This was a fun one, but also a tough one. For almost all of the albums below, it’s truly difficult to pick a best track. When you’ve got a banger of an album from front to back, it’s incredibly hard to pick a favorite child. However, that’s also what makes the last tracks on these records that more special. It’s almost impossible to make a 10/10 album through and through, but if you can do that with an incredible last track that leaves the listener wanting more? Home run. In no particular order, here we go:
Converge: ‘Jane Doe’ from Jane Doe
The sonic wildcard on the album (and up to this point, the wildcard in Converge’s catalog, too), but the one that arguably leaves the biggest and most jarring impression on the listener. The song is just fucking epic.
Rage Against the Machine: ‘Freedom’ from Rage Against the Machine
Not much that has to be said on this one. An album filled with back to back bangers that somehow levels up the energy for the last track and kicks the damn door down before it walks right through it.
Metallica: ‘Spit Out The Bone’ from Hardwired… to Self-Destruct
Is this album really a classic? Depends on who you ask. We ourselves aren’t always sure where we rank it in Metallica‘s post-Black album cannon. However, we’ll tell you one thing with conviction: ‘Spit Out The Bone’ is an absolute rager of a track. And if we’re being completely honest, it might just be the best song Metallica has written in decades. If the dueling guitar melodies at 4:09 don’t move your soul, do you even really like metal?
Power Trip: ‘Crucifixation’ from Nightmare Logic
Yes this album is technically only a few years old. But is it already a bonafide classic that will go down in metal history as one of the greats? You bet your ass it is. And what a way to go out with ‘Crucifixation’- the half time breakdown at the 2 minute mark makes us want to put our head through the wall of mom’s basement (which we, uh, definitely don’t live in).
System of a Down: ‘P.L.U.C.K.’ from System of a Down
Like Rage Against the Machine above, this is another that doesn’t need much explanation. It’s an incredible song that night caps an incredible album, and contains all of the right System of a Down ingredients- wackiness, aggression & a gorgeous chorus.
Pantera: ‘Hollow’ from Vulgar Display of Power
Is this one of the greatest Pantera songs of all time? Yes, yes it is.
Nails: ‘They Come Crawling Back’ from You Will Never Be One of Us
Like Nightmare Logic, you might be asking yourself- a classic? Didn’t this just come out somewhat recently? Yes, 6 or so years ago but yes, it’s that good. This song sonically actually sounds nothing like the rest of the Nails library of pain, but by taking a breath and going the slower, doomier and brooding route, they actually somehow manage to be even more ferocious.
Korn: ‘Daddy’ from Korn
When this album (and this song) dropped, there was NOTHING at the time that sounded like it. Korn was a sonic revelation that pretty much changed the game overnight. While the whole album is something to marvel at, it’s ‘Daddy’ that probably left the strongest impression because of its gut wrenchingly-raw emotional honesty. Real art isn’t always fun nor easy to listen to.
Down: ‘Bury Me in Smoke’ from NOLA
Do you like weed? Do you like breakdowns? Do you like your metal infused with southern rock, soul and blues? NOLA is a stone cold classic, and it goes out in a thick bong rip-produced cloud of excellence with this banger: