Bold statement, Zig! It’s certainly the most electrifying debut hard rock album I can think of, that’s for damned sure. But….

Honestly, I’m not gonna fight you on this one, as it’d be like a knife fight: ugly, with both of us winding up bloody, and for no good reason. So, all hail VH I!

Thanks for the vid, which is amazing….

About to go rock out with VH I, arguably the best hard rock album ever made. Who’s ready to fight me on it?

Cool. Just got a break from the endless childcare/online university education so I could watch it. Damn, we’re all getting old! Lars is starting to look like Harry Dean Stanton.

I really enjoyed catching up with you guys and watching that doc. Can we do it again sometime soon? How about a concert video?

I think there are actually two amazing things here:

1) “[Y]ou somehow have managed to avoid the calcification of musical tastes that is a basic biological fact of age. How did you do that?”  I agree, this is truly exceptional.  In case you want to know what the near opposite of what you have been able to achieve is, here is a list of the ten albums I have most recently purchased:

• Candlemass — The Door to Doom
• Dream Theater – Distance over Time
• Overkill – The Wings of War
• Visions of Atlantis – The Deep & The Dark Live @ Symphonic Metal Night
• Avantasia – Moonglow
• Beast in Black – From Hell with Love
• Evergrey – The Atlantic
• Within Temptation – Resist
• Ancient Bards – Origine: The Black Crystal Sword Saga PT.

Thank you, my friend! I think the First Listens have had the key effect of keeping my tastes fluid and evolving. I’ll keep that going, as I said, so that I can That, and being in frequent contact with other (younger?) metalheads in my area; these folks are not shy about talking at me about <insert random band or subgenre> at me until I relent and promise to give it a listen with an open mind.