The best 3 black metal albums

[shagrat]

but it should have Dark Funeral in there, their new costumes are amazing hahaha

Yep, they most definitely are.

[rlk222]

1. Mayhem - "Wolf's Lair Abyss"
2. Burzum - "Filosofem"
3. Immortal - "At The Heart of Winter"
(very very close underrated tie for a 4): Naglfar - "Vittra" (enslave The Astral Fortress, great tune) and (Covenant or Kovenant or whatever the hell they call themselves now, electro-black awesomeness "In The Times Before The Light")

[The She-Wolf]

Hmm... it's very hard to choose but perhaps...

1- Emperor: In the Nightside Eclipse

2 - Mayhem: De Mysteriis Dom Sathanas

3 - Satyricon: The Shadowthrone

[ivofriul]

bloody hard but I'll try...

- Venom "Welcome to Hell"
- Gorgoroth "live in Grieghallen"
- Immortal "Battles in the North"

[rlk222]

P.S. - Damn , I forgot about Shadowthrone! That IS a fantastic classic album. Good call.
Edit: And as far as Grand Declaration of War, I love it, its the most technical album Mayhem produced musically, structurally, but it is their 34.788%... , it's too much Maniac Preaching in spoken word and not enough black metal howl to be a top BM album, with all due respect, of course! =)

[TST.LP]

1. Bethlehem - 1996 - Dictius Te Necare
2. Sortsind - 1999 - Sår
3. Frozen Shadows - 2004 - Hantises

[Blakkheim]

These are my favourites:

1. Burzum - Burzum
2. Satyricon - The Shadowthrone
3. Arckanum - Fran Marder

Not true black:

1. Carach Angren - Where the Corpses Sink Forever (Symphonic Black Metal)
2. Diabolical Masquerade - Ravendusk in My Heart (Avant-garde Black Metal)
3. Carach Angren - Death Came Through A Phantom Ship (Symphonic Black Metal)

[Thiago]

I listen more Depressive Black Metal stuff. Bands like Lifelover and Forgotten Tomb. But I think that this band's it's a little...different for this post.

1 - Darkthrone - Transilvanian Hunger
2 - Immortal - At The Heart of Winter
3 - Hades Almighty - Dawn of the Dying Sun

....

Dimmu Borgir - For All Tid (When they played good music ...)

[Poundskin]

I'll take 'black metal' in it's broadest sense:

Mayhem - Ordo Ad Chao
Gorgoroth - Under The Sign of Hell (As much as I love Destroyer )
Profanatica - Profanatitas De Domonatia ‎

Havohej - Kembatinan Premaster almost made it, but it's more black 'noise' than metal.

[Danhod]

I'll take 'black metal' in it's broadest sense:

Mayhem - Ordo Ad Chao
Gorgoroth - Under The Sign of Hell (As much as I love Destroyer )
Profanatica - Profanatitas De Domonatia ‎

Havohej - Kembatinan Premaster almost made it, but it's more black 'noise' than metal.

This

[Rigidhandsomepoet]

Ooh, a black metal thread...

-Black Metal

*Darkthrone - Under A Funeral Moon
*Cradle Of Filth - The Principle Of Evil Made Flesh (yes it IS black metal, no debate)
*Bathory - Blood Fire Death

If you absolutely MUST be silly and exclude the COF album, then Satyricon - "Dark Medieval Times".

-Experimental BM

*Ved Buens Ende - Written In Waters
*Fleurety - Min Tid Skal Komme
*In The Woods... - Heart Of The Ages

Done!

[Lychfowel]

At the risk of having replied before with three entirely different suggestions...

TAAKE Hordalands Doedskvad
DISSECTION Storm of the Light's Bane
EMPEROR In the Nightside Eclipse

.. but there at probably at least thirty other eligible albums for this brutally short list

[SearedMCMXCV]

In my humble opinion:

THE SOMBERLAIN
BERGTATT
A BLAZE IN THE NORTHERN SKY

Gold standards of three different styles: Melodic, Atmospheric, Raw

[Rigidhandsomepoet]

See, this why selecting just 3 black metal records is so difficult: I could have so easily gone for Darkthrone's "A Blaze In The Northern Sky" or Ulver's "Bergtatt" as above instead. Or Lychfowel's mention of Emperor's album, another one which I found incredibly hard to omit. It's amazing for me to think back and realise just how FRESH "In The Nightside Eclipse" sounded when it first came out! Although Ved Buens Ende's only 'proper' album is my overall favourite, and has been for so many years. It just showed me what black metal was capable of and I'll always love it for that, much like MDB's "ATFW" showed me what could be done with death metal. Some albums just redefine a whole genre. And yes, you could more rightly class it as death/doom, but that was a virtually a whole new classification in itself at the time! Think back to 1992 and see how many death/doom albums had already been released. Not many, I can assure you...

Nick