Welcome everybody to a little lesson on the history of Sludge & Stoner Metal. I'm Guib and today I have the immense pleasure to serve as your humble teacher.

Please take a seat and travel with me through time as we explore the very best of those two, often blurred, genres. The goal here is simple, I want to get you familiarized with the styles. I want you to understand where they come from through albums on a timeline and while we're at it get a sweet selection of great releases that you might not know and that, hopefully, will get you hooked to explore even more!

But this is a classroom and in my classroom there are a few rules. We want to keep this clean, clear and prevent having a 500+ albums mess. So here are the rules we'll follow throughout this lesson.

- - - - - The Rules - - - - -

1. We will settle for a maximum of 4 albums per year and they will be listed from oldest to newest. Makes it simple to navigate. Those releases will represent what I consider to be hallmarks of the genres for that year. Essentials if you want, yes? Of course, I'll sprinkle a bit of my personality here and there so you will find some unorthodox choices and some less known albums from time to time. It would be boring otherwise... and also why not?

2. We will begin the journey with Melvins' "Gluey Porch Treatments" released in 1987. Why? Because it is arguably the first album to be widely considered as Sludge.

3. The list will mostly feature studio albums. So no Demos & bare minimum when it comes to EPs if any at all. Thank you.

4. I am not going to include releases by Black Sabbath, Blue Cheer, Hawkwind, etc... I fully understand and recognize the influence older bands had on Stoner Rock, but this is not the list for them.

5. Lastly, not really a rule but more of a note. Considering that we're talking about Sludge & Stoner, it is inevitable that Doom, Post, Progressive, Grunge & Hardcore acts will be featured in this list. Those genres simply go together naturally and are often mixed so do not be alarmed!

- - - - - - - - - -

That is it, I hope you will all discover something to enjoy through my little history lesson. Also, do not hesitate to comment below if you agree or disagree with some of my picks. After all, this is a classroom and debate is invited as it can be fun and educative. As long everything's done respectfully, of course.

Enjoy & Have Fun... Class dismissed!

NOTE: I will now add my picks for best album of the year using this format (best of xxxx) in the chosen album's description.

- Guib -

- - - - - - - - - -

Guib's best Sludge/Stoner Album Picks

Best Of 2023:
Urne - A Feast On Sorrow

Best Of 2024 So Far:
O Zorn! - Vermillion Haze

- - - - - - - - - -

Last Update: March 27th, 2024

1.Melvins - Gluey Porch Treatments

2.Soundgarden - Ultramega OK

3.Oxbow - Fuckfest

4.Melvins - Ozma

5.Soundgarden - Louder Than Love

      View entire list ››

2016 was... well... oh oh... oh oh... well... what the fuck!

Anyhow, here is my top 50 ranking of albums I scored 8+

Album count: 126
Average rating: 7.1

1.Alcest - Kodama

2.Khemmis - Hunted

3.Insomnium - Winter's Gate

4.Trees Of Eternity - Hour Of The Nightingale

5.Skuggsjá - A Piece For Mind & Mirror

      View entire list ››

Listen to metal for more than the half of my life, here is the list of my favorites albums of all time.

1.Alcest - Les Voyages De L'âme

2.Alcest - Kodama

3.Alcest - Spiritual Instinct

4.Alestorm - Sunset On The Golden Age

5.Alestorm - No Grave But The Sea

      View entire list ››

Thanks to digital media, I have been exposed to a large number of great metal albums from female vocalists, especially over the last 5 years. 2020 saw a number of these super releases, and lead me to make this list to celebrate my favourite women of metal.

1.Royal Thunder - CVI

2.Konvent - Puritan Masochism

3.Julie Christmas - Mariner [Collaboration]

4.L7 - Smell The Magic

5.In This Moment - Blood

      View entire list ››

2000-2004 list: http://www.metalstorm.net/users/list.php?list_id=5844
2005-2009 list: http://www.metalstorm.net/users/list.php?list_id=5838
2010-2014 list: http://www.metalstorm.net/users/list.php?list_id=5828

I sure do love this site and it's rating system, it makes finding great music so easy and, even more importantly, when an album is overlooked for a while but starts getting a buzz a few months later, boom, there it appears in the top 20.

All that being said, I still wish there was some way to get a weighted ranking that not only takes the rating of the album into account, but also the number of votes that were cast. For example, an album with a rating of 8.8 and 1000 votes would rank higher than an album with a rating of 8.9 and 20 votes. So, I scraped all the albums on the site with at least 1 vote into a database. Then, taking a leaf out of IMDb's book, I used Bayesian estimation (like the IMDb's Top 250) to calculate a weighted rating for each album based on its Metal Storm rating and the number of votes it had received.

The formula for calculating the Top 100 Albums gives a true Bayesian estimate:
Bayes rating (BR) = ( C × m + R × N ) ÷ ( m + N ) where:
C = average expected rating given...
m = minimum number of votes
R = average rating for the album = (Metal Storm rating)
N = number of votes for the album = (votes)

The way the Bayesian estimator works is that all albums in the database are given and additional m fake votes with an average rating of C, irrespective of how many true votes it already has. Then a new weighted rating is calculated...
If the album has no true votes ( N = 0 ), then BR = ( C × m + R × 0 ) ÷ ( m + 0) = C × m ÷ m = C (the average expected rating).
If the album has a number of true votes equal to the minimum ( N = m ), then BR = ( C × m + R × m ) ÷ ( m + m ) = ( C + R ) × m ÷ 2m = ( C + R ) ÷ 2 (halfway between the two ratings).
If the album has a very large number of true votes ( N >> m ), then BR = ( C × m + R × N ) ÷ ( m + N ) ≈ R × N ÷ N = R (the Metal Storm rating).
This means that the Bayes rating will never equal the Metal Storm rating but will approach it as the true votes grows arbitrarily large.

