Blood Incantation

The Best Metal of 2016

We already ran down the 45 best albums of 2016, the 20 best emo/punk albums, the 15 best new(ish) rock bands, and 10 overlooked albums. Now let’s talk about the best metal of 2016.

Our metal sister site Invisible Oranges published individual lists by the site’s contributors (including yours truly), and the average top 10 of all the lists looks like this:


10) Deathspell Omega – The Synarchy of Molten Bones / 40 Watt Sun – Wider Than The Sky (15 points, tie)

09) Neurosis – Fires Within Fires / Sumac – What One Becomes (16 points, tie)

08) Ghoul – Dungeon Bastards (18 points)

07) Oranssi Pazuzu – Värähtelijä / Kvelertak – Nattesferd (19 points, tie)

06) SubRosa – For This We Fought the Battle of Ages (20 points)

05) Vektor – Terminal Redux (21 points)

04) Abbath – Abbath (22 points)

03) Cobalt – Slow Forever (26 points)

02) Hammers of Misfortune – Dead Revolution / Oathbreaker – Rheia (27 points, tie)

01) Blood Incantation – Starspawn (31 points)

Oathbreaker, Cobalt and Kvelertak also cracked the BV top 45 (as did Inter Arma).

Here are Invisible Oranges’s individual IO lists:

Joseph Schafer
Ian Cory
Andrew Sacher
Jon Rosenthal
Rob Sperry-Fromm
Bruce Hardt
Chris Rowella
Greg Majewski
Rhys Williams
Aaron Maltz
Courtney Iseman
Andrew Rothmund
Spyros Stasis
Daniel Evans

Also check out honorable mentions and top songs by editor Joseph Schafer, overlooked albums by Dan Lawrence, and Stereogum’s 40 Best Albums List of 2016 (written by ex-Invisible Oranges editors Michael Nelson, Doug Moore, Aaron Lariviere, Wyatt Marshall, and Ian Chainey).

For more of the year’s best metal, check out Decibel’s Top 40 list, plus top 10s from Stephen Brodsky, Aaron Turner, King Woman, and Iron Reagan.

If you haven’t heard that Blood Incantation album, stream it below. If you’re in NYC, catch them at the Stardust fest at Saint Vitus in February.