Muthas, 2014 is in the books and once again we’ve picked the top fourteen Metal albums of the year. We’ve also picked the best live albums, best
reissues, best live shows, and the biggest disappointment of the year. Read on!
The Fourteen Best Albums of 2014
2014 offered up tons of quality Heavy Metal for your
listening pleasure and here are the fourteen releases that dominated our
turntables, CD players and mp3 players at The Metal Blog of Metal.
Grand Magus – Triumph and Power
The Magus cranks
out yet another rock solid album that is loaded with epic tunes. Drink some mead and crank this up! Read the
full review here.
Overkill – White Devil Armory
The Wrecking Crew delivers another stellar Thrash opus. Read the full review here.
Judas Priest – Redeemer of Souls
The Priest is
back! An unexpectedly good album that
manages to overcome a weird mix. Check
out the full review here.
Orange Goblin – Back From The Abyss
A bludgeoning masterpiece of burly, manly, beardy
Metal! Orange Goblin serves up a disc that may just be best of their
career. If we gave out a best of the
year, this may have been it. So damn
good! BUY, BUY, BUY!!!
The Dagger – The Dagger
Sweden strikes again with an album that’s full of excellent 70s style Metal. Imagine a tasty brew composed
mostly of Rainbow and sprinkled
liberally with Thin Lizzy, and Judas Priest. It’s a very impressive album especially
considering ¾ of the band is composed of former members of Dismember. Highly
recommended!
Striker – City of Gold
The first of three awesome Canadian releases in our best of
2014. Striker’s third album is a smashing combo of Speed Metal and Traditional
Metal. The band they most recall is the
godly Vicious Rumors. All of their albums are excellent and this is
as good a place as any to start. Buy or
die!
Midnight Malice – Proving Grounds
Canadian band number two on our list crushed 2014 with a killer Traditional Metal disc that is hooky as all hell. They completely delivered the goods after
being mostly silent since their 2010 demo Pray
For Death. The only negative is they
advertise this as a CD on their website, but it’s actually a CDR. That’s kind of shitty, but the quality of the
music more than offsets this minor disappointment. If you dig
Riot and other good Traditional
Metal bands you need to add this to your collection post-haste.
Bullet – Storm of Blades
If you don’t know about Bullet
by now here’s their obvious description - take one part Accept and one part AC/DC
and mix in a metric shit-ton of fun. Storm of Blades is a focused and
blistering offering, and it's a definite step up from the average Full Pull. Don’t miss this one. Killer Anvil-esque album cover too!
Skull Fist – Chasing The Dream
The last of our Canadian trio, Skull Fist brought out their best album yet in 2014. They cranked back on Jackie Slaughter’s
insane vocals a tiny bit, but kept the excellent songwriting and hooks. Some complain that his vocals are (possibly?) auto-tuned,
but we didn’t because the album kicks all kinds of ass. Hail Canada!
Stallion – Rise and Ride
German bangers Stallion’s
first full album is a cool combo of Heavy Metal, Speed Metal and a bit of a
Sleaze Metal edge. Fun. Fun. Fun. They completely embrace the early 80s Heavy
Metal aesthetic of songwriting and fashion. Tiger stripes and bandanas ahoy!
They even have a song called “Wild Stallions.” Party on dudes!
Primal Fear – Delivering The Black
Something of a comeback for these Power Metal veterans, with
great songs and a real sense of urgency to the writing. Read the full review here.
Grave Digger – Return of the Reaper
Speaking of Germany, these stalwarts have brought out a killer
album that’s NOT a concept album!
Hooray! It’s a pummeling platter
of muscular Power Metal. Also, the album
cover is amazing. Highly recommended!
Stone Dagger – The Siege of Jerusalem
A little bit of cheating here, but were adding this to our
2014 list because the original 2013 release was very limited to a few cassettes
and it didn't get a wide release until 2014. This two-tracker recalls all of the best of the NWOBHM and is an absolute must
buy. Go get this now. Seriously. NOW!
Wolf – Devil Seed
Wolf are one of
the bands that kicked off the whole NWOTHM movement way back in 1999 and they are still
going strong today. They always seem to
get lost in the shuffle, but Devil Seed
is another great addition to their legacy of high quality Traditional Metal. It’s definitely worth your coin if you dig
music that doesn’t suck.
Live – After Death! – The Best Live Albums of 2014
Satan – Trail Of Fire – Live In North American
Documenting NWOBHM legends Satan’s first tour of North America, Trail Of Fire is a very good set of classics that will please any fan of the band or the genre. The band sounds great with Brian Ross's vocals being just as good now as their were way back in the 80s.
The crowds are very excited to hear them which makes this a really special
live album. Pick it up.
