Tag: Death Metal

My Top Albums of 2021

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And starting off at number fifteen. . .

15. Pan-Amerikan Native Front – Little Turtle’s War (United States – Independent)

Black metal with a dash of awe. Pan-Amerikan Native Front’s second full-length is intense with power and rage. It’s lo-fi production adds to the chaos. My favourite track, The Great White Beaver Lurks, is an awesome mid-paced song among the disruption.

https://pan-amerikannativefront.bandcamp.com/album/little-turtles-war

14. Friisk – ..un torügg bleev blot Sand (Germany – Vendetta)

Unlike Pan-Amerikan, Friisk bestows intense moods and atmosphere with their debut album. Similar at times to one of my favourite Icelandic black metal bands, Auðn, Friisk brilliantly showcases some blistering speed alongside their dramatic performances.

https://friisk.bandcamp.com/album/un-tor-gg-bleev-blot-sand

13. Fluisteraars – Gegrepen Door de Geest der Zielsontluiking (Netherlands – Eisenwald)

It’s rare to see 20+ minute black metal songs, yet Fluisteraars pieces one together and it goes by in an instant. Almost avant-garde at times, Fluisteraars’s fourth album is ambitious and rich with nuance – all-the-while still showcasing moments of insanity.

https://fluisteraars.bandcamp.com/

12. Drawn and Quartered – Congregation Pestilence (United States – Krucyator Productions)

A group of death metal veterans, Drawn and Quartered’s newest release features the band’s technical ability to write strong, creative music. With a solid old-school death metal sound, Congregation Pestilence is rich with pacing and riffs to make your ears bleed. Without going into the typical verse/chorus structure, D&Q’s music is filled with brilliance.

https://krucyator.bandcamp.com/album/congregation-pestilence

11. WODE – Burn In Many Mirrors (United Kingdom – 20 Buck Spin)

A mix of blackened/death thrash metal makes WODE’s third album an extreme journey to experience. Unrelenting and surprisingly melodic, the album comes with a great energy to it. With unexpectedly catchy riffs and crisp production, WODE’s ever-changing style serves them well.

https://listen.20buckspin.com/album/burn-in-many-mirrors

10. Cannibal Corpse – Violence Unimagined (United States – Metal Blade)

Another group of veterans in the death metal world, Cannibal Corpse’s newest may be one of their best since Kill (although I prefer Torture). While still keeping up the same sound listeners have become accustomed to, newcomer Erik Rutan added some awesome power I’m sure no one felt the band was lacking.

https://cannibalcorpse.bandcamp.com/album/violence-unimagined

9. Ŭkcheănsălâwit – Alaskan Escape EP (Canada – Les Productions Hérétiques)

My favourite EP of the year! This speedily album feels bleak and cold – which is exactly what it was going for. To showcase a song: To an Alaskan Glacier, while minimal in instruments, is huge in drama making for an incredible feat to achieve. I would surely buy a full LP of this music whenever one is made.

https://ukcheansalawit.bandcamp.com/album/alaskan-escape

8. Olhava – Frozen Bloom (Russia – Avantgarde Music)

While Fluisteraars had a single 20-minute song, Olhava has one, plus a few more over the 10-minute mark. The Russian duo pieces beautifully intense music with a raging atmosphere and subtle soundscapes. While two of the four songs are really black metal, Olhava brings in drone and ambient elements which perfectly encapsulates the ebb and flow of the natural concept they were aiming for in Frozen Bloom.

https://avantgardemusic.bandcamp.com/album/frozen-bloom

7. Outre-Tombe – Abysse Mortifère (Canada – Temple of Mystery Records)

This band just keeps impressing. Outre-Tombe’s now three for three on making my annual lists and for good reason – their music is really flipping awesome. Moments of Abysse Mortifère remind me of early-Voivod, while others standout as early-Morbid Angel. A ripping good time, Abysse Mortifère knocks it out of the park.

https://templeofmystery.bandcamp.com/album/abysse-mortifere

6. Cynic – Ascension Codes (United States –Season of Mist)

After two thirds of the band passed away in 2020, how could Cynic continue? Paul Masvidal carries on Sean Reinert’s and Sean Malone’s legacy with Ascension Codes – a strange, yet familiar feeling. While the album feels bogged down by short interludes between songs, the music is an emotional progressive journey: absolutely brilliant and constantly transcending.

