2019 Metal & Hard Rock Albums

BABYMETAL’s third album expands its universe through worldwide musical colors, major guests and a broad light-and-dark design.

A full-length that expands BAND-MAID’s expressive range, balancing wider melodies with hard-driving performances.

Moonglow revisits Avantasia’s metal-opera scale with deeper shading, polished melodies and a stronger sense of story.

Sliver & Gold captures Backyard Babies’ streetwise rock and roll without sanding away its rough edges.

From Hell with Love brings Beast in Black’s sharp heavy-metal riffs, eighties-style synthesizers and exaggerated science-fiction drama into an extremely catchy song-drive

Warpaint puts Buckcherry’s blues-stained hard-rock weight and Josh Todd’s exposed vocal delivery at the front.

Face the Music gathers Burning Rain’s bluesy pull, classic hard-rock riff weight and melodic vocal focus into a balanced, mature statement.

Hexed places Children of Bodom’s slicing guitar work, high-speed keyboard exchanges and rough-edged vocals back at the front of the mix.

Rust keeps Crashdïet’s glam and sleaze-metal flash intact while bringing more weight and wounded atmosphere into the picture.

Forever Wild openly embraces the spirit of eighties arena rock and rebuilds it with contemporary weight.

Humanicide shows Death Angel preserving the sharp identity of Bay Area thrash while making its arrangements and weight even more exacting.

Empath gathers the heaviness, pop instinct, ambience, extreme-metal intensity and humor of Devin Townsend’s work into one large emotional journey.

Distance over Time returns Dream Theater to a tighter, more concentrated form of progressive metal after the expansive scale of its previous project.

Paradigm is Eclipse at its most sharply focused: a melodic hard-rock record built from thick riffs, urgent rhythms and choruses that arrive quickly and decisively.

Dynamind joins Sabine Edelsbacher’s clear, expressive voice to Lanvall’s symphonic writing with unusual precision.

Line of Fire builds around Harry Hess’s rich voice and pursues the ideal texture of melodic rock and AOR.

M.E.T.A.L. is Freedom Call’s wholehearted celebration of melodic power metal and the joy of listening to it.

Frozen Crown’s second album joins sharp, melodic-death-inflected riffing to the lift of European power metal.

Into the Purgatory is Galneryus’s twelfth studio album and a strong restatement of the band’s core after its fifteenth anniversary.

Life brings Hardline’s polished melodic-hard-rock craft into songs that carry both brightness and melancholy.

I, the Mask reconnects In Flames’ melodic-death-metal sharpness with the modern heavy-rock sensibility the band has developed over time.

Kill or Get Killed unites Iron Savior’s science-fiction imagery, steel-edged riffing and heroic choruses into a single forward drive.

Atonement brings together the elements Killswitch Engage do best—heavy riffs, urgent screams and clean vocals that reach for relief—in an especially emotional form.

The Nothing turns Korn’s long-developed sense of uneasy groove and emotional exposure into one of its heaviest sound worlds.

After a long gap, Determinus brings Leverage back with the strength of Scandinavian melodic metal and the song-minded feeling of hard rock at the front.

Behold Electric Guitar finds Paul Gilbert treating extraordinary technique as part of the music rather than the point of it.

The Verdict condenses Queensrÿche’s hard-metal drive and progressive-rock shading into a notably focused set of songs.

Hollywood Cowboys brings Quiet Riot’s positive, hook-driven hard-rock instinct into a present-day band setting.

The Eighth Mountain reconnects Rhapsody of Fire’s fantasy scale with racing power metal through a strongly narrative design.

Space Between is the first studio album credited to Sammy Hagar & The Circle, bringing together hard-rock momentum, blues warmth and songs that look out over life wi

We Are Not Your Kind expands Slipknot’s anger and chaos through more detailed production and a deeply uneasy atmosphere.

Verkligheten spreads Soilwork’s melodic-death-metal attack and open hard-rock sense of melody across a double-album scale.

Talviyö finds Sonata Arctica exploring its present identity through melody, vocal expression and atmosphere rather than simply recreating early speed.

Heavy Metal Rules puts Steel Panther’s love of eighties glam metal, excessive humor and surprisingly solid musicianship directly out front.

Shock keeps Tesla’s bluesy hard-rock framework while adding a more compact, contemporary push.

Renaissance Men is The Wildhearts’ studio return after a long gap, packing punk impulse, power-pop melody and heavy guitar into compact, high-density songs.

Flesh & Blood presents Whitesnake’s blues-rooted hard-rock language with a modern, tightly focused sound.

Resist takes Within Temptation’s dramatic foundation into a leaner, more electronic and pop-conscious sound world.

Blue Lightning has Yngwie Malmsteen facing the blues and classic-rock music at the roots of his style through a mix of covers and originals.