Before At The Gates locked into the impeccable groove that would yield their undisputed kingmaker, Slaughter Of The Soul, and leave an indelible impact on the evolution of melodic death metal and metalcore, they were an almost formless entity. Their first two albums are swarms of otherworldly chaos, creeping weirdness, shifting time signatures, unstable tempos, bizarre melodies, and lurching riffs and percussion that seem to change direction with each passing measure - so far-removed from the "angrier thrash" template of most early death metal as to be incomparable. While The Red In The Sky Is Ours typically gets more attention for these qualities, for me, With Fear I Kiss The Burning Darkness is the secret jewel of the band's discography: it has all of that unpredictability (plus a raft of undisputable classics and poetic, strikingly colorful lyrics), but it's all packed within the deepest, darkest, and most luscious production they ever achieved. The distortion is heavy but the tones are a luxurious purple-red-black, and Tompa's gutting shrieks are as frigid and biting as the void itself; you can feel time tearing itself in the riffs. This is a perfect illustration of the sound of burning darkness.

This magnificent album turned 30 this week, so take some time to pay special attention to the most underappreciated album of At The Gates's early work.

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Endorsed by: Nejde, RaduP, Redel, Netzach, Daniell, nikarg, Starvynth, X-Ray Rod

In Flames revived a spark of their old selves with the surprisingly listenable Foregone, and last year's debut from The Halo Effect was a much better recapitulation of the band's classic style in a modern context. But if you want another truly capital-g Great Gothenburg album, this is the one to pick: it's not just the groove, not just the guitar tones, not just the screams, but the feeling that Majesties have harnessed. Vast Reaches Unclaimed has the mystique, the darkness, and the infernal romantic luster that made albums like The Jester Race, With Fear I Kiss The Burning Darkness, and Skydancer so rich and beautiful. The red in the sky may, in fact, be the glint of a new star on the horizon.

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Endorsed by: Nejde, nikarg, Starvynth, Dream Taster

From dungeon crawl to alpine odyssey, from cave quest to fortress siege, from forest foray to blizzard-beaten battlefield, Stormkeep's debut serves as the perfect soundtrack to any adventure that can be measured with a dice roll or described while wearing a wizard hat. Though a colossal melodic black metal base defines Tales Of Othertime, the diversity of flavors is enough to put to shame any other of the millions of Tolkien-infused, medieval-themed black metal albums flooding the market. The synth passages are tastefully placed and artfully constructed, and for once, we've got an album that spends as much time with the dragons as with the dungeons: power metal from Blind Guardian to Bal-Sagoth echoes through the majestic choruses, and the riffing is catchy enough to allay your Dissection withdrawal for a time. Like a tale out of time from an ancient, forgotten tome, Tales Of Othertime is filled with magic - and it's been a long time since black metal last felt so powerful.

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Endorsed by: RaduP, X-Ray Rod, Starvynth

As talented a vocalist as David Wayne was, his departure from Metal Church was a true blessing in disguise, for it opened the door for the man who has always been my favorite MC vocalist: Mike Howe. His distortion was beautiful, his articulation was savage, and he was one of the proudest members of the lineage of gravel-voiced frontmen alongside folks like Zetro and Bobby Blitz. Even after 20 years of absence, when he reunited with Metal Church for XI and Damned If You Do, two very strong late-career records, Mike's tone was still rich and his delivery forceful. At only 55, he sadly joins the ranks of those gone from us too soon.

Blessing In Disguise has long been in competition with the self-titled album for my favorite Metal Church work, and while of course the killer riffs and rhythm work throughout make it solid gold, Mike's shredded howl sells every song so well. Perhaps I should have picked The Human Factor as a tribute, because Mike truly had a human factor in his singing that drove the lyrics to the heart more than your average head-bangers could, especially on that album, but Blessing In Disguise has "Badlands," one of my all-time favorite songs, and there's not much better you can do than that.

Rest in peace, Mike.

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Endorsed by: Dream Taster, RaduP, Deadsoulman, Starvynth, Daniell, nikarg, BitterCOld, Yaniv

It's hard to believe that human civilization peaked on March 12, 2001, but we of Metal Storm are well aware of the fact that Opeth's Blackwater Park is the single most important and amazing work of art ever to grace our unworthy human senses - and today this pillar of sonic achievement turns 20 years old.