https://cyniconline.bandcamp.com/album/ascension-codes

5. Liquid Tension Experiment – Liquid Tension Experiment 3 (United States – InsideOut)

Their first release since LTE2 in 1999, LTE3 brings back the brilliance of Dream Theater members John Petrucci, Jordan Rudess, and Mike Portnoy, along with legendary bassist Tony Levin, to produce one of the most surprising albums for me this year. All-instrumental, LTE3 is not so much a jam session like previous albums, but a well-executed romp into prog rock and metal.

https://open.spotify.com/album/6GDFV4kWsQDYuah6tSqmu2

4. Grima – Rotten Garden (Russia – Naturmacht Productions)

My favourite atmospheric black metal album of the year, Grima’s Rotten Garden was also the first album I picked up when it was released in January. It has been regularly spun since. It’s haunting beauty comes together with nature and grandiose scope. With the odd keyboard frill and additional accordion in certain songs, Rotten Garden is absolutely a fresh listen to every spin.

https://grima.bandcamp.com/album/rotten-garden

3. Koldovstvo – Ни царя, ни бога (??? – Extraconscious Records)

Not much is known about the band and their debut album: A Russian band name. Roman Numeral song titles. Signed to an American label. Is it one person or a group? What Ни царя, ни бога is though, is an experience. Was the album recorded in another room? The production is both astonishing and very entrancing. It’s albums like this one which I live for. Tracks I and IV are absolute standouts.

https://koldovstvo.bandcamp.com/album/-

2. Ferriterium – Calvaire (France – Epictural Production)

Also released in January, I unfortunately wasn’t able to grab a physical copy as it sold out. And it sold out fast for good reason too: it’s incredible. Immediately fast and dramatic, Calvaire is doused in both strength and agony. A rich and fast-paced album, it’s still a melodic black metal journey filled with so much emotion and heartbreak, you find yourself picking up pieces when all is said and done.

https://ferriterium.bandcamp.com/album/calvaire

1. Mannveira – Vitahríngur (Iceland – Dark Descent Records)

There’s a handful of albums that happen to be there when you need them the most. Mannveira’s debut album Vitahríngur just happened to be that album for me this year.

Doused in sludge and dreariness, Vitahríngur time-and-time again happened to be my go-to when I needed it the most. It’s raw, rather simplistic approach to music writing can keep the listener engrossed to the music and feel what they need to feel.

Rarely going into blast beats or fast speeds, the album keeps a mostly mid-paced tempo to it – its dark nature sucking you in with each kick of the bass drum. The muddied vocals give grief, anger, and sorrow, keeping with the overall tone of the album. The song, Í köldum faðmi is a perfect example of all of that.

While the title track offers a bit of optimism, the album constantly keeps you down, throwing the listener back into the cacophonous well.

While straying a slight bit from the overall sound of Icelandic black metal, Vitahríngur still defines its own sound with a nihilistic approach and gloomy dissonance.

https://darkdescentrecords.bandcamp.com/album/vitahr-ngur

Honourable Mentions:

Ungfell – Es grauet

Anneke van Giersbergen – The Darkest Skies are the Brightest

Cerebral Rot – Excretion of Mortality

Dordeduh – Har

Hulder – Godslastering: Hymns of a Forlorn Peasantry

The Crown – Royal Destroyer

Japanese Breakfast – Jubilee

Proscriptor McGovern’s Apsû – Proscriptor McGovern’s Apsû

Havukruunu – Kuu Erkylän Yllä EP

Most Disappointed:

Steven Wilson – The Future Bites

Darkthrone – Eternal Hails

Bent Knee – Frosting

Review: Blessed by Perversion – Remnants of Existence

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Blessed by Perversion – Remnants of Existence
Iron, Blood and Death Corporation

Brutally intense with some pulse-pounding riffs and beats, Blessed by Perversion’s second album, Remnants of Existence, is a thrilling album for death metal fans to really engage with.

