Oh, I also listened to High on Fire again for the first time since I started this whole thing and Plumpudding recommended I listen to Devilution. It’s funny how different my perspective on them is from this side of things. I still really enjoy them but they sound a lot less crazy to me now. This is what Sleep turned into? I dig it.
It’s more of a side project. You should go through all of Blessed Black Wings. Their earlier albums are good too. The Art of Self Defense is slower, with more slop, less direction and with a somewhat less full sound, but still worth a listen. Surrounded By Thieves is a great album, and you can hear they’re really getting into gear, but suffers from bad audio. I can’t comment on the rest of their output, as I drifted away from metal for a while around 2008. I’ve only recently gotten back into it again myself, and I haven’t gotten around to their later releases yet.
Aye; there’s just something special about Bolt Thrower. 
Really, really glad that you like them.
Entombed aren’t my thing but Wolverine Blues is what gets talked up, aye.
This is an example of Gothenburg-ian metal. I’m not a big fan of of melodeath (melodic death metal) in the first place because I’m not a big fan of melody, but it does appeal to quite a few people.
Both of these bands are TDM bands, although Nile sometimes strays into straight up brutal death metal territory.
Tech death can be amazing but usually isn’t. I’ll post separately about tech death later.
I think you’re going to like the two Electric Wizard albums I linked in an earlier post, eh.
Sutur Rising is a fantastic album. Their next two are more of the same only more so; as I said, they seem to be doing the same thing Bolt Thrower did: honing their sound with every album.
Not really. Certain songs are harder, but not a whole album. I love the band and respect the hell out of them, but with every song being it’s own 12-minute mini-epic amalgam of styles, I’m okay with them popping up on shuffle rather than listening to a whole album.
Don’t get me wrong: every album I buy gets listened to from start to finish at least once; that’s what I’ve done since I was a kid. But not every album is 10 or 12 or 16 fantastic songs in a row, ya know what I’m sayin’?
Sleep didn’t turn into HOF; it’s more nuanced than that.
Sleep is Shirtless Matt Pike (guitar), Crazy Al Cisneros and (now) Jason Roeder (drums).
Matt Pike formed High On Fire after Sleep broke up in the '90s over the non-release of their 2nd full length, submitted to the record company as a single 63 minute track called Dopesmoker. HOF are a low-end chuggy kind of sludge/stoner/biker/doom metal band. High On Fire - Rumors Of War.
Al Cisneros and Chris Hakius (Sleep’s original drummer) formed Om, a drone metal band. Like, serious drone. Om - Pilgrimage (full album)
Very different styles of music.
Jason Roeder is one of the founding members of Neurosis (if you haven’t heard of them, I suggest you look them up; very good, very important band). He started playing with Al when Chris retired from music back in 2009.
Here’s a fun fact: Al Cisneros has also recorded with Scott Kelly, the bass player from Neurosis. In 2009, without warning, an eponymous album from Shrinebuilder hit the shelves. I had no idea what to expect; the CD ended up in my truck for more than 8 months. Recorded in just 3 days by Al Cisneros (bass), Scott Kelly (guitar), Scott “Wino” Weinrich (guitar & vocals) and Dale Crover (drums, from Melvins, Nirvana, Eyehategod, Fantômas, etc.)
After a number of years went by with no word of a new album or a touring or anything, people started asking questions, which led to this infamous interview quote:
They get better, for the most part. You’re absolutely right that poor production hurts their earlier releases, but their songs get tighter, leaner and meaner with each album too, IMO. Oh sure, they’ve tried their hands at long, proggy stuff a few times over the years; what doom-ish band doesn’t? ;)
I think I might’ve heard a later release, as a friend of mine is heavily into doom and sludge, but that must have been at a party. My memory is bad enough when I’m sober, so I can’t say for sure. I bought BBW at Supersonic in Birmingham, just after they’d gone off “stage” (the audience was standing in an empty swimming pool). Then Modified Toy Orchestra entered and I was blown away again. Straight back to the merch booth!
