Best metal albums of 2021—Top 30

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Before I dig into my top picks for 2021, I reached out to a few familiar faces within the sphere of metal and got them to send me the albums they dug the most this year. I told them the rules for the list are pretty flippant. Here's what they sent me:



Horus aka James Brown III (Harassor, Moonknight, Vorpal Sword, Rising Beast Recordings)



* In no particular order 
10) Stormkeep - Tales of Othertime

09) Trhä - Endelhëtonëg

08) Tardigrada - Vom Bruch Bis Zur Freiheit

07) Circle of Ouroborus - Kiromantia

06) Sadness - April Sunset

05) Kuka'ilimoku - Pahu O ka Ua

04) Zhmach - Euphoria Never Leaves

03) Kêres - Flaming Ash

02) Mooschops - Adventures Above the 61st Parallel North

01) Fugitive Wizard - Obscuri Æternum



Artur de Carvalho (Forever Cursed—Best underground metal blog laid to rest (R.I.P.)


10) The Devouring Void - Hypnagogic Hallucinations


Holy shit I just realised these guys are from Portugal as well.. fuck me!

09) Sermon of Flames - I Have Seen the Light, and It Was Repulsive


Repulsive as fuck

08) Carcinoma - Labascation


Good shit from the UK

07) Gosudar - Morbid Despotic Ritual


Some good OSDM shit from Russia

06) Koldovstvo - "Ni Tsarya, Ni Boga"


Great entrancing BM

05) Fuoco Fatuo - Obsidian Katabasis


Feels like being swallowed by a black hole


04) Qrixkuor - Poison Palinopsia


A two track, total 48 minutes of filthy obscure DM? Yes please


03) Lykhaeon - Opprobrium


A more traditional approach to BM as we know it, still a banger though)

02) Labored Breath - Dyspnea


A fucking trip into the bowels of the most insane BM you’ll hear this year


01) Reverorum ib Malacht - Svag i Döden


I know these guys have released two albums this year, but I’m a huge fan of this approach

A.L.N. (Mizmor, Hell)

07) Emma Ruth Rundle - Engine of Hell

06) Hoverkraft - Schwebende Musik

05) Vouna - Atropos

04) Grouper - Shade

03) Walt McClements - A Hole in The Fence

02) Andrew Black - Welcome Home

01) Yautja - The Lurch



Mattias Alagna (Abstracter)



06) Filth Chasm - Demo 2021

05) Apostasy - Death Return

04) Grinning Death's Head - Cataclysm

03) Altarage - Succumb

02) Antediluvian - The Divine Punishment

01) Moonscape - Monolith

Big thanks for those that contributed!



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Another year down the hatch. And another year where I am certain beyond a shadow of a doubt that I have overlooked a few releases (I always do) but I'd say this year in particular I have a pretty firm grip on the records that impressed me the most—I can say that in order to whittle the list down to 30 I have made some hard omissions, but that's just the nature of the beast! Pretty heavy on the black/death metal releases, which either speaks to the quality of the release or where my palette is at. It really doesn't matter, here's what moved me in order:



30) Forsman - Dönsum í Logans Ljóma (Ván Records)



Another example as to why Icelandic black metal is legitimately one of the most consistent and innervating within the second wave of black metal.







29) Abstracter - Abominium (Sentient Ruin Laboratories)



A dizzying descent into a mix of well articulated doom blackened crust, doom, sludge and sonic overall sonic hostility. 

28) Tentation - Le Berceau des Dieux (Gates of Hell Records)



An absolute nod to the old days of heavy metal and a hell of a debut.



27) Divide and Dissolve - Gas Lit (Invada Records)



2-piece doom metal enveloped in a thick cloud of doom. Hits hard and feels significant.



26) Stormkeep - Tales of Othertime (Van Records)



Much like Havukruunu, Stormkeep have managed to capture all the elusive grandeur found in pagan black metal and dungeon synth without succumbing to the frivolity often found in it.



25) Concrete Winds - Nerve Butcherer (Sepulchral Voice Records)



Fast and dizzying death metal with very intentional glances towards grind and thrash. Pretty Spot on!



24) Wanton Attack - Wanton Attack (Black Writs Records)



A potent mix of early heavy metal rife with gritty duelling guitars and speed metal vitatlity!



23) Suffering Hour - The Cyclic Reckoning (Profound Lore Records)



Suffocatingly heavy death metal from a label that knows a good thing when it sees it. I don't think this record has any weak spots.



