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What a brilliant year for music- 2023 has come up with some amazing albums and we wanted to share with you our favorites. As it is approaching the end of the year, it is time to do what everyone else does and write a list to be perused, and judged, by everyone else who does exactly the same thing. These albums have been nominated by you, and then editorially ranked with lengthy discussions, numerous voting rounds and luckily no arguments (…yet) Here are the actual top 20 albums of 2023. Our list is obviously the best one because we wrote it. 20. Burner - It All Returns To Nothing One of the finest heavy debuts in a long while, London’s Burner have not pulled a single punch. ‘It All Returns To Nothing’ is a stellar piece of work, mixing death metal with hardcore and little bits of metalcore to create one singular chaotic, angular, aggressive vision that is at violent, impactful, and thoroughly enjoyable. [JL] 19. Killing Me Softly - Autumn Lost in Silence The latest addition to our list comes from heavy hitting newcomers Killing Me Softly. Released at the start of December this debut was sure to throw all album of the year lists off course. There will be a lasting impression from this album as it demonstrates the musicianship of those who created it and is a monument to the craft of hardcore music. Melodic components serve to stir up the aggression that comes naturally with their style of music. This should be on the radar of deathcore fans as much as their targeted hardcore community. It is a bold and thrilling album that features moments of enchanting despair interspersed with cathartic screaming. Definitely a band to keep your eye on. [DU] 18. As Everything Unfolds - Ultraviolet As Everything Unfolds ‘Ultraviolet’ is an album brimming with grinding riffs and pulverizing vocals that still somehow finds space for uplifting, celestial choruses. The South Buckinghamshire band have given the world even more reasons to believe the hype surrounding them, not that any more were needed. They’ve grabbed the attention of the scene and showed everyone that female-fronted metal is the future, and that the future is now. [AL] 17. Carly Rae Jepsen - The Loveliest Time Carly Rae Jepsen has done it again, blowing everyone else out the water. ‘The Loveliest Time’ is intrinsically linked to her previous LP ‘The Loneliest Time’ and serves as something of a B-sides album. Don’t let the term B-sides fool you though, because this album is incredible as a stand-alone release. Carly’s B-sides are more comprehensive than the majority of pop artists at their best - she is a pop goddess, and has yet again proved why she has earned that title. [AL] 16. VEXED - Negative Energy When VEXED released ‘Negative Energy’, it exploded out with the power to cause serious collateral damage to anyone within earshot. After the release of their debut ‘Culling Culture’ in 2021, they took that hate to the next level with thick intricate riffs and chunky demonic screams. This album has the most brutally honest lyrics of the year, putting a knife to nepotism, mental health and trauma in the most cathartic way possible. [AB] 15. ten56. - Downer The success of ten56.’s debut ‘Downer’ comes down largely to how they dominated the live music scene this year. One of the most addictive and exciting bands touring at the moment, they are guaranteed to get one of the biggest and most inviting pits of any festival weekend. Their sound is deep and dangerous, their vocals incredible, and they are absolutely one to watch. [AB] 14. Dying Wish - Symptoms Of Survival Coming late in the year, at the beginning of November, Dying Wish had a lot of brilliant releases to compete with in order to squeeze into any end of year lists. Lucky for them that they managed to provide us with a half an hour offering of hardcore that is awash with pain and suffering, and yet also full to the brim with the stubbornness to survive, and the strength to carry on. ‘Symptoms Of Survival’ is full of exactly that, and if Dying Wish keep writing like this they will do far more than just survive. [JL] 13. Code Orange - The Above Code Orange are in need of no introduction, however for a band who seem to always be lumped into one category they have a very consistent pattern of sonic evolution. Their latest LP does exactly this, as it takes a hard left turn away from the maximalist production and electro drenched hardcore soundscapes of 2020’s stunning Underneath to become a more subtle, back to basics album. That said, this is an unbelievable release with massive change throughout, allowing the entire band to flex their creative muscles in all manner of new and interesting ways. ‘The Above’ is yet another brilliant example of why Code Orange are a cut above. [JL] 12. Pupil Slicer - Blossom Extreme metal bands and nerdiness have long gone hand in hand, but rarely in such an artistically powerful statement. ‘Blossom’ was written with Final Fantasy XIV at the heart of it, and amongst the most obvious examples of this is the song entitled ‘The Song at Creation’s End’ - directly referencing Hydaelyn’s words during her trial. Musically, the