I like this thread, as I’m also getting back into metal. Lots of great stuff in here. I’m also getting back into the metal scene in Oslo and I’m a bit nervous. Last time left me an off taste for over a decade… “Kerry King is a shit guitarist! He’s not playing Dream Theater!” Ugghh…
Spent the morning commute catching up on this thread. interesting thoughts, and I like the (sort of) chronological way you’re working through them. Good work to the various posters helping out with suggestions and explaining the history of different scenes and sub genres.
Looks like we’re approaching modern day, so I offer one suggestion (mainly because I don’t think they’ve been mentioned yet): Deafheaven.
Modern black metal band with a lot of post rock and shoe gaze influence. Other bands have done similar things, but never as well in my opinion. Who would’ve thought that black metal could be so colourful.
A lot of black metal purists (and regular metal purists) hate them, but I think their album Sunbather is one of the most important metal albums of the decade.
Okay, so that’s what I aim to do here: post about Technical Death Metal.
I linked an Atheist album earlier, and I know NAF has heard some Death, so that’s a good starting point.
Atheist really opened people’s eyes (and ears) by showing what highly competent, technically proficient musicians could do within the metal oeuvre. They stretched the hell out of the boundaries of metal, but it was still recognizably metal. I know I’ve harped on it before, but this is where the music became part of the abilities of the performers. The skill level then was stellar, today it is somewhere at the edge of the cosmos, pushing back against the void. And technical death metal exists to showcase those abilities first and offer cool songs second. That can be important to remember when listening.
Now, some bands have both playing ability and songwriting skills. Those are the artists that I’ll focus on, because frankly, they’re the ones I like and care about.
So what you’re gonna get with tech death is lots of crazy time-changes, lots of crazy time signatures, and lots of intricately arranged and performed music. Inhuman beats per minute, machine-like sweep picking, etc. Some variation in the vocals but expect good solid CMVs. Remember that basically everyone involved is here to show off. Oh, and lots of proggy songs, too, because of course there will be.
Some bands show off a lot but suck to listen to. One of my favorites of this ilk is Behold… The Arctopus. Check out the first song on their debut album: Behold… The Arctopus - Exospacial Psionic Aura. That’s 2 guys: a drummer and a guy playing a 12-string Warr guitar. They are jaw-droppingly talented players and their music is complicated as hell. It’s also painfully boring to listen to, IMO.
So that’s the problem with tech death: the priorities of the artist and/or music may not be much fun to listen to, despite how much fun it was to play.
This was especially a problem back in the early days (throughout the '90s, I’d say), but again, as the genre developed and as young artists explored their own talents, the ones with songwriting skills had more staying power, overall, and more influence on later practitioners, so now there’s a sizable body of really good tech death. Like all metal genres, there’s quite a bit of crossover into other related genres (like slam, brutal death, grindcore, and plain old death metal, for instance).
Another early band besides Atheist and Death that is important is Cynic (although for the life of me I don’t know why), known for their painstaking songwriting process, intricate arrangements and their pursuit of “perfection”.
I’m reasonably certain that anyone who explores tech death is gonna find lots of stuff they don’t care for; that part is easy. That’s why I’m gonna try and help with the hard part and offer some shortcuts to the good stuff (I’ve already suffered so y’all don’t have to, eh):
In 2003 Necrophagist’s debut Onset of Putrefaction dropped on us. Highly complex arrangements and parts, all played with incredible speed & precision. Excellent CMVs. And, it turned out, all the product of one man, Muhammed Suiçmez. Thanks to the album’s enthusiastic reception by the metal community, he soon found other high caliber musicians and the next album, 2004’s Epitaph was even more polished and accessible, IMO.
Necrophagist - Stabwound
Necrophagist - Only Ash Remains
That set a pretty high bar, eh, and bands woke the fuck up and got to work.
Obscura - Akroasis
Obscura - Diluvium
Beyond Creation - Omnipresent Perception
Beyond Creation - Earthbound Evolution
Dying Fetus - From Womb To Waste
Dying Fetus - Wrong One To Fuck With
The Faceless - Sons Of Belial
The Faceless - Hymn Of Sanity
Between The Buried And Me is a tech death band, by the way. That track you listened to is on their latest album, Automata II. They do a lot of thematic albums that sometimes carry over for more than one release.
