i dont give a shit about covers since they are basically bonuses, and sometimes the bands even go out of their way to tell you that in BIG CLEAR LETTERS.
Sometimes they're good and sometimes they're not. It depends on the band and what song it is. It's rare to encounter one that completely drags down an album.
what a bizarre top 40. like half of those absolutely belong there, the other half do not and some are questionably even thrash
[EDIT] I think they are weighting number of votes too highly. Like after a certain sample size the law of large numbers applies and adding more votes has minimal affect on the average.
Just because Phantom Antichrist and Nightmare Logic have 1000 to 1500 votes doesn't mean they're better than Black Fast - Starving Out the Light (they're not by far) with 100 votes.
[EDIT] BTW listen to Black Fast CIG if you haven't already.
Yeah, that's the problem with including subgenres, you get a lot of rock'n'rollish speed metal stuff.
For me, there's nothing in the black metal top 40 I even own, let alone would highly rate (though I plan to get those Inquisition, Primordial and Summoning albums eventually) whereas the thrash metal top 40 has a bunch of stuff I really really like such as Antichrist's Forbidden World and Nekromantheon's Divinity of Death.
Furthermore I can't think of any recent black metal album I've liked more than anything by Droid or Deathhammer.