It’s now time to announce which album you all voted as the best album of the year via the Metal Hammer Readers’ Album Of 2014 poll… And it’s Slipknot’s .5: The Gray Chapter!

The tragic death of Paul Gray, along with the drama surrounding Joey Jordison’s departure, meant that Slipknot’s return was met with as much trepidation as excitement. Concerns were quickly put to rest, the likes of AOV had the sort of gargantuan choruses that we’d come to expect from latter-day ‘Knot, while songs like the deranged Custer offered callbacks to their twisted origins.

Read our full review of Slipknot’s .5 The Gray Chapter.

Check out Dom Lawson’s Iron Sandwich review of the album.

Here’s to a very metal 2015!