Ironically (or coincidentally) the Greek band released their album on Christmas Day in 2020. Their six-track album hits the ground running and setting a mood of what they’re trying to accomplish. The intro track, Descending into the Catacombs, is a slow minute-fifteen-long burn as the listener becomes surrounded by the sounds and sights the music creates in their mind. Then come the double kicks and Gallery of Bones picks the album up.

Flowing with mid-paced and rhythmic chugging for a short while, a sudden change in structure is where Hell breaks loose. Guitar and bass change – the tempo picks up and the listener is slammed with a wall of brutality. With an impressive guitar solo and well-placed, almost groovy riffs near the end of the track, the song ends only to be carried by an even heavier track, Atonement Refused.

Feeling more in-place with mid-90s death metal, Atonement Refused rips through with blistering speed. The hefty chugs within the chorus, followed by its technical bridge – and well-placed bass groove – changes up with moments of a Phrygian scale and mirrors something sounding almost from Nile. However, it doesn’t come across like a “copy” as the ideas fits within the atmosphere and feeling Remnants of Existence is aiming to create.

Within Among the Tombs of Absent Gods, the crushing riffs don’t stop. Feeling even darker than the last track, the album continues its descent for the listener. With layered vocals, the growls become more sinister and absorb the listener down the band’s dark path.

In Caverns of Torture, there’s a Cannibal Corpse-y feel to the song with its finger tapping intro and addition to more treble on bass guitar. The pounding chorus with pinched harmonics, along with the slamming snare adds some interesting colour to the already impressive track. After a bit of a break down, the song resets itself with the finger tapping intro and descends into madness with a dark guitar solo and filthy riffs that really pushes out the aggression.

The anthem-like Within Monumental Chaos concludes the album with probably the more memorable chorus on the album. The song features a descending scale with a technical breakdown which, in my opinion, really encapsulates the songwriting prowess of Blessed by Perversion. With a sweeping guitar solo, the song begins its double-kick conclusion as it wraps up the album with an epic, yet dark feeling.

Every song on the album was an impressive feat. While bass could been louder in some moments and kick drums may feel over-processed in some parts, Remnants of Existence floored me with quality in both production and song-writing capability. Rarely do I get to review albums from independent bands that really knock me off my feet.

A technically brilliant and dark, haunting journey, Blessed by Perversion’s Remnants of Existence is an album within the death metal realm that should not be missed.

Blessed by Perversion on Bandcamp

Review: Bloodfeast Ritual – Altars of Sacrifice

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Bloodfeast Ritual – Altars of Sacrifice
Self-release

In their debut EP Altars of Sacrifice, Los Angeles band Bloodfeast Ritual serve up the guts and glory of old school death metal alongside a variety of death metal styles.

With relentless energy throughout each song, the 20-minute EP perseveres with a battery of brutality mixed in with many melodic moments. In the opening track Grave Fodder, the very-Swedish death metal influence shines through. Many unison riffs in the higher register initially present the band similar to one like Arch Enemy – with epic choruses and bright solos – the song provides a lot of heft among the beauty.

That beauty, however, somewhat disappears within the next song title: Eternally Molested By The One Most Foul. With the band still reeling Swedish death influences, the song itself begins to show a different sound the band is going for. With an influence more similar to the band Death, the song features lots guitar prowess while still being a cohesive song. Riffs and chugging dominate the majority of the song with more-shredding than melodic solos in-between.

And yet, the style changes yet again, rather smoothly into classic death metal with No More Room in Hell. Featuring some of the more guttural vocals on the album, the music also feels heavier. The layered vocals hearken to Aborted, but the music to something like Cannibal Corpse. Fast and devastating, the lyrics even evoke the scenes from Dawn of the Dead: “Eat them one by one / Feast upon the intestines / Smell of death fills the air.”

The heaviest song on the album, Chopped Up and Burned, is the song with the most weight. Blast beats abound, the darkest lyrics, the dirtiest riffs: the song has it all. The very traditional death metal sound is the clear inspiration for the song, with some of the more fast and intense solos the album has to offer.

Concluding the EP with the shortest track, Fetid Offering is the “newest-sounding” song on the album, with melody similar to the first track and guttural vocals reaching some of the higher registers, almost becoming screams. The song ends the EP on a high note with a steady growing, epic-feeling conclusion which somewhat contrasts the rest of the album.

