Josh's Top Albums of 2014

I didn’t listen to nearly as much metal this year as I have in years past, but I hope you can still find something you haven’t heard before here.  Before we go any further, let me remind you that 2014 was a fucking AMAZING year for full-lengths…but not so much for EP’s.

Top 10 EP’s of 2014

Again, keep in mind that 2014 basically flat-out sucked as far as EP selection went…at least in my experience.

10.  Flub – Advent

Genre:  Progressive Death Metal/Experimental

Preview:  “Unrequited”

9.  The Healing – Transcendence

Genre:  Progressive Deathcore/Atmospheric

Preview:  “Continuance”

8.  Lorna Shore – Maleficium

Genre:  Deathcore

Preview:  “Godmaker”

Some of the most evil deathcore the world has ever seen.  This album would be a lot higher on my list, but I’m *really* not big on the chugga-chugga beatdown stuff that they have a tendency to focus on.  Make no mistake – when Lorna Shore focus on shredding, they make my mouth water.

7.  Empyrean Throne – Demonseed

Genre:  Symphonic Death Metal/Black Metal

Preview:  “Follow The Plaguelord”

6.  Aronious – Truth in Perception

Genre:  Technical/Progressive Death Metal

Preview:  “Disillusionment I”

If The Faceless & Fallujah are your thing, prepare to go from 6 to midnight.

5.  Writhen -  Condemned

Genre:  Deathcore/Death Metal

Preview:  “Son of Sin”

These guys sound like an insane mash-up of Wretched, Decades of Despair, and some Thy Art is Murder.  So ridiculously heavy…don’t miss out on this one!

4.  Delusions of Grandeur – Reclamation

Genre:  Progressive Deathcore

Preview:  “Reclamation”

I’m actually pretty amazed that there were even 3 EP’s that I enjoyed as much (or more) this year, with how good that preview track is.

3.  The Ralph – Fragments

Genre:  Progressive Metal

Preview:  “Fractured”

Easily the most under-the-radar release of the year.  I saw MAYBE 2 or 3 others posting about this album, but it was one of my most-played of 2014.

2.  Warforged – Essence of the Land

Genre:  Blackened/Atmospheric Death Metal

Preview:  “Essence of the Land”

This album made me feel like I was being dragged into the swamp by a monster.  So fucking dark, deep, and spooky.  Just watch that preview video, HNNNGGGHHH.  I thought for sure this album would be a shoe-in for the top EP of the year, until….

1.  Erra – Moments of Clarity

Genre:  Progressive Metalcore

Preview:  “Moments of Clarity”

This might just be one of my favorite albums of all time, EP or otherwise…seriously.  I can’t recall any album, past or present, that has made me feel like “Moments” on a consistent basis – I’m getting goosebumps even thinking about it.  Plus the chorus of the preview song has probably the first lyrics I’d ever even consider getting tattoed on my body, since they resonate so incredibly strongly:

“The dreams that I have followed are breathing lungs full of air right before my eyes.”

Erra has more than validated their place on the throne of the metalcore kingdom, and nobody else is even close.

1A.  Mandroid Echostar – Citadels

Genre: Progressive Metal

Preview:  “The Sleeper” / “Ethereal Dawn”

This album shouldn’t even be on my list for 2014, since it came out in November 2013, but it wasn’t on my list last year…I didn’t even know this album existed until May of this year, and I couldn’t’ live with myself NOT giving this album the credit it so richly deserves.  You know how I just said that Erra was up there on my all-time list?  Well, so is this album, and perhaps even higher.

Mandroid Echostar sounds like an INCREDIBLE blend of I Am Abomination, Protest The Hero, and Coheed and Cambria, if you’ve never heard them before.  Insane guitar acrobatics, catchy lyrics, soaring vocal melodies, and songwriting and vocal abilities rival ANY of those bands.

“Citadels” has absolutely INFINITE replay value, and it’ll be one of those albums that I’ll still be blasting in my car when I’m old enough to be a grandfather.

Top 30 Full Lengths of 2014

2014 was impossibly good for metal, so a lot of deserving albums didn’t even make the cut in my honorable mentions…sorry if the album you were looking for isn’t on here!

By the way…Unique Leader completely owned 2014.  When you’re a (relatively) small label, and you put out like 7 or 8 albums that are more than good enough to contend in a “Best of” list, you’re doing something right.   That being said…let’s get to the list.

