I love instrumentals (songs without vocals)!
One doesn't need words to convey a message and evoke emotions. Instrumentals also show how metal is very closely related to classical music!
These are my favorite instrumental songs. (There are some songs that contain a few spoken words. These I denote with *)
Suggestions are appreciated! Enjoy!

1.Dissection - Storm Of The Light's Bane

2.Metallica - Ride The Lightning

3.Summoning - Minas Morgul

4.Metallica - ...And Justice For All

5.Judas Priest - Screaming For Vengeance

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Albums with the most epic cover art!

1.Iron Maiden - Powerslave

2.Rainbow - Rising

3.Death - Scream Bloody Gore

4.Megadeth - Peace Sells... But Who's Buying?

5.Necrophobic - Mark Of The Necrogram

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My favourite black metal albums listed and ranked, all varieties within the black metal genre.

1.Summoning - Oath Bound

2.Immortal - At The Heart Of Winter

3.Primordial - To The Nameless Dead

4.Mayhem - De Mysteriis Dom Sathanas

5.Mgła - Exercises In Futility

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**Trigger warning**

Albums and EPs rated 8.6+ from 100+ votes which I've given an 8 or lower to.

I've listened to and rated every album on MS that meets this criteria (at time of most recent update) - some of them multiple times - so I feel I can give my honest opinion.

The purpose of this is to list and order the albums that I simply don't "get" and to try re-listening to them in the hope of understanding why they've received so many 9 and 10 votes.

Ordered by my rating then MS rating then number of votes.

Updated: 03-Jan-24

My other lists:
Top 500 Albums (ordered & rated)
Top 25 EPs (also ordered & rated)
Top 200 Overlooked Albums (with genres)
So I Heard You Like Wintersun... (Time II find new bands)

1.Anathema - Judgement

2.Paradise Lost - Draconian Times

3.Anathema - Alternative 4

4.Motörhead - Ace Of Spades

5.Motörhead - Overkill

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1.Bathory - Blood Fire Death

2.Emperor - In The Nightside Eclipse

3.Satyricon - Nemesis Divina

4.Immortal - Sons Of Northern Darkness

5.Mayhem - De Mysteriis Dom Sathanas

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1.Death - Spiritual Healing

2.Slayer - Reign In Blood

3.Black Sabbath - Paranoid

4.Bathory - Blood Fire Death

5.Darkthrone - A Blaze In The Northern Sky

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1.Iron Maiden - Seventh Son Of A Seventh Son

2.King Diamond - "Them"

3.Death - Leprosy

4.Bathory - Blood Fire Death

5.Running Wild - Port Royal

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A (most probably incomplete) list of albums on which I really enjoy only a single song (in alphabetical order, excluding one-track albums).
They turn out to be albums that I rate a 6 or 7 overall -- with few exceptions.
The songs mentioned though are all-time favourites, which I would rate at 9 or 10.
I only listed albums on which I found exactly one such song.

1.Agalloch - Pale Folklore

2.Amorphis - Far From The Sun

3.Annihilator - Set The World On Fire

4.Asphyx - The Rack

5.Bathory - Blood Fire Death

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A list of bands ordered by the biggest difference between their highest rated album on MS and their lowest rated album on MS. Finally my Excel skills paid off. Some ratings may be a bit outdated. Open to suggestions because I barely scratched the surface.

1.Metallica - Ride The Lightning

2.Metallica - Lulu [Collaboration]

3.Celtic Frost - Monotheist

4.Celtic Frost - Cold Lake

5.Machine Head - The Blackening

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1.Bathory - Blood Fire Death

2.Venom - Welcome To Hell

3.Venom - Black Metal

4.Bathory - Under The Sign Of The Black Mark

5.Mercyful Fate - Melissa

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1st Wave of Black Metal. Most bands here may not be considered black metal as we know it today or even in the 2nd wave, but had some sort of influence of the genre's subject matter, sound and imagery.

1.Bathory - Bathory

2.Bathory - Under The Sign Of The Black Mark

3.Bathory - Blood Fire Death

4.Blasphemy - Fallen Angel Of Doom

5.Bulldozer - The Day Of Wrath

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Here is a list of MY favorite black(ish) metal albums (sometimes I like a little creamer...but no sugar). And yes I am aware that bands like Kreator and Amebix and not "Technically" black metal, but I don't care because they had a huge influence and their sound is very "blackened" on certain albums.

1.Emperor - In The Nightside Eclipse

2.Agalloch - Ashes Against The Grain

3.Ulver - Bergtatt - Et Eeventyr I 5 Capitler

4.Burzum - Filosofem

5.Alcest - Les Voyages De L'âme

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1.Death - Leprosy

2.Coroner - Punishment For Decadence

3.Metallica - ...And Justice For All

4.Queensrÿche - Operation: Mindcrime

5.Ministry - The Land Of Rape And Honey

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1.Bathory - Blood Fire Death

2.Bathory - Under The Sign Of The Black Mark

3.Bathory - The Return Of The Darkness And Evil

4.Bathory - Hammerheart

5.Bathory - Bathory

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Unfinished as I still have to catch up on more recent years. Also all of the places on the list are of course subject to change as I discover more music from each year.

My taste is very much centred around the power of the riff. That means most of the albums on this list are thrash, death, heavy, black, or some offshoot of those genres.

1.After The Burial - Dig Deep

2.Behemoth - The Satanist

3.Carcass - Surgical Steel

4.Cattle Decapitation - Monolith Of Inhumanity

5.Fleshgod Apocalypse - Agony

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