I was lazy in 2017, so enjoy this. A massive list of the 15 best EP’s (+6
honorable mentions), and the 60 best LP’s (+20 honorable mentions) from the
past two years. Very little commentary
to save me time. If you don’t see one of
your favorites on here, just remember that I had more than 200 contenders
written down, and I might’ve missed it.
These years, I put a *heavy* emphasis on what albums I had
the most *fun* listening to…not just what was objectively the “best”
albums. Hopefully you guys enjoy it, and
find a bunch of new stuff!
Top
EP’s of the year
There is WAAAAYYYY more deathcore in my EP of the year list
than there is in my album of the year list, if you’re not a big deathcore guy.
Honorable Mentions
A Trust Unclean – Parturition (2017)
Genre: Deathcore/Blast Beats
Preview: Exonerate
Eartheria – Awaken the Sun (2018)
Genre: Progressive Death Metal/JFAC/Virvum
Preview: Escapist
Nociceptor – Penumbra (2017)
Genre: Progressive Metal/Monstrous Grooves
Preview: Conduit
Avenge the Sin – Atonement (2017)
Genre: Deathcore/The Crimson Armada but Broooootal
Preview: False Awakening
In Reverence – The Selected Breed (2017)
Genre: Death Metal/Blast Beats
Preview: The Sixth Bloodletting
Top 15 EP’s of
the year
15. Zeolite – Sermones Mortis (2018)
Genre: Deathcore/Death Metal/Impending Doom/Paradise
in Exile
Preview: Ruination
Get ready to
have your face ripped off. Some of the
hardest music released in the past 2 years.
Genre: Deathcore/Australia
Preview: Lifelike
OK, so the
preview song is actually a single they released after the EP, but the EP
absolutely rips, trust me.
Genre: Progressive Rock/Metal
Preview: Closure
One of my
favorite songs of the year. Almost
unfairly catchy.
Genre: Technical Deathcore/ “Unhallowed”-era Dahlia
worship
Preview: Unto Ashes
The chorus in
the preview song is one of the most violently headbangable riffs I’ve
heard. If you’re looking for a band that
sounds a lot like they could’ve written a song like “Elder Misanthropy”, this
is it.
11. Blame –
Almanac (2018)
Genre: Technical Death Metal/Russian Insanity/Taking
Your Last Chance
Preview: War
10. Epiphany from the Abyss
– Epiphany from the Abyss (2018)
Genre: Technical/Blackened Deathcore
Preview: The Bargain
9. Delusions of Grandeur –
Apotheosis (2018)
Genre: Progressive Deathcore
Preview: Groovetrain
Artwork of the
year, other than Bell Witch and Archspire.
8. Omnisium
– Celestial Filicide (2018)
Genre: Technical Deathcore/Crimson Armada
Preview: Full Album
7. The
Odious Construct – Shrine of The Obscene (2018)
Genre: Blackened/Extreme Deathcore
Preview: Full Album
6.
The
Hopewell Furnace – 1877 (2018)
Genre: Technical Deathcore
Preview: Coffin Notice, Pt II
5. Damned Spring
Fragrantia – Chasm (2017)
Genre: Progressive Metalcore/Bounce
Preview: Pages
That preview
song has one of the most violent grooves you’ll ever hear right smack-dab in
the beginning of that song, and I’d be shocked if it didn’t get you moving.
4. Mordant Rapture –
The Abnegation (2018)
Genre: Technical/Progressive Death Metal/Obscura
Preview: Unsightly Beast
Artisan Era
needs to stop.
Genre: Progressive Metalcore/Heart of a Coward
Preview: Lavender
2. Kardashev
– The Almanac (2017)
Genre: Atmospheric/Progressive Metal/Beauty/Fallujah
Preview: Beside
Cliffs and Chasms
Aluuuuuneeeeaaaaaaaaaa...
Kardashev literally made a new language for this song. +5000 prog points.
Kardashev literally made a new language for this song. +5000 prog points.
1. Nexilva – Aseity I (2018)
Genre: Progressive/Symphonic/Blackened Death
Metal/Deathcore
Preview: Decades
Couldn’t be any
other album. This was my favorite EP of
the past few years by a large margin.
TOP
FULL LENGTHS OF THE YEAR
Honorable Mentions
Hate Eternal – Upon Desolate Sands (2018)
Genre: Death Metal
Preview: Portal of Myriad
This band is
still as preposterously good at death metal as anybody, even after all these
years.
Voices From
The Fuselage – Odyssey: The Founder of Dreams (2018)
Genre: Progressive/Atmospheric Metal/Beauty/Ashe
O’Hara
Preview: Vestibule of Hell
Ugh, god I miss
Ashe so much in Tesseract. Dan is good,
but his vocals sound cold and soulless compared to Ashe.
