As I'm layed up at the moment I've taken it upon myself to conduct this survey.

The following text is borrowed from previous polls but diiffers in one area: I see no point in restricting votes to those bands that have the genre in their profile. The reason being that if you're stupid enough to include Det Som Engang Var in your heavy metal list, chances are it won't make the final result. In other instances the genre of a band may be a little vague and even the 'experts' can differ in opinion as to their appropriate classification ie. Agalloch appears in the Black, Doom and Folk survey results.

I will include the results in the As Voted By Metal Archives spreadsheet (an invaluable tool!) and will also post an appropriate thread.

1. Make your individual Top 15 "Best Heavy Metal Albums" list and PM THE ORDERED/RANKED LIST TO ME instead of posting them on this thread. Lists will be accepted for five (5) days starting from when this thread is created.

(I will not be providing updates, as not to influence voting. I will release all the individual votes which were cast/PM'ed to me.

The reason why PM'ing the lists to me are preferred is because we all know how people like to jump on a bandwagon when they see a particular album have more votes or less votes than they intend, so PM'ing me the list will help eliminate that)

2. The points assigned to each rank are as follows:

(the rationale for this point system is so that there's an appropriate distance/number of points separating the higher-rated tracks and lower-rated tracks. Think of it making your #1 vote really feel like #1 and so on and so forth...)

1 - 32
2 - 29
3 - 26
4 - 23
5 - 20
6 - 18
7 - 16
8 - 14
9 - 12
10 - 10
11 - 9
12 - 8
13 - 7
14 - 6
15 - 5

3. IMPORTANT: You are only allowed to include two albums MAXIMUM per artist on your individual lists. However, the final Top 50 list is not restricted to two albums per artist.

4. As much as possible, please keep the items in your list in this format: <Artist> - <Album> and do try to spell properly.

5. Additionally, [please] vote only if you feel that you are a fan of the heavy metal genre enough to be capable of submitting a credible list.

6. Members with a join date after the thread has started may not vote.

7. Once you have submitted your list, you may not alter it anymore, so think about it well before submitting.

8. On the final list, those albums with only one vote will be discarded.

Please follow these rules. We want to have the most comprehensive list possible, and a stupid mistake here and there only hurts the overall quality of the list. Just to be sure I recommend you always re-read your list, re-read the rules, and then re-read your list again.

Now...go.

I take it you mean NWOBHM and traditional heavy metal. Right?

Was this approved? I don't want to send my list in only to find that this will be locked or something.

It better not be locked. This is actually a list I will be contributing to.

I wasn't aware that it required approval as it is no more 'official' than any of the other surveys. Does it require a nod from the mods?

And yes NWOBHM and traditional heavy metal. I'm also considering that it encompass speed as well. Thoughts on this?

Did you get permission from Lyrici17 and lastdodobird?

Damn, I don't think I'll be able to make a list of my top FIFTEEN heavy metal albums, especially if I can't load it with Black Sabbath, without just listing albums for the sake of listing.

Well, I've already submitted my list. I do hope it is official, but I'm pretty sure the PM saves, so I could just resend it.

Can we use live albums? Or is it only about full-lengths?

No he didn't, although I don't really mind.

I did death... thrash... black... doom... and power metal because those are what I consider to be the 5 most prominent subgenres of metal. Any other survey wouldn't really get as much participation such that we would be able to form a decent consensus. Of course, this is all my opinion which is why I don't mind if other people start similar surveys and use the system I used.

My only issue with more of these surveys popping up is that it might get a little bit out of control... Like we might have surveys for smaller and more specific subgenres that the participation might already be moot... or there might be more than one survey running at a time... etc, etc...

I think the first surveys were relatively frowned upon by the mods already but were allowed to continue since it promoted forum activity and discussion. So as long as it promotes good discussion, it doesn't get "out of control" and has a good level or participation I think these threads won't be locked; and I won't mind too.

Good luck with this

Thanks for the nod lastdodobird - I hope now the masses are happy.

