Was Death By Metal a Seminal Recording?

[Sepulchral Voice]

Hessians seem to ignore this release. Mantas' debut demo was recorded in 1983 (Most sources now claim 1984, but for the longest time it was widely known as 1983), a time when Hellhammer was the ultimate extreme metal band. Granted the songs themselves are not amazing, but it amazes me how early this was recorded. The guitars are tuned to C (2 steps down), and the vocals are grunted and snarled by Kam Lee of Massacre.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UfuAi1ZvCsU

[Devamitra]

It is interesting, I can hear the hardcore and Venom influence. Kam's vocals just probably came out like that when he tried to sing like Cronos or Lemmy. Not unique for it's time, but definitely deserves a cult status.

[Heydrich]

Exactly why do believe this to have "ignored" by anyone? This topic has certainly been visited here...

[Humanicide]

I think that while Death doesnt get put up on a pedestal here (which is refreshing), they also don't seem to get any musical recognition. Seems that whenever someone mentions them it just turns into a whole AIDS accusation thread.

Death/Mantas deserves a place in the sun, but they shouldn't be the only ones.

[Sepulchral Voice]

I think that while Death doesnt get put up on a pedestal here (which is refreshing), they also don't seem to get any musical recognition. Seems that whenever someone mentions them it just turns into a whole AIDS accusation thread.

Death/Mantas deserves a place in the sun, but they shouldn't be the only ones.

I agree completely. For those wondering why I think it is ignored:

"One of the first to popularize (but not invent: Possessed, Massacra, Sepultura, Morbid Angel, Deathstrike, Hellhammer and Necrovore predate them) the death metal genre."

- DLA

Massacra - Formed 1986
Sepultura - Formed 1984
Morbid Angel - Formed 1984
Necrovore - Formed 1986

Death/Mantas - Formed 1983. Also the first of these bands to actually release a demo.



I detest 90's Death just as much as the rest of you guys, by the way.

[Humanicide]

Yes but so far as debut albums, Possessed, Sepultura, Celtic Frost/Hellhammer, and Deathstrike have them beaten. Albums are more a contributing factor to a movement than a demo, usually.

[Sepulchral Voice]

Death Strike/Master don't count. Fuckin' Death wasn't released (as a full length) until 1991, and Master waited until 2003 to release their 1985 album.

[Heydrich]

I think that while Death doesnt get put up on a pedestal here (which is refreshing), they also don't seem to get any musical recognition. Seems that whenever someone mentions them it just turns into a whole AIDS accusation thread.

Death/Mantas deserves a place in the sun, but they shouldn't be the only ones.

I loved early Death in the 80's and do so to the day - and apologize to no one for it. I do like to remind folks, however, that there was a great deal more to those albums than Shuldiner's much-balleyhooed creative genius. Without Kam Lee(pre-Death), Chris Reifert, Rick Rozz, etc. (or even later without Murphy, Masvidal, Digiorgio, Hoglan, etc.) Death would almost certainly have been a great deal less impressive all around. 
 

[Humanicide]

Death Strike/Master don't count. Fuckin' Death wasn't released (as a full length) until 1991, and Master waited until 2003 to release their 1985 album.

Only because of label problems. Same deal with Morbid Angel.

[Conservationist]

Death/Mantas - Formed 1983. Also the first of these bands to actually release a demo.

Slayer released an album in 1983 that was more death metal than anything Mantas would do until 1988. The early death stuff is just bad speed metal with death vocals, coming (in 1984, their first release) a full year after Bathory, Sodom, Hellhammer.

Then the 1985 albums by Possessed, Sepultura, and the 1986 album by Morbid Angel are all more fully advanced.

It was only when Chris Reifert got involved that the band became death metal, it seems. Kam Lee is underrated but that didn't save Mantas from being not only bad music, but not even really death metal.

[Humanicide]

See now this is what I mean.

What the hell disqualifies Mantas/Death from being death metal? Granted, Mantas were more along the Venom vein until they got their hands on a Possessed demo (of course now someone will tell me that Venom is insignificant as well), but they are an early example of a death metal band. NOTE: they are not the first death metal band, but calling Mantas/Death not death metal is absurd, regardless of personal feelings toward the band and Schuldiner.

May I also remind that death metal was influenced heavily by speed metal, among other things.

[Heavy_Jerk]

As far as Schuldiner-hate on anus.com goes, it's really pathetic. First it was funny, but now it's just getting more and more ridiculous.

[Galvanized]

As far as Schuldiner-hate on anus.com goes, it's really pathetic. First it was funny, but now it's just getting more and more ridiculous.

The most often I see it brought up now and days is when a) a fan of Death finds some old trolling material centered on Schuldiner via google, or what have you, and posts on the forums looking for a fight, or b) occassionally on the birth-date of one of the band members or a seminal release date of one of Death's albums. The second case is far, far more rare than the first.

[Devamitra]

This album innovates many of the styles of death metal: cyclonic strumming that synchs to micro-reductive rhythms, churning like an underground music; the placement of muffled strumming between verses for Baphomet-style riding brutality; ambient rolling tonal shifts subtly altering harmonic space behind lead guitars or lead rhythms of fast, liquid notes; backgrounding of major notes into the riff to achieve subtle but effective double-strumming; and synchronizing of strumming rhythm with percussion high register (high hat or similar distinctive low-footprint sounds). In these, and in the basic and undefinable art of phrase/virus composition, Death are supreme.

http://www.anus.com/metal/death/

Don't you think this is quite enough praise given to the whole phenomenon that is Death? I mean, there could be reviews of later albums just reiterating the same thing but adding how the degenerative influences of power metal and progressive metal start to creep in, creating mostly useless genre hybrids like Gothenburg and in the end, metalcore. But then those reviews would create their own pointless threads and discussion that doesn't help anyone, because the worshippers have made up their minds about them and we have too. I'm not going try to force myself like "Symbolic" because it is supposedly a metal classic. I tried it and lost valuable moments.

Maybe "Leprosy" would be nice to see reviewed one day, though.

[RedReign]

I think part of the problem with Death is that Schuldiner was by many accounts an incredible asshole.  He rubbed a whole lot of people the wrong way and it's colored many opinions about the band.

Perhaps that had something to do with the mass that was growing inside his skull.

Personally I haven't been much of a fan since Leprosy.  I still think  of Leprosy as the "new Death sound" which I'm still not altogether sure about.

I suppose I should probably form an opinion on it one of these years.

How many shots of Jaeger did I have the night of the Death show in 1995?  I remember King Diamond being completely off the hook awesome, as always, but the only thing I remember of Death was the opening of Pull the Plug, then staggering into the pit.  That's the last time I got absolutely blacked out drunk.

"I really had a blackout, baby!"