As I go through the mountains of best of lists at the beginning of each year, it's inevitable that I'm going to miss a ton of albums, including a few albums that should have been on my "best of" list.
(Album Art by Luke Oram)
My favorite late discovery was an atmospheric proggy black metal band heavily inspired by Dark Souls. They are a two person band made up of multi-instrumentalist Harrison Stivarius and vocalist Adrian Davis.
The Dark Souls series has been a safe haven for me and helped me get through the craziness that 2020 had to offer. These guys are very passionate about the game and take it to next level by writing entire albums dedicated to the videogame series.
Click on album art to go to their Bandcamp page and give them $$$ if you dig it.
For the rest of the albums, it includes some punk, a band that sounds like a black metal sex move, an EP made up of one 14 minute song, some cosmic black metal from the depths of space hell, German pirate folk metal, hip hop / R&B, as well as WTF IS THIS MUSIC EVEN?!
I've included album art from some of the albums my list. Click on them to check out the band! WIthout further ado, onwards to the list!
Rimfrost - Expedition: Darkness
Fen - The Dead Light
Blood Command - Return of the Arsonist
Absolute Valentine - Omega
Poly-Math - Sensors in Everything
Shabti - Trembling and Shorn
Blut Aus Nord - Hallucinogen
Helium Horse Fly - Hollowed
Xoth - Interdimensional Invocations
DJ Shadow - Our Pathetic Age
Necropanther - The Doomed City
Midnight Odyssey - Biolume Part 1 - In Tartarean Chains
The Cinematic Orchestra - To Believe
Dimhav - The Boreal Flame
Knasterbart - Perlen vor die Saue
Dimaeon - Void
Vomitron - Vomitron 2
Faye Webster - Atlanta Millionaires Club
Evan Carson - Ocipinski
Ari Lennox - Shea Butter Baby
Rapsody - Eve
Mother of Millions - Artifacts
Krokofant - Q
Slow - VI - Dantalion
Tardigrade Inferno - Mastermind
FKA Twigs - MAGDALENE
Goreshit - Ap1 (Nineties Rave Retrospective Volume 7)
Hasse Fröberg Musical Companion - Parallel Life
Rosalie Cunningham - S/T
Carnal Forge - Gun to Mouth Salvation
The Negative Bias - Narcissus Rising
Motanka - S/T
Baby Rose - To Myself
Takafumi Matsubara - Strange, Beautiful and Fast
Rainer Landfermann - Mein Wort in Deiner Dunkelheit
Wishfield - S/T
Pensées Nocturnes - Grand Guignol Orchestra
Bruce Soord - All This Will Be Yours
In Mourning - Garden of Storms
Eveline's Dust - k.
Festerday - Iihtallan
Inventions - Logica
Afenginn - Klingra
AVA - Waves
Caharlie Cawood - Blurring Into Motion
Feather Mountain - Nidus
Color Palette - Shed Your Skin
Boreal Hymn - Tundra (Demo)