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Death’s Discography Analysed | Chuck Schuldiner’s influence on Death Metal
41 Plays1 year ago
Chuck Schuldiner and Death are said to be responsible for the inception, innovation and permutations of Death Metal.
Having, arguably, started the genre with 1987’s ‘Scream Bloody Gore’ they went on to develop and progress the genre in numerous ways.
In this livestream we take a look at each of Death’s albums and have an overview look at the key characteristics & traits of each album, how they changed from previous albums and how this developed Death and Death Metal’s overall sound.
You can also watch us on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC7mfJVCp_TzbPNZNMMemJuw
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Transcript
Initial Opinions on Death Metal
00:00:00
Speaker
Death metal. There we go. Maybe that's like the clickbait line to get everyone in. Death metal. Right, death metal is a subgenre of metal that I have not spent nearly enough time listening to. Likewise. I don't like it. I didn't like it. I didn't like it. I didn't like it. I found it convoluted, messy,
00:00:25
Speaker
overly loud and noisy and hectic for the sake of it. I didn't like that I couldn't hear the low screams on the lyrics. You know, when I go into metal, I like Sabbath, I like Maiden, I like Metallica, I like that you could sing along and hear the words. I didn't like that you couldn't hear it with death metal. What about yourself in death metal?
First Exposure and Growing Appreciation
00:00:45
Speaker
Yeah, I'm not really that familiar. I wasn't that familiar before this live stream. Like yourself, I always thought that it's potentially a little bit too messy. And sometimes the music that scares me, I just sort of just leave aside for another day.
00:01:05
Speaker
I was introduced to death metal through a movie, and maybe some of you were as well, and the movie was Ace Ventura. And when he goes into that club and he starts dancing along to Cannibal Corpse, that for me was the moment I realised, because probably at that moment I was probably listening to metal, like I said, made in Metallica. And then I saw that and I thought, whoa, I was like, wait, you're telling me there's metal that sounds like that heavy?
00:01:31
Speaker
I need to check it out. When I checked it out and I love the idea, I love the attitude, I love what it stands for, I just don't like or didn't like the sound of it. Okay.
00:01:40
Speaker
But that all changed this week. Well, I say this week, the last few weeks, the last couple of months for me, last week for you. This all changed when we or I started doing my research into death metal a month or two ago.
History and Influences of Death Metal
00:01:57
Speaker
And I was like, you know what? Everyone seems to love death metal. And I want to give it a go. I want to see what this is all about. Well, you know, also a really big factor for me was I think I asked on Facebook and Instagram, I asked you guys
00:02:10
Speaker
what your favorite sub-genre is. And I was so surprised to see that so many of you, well, the majority of you actually, love.
00:02:21
Speaker
thrash and death that's right yeah so so we thought we why not why not immerse ourselves in the uh in the sub genre of metal that our followers love so i took it upon myself to sort of really get into the nitty gritty of it and find out how it began where it went where it is now the various sub genres that have sprouted off of death metal
00:02:41
Speaker
And it turns out that you can trace this, and I will give the credit to the other artists when it's due, you can trace this back to one man and his band. And that man is Chuck Scholdinger and his band Death.
00:02:54
Speaker
So before we get there, I'm going to give you a quick little history lesson. Sounds a bit patronizing. A little musical analysis of where Death Metal came from. So at the start of the late 70s and early 80s, you've got extreme metal, which isn't in itself a subgenre. You wouldn't say, oh, that band or an extreme metal band. It's a bit more of a collective grouping.
00:03:17
Speaker
You've got bands like Venom and Merciful Fate, who kind of took what we had in traditional metal throughout the 70s, added the elements like New Waver Bridge, heavy metal like The Punk, but just took things to the next level, played faster, screamed higher, screamed louder, you know.
00:03:34
Speaker
It was extreme in all ways, and that's why it's called extreme metal. So you've got extreme metal in the late 70s and the early 80s. Mid 80s, you've got thrash establishing itself. And as well as that, you've got hardcore punk coming through the end of the 70s and into the early 80s. The combination of these three sub-genres, if you like, together gave us death metal.
00:03:55
Speaker
Now this comes in many forms, you know, some band will be inspired by an extreme metal and a thrash metal band. Some band may just come from loving a hardcore punk band or something. But generally, okay, generally that is how stylistically and evolutionary wise we got to death metal. Extreme metal plus thrash metal plus hardcore punk. Put them together, death metal.
00:04:20
Speaker
A couple of albums that you guys should go and check out if you want to hear how we got to Death Metal. Venom's Black Metal from 1982 is a great album to see how we went from that easy-going listening metal to the harder and the more extreme stuff. Celtic Frost's Morbid Tales from 1984.
