That time of year, releases have mostly finished up, you've probably been listening to your favorite album a ton, so lets see what people were enjoying! This of course is for just whatever, no specific genre, just what you enjoyed this year.
My honorable mention goes to an album that was made in 2015 from a small band called Nylithia, who made "Hyperthrash". I had heard of this band before with a song or two from awhile back, they did a great Bowsers Castle from NES Mario years ago and I had heard a song from their actual album and then found the album and realized that holy crap, this album is amazing. So I can't count it for this year, but I've listened to these songs dozens of times.
Sadly not a year that did a lot for me album wise. Listenable stuff for sure, and some stuff I actually missed (I haven't gotten around to checking out November Doom or Annihilator). Pentakill, the League of Legends metal band, released a free album that was pretty solid fantasy power metal. Overkill released another solid, but familiar album. Marty Friedman did another solo release, but it didn't hit me as much as his last one, Inferno, did. I kinda liked parts of Iced Earth's new album. I liked Arch Enemy's new release more than their last one.
Otherwise, I think my favorite 2017 album is going to be Brendon Small's "Galaktikon 2". There isn't a lot that blew me away on this, but I enjoyed it because it feels almost like a Dethklok album and we haven't had a proper one 2012 as 2013 was the Doomstar Requiem, which was from their musical one-off.