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1.
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Emptiness - Vide
Post-everything, maybe not very much metal, but still the sickest album of the year. And the best. |
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2.
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1914 - Where Fear And Weapons Meet
Bloody and furious as the WWI has been, and dramatic and epic too. |
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3.
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Amenra - De Doorn
The shape - powerful and precise to the millimeter - of despair. |
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4.
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Antediluvian - The Divine Punishment
A completely deranged sonic nightmare, hallucinogenic and evil. |
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5.
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Barús - Fanges
Just two tracks that sound like a contemporary DM symphony. |
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6.
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Black Sheep Wall - Songs For The Enamel Queen
Desperate, anarchic, completely free: you can find everything here but joy. |
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7.
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Choir - Songs For A Tarnished World
Apocalyptic blackened doom-death that simply destroys everything in its way. |
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8.
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Cold Cell - The Greater Evil
Dark and elaborate BM, aggressive but not without some scraps of vicious melody. |
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9.
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Converge - Bloodmoon: I [Collaboration]
Converge are at this point on another level of songwriting and CW offers them some new intriguing variations. |
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10.
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Culted - Nous
Poisonously slow and obsessive, but able to throw the listener off-guard just before becoming hypnotic. |
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11.
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Der Weg Einer Freiheit - Noktvrn
Without any fear of experimentation, this album finds a very personal and lively approach to progressive BM. |
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12.
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Dormant Ordeal - The Grand Scheme Of Things
Violent yet weirdly melodic DM, its last track is one of the best songs in 2021. |
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13.
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Flood Peak - Fixed Ritual
Sludge and post-metal intertwine between despair and fury. |
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14.
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Fossilization - He Whose Name Was Long Forgotten
25 minutes of OSDM with such a monolithic, cavernous, and badass sound you feel like one minute more could kill you. |
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15.
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Frontierer - Oxidized
Total neurotic destruction with some uncanny digital glitch that makes everything even nastier. |
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16.
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Funeral Mist - Deiform
A master class in BM, amazingly vivid, varied and well written. |
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17.
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Fyrnask - VII: Kenoma
A dense, elaborate, profound spiritual journey into the dark. |
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18.
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Gravenchalice - Samael
A melancholic and glacial BM, full of a deep sense of suffering. |
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19.
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Inanes - Acedia
Some brand new polish DM, at times muscular and at times surprisingly melodic and atmospheric. |
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20.
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LLNN - Unmaker
Fierce and oppressive, but still subtly arranged with unsettling synths. |
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21.
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Misotheist - For The Glory Of Your Redeemer
The soundtrack of the world going utterly and chaotically awry. |
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22.
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Mourning Dawn - Dead End Euphoria
A slow, overwhelming, dreamlike drift towards death. |
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23.
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Norse - Ascetic
Sharp dissonant BM rich of icy industrial tinges. |
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24.
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Omination - NGR
A black mass celebrated between ecstasy and intoxication. |
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25.
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The Ruins Of Beverast - The Thule Grimoires
Malice and melody, pain and lyricism, slowness and acceleration: you'll find here anything you're looking for. |
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26.
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Sermon Of Flames - I Have Seen The Light, And It Was Repulsive
I heard melody and stillness, and it was repulsive (the devil said reciting a sermon of flames). |
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27.
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Sigil - Nether
Desolation in chaos, sufferance and fury in misery. |
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28.
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Succumb - XXI
Noisy, exhilarating, sweaty and at times even punkish DM, fighting and kicking hard. |
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29.
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Suffering Hour - The Cyclic Reckoning
Elaborated schizoid guitars textures beneath a fierce growl. |
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30.
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The Devouring Void - Hypnagogic Hallucinations
Between earth, heaven and underworld, the sorrowful litany of the underground. |
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31.
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Veilburner - Lurkers In The Capsule Of Skull
The oblique musical plots of a nightmare suspended between brutality and hallucination. |