00:04:37
Speaker
Bathory's Bathory from 1984 and Possessed's Seven Churches, which some people would call the first ever Death Metal album. And I'm not willing to argue with them. If you have that opinion, that is absolutely fine. However,
The Role of Chuck Schuldiner and the Band Death
00:04:50
Speaker
I see it more as the bridging album between Extreme Metal and Thrash to Death.
00:04:56
Speaker
So if we're calling what we're going to call the first death metal album, death metal, and this is the extreme and thrash metal, I'm putting possessed seven churches in the middle, maybe more towards death, but I still feel we haven't really reached death metal by the time seven churches comes out. There's a quick little thing on how we got to death metal. Do you have anything?
00:05:17
Speaker
No, it's great. It's great. It's just, I'm just soaking in what you see in. No, it all makes sense. And I think we mentioned some of these hours before actually. We did in our reels. If you're here for my reel, you'd have heard those before. Right, so here's what we're going to do. During my an hour research over the last months and weeks,
00:05:36
Speaker
We have found out that Death, the band Death, my new favourite death metal band, you can see, and Chuck Scholdinger are largely responsible for doing so much for this genre, potentially establishing it.
00:05:51
Speaker
if not establishing
Exploration of Death's Albums: 1987-1998
00:05:52
Speaker
it then at least moving it on and progressing it several times. So we are going to look at all of their albums and it's not going to be in depth, we're not going to go track by track, we're just going to have an overview of the album and have a look at what it did for Death's Legacy and Death Metal as a sub-genre. Now the way we're going to do this is we've split it into four different categories. We've got general music, so the technicality and the progressiveness as well as the musicianship,
00:06:16
Speaker
We've got production, we've got lyrics, and we've got the influence slash commercial success that it had on metal. So we're going to jump straight in. I will give you the albums first and then we'll go to our categories. So album number one, Screen Bloody Gore from 1987. Album number two, Leprosy from 1988. Album number three, Spiritual Healing from 1990. Album number four, Human from 1991.
00:06:45
Speaker
Album number five, Individual Thought Patterns from 1993. Album number six, Symbolic from 1995. And album number seven, The Sound of Perseverance from 1998. So we're going to crack on right now with the music aspect of it, the technicality, the precision, the intricacy, and the progressiveness of death's music. So we're going to kick off with Screen Bloody Gore. What were your thoughts when you first heard this album? You remember. I do, yeah.
00:07:14
Speaker
I was like, what is going on, honestly? Can I ask, was this your first introduction to death metal? More or less. I heard some stuff before, but introduction to death, definitely. And I was just thinking, oh my goodness, this is so technical. This is so fast. And you know what also I thought? I thought it was very thrashy.
00:07:37
Speaker
And actually I have a question about that. Can you explain the difference? What is the difference between thrash and death metal?
00:07:50
Speaker
You can hear how one comes from the other, I think, and I think that's a nice bridge to see, to go from thrash to death. You've got a few differences in the vocals. For example, vocals. Thrash is more aggressively sung or shouted, whereas death is that low, guttural, growly vocal. Guitar-wise, you've got riffs being played
00:08:19
Speaker
chuggy, speedy, precision, down picking, with death metal, it's not necessarily
00:08:31
Speaker
fast. All the time there are some slower sections as you know from the albums that we've heard. But often you're going to have the emphasis on the dissonant notes. You're going to have the emphasis on the darkness with death metal. Quite a lot of tremolo picking which is the like you know going up and down not just down picking. Down tuned guitars would be quite a big factor as well. A lot of death metal you can hear is detuned quite a bit and it's just more heavily distorted. Now when it comes to the drums
00:08:56
Speaker
I think I sum up death metal and the difference between their drumming in two ways. One, with thrash metal, you've got the drums, although they're playing the fast-paced, technical, aggressive patterns, they are still holding a groove. They're still the backbone of the song.
00:09:21
Speaker
Okay. If you were to take all the guitars and vocals and bass out of a thrash song and you leave the drums in, you could still get an idea of tempo, feel, speed, aggression. Death metal drums I find often to align themselves more with the guitar and the bass. So if we've got a riff for thrash and it's like... You
Thrash vs. Death Metal
00:09:43
Speaker
still might have the drums go...
