega Therion - pretty much copy/paste everything you said about the album. It took a bit for this album to fully connect with me, but it’s an almost monthly jam now. Circle of Tyrants and the other fast thrashy tracks are iconic, but slower, roomier songs like Dawn of Meggido or Necromantical Screams are the ones that really get me going. Great record! 3. Morbid Tales - Very fun record that has an almost punk flair and energy to it. I find myself singing the refrain Into the Crypt of Rays all the time lol. 4. Into the Pandemonium - this record is kind of messy, and Tom’s goth whiny vocals occasionally get on my nerves, but there’s still so many brilliant moments on this album and also I just respect the fuck out of the experimentation going on here. 5. Vanity/Nemesis - much better than people give it credit for, but still never my first pick when listening to Tom G Warrior music. 6. Cold Lake - never jammed more than the first two or three tracks on it. Can’t. Won’t. Lol Absolutely adore Triptykon too! Would love if they’d drop some fucking music though, as it’s been nearly a decade since Melana Chasmata
I've watched the Thralls of Metal's ranking of Celtic Frost. They had Monotheist at #1! Unfortunately, Celtic Frost did not stay together very long after Monotheist and disbanded in 2008 and Thomas Gabriel Fischer formed Triptykon shortly after, and sadly, Martin Eric Ain passed away in 2017 of a heart attack.
For Celtic Frost, I love To Mega Therion. I feel like it's one of the greatest early extreme metal releases ever made and that it's one of only a handful of records that would probably be a perfetc gateway into extreme metal for people who've never touched a black or death meetal record in their lives, because Tom G. Warrior's vocals are, while still a lil' harsh, very understandable and a perfect bridge to cross before getting into death growls/black metal shrieks IMHO.
Celtic Frost are just legendary when it comes to extreme metal. Tom G Warrior is a metal legend and has also proven this with Hellhammer and Triptykon. Here would be my rating for all these albums, and aside from Cold Lake they’re all great: Morbid Tales: 4.5/5 To Mega Therion: 5/5 Into the Pandemonium: 3.5/5 Cold Lake: 1/5 Vanity/Nemesis: 4/5 Monotheist: 4.5/5
bro thanks for reviewing their discography. I never got into them but I started on Cold Lake lmao! Monotheist is a monster of an album! that 14 min song is brutal! the drums on that are so hypnotic! it makes me want to destroy everything lmao
Killer video as always! Cool to hear that you like Pandemonium almost as much as I do, I really love that album (along with most of the CF discography). I also definitely agree Cold Lake is underrated! Not a masterpiece by any means but nowhere near as terrible as most people say it is. Just picked up a copy of the Danse Macabre box set too which I’m pretty stoked on! Thanks for all the quality content! Cheers 🤘🤘
I love celtic frost but I never really got the hype behind To Mega Therion. I actually love morbid tales more. My absolute favorite is Monotheist which kicks ass
"Kind of like how Ulver went from black metal to experimental synth-pop." "They couldn't decide if they wanted to play Venom or Poison, so they played both at the same time." Man, you can turn a phrase! lol. It's funny, I love every era of Ulver, but putting it that way makes it sound absolutely ridiculous and If I wasn't already obsessed with them, that would intrigue me enough to check it all out. I know most of it isn't metal at all, but I that that a video exploring their discography would be something I'd like to see from you.
Guess which Celtic Frost album I bought first back in 1989 when I only knew of their name and not much else about them? That's right: Cold Lake. I didn't hate it, partly not having any point of reference as to why it was a huge career misstep. Later I got Morbid Tales and then Into the Pandemonium and promptly had my mind blown. Especially by the latter. At that point I fully understand why Cold Lake was such a faceplant.
11:45 *Me having flashbacks of Thralls of Metal Jammin Jon putting cold Lake #2* But in all reality Celtic Frost are awesome Hip Hop Jugend and the Helter Skelter cover are the 2 greatest songs that Celtic Frosted Flakes ever made *Everyone punches me* but yeah Celtic Frost is fucking awesome, and one of the most influential extreme bands of all time S: Monotheist, Into the Pandemonium A: To Mega Therion B: Morbid Tales B-:Vanity/Nemesis CHERRRY ORCHARDS: Cold Lake
My faves are Into the Pandemonium for it's unapologetic weirdness and Monotheist. That last album is their most polished, mature, and heavy. I love it.