There’s a ton of bands that have tried their hands at this kind of music, and most, like Behold… The Arctopus just never quite make the music as fun and interesting to listen to as it must be to play but a few have managed to achieve listenability and helped refine the template further. And of course, the general skill level of plain old death metal continues to climb, with every successive generation notching it up a bit from their predecessors so that the sub-genre lines get blurred a lot with certain bands. For instance, Dying Fetus is also referred to as a brutal death metal band and a death metal band. None of that is wrong, just incomplete (they’re all of the above).
So that’s an overview of the genre and some examples to listen to. Any questions?
:smack:
That should be Earthborn Evolution. DYAC!
Thanks for the breakdown. I will add Atheist to my listening list. You also mentioned Death as a tech death band? I have listened to Scream Bloody Gore and Leprosy, a good start?
How do those connect to this which seems to be super critically acclimated and which… Like how do you even listen to that? Everyone is playing in a different time signature. It’s like a less listenable Trout Mask Replica.
Aye; Death would be an example of an early tech death metal band. The music is sufficiently complex and the playing is very accomplished and precise.
Hmmmm.
Not sure how to answer that except to say that it all works for me. I mean, Cryptopsy aren’t my favorite band, but I can hear what they’re going for.
Tech death is a difficult genre because, as I said, the focus of the music is squarely on the playing and composing abilities of the performers. The genre lives and dies on those abilities and talents, so the trick is to play stuff that is difficult that’s still compelling to listen to.
Think of tech death as a spectrum. On one end is all scales and insane blastbeats and atonal riffing at lightspeed. At the other end is pure chugga chug mosh pit-y-ness. Every tech death band has to find their own space on that spectrum. Dying Fetus is arguably more groove-oriented than Behold… The Arctopus. Gigan is more focused on the difficulty than on the groove. Necrophagist did a great job of balancing the two, IMO, as does Opeth. There’s just a lot of variation in tech death as far as difficult to play/listen to and frankly, I think that sometimes their ears are just more educated than mine so that it’s entirely possible that I’m not getting it so that helps me keep an open mind too.
An interesting thing about tech death that I forgot to mention is that the lyrical subject matter is typically a lot more science fiction oriented than sword & sorcery oriented. Kinda goes with the music, IMO, but it is notable, I think.
I was kind of saving this band, but I’ll offer them here because I love them and because they’re a great example of how amazing tech death can be.
This band catches some flak because they aren’t a real, proper live act; they exist only in the studio. There’s also occasionally some crap about the drums being triggered but I don’t give a fuck.
What I like is that they’re brutal as all fucking hell. People in other brutal death metal bands describe them as “the most brutal thing I’ve ever heard” (seriously: there are reaction videos all over YouTube). IMO their music contains some of the finest death metal vocal work ever done, some of the best songwriting in the genre and without a doubt some of the most brutal, most vicious, most skull-crushing music around today. Their lyrics focus on the abuse of children by priests, usually told from the priests point of view, so they have that going for them/working against them too, depending on your perspective. Oh, and their videos often contain imagery that homophobes may have problems with. They are not for everyone!
Infant Annihilator - Soil The Stillborn - start slow with a lyric video
Infant Annihilator - Motherless Miscarriage - IME one of the most gleefully uncomfortable videos for people to watch, ever
IMO this band is the apex of tech death. Their music is complex, requires an amazing degree of technical proficiency to play AND is brutal as hell. Their songwriting is accessible to a much higher degree than many other acts too, IMO. Oh, and for extra oomph: did I mention that there’s only 3 guys? The guitarist also plays bass for their recordings; he’s crazy talented.
For the record: my review of Elysian Grandeval Galèriarch on AllMusic.com.
Well that was an interesting change of pace from Atheist. Are they sampling Mario Brothers in this? It’s a royally fucked up song. But recognizable as a song at least.
All right, all right, all right. You guys have worked the thrash and the death and the doom in, and some indus (**Rammstein **is really fucking good, even if they shine even more crazily on stage), and you’ve more or less covered the American scene. But how about some more noodly, symphonic stuff from good old Yurop ?
Sonata Arctica is Nordic speed metal. They used to only be able to play in a studio, but these days they can even shred for real on stage. I’d recommend their first two (*Ecliptica *and Silence) but the rest is also very listenable.
