Black Metal vs Death Metal

Louis you must hear http://open.spotify.com/album/5nrZejD99ZmAXrmrouIJcU

and even more
http://www.headbanger.us/gallerie_e/bilder/entombed_wolverine_blues_front.jpg

which is easily in my top 10 metal albums of all time. prob the 1st "extreme metal" album i bought (if you dont include Godflesh or industrial stuff as 'metal'

What would Absu be classified as?

haha i remember reading about "wolvering blues" in wizard magazine. there was an "animated" video to this right? (but it was just cutouts of wolverine zooming in and out)

a wolverine, or the X-men character?

What would Absu be classified as?

but more specifically: SUMERIAN WAR METAL

Absolutely, but would they be considered avant-garde? They have interludes of other types of music on one of their albums, so they're not as straightforwardly metal as some that I've heard.

Not to cop out but I really enjoy about a dozen titles in each genre to a huge degree.

I just care if the bands are good, not what style they fit with.

Overall, I got into a lot more death metal first because I don't naturally appreciate lofi production. Morbid Angel's Domination has to be the best production of any truly extreme metal until Slipknot came along.

I'm pretty sick of black metal by now, but that Mayhem show this year was one of the best concerts I've ever seen.

I vote Doom.

but that Mayhem show this year was one of the best concerts I've ever seen.

Some of my friends went and they all said it was awesome. I'm only now getting into it - first, I was on the opposite side of what I perceived as a punk - metal divide, then because it was a hipster thing to do, then I stopped caring

"Morbid Angel's Domination has to be the best production of any truly extreme metal until Slipknot came along."

OUCH! and i even like slipknot...

lol

Choosing early death metal vs. early black metal, black metal wins out, easily. These days it's a lot closer in my opinion, there's great stuff and boring crap on either side.

I don't care for Slipknot. I just project/imagine that they are getting ridiculous budgets to make really heavy music.

Domination was recorded over 3 months in Morrisound studio. I doubt any other underground death metal band ever had such a luxury.

"Choosing early death metal vs. early black metal, black metal wins out, easily. These days it's a lot closer in my opinion, there's great stuff and boring crap on either side."

I dunno--I'll take Morbid Tales and Scream Bloody Gore over Venom and Bathory any day of the week. So maybe my true allegiance is showing through.

ALL BLACK, ALL THE TIME

I always want to prefer black metal, but death metal delivers for me more often. Would def take Celtic Frost and Bathory over early Death and Repulsion, though.

One could make convincing arguments that Morbid Tales is either proto-death or proto-black. But yeah, I'd definitely take Venom and Bathory over Scream Bloody Gore. That's just me!

Oh yeah, def agree Celtic Frost could take either side comfortably, but they've just got that European thing which puts them in my mind's BM camp.

celtic frost transcend genre tags. they influenced EVERYONE. i mean, i'd take good celtic frost over, like, most music in general.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VNQve866m0g

I can't fathom the cross-licensing meeting that took place behind this (but I am picturing Stan Lee there gesticulating wildly)

great album

It's definitely more compelling than the Wolverine movie.

alright, voting death metal. but stipulating that i mean pre-BR00TAL DM for the most part, because i am old and becoming a traditionalist. in my straw hat, on the porch, listening to "severed survival" and "grey misery."

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jy1KDPt-h3E

this made me drool uncontrollably. want...all...these...rekkerdsssssss...................

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KVEc99zizK0

i don't really have a preference, tbh

the mythology and imagery of BM is more compelling to me (as cliched as it's become) but musically, it just depends on the individual band whatever the genre.

hey, it's no fair classifying Venom and CF as black metal.

i grew up listening to death metal and going to death metal shows. I like the scene and aesthetic a lot better than black metal's, which when you really get down to it is only a few degrees of separation from emo. i love all kinds of metal, but if i had to choose between DM and BM, it's definitely DM. and i'd take it over Doom, too, as I did in that last big metal subgenre poll.

voted "Avant Garde" out of habit, before reading any posts in the thread ...

i REALLY wish more people had heard the last Necrodemon album. I love that album in a way that I never love most new black metal albums. so great.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qKbC-FmfA7w

and their older stuff is cool too:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hC964f6RqK8

Scott were you ever in a dm or bm band?

me! oh god no. i don't know how to do anything. except eat pie and sleep.

in a car: Black Metal

in my room, alone: Black Metal

at a live show: Death Metal

on headphones while working out: Death Metal

so, I guess DM is yang and BM is yin.