22) Vorpal Sword - Omens (Rising Beast Recordings)

The best account of blown out raw black metal I heard all year! A pastiche of noise punk, experimental ambient and shoegaze—It's perplexing how something so abrasive and corrosive in nature can be perceived as beautiful, but it does.

21) Sermon of Flames - I Have Seen The Light, and It Was Repulsive (I, Voidhanger Records)



A bubbling cauldron of cacophonous death metal infused with sludge, crust, doom and black metal with  incredibly devastating pace.

20) Ekulu - Unscrew My Head (Cash Only Records)



Nailed down New York Hardcore with a heavy grip on 80’s metal. Why even bother with Turnstile?

19) Labored Breath - Dyspnea (Sentient Ruin Laboratories)

A spiralling churn of death metal infused black metal pushing through a feral wall of sound that straddles the line of the obscure and barbaric. 

18) Labor Intvs - Sunken Crucible (Unsigned/Independant)

This has got to be one of the most overlooked albums on this list. Some of the nastiest death/black metal releases this year heavily exploring elements of doom and the underground obscure.

17) Mork - Katedralen (Peaceville Records)


Mork have pretty consistently been the best example as to how we can still successfully draw from the nearly dried up well of 90's black metal, and this year on Katedralen they prove that point yet again with a bullet.


16) Phrenelith - Chimaera (Nuclear Winter Records)

Massively over-looked death metal in my opinion. Phrenelith aren't exactly incorporating anything new into their sound, but somehow they manage to sound like nothing else—A black hole of dynamic death metal with reverence to the underground. Some of the best drumming on a death meal album this year?

15) Succumb - XXI (The Flenser)

Incredible death metal with Cheri’s possessed vocal belch being the backbone of what makes them unique from their contemporaries. I'm so glad they didn't fuck this up.


14) Fuoco Fatuo - Obsidian Katabasis (Profound Lore Records)



Crushing funeral doom with a lot of mid-tempo death metal influence that will drag you through an hour of some of the most potent and unyielding metal this year. A full listen through of this colossus will leave you bereft and beaten, just the way we like it.



13) Big Brave - Vital (Southern Lore Recordings)



Big Brave's suffocatingly plodding doom intertwined around a whirring mix of reverb-ladened guitars and vacuous space comes full-force on Vital. Beauty and brutality.


12) Koldovstvo - Ni Tsarya, Ni Boga (Unsigned/Independant)

Atmospheric black metal with heavy emphasis on the atmospheric, bordering on ambient or shoegaze. Incredibly raw, visceral and avant-garde with a lot of uncertainty surrounding any information around the band. It's hard to explain, but theres also this inexplicable feeling that comes over me when I listen to this album… Like I am slowly being consumed by madness. A mix of euphoria and malaise. 


11) Altarage - Succumb (Season of Mist Underground Activists)



This release can hang with any of the aforementioned in the department of ferocity and heaviness, clocking in at over an hour of downright unfettered black/death from Spain. 

10)  Defacement - Defacement (I, Voidhanger Records)


Back when I talked about this release earlier in September I said "This is one of those albums that drags you through the abyss—A serpentining downward spiral through cavernous death metal that is equal parts technical, murky and experimental." Yet another album of extremely high caliber that has been buried amidst an ocean of sub-par music with high pay-grades and a full marketing team throwing petals at their feet. Stick with this, you'll thank me later.


09) Fyrnask - VII - Kenoma (Ván Records)

Fyrnask have been quietly creating some of the best atmospheric black metal around for over a decade now and VII - Kenoma is at the helm of it all. Powerfully melodic and thought provoking—Something between Misþyrming, Ash Borer, Morne, and Bölzer. 


08) Voidsphere - To Overtake, To Overcome (Amor Fati Productions)



Spirit inducing black metal that takes shape through blistering riffs built upon a wall of sound. One of the best uses of atmospheric ambience, dense but not without melody or purpose. These Prava Kollektiv guys sure know how to write a record.

07) Warloghe - Three Angled Void (Northern Heritage Records)

Dizzying black metal from the nether, ugly, brutish and filled with cold riffs! I'd even go as far as saying some of the best riffing I heard in a black metal album all year, this is pure fucking armageddon.


06) Portal - Avow (Profound Lore Records)

Portal remain thee lords of hypnotically plodding and nauseating death metal. Lovecraftian obscurity in sonic form. This is up there with my favourite Portal has ever released—It sounds like a lobotomy. And It feels like a nauseating decent into the abyss. Encompassing. 