Now, iconic reviews aside, I don't actually believe that Blackwater Park is the greatest album ever released - in fact, it's not even my favorite Opeth album - but there's no denying that it is a milestone in its genre, easily one of the definitive recordings of progressive metal. It ranks among the most significant and influential works in its sphere, standing tall even within Opeth's discography; with a career practically founded on the production of successive magna opera, Opeth will likely never have a single, incontrovertible outlier to be crowned their best, but Blackwater Park does have something like a mythology surrounding it. Maybe you don't have to treat it like the apex of heavy metal, but it's still a damn good progressive death metal record that we can all enjoy, and what more reason do you need to give it a spin?

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Endorsed by: RaduP, musclassia, Starvynth, corrupt, Deadsoulman, Daniell, X-Ray Rod, Dream Taster, Redel

For generations, ever since his explosive debut with this legendary album, Eddie Van Halen has been synonymous with the electric guitar. With the runaway success of Van Halen and the wild, high-energy rock/metal combination the band purveyed in so many hit singles, Eddie became one of the most visible and respected shredders of the '70s and '80s; his most lasting contribution to the craft may be the popularization of tapping, especially of the two-handed variety, and he expressed a familiarity with pinch harmonics, sliding, vibrato, and other techniques that had yet to be fully mined by his genre, but beyond that he wrapped the spotlight around himself and pushed the art of guitar-playing into a new plane of excess. From his distinctive tone to his knack for riff-writing to his seemingly effortless facility with his instrument, Eddie was a monumental figure, the gold standard for hard rock and glam metal in his heyday and even now one of the faces of the guitar to the world at large. We shouldn't forget how he pushed the envelope even further with his daring use of synthesizers on "Jump" and his collaboration with Michael Jackson on "Beat It," but it is this album that more than any illustrates why people have always talked about Eddie Van Halen as a revelatory force.

"Eruption" is a notorious benchmark of technical prowess, as iconic as "Smoke On The Water" or "Iron Man" but for a higher skill set, and songs like "Ain't Talkin' 'Bout Love" and "Runnin' With The Devil" boast some of the most recognizable riffs of the decade; the name "Van Halen" itself has become an antonomasia to describe a musically skilled showman. Even the design of his trademark "Frankenstrat" has developed into an image and a brand all its own. I may not be the biggest Van Halen fan out there, but it's impossible to deny the status that Eddie enjoyed in the musical world and the sway he held over generations of players; I'm glad I was able to see him once and watch him live up to that reputation.

RIP Eddie.

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Endorsed by: musclassia, D.T. Metal, RaduP, nikarg, BitterCOld, Daniell, Dream Taster, Starvynth, Pierre Tombale

I'm not going to go to the same effort that I did to mark the half-centenary of Black Sabbath, but I do think that Paranoid is the superior album by far - it was one of my first metal albums (mine and the rest of the world's) and it remains one of my favorites. The guitars, bass, and drums on this album are simply flawless, and the vocals are pretty good, too. I would tentatively say that heavy metal has not yet produced another work as instrumentally well-rounded and complete as "War Pigs." Every groove of this album is the very essence of metal incarnate, and while you are correct in noting that we mostly use the Staff Picks feature just to mark anniversaries nowadays, there are few albums worth celebrating as much as Paranoid. It boggles the mind to consider that this album has been in the world for 50 years and it is still looked upon as a masterpiece.

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Endorsed by: X-Ray Rod, Starvynth, RaduP, Auntie Sahar, nikarg, Fat & Sassy!, BitterCOld, Abattoir, Daniell, Redel

30 years ago, on September 3, 1990, Judas Priest released the perfect heavy metal album. Not A perfect heavy metal album - THE perfect heavy metal album, a nonstop death machine bristling with power and speed that puts all competition to shame. The title track really says it all: it's iconic from head to toe, opening with Scott Travis's merciless drum volley and closing with Rob's peremptory shriek of "PAIN!!", with some of the greatest shredding ever committed to wax in between. But the album doesn't end there; for 47 minutes, Painkiller holds its listeners captive with stratospheric screeching, face-melting guitar solos, and the sleekest, heaviest, most brutally effective solution of thrash-laced heavy metal that the world has ever heard. The snarling evil of "Night Crawler," the pummeling metallic frenzy of "Metal Meltdown," the epic and intimidating groove of "Hell Patrol" - every track is a guaranteed killer from one of the most legendary bands ever to give meaning to the phrase "heavy metal." I love the myriad styles of metal music and I embrace it in all its deathly, blackened, doomy, thrashy, folksy, grindy, djenty extremity, but when it comes to the grand tradition, the classic sound, the stuff that "heavy metal" in its purest form is made of, there is nothing better than Painkiller.

