A Heavy Year: The Best Local Metal Releases of 2025

The year is ending. Goodbye, 2025.

But before we turn all our attention and good intentions to 2026, we’re looking back on the past twelve months of Colorado metal music and sharing the ten best releases we heard this year…from devastating debuts to standout LPs from longstanding local acts.

Good luck with those New Year’s resolutions. See ya in the pit in 2026.

Allegaeon
The Ossuary Lens
Fort Collins tech-death kings Allegaeon still got it. Not that the veteran band’s chops have ever been in doubt over the past twenty years. But on its first album since 2022, The Ossuary Lens (released on April 4 via Metal Blade Records), the five-piece is as fierce as ever, led by the face-melting proficiency of original guitarist Greg Burgess, a shredder who should probably play with a fire-extinguisher nearby.

“Driftwood” and “Chaos Theory” are the crown jewels here, while “Dark Matter Dynamics” features the acoustic fret gymnastics of Adrian Bellue, another combustible guitarist. The Ossuary Lens contains so many licks it’ll leave your mouth dry.

Cronos Compulsion
Lawgiver
Nobody does caveman death metal better than Cronos Compulsion. The Denver troglodytes dropped debut album Lawgiver, released July 11 via Avantgarde Music, after four years, and it is satisfyingly skull-crushing.

From the jump, when opener “Obligate Condition” kicks in, Lawgiver is a relentless riff fest, courtesy of guitarists Wil Wilson and Raye Mokarry. Cronos Compulsion can kill you with break-neck speed, as evidenced in the groove of “Maladapt” or slamming reprieves included in “Ancestral Remains.” Then there’s the death-doomy “Sun Devouring Wound” that hits just right among all the brutality.

With the recent resurgence of slam and brutal death metal nationally, Cronos Compulsion is well-positioned to not only survive, but thrive.

Flahoola
Electric Scythe
Electric Scythe, the long-awaited debut of gritty Denver rock-and-rollers Flahoola that was released independently on Halloween (October 31 was a big day for local musicians) really got the juices flowing.

There’s something about this type of biker-rock-stoner-metal that just sounds like a bar fight is about to break out at any moment, so you better keep your head on a swivel. It’s kind of fitting that the album kicks off with “Age of War,” and it’s fast and furious from there. “Italia,” inspired by a recurring nightmare bassist-vocalist John Napier experienced for years growing up, and “Frankenstein’s Hell,” horrors told from the monster’s perspective, are ragers. Then Stephen King-inspired closer “TommyKnocker” rips.

In the Company of Serpents
A Crack in Everything
In the Company of Serpents returned with its first full-length in five years, A Crack in Everything, released independently on July 11. The syrupy Denver trio, always content and confident in doing its own thing, pushes past boundaries previously explored only by In the Company of Serpents on its fourth full-length.

Interwoven with psyched-out versions of apocalyptic alt-Americana and devastating stoner-doom dirges, songs such as “A Patchwork Art” and “Cinders” give off dystopian Western sci-fi vibes, while “Ghosts on the Periphery” and “Buzzard Logic” build and brood along dreadfully, as if vocalist-guitarist Grant Netzorg, bassist Ben Pitts (also of local death-prog band NightWraith) and drummer Andy Thomas wrote ’em on the edge of a cliff.

Old Deer
Someone in the House
Another decibel-dense debut, Someone in the House, released independently on November 7 by Denver post-doom crew Old Deer, is indicative of just how crazy-varied the local metal scene is.

Looking for mathcore, post-metal, doom, metalcore? How about some sludge? This album has a little bit of all that. There’s even a soothing acoustic interlude on the record. Old Deer follows no rules.

It creates for a chaotic listening experience, especially at first go, but what stands out is how effortlessly the four-piece melds so many subgenres and sounds, like the sax on “The Hatch” and title track, into a claustrophobic cohesion only Old Deer can claim. If there is one song that perfectly encapsulates that, it’s the twelve-plus-minute closer “4507,” which includes yet another surprise at the very end. We guarantee you’ll never guess what it is. Old Deer ain’t right.