00:09:47
Speaker
just keeping it going. Whereas with death metal you might find the drums following the rest of the instruments. Right. So it might play fills if you've got a riff that goes... Whilst the flash might go... Death might go... Yeah, I noticed that. It might follow the rest of the instruments and that's because I think when you've got everything together, all the instruments together playing their piece,
00:10:13
Speaker
In Death Metal, it adds a little bit of chaos. It adds a little bit of, I don't know what word to use, but the way that my thinking is, is that Flash has the backbone of the song. Whereas the drums in Death Metal might align themselves more as an individual instrument, as opposed to the thing that is keeping the song in time. Okay. So what did you think about Screen Bloodie Gore?
00:10:38
Speaker
Right so it's characterized by raw aggressive riffing and very simple song structures when we look later on into the death of discography these are quite simple compared to them. The songs however I do think they sound similar and alike and it's hard to differentiate but oh okay wait so that song ended did it on that song started oh hold on the intro of that song sounded like the break of that song I did find it was very similar
00:11:01
Speaker
Very good as far as death metal, you know, like I said I'm far from a death metal aficionado so I can't comment on how good it is as in a death metal album but I enjoyed it. Shorter songs, less complex, simpler solo sections and most importantly very very little melody.
00:11:18
Speaker
Okay very very little melody and that's going to be important later on in the video. Longest song on the album, four minutes 35 seconds, just remember that. So now we move on to 1988's Let Proceed and the first song on the album is a great indicator of the changes.
Evolution in Sound: Leprosy to Spiritual Healing
00:11:33
Speaker
Instantly you've got slightly more melodies being played, the snare sound is playing like a syncopated, not the snare sound, the snare drum is playing like a syncopated
00:11:43
Speaker
syncopated hits during that intro and it's sounding more progressive and daring already. You've got more complex songwriting and memorable riffs, hints of melodic guitars in the form of melodies and motifs during the solos. The drums venture further than the normal patterns and it's way more progressive in terms of loads of tempo changes.
00:12:05
Speaker
And the final thing is that there's only, so remember what I said on the last album, the longest song is 4 minutes 35, on leprosy there is only one song shorter than 4 minutes 25.
00:12:18
Speaker
So it's a bit of a cop-out saying progressive music equals longer songs, but that is one of the aspects. Because if you make music more complex and you have more structural changes, more tempo changes, the songs start to grow. And so I think this is already an indicator that leprosy is just trying to move things on a little bit, being more progressive.
00:12:37
Speaker
Well, I thought that as soon as, you know, because we, I thought we listened to Scream Bloody Gore and then we did it in order, didn't we? So it was really fresh in my head. Um, and instantly I was like, wow, this is a lot more melodic, like guitars straight. So I just heard that melody. I was like, yep, that's, that's a lot more melodic. And actually that made it easier for me to listen to it.
00:13:02
Speaker
I don't know why. It just did. It just really did. And overall, I think I personally enjoyed leprosy a lot more because of the introduction of some form of melody in the guitars and stuff. So following melody came spiritual healing, which was increased technicality. So we did see more complexion coming into the musicianship and the band members, but with a focus on melody.
00:13:27
Speaker
It transitioned more towards a melodic and technical sound. It kind of avoided trying to be heavy for death metal's sake and actually just started relying on some technical aspects as well as melody. There are so many more melodic guitars, the intro to spiritual healing and dual leads as well throughout the album. I didn't really have much to say about this album other than that. Well, actually I do. Okay, can I ask you something?
00:13:58
Speaker
No, don't worry. Look, so I heard, in spiritual healing, okay, I heard some doomy sections in that album. Oh yes, I remember saying, yeah, that was the whole song, yeah. So how come we get traces of doom metal in a death album? Like how come? Do you think there's a reason for it, like songwriting wise? Yes, I do. I think that in
00:14:26
Speaker
So whilst we characterize death metal as thrash plus extreme plus hardcore punk, you can still chuck other things in there. The last word I said before Dash took over was jewel leads. And we know jewel leads have come from Wishbone Ash, Thin Lizzy, Iron Maiden. We know that they come from previous metal eras. And so I think what I've heard through this whole death discography is tiny element, big elements of some things, thrash, extreme metal,
00:14:55
Speaker
little hints of other things, little hints of Doom Metal which actually started sort of started gaining popularity a few years before Death Began, a 1987 screen bloody gore. So Doom would have been in the Metal scene building and it would have become a bit notorious, you know Candlemass would have already released their their Epicus Doomicus Metallicus album which is just the
00:15:20
Speaker
the most obvious example of a Doom album you can give. So that would have been in and around the metal scene. So I like to think that Chuck was hearing these things and just wanting to put them in his music. But again, this is another example of Chuck Scholdinger not just sticking with his formula of death metal, which he had in Screen Bloody Gore, but just trying to advance things.
