2014 has produced a pretty incredible trend of really fucking weird metal albums coming from young bands. For evidence of this, check out the recent releases from Thantifaxath, Emptiness, Pyrrhon, and Psalm Zero, among others. The apotheosis of this movement, though, is Sweven, the sophomore album from Swedish death metal band Morbus Chron. The album’s title translates as “dream,” and that’s exactly what Sweven feels like: It’s a shapeless, haunting, howling, creepy, beautiful creature, as impossible to pin down as it is to turn away from. Sweven uses elements of old-school death metal to cast its spell, but it feels more like a lost psychedelic folk album than an Autopsy retread. Sweven may not be the highest-ranking metal album on this list, but if you were to call it the best metal album of 2014, you wouldn’t be wrong. –Michael [LISTEN]