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I've been listening to power metal for years now, but I still haven't managed to find a blog or website or magazine that regularly posts/writes about power metal. Most metal sites and magazines focus more on other sub genres, with power metal news and reviews few and far between. Does anyone know of any place that is even somewhat committed to power metal? I'm getting tired of hearing about new releases or upcoming albums months after they drop.
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Encyclopedia Metallum for reviews, first and foremost. I use them as a starting point for looking for info on bands and albums.
They're pretty good but almost always there's one guy giving 100% to a band he loves and another guy giving 5% cause he hates them, not really unbiased.
Never said they were perfect, just that I went there first.
Basically I would look at u/mushmancat's comment history and listen to the songs he hates. Actually, I'm just kidding
Believe it or not, this subreddit is helpful. People actually occasionally dig up some band that's not popular and there's an occasional local band featured here.
Outside of that, the Wikipedia album releases page is handy. I do try to listen to all kinds of music, but most of my picks come from power metal
+1 for looking at what people on this sub like and post. I'd trust what most people here have to say on an album or song more than most reviewers.
And seriously, you might love something that u/mushmancat hates, but when he likes something, you should probably pay attention.
What he likes has been hit-or-miss with me, but that's perfectly fine. The world is full of opinions that are based on our life experiences. I do respect his sense of humor over our taking jabs about what he dislikes, though.
However, even if the Internet hates a band like Nickelback, I'll still try them out, even if it means I turn a little hipster for liking them out of irony. Just to be clear: they were overall good, but I don't feel compelled to listen to the album again.
I usually hit http://www.angrymetalguy.com for reviews. The tone is frank, and the power metal reviewers aren't quite so in love with power metal that they score everything with soaring vocals 80+. There's also usually genuinely interesting discussion in the comments.
Edit: http://www.angrymetalguy.com/tag/power-metal/ for a direct list.
This sub.
The Metal Observer, the site I write for, covers power metal quite a lot. I've done a few articles on there about Japanese power metal, as well as plenty of power metal reviews, both signed and underground bands.
Black Wind Metal writes on almost nothing but power metal albums. The only issue is that they're a little inconsistent with reviews, but I know the site's admin and all of their writers, and they're all dedicated guys.
Cool! I'll definitely check these out.
Follow the bands you like on facebook, you'll receive news from them on your news feed.
Actually, though, the place I've seen most news is on my update page on wikipedia, which shows when pages that I'm watching have been edited. Sometimes news about bands comes out and people inevitably edit the band page to reflect the news. I watch like 95% of power metal bands on wikipedia so I tend to see the news relatively quickly. But facebook is usually the earliest.
For reviews, I don't really know anywhere that great. Online is sketchy for individual reviews. Would be nice for a metacritic for metal albums to exist. Review aggregation is a very useful approach to ranking things. There isn't many online review websites with editing crews and typical publication approaches. I know this because that sort of approach is required for websites to be usable as references on wikipedia. No user-created content, etc.
I do like reading Metal Observer though, but I don't think it's allowed to be used as a reference on Wikipedia.
Following bands' social media accounts tends to be good for finding reviews and interviews as well, since they do tend to like the promotion.
First party sources are definitely good for positive reviews. Again though, having an aggregated set would be amazing. Someone do it, easy money.
www.metal-rules.com - They cover a wide variety of genres and I think most of their reviews are fair.
I was about to mention that site.
Yes. If you PM me, when I get home, I'll send you a great website that lists 99% of power metal releases as they come out. It's almost overwhelming.
Why not share with everyone?
inb4 meatspin