00:15:49
Speaker
Yeah. And mind you, it's only been a year. Two years. I'll be talking to Suresh here. It's still, you know, it's not, it's not that much time and I think it's good to sort of move with time. Yeah, exactly. So yeah, that's really good. You know, I also noticed, I told you in Scream Blood, you got all that and leprosy that I personally couldn't
00:16:13
Speaker
I don't understand, I could, but because the screaming is so intense, you kind of get lost with the lyrics, like you can't really understand the lyrics. Yeah, so easy to not know. And I was like, I just, I'm not following that, I don't know what the lyrics are, but it changed in spiritual healing. I thought that it was, you know, the pronunciation, articulation per se, okay, was more there, and I could definitely
00:16:43
Speaker
you know, make some words out. I think his screams get better each
Technical and Progressive Elements in Human and Beyond
00:16:47
Speaker
album. I think it goes up. You go from the low kind of scream in the first album and then as you go through, you just know he's kind of, you can, I can hear what he says in some of the screams, especially in the later albums, which we'll get to.
00:17:01
Speaker
So after that comes human, and this is the moment where we see a far more technical and progressive side come into death's music. We kind of lose the melodies a little bit, they kind of sort of are pushed out in place of technicality and progressiveness. You know, let's look at what's going on. The intro of Secret Base,
00:17:23
Speaker
You've got bass solos in there. It's far more complex in time signature changes, tempo changes. The next thing to add is that he had a new band and actually we'll just take a minute on this to say that every album has a new lineup. That's another thing I think is very important because with certain bands, if you stick together and one band, four members stick together through the whole career of a band,
00:17:50
Speaker
I don't at all want to say it's a bad thing. Look at the wonders it's done for Metallica's career. I mean, obviously it's not the same for guys, but you know what I mean? Keeping a consistent core of a lineup. Chuck changed his musicians every album. And this, I think, was a huge part of Death's success. Because each time you've got a new album in the works and you've got new people coming in, they're offering different things than the band before.
00:18:15
Speaker
True. And I also read that Chuck was a man of a vision. He like knew what he wanted from the next lineup. He knew what he wanted to produce on the next album. So he knew the musicians. Well, that doesn't surprise me then because it means that he's come and he's said, well, I want a more technical sound on this album. Let's go and get some better players. There you go. No offense to the guys on leprosy. Like maybe musicians who play more technical stuff. Absolutely.
00:18:42
Speaker
And as I said, the first prominent signs of a melody slash a jewellery guitar we get is on the last song. It's simply not the focus on this album. Yeah, well...
00:18:52
Speaker
I just, I really enjoyed the bass on it. I enjoyed the solo that you mentioned before. And we have an instrumental track done with Cosmic C. And that was, I just, I don't know why, but I didn't expect to hear an instrument. It took us by surprise. I was like, do you remember more like halfway through? I was like, is this going to be an instrumental? Is this going to be an instrumental? And you know what? It was really, really enjoyable. And the bass solo was absolutely brilliant.
00:19:22
Speaker
And again, like there was a song, lack of comprehension, I think that the intro, again, just with such melodic baselines and it's just another step up, you know, for that melody that we talked about. Yeah. So following human comes individual thought patterns, which continues and even actually further develops the technicality and the progressive aspects. There is a big emphasis on time signature changes in this album. There are lots of them going on all over the place, several times each song.
00:19:51
Speaker
but with individual thought patterns they start adding more melody so I said in human there's a severe lack of melody if individual thought patterns they start bringing it in a bit more um go and check I mean I suppose it's it's things that you could mistake for a guitar solo like little sections where he's double tapping on like on his on his thing but you think it was a solo until you realize that it's got a structure to it it moves up to the next note goes up again back down to the original and he's repeated it again it's not a solo per se it's a very intricate
00:20:21
Speaker
virtuatistic melody or motif. Okay. Well, you know what I noticed about individual thought patterns is the use of fretless bass. Yes. That was very interesting. Fretless bass in death metal. Yeah.
00:20:37
Speaker
Is that just another kind of progressive element? Yeah, I think that's all it is because there's no way that chart. I mean, it's the same bass player. So although most line up of the lineup changed, it's the same bass player on humans. It is individual thought spam. Steve D Giorgio, I think his name is.
00:20:57
Speaker
There's no way that they would have just accidentally, you know, Steve didn't just go, hey, Chuck, I bought this fretless bass. Let me give it a whirl. He's that they've gone in there looking for a specific sound. And the thing about fretless bass, I can answer this as a bass player. I used to play fretless. First of all, I've got to give Steve absolute credit because the fretless bass is an incredibly hard instrument to play. You can get fretless basses with fret markers. So you can actually see where you'll notice where your fingers supposed to go to.
