ah yes . . . it’s that special time of year

As this week draws to a close, I thought I would let you know what we have planned for you in the 11 days left in 2013, and then toss some free music your way. And by the way, are you as weirded out as I am to realize that this year will be over in only 11 days?

2013 has been a fantastic year for metal. I had been thinking that even before we started our LISTMANIA series, but all the lists we’ve been posting have really driven the point home. With every list I’ve been finding fantastic albums that I failed to hear or never even knew existed, on top of all the great albums, EPs, splits, and demo’s that I did manage to check out. And we’re far from finished with LISTMANIA.

At the risk of overloading you with still more discoveries, at the moment I have 11 more year-end list articles in the publication queue and am expecting at least another half-dozen to arrive in the next week. They come from NCS readers, fellow bloggers (including a quasi-reunion of writers from The Number of the Blog), metal musicians, and of course the NCS staff writers. And they are as diverse as the list pieces we’ve already published. I think they’ll be well worth your time. Continue reading »