12 Great Metal Albums from Summer/Fall 2025
I know what you’re thinking: Where has Shadow of the Horns been for the past few months? That’s a fair question! My last entry was in July, and since then Treble has launched a new slate of quarterly columns covering a wide spread of genres. And if you’ve kept up with the rollout, you’ve probably noticed that I write two of them: Smash It Up, our best punk round-up, and For the Sake of the Song, which covers the best folk of the season. Suffice it to say, I’ve had my hands tied, but it’s a good problem to have.
I dare say taking on these other projects has been a necessary diversion. Sometime this summer, I started to feel a little worn out, and perhaps too weighed down by less than stellar offerings from all corners of the internet. It’s harder than ever to keep up with new music, and considering metal bands multiply like bacteria, it’s nearly impossible to fully wrap your arms around what’s out there.
So I took a little vacation from writing about metal, and sure enough, a couple months down the road, I find myself newly thrilled to be immersed in noise. The 12 albums assembled here (that’s right: not six, twelve!) feature some of the most exciting records I’ve heard this year, and as we ease into fall, I’m ready for the riffs to come raining from the sky. Let’s do this.
Note: When you buy something through our affiliate links, Treble receives a commission. All albums we cover are chosen by our editors and contributors.
Agriculture – The Spiritual Sound
From the opening thrum of bass and onslaught of sound that came flooding out of “My Garden,” it was readily apparent that Agriculture were operating on another level with their sophomore album. Don’t mistake me, their 2023 self-titled debut was one of my favorites that year. But this is something else entirely, an explosion of sound and intention that sends them expanding in every possible direction. The Los Angeles group embraces a greater sense of melodicism alongside harsher, heavier textures, proving that it’s not a binary choice—you can embrace immediacy and abrasion all at once, and they do. But even more than that, Agriculture use both as springboards toward more challenging and powerful songwriting on The Spiritual Sound, elevating their self-coined “ecstatic black metal” toward the transcendent heights such a phrase evokes.
Also while you’re at it, read Michael Pementel’s interview with Agriculture, which is one of my favorite we’ve published this year.
Listen/Buy: Bandcamp | Rough Trade (vinyl)
Black Magnet – Megamantra
Oklahoma City industrialists Black Magnet won me over a few years ago with the vintage violence of Body Prophecy, updating a relentlessly punishing old-school industrial metal sound with contemporary production and the occasional appearance of a breakbeat or other surprising sonic ephemera. Megamantra doesn’t necessarily stray far from that core of Godflesh grind and Broken-era Nine Inch Nails heathen hedonism, but it does everything bigger, louder, and just a little bit weirder. James Hammontree and company’s third LP brings with it unrelenting aggression (“Endless”), EBM danceability (“Spitting Glass”), head-spinning electronics (“Night Tripping”) and a dose of nihilistic psychedelia (“Smokeskreen”). Yet as rooted in ’90s-era sounds as Black Magnet might be, Megamantra ultimately feels wholly contemporary, perhaps even futuristic in a way that their predecessors sought to be (and in some cases still feel as forward thinking as ever). Industrial music has always felt like the sound of dystopia, and while it’s perhaps small comfort given how much closer we are to that reality, a record such as this has never felt more relevant.
Listen/Buy: Bandcamp
Castle Rat – The Bestiary
The sophomore album by Castle Rat, The Bestiary, is fun as hell, rife with its share of phenomenal riffs but rooted in outstanding songwriting, showcasing a band that’s graduated from promising and—as their Decibel cover should attest—have fully arrived. It doesn’t hurt that the group’s leader, The Rat Queen aka Riley Pinkerton, is a sword-wielding Red Sonja of a lead vocalist, a custom van airbrush painting come to life, further enhancing their dramatic stage presence. Still, their quick rise and theatrical presence has led to some skepticism in certain corners (once the Ghost comparisons start, you know there’s dissent a-brewin’), and even internally here at Treble there’s been some disagreement (we have a review posting soon that reveals some of those disagreements—the Treble team has a diversity of opinions, as any editorial team should!). But here’s my take: this album is a hoot, and it’s loaded with bangers, not the least of which is the soaring “Crystal Cave,” rife with strings and a sense of grandeur that’s hard to pull off under the best of circumstances. But Castle Rat simply make it sound effortless.
