The Best Metal Albums of 2014, As Chosen by Metal Musicians Themselves — Part VII

Every year, MetalSucks asks musicians from across the vast spectrum of the metalsphere (or, in a few cases, the almost-metalsphere) what their favorite albums of the year have been. Death metallers, thrash metallers, black metallers, stoners, grinders, and djenters alike graciously contributed lists to MS, and we’ll be running them in small groups throughout the week.

Below, check out the seventh batch… we hope you enjoy seeing what some of metal’s heaviest hitters were into this year as much as we have!

Alex Webster, Cannibal Corpse

1. Marty Friedman – Inferno
2. Hideous Divinity – Cobra Verde
3. Animals As Leaders – Joy of Motion
4. Overkill – White Devil Armory
5. Stephan Forte – Enigma Opera Black
6. Abysmal Dawn – Obsolescence
7. Revocation – Deathless
8. Accept – Blind Rage
9. Goatwhore – Constricting Rage of the Merciless
10. Amberian Dawn – Magic Forest

Herman Li, Dragonforce

1. Babymetal – S/T
2. H.E.A.T – Tearing Down the Walls
3. Marty Friedman – Inferno
4. Harem Scarem – 13
5. Winger – Better Days Comin’
6. Mr Big – The Stories We Could Tell
7. Amaranthe – Massive Addictive

Charles Elliott, Abysmal Dawn

1. Cannibal Corpse – A Skeletal Domain
2. Insomnium – Shadow of the Dying Sun
3. Archspire – The Lucid Collective
4. Sanctuary – The Year the Sun Died
5. Narcotic Wasteland – Narcotic Wasteland
6. Inferi – The Path of Apotheosis
7. The Haunted – Exit Wounds
8. Vader – Tibi Et Igni
9. Aborted – The Necrotic Manifesto
10. Origin – Omnipresent

Honorable mentions:

• Misery Index – The Killing Gods
• Triptykon – Melana Chasmata
• Belphegor – Conjuring the Dead
• The Francesco Artusato Project – Our Dying Sun

Digestor, Ghoul

1. Cannabis Corpse –From Wisdom to Baked
2. Dystopia – Human=Garbage re-release
3. Iron Reagan – The Tyranny of Will
4. Autopsy – Tourniquets, Hacksaws, and Graves
5. Black Anvil – Hail Death
6. Exodus – Blood In, Blood Out
7. Exhumed/Iron Reagan Split
8. Midnight – No Mercy for Mayhem
9. Final Conflict – Ashes to Ashes re-release
10. BAT – Primitive Age

Terence Hannum, Locrian

1. Have A Nice Life – The Unnatural World LP
2. Pig Destroyer – Mass and Volume
3. Reverorum Ib Malacht – De Mysteriis Dom Christi CD
4. Ancestors – In Death 7″
5. Horrendous – Ecdysis LP
6. WOLD – Postsocial
7. Trepaneringsritualen – Perfection & Permanence
8. Prurient – Washed Against the Rocks 7″
9. Wreck & Reference – Want
10. Deathpile – Final Confession 2xLP (Reissue)

Matthew Friesen, Culted

1. Yob – Clearing the Path to Ascend
2. Godflesh – Decline & Fall
3. Godflesh – A World Lit Only by Fire
4. EyeHateGod – S/T
5. Earth – Primitive and Deadly
6. Belphegor – Conjuring the Dead
7. Obituary – Inked in Blood
8. Khold – Til Endes
9. Behemoth – The Satanist
10. Exodus – Blood In Blood Out

Jenks Miller, Horseback/Mount Moriah/Rose Cross NC

In alphabetical order:

• Autopsy – Tourniquets, Hacksaws and Graves
• Nathan Bowles – Nansemond
• Dama/Libra – Claw
• Brian Eno & Karl Hyde – Highlife
• Faust – jUSt
• Terence Hannum – Via Negativa
• Lana Del Rey – Ultraviolence
• Mortuary Drape – Spiritual Independence
• Nazoranai – The Most Painful Time Happens Only Once Has it Arrived Already?
• Nuclearhammer – Serpentine Hermetic Lucifer
• Pyrrhon – The Mother of Virtues
• Reverorum Ib Malact – De Mysteriis Dom Christi
• Ride for Revenge – Enter the Gauntlet
• Swallowed – Lunarterial
• Teitanblood – Death
• Zeitkratzer & Keiji Haino – Live at Jahrhunderthalle Bochum

Jef Whitehead and Stevie Floyd

1. Thee birth of GRAIL FLOYD-WHITEHEAD
2. Reverorum Ib Malacht – De Mysteriis Dom Christi (Trinity)
3. Blut Aus Nord/P.H.O.B.O.S. split
4. Hädanfärd – Destruktiva Reflektioner
5. Bekëth Nexëhmü – De Urtida Makterna
6. Taurus – No/Thing (whthd pick)
7. Krieg – Transient
8. Atriarch – An Unending Pathway
9. Daudadagr – Nordanland
10. Grifteskymfning – Likpsalm demo (we were obsessed with this all year)

Sindre Solem, Obliteration/Nekromantheon

In no particular order:

1. Drowned – Idola Sepcus
2. Execration – Morbid Dimentions
3. Gravmaskin – Volym 1
4. Okkultokrati – Night Jerks
5. Funereal Presence – The Archer Takes Aim
6. ZOM – Flesh Assimilation
7. Swallowed – Lunarterial
8. Bölzer – Zoma
9. Tusmørke – Riset bak Speilet
10. Deathhammer – Evil Power
11. Black Magic – Wizards Spell