2020 Metal ’n’ Heavy Rock/Heavy Music Poll: RESULTS – Top 100 Countdown

I like all the false and flat out not metal in these roll-outs, because it's cool to see what else all you metal loving nerds listen to and it usually doesn't overlap with the main ilm countdown anyway.

I'm way behind today's rollout, but just popping up to say glad to see Gulch here. Heavy hardcore but not exactly metal, admittedly, and more of an EP, but has a very satisfying ratio of ideas to running-length.

and it usually doesn't overlap with the main ilm countdown anyway.

True. Marnie Stern, Zombi et al dont tend to get near the general poll

we did get uncle acid & the deadbeats in the top 10 once

The days of Boris getting in the big poll are long gone too. Did Earth ever get in the main poll? I think they must have

#48
Esoctrilihum – Eternity of Shaog
183 points, 6 votes, 1 #1 vote

https://f4.bcbits.com/img/a3230531509_10.jpg

https://i-voidhangerrecords.bandcamp.com/album/eternity-of-shaog

Esoctrilihum is a French avant garde black metal project signed to I, Voidhanger Records. This project has been making waves for a few years now. The unique mix of rich songwriting and epic concepts has made Esoctrilihum one of a kind. This is perfectly showcased in their new record, Eternity Of Shaog. Asthagul, the man behind the project, has gone above and beyond even the levels he's set for this project. He has created his most fully realized work yet. Eternity of Shaog acts as part of a diptych with his last album The Telluric Ashes of the Ö Vrth Immemorial Gods. This record is a part of a much broader overarching journey that explores demonic possession and insane deities. There is simply so much to unpack from a project that has fascinated underground metallers across the globe.

Many bands attempt to conjure up hellish sounds. However, few succeed the way Esoctrilihum does. Some tracks like "Exh-Enî Söph (1st Passage – Exiled From Sanity)" impress with their black metal intensity. Others such as "hayr-Thàs (6th Passage – Walk The Oracular Way)" dazzle with psychedelic violins. The violins are in fact showcased throughout the album. They really add to the magic of what they are creating. As a rule, the band thrives on off kilter songwriting, weird harmonic approaches, and unholy testaments to gods gone mad. There is such power to the production though that makes it all possible. For years Asthagul has been working at pulling it all together, but it is on this record that it finally has started to click. Eternity Of Shaog is perhaps the first Esoctrilihum record that really showcases Asthagul’s potential at its fullest.

https://metalinjection.net/reviews/esoctrilihum-eternity-of-shaog

His best tracks so far, some of the finest of 2020, but his previous LPs were more consistent.

I worked my way through this guy's entire discography last year, nothing clicked though. The riffing style is so fucking plain.

Pom didn't make this band up. It really exists https://open.spotify.com/album/3XOHlh0kHUHKhXiMTgCMRK?si=KllY0uNUTh-evHBw7YbNOQ

esoctrilihum was my #1, loved it

strong year for i, voidhanger

also lol great cover

cover art looks like one of the title cards from adventure time

hell yeah, that's more like it. This was my, checks notes, #18. I've always enjoyed this guy's stuff and his albums just keep one upping each other.

#47
Void Rot – Descending Pillars
184 points, 6 votes, 1 #1 vote

https://f4.bcbits.com/img/a0569123194_10.jpg

https://everlastingspewrecords.bandcamp.com/album/descending-pillars

There are a small number of times a year that a listener who delves into the great milieu of Bandcamp and who eschews algorithms and instead scours the bottomless depths of Spotify, makes a mental note to continue tracking the advancement and activity of a band. One such time occurred for me in late 2018 when I came across Minneapolis, Minnesota based quartet Void Rot. They had just that moment released their debut EP, Consumed by Oblivion. Said release featured only three tracks and barely a quarter an hour of music, but it knocked me sideways.

