Find
my honorable mentions for EP of the year posted
HERE,
and my top EP’s of the year posted
HERE.
While this year hasn’t been quite as good as 2012, 2013 has been a
pretty good year for metal…ESPECIALLY death metal. That being said, expect a healthy dose of
death. I tried to make this list a
healthy blend of both my opinion/favoritism and a *SOMEWHAT*
unbiased/subjective take on what I thought the best metal albums were. As I said last year, I tend to place a HEAVY
emphasis on progression/innovation within a genre, technicality, lyrical
content and especially replay value.
With that, let’s get to the honorable mentions first. In
no particular order:
Genre: Melodic/Progressive Death Metal
Genre: Technical/Brutal Death Metal
Genre: Death Metal/Tech Death
Rings Of Saturn –
Dingir
Genre: Technical Deathcore
Genre: Post/Progressive Metal
Genre: Progressive Metal/Instrumental
The Burial –
In The Taking Of Flesh
Genre: Blackened Metalcore?/Thrash
For
some reason, this album gets NO love whatsoever, but it’s got pretty much all I
look for in metal.
Infernaeon –
The Cancer Within
Genre: Blackened Death Metal/Technical Death Metal
Blackened
death as it should be. Sounds kind of
like if Aeon added a lot more black metal influence to their sound.
Humanity’s Last Breath
–
Humanity’s Last Breath
Genre: Progressive Deathcore
Vildhjarta,
eat your heart out. By FAR the
hardest-hitting album of the year.
Genre: Technical Death Metal
Trevor
from TBDM approves.
Aenimus –
Transcend Reality
Genre: Progressive/Technical Deathcore
Riffs
for miles.
Of Glaciers –
Heart Museum
Genre: Melodic/Progressive Metalcore
One of the feelsiest metalcore
albums of the year.
Dysmorphic –
Notion Of Causality
Genre: Technical Death Metal
Genre: Deathcore
If I was more of a
fan of straight-up deathcore, this would be up near the top of the whole list.
Scorned Deity –
Adventum
Genre: Blackened/Melodic Death Metal
One of the most
theatrical, epic releases of 2013. I
REALLY struggled with not having this in my top 25…
Immolation –
Kingdom Of Conspiracy
Genre: Death Metal
Carcass –
Surgical Steel
Genre: Melodic Death Metal
Seker –
Transcendence
Genre: Technical/Progressive Death Metal
Fans of “Planetary
Duality”-era The Faceless or a more death metal-ish Abiotic will SHIT THEIR
PANTS. These guys are set to blow up.
And here we go…the top 25!!
Genre: Technical/Blackened/Symphonic Deathcore/Death
Metal
Genre: Symphonic Death Metal
Genre: Progressive Metal
22.
Aether Realm –
One Chosen By The Gods
Genre: Extreme/Folk Metal
Band bio = “WE ARE
NOT FROM FINLAND”
Genre: Progressive/Atmospheric Deathcore
Genre: Technical Thrash Metal
19.
Unhuman –
Unhuman
Genre: Technical/Experimental Death Metal
Some of the most
unique, creative, and off-the-wall death metal I have EVER heard. Unreal.
Genre: Progressive Metalcore
The preview track is
one of my favorite Track 1’s of all time.
17.
Arsis –
Unwelcome
Genre: Technical/Melodic Death Metal
Something doesn’t
feel right about having Arsis, who are one of my favorite bands of all time, at
number 17, especially considering how incredible this album was….
16.
Rivers Of Nihil –
The Conscious Seed Of Light
Genre: Death Metal
Rivers Of Nihil is
going to take over the death metal world – pretty much universally-praised
album from everybody here.
15.
Shores Of Elysium –
Entity In The Void
Genre: Technical Deathcore
Some people compare
Shores of Elysium to Within The Ruins, but I think that’s doing them a
disservice – SOE is MUCH better in pretty much every aspect, minus production. This band pretty much dominated in the riff department in 2013.
Genre: Progressive Death Metal
HOW IS THIS OUTSIDE
OF THE TOP 10, SERIOUSLY. Unfortunately
SOTC didn’t achieve quite the same resonance with “End Game” as they did with
their self-titled, but this is still a phenomenal album.
13.
Dissonance In Design –
Sentient
Genre: Progressive/Melodic Death Metal
Imagine a mixture of
Fallujah and Vale Of Pnath…not too shabby, huh? Not only does this band does a wonderful job weaving a great story (the concept of the album is metal-as-hell by itself), but they also find a way to create a nuanced, immersive atmosphere that perfectly complements each chapter of the album's story. Oh, and THE RIFFS.
Genre: Progressive/Atmospheric Metal
This album is so high
almost entirely because of the chorus in the preview song…literally the most
beautiful lyrics I have ever heard/seen.
Genre: Blackened/Avant-Garde Death Metal
Well this had to be
on here, didn’t it? No AOTY list is
complete without it.
10.
Persefone –
Spiritual Migration
Genre: Progressive/Melodic Death Metal
One of those albums
that absolutely hits you in the fucking face and screams “HEY, WE HAVE INSANE
TALENT AND WE KNOW HOW TO USE IT.”
9.
Protest The Hero –
Volition
Genre: Progressive/Technical Metal
My favorite album of
theirs’. Out-of-this-world technicality.
8.
The Black Dahlia
Murder –
Everblack
Genre: Melodic Death Metal
Until Ne Obliviscaris
comes out with 10 years worth of incredible albums, TBDM is my favorite band,
period. Definitely not their best work
to date, but it’s still Dahlia.
Genre: Blackened/Avant-Garde Death Metal
What you wouldn’t
have expected is that this album was actually better than Gorguts’ release from
this year. Deep, dense, dark, twisted,
and evil-as-all-fuck.
Genre: Progressive Death Metal
This album will
change the prog death metal scene. Count
on it.
5.
Erra –
Augment
Genre: Progressive Metalcore
This album was
somehow number 5 on my album of the year list, despite being probably my most
disappointing release of 2013…I had such high expectations after “Impulse”, and
this album didn’t QUITE live up to them.
Regardless, a phenomenal achievement by a band that’s poised to explode
as the kings of American metalcore.
4.
Caligula’s Horse –
The Tide, The Thief, And The River’s End
Genre: Progressive Metal/Alternative Rock
You are seriously
fucking up if you don’t give this a chance.
Soaring, beautiful vocals, outrageous technicality and composition, and influences
from approximately 3 jillion different genres.
If you take a chance on one album this year, PLEASE let it be this one.
Genre: Symphonic Death Metal
God mode. The production is kinda meh (should’ve been
mastered a little quieter to get rid of the “wall-of-noise” effects), but
whatever. The album is insane enough to
make up for it.
2.
Ovid’s Withering –
Scryers Of The Ibis
Genre: Symphonic/Progressive Deathcore
Fuckin Ovdi, am I
right? FLAWLESS album. Do I even need to justify this one any
further?
Genre: Progressive/Melodic/Blackened Death Metal
I’ll say now what I
said when I first heard these guys:
Shaded Enmity do for death metal some of what Ne Obliviscaris do for
black metal. Unparalleled passion,
emotion, and composition. A more than
deserving #1 album of the year, and NOBODY ELSE IS GIVING THIS ALBUM ITS
DUES. FIX IT!