00:21:24
Speaker
a proper fretless bass player doesn't have fret markers and it's like playing a violin or a cello you just got to know where the notes are and so to play some of those riffs and some of those
00:21:35
Speaker
technically difficult riffs and and passages that Chuck has asked him to do on a fretless is something that you've got to admire hugely. It's just loud. The fretless it's even it gives a different tone it is smoother you can glide to the note you know instead of going it goes like it just glides up there there's no frets getting in the way. It's a more expressive bass you can simply because of that reason it's kind of like
00:22:07
Speaker
Obviously, you can play expressively on a piano. Yeah. But you know what I mean, that you still have to change the note you're on and click another note down. Yeah. With fretless instruments, you can just play one note and slide to the other. Mm hmm. Yeah. So do you think that feature, the else called a feature, sort of helped the amount of melody
00:22:37
Speaker
Not really because I don't think he plays much melody. So what do you think it contributed towards? Tonal. Just the tone, just the sound. Don't forget Chuck was always trying to experiment with things and see how we can make this better. How can I make this different?
00:22:52
Speaker
The bass playing doesn't feel different to human. It just sounds different. My point is, Steve DiGiorgio is being asked to do the same sort of thing on individual thought patterns as he is on human. It's not like Chuck has said, right, we're going to do a death metal album for human, so use a proper bass, and we're going to go and do some Latin Bossa Nova vibes for the second album, so get fretless. He's being asked to do the same thing. I just feel that tonally it's different.
00:23:20
Speaker
Yeah, it is. Yeah, it's very unusual. That's all I had. Apart from that, individual 12 pounds. I mentioned the technicality already, but I think it needs to be mentioned again that the level of musicianship on the album
00:23:34
Speaker
is just phenomenal because Chuck's songwriting with each album is developing and getting better and better and better. And he's learning more about his instrument, about the industry he's in, the genre he's supposedly pioneering. You know, something we actually forgot to mention at the start when we did Screen Bloody Gore is that Screen Bloody Gore is arguably the first death metal album of all time.
00:24:02
Speaker
I already said some people would say it's possessed seven churches. I gave my reasons for why I don't think so. I'm not going to argue with you if you do. But this guy arguably invented death metal with his first album and he is now constantly looking to evolve it and change it. We've seen through the album so far what he's done to change it and adapt the death metal sound. It's brilliant. And part of that comes the riffs that he writes and they're so good
00:24:28
Speaker
And you kind of think, how can you write anything harder or more daring or more complicated than this? And he does it. And then you go to the individual thought patterns. It's brilliant. Any more thoughts on that album? No, I just also think that with this album, it seems that his screams are really solid now. And I think from that album onwards,
00:24:49
Speaker
It just got better with that.
Symbolic: A Gateway Album
00:24:52
Speaker
So then comes symbolic. Symbolic is arguably, well, I think it is the most famous death album. It's the one that kind of everyone would recommend. Oh really? Yes, it is cited as their best. A lot of people would say it is the death album. It is my favorite album. Well, and this is why. Tell me, give me the one word why you like it, compared to the other albums. Interesting. Well, I don't know. There's a lot I like about it. But what's different?
00:25:19
Speaker
acoustic guitar? No, melodies. Okay, but melodies, we have melodies. Yeah, but not to this level. In symbolic, we see melodies galore. It is all about the melodies. We're getting this in, even in some of his vocal screens, he's doing melodies as opposed to just his monotone, normal scream. And we get more guitar solos, longer instrumental passages that focus on things like melody.
00:25:44
Speaker
imagine if you had a three and a half minute instrumental section and all it was is like the rhythms and the heavy drums that we kind of got in screen bloody gore i think you'd get bored i think i think a lot of people get bored but chuck embellishes it with beautiful melodies and motifs throughout this album and i think that actually along with you know i mentioned acoustic guitar yeah so acoustic guitar there's like little flamenco vibes going on in one of the songs and one of the outro and it's just like lightly just there and there the background and that is really beautiful again something i really didn't expect to see
00:26:14
Speaker
I don't know why, but you know. We don't have it before. Because we haven't had it before and it's just not something that I associate death metal with, to be quite honest with you. But I just think I lost what you were saying. Well, I was going to say that with the refinement and the furthering of the technical aspect of it with symbolic. So we've already established. Yeah, I know. So when you were talking about the melodies, I actually think
00:26:44
Speaker
those melodies in that variety of them is what made it a bit, it feels a bit more listenable to someone who can't really or doesn't really listen to death metal. But that's why someone who says, if you say I want to get into death metal, a lot of people would say go listen to symbolic by death. That's what happened to me. It's my favorite of all. There you go. I just found it really enjoyable and I'm actually going to go back and listen to it again.
