Bill's New Home

[vander]

Hey Bill and others,
I hope you don't mind me posting this question here but I figured I'd get shit if I started a thread in another section...
I have done some research but can't figure out if there is a concrete definition of what death metal is. Does it have to be about death or is it about how the song is written mechanically or are only certain bands considered death or is it an antequated term?
A lot of people at work refer to me as the guy who listens to death metal...but I am usually listening to something like Nevermore or Primal Fear...stuff that I know is not considered death metal.
Just made me wonder and any DM google results I got seemed to conflict with eachother? Figured I ask the resident pro.
Thanks...Hope I didn't interrupt any important ongoing discusion.

[Fragle]

mh....ya know what? just listen to some cannibal corpse, malevolent creation, death, nile, obituary, kataklysm, and see if you notice some similarities

[vander]

mh....ya know what? just listen to some cannibal corpse, malevolent creation, death, nile, obituary, kataklysm, and see if you notice some similarities

I can preety much take a hint from the names of the bands..by the way I listened to your band when Bill posted the notice a few days ago....Really impressive stuff. Congratulations.

[horns666]

:ROTF: "a drunk chick bite my pp "....:ROTF:

Sorry E ..that just made my acid reflux prob ...seem so much better!!

Arrrghhh I hate Acid reflux and YES the biggest culprit is WEED and the lack of control to surpress the munchies..

[horns666]

Vander..There is no such thing as stupid questions ..just stupid people..

OK.."Death" metal..gotcha..well it is one of my favorite genres of metal..But there are MANY sub genres to "Death" metal..

Let's start by going right to the band Death fronted by the late Chuck Shuldiner.. He cultivated and inspired a scene especially in Tampa Florida.

Death Metal is "angry" or "dark" metal..in nature. Brutality seems to be the constant..whether adding technicality or melody or both to that "brutality" is the key here..and that key is what divides the style of metal into many Sub genres..be it Grindcore..Death Metal...Black metal (a whole genre in itself) and the New Wave of Swedish Death Thrash..ala At The Gates, In Flames , The Haunted, Soilwork..which is very popular these days..with the likes of new bands like Lamb Of God, The Black Dialah Murder , Himsa , God Forbid and so on..

The constant element to death metal is "Gruff" vocals..to articulate the Brutality or aggression of Death Metal itself..These days you could put a "Gruff" vocals into a "power" metal band and be considered "death" metal..

Other than the "Gruff" vocal style..either from the throat or more gutteral ..from the belly..it all conveys the same message.."we hate you and love it".

It's supposed to be loud and obnoxious..to offend those who are stuck in traffic with you..what says "I hate you" better than some loud "death" metal when it is YOU that is the victim of "stuck in traffic rap music" coming from that Blazer with that 20 year old white goof at the wheel..:ROTF:

Well, the things I LIKE about Death Metal IS the aggression..but I like it "polished" meaning played with much virtuocity..the same virtuocity that you can find in bands like Dream Theater or Symphony X..just in a different context.

Don't get me wrong there is some shit Death metal out there...seems to me this genre seems to collect the worst case of "wannabes" , Garage grade talent that should STAY in the garage..!!!!!!!

Blast beats, Double kicks and gruff vocals all seem to be the essential to all death metal...

Just beacuse it blasts, and growls does NOT means it's "good"!!!

Like I said there is some technically AWESOME death metal ..such as Theory In Practice, Symbyosis, Cynic, Coroner, Krisiun, Cryptopsy, Necropahagist, Alarum, Carpharnaum, Athiest, Farmakon, Lunaris...so many great bands with the profenciency and virtuocity of any band you can think of in another genre of your preference..

I personally find that the BEST drummers are in the death and black metal genres..because it requires very fast feet and hands with great meter..that right there is a work of art!!

[zeegler]

Beer, and pot and percs oh my.

I feel good says James Brown, and me too.

[vander]

Thanks..that pretty much sums up what I was wanting to know. Is Opeth considered death metal? Are the bands that sing gruff versus and beautiful choirboy-like choruses ( Demon Hunter and Caliban style bands) considered death then? I would think real hardcore death metal bands would be offeded to share the genre with them. I'm glad you mentioned grind-core as I hear that a lot and have never understood what it was. Also, what is considered thrash.
I Knew I came to right place.

[horns666]

Grindcore..very deep baritone "gruff" vocals, from the belly..Mortician, Incantation, Malignancy, or faster shit like Cannibal Corpse..slow and sludgey...usually themes of cannibalisms and slimy stuff like that...it's all just fantasy metal..

like anything else..the "imagery" is a big part of it..be it Satan for "black" metal..Corpse and death for "Death" metal or "dragons and swords" for powermetal..these seem to be the usual "themes".

Of all the sub-genres of metal I seem to like Grind-core the least..I find most of it pretty interchangeable, predictable, and boring ..resulting in the whole album sounding like one long tedious song...Brutality just for brutality sake SUCKS IMO..Bash beats and growls alone don't make a band "good"!!

Like I said I love metal because their is so many GREAT musicians in this game..Metal to me is the epitome of virtuocity in many ways..so many bands keep pushing the envelope and sometimes break new ground doing so..even by adding jazz and or fusion elements into their music ..like Atheist, Cynic, Symbyosis, Arsis and our own JCF bro in Severed Savior..

what got me into Death metal for the first time was Coroner.. hands down..TT Baron (Tommy Verterlli) is an amazing guitar player..He he the chops , the tone the whole package..and they were a three piece and one amazing band..one of my very favorite guitar tones, riffs and writing is on Coroner's "Mental Vortex"..in fact I wrote a song that is VERY influenced by that record..I came up with a cool few riffs while listening to that album for a month straight!!..