Whitesnake – Live In ’84 – Back To The Bone
Here’s a song for ya!! This is a deluxe CD + DVD package
that showcases Whitesnake’s killer
1984 lineup at Super-Rock Japan. Also
included are several other live tracks from the same time period as well as Jon
Lord’s final show with the band. This is
Whitesnake at their peak with John
Sykes before 1987’s “Whitesnake” album.
Just get it.
Born Again – The Best Reissues of 2014
Revered – Reverend
EP, World Won’t Miss You, Play God, Live EP
Divebomb Records deluxe reissues of the entire Reverend Caroline Records catalog. These are mandatory for any Metal Church fan or fans of Power
Thrash in general. Get ‘em before their
gone.
Picture – Picture 1, Heavy Metal Ears, Diamond
Dreamer, Eternal Dark
Divebomb Records strikes again with four albums from the
Netherlands own Picture! Superb Traditional Heavy Metal that will
please fans of 70s and early 80s Judas Priest. Pitch those shitty Greek bootlegs and pick
these deluxe editions up. Great stuff!
S.A. Slayer – Prepare To Die, Go For The Throat
Finally! A legit 2 on
1 reissue of the legendary “other Slayer”
from San Antonio, Texas. This is from
the excellent Polish label Skol Records and is very nicely done – just like all
of their reissues. Buy!
Satan’s Host – Metal From Hell, Midnight Wind
It’s another excellent, finally legit reissue from the good
folks at Skol Records. Get this and see where it all began for Leviathan
Thisiren and company way back in 1986. By
the hands of the devil indeed!
Black Conventicles – The Best Concerts of 2014
Metal Church – March 7th,
The Rex Theater, Pittsburgh, PA
A great set of classics and very little new material from Metal Church on a Friday night in the Steel City. They were filming a concert video so we
actually got to hear “Start The Fire” and “Ton of Bricks” twice back to
back! Very cool. Unfortunately, this proved to be the last
tour with Ronny Munroe, as he left the band shortly thereafter. Here’s hoping they can continue with another vocalist before they
lose the momentum built up from their return.
Black Label
Society/Down – May 15th, Stage A.E., Pittsburgh, PA
It was nice to see BLS,
but the real attraction was finally getting to see Down and Phil Anselmo. Phil
and the boys belted out a great set of Down
classics and left us wanting more. This
is the fourth or fifth time that we’ve seen BLS and Zakk always delivers his guitar hero antics with style and flash. A fun time was had by all.
Primal Fear – May 24th,
The Altar Bar, Pittsburgh, PA
It was quite unexpected when Primal Fear announced a United States tour and that it would be
hitting Pittsburgh. Seeing as this was
their second-to-last show in the States, their performance was excellent and
they band was tight as hell. They
delivered song after song of top-notch German Power Metal to the faithful that
ventured out that night. It was a damn
good set that showcased a band thats far from running in the dust. Hailz!
King Diamond – October
19th, Stage A.E., Pittsburgh, PA
It was a definite treat seeing the revitalized King Diamond and his theatrical stage
show of evil awesomeness right before Halloween! It was pure chance
that had him book a show here in the Steel City, and everyone there was glad to
see him back in action. Here’s hoping
that more tours and albums follow. A new
Mercyful Fate album and tour would
be great too!
Message In Blood – The Best Album Cover of 2014
Grave Digger – Return of the Reaper
Now that’s an awesome cover!
The Grim Reaper, a graveyard, fire, a casket, and ravens all presented
as if they are coming right at you as they bust out of the graveyard. Sweet! Looks exceptionally good on vinyl.
The System Has Failed – The Biggest Disappointments of 2014
Sebastian Bach – Give ‘Em Hell
We keep waiting for Baz to unleash a worthy follow up to the
smoking Angel Down and he’s never
gotten close. The album sounds uninspired and
his vocals are weirdly strained on much of the material. WTF?
Also, the album cover is an abomination. Boo!!!! Get Metal Mike Chlasciak back and write some better material. We'll be waiting.
Accept – Blind Fury
It’s a pile of meh.
Full review here.
The 124th Annual The Metal Blog of Metal
Comeback Of The
Year Award
Chromium Dioxide
Magazine
If you don’t read this Canadian Metal ‘zine I pity your
shallow, colorless existence. It’s
packed full of hilarity, Metal, VHS bargain bin treasures, and everything else
the 1990 version of me thought was great. Main men Philthy Chromium and Dave
Slimer hadn’t been able to put out an issue since 2011 due to various fires, health scares,
and other shittiness, but now they are back for the attack! Buy it here and know what it is to live life
to the fullest as a man should do. Hoist
a midnight champagne with me in celebration!
Cheers!
_____________________________________________________
Have a great 2015 and as always, MAKE MINE METAL!
