Advertised as a black metal release, Terra contains each and every one of the traits people might identify the genre with. The raspy vocals eclipsed by the distortion of the guitars, the dominating use of tremolo or simple strumming on the guitars and the steady and smoothly changing pace of the songs, and even a folk melody or two.
A few tell-tale signs tell us this is more in the vein of post-rock with progressive pretension. The inclination towards plain major-scale melodies can be considered superficial, but more often than not does separate black metal from the foreigners who are only borrowing its tools. The alien scent is most offensive in the blatant filler of Dj-groove sections which almost bring to mind Periphery’s Matt Halpern.
The importance of dissecting Terra lies in the relevance of knowing how to separate black metal’s “atmospheric” tendencies versus post-metal and the lesser (most) ambient music whose sole point is to “create atmosphere”. Black metal creates atmosphere and that atmosphere becomes a tool to what it is saying. Terra’s music is atmosphere.
Music is not about pointing out different elements.
Music, a work of music, is about integrating all the elements.
If you are able to say “this is a very rhythmical part/this is a very emotional part/this is a very technical part/this is a very atmospheric part”, you are not making music. You are, maybe, only producing some (could be also very interesting and very beautiful) sounds.
Texas crossover thrash unit BIRTH A.D. is looking for a permanent guitarist in the Austin/Central Texas area. They are currently signed to Unspeakable Axe Records and distributed by Dark Descent Records in the Americas, along with European label support through Metal Age Productions. Vocalist/guitarist Jeff Tandy released the following statement about the search:
“All viable players will be considered. If you can play anything and everything onSpeak English or Die, you are welcome! Classic-era Slayer worship is also a plus. Contact the band at birthad@gmail.com. Join us in the war on morons!”
BIRTH A.D. released I Blame You in March 2013 on Unspeakable Axe Records. Purchase and/or stream the album Here.
After parting ways with Carcass following the completion of Heartwork, the Swede Michael Amott embarked on his own project called Arch Enemy. Stigmata is the non-sell-out sibling of that last reviled/worshiped Carcass album in which Amott participated in. Starting out with Johan Liva barking in the vocal department, this was a far cry from the embarrassingly audience-pleasing act this band later became.
While most so-called melodic death metal acts, including later Arch Enemy, following in the footsteps of Carcass’ last album (Swansong should have been kept by Bill Steer for private use) produce clear, straight-up pop verse-chorus with riffs and solos in the manner of the most mainstream 1980s metal. Sticking out from the crowd, Stigmata explores different song structures, and different ratios between Swedeath Carnage-style riff sections and those which are direct references to 1980s melodic metal. Michael Amott presents us here, in this still underground release, the best of his ideas in their most sincere (though not optimal) form.
Symptomatic of the middle-age crisis that underground metal went through in the mid 1990s, Stigmata shows a sincere desire to produce solid, thought-out metal music, but its motivation and direction is misplaced in nostalgia-driven emulations of the past rather than a forward vision. This was the end of metal’s own romantic era. Metal artists’ general illiteracy in art could give no rise to a counterpart to the 20th century modernist classical music (perhaps Obscura was an exception?) and it went straight to post-modernist pandemonium shortly after the turn of the century.
When receiving descriptions of new releases from labels, one can read all sort of outrageous and preposterous claims on par with “the beginning of a new era in metal”, “unprecedented innovation”, “I’m tougher than Vladimir Putin” or “We went to Afghanistan to bring democracy to the people”. It wasn’t all that surprising, then, to read the first introductory line and find that young Indonesian band Exhumation was being hailed as a classic. I rolled my eyes at this and proceeded to get my face punched.
Exhumation plays a violent proto-black metal in the vein of Sarcófago and an aftertaste of Blasphemy. I will stress that they play in the vein of those bands. But they escape the clone-curse and give the listener a familiar but altogether new and original experience. As underground metal styles death and black have moved well past the initial stages of formation and definition, most bands have turned to simple rehashing or attempts at innovation. Unfortunately innovation is often perceived superficially. We should talk about progress and not innovation, which is often confused with novelty. I would not hesitate to call this album true progress. Albeit a conservative, cautious progress in this particular style.