Honorable Mentions

Creatures of Habit – Hyperion

Genre:  Technical Death Metal

Preview:  “Knife of the Fortified”

Wretched – Cannibal

Genre:  Technical Death Metal/Thrash

Preview:  “Cranial Infestation”

This band never fails to riff me to death, and this is their best offering since “Beyond the Gate”.  I almost hate myself that this isn’t in my top 30.

Acrania – Totalitarian Dystopia

Genre:  Technical/Brutal Deathcore/Slam

Preview:  “Disillusion in a Discordant System”

Fuck You And Die – Elements of Instability

Genre:  Technical Death Metal

Preview:  “Roar, Allay, and Alter”

Septycal Gorge – Scourge of the Formless Breed

Genre:  Technical/Brutal Death Metal

Preview:  “No Spawn No Reign (Sons of Enoch, Pt. 1)”

Bloodbath – The Grand Morbid Funeral

Genre:  Death Metal/Blackened Death Metal

Preview:  “Anne”

So.  Fucking.  Heavy.

Allegaeon – Elements of the Infinite

Genre:  Progressive/Technical Death Metal/Thrash

Preview:  “1.618”

Well, Allegaeon definitely win the top music video of the year for the preview song.

At The Gates – At War With Reality

Genre:  Melodic Death Metal

Preview:  “The Book of Sand (The Abomination)”

Adversary – Ruination

Genre:  Melodic Death Metal

Preview:  “A Hero’s Tragedy”

For fans of bands like Amon Amarth!

The Dali Thundering Concept –  Eyes Wide Opium

Genre:  Progressive Metal/Deathcore/Mathcore

Preview:  “Phoenix (feat. Nick from Molotov Solution)”

Abysmal Dawn – Obsolescence

Genre:  Death Metal

Preview:  “Perfecting Slavery”

Artificial Brain – Labyrinth Constellation

Genre:  Death Metal/Post-Death Metal?/Atmospheric Death Metal

Preview:  “Absorbing Black Ignition”

For fans of Portal, Ulcerate, Gorguts.  Also, this is a side project of one of the guys from Revocation!

Shokran – Supreme Truth

Genre:  Progressive Deathcore/Groove/Djent

Preview:  “Dark Desert”

Architects – Lost Forever // Lost Together

Genre:  Metalcore

Preview:  “Gravedigger”

The Seer – The Seer

Genre:  Progressive/Symphonic/Melodic Death Metal

Preview:  “Embrace Pestilence” / “Eternal Cataclysm”

This album was the hardest of all to leave out of my top 30…

Ageless Oblivion – Penthos

Genre:  Progressive/Melodic Death Metal

Preview:  “A Crawling Ingression”

The Antioch Synopsis – The Antioch Synopsis

Genre:  Technical Deathcore

Preview:  “A Foreign Concept of Forgiveness”

Monuments – The Amanuensis

Genre:  Progressive Metal

Preview:  “I, The Creator”

The Top 30 Full Lengths

30.  Hope For The Dying – Aletheia

Genre:  Metalcore/Death Metal

Preview:  “Acceptance”

29.  Separatist – Motionless & Closure

Genre:  Death Metal/Blackened Deathcore

Preview:  “Deluge Arterial” / “The Reprieve”

This was technically two albums, but they were released on the same day, so I’ll just go ahead and count it as one…Anyways, some of the most diverse, heavy, gloomy music of 2014.

28.  Bloodshot Dawn – Demons

Genre:  Technical/Melodic Death Metal

Preview:  “Demons”

The blasts at 2:52 in the preview song will LEGITIMATELY make you feel like running through a fucking brick wall, guaranteed.

27.  Aeon of Horus – Existence

Genre:  Progressive/Melodic Death Metal

Preview:  “Dissipate”

Un-fucking-believable musicianship.

25.  Structures – Life Through A Window

Genre:  Metalcore/Hardcore

Preview:  “Follower (feat. Adrian from Northlane)”

Easily the surprise album of the year – I usually don’t enjoy this type of music at all, and I’ve never really been into Structures, but Life is savage.

24.  Silent Planet – The Night God Slept

Genre:  Progressive Metalcore/Hardcore/Emotional?

Preview:  “Tiny Hands (Au Revoir)”

The best metalcore full length of the year….with one exception.  This album also went unbelievably under the radar.

