WHAT A FUCKING YEAR FOR NEW MUSIC! There, I got it out of the way right at the start this year. But seriously, how the fuck did we end up with an even more epic year than 2022? And did the members of the ‘Death Metal Legends’ Whatsapp group just all agree to release an album to mess with our lists?? I need answers!
Regardless of how painstakingly horrific it was to try and put this list together (I think I made 13 different versions), I wouldn’t have it any other way. Bands, keep doing your thing, keep striving to be great, and keep spoiling us with all of this exceptional music. Except you, Staind. You can call it quits any time now. Please stop.
So, without further ado, people of the internet…here are the end of year lists from the Metal Epidemic team!
Dave Buchanan
1. Flesh of the Stars – The Glass Garden (Bandcamp)
2. Cattle Decapitation – Terrasite (Bandcamp)
3. Riverhead – Cancer (Bandcamp)
4. Poison Ruin – Harvest (Bandcamp)
5. TankZilla – TankZilla (Bandcamp)
6. AVKRVST – The Approbation (Bandcamp)
7. Telos – Delude (Bandcamp)
8. Underdark – Managed Decline (Bandcamp)
9. Pupil Slicer – Blossom (Bandcamp)
10. Johnny The Boy – You (Bandcamp)
Duncan McLeish
1. Flesh of the Stars – The Glass Garden (Bandcamp)
2. Poison Ruin – Harvest (Bandcamp)
3. AVKRVST – The Approbation (Bandcamp)
4. HEALTH – RAT WARS (Bandcamp)
5. Riverhead – Cancer (Bandcamp)
6. Will Haven – VII (Bandcamp)
7. Pupil Slicer – Blossom (Bandcamp)
8. Hexvessel – Polar Veil (Bandcamp)
9. Haken – Fauna (Stream)
10. Teenage Wrist – Still Love (Bandcamp)
Paul Cairney
1. Obituary – Dying of Everything (Bandcamp)
2. Cannibal Corpse – Chaos Horrific (Bandcamp)
3. Cattle Decapitation – Terrasite (Bandcamp)
4. Thunderhorse – After the Fall (Bandcamp)
5. Domkraft – Sonic Moons (Bandcamp)
6. Voyager – Fearless in Love (Bandcamp)
7. Turbid North – The Decline (Bandcamp)
8. Music in Low Frequencies – Catharsis (Bandcamp)
9. Anima Hereticae – Descended from the Mountains (Bandcamp)
10. Morne – Engraved with Pain (Bandcamp)
Ross Bowie
1. Sleep Token – Take Me Back to Eden (Stream)
2. 100 Gecs – 10,000 Gecs (Bandcamp)
3. Code Orange – The Above (Stream)
4. Spanish Love Songs – No Joy (Bandcamp)
5. Creeper – Sanguivore (Stream)
6. Laufey – Bewitched (Stream)
7. Blood Command – World Domination (Bandcamp)
8. Grave Pleasures – Plagueboys (Stream)
9. Zulu – A New Tomorrow (Bandcamp)
10. Avenged Sevenfold – Life Is But A Dream (Stream)
Paul Franklin
1. Ritual King – The Infinite Mirror (Bandcamp)
2. Gaslight Anthem – History Books (Bandcamp)
3. Duskwood – The Last Voyage (Bandcamp)
4. Creeper – Sanguivore (Stream)
5. TankZilla – TankZilla (Bandcamp)
6. Jelly Roll – Whitsitt Chapel (Stream)
7. Phil Campbell and the Bastard Sons – Kings of the Asylum (Stream)
8. Green lung – This Heathen Land (Bandcamp)
9. HEALTH – RAT WARS (Bandcamp)
10. Skindred – Smile (Bandcamp)
Andy Spoon
1. Cattle Decapitation – Terrasite (Bandcamp)
