Compiling My 2013 Best Metal Albums List Has Put Me In A Metal Quandary!
CARCASS – Surgical Steel
For the past month, I’ve been listening to, re-listening to and debating over which albums will make my “Best Metal Albums Of 2013” list. For clear reasons (to me) this year marks the most difficult time I’ve ever encountered, in compiling this list. I’m in a quandary!! Someone call Dr. Phil or better yet, someone call Black Sabbath, Motörhead, Carcass, Sodom, Stryper, Satyricon and Satan and tell them ALL they should have never released such amazing milestone Metal albums; especially ALL at once this past year! Um, please, no one tell them that.
Throw in the fact that Witch Cross and Sinister Realm are in the mix with spellbound like True Metal releases in 2013 and I’m on my knees begging for the Metal Gods to help me sort it all out!! Which band’s album gets #1 and why? Which band’s album comes in last on my best of list and for what reason? Rankings super SUCK and I have the urge right now to eat a case of Doritos. Can anyone please kick me in the ass and tell me to stop!?
Motörhead – Aftershock
Adding to this quandary, is: I believe that any album that makes any “Best Of” album list of mine, equates to either an instant classic or soon to be classic, within our beloved pages of Metal History; at least my pages of Metal History! All of this self-debate and (at times) self-doubt over which best Metal albums I’ve listened to over the year is very important to me. I need a very cold beer right now, from my very cold garage.
Stay tuned. My Metal list will be done eventually. Stone will come through. Hell, my “Best Hard Rock Albums Of 2013” list is already secured in my brain. For some crazy reason, the Hard Rock albums list never drove me even remotely insane. My “Top Ten Songs Of 2013” list went down easier than a Yuengling lager. Go figure. Best Metal Buddy, Scott Coverdale, already has his Best list done and ready to go. I know he struggled with it, though. Ha, ha. Still, he’s the best.
I gather it’s time for me to stop whining and get back to my Metal debate with myself. Once this fun task is complete, I can then begin to listen to what 2014 has in store for my Metal hunger… and look forward to another quandary such as this in a year from now. Metal be thy name.
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LONG LIVE METAL.
METAL FOR LIFE.
Stone.
Metal Odyssey > Heavy Metal Music Blog 
December 28, 2013 at 12:10 pm
I’m not even attempting a list this year! There was just waayyy too many amazing Metal albums out. I can’t separate them!
December 28, 2013 at 12:15 pm
RIGHT??? RIGHT ON!!! I couldn’t agree with you more!
I feel light years better, now that you stated that! I thought (maybe) it was just me and I wasn’t listening hard enough to ALL these albums! LOL!!
At the end of my Metal day, I’ll still have my list… and I’ll still feel that ALL the bands on my list put out a #1 album in one Metal shape or form! 🙂 \m/\m/
You ROCK Metal Buddy!! Hope your holiday season has been cool and kick-ass!
December 29, 2013 at 11:47 am
Just in December alone I got 3 or 4 albums that in any other year would have been number 1s! It’s been a great year.
Hope you had a great holiday season too! All the best for 2014. I hope you have a full-on rocking METAL year!
December 29, 2013 at 11:57 am
Thanks Metal Buddy!!
Right? So right!! Honestly, I do miss the 80’s and the whole Heavy Metal revolution and all… yet life has been incredible when it comes to Metal; both this year and going back a full decade now, it seems!! LOL!!
I cannot stop listening to ‘Surgical Steel’ from Carcass… ALL weekend long!! \m/\m/
Which albums did you get in December? I bought the new Deicide ‘In The Minds Of Evil’… it’s killer!!
December 29, 2013 at 12:11 pm
I’ve been LOVING the new Hell album. In December I got Avatarium which is also excellent, Inquisition, Voices… And finally got the new Ghost album too which was better than I expected! If I can borrow your catchphrase… WHOA!
December 29, 2013 at 3:30 pm
LOL!! You can borrow that catchphrase anytime! The only album out of that bunch you’ve mentioned that I grabbed this year is the new Ghost. Like you, I was pleased with it, only their debut I still like better… more raw and retro \m/\m/
December 29, 2013 at 3:52 pm
I prefer the debut too but I didn’t expect the new one to be as good as it is. I just picked up their covers EP today and I’m not that fussed about it so far. I definitely prefer it raw and retro!