Fit for an Autopsy – The Great Collapse (2017)
Genre: Deathcore
Preview: Black Mammoth
In Vain – Currents (2018)
Genre: Progressive/Melodic Death Metal
Preview: Soul Adventurer’
Soen – Lykaia (2017)
Genre: progressive metal/Tool/Opeth worship
Preview: Opal
Dance Gavin Dance – Artificial Selection (2018)
Genre: Progressive Rock/Pop-Punk
Preview: Evaporate (feat. Andrew from
Eidola)
By far the best
song DGD has ever made, and is it any wonder that it features Andrew from
Eidola on vocals this time? (He’s one of
their touring guitarists)
Unflesh – Savior (2018)
Genre: Technical Blackened Death Metal
Preview: Bestowal of Decay
Hieroglyph – Ouroboros (2017)
Genre: Progressive Metal
Preview: Enochian
(The Hermit)
One of the most
criminally underappreciated releases from the past 2 years.
Dodecahedron – Kwintessens (2017)
Genre: Black Metal
Preview: Tilling the Human Soil
The
Breathing Process
– Samsara (2018)
Genre: Blackened Deathcore
Preview: Absolute Truth
Tetrafusion – Dreaming of Sleep (2017)
Genre: Scale the Summit with Vocals / Progressive
Metal
Preview: The Void
That preview
song is one of the best prog songs I’ve heard in YEARS.
Through
the Eyes of the Dead
– Disomus (2017)
Genre: Death Metal
Preview: Obitual
The Kings are
back.
Sorrow Plagues – Homecoming (2017)
Genre: Emotional/Atmospheric Black Metal/Deafheaven
but better
Preview: Homecoming
SikTh – The Future in Whose Eyes? (2017)
Genre: RIFFFFFFFFFS
Preview: Century of the Narcissist?
This album
should really, really, really be in my top 60…
Black Tongue – Nadir (2018)
Genre: Low-N-Slow/Deathcore
Preview: Ultima Necat
Gorod – Aethra (2018)
Genre: Technical Death Metal/Prog/Trippy/Jazz?
Preview: Aethra
No, this album
is not named after the hole where your pee comes out. Common misconception. Gorod doing what Gorod always does.
Machines of Man – Dreamstates (2017)
Genre: Progressive metal/BTBAM worship
Preview: I Am The Colossus
If you like
Colors-era BTBAM, you are going to LOVE this.
Currents – The Place I feel Safest (2017)
Genre: Progressive metalcore/bounce
Preview: Apnea
The
Parallel –
Weaver (2018)
Genre: Invent Animate’s Younger Brother
Preview: Chimera
Ingested – The Level Above Human (2018)
Genre: Slam/Brutal Death Metal/Grind
Preview: Better Off Dead
Between the Buried and Me – Automata II (2018)
Genre: Progressive / Avant-Garde Metal
Preview: Condemned to the Gallows
BTBAM’s weakest offering in a while, but it’s still BTBAM,
so who can complain I guess?
Top 60 Full Lengths of the year
Genre: Death Metal/Ulcerate
Preview: Fall to Depravity
Ulcerate worship
never sounded so good. If you’re a fan
of Ulcerate or Gorguts, you’ve GOT to check this out.
Genre: Theatrical/Symphonic Deathcore
Preview: Weavers of Illusion / The Vitruvian Augmentation
These guys are
what Born of Osiris *wishes* they sounded like after “The Discovery”…at least
until their new album dropped at the start of 2019.
Genre: Progressive Metal/The Human Abstract/Metalcore?
Preview: Dizziness Explained
While there isn’t
as much neoclassical influence as THA, these guys will whet a bit of your
appetite for more, especially that preview song.
Genre: Progressive Metal/The Human Abstract/Art By
Numbers
Preview: Unself Portrait
Maybe a bit of
a theme from these first two albums with the Human Abstract influence?
Genre: Progressive/Technical Death Metal/Obscura
Preview: Sons of Ignorance
Should really
be higher up on my list…fans of Obscura will absolutely LOVE this, and will
probably get hooked within the first minute of that preview song.
Genre: Post Metal/Atmospheric
Preview: The White
Genre: Progressive Metal
Preview: King
AsheIsBetterAct, but still the best thing they've done since Altered State.
Genre: Sludge/Doom/Death Metal/Ulcerate
Preview: The Mire
Genre: Death Metal/Groove Metal
Preview: Votive Offerings
Genre: Post Metal
Preview: Wishes Fallen on Deafened
Ears
Genre: Progressive Metalcore/Erra
Preview: Floodgate
Genre: Progressive Metalcore/old
Northlane/Structures worship
Preview: Canvas
Nothing new or
groundbreaking here, just really well-executed Invent Animate/Northlane style
metalcore.
Genre: Progressive Metal/Monuments new album, but
good
Preview: The Scent
The new Monuments
album won’t make this list, but rest assured, at least one band that sounds
like Monuments did.
