Wednesday, December 31, 2025

Arthalos' Best of 2025

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Not as loaded as 2024 or 2023, granted, but 2025 was nevertheless full of surprises and stellar music. AI took over music, the world burrowed deeper into a geopolitical firestorm, and I grew one year more cynical. That said, coming back to the year's glut of releases in December is something that always brings me joy, even 10 years into the endeavor. So let's dive in.

As per usual, my top picks are all over the place, a weird tapestry of my old school-coded preferences (80s/90s metal being what fed me through my awkward teenage years), technical and melodic death metal, and a sprawl of black and weird avantgarde preferences. The ineffable tide of new music means that there's always something new and fresh coming our way, to the point that music blogs and channels have started to dissect music on a monthly basis. The sheer overload of new material means there's no way I can hear everything or even give equal appreciation to every artist to emerge from the woodwork, and with work/life pressures that means I increasingly have to narrow my choices to genres or at least labels that I know will deliver some form of quality. An idea is to have a list of such labels and even go full-on autistic with an Excel sheet to map out and rank appropriate releases - though I'm sure a few avid listeners have already engaged in such nerdery. All in all, I listened to somewhere between 200 and 250 full-length LPs and EPs this year, roughly what I get to absorb on an annual basis. Let's get to the cream of the crop.

Technical and melodic death metal was well-represented this year, thanks to the excellent offerings of The Halo Effect, Rivers of Nihil, Aversed and Allegaeon. While I think the best tech death album I've heard since 2020 still might be Archspire's Bleed the Future, Rivers of Nihil, Aversed and Allegaeon come pretty damn close to that standard, reveling in various melodic/progressive permutations that expand the tech death space whilst simultaneously cherishing accessibility. Meanwhile, as keen readers will guess, there's always room for dessert, meaning in this case retro, throwback heavy metal that remains unapologetically nostalgic. Of course I'm talking about Void, Century and Sölicitör. Void, in particular, was a band I'd never heard of before, and they crushed all expectations I had, flooring me with an insane technical thrash escape. Thrash is simply not something you hear often these days, even less so when it's well-written or giving nods towards the technical thrash champions of the 80s: bands like Deathrow, Mekong Delta or Toxik. Insane stuff, rivalled only by an actual master returning from the dead with what I'd consider to be the best thrash record of the 2020s, a definitive "fuck you" to all the genre cynics and prog nerds who can only get hard while thinking about polyrhythms. Dissonance Theory is so good, I felt like I'd forgotten what good music was for a while as I was first blasting it during those chilly October nights when it first came out. 

I'm a sucker for the avantgarde, and that tends to accordingly manifest itself on my lists. This year, Imperial Triumphant came out with their opus magnum, a genuinely terrifying blackened death immersion into the New Yorkers' obsessive vision of their home city. Selvans, too, delivered an interesting record. Horror-core isn't usually my thing, but their distinct blend of horror aesthetics, virulent blackened heavy/thrash and 70s prog kept me coming back. In parallel absurdity, Igorrr released Amen, which meant that I couldn't wipe off the stupid, awed smirk from my face every time I plugged in. A totally illustrious artist in his own right, while his output is not strictly metal, here the Frenchman very much played to everyone's strengths, incorporating big, brawly modern metal elements seamlessly into his trademark baroque-meets-breakcore sound. Some of my other top picks are relatively 'safe' choices, and they're only there because I couldn't stop listening to them. Eluveitie, Messa and Rivers of Nihil all belong to that category, boasting stellar production values across. All of their respective albums that flowed wonderfully as a whole whilst latching themselves into my memory with ease.  


Links to the songs embedded below.

Thanks for reading, and see you all next year. 


~ Top 20 Metal Albums of 2025 ~



~ Top 10 Books I Read in 2025 ~

10. A World After Liberalism: Philosophers of the Extreme Right by Matthew Rose (2021)
09. Knife: Meditations After an Attempted Murder by Salman Rushdie (2021)
08. The Vegetarian by Han Kang (2007)
07. The Hundred Years of War on Palestine by Rashid Khalidi (2017)
06. Hayek's Bastards by Quinn Slobodian (2025)
05. Free by Lea Ypi (2021)
04. The Great Global Transformation by Branko Milanovic (2025)
03. A Waiter in Paris by Edward Chisholm (2022)
02. One Day, Everyone Will Have Always Been Against This by Omar El Akkad (2025)
01. Educated by Tara Westover (2024)



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Sunday, December 29, 2024

Arthalos' Best of 2024

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2024 proved, if anything, that there's still wild fucking fun to be had in the metal sphere, and that Covid-19 clearly didn't eliminate the worldwide hunger for the genre. In our world of Spotify wrapped, bogus, overproduced pop and hip-hop, and now an increasing craze to drive AI into the domain of music, it gives me joy - nay, peace of mind - to labor through hours and hours upon of random underground music, discovering the albums that will be the soundtracks to my life for the next few months, even years. Whether the casualization of music will truly bode ill for the future remains to be seen, but until then, and probably even after the worst of technological advancements have befallen us, I'll remain committed to exposing my ears to heavy and experimental music. Till the end of my days. With all that sappiness taken care of, let's get to it. As always, my 50 favorite listens can be found with commentary on RYM.

