Ashes of the Wake by Lamb of God

Ashes of the Wake, Lamb of God's third studio album and their first on a major label, came out on Epic in 2004, and the Richmond, Virginia, crew didn't sand off a single edge for the privilege. Randy Blythe barks like he's gargling gravel, Mark Morton and Willie Adler lock their guitars into riffs that grind and lurch, and John Campbell and drummer Chris Adler keep the whole groove-metal machine slamming. "Laid to Rest" is the track that crashed the countdowns.

It debuted at number 27 on the Billboard 200 on 35,000 first-week sales and kept going to become the band's best seller, past 400,000 copies by 2014 and gold in 2016. Guitar World later ranked it the 49th greatest guitar album of all time, and Metal Hammer put it 5th among the best metal albums of the 21st century.

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