00:27:11
Speaker
some further aspects of symbolic. So we've already established that with human and individual thought patterns, they really push the limits of progressiveness and technicality. Here, they kind of refine it. They don't push anymore. They've established what the perfect line is for them. And that's what I really like about it. It's a masterclass in technical death metal. Each musician masterfully displaying his talent.
00:27:38
Speaker
The same thing for progressiveness. They don't overdo it, but there are still plenty of time signature changes, atmospheric changes, acoustic guitar out of nowhere, tempo changes, unconventional song structures. They've just
00:27:53
Speaker
absolutely nailed and found that perfect balance between melody, technicality and progressiveness and that's why I think this is the perfect death album if you like. And I also think that what I noticed is something about the drums, that the drum groove sometimes went into something a bit
00:28:11
Speaker
simpler per se, if you can say simpler in relation to death, but there we go. Yeah, no, I agree. And it's just, it again, it contributed to me just having a really good time listening to it. It feels like a death metal album way more with sprinkles of traditional stuff, doesn't it? Like, I think you can hear certain choruses played with chords that I'm made in the famous of using.
00:28:39
Speaker
you know some dual leads you listen to it you think oh that's there's a bit of name in there yeah um but yeah symbolic that's a personal favorite of mine and yours so yeah tell us your favorite sorry tell us your favorite album actually think about it and tell us
The Sound of Perseverance's Complexity
00:28:55
Speaker
in the comments
00:28:55
Speaker
So finally, in terms of this musical, in the musical aspect of these albums, we're on the final stage of this part, the sound of perseverance. Now, this is the pinnacle at the time of technical death metal. Chuck decided to go all out and say, why don't we just try everything we can and go as technical as possible.
00:29:17
Speaker
We kick, it's so evident this is happening because you kick the whole album off with the most incredibly intricate drum intro. And it's just so typical that you're sort of sat there and it's like, well, what do we think this death album is going to be like? And there's this crazy drum intro and you're like, that's it. There's the answer. It's far more unforgiving and complex. It's hard. I think it's hard for,
00:29:39
Speaker
Comparing symbolic, I think the biggest difference in sound of an album, in depth's discography, is between symbolic. I actually, for me, probably. That's also because I remember listening to the first track of The Sound of Perseverance and I couldn't focus on the melody because it's so technical. It's got a lot behind it. There's a lot going on. Do you have anything else to say about that one?
00:30:07
Speaker
Well, I just thought one of the tracks, we had another acoustic guitar again coming in, and it sort of served as the main instrument for the track, which was very unusual again, I thought. What's it called? Vision of Soul or something? Yeah, I don't know exactly. Soul Vision or something. That was beautiful. It was. It was really lovely. It was actually lovely. Unexpected. Unexpected. Very nice. And you know what I also didn't expect is that the last song,
00:30:34
Speaker
It's a cover. Oh yeah, yeah. Painkiller by Judas Priest. Judas Priest? Yeah, really good cover as well. That to me was really special because we see Chuck for once. I know his vocal style had changed. I know his... No, it hasn't changed. I know his growling style had changed. He went from very low to higher, getting better at enunciation, getting better at pronunciation, getting better at this. But then at the end, the final piece of deaf music we get to hear on an official album, of course,
00:31:00
Speaker
is him scream belting, you know, growls slash screaming like Rob Halford. And yeah, it's very, very enjoyable for me. So that's the end of the first section where we're talking about the musicality aspect of Death's albums. Do we have any comments we want to address?
00:31:19
Speaker
No, I think it was just enjoying. Great, awesome stuff. Watching and we've got someone saying, can't watch right now but surely check out later. Make sure you do, yeah. Make sure you do. So the next section we're going to go into is production and we've got all the rest assured these sections aren't going to be as long as what we've just had because we've covered all the nitty-gritty detailed aspects of the music. Now we're going to kind of sum up and see in groups what happened.
00:31:41
Speaker
So the production, with Scream Bloody Go, I think it's very obvious
Production and Thematic Evolution
00:31:45
Speaker
to hear it is a raw, do-it-yourself kind of underground production vibe, which is how it was in the early days of Death Metal. It's certainly how it was in the early days of Black Metal. You know, we listened to a bit of Dark Throne, who were a Black Metal band,
00:32:02
Speaker
And we thought, my God, are they serious? Not the band, but is Spotify serious? Like, they want us to listen to this. It's so hard to hear the instruments because the mix is just so terrible. Yeah. And I think Scream by the Gores. OK, the production's OK, but it's still just a bit overly loud, a bit distorted in places. Yeah, I agree completely. It does get better, though. Yes, fuller love.