05) Sulpur - Embracing Hatred and Beckoning Darkness (Amor Fati Productions)

Blown-out black metal doing everything MGLA does but even colder. A barrage of eerie riffs against a galloping tempo with some of the best sounding cymbals in the genre.



04) Darkthrone - Eternail Hails…… (Peaceville Records)

Has everyone forgot about Darkthrone? Hardly any mentions of Darkthrone this year… Am I the only one who loves the direction they’re moving in? I still think they're one of the most important bands in all of music right now. Three decades later and they’re still moving a worn-out genre into new territory. 



03) Qrixkuor - Poison Palinopsia (Dark Descent Records)



One of the most crushing death metal albums released in 2021. Two songs of obscure death metal that drag you through a serpentining labyrinth of riffs that sound like a spiral into your own absolute insanity. Much like the Defacement release sitting at my number 10, this album is and was way under-appreciated for how good it is. I'm not sorry to sorry to say it, but it's more dynamic and crushing than 99% of the other releases that pass off as death metal. 

02) Antediluvian - The Divine Punishment (Nuclear War Now! Productions)

Few try (with little success) to be as primitive and feral sounding as Antediluvian, its not something that can (or should) be contrived. It needs to come from a festering open wound or a sincere disapproval with some inner or outward force. The Divine Punishment is a pantheon in where these negative forces can live—A barbaric pile of forward-thinking death metal built upon an altar of whirring guitars, abyssal vocals and drumming that sounds like none of its contemporaries. Plodding, perverse, esoteric and entirely new.



01) Lykhaeon - Opprobrium (Repose Records)


Bestial death metal married with black metal and doom is hardly a new concept within the walls of metal, but very few albums are able to traverse new and refreshing soundscapes the way Opprobrium successfully does—An overtone of of ritualistic rites and dirges permeate the many layers of this album as you're dragged through a swath of of musical landscapes, all  equally barbaric and mind altering. The best metal release of the year for me for sure, not a single flaw to be found.

Warloghe - Three Angled Void (2021)

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Warloghe's newest album Three Angled Void came out of the fucking abyssal ether, without mention or promotion. A spectre out of nowhere carrying a barrage of frozen riffs and a landscape built around pillars of jagged guitars and drums that don't feel any compliance to the constant blast-beat quota which might seem ubiquitous in the genre. Not to say you won't find any of that on here, you will, but it's not heavily leaned on—In fact, the drums are mixed in perfectly to my liking. Pure abominable class!

It's not unlike me to say this, but it's exceptionally rare for me to listen to an album and know right off the opening track that it will be a favourite of mine… There's always massive disappointments and pitfalls, but Warloghe is Warloghe, and every so often there are sure things. Three Angled Void is that. One of the best black metal albums released this year, in my opinion, and will be overplayed into oblivion for the rest of the year and well into the next. Cold chaotic energy.

As of right now, no streams or bandcamp downloads are available. But I will link a download to the album courtesy of the esteemed Finnish Black Metal blog.

Warloghe - Three Angled Void (DOWNLOAD)
Warloghe - Three Angled Void (YouTube)

Vorpal Sword - Omens (2021) [Demo]

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My comrade and crony for all things reverb soaked Dream pop/Shoegaze has released another gem of uncompromisingly raw black metal under the prolific umbrella of his label, Rising Beast—And not unlike everything else he puts out, it's right on the fucking money!

Omens musical landscape is one with sparse foliage or places of refuge amidst the expanding sprawl of heavily blown out black metal, that is in personality and ethos, equal parts raw and musing—But it's terrain isn't totally devoid of life, not at all, peppered throughout the hanging guitars and thick fog of noise are delicate ambient passages (created by the Korg Monotron?) which offer a brief respite from the proverbial sonic deluge. It's all very intentional and cohesive. Now without being pedantic, the love Horus has for dream/noise pop and shoegaze are on full display here, with absolute tact and grace. 

If you're unfamiliar with Vorpal Sword, check it out. And while you're at it, check out everything else under the banner of Rising Beast and toss in a few bucks into whatever strikes you down—Do your part in keeping the underground lit!

Vorpal Sword - Omens (bandcamp)

Mystras - Empires Vanquished And Dismantled (2021)

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Another I, Voidhanger Records offering laid out on the sacrificial altar for you to piss on and proclaim "This is mine. I mark my territory… look how important I am." In all seriousness though, black metal from Greece hardly ever disappoints and Mystras sure as shit doesn't abandon that rule—Spectral Lore's Ayloss manages to mix blistering raw black metal with small fragments of traditional folk soundscapes and themes without falling into the gaudy camp of the many that attempt and fail this same concoction. 

