BELIEVER v VENGEANCE Debut Album Poll

For many this is very tough but not for me.  Believer wins hands down, such a phenomenal thrash metal album secular or Christian IMO.

While I’ve probably listened to HS more, I’d say EfM is a better album. So I’ll pick that.

Both are good, but both are blown away by Stop the Bleeding and Living Sacrifice, IMHO.

Easily my favorite Believer album, but still Human Sacrifice by a nose.

it's too close to call but I went with HS because I regularly call it my all-timer

Believer. Roger's vocals suck and I listen to gnarly vocals.

Black Rider wrote:Believer. Roger's vocals suck and I listen to gnarly vocals.

As much as I enjoy VR, Roger’s vocals on the first two keep me from enjoying them as much as I should.

I feel like he's straining too much, too much throat and not enough diaphragm.

Black Rider wrote:I feel like he's straining too much, too much throat and not enough diaphragm.

Agreed. He sounds like he’s vomiting.

Extraction is my favorite Believer album. I appreciate the energy of Human Sacrifice… but the vocals and production make it a hard listen. Gotta go with Believer!

Pethead wrote:

Black Rider wrote:Believer. Roger's vocals suck and I listen to gnarly vocals.

As much as I enjoy VR, Roger’s vocals on the first two keep me from enjoying them as much as I should.

Agreed. Although I think Roger greatly improved on the last two VR albums. I’m one of the few that like Destruction Comes the best. I like his rapid-fire crossover thrash shouting. And on Released Upon the Earth, he finally had a nice guttural death growl.

TZ75 wrote:

Pethead wrote:

Black Rider wrote:Believer. Roger's vocals suck and I listen to gnarly vocals.

As much as I enjoy VR, Roger’s vocals on the first two keep me from enjoying them as much as I should.

Agreed. Although I think Roger greatly improved on the last two VR albums. I’m one of the few that like Destruction Comes the best. I like his rapid-fire crossover thrash shouting. And on Released Upon the Earth, he finally had a nice guttural death growl.

Absolutely

Believer but HS is a bona fide classic with White Throne, I love Hating Evil and other all time favorites.

I think EFM is Believer’s equivalent to Sepultura’s Beneath the Remains. They both even have songs that have the same exact double kick drum intro (Vile Hypocrisy & Sarcastic Existance). And both albums are from 1989.

TZ75 wrote:I think EFM is Believer’s equivalent to Sepultura’s Beneath the Remains. They both even have songs that have the same exact double kick drum intro (Vile Hypocrisy & Sarcastic Existance). And both albums are from 1989.

I like this comment. Beneath the Remains is my favorite thrash album of all time. Visceral, brutal, varied and yet somehow having killer melodic solos. It was, for me, a leap of indescribable proportions from Schizophrenia.

Though Extraction From Mortality, for me, is a big step down from that I love it for many similar reasons (except Believer's guitar solos, while unique, stink ).

Vengeance Rising is a conundrum for me. Human Sacrifice is the only album I can truly enjoy aside from parts of Once Dead and Released Upon The Earth. I do not like the band in general. Human Sacrifice however has some truly killer songs on it and the out of place bluesy solos at times work brilliantly. Beheaded is worth the price of admission alone.

Extraction From Mortality dominates this because I by far prefer Believer.

You have to take my vote for Human Sacrifice with a grain of salt, as I've only listened to Believer a handful of times. It wasn't melodic enough for my taste, so I didn't listen anymore. I tried again a year or two ago, but it's just one of those things...

So this poll was very easy for me, as HS wins by a landslide. But I'm not the best person to be judging these two albums.

That's really tough. Even though DC is my fav from vengeance Rising, when I first heard that intro to White Throne (which id memory serves was the first time I heard Vengeance)  that melodic and ominous guitar line pedaling over those chords changed how I viewed music from that day. Also, the reckless way roger "sings" tore my head of when I first heard it, where as Beliver was another standard thrash vocal. Roger was insane, which I dig.

Believer it was Sanity Obscure that hooked me in first and the debut took a me a while to feel out it's hidden hooks.

For those reasons I'll go with HS.

^
I prefer the Unreleased First Mix of HS

VR because it had unique qualities that set it apart.  The Believer debut was good but to someone who listened to a lot of secular thrash, it was not unique except for some awesome lyrics.

HS but only the First Mix edition!

Extraction is better, Destruction Comes is not bad, but is just a regular records for me.

Pethead wrote:

Black Rider wrote:I feel like he's straining too much, too much throat and not enough diaphragm.

Agreed. He sounds like he’s vomiting.

To me he sounds like he's in extreme pain the entire time. Overall, I like VR a lot, but they seem like a thrash band trying to be a death band and failing.

HS is probably my favorite VR album, and was my introduction to brutal vocals, but gotta go with EfM.

I went with HS. I never listened to EfM much, but with that said I absolutely love Sanity Obscure. It may actually be one of my favorite Christian releases of all time. It essentially started an entire new genre of metal music with Dies Irae.

I had always been an EfM fan… but recently I have purchased the Human Sacrifice album for the first time and also got the new Sanity Obscure remaster. While I still like the EfM album, I’m enjoying those other two a lot as well. I actually might be starting to like Sanity Obscure more that EfM… but that could wear off and I’ll just like them both the same. 

One thing is for sure though… the title track of EfM is beautiful and thrashing, like two separate songs in one. The orchestration is very moving and rivals some of the well known classical pieces from the masters.