METAL CHURCH released their second album, "The Dark," on October 6th, 1986 through Elektra, recorded across 1985 and 1986 at Steve Lawson Productions in Seattle and produced by Mark Dodson, with Terry Date engineering. It was the last record made by the band's classic lineup of David Wayne, Kurdt Vanderhoof, Craig Wells, Duke Erickson and Kirk Arrington, and it is widely treated as an essential thrash metal album. The songs deal in assassination, ritual and the supernatural: "Line of Death" drew on the Libyan hostilities in the Gulf of Sidra, while the title track strands its narrator overnight in a house with something trying to drag him to hell. "Watch the Children Pray" became their power ballad and video. The album is dedicated to METALLICA's Cliff Burton, who died nine days before its release.

SEPULTURA released their seventh album, "Against," on October 6th, 1998 through Roadrunner Records, produced by Howard Benson with the band. It is the first SEPULTURA record with Derrick Green, who had replaced founder Max Cavalera in 1997, and it was made under impossible expectations. Like "Roots" before it, the album is full of guests and tribal influence, this time including the Japanese taiko group Kodo, recorded at their village on Sado Island, plus Mike Patton, Jason Newsted, Carlinhos Brown and original SEPULTURA guitarist Jairo Guedz. "Against," "Choke" and "Tribus" were singles. It sold only eighteen thousand copies in its first US week and peaked at 82 on the Billboard 200. Green said in 2019 that he feels enormous pride in it now, and that it was the album that held the band together.

MY DYING BRIDE released their fifth album, "34.788%...Complete," on October 6th, 1998 through Peaceville Records, recorded that year at Academy Studios and produced by Mags with Calvin Robertshaw. The title came from a dream Robertshaw had, in which he was told the human race had a limited lifespan on Earth and that 34.788 percent of it had already expired. It is the most divisive record the English band ever made — the first without keyboardist and violinist Martin Powell, who left for ANATHEMA, and the only one with drummer Bill Law, and it pushed their doom into trip-hop rhythms, spoken word and outright experiment. The interlude in "The Whore, the Cook and the Mother" is modelled on the replicant interrogation from "Blade Runner," with questions asked in Cantonese and reversed. It is dedicated to bassist Adrian Jackson's father.

THE BLACK DAHLIA MURDER released their eighth album, "Nightbringers," on October 6th, 2017 through Metal Blade Records, self-produced with Jacob Hansen mixing and mastering, and cover art by Kristian Wahlin. It is the first album with Brandon Ellis on lead guitar, replacing Ryan Knight, and his arrival sharpened the Michigan band considerably — the leads are faster, more classically shaped and more prominent than at any point in their catalogue. Trevor Strnad wrote all the lyrics and the record scored 85 on Metacritic. It became the best-selling direct-to-consumer pre-order in Metal Blade's history, no small feat for a label operating since 1982. Strnad died in May 2022, which makes the ferocious confidence of "Widowmaker" and the rest of this album harder to hear now than it was then. Max Lavelle played bass and Alan Cassidy drums.

SANCTUARY released their third album, "The Year the Sun Died," across Europe on October 6th, 2014 through Century Media, produced by Chris "Zeuss" Harris at Soundhouse Studios in Seattle, with North America following eight days later. It was the band's first studio album in twenty-four years, since 1990's "Into the Mirror Black." Four founding members — Warrel Dane, Jim Sheppard, Lenny Rutledge and Dave Budbill — had reunited in 2010 intending only a handful of shows, but the response convinced them to record. Brad Hull of FORCED ENTRY replaced Sean Blosl on guitar, and it proved to be the last SANCTUARY release with Sheppard. It is also the final album of original material to feature Warrel Dane, who died in December 2017. Rock Hard gave it eight and a half out of ten.

WINTERFYLLETH released their fourth album, "The Divination of Antiquity," on October 6th, 2014 through Candlelight Records, running fifty-six minutes. Singer Chris Naughton said the band spent far longer writing these songs than on previous records, building many versions and rearranging them repeatedly. The title is meant as an argument for studying history in order not to repeat its mistakes, tied to a wider theme of cyclical time and a present defined by monetary rule and exploitation. The cover continues the English band's habit of using English landscapes — here a photograph of West Water in the Lake District taken by drummer Simon Lucas. Metal.de called it one of the year's best melodic black metal albums, while Metal Hammer's Dayal Patterson noted its nods toward post-black metal and an introspective tone reminiscent of ALCEST.

KHANATE released their second album, "Things Viral," on October 6th, 2003 through Southern Lord, produced, recorded and mixed by bassist James Plotkin. Four tracks fill nearly sixty minutes, two of them running past nineteen. The New York band existed to test how slow and how hostile metal could get before it stopped functioning as music: Stephen O'Malley's guitar leaves vast gaps between chords, Tim Wyskida's drums arrive like separate events rather than a beat, and Alan Dubin shrieks over the emptiness in a register closer to distress than singing. It is genuinely difficult listening and entirely deliberate. Pitchfork gave it 8.2. A video was made for "Dead." The CD appeared in a European digipak and a US jewel case, with a thousand gatefold LP copies issued by Load Records. Southern Lord catalogued the release as SUNN28.

SOILENT GREEN released their second album, "Sewn Mouth Secrets," on October 6th, 1998 through Relapse Records, recorded between May 22nd and June 1st that year and produced by Keith Falgout with the band, mastered by Dave Shirk in Tempe, Arizona. It was their first full-length for Relapse after the earlier EP "A String of Lies," and it is the album that fixed the New Orleans band's peculiar identity: grindcore speed and sludge weight welded together, with unexpected southern blues and country figures surfacing in the middle of the violence. Ben Falgoust's vocals shred through forty-five minutes that never settle into a single tempo for long. Brian Patton played lead guitar while also serving in EYEHATEGOD, and Tommy Buckley drummed. The Collector's Guide to Heavy Metal gave it eight out of ten.

CARNIFEX released their ninth album, "Necromanteum," on October 6th, 2023 through Nuclear Blast, produced by Jason Suecof with vocalist Scott Lewis and drummer Shawn Cameron, and mastered by Mark Lewis. It is the first CARNIFEX album with lead guitarist Neal Tiemann. The San Diego band announced in February that writing was winding down and entered the studio with Suecof on the 15th; the title track arrived as the lead single on July 6th, followed by "Death's Forgotten Children" featuring Tom Barber of CHELSEA GRIN in late August. Spencer Creaghan arranged the orchestral and choral parts that push the record further into symphonic black metal territory than the band's deathcore roots would suggest. Rich Webb of Distorted Sound scored it eight out of ten, calling it a marked improvement on "Graveside Confessions."

REDEMPTION released their fourth album, "Snowfall on Judgment Day," on October 6th, 2009 through InsideOut Music, produced by Tommy Hansen and running seventy minutes. Every song was written by guitarist and keyboardist Nick van Dyk, who founded the American band and had been diagnosed with multiple myeloma in October 2008, reaching complete remission shortly before this album appeared — a fact that gives its preoccupation with mortality and endurance considerable weight. Ray Alder of FATES WARNING sings, Bernie Versailles plays guitar, and James LaBrie of DREAM THEATER guests on "Another Day Dies." It is the only REDEMPTION studio album with Greg Hosharian on keyboards. Although the official American release date was October 6th, copies were sold nearly a month early at the tenth Prog Power festival in Atlanta on September 11th and 12th. Travis Smith supplied the cover art.