🌶️ To The Teeth's List of Lists 2023: Tomb Mold made the album of the year!
Runner's up: Dødheimsgard, Cattle Decapitation, Metallica, Horrendous & Fires in the Distance. See the whole list!
Here they are: the objectively best heavy albums of the year! New stuff is on the playlist on Spotify, and you can support To The Teeth via Patreon and Bandcamp (get a patch!).
There are a few new songs out too, check out the Spotify playlist!
Tomb Mold made the best heavy album of the year! They're on top of an aggregated list of over 350 albums that were on international end of the year lists. Tomb Mold follow in the footsteps of Chat Pile (2022), Archspire (2021), Oranssi Pazuzu (2020), Blood Incantation (2019), Yob (2018), Converge (2017) and Vektor (2016).
"I came here to get my face stomped, but I wound up on an odyssey through death metal innerspace", wrote Angry Metal Guy.
"Tomb Mold play fast and loose with the boundaries between death metal and their myriad other interests—jazz fusion,’70s prog, 4AD-style dream-pop. But crucially, they never sound bored with death metal", said Pitchfork.
"These pieces are sharply melodic, the parts song-oriented even when they are of the more technical variety", wrote Treblezine.
"They showed that they could make a death metal album that could be dynamic without having to turn down the brutality", said Anthony Fantano.
"Even I – as cynical and as jaded as I’ve so clearly become – have to admit that Tomb Mold have absolutely earned all the attention and acclaim that this album has already garnered", said No Clean Singing.
“The Enduring Spirit is packed full of swingin’ riffs that’ll blow your head clean off”, thus spake the Toilet Ov Hell.
It's the second death metal band winning this list, and the second Canadian band to do it. Unlike last year's winner, Tomb Mold didn't have a really very hard time - but it wasn't a a landslide either. With 71 points they're just a single number two spot away from follow-up Dødheimsgard, who landed place two with their opus Black Medium Current. Together these two tower over the rest though, as bronze medallist Cattle Decapitation have a (relative) mere 52 points for their Terrasite. And look who’s behind them: Metallica, shyly sitting in fourth place with 48 points. Quite a feat for these gentlemen, who have been maligned for decades.
Also significant about Tomb Mold's win, is that they did it in such a good death metal year. They've won out on acts like Dying Fetus, Cruciamentum, Cryptopsy and - almost invisible way way down on the list - Suffocation. Three other death acts made it into the top ten: the aforementioned Cattle Decapitation (#3), Horrendous (#4) and relative newcomers Fires in the Distance (#5). Cannibal Corpse, Insomnium, Afterbirth, Autopsy and Obituary are all not far behind.
The highest placed album with the least amount of votes this year is Creeper’s Sanguivore. It was featured on just three lists, but still with enough points to make it onto #27 (I guess they’ll have to send Metal Hammer a few copies of the vinyl). Sacred Outcry was also on three lists, and landed on #31. The latest Bell Witch record (one of my favourites) was on just two lists, and still made it on to #36. On the other hand there’s Enslaved: Heimdal was on no less than nine lists, with not enough points to bring them higher than #29.
Anyway. The list!