I love death metal. I love doom. But ‘death doom’ was always a genre I enjoyed, but where I found the sub-genre title fanciful – it was always a death metal band who threw a doom-influenced riff into the mix on the final, invariably longest, track. Or, vice versa, a doom band, who had some gurgling vocals or who may feature the occasional visceral, jagged riff. I had never found many bands who invested in truly warping the two seemingly disparate genres into something new, blurred and delightfully horrific. Enter Void Rot.

https://echoesanddust.com/2020/09/void-rot-descending-pillars/

Best cavernous atmosphere of 2020 imo.

Ooh, I voted for this one, too. Smack dub in the middle of my ballot. Def my fav doomy death and/or deathy doom release this year.

These feel AI-generated at this point

The AI is improving.

Relistening to Void Rot, and while I think the tracks on the Ativisma split grabbed me more, this is excellent, and I should have probably ranked it higher. Very 'Krypts' vibe.

coming up next: Cavern Tomb

who will be the Mammoth Weed Wizard Bastard of doomened death

#46
Of Feather and Bone – Sulfuric Disintegration
187 points, 5 votes

https://f4.bcbits.com/img/a2974669090_10.jpg

https://offeatherandbone666.bandcamp.com/album/sulfuric-disintegration

I don’t know about the rest of you, but I am extremely ticklish. Even the void where my bloodpump is supposed to be can be tickled with the right stimulus. Death metal is usually the best option to that end, especially when it writhes like a thrashing pit of jacked snakes. After hearing tell of the badassery of Denver’s Of Feather and Bone, I knew that they would deliver that which tickles my most demanding fancy. With their third full-length, Sulfuric Disintegration, these nasty motherfuckers show no mercy. Believe me when I say I lose molecular cohesion every time I play it.

You’ve heard death metal like this before. It’s a tried and true formula built on bone-crushing riffcraft and just a touch of musicality often delivered with buzzing tremolos. Double bass runs and blistering blasts compose the meat of the rhythm section, the bass guitar chasing after it with everything it’s got. Though the core sound is death metal through and through, the band applies it with the same livid intensity that acts such as Infernal Coil utilize. In this manner, Of Feather and Bone toy with the line between death and grind, though the time they spend thoroughly hacking a sick riff into your chest cavity—instead of attacking with ten riffs in a matter of mere seconds—prevents me from attributing a “grind” tag to their work.

https://www.angrymetalguy.com/of-feather-and-bone-sulfuring-disintegration-review/

I didn't get much out of this one, I'm afraid. Felt very generic.

wow, much lower than expected. this is a top 10er for me.

Guess I need to check this one out, I remember liking the previous one but I just spaced on the new one.

Never really connected with their stuff much before, but this one really hit my sweet spot. Voted it as my #2.

yeah, I went back to the album before it, and it was decent, but nothing approximating the newest one.

I didn't connect with this one either but these comments are making me want to give it another shot.

void rot somehow passed me by, it's new to me. but I do love krypts.

#45
Kaatayra – Toda história pela frente
188 points, 7 votes

https://f4.bcbits.com/img/a3216140200_10.jpg

https://kaatayra.bandcamp.com/album/toda-hist-ria-pela-frente

(No review, wtf.)

T
O
O

L
O
W

Beautiful album that I listened to all the time

My #6.

electric guitar suits him! #judas

ooooh now this looks neat

getting a bit of a devin townsend vibe?

the keyboards in this are lush as hell

getting a Negura Bunget vibe

this is fantastic damn

Also the pastoral sweep, and acoustic folk elements, mixed with black metal reminds me of the Stara Rzeka album that did well in this poll a few years back.

Need to check both of the Kaatayra 2020 offerings out. Devin Townsend namedrop has me doing the upper left quadrant of the drake meme, Negura Bunget has me doing the lower left quadrant though so we'll see.

