Press "Enter" to skip to content

Posts tagged as “Broken Hope”

A thing I love about metalheads.

A little bit ago, I was listening to the stream for Defeated Sanity’s Passage Into Deformity and reading the accompanying article. I had a thought which I expressed in a comment on the post.

Screen Shot 2013-02-13 at 5.45.01 PM

Nevermind the typo, the point is totally true. How many times have I sat there chatting with my brother or a friend or whoever and said things like, “I think The Bleeding is the pinnacle of Chris Barnes-era Cannibal Corpse. ‘Stripped Raped and Strangled’ is an amazing song.”

Or, “Braindrill’s ‘Forcefed Human Shit’, for all its brevity, is a masterful piece of death metal.”

Or, “When it comes to old school proto-grind, you can’t argue that General Surgery is basically just a very competent Carcass-clone.”

I’ve said things like this thousands of times over the 20 years I’ve been listening to metal, and I don’t foresee it stopping. As metalheads, we are so accustomed to absurd song/band/album titles that it becomes a total nonissue for us. We can talk about Once Upon the Cross by Deicide, or a band called Torture Killer, or whether or not you think Goatwhore is a solid example of the New Wave of American Black Metal without thinking twice about the actual words you are using. I am sure that an intrepid explorer of old blog posts could find tons of examples on this very site.

We can say absolutely vile things unfazed because we’re used to them. Quickly scanning my Spotify death metal playlist reveals the following song titles as perfect examples.

  • Remnants of the Tortured
  • Let The Blood Spill Between My Broken Teeth
  • Trapped, Terrified, Dead
  • Swamped in Gore
  • Regurgitation of Giblets
  • Boiling Vomit Through My Veins

That list took me about 1 minute to compile. Consider it a random sampling of bands that start with the letters A through D. A THROUGH D. THAT IS AS FAR AS I GOT THROUGH THE LIST. And I didn’t even dig into me black metal or grindcore playlists.

No one whose idea of heavy metal ends at Metallica could say the song titles above without being acutely aware that the words they’re uttering are just not normal. But metalheads? Nope. No problem. And there are lots more where those came from.

And I will say this in closing, I’ve only ever really listened to Broken Hope’s The Bowels of Repugnance, but recently gave Grotesque Blessings a listen and, man, that is a good record.

Metal for life.

New Old School Death Metal (NOSDM)

Today I learned about a genre of metal called “New Old School Death Metal” or NOSDM. While I think the resurgence of old school style Death Metal is awesome, I’m a little surprised by it. Had it really gone anywhere? I was always of the opinion that since its inception, there have been dudes playing Death Metal the same way. Sure, the bands change and the members of the bands change, but hasn’t there always been a core of old school Death going on somewhere?

Did I miss out on something? Was I too busy listening to Old Old School Death Metal (OOSDM) records to notice?

Did Death Metal change so much that we’re experiencing a revival of the classic form much in the same manner as thrash suddenly became huge again about three years ago? Do we refer to Municipal Waste and Toxic Holocaust as “New Old School Thrash Metal” or NOSTM? Are all these labels really necessary? If we didn’t call these new DM bands NOSDM, but just plain called them Death Metal, would it be so hard to understand? Would it be wrong?

Let’s posit that Death Metal in its traditional form peaked about 1994, to be superseded by the Swedish style that dominated the later 90s and early 00s. (No, nü-metal doesn’t fucking count.) The earliest known uses of the term “Death Metal” were found somewhere around 1984, giving Death Metal a 10 year run. Now, if a style falls out of favor but does not disappear completely, can we really call its resurgence by a new name? Composers wrote Baroque music for 160 years. It’s not like when Baroque first showed up, went through a wave of initial popularity, decreased slightly in public opinion, and then showed up again they called it New Old School Baroque Music (NOSBM), did they?

The whole thing, and really the extreme fragmentation of metal subgenres in general, seems pretty silly to me.

And, because I am such a caring person, I won’t let you go without some examples.

Let’s do a chronological survey of some of my favorite Death Metal, shall we?

1987’s “Beyond the Unholy Grave” – Death
[audio:https://www.theblacklaser.net/blog/wp-content/uploads/2010/01/11-Beyond-The-Unholy-Grave.mp3|Artists=Death|titles=Beyond The Unholy Grave]

1987’s “Bleed for the Devil” – Morbid Angel
[audio:https://www.theblacklaser.net/blog/wp-content/uploads/2010/01/1-07 Bleed For The Devil.mp3|artists=Morbid Angel|titles=Bleed for the Devil]

1989’s “Sacrificial Suicide” – Deicide
[audio:https://www.theblacklaser.net/blog/wp-content/uploads/2010/01/02-Sacrificial-Suicide.mp3|artists=Deicide|titles=Sacrificial Suicide]

1990’s “Burden of Evil” – Monstrosity
[audio:https://www.theblacklaser.net/blog/wp-content/uploads/2010/01/Burden Of Evil.mp3|artists=Monstrosity|titles=Burden of Evil]

1991’s “Jesus Wept” – Suffocation
[audio:https://www.theblacklaser.net/blog/wp-content/uploads/2010/01/09 Jesus Wept.mp3|artists=Suffocation|titles=Jesus Wept]

