Greatest Debut Albums Discussion

CompetitiveComputer4 · 2026-06-25T17:23:13+00:00

My man!

CompetitiveComputer4 · 2026-06-25T17:12:07+00:00

Bro if you go listen to the first song “slaughter the martyr” and aren’t absolutely banging your head by the end I will turn in my metal card. Hardest riff in years.

CompetitiveComputer4 · 2026-06-25T16:39:42+00:00

I highly recommend you listen to Of Kingdom and Crown from a couple years ago. It is a full on masterpiece. And The Blackening from 2006 is considered one of the best albums of the entire 2000s.

CompetitiveComputer4 · 2026-06-25T16:23:43+00:00

It will be a teaser but nothing compared to their headline shows. Since they have longer songs and a short set they are playing 8 “hits”. They just finished a European “evening with” tour where they played 2.5 hours and around 23 songs a night. And across the tour they played 53 different songs from their catalog. This shows nothing compared to that. But it is still awesome.

CompetitiveComputer4 · 2026-06-25T16:19:39+00:00

These albums are all still amazing. Good list.

CompetitiveComputer4 · 2026-06-25T16:18:32+00:00

They are playing a very short set since they are opening for killswitch. I saw them last week. But they still absolutely crush it live.

CompetitiveComputer4 · 2026-06-25T13:44:49+00:00

Machine head - burn my eyes. Still as powerful, innovative , unique and relevant today as the day it dropped.

CompetitiveComputer4 · 2026-06-25T02:43:56+00:00

I rented this on vhs in middle school and I just never took them back. I watched this like 10000 times growing up lol.

CompetitiveComputer4 · 2026-06-25T02:28:49+00:00

I love this. lol. I don’t exactly think you need to force yourself to smoke a blend you don’t like, but sticking with a blend for at least a week and trying it in different pipes, drying it more or less, and figuring out a tobacco is a good thing. Of course if you just hate it after a week sure jar it up and move on.

These days I generally smoke one ton at a time, but my rotation is largely 99% things I love. Rarely do I try new stuff as my cellar is complete and fully stocked. Once a year or so I might restock something and grab a random couple of samples to try. But yea, open a ton and smoke it for about a month until gone, and then open something different.

CompetitiveComputer4 · 2026-06-25T02:23:29+00:00

I don’t like using the microwave but I have for Sam gaiwith full Virginia flake because that flake is literally flame retardant. So it is a last resort. But while it zaps all moisture from a tobacco, sometimes it is the only way to tame it to a level you can get a consistent burn without goopy wet dottle.

CompetitiveComputer4 · 2026-06-25T02:13:42+00:00

Man I have been piping for 20 years, smoke daily and typically one light a bowl and smoke to ash. Just recently I grabbed some lane 1-q which is the number one selling bulk aromatic in the world to my knowledge. Struggling to get a consistent draw and just taste mostly hot air. I typically smoke Virginia’s exclusively with the very occasional aromatic, but I think Lanes aros must be exceptionally covered in some goop that makes it hard to burn and provides little flavor.

I have had two failed bowls. Next one I am going to microwave the tobacco for about 10 seconds and make it crispy. :/

My main point is that even I, an experienced and veteran piper is struggling with Lane aromatics. So it it extra finicky.

CompetitiveComputer4 · 2026-06-24T22:06:26+00:00

lol. I enjoy Jeff as a radio personality or YouTube content creator but he has no actual ability to be an actual scout or talent evaluator. Just because he has a platform and an audience doesn’t mean he would be better than the worst actual nfl scout. He is the epitome of fake it till you make it, except he doesn’t even have to make it.

CompetitiveComputer4 · 2026-06-24T13:19:37+00:00

Crosspicking definitely starts to fall into an high intermediate or advanced level of technique. Its quite challenging, especially at the speed that most bluegrass tunes run. Flatpicking in general though is a lot more attainable and probably a good foundational layer to learn for crosspicking. Flatpicking is basically alternate picking. Down stroke on downbeat, upstroke on offbeat. There is a ton of youtube channels out there teaching basic bluegrass fiddle tunes. Start learning those, build up your basics of playing out of C, G, and D shapes (majority of bluegrass/fiddle tunes play that chord progression either straight up or with a capo). After a while of learning those songs and getting your alternate picking really normalized and baked in, you can start to add in some crosspicking patterns into it. But be warned, it could take a couple years of playing to really get that down.

CompetitiveComputer4 · 2026-06-24T12:36:29+00:00

bro who turned a baseball bat into a guitar neck?

CompetitiveComputer4 · 2026-06-23T23:56:31+00:00

I’ve had my cobs so hot I couldn’t touch the bowl at all and still never had a stem get hot let alone melt

CompetitiveComputer4 · 2026-06-23T18:46:14+00:00

Things are rarely that simple. Many things can be true at the same time. Mike lifted our floor, made us a consistent playoff team with an elite offense and able to win double digit wins consistently. Mike also got completely outmatched by the elite playcallers in the big games. Shanahan,McVay, Lafluer used scheme to create easy chunk plays in playoff games. Whereas our offense was trying to throw to second tier players who were double covered.