If you want to get into "death" metal but never found a band interesting enough..start with Coroner..worked for me...Opeth may work for you..well their songs have "hooks"..which is important to me!!

Opeth is a Progressive Death metal band..so Opeth is a death metal band..very good band, lots of dynamics and good writing..lot's of light and darks..I like that!

I found Opeth a little boring this time around ..but they blew mw away the first time I saw them live....plus they just followed the enengy of Nevermore.

We have our own Fragle who is in a very cool death/thrash band..Final Breath..cool stuff ..ala old Kreator, Destruction, with some At The Gates thrown in..

Very much along the lines to my own band Bed Of Nails..which I would like to record a cd this Summer..that would be cool!!

[Endrik]

death metal's roots is thrash metal, DM added faster rhythms, blast beats, tremolo picking and cookie monster vocals, but otherwise a lot of riffs are very similar to thrash.

grindcore is a similar to death metal, a lot of death bands have played grindcore, it's faster and more insane but gridcore isn't really a metal sub-genre, because the roots are from hardcore-punk genres.

while Thrash Metal is heavy metal (New Wave Of British Heavy Metal to be exact) + punk (The Misfits etc.) and death metal was based on thrash, then grindcore took the influence directly from the punk/hardcore genre.

It's said that black metal was also influenced of Thrash metal but I can't say where its roots are from because it doesn't sound anything like thrash, death, grindcore, hardcore punk etc.
I don't find ANYTHING musical about black metal.

[Snoogans]

On a similar note, here's a query for you guys. As I've mentioned previously, I'm pretty new to all of the more extreme forms of metal. I have a copy of "Heartwork" by Carcass, which I think is brilliant, and I'm now looking for music in a similar vein. That is to say, super-tight heavy riffage, but with melodic guitar harmonies and decent solos! I can handle most growly vocal styles, but I can't be dealing with the high-pitched "Angry Hamster" sounding ones. Any suggestions?

[RacerX]

vander, check out BNRMetal, they have a whole section on genres:

http://www.bnrmetal.com/pages/genres.htm

Death Metal
One of the more extreme forms of metal, death metal is basically an offshoot of thrash, with less melodic riffs and a low, growly, often almost unintelligible vocal style that at its best (or worst, depending on one's point of view) has been described as "cookie monster vocals". The early nineties saw the initial rise of death metal in places such as Florida ( Death, Morbid Angel, Deicide, Obituary, and others) and Sweden ( At The Gates, Entombed, and others), and remains a dominant form of extreme metal to this day.

[Endrik]

I can handle most growly vocal styles, but I can't be dealing with the high-pitched "Angry Hamster" sounding ones. Any suggestions?

ahaa, Angry Hamster :ROTF:

I don't listen to extreme metal at all but sometimes (that means once in two years or something) with friends we put on some death metal or grindcore cd because it's hilarious. I can't listen to it too long tho. 20 minutes is the maximum amount I can take.
The lower the growl the better and funnier.
The high pitched cookie monster style wich is used in black metal is the most ridiculous thing I've ever heard. Dudes are screaming like they have dick in their throat
The low pitch growl is funny. If you are gonna sound like an animal then do it in a manly way.

[VitaminG]

On a similar note, here's a query for you guys. As I've mentioned previously, I'm pretty new to all of the more extreme forms of metal. I have a copy of "Heartwork" by Carcass, which I think is brilliant, and I'm now looking for music in a similar vein. That is to say, super-tight heavy riffage, but with melodic guitar harmonies and decent solos! I can handle most growly vocal styles, but I can't be dealing with the high-pitched "Angry Hamster" sounding ones. Any suggestions?

check out Arch Enemy & Lamb of God for a start. I'm not much into the whole genre, but the guitar in these two bands is too good to let something petty like vocals get in the way of my diggin' 'em

[RacerX]

Similar artists to Carcass:

http://music.yahoo.com/ar-296244-similar--Carcass


I'm most familiar with Bolt Thrower, really dig those guys (and girl)!

[vander]

Thanks for all the explanations. I'm not looking to get into death metal as much as just trying to educate myself a bit. I see these classifications thrown around and never really understood what the implications were.
I mentioned Opeth because Ghost Reveries was the album that popped my cherry on gruff vocals...not because I'm such a huge fan. I had the exact impression you did of the opeth/nevermore show. I have since been listening to internet radio metal stations with rotations that feature gruff vocal bands and have found dozens I would listen to before I would put in Opeth.
Since we're in Q/A mode...talking about the Opeth/NV show made me think of another question.
That concert ended up being the first 6:30 show I saw at the House of Blues. I'm 40 and a now reformed old school metal..Maiden..Dio..type fan and all the shows I had seen previously at HOB were the 9:00 pm over 21 variety so this was my first up-close exposure to pits. I have been to Ozzfest type shows but always had pavillion seating so was never really a witness/unwilling participant to this before.
I'm not complaining about the kids that do this...I just don't really understand it. Is there more to moshing(?) than I guess just letting out aggression. It strikes me as odd because you laid out a pretty good sum to see a band you like..it seems funny to spend all your time knocking heads with the kids you see at school everyday rather than watch the band you paid to see. Like I said, peace and love, it was really more entertaining than annoying to avoid but it kinda got me scratching my head. I saw hundreds of metal shows in the Eighties and all we did was flash horns and bob our heads.
The bands seem to encourage it so I didn't know if there was a deeper meaning I was not aware of.
Sorry for the long winded questions...but these are things I have been wondering about for some time.