Maidenfans Best Albums of the Millennium: 2017

[Mosh]

Spoiler

THIS IS A POWER RANKING GAME. The albums are arranged in the poll from best to worst, with the top seeded album being the top ranked album. I seeded the albums based on two facts: how many lists it appeared on, and my general understanding of this board's tastes after being here for 15 years. This way we don't have to spend multiple rounds moving an album like Brave New World to the top, it's already there unless voters decide to knock it off the top spot.

Essential Questions:
How do you knock albums off the top spot? If you feel like an album is ranked too low, vote for that album. Any album that receives a significant plurality of votes (this number will be fluid and based on participation) will move up a slot. If you like the list as is, vote for the top album.

How often does this update? I will look at the numbers roughly every 24 hours and move albums accordingly. You can vote for as many albums as you want and you can vote whenever the poll resets. After a week, I will close the poll and we will move on to the next year. This will take us to mid December with the finals wrapping up right at the new year.

How were albums selected? I would say 95% of the albums that will appear in this game were sourced from Maidenfans lists. Every album that was submitted will appear in the game. For years that have a lot of duplicates (2000 being one), I filled in the list with other acclaimed albums. Many years surprisingly had close to all unique albums, with 2014, 2020, and 2023 having only one duplicate each. No year featured an entirely unique list of albums. No Maidenfans nominated albums were seeded lower than an album I pulled from an outside source.

Do I need to listen to every album here? Not necessarily, but I would highly encourage it! You have a week to vote and the voting will update every day (so you can vote every day or you can vote once a week or whatever you want). Everybody has unlimited votes. I think you will get more out of this game if you listen to the albums you're not familiar with and see if you can find any new favorites.

My favorite album isn't here! You had 7 months to send me a list!!!

I want to thank everybody who participated. I received 17 lists and 250+ albums! Most years had quite a variety of material and it made me appreciate the diversity of taste around here. I'm really excited to dig into each list I got and I am going to do my best to listen to every album. With that being said, let's get started with...

MMXVII

1. Unleash the Archers - Apex
2. Mastodon - Emperor of Sand
3. Iced Earth - Incorruptible
4. Soen - Laikaia
5. Kreator - Gods of Violence
6. Blaze Bayley - Endure and Survive
7. Wintersun - The Forest Seasons
8. Ayreon - The Source
9. Pain of Salvation - In the Light of the Passing Day
10. Elder - Reflections From the Floating World
11. Enslaved - E
12. Ball Noir - Lost Serenades
13. Ulver - The Assassination of Julius Caesar
14. Ne Obliviscaris - Urn

This is another year with all user nominated albums! There are a lot of interesting choices here. Unleash the Archers enters the game as a recent Maidenfans favorite and I think Apex has a strong chance of maintaining its top slot. Mastodon has been underpowered in this game imo so I am not convinced that Emperor of Sand will maintain its slot, but we'll see. Iced Earth's final album (at least as of 2025) finds itself in possibly the highest starting seed for Iced Earth since Horror Show (can you believe they're in the same century?). Again, not convinced it will stay in its slot, which essentially means the top three could see some big changes. With that being said, I'm not sure I see a clear favorite anywhere here so this might end up being a weaker year. I love the Soen album, highly recommended if you want a folkier extreme metal (a little Maiden-y in places). Ayreon and Pain of Salvation lean more into prog rock and are divisive even within the fandoms. Ulver isn't a metal album really, so that seems unlikely. Ne Obliviscaris is my Prog Pick for 2017, I highly recommend everyone giving this album a chance before they vote.

 

[Jer]

Don’t sleep on Ball Noir’s Lost Serenades — it’s really well-crafted growl-free folk metal with a melancholy feel. Hurdy-gurdy, harp, and bass clarinet alongside the guitars! Great stuff.

Full album linked above, but here’s a taste:

 

[Sth2112]

Voted Pain of salvation, Wintersun and Ayreon

 

[Kalata]

• Endure And Survive - probably Blaze's best album from the Trilogy. Melodic playing, good choruses and effective songs. I like all songs more or less, which is always good. Some of the songs (at least 5) are some of my favorites from his solo career.
• Incorruptible - the songs, the heavy music and vocals (Stu has a similar voice to Matt) work enough for a vote. Defiance is a classic.
• Apex - classic power metal, what's not to like. Strong vocals. I really enjoy almost all the songs. The title track is pure Maiden and class! This should not be an underrated album.

 

[srfc]

First year I don't have any of those albums

 

[Detective Beauregard]

The Source is one of my favorite prog rock/metal albums of all time. Combining the elite songwriting of Arjen Lucassen with so many unique and talented voices, from Russell Allen's badassery to Tommy Karevik's soulful crooning to Floor Jansen's wailing to Tobias Sammet and Hansi Kursch's cheesiness, this is an album any rock or metal fan should appreciate.

While I prefer Abyss just slightly, Apex is a fantastic album by Unleash the Archers. The title track is glorious, and songs like The Matriarch and Ten Thousand Against One are punchy and fun.

Mastodon has been trending down since Crack the Skye in my opinion, but I recall Emperor of Sand being one of their better later efforts (if memory serves correct). Not good enough for my vote, though.

Black Flag is one of my favorite post-Barlow Iced Earth tracks, and Clear the Way is up there, too. But I still maintain that the band peaked with Horror Show, despite several releases after being consistent overall. They've lacked a lot of their earlier year magic, starting particularly with The Crucible of Man (we all probably prefer Barlow to Ripper, but Framing Armageddon is a far stronger album).