Genre: Progressive Metal
Preview: Enter Escape
Genre: Deathcore/Beef
Preview: The Son of Misery
Ho-hum, another TAIM album where they absolutely kill it. I hope they change up their formula a bit for the next album, though.
Genre: Blackened Deathcore
Preview: Flesh Coffin
The main reason I put Lorna Shore ahead of TAIM is because they actually made a "new" album, rather than a rehash of the old, and it turned out wicked good.
Genre: Progressive Metal/Tesseract
Preview: Lumen
Genre: Symphonic/Blackened Death Metal/Fleshgod
worship
Preview: Invocation
ov the Kavod
This is EASILY
one of the least-known albums on the list, and I have no idea why. Such a phenomenal album when you’re looking
for something that’ll just tear you apart.
Genre: Prog/Symphonic/Blackened Death/Thrash/Vektor?
Preview: Awakening Inception
While not as good as Vektor, Aepoch is 2018's answer to Vektor's masterpiece from 2016.
Genre: Prog/Tech/Extreme Death Metal/Necrophagist
Preview: Azagthoth
Genre: Progressive Death Metal /Blackwater Park
Opeth
Preview: The Ruby
Maybe the most criminally underappreciated album on the entire list. If you like progressive death metal even a little bit, Barren Earth is an absolute must.
Genre: Progressive Metalcore/Riffs
Preview: Living Ghost
The intro to
that preview song is one of the tightest riffs I’ve ever heard.
Genre: Thrash/Death Metal
Preview: Of Unworldly Origin
Revocation’s
best album ever.
Genre: Technical Death Metal/Grind/Groove
Preview: All You Can
Eat
Genre: Technical Deathcore
Preview: Pillars of
Thought
SHRED SOME MORE! I’ve been
waiting for this album for *years*, and it totally lived up to the billing. The lyrics are kind of stupid, but the fretwork will make any technical deathcore fan salivate.
Genre: Post Metal/Deafheaven, but better
Preview: Heroin Waltz
Sheer beauty. For fans of Alcest.
Genre: Progressive Death Metal/Funk/Groove
Preview: The World Without Us
Genre: Progressive Metal/Funk
Some of the
best clean vocals all year, and such a perfect blend of funk and metal. This album stuck in my head more than almost
any other in the past two years.
Genre: Folk Metal/Extreme Metal/Functional Alcoholism
Preview: The Sun, The Moon, The Stars
Album-To-Chug-Ale-Out-Of-A-Stein-To-Of-The-Year-2017
Genre: Symphonic Deathcore
Preview: The
Heretic Prevails
Ben Duerr’s voice
is the stuff of nightmares.
Genre: Post black metal/death metal
Preview: Soothsayer
Genre: Technical Deathcore/Dictionarycore
Preview: Prismatic Abyss
This band keeps
getting better and better.
Genre: Retro synthpop / darkwave
Preview: Transverberation
I don’t usually like darkwave, but this is SOLID.
Genre: Oppressive/Dissonant Death Metal/Ulcerate
Preview: Inert
One of the best one man bands I’ve heard in YEARS.
Genre: Technical/Epic Death Metal
Malcolm Pugh is not human. Artisan Era is unfair. Everything sucks, but this is good.
Genre: Blackened Death Metal
Preview: Mark of the Necrogram
Best blackened
death metal album in years.
Genre: Progressive/Technical Death Metal
Preview: Immersion
These guys
spent an inordinate amount of time listening to “Harvest Wombs” by Fallujah,
and that’s perfectly OK.
Genre: SCREAMING AS WE’RE BOTH EATEN ALIVE/Spiders
Preview: Catacomb Hecatomb
Dahlia's best since Ritual. Brandon Ellis is the best thing to happen to this band in some time.
Genre: Post Metal/Groove
Preview: The Crimson
Path
These guys are
what I imagine Mastodon would sound like if they stuck to their roots.
Genre: Soreption/Slugdge/Death Metal/Groove
One of the best,
most unrelenting collections of riffs of the past 5 years, with the exception
of a few albums I have yet to get to on this list…
Genre: TRULY Progressive/Atmospheric Death Metal/7 Horns 7
Eyes
Preview: Descent
This is
progressive death metal perfection – and when I say “progressive”, I mean
it. Total originality.
Genre: Progressive Metalcore
Preview: Disarray
Erra’s weakest album, but it’s still Erra, and they're still the Kings of Metalcore.
Genre: Progressive/Technical Death Metal
Preview: Ethereal Skies
Preview: Stillness is Timeless
Maybe one of
the most talented bands in the world. Aathma
is awe-inspiring in scope, and guaranteed to never bore you.
Genre: Technical Death Metal/¥2 beats/min
Preview: Remote Tumor Seeker
Maybe the only
band with a vocalist on the planet that you will probably never, ever, EVER see
anybody able to sing along with at a concert.
