The 10 Best Albums Ever (Numbers 10 - 7)

Series index:

 Intro | 10 - 7 | 6 - 4 | 3 - 1

Today I'll be bringing you numbers 10 -7 of the best albums ever made. If you haven't yet read the introduction to this series, you should probably do so now.

10. Trollfest - Kaptein Kaos (2014)

Having heard some of Trollfest's past material, I didn't have very high expectations for this album. Then came the video for the title track and I was blown away--it was goofy metal at its finest. They couldn't keep up that quality for a whole album, could they?
Yup.
This album has a ton of variety between songs and while some don't reach the lofty hights of the title track, "Solskinnsmedisin," or "Die Grosse Echsen," they're at worst decent.
Kaptein Kaos is all kinds of fun and is a rare case of a band with comedic lyrics making music that would stand on its own without the comedy element. I'm pretty sure the happy goofy comedy is actually the only thing keeping this from being higher on the list, as I'm a miserable bastard and this is just too happy for me to rate it higher.

9. Weezer - Weezer (1994)

I probably don't need to say much about this album as it's indesputably a classic. This was one of the first albums where I remember regularly listening the whole way through without skipping any songs.
"Say It Ain't So" might be the best song on the album and still gets a fair lot of radio play today, but check out the underrated closer "Only In Dreams" if you haven't heard it yet.

8. Indica - Valoissa (2008)

This is Indica's fourth offering of Finnish pop/rock and easily their best. Valoissa was produced by Nightwish's Tuomas Holopainien, and his influence on the album is palpable as this has some distinctly Nightwish-y moments in the production and songwriting. Additionally, Troy Donockley makes an appearance on the low whistle here, a few years before joining Nightwish as a full-time member.
These are good things.
The keyboards and vocals shine in particular, though no instrument lags far behind. The almost-metal "Pahinta tänään" is what got me into this band, but the real winners on this album are "Hiljainen maa" and "Ei enää."
"Täältä pois" is the only track that could be accused of being weak, but the piano solo kinda rocks so it isn't a total loss.

7. Burzum - Hvis lyset tar oss (1994)

The common consensus is that Filosofem is Burzum's best album, but the common consensus is wrong. That album gets a disproportionate amount of love due to featuring the song "Dunkelheit," which is the closest to mainstream Burzum has ever veered. It's not a better album, it's just the only album non-fans of black metal can stand to listen to.
Varg Vikernes is a master of creating atmospheric black metal and this album is the pinnacle of that style. Filosofem makes a good case for being his best and could arguably be ranked second, but with Hvis Lyset Tar Oss's "Tomhet" being the best synth instrumental of Varg's career, this album is the clear winner.

Next post will be numbers 6 through 4.

The 10 Best Albums Ever (intro and honorable mentions)

Once upon a time, I shared with you my favorite movies. These were listed as my favorites, not objectively "the best ever," but let's face it--my opinion is basically fact. You can go ahead and read it as a "best ever" list.
In the same spirit, I will be bringing you my top 10 favorite books, music videos, and albums (not necessarily in that order). First to come will be the albums.

As evidenced by the multitudes of  one-hit wonders we've seen over the years, writing a good song doesn't necessarily mean you'll write a good album. To be truly great, an album needs to be a constant stream of good songs from start to finish as well as a few great ones.
Unfortunately, bands are notoriously bad at self-editing and will include songs that could and should have been omitted. More songs doesn't necessarily mean a better album.

A prime example of this is Nightwish, whose album Once you will find conspicuously absent from my list despite featuring "Ghost Love Score," which is the best song ever written.¹ Once eliminates itself from contention with a few mediocre songs and the embarrassingly bad "Creek Mary's Blood," which sullies the message it tries to convey with bland music and weak lyrics.
Due to their similar penchant for filling their albums with nonsense and filler material, Type O Negative find their discography falling short of my top ten despite being one of my favorite bands with plenty of my favorite songs.
Worse still, Rammstein's Rosenrot album would have made the top five if it were only the first five songs, but they decided to follow the best material they've ever written with six tracks of unlistenable crap.
The point I'm obviously trying to hammer home here is that albums are judged from start to finish without skipping any songs.

Similarly to my movie favorites, albums will come and go from the lesser echelons of the top ten depending on my mood and what styles I've become obsessed with of late. Once we get closer to number one there's more stability to be had.

Lastly, I've limited each band to one entry on this list because it was otherwise at risk of being "Jake's top ten favorite Metsatöll albums."

The countdown will begin in the next post, but first some honorable mentions that didn't make the top ten:

Finntroll - Nattfödd (2004)

Just a solid album from start to finish with no bad tracks. It was tough to leave this one off the list but the album's brevity nearly pushes it into EP territory and the overly compressed production combines with some repetitious material and lack of variety to just miss the cut.

Various albums by Type O Negative, Arkona, and Eluveitie

For these three bands to miss the cut was painful for me as all three would land in my "top ten bands" list with little risk of falling out. Unfortunately none of them have yet managed to release an album that doesn't suffer from too many bad songs mixed in with the great ones (Type O), or too many forgettable, samey songs (Eluveitie and Arkona). These three bands are further proof that writing a great album is a tricky thing to do and apparently not even necessary for a band to be successful. I'd argue that all three could have made the list simply by removing a handful of junk songs from any of their albums, which seems counterintutitive BUT I SAID THE ALBUMS WILL BE JUDGED FROM START TO FINISH, DAMN IT!

Stay tuned for numbers 10 through 7 next.


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1. I guess this means I've spoiled a "top ten favorite songs" list already, huh?