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Thumbs up: +104
The Encyclopaedia of Beautiful Metal Ballads

If you know other wonderful songs which are missing in this list, feel free to suggest them to me

1.Adagio - Underworld
2.Aerosmith - Aerosmith
3.After Forever - Prison Of Desire
4.After Forever - Decipher
5.After Forever - After Forever

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Created by ~Starchild~ on 28.12.2010



Thumbs up: +40
The Greatest Power Metal Albums Of All Time

The best Power Metal albums by the best bands in the genre. The albums are not in any specific order, at least after the first 10. I placed more than 1 album per band cause they really deserve to be here. Feedback is appreciated.

Note: I edited the list and changed the title because there are albums that deserve to be here and I felt 20 albums are not enough

1.Helloween - Keeper Of The Seven Keys Part I
2.Helloween - Keeper Of The Seven Keys Part II
3.Angra - Temple Of Shadows
4.Angra - Rebirth
5.Stratovarius - Visions

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Created by Mountain King on 09.04.2010



Thumbs up: +35
My Top 10 EU Power Metal Albums Of All-Time

Here are my all-time favourite european / melodic / neoclassical power metal albums.

1. The birth of EU power metal pt.2.
=> best songs: Eagle Fly Free, I Want Out, Keeper Of The Seven Keys

2. The birth of EU power metal pt.1.
=> best songs: A Tale That Wasn't Right, Future World, Halloween

3. The birth of hollywood metal mixing classical music and power metal pt.1.

1.Helloween - Keeper Of The Seven Keys Part II
2.Helloween - Keeper Of The Seven Keys Part I
3.Rhapsody Of Fire - Legendary Tales
4.Avantasia - The Metal Opera Part I
5.Stratovarius - Visions

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Created by Kallis Helmi on 03.03.2010



Thumbs up: +27
Jay's Top Metal Albums...no Particular Order 2.0

I havnt been into metal all that long...so this is a good chuck of the metal albums i own...though ive heard many, many more....these are all albums ive spent a lot of time with (or soon will). I tried to stay away from multiple albums by an artist, but a few exceptions were made hehe.

1.!T.O.O.H.! - Order And Punishment (Řád A Trest)
2.3 Inches Of Blood - Here Waits Thy Doom
3.Absu - Tara
4.ADX - Division Blindée
5.Agalloch - The Mantle

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Created by JÄY on 28.07.2010



Thumbs up: +22
My favourite Power Metal Albums

Since many of you felt annoyed by my previous list title I changed it and hopefully you will be ok with it.Power up everybody!!!

1.Helloween - Keeper Of The Seven Keys Part II
2.Blind Guardian - Imaginations From The Other Side
3.Helloween - Keeper Of The Seven Keys Part I
4.Riot - ThunderSteel
5.Gamma Ray - Land Of The Free

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Created by stormlord77 on 29.04.2013



Thumbs up: +21
Top 500 Albums of All Time

I've been listening to Metal since 2005 and it has become my biggest passion in life.

Rarely a day goes by where I don't listen to it in one form or another. The bands I listened to in my teens inspired me to pick up the guitar (and later drums) and start making music of my own.

So here are the albums that have stood out and made the largest impact on me. To be as transparent as possible, I've labelled albums as 'nostalgia bias' where my memories of the album give it an advantage over others.

(Score is an average of each album's song ratings, full list located here. There are a ton of albums that I've rated 9/10 in the 'TBR' tab that may never make it to this list, be sure to check those out.)

If you discovered any new albums or like the same sort of metal, be sure to give this list a thumbs-up and leave a comment so more people can find these amazing bands!

My other lists:
Top 25 EPs (ordered & rated)
Top 200 Overlooked Albums (with genres)
Top 200 Overrated Albums (trigger warning)
So I Heard You Like Wintersun... (Time II find new bands)

Genre-Specific:
Top 50 Black Metal Albums
Top 50 Melodic Death Metal Albums
Top 45 Thrash Metal Albums
Top 40 Power Metal Albums
Top 30 Doom Metal Albums
Top 30 Heavy Metal Albums

1.Nine Inch Nails - The Downward Spiral
2.Opeth - Blackwater Park
3.Metallica - Master Of Puppets
4.Edge Of Sanity - Crimson
5.Opeth - Still Life

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Created by nonZero on 06.10.2018



Thumbs up: +16
Andy's top ranked all time favorite songs

All my favourite songs ranked in order best down.

