12 PERFECT Metal Albums With NO Bad Songs

If you wanted to still make a name for yourself in the '00s, many metal acts had to drop the more cringey nu metal elements of their sound. From Linkin Park's introspective hookiness to the raw brutality of Slipknot, every band was putting their own unique spin on the genre in order to stick out. System of a Down may not have fit inside a neat box at the time, but what they gave us was more potent than any other nu metal act could muster.

Across Toxicity, the band's militant political edge became their greatest strength, with songs like "Aerials" and the title track becoming some of the most celebrated metal of the new millennium. For as many kids bought this album just for the headbanging licks, there is a lot more to unpack here once you look at the lyrics.

Whether it's the existential turmoil that runs throughout songs like "Forest" or the straight statistics that you're given on the opening cut "Prison Song," this album clearly has something more to say aside from just internal angst. More militant acts like Rage Against the Machine may have fallen by the wayside at this point, but Toxicity showed that System of a Down could carry the torch when it came to injecting real unrest into their work.