Your favorite albums of 2013

[[)eadmund]

I only started listening to metal in, like, July, but I liked An Arrow in Heart (Aosoth), Obscure Verses for the Multiverse (Inquisition), and Colored Sands (Gorguts) a lot.

 

[Lateralus14]

1 - meh
2 - meh
3 - meh
4 - meh
5 - meh
6 - meh
7 - meh
8 - meh
9 - ok
10 - need to hear

You have some of the better tastes around these parts and yet...

 

[Master_Yoda77]

When did you turn into such a gigantic, metal-hating cunt?

 

[Lateralus14]

It's been a strange transformation, my friend. I don't hate metal in the least. BUT something odd happened when I realized music existed before 1960. The repertoire multiplied tenfold, and suddenly "kinda neat" 2013 metal records became insignificant specks. It's really kinda depressing.

 

[Lateralus14]

Most of those "mehs" don't actually sound bad. It's all relative though; the issue arises when you realize you could fill AT LEAST one lifetime with music more rewarding than the new Autopsy record.

 

[Eligos]

Damn, dude. I mean I'm all for some Count Basie, Morton Feldman, Gil Evans and Barber, but my love for those great records of yore didn't turn me into some kind of dissenter.

 

[Bitencourt29]

Most of those "mehs" don't actually sound bad. It's all relative though; the issue arises when you realize you could fill AT LEAST one lifetime with music more rewarding than the new Autopsy record.

I think I understand you...I've been listening to Metal since 1987/88 and this year it was really hard to come up with the list I usually make, with 30 or so albums. Should I make a list considering 10 or 15 years, only a couple 2013 releases would probably make it.

Despite 2013 being not as great as other recent years for Metal, I really enjoy listening to stuff like the new Aosoth, Carcass, Darkthrone and the other top 10 albums. I listen to other kinds of music like classic Jazz, Bossa Nova, Blues and classic Rock, but extreme Metal still rules my world.

 

[Lateralus14]

Ofc I'm a little jaded in general for the last week or so. Tchaikovsky's 6th this morning was so devoid of feels, and cigarettes are tasting lame for the last few days too. I'm planning on waiting ~5 years or so to see how this whole woman thing plays out before another suicide attempt though.

 

[Krow]

Fuck attempting. Use a gun. Don't put your family and your own body through failures.

What I am trying to say is go blow your fucking heading off.

 

[Baroque]

Fueled by Fire - Trapped in Perdition is my album of the year. Maybe I'll edit in more later but I've already posted other favorites on other threads.

 

[[)eadmund]

Only about half of what a good listener gets out of a song or record is actually in the music itself; the rest the listener brings to it.

 

[Onder]

Only about half of what a good listener gets out of a song or record is actually in the music itself; the rest the listener brings to it.

For some reason this statement really bugs me. Maybe it's because it tries to specify such intangible matter but I'm afraid it's also a generalization and a "wannabe wiseness" if you will. Of course some music needs effort from the listener's side but I just wouldn't throw these "about halfs" around like that. I'm willing to discuss it though if you care to explain yourself further as I'm interested in these topics.

 

[[)eadmund]

For some reason this statement really bugs me. Maybe it's because it tries to specify such intangible matter but I'm afraid it's also a generalization and a "wannabe wiseness" if you will. Of course some music needs effort from the listener's side but I just wouldn't throw these "about halfs" around like that. I'm willing to discuss it though if you care to explain yourself further as I'm interested in these topics.

I just mean that part of what you get out of music is what you bring to it. On one hand this is kind of obvious stuff like getting references in lyrics and in music itself (like a "musical quote" or just hearing a band's influences in their music/sound). But on the other hand (and what I was more thinking of) is something more difficult to articulate. It's kind of like imagination - do you kind of get the musical idea a band or bit of music is going for so that you're actually able to hear how the band succeeds and fails in pursuing that idea? Are you able to step beyond your own preexisting preferences and give something new and different a chance?

I don't play any instrument or read music or anything, so it's hard for me to speak clearly about this. There is something similar going on with books or movies though - like one person can think a certain book is totally stupid, but another person can really be enlightened or challenged or realize new things from that same book. Some people just think that one of those two hypothetical people must be stupid or wrong (and of course lots and lots of people are stupid and wrong), but sometimes, both of those people are smart. But one of them thought about the book longer, or harder, or in a more creative way. And then he learned something.

Basically, two smart people can read or listen to the same thing and get totally different ideas or feelings out of it. You bring all your own experiences and ideas and preferences and habits to a bit of music, and those things play a very big role in how that music sounds and what it seems to be about to you.

I really believe that people can be better or worse at reading and listening and watching - in this case, "better" means the ability to get useful and interesting experiences out of reading/listening/watching. It's basically creative in my view.