23.  Mapmaker – Automation

Genre:  Progressive/Atmospheric Deathcore

Preview:  “Genesis”

22.  Mors Principium Est – Dawn of the 5^th Era

Genre:  Melodic Death Metal

Preview:  “Monster In Me”

21.  Alterbeast – Immortal

Genre:  Technical Death Metal/Deathcore

Preview:  “Flesh Bound Text”

Unique Leader album #1 in the top 21.

20.  Son of Aurelius – Under A Western Sun

Genre:  Progressive Death Metal

Preview:  “The Great Liberation” / “Chorus of the Earth”

19.  Beyond Creation – Earthborn Evolution

Genre:  Progressive/Technical Death Metal

Preview:  “Elusive Reverence”

18.  Archspire – The Lucid Collective

Genre:  Technical Death Metal

Preview:  “Spontaneous Generation”

17.  Hour of Penance – Regicide

Genre:  Technical Death Metal

Preview:  “The Sun Worship”

16.  Invent, Animate – Everchanger

Genre:  Progressive Metalcore

Preview:  “Nocturne:  Lost Faith”

The top metalcore full length of the year, hands-down.

15.  The Contortionist – Language

Genre:  Progressive Metal

Preview:  “Thrive”

14.  Hideous Divinity – Cobra Verde

Genre:  Technical Death Metal/Holy Shit

Preview:  “Alonest of the Alone (feat. Dallas from Nile)”

Unique Leader album #2 in the top 21.

13.  Inanimate Existence – A Never Ending Cycle Of Atonement

Genre:  Progressive/Technical Death Metal

Preview:  “Bioluminescent Photophores”

Unique Leader album #3 in the top 21.

12.  Nero di Marte – Derivae

Genre:  Death Metal/Doom Metal/Post Death Metal

Preview:  “Il Diluvio”

THE FEELS OH GOD

11.  Nexilva – Eschatologies

Genre:  Symphonic/Blackened Deathcore

Preview:  “Eschatologies”

10.  Hadal Maw – Senium

Genre:  Progressive Death Metal/Post Death Metal

Preview:  “Coil” / “Altar of Ire”

9.  Aborted – The Necrotic Manifesto

Genre:  Death Metal/Brutal Death Metal/Deathgrind

Preview:  “Chronicles of Detruncation”

8.  Fall In Archaea – Aura Magenta

Genre:  Progressive Metalcore/Mathcore

Preview:  “Aureolin”

If mathy breakdowns or grooves in the vein of Danza have ever been your thing, prepare to have your neck broken.

7.  Revocation – Deathless

Genre:  Thrash Metal

Preview:  “A Debt Owed To The Grave”

Best riffs of the year, hands-down.

6.  Soreption – Engineering The Void

Genre:  Technical/Industrial (?) Death Metal

Preview:  “Engineering The Void (feat. Trevor Strnad of The Black Dahlia Murder)”

NOBODY sounds like Soreption.  Probably my favorite overall tech death band right now – lightning precise, basically an all-out onslaught of technicality.  And oh by the way, Unique Leader album #4 in the top 21.

5.  Black Crown Initiate – The Wreckage of Stars

Genre:  Progressive Death Metal

Preview:  “The Great Mistake”

4.  Job For A Cowboy – Sun Eater

Genre:  Progressive Death Metal

Preview:  “Sun Of Nihility” / “Buried Monuments”

3.  Inferi – The Path Of Apotheosis

Genre:   Technical Death Metal/OH MY GOD HOW IS HE PLAYING THAT

Preview:  “The Ancients of Shattered Thrones”

Never before has an album so totally made me feel like I’m on a battlefield.  And oh…Unique Leader album #5…

2.  Fallujah – The Flesh Prevails

Genre:  Progressive/Technical Death Metal

Preview:  “Sapphire”

Unique Leader album #6….also, “Sapphire” might actually be one of my favorite songs of all time.

1.  Babymetal – Babymetal

Genre: J-Pop/Power Metal

Preview:  “My Heart Will Go On”

Just kidding, obviously.

1.  Ne Obliviscaris – Citadel

Genre:  Blackened Death Metal/Black Metal

Preview:  “Painters Of The Tempest (Parts I – III)”

I’m genuinely confused how anybody could have anything else at #1 – if “Citadel” wasn’t your top album from last year, I’m immediately going to assume you either didn’t hear it or you’re deaf, and still didn’t hear it.