What do you think about the new demon hunter?

Yeah I do. And I still love to explore new bands and check for bands I alread listen to. New confessions of a traitor is awesome!

Superb music taste over here. Greetings from Germany

...of Beauty and Rage is one of my favorite Red albums, although it does take a little bit of getting into. Honestly, I was disappointed by Red's most recent album.

What's up, man! I've been thinning for a long time now...cursed genetics! TBH, I'm not really concerned about it. Keeping busy with work as usual.

Glad to hear everything is going well. I am actually moving closer to where I work next week, which will cut down the drive about 30 minutes. Really looking forward to it. Still working at the same place.

Mushuggah's alright, one of those bands I listen to every once in a while when it suits the mood. How are things going?

Ah, that's too bad about work. I listen to a lot of music in my car, as I drive about an hour to work. I can blare it without anyone taking offense :P I ordered the Zao CD and a shirt, and they're in the mail to me right now! I'll definitely let you know what I think once it's in my hands.

As tempting as it is, I think I'm going to wait until my pre-order arrives. I'll also be writing a review of the album :D What do you think so far?

That's good to hear. The hurricane didn't affect me too much, where I am just a lot of rain and some strong wind. I work in Jacksonville, though, and the beaches got hammered pretty hard. We ended up missing 3 days of school because of the storm. Are you going to get the P86 album when it comes out?

Hello friend! It's been a while. How are you doing?

That's a hard one lol. My personal preference would point to Red's "of Beauty and Rage." I checked my scrobbles on it and it's over 400 haha. The most recent Demon Hunter and P86 were okay, nothing super amazing, but solid overall. I was very much let down by the new HTD album. The production quality on it was quite shoddy. You may want to check out the new Pillar album "One Love Revolution," it's pretty good. It only took them 6 years to release another album lol.

Congratulations, father! What's his name?

Haha no I don't usually play music in the classroom, although I've thought about it. I play some Jazz sometimes. My students do know I listen to rock and metal -- we've had some interesting conversations. About 99% of my students listen to rap, pop, r&b, etc.

I completely understand. I guess I should enjoy being single while I can haha. Music really helps me deal with some of the more stressful things related to my job, and I guess it's also just a hobby. So...do you have Spotify? The new FIF stuff is on there and you can listen to it for free.

That sentence below should read "I think I like the new Five Iron Frenzy better than the old one."

Congratulations! Your life is about to get a lot more fun, then :P Boy or girl, if you don't mind me asking? I'm doing okay, could be better I suppose. I was in a pretty bad accident a few weeks ago and my car has been in the shop since. Somehow I wasn't hurt, praise God! My best friend is also getting married in less than two weeks and I'm the best man, so there's a lot of stuff going on. Thankfully, this week I have spring break (or the students do, however you want to put it). So I have some time to catch up on things. Fun things like paying my income tax haha... On another note I saw you listening to Five Iron Frenzy and I realized that I hadn't listened to their new EP yet, so I immediately remedied that. It's pretty good. I think I like the new Five Iron Frenzy. Sometimes the wacky stuff was okay, but most of the time it was just over the top.

In terms of comparison to previous Red releases, it is a darker, more mature sound. There are fewer choruses overall and a focus on thematic progression. I think it's my favorite Red album, but it's a sound that definitely had to grow on me. The band also went back to their roots, including more symphonic elements on Of Beauty and Rage. How are you? :P

Hey, sorry I didn't see your post until now. Merry Christmas! I've lost tons of scrobbles to my iPod being stupid, haha. Sometimes it just doesn't read it. You'd think that last.fm would have improved their scrobbling technology by now....and it always causes my last.fm to crash after I scrobble it.

Well, there really hasn't been that much in the way of new music recently. Have you gotten the chance to listen to Haste the Day's new album?

Yup, today was the last day for students. Two days next week of post-planning and then I'm home free. I guess the year went alright; it seemed to go by fairly quickly. I've completed everything I need for my permanent certification now :) How has it been going on your end?

Yeah, I've been listening to them for a couple of years now. I suppose it's one of my guilty pleasures...one of the few non-Christian bands I listen to.

It is similar to the past few albums in most regards. My two favorite songs are "Pale Rider" (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pUFM4yLnOTg) and "Oculus" (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bhWNQl3_IIw) Oculus in particular seems like a place that band hasn't really gone before, or at least not that I can remember. Check them out and tell me what you think. If money's tight (I understand), then just put it off for the future.

P.O.D. is always great. That's too bad to hear about NYVES. I don't listen to that genre at all, so I have no way of measuring it against standards or anything like that. I will probably check it out when it releases just because it's Ryan Clark singing, but you're probably right -- why not just listen to Demon Hunter instead? I'm pumped for Haste the Day, hopefully we will get a single soon...

