How to Appreciate Death Metal

[Manic Ferocity]

The Swedish death metal scene all had that trademark "buzzsaw" guitar sound which kind of made it all sound the same. That doesn't mean they aren't quality bands, of course.

 

[skeptik]

Oh, trust me, some of my favorite bands have come out of Sunlight Studio. And Tico Tico Studio in Finland. and Morrisound in Florida. I was just pointing out that all of these bands using the same studio has made for a consistent "sound" within each scene.

 

[ohiogrinder]

The Swedish death metal scene all had that trademark "buzzsaw" guitar sound which kind of made it all sound the same. That doesn't mean they aren't quality bands, of course.

Swede death is definitely awesome. I've come around for it.

 

[Manic Ferocity]

Oh, trust me, some of my favorite bands have come out of Sunlight Studio. And Tico Tico Studio in Finland. and Morrisound in Florida. I was just pointing out that all of these bands using the same studio has made for a consistent "sound" within each scene.

I have absolutely no problem with bands sounding the same within a given scene, really. As long as they make memorable songs I could care less if it has a similar sound.

 

[skeptik]

Neither do I, I was just responding to a point that The Greys made.

 

[Manic Ferocity]

Yeah I know. I was just stating my opinion. I wasn't challenging yours.

 

[MasterT44]

I officially hate this thread, think it is beyond useless, and find that it is stupid on so many levels:

1. Saying that you HAVE to do something to appreciate/like Death Metal
A.There is a list of standards that needed to be followed and are written in stone. (This really is as far as you need to read)
a)These things also happened to be know by the starter of this thread...lucky for us, eh?
b)By the way, I guess doing what you want to is just a thing of the past now, every country in the world has become communist!
2. This thread will probably spawn more threads just like it except with black, thrash, etc.
3. Somehow it has sparked a lot of controversy.
A. (People disagreeing on their "rules" for appreciating Death Metal)
4. It hasn't been closed yet.

 

[Blue_Jay]

I don't care about this thread either it's boring so amen to MasterT.

 

[Wires & Waves]

I officially hate this thread, think it is beyond useless, and find that it is stupid on so many levels:

1. Saying that you HAVE to do something to appreciate/like Death Metal
A.There is a list of standards that needed to be followed and are written in stone. (This really is as far as you need to read)
a)These things also happened to be know by the starter of this thread...lucky for us, eh?
b)By the way, I guess doing what you want to is just a thing of the past now, every country in the world has become communist!
2. This thread will probably spawn more threads just like it except with black, thrash, etc.
3. Somehow it has sparked a lot of controversy.
A. (People disagreeing on their "rules" for appreciating Death Metal)
4. It hasn't been closed yet.

fuck off, never post again

 

[RedinTheSky]

Another thing: go get that Discharge album from '82 and listen for all the ripping thrash metal-esque guitar solos.

Yeah, I can see the collective members of the bands that started thrash watching a Discharge show at a bar the night before their own gigs : "Dude.. this shit is rippin'" ! "Man fuck all those lessons from Joe Satriani, these guys really know what they're doing" "Shit man, before tonight, we were only gonna do Black Sabbath covers, I would never have thought to just play the riffs I already knew a bit faster " ! "Man those Jazz lessons were bullshit, double bass my ass " " Man fuck this, tomorrow morning, the whole band's taking punk lessons, we should have this style down before lunchtime "

 

[RedinTheSky]

You mentioned these before, and my question is this: if they didn't come from punk, where did they come from? To me, it sounds like you're making the assumption that every element of metal was borrowed directly from another source and not altered for the artists' own needs and intentions, which is incorrect. Have you ever read any interviews with older black/death/thrash metal bands? From what I've read, the way in which they helped develop extreme metal into what it now is was not entirely through the direct derivation of other musical elements, but also through a bit of experimentation and trial and error. The ultimate goal of many of them was to be as fast and aggressive as possible, and while double kicks and tremolo picking technically might not have been employed by older, influential punk bands, speed and aggression certainly were employed and ---as formica just mentioned above---used as a template for metal bands to work from. Through the aforementioned experimentation, they channeled that speed and aggression into something much more extreme sounding such that we now have these elements which have become indispensible cornerstones of the metal sound.

