It’s getting to be that time of year, the time when we dive head first into the polluted sea of year-end listmania. Our listmania extravaganza comes in four parts. First, we re-print assorted lists of the year’s best albums, leeched from other web sites and magazines. Second, we collect our readers’ lists of the songs they enjoyed the most from the year that’s rapidly drawing to a close. Third, we post the year-end lists of our own staff and assorted guest writers. And fourth, we roll out our list of the year’s Most Infectious Extreme Metal Songs.

And that last list is the subject of this post (we’ll be inviting you to give us your lists of the year’s best albums as we get closer to the actual end of the year — so start thinking about that).

In case you’ve forgotten, or you’ve become an NCS reader since this time last year, here’s what this is about:

To repeat, this isn’t a list of the best metal albums of the year. It’s not even our list of the best individual extreme metal songs of the year — though some of the songs might actually be among the best of the year. Instead, ours is a list of the most infectious extreme metal songs we’ve heard this year. We’re talking about songs that might produce involuntary physical movement, songs that have got catchy rhythms, memorable melodies, sweet grooves, or anything else that sticks the song in your head and makes you want to keep listening to it. Continue reading »