1.Rush - 2112
2.Deep Purple - In Rock
3.Jethro Tull - Aqualung
4.Rainbow - Rising
5.Black Sabbath - Paranoid

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Created by AndyMetalFreak on 23.08.2021



Thumbs up: +16
Best Of European Power Metal

Simply a list of the 30 best Power Metal albums of the European/Melodic style in my opinion. One album per band and in order of preference, although the order may change over time.

1.Gamma Ray - Land Of The Free
2.Blind Guardian - Tales From The Twilight World
3.Kiuas - The Spirit Of Ukko
4.Dark Moor - The Hall Of The Olden Dreams
5.Helloween - Keeper Of The Seven Keys Part I

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Created by R'Vannith on 22.12.2010



Thumbs up: +12
109 All-Time Favorite Songs

My Favorite Metal Songs. I tried to limit myself to one song per album, so this list also doubles as my favorite song off of each of these albums also. Probably stop the list at 666 if I ever get there.

1.Metallica - Ride The Lightning
2.Iron Maiden - Rock In Rio
3.Testament - The Legacy
4.Exodus - Bonded By Blood
5.Wolf (UK) - Edge Of The World

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Created by Death To Posers on 10.01.2011



Thumbs up: +6
Empowering Albums For Powerless Losers

This is a list of all the power metal albums I have listened to that are worth remembering. Like my other genre lists, this is not meant to be a definitive guide to power metal or a binding judgment on what power metal is or is not. The list exists purely for my own organizational purposes and may contain bands or albums that are not strictly True Knights of the Eternal Thundersword.

The first cluster includes my favorite albums in the genre (and a significant number of my all-time favorites); beyond that, they are listed by rating from 9/10 down to 6/10 and alphabetically within each bracket.

Last updated November 27, 2021.

1.Blind Guardian - Nightfall In Middle-Earth
2.Blind Guardian - Imaginations From The Other Side
3.Blind Guardian - Somewhere Far Beyond
4.Jag Panzer - Thane To The Throne
5.X Japan - Art Of Life

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Created by ScreamingSteelUS on 19.09.2019



Thumbs up: +5
Top 100 (+5) Of 2000-2004

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
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 2000 to 2004, with at least 1 vote, were included.
The average expected rating (C) was determined by averaging all the Metal Storm ratings from 2000-2004.
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 +5.

C for 2000-2004 = 7.599
m = 30

Number of albums from each year in the list:
2000 - 15
2001 - 27
2002 - 14
2003 - 20
2004 - 29

Ratings are accurate as of 30/10/2023

1.Opeth - Blackwater Park
2.Agalloch - The Mantle
3.Tool - Lateralus
4.Wintersun - Wintersun
5.Ensiferum - Ensiferum

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Created by Crys1s on 26.09.2019



Thumbs up: +4
Top Metal Albums Each Year I Have Been Alive 2001

A little list series where I list my top 20 favorite metal albums every year starting from the year I was born in.

2001 was pretty great year... for metal that is, one of the best in my opinion, this year was especially great for Symphonic metal, power metal and Folk metal. Also 2001 saw the release of a couple of the most Iconic albums in progressive metal history.

1.Opeth - Blackwater Park
2.System Of A Down - Toxicity
3.Rammstein - Mutter
4.Ensiferum - Ensiferum
5.Moonsorrow - Voimasta Ja Kunniasta

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Created by Handala on 08.09.2022



Thumbs up: +4
My Favorite Rock/Metal Ballads

The best ballads in the history of Metal. Of course, all these bands and other bands have really good ballads but this list shows the very best, handpicked by me. In alphabetical order by bands name to make the list less chaotic and not by order of preference.

1.Accept - Eat The Heat
2.Accept - Blood Of The Nations
3.Adagio - Underworld
4.Aerosmith - Aerosmith
5.Allen/Lande - The Battle

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Created by Mountain King on 07.01.2012



Thumbs up: +4
10 Fav Power Metal Album All Time!

my list!!vote it!

1.Angra - Angels Cry
2.Aquaria - LUXAERTERNA
3.Blind Guardian - Somewhere Far Beyond
4.Stratovarius - Infinite
5.Rhapsody Of Fire - SYMPHONI OF ENCHANTED LANDS

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Created by MeTalRea|istiK on 20.09.2010



Thumbs up: +3
The Most Epic Pharaoh Metal Songs

The best ancient Egypt themed metal songs.

1.Symphony X - V: The New Mythology Suite
2.Serious Black - As Daylight Breaks
3.Edguy - Mandrake
4.Nocturnal Rites - New World Messiah
5.Kotipelto - Waiting For The Dawn

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Created by Mountain King on 14.05.2015