 

[Jimmy... Dead.]

 

[Nephilim96]

Ofc I'm a little jaded in general for the last week or so. Tchaikovsky's 6th this morning was so devoid of feels, and cigarettes are tasting lame for the last few days too. I'm planning on waiting ~5 years or so to see how this whole woman thing plays out before another suicide attempt though.

"Woman thing"? Are you turning into a woman?

 

[Rossiya]

Good enough topic as any for an initial posting...

I typed out a whole "TOP 10" list but I'll save that for later. I guess I'll just break it down by genre for the sake of being concise:

Best trad album: Argus - Beyond the Martyrs
(I also think the solo in "Four Candles Burning" is the best one of the year even if I never give a shit about guitar solos)

Best death album: Hail of Bullets - The Rommel Chronicles

Best thrash album: Onslaught - VI

Best album for a 'big' name: Motorhead - Aftershock

Best album I should have no business liking: It's a tie between PRO-PAIN's "The Final Revolution" and Sulphur Aeon's debut.

 

[Werckmeister Harmonies]

Atlantean Kodex- The White Goddess
Chelsea Wolfe- Pain is Beauty

There were other albums I liked this year but these two are the absolute apex for me.

 

[Vamos]

I am probably forgetting some…in no particular order:

SubRosa - More Constant Than the Gods
Funeralium - Deceived Idealism
Obliteration - Black Death Horizon
Blood Ceremony - The Eldritch Dark
Jex Thoth - Blood Moon Rise
Crone - s/t
Ataraxie - L'Etre Et La Nausée

EPs:
Black Moth - Savage Dancer / Tree of Woe

 

[Avigrus]

Still need to wither down this list;

Altars - Paramnesia
Abominant - Onward to Annihilation
Acerus - The Unreachable Salvation
Aquilus - Griseus
The Amenta - Flesh Is Heir
Autopsy - The Headless Ritual
Argus - Beyond the Martyrs
Azure Emote - The Gravity Of Impermanence
Amorphis - Circle

Bolzer - Aura
Black Oath - Ov Qliphoth And Darkness

Carcass - Surgical Steel
Cult of Fire - मृत्यु का तापसी अनुध्यान
Code - Augur Nox
Craven Idol - Towards Eschaton
Chvrches - The Bones of What You Believe

Desolate Shrine - Sanctum of Human Darkness
Deeds of Flesh - Portals to Canaan
Denouncement Pyre - Almighty Arcanum
Demonical - Darkness Unbound
Darkthrone - The Underground Resistance
Disfigurement - Soul Rot

End Times - Descension

Fulmination - Humanity's Dirge

Gorguts - Coloured Sands
Graveyard - The Sea Grave
Germ - Grief
Grave Miasma - Odori Sepulcrorum

Hypocrisy - The End of Disclosure
Havok - Unnatural Selection

Impious Baptism - Wrath of the Apex Predator
Insulters - We Are the Plague
Inquisition - Obscure Verses for the Multiverse
Imprecation - Satanae Tenebris Infinita
Immolation - Kingdom Of Conspiracy

Kauan - Pirut

Lantern - Below
Lifeless - Godconstruct
Lycus - Tempest

Mammoth Grinder - Underworlds
Mephistopheles - Sounds Of The End
Mammoth Grinder - Underworlds

Necrophobic - Womb of Lilithu

Obliteration - Black Death Horizon
Onirophagus - Prehuman

Protector - Reanimated Homunculus
Paganizer – World Lobotomy
Procession - To Reap Heavens Apart
Power Trip - Manifest Decimation
Poltergeist - Effigy of the Grotesque
Paradise Lost - Tragic Illusion 25 (The Rarities)
Profanal - Black Chaos
Purtenance - Awaken From Slumber
Pestilence - Obsideo

Ruins of Beverast - Blood Vaults: The Blazing Gospel Of Heinrich Kramer
Revel In Flesh – Manifested Darkness

Stormlord - Hesperia
Sickrites - Irreverent Death Megaliths
Soul Remnants - Black And Blood
Supuration - CU3E
Shadow Of The Destroyer - Shadow Of The Destroyer
Sorcery - Arrival At Six
Skeletal Spectre - Voodoo Dawn
Sodom – Epitome of Torture
Sathanas - La Hora De Lucifer

Tribulation - The Formulas of Death
Toxic Holocaust - Conjure And Command
Todtgelichter - Apnoe
Torture Killer - Phobia

Ulcerate - Vermis

Vastum - Patricidal Lust
Verminous - The Unholy Communion
Verminous - The Curse of the Antichrist

Witherscape - The Inheritance

 

[Lateralus14]

That sound is Summoning's, not yours. Go home, Caladan Brood, you're drunk.