(Andy Synn finishes off “List Week”, as always, with a list of his ten favourite albums of the year)

You might expect my “Personal Top Ten” to be an easier list to make than my “Critical Top Ten“… and for the most part you’d be right. But also wrong.

Because while the top three have been pretty much set in stone for a while, the question of how to rank the rest was far more difficult, as the differences between most of these albums was often just a matter of degrees, meaning any order I had one day was likely to be completely wrong by the time I woke up on the next.

This was particularly problematic around the #10 cut off point, with the result being that there are several albums (like Krallice‘s most-excellent Psychagogue, and Feral Light‘s fantastic Psychic Contortions) that, in another timeline, could just as easily have been included if things had only been slightly different.

So what can you expect this year?

Well, while it’s definitely a Metal list (if you want to know what my favourite non-Metal album of the year was, then check this out) you can expect to see a lot of Hardcore and/or Hardcore-influenced stuff here, as well as some long-time favourites of mine whose new albums immediately shot to the top of my list, and stayed there.

It’s definitely not the coolest or most “kvlt” collection of recordings you’re going to read this year, but it’s full of artists and albums I love and hope to still be listening to years from now.

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(Is it possible to capture the very best of an entire year in just ten albums? Of course not… but that isn’t going to stop Andy Synn from trying!)

This one’s for all you new people… let me explain how this works.

Unlike tomorrow’s “Personal” list, the “Critical Top Ten” is my attempt (emphasis on attempt) to inject some sort of objectivity into the proceedings by identifying ten albums which I think represent the cream of this year’s metallic crop, across as wide a spectrum of styles and sub-genres as possible.

It’s not ranked (as I’m sure you’ll notice) as it’s meant to be more of a representative sample of the year – although, I have to say, ten albums is never enough to properly cover all the bases (for example, I’d love to have included Inanna‘s Void of Unending Depths, but simply didn’t have the space).

Interestingly, this year feels like the first year in a long time where at least a couple of my selections actually align with the wider consensus, and while I’m sure there will be some complaints about the list not being trve/kvlt/underground enough as a result, for me it just says that sometimes, on very rare occasions, I’m not as out of step with the rest of “the scene” as I think I am.

PS – as always (since it’s seemed to have gone down well in previous years), I’ve included a little bonus recommendation alongside each of my main choices, just to increase your potential enjoyment!

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