Listen/Buy: Bandcamp
Cosmic Reaper – Bleed the Wicked, Drown the Damned
So much of stoner-doom is dependent on great tone. If your guitar doesn’t sound like a lung full of bong resin, you need to go back to the drawing board. North Carolina’s Cosmic Reaper have that part down pat; from the opening of “Hammer,” the leadoff track on their third album Bleed the Wicked, Drown the Damned, it’s just a dense and toxic fog of hallucinogenic fuzz. They wield that weapon nimbly, offering plenty of titanic riffs throughout the album’s 43 minutes, but it’s not the entirety of the story, either. When Cosmic Reaper stray from stoner metal’s hazy path, they veer into some playful surprises, like the boogie jam session outro of “Parasites,” or the one-way trip to Planet Caravan on moody psych dirge “Dwelling.” But when they summon the thunder once again on “Bones,” it’s hard not to fall under the spell of their sticky, icky sorcery.
Listen/Buy: Bandcamp | Rough Trade (vinyl)
Der Weg einer Freiheit – Innern
Employ a singer with the most inhuman goblin shriek and capture it on a horrendously oxidized TDK 90 and black metal can easily be among the ugliest music out there. But the code for black metal beautification was cracked decades ago, and now frequently comes to represent the most graceful and emotionally affecting sounds that metal has to offer. Innern, the sixth album by Germany’s Der Weg einer Freiheit, is just such an encapsulation of grace and emotion through an extreme metal approach, which reaches peak elegance and vulnerability in its second half, whether via the Alcest-like dreaminess of “Fragment,” the stark piano instrumental “Finisterre III,” or the soaring shoegaze of closer “Forlorn.” What sets Der Weg einer Freiheit apart from so many other bands who’ve merged the layered aesthetics of shoegaze with the urgency of black metal is that any one element doesn’t ultimately win out over the other—everything is in perfect balance, gorgeously cascading into breathtaking melancholy in “Eos” or ascending toward a kind of maximalist majesty in “Xibalba.”
Listen/Buy: Bandcamp | Amazon (vinyl)
Faetooth – Labyrinthine
Doomgaze bands with a mystical darkness about them tend to cast a spell on me. Bands like Iress, Blackwater Holylight and Messa have each earned their spaces on my annual list of the best metal records, and I can easily see Faetooth doing likewise this year as a result of the moody, murky dirges on their sophomore album Labyrinthine. Their first release with The Flenser, Labyrinthine is a highly melodic affair, Ari May’s hazy and hypnotic vocals guiding the group through a thick and hefty doom metal churn that’s as aligned with the dense roar of Windhand as it is gothic metal predecessors like SubRosa. But it’s in moments such as the eerily beautiful “White Noise,” where their contrasting ferocious and fantastical elements intertwine, where Faetooth conjure up something special.
Listen/Buy: Bandcamp | Amazon (vinyl)
Hedonist – Scapulimancy
It’s still a little early to award 2025’s best metal debut, but I’m hard pressed to think of one that can match this absolute triumph of a death metal debut from Victoria, British Columbia’s Hedonist. Comprising a lineup of veteran hardcore and crust players who have played with the likes of Iskra and Storm of Sedition to name a few, Hedonist take a uniquely crusty approach to old school death metal—which makes it feel all the more appropriate that the group should release their debut from an increasingly more-active-of-late Southern Lord. The band’s raw yet direct riff delivery draws from golden age MVPs such as Entombed and Bolt Thrower, yet Scapulimancy is a dynamic and endlessly unpredictable series of rippers. There’s wasn’t a moment during my first listen to the album in which I wasn’t floored—it’s go-for-the-throat old-school death metal with razor’s edge riffs, sharpened hooks, and it’s as fun as death metal gets.