**Nightwish **is also from up there. They (along with Lacuna Coil and Within Temptation) were where the “hey, how about we front our symphonic metal band with a hot chick who can sing opera ?” trend started. They had trouble with their singer(s) and sort of mellowed out as time went by, but *Wishmaster *is a great fucking album. That being said, metal with chick singers tends to really work for me - check out White Skull for a more thrashy, speedy sound - particularly Public Glory, Secret Agony.
Then you’ve got the more epic stuff. Rhapsody of Fire and Blind Guardian are two bands that probably would have creamed their leather pants if they’d been offered the chance to score the battle scenes of the LOTR movies. Very technical stuff, Luca Turilli’s solos will deffo make you go “bwuh ? How many fingers does this asshole even *have *?”. Legendary Tales through Rain of a Thousand Flames was peak Rhapsody : they knew they were getting more and more ridiculous, and pushed it beyond 11. Around that time they started describing themselves as “Bombastic Epic Hollywood Metal”. Yeah. Blind Guardian is more on the power metal side of things, Nightfall in Middle Earthis fucking awesome, as is Somewhere Far Beyond.
But now I’ve started drifting into old school German power metal bands and I can’t move on without mentioning Grave Digger. They started as generic power metal band (including a really good Children of the Grave cover) then found their niche in historical concept albums. Tunes of War, Knights of the Cross, Excalibur, Rheingold… I just love those albums. The frontman’s voice is out of this world - which is hilarious live because he’s the most adorable, baby-faced, innocent-smiled guy you’ll ever see. And then he starts growling his ass out and you’re like wut ?
I’ll end this by moving back into the darker side of things (and moving back north) by name-dropping **Avatar **- I’m not sure exactly how I’d categorize them. They have death metal sounds, peppered with more rocky (almost rockabilly) riffs and sometimes more melodic stuff. All I know is they always energize me and make me happy. Let It Burn is my go-to morning song when I feel like a day’s going to be shitty (along with Annihilator’s King of the Kill). Then I proceed to have a great fucking day.
No sampling; that’s sweep picking.
Some more examples of impressive sweep picking and string tapping:
Chimp Spanner - Mobius Pt I
Chimp Spanner - Cloud City
Animals As Leaders - CAFO
Animals As Leaders - The Brain Dance (live in studio)
Note that AAL are much revered in the metal community even tho they aren’t really a metal band. AAL is it’s own thing, a jazz group that often incorporates elements of metal (and punk and funk) into their sound. They do it so well and with such skill, tho, that they have the respect and enthusiasm of people across many genres.
Sarah Longfield is an insanely talented young guitarist. She’s got a great sense of humor, too. I first noticed her when a video popped up in my sidebar that I couldn’t resist clicking on; other headbangers felt the same and word got around about the Uke Group videos.
Her band is or was called The Fine Constant. Another example, I think, of headbangers being able to appreciate her skill level and thus also able to appreciate her music more than the average pop music fan or even jazz aficionado: we have the musical vocabulary necessary.
Sarah Longfield - Stay Here - uploaded just a few months ago, eh.
The technique has been widely adopted by metal. In general, anyone who can sweep pick, will sweep pick. It offers a weirdly inhuman sound at times, akin to a sequencer except we know it’s a human being making those sounds, which adds to how weird/cool it is. And now we’re seeing other genres adopt the technique, as more and more players are able to execute it; I think that totally fucking rocks. Metal really is gonna spread out and cover the planet, eh.
Damn, I realize I was trying to talk about Yuropian symphonic metal and clean forgot about the most Yuropian symphonic metal band of them all : Therion. We’re still oop norf (Sweden this time). I’m most familiar with *Vovin *to *Secret of the Runes *; which is when they really went hogwild with the “symphonic” part, including gothic choirs or full blown orchestras to their performances (much earlier than Metallica’s S&M - it’s a combination that just works, which is probably also why so many metal shredders come from classical music backgrounds). Their work previous to that is more straight up death metal and their later stuff is… odd (Les Fleurs du Mal always makes me laugh - I’m sure it sounds exotic and new to people from Sweden, but to this French guy it’s just metal covers of 80s French pop that I know all too well well because it’s super corny and mostly featured in baby boomers’ 14th of July balls and the like (so very, VERY not cool) and it comes out just as silly (but kind of in a good way ?) as when Boney Nem did it).
