The end of this year came, which means it‘s time for everyone’s personal or non-personal
annual lists with the best releases for the last twelve months. Many people
stigmatize this year as one of the weakest in our favourite music… and partly
they are right. Besides that this period gave us some great, monumental albums
which, I guarantee, will be remembered for a long time. Here’s some of them in
my humble opinion.
10. Primordial – Where Greater Men Have Fallen
The Irish heathens announced their new album at the very beginning of the year, thus awakening our hunger for more pagan metal. With “Where Greater Men Have Fallen” Primordial didn’t surprised anyone and that’s not necessary. Following their working formula of eight songs, standing at overall long length, each one of them filled with epicness and heroism, they showed us that the quality in their music is constant.
09. Vallenfyre – Splinters
Paradise Lost’s Gregor Mackintosh created this side-project in a very good time for us a few years ago. It’s practically a supergroup containing At The Gates and My Dying Bride members. It’s used by him to release his anger and to show us that his love for extreme metal haven’t faded. This release is a blessed old school death metal filled with punk attitude, fast tempos (which are slowing here and there in the laws of doom metal) and some great rasping guitars.
08. Decapitated – Blood Mantra
“Blood Mantra” continues the musical road taken in Decapitated’s previous album “Carnival Is Forever”. With it Vogg and the others moved away even further from the typical technical death showed in their earlier releases and started to sound more and more like a more extreme version of Meshuggah. For some people this was a disappointing decision. Not for me. Besides that I really do like Rafal “Rasta” Piotrowski’s vocals more.
07. Septicflesh – Titan
Symphonies, orchestrations and death metal? One of the first associations without a doubt is the Greek band Septicflesh. The compositions in “Titan” are extreme enough from the point of view of metal music and at the same time eccentric and epic enough as seen from their symphonic side. Without being pompous at all, Septicflesh are climbing to the top bravely with their different look in music.
06. Misery Index – Killing Gods
“The Killing Gods” is a step away from Misery Index’s typical deathgrind, known in their earlier works. Instead of that it’s much more straightforward death metal. Ignoring that, the album is still a relentless punch in the face for the listener. Now we wait for Dying Fetus’ answer.
05. Sinister – The Post-Apocalyptic Servant
The music in this release may be not innovative but I’ll be damned if it’s not one of the best death metal releases I’ve heard recently. There is something which grabs the listener for the throat. Songs like “The Macabre God”, “The Masquerade Of An Angel”, “The Saviour”, “The Burden Of Mayhem” are one of those which you either absolutely love or hate.
04. Incantation – Dirges Of Elysium
It’s impossible for these American blasphemers to disappoint their fans. John McEntee’s growls are now even more deep and low, the tempo is still varied – from furious blast beats to a much slower doom drumming and riffing. Just pay attention to the closer “Elysium (Eternity is Nigh) – over 16 minutes of bliss and darkness.
03. Behemoth – The Satanist
Nergal succeeded in the battle with leukemia and thanks to all gave us probably his best work. Not without the help of Orion and Inferno, of course. “The Satanist” is a lesson how to make an extreme music, without being ultra fast, technical or brutal in musical point of view. This album is an art.
02. Bloodbath – Grand Morbid Funeral
I’ve awaited with such an eager only one album - “13” by Black Sabbath last year. Until the announcement of Bloodbath’s “Grand Morbid Funeral”. This is a pure Swedish saw-mill. With a new vocalist in the face of Nick Holmes, the swedes look at their strongest level. This release show us how to play an old school death metal in 2014 without falling in citing or self-citing. It shows us that no one is irreplaceable; shows is that Holmes’ death grunts are intact. Four Swedish guys and one British “Old Nick” created a dark and rotten masterpiece. And I thank them for that.
