Hello! Just like with any year, we like to bring a bit of flavor to our Album of the Year content by asking some of our favorite artists to submit their guest list. This year, the first artist I reached out to was a no brainer - Frank AKA Caelestra. If you've been following the blog at all, you'll know that the project's Bastion quickly became one of our favorite releases when it dropped late last year. And so, reaching out to the heart and mind behind the release was my natural first step when compiling our guest lists.
Lo and behold, Frank's list is great. It contains some of my favorite albums of the year and serves as yet another reminder to listen to them. It also serves an interesting composite of the influences that make up Caelestra's sound and will, perhaps, hopefully, convince a few more people to check out Bastion.
Without further ado, here is Frank's list!

CAELESTRA'S TOP 10 ALBUMS 2024
1. Amiensus - Reclaimation Part 1 & 2
An incredible double album where both parts are equally as strong. The musicianship here is just phenomenal. These records go all over the place sonically, and are chock full of absolutely face melting riffs. Not just the best of the year, but some of the finest, most grandiose Progressive Death Metal I've ever heard. Mindblowing.
2. Ulcerate - Cutting the Throat of God
A fascinating whirlwind of interweaving, dissonant guitars and pummeling drum work. On 'Cutting the Throat of God', Ulcerate's labyrinthian riffage has never felt so oddly catchy and dare I say, accessible. A record that demands your full attention from start to finish and a shining example of the incredible musicianship one comes to expect from Ulcerate. Just phenomenal.
3. Iress - Sleep now, In Reverse
Mesmerising shoegaze/slowcore with its toes dipped in the doom metal camp. Somber yet borderline anthemic, with a deeply emotive vocal performance from front-woman Michelle Malley. An album to get completely lost in... preferably on a long, rainy train journey.
4. Blood Incantation - Absolute Elsewhere
'Prog' death metal in the realest sense of the term. Super interesting and immaculately conceived mashup of the finest early death metal with a healthy dose of 70's prog exploration... and a collab track with electronic/synth wizards Tangerine Dream?! Honestly, it's like this record was made for me.
5. Mother of Graves - The Periapt of Absence
A devastatingly heavy slab of super melodic doom-death with absolutely monstrous vocals. Fantastic song writing, beautiful use of strings and keys and with Dan Swano involved in the mastering, it of course sounds enormous. This band were a new discovery me last year, and wow... i'll certainly be paying close attention from this point on.
6. Infant Island - Obsidian Wreath
This was a surprise for me. A kind of blackgaze/grindcore/screamo hybrid with ambient elements? Yep. This is that. And it's incredible. Really excited to see where these guys go from here with this sound.
7. Oh Hiroshima - All Things Shining
Just two guys make all this noise! Incredibly diverse texturally, yet super cohesive. This record features beautiful jangly guitars, thundering drums, killer clean vocals as well as horns, brass, keys and strings... all tastefully melded together to form one of the strongest post-rock records I've heard in a very long time. Another record to lose yourself in.
8. Ocoeur - Breath
Kind of minimalist but none the less extremely transportive synth ambience from Franck Zaragoza's 'Ocoeur'. Ethereal soundscapes swell effortlessly into enormous gleaming crescendos. Really good to listen to on walks out in nature where you want to just marvel at how amazing the world can be.
9. Devin Townsend - Powernerd
This was a grower at first for me, but it's become one of my favourite releases from Devin in recent years. It's kind of silly and playful in parts, which is fun, but also there's quite introspective tracks like "Ubelia", "Younger Lover", "Glacier" and "Goodbye" that are just straight bangers. Just really great, heavy songs.
10. Bedsore - Dreaming the Strife for Love
My initial reaction to this record was "What on earth is this!?" but it turned out to be such an interesting listen. Incredibly progressive and exploratory death metal with way more emotional depth than I initially gave it credit for. Kind of similar to Blood Incantation's Absolute Elsewhere in that you can hear the reverence for 70's prog and experimentation laced throughout, but still hits pretty damn hard in the melodic death metal department.