Yeah, NYVES is interesting, we'll have to see what comes of it. I haven't checked it out in a while, are they releasing an album now? The new P86 album is pretty good -- you should take a listen when you get the chance.

Hey man, I just realized I never replied to your post. Sorry about that! It's not that I don't listen to music anymore, it's just that about 90% of it is on my iPod. I've had a real problem scrobbling it for a long time. Sometimes it just wouldn't scrobble at all and I just gave up out of frustration. I've started scrobbling it again and it looks like it's working for the time being, so that's good. Know of any killer new releases? It looks like 2015 will probably be a good year for music. To start out with Red and Haste the Day coming up, and then I will be looking forward to Zao, Ecthirion, Crimson Moonlight, Mortification, Believer, My Silent Wake, and Theocracy. That's all I can think of at the moment. How's it been going lately? I need to do more writing...

Sounds like fun! I should probably break out my sax again one of these days...

Yeah, Pressure the Hinges is great. It was also my first metal album that I bought, so it holds a special place in my heart. Wow, that sounded gushy...

Yeah, everything is super busy with work! Glad to hear that everything's stable on your end.

Yes, I enjoy the series very much. I have a thick copy of it with all three books in it, and I've read it multiple times. I guess you could say that I'm more abstract. If I remember correctly, one of the reasons Lewis wrote it was to compete with Tolkien, who was his friend, in the creation of languages. They are definitely a good read, though.

It's not exactly easy. You have to work on it pretty regularly. A lot of the times I go back and edit scenes or discard ones. If it's an extreme edit I'll sometimes just make a note in the margin to come back to it. I'm about 100 pages into my novel, but haven't worked on it much in the past year. I think I'm going to restart it, keeping some parts of it and getting rid of others. I have a different vision with where I want to go with the book. Right now I'm working on a couple of short stories that I will soon submit to some sci-fi magazines and hope to get published. More or less, I'm just going to keep submitting stuff, keep writing stuff. In the end it will be more about persistence than anything. The hardest will be the first--once I can put that I've published something on my cover letter, then I think it will become a little bit easier.

I'm doing well! My sister just got married, so I was away for a week. I finally have some time to relax; it is really nice. I'm going to be writing a lot :)

That's cool, I didn't know you were farming (unless you told me and I just forgot). How much land do you have?

They've recorded a new album recently, you should check it out, it's great!

I completely understand! My kids don't want to do anything right now because the end is so near...I'm going to be doing a lot of writing over the summer. Hopefully I'll be able to complete the rough draft of my novel by the end of it.

Yeah, it's not easy. But at least I didn't have to try and teach Great Expectations or something like that.

I teach 9th-10th grade. The curriculum is a mix of what you might expect -- everything from To Kill a Mockingbird to Antigone. I write all my lesson plans and such, and I do sometimes have my own narratives that we use every once in a while.

Yeah, it's a lot better. I've gotten used to it for the most part. I'm not sure if the "enjoy" part is always there, but that's a work in progress :D

Yeah that's definitely true. Some bands change so much over time...Demon Hunter still has the same core principles in mind when they make music.

I see you listened. What do you think?

I haven't read any reviews on it or wrote one of my own as I haven't had time. My first reaction to the album was that it was okay. I've listened to it nonstop the entire week and I must say that it's grown on me a lot. I like it much better than their last album already, even if it not on par with some of the earlier albums. One thing that sticks out is the guitar work on this album; it may be the best they've ever done. The biggest drawback for me on this album is that Ryan doesn't go into the baritone range much. As that's my favorite part of his voice, I was a little disappointed on that note. There are some pop influences on some of the songs, so it may be that's where the reviews are slamming them. That's just a matter of taste. So far I'd maybe rate it 3.0 or 3.5/5 or something like that.

One of those "made sense at the time" decisions. :P

Haha, yep, still fairly obsessed with tracking my musical charts. I wish I hadn't created a second profile though.

Sorry for the tardy reply. The new DH album should be good, hopefully! It's interesting to see some of the albums that influenced Ryan Clark. I've always thought that Focused album, along with Few Left Standing's album Wormwood, were some of the most underrated in the Christian hardcore scene.

The album is also on Spotify, if you want to check it out first, and most of the songs are on YouTube as well.

That's a shame. But at least you get to spend less time on the road, which must be nice. Have you listened to the new We As Humans album? I think that you would really like it. They are one of my favorite Christian "modern" rock bands now, alongside Red and P86.

Yeah, I guess you could say I've gotten into a rhythm. It's nearing the end of the 2nd quarter, so I'm really busy this week and next.

I just realized that I didn't reply to your post. Sorry about that. Sounds like your situation has improved. That's great! I go back to work tomorrow. I get the same breaks as the students, so I've been off for winter break. It's been nice; finally a chance to relax.

Yeah. I haven't had the time to give it a really thorough listen yet.

Congrats! Sounds great! Enjoy the time off as well, as that's hard to come by.