YEAR END LIST - ALBUMS 10-6

Yes indeed! It's that time again where I count down my top ten discs of the year. It would have been five, but 2014 was a very good year for music and five simply isn't enough.

10 - The Algorithm - Octopus4

It's rare for an album that can be described as instrumental to make it onto my list (it's not fully instrumental - there is a prolonged section of French rapping on 'Un Dernier Combat' and scattered vocal clips here and there on other tracks), but The Algorithm has managed to make it onto this year's. More focused than his last release, 2012's 'Polymorphic Code', as well as more organic and with a higher focus on melody and catchy songwriting,

9 - Mastodon - Once More 'Round the Sun

Some bemoan Mastodon for their current direction, deride that they have eschewed heaviness for songs that are more accessible. I quite enjoy their current progressive leanings. Once More 'Round the Sun continues along the same tangent that began with The Hunter, with a few tracks that hearken back to their material on Crack The Skye. 

8 - Nexilva - Eschatologies

This is the debut full length (at least, to my knowledge) from these guys, who I saw in April this year. Extremely rapid, technical riffs and machine gun drumming meet a dual-layered vocal delivery of throaty growls and shrieks, with just a smattering of keyboards to blacken things up a little. They're also possessed of one of the most terrifying bassists ever. Sweep picking a bass? Yup. Fucking scary. The only downside to the album is that the snare seems mixed far too low for all those blasts.

7 - Scar Symmetry - The Singularity, Part I: Neohumanity

With Death Jovi, you know what you're getting, by and large. Technical, widdly riffs, coupled with thundering bass, drums and a double vocal delivery. It's cheesy as fuck and they know it. And normally, pop-metal doesn't work. But when it;'s left to Per Nilsson, it works, and it works bloody well. Scar Symmetry will likely never return to the melodeath sound of their Alvestam years, but that's fine - the current direction fits them like a glove. Or a custom fleshlight.

6 - The Contortionist - Language

2014 was certainly the year in which I came to appreciate dreamy, spaced-out tunes, where sonic density and heaviness takes a back seat. The Contortionist certainly sound nothing like they did on Exoplanet, and to a lesser extent Intrinsic. Lessard's vocals are warmer than Carpenter's, which leads to a warmer sounding album than the previous two were, but one no less compelling for it. Walk through a row of trees in autumn and tell me this doesn't make sense.