00:32:26
Speaker
it does yes so next with leprosy and spiritual healing it's better production isn't it oh yeah absolutely and it's just it's just a better mix overall like instruments you can actually make out the instruments better and follow them yeah it all makes much nicer but despite that it doesn't lose the brutality and the aggression i don't find ever i mean we're just talking about leprosy and spiritual healing i think it kind of enhances it makes it a bit more there makes it more sharp
00:32:53
Speaker
And I suppose if you're able to identify the instruments better, that's only going to enhance hearing kick drums play faster. Then we get to the last four albums, Human, Individual Four Pants, Symbolic and The Sound of Perseverance. And you kind of get the idea with these albums, they've kind of been like, right, we've nailed this. We know how to mix death songs because the mix is nailed.
00:33:19
Speaker
Your instruments are perfectly clear, the balance of the sounds is fantastic. And now they look to develop and to add things like special effects, atmospheric changes, playing with the tones of the guitars, you know, songs like the song flattening. There's more words to that, but I just wrote the first one, flattening, the drum intro. In all of death, we've never had drums coming up really quiet and then come louder, louder, louder into the song.
00:33:45
Speaker
yeah it was like a every song yeah um secret face the heavy guitars at the start there's some effects on them the lack of comprehension the intro the whole of cosmic sea just this production that's added that makes the song even better due to atmosphere and that's why i think he's key about the production of the last four albums is that once you've nailed the mix and you've found out how your band want to sound then you can start pushing forward with special effects and making you know guitar tones and stuff like that
00:34:14
Speaker
Yeah, no, I really, it actually sort of enhanced my whole listening to death experience, you know. The better production level. Yeah, and it's just use of effects was very interesting later on. I think it was start with human. And that was, yeah, that it didn't make it better, but it just, it just opened sort of another side of them. It's like a quality thing, isn't it? Why would you watch something in HD when you can watch in 4K?
00:34:40
Speaker
That's a great example, yes. So that's the production section done. Now we're going to move on to the lyrics. So with Scream Bloody Gore, lyrically, it was very much like what we associate most death metal to be about. Gore, horror, violence. Just go and take a look at the Cannibal Corpse album, can't there? And you'll see everything that people think death metal is about.
00:35:03
Speaker
However, one thing that was interesting is what cannibal corpse or bands like cannibal corpse have continued to sing about these gore, horror, death, violent themes, Chuck and death.
00:35:16
Speaker
I say Chuck and Death, Chuck is Death, but Chuck in the form of Death changed his lyrics. And they're not major changes, but you can start seeing tiny little tweaks and differences between albums. So from, like I said, Screen Bloody Gore, Horror, Violence and Gore.
00:35:34
Speaker
It's in the title, isn't it? Scream, bloody gore. With leprosy in spiritual healing, we're seeing a much more introspective set of lyrics. It's like Chuck is being a bit more human, a bit darker, looking in himself, exploring death, life, suffering, a bit of existentialism, and change isn't there. Yeah. Now, I just like the whole array of topics that he goes through, actually, throughout the discussion.
00:36:01
Speaker
With human and individual thought patterns, we continue veering away from the gore and horror and it tackles more philosophical and existential themes. Songs like The Philosopher and Human Form are demonstrative of this philosophical theme.
00:36:17
Speaker
and then finishing off with symbolic and the sound of perseverance, he kind of goes back to those existential metaphysical themes, you know, concepts of life, death, the human experience, human existence. And lyrics, I think, is something you don't tend to focus on a lot with Death Metal, which is why we've kept our partners in short here, because you can't hear him half the time. Sorry, Death Metal fans, sorry to put it out there, but it is true. It's true. It's true. You can't hear everything half the time. But yeah, so should we move on to our final category?
Chuck Schuldiner's Impact and Legacy
00:36:47
Speaker
Yeah, the final category is commercial success slash influence. Now, this is massively important because of the video. I made a bold statement how Chuck is like the most important man in death metal. I think a lot of people would agree with me, but now we're going to tell you how and why that's happened. So with Scream Bloody Gore, like I said, this album is arguably the first death metal album. This gave other bands the platform to go holy. I swear. Holy shit.
00:37:17
Speaker
look at how aggressive and brutal and heavy this man's music is. Why can't we do that? Imagine, you know, it's the end of the 80s, you've got glam metal, the Guns N' Roses have kind of taken the glam off of glam metal, they've taken the hair and the makeup and the spambex away, they're now writing heavier glam metal. We know it, songs like Sweet Child of Mine, you know, we know it.
