Intestinal Crank: Crohn's Disease and Metal Fandom

I've written before about some of the influencing factors in my getting into metal; discovering new music through internet radio and a few key friends who turned me on to bands like Thrice, Mastodon, and Opeth which turned out to be the Gatekeepers to my metal fandom.  One thing I haven't really written about is my fifteen-plus years of dealing with Crohn's Disease, and the impact that's had on my perception of metal, discovery of new bands, and even tastes in metal sub-genres.  During the last few weeks of 2014, however, as I was working on my Top Albums list, I was simultaneously dealing with one of the worst Crohn's flares I've ever had; metal and my intestines had never been so blatantly linked, but the more I thought about that, the more I realized that there's a great possibility that being diagnosed with Crohn's is a much bigger part of why I'm a metalhead than I ever gave it credit for.

Albums of the Year, Then and Now (2003-2007)

Ah, December.  That magical time of year when the blogger’s fancy turns to letting you know their favorite albums of the year in a long, drawn out list.  Fear not; this is not that list.  That list will be released sometime within the next few weeks.  This is more of a primer, a dual post to get you started thinking about what “Album of the Year” really means while at the same time giving you an unasked for history of my listening tastes over the past decade… and more importantly, how things have changed in hindsight.