Metal Injection is about to celebrate its twelfth anniversary, and with every passing year, I look forward to writing this Albums of the Year column less and less, mostly because I've already written about how great these albums are. One thing I love about the crew of writers we have is the diversity in taste shown by all of them, and showing just how massive a genre metal is.
So it's late in the year, you've probably already read a bunch of these and chances are you are just going to scan the list anyway, so I'll keep things simple. I'll just post the album and one or two sentences each.
10) Cult Leader – Lightless Walk
These guys make aggressive-sounding hardcore-inspired metal that woke up more than my morning cup of coffee.
9) Psycroptic – Psycroptic
I will always have a soft spot for melodic and technical death metal and these Tasmanians never fail me.
8) Between The Buried and Me – Coma Ecliptic
I was a huge supporter early on, but they lost me with their last two records, where I felt there was more of an emphasis on noodling than catchy songs. Not with this one. They absolutely nailed it.
7) Cattle Decapitation — The Anthropocene Extinction
The best pure death metal band on the scene today. Vocalist Travis Ryan keeps surprising me with his incredible range and guitarist Josh Elmore brings the shred!
6) Tribulation – Children of the Night
I got into this band because Frank, the dude who co-owns the site with me, just would not shut up about them. Turns out he was right. These guys are labeled a black metal band, but they are so much more. Just listen!
5) Envy — Atheist's Cornea
Randomly stumbled upon this Japanese post-hardcore act when the Deafheaven tour was announced. When I told my friends how much I loved them, they were all like dude…where have you been?. Sorry guys! This one is a total keeper.
4) The Black Dahlia Murder – Abysmal
Not to brag (okay, maybe a little) but I got this album in July, while it was officially being released in the fall. This was the soundtrack to my summer. The Black Dahlia Murder have perfected their formula, but still always offer something new and exciting with their albums.
3) Faith No More – Sol Invictus
I was really worried this album would suck. I could not be more wrong. Not only did it deliver in my headphones, but also watching these songs performed live was a real treat. One of the most fun bands to see live ever.
2) Ghost – Meliora
I don't care about the hype, I don't care about the backlash, what I care about is great music and a great show. And Ghost provides both. I loved their entire discography, but they really took it to a new level with this one, in terms of heaviness and scope. My favorite release of theirs by far.
1) Mutoid Man – Bleeder
Wow, wow, wow. If you had cloned Led Zeppelin and they grew up in the 90s and then found each other and formed a band, this is what they would sound like. Teetering the line between heavy metal and hard rock, this is an album I was able to come back to all year long.
Honorable Mentions
Albums that just missed the cut. Perhaps if I had another month, some of these would end up in the list…
Deafheaven — New Bermuda
Intronaut – The Direction of Last Things
Black Breath — Slaves Beyond Death
Leviathan – Scar Sighted
High on Fire – Luminiferous
Harms Way – Rust
Non-Metal Album of the Year – Giorgio Moroder – Déjà Vu
I first discovered legendary 70s disco producer Giorgio Moroder during his collaboration with Daft Punk a few years ago, and have been digesting his discography whenever I needed a break from metal (which happened a lot this year) and his new album is just the perfect mixtape. Two tracks specifically on the album might be the greatest pop songs ever written, the title track, Déjà Vu featuring Sia and Diamonds featuring Charlie XCX. I played this album out and still go back to it and have as much fun as the first time.
