40. Kalandra - A Frame Of Mind (By Norse Music)
On the follow-up to sublime 2020 debut The Line, Kalandra mixed Nordic folk and contemporary rock even more skilfully. Early standout The State Of The World bridged those realms both musically and thematically, classical strings scoring vocalist Katrine Stenbekk’s lamentations about humanity’s current callousness.
Meanwhile, Bardaginn attempted the opposite, seeing Katrine chant in Old Norse atop modern, anthemic prog. Countless acts, from Wardruna to Heilung, have reappropriated Scandinavian tradition for modern times, but Kalandra’s approach to it still proved distinct.
39. Pijn - From Low Beams Of Hope (Floodlit Recordings)
Fans of Pijn had to wait nearly six years for a follow-up to 2018’s excellent debut album, Loss, but it took less than a single spin of From Low Beams Of Hope to show that every second spent in anticipation was worth it.
Across four songs and 45 minutes, the Manchester post-metal sextet delivered an encapsulating, exceptional body of work that soared seamlessly between elation and melancholy, and took listeners on an instrumental journey of sheer beauty and wonderment.
Job For A Cowboy - Moon Healer (Metal Blade)
Arizona’s tech-death titans vanished without a trace after 2014’s seminal Sun Eater. A decade later, they returned in blistering form. Moon Healer was the perfect sequel to the labyrinthine savagery of its adored predecessor.
Smart, intricate and full of inspired melodic touches, songs like Etched In Oblivion and The Agony Seeping Storm fulfilled fans’ high expectations and ensured that JFAC’s relaunch was an unequivocal success. When it comes to refined, neck-threatening virtuosity, nobody did it better this year.
37. Melt-Banana - 3 + 5 (A-Zap)
Nothing on Earth is like Melt-Banana. The Japanese duo’s ninth album and first in 11 years, 3+5, offered a jubilant reminder.
Yasuko Onuki’s idiosyncratic yelps zipped across grinding hardcore, blissed-out noise-pop and everything between; Ichiro Agata’s wild musicianship zapped along 24 minutes of neon abandon, heavier than every other album this year but always catchy, forever fishing a hook or 12 from his back pocket. Mind-melting and completely bananas, 3+5 was the sound of a migraine made flesh.
36. The Obsessed - Gilded Sorrow (Ripple Music)
Scott ‘Wino’ Weinrich is perhaps the most totemic figurehead in doom outside of Signor Iommi himself. After stints with multiple scene leaders (including Saint Vitus, Spirit Caravan and Shrinebuilder), his contribution to the world of slow’n’low is incalculable.
Returning in his 60s to the band he formed as a teen, Gilded Sorrow really tugged the heartstrings; the weight of soul and grizzled lifer wisdom that Wino brings to any party was multiplied tenfold on these classy biker grooves.
35. Big|Brave - A Chaos Of Flowers (Thrill Jockey)
A companion piece of sorts to last year’s Nature Morte, A Chaos Of Flowers found Big | Brave taking their avant-garde yet emotionally ravaging take on post-metal into sparser but no less crushing places, summoning both the delicate, plaintive folk of their earliest material and the chasmic drone of early Earth.
Woven around Emily Dickinson and less remembered female poets, this was a clarion call for repressed voices from the most precarious of precipices.
34. Zetra - Zetra (Nuclear Blast)
For those who wished to exist in an alternate universe where The Human League dressed as Immortal and collaborated with The Jesus And Mary Chain on songs for the Lost Boys soundtrack, Halloween came early when London duo Zetra released their debut album.
Their mix of classic, icy, goth melodrama, late 80s Creation Records roster worship and early synth-pop cool was brilliantly realised on the sublimely catchy, yet delightfully evil-sounding likes of Suffer Eternally and Gaia.
33. Thou - Umbilical (Sacred Bones)
Baton Rouge, Louisiana-based sludge swamp monsters Thou have historically been recognised as premium purveyors of sonic anguish and psych-ward despondency through the medium of sound.
Umbilical absolutely didn’t scrimp on the gloom, but what the band did to make their sixth album uniquely special was add engaging layers of melody and, dare it be said, hooks to the mix that spun a purgatorial web where frowning doom metal was forced to crack a smile and tap a toe.
32. Kerry King - From Hell I Rise (Reigning Phoenix)
As Angel Of Death would put it, “He’s baaaaaeughhhhhhck!” Unsatisfied with Slayer’s decision to go into retirement, and with vast reserves of hellfire still to expel, six-string legend Kerry King instead assembled an all-star force of thrashers to create his debut solo record.
With Mark Osegueda up front and an engine of Paul Bostaph, Phil Demmel and Kyle Sanders, Kerry got back to business in the fiercest way possible. Top grade thrash metal, pure and simple.
READ MORE: Inside the rebirth of thrash metal titan Kerry King
31. Dodsrit - Nocturnal Will (Wolves Of Hades)
Dödsrit’s shtick was always an easy sell: foe-vanquishing, epic black metal riposting gutter-worthy crust-punk. The Swedes’ fourth album made that pitch even simpler, paddocking the d-beats into one track and leaving the rest to flourish in a fashion most grandiose.
Nocturnal Will was a supreme display of melody amid muck; Lamp Of Murmuur’s M. even turned up for a church-kindling solo. A record so throat-squashingly vital, you forget half of it was instrumental.
