Best metal releases of 2014 Part I

The year treated me well with countless albums that I simply could not put down.  Albums that I would daydream about.  Records that I anticipated showing up at my door like a little kid waiting for a new toy.  A few bands that came out of nowhere and utterly blew me away.  Albums that challenged me to the brink of love.  I hope that you find something here that you love.

My favorites:
1) Falls of Rauros - Believe in No Coming Shore
   A) Falls of Rauros / Panopticon - Brotherhood
2) Panopticon - Roads to the North
3) Merkaba - Bones of the Sacred Forest
4) Eternum - The Devouring Descent
5) Blut Aus Nord - Memoria Vetusta III Saturnian Poetry
6) Cross Vault - Spectres of Revocable Loss
7) Waldgefluster - Meine Fesseln
8) Taurus - No/Thing
9) Beketh Nexehmu - De Svarta Riterna
10) Dead Congregation - Promulgation of the Fall
11) Nasheim - Solens Vemod
12) Drowned - Idola Specus
13) Darkenhold - Castellum
14) Wheels Within Wheels - Thirty Five Thoughts to Nineteen Elements
15) Yob - Clearing the Path to Ascend

Other great releases:
Animals as Leaders - The Joy of Motion
Annthennath / Quinntessence - Eram Quod Es, Eris Quod Sum
Blood of Kingu - Dark Star on the Right Horn of the Crescent Moon
Caïnan Dawn - Thavmial
Circle of Ouroborus - Kuuhun Kahlittuthe Deathtrip - Deep Drone Master
Diocletian - Gesundrian
Doom:vs - Earthless
Emeth - Aethyr
Encoffination - III – Hear Me, O’ Death (Sing Thou Wretched Choirs)
Funereal Presence - the Archer Takes Aim
Furia - Nocel
Giant Squid - Minoans
Hypothermia - Självdestruktivitet född av monotona tankegångar IV: Warakumbla
Jute Gyte - Cast Chains
Kermania - Kehre Heim
Krieg - Transient
Kriegsmaschine - Enemy of Man
Menace Ruine - Venus Armata
Messial - Gravitational Dissonance
Morbus Chron - Sweven
Nightbringer - Ego Dominus Tuus
Noble Beast - s/t
Obligatorysk Tortyr - Mork Triad
Old Wainds - Nordraum
Paths - Where the Oakenhearted Dwell
Posthum - The Black Northern Ritual
Primordial - Where Greater Men have Fallen
Rauhnåcht - Urzeitgeist
Saor - Aura
Sargeist - Feeding the Crawling Shadows
Skogen - I Doden
Sons of Crom - Riddle of Steel
Stargazer - A Merging to the Boundless
Stilla - Ensamhetens andar
Stworz - Koło życia
Sviatibor - La Foi Des Ancêtres
Torrid Husk - The Carrion Fields
Ulvegr - the Call of Glacial Emptiness
Urkaos - Rehearsal XIVarathron - Untrodden Corridors of Hades
Vargsang - In the Mist of Night
Venenum - s/t
Winterfylleth - The Divination of Antiquity
Wolves in the Throne Room - Celestite
Zgard - Contemplation

Meh / Forgettable:
At the Gates - At War with Reality
Empty - Etica Profana Negativa
Graveland -Ogien Przebudzenia
Ungern - Steppenwolf
Mannveira - Von Er Eitur
Zorn - Gegen Alles
Tymah - the Past is Alive
Deep Mountains - Lake of Solace
Lantlos - Melting Sun
Insomnium - Shadows of the Dying Sun
Pallbearer - Foundations of Burden
Agalloch - the Serpent & the Sphere
Manes - Be All End All
The Morningside - Letters from the Empty Towns
Ripper - Raising the Corpse
Botanist - IV Flora
Murmur - s/t

Bummers:
1349 - M.C.C.
Anaal Nathrakh - Desideratum
Darkspace - III I
Bethlehem - Hexakosioihexekontahexaphobia
Midlake - Antiphon
Solefald - Norronasongen: Kosmopolis NordBethlehem - Hexakosioihexekontahexaphobia
Empyrium - The Turn of the Tide
Mortifera - IV Sanctii Tristhess