The one fun thing about my recent COVID-laden vacation was sitting back with a thick book of Canadian music critic Martin Popoff sounding off writ large at heavy metal records. Specifically, The Top 500 Heavy Metal Records Of All Time, as compiled via poll over 20 years ago. I’m a big fan of Popoff – even when I don’t agree with him (and that can be often regarding certain bands and genres) he has a very clear, entertaining voice, is deeply knowledgeable about the field of rock and roll, and – most importantly – backs up his opinions and claims. We’ll get a little more into that below, but despite being sick it was a blast to read him sound off on all 500 albums (again – he had no say in what was chosen, so it was a delight to read him rip on particular picks that don’t jibe with his own vision), bringing said albums up in my headphones and listening, forming my own opinions as I went along. And lo and behold: I learned a couple things in the process. 10 things to be exact, so let get over the jump and see what those things are and how they inform the way I consume music in this day and age.