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Endorsed by: RaduP, nikarg, Troy Killjoy, Dream Taster, Abattoir, Redel

30 years ago today, Entombed taught the world what Boss HM-2 and DS-1 pedals could do to a cheap rig and, by extension, what Sweden could do for death metal. Left Hand Path was not the first death metal album recorded by a Swedish band, nor was it the first recorded by Tomas Skogsberg at the legendary Sunlight Studio, but it was arguably the first Swedish death metal album: with evil-infused hardcore punk riffs, D-beat drums, mid-range harsh vocals, and guitars so distorted they sound like two slabs of concrete being scraped together, Entombed set a trend and heralded the irruption of one of heavy metal's most iconic and influential scenes. Even though they themselves would not stay on the left-hand path for much longer, crossing over into death'n'roll, between this album and Clandestine Entombed are rightfully remembered as death metal legends. Here's to three head-kicking decades of buzzsaw guitars, strangled growls, and dark, crushing Swedeath.

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Endorsed by: Troy Killjoy, RaduP, Daniell, nikarg, BitterCOld, Abattoir, X-Ray Rod, Darkside Momo, Starvynth, Redel

We all knew Marcel as a doom guy, and that's certainly the first association I have with him, but on this very site you will find a 10.0 review of this here classic thrash album (or at least the 20th anniversary reissue) from none other than Marcel himself. Personally, I've never been the biggest fan of Flotz, but Doomsday For The Deceiver is without a doubt one of the best thrash albums to come out of the 1980s, thanks to its sky-piercing vocals and riffs as monstrous as the cover art. We know which band Jason Newsted really belonged in... but that's another discussion.

The point here is that Flotsam And Jetsam were no hangers-on, but were paving the way for future thrash (and other styles) in ways the Big Four couldn't have imagined, and I paid much closer attention to this album thanks to the affection shown it by Marcel.

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Endorsed by: Daniell, nikarg, Darkside Momo, Ag Fox, X-Ray Rod, Redel

I reviewed Secrets Of The Magick Grimoire in 2017 and, though I spoke very highly of it at the time, it has since grown even greater in my esteem, not only yielding many staples of my mental power/folk metal canon but also climbing the ranks to become one of my favorite albums of all time. Reader Of The Runes - Divination is already beginning the same ascent, thanks to its unmistakable aura of high fantasy and woodland elven magic. The many, many layers of metal and traditional instrumentation and sweet-sounding vocals build a beautiful atmosphere, and the songs themselves are enchanting. Elvenking is our champion of dense, folk-heavy power metal.

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It has been over a year since my last staff pick, so I decided to throw out a real corker to get my momentum going again. Li Nan is a maniac whose voice will leave you scarred for days after listening to this album. He's backed by a mash-up of nu/alt metal and Chinese elements that swings from brutal breakdowns to meditative atmosphere. VooDoo KungFu is a bizarre project - it's groovy, scary, freakish, and extreme, and all the while it's sui generis.

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Mousy vocals, reedy tones, modest production... but bombastic riffs, lofty concepts, fantastical mystique, and complete mastery over the art of flaming metal systems. Touching on power, prog, speed, and traditional heavy metal, Manilla Road produced a string of the finest albums ever released in any of those genres, and Crystal Logic crowned them all with its ensorcelling grooves. In losing Manilla Road, the heavy metal genre has lost one of its most literate and classically epic artists.

RIP Mark the Shark.

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Endorsed by: BloodTears, Daniell, Dream Taster, X-Ray Rod, nikarg, Redel

I'm about a month late for the exact anniversary, but Nightfall In Middle-Earth is 20 years old now, and for the last 10, it has been my favorite album of all time. Andre Olbrich's guitar solos, Hansi Kürsch's vocals, the songwriting, the production, the choirs, the drama, the emotion, the cover art, even the cavalcade of excessive interludes - just about every characteristic of this album is, for me, the gold standard by which that characteristic is measured in all other works of music. I can still clearly remember hearing "Nightfall" for the first time and thinking within the first ten seconds, "This is the perfect band for me." Ten years later, I feel the same sentiments I did that first time. Happy birthday, Nightfall. Happy anniversary, Bards of Metal.

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Endorsed by: BloodTears, BitterCOld, Dream Taster, Daniell, Darkside Momo

After 26 years and ten albums whose titles all start with the letter "i," Dew-Scented have decided to make the world a nicer, calmer, gentler, and overall suckier place by taking themselves out of it. This was one of the bands that first acclimatized me to harsh vocals and more extreme forms of metal, and what a band to start with; to this day, Inwards is one of my go-to albums whenever I need something that is loud, fast, brutal, angry, unsubtle, and wicked sick in equal measure. I hate to see them go, but we've still got in "Bitter Conflict" one of the finest metal songs ever written.

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