(Andy Synn‘s week-long round-up of metal in 2020 continues with this list of his picks for the year’s “Critical Top Ten” across a broad range of metal genres. You might also want to read his round-ups of the year’s “Great“, “Good“, and most “Disappointing” albums to see what you may have missed.)

So here’s the thing… I recently came to the realisation that there’s more than one reason why this article is referred to as my “Critical” (that’s the key word) Top Ten, and not “The Best of…”.

It’s not just because it symbolises me putting on my “critic” hat in an attempt to inject a sliver of objectivity and self-awareness into the proceedings (because of this my “Critical” and my “Personal” lists rarely cross over), but because I believe that these ten albums are critical if you want to gain a fuller, more rounded grasp of the visceral variety and creative vitality of the Metal scene in 2020.

Of course, ten entries is woefully insufficient to cover the full breadth and depth of the year’s output, but you’ll find that the albums I’ve selected still encompass a range of styles and sub-genres, and feature releases ranging from as far back as January to as recently as a few weeks ago.

As always the list isn’t ranked – this article isn’t about saying which albums are better/worse, but about presenting a representative sample of the year’s best – and I’ve again included an extra “bonus” recommendation alongside each main entry, so even if you’re already familiar with something picked out there’ll should still be something new for you to listen to as well/instead.

This year it really feels like I’ve diverged quite a bit from the common consensus (not on purpose, I hasten to add), as there’s only really one entry here that I would call an “obvious” pick, but I still stand by every one of my choices regardless of how divisive and/or controversial they might be.

And so, without further ado, let’s get critical. Continue reading »