Number Five: Dagtum – Revered Decadence VIDEO Revered Decadence . The band is actually a supergroup hailing from the Philippines, and they truly deserve the “super” prefix, as everything they do on that album is insanely bleak and amazing!
Number Four: Carcinoma – Labascation VIDEO earlier this year , so why haven’t you listened to it yet?
Number Three: Barús – Fanges VIDEO Fanges was released on the very last day of the year, and it’s an absolute masterpiece! Progressive, atmospheric death metal that can put any other to shame. The album is made up of two tracks, the first of which, the title track, plays a little more into the doom metal territory, while the second one, “Chassis de chair”, showcases the band’s more black metal and technical death metal influences.
Number Two: Yautja – The Lurch VIDEO The Lurch is one of the best death albums this year. Blending grind, post, and sludge into a wormhole of death! I’ve just been constantly going back to this album whenever I needed something heavy throughout the year. Endlessly rewarding and cathartic to listen! If you haven’t already, please do.
Number One: Ad nauseam – Imperative Imperceptible Impulse VIDEO Imperative Imperceptible Impulse , the Italian avant-garde dissonant death metal entity really outdid themselves, and to surpass a masterpiece, their previous album that is, is a Herculean endeavour.
Notable Releases Hover over foreign scripts for pronunciation and romanization.
Friday, 5 February DSKNT – Vacuum γ -Noise Transition 43:19Switzerland
Tracklist (click to display) 1. Spin [03:03]
2. Deconvolution J/ψ [Part I] [07:38]
3. Transition K0 [Part I] [06:39]
4. Θ-Noise – Phase Shift [05:59]
5. Transition Ω- [Part II] [07:20]
6. Deconvolution Ξ*0 [Part II] [09:17]
7. Spore [03:23]
Friday, 12 Ad nauseam – Imperative Imperceptible Impulse 57:05Italy
Tracklist (click to display) 1. Sub Specie Aeternitatis [08:41]
2. Inexorably Ousted Sente [08:45]
3. Coincidentia Oppositorum [12:05]
4. Imperative Imperceptible Impulse [09:45]
5. Horror Vacui [08:44]
6. Human Interface To No God [09:05]
Friday, 19 Carcinoma – Labascation 37:10Plymouth, UK
Read our review.
Tracklist (click to display) 1. Paroxysmal [01:04]
2. Verminous [02:20]
3. Inner Tyrants [04:06]
4. Senescence [04:37]
5. Bloated Parasites [05:43]
6. Rectify [01:32]
7. Futile Hope [12:45]
8. Occupier [05:03]
Suffering Hour – The Cyclic Reckoning 44:29Forest Lake, Minnesota
Tracklist (click to display) 1. Strongholds Of Awakening [05:27]
2. Transcending Antecedent Visions [07:58]
3. The Abrasive Black Dust Part II [07:59]
4. Obscuration [06:33]
5. The Foundations Of Servitude [16:32]
Monday, 22 February Unknown Artist – The Stench of Delusion 19:20France
Tracklist (click to display) 1. The Stench Of Delusion [19:20]
Thursday, 25 March Vile Dissonance – Music Theory Is a Social Convention 35:06USA
Tracklist (click to display) 1. The 80’s aren’t that terrible [04:39]
2. A drunken man’s words are a sober man’s thoughts [04:24]
3. To groove or not to groove, that is the question [01:46]
4. Start without finish [04:49]
5. Everything out there has only one purpose, to distract us from ourselves [06:02]
6. Drums [01:42]
7. Richard Wilder [04:41]
8. On second thought, I hope she suffers quite a bit before she dies [07:03]
Friday, 26 Aziola Cry – The Ironic Divide 49:47Chicago, Illinois
Tracklist (click to display) 1. And Cowards [09:36]
2. Hollow Reflections [06:38]
3. The Ironic Divide: I. Premonitions ● II. A Torment Of Reason ● III. Distort Persona ● IV. One Final Collapse [21:05]
4. Scars Now Rest Where Once Bore Wings [12:28]
Blindfolded and Led to the Woods – Nightmare Withdrawals 39:07Christchurch, New Zealand
Tracklist (click to display) 1. The Inevitable Fate of the Universe [04:05]
2. Black Air [02:52]
3. …And You Will Try To Speak [05:17]
4. The White of the Eyes [01:25]
5. Atop the Wings of a Magpie (feat. Karl Sanders) [05:38]
6. Lucid Visitations (feat. Callum Gay) [04:04]
7. Nightmare Withdrawals [02:28]
8. The Obscured Witness [03:03]
9. Rorschach and Delirium [04:20]
10. Sic Mundus Creatus Est [05:55]
Friday, 23 April Altarage – Succumb 63:03Bilbao, Spain
Tracklist (click to display) 1. Negative Arrival [02:02]
2. Magno Evento [03:45]
3. Maneuvre [03:20]
4. Foregone [07:39]
5. Drainage Mechanism [04:22]
6. Watcher Witness [04:37]
7. Fair Warning [01:42]
8. Lavath [04:07]
9. Forja [04:01]
10. Inwards [02:18]
11. Vour Concession [04:06]
12. Devorador De Mundos [21:11]
Friday, 21 May Yautja – The Lurch 46:00Nashville, Tennessee
Read our review.
