The Top 12 Metal Albums of 2012
(and some other stuff)
Muthas, 2012 was a great year in Metal, and we here at The Metal
Blog Of Metal have picked the twelve best albums of the year. We have also picked the best reissues of the
year, the best concert of the year, the best live albums of the year, and the
worst releases of the year. Read on!
The Twelve Best
Albums of 2012
2012 proved to be a very good year for Metal and we got
great releases from across the various genres.
We won’t number these this year, but encourage you to check out all the skullcrushers
below. These twelve dominated the
turntables, CD players and MP3 players at The Metal Blog Of Metal.
The Sword - Apocryphon (Razor & Tie)
Back with more 70s influenced awesomeness, The Sword cranked out the excellent Apocryphon.
It’s another superb entry into their growing discography and
features the band really exploring the power of the mid-paced song. Every track is superb and we have
listened to this album countless times.
Get it.
Gypsyhawk – Revelry & Resilience (Metal
Blade)
Another band that channels all that was great about 70s
Metal, Gypsyhawk kills it Thin Lizzy style with this awesome
disc. Check out the snaking and twisting
guitar melodies, as well as the sweet fantasy based lyrics. These guys are doing it right.
Orchid – Heretic (Nuclear Blast)
This band can do no wrong.
Period. Sure, it’s only a 4 song
EP, but damn, do they know how to craft witchy, hooky and crushing Doom
Metal. We love this band and eagerly
await their next LP.
Testament – Dark Roots of Earth (Nuclear Blast)
Thrash legends Testament
really know how to write wicked good songs that are both melodic and heavy as
hell. There’s a reason why they were
able to soldier on when so many other lesser Thrash bands shit the bed in the 90s. Dark
Roots of Earth is an excellent platter that surpasses their previous album and
is a fine addition to their legacy (Get it? See what I did there? Ah, forget it.)
Accept – Stalingrad (Nuclear Blast)
Damn fine follow-up to Blood
of the Nations, which erases any doubts about the new Accept lineup (not that there should have been any doubts.) Stalingrad kicks ass as only Wolf and
the boys know how, with anthemic, rifftacular, melodic Metal. Poor Udo, his latest album, Rev-Raptor, really sounds like complete
shit next to this.
3 Inches of Blood –
Long Live Heavy Metal (Century Media)
Canadian crushers 3IOB
came roaring into 2012 with a killer album that celebrated all that is great
about Heavy Metal. Long Live Heavy Metal featured tracks reminiscent of Priest, Dio, Rainbow and other
legends of the genre, as well as 3IOB’s
own brand of shredding Metal. Check out
the infectious “4000 Torches,” “Metal Woman,” “Leather Lord” and “Look Out” for
a taste of their steely mastery. Posers
leave the hall!
Van Halen – A Different Kind of Truth (Interscope)
This was easily the biggest surprise of the year. We expected this album to be a crapfest of old
man rock. You know, a mid-paced
collection of boring garbage that some out-of-touch 50 year-old would pen in
hopes of staying relevant. The first
single, “Tattoo,” did little to change our opinion because that song is complete
shit. Why in the hell was that chosen as
the lead single? Thankfully, the rest of
the songs are absolutely primo DLR-era Van
Halen. The swaggering, balls-out
hard rock that everybody wanted them to make was finally delivered! Sure, Dave’s voice is a bit limited by age
and Michael Anthony’s harmonies are sorely missed, but the songs are damn
good. Ed had the good sense to go back
to all of his old demos and pull out some 70s and 80s cuts and flesh them
out. Well done gents, now get back out
on tour.
Cauldron – Tomorrow’s Lost (Earache Records)
Canuckistani Metal maniacs, Cauldron, forged another LP that celebrates the glory of mid-80s
Heavy Metal. It’s great that there is a
band out there that eagerly embraces the more commercial side of classic
Metal. Jay Decay and Ian Chains know how
to write a memorable and heavy mid-paced tune that would fit beautifully on Metal Massacre’s I-IX. Buy the LP, get their patch and sew it on
your vest. We did!
Grand Magus – The Hunt (Nuclear Blast)
Do you like Vikings and Metal? You do?
Well go buy this album immediately because Grand Magus loves both more than you do and are masters of their craft to boot. The
Hunt features nothing but songs about Vikings, wolves, Odin, Thor, ravens,
longships, etc… You’ll want to grab a
longsword and run out to the nearest monastery for some plundering! Think of them as the traditional Metal
brother of Amon Amarth and you’ll
get the right idea. The band has
completely moved away from Doom Metal and focuses entirely on Scandinavian
Glory Metal a la Heavy Load, Overdrive or Torch. Join them in the mead
hall, won’t you? To Valhalla!
Ugly Kid Joe – Stairway To Hell (UKJ Records)
Yes, that’s right, Ugly
Kid Joe actually made it into the best albums of 2012 with this awesome EP
of new material. UKJ have managed to record six cuts of snarling, venomous hard rock
that has Whitfield Crane sounding like Bon Scott. Damn it’s good. Check out “Devil’s Paradise” or “You Make Me
Sick” for a taste of hate, or get the funk out with “I’m Alright.” It’s good to have these guys back and we hope
they crank out a full length LP soon.