With plenty of ideas mixed together as an EP, it shows many different avenues Bloodfeast Ritual can take. Although each song is brilliantly constructed, as a cohesive whole, the listener may get mixed messages to what the sound the band really wants to achieve.

Consistently brutal and relentlessly thrashy, Bloodfeast Ritual’s Altars of Sacrifice is an impressive and intense debut showcasing the many musical influences and songwriting prowess the band has to offer.

Bloodfeast Ritual on Bandcamp

Review: Deathcraeft – On Human Devolution

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Deathcraeft – On Human Devolution
Self-release

Deathcraeft’s debut and concept album, On Human Devolution, features lots of juicy riffs and hefty blast beats with lyrics that explore the socio-political and self-destructing nature of humanity. With clear influences from Testament, Possessed, and Aborted come together, this Greek band offers a surprisingly genuine effort of great arrangements and solid songwriting.

While the The Ritual starts things off with lots of heft and thrash metal influence, The Beginning of the End really kick starts the album with brilliant riffs and chugging that are catchy as hell. The song also starts to showcase more death metal influences in the band while still holding its thrash-like feel – the guitar and bass sounds feel thick and heavy and filled with a groove that almost adds a Pantera-like influence to the song.

Spreading Lies fluctuates with tempos and provides a lot of different highlights throughout the song which feel naturally powerful with its upbeat, catchy chorus.

The fourth track, Welcome to Oblivion, features the closest resemblance to the Possessed/Testament-influence. The groovy descending riffs layered on top of the battering double kicks really strike the listener with intensity. The chorus has triumphant moments which do not detract from the brutality before it, and ripping solos compliment the chorus as it transitions back into the verses.

If there’s one major compliment to give, singer Nikonas Tsolakos offers a wide range with his vocal styles. Whether grunts, growls, screams, or gutteral whispers, there’s a versatile mix of singing provided on the album which keeps the album fresh and easily digestible for listeners who may shy away from the more lower range of death metal vocals.

While featuring one of the better solos on the album, Survival slows down the pace the album has been running with. As a six minute song, it becomes a bit of a fight to bring the album back up again with the next song, Daydreaming in the Abyss, which arguably could have been the slower song transitioning into Paving the Way. However, the slow down allows the listener a bit of breathing room to absorb what they’ve heard before and perhaps realize a lot of the riffs and songwriting had been thematic in many songs – something that can be overlooked and certainly is not common in the death/thrash genre.

With the longest song on the album, Free into the Void is the most climatic song on the album – fitting to conclude the 48-minute concept album off properly – as it closes with a dripping-with-mood conclusion. With some of the heaviest riffs and fastest double kicks on the album, the song’s outro ends rather triumphantly – almost pulling from the folk metal sub genre with feelings of Amon Amarth shining through.

Intense, brutal, and surprisingly progressive, Deathcraeft’s debut throws lots of surprises at the listener to make a impressively creative debut.

Deathcraeft – On Human Devolution

Have You Heard? The Top 10 Death Metal Albums of the Past Five Years

On By UncannyDerekIn Editor's Pick, Music, Music ReviewsLeave a comment

2020 has been one helluva year so far with new releases (not to mention other global issues). We wanted to go back and look at what really impressed us over the past five years – reminding us of easier, pre-COVID times. Given the vast nature of the death metal genre, we wanted to highlight some of what we felt were stand-out releases from 2015-2019. If you feel we missed anything, let us know in the comments below!


Outre-Tomb – Répurgation
HSP Productions, 2015

From Quebec, Canada, Outre-Tomb slam you down in their first track, L’antre de l’horreur and keep the pace up all the way to the end. Crisp production with an old-school vibe, Outre-Tombe’s debut establishes the band as a brutal force to be reckoned with. With incredible tempo-changing tracks like Psychose Toxique and thrash-influenced tunes like Mutation, Répurgation stands out as not only a solid debut but a must-listen to. Their 2018 album, Nécrovortex, should also be looked at (and spun regularly).


Aborted – Retrogore
Century Media, 2016

Seasoned musicians Aborted came out with a refreshing, almost up-beat album in Retrogore. With lyrical content based on the vibes the album cover gives, Retrogore is filled with blast beats, filth, and ripping guitars that makes us want to go back and listen to it again and again. Sven de Caluwé’s vocal versatility gives the impression there’s more than one singer on the album – and truly livens up the music. With its technical prowess and often-catchy hooks, Retrogore is hands-down one of Aborted’s best albums.


