2015 has sucked in almost every way for me and for a lot of people that I know, too. You could say it was full of Trials and Tribulation (that’ll be funny AFTER you see the top of my list). Fortunately, we were gifted a litany of top-shelf metal albums to get us through it without losing our minds. The following are the top 20 metal records that I subjected my children to while driving them all over L.A. I have to admit that there was so much great stuff this year that I sort of cheated here by including a very extensive “honorable mentions” category for all of the other albums that might have made the list had the year ended when they came out. All of them are excellent efforts that I know I’ll be listening to for years to come.

Check out the list and let me know what you think in the comments below because if I know metalheads (and believe me, I do) you’ll all have some very strong opinions about your own likes and dislikes. The best thing about other people’s year-end “best of” list is that I always discover a few absolute gems that got past me during the year. Last year, you, the readers, even turned me on to Ne Obliviscaris and Solstafir, two amazing bands that I was unfamiliar with and whose albums should have been on my list. It is my hope that no matter what your opinion of my personal list is, that it will inspire you to check out some artists or records that you haven’t yet discovered. Who knows, maybe you’ll find your new favorite metal band contained herein.

Have a wonderful holiday season and rest up, because 2016 promises to be another pummeling year in extreme music. And be sure to stay tuned here at GoD because you know we’ll be doing our very best to keep you informed about all of it.

Bloodbath is a long-running supergroup consisting of a “who’s who” of Swedish death metal musicians. The band has, at various points, consisted of members of Opeth, Katatonia, Edge of Sanity, and Paradise Lost. They have issued four full-length albums, two EPs, and two DVDs since their inception in 1998.

Original singer Mikael Ã…kerfeldt left the band to concentrate on his duties as the leader of Opeth and was replaced by Paradise Lost singer Nick Holmes for last year’s spectacular album Grand Morbid Funeral.

This week’s Massive Metal Monday track takes us back to Akerfeldt’s final album with the band. From 2008’s The Fathomless Mastery, this is “Hades Rising.”

Twenty seven years into their career, Paradise Lost has come full circle. The band’s recently released 14th studio album The Plague Within, sees the legendary English unit returning to their death metal roots, much to the delight of old school fans. Few bands in metal, or any genre for that matter, have taken such a wide creative arc in their careers. Aside from a few notable missteps, these guys have conquered everything from death metal to gothic synth metal to straight rock, and have even composed some things that would not be entirely out of place on a Depeche Mode record.

Check out the the video for the first single below.

British metal legends Paradise Lost have just entered Orgone Studios in London with producer Jaimie Gomez Arellano (GHOST BC, ULVER, CATHEDRAL, ANGEL WITCH) to begin work on their fourteenth studio album.

Longtime fans will be excited to hear the musical direction that the band has chosen to pursue on this outing.

Paradise Lost 3: Purgatory
Coming to DVD
Directed by Joe Berlinger and Bruce Sinofsky
Starring Jessie Misskelley, Damien Echols, Jason Baldwin, Stevie Branch, Christopher Byers, Michael Moore, Lorri Davis, Mark Byers, Terry Hobbs, Burk Sauls, Dale Griffis, Natalie Maines, Joe Berlinger, Bruce Sinofsky
HBO
Aired: January 12, 2012

The new documentary, Paradise Lost: Purgatory, third in the Paradise Lost series, attains a sense of closure in the case of the West Memphis Three. Recalling and reprising events from the previous two documentaries, filmmakers Joe Berlinger and Bruce Sinofsky also follow the developments of the preceding ten years, leading up to the release of Damien Echols, Jason Baldwin, and Jessie Misskelley in 2011.

Being a long-time believer of the innocence of, and a supporter of, the West Memphis Three, and this now being the year of 2012, I still find it difficult to believe that the convicted men are now free. I was always hopeful they would one day see freedom and liberty, but had a lingering, deep, dark fear that it would never be in my lifetime.