Ideally I’d be writing about how last year was a year of immense positive changes in my life, but like most years the trajectory of my 2023 was just something of a slight upwards trend. I continued my college education. My band, Earthshine, recorded an album that’s currently being mixed, and I listened to more music than ever. I feel that 2023 was a strange year for progressive metal with several strong releases, but none that were great enough to transcend genre bounds and garner respect from all prog fans. Regardless, there were still many albums I loved this year and my favorites were as follows:
Honorable mentions:
- 夢遊病者 (Sleepwalker) – Skopofoboexoskelett
- Haralabos [Harry] Stafylakis – Calibrating Friction
10. The Anchoret – It All Began With Loneliness
Style: progressive metal, death metal (clean vocals)
Recommended for fans of: Caligula’s Horse, Pain of Salvation, Opeth
To begin, we have the album with the consistently best solo sections of the year. Good, or at least serviceable, guitar solos are something I’ve come to expect from progressive metal, but when I get to hear truly great solos from sax and flute on a progressive (death) metal album, I really begin to take notice. Combine that with the fact that this is a debut and It All Began With Loneliness becomes that much more impressive. Toeing the line between trad prog and prog death, this album is full of intense climaxes and stellar production, and while I’m not sure I’ll always turn to The Anchoret when I’m in need of a prog metal fix, I can’t help but respect the talent on display here. The Anchoret is without a doubt a band to look out for in the future.
Recommended tracks: A Dead Man, Someone Listening?
Related links: original review | Bandcamp | Spotify | Facebook
9. Xoth – Exogalactic
Style: technical thrash metal, technical death metal (harsh vocals)
Recommended for fans of: Revocation, Slugdge, Blood Incantation
Exogalactic is the type of thrash album that makes me feel inadequate as a guitarist and songwriter. By sheer quantity of riffs alone, this album is deserving of a spot upon this list, but combine that with stellar songwriting and compositional flow and this album becomes truly memorable, something that makes aspiring guitarists such as me simultaneously awestruck and ashamed. Riffs weave this way and that constantly shifting in and upon themselves yet never losing their catchy edge. Spastic solo work punctuates the strophic song structures with pyrotechnical passages, and the lyrical concept is just as fun as you’d expect from a space themed technical thrash metal album. I for one cannot wait to see what Xoth have in store next.
Recommended tracks: Saga of the Blade, Battlesphere
Related links: original review | Bandcamp | Spotify | Facebook
8. Fires in the Distance – Air Not Meant for Us
Style: melodic death metal (harsh vocals)
Recommended for fans of: Be’lakor, Swallow the Sun, Insomnium
For a while, I thought I had grown out of melodic death metal. After all, it had been a long time since I listened to anything like Amon Amarth or At the Gates, but what Fires in the Distance showed me with last year’s Air Not Meant for Us is that all I needed in my melodeath was some piano and a whole lot more atmosphere; boy, did they deliver. Listening to Air Not Meant for Us is like visiting an all-you-can-eat buffet of melody and atmosphere; by the time you’re done, you’ll have enough catchy melodies stuck in your head to sate even Andy, our resident prog metal hater, for a millennium. So whether you’re like me and haven’t listened to much melodeath recently or you’re a staunch melodeath fanatic, Fires in the Distance deliver the goods.
Recommended tracks: Harbingers, Idiopathic Despair
Related links: original review | Bandcamp | Spotify | Facebook
7. Alkaloid – Numen
Style: progressive death metal, technical death metal (mixed vocals)
Recommended for fans of: Gojira, Obscura, Black Crown Initiate
Numen is a strange album for me to place on this list. On one hand, I’m slightly disappointed because it simply is not of the same quality as its predecessors Liquid Anatomy and The Malkuth Grimoire, but on the other hand, the level of quality on display on Numen is still, for the most part, leagues beyond what many other progressive death metal bands are doing. The riffs always hit–which is no big surprise seeing how many of them sound like Gojira, the theming is powerful–I particularly love the now multi-album sci-fi concept that they’ve been exploring–and the humor, intentional or not, always finds a way to land; I’ll never forget the first time I listened to “The Cambrian Explosion” and heard, “In the muck, things start to fuck,” causing me to replay the section multiple times until I was sure I’d heard it right. I’m not sure I’ll ever rank Numen over Liquid Anatomy, but that doesn’t change how good it is in relation to other albums released last year.
Recommended tracks: Qliphosis, The Cambrian Explosion, Clusterfuck
Related links: original review | Bandcamp | Spotify | Facebook
6. Carnosus – Visions of Infinihility
Style: technical death metal, thrash metal (harsh vocals)
Recommended for fans of: Revocation, Archspire, Slugdge
Technical death metal is always an interesting genre, I feel, to place on an AOTY list. Those that get it just get it, and those that don’t really don’t. So when I say that Visions of Infinihilty was the best technical death metal album released last year, there will be those who understand, there will be those who blindly accept without bothering to listen, and there will be those who disagree, either because they feel some other tech death was superior or because they disagree that tech death itself is undeserving of placement in such a list. So to anyone who disagrees with me, I simply say “Pshaw!” I’ll keep listening to the “Ossein Larcenist” until the day I die!