Opus Death, a silly title which made me seriously doubt the album at first, is Exhumation’s second album. Exhumation understand the language and are proficient users of the same, knowing how to formulate their own statements. Not only are they original in what they say, but they also learn from the classics by avoiding their errors and carefully expanding where there is potential to expand. Ideas and the riffs they span let the listener become familiar with them as is required in the black metal tradition, but they do not overstay their visit nor overstep their roles. Transition riffs are adequately unstable and work effectively with drum patterns to create the gasping effect so that the listener can breath before the music goes on, unrelenting.
Both highly chromatic, Slayeresque solos as well the simple, rough and tonal melodies make an appearance in the record without sounding disparate in any way. The balance of taste and style always carefully preserved. Much can be said of the placing of the solos which is always optimal and contributing to the emotional upheaval they cause within the emotional predictability of this kind of music.
Another feature of this album that should not be overlooked or underestimated is the use of piano and guitar interludes right at the middle and at the end of the album, respectively. It is hard not to draw a parallel with Blessed are the Sick, but I am willing to venture and say that as to their contribution to the album as a whole, they are much more powerful and relevant in Opus Death. Both beautiful in their minimalist rendition of the harmonic skeleton behind the ripping black metal of the band, they contrast the slaughtering slashes of the rest of the album and serve as inverted climaxes.
Trying to praise this as uncompromising is an insult to Exhumation. Rather, the mature and sensible compromises Exhumation incurs in are what account for the steady and sure steps of their music. It might be too soon to call it a classic, but it sure feels like one. Far from naive or wanting in any technical respect, Opus Death shows us that even though traditional and true underground metal may be difficult to carry on whilst being original, it is not impossible, but we need to look beyond juvenile feelings of rebellion to do so. Metal is not young anymore, act accordingly.
“Why?” you ask. Why indeed. “Why is this on a website called deathmetal.org?”. Because to promote ideals, what must be avoided must also be examined. Obsolete gives us plenty of material to work with in this respect. It has the gimmicky over-emotional vocals and the string unrelated catchy and head-bob-inducing sections that would not be out of place in a Coheed and Cambria record.
With the all-too-common excuse of being a progressive band, Obsolete give little thought to whether the ideas they are pasting together actually make any sense as a whole. Not only is the whole unconvincing but the individual ideas are also echoes of the past in a series of bland reincarnations of alternative rock voices. Often voicing social protest in Latin American music, this style of music is used by Obsolete to speak of plain and obvious things as if they were the most mysterious enigmas of the universe. Such is the power channeled by this music.
Riven represents the lowest common denominator for the casual music fan. By definition, there is no shortage of these, so that this album is sure to find a substantial audience ready to talk about how deep and emotional this music and its lyrics are.
The reader can help themselves to this profound music here.
Centinex has revealed the music video for Moist Purple Skin, from their upcoming album titled Redeeming Filth.
The band will perform a short string of selected dates this summer, including the following festivals:
12.06 2015 ROM – Bucharest – Metalhead Meeting Festival
26.06 2015 GER – Protzen – Protzen Open Air
10.07 2015 CZE – Trutnov – Obscene Extreme Festival
25.09 2015 SWE – Hultsfred – Mörkaste Småland Festival
The purpose of this series is to present the death metal fan (and by extension, the death metal writer/artist/composer) with a look into great classical string quartets that evoke the same violent and stark atmosphere that is typical of death metal.
The metal fan is encouraged to look beyond superficial parallels or differences so that he realizes how these string quartets by master composers developed into a cornucopia of expressions, patterns and details. I wish this would also be an aspiration or at least an inspiration for the artist (or would-be artist) that has the chance of reading it.
Another good reason to listen to string quartets in general is that they tend to express a more sincere and private facet of the composer while also being a test to his prowess in composition.
Ludwig van Beethoven: Op. 133, Grosse Fuge
Originally written as the last movement of his Op. 130, String Quartet No. 13 in B flat major, this massive movement was once commented on by Stravinsky saying that it is “an absolutely contemporary piece of music that will be contemporary forever.”. Stravinsky was referring to the absolute character of the music and its jarring disparity with temporal conventions.
Dmitry Shostakovich: String Quartet No. 10 in A flat, Op. 118
The well-known dark personality of Shostakovich’s compositions comes through in distilled and intensified manner in his string quartets. In here we find a mature Shostakovich channeling visions of a personal hell. We can imagine his will to fight through and see the light at the end of the tunnel despite facing terror and dread.