🌶️ The List of Lists
Tomb Mold - The Enduring Spirit
Dødheimsgard - Black Medium Current
Cattle Decapitation - Terrasite
Metallica - 72 Seasons
Horrendous - Ontological Mysterium
Fires in the Distance - Air Not Meant for Us
Jesus Piece - So Unknown
Katatonia - Sky Void of Stars
Sleep Token - Take Me Back To Eden
Avenged Sevenfold - Life is but a Dream
Panopticon - The Rime of Memory
Wayfarer - American Gothic
Thantifaxath - Hive Mind Narcosis
Baroness - Stone
Cannibal Corpse - Chaos Horrific
Hellripper - Warlocks Grim and Withered Hags
Insomnium - Anno 1696
Blackbraid - Blackbraid II
Afterbirth - In But Not Of
Lamp of Murmuur - Saturnian Bloodstorm
Ne Obliviscaris - Exul
Moonlight Sorcery - Horned Lord of the Thorned Castle
Code Orange - The Above
Green Lung - This Heathen Land
Khanate - To Be Cruel
Kostnatění – Úpal
Creeper - Sanguivore
Autopsy - Ashes, Organs, Blood and Crypts
Enslaved - Heimdal
Godflesh - Purge
Sacred Outcry - Towers of Gold
End - The Sin of Human Frailty
Pupil Slicer - Blossom
Drain - Living Proof
Great Falls - Objects Without Pain
Bell Witch - Future's Shadow part 1: The Clandestine Gate
Ulthar – Anthronomicon/Helionomicon
Frozen Soul - Glacial Domination
Agriculture - Agriculture
Dying Fetus - Make them Beg for Death
Blut Aus Nord - Disharmonium Nahab
Ragana - Desolation’s Flower
Malokarpatan - Vertumnus Caesar
Sermon - Of Golden Verse
Svalbard - The Weight of the Mask
Obituary - Dying of Everything
Godthrymm - Distortions
Liturgy - 93696
Zulu - A Better Tomorrow
Xoth - Exogalactic
The small print
This year I’ve counted the lists from Album of the Year, AngryMetalGuy, Banger TV, BrooklynVegan, Consequence of Sound, Daily Bandcamp, Decibel, Encyclopaedia Metallum, Heavy Blog is Heavy, Heavy Music HQ, Invisible Oranges, Kerrang, Last Rites, Loudwire, Metal Hammer, Metal Injection, Metal Trenches, Metalstorm, Metalsucks, No Clean Singing (Andy Synn), Popmatters, Revolver, Rolling Stone, Sputnikmusic, Stereogum, The Headbanging Moose, The Quietus, To The Teeth (that's me), Toilet Ov Hell & Treblezine.
I gave every number one position 10 points. Numbers two got 8 points, numbers three got 6 and the rest of the top-10 positions got 5 points. A top-25 was 3 points, and everything below 1 point. When two records had equal points, the amount of list mentions prevailed. When those were equal as well, the amount of number 1’s (or, subsequently number 2’s) counted.
Tomb Mold being #1 on the aggregated lists isn't a surprise. The fact Dodheimsgard wound up so high on so many lists kind of surprised me. Maybe we're all getting weirder. Anyway, here's my top 10 of 2023. I'm tempted to fly out to New York for that Tomb Mold/Afterbirth show. I'm also shocked at how much I liked that Gunship album.
1. Afterbirth - In But Not Of
2. Sermon - Of Golden Verse
3. Lunar Chamber - Shambhallic Vibrations
4. Horrendous - Ontological Mysterium
5. Haken - Fauna
6. Voyager - Fearless in Love
7. Gunship - Unicorn
8. Tomb Mold - The Enduring Spirit
9. Sulphur Aeon - Seven Crowns and Seven Seals
10. Nuclear Power Trio - Wet Ass Plutonium
Great job and thanks for doing this! This list added like 25 more 2023 albums to my listening list, which already had 25, so I know what I’m doing for the next couple months. If forced to make a top ten right now without hearing those 50, it would look something like this:
1. Venomous Concept, THE GOOD SHIP LOLLIPOP
2. Gridlink, CORONET JUNIPER
3. Hexer, ABYSSAL
4. Tomb Mold, THE ENDURING SPIRIT
5. Ulthar, HELIONOMICON (but not ANTHRONOMICON; I liked it a little less)
6. Godflesh, PURGE
7. Ὁπλίτης, Ψευδομένη (Hoplites, FAKE)
8, Leiþa, REUE
9. Nithing, AGONAL HYMNS
10. Negative Blast, ECHO PLANET
But this leaves out a whole bunch of great albums, like Kostnaténí’s ÚPAL and Lamp of Murmuur’s SATURNIAN BLOODSTORM.
Anyway, can’t wait to see what 2024 and To The Teeth have in store!