Much of my usual suspects run though this list, as 2024 was a year where the conjurations of heavy and power metal were particularly puissant. There's a demographic range here, from highly young acts like Horndal, Iotunn, and Kanonenfieber to relatively established underground groups like Blood Incantion, Madder Mortem, and Tribulation to absolute oldies like Priest, Warlord, Riot V and their ilk. So the classic heavy metal front was clearly a strong pillar here. Other old, but much less known acts like Mork Gryning and Scavenger brought the heat with records sneaked up on me with dangerous cunning, and I was more than content with what I heard. There are tasty chunks of progressive and prog-adjacent metal to be had, from the hugely anticipated Opeth to Ihsahn's scintillating self-titled orchestral ode, to Hungary's finest metal export, Thy Catafalque with what's probably his best work outside of Róka Hasa Rádió (2009). Opeth, perhaps to nobody's surprise, absolutely crushed it, even bringing a few Jethro Tull flute solos along the way. The Blood Incantation record belongs to that vein as well, and it was also one of those records that deserved all the praise it got, marrying 70s progressive a la Emerson, Lake and Palmer to old school death metal in an unthinkable move. Other great records like Kinship and Head Hammer Man also held their own.

Outside the progressive domain, which seems to be increasingly a fundamental part of my auditory fix, there were some great, fiendish black metal excursions like the new Hail Spirit Noir, Mörk Gryning and Kvaen who exploited the bounds of the genre I know and love for its sheer malleability. Vast, tumultuous vistas of malice and introspection. Oranssi Pazuzu, one of my favorite younger black metal bands, went full techno / drum and bass with Muuntautuja. They barely broke a sweat while doing so, and unnerved me to my core. The new Ministry was also a welcome surprise; it kept me grooving and dancing in between many a workout set. In the end, though, despite its beautiful exploration of themes such as loss and control, Old Eyes, New Heart is only my second favorite album of the year. Not only that, but it rivals the masterful Desiderata (2006) in sheer quality, an album which I consider a milestone in the gothic/progressive niche. It stymied and moved me through almost every song and refused to drop from my rotation. But the cake goes to the latest by Crypt Sermon, the best album so far from a band that almost forcibly converted me into being a doom goon. There wasn't a song there that didn't connect, and whenever they did, I found myself at a loss at its sheer fluidity, heft and atmosphere. Truly ceremonial music for the 2020s, harkening to its 80s epic doom origins, but angrier, more deranged, just like the world that birthed it. 

Links to the songs embedded below.

Thanks for reading, and see you all next year. 



*Top 25 Metal Albums of 2024*



You can find a more comprehensive list with short review blurbs that I've written for my top 50 albums over at RateYourMusic. Link to that list over HERE.  


~


~ Top 10 Books I've Read in 2024 ~

10. The Invention of Prehistory: Empire, Violence, and Our Obsession with Human Nature − Stefanos Geroulanos
09. Fire Weather: A True Story from a Hotter World − John Vaillant 
08. Less Than Zero − Brett Easton Ellis
07. Cobalt Red: How the Blood of Congo Powers Our Lives − Siddharth Kara
06. New Dark Age: Technology and the End of the Future − James Bridle
05. End Times: Elites, Counter-Elites, and the Path to Political Disintegration − Peter Turchin
04. The Deluge: The Great War, America and the Remaking of the Global Order, 1916-1931 − Adam Tooze
03. Making the Arab World: Nasser, Qutb, and the Clash That Shaped the Middle East − Fawaz Gerges
02. Family Values: Between Neoliberalism and the New Social Conservatism − Melinda Cooper
01. The Looming Tower: Al-Qaeda and the Road to 9/11 − Lawrence Wright 