album jumps from abrasive grindcore to ethereal dream pop and hits almost everything in between the two at some point, with the band doing justice to every single genre they have used. Pupil Slicer’s ‘Blossom’ is without doubt an extreme metal masterclass. [JL] 11. JPEGMafia, Danny Brown - Scaring The Hoes ‘Scaring The Hoes’ presents the most dangerous and the most off-the-wall collaboration from JPEGMafia and Danny Brown. This album is unpredictable - sonically, it provides a minefield of wicked sampled sounds, a collage of everything the GTA6 soundtrack needs to be. This album provides an insight into the twisted and cultural genius of the future of rap. [AB] 10. Squid - O Monolith Post punk with a jolt of OK Computer-esque sonics, ‘O Monolith’ is a delightfully emotive and connected piece of music. The LP takes in a huge array of sounds and let’s each take shape whenever feels right, ranging from grunge to Latin to conventional pop. For an eclectic, free flowing, provocative and meaningful listen, no need look any further than Squid’s most recent album. [JL] 9. Sleep Token - Take Me Back To Eden From the darkness came ‘Take Me Back To Eden’, an alluring triumph from heavy music enigma Sleep Token. A eulogy to pain and pleasure, ascending the band into global stardom this year upon its release. Dominating award season this year and pushing the capabilities of both the band and the genres it is associated with, this record is a masterclass that calls out to the void, and in return the universe has screamed back. [AB] 8. Buggin’ - Concrete Cowboys With their UK debut at Outbreak Festival this year, hardcore partycrashers Buggin’ tell you how it is straight from the pit. Fast paced, fun and looking for a fight, ‘Concrete Cowboys’ is for anyone who needs to let off some steam. A perfect album to two-step in the living room to with no judgment. [AB] 7. Drain - Living Proof In May, Drain unleashed 25 minutes of pure rage and fun. Living Proof establishes itself as a record that is instantly captivating with furious and complex grooves that appeals to both hardcore fans and the wider metal community. Despite it being a textbook hardcore album there’s an element of joy running throughout. [DU] 6. END - A Sin Of Human Frailty Hardcore supergroup END brought out an onslaught of raw, unfiltered emotion and intensity with The Sin of Human Frailty. There is definitely a feeling of unease and fear. With a blend of industrial, brutal death metal, and hardcore, END has a sense of darkness that many other artists in their genre lack. This is definitely not an album for the weak of heart. The band delivered a sonic assault from start to finish. With unrelenting speed and aggression, beats and crushing riffs, insanely chaotic and intricately composed guitar parts, it's a combination of various influences from members' past works in the metal and hardcore communities resulting in an outstanding album. [DU] 5. Graphic Nature - A Mind Waiting To Die Nu metal is back and it’s better than ever. Combining the hooks and drop tuning of nu metal with the uncompromising attitude of hardcore, Graphic Nature’s latest is full to bursting with riffs, breakdowns, and all the heavy goodness you could want. Without overstaying its welcome, it shows the bags of potential that the band have, and also makes you want to get out the baggiest jeans possible and put on a red baseball cap. [JL] 4. Guilt Trip - Severance Bringing Manchester’s crossover sound to vivid life on their most recent full length, Guilt Trip have expertly fused beatdown, hardcore and more into a muscular album that pulsates with fury. Every second of ‘Severance’ makes you want to let every ounce of anger out in the largest moshpit you could possibly imagine. If their recent shows with Malevolence are anything to go off, they’ll be sending people to A&E with broken noses and bleeding eardrums for many years to come. [JL] 3. Svalbard - The Weight Of The Mask With ‘The Weight Of The Mask’, Svalbard have delivered a musical experience that will thrust you into a different astral plane. The intricate instrumentals are wrapped into an ethereal experience that alternates between angelic clean vocals and colossal screams. The album is extraordinarily heavy, not only musically but emotionally, and you can feel the pain in every second yet also the sense of hope that shines through each song. Svalbard have graced us with yet another masterpiece, that transcends our earthly realm. [AL] 2. Paramore - This Is Why Paramore’s ‘This Is Why’ presents a dazzling new era for the Nashville pop-rock trio. The album embraces anxiety to justify a cruel world backed by an uptempo beat. It is brooding, introspective and intensely powerful, capturing color in the chaos. This is the same Paramore that set the world on fire fifteen years ago, but the final ‘Riot’ from Hayley and the gang comes at a time when the world really needs a spark to bring them out of the post-pandemic darkness. [AB] 1. Jesus Piece - …So Unknown And finally, we’ve made it to the end of our list. Jesus Piece have created an album that brought together so many of our contributors in belief of its brilliance that it couldn’t