December 28, 2013 at 12:20 pm
There have been some epic metal releases this year Stone. I’ve been rocking out to both ’13’ and ‘Aftershock’ this very day, and mighty they are too in their Metal-ness! Me and the guys in Witch Cross are honoured to be even mentioned in the same post! But one thing is for sure…whatever the problem, Doritos are the answer! \m/
December 28, 2013 at 12:27 pm
LOL!! Kev, you are the greatest!! 🙂
I am not kidding when I tell you that I am listening to ‘Aftershock’ as I write this… and ’13’ was in my ears this morning too!! LOL!!
You are so spot on with ‘epic Metal releases’ and 2013 has surprised the daylights out of me! The comebacks of Black Sabbath, Witch Cross, Satan and Carcass with QUALITY beyond reason is a HUGE story in itself!! 🙂
Now… I just gotta get to the corner market for some Doritos! 😮 \m/\m/
December 28, 2013 at 4:51 pm
I know what you mean, there’s been so much this year I literally can’t even afford half the stuff I want. Motorhead’s album dropped after I’d blown my budget for the whole year lol.
December 28, 2013 at 5:36 pm
Understood! It does add up. I passed over many CD’s myself due $$ constraints. The new Dream Theater, Metallica ‘Through The Never’ (live), Hell ‘Curse And Chapter’… are just a few of the many! Hope you do get the new Motorhead once you catch up… it’s worth every nickel! 🙂 \m/\m/
December 29, 2013 at 8:51 am
I’ve heard very good things about it. Can’t wait.
I need to try that new Dream Theater album too, I got the Luna Park Blu and loved it, and my best friend speaks highly of the new record.
Never heard any Hell though. That’s Andy Sneap’s band isn’t it? I’d be very interesting to check them out.
December 29, 2013 at 10:54 am
Worked with Hell at Metal Magic festival. Great band, Very theatrical, looking forward to checking this album out. I like Sneaps production with Accept, but I guess it can get a little generic.
December 29, 2013 at 12:09 pm
Very cool, Kev!! You guys should do a split – album together! Witch Cross and Hell… that would be a Metal treat!! Call it: ‘A Witch Cross Alliance With Hell’…
…Maybe I’m getting out of control a bit here, Kev. Sorry. The notion of it all just psyches me out! LOL!!
Yeah, just like many of the producers, mixers they do stand out with their ways of making an album sound… they eventually become a ‘brand’ in their own right. I think that sounds right… LOL!! Andy Sneap is very much ‘hands on’ with all albums he produces, unlike Rick Rubin. I do understand fully though, your using the term generic… so much truth to that.
Kevin Shirley, Chris Tsangarides, Nick Raskulinecz, Devin Townsend and Adam Dutkiewicz are my favorites 🙂
December 29, 2013 at 1:17 pm
Can’t argue with that roll call of epic producers! \m/ \m/
December 29, 2013 at 3:27 pm
Kev, I value your opinions (as you know, LOL) and do you feel that Rick Rubin is a bit overrated as a producer now? I realize what he did for Slayer early on and most likely kept Black Sabbath on task with ’13’… still, I’ve read a Metallica (James Hetfield) and Tony Iommi interview where they both stated Rick Rubin walks in and walks out, they never saw him. What’s your take?
By ‘the sound and atmosphere’ of ’13’… Rubin must’ve tapped into something? Or do you think it was Sabbath controlling the wheel? Sorry for such a crazy question, just that you have a much more profound feel for this stuff than I do! LOL! 🙂 \m/\m/
December 30, 2013 at 3:57 pm
It’s a fair question, Stone. I personally think he is overrated….but…..in certain cases, he has a knack of getting bands that may have strayed from their remit back on track. mainly though, it’s his judicial use of common sense. For example, he told Sabbath to ignore all the bands that they had influenced, all that had followed, and to get back to where they came from, that point in time. He made them sit down and listen to their debut album, something they hadn’t done for a long time. It clearly worked. ‘Damaged Soul’ could have been recorded in 1970. I’d love him to work that kind of magic with a band like Status Quo for example, not the cabaret caricature version they’ve become, the original hard boogie line-up, get them to listen to Piledriver and Hello, and get them to record an album chanelling that era. He may have worked his magic with ZZ Top too, I love the last album, but a Billy Gibbons interview I read seems to hint that it was a painful process!
December 30, 2013 at 7:02 am
Accept’s Stalingrad has one of my favourite ever production jobs.