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Your Top 100 Death Metal Albums


BlutAusNerd

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14 minutes ago, BlutAusNerd said:

I would suggest doing so with Altars or Covenant, I feel that Blessed doesn't quite measure up to those two.

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I went with Blessed because I seem to recall Macabre being particularly fond of it. I've tried to get into Altars on and off since I was a teenager, never liked it. Maybe something will click if I hammer it enough. 

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14 minutes ago, BlutAusNerd said: I would suggest doing so with Altars or Covenant, I feel that Blessed doesn't quite measure up to those two.

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I went with Blessed because I seem to recall Macabre being particularly fond of it. I've tried to get into Altars on and off since I was a teenager, never liked it. Maybe something will click if I hammer it enough. 

I think Covenant's more complex nature might reach you more easily. It was recently pointed out to me that the song and riff structures in Covenant are classically influenced, which I can agree with. I can hear them working well in context with a symphony, which I think contributes to the unique feel of it.

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They have never bettered "Blessed..." for me.  That album was a step up from "Altars..." in terms of being much darker and having the added substance that "Altars.." lacked (great album though it still is).  "Covenant" is a good album but always sounds a bit thin guitar wise for my liking the more I listen to it.

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They have never bettered "Blessed..." for me.  That album was a step up from "Altars..." in terms of being much darker and having the added substance that "Altars.." lacked (great album though it still is).  "Covenant" is a good album but always sounds a bit thin guitar wise for my liking the more I listen to it.

Blessed is darker and more varied than Altars, but it's also missing that rabid, frenetic energy that jumps through the speakers when Altars is playing. I think David's vocals hit their peak on Altars too, he sounds sick and feral, but more restrained on later recordings.

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Actually never liked his vocals, which is a big part of why I don't dig Altars. I'm enjoying the drumming and some of the grooves that the guitar goes into on Blessed, but I'm mostly listening past the vocals to get into the music. It's cool, took me years to get into Death for a similar reason. 

That's surprising considering that you were spinning Nocturnus the other day, and Vincent's vocals on Altars are clearly inspired by their former vocalist who would found Nocturnus after his departure from MA.

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  • 2 months later...

Hey Relentless, would you mind working your magic and fixing the stupid spacing error on this list that plagued many old posts as they moved to the new format? I'm pretty tied up with the new baby and my wife recovering from the c-section, so even without a job I've been staying busy. You did a great job with the recommendation threads, and this is for posterity and could benefit users that haven't heard some of these albums, so I think this might merit a cleanup.

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  • 3 years later...

My list does include a few EPs/compilations/releases which aren't 100% death metal. Not to mention that I've probably forgotten loads. But anyway, if I could only take a hundred death CDs from my racks to a desert island right now it would probably be these:

1914 - The Blind Leading The Blind
Acrostichon - Engraved In Black
Antichrist - Pax Moriendi
Ataraxy - Curse Of The Requiem Mass
Ataraxy - Revelations Of The Ethereal
Autopsy - Severed Survival
Autopsy - Mental Funeral
Autopsy - Fiend For Blood
Banished - Deliver Me Unto Pain
Baphomet - The Dead Shall Inherit
Benediction - Transcend The Rubicon
Blackthorn - The Rotten Ways Of Human Misery
Blood Incantation - Interdimensional Extinction
Blood Incantation - Starspawn
Bolt Thrower - War Master
Bolt Thrower - The IVth Crusade
Bolt Thrower - For Victory
Bolt Thrower - Mercenary
Bolt Thrower - Honour Valour Pride
Bolt Thrower - Those Once Loyal
Cannibal Corpse - Compilation
Captor - Lay It To Rest
Carcass - Symphonies Of Sickness
Carcass - Necroticism
Carcass - Heartwork
Carcass - Swansong
Carcass - Surgical Steel
Cruciamentum - Charnel Passages
Death - Scream Bloody Gore
Death - Leprosy
Death - Spiritual Healing
Death - Human
Death - Individual Thought Patterns
Death - Symbolic
Death - The Sound Of Perseverance
Deicide - Once Upon The Cross
Demented Ted - Promises Impure
Demigod - Slumber Of Sullen Eyes
Depravity - Silence Of The Centuries
Desultory - Into Eternity
Devouring Star - Antihedron
Disembowelment - Transcendence Into The Peripheral
Dysylumn - Occultation
Eternal Darkness - Total Darkness
Eucharist - A Velvet Creation
Evoken - Shades Of Night Descending
Evoken - Embrace The Emptiness
Evoken - Quietus
Evoken - A Caress Of The Void
Evoken - Beneath The Frozen Soil split
Evoken - Antithesis Of Light
Evoken - Atra Mors
Evoken - Hypnagogia
FaithXtractor - Razing The World Of Myth
Fleshcrawl - Descend Into The Absurd
Gorguts - Considered Dead
Immolation - Atonement
Immolation - Providence
Inverloch - Dusk/Subside
Inverloch - Distance/Collapsed
Krypts - Descending Era Of Putrefaction
Krypts - Unending Degradation
Krypts - Remnants Of Expansion
Krypts - Cadaver Circulation
Macabra - Blood-Nurtured Nature
Memoriam - For The Fallen
Memoriam - The Silent Vigil
Monstrosity - Millenium
Monstrosity - In Dark Purity
Monstrosity - Spiritual Apocalypse
Monstrosity - The Passage Of Existence
Morbid Angel - Altars Of Madness
Morbid Angel - Blessed Are The Sick
Morbid Angel - Covenant
Morbidity - Revealed From Ashes
Morgue - Eroded Thoughts
Morta Skuld - Dying Remains
Morta Skuld - As Humanity Fades
Napalm Death - Compilation
Necrot - Blood Offerings
Obituary - Cause Of Death
Obituary - Don't Care
Obituary - Xecutioner's Return
Obituary - Inked In Blood
Obliveon - From This Day Forward
Obliveon - Nemesis
Plague Lust - Venereal
Purgatoire - Passe Decompose
Scour - Grey
Scour - Red
Sentient Horror - Ungodly Forms
Sorrowful - In The Rainfall
Sorrowful - Grief Of The Dying
Soulskinner - Crypts Of Ancient Wisdom
Soulskinner - Descent To Abaddon
Spectral Voice - Necrotic Doom
The Chasm - Farseeing The Paranormal Abysm
Vader - The Ultimate Incantation
Vader - Compilation
Vltimas - Something Wicked Marches In

