I have to give these guys credit for being the first (mainstream-leaning, US) metal band in a fairly long time to go all-out with shredding guitar solos. It had been like a decade since popular metal bands had done it (notable exceptions being Pantera and almost every European band), and Avenged Sevenfold just appeared out of nowhere with this album. They didn't half-arse it and ease into solos; it was just instant dual-guitar shred. I do have to credit them for that. I also have to say that I really do like the album Nightmare. It rocks start to finish, really gets the blood pumping. Hail to the King is pretty cool too. On this album, I dig the first half, especially beast and the harlot and bat country. That's my only real issue with this album - two songs stick out, the rest is just kinda average metal, and it's a LONG album. Also, here's some extra criticism: this band is FUCKING DUMB TO LOOK AT. I know that's such a shallow thing to say, but oh god the fucking skinny-goth-boy Top Gun look? Spare me. Similarly, the whole military vibe they've managed to build up around themselves, sorta like a less-retarded Five Finger Death Punch... ew. I know it works for them and my opinion doesn't matter, but EW all the same. Also, the singer fucking sucks. He has some weird quality to his voice, like Axl Rose's late-career Mickey Mouse impression. It's bearable, but only just. Despite all that, I still think they're kinda cool. Anyway, those are my conflicted feelings on Avenged Sevenfold. 4/5.
City Of Evil
Avenged Sevenfold
2005
Album Summary
This album has been submitted by a user and is not included in any edition of the book.
City of Evil is the third studio album by American heavy metal band Avenged Sevenfold, released on June 6, 2005, through Warner Bros. and Hopeless Records. Co-produced by Andrew Murdock, City of Evil contains a more traditional heavy metal and hard rock sound than Avenged Sevenfold's previous two albums, which showcased a predominantly metalcore sound. The album title is derived from a lyric in the song, "Beast and the Harlot". The album is notable for the absence of fry vocals. M. Shadows worked for months before the album's release with vocal coach Ron Anderson, whose clients have included Axl Rose and Chris Cornell, to achieve a sound that had "grit while still having the tone". In order to increase stamina and strength on the pedals, The Rev would sit for hours practicing until he could get up to 210 beats per minute. The album contains some of Avenged Sevenfold's most popular and famous songs, including "Bat Country", which is arguably their most successful to date, being one of their two singles certified gold by the RIAA. City of Evil was very successful after its release, debuting at number 30 on the Billboard 200 chart and has been certified platinum by the RIAA in the United States and gold in both Canada and the United Kingdom. It went on to sell over 1,500,000 copies in the United States, and 2,500,000 total worldwide, making it the best-selling album out of Avenged Sevenfold's discography as of 2020. "Burn It Down", "Bat Country", "Beast and the Harlot" and "Seize the Day" were also released as music videos, directed by Marc Klasfeld, Tony Petrossian, and Wayne Isham, respectively. "Blinded in Chains" was featured in the video game Need for Speed: Most Wanted, and is the promo of the Japanese-Canadian anime Bakugan Battle Brawlers on TV3. The album was ranked No. 63 on Guitar World magazine's "100 Greatest Guitar Albums of All Time". City of Evil also appears in Kerrang!'s "666 Albums You Must Hear Before You Die" and "50 Albums You Need to Hear Before You Die". The album was ranked No. 35 in Kerrang's list of "50 Greatest Metal Albums Ever" in 2016. Rolling Stone listed the album at No. 100 on its list of The 100 Greatest Metal Albums of All Time.
Reviews
Like a review? Give it a thumb up to help us display relevant reviews!RIP The Rev. This is a classic pop prog metal album. Good stuff, nostalgic, and catchy.
Thought I liked avenged Sevenfold Guess not 2
Rating: 7/10 Best songs: Burn it down, Bat country
A bit silly but also goes hard AF. If you don't like this then I guess you aren't cool, chill, or fun.
Late 00s Alt Rock Radio that goes hard the whole way through
found myself liking it more than I would've thought
Metal is not my top genre though I don't mind d a little time to time and admire the technical prowess required. I was introduced Teresa's reading about the vocal training the lead did for a different vocal style - but found the results a little hit and miss. Too much Axle Rose nasal whine on a lot of it. Overall solid though and generally enjoyable.
This is an ok heavy (prog) metal album. For me the artist wants to do too much: ideas, melody changes, instruments, vocals and choirs. It gets on my nerves (while I can take a lot).
I was not looking forward to this at all… but I persevered and it was better than I had thought it was going to be. I’m not totally sold on the vocals, but they were better than the gruff screaming I expected. I also thought there was some fun and retro-feeling guitar antics. Still not my thing really but I didn’t hate it.
Far more major key than I expected from the name. Not for me, but I respect it.
As a guitar player, this one had some really fun technical elements but was sunk by its runtime and rigid adherence to only one sound across the entire LP. If you're going to make an hour+ album, instrumental dynamics and contrast are essential – the base sound here is great, but too much of a good thing would kill any musical effort.
Heavy metal from the 2000s. Great time to be into terrible album covers and also terrible graphic t shirts. This album is an interesting choice as it’s not avenged sevenfolds most popular album. It does have bat country which was a classic from like nhl 2006 but other than that this album was filled too much of high pitched guitar solos and holding notes for way too long. This album isn’t that great overall and not the best A7Fold album. 4.6/10
This falls into the theory of a deadman category of “music that’s cringe and sucks with terrible vocals but nostalgia and decent guitar work force me to be nice to it”. Bat country is the closest this gets to being actually good but even that isn’t great. Also the album art goes hard; can totally imagine it being on a cutoff of the most white trash person you’ve ever seen.
One of my favourite metal albums of all time. This is a top 25 all timer. Just flawless from start to finish.