2. Earthside – Let The Truth Speak (Bandcamp)
3. To the Grave – Director’s Cuts (Bandcamp)
4. Entheos – Time Will Take Us All (Bandcamp)
5. Ironmaster – Weapons of Spiritual Carnage (Bandcamp)
6. Nothingness – Supraliminal (Bandcamp)
7. Sleep Token – Take Me Back to Eden (Stream)
8. Mental Cruelty – Zwielicht (Bandcamp)
9. Cryptopsy – As Gomorrah Burns (Bandcamp)
10. Pyramid Mass – Monolith (Bandcamp)
Kira L. Schlechter
1. Within Temptation – Bleed Out (Bandcamp)
2. TULIP – The Perpetual Dream (Bandcamp)
3. Bjorko – Heartrot (Bandcamp)
4. Hawxx – Earth, Spit, Blood and Bones (Bandcamp)
5. Category VI – Firecry (Bandcamp)
6. Vansind – Mørket (Bandcamp)
7. Rome – Gates of Europe (Stream)
8. Black Roze – Penny for Your Sins (Stream)
9. Enemy of Reality – Where Truth May Lie (Bandcamp)
10. Heathen Foray – Oathbreaker (Bandcamp)
Metalcore Mike
1. Currents – The Death We Seek (Bandcamp)
2. The Amity Affliction – Not Without My Ghosts (Bandcamp)
3. Polaris – Fatalism (Bandcamp)
4. The Wise Man’s Fear – Atlas Ruinica (Bandcamp)
5. When Plagues Collide – An Unbiblical Paradigm (Bandcamp)
6. Solar Eruption – The Demon’s House (Bandcamp)
7. Invent Animate – Heavener (Stream)
8. Hollow Front – The Fear Of Letting Go (Bandcamp)
9. In Flames – Foregone (Bandcamp)
10. Monasteries – Ominous (Bandcamp)
Trina Julian Edwards
1. Enforced – War Remains (Bandcamp)
2. Creeping Death – Boundless Domain (Bandcamp)
3. Chelsea Grin – Suffer in Heaven (Stream)
4. Moonlight Sorcery – Horned Lord of the Thorned Castle (Bandcamp)
5. Carnifex – Necromanteum (Stream)
6. Unearth – The Wretched; The Ruinous (Stream)
7. Swansong – Awakening (Bandcamp)
8. Cryptopsy – As Gomorrah Burns (Bandcamp)
9. Frozen Soul – Glacial Domination (Bandcamp)
10. Cannibal Corpse – Chaos Horrific (Bandcamp)
Rick Farley
1. Katatonia – Sky Void of Stars (Bandcamp)
2. Blackbraid – Blackbraid II (Bandcamp)
3. Hellripper – Warlocks Grim & Withered Hags (Bandcamp)
4. Crypta – Shades of Sorrow (Bandcamp)
5. Horrendous – Ontological Mysterium (Bandcamp)
6. Serpent of Old – Ensemble Under the Dark Sun (Bandcamp)
7. Ruim – Black Royal Spiritism – I – O Sino da Igreja (Bandcamp)
8. Enslaved – Heimdal (Bandcamp)
9. Malokarpatan – Vertumnus Caesar (Bandcamp)
10. Wayfarer – American Gothic (Bandcamp)
Mark Waight
1. Black Roze – A Penny For Your Sins (Stream)
2. Swansong – Awakening (Bandcamp)
3. Blackbriar – A Dark Euphony (Stream)
4. Re-X – Tornare a Vivere (Bandcamp)
5. Front Row Warriors – Wheel of Fortune (Bandcamp)
6. Endless Exam – Voice of Passion (Bandcamp)
7. Death Dealer Union – Initiation (Bandcamp)
8. Oryad – Sacred & Profane (Bandcamp)
9. In This Moment – Godmode (Bandcamp)
10. Burning Witches – The Dark Tower (Bandcamp)
Eric Wilt
1. The Zenith Passage – Datalysium (Bandcamp)
2. Tomb Mold – The Enduring Spirit (Bandcamp)
3. The Ritual Aura – Heresiarch (Bandcamp)
4. Suffocation – Hymns From The Apocrypha (Bandcamp)