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  • 3 years later...

Been working on my top 100 death metal list off and on for about 2 weeks now. Even without a single Morbid Angel album I still just have too many. I've got some more narrowing down to do mostly for the last 15 years. It was easy enough to get down to my top 2 or 3 albums from most of the early years. But starting in 2008 I can't seem to get any year down to less than about 5 - 8 essential albums. Feels like having 6 kids and being forced to send 3 of them off to brutal labor camps, it's just not fair.

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18 minutes ago, GoatmasterGeneral said:

Been working on my top 100 death metal list off and on for about 2 weeks now. Even without a single Morbid Angel album I still just have too many. I've got some more narrowing down to do mostly for the last 15 years. It was easy enough to get down to my top 2 or 3 albums from most of the early years. But starting in 2008 I can't seem to get any year down to less than about 5 - 8 essential albums. Feels like having 6 kids and being forced to send 3 of them off to brutal labor camps, it's just not fair.

 

4 minutes ago, SurgicalBrute said:

Paring down my death metal to just 100...not sure I could actually do it. I'd probably just start knocking off random albums to cut it down, because no way could I do it just based on which ones I liked better than others.

 

I wouldn't mind reading a top 200.  Hell, I've got a list of my 500 greatest albums ever, and all of them are IMO flawless for what they're trying to achieve.  But for death metal, I still got a few bands I need to check out, like The Chasm.

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100 sounds like it'd be enough slots, until you actually get into doing it and start counting up albums. I might have been able to at least come close to 100 back in 2015 when they were doing this, but now in 2022 I have an additional 7 years worth of death metal albums to contend with. I'm thinking 150 might be the best I can do.

Funny that even though I'm more of a black metal guy I'd probably find it easier to narrow down a black metal list as the best albums really stand out as being head and shoulders above all the others. With death metal I find it's much more difficult to separate them, and at times can it become almost arbitrary which ones get the axe.

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32 minutes ago, GoatmasterGeneral said:

100 sounds like it'd be enough slots, until you actually get into doing it and start counting up albums. I might have been able to at least come close to 100 back in 2015 when they were doing this, but now in 2022 I have an additional 7 years worth of death metal albums to contend with. I'm thinking 150 might be the best I can do.

I just keep an openoffice ranked list.  I've been keeping a ranked list for fun ever since October 2012, when I started on forums.  I keep every entry genre tagged, so I always know what my top death metal albums are.

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  • 3 weeks later...

Just 40 records for me :

Anata - The infernal depths of hatred
Angel Corpse - Exterminate
At The Gates - Slaughter of the soul
Atheist - Piece Of Time
Atheist - Unquestionable Presence
Atheist - Elements
Atrocity - Todessehnsucht
Bloodbath - Grand Morbid Funeral
Cannibal Corpse - The Wretched Spawn
Cynic - Focus
Death - Leprosy
Death - Spiritual Healing
Death - Individual thought patterns
Death - Symbolic
Deicide - Deicide
Deicide - Serpents Of The Light
Edge Of Sanity - Crimson
Entombed - Left hand path
Hate Eternal - Conquering the throne
Hate Eternal - I monarch
Incantation - Diabolical Conquest
Incubus - Beyond the Unknown
Krisiun - Assassination
Luciferion - Demonication (The Manifest)
Massacra - Enjoy the violence
Mercyless - Abject Offerings
Morbid Angel - Altars of madness
Morbid Angel - Blessed are the sick
Morbid Angel - Covenant
Morbid Angel - Domination
Necrophagist - Epitaph
Nile - Annihilation of the Wicked
Nocturnus - The Key
Pestilence - Consuming Impulse
Pestilence - Testimony Of The Ancients
Pestilence - Spheres
Sadist - Tribe
Septic Flesh - Mystic places of dawn
Undead Prophecies - Sempiternal Void
Vader - Black To The Blind

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