Also, *probably* one of the best album covers ever.
Genre: Progressive Metalcore
Preview: Consume / Crooked Path
Mortal Coil may
be my absolute favorite metalcore album since Erra’s Augment. Every track is violently catchy, and they
seem to take elements from all the best bands in the genre and combine them
perfectly.
Genre: Technical/Brutal Death Metal/Massive
Radiation Detected
Preview: Radiatus Generis
The Geiger
counter breakdown in the preview song is one of the coolest things I’ve ever
heard in metal, unnfffff. Beneath the
Massacre says what up.
Genre: Progressive/Theatrical Black Metal
Preview: Libera I: Saturnine Spheres
Again, Ne
Obliviscaris’ weakest album (at least in my opinion)…but it’s still NeO, aka
the best band on the planet. Want
evidence? This is the ONLY preview link
with a live version, because they’re so preposterously good live.
Genre: Progressive/Technical Death Metal
Preview: The Inversion
Genre: Progressive Death Metal/Slugs
Preview: Limo Vincit Omnia
Genre: Progressive Metal/Atmosphere/Extinction Event
The two preview
songs might be two of the best metal songs I’ve ever heard. If the rest of the album held my attention as
consistently as that, Phanerozoic would be in the top 3.
Genre: Progressive Metal/Metalcore/Beauty
Preview: How Fleeting
Catchiest, most sing-alongiest album of the year.
Genre: Technical Death Metal/Groove
Preview: We Were The
Keepers / Beyond
The Black
“Kingdom” is up
there with Wretched’s “Exodus of Autonomy” as one of the most relentless
compendiums of unbelievable riffs ever.
Genre: Technical Death Metal / Groove
Preview: Children of the Automaton / Virulent Well
Soreption
is what Decapitated might’ve evolved into after “Organic Hallucinosis” if Vitek
and Covan didn’t die.
Genre: Heavy metal/thrash/Iron Maiden worship
Preview: Shadow Guide / Awakening
Probably
the best power metal I’ve ever (or will ever) hear. If you’ve never liked power metal, give this
a chance…trust me. I’m not a big power
metal guy, but this album makes me feel like riding a goddamn dragon into
battle.
Genre: Progressive Metal/Jazz Fusion/Darkwave/Indescribable
Preview: Alien Shivers / Ruby Pool
Get ready to be
blown away by something you’ve never heard before. Try to imagine if Meshuggah and Ulver had a
baby that took jazz classes, and knew how to write the ever-loving shit out of
a song.
Genre: Swancore / Progressive Metal
Preview: Tetelestai / Dendrochronology
Eidola is going
to be one of the biggest bands in the scene one day, if there’s any justice in the world. Andrew Wells’ voice is one of the purest things
in metal, and their lyrics are wildly intelligent and thought-provoking.
Genre: Death Metal / Groove / Angus Beef
Preview: Iron Strengthens Iron / This is Fire
The best
flat-out death metal album I think I’ve ever heard, and Mark Morton of Lamb of God agrees -- he called Dyscarnate one of the best bands in metal, just last year after seeing them live. This album will CRUSH you.
Genre: Progressive / Atmospheric Death Metal
Preview: A Home / A Silent Life
It’s not a 2018
album list without Rivers of Nihil’s masterpiece at the top…HOWEVER……..
Genre: Progressive Metal / Reach
Preview: Songs for No One / The Hands Are The Hardest
There has never been a metal album that
resonated with me, and spoke to me the way that “In Contact” did when I first
heard it, and continues to. I literally
get goosebumps from start to finish.
As Jim, the lead singer says, “In the
world in which this album is set, every piece of art is an attempt by human
beings and artists to remember a dream we’ve all shared in the past, that we’ve
all forgotten”. The dream connects us all,
and all of artistic inspiration is an attempt to reach for that
connection. The story of the world is
told through the perspectives of four different artists – a writer, a singer, a
poet, and a sculptor. I won’t spoil the
whole album, but the first preview song “Songs for No One” is about a singer/musician
(maybe back in renaissance times) who’s kind of a Cassanova type with ladies
swooning all over him…but he’s actually gay and needs to hide that fact from
everybody else so he isn’t executed.
Every song that he writes, the ladies he sees think the songs are for
them, but his songs are actually written for his real inspiration/muse – the man
whom he loves – and he expresses his hidden hurt that he cannot reveal his true
self throughout the song.
The rest of the album goes on in that
way. It’s one of the most beautiful
concepts I’ve ever heard, told through beautiful personal stories, and one of
the most well-written, far-scoping, ambitious albums I have ever or will ever
hear. For that reason, not only is “In
Contact” my #1 album of 2017 and 2018, it’s firmly in my top 5 albums in any
genre, ever.