Mystras - Empires Vanquished And Dismantled (bandcamp)

Sermon of Flames - I Have Seen the Light, and It Was Repulsive (2021)

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Twisting mess of death metal with a heap of influences and styles pulling from the melange of distortion and competing tempos oft heard in sludge, and as per most things heralding the title of metal, there's what you would refer to as a black metal influence permeating throughout. I haven't spent too much time on this album yet, but it quickly left an impact through its sheer intensity alone. How could you go wrong with anything from I, Voidhanger? You (almost always) can't. 

Sermon of Flames - I Have Seen the Light, and It Was Repulsive (bandcamp)

Succumb - XXI (2021)

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SHOM has been keeping a finger on the pulse of San Fran's Succumb since their debut record in 2017 which (like this album) saw its release made possible from the consummate and enigmatic The Flenser—which in my books, is a breath of fresh air in a saturated world of music where sterility and originality are celebrated and touted.

I digress, XXI picks up right where it's 4-year old predecessor left off: Down a serpentining pit of crust, grind and death metal with a sound that encompasses a lurching energy which simultaneously feels unique and familiar—Not much parsing needs to be done to hear a broad musical soundscape that harkens back to Converge, Gorguts, Mitochondrion, Caustic Wound, with tinges of Disfear.

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This album is going to end the year in high ranking with me… I think for all intents and purposes, this record is flawless. You've got to be bent to not get the appeal, brutish ferocity and whirling doom packed into 30+ minutes of abyssal death metal.

Succumb - XXI (bandcamp)

Nocturnal Graves - An Outlaw's Stand (2022)

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Following up a Melbourne release with another Melbourne release albeit with significantly different soundscapes and ethos—but all the same, I maintain that Australia has one of the most banging music scenes going on at the moment.

Nocturnal Graves is just pure unfettered worship for all things thrash and black metal and all the muck and mire in-between this ilk. We've got a one track (very early) teaser to go off of for the upcoming album, An Outlaw's Stand, and it's what you'd probably expect out of these guys; bestial energy pulsating through a barrage of blackened thrash with emphasis on a greased-up tempo and ruining your day.

Nocturnal Graves - An Outlaw's Stand (bandcamp)

Michael Beach - Dream Violence (2021)

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Australia is an absolute uncontested hotbed in the realm of toothy rock and roll and Michael Beach is just yet another fish in the pond of energetic and woollen post-punk from Melbourne. Angular guitars pervade through a post-punk sentimentality that isn't at all afraid to traverse the sonic highways of a multitude of different genres and ideas, experimenting between tracks that harken to The Velvet Underground, Joy Division, Solid Space, Nick Cave and even a track in 'You Know Life Is Cheap' that sounds like something Timber Timbre would write with its wobbly bayou dirge. 

Michael Beach - Dream Violence (bandcamp)

Skourge - Hardcore Up Your Ass (2021) [EP]

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New Skourge EP is right up my alley! Nothing new being invented here, in fact it's more of a regurgitation of things already out there  (I mean this in a positive way), because it is a mish-mash of all that good stuff in the early 90's—Exxxtremely heavy and up your ass hardcore with half a foot in the early metal scene of thrash. A pivot from the production of 'Spiritual Disrepair', trading in murkiness for a bit more bottom-end and heft? Make sense? Doesn't matter. 'Spiritual Disrepair' is very worth your time, to say the least.

I can't find a damn thing anywhere on this album except the album uploaded on YouTube.

Cerebral Rot - Excretion of Mortality (2021)

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It should come as no surprise at all that I like Cerebral Rot. Death metal of this ilk, putrefying and almost garish, can sometimes be executed with such incredulity that it's totally bereft and unconvincing, and though Cerebral Rot isn't pushing boundaries in the same way that Irkallian Oracle or Funereal Presence might be, they are maintaining an old guard in the way that death metal is meant to sound. A sonic sentinel in the way of repugnant hymns—Excretion of Mortality is extremely foul and heavy death metal and though I haven't gotten around to overplaying it I will most definitely be revisiting it often (even though I can't stop listening to the new Antediluvian record) and I'm sure you will too.

Cerebral Rot - Excretion of Mortality (bandcamp)