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Save on corpse paint now – stock up before the inevitable price hike this Halloween! Not sure what you new look should be? Let extreme metal professor John Taylor explain:
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These are cool! I like that Jon sticks mainly to the basic characteristics of each without going too far down the sub-sub-sub genre wormhole. Death Metal is especially guilty of multiple sub-genres, some of which, like Death n Roll and Melodic Death Metal, the riffing can really deviate from the traditional “vanilla set” of Death Metal riffing styles. Also different geographical “scenes” have very distinct differences in sound (Floridian Death Metal, UK Death Metal, and Swedish Death Metal, for example, all have their own “flavor” of death metal riffing).
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For sure. This is probably heretical but in the “In Flames” examples we used in the initial intro video, I had trouble hearing how melodic death was even death at all. It’s got emo choruses. I was editing that and thinking, isn’t this just what mainstream metal sounds like now??
So yes, so many genres!
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I think most people just hear the vocal style and the band gets categorized based on that, even if other elements really deviate from other main aspects of the style.
Those mid-late 90s Melodic Death Metal bands like At the Gates, In Flames, and Carcass’ Heartwork and Swansong albums were also huge influences on Metalcore bands like Killswitch Engage, Trivium, Shadows Fall, etc. so it definitely had a hand in defining what we think of “modern mainstream metal” in general.
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From a technical perspective I can understand why you’re looking into this regarding picking technique…
but focusing in on this subset, is just cashing in on “Satanic Panic” and everything that comes along with it.
much better uses of your time imo
I thought about this, but honestly, as someone who both plays in a death metal band and is just in general a big death metal fan, I kind of appreciated that this overview wasn’t shy about the lyrical and aesthetic elements of these genres. Like it or not, they are an important part of the styles, as it all goes hand in hand.
I loved what Troy said in Brandon Ellis’ interview that death metal can be for (paraphrasing) “harmony nerds that also like B-Horror.” this 100000% Nicke Anderson from Entombed said that the Hellraiser soundtrack was an influence on their album Clandestine, and then of course they straight up lifted the theme from “Phantasm” for the glorious title track of “Left Hand Path” (IMO the greatest death metal record of all time).
So yeah, you can’t really talk about these genres without getting into the sometimes unsavory things (both fictional and non-fictional) that inspired the aesthetics.
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Glad you dig this stuff! Yeah, too many sub genres. Man, I can’t track of all of it. Way too complicated, so I like just sticking with the broad overview. I’ll let those who are more “elite” bicker about what nuances are out there.
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Trust me, if we wanted cash, I don’t think Black Metal is going to deliver it to us by the truckload! I’m actually kind of amazed there’s enough money in it to keep some of these bands going after all these years. There are huge deathy bands like Gojira, but most seem to be almost mom-and-pop level, playing for the super insiders.
You are right that we’re doing this because it’s a style where the mechanics really are specialized in a way that is perfect for what we study. But I also just think it’s a creative niche populated by dedicated people that keep doing their own thing regardless of what’s considered cool. That alone is worth supporting.
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To your point, when I heard the In Flames clip, I actually thought of Underoath. And not being a metal insider I sort of always associated those bands more with pop punk of the mid 2000s rather than extreme metal, since there’s not much in the way of blast beats or growls in that music. Kind of like a more extreme My Chemical Romance. I had no idea about the death metal connection until we started doing John’s seminar.
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Well that’s because most of the 2000s melodic metalcore bands loved At the Gates and In Flames.
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maybe “cash in” wasn’t exactly accurate… “sensationalize”? lol I dunno?
again, i’ll recognize the talent/technique in some of these extreme forms of music, but as a Bible believing Christian I stand opposed to their “message”… but they do as their father tells them to.
I have alot to say about this segment of heavy/hard rock music that delves into Occult, but I digress.
Gotcha. Yes, there are definitely lyrical messages there that we’re not trying to endorse. The intent was definitely not to try and sensationalize either for the sake of sales. I don’t even see how that works. If anything we tried to deliver the overview in the most neutral way possible. John actually re-recorded some of those voiceover segments so we could add in more examples to represent the different shades of this, since these bands are definitely not monolithic.
For example, Slayer definitely express specifically anti-Christian views in a few of their songs. But Dave Mustaine is actually a born-again Christian. And Megadeth still plays “Holy Wars” live. The song is not so much against religion as it is against religious and government corruption. The attempt here was to be documentarian more than anything else, in representing the range of messages present in these musical styles.
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Yes I see that now! Making the seminar was definitely a learning experience that helped tie together things I only knew as a casual listener.
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I’ve been listening to this shit since I was a kid. I had a babysitter who introduced me to Shout At The Devil, and then Reign In Blood. I took over after that and dove in head first. I was lucky enough to see almost all of the original Florida death metal band early in their careers and many of them multiple times. The only one I didn’t get to see that still bums me out to this day is Carcass.
I never bought into the gimmicks and my mom was cool enough to know that. But the more extreme the cover and song titles were, the more I wanted to hear it. I owe all of my early speed and stamina to the genre. I still listen to the first couple of albums from quite a few of those bands to this day. Not daily, or even weekly, but when the mood hits, there’s nothing better!
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They do still tour and are still awesome live. Bill Steer is my #1 favorite death metal guitarist, both for riffs and leads. They were the first death metal band I ever saw live, on their 2008 reunion tour. Suffocation and Necrophagist opened (!!). Definitely one of the most memorable concerts I’ve ever gone to.
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I watched their Waken set from last year and it was fantastic! Necrotism is my favorite album of theirs and my favorite death metal album overall.
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Carcass is awesome definitely see them if you get a chance they are incredibly on point with the guitar harmonies when I saw them in the Surgical Steel tour.
As a Christian I have a very love/hate relationship with black metal for the same reason. The second wave Norwegian scene was mostly just spoiled edgelord teenagers being edgelord teenagers. I like the riffing style and the way they make almost symphonic kind of ideas with walls of guitars especially the very technically proficient players like Ihsahn from Emperor. Definitely a big fan of the atmospheric/ambient stuff like Paysage D’hiver that’s just about winter and nature landscapes and the more folk stuff like early Ulver and Agalloch.
Boss should legit use that one riff at about 2:30 as the advert for the HM-2 pedal legit one of the best tones ever.
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In the “bedroom shredding” scenes we dramatized for the original series, I made sure to include closeups of the HM2 and the Peavey Backstage 30 practice amp, since that’s all I had for years. I understood that pros probably used other gear to get their luscious EVH-like overdrive, but had no idea what it was. All I had was my bees-in-a-can pedal into a clean amp - and not a good clean amp. To find out later that this pedal was responsible for any kind of classic tone is just totally hilarious.
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I wonder if that’s better than using an Alesis Quadraverb into a Marshall JCM800, but only as a “power amp” for the Alesis… I still cringe at the thought of doing that.
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