Dave Everley

They played Eurovision, met the king and toured with Iron Maiden - but 2023 was just another wild year for Germany's Lord Of The Lost

Mocked by most of the UK press, Bradford band New Model Army have remained as steadfastly uncompromising as they have unfashionable

Thirty years ago, Guns N’ Roses released The Spaghetti Incident?, an album of covers, and brought a load of mostly obscure, mostly punk-rock tracks to a wider audience

Tobias Forge remains tight-lipped on what Ghost's massive two-night LA residency was about, but does drop hints about the band's future going into 2024

The Eagles’ Don Henley, Joe Walsh and Timothy B Schmit look back on their band’s rollercoaster career

Broke, directionless and dumped just before his wedding, the former Marillion singer forged 13th Star amid the turmoil

"He takes me down this dark path, and suddenly Mark Lanegan just appears out of nowhere, wreathed in smoke, kind of like the devil" - Brian Fallon

In 1994, Blaze Bayley became Maiden’s new singer – but he wasn’t the only contender for the job

Sleep Token, Creeper, Within Temptation: 2023 has been a massive year for metal, and these 50 records represent the very best the year has had to offer

Mike Portnoy and Steve Howe provide supporting evidence that Bohemian Rhapsody is only the tip of the band’s boundary-pushing iceberg

Featuring members of Guns N’ Roses, Def Leppard, Deep Purple, Alter Bridge and more, Kings Of Chaos are rock’s most high-profile covers band

Duff McKagan’s Lighthouse album might be a long way from the music he’s best known for with Guns N' Roses, but it still reflects the punk rocker in him

From the monolithic Metallica to rising stars like Green Lung, these are the greatest shows that Team Hammer saw this year

Necromandus were earmarked as the next Black Sabbath by Black Sabbath themselves - but their dreams were not fulfilled

The past 12 months may go down in history as a period of tumult and turmoil, but on the positive side, rock'n'roll is very much alive and well – as the best 50 albums of 2023 reflect

From Metallica to Sleep Token, Avenged Sevenfold to Babymetal, these are the best metal albums of 2023 - as voted by you!

He’s not out to mislead or deceive with his seventh solo album, but admits: “You can look for explanation, you can look for logic, but it’s not there”

Enigmatic trio King's X have never quite enjoyed the success they deserved, but they've made excellent music along the way – and these are their best albums

Paranoid? Sabbath Bloody Sabbath? Heaven And Hell? Hammer's top writers duel it out to declare Sabbath's best album ever

Every song from Led Zeppelin’s iconic fourth album from Black Dog to When The Levee Breaks, captured at different points in their career

The self-described “Cornish hippies” on their folk, art-rock, global music roots, new album Ubiquity – and how they owe everything to the kindliness of (pink) strangers…