Top 10 Albums of 2013

First of all, welcome to 2014!
It seems like just the other day when I was posting Top 10 Albums of 2012. Alas, another year has passed by and it's been a pretty good one for music so let's get started, shall we?

(Note: The albums here can be clicked on to be viewed in higher resolution.)

10. Shpongle - Museum of Consciousness

When it comes to anomalous trippiness, there are few artists who do it better than Shpongle. I would still consider the debut album, Are You Shpongled?, to be his undisputed best work, but Museum of Consciousness may just be the greatest since. This album is markedly brighter and smoother than most of Shpongle's previous works and it has more of a flow to it. This sound is created in part by the heavy implementation of flutes and other woodwind instruments and it makes this whole album very soothing in nature. While the usual gibberish vocals are commonplace here, there is plenty of clearly worded english as well, which is a bit unusual for Shpongle, but it works, just like everything else.

9. October Falls - The Plague of a Coming Age

The Opeth inspired ambient/folk/dark metal band, October Falls released their fourth studio album this year and it doesn't disappoint. Labeling this album as one specific genre would be difficult as it's mood is all over the place. It goes from folk to doom to progressive to black all in 51 beautifully ambient minutes. The usage of clean vocals are reminiscent of mid-period Katatonia while acoustic interludes bring to mind influential bands like Agalloch. The greater number of tracks in this release compared to their other works allow the band more experimentation with dynamics and tempo and it's just another thing that makes The Plague of a Coming Age unique and varied.

8. 8 - Uneven Structure

No, I'm not giving this album the number eight spot just so I can say eight is 8 (the eighth song is titled 8 and it's eight minutes so I can already say eight on 8 is 8 for eight minutes). Uneven Structure has such a strong progressive feel to it and 8, despite being a 25 minute EP, is an amazing work of djent that's deserved of much more recognition than it's currently getting. The Meshuggah inspired group is full of distorted screams and blends polyrhythmic-passages and low bass tunings with heavy layerings and ambience and the result is something you just have to sit back and listen to. 8 is a work that flows from beginning to end and if heard all at once, it can be difficult to guess where each song ends and the next begins. Well worth 25 minutes of your time.

7. In Vain - Ænigma

Norwegian, progressive death/black metal, sextuplet, In Vain released their third full-length album titled Ænigma this year. Equal parts melodic, abrasion and atmosphere; incredibly and surprisingly catchy hooks, brutal riffing and impressively tight tremolos are all amazing features of this work but they are not what make it a standout gem. Rather, the varied vocal working which transitions from core-inspired guttural growls, screams and shrieks that borrow from black metal, hauntingly beautiful clean vocal segments and musically complex more energetic singing and shouts make for an experience that can't help but captivate. The lyrical themes of war, inner-struggles for meaning, loss and questioning the future of humanity only make for an even darker ambience that gives me chills every time I hit replay.

6. Ulver - Messe I.X - VI.X

Experimental is a broad genre that the tenth studio album by Ulver, Messe, could be found under. I'm not sure there are too many albums that quite capture dark and mournful ethereality as Ulver does with this masterpiece. While Ulver is well known for their start in the black metal genre with legendary albums such as Bergtatt still holding a formidable title within the metal community, they have long since strayed from traditional music forms and Messe I.X-VI.X is an elaborately eerie work. With almost no vocals to speak of, all of them clean, Ulver has pulled a serious 180 since their days as black metal in the early and mid 90's. Messe is an atmospheric landscape that simply takes you somewhere else when you're listening to it. As one EM reviewer put it,

"This album is a great example (even for today's cynical and over-experienced standards) of contemporary academic music mixed with the very edges of the Ulver brand, post-industrial ambient."

It's a haunting work that I've found myself playing over and over again. It is stripped of rock and metal elements and remains only the bare and chilling soul. A modern classical masterwork.

5. Aborym - Dirty

Yet another album that I repeatedly find myself replaying over and over again, Dirty by industrial-black metalists, Aborym is just as the title says, quite dirty indeed. It's music that has been referred to as "jaundiced" but in a positive way. It's a sticky and thick sounding work that is plagued with rampant distortions and moments that almost sound like glitches. It's far from anything beautiful, rather it has a filthy luster to it that is sprawling and enticing to the ear. It may not be as unrelenting as some other harder black metal influences, but it's still a great album to play at full blast and it's catchiness makes up for that completely.