Gorguts – Pleiades’ Dust
Season of Mist, 2016

Our second band from Quebec, Gorguts’ follow up from 2013’s Colored Sands is vastly different than anything the band has released before. This 33-minute behemoth speaks about the fall of the House of Wisdom. While both historical and introspective in narrative, the music is beyond outstanding. With ebbs and flows, peaks and falls, each movement in the song speaks for itself. This is also the first album where Gorguts leader Luc Lemay allowed creative input from the rest of the band. The song speaks for itself.


Rude – Remnants…
F.D.A. Rekotz, 2017

The second album from the California death heads, Rude’s Remnants… is a reminder of what got us here regarding death metal in the first place. With production strongly resembling early-Morbid Angel, the songs are fresh and the riffs are heavy. Songs like Blood Sucker and Sanctuary are real bangers, while Fracturing the Gates of Truth really encompasses everything the band has to offer. Their 2014 album Soul Recall may have established the band to many, but it’s with Remnants… that Rude really blew us away.


Artificial Brain – Infrared Horizon
Profound Lore Records, 2017

The more this album is listened to the more there is to take away. Using technology to their advantage, there is always something that feels different on an Artificial Brain album. Bright, clean guitar tones mixed with a treble-laden bass guitar gives the band a truly unique feel. Their dissonant, diminished chords and song structures add a brilliant sense of drama to their music that is rarely encapsulated in the death metal genre. The beautifully sinister chorus from Estranged in Orbit is a testament to that. This is an album you must check out.


Ulthar – Cosmovore
20 Buck Spin, 2018

While we have just reviewed their 2020 release Providence, Ulthar’s debut Cosmovore is really something else. Ulthar manages to merge different genres together seamlessly on Cosmovore. The second track, Solitarian blends both screams and guttural vocals to give a wild impression to the music. The cool pacing of Infinite Cold Distance gives a plethora of different riffs and many crazy moments that absolutely impress. A debut album you definitely do not want to miss.


Augury – Illusive Golden Age
The Artisan Era, 2018

Yet another Quebecois metal band (believe us, the amount of bands from Quebec was unintentional), Augury returned from their nine year hiatus and did not disappoint. Incredibly brutal at times while still operatic during others, Augury provides a little bit of everything in their third album. Ripping scales and tempo changes galore, Augury still remind us on what Atheist would sound like if they upped the ante. With their mechanical prowess as strong as ever, The Illusive Golden Age is a triumph in technical death metal.


Ares Kingdom – By the Light of Their Destruction
Nuclear War Now! Productions, 2019

Intense and thrashing, Ares Kingdom’s fourth album hits the mark with their blazing solos and thudding percussion. It’s a rough sounding album which offers the raw feeling you’d want in a death metal album. The Hydra Void kicks off a brilliant start to the album with the pounding drums on the low toms and double-kick. Burn, Antares (Scorpius Diadem) comes with incredibly catchy riffs, while The Bones of All Men is just a magnificent ride into what death metal has to offer as a genre with its ungodly chugging. Ares Kingdom proves that four albums in, bands can still release their best material (see Aborted – Retrogore).


Tomb Mold – Planetary Clairvoyance
20 Buck Spin, 2019

While Manor of Infinite Forms put them on the map, Planetary Clairvoyance, Tomb Mold’s third album, is just brutally enjoyable. The horror from their previous two albums bleeds into the science-fiction and alien-filled world of this release. The real charm from the band was arguably how simple everything sounds, yet comes together cohesively as a technical achievement. While songs like Beg For Life and Heat Death may only offer a handful of riffs, vocalist/drummer Max Klebanoff keeps things fresh with his variations in percussion. The old school death metal sound with modern production doesn’t get any better than it does with Tomb Mold.


