So solid, one wonders if perhaps it could use more yield.Īs David Alan Coe once said, if you’re going to be dumb, you gotta be tough. That’s perhaps why it’s so low on this list, too - there’s something a little too simple about “Deer Dance,” and it never quite yanks the heartstrings the way so many of the album’s other tracks do. Sure, there’s the folkish breakdown in the middle, but this song is as straightforward a metal track as any of its neighbors. The sheer slam of “Deer Dance” sets it apart from the other tracks on Toxicity. But on the other hand, on a record this deep, it’s pretty surface level, and as such ranks low on this list. It’s a microcosm of SOAD’s backstage antics that is better than those of other bands. The track’s opening suggests a dark, brooding track - and then it’s about groupies and coke. On the one hand, there’s a real beauty to how “Psycho” sets up one’s expectations and then dashes them. In a list of total bangers, there’s no shame in being at the bottom. The track is certainly gnarly and intense - but it lacks the awesome nuance that make the rest of the album so fantastic. “X” is a solid nu-metal rager, and includes some of SOAD’s few blastbeats (as they were). It’s telling that the least-good song on Toxicity is still pretty badass. Since tomorrow marks the 20th anniversary of this mindblowing record, we decided to rank the songs on Toxicity from worst to best. To this day, it remains one of the genre’s few perfect releases. Artistically, the record was a lush, bizarre reimagining of what metal could be critically and financially, the album was a massive success, winning over even hardened nose-raisers.
But with 2001’s Toxicity, California’s System Of A Down managed to take both hills that nu-metal was determined to die on. So much of the genre’s struggle was that of being taken seriously, with the answer usually coming as a shrug and a nod towards the scoreboard showing number of albums sold. This is Danny Brown.Nu-metal was always wanting of legitimacy, mired as it was in white-boy angst and rockstar bullshit. That was what was a part of my world, doing festivals. With Old, I wanted to have those performance songs so I can play those shows. Kelela and B-Real have guest spots, and “Really Doe” brings out the murderers row of Kendrick Lamar, Earl Sweatshirt, and Ab-Soul, marking the first time Kendrick and Earl have been on a track together.Īs for the album’s aesthetic, Brown says it veers away from the EDM tendencies of 2013’s Old because he wasn’t really writing with festivals in mind this time: Other producers on Atrocity Exhibition include Evian Christ, Black Milk, Petite Noir, and Alchemist. That’s just how I felt with this album, ’cause a lot of people expect for me to be some crazy drugged-out I-don’t-know.īrown also told RS he and producer Paul White used so many samples that clearing them all cost more than $70,000. People just wanna come see him and they just wanna see him be a certain type of way. That song, pretty much talking about how he feels like he’s part of a freak show almost. Ultimately, though, Ian Curtis and “Atrocity Exhibition” hang over this music most: And in a new interview with Rolling Stone, Brown says the album also channels Björk, Raekwon, and System Of A Down. Brown has cited the Talking Heads as an influence, and he told Zane Lowe he’s been working out to Radiohead’s A Moon Shaped Pool. We already knew Danny Brown’s upcoming album was inspired by Joy Division - it is called Atrocity Exhibition, after all - but the legendarily gloomy post-punk band isn’t the only darkly iconic artist fueling Brown’s latest vision.