Is Death Metal...dead?

ChaosDecides

Senior Member
Of course a good number of people hate extreme metal so obviously this topic is not for you. To me it seems like death metal has stagnated to the point where it has become extremely predictable and extremely boring, at least for the most part. Playing at hyperspeed has been done, and if that's all a band is trying to use as a musical weapon they are missing the point of creating music in the first place. Though a lot of people really like Origin, to me it's just a monotonous, technical gymnastics event. Given death metal has been around at least 25 years, it seems that for the most part it has run its course. Like most styles, there have been innovators and clones that came later when the style got more popular. It seems like clones are the norm this day, even if they are trying to do their own thing and are not consciously trying to copy others. Blasting, gutteral vocals, gore/horror lyrics, have been done to death, almost becoming a parody more than a musical style.

It's interesting that the proclaimed (by fans) godfather of death metal, Chuck Schuldiner, got over the whole old school death metal rather quickly and evolved into something that has garnered praise by musicians from all over the metal world, yet this whole idea of evolving seems to have taken root with a handful of bands, but most are still playing catch up. There have been some hybrid type death metal, whether it's with black metal elements, melodic elements (Iron Maiden, etc.), industrial elements, but they too have become stagnant.

I'm just curious what direction death metal is going to take, or if it has hit a wall and is not going any further.

I'm a pessimist in general, so maybe my outlook is a little bleak. What do you guys think?
 
Umm, I've been to like 10 proper death metal gigs since the beginning of the year, and that's only the ones I could attend. In london/EU it is alive and kicking. I was with Krisiun last night.
If you're talking about the quality of the music, well that's not my judgement to make. I think it's fine.
 
I think the pessimist in you has moved on. As long as there are still people playing it, it isn't dead.
 
Umm, I've been to like 10 proper death metal gigs since the beginning of the year, and that's only the ones I could attend. In london/EU it is alive and kicking. I was with Krisiun last night.
If you're talking about the quality of the music, well that's not my judgement to make. I think it's fine.

I agree, DM definitely isn't dead. Plenty of good new bands out there, and some of the old ones are churning out great stuff. It doesn't have to be super-inventive.

(Missed the Krisiun/Vital Remains gig last night *sniff* - but heard it kicked ass!)
 
I think it's always difficult to imagine the direction music is going to take, because we do not have crystal balls that can see into the future of music. You've just got to keep writing, keep being inspired and let the music take you in new directions. Or some shit like that anyway.
 
Not in the Albany NY area its not. Its almost the preferred music at my local metal venues nowadays. Just had Suffocation here, Lock Up, Immolation, Dying Fetus is coming soon. Goatwhore was here with Lock Up. I guess it just depends on the person, and maybe the region where you are located.
 
death metal is alive and well, even in the bible belt where i spend most of my time.... there are bands who are still creating new and interesting music...Mitochondrion, Ulcerate, Antigama to name a few bands off the top of my head...and will even shoot out my own band Lecherous Nocturne. we've recently toured with Cannibal Corpse, Immolation, Vader, and are about to hit the road with Deicide next month...new record out soon as well.

imo, song structure is the where the innovation in death metal is going to be. Much room to grow there...
 
Of course a good number of people hate extreme metal so obviously this topic is not for you. To me it seems like death metal has stagnated to the point where it has become extremely predictable and extremely boring, at least for the most part. Playing at hyperspeed has been done, and if that's all a band is trying to use as a musical weapon they are missing the point of creating music in the first place. Though a lot of people really like Origin, to me it's just a monotonous, technical gymnastics event. Given death metal has been around at least 25 years, it seems that for the most part it has run its course. Like most styles, there have been innovators and clones that came later when the style got more popular. It seems like clones are the norm this day, even if they are trying to do their own thing and are not consciously trying to copy others. Blasting, gutteral vocals, gore/horror lyrics, have been done to death, almost becoming a parody more than a musical style.

It's interesting that the proclaimed (by fans) godfather of death metal, Chuck Schuldiner, got over the whole old school death metal rather quickly and evolved into something that has garnered praise by musicians from all over the metal world, yet this whole idea of evolving seems to have taken root with a handful of bands, but most are still playing catch up. There have been some hybrid type death metal, whether it's with black metal elements, melodic elements (Iron Maiden, etc.), industrial elements, but they too have become stagnant.

I'm just curious what direction death metal is going to take, or if it has hit a wall and is not going any further.

I'm a pessimist in general, so maybe my outlook is a little bleak. What do you guys think?

Immolation has released amazing albus lately. Let's not talk about the latest Morbid album , not my cup of tea.
I heard "Revocation," reccomended by a drummer friend of mine. Interesting take on metal in general. Behemoth put some stuff out that is pretty cool, although for any extremem metal I prefer Emperor for anything. Even though they were Black Metal.