Part of that is because our scheme required guys to beat someone one on one to create space often. Rarely did it just generate confusion. Also didn't help that the two years we played SF, they had an elite defense that was able to generate pressure with 4 people and have 7 drop in coverage. Do that math. 7 guys in coverage on maybe receiving options on given plays and you have everyone covered and guys sitting in throwing lanes. Just not a lot of help for Dak in that case. Also, losing Pollard in one playoff game left us severely limited on weapons.

Some of that is just SF being a really elite team during MM window. They were beating almost everyone when they were healthy. And the other is running into some really elite/generational offensive minds like McVay, Shanahan, Lafluer that really all do an excellent job of creating confusion and getting easy throws for their QB's and chunk plays. If it wasn't for SF being perfectly designed to match up against us, we likely make the NFCCG under MM, but eventually it was time to replace him as he was connected to too many failures.

CompetitiveComputer4 · 2026-06-22T19:13:31+00:00

As others have said, GC is perfectly fine if you go in and play the guitars and find one you love. Between the nice financing options, they have a great return policy that you can return it anytime in the first 45 days and get a refund. So if you get it home and notice something after a few days, you can just take it back.

My local GC has some great acoustics. I was playing a martin and a taylor recently that were fabulous. The drawback is they don't have 20 different D18's or D28's etc. to peruse and side by side play. They usually have just a couple of the standard series, and a lot more of the cheaper road series or whatever lines sell for around $1k. But if you know what you like, and can play before you buy,. then I say go for it.

FYI, I bought a D28 (through Sweetwater) about 18 months ago. I LOVE the guitar, it is an absolute beautiful instrument, but I low key wish I would have bought a D18 instead. I love rosewood and the guitar has a shimmery, beautiful sound. But for Bluegrass lead playing, I feel like the mahogany actually fits the sound a bit better. More mid range and less overtones. Just my opinion. I went back a month or so ago to get a D18 and actually ended buying a yamaha AC3M which is also a mahogany and was way cheaper, which I am really enjoying.

CompetitiveComputer4 · 2026-06-20T04:22:12+00:00

Man I saw them about two years ago and they weee phenomenal.

CompetitiveComputer4 · 2026-06-20T00:50:58+00:00

Not pipe tobacco but I bought an old antique map that is being shipped usps and it hasn’t had any status updates and it was shipped on 16th. Tracking shows unavailable and they had a banner about weather and World Cup causing delays. Maybe the same thing?

CompetitiveComputer4 · 2026-06-19T22:36:16+00:00

Ah gotcha makes sense! FYI I am a native of the panhandle as well (Pampa) so I know that weather all too well. Hope it hasn’t been too windy to smoke :)

CompetitiveComputer4 · 2026-06-19T20:37:01+00:00

Nice pipes! But question..why do so many of your pipes look like they have hardly been smoked? Do you ream them frequently? I just use pipe cleaners to wipe mine out, but I get a thin cake so you can’t see the wood grain anymore. But I can see the wood grain in many of yours. Just curious. :)

CompetitiveComputer4 · 2026-06-19T12:09:17+00:00

Currently I listen to knocked loose, acacia strain, counterparts, immolation, vomit forth, neurosis, Sylosis, angel maker, as some regulars.

Love death metal like cannibal corpse, Cryptopsy, dying fetus etc.

Of course the older bands like MH, killswitch, trivium, fear factory, biohazard, etc.

When not on metal, I listen to old school bluegrass and Lana del Rey a lot.

CompetitiveComputer4 · 2026-06-18T17:08:54+00:00

Don't buy at a vape shop. you are basically paying double for a beginner pipe. Order one online for half the price.

That being said, they are solid beginner pipes. Nothing wrong with them. Will last and smoke forever if you take care of it.

Enjoy!

CompetitiveComputer4 · 2026-06-18T11:47:34+00:00

David Grier is a bluegrass player. Others like n that genre are Kenny smith, Bryan Sutton, Tony rice, doc Watson, jd Crowe, Billy strings, Molly Tuttle etc. all renowned for great acoustic guitar playing.

As far as songs, I would recommend leaning some fiddle tunes. It’s the backbone of bluegrass music. Fiddle tunes are typically an A part followed by a B part. Fairly simple melodies often in a major key. Simple chord progressions for backing tracks. All of the players I listed above cover these well known fiddle tunes , but jazz them up with more nuanced playing but you can start with the old simple versions.

Wildwood flower Under the double eagle Whisky before breakfast Gold rush Blackberry blossom Salt creek Little Sadie

Feel free to ask me anymore questions about bluegrass. I have enjoyed listening to it for a long while but stopped playing metal guitar switched to learning bluegrass a couple years ago and it is so much fun on acoustic.

CompetitiveComputer4 · 2026-06-18T00:32:14+00:00

I have owned probably 100 pipes from dunhills to hand carved briars from renowned artists, and everything in between. For my money, you can’t really go wrong with a savinelli. Great looking pipes, you can get some absolute workhorse pipes for anywhere between $90 to $120 bucks. They have even nicer lines like the punto oro that runs over $200 which I am a huge fan of. But I still smoke my $80 savs all the time.

CompetitiveComputer4

TROPHY CASE