have been any other choice. With the aggression of hardcore but the uncompromising heaviness of death metal, and a little bit of slam groove, ‘…So Unknown’ is an astounding offering from one of Britain’s best heavy bands that is a call to arms aimed at every single other even remotely hardcore oriented band, telling them to up their game. Jesus Piece are clearly at the forefront of British heavy music, and are more than deserving of the top spot on our list for this year. [JL] Jesus Piece take on Manchester's Canvas earlier this month. Photo: Nic Howells If you want to take a deep dive into our albums of the year, we have made a handy Spotify playlist. Cover photo: Nic Howells Writers: Amber Brooks, Alex Long, Jake Longhurst, Danika Ulrich Final Order Voting Panel: Amber Brooks, Kyrill Borzenko, Kayleigh Fryer, Alex Long, Jake Longhurst, Danika Ulrich

As an enormous fan of Frank Carter and the Rattlesnakes, this is both a very easy and very difficult review for me. On the one hand, I will naturally have a tendency to sway in favour of them due to enjoying their stuff, but on the other I want to make this review as unbiased as possible. This will be my attempt at showing you my enjoyment as a fan, whilst keeping the review as fair as possible. Starting out, a song that the band debuted live many months ago during an excellent performance headlining 2000 Trees, is the song ‘Honey’. Starting the record off with a nice riffy hook, the band feel to be on fairly familiar territory here, as lead guitarist Dean Richardson deftly sends out lick after lick. However, the punk rocking sound abruptly fades as lead single ‘Man of the Hour’ comes next, and the melancholic piano lead jumps in. This seems to be the song to really start the theme of the album - in a variety of interviews, Frank has mentioned that this album is an incredibly personal project, believing it to be the first time himself and Dean have truly written an album for themselves rather than the fans or the events of the world. Having mentioned the death of the rockstar before, this song fits perfectly into a discussion of that very idea, whilst a haunting piano ballad writhes underneath every lyric. Photo: Brian Rankin The third song on the album is called ‘Can I Take You Home’ and embraces parts of both the previous songs. Combining the haunting feel and piano driven melody of ‘Man Of The Hour’ but bringing more of the riffs and sexiness of ‘Honey’, this already feels like an extremely cohesive album. Lyrically, there are yet more ongoing themes. The album title ‘Dark Rainbow’ feels ever present in all sorts of metaphors, phrases, and more, from the opening line “Stood in the sun, way after dark” of ‘Man of the Hour’ to “Lost in the night, just before dawn” in ‘Can I Take You Home’, there are constant references to light, darkness, and a plethora on colour too. To carry on discussing the song at hand, it is a plea to the subject of Frank’s desire, after having spent time together and whittled the hours away he would like to take them home, possibly for the last time, but that is purely hypothetical judging by the tone of the song. Suddenly, we take a sonic left turn into country americana territory, and not a moment too soon as we’ve reached a song entitled ‘American Spirit’. Clearly overflowing with a heavy blues influence, and even allowing for the occasional touch of cowbell, this is the sound of a band enjoying their influences and still painting on their own irresistible brand of sultry guitar music. Having fun seems to be at the centre of this song, with an upbeat feel and a chorus all about dancing, having a good time, and that titular “American spirit”. Shifting out of country and blues, into punk laced alt rock, we’ve reached song five ‘Happier Days’. This really feels like a song of yearning, all about the desperation of craving happiness out of life after seemingly years of being beaten down - chorus lyrics “Happier days are so hard to find... and I hope, I hope, that we’ve been through the worst” are all but spelling it out. Even with the punk feel of the song, there’s still room for a solemn break midway through to let you sit and just feel the mood of the track, before breaking out into the outro. ‘Brambles’ comes next, and as the other single we’ve had available for a while now, we’ve long become accustomed to Frank’s croon over Tom Barclay’s funky, rhythmic bassline. Telling a timeworn tale of how love leaves its brambles dug deep in your skin, and asking for love, it’s all too easy to hear the pain in Frank’s voice as he changes the end of the chorus from “I want love”, as it is the whole way through, to “I need love” at the very final pass. Then comes song seven, ‘Queen of Hearts’ has taken on that melancholy feel of earlier in the album and given it a more despairing undertone. With more piano, anyone reading who is yet to hear the album may be able to tell that this is by far the furthest the band have strayed from the sound they created on ‘Blossom’ and ‘Modern Ruin’. This doesn’t change in eighth song ‘Sun Bright Golden Happening’, which dials up the love factor and expresses the power of someone’s love through the beauty