Twilight of the Thunder God by Amon Amarth

Twilight of the Thunder God, the seventh studio album from Sweden's Amon Amarth, came out on Metal Blade on 29 September 2008 with Jens Bogren producing, and it's the record where the Tumba crew's Viking saga finally broke through. The title track tells of Thor slaying the Midgard Serpent Jörmungandr, and the whole album sails on that kind of myth.

Johan Hegg roars like a storm over the bow, Olavi Mikkonen and Johan Söderberg lock their guitars into galloping, battle-ready melodies, and Ted Lundström and drummer Fredrik Andersson hammer out the rowing beat. The band call it melodic death metal rather than Viking metal, and here the melody does as much damage as the brutality. It opened at No. 10 in Sweden and No. 50 on the Billboard 200, and Surtur Rising followed.

Written with AI assistance from RockLists chart data, MusicBrainz and Wikipedia.