Metal Hammer has done a poll recently. and apparently Slipknot's Iowa album has been voted the BEST album of the 21st century. now considering the publication writes about metal bands, let's limit the choices here to Metal albums. How this choice was determined? well gathering votes, from critics, 'bands' and readers of Metal Hammer. I'm curious as to how it's the greatest metal album of the 21st century. Impact? Sales? How Good the Album was from Beginning to end? Influence? I can think of 5 or 10 off the top of my head that fit all these criteria. I'm not discrediting Slipknot. Slipknot's self titled album and Iowa are excellent bodys of work. people enjoy saying Slipknot sucks cause it's "Cool". similar to how we can all say Coldplay is terrible but 95% of people who say that probably never took the time to listen to their music..
Anyways back on topic, No one took the time to actually browse 16 years of artistry as expected. but really? no one looked at Linkin Park's 'Hybrid Theory', Disturbed's 'The Sickness'? Emperor's Prometheus album?
Thoughts? on this cause this was somewhat trigger worthy for me as a proud metal head since early 2006.
I doubt it would be for money. Iowa came out a decade ago.
I don't think it's also poor taste. Iowa isn't a bad album. It's definitely up there but being the greatest of the 21st century? Come on now. There has been Much better albums that were out before Iowa and after Iowa. Linkin Park's Hybrid theory ain't no one is going to deny that was a impactful and a classic album. But that's one. Slayer's God Hates Us All, Behemoth's Demigod album, Emperor's Prometheus album.
It's all opinion based. The individual gets to decide for themselves on this one. I'm kind of excited because I'm going to see SlipKnot and MM next month
How did they decide that it was best in the 21st century when we're only 16 years into the 21st century? It would be like saying that The Original Dixieland Jass Band were the height of the 20th century rather than, say, the Whispers, or Yes, or Led Zeppelin, or any of the hundreds of pop, rock, disco and alternative music bands that came and went during the late 20th century.
Honestly, I would give Sabaton's Heroes the best album. It wasn't the most popular, but for me it was the most consistent as far as having great music all the way through, it was easy to listen to, hell even my parents don't mind a little Sabaton. I've listened to this album SO many times.
Well, I wouldn't consider Linkin Park metal (nothing against them, I love Linkin Park to the extent that for a time most my shirts were Linkin Park shirts and I was in the LPU for years). They are a Rap/Rock group, which is the way they used to describe themselves anyway. The difference between that and Nu Metal? One is doing metal, the other rock or hard rock I guess. But, I guess that's a debate. Aside from that, technically Hybrid Theory wasn't released in the 21st century (Gregorian Calendar / AD system starts at 1, not 0). I'd still give Meteora the pick though over slipknot personally.
All that said, there are a lot of other albums I'd consider over them. One of the 21st century Iron Maiden albums, or a number of Doom, Power and Prog metal albums, but I'm guessing most of Metal Hammer's audience is from the U.S. where those genres aren't well known or popular.
The thing is, it's really a popularity contest it sounds like, so... whatever. It's what people know and like.
Heroes must have been a tough album to make. They knew they were going to have a hard time making an album that was as good as Carolus Rex. Whether or not they succeeded is up for debate. Heroes at some points is a tad too ... unpolished (by lack of a better word) to my liking.
Personally I'd go for Judas Priest's Angel of Retribution or Five Finger Death Punch's American capitalist.
I'm in high school. Can confirm. School of 1,200 people. The 20 or so people that listen to metal only like stuff like Slipknot, Disturbed, FFDP, and/ or Machinehead. They will say they like the classics too, but they just say it to sound cool.
I saw this last night and wanted to reply but I had to head to bed. These 'best' polls almost always lead to hilarious outcomes. First off, there's just too many ways to calculate what's 'best' or 'top' and, secondly, you're relying on the polled population to be experts in the subject matter which is usually not the case with pop-culture polls like this.
It would've been nice if they would have created a thorough list of categories that focused on specific characteristics like sales, popularity, musicianship, etc (assuming they didnt do this cause I didnt actually read the article :D) rather than going the nebulous 'best' route.
As far as my top pick, I'm not sure I could come up with a single answer, but I might choose Dream Theater's Six Degrees of Inner Turbulence as the 'Most Epic Musical Masterpiece' if they had a bunch of categories :D
But I agree... slipknot doesn't have the best album of the 21st century. They might for their particular subgenre of metal (though I don't listen to that genre at all so idk...). But, to say they have the best album of the 21st century (so far) is pretty ignorant considering all the different subgenres of metal that are out there, particularly things like prog metal with Dream Theatre.
Of course, it is also too early to tell which of today's bands will have the same level of influence as an Iron Maiden, Zeppelin, Sabbath, Rush, etc. which I consider to be a very important criterion in determining an album's "greatness"
I think the problem that makes something like this difficult is most the bands making "Monumental" albums are who have had 'Monumental' albums are from the 90s. Slipknot included. No one who has come out since 2000 and above has had what is probably something that shook the metal industry. though there's a bunch of bands who made incredible albums in these past 16 years that have been somewhat ground breaking or at least what would be considered classics.
The only band I can think of off the top of my head that has started in the 21st century (in terms of selling albums anyway) that has shaken up any part of metal (ok... the stuff I listen to anyway) would be Alestorm's popularization of pirate metal. But that is still too small to say it shook the metal industry.
Iron Maiden's "Number of the Beast" did get Best British Album of the last 60 years a few years back, which was a surprise as they beat out the Beatles (overrated anyway) and others.
I also find it a bit funny, as Number of the Beast is their best known album, but I'd say far from their best (that spot clearly goes to Seventh Son of the Seventh Son).
But, things are opinion based anyway, and metal is so incredibly diverse it's hard to pick a best because you have everything from Grindcore to Symphonic Power Metal to consider. Any metal fan could fall in any number of vastly different parts of the spectrum, so it kinda makes sense that simply whatever is popular and somewhat generic... is the popular pick.
I'd actually say it might be easier to pick out the best metal album of all time though, since you really just get a choice between Black Sabbath and Iron Maiden albums at that point.
Gloryhammer (which has members from Alestorm, so ha), as they managed to break Power Metal into new markets, including getting some wider attention in the U.S. which hasn't been able to get traction for that genre despite some big power metal bands like Kamelot originating in the U.S.
They've only been around a couple years now, so you need to give them time to see influence, but it's already been more than I'd expect over that frame.
Then again, with only 16 years into the century, I can't imagine "most influential and most impact" is really relevant for the particular poll. There hasn't been enough time!
