[b]Heavy Metal Albums:[/b] - Black Sabbath (Black Sabbath) - Powerslave (Iron Maiden) - Holy Diver (Dio) - British Steel (Judas Priest) [b]Thrash Metal Albums:[/b] - Rust in Peace (Megadeth) - Kill Em All (Metallica) - Coma of Souls (Kreator) - Bonded by Blood (Exodus) - Eternal Nightmare (Vio-lence) - Reign in Blood (Slayer) - Act III (Death Angel) [b]Power Metal Albums:[/b] - Keeper of the Seven Keys Part 2 (Helloween) - Nightfall in Middle-Earth (Blind Guardian) - Carolus Rex (Sabaton) - _____________ - _____________ [b]Death Metal Albums:[/b] - Symbolic (Death) - Twilight of the Thunder God (Amon Amarth) - _____________ - _____________ [b]Black Metal Albums:[/b] - _____________ - _____________ [spoiler]Help fill in the blanks. I'm new to power metal and death metal (Death is one of my favorite bands, though), and haven't listened to a black metal album.[/spoiler]

Not sure if these have already been mentioned, but "The Number of the Beast" and "Powerslave" from Iron Maiden are pretty essential for the heavy metal subgenre. Judas Priest albums like "British Steel" and "Painkiller" are as well.

For some reason, i just can't get into iron maiden. I have those two albums you mentioned, aswell piece of mind vinyl. I see why so many people like them and i appreciate what they did to metal music. I need help.

I'd say Powerslave over Number of the Beast and Painkiller over British Steel

Subgenre 4: death metal Albums would be, Death - Human (death) Edge of sanity - Crimson (technical death) Wolfheart - Winterborn (melodic death) (also this band should be on the top of melodeath with Arch enemy and Children of bodom) Opeth - Blackwater park (progressive death) Behemoth - Evangelion (blackened death) Honorable mention goes to Be'lakor with their albums Stone's reach and Of breath and bone (progressive/melodic death), which are tied in my favorite albums first place with Wolfhearts Winterborn.

Instead of death should we not have extreme metal? Death, black, thrash, doom all come under extreme so I feel as though this is the genre, and the others are subgenres.

Not sure about thrash, but otherwise that's a good option. Then again, extreme metal has large variety of genres, so it would be hard to decide one album from each genre. But that can work toon

But with how diverse metal is as a genre, can we really afford to have more than one genre of extreme in our catalogue?

I think Black Metal would suit as one of the genres. It has darker themes [as to be expected] than normal and the style of music often adopts an almost storybook kind of feel. Essentials would of course consist of stuff like Filosofem by Burzum as it follows a more ambient and different sound that black metal is known for. On the opposing end, we would have either Serpents Unleashed or Beyond The Permafrost, both by Skeletonwitch since it would more than likely be associated with Thrash metal since it does lend more to the hardcore style of music although still following satanic themes in its lyrics. Midian by Cradle of Filth in there as well as it pretty much is as black metal as it gets. Dark themes, emphasis on atmosphere, satanic themes, unconventional structure, it's got everything. Battle Magic by Bal Sagoth lends itself more to the storybook aspect I was talking about and is a more symphonic and less harsh style for the genre. That's all I have for now, though. It's half past 3am where I am, so forgive me if I'm not up to peak with my metal knowledge. Kek. I just saw this cool thread and thought I'd throw in my piece.

What about Darkthrones albums A blaze in the northern sky, Under a funeral moon and Transilvanian hunger? Those three albums are labeled as "unholy trinity" of black metal, aswell being one of the more influencal albums of the norwegian black metal scene.