Heavy Metal Albums

What Are the Best Heavy Metal Albums of All Time?

My friend and I love to sit around and talk about the glory days of heavy metal, when bands like Metallica, Guns n' Roses and Megadeth reigned supreme. The other day we got into a discussion about heavy metal albums, and the challenge was posed for each of us to name the best album of all time, and we each had to defend our answer.

I started things off with And Justice for All by Metallica. In terms of the shear number of great songs and most memorable lyrics, that ranks among the best heavy metal albums of all time, if not the absolute best. It was an album of pure metal, and the one that made me fall in love with that style of music.

My friend Greg said that of all the heavy metal albums he ever heard, Guns N' Roses album Appetite for Destruction was the greatest, because he felt that Guns N' Roses, more than any other metal band, brought heavy metal into the mainstream. He also argued that it had a number of hits on it, as well.

Then it was my cousin Michael's turn, and I should begin by saying that he is considerably older than the rest of us, and he said he felt the best album was Master of Reality by Black Sabbath.
He quite aptly pointed out that even though the first two heavy metal albums named were great, this was the one that got everything started.

It was my cousin Kevin's turn next, and he selected Reign in Blood by Slayer as the best of all the albums because it really brought speed metal to the forefront, and his mind, nobody was as hard as Slayer. The conversation was becoming more and more interesting, because everyone was making pretty good points and we were all getting in the mood to listen to some great music, which we would do when it was all over.

My cousin Alan took his turn next, and he is just a few years younger than Michael. He chose Motorhead's No Sleep 'Til Hammersmith as the greatest among the heavy metal albums we had already chosen, because he said that as a whole, Motorhead produced the most quality albums of any to the bands we had mentioned, and this was probably the best of all.

Nobody even mentioned my favorite metal band of all time, which is Pantera, but it didn't even really matter. Pantera had a number of great heavy metal albums, but we all had a bunch of other CDs we were all set to listen to, and we had a great time playing them that day when we were finished talking.