The eight tracks here are a perfect fusion of technical death metal, progressive rock and jazz fusion. – Ryan Brunįor being roughly only 32 minutes in length, Unquestionable Presence packs one hell of a punch. Davis’ performance was, and remains to this day, one of the most expressive and emotive outpourings ever caught on tape, proving that vulnerability and heavy metal really can coexist. However, the real lynchpin to the albums potency was singer Jonathan Davis’ rabid outbursts, dealing everything from betrayal (“Ball Tongue”) to addiction (“Helmet in the Bush”) to child abuse (“Daddy”). A musical amalgamation like none other before it, Korn blended the down-tuned, dual-guitar attack of Munky and Head, Fieldy’s slap-funk inspired bass and the razor precise groove of drummer David Silveria, to create a sound that would be the inspiration (for better or worse) for countless bands since. MichaelĬlawing their way out of the sun-drenched wasteland of Bakersfield, Calif., Korn arrived with a debut album that was impossible to ignore, if for no other reason than that it sounded like little else at the time. Lord knows what guitarist Chip King is howling about, but this is the soundtrack to the apocalypse. Lee Buford’s bass drum stomps like an angry elephant from hell and his cymbals crash like a thousand shattered windows. The Body teamed up with the 13-member Assembly of Light Choir, and the seven minutes of sweet gospel hum that opens All the Waters is deceiving The Body slaughters that initial sense of delight for the remaining 43 minutes. This is not easy listening, and it’s not supposed to be. On A ll the Waters of the Earth Shall Turn to Blood the Portland-based sludge duo has no problem inducing terror - blood-curdling screams, menacing guitar drones, and crushing drums - and a fuller effect can be felt in a dark room with a few candles lit. The Body may be one of the most frightening bands on the planet. The Body – All The Waters of the Earth Shall Turn to Blood Listen to our Top 100 Metal Albums highlights playlist on Spotify.ġ00.
So we won’t delay this any further here are Treble’s Top 100 Metal Albums. And though no one list is going to be perfect, we hope you at least enjoy reading our perspectives on it. But we wouldn’t do this without a love of metal to motivate us to put something this massive together. Hell, we expect hate mail - we’ve read Metalsucks enough times to figure that out. We imposed a limit of two albums per artist (expanded to three for Sabbath and Metallica because of their influence), and made the necessary adjustments to make sure no subgenre was left behind: doom, sludge, thrash, death, black, NWOBHM, grindcore, mathcore, drone doom, nu-metal, post-metal, et al. In compiling a list of what we consider the best metal albums of all time, we voted on our favorites, reviewed the list and had extensive discussions over whether our Top 100 did justice to metal as a whole. Our timeline starts with Sabbath’s debut, veers into Judas Priest’s rock ‘n’ roll thunder and Motörhead’s power-trio rebellion, and then makes the journey from speed to thrash to death to all of the various and strange bastardizations that have cropped up since. There are a lot of bands that contributed to shaping metal - including Led Zeppelin, Grand Funk Railroad, Deep Purple, Uriah Heep and AC/DC - but you won’t find them here. Metal essentially begins with Black Sabbath, who are rightly seen as the first true heavy metal band.
And while metal is tough to define on such a broad scale, if it’s loud, heavy, dense, powerful and often extreme, then you’re on the right track. Metal comprises a long list of varying subgenres that span far and wide, and to some degree, we agreed that nothing was off limits as long as it was actually metal. On the 30th anniversary of three of the most important albums in the genre’s history - Ride the Lightning, Powerslave and Don’t Break the Oath - we present our Top 100 Metal Albums.įirst and foremost, it’s important that we define our terms. So we’re continuing in that vein this year with another genre-specific list. In the past we’ve done decade lists of albums, decade lists of songs, and most recently, a list of our favorite hip-hop records of the ’90s. Treble operates a little bit like a Hollywood studio during the summertime, we pull out a massive blockbuster for the sake of wowing our audience, usually in the form of a giant list.