Krisiun is cool.

Nile is still going strong, the last few Cannibal records have been not so great to me.
 
Also I thinkt hat Gojira is doing some things in Europe. I am not really a fan but they keep DM alive.

Personally I listen to a lot of jazz lately, learning saxophone.

"Failures for gods" by Immolation is amazing live.

There are also good offerings by Death metal influenced Bands.

"Ishan" Album is called "After." Yes it is the singer of Emperor, but it is very good EXTREME metal. It has influences of Death Metal. Similar to how OPETH use them, but not as pschedelic.

Check out "Lakes on Mars," "Barren" and really anything off the album.

Deicide still puts out albums, although nothing beats "Legion."

Suffocation just put out a new albunm i wanna say last year.
 
death metal is alive and well, even in the bible belt where i spend most of my time.... there are bands who are still creating new and interesting music...Mitochondrion, Ulcerate, Antigama to name a few bands off the top of my head...and will even shoot out my own band Lecherous Nocturne. we've recently toured with Cannibal Corpse, Immolation, Vader, and are about to hit the road with Deicide next month...new record out soon as well.

imo, song structure is the where the innovation in death metal is going to be. Much room to grow there...


You guys have a bandcamp or something?

Congrats! I love Immolation! Alex Webster is agreat bass player...
 
There are more people who want to play metal, than listen to it. It's the single-most discussed genre on this board, but has the least popularity. What's up with that?

Metal isn't dead; it's just being classified out of existence. I swear, the next time I fart, four sub-genres are going to come out.
 
There are more people who want to play metal, than listen to it. It's the single-most discussed genre on this board, but has the least popularity. What's up with that?
Hmm... Maybe some people don't care for statistics but simply decide to go for what brings them most fun or what they feel it's what they wanna do. If I cared for statistics I'd have to do dancefloor, country or whatever - no thanks.

I guess metal (drumming) is also intriguing to many (me included) because it comes across as 'energetic' and/or 'raw', and also the bpm values are impressive (they are, aren't they? - but impressive skills can be found (in heaps) in funk, jazz, fusion etc drumming also).

Deathmetalconga,
you like to bring up a similar view regarding the use of double pedals. I see some parallel here to why I took up playing the electric guitar and why doing this, I focused on solo techniques quite early. While solo stuff makes maybe 2 % of what you're actually playing, to ACHIEVE playing those 2 % at a "good" level requires maybe 70 % of your practice time. In retrospective I'm so damn happy to have invested all that time because if I want to play a decent solo then I can do it, no need to ask someone to do it for me.

Plus, allow everybody to mature - both musically and as a person. Some people stick to the same music all their life, some evolve or 'open up' stylistically. But don't judge metalheads as 'limited'. Some are, some aren't. I think there are enough e.g. 'limited' jazz fans out there ('limited' meaning narrow minded and looking down on some genres). Just be fair. No need to talk down stuff which you don't like. If you don't like it - avoid it, avoid spending your time/energy/forum activity on it. Simple.

And as for 'metal genre diversity': We already had some discussion on DRUMMERWORLD. Please be aware that often (most?) times the bands themselves (and the majority of their fans) don't really care for labeling their style but simply are doing what they do/like. It's the recording companies/labels/magazines/promotion people who obviously see some sense/need to come up with those designations, hoping for more business. Just stay fair.
 
There are more people who want to play metal, than listen to it. It's the single-most discussed genre on this board, but has the least popularity. What's up with that?

Metal isn't dead; it's just being classified out of existence. I swear, the next time I fart, four sub-genres are going to come out.

It is interesting the large amount of metal listeners who also play an instrument. It is a bit like George Formby fans who play the uke or something.
 
Death metal is far from dead.

Though on the fast, heavy, guttural vocal side, I like what the band Condemned has done on their newer album Realms of the Ungodly. One of the better on the brutal death side, with a touch of slam death.

If you haven't heard of them, Sybreed has done well with a mix of Industrial and Death metal.

Also Psycroptic has put out an awesome album recently. They may be tech death, but they aren't ridiculous like Origin or Brain Drill or something.

I'm more of a black metal guy. Now THAT is pretty stagnant in some branches xD
 
And as for 'metal genre diversity': We already had some discussion on DRUMMERWORLD. Please be aware that often (most?) times the bands themselves (and the majority of their fans) don't really care for labeling their style but simply are doing what they do/like. It's the recording companies/labels/magazines/promotion people who obviously see some sense/need to come up with those designations, hoping for more business. Just stay fair.

