Announcing the Winners of Our 1st Annual Readers Choice Awards!

Thanks once again to everyone who voted in our 1st Annual Readers Choice Awards! Over 1,100 votes were cast and 46 albums nominated!

Our original plan was to feature the top 10 vote-getting albums. However, due to a three-way tie for the last spot, we have 12 albums instead! Let’s see if you can identify the albums in the collage below!

Thanks very much to Mimi of the UtF staff for putting this image together!

So, now you see the covers of the honored albums.  Here is a more detailed list of the winners:

1. Modified – Modified
2. Dama – Eirwen
3. (tie) Stream of Passion – Darker Days
3. (tie) Echoterra – Land of the Midnight Sun
5. Crysalys – The Awakening of Gaia
6. Nemesea – The Quiet Resistance
7. Amaranthe – Amaranthe
8. Only Fate Remains – Breathe
9. Benedictum – Dominion
10. (tie) Cassandra Syndrome – Satire X
10. (tie) Draconian – A Rose for the Apocalypse
10. (tie) Noctura – Surrender the Sun

Once again, thanks to everyone who voted this year!  The Awards were a great success – so let’s have it again next year, shall we?

UtF Looks Back on 2011 – and Looks Ahead at 2012

Yup, it’s that time of year: to take a look back on the year that was 2011. In female-fronted rock and metal music, of course. However, while every other media outlet out there shares Top 10 or Top 20 lists of favorite albums, we decided to do a different kind of year-end wrap-up.

Instead of highlighting albums, we chose to highlight bands. All of us at Unleash The Furies discovered a wealth of female-fronted rock and metal bands this past year – some of which didn’t actually release any albums in 2011, but got heavy rotation in our music players regardless. With this idea in mind, four of our staff writers sat down and picked their favorite discoveries of 2011. They also shared their predictions for up-and-coming bands who could make major breakthroughs in 2012.

Let’s start with…

Vote in Our First “Band of the Month” Poll!

Great news: Today we launch our very first Band of the Month Poll!

Every month, readers can vote for one of five up-and-coming female-fronted bands selected by the UtF staff. The band with the most votes at the end of the month will, of course, be our Band of the Month and have their own special feature on our site. (We’re still working on those details right now.)

Here are our nominees for the UtF Band of the Month for May 2010:

• Echoterra, a symphonic metal band from Minneapolis, Minnesota (U.S.), fronted by former Aesma Daeva / Visions of Atlantis singer Melissa Ferlaak. Echoterra recently announced their second album, Land of the Midnight Sun, will be released this summer.
• Noctura, a rock duo from Indianapolis, Indiana (U.S.). Noctura’s debut album, Surrender the Sun, will be released later this year – and the band’s debut show on June 25th has already sold out!
• One Without, a gothic metal band from Gothenburg, Sweden. One Without is working on its second album and recently released their cover of Kent’s “Om Du Var Här” on iTunes.
• Straight Line Stitch, a metalcore band from Knoxville, Tennessee (U.S.). Straight Line Stitch just released its new album, Fight of Our Lives, and will tour the U.S. this spring with In This Moment and recent UtF-featured band System Divide.
• Triosphere, a heavy progressive metal band from Trondheim, Norway. Triosphere’s second album, The Road Less Traveled, was released last year, and the band is touring Europe with Sonata Arctica this month and with Crimson Glory in May.

To cast your vote, visit any page on the UtF WordPress site and scroll down to find the poll on the right side (between the Recent Posts and Facebook / Twitter link widgets). Voting closes on Saturday, April 30^th, and you can vote once a day!

Which band(s) would you like to see featured in our next Band of the Month Poll? Let us know by sending an email to unleashthefuriesmetal@gmail.com!