Recommended tracks: Ossein Larcenist, In Debt to Oblivion
Related links: original review | Bandcamp | Spotify | Facebook
5. The Salt Pale Collective – A Body That Could Pass Through Stones and Trees
Style: post-metal, doom metal, IDM (mixed vocals)
Recommended for fans of: The Ocean, Primitive Man, Cult of Luna, Dvne
When I first reviewed this album, I remarked at how impressive of a debut it was, but now that I have listened to it more, I am comfortable saying that it is one the best post-metal debuts ever, perhaps only second to Psychonaut’s Unfold the God Man. From the harsh noise and tribal chanting that begins the album on “Tria Prima” to the luscious analog synth passages of tracks like “The Metabaron” to the brutally heavy, sludge-laden riffage of rippers “The Great Work” and “Exploding Triangles”, The Salt Pale Collective run the gamut of sonic textures on this release, and still not one moment feels underbaked. With A Body That Could Pass Through Stones and Trees, The Salt Pale Collective have created a distillation of all that is post-metal, meaning that The Ocean Collective is no longer the only stellar post-metal collective on the scene. Also, be sure to check out this album’s companion EP, The Crimson Queen Has No Tongue.
Recommended tracks: The Great Work, Exploding Triangles, Sermon of the Edacious Reverent
Related links: original review | Bandcamp | Spotify | Facebook
4. Ahab – The Coral Tomb
Style: funeral doom, progressive metal (mixed vocals)
Recommended for fans of: Agalloch, Bell Witch, Stygian Bough
Released January 13, the Jules Verne inspired The Coral Tomb is an album that I’ve spent a lot of time with last year. Often the soundtrack to any long drives I took, the methodical yet never boring mix of stellar funeral doom and intelligent progressive metal provided the perfect backdrop to the subtly shifting mountain landscapes of my travels. There are moments on this album, specifically the choruses of several songs, that are so engaging I find myself constantly returning to them, but once I start one song I can’t help but listen to the whole album, as though I’m trapped in The Coral Tomb’s underwater world. My love of this album now has me wanting to read 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea, and the last album that inspired me to read a book was Mastodon’s Leviathan, quite the company for Ahab.
Recommended tracks: Prof. Arronax’ Descent into the Vast Oceans, Colossus of the Liquid Graves
Related links: Bandcamp | Spotify | Facebook
3. Hypno5e – Sheol
Style: progressive sludge metal, post-metal (mixed vocals)
Recommended for fans of: The Ocean, Gojira, Vildhjarta
This is an album which I didn’t quite realize how much I loved until I recently reviewed it as part of our Missed Album series whereupon I discovered just how unique it is in the Hypno5e discography. Coming after a lineup change that saw the addition of a completely new rhythm section, Sheol sees the band exploring moments of calm and beauty just as much as they do moments of brutality and complexity, regularly combining the two moods. This is aided particularly by the masterful drumming on this release; whether its a simple backbeat, a normally inconsequential fill, or a technical breakdown, the drumming on Sheol is always engrossing, referential to techniques and ideas of metal prior yet refreshing in its playfulness and occasional subtlety. I hope we’ll get to see several more releases from this Hypno5e lineup.
Recommended tracks: Sheol, Lava from the Sky
Related links: original review | Bandcamp | Spotify | Facebook
2. The World is Quiet Here – Zon
Style: progressive metalcore, death metal (mixed vocals)
Recommended for fans of: Between the Buried and Me, Native Construct, The Human Abstract
Ever since I first heard Zon all the way back in January, and especially since I reviewed it back in June (we aren’t always the most efficient), I have been a staunch proponent of everything The World is Quiet Here achieved on their sophomore release. From the dazzling debut of vocalist Lou Kelly who utilizes his pipes to their utmost extremes, ranging from throat-ripping gutturals to hair raising highs to seismically active lows, to the cross-referential riffing that sees motifs dropped and then recalled seemingly at a whim, this album is a dizzying display of talent on all fronts that only rewards repeated listens. Progressive deathcore, if that is what you want to call this album, is a genre that is–in my mind–dominated by a few seminal releases. Whether you still view BTBAM’s Colors as the pinnacle of the genre or if you prefer the grander Odyssey to the West or the techier Reclaimer, there is no denying that Zon is an album that now demands to be part of the conversation.
Recommended tracks: Ossuary, Heliacal Vessels, Aphelion
Related links: original review | Bandcamp | Spotify | Facebook
1. Horrendous – Ontological Mysterium
Style: death metal, progressive metal, thrash metal (mixed vocals)
Recommended for fans of: Death, Atheist, Tomb Mold
This album is everything I love about progressive death metal distilled into one infinitely listenable package. It is an unabashed love letter to bands like Death and Atheist that began the sub-genre in the first place, yet it reaches pinnacles that its inspirations could only have dreamt of thanks to its crystalline production. Each instrument is giving room to breathe, and as such sings as though the musicians were in the room with you. The riffs are snappy and memorable, and the lyrics are poignant and shamelessly brazen just like those of Horrendous’s muses. Horrendous have crafted an album that redefines an entire era of progressive death metal, referencing and often exceeding its forefathers. 30 years later, Ontological Mysterium joins the ranks of albums like Unquestionable Presence and Symbolic, truly an album for the ages.
Recommended tracks: Chrysopoeia (The Archaeology of Dawn), Preterition Hymn
Related links: original review | Bandcamp | Spotify | Facebook
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The Progressive Subway's Official Top Ten Albums of 2023: A Report from the Underground - The Progressive Subway · January 11, 2024 at 16:00
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