~


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Monday, July 15, 2024

Arthalos' Best of 2008


20. Falchion – Chronicles of the Dead
19. Stormlord – Mare Nostrum
18. Spite Extreme Wing – Vltra
17. Valient Thorr – Immortalizer
16. Archons – Consequences of Silence 
15. Cynic – Traced in Air
14. Opeth – Watershed
13. The Monolith Deathcult – Trivmvirate 
12. Leviathan – Massive Conspiracy Against All Life
11. Darkthrone – Dark Thrones and Black Flags
10. Amon Amarth – Twilight of the Thunder God
09. In Flames – A Sense of Purpose
08. The Faceless – Planetary Duality
07. Firewind – The Premonition
06. Septic Flesh – Communion
05. Enslaved – Vertebrae
04. Falconer – Amongst Beggars and Thieves
03. Pharaoh – Be Gone
02. Protest the Hero – Fortress
01. Gojira – The Way of All Flesh





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Sunday, December 31, 2023

Arthalos' Best of 2023


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This was another year loaded with quality releases, so much so that, like last year, I had to push back some extremely good records and had to picky extra picky in choosing a top 23. For context, I'd rate everything below an 8.5/10 or above. As always, the most important predictor of a high rating is how likely I would re-listen a given album, and how much much I would enjoy it months after I first spun it. Albums released in winter have a bit of disadvantage given that 'time' element, which is why I periodically reassess my rankings and reorder where necessary. The diversity of genres is on point, I even surprised myself for having included so much underground black/death variety, since this niche is typically overcrowded with cavern-mongering copycats lacking inspiration. Yet it was impossible to disavow the efforts of Wyrgher, Vertebra Atlantis, and Valdrin, who showed once again that smaller, underground labels that easily oust the more established mainstream companies in quality and quantity. 

There was a lot of heresay about 2023 being 'the year of death metal', and though it was definitely a stalwart year for veterans joining back into the foray, I found more enjoyment in the backlog of black metal I listened to. My top 50 has a more comprehensive list of everything I enjoyed in that realm in case you were wondering where all the black metal was at. For sure, my tastes veer more towards the unorthodox and innovative, so it's almost a given that bands like Kvelertak, Dødheimsgard, Enslaved and Malorkarpatan ended up where they did. Insane performances all, the Dødheimsgard disc especially mesmerized me every time I spun it. An elegiac, mind-bending ode to absurdism. 

There are also a couple of 'outliers' like the new In Flames and Voyager, records that seem to fit awkwardly between the grim, subterranean subtext engulfing them. As with previous years, I do not give a damn, these records were on repeat until my ears bled dry this year, and they've earned their spot for having some annoyingly catchy songs. Go figure. Finally, although there's a relatively equitable distribution of genres, it would have been nice to see some more standout tech death this year. My craving for noodling guitars and clinical breakdowns that thankfully satisfied by Gorod with one of their strongest outings to date, although Suffocation and Afterbirth (on my top 50 list) also did well. Other popular albums from this space, like the new Nithing or Nightmarer were either mediocre or poorly executed. 

Links to the albums are below, as well as other random lists I've accrued over the year. 



* Top 23 Metal Albums of 2023* 




~ 


You can find a more comprehensive list with short review blurbs that I've written for my top 50 albums over at RateYourMusic. Link to that list over HERE.  

~ 


~ Top Gym Tunes of 2023 (In No Order) ~

2023 was a year of many good albums, but also of many good lifts. 

Coldly Calculated Design − The Faceless (US)
The Grand Conjuration − Opeth (Se)
Somewhere I Sadly Belong − Subterranean Masquerade (Il)
The Secrets of the American Gods − Blind Guardian (De)
We Are the Sun Gods − Gorod (Fr)
Wheels of Fire − Anthem (Jp)
Unleashing the Bloodthirsty − Cannibal Corpse (US)
Motsols − Kvelertak (Nr)
Back to Times of Splendor − Disillusion (De)
The Widow Maker − Carpenter Brut (US)
Fallow Season − Madder Mortem (Nr)


~ Top 10 Books I've Read in 2023 ~


10. Nomadland − Jessica Bruder 
09. Burning the Books − Richard Ovenden
08. The Fall of Yugoslavia − Misha Glenny 
07. Alexander the Great − Norman F. Cantor
06. Why We Sleep − Matthew Walker
05. The Pursuit of Italy − David Gilmour 
04. Snow Crash − Neal Stephenson 
03. Crack-Up Capitalism − Quinn Slobodian 
02. Empire of Pain: The Secret History of the Sackler Dynasty − Patrick Radden Keefe
01. Not Enough: Human Rights in an Unequal World − Samuel Moyn 


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Friday, December 30, 2022

Arthalos' Best of 2022

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Another fantastic year, 2022 was where all the unreleased potential from 2021 and 2020 spilled over. Normally, I find it difficult to fill in the last half/quarter of my top 20 lists, not because I don't enjoy those later entries, but rather that I find there is a large removal between the first half and the second in terms of quality. This was certainly not the case this year, and I realized I had such a large bastion of records that the list go up by 30-40 entries. Nonetheless, you can find those non-hierarchically ordered entities in my RYM list alongside short review blurbs. 