Blood Incantation – Hidden History of the Human Race
Dark Descent, 2019

As most bands honor the legacies of the bands who came before them, Blood Incantation celebrates them. From Death and Gorguts to Pink Floyd and King Crimson – Hidden History of the Human Race comes with a plethora of new ideas and an unfathomably brilliant atmosphere to make an outstanding record to end 2019 with. The band’s thought provoking and technically savvy songs are intense, ambient, and most importantly, heavy as all hell. Unlike many death metal albums, there’s groove and feel that comes with many of the songs, such as the stoner-riffic Inner Paths (to Outer Space). There’s many incredible moments on this album. It’s not only a must-listen, but a must-own.

Top 20 Albums of the Decade (2010-2019)

On By UncannyDerekIn Editor's Pick, Honest Reviews, Music, Top AlbumsLeave a comment

As 2019 comes to a close, I decided to go back and think about what really impressed me over the last ten years. There was so much new music this decade, one may think it was difficult to come up with a list.

You know what? It was!

On average, I listen to about 50 new albums every year. Times that by a decade and holy smokes – that’s a lot of music!

Initially I had started this list with thirty albums that really impressed me. However, I felt that was a bit too long. Cutting down to twenty was surprisingly easy. It was the painstaking task of sorting the top twenty which really took time.

I only put one album from 2019 in my list as I felt most of the albums released this year are still too “fresh” for me to make a decent judgement call on. You’ll notice what I mean when you see songs that were #1 from 20XX suddenly not holding their own – or even on the list at all!

Albums that are labelled “DNR” means they “Did Not Rank.” This may mean they were in my Honorable Mentions from that year, or maybe missed getting recognized entirely!

Starting off at number twenty. . .

20. Ozric Tentacles – Technicians of the Sacred (2015 – #3)
Fav. song: Changa Masala

This all instrumental double album from these psychedelic English prog rockers is some of their best work in their over thirty year career. Grooving, atmospheric, and just downright fun – it’s definitely their most accessible album for all listeners.

19. Gridlink – Longhena (2014 – #5)
Fav. song: Island Sun

It’s still something I like to call “beautiful grindcore” – there’s something very angelic to Gridlink’s Longhena. Intense as it may be, there’s a sense of beauty and poetry behind all of the chaos.

18. Riverside – Love, Fear, and the Time Machine (2015 – #1)
Fav. song: Lost (Why Should I Be Frightened By a Hat?)

While not all #1 albums can make it to #1 again, in 2015, Riverside’s LF&tTM hit me in the right spot at the right time. Still melancholic, this prog rock album is most peaceful when listened to in the right mood.

17. Spaceslug – Eye the Tide (2018 – #4)
Fav. song: Spaced by One

This is one heck of a dirty album. Sludge/doom/stoner – whatever the genre you wish to call it, Spaceslug’s Eye the Tide delivers. A couple of years later, I still have a bit of the spaceslug in me.

16. Barenaked Ladies – Fake Nudes (2017 – DNR)
Fav. song: The Township of King

Not everything needs to be metal, y’know. The first album on this list which eluded getting ranked before. When one removes the obvious pop-fueled “singles” from the album, what is left is an incredible mix of musicianship and production. Fake Nudes is a relaxing joy to listen to.

15. Bell Witch – Mirror Reaper (2017 – #5)
Fav. song: Mirror Reaper

One of the bleakest albums on the list, Bell Witch’s funeral doom album stretches over an hour and twenty minutes. Foreboding and crushing in darkness, Mirror Reaper is something I play for introspection rather than entertainment.

14. Cannibal Corpse – Torture (2012 – DNR)
Fav. song: Scourge of Iron

One of a few albums that originally had not ranked before, Torture turned around on me. Impacting, aggressive, intense, great production – all these things and more is why I’ve listened to Torture more than any other Cannibal Corpse album this decade.

13. Khôrada – Salt (2018 – #2)
Fav. song: Seasons Of Salt

Salt is still an album that weirds me out – I still haven’t heard anything like it before. With the strangest of production, composition, and sounds, I feel Khôrada will keep me interested for years to come.

12. Marillion – Fuck Everyone and Run (FEAR) (2016 – #10)
Fav. song: Living in F E A R

FEAR has grown on me a lot over the few years it has been out. I spin it regularly and each time I feel something truly historic and beautiful about it. Marillion created an album which continues to give. It’s a wonderful album.