Now that the maths bit is out of the way, here was my methodology:
Only Studio and EP album types, from the years 2015 to 2019, with at least 1 vote, were included.
The average expected rating (C) was determined by averaging all the Metal Storm ratings from 2015-2019.
The minimum number of votes (m) was determined by calculating the 75th percentile of the votes, rounded to the nearest 10.
I also decided that if an album's Bayes rating was within 0.005 of #100, it would be included too; hence the +2.

C for 2015-2019 = 7.422
m = 20

Number of albums from each year in the list:
2015 - 31
2016 - 24
2017 - 18
2018 - 12
2019 - 17

Ratings are accurate as of 30/10/2023

1.Mgła - Exercises In Futility

2.Insomnium - Winter's Gate

3.Amorphis - Under The Red Cloud

4.Vektor - Terminal Redux

5.Trees Of Eternity - Hour Of The Nightingale

      View entire list ››

Top for my favorite band !

1.Cult Of Luna - Vertikal

2.Cult Of Luna - Mariner [Collaboration]

3.Cult Of Luna - Somewhere Along The Highway

4.Cult Of Luna - A Dawn To Fear

5.Cult Of Luna - The Raging River

      View entire list ››

Input:
10 years
20 decade lists
749 bands
973 albums

Output:
200 top albums from 2010-2019

FAQ

How are the points calculated?
Simple math.

Ranked top lists:
1st place = 150 pts.
2nd place = 149 pts.
...
100th place = 51 pts.
...
150th place = 1 pt.

Alphabetically sorted lists:
Each place = 100 pts.

1.Enslaved - Axioma Ethica Odini

2.Esoteric - Paragon Of Dissonance

3.Emptiness - Nothing But The Whole

4.Esoteric - A Pyrrhic Existence

5.Tribulation - The Formulas Of Death

      View entire list ››

I joined Metal Storm in late 2010 and throughout the years I have discovered so many incredible bands and albums thanks to this site.

My taste in music has changed considerably during this decade so putting together this list was not an easy task. This is the result but I will continuously update it as I revisit albums and discover new ones.

Let's see what the next decade brings! \m/

1.SubRosa - More Constant Than The Gods

2.Chelsea Wolfe - Abyss

3.Nhor - Within The Darkness Between The Starlight

4.Trees Of Eternity - Hour Of The Nightingale

5.Agruss - Morok

      View entire list ››

To explain the title, there is no year 0, regardless of what Ghost may tell you. Thus, the first decade was years 1-10, instead of 0-9. So then it would be 11-20, and so on. But I know that would imply that Paranoid is a 60s album, which we cannot have.

So now that all the cool kids are doing it, here is my top 100 albums of the "decade", most of it might be a bit too mainsteam, most of it you'll find on others' lists, and so on. Restricted to one album per artist/band (including collabs), ordered alphabetically.

1.Abyssal - Antikatastaseis

2.Agalloch - The Serpent & The Sphere

3.Akhlys - The Dreaming I

4.Alcest - Écailles De Lune

5.Altar Of Plagues - Teethed Glory & Injury

      View entire list ››

I began this decade in my final year of high school, in the early phases of my metal journey (Mastodon, Machine Head, Dream Theater, Pantera and Avenged Sevenfold were still recent discoveries). One Masters degree and one PhD later, I'm now a tax-paying Londonian, and have ploughed through what must be comfortably over 2000 new releases during the previous ten years. To commemorate the end of a turbulent decade, I've put together a list of the albums that have stuck with me throughout this decade - I wouldn't consider this to be a 'best albums' list, as there have been some truly ingenious works released in more avant-garde territories, but ultimately these are the albums that have ended up dominating my listening habits, or otherwise making a sufficient impression to make this list.

1.Sylosis - Monolith

2.Sylosis - Edge Of The Earth

3.Amorphis - Under The Red Cloud

4.Be'lakor - Of Breath And Bone

5.Cult Of Luna - Vertikal

      View entire list ››

Fifty years of metal, 50 best albums of the year. Note that in order to diversify the list I limited it to one album per band, otherwise there would have been too much Judas Priest and Iron Maiden.

1.Black Sabbath - Paranoid

2.Led Zeppelin - Led Zeppelin IV

3.Deep Purple - Machine Head

4.Budgie - Never Turn Your Back On A Friend

5.Queen - Queen II

      View entire list ››

1.The Body - No One Deserves Happiness

2.Cobalt - Slow Forever

3.Cult Of Luna - Mariner [Collaboration]

4.The Dillinger Escape Plan - Dissociation

5.Nails - You Will Never Be One Of Us

      View entire list ››

1.Saor - Guardians

2.Oathbreaker - Rheia

3.SubRosa - For This We Fought The Battle Of Ages

4.Astronoid - Air

5.Zeal and Ardor - Devil Is Fine

      View entire list ››

In no particular order

1.Devin Townsend - Transcendence

2.Cult Of Luna - Mariner [Collaboration]

3.Astronoid - Air

4.Borknagar - Winter Thrice

5.Messa - Belfry

      View entire list ››

1.Cult Of Luna - Mariner [Collaboration]

2.Oranssi Pazuzu - Värähtelijä

3.Mistur - In Memoriam

4.Thy Catafalque - Meta

5.In The Woods... - Pure

      View entire list ››