Like most of these yearly pickings, it's difficult to find a grand, overarching theme: it's safer to say there was smorgasbord of quality albums from the usual genre suspects... lots of traditional heavy/power, melodic death, some avantgarde/experimental stuff, a small league of varied black metal, and some miscellany. Bands like Shape of Despair, Cult of Luna and Final Light produced some impressive atmospheric material, regardless of whether they evoked a sense dread or majesty, all these bands transported the listener into a plateau ethereal immersion. Cult of Luna, in particular, astonished me so much by raising the bar again after A Dawn to Fear in 2019 that I think it's evident they've become the true inheritors to the Neurosis sound, going above and beyond. 

Sumerlands, Spell and Hell Fire came in guns blazing with trad-heavy, ancient-sounding paeans to 80s metal, inspired by, without mindless recycling riffs. Even Ghost released their most accessible record to date which was somewhat reviled by critics, though personally I enjoyed the shit out of it. More than ever, I'm now ready to pay for one of their extravagant shows. There are also a few records I avoided for a while on account of the hype they were getting across the internet - Cave In and Messa in particular. Upon returning to these albums later on in the year, however, it was evident that they fucking slayed, and between the groovy sludge panache of the former and the morose, oriental charm of the latter there is plenty of inspiration to be found for future sludge/doom practitioners. Immolation, conversely put out the greatest pure death metal album of the year, validated across countless review boards and forums. An impeccable fortress of profanity that should make about 95% of other OSDM outfits wet their pants in terror. The one outlier here is clearly the Final Light debut, an album that caught much less attention than it deserved, which is a shame. It remains a hypnotizing testament to inventiveness across electronic and metal music. 

But nothing could have prepared me for Blind Guardian's masterwork, a record so shocking in how hungry and crushing it was I might consider it the second best album in their sprawling discography. I'd only tie it with Disillusion's Ayam, a record that, as the product of planetary alignment in some oceanborne galaxy, provided me with warmth, comfort, and dreams for days in an otherwise uncompromising universe. Soilwork and Voivod trailed just behind with their most proficient meditations in many years, one melodic and achingly beautiful, the other a challenging remedial pill for our postmodern, cybernetic age. Records I caught myself blasting in the shower over a dozen times. 

As always, thank you for reading. See you all in 2023.

Links to the albums embedded below.



*Top 20 Metal Albums*






~~~~~


I also write short blurbs for all the albums I enjoyed yearly on RateYourMusic. Link to the full, non-hierarchical list of my 50 favorite metal albums of the year here.


~~~~~


Non-metal Albums I've Enjoyed

In no particular order. These records just represent the few samplings I managed to listen in my down time, when I needed something... less heavy. Mostly records by bands I've been following for a while, so it's in no way meant to be comprehensive. 




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Thursday, October 20, 2022

Best Metal Albums of 2003

20. TIE Trauma – Imperfect Like a God | Nasum – Helvete
19. Sargeist – Satanic Black Devotion
18. Septic Flesh – Sumerian Daemons 
17. Green Carnation – A Blessing in Disguise 
16. Killing Joke – Killing Joke
15. Children of Bodom – Hate Crew Deathroll 
14. Intestine Baalism – Banquet in the Darkness
13. Carpathian Forest – Defending the Throne of Evil
12. Katatonia – Viva Emptiness
11. Soilwork – Figure Number Five
10. Rage – Soundchaser 
09. Hammers of Misfortune – The August Engine
08. Dream Theater – Train of Thought
07. Atrophia Red Sun – Twisted Logic
06. Unmoored – Indefinite Soul-Extension
05. Opeth – Damnation
04. Moonsorrow – Kivenkantaja
03. Enslaved – Below the Lights
02. Slough Feg – Traveller
01. Mörk Gryning – Pieces of Primal Expressionism 


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Sunday, July 3, 2022

Best Metal Albums of 2013


(Updated 2024)