I've read plenty of old reviews, and yes punk is 'fast and aggressive, without pioneering tremolo picking or double bass drumming'. So the 'ultimate goal' of this whole wall of unnecessary text is that punk didn't invent tremolo picking or double bass drumming, and pioneering thrash bands never ever would have thought to play faster on their own. Classical and flamenco guitarists (not to mention turkish folk which was Definitely a black metal influence) came up with tremolo picking, and jazz drummers came up with double bass. Speaking of drummers... how many of them do you think learn jazz as opposed to punk style drumming from their teachers ? Now or then ..

 

[skeptik]

The only people who studied under Satriani that were notable to Thrash were Kirk Hammett and Alex Skolnick, and not many others were influenced by Jazz either. The only one I can think of as a clear example at the moment is Gar Samuelson. The vast bulk of the influences in Thrash Metal came from the NWOBHM scene in Angel Witch, Saxon, Diamond Head, Iron Maiden, etc., along with bands like Mercyful Fate. This style combined with the attitude, looseness, intensity, brashness, etc. found in Punk music essentially created Thrash Metal. The vast majority of the lead guitar players in Thrash took their cues from their NWOBHM heroes, which is why you notice a stark contrast between the playing of Hammett, Skolnick, and Friedman, and, say, Hanneman, Holt, Altus, and Flynn.

 

[WNxScythe]

Kind of a pointless article. It's just making the whole "death metal takes the skillz therefore it pwns" argument, which is like saying you should listen to someone just because they can fret with their toes and pick the strings with their teeth faster than anyone else can.

 

[Ender Rises]

The thing I like about death metal is guitarists having their own guitar sound and style. You hear so much music where all the guitarists have the same tone and production. You listen to a death metal albums and you kinda think the guitar tone is cool and wonder why it sounds the way it does and why these people decided to go about the style they play.

I completely agree.

 

[ohiogrinder]

Yeah, I can see the collective members of the bands that started thrash watching a Discharge show at a bar the night before their own gigs : "Dude.. this shit is rippin'" ! "Man fuck all those lessons from Joe Satriani, these guys really know what they're doing" "Shit man, before tonight, we were only gonna do Black Sabbath covers, I would never have thought to just play the riffs I already knew a bit faster " ! "Man those Jazz lessons were bullshit, double bass my ass " " Man fuck this, tomorrow morning, the whole band's taking punk lessons, we should have this style down before lunchtime "

that reeks of sarcastic smugness.

 

[Ender Rises]

Yeah, I can see the collective members of the bands that started thrash watching a Discharge show at a bar the night before their own gigs : "Dude.. this shit is rippin'" ! "Man fuck all those lessons from Joe Satriani, these guys really know what they're doing" "Shit man, before tonight, we were only gonna do Black Sabbath covers, I would never have thought to just play the riffs I already knew a bit faster " ! "Man those Jazz lessons were bullshit, double bass my ass " " Man fuck this, tomorrow morning, the whole band's taking punk lessons, we should have this style down before lunchtime "

Can you show me to a good punk guitar teacher? I've never heard of any and you seem to know about them so well. No one takes fucking lessons for punk you douche. That defeats the purpose completely. If anyone does they are complete douches as well.

 

[skeptik]

I think that was his point, which he doesn't realize actually works against him.

 

[Ender Rises]

I must have mistaken his point, I read it as the band deciding to take punk lessons to include it more in their sound because they couldn't have gotten the influence any other way. Which is pretty fucking dumb, and most of the post was based on the thought that punk lessons exist and are a good way to learn punk, which is fucking stupid as well, not to mention glaringly wrong.

 

[skeptik]

Yeah, he seems to be suggesting that:

1) You learn musical styles by taking lessons
2) There are no Punk guitar lessons

Therefore

3) There's not a lot of Punk influence in Thrash Metal.

 

[Ender Rises]

I understand now. 1 is so fucking wrong that it's ridiculous. Lessons are for learning specific techniques and exercises to improve your playing style, whatever it may be. Jazz, blues, and metal lessons exist for genre-specific techniques and sounds, but the sound of a band comes from the meshing of every member's individual style and ideas, and the punk influence comes from fans of the music who played and listened to primarily Sabbath and NWOBHM, and applied punk ideas that they got from the music to their own sound. At least that's how I understand it. There are no lessons for punk because there are no techniques for punk, it's so simple. But metal requires strong fast, good, strong technique, which comes from lessons, woodshedding, or both, whereas a sound (which is where punk influences metal, find me one punk technique other than double bass in metal.) comes from you and is influenced by what you think sounds good, what resonates with you, I.E. what you listen to. Again, this is how I understand it, I could be wrong.