Top Five Riffs of the 1990’s

When I was picking songs to share as my top five riffs of the 2000’s, I noticed just how many of my favorite extreme metal songs are from the 1990’s. I wasn’t surprised; the 90’s were a time of exploration, a time when extreme metal and progressive metal branched out into more and more moods […]

Top Five RIFFS of the 2000’s

Hey there! I hope you all are doing well in spite of the pandemic. As promised, I’d like to share my top five riffs of the 2000s, starting off a series of posts exploring my top five riffs of each decade that metal has been around for. At any point in time, metal is so […]

Standout Albums of 2019, Part Two

There were way too many great albums last year to cover even a fraction of them in a single post, so here are some more metal and alternative albums from 2019 that I found to stand out! Borknagar – True North (blackened progressive metal) Borknagar are a fairly big name in the progressive extreme metal […]

Standout Albums of 2019, Part One

2019 concluded the decade with a fantastic year for alternative music. I’m still working my way through my long playlist of 2019 releases in extreme metal, heavy metal, alternative and post rock. In the meantime, as we are now three months into the new year, and The Metal Beholder missed the hype of years-end favorites […]

Katatonia and the Album that Changed My World

Opeth were one of my absolute favorite bands going into my first year of college. The soundtrack to my adolescence may have comprised more of thrash and “heavy” metal bands, such as Testament, Iron Maiden, and Megadeth, but Opeth had something interesting in that darkness that made their music feel more impactful to that younger […]

Five More Albums Core To My Taste

While my first post covered ten albums that were formative in my taste in music, it’s impossible to cover the full spectrum of anyone’s taste in just ten works. Here are five more albums that I feel soundly represent my taste in metal, most of which I discovered in a black metal phase in college. […]

The Zen World of Psychill

Metal is one of my greatest passions and interests. The artists I grew up listening to had a permanent impact on my sense of self and taste in art. However, metal is just one of the genres of music I listen to nowadays. I would say most of the music I listen to now is […]

Intro: Ten Impactful Albums

Hello! My name is David Potter; on the internet and in fictional worlds, I go by Dairen. I am not “The Metal Beholder,” I am just its servant. I am a 27-year-old music nerd and cat person studying at Ramapo College of New Jersey. “The Metal Beholder” is a music and nerd blog, meant to […]