20. Cult of Luna – Vertikal
19. Neige Éternelle – Neige Éternelle
18. Oranssi Pazuzu – Valonielu 
17. Witherscape – The Inheritance
16. Gris – À l'Âme Enflammée, l'Äme Constellée...
15. Autolatry – Native
14. Mouth of the Architect – Dawning
13. Gorguts – Colored Sands
12. Sulphur Aeon – Swallowed by the Ocean's Tide
11. The Dillinger Escape Plan – One of Us is the Killer
10. Attacker – Giants of Canaan
09. Iron Dogs – Free and Wild
08. Helloween – Straight Out of Hell
07. The Safety Fire – Mouth of Swords
06. The Ocean – Pelagial 
05. Warlord – The Holy Empire
04. Protest the Hero – Volition
03. Summoning – Old Mornings Dawn
02. Satan – Life Sentence
01. In Solitude – Sister



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Tuesday, December 28, 2021

Arthalos' Best of 2021


This was a bountiful year for all genres at large, and I found myself diversifying into all sorts of avenues of extreme metal, beyond my conventional tastes in prog, doom, traditional and power metal. I probably listened to something in the vicinity of  200-250 new albums this year; the list could have included at least another ten entries that I found to be well worth my time, with all genres well-represented – a testament to sustained quality in songwriting even in the throes of an overlong pandemic. Again, there were stellar performances all across the board. A slew of amazing newsprint progressive power/heavy acts like Edu Falaschi, Silver Talon, Pharaoh and Witherfall take up a large chunk in the top 10, owing not least to the energy and inventiveness that they approached to the niche, managing to stand out amid a throng of fluffy symphonic denizens and Euro power metal. Speaking of symphonic, the only record this year that managed to capture my attention with that tag was the Seven Spires full-length, a wonderful, swashbuckling mirage that wasn't afraid to straddle a number of influences, proving the band should be every bit the successor of the Nightwishes and Epicas of the world. The spectrum, however, was as equally proficient in its musical wizardry as it was epic and memorable, thanks in no small part to groups like Archspire, First Fragment and Obscura, the latter of which stunned me with what seems almost like a perfect 'one step back, two steps forward' approach in the evolution of their style, harkening back to the Gothenburg melodeath etiquette to refresh their established tech death pedigree. Some of these pickings are also grim and beautiful in their own quaint ways, with Sarke, Worm, Thy Catafalque, King Woman, The Silver and most notably Tribulation generating eclectic, forbidding and morose spins on more standardized genre narratives. All in all, this was one of the more memorable years in recent memory, and a lot of musical windfall here provides us with compelling listens well into 2022.

Links to the albums are embedded below.


*Top 20 Metal Albums of 2021*



I also write short blurbs for all the albums I enjoyed yearly on RateYourMusic. Link to the full, non-hierarchical list of my 50 favorite metal albums of the year here. 


~~~~~

As per usual, anything that drew my attention this year that wasn't metal was probably a splurge of synthwave and synth pop, with a couple of rock records that weren't 'heavy' enough to qualify for the metal list. I don't get to explore that much when it comes to these genres, but I do my best to weed through the relevant releases. I've rounded things off with a sprinkle of pop and and punk/hardcore, although truth be told I'm probably neglecting a lot of really phenomenal efforts that unfortunately went under my radar. All in all, the Jess and the Ancient Ones record was the most addictive, something I've listened to intermittently throughout the year. The Finns have clearly injected an excellent sense of folk, psychedelic and prog rock elements into their compositions, filled to the brim with sequences with sequences so catchy and inspiring that the few sentences on this blurb would do them little justice. Reliable acts like TNFO, Steven Wilson and Perturbator also produced terrific music that probably received nods from a large chunk of the metal crowds, while I was pleased to discover a novel set of pop and synth-pop finesse via Actors, Magdalena Bay and Japanese Breakfast, setting the stage for a future cohort of artists to look out for.


*Top 15 Non-metal Albums of 2021*



Bonus: Top 10 Books That I Read This Year

01. Leonardo da Vinci – Walter Isaacson (2017)
02. Black Wave – Kim Ghattas (2020)
03. How Asia Works – Joe Studwell (2014)
04. Capital – Rana Dasragupta (2015)
05. Shock of the Anthropocene – Christophe Bonneuil & Jean-Baptiste Fressoz (2015)
06. Shutdown – Adam Tooze (2021)
07. Sex at Dawn – Christopher Ryan (2010)
08. Empire of Cotton – Sven Beckert (2015)
09. The Darkness That Comes Before – R. Scott Bakker (2004)
10. Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? – Philip K. Dick (1968)

Honorable mentions:

- The Nickel Boys – Colson Whitehead (2020)
- Providence [graphic novel] – Alan Moore & Jacen Burrows (2021)
- Down and About in Paris and London – George Orwell (1933)
- Afropean – Johny Pitts (2019)


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