Since a tornado warning has ruined my labor day plans of being lazy by the pool,  I felt I should write something.  Thankfully today is the 20th anniversary of Chaos A.D.  by Sepultura and I have a cool story of how I found the album and how it became one of my all time favorites.

Metalsucks did a nice little write up about the album and why it rules so I am going to skip all of that.

My story begins during a summer vacation on the way back from an amusement park in central Pennsylvania called .  It’s not a big park or anything,  but it’s out in the mountains and they had laser tag.  On the way back we decided to stop by a random flea market to see what they had.  This would have been around 1997 or 1998, also known as my Metallica/Megadeth years.  Antiques and old furniture did not peak my interest at all.  Luckily there was a CD area,  even if it was mostly country and classical.

So I’m browsing through the rows of jewel cases one by one.  Emerson, Lake, and Palmer.  Nope.  Bing Crosby Christmas.  No.  Johnny Mathis.  Get this shit out of here.   I appreciate all of this music now  but at the time I had the blinders on for metal and only metal.

Then it appeared.

Chaos A.D.  and the band was named Sepultura.  Interesting…

Three things that peaked my interest in a CD back then.

1) Does the album title sound “metal”  –  It said Chaos, check.

2) Does the band name sound “metal” –  Definitely in the vein of my favorite bands of the time, check.

3) Does the art look “metal” –  Dead body wrapped up and held by some mechanized killing machine, check.

I felt confident for the price of $1 this album would be worth the purchase.   I plucked the CD from the rack and purchased it.  I spent the rest of the ride back listening on my portable CD player and having my mind blown by what I heard.  I don’t even want to describe it.  If you have the album you know,  if you haven’t heard it please do yourself a favor and give it at least one listen through.  Two if you got time.  It’s a classic for a good reason.

Funny enough this was my first Road Runner Records album,  and I bought Roots  not to long after because of what I heard.  In 8th grade I covered  ”Roots Bloody Roots” with some high school kids at a battle of the bands (we didn’t win,)  along with “Blind” by Korn and maybe a Metallica song.  Even though it’s much easier to find albums like this with Spotify,  there is something special about purchasing a CD or album off instinct,  especially when you were 100% right about it like this one was for me.

P.S.  We did a cool cover of “Slave New World” if you didn’t know.