01. Triptykon – Melana Chasmata
Only one album can take the first place from Bloodbath – “Melana Chasmata”. Dark, heavy, hopeless, filled with despair, in the same time beautiful and touching. That’s Triptykon’s art. No matter how happy and bright person you are, you’ll fade at least for a while after listening this work. Even with that in mind you want more and more. Darkness shall rule!
And since it’s not easy to mention only ten titles, even in a weaker year as this, I will make a short analysis as I saw the rest releases in 2014.
Cannibal Corpse gave us another great album containing their good old material. Another good death metal works for the last twelve months were given from Aborted, Acheron, Hour Of Penance, Origin, Vader, Autopsy, Cannabis Corpse. The thrash veterans Overkill showed us that it’s not necessary to be young in being a good thrasher. Steve “Zetro” Souza’s return to Exodus was marked with the release of “Blood In, Blood Out”. Even though it’s not a bad album, it’s kinda disappointing.
This year we saw also the return of At the Gates, whose “At War With Reality” turns out to be a great disc, but somehow became a victim of fans’ high expectations. Another good albums we heard from 1349, Kampfar, Origin, Mayhem, Novembers Doom, Taake, Winterfylleth, Insomnium.
Judas Priest and Accept released also a strong works. “Redeemer Of Souls” may be far from Priest’s best, but it’s still a very solid album. While with “Blind Rage” Wolf Hoffman, Peter Baltes, Mark Tornillo and rest had proven once again that they’re getting stronger and stronger every year.
Now it’s time to mention some of the disappointments. On first place here it’s Obituary. For a band which’ve created an eternal masterpieces like “Cause Of Death” and “Slowly We Rot”, such mediocre releases like “Inked In Blood” and it’s predecessors is kind of unusual, and to be honest, unnecessary. We saw also another AC/DC album which musically is more of the same stuff, only with a lower quality. Besides that, the illness of Malcolm Young and the legal problems of Phil Rudd is adding more sault to our wounds. Opeth, Agalloch and Burzum also released questionable works, but still Varg’s ambient have some nice moments.
Getting out of the metal boundaries we saw nice albums from Pink Floyd and the former metal band Anathema. In folk and neofolk scenes Adrian Von Ziegler, Sonne Hagal and Sol Invictus also contributed with good music.
10. Primordial – Where Greater Men Have Fallen
The Irish heathens announced their new album at the very beginning of the year, thus awakening our hunger for more pagan metal. With “Where Greater Men Have Fallen” Primordial didn’t surprised anyone and that’s not necessary. Following their working formula of eight songs, standing at overall long length, each one of them filled with epicness and heroism, they showed us that the quality in their music is constant.
09. Vallenfyre – Splinters
Paradise Lost’s Gregor Mackintosh created this side-project in a very good time for us a few years ago. It’s practically a supergroup containing At The Gates and My Dying Bride members. It’s used by him to release his anger and to show us that his love for extreme metal haven’t faded. This release is a blessed old school death metal filled with punk attitude, fast tempos (which are slowing here and there in the laws of doom metal) and some great rasping guitars.
08. Decapitated – Blood Mantra
“Blood Mantra” continues the musical road taken in Decapitated’s previous album “Carnival Is Forever”. With it Vogg and the others moved away even further from the typical technical death showed in their earlier releases and started to sound more and more like a more extreme version of Meshuggah. For some people this was a disappointing decision. Not for me. Besides that I really do like Rafal “Rasta” Piotrowski’s vocals more.
07. Septicflesh – Titan
Symphonies, orchestrations and death metal? One of the first associations without a doubt is the Greek band Septicflesh. The compositions in “Titan” are extreme enough from the point of view of metal music and at the same time eccentric and epic enough as seen from their symphonic side. Without being pompous at all, Septicflesh are climbing to the top bravely with their different look in music.
06. Misery Index – Killing Gods
“The Killing Gods” is a step away from Misery Index’s typical deathgrind, known in their earlier works. Instead of that it’s much more straightforward death metal. Ignoring that, the album is still a relentless punch in the face for the listener. Now we wait for Dying Fetus’ answer.