But I mean, you really can’t hate a metal band that covers O Fortuna, can you ?
I’m glad someone came along who’s into symphonic metal, Kobal2. It’s not usually my thing but I know it’s freaking huge in its own right.
I am fond of Rage’s Speak of the Dead, tho. When symphonic elements are done right, they can be a powerful and beautiful addition to the music (like anything, natch).
Something you might like which is a little tongue-in-cheek, yet with some serious musicianship: Dream Evil. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8HXlvA9a_TA&start_radio=1&list=RD8HXlvA9a_TA
My list of things to listen to is growing very long. This isn’t a bad thing, but forgive me if I don’t update on every single album.
Quick thoughts. Electric Wizard kick butt. Seriously. My only complaint is the lack of variety in their sound, but honestly when your sound is as good as theirs is you don’t always need it. Dopethrone was awesome. I see myself listening to that a lot.
Entombed Wolverine Blues. I liked it! It’s the most accessible of the death metal I have listened to, but that’s not so bad. Definitely more cohesive than Left Hand Path. It is interesting, though logical, that listening to the more extreme stuff, even if just a little bit, makes the regular death metal sound pretty much like straight ahead rock and roll. I’ll get back to that idea.
Atheist unquestionable presence. Decidedly fun. I’m not sure if it’s really for me, but I’m glad I listened to it and might go back to it. I liked the jazz, I can only imagine how mind blowing this must have been at the time. Obviously good, but a little noodly for my taste. The whole playing for the sake of playing thing isn’t so much my bag unless there is a really strong songwriting structure underneath also.
High On Fire Blessed Black Wings and Surrounded by Thieves. It’s too early to say really but High on Fire may have taken over as my favorite band I have listened to in this whole experiment. Seriously the last two times I have opened up Spotify to listen to the next thing on my Playlist High On Fire was already cued up from last time and I ended up listening to them for a half hour instead. For me they balance all the various metal elements that I like perfectly. It’s aggressive and musical and heavy but balanced. They, like Bolt Thrower also have kind of an x factor that I can’t quite identify but that makes them click for me as just… Right.
Which brings me to Between the Buried and Me Colors. I picked an album at random because I got a lot of conflicting opinions about where to start. Dang. I really seriously liked this. If I hadn’t spent so much time with Bolt Thrower and trying to listen to Opeth and Nile and At The Gates, even Atheist and Mastodon I don’t think I would have gotten far with this, but I think I may have come around on cookie monster vocals. It’s not the furthest edge of extremity. It’s decidedly not Infant Annihilator or Cryptopsy or even Nile, but it gets fairly hard at times. It also has a lot of the progressive elements and killer guitar work and songwriting and just a touch of that insanity that I liked so much on Voice of Trespass. I’m glad not everything is quite that insane, but I like a touch of madness sometimes. I’m going to listen to more of them.
Hey, thanks !
I must admit however that I’m a poor advocate for the genre. I’m no musician at all - I just sing what they tell me to sing how they tell me to sing it - and I couldn’t tell a pentatonic scale from a kitchen one. So I won’t be able to engage in that kind of talk on your (and NAF’s) level, not by a long shot. I can only tell y’all what I like, not really why I do, what they do right, what they try to explore etc…
Which seems pretty weird when I’m the one talking about the guys who stumbled into shredding by essentially going “what if Wagner, but less pansy about it ?”
This is also probably why I just can’t grok the more progressive sympho metal out there (or hardcore death metal for that matter). Stuff like **Dream Theater **for example. Like, I can tell they’re ridiculously talented technicians. I can tell they pour a lot of thought into what they do, I know their songs are stupid intricate and make music theorists go “wow, that was a bloody clever bit, that was”. I just have no idea what I’m listening to, the rhythm seems to change every other measure, it’s jazz all over again and it makes my head hurt. Even some of Rhapsody’s aeon long songs from their earliest albums get on my nerves sometimes. Gimme something I can either contentedly headbang to or scream in unison with, with a rhythm signature I can hopefully identify :o.