Like any artform, music is not a competition. There is only good and bad music and that categorisation in itself is all down to subjective taste. However, in a bid for scientific rigour; some quantitative analysis to fortify the qualitative spiels, we’ve asked all the Thrash Hits contributors to list their favourite albums of 2013. Yeah, it’s here to boost our egos by claiming what we say is best and it’ll surely get some good clicks and you may (rightly) point out that it’s just another list but, at the very least, you might see an album that you’ve never heard of and think about buying it. That would be cool.

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Part and parcel of being opinionated music lovers is that we go and experience lots of music in its natural habitat – on a stage – and then we decide how good it was. Some spectacles are so powerful that they evoke emotions strong enough to form memories through the drunkenness. It’s a rarity but that’s why some here have to name several before deciding upon their Favourite Gig of 2013. There is zero reason for you to be reading this but if you’ve read this far, you’ll get at least halfway down before clicking the cross.

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Due to the fact Raz and Hugh run things at Thrash Hits, their opinions are the most important. Yes there’s an overall TH Top 20 Albums of 2013 and there’s a list of the individual contributors’ favourite albums, but their opinions are also the most correct. That’s why they’ve got their own post where they can explain their own favourite albums of 2013 without being sullied by democracy.

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HEY YOU: the Mercury Prize is announcing it’s 2013 winner on Wednesday 30 October 2013. That mean we’re announcing the winner of our COROT-3b Prize too. Don’t know what the COROT-3b Prize is? Well, go click on that link. Everyone up to speed? Good. You’ve got mere hours left to cast your vote, so we figured we’d use this week’s Sunday Slaylist to not only remind you of who’s up for the prize, and to prompt any Johnny-come-lately types to CAST THEIR VOTES NOW.

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The triple threat of Motionless in White, The Defiled and Glamour of the Kill might give some people nightmares about bad haircuts and too much make-up, but for others it’s a goth-fuelled dream. Those people were all in Kentish Town watching the gig with Gavin Lloyd, who’s also bang up for dreaming about goths. And then writing about them.

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Yes, yes, yes, the Mercury Prize doesn’t have any metal in it. Yes, yes, yes, it doesn’t really matter in the grand scheme of things. Yes, yes, yes, that hasn’t stopped us resurrecting the COROT-3b Prize to celebrate a dozen great British metal albums from the last 12 months. Go click that link if you need an explanation why we called that. Everyone else: go click the “Read More” link and go listen to our Sunday Spotify Slaylist of this year’s COROT-3b nominees.

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Yes, we know the Mercury Prize is just a marketing vehicle for the NME and the Guardian and we’ve genuinely given up complaining about rock and metal not being included in there – even as a token gesture, like they occasionally do with avant garde and jazz artists – but it’s a bloody good excuse to have a little celebration of the excellent British music that has been released over the past year.

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The Defiled
Daggers
Nuclear Blast
02 August 2013

by Gavin Lloyd

It must be somewhat a double edged sword to be labelled as a band with “potential”. On the one hand it’s great that people think your band could be something special, yet at the same point this potential has to be realised or it won’t be long before people’s interest dwindles. Case in point: The Defiled.

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In the second of our Download Festival 2013 mini-podcasts, we interview The AvD from The Defiled about Daggers, the band’s forthcoming second album. Not that interviewing The AvD about anything is ever simple…..

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We’re at the mercy of modern technology for this episode of the Thrash Hits Podcast – Raz has decamped to the USA for a few weeks for SXSW and some California sunshine, leaving the rest of us here in miserable old England. With possibly the dodgiest Skype connection imaginable, Hugh and Raz discuss how SXSW has changed over the years, as well as speculating on how two very different kinds of hype affect bands – that currently being felt by Ghost (or Ghost BC, if you’re an American) and the kind that surrounds Uncle Acid & The Deadbeats.

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