1992’s “Hammer Smashed Face” – Cannibal Corpse
[audio:https://www.theblacklaser.net/blog/wp-content/uploads/2010/01/Hammer Smashed Face.mp3|artists=Cannibal Corpse|titles=Hammer Smashed Face]

1993’s “Preacher of Sodomy” – Broken Hope
[audio:https://www.theblacklaser.net/blog/wp-content/uploads/2010/01/Preacher of Sodomy.mp3|artists=Broken Hope|titles=Preacher of Sodomy]

1994’s “Born Headless” – Cryptopsy
[audio:https://www.theblacklaser.net/blog/wp-content/uploads/2010/01/Born Headless.mp3|artists=Cryptopsy|titles=Born Headless]

1995’s “Nothing But Fear” – Morbid Angel
[audio:https://www.theblacklaser.net/blog/wp-content/uploads/2010/01/Nothing But Fear.mp3|artists=Morbid Angel|titles=Nothing But Fear]

1996’s “Permanently Disfigured” – Dying Fetus
[audio:https://www.theblacklaser.net/blog/wp-content/uploads/2010/01/Permanently Disfigured.mp3|artists=Dying Fetus|titles=Permanently Disfigured]

1997’s “Save To The Cross” – Deicide
[audio:https://www.theblacklaser.net/blog/wp-content/uploads/2010/01/Slave To The Cross.mp3|artists=Deicide|titles=Slave To The Cross]

1998’s “Flame To The Surface” – Cryptopsy
[audio:https://www.theblacklaser.net/blog/wp-content/uploads/2010/01/Flame To The Surface.mp3|artists=Cryptopsy|titles=Flame To The Surface]

1999’s “Blowtorch Slaughter” – Cannibal Corpse
[audio:https://www.theblacklaser.net/blog/wp-content/uploads/2010/01/Blowtorch Slaughter.mp3|artists=Cannibal Corpse|titles=Blowtorch Slaughter]

2000’s “Christians To The Lions” – Behemoth
[audio:https://www.theblacklaser.net/blog/wp-content/uploads/2010/01/Christians To The Lions.mp3|artists=Behemoth|titles=Christians To The Lions]

2001’s “Blind The Vision That Shatters” – Neuraxis
[audio:https://www.theblacklaser.net/blog/wp-content/uploads/2010/01/Blind The Vision That Shatters.mp3|artists=Neuraxis|titles=Blind The Vision That Shatters]

2002’s “Dead Sea Scroll Deception” – Lock Up
[audio:https://www.theblacklaser.net/blog/wp-content/uploads/2010/01/Dead Sea Scroll Deception.mp3|artists=Lock Up|titles=Dead Sea Scroll Deception]

2003’s “History Is Rotten” – Misery Index
[audio:https://www.theblacklaser.net/blog/wp-content/uploads/2010/01/History Is Rotten.mp3|artists=Misery Index|titles=History Is Rotten]

2004’s “Sensual Sickness” – Decapitated
[audio:https://www.theblacklaser.net/blog/wp-content/uploads/2010/01/Sensual Sickness.mp3|artists=Decapitated|titles=Sensual Sickness]

2005’s “The Victorious Reign” – Hate Eternal
[audio:https://www.theblacklaser.net/blog/wp-content/uploads/2010/01/The Victorious Reign.mp3|artists=Hate Eternal|titles=The Victorious Reign]

2006’s “The Crawl Inside Me Uninvited” – Coldworker
[audio:https://www.theblacklaser.net/blog/wp-content/uploads/2010/01/They Crawl Inside Me Uninvited.mp3|artists=Coldworker|titles=They Crawl Inside Me Uninvited]

2007’s “Rebirth In Blood” – Blood Red Throne
[audio:https://www.theblacklaser.net/blog/wp-content/uploads/2010/01/Rebirth In Blood.mp3|artists=Blood Red Throne|titles=Rebirth In Blood]

2008’s “Slaughtering The Will To Live” – Bloodbath
[audio:https://www.theblacklaser.net/blog/wp-content/uploads/2010/01/Slaughtering The Will To Live.mp3|artists=Bloodbath|titles=Slaughtering The Will To Live]

2009’s “Carrion Sculpted Entity” – Cannibal Corpse
[audio:https://www.theblacklaser.net/blog/wp-content/uploads/2010/01/Carrion Sculpted Entity.mp3|artists=Cannibal Corpse|titles=Carrion Sculpted Entity]

Sorry, for some reason I don’t have any Death Metal from 1988 on my iPod right now. I’ll fix that oversight when I get home tonight.

Now, listen to the bands on an article by Decibel Magazine about NOSDM. It seems to me that besides some basic evolution in the quality of the productions, that Death Metal has been alive an well since at least 1987. So, do we need this new label at all? Can we not just keep calling it Death Metal? Do we need OOSDM, MEOSDM (Mid-Era Old School Death Metal), and NOSDM? What happens when NOSDM becomes Old New Old School Death Metal (ONOSDM)?

For the initiated and uninitiated out there who take the time to read and listen to this, what do you think? Comment away.