Great albums with less than 100 RYM ratings

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L'Ordre Du Temple In Hoc Signo Vinces

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Rivendell Elven Tears

I listed a couple black albums that I've always held in high regard. They're of the whimsical, folky variety, with clean choruses intermixed with the harsh vocals. If you're a fan of Summoning or Caladan Brood, you'd do well to add these to the collection. Rivendell actually has three albums with under 100 ratings, all of excellent quality. I just landed on Elven Tears because my favorite track happens to be on that album.
 
Living Impaired - Blossom and Decay
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underheard late '90s tech death metal oddity out of maine, just 14 ratings. seen 'em compared to everything from godflesh to gorguts to voivod to atrocity (GER) to hardcore punk--this is the weird twisted goodness.


im only about 10 minutes in but ...
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It is and isn't surprising that most of Paul Chain's discography is sitting under 100 ratings save for In the Darkness, Life and Death and Alkahest. He can venture into some fairly nebulous territory (especially on those 90's albums) but nevertheless it's a bit strange that the other Violet Theatre stuff isn't rated more. This is the final album to bear the VT moniker and a sign of where the maestro would go after going totally solo, especially on the mammoth half-hour opener which occupies that aforementioned nebulous space as Chain's later output. It seems to be the biggest hurdle to get over with most listeners, though fans of the likes of Goblin and Devil Doll should feel right at home. The remaining tracks are an offering of quality heavy/doom that should easily please fans of the doom of olde while still not sounding like any other doom. The King of Italy.
 
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1993 strikes again. The year of years. This bands entire discography has under 100 ratings. What a shock. It's probably equally as bad that their best remembered for being the band on Phil Anselmo's t-shirt on the back of Vulgar Display of Power. Unfortunately, Anselmo's choice of clothing did little to boost their musical profile. Neither did a fair bit of press push with full page ads in a lot of big name music mags of the day for their 1990 album The Goddess (by the way, fuck that M-A review). They always seemed on the cusp of breaking through but deemed too strange by the general public. Always a tricky band to pigeonhole, a mission from the start, file somewhere between alternative and prog.


 
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Artefact, Ruins

gods, totally forgot about this gem. melodic black metal with a nice medieval flair, killer riffs and harmonies. Definitely for fans of Emperor, Dissection, etc... derivative to an extent, but all good shit's derivative. The atmosphere and melodies are enough to carry it. One of the albums, along with Emperor, that got me into melodic black metal. And while I'm at it, Magic Spellcraft is pretty good too...

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Ludicra- Hollow Pslams

Black metal with doom influences on some of their tracks. The riffs have always reminded me of early Satyricon, but with an aesthetic that is more urban and personal. Laurie Sue Shanaman has a really tortured screech and I always liked the way they layered the clean vocals but only in the backdrop. On a personal level, I’ll always love this band, for sneaking me into their show when I was underage as a fake roadie. And I didn’t even know them. I emailed them on a prayer.

 
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One of the most left-field sonic shifts of the 90's. After recording one of the most singular and esoteric death metal albums in the form of Prodigal Sun, Afflicted got a different vocalist and went full on heavy/power metal. I won't say this is an amazing album but it is a real curiosity, especially seeing as it was released in 1995 before the whole Euro power metal thing really caught fire. Plus it really doesn't sound all that European. The beefy production puts it more in line with the likes of American power/trad like Omen or Manowar.
 
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Xysma - First and Magical. All of Xysma's stuff is under 100 except for the debut album Yeah. Still so undervalued. They were good if they were playing death/grind or surf rock. If any death metal could be considered "happy", this is it, so don't expect a normal sounding death metal album. Expecting anything that resembles normalcy from Xysma is futile. A lot of this boogies like later Motorhead at their most classic rock 'n' roll influenced. So much groove Wolverine Blues offers to hold its beer. Same year, too, 1993. They might have even beat Entombed to the punch.
 
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Brute Chant - Killer Each of You 2002. Latvian death metal currently sitting at 42 ratings. Don't really know who to compare this to, usually gets tagged as avant-garde and technical, I guess they fit but in a not-so-obvious way like with other bands. Definitely feels like the product of a post-USSR scene, after the country opens up and the kids absorb everything that was new into these bizarre contradictory musical ideas.




Hardware - Hardware 1990/91. Mexican "experimental" death metal (+ some dark ambient) with only 22 ratings. Pretty amazing thing to come out of a place like Mexico that is usually known for its less ambitious and more raw metal, kind of like Mordeth coming out of a place like Brazil. This demo fucking rules, it's a shame they were never able to fully realise their potential.




Nomicon - Tri-Angle 1991/92. Screeching Finnish technical death metal, unfortunately the demo is less than 10 minutes long so it feels like it's over as fast as it started, but it does a lot in that time and I love it. Has 35 ratings right now. I think they became a black metal band later on, never bothered to check it out.



(Only the first 20 minutes is this EP, the rest is compilation material.)

Agretator - Distorted Logic 1996. Dropping a good amount of the death metal from their album 2 years prior and leaning heavily towards more dexterous tech-prog-thrash, really good shit. This band split a few years later and basically became Darkane. Only 20 ratings.
 


Trails of Anguish - Relentless Abhorrence of Misery's Grievance. Canadian black metal. 54 ratings. It's like all the instruments are screaming out in anguish all at once. Love the way the guitars and the frantic drumming drift out of sync from time to time, just adds to the urgency of the music if anything.



As Serenity Fades - Earthborn. Finnish melodic death metal, 63 ratings. One of my favorite obscure releases in the early style of melodic death metal, before it became commercialized garbo.
 


Hospice - Irreparableness 1995. Somewhat outlandish and chaotic progressive death metal out of Belarus currently sitting at 57 ratings.




Phantasma - Welcome in Heaven 1994. 12 ratings only! Weird "atmospheric" Slovakian death metal and if I understand the words right this is a Christian band. Whatever the music fucking kills, like early Disharmonic Orchestra meets Baphomet or something.




Sephiroth - Moon, Sun, Heaven and Earth 1994. Killer dark American death metal EP with 39 ratings. Slightly more interesting take on the 90's sound with some melodic twists.




Mictlan - Donde habitan los muertos 1995. Mexican folk death metal, as unique as that sounds. Shame it only has 26 ratings, I think if more people knew about this album they'd like it. Aggressive, riffy, with all kinds of native instrumentation and a vocalist who changes up his style a lot. The whole thing is so chocked full of ideas it's threatening to fall apart at any moment.

That's the last of my favourites under 100 ratings I wish more people heard.