4. Deafheaven - Sunbather

Before you accuse me of jumping on the Deafheaven bandwagon, hear me out. Sunbather is probably one of, if not, the first and only black metal album to receive resounding acclaim and to almost be regarded as something close to popular. It has made it's way into to all sorts of praising including NPR's top 50 albums of 2013 (a remarkably unbiased list that's worth checking out, by the way) and rightfully so. Deafheaven have gone beyond the confines of stigma and genre to create a sound that is wholly theirs. It combines traditional and post-black metal elements with contemporary rock sounds and bright, romantic acoustics, interludes and choral progressions. The vocals are screeched and sound authentic and pure and what has generally been regarded as an aberrant and contrast works amazingly well in Sunbather. Deafheaven may very well have created an entirely new genre with this release, time will tell if it can garner a following.

3. Apocynthion - Sidereus Nuncius

For the atmospheric connoisseurs, Sidereus Nuncius is about as airy and ethereal as it gets. Drawing inspiration from other masters of the genre and even naming the group after a track by artist, Nhor, of the same name, Apocynthion is a dramatic post-black metal and post-rock fusion that while maintaining a strongly atmospheric tone manages to sound wholly raw when the metal actually kicks in. I've played this album probably more than a dozen times and I still feel as though there are pieces and meanings buried beneath it that I have yet to uncover. With a low production value, it's amazing that this album sounds as good as it does and if Apocynthion are ever picked up (and I do hope that they are) they could be putting out some seriously game-changing works that appeals to more than just the metal crowd but also branches out to the rock groupies as well. A great album that sounds like the music of nebulae in deep space and has a strongly off-earth feel to it.

2. Thrawsunblat - Wanderer on the Continent of Saplings

In stark contrast to the spacey, anything-but-here vibe that comes from Sidereus Nuncius, Thrawsunblat has a predominantly folk/black metal sound and is about as earthy as it gets. This as-of-yet unsigned Canadian trio has folk down pat but also manages to remain effectively melodic in nature. With songs such as Once Fireveined fleshing out the band's variability and utilizing both screams and clean vocals reminiscent of bands like Windir; others such as Maritime Shores that showcase the band's affluence with true, unbridled folk music, serving as a great break from the heavier material and also managing to be distinguished and not simply filler; and finally to heavier tracks like Borea that are unrelenting and almost thrashy; Thrawsunblat sounds very authentic and undistorted which perfectly accentuates the natural focus of the album. A captivating work and one of my favorite folk metal pieces.

1. Nhor - Within the Darkness Between the Starlight

In all of my purest honesty, my words cannot effectively describe this masterpiece of an album. It is dark and emotional, eerie and atmospheric, earthy and ethereal. This one man project, who is referred to only as Nhor, is as beautifully vibrant as it is devastatingly mournful. It seamlessly flows from soft, sorrowful scintillating piano pieces into anguished and echoed black metal passages. It's a patient work but requires your full attention the entire time. It's a very unpredictable album that's shrouded in a somber haze and the music feels distant as if it were a memory.
Tracks like the title song, along with it's intro piece, are intensely melancholy; their slow pace allowing for introspection and imagery to work their ways into the mind. After having listened to the intro track, A Forest Draped In Moonlight, hearing next song kick in with Nhor's reverberating screams is among the most chilling experiences I've ever had with metal. The following tracks are just as essential and the album keeps pace with itself, never losing that darkened tone or rushing itself. Piano interludes abound, the longest being on The Temple of Growth And Glimmer Ascends. Never do these seem boring or like filler; they set up the melody and give contrasting accent to the harsher parts making them all the more effective. It is in this way that Nhor has the incredible ability to utilize the silence as if it were an instrument of it's own and it's a beautifully somber work because of it.
That's what this work does so masterfully; it paints such vivid images into my mind. When I close my eyes, I can see the pinpricks of light in the velvet black of night, taste the faint bite of winter and feel the longing nostalgic breezes. It's comparable to stepping out of reality and into a dream. I cannot understate this album. From beginning to end, it utterly captivates me and I find myself so deeply enveloped in it's spell that any outside rousing seems jarring to me. There is no point that is any weaker than the last. It's poetry in a non-verbal form.

Honorable Mention

Imperium Dekadenz - Meadows of Nostalgia

October Tide - Tunnel of No Light

Impending Doom - Death Will Reign

Means End - The Didact

Entities - Aether

I would also like to point out that had I made the 2012 list now, it would look a bit different. Most notably Ashen Eidolon by Gallowbraid would be in the top slot as the best album of that year. It's amazing and you should check it out.