Obvious point but raging, technical, fist-pumping Death metal makes me feel "powerful" and "alive" while
needling, monotonous, jaw-clenching Black Metal makes me feel "powerless" and "dead". Both psychic states are worth cultivating in my opinion.

While I'm spitting out bullshit binarisms . . .

Death Metal = sadism
Black Metal = masochism

which might also explain the kind of jock-y, bro-esque vibe to death metal fans and the indie crossover appeal of BM to lol indie types (the jump from Xasthur to Smog/Cat Power/Palace is shorter than you think). If you identify with the torturer and aggressor, you're going to get off on the scenarios in Obituary and Cannibal Corpse lyrics; conversely, it's no accident that there are actual black metal bands called Weakling and Mark of the Masochist, as the basic emphasis upon misery is key to the genre.

death metal sounds like it's made by monsters and when i listen to it i feel like someone is sticking a powerdrill inside of my ear, so naturally it gets my vote. i don't even listen to any black metal anyways, so maybe i shouldn't be voting. also i only own like three dm albums but oh boy ain't it just fine when i do put them on.

When on ILM someone says they listen to DM, I automatically think they're talking about Depeche Mode.

I wonder how many people in the USA got into black metal via Phil Anselmo, he was the first big metal star to embrace BM. I dont recall Slayer or anyone bigging it up. Am i wrong here?

A lot of what is being said here about Black Metal - introverted, masochistic, 'emo', made by shut-ins, attracting interest from outside of the metal ghetto (pandering sell-outs!) - seems to be a caricature of latter-day Depressive BM acts (and specifically Xasthur). It doesn't have much to do with the first or second waves of BM, or the majority of what's going on out there now.

Neotropical's post feels pretty OTM tho

it certainly doesnt describe children of bodom or cradle of pish

not real sure about the identify-with-the-aggressor aspect - I don't know that the I-am-the-vocalist dynamic of identifying with the lyrics is as operative in death metal as it is in general rock music

not to say that for example t-shirts at the deathfest don't generally suggest that yeah there's a fair amount of id'ing-as-torturer in the audience

i am a disinterested third party, merely observing the interaction between torturer and victim without judgement.

The stereotypical rationalization for death/gore performers and audiences seems to be "It's like a horror movie." I'm comfortable buying that, though there are instances (in metal and in movies) where revulsion at creepiness or sadism exceeds my enjoyment and I decide I do not want.

The black metal stereotype seems to be that the performers and audience experience lyrics and imagery as more expressive of their own beliefs and emotions. To me this doesn't imply identification with a torturer or victim, but more of a personal engagement with the feelings and ideas of black metal. I admire the risks taken by artists who aren't afraid of making themselves look ridiculous (whether by wearing corpsepaint or by wrestling with theology). A camp or ironic approach to black metal usually ruins it for me.

I tend to listen to death metal in a variety of situations and moods (driving around, exercising, with friends) and to black metal when I'm mopey and vant to be alone.

I don't buy the sadism/masochism dichotomy. Old School-style BM tends to be relentlessly aggressive - I remember cracking up over the Nachtmystium vocalist solemnly informing me of his intention to invade my land, slaughter my cattle and burn my temples - the thing is, BM does other things as well.

Brad OTM on the point that BM performers are expected to commit a lot more of themselves into what they do.

"I wonder how many people in the USA got into black metal via Phil Anselmo..."

I dunno. I owned a Bathory cassette long before I ever heard of Pantera. Though I am not really the average listener.

I don't think I've heard of anything because of Phil Anselmo, but I'm definitely one of those people who heard about black metal from Aquarius lists.

What if you DO like the rest of BM?

Need to hear more DM before voting.

― You are Rebels! You are all yankees (country matters),

Okay, my current hypothesis is LJ does not like blast beats or aggressive, fast drumming ...which honestly breaks my heart ... kinda doubting he'd like death metal.

i think he has to justify listening to something, i just dont know who he has to justify it to.

If "avant garde black metal" means black metal with more minimal drums, then I'm pretty sure I voted for the wrong thing. I was imagining some theoretical thing that was like Xenakis + shreiking vocals + blastbeats.

> I remember cracking up over the Nachtmystium vocalist solemnly informing me of his intention to invade my land, slaughter my cattle and burn my temples

he was serious?

Okay guys, in the next ten minutes: help me choose whether to read:

Sound of the Beast
Lords of Chaos
or
Choosing Death

on the bus ride home today.

black metal is the wrong answer but uhm I submit this stanza from Christraping Black Metal:

"The daughters of satan abuses your body
And drool in ecstasy when you die
While our warriors rips the beard
Of your idiot father halls up high"