Delirium was formed in 1990 as Delirium Tremens. In 1995 they debuted with a self-titled album considered to be a Central American classic. It was a particular style drawing influences from many different styles of metal ranging from NWOBHM, Speed Metal, Thrash to punk and alternative rock without falling into the carnival approach of modern metal bands. The influences blend and boil down to form an almost concrete and new street-dirty heavy metal style. A close look at Delirium’s discography shows how the band has evolved through the years gradually taking in more mainstream influences after having parted from a mixture of early Iron Maiden and Metallica. Looking under the hood of post-debut Delirium one can find a weakening of an original voice and the more obvious influence of 1980s Rush and late, prog-bent Iron Maiden.
Tiempo, Limites y Espacio is a collection of acoustic arrangements of older songs. The band retains a professional musician’s touch for pacing and pausing, showing us why they are still one of the leading acts in central america. We find Latin-styled acoustic guitar leads, understated popular drum rhythms along with Latin hand-percussion in some interludes, bridges and intros. Occasional use of maracas for rhythmic emphasis are use in very limited instances. Verses reduce guitar to chords supporting the vocal melody line. Characteristically 1970s synth effects are used for melodies and even a solo on the track Abismo, while the remaining use of keyboard functions are simple and direct organ and piano chord outlining. The refreshing presence of bow instruments grace brief interludes. The aura these exude may remind one of Empyrium’s Into the Pantheon, a personal favorite of the writer. It is also clear that the singer is consciously aiming to emulate the overt style of Adrian Barilari, of the late Rata Blanca, and by extension the style of Bruce Dickinson.
What we find here are original Latin street heavy metal and alternative heavy metal styled songs fine tuned and made ready for mainstream radio exposure for quick acceptance with a mainstream audience. This acoustic release (as is any faithful acoustic arrangement of metal music) is a highlight of the qualities behind the music and the songwriting capabilities of the band.
If, like me, the reader has also purchased the latest reissue of Gorguts’ Obscura, he will find that the booklet’s back side is graced by the following quote by Osho:
The journey is long and the path is pathless and one has to be alone. There is no map and no one to guide. But there is no alternative. One cannot escape it, one cannot evade it. One has to go on the journey. The goal seems impossible but the urge to go on is intrinsic. The need is deep in the soul.
Although definitely not typical of a 1990s death metal record, these lines describe the drive that produced this almost accidental album. But aren’t all such savant releases at least partially accidental?
The spiritual and existentialist atmosphere that this quote evokes actually reflects the nature of the album as a whole and are in perfect alignment with its lyrics.
Some metal albums have beautiful lyrics accompanying the music. But the best albums bring sound and word together to shape a living entity that takes lodge in man’s heart.
Latest being drowned
In fictive degradation
Coming depression revolved
Around an Earth
Nostalgia excludes the whole
As spleen takes over me
Resound, the echoes of my threnodies
And then the fact of being
Has no longer meaning
The hymns of light
They’ll sing once I’ll be gone
Reverie appears cause
Existence collapse
Nostalgia
Sadness shall obnuilate
Sadness, feels, the desolated
Desperately lost within
Lament, pain and misery
The more lies burden lives,
The more I am dying
The realm of light
I’ll reach once I’ll…
Latest feeling drowned
In lucid contradiction
Coming relation revolved
Around a heart
Nostalgia excludes the whole
Emerging from a hard rock background, Rush made increasingly ambitious attempts at being on par with the European progressive acts of the early 1970s. Although dubbed a progressive rock band, Rush’s music would be best described as a “poor-man’s” progressive rock. A naive and straightforward attempt at emulating the workings of the music of more refined bands like Yes or King Crimson. As such it has been one of the most easily comprehensible progressive bands to the general public.
Released in 1980, Permanent Waves is the Rush album that most closely approaches the ideals of the by-then defunct progressive rock movement. Being the highlight of the band’s technical competence, here we find Rush at its most bombastic and dynamic. As a preamble to later so-called progressive rock and metal (henceforth referred to as pseudo prog), this album features songs which make use of elements of contrasting musical styles (the listener will even find a reggae-styled section) to break the spell of a mood. In doing so it aligns itself with music appropriate for listeners who prefer a casual but engaging distraction.
Despite this stylistic digressions ,Permanent Waves manages to be generally constant in its artistic voice. Rush’s expert and moderate use of synths, the ease of transitions, and the satisfactory clarity of the goals in their structure-building-oriented songs make this release the peak of Rush’s works.