June 19, 2025 HL: "Beast and the Harlot", "Blinded in Chains", "Strength of the World", "Sidewinder" Look, I'm not an arbiter of good taste, particularly when it comes to metal- but I had fun with this overlong, overblown, delightfully unserious album. Especially because it's from a band I was sure I didn't care for! Apologies to those I judged in grade seven
The first half of City of Evil is really good, modern metal, not old school metal but certainly melodic updated metal with plenty of shredding, more major key than would be expected, but it definitely works. I think Avenged Sevenfold are really a band who made their name off of outstanding singles rather than consistently strong bodies of work; look through their discography and each record has one or two smashes like Bat County, Hail to the King, Welcome to the Family, Nightmare, Afterlife etc, but quite a bit of filler otherwise, and that's where this album loses a couple of marks. The back half really drags because there are five straight songs at 7 minutes or longer and they don't need to be that long. Seize The Day just before it feels too long because the first ninety seconds or so are a waste of time before it rips into an epic crescendo, but maybe I'm being picky because I'd rather have this on the list than hundreds of alt indie rock bands you couldn't tell apart from one another. High 3 or Low 4, good with moments of excellence, lacking consistency in quality and diversity in sound; it's a bit samey.
Heavy metal, progressive metal, power metal, thrash metal, hard rock. Ni fu ni fa.
Musically I thought this was fine, with some genuinely excellent guitar work, but I really don't like the vocals. There are plenty of interesting things going on here, but some of these 7-9 minute songs could have been improved if they were just made shorter. It's just so self indulgent. I thought "Seize the Day" was fun in a Guns N' Roses-y kind of way. Fave Songs: Seize the Day, The Wicked End, Sidewinder
I did enjoy it to begin with l, but some of the song lengths were a bit self indulgent
A lot better than I expected
Over 3 beats per second? As Susan Pewter would say, "Stop the Insanity!" I'm usually not a big metal listener, but this one is interesting. The most listened to song (Seize the Day) is a ballad with the obligatory extra long guitar solo that has notes so high only dogs can hear them. Very ironic.
I remember a lot of people in high school liked this album but I was always more of a Slipknot/Metallica fan. Something about the voice, but still a good album! Some great drums I caught this time.
I listened to the song “bat country” 100’s of times when it came out but not the rest of the album. I’d consider myself a casual fan of some of their music. This album was ok if not a bit bland at times.
A very mixed album for me. The Rev’s drumming on songs like Beast and the Harlot and Bat Country were hugely inspirational for me when I was learning, and the guitar playing across the album is fantastic. Unfortunately the songs themselves don’t quite hold up, especially on the second half where the album really meanders. After the big Guns ‘n’ Roses style centrepiece ballad Seize the Day (complete with a soaring guitar solo), every song is about 7 minutes or longer and it’s incredibly uneven (despite some really good moments like the classical guitar outro to Sidewinder) M Shadows’ vocals are also pretty mixed throughout. There are some really powerful moments like the pre-chorus of Trashed and Scattered and the emotional bridge of Seize the Day, but other times where his voice is super whiny (he insists on doing this falsetto overdub on some tracks that just sounds really bad, and he just generally doesn’t sound great on the tonally-confused closer M.I.A). The production is also quite tinny on a lot of the tracks, which is a shame as you end up missing some details of the very intricate drumming. It’s nowhere near as consistent as their self-titled follow-up or Nightmare, but there are some absolute bangers in the first half and some very impressive and influential moments elsewhere.
Opens in archetypal metal style perfectly matched to the cover. Fun lots of guitar driven energy but lost me by Strength of the World where the vocals completely jumped the shark.
Polished, mathy prog metal with frankly underwhelming vocals. Not bad, but not my type of metal.
It was ok.
Ultimately a bit boring and self-indulgent. Though it varies tempo and has some more interesting tracks (Bat Country, Seize the Day), too much of it is hard rock that is just loud and long. Its not really bad, but just becomes uninteresting well before the album is over.
Nah, not in the mood for this. Don't think I will even be.
I was expecting better music, I had heard Avenged songs before that were really good so I had high expectations for this album but it fell short.
It's almost a pastiche of everything and the kitchen sink thrown in. The fact they can play and are thinking about what they are doing rather than just a mindless scream saves them from a One star.
Used to be a fan of avenged sevenfold when I was a teenager, listening back now the vocals just go right through me. Can see why this isn’t a band from my youth I revisit often. This album is a bit all over the place.
Never listened to this band. Why is it so long.?. I expected the vocals to be screamy, so that a bonus. Unfortunately metal is a difficult genre for me. Sorry but about 5 songs in, it gets a bit tiresome.
Operatic metal rock that tries a little too hard.
Overblown garbage
Cartoon rock.
Unfortunately this is the type of metal/hard rock that doesn’t really do it for me. While it’s not my primary genre I have seen bands like GnR, NIN, Maiden, Slayer, Anthrax live. There is just something about this harder music from this time period I just can’t get into.
I keep confusing this band with 6 Feet Under so I was relieved to not have to listen to 72 minutes of that band. 72 minutes of this band is still a bit too much though
Oh it's just exhausting isn't it. Just too much..
A bit tame, even by my standards. Not my thing. But I’d really like to know why it was the submitters thing.
Awful, it's like an assault on your eardrums. If I could, I would give it a zero
You shouldn't be allowed to participate in communal listening projects where you get to add your opinion.
Cannot countenance. Zero stars.
oh come on. The drum work? incredible. The whole album is basically a sonic time capsule of when pop metal jumped the shark. this is the metal kid equivalent to ska. Mother of christmas I hate that album.
Eugh this is just so boring. It's all the same and it's wet as hell.