5. Stortregn – Finitude (Bandcamp)
6. Alkaloid – Numen (Bandcamp)
7. Nuclear Power Trio – Wet Ass Plutonium (Bandcamp)
8. Bekor Qilish – The Flesh of a New God (Bandcamp)
9. Gorod – The Orb (Bandcamp)
10. Nospun – Opus (Bandcamp)
Jeff Finch
1. All Out War – Celestial Rot (Bandcamp)
2. Sleep Token – Take Me Back to Eden (Stream)
3. Avenged Sevenfold – …Life is But a Dream (Stream)
4. Blackbraid – Blackbraid II (Bandcamp)
5. Violent Life Violent Death – Break.Burn.End (Bandcamp)
6. KEN Mode – Void (Bandcamp)
7. Dying Wish – Symptoms of Survival (Bandcamp)
8. Year of the Knife – No Love Lost (Bandcamp)
9. The Acacia Strain – Failure Will Follow (Stream)
10. Hail the Sun – Divine Inner Tension (Stream)
Hillary Wisniewski
1. Blackbraid – Blackbraid II (Bandcamp)
2. Queens of the Stone Age – In Times New Roman (Bandcamp)
3. Mutoid Man – Mutants (Bandcamp)
4. Baroness – Stone (Bandcamp)
5. Super Pink Moon – Iron Rain (Bandcamp)
6. Panopticon – The Rime of Memory (Bandcamp)
7. Graveripper – Seasons Dreaming Death (Bandcamp)
8. Oro – Vid Vägs Ände (Bandcamp)
9. Grave Pleasures – Plagueboys (Stream)
10. Sanguisugabogg – Homicidal Ecstasy (Bandcamp)
Carlos Tirado
1. Panopticon – The Rime of Memory (Bandcamp)
2. Cattle Decapitation – Terrasite (Bandcamp)
3. Blackbraid – Blackbraid II (Bandcamp)
4. Tomb Mold – The Enduring Spirit (Bandcamp)
5. Horrendous – Ontological Mysterium (Bandcamp)
6. Ne Obliviscaris – Exul (Bandcamp)
7. Saturnus – The Storm Within (Bandcamp)
8. Vomitory – All Heads Gonna Roll (Bandcamp)
9. Mānbryne – Interregnum: O próbie wiary i jarzmie zwątpien (Bandcamp)
10. Dødheimsgard – Black Medium Current (Bandcamp)
Mark Young
1. Celestial Sanctuary – Insatiable Thirst For Torment (Bandcamp)
2. Burner – It All Returns to Nothing (Bandcamp)
3. SERMON – Of Golden Verse (Bandcamp)
4. Spotlights – Alchemy For The Dead (Bandcamp)
5. Forcefed Horsehead – Monoceros (Bandcamp)
6. Sarcoptes – Prayers to Oblivion (Bandcamp)
7. STAHV – Simple Mercies (Bandcamp)
8. Oro – Vid Vägs Ände (Bandcamp)
9. Hellripper – Warlocks Grim & Withered Hags (Bandcamp)
10. Heretoir – Wastelands (Bandcamp)
John Newlands
1. Spurv – Brefjære (Bandcamp)
2. EYES – Congratulations (Bandcamp)
3. Rezn – Solace (Bandcamp)
4. Briqueville – IIII (Bandcamp)
5. Sâver – From Ember And Rust (Bandcamp)
6. HEALTH – RAT WARS (Bandcamp)
7. Full of Hell / Nothing – When No Birds Sang (Bandcamp)
8. KEN Mode – VOID (Bandcamp)
9. Zahn – Adria (Bandcamp)
10. WuW – L’Orchaostre (Bandcamp)
Metal Miguel
1. Sevendust – Truth Killer (Bandcamp)
2. Sleep Token – Take Me Back to Eden (Stream)
3. Gideon – More Power. More Pain. (Stream)
4. TesseracT – War Of Being (Bandcamp)
5. Spiritbox – The Fear of Fear (Bandcamp)
6. Mouth For War – Bleed Yourself (Bandcamp)
7. Polaris – Fatalism (Bandcamp)
8. Veil of Maya – [m]other (Stream)
9. Atlases – Between the Day and I (Bandcamp)
10. Resolve – Human (Bandcamp)