Tracklist (click to display) 1. A Killing Joke [03:52]
2. The Spectacle [03:54]
3. Wired Depths [04:16]
4. Undesirables [07:12]
5. Tethered [03:12]
6. Clock Cleaner [05:52]
7. Catastrophic [06:16]
8. The Weight [04:07]
9. Before The Foal [07:19]
Sunday, 30 May Charnel Grounds – Molecular Entropy Examined in the Bowels of a Great One 9:51Florida
Tracklist (click to display) 1. The Hellmouth Beckons Across The Void [01:16]
2. Desecration Of The Host: Madness Complete [03:28]
3. Soul Scavengers Of The Abyss [02:28]
4. On A Cross of Ether [02:39]
5. As Above, So Below [03:06]
6. Pineal Gland Recalcification [03:50]
Friday, 13 August Diskord – Degenerations 41:06Norway
Tracklist (click to display) 1. Loitering in the Portal [02:48]
2. Bionic Tomb Eternal [02:51]
3. Abnegations [04:39]
4. The Endless Spiral [03:56]
5. Dirigiste Radio Hit [03:54]
6. Lone Survivor [01:31]
7. Dragged for Coronation [02:59]
8. Clawing at the Fabric of Space [04:01]
9. Atoms Decay [02:19]
10. Raging Berzerker in the Universe Rigid [03:22]
11. Gnashing [04:31]
12. Beyond the Grime [04:15]
Friday, 27 White Stones – Dancing into Oblivion 35:46Barcelona, Spain
Tracklist (click to display) 1. La Menace [02:16]
2. New Age Of Dark [04:54]
3. Chain Of Command [04:40]
4. Iron Titans [08:43]
5. Woven Dream [02:11]
6. To Lie Or To Die [04:57]
7. Freedom In Captivity [06:30]
8. Acacia [01:35]
Monday, 30 August Dagtum – Revered Decadence 37:25Philippines
Tracklist (click to display) 1. Immaculate Decay [04:02]
2. Avarice Enshrined [04:49]
3. Ad Infinitum [03:47]
4. Werewhale [04:41]
5. Seething Seasons in Catharsis [05:35]
6. Ocean’s Edge [05:10]
7. Ill-Lit [04:36]
8. Monolith of Grace [04:45]
Friday, 3 September Defacement – Defacement 39:06Utrecht, Netherlands
Tracklist (click to display) 1. Limbo I [02:06]
2. Shattered [09:29]
3. Limbo II [00:54]
4. Disavowed [06:37]
5. Limbo III [01:04]
6. Disenchanted [09:50]
7. Limbo IV [01:12]
8. Wounded [07:54]
Friday, 17 Michel Anoia – Nervures 27:09Lyon, France
Tracklist (click to display) 1. Nigredo [04:24]
2. Albedo [02:01]
3. Rubedo [02:57]
4. Nervures [06:17]
5. Suture [02:15]
6. Ibliss [02:59]
7. L’ombre et l’errant [06:16]
Friday, 24 September Cognizance – Upheaval 33:05Leeds, UK
Tracklist (click to display) 1. Hymns [02:16]
2. Drifting (R)evolution [03:25]
3. Decaying Gods [03:22]
4. Oneiric [03:00]
5. The Mouth Which Cannot Speak [03:20]
6. Forbidden Alchemy [03:13]
7. Syntheticus I: Atrophy [03:26]
8. Syntheticus II: Refuge [03:03]
9. Fever Dream [03:56]
10. Aeon Sickness [04:04]
Friday, 22 October Apparition – Feel 34:29Los Angeles, California
Tracklist (click to display) 1. Unequilibrium [04:49]
2. Drowning In The Stream Of Consciousness [05:09]
3. Nonlocality [05:01]
4. Perpetually Altered [06:11]
5. Entanglement [06:22]
6. Feel [06:57]
Friday, 29 Prophetic Scourge – Gnosis: A Sorrower’s Odyssey 64:44Bayonne, France
Tracklist (click to display) 1. THE KING: An Odyssey Begins Aright [08:35]
2. THE CYCLOPS: Blinded In The Garden Of Eris [07:50]
3. THE FURY: Of Tasteless Wine And Sorrow’s Flesh [06:47]
4. THE PSYCHOPOMP: Deaf To The Siren’s Hail [07:04]
5. THE DRAGONCHASER: Crowned On The Throne Of Loti [09:49]
6. THE MENDICANT: Known Only By Touch [08:21]
7. THE TYRANT: Wading ‘Ward Solace He Lucidly Drowns [16:18]
Sunless – Ylem 39:07Minneapolis, Minnesota
Tracklist (click to display) 1. Spiraling into the Unfathomable [04:40]
2. Ascended Forms [03:21]
3. The Unraveling of Arcane Past [05:23]
4. Atramentous [05:11]
5. Flesh-Particle Amalgamation [04:49]
6. Forgotten (Remnants of Life) [03:47]
7. Perpetual Contortion [04:29]
8. Molding Axioms of the Metaphysical [07:27]
Friday, 4 December 2020 Burning Palace – Hollow 32:02Santa Rosa, California
Tracklist (click to display) 1. I [01:00]
2. Admonished Ones [03:37]
3. Process Of Hollowing Out [04:24]
4. Drowned [05:14]
5. II [01:57]
6. Oceans Of Black [04:52]
7. Casting Shadows [05:24]
8. Plagues [04:20]
9. III [01:14]
Friday, 10 Dessiderium – Aria 33:12Phoenix, Arizona
Tracklist (click to display) 1. White Morning in a World She Knows [15:13]
2. Pale [10:59]
3. Aria [13:41]
4. Moon Lust Delirium [09:15]
5. The Persecution Complex [11:26]
Friday, 31 December Barús – Fanges 34:23Grenoble, France
Tracklist (click to display) 1. Fanges
2. Châssis de Chair
Best of 2021 01/01 – Best of Afrobeat 01/02 – Best of Atmospheric Black Metal 01/03 – Best of Avant-Garde Black Metal 01/04 – Best of Brutal Death Metal 01/05 – Best of Classical
