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15 Metal Christmas Songs for Unsilent, Unholy Nights

AC/DC, Dio, Type O Negative, Korn and more deck the halls with heavy riffs

Stevie Wonder once said “Everyone’s a kid at Christmas,” and the thrashers set are no exception. Over the years, metal bands have turned their inverted crucifixes around and cut some of the heaviest, loudest, most rip-roaring odes to the holiday season. Here are 15 if the most fist-pounding, throat-shredding, head-banging, heavy metal Christmas tunes ever recorded.

13

Henry Rollins – ‘Twas the Night Before Christmas’

This one isn’t strictly heavy metal, but we’ll let it slide because it’s Henry. On Rollins’ rendition of the Christmas classic, he reads the poem over the top an avant-garde sound collage that includes sirens and gunshots. But in Rollins’  version, after he waves hello to St. Nick, the poor fellow gets blown out of the sky by a missile.

14

August Burns Red – ‘Carol of the Bells’

Christian metalcore outfit August Burns Red loves Christmas so much that the band recorded an entire instrumental album of metalized carols and classics, 2012's August Burns Red Presents: Sleddin' Hill, A Holiday Album. But the group first got into the Yuletide spirit in 2007, recording a fan-favorite cover of "Carol of the Bells," which turned the already fairly metal-sounding tune into a shreddy epic. –BRANDON GEIST

15

Christopher Lee – ‘Little Drummer Boy’

Thick, chugging riffs rumble in the background while 91-year-old British actor Christopher Lee, with his impossibly deep baritone, delivers a take that can only be described as epic. The other metalers on this list turned in smashing versions of their songs, but how could anyone top Saruman himself, bellowing "A-rum-pa-pum-pum!"?