Very well put. My band, for instance, has been dubbed "War Metal" because we fuse genres of harcore metal, hardcore punk, death metal, and yes...even have a quick little jazz breakdown. But what gets me, is peeking out from behind my kit during a show, and seeing people dancing, moving around, bobbing their heads, and when we end a song, listening to them applaud and cheer. Thats what it should be about. No scenester stupid kids, no subgenres. Just play metal, man. Who cares what its called. As long as you and youre fans enjoy it, thats what counts.
Death metal isnt dead, its just being covered up by different sub genres. Deathcore, Grindcore, Porncore....why?
 
There are more people who want to play metal, than listen to it. It's the single-most discussed genre on this board, but has the least popularity. What's up with that?
.

Quite simply because you are not correct that is it least popular.

Total US total album sales by hard rock/metal bands
http://www.theaceblackblog.com/2010/01/music-all-time-best-selling-heavy-metal.html
1. Led Zeppelin: 88 Million
2. AC/DC: 62 Million
3. Metallica: 54 Million
4. Van Halen: 50 Million
5=. Aerosmith: 39 Million
5=. Guns N' Roses: 39 Million
7. Bon Jovi: 29 Million
8. Def Leppard: 28 Million
9. Ozzy Osbourne: 21 Million
10. Motley Crue: 19 Million

If you look at the RIAA webs tie for best selling albums of all times:
http://www.riaa.com/goldandplatinum.php?content_selector=top-100-albums
AC/DC Back in Black is 6th all time
Metallica's Black album is 23rd all time.

On an international level, of course, this much bigger, depending on the band.

Nielsen SoundScan shows that for 2011, Metal outsold rap, and is the 5th leading genre
http://www.statista.com/statistics/188910/us-music-album-sales-by-genre-2010/



Here some solder stats showing that from 2006-2009, all music sales declined.
Metal only declined some. Country declines the most. R&B and Rap had significant declines in sales, putting them behind metal.
http://www.statcrunch.com/5.0/viewresult.php?resid=814261


And granted, this all just USA sales figures. Most metal acts have significant international followings. Metal is much bigger in Europe overall than in the USA.

For example, Metallica s credited with 54 million albums in total US sales, but over 100 million internationally. Rush is credited with 15 million US, and 40 million internationally. Iron Maiden US sales lag behind other metal bands, but internationally they have some 85 million albums sold, and are one of the few bands that can fill an arena is any part of the globe.
 

As someone who is not into what I would consider Death Metal scene at all, I have to wonder about some of the bands in this list. I mean can bands like Bon Jovi, Def Leppard and Van Halen really even be considered Hard Rock or Metal? Dont' get me wrong, I like each of them but I would never put any of those bands, and several of the others on the list, into either of those categories.

I'm not trying to be contrary here Drum, but seriously am asking the question, where does pop music end and Hard rock or metal begin? I guess, like everything else, there is no black and white but there is just no way, in my mind at least, that these bands represent Metal in any form or fashion.

Just my own observation...
 
As someone who is not into what I would consider Death Metal scene at all, I have to wonder about some of the bands in this list. I mean can bands like Bon Jovi, Def Leppard and Van Halen really even be considered Hard Rock or Metal? Dont' get me wrong, I like each of them but I would never put any of those bands, and several of the others on the list, into either of those categories.

I'm not trying to be contrary here Drum, but seriously am asking the question, where does pop music end and Hard rock or metal begin? I guess, like everything else, there is no black and white but there is just no way, in my mind at least, that these bands represent Metal in any form or fashion.

Just my own observation...

I wouldn't consider Jovi or Van Halen metal. I just didn't deleted them off the copy and paste list. And clearly none of the bands have anything to do with Death metal. But that wasn't the point. It's just part of a presentation of facts that metal as a whole sells far better than our friend DMC thinks it does.

In terms of genres discussed on this board, jazz as a whole sells far, far far less than metal as a whole. But no one would dare say we shouldn't discuss jazz. We'd miss Steamer if we did that! (and speaking of, he seems to have disappeared again...)
 
Metal isn't dead; it's just being classified out of existence. I swear, the next time I fart, four sub-genres are going to come out.

Not sure it's dead and not sure there are more players than listeners. But I'm completely convinced that each band gets its own sub-genre.

War metal? Porncore? Brutal death? Slam death? Someone's pulling the piss now. The running gag has spread and now everyone's on board. As much as I get a giggle out of it, it does border on the absurd.

FWIW, I think "warcore" has a far better ring to it.......I'm off to start a new genre.
 
No, Death Metal is alive! Tom Araya, Glen Benton are still growling and King Diamond is screaming for vengeance!
 
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