05. Sinister – The Post-Apocalyptic Servant
The music in this release may be not innovative but I’ll be damned if it’s not one of the best death metal releases I’ve heard recently. There is something which grabs the listener for the throat. Songs like “The Macabre God”, “The Masquerade Of An Angel”, “The Saviour”, “The Burden Of Mayhem” are one of those which you either absolutely love or hate.
04. Incantation – Dirges Of Elysium
It’s impossible for these American blasphemers to disappoint their fans. John McEntee’s growls are now even more deep and low, the tempo is still varied – from furious blast beats to a much slower doom drumming and riffing. Just pay attention to the closer “Elysium (Eternity is Nigh) – over 16 minutes of bliss and darkness.
03. Behemoth – The Satanist
Nergal succeeded in the battle with leukemia and thanks to all gave us probably his best work. Not without the help of Orion and Inferno, of course. “The Satanist” is a lesson how to make an extreme music, without being ultra fast, technical or brutal in musical point of view. This album is an art.
02. Bloodbath – Grand Morbid Funeral
I’ve awaited with such an eager only one album - “13” by Black Sabbath last year. Until the announcement of Bloodbath’s “Grand Morbid Funeral”. This is a pure Swedish saw-mill. With a new vocalist in the face of Nick Holmes, the swedes look at their strongest level. This release show us how to play an old school death metal in 2014 without falling in citing or self-citing. It shows us that no one is irreplaceable; shows is that Holmes’ death grunts are intact. Four Swedish guys and one British “Old Nick” created a dark and rotten masterpiece. And I thank them for that.
01. Triptykon – Melana Chasmata
Only one album can take the first place from Bloodbath – “Melana Chasmata”. Dark, heavy, hopeless, filled with despair, in the same time beautiful and touching. That’s Triptykon’s art. No matter how happy and bright person you are, you’ll fade at least for a while after listening this work. Even with that in mind you want more and more. Darkness shall rule!
And since it’s not easy to mention only ten titles, even in a weaker year as this, I will make a short analysis as I saw the rest releases in 2014.
Cannibal Corpse gave us another great album containing their good old material. Another good death metal works for the last twelve months were given from Aborted, Acheron, Hour Of Penance, Origin, Vader, Autopsy, Cannabis Corpse. The thrash veterans Overkill showed us that it’s not necessary to be young in being a good thrasher. Steve “Zetro” Souza’s return to Exodus was marked with the release of “Blood In, Blood Out”. Even though it’s not a bad album, it’s kinda disappointing.
This year we saw also the return of At the Gates, whose “At War With Reality” turns out to be a great disc, but somehow became a victim of fans’ high expectations. Another good albums we heard from 1349, Kampfar, Origin, Mayhem, Novembers Doom, Taake, Winterfylleth, Insomnium.
Judas Priest and Accept released also a strong works. “Redeemer Of Souls” may be far from Priest’s best, but it’s still a very solid album. While with “Blind Rage” Wolf Hoffman, Peter Baltes, Mark Tornillo and rest had proven once again that they’re getting stronger and stronger every year.
Now it’s time to mention some of the disappointments. On first place here it’s Obituary. For a band which’ve created an eternal masterpieces like “Cause Of Death” and “Slowly We Rot”, such mediocre releases like “Inked In Blood” and it’s predecessors is kind of unusual, and to be honest, unnecessary. We saw also another AC/DC album which musically is more of the same stuff, only with a lower quality. Besides that, the illness of Malcolm Young and the legal problems of Phil Rudd is adding more sault to our wounds. Opeth, Agalloch and Burzum also released questionable works, but still Varg’s ambient have some nice moments.
Getting out of the metal boundaries we saw nice albums from Pink Floyd and the former metal band Anathema. In folk and neofolk scenes Adrian Von Ziegler, Sonne Hagal and Sol Invictus also contributed with good music.
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