of nature, particularly the sun. Yet again, the parallels to the album title are felt through so much allusion to the light of the sun, and the spaces left without words. Reaching the final few songs shows a bit more of the sleaze factor coming into play now, as ‘Superstar’ tells about intertwining lovers before Frank asks the listener if they’ll “... let me be your superstar”. Getting grittier again, the guitars have been turned on and turned up for this and for penultimate song and single ‘Self Love’ which is as simple a title as you could ask for. The chorus says it how it is saying “If I ever fall in love again, let me love myself”. This feels arguably the most like it could have been on a previous album, with a sound that would fit in very nicely with almost anything off of ‘End Of Suffering’. However, this all changes for the last song. The title track is comfortably longer than any of the previous tracks, by at least a minute for all bar one. Instantly, I’m struck by one of the most bombastic non-guttural vocal performances we’ve heard from Frank Carter as of yet with soaring choruses, crooning verses, and a perpetual splash of wretched emotional pain streaking through the entire song. Telling the audience about “three little words” that come into mind in all sorts of situations, from “each goodnight kiss” to “when you look in my eyes” and when you “want me to stay”, these three little words are “all [he] know[s]”. Finishing the album with an emotive title track is exactly how they finished ‘End Of Suffering’ and this song does have a lot of the same DNA of that exact title track. Whilst we can only assume who the subject of those three little words may be, it seems well within the realms of possibility that Rose, Frank’s daughter, might well be the subject of this song too, although we won’t know without asking the man himself. As the song fades, we’re treated to a softly sung outro that almost could be a lullaby, before the very last lyric of the entire album that wraps up the entire experience - “A Dark Rainbow”. For an album as full of colour, darkness, pain, and recovery as this, the title fits as well as you could ever hope for. In making an album that felt like it was for them, Dean and Frank have given us an immaculate example of writing music that comes from within. Whilst not being chockful of breakdowns, screamed gutturals, dirty riffs and mosh material, ‘Dark Rainbow’ is a captivating listen that will echo around your head long after the last note has played out. Words: Jasmine Longhurst Photo: Brian Rankin

Words by Nika Ulrich Are you a big music lover but don’t want to be an artist? Long for the stage but definitely not a musician? A career as a band manager can be ideal for you if you have a strong interpersonal skill set and a passion for music. Artist management is well suited to socially adept and well organised people who can handle all the paperwork and negotiating needed to assist a band or artist in connecting with and finding its audience. A manager's job might encompass a wide range of responsibilities, from contract negotiations to marketing, so every day can be rewarding and challenging in different ways. An artist manager at the start of a bands career could be building their online and social media presence, putting them in touch with venues, radio stations and festivals. They assist in building the band's brand. The manager of the band searches for chances to record music by communicating with record labels or the studios themselves if the band are wanting to stay independent (like my band are). Having skills in a music background, web design, marketing or graphic design can be a helpful thing to have when you’re managing a band in the early stages of their career to develop their brand. You don’t have to do a degree in music management, I spent most of my career working in live events before deciding to take bands on. You’ll be surprised how much you can learn about helping an artists career thrive working elsewhere in the industry. Working at a venue can teach you what touring bands require and what represents a positive working relationship between a band and their manager. You can learn how music distribution operates and what drives people to purchase songs by working at a record store. Along with introducing you to musicians and other professionals, gaining experience in places like those can help you master fundamental marketing skills like website design, digital marketing, social media, and promotion. You can start interacting with artists if you are active in your local live music scene. Attending local shows regularly will introduce you to up and coming musicians without a manager and if you think you're the appropriate fit, you might be able to land your first act as manager. It is tiring work being on call 24/7, sometimes you’ll feel like what you’re doing is amounting to nothing. But, when you start to see the success form for your artist it will all be worth it. About Nika Nika currently works as a band manager in the North West. When she isn't assisting headline bands on stage at Download festival, she helps run gigs at The Live Rooms in Cheshire.