Old Skin
Wails of Ten Thousand
Sludge, sludge, baby. Old Skin, the Fort Collins band that blares at the altar of resurrected NOLA sludge gods Acid Bath, put out the top sludge album of 2025 in Wails of Ten Thousand, released independently on February 21.

It’s grimy, it’s dirty, it’s perfectly executed sludge, and then some. Opener “Crosspusher” immediately proves Old Skin has the intestinal fortitude to do it right, but then the six-piece goes even further throughout Wails with some sinister harsh noise and amplified agony.

“Cauterizing Hammer” is the climactic closer that nearly drove the group insane, guitarist Hayden Cooley admitted to Westword earlier this year.

“We took a step back and were like, Do we like this? Do we like that it starts with this fun, positive song and by the end of ‘Cauterizing Hammer,’ you just want to kill yourself? Oh, yeah, it’s perfect. It’s just brutal.”

Pedestal for Leviathan
Enter: Vampyric Manifestation
When this album came out on Halloween, I immediately nailed garlic to my front door. Enter: Vampyric Manifestation, the debut from Denver riffwraiths Pedestal for Leviathan, is epic in its intensity and scope, a cauldron of symphonic black metal, synths and all, sewn together with meat-grinding death metal.

It all makes for a sonic spell book filled with tales of demons, bloodsuckers and werewolf Jesus. Yes, “Lycanthropichrist” is literally about that. From top to bottom, it’s that type of horror-inspired metal that makes Enter: Vampyric Manifestation refreshing and fun. This is the type of music for metalheads who play Magic: The Gathering love. And there are not many bands locally, if any, or elsewhere doing it quite like Pedestal for Leviathan, the godless creation of one Kendrick Lemke (also of projects Fatalist, Disgustingest and athousandangelsandseven).

Primitive Man
Observance
Nothing written or read about Primitive Man can truly convey the sheer madness and chaos this stalwart Denver noise-devastation band still continues to make after thirteen years. But this latest record, Observance (released on Halloween via Relapse Records), is Primitive Man at its mightiest, flexing how harsh doom can be when it’s ten-plus minutes filled with feral feedback, dead-on-arrival discordance and guitarist-vocalist Ethan Lee McCarthy’s anguished screams (his vocal cords must be made of Kevlar).

“Transactional” and “Natural Law” are quintessential Primitive Man, two songs that mark nearly thirty minutes. Then there are the “shorter” ones — “Devotion” and “Social Contract,” both still over ten minutes each. Fucking insane.

Ukko’s Hammer
Ukko’s Hammer
Crossover kings Ukko’s Hammer was the biggest surprise of 2025 in our book. While the four-piece had been making some noise locally in both the hardcore and metal scenes since 2020, this year’s self-titled debut, released independently on March 15, made us really take notice.

The sharp guitar tone alone is enough to cut stone, but throw in some Slayer squeals and schizo solos, and yep, Ukko’s Hammer is bringing serious ’80s thrash attitude to current hardcore.

We’re not sure if it’s an homage, but “Endless Pain” is also the title of Kreator’s first album from 1985. But Ukko’s Hammer is far from a rehash. Listen to standout tracks “All For One,” “Excited Delirium” and “Skin and Bone” and feel how it hits for yourself.

Victim of Fire
The Old Lie
The blackened crustcore that Victim of Fire dispels on The Old Lie, released August 1 via Human Future Records, fits perfectly with the album’s overarching anti-war ethos. It’s a more modern metal approach brimming with tried-and-true crust-punk spirit.

“Apocalyptic Inclination” and “Soldier’s Dream” are indicative of the record’s pounding pulse, thanks to the melo-death delivery of guitarists Austin Minney and Emily First-Name-Only.

The doomier “Disharmonist” is a nice change-up among the nine originals, while the album is wrapped with a high-energy cover of Iron Maiden classic “Aces High.” Billing itself as “stadium crust band,” Victim of Fire certainly lives up the tongue-in-cheek tagline on The Old Lie.