It sounds nothing like Devin Townsend honestly, Negura Bunget's a closer shout, residing in a very different kind of forest. Strikes me as Spectral Lore-ish in places too.

it really is quite something

#43 TIE
Mamaleek – Come & See
191 points, 6 votes

https://f4.bcbits.com/img/a0687484033_10.jpg

https://mamaleek.bandcamp.com/album/come-and-see

Since Mamaleek started releasing music in 2008, the band has slyly, playfully engaged the ethos and aesthetics of black metal. Like numerous underground black metal bands, very little is known about the people involved in Mamaleek. The founding and continuous members are alleged to be brothers, perhaps of Middle-Eastern ethnicity (the band’s name is an anglicized version of an Egyptian Arabic word for slave, and some of the music has been recorded in Beirut); but they have never publicized their names, and at many of their rare live gigs, the band has appeared hooded or veiled. Their records have combined the scabrous vocals, dissonant guitar playing and ominous atmospheres of black metal with harsh noise, free jazz and hip hop electronics, and the occasional vocal or instrumental nod to North Africa or the Levant. Mamaleek’s work has often been as mystifying as it has been challenging, and angry. Always angry. 

Come & See is still angry, but the record is stylistically a bit easier to contend with than its predecessors. Come & See was recorded with a full band (and Mamaleek has recently gigged in a four-piece configuration). That change seems to have had tangible effects on the songs. Their dominant textures are still harsh and confrontational, vocals are still howled and shouted. But there are riffs. There are melodic structures. You catch yourself nodding and swaying. Those may not be affirming gestures—they are more a set of responses prompted by the music’s sheer force. But this LP feels more sonically legible. It’s nearly a variety of rock music. It’s also a terrific record. 

https://dustedmagazine.tumblr.com/post/614840957794500608/mamaleek-come-see-the-flenser

#43 TIE
Thou & Emma Ruth Rundle – May Our Chambers Be Full
191 points, 6 votes

https://f4.bcbits.com/img/a3696645020_10.jpg

https://thou.bandcamp.com/album/may-our-chambers-be-full

Thou want to make a new world. Sure, the Louisiana sludge militants sound obliterating—Bryan Funck screeches with anguish, as if a scab were being repeatedly ripped from the surface of the band’s music. But Thou have long hopscotched among labels, collaborators, and split-mates, creating a non-hierarchical network of partners. They do what they want, whether covering Nirvana in quasi-exhaustive fashion or weaving an exhausting web of side-projects. Even their New Orleans hub, Sisters in Christ, feels as much like some communal anarcho-outpost as a record store. In Kentucky, songwriter, painter, and bandleader Emma Ruth Rundle occupies a related role. She works in multiple groups while making her own transfixing chiaroscuro folk-rock, too.

Together, Rundle and Thou shape a grand world of their own. On their seven-track collaborative debut, May Our Chambers Be Full, gothic majesty and charred metal curl into moments of unlikely wonder. At their best, these songs pair the power of a rock-radio anthem with the gnarled eccentricity of their respective DIY roots. Chambers suggests a mutual-aid network: Rundle, an evocative singer with a kind of priestly command, supplies Thou with a central melodic ballast. Thou, one of the most dependably mighty bands to emerge from the South this century, add intensity and muscle. Funck’s serrated screams cut across Rundle’s resplendent tone like a hacksaw grinding against a diamond.

These bits are enthralling. Rundle and Funck volley verses back and forth, for instance, during “Out of Existence.” She initially gives in to the band’s relentless rush, allowing herself to be swept inside, while he climbs atop it, sneering from above like a gargoyle. But the guitars, interwoven like a cat’s cradle, swell beneath Rundle during the climax. The effect is transcendent, lifting you from your own gloom for 30 seconds, too. On “Magickal Cost,” Rundle rejoins Funck after the black metal tirade at song’s center, the superhero and arch-villain suddenly joining teams and making your hairs stand on end.

https://pitchfork.com/reviews/albums/emma-ruth-rundle-thou-may-our-chambers-be-full/

Mamaleek > Thou & ERR imo.

the imago section

Mamaleek was my #14. Really fantastic record, less all over the place than their previous stuff, which I found gimmicky in comparison.

Voted for Mamaleek. There's some sick, sick stuff on there. Much more noise-rock than metal imo, or at least it works better when interpreted as such

This is hardly the imago section, I only voted Mamaleek, and low down at that! Would have voted Kaatayra mind

Mamleek's is a great record, something different for them, though I prefer the bizarre eclecticism of the previous few albums. Come and See is more like Oxbow than anything else.

Yeah, Oxbow is a good point of comparison.