18th October 2026

5 Albums I Want To Be Buried With #41: Crucible of Hate!

At the end of August Lancaster, Ohio Death Groove powerhouse Crucible of Hate reached a decade together and celebrated in style with EP “Chasing the Wind“. Recorded, mixed and mastered by Neil Tuuri (Ruins Of Yith, Horseburner, Friends For Sale) it’s one which finds them musing on the futility of resisting change, the inner turmoil of facing life’s difficult decisions, and other personal struggles. Once we’d reviewed the powerful statement piece we asked bassist and vocalist Dan Rivera gave us his selections for “5 Albums I want To Be Buried With” and the conversation went something like this…

The premise is simple: “Back in ancient Egypt they believed that the items their Kings were buried with would travel with them into the afterlife and so part of the burial ritual would see the mummified bodies surrounded by chariots, gold and more. Fast forward to now. If there were five albums that you’d want buried in the coffin with you to take to the afterlife, what would you choose?”

Opeth – Blackwater Park

“This album was my introduction to Opeth. I heard it right before Damnation and Deliverance came out in the early 2000s. At first I didn’t love it because it was so DIFFERENT, but I kept coming back to the song The Drapery Falls because I was so intrigued by it. The combination of death metal and acoustic folk music was so interesting I couldn’t help myself but listen again, and after a few weeks I was hooked. This album takes you on a musical journey. The soundscapes created here remain unmatched over 25 years later. The instrumental passage in Bleak remains one of my favorite musical moments of all time. Mikael’s vocals also became a big inspiration for me, both the clean singing and his superb death metal growls. I could probably write a discourse on this album alone. Absolute GOAT.”

Haken – Virus

“This is a band that was always hit or miss for me, so ironically I missed this album entirely when it came out. Three or four years later a track came up on a playlist and it immediately got my attention. To me this is Haken’s greatest work, and so incredibly heavy while being a perfect prog album. Virus has it all: odd time signatures, djent riffs, soaring clean vocals and interesting harmonies, blazing guitar solos, and not one skippable track.”

Meshuggah – ObZen

“It was difficult to choose this album over Immutable, but ObZen was the first Meshuggah album to get my attention and it still blows me away. I have spent hours listening to this album and dissecting the riffs and rhythms, and I still don’t understand how Thomas Haake can play this stuff so flawlessly live. This is a djent masterpiece, the album by which any band attempting to perform this style should hold themselves accountable. My claim to fame is that I can play Pravus on drums and even made a drum cover video that is available on YouTube.”

Tool – Lateralus

“As a huge Tool fan it’s hard to pick one album, but like most I always come back to Lateralus. This is another album that takes you on a musical journey from start to finish, and there’s not one skippable track. This was when Tool really became a “progressive” band, though there were hints of it on Aenima. I remember when Schism was a huge radio hit, becoming annoyingly overplayed, but even now it’s still a great song. Tool reached new heights with this album, and to this day I love to listen to the back half of this record, from Lateralus through Triad, which is when the journey gets really deep and transcends the listener to another plane…”

Dream Theater – Awake

“This was another tough one to pick over other albums, especially Scenes From a Memory, but Awake holds so much nostalgia for me and still holds up to this day. It’s not only one of Dream Theater’s best, but was the first time they used 7-string guitars on an album and it really made a huge difference in the sound. There’s a dark heaviness to it, yet still an incredible atmosphere throughout. I just love everything about it: The drumming, the guitar solos (the solo at the end of Lie is a GOAT), the songwriting, the vocal melodies. It hasn’t gotten old over 30 years later.”

“Chasing the Wind” by Crucible of Hate is out 28th August 2026 and is available over at bandcamp.