11. Ulver – The Assassination of Julius Caesar (2017 – #2)
Fav. song: So Falls the World

The production on this album won me over, as did the enchanting journey it provided. It’s a producers delight and brilliant fun with headphones on.

10. Aborted – Retrogore (2016 – #7)
Fav. song: Retrogore

In your face and direct, Retrogore ranks high for being self aware and ridiculously good death metal. It’s fast, brutal, and something I spin regularly for having a good time. It has easily became my favourite album of theirs.

9. YOB – Our Raw Heart (2018 – #1)
Fav. song: Beauty in Falling Leaves

An emotional thrill ride, Our Raw Heart delivers with the slow burns of intensity. It’s still one of the most beautiful doom metal albums I’ve ever heard, and most certainly their best sounding release this decade.

8. Gorguts – Pleiades’ Dust (2016 – #3)
Fav. song: Pleiades’ Dust

A modern-day epic, Pleiades’ Dust is a monument to songwriting. As the song/album ebbs and flows, one can really pick out the instrumentation and true “orchestral” beauty that Gorguts puts into their music.

7. Vektor – Terminal Redux (2016 – #1)
Fav. song: Recharging the Void

Bringing me chills by the end of it, Terminal Redux may be one of the best thrash albums I’ve ever heard. With a great story to boot, Vektor knocked it out of the park with such an impactful piece of art.

6. Devin Townsend – Empath (2019 – #1)
Fav. song: Singularity

The only album from 2019 on my list, Empath ranks so high because it certainly deserves it. Much like Khôrada’s Salt, Empath brings something new to the table. For that, it must be recognized.

5. Triptykon – Melana Chasmata (2014 – #1)
Fav. song: Tree of Suffocating Souls

Where would I be without Triptykon? Some of the most extreme and honest music on the list; this album sings right from the depth of the soul. Melana Chasmata something I spin regularly.

4. Steven Wilson – Hand. Cannot. Erase. (2015 – #2)
Fav. song: Happy Returns

Initially getting beat out by Rivierside in 2015, Steven Wilson now jumps ahead of the pack. The metaphorical lyrics, the subtle musical moments and technical prowess – Hand. Cannot. Erase. is truly one of the best concept albums of the decade.

3. Agalloch – Marrow of the Spirit (2010 – DNR)
Fav. song: Black Lake Nidstang

This Agalloch album is VERY closely contended with my #1 and 2. I’ve been going back and forth for a couple of weeks debating and choosing one over the other. Alas, I had to decide. But first: Marrow of the Spirit, I believe is the best Agalloch album. Not The Mantle and not Pale Folklore. Don’t @ me. Marrow of the Spirit has something rustic, intense, and intrinsically beautiful lingering among all of the chaos.

2. Anathema – Weather Systems (2012 – #1)
Fav. song: Untouchable, Part 1 & 2

Anathema’s Weather Systems may be one of the most beautiful, yet surprisingly sad albums to have ever graced this planet. Musically, it’s genius. Lyrically, it’s poetic and sincere. Weather Systems is a triumph for both the mind and ears.

1. Triptykon – Eparistera Daimones (2010 – DNR)
Fav. song: The Prolonging

From the incredible album cover created by the late and great H.R. Giger, Eparistera Daimones encapsulates all I love in the heavy metal genre. From start to finish, this album absolutely dominates the listener and refuses to let them breathe. Its lyrical content is brutally honest and the music properly reflects that. Songs like Abyss Within My Soul are heavy in both sound and content. My Pain is hypnotically ethereal yet devastating at the same time. It being the segue into the nineteen minute epic, The Prolonging, is absolute genius.

I debated putting both Triptykon albums in my list. It may seem like both albums in my list here are the same: but they’re most certainly not. Eparistera Daimones, coming out of the ashes of Celtic Frost, has a unique quality and sincerity about it. There’s purposeful cracks in the armor. There’s noticeable pain, bleakness, anger, and darkness. I really cannot stress the honesty of this album enough. It’s a masterpiece and work of art wrapped around in doom, aggression, terror, atmosphere, and chaos. The album is non-apologetic for what it is and proudly wears its wounds.

For those reasons and a ton more, is why Eparistera Daimones is truly one of the greatest albums of the decade.

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Until next time, keep on Space Truckin’!