Listen/Buy: Bandcamp
Heretoir – Solastalgia
What’s that—two German black metal bands with a tendency toward shoegaze or post-metal? It’s true! Heretoir color outside the lines a little more than their peers in Der Weg einer Freiheit, aiming for the stadium heroism of third-wave emo—complete with clean vocals, and singer David Conrad is a belter at that. But there’s an undeniable beauty in their songwriting; Heretoir have a knack for melody that aims beyond the grim and the grimy, but rather reveals something more human and affecting. Despite the harsher moments and the requisite blast beats, the group at times has more in common with a more lush and progressive group like Astronoid, albeit cloaked in a blanket of darkness. This kind of soaring, heart-pounding-in-your-chest immediacy really only works if you give it your all, and I’m happy to report that Heretoir hold absolutely nothing back.
Listen/Buy: Bandcamp
Malevich – Under a Gilded Sun
Malevich are, like most bands under the broad umbrella of “post-metal,” something of a hybrid. The two complementary halves of their approach being the blistering intensity of screamo and the avant garde sludge metal sound of a band like Sumac. It’s not a pairing I’d ever imagined before, primarily because there aren’t that many bands that remind me of Sumac period, and I should qualify this statement before I go any further: the Atlanta group primarily evade the lengthy stretches of improvisation that have defined the latest chapter of Sumac’s career. But Malevich nonetheless tap into a similarly complex tangle of melody and precision, bolstering their ferocious heft with an intricacy that give even their most direct and relentless songs an added depth. It’s like trying to untangle a knot that’s on fire.
Listen/Buy: Bandcamp
Malthusian – The Summoning Bell
On the subject of death metal, the sophomore full-length from Irish death metal outfit Malthusian offers a massive and versatile approach to the sound that nonetheless hits all the right notes you’d ask for in a death metal album. Ominous atmosphere? Check. Brawny riffs? Yep. Moments of harsh and disorienting dissonance? You bet. A 16-minute epic that feels like a descent into hell itself (“Amongst the Swarms of Vermin”)? Absolutely. It’s a refinement of the doom-tinged death metal the band put forth on their 2018 debut Across Deaths, but amplified, expanded and with a bit more fire in its throat.
Listen/Buy: Bandcamp | Amazon (vinyl)
Violator – Unholy Retribution
Brazil’s Violator have been around a minute, but they release music at their own pace. Unholy Retribution is only the band’s third full-length album in 20 years, and their first in 12 years, so it’s been a long time coming. It’s also just an absolute beast of a thrash record, employing the tried-and-true Slayer approach of playing everything as fast as possible and with more than a little devilish mean mugging to go around. They deliver guitar riffs at breakneck speeds (breaking guitar-neck speeds?) while chanting taunts like “You rot in hell! You rot in hell!” It’s not the kind of elaborate necromancy that some of the more dramatic black metal bands of today would attempt, just good, old-fashioned ass-kicking nastiness.
Listen/Buy: Bandcamp
Wode – Uncrossing the Keys
I’m a fan of pretty much anything Wode releases. The UK group’s self-titled debut is black metal, full stop, but as they’ve progressed they’ve continued to add new elements into their approach. A little thrash here, some brighter melodies and bigger hooks on their excellent 2021 album Burn In Many Mirrors. And now, with their fourth album Uncrossing the Keys, some classic heavy metal riffs and melodies to bring even more candlelight into their dungeon. It’s a hybrid that simply works, as proven by contemporaries such as Nite, Tribulation and Cloak, and given how much of Mercyful Fate’s proto-black metal was already part of Wode’s lineage, it’s less a leap than a full realization of elements that were already there; listen to that chugging gallop on “Prisoner of the Moon”—they know what they’re doing. Wode are a great black metal band, but they pull off the transition to trad-metal seamlessly and brilliantly.
Listen/Buy: Bandcamp | Rough Trade (vinyl)
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