1.Triptykon - Melana Chasmata

2.Kypck - Имена На Стене

3.At The Gates - At War With Reality

4.Ne Obliviscaris - Citadel

5.Primordial - Where Greater Men Have Fallen

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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
2015-2019 list: http://www.metalstorm.net/users/list.php?list_id=6722

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 grow 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 2010 to 2014, with at least 1 vote, were included.
The average expected rating (C) was determined by averaging all the Metal Storm ratings from 2010-2014.
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 2010-2014 = 7.478
m = 20

Number of albums from each year in the list:
2010 - 24
2011 - 28
2012 - 16
2013 - 22
2014 - 12

Ratings are accurate as of 30/10/2023

1.Gallowbraid - Ashen Eidolon

2.Enslaved - Axioma Ethica Odini

3.Aquilus - Griseus

4.Ne Obliviscaris - Portal Of I

5.Be'lakor - Of Breath And Bone

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The things I liked in 2014

1.Disforia - The Age Of Ether

2.Accept - Blind Rage

3.Arion - Last Of Us

4.Exodus - Blood In, Blood Out

5.Machine Head - Bloodstone & Diamonds

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1.Altar Of Plagues - Teethed Glory & Injury

2.The Angelic Process - Weighing Souls With Sand

3.Arcturus - The Sham Mirrors

4.Atheist - Unquestionable Presence

5.Beherit - Drawing Down The Moon

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My personal favorite studio albums of 2014

1.Ghost Brigade - IV - One With The Storm

2.Epica - The Quantum Enigma

3.Primordial - Where Greater Men Have Fallen

4.Sólstafir - Ótta

5.Shylmagoghnar - Emergence

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This serves as a memory note, pretty much.

1.Insomnium - Above The Weeping World

2.Amorphis - Under The Red Cloud

3.Ghost Brigade - IV - One With The Storm

4.Be'lakor - Of Breath And Bone

5.Metallica - Ride The Lightning

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1.Alestorm - Sunset On The Golden Age

2.Alterbeast - Immortal

3.Archspire - The Lucid Collective

4.Barathrum - Warmetal

5.Dagor Dagorath - Dissident

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The best album of 2014 is Sky Blue by Devin Townsend imo, but it's a double album so rated likewise.

1.Hail Spirit Noir - Oi Magoi

2.Empyrium - The Turn Of The Tides

3.Agalloch - The Serpent & The Sphere

4.Fen - Carrion Skies

5.Ne Obliviscaris - Citadel

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1.Soen - Tellurian

2.Opeth - Pale Communion

3.Rishloo - Living As Ghosts With Buildings As Teeth

4.Mastodon - Once More 'Round The Sun

5.Behemoth - The Satanist

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These are my favorite metal albums

1.Megadeth - Rust In Peace

2.Wintersun - Time I

3.Ne Obliviscaris - Citadel

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1.

2.Fates Warning - The Spectre Within

3.Slauter Xstoyes - Winter Kill

4.Watch Tower - Energetic Disassembly

5.Trilogy - Life On Earth

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1.Freak Kitchen - Cooking With Pagans

2.Threshold - For The Journey

3.Serdce - Timelessness

4.Lux Occulta - Kołysanki

5.Freedom Call - Beyond

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1.Septicflesh - Titan

2.Autumnal - The End Of The Third Day

3.Ne Obliviscaris - Citadel

4.Novembers Doom - Bled White

5.Epica - The Quantum Enigma

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1.Ghost Brigade - IV - One With The Storm

2.Empyrium - The Turn Of The Tides

3.Insomnium - Shadows Of The Dying Sun

4.Ne Obliviscaris - Citadel

5.In Flames - Siren Charms

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2008 might've been my first proper taste of metal, with the acquisition of albums from the likes of Metallica, Megadeth, Black Sabbath and that most grandiose of gateway bands, DragonForce. 2009 might've seen me expanding my palette, with Iron Maiden, Alice In Chains, Avenged Sevenfold, and more entering my world, and Guns N' Roses triumphantly re-entering it. But 2010 was when I delved into more 'intense' stuff with Machine Head, In Flames, and most notably of all, Sylosis, and saw my relationship with metal shift from ever-increasing interest into full-blown love affair. To commemorate this 5-year anniversary, and because I love making lists, I decided to do a retrospective of the best albums and songs that have been released during this time period, and give brief tributes to them. Yay music!

1.Sylosis - Edge Of The Earth

2.Sylosis - Monolith

3.Protest The Hero - Volition

4.Orphaned Land - The Never Ending Way Of ORwarriOR

5.Be'lakor - Of Breath And Bone

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