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Mixing metal genres can be tricky alchemy. Each listener brings multiple sets of preferences, prejudices, and expectations to the table. For example: While death-doom or blackened crust are chocolate-and-peanut-butter delights to these ears, the blending of black metal with shoegaze or post-rock hits me like toothpaste and orange juice.

Check out our selection of the best rock albums from the 1980s!

In New Jersey, where I’m from, Bruce Springsteen is considered to be the musical voice of the state, the songwriter who captures its working-class grit. “The Boss,” some people call him. Twenty-four years in Jersey and I never got one paycheck from this guy, so I say funk dat. Especially when Lodi, NJ, birthed not just New Jersey’s but, in my sincere opinion, America’s greatest songwriter: Glenn Danzig.

If you look back with fondness at the symphonic black metal that rose to prominence in the mid to late ‘90s-—and I certainly do, as this stuff was my personal gateway to the genre as a whole—Hulder’s second LP Verses in Oath captures this era with such precision that it evokes hyper-specific sense memories: Necropolis Records sampler CDs, Red Stream mail order catalogs, Century Media Black’s Firestarter compilation with the wooden match in the spine of the jewel case.

February might be the shortest month but it definitely has not been in short supply of sick metal releases throughout the years.

"Rhymes Records in New Haven was my first real record store. It was located on the second story above an art-house, independent movie theater, the York Square Cinema , and below a vintage clothing store. It was small. Crammed with new and used vinyl, walls of cassettes, zines from all over the world, and, later, a few cds. I was only about 13 when I started going there weekly, and it was my favorite place on the planet. "

"Almost 8 months after Gimme’s demise (which left a hole in the heart of the metal community), Gimme rises from ashes. We are excited to announce that the Gimme store reopens its virtual doors today, with the same goal of community engagement & customer satisfaction."