Overkill – The Electric Age (Nuclear Blast)
New Jersey’s favorite bangers unleash another superb album
that harkens back to their more groove oriented late 90s albums. It’s a bit more From The Underground and Below and a bit less Ironbound. Overkill never fail to deliver the
goods and they do it once again. Fuck the
Big Four, Overkill has been
defending the faith while those assholes meandered aimlessly from one mediocre album
to the next. Hello from the gutter!
Icarus Witch – Rise (Cleopatra Records)
Want a more modern sounding album stuffed full of anthem
after anthem? Well, then Rise is exactly what you are looking
for. The album was a real shocker
following the tired-sounding Draw Down
The Moon and the departure of former vocalist Matthew Bizilia. All signs pointed to Icarus Witch disappearing into obscurity, but instead they roared
back to life with this LP of peppy and hooky melodic Metal. New singer Christopher Shaner fits the new
style perfectly and adds much needed energy to the songs. Hopefully Icarus Witch will continue rocking for
years to come!
The Best Reissues
Dio – Holy Diver & The Last In Line (Audio Fidelity Reissues)
If you want to hear
how remasters should be done, check out these two releases from the sonic
wizards at Audio Fidelity. We have all
heard these albums a million times before, but these remasters uncover all
sorts of sounds that were previously buried in lesser versions of this
album. Superb!
Dio – Holy Diver, The Last In Line & Sacred
Heart (Deluxe Editions from Universal
Music)
More Dio?
Yep. These UK Imports have nice
mastering and tons of bonus tracks.
Essentially, you get every single and B-side released by Dio during this period, as well as the
entire Intermission EP. They may be expensive imports but the value
is incredible for what you get. Buy!
Dammaj – Mutiny (Skol Records)
It’s awesome! We
reviewed it here and we still urge you to buy this album of rock-solid,
blistering, U.S. Power Metal. This is
Heavy Metal at its very best. Hailz!
Desolation Angels
– Desolation Angels (Buried By Time
and Dust)
Another very late NWOBHM album that got lost in the Thrash
deluge. Thankfully, the Metal archivists
at Buried By Time and Dust records have resurrected this gem in both vinyl and
CD formats. They have also included the Valhalla/Boedicea single as a bonus in
both formats! We will review this in
depth coming up, but get out there and buy it because supplies are
limited.
Witch Cross – Fit For Fight (Hells Headbangers)
It’s about damn time that this legendary 1984 album from the
not-so-melancholy Danes of Witch Cross
got reissued! Hells Headbangers serve up
Fit For Fight on CD, vinyl and, believe
it or not, on cassette, with good remastering and lyrics for the whole
shebang. We’ll review this album in the
near future, but get out there and buy it.
The Best Live
Albums
Pickings were a bit slim this year so we only picked these two:
Saxon – Heavy Metal Thunder – Live Eagles Over
Wacken (UDR)
Bangers, gorge on this metal feast from the venerable Saxon!
This is an essential release because it includes a DVD that features 31 tracks
from three different years at the massive Wacken Open Air festival. The band sounds great as they crush and
destroy the huge crowds of Metalheads. Also included are two bonus CDs recorded at a
Glasgow show in 2011, which feature many new songs from their latest studio
effort, Call To Arms. It’s well worth the coin.
Vicious Rumors – Live You to Death (SPV)
Keeping up their momentum from last year’s Razorback Killers, Vicious Rumors offers up this single disc live show that was
recorded on their 2011 European tour.
The album features nine live cuts, including two songs from Razorback Killers alongside other
classics such as “Digital Dictator,” “Down To The Temple,” “Abandoned” and “Don’t
Wait For Me.” The band is tight and
Brian Allen does a commendable job on both the new and old material. The album also includes two new studio
tracks: a cover of Black Sabbath’s “The
Sign of the Southern Cross” and Judas
Priest’s ”Running Wild.” Pick this
up if you are a VR fan or if you like
music that’s not terrible shit.
Best Live Show
Accept – The
Newport Music Hall Columbus, Ohio 9/14/2012
The Teutonic Terrors absolutely killed it on a beautiful
Friday night in Ohio and blew the roof off the place with pure Metallic
fury! Wolf Hoffman appeared to be having
the time of his life as he blasted out riff after riff of molten steel. Mark Tornillo was in fine form and sounded
great. Udo who? Poor old Kreator
was a mere afterthought when Accept
left the stage. The only complaint was
they still didn’t play ”Midnight Mover.”
Damn it! Even so, it was a great
night of Metal in the Buckeye State!
Catch them live if you can.
Worst Shit Foisted
on Metaldom in 2012
Metallica – Beyond Magnetic (Warner Brothers Records)
We reviewed it here and it still sucks ass. Sometimes talent just dries up like an old turd left in the sun.
Chris Holmes – They All Lie And Cheat
Holy shit! This makes
Beyond Magnetic sound like a choir of
angels. What the fuck is going on
here? Holmes looks and acts like the alcoholic,
toothless bum that he was always destined to be (see here.) Who is the random crackwhore swearing in the
video? Is this the worst lip-synching since
Milli Vanilli? Why was this made?
Baffling.
Have a great 2013 and may your year be Metal!
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