Well done dude! I just re-downloaded Emperor's Tales cuz it's been a while, and I've never given Vanity/Nemesis a fair shake, so I will. Whole-Heartedly agree though, Monotheist is INCREDIBLE. It's one of my favorite albums of ever.
Cold Lake aint THAT bad to be lumped alongside st anger and illud divinum in my opinion. They definitely should have separated that album from the Celtic Frost name though, the changeup was too jarring.
I was listening to their last album which was ok. I've always wanted to check out their music because I've seen them all the time, but never payed them any mind.. I really don't know where to begin. I'm always just into Technical Death Metal and Progressive Metal all of the time lol.
In my opinion, there is nothing significantly wrong with ‘Cold Lake’ other than the fact that it’s a CF album. If some unknown band had released the exact same album at the time, it might be much more highly regarded, maybe even be considered a classic today. Yes, the back cover is goofy as hell, but IMHO most of the music is unusual in a good way. Objectively speaking. This is coming from someone who loves old-school metal, but no longer struts around identifying as a “metalhead” at age 53 😄
Celtic Frost together with Voivod is my favourite metal band. I, strangely, think that their best album is "Vanity/Nemesis". CF doesn't have really bad album, but Cold Lake is the weaker.
I will come to Cold Lake's defense, if you don't look at how they're dressed and put that out of your mind the actual sound of the record is still much more Celtic Frost/Venom sounding then it is Crue/Poison, at many points it's more heavy and energetic than the record before it and still experimental. That opening riff to Cherry Orchards makes anything on To Mega Therion sound boring, easily one of the bands best songs, the female spoken passages also add to it. Seduce Me Tonight and Juices Like Wine are fun riffy songs and Tease Me and Dance Sleazy are good aggressive ones, Downtown Hanoi is a great groovy song and infinitely better than Procreation of the Zzzzzz. I'm not in love with every song but aren't on any of their other albums either, or most albums, there isn't a song on it that has anything particularly wrong with it, imo the album is hated because it's a heavier band going more mainstream and not because it's a good band going bad. BEST 1. Monotheist 2. Vanity/Nemesis (Not as experimental but just does everything better than Morbid Tales or below, except for David Bowie) 3. Cold Lake 4. Morbid Tales 5. Into the Pandemonium WORST 6. To Mega Therion (You only want The Usurper) The demos Prototype/Nemesis of Power are even more underrated than Cold Lake, some of the most unique and interesting music out there and all done really well I'd put them above any of the albums except maybe Vanity/Nemesis or Monotheist.
Good rankings. For me, Celtic Frost has always been a band I’ve respected more than I’ve enjoyed. They’ve put out material I enjoy, but far from one of my all time favorite bands. Though I still maintain that Cold Lake is underrated, or at least, overhated. I also feel that Into the Pandemonium is overrated. Morbid Tales: 7.5/10 To Mega Therion: 8/10 Into the Pandemonium: 3/10 Cold Lake: 6/10 Vanity/Nemesis: 5/10 Monotheist: 7/10
Celtic Frost may not have sold as many records as those other bands mentioned, but I would argue they're one of the very few metal bands to kind of break outside their genre, with some of those alternative bands citing them as an influence (Nirvana especially). Not sure how I would rank the albums but i think you got it about "right". I think I admire the audacity of Into the Pandemonium more than I actually like it -- not sure all the weird pseudo-classical touches really come off right and starting your album with a cover like that is just getting off on a weird foot. I do love "Mesmerised" and 'Sorrows of the Moon" though.
Cold Lake is actually kinda fascinating considering it is probably the first ever truly bad metal album. Or at the very least, the first time we've seen such a departure from a band's style into something that caused such a massive disappointment from fans.
I dig Celtic Frost’s music and all the bands they influenced, and the impact on metal in general- but I don’t like Tom G’s vocals at all. Agree To Mega Therion is their best.
I'll be honest, the only CF album I've listened to is Morbid Tales, it's fine for what it is, I hardly ever listened to any songs off it again (except for Procreation of the wicked, that one just has a sick groove to it). I may listen to the rest in the future.