It requires an approval from an admin, not lastdodobird.

I hope it does get permission, because this could be a really awesome list. I must say choosing a top 15 was really freaking hard. So many good trad metal albums to choose from.

Did you have to get permission from the admins, lastdodobird?

I really hope this one gets passed. This is the one I've been waiting for.

Obviously I don't care either, especially since I borrowed heavily from lastdodobird anyway.

Hmmm should speed be included... I know it probably won't ever get it's own survey... it is a very related genre.

I don't really get the point of this list. Is it like a miscellaneous list, where we put stuff that didn't belong in any of the major categories that have already been done? Because I thought saying "heavy metal" is just an older way of saying "metal", or has it taken on some new meaning around here?

We are talking about "traditional" / "classic" / "old school" heavy metal. Stuff like Iron Maiden, Black Sabbath, Manowar, etc that aren't a part of all the crazy sub-genres of metal. The pure stuff. That classic sound.

That help?

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Now playing: Keep of Kalessin - The Mark of Power
via FoxyTunes

"Heavy metal" generally refers to traditional heavy metal, NWOBHM (if regarded as a genre in it's own right, I just call it heavy metal personally) and, to an extent, some speed and trad doom metal.

Does Candlemass count?
Heavy/Doom metal is their genre listing on MA, but allowing them kind of opens the door for a lot of other bands.

The problem with the term "Heavy Metal" is that we all know what we SHOULD be listing but at the same time, there are bands that people may consider to belong but shouldn't. Candlemass is a good example of a band that COULD fall into the category but SHOULDN'T because of their mainly doom roots.

Agreed. I didn't include them on my list... but I really wanted to. I also wanted to include 3 more Priest albums, but whatever.

shit if I had known Sabbath counted for this I would have had a different list. I didn't post them because they are doom metal and that had it's own survey.

No it doesn't.

Though an admin - on his/her prerogative - can decide to lock such a thread. Like I said, I think it was Nightgaunt who told me that he's not really too crazy about this whole thing but it did promote active discussion and participation so he let it go on.

When I felt that doing it for other subgenres wouldn't be so productive anymore, I decided to stop it.

So I think those who want to vote should just vote... everyone should continue as is... and the OP should facilitate this thing well until it so happens that an admin decides to come in, intervene and stop this whole thing...

I've pm'd Nightgaunt... keep sending the lists in the meantime.

sweeeeeet i've been so looking forward to this survey. with all said and done Heavy metal really is the king of genres isnt it

Do singles, demos, EP's and compilations of the afromentioned items (say a compilation of a single band's demos and singles; AND they haven't released a proper full-length album) count?

Alright, submitted my list. I hope some of the borderline bands I put in there are alright...

As long as people make carefull decisions when they go into borderline territory it shouldn't be any problems, since the real classic metal acts will dominate the top anyway.

these surveys are extremely helpful. i cant wait to see the results of this one.

I think it's better to include speed metal, because doing a separate survey on it is kind of useless, as it won't attract any people and there aren't that many albums to choose from. So yeah, I'm going to include three speed metal LPs in my list.

Yeah most lists contain speed metal so I'm including them.

QFT. This is exactly the reason why I didn't restrict albums on the surveys I ran. The most valid albums will rise to the top anyway...

cool took me over an hour but i did it

List sent. Vote splitting is going to be a big problem this time around.

I'm quite intriguedon how this list will turn out.
Either it will be an utter disappointment, topped with Iron Maiden and nothing else or something of the like, or it will be a pretty much interesting list mixed with some modern aswell as old classics.

Eh, seeing this list topped with Maiden wouldn't be as bad as the way some of the other lists turned out.

If any of you are still concerned I have received approval from Nightgaunt to undertake this endeavour.

Not that it was required as such....

Fuck, is this gonna be hard

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Now playing: Ereb Altor - By Honour
via FoxyTunes

I was only participating in the old death/black-metal ones, so I can't say anything about the other lists, but I was quite content with those... Except Emperor taking the number one spot in the black one.