They're very different, these two albums, but between the two of them, I think they give a good snapshot of my current musical mood.

The first album is Stevie Wonder's Journey Through The Secret Life of Plants. Perhaps you've never heard of it? Not surprising, considering it's out of print in America. This double album is the soundtrack to an obscure movie of the same name (minus Stevie's possessive prefix). This album was released in 1979 at the end of the most highly revered period of Wonder's career. It is a strange, moving, diverse, experimental and passionate collection of songs. Much of the album is instrumental, making full use of the 70's-era electronic innovations to craft eloquent and interesting sounds and effects. Other parts of the album are more traditional, tuneful departures, such as the only hit off this collection, "Send One Your Love." As exploratory as the two discs are, you never lose that special, soulful vibe that is unique to Stevie Wonder.

However, Stevie's contemporary audience did indeed get lost. The album confused the hell out of the public and his following. It did not sell well, and people apparently began to wonder what was going on in the head of Wonder. It is said that Stevie and his record company rushed out Hotter Than July to reassure the public that Stevie hadn't gone all loopy on people. This is really sad, I think, because from Music Of My Mind through Songs In The Key Of Life, Stevie Wonder continued to grow, develop and explore his musical world. Secret Life of Plants is in many ways the culmination of that journey, and if the public had followed where Stevie led, I think it's very possible that today's soul would be in a much more creative place. Alas, Hotter Than July was a come-down from its predecessors and eventually lead to Wonder's more listless modern material.

The second album is more recent and drastically different. It comes from a French Canadian progressive death metal band called Cryptopsy, and the album is titled Once Was Not. Those who know me are aware that though I've always been a metalhead — my favorite band since high school is classic Black Sabbath — I have recently developed a taste for death metal. In particular, longtime brutal technicians Suffocation have been my favorite discovery, but apparently Cryptopsy and Suffocation go way back, about 10 years. Though I have heard and own some old Cryptopsy, including their most acclaimed classic disc, None So Vile, this new effort is by far the most impressive thing they've produced.

The riffs and changes on this album are mesmerizing. I simply have not heard licks, phrases and beats quite like these before. Whereas Suffocation is like taking a 20-minute Sabbath song and compressing it into a 4-minute bludgeoning, Cryptopsy is like a hyperactive surgeon, scalpeling at the speed of thought. However, to keep things fresh, there are quite a number of quick stylistic change-ups throughout. (Beauty through contrast!) The album begins with a classical, nylon-stringed flamenco intro that is briefly reprised within the first metal execution, "In the Kingdom Where Everything Dies, the Sky Is Mortal." Throughout the disc, breaks of jazz guitar comping, clean funk clanking, piano dabblings and church bells punctuate the already impressive diversity of the death metal itself. It keeps you on your toes, and the more you listen, the more details you hear.

Additionally, the album probably has my favorite lyrics of any death metal album yet. While the genre definitely favors gory, turgid prose focusing on gore and violence, this album — primarily in English with smatterings of French, German and Latin — invokes that feeling more eloquently than any other. An example from war-themed "The Curse of the Great":

In this soiled World
we see aspects of Damnation
on the faces of the killed,
instead of gratitude.

This psychology may seem
a bit Baroque at first,
but what a boon it be
when the demons come.

With time and telling, Memory dulls
of rotting boys with empty skulls:
all Sons of Ares, Sons of Mars,
whose flesh be Worms, whose souls be Stars

Now, for my own part, when I listen to insanely heavy and chaotic music, that is exactly the type of lyrics I want to hear. Of course, they're barely legible; without the cd booklet, you'd really have no idea what the singer, Lord Worm, is saying. But that's par for the genre.

So there you have it, soul and death metal. These two albums are currently guiding my listening mood, orbiting each other like binary suns, spinning off into other similar albums, crashing into one mood. Of course, I'm a little hungover this morning, so the first disc is definitely preferable.