Top Metal Albums of 2011

This list is sort of irrelevant, since it's already 11 January. I'll keep this list short and sweet.

In no particular order:
Obscura – Omnivium (death metal)
Riot – Immortal Soul (traditional metal)
Megadeth – Th1rt3en (thrash metal)
Ulcerate – The Destroyers of All (death metal)
Primordial – Redemption at the Puritan’s Hand (progressive black metal)
Blut Aus Nord – 777 Sects/The Desanctification (black metal)
Amon Amarth – Surtur Rising (death metal)
Battle Beast – Steel (traditional metal)
The Physicists - Observation (progressive/industrial/just-plain-strange metal)
EDIT: I forgot to add Burzum - Valen (black metal)
Honourable mentions go to Hemoptysis - Misanthropic Slaughter and Impureza - La Iglesia Del Odio (if I'd managed to get hold of the full albums last year, these two would've been on my top albums list).

Two South African releases that really impressed me were Architects of Sadism by A Walk With the Wicked (death/groove metal) and Recursive by The Broken Result (death metal; released in 2010, but I only heard it this year, thus the inclusion on my 2011 list). Two of my favourite local bands are planning album releases for 2012, so I've already got something to look forward to in the realm of 2012 albums.

How I got into metal

I reckon some of you who've known me a long time are wondering what mental change I underwent that makes me now submit myself to such barbaric music.

The spark that would eventually ignite into a love affair with heavy metal was lit by thrash metal band Metallica. When I was in junior school, my sister and I used to watch a lot of VH1. There was this montage of clips from rock videos that would play, and the intro track was Enter Sandman by Metallica. One day I realised that I really liked this song. It took a few more years after that before I got into metal. I consider a friend of mine to be the second heavy metal spark - he was (and still is) into metal, and would often have it playing in the background when I happened to be at his house. I always used to ask him to turn it down, while resenting him for playing music that was such an aural abomination. Eventually, I decided to give some of the music on his ipod a go. I thought, ''If he thinks metal is so wonderful, I might as well try it.'' At the time (around 2009) I was starting to get into Metallica, Iron Maiden, Saxon and other older bands. I then created a station on internet radio site Jango.com for the heavier subgenres of metal, and my liking for metal has continued to grow since then. I now have about 7 metal stations on Jango!

It was the guitars that first drew me to metal. When I hear a beautiful, well-executed riff or solo, I am moved. I feel motivated to grab life by the horns, and that there is always a light hiding somewhere in the vast darkness that life sometimes seems to be.