Top 30, Page 1
Temple of Void – The World that Was
My personal album of the year, The World that Was combines the best of death metal fury and crushing doom. The title track and “Leave the Light Behind” are two of the best tracks I’ve heard all year. Mike Erdody’s vocals are extremely guttural and impactful, while the riffs and soulful leads kept me coming back all year. Highly recommended for fans of Hooded Menace and Paradise Lost.
Ulcerate-Stare into Death and Be Still
Ulcerate’s latest (and in my opinion greatest) is their most melodic, accessible album to date. That’s a relative term of course, because Stare into Death and Be Still is an abrasive, dissonant journey that’s full of immersive, oppressive atmosphere. Its melodies remind me a little of something the Icelandic black metal scene would come up with, but over a fractured, violent tech death skeleton. Stare into Death and Be Still is a beautiful, difficult album that may require multiple listens, but is definitely worth it.
Live Burial-Unending Futility
Live Burial’s sophomore album is one of the more varied OSDM albums of the year. It has some excellent doom moments, but I wouldn’t really call it doom/death. At the same time, it also has a varied set of death metal influences-you’ll hear bits of Benediction and Bolt Thrower in there somewhere, along with Death and even some shades of early Immolation’s use of dissonance. Very few bands could pull off this mix, but Unending Futility is a surefire winner and one of the best death metal albums of the year.
Faceless Burial-Speciation
Bands that have taken up Demilich’s brand of weird tech death have been more numerous in recent years. While Blood Incantation is probably the best known and most critically well-received, Faceless Burial deserves to be in that conversation. Speciation is a masterclass in death metal that balances spacy weirdness and heaviness.
Undergang-Aldrig I Livet
One of the more well-known and longest running entries on this list, Undergang’s newest album (their fifth) is another foul monstrosity birthed from sewage. Aldrig I Livet sounds like a better, more fully-realized version of the band’s previous album, Misantropologi. Adding a second guitarist took things to the next level, with an increased emphasis on eerie, Finnish-style leads
Cryptic Shift-Visitations from Enceladus
It’s a bold move to open an album with a 26-minute track, even for a band with progressive leanings like Cryptic Shift. But that track and this album are brilliant. To try to put this in a very limiting box, imagine the early tech death of Atheist combined with the spacy prog thrash of Vektor. That’s not the most accurate description for everything Cryptic Shift is up to on this debut, but it’s a start.
Soulskinner-Seven Bowls of Wrath
This Greek project’s fifth album is an excellent throwback to the days of the early Gothenburg scene when death metal could be melodic without turning into power metal with harsh vocals. The tremolo melodies on this album are fantastic and worth the price of admission alone, but the album contains plenty of great songs too, but the underlying death metal framework of the album is brilliantly executed also.
Sepulchral Curse-Only Ashes Remain
Sepulchral Curse’s debut album, Only Ashes Remain, is a loving homage to classic Finndeath. It oozes morbid atmosphere, with riffs that combine the best of death and doom with the occasional blackened edge. Kari Kankaanpää (Solothus) also turns in a monstrous performance, but it’s really the massive riffing of Only Ashes Remain that make it such a special album. Highly recommended for fans of Lantern, Demigod, and Solothus.
Heads for the Dead-Into the Red
Heads for the Dead is the brainchild of Jonny Pettersson from Wombbath, who put out two albums themselves this year, and Revel in Flesh’s Ralf Hauber. This time around they’re joined by Gorefest/Ayreon drummer Ed Warby and the results are impressive. Into the Red isn’t as vitriolic as the band’s debut, but it is a fine example of modern Swedeath. Also, and I may be in the minority on this, but I love the cover of “Transylvanian Hunger.”
Solothus-Realm of Ash and Blood
For the uninitiated, Solothus is a doom/death band from Finland that plays a brutal, crushing version of the subgenre. Their third album, Realm of Ash and Blood, delivers all of the monstrous riffs, deep bellowing vocals, and punishing rhythms I’ve come to expect from them. Highly recommended for fans of fellow Finns Hooded Menace and Krypts, along with Runemagick.
Question-Reflections from the Void
If you like The Chasm (and you should) but think they’re not quite active enough, Question is here to fill that void in your life. But while the bands are similar to some extent, Question is also very much their own band, with some subtle psychedelic moments and prog elements. At times it reminds me of vintage Death, but balances its prog moments with firmly grounded death metal. This one slipped under the radar for many (I found it fairly late in the year myself) but don’t sleep on it.
Voidceremony-Entropic Reflections Continuum: Dimensional Unravel
Cynic’s Sean Malone unfortunately passed away this year, but his legacy lives on in bands like Voidceremony. Damon Good provides fretless bass lines, recalling Malone’s genre-defining work. Drummer Charlie Koryn, who seems to be everywhere these days, also provides an excellent performance. Entropic Reflections Continuum: Dimensional Unravel is easily one of the year’s standout progressive death metal albums.
Molder-Vanished Cadavers
After a bunch of splits, demos, and live albums, Joliet, Illinois based Molder finally put out their debut album in 2020. And it’s a ripping homage to the best of (mostly) American OSDM. There’s plenty of Autopsy and Obituary worship on here, along with some Asphyx style doom elements. There’s a sense of raucous fun to Vanished Cadavers and Molder is certainly a new death metal band to keep an eye on.
Disembowel-Echoes of Terror
If you’re a fan of Maggot Stomp’s brand of chunky, crude death metal, Disembowel’s debut is for you. Disembowel has all of the barbarism the label delivers with bands like Sanguisugabogg and Fluids, but with an extra added dose of Autopsy sloppiness. Nothing revolutionary here, just skull-cracking gory death metal for fans of the Pacific Northwest sound.
Plague-Portraits of Mind
Sometimes I just like a good Death clone. Portraits of Mind, the debut album from Greek band Plague, is a very good Death clone, specifically the Leprosy and Spiritual Healing era of the band. It’s a very fun album from a band that essentially came out of nowhere, having only released a single before this album.
