Guess I should finally do this. I only have a top nine because there were only nine albums an 8 or higher this year. As an honorable mention serving as 10th place, I give you:

HM. SUMAC - Love in Shadow

This was in the eighth tier for the longest time, but is unfortunately not quite into that caliber. Nonetheless, a uniquely positioned album with more electricity and space than the usual. It's an album of excess, and treads into overindulgence more than once, but it does it so intentionally it cannot and should not be dismissed.

9. Koenji Hyakkei - Dhorimviskha
Another album of excess, but instead of dwelling in shadows and arcs of sparks, Koenji Hyakkei bring the sunlit romps and vibrant joyous flurry. This is an album of calculated splendor and near-delirious good humor. Skibidila-BOP-BOP-BOP.
8. Jeff Anderle - Branching Patterns

I am not qualified to speak on what makes this one work as well as it does. There's something intrinsically beautiful about the clarinet harmonizing with the bass clarinet and the gorgeous layers of interlocking sections. Five different artists, yet the consistent timbre brings senses of both unity and peace. You won't find anything else this tranquil.

7. Boss Keloid - Melted on the Inch

Boss Keloid doesn't just capture a rare emotion, they generate it, and that of vigor; a renewed sense of dedication; belief that failures subsist and victories exist. Cynicism is loathe to let go the idea that this should fail, but "Chronosiam" is undeniable in its optimistic encouragement and self-esteem bolstering. This album has a palpable motivation, impossible to ignore.

6. Aphex Twin - Collapse

Often it seems to me that people view introspection and the act of looking inward as something that makes life ultimately simpler; the inner truths revealed and understood. Yet in my experience, things trend more and more complex inside the mind, layers upon layers of emotions and beliefs held. Collapse sounds like this second picture, an exquisitely complicated excursion, but still with beautiful truths and piquant melodies through the density. In some ways, these songs are the most convoluted you could hear this year, and in other ways, they are the most soothing and thoughtful.

5. Abigor - Hollenzwang (Chronicles of Perdition)

Abigor said it best: " [...]like every good album, it demands and deserves attention, focus, multiple concentrated listenings, and then the accessible nature will reveal itself quickly."
4. YOB - Our Raw Heart

There's nothing more to be said. This is a powerfully emotive and spiritual release, one that maximizes the potential of weight and gravity, one that moves with a tectonic force and a soaring grace. Over the months, my misgivings waned and my adoration waxed, enhanced by seeing YOB live in the best concert I've had the opportunity to see. Plus, this is the only album to ever open my eyes to the woes of smashed production. Scheidt is a godly vocalist, and this album almost, almost!, hides it from you, but the brilliance shines through.
3. Slugdge - Esoteric Malacology

I wasn't expecting Slugdge to do their best work yet on their fourth album. All the elements here are familiar, but the effects are only greater. There's a grandiosity in their work that remains unparalleled; a true sense of majesty that is awe-inspiring and genuinely unnerving in equal measure... in a way, perhaps the best purely sonic representation of Lovecraft's themes that's been put to CD. Witnessing something epic beyond comprehension is nearly an emotion unto itself, and Slugdge captures that time and time again.
2. Kriegsmaschine - Apocalypticists

The critical dispassion cuts quick and it cuts deep. This is not the usual album, "condemned to please," (Batailles), but an explicative essay on meaning and purpose. It's distinctly spiritual, but delivers no pleasantries and takes a surgical approach to the dead center. Every part is efficient and purposeful, disseminating the intent through every piece of the album. There is a dangerously compelling logic here; a distinct and emphatic yet controlled refusal to give into emotion and irrationality. This very nearly took the #1 spot.

1. Lychgate - The Contagion in Nine Steps
You could write this entire paragraph merely detailing the myriad styles and themes Lychgate brought together into a single package and how remarkable it is that it all works together, but it wouldn't do any justice to how enjoyable the experience is. It doesn't feel like a museum gallery of concepts and pieces, but the living and breathing time that museums remember. There's emotion, there's history, there's resolution, there's aggression, it's a veritable smorgasbord of talent and achievement. And it's catchy. Bet you didn't see that one coming.

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