00:37:42
Speaker
This is what the focus of metal was on glam and bands like Guns N' Roses in the end of the 80s, when you've got this underneath. I can just imagine so many other bands being like, wait, I'll look over here, Guns N' Roses, nothing against them, great band. Or I could play that Guns N' Roses and those kind of bands.
00:37:58
Speaker
Or I could play Chuck Schuldinger and write the heaviest, most brutal music I've ever heard. Screen Bloody Gort gave those bands a platform and an example of how to make this music. Unrelenting aggression and darkness that would set a precedent for death metal bands to come for many, many years.
00:38:26
Speaker
Now, what's important about leprosy and spiritual healing is that it continued the raw aggression and the brutality. But it said, this doesn't just have to be simple songs that when we're playing with raw aggression, we can make this complex. And that's what they did. They started adding complexity and sophistication into this raw, aggressive music. OK.
00:38:52
Speaker
Chuck's talent and notoriety for being an excellent songwriter and guitar player just elevated again. You know, people looked at Screen Bloody Gore and went, wow, it's a fucking good album. And then they hear leprosy and spiritual healing. They're like, Jesus, this guy can write, like really important stuff. With human and individual thought patterns, these are key. I mean, I've said this about it. I've said it about every album. These albums are key. That is true. Yeah.
00:39:16
Speaker
progressive death metal and technical death metal, I'm going to go out on a limb and say these sub genres would not exist without these two albums. We spoke in the musical section about how important, not how important, how
00:39:30
Speaker
technical and progressive. How many technical and progressive aspects Chuck has fitted into these songs whilst keeping his original brutality and aggression, whilst also keeping hints of melodies in there. And this is what is so significant. It's played a massive part in the development of progressive metal. Songs like Cosmic Sea showed that you could really, really push the boundaries of death metal to lengths that people would even, would not even consider.
00:39:59
Speaker
technical death metal as well. That's a huge factor for exactly the same reasons. Messing around with incredibly complex riffs using unorthodox scales, unusual arpeggios, unusual guitar techniques. That, exactly the same way as you say with Screen Buddy Gore, gave an example and an allowance for other bands
00:40:21
Speaker
to step in and say, well, I can play complicated riffs. Why don't I write music like this? And you look at the bands we've got now who you call technical death metal, you know, mesh of that.
00:40:31
Speaker
incredibly technical band and you kind of think well the rhythms they play in some of their songs are incredibly intricate and difficult but would they ever have gotten there had it not been for the likes of human and individual thought pans and Chuck saying to these guys you can do what you want with Death Mail it doesn't just have to be loud, brutal and aggressive. Do you have anything to say? No I just think overall I think that well it's got so much influence on me
00:40:59
Speaker
Yeah. Because I am not someone who just casually listens to death metal. And I think it's that technicality that apparently, it's just so technical that I just have so much respect for those musicians. And I think if you don't hear it in the context, when I'm trying to say it,
00:41:20
Speaker
if you don't understand what it means it can come across as messy and horrible but we'll get we'll come back to this later yeah because we're going to give our thoughts on death metal a bit later symbolic now as i said this is cited as the best death album and it is the pinnacle of technical and progressive death metal because as i said in the music section
00:41:43
Speaker
They've absolutely nailed it. They've now found the perfect balance between technicality, progressiveness, and melody.
00:41:51
Speaker
It allowed bands to explore many, many avenues of combining these things. Do you want to go technical and melodic? Should we go progressive and melodic? And you think of all the subgenres that have come out. Melodic death metal. Now, I wouldn't attribute symbolic with that subgenre because melodic death metal supposedly started earlier than that. But you can't for help but think that maybe leprosy or spiritual healing had a part to play in the rise of melodic death metal.
00:42:18
Speaker
It's just so much, so much that we can see as a direct result of this. And the sound of perseverance, to finish it off, Celebrate is one of the most significant achievements in both the tech metal and the progressive metal history, let alone Chuck and Death, just in the history. Chuck Swansong, which means his last piece of work, because
00:42:44
Speaker
We lost him in 2001 and this was very sad reading up on it, you know, so he developed a brain tumor, a cancerous tumor in his brain. And it was very, very sad because, you know, he was still writing, he was still playing, he was still doing his thing really well. And you had bands, I don't know if you know about this,
00:43:04
Speaker
in 2000, I'm not going to put a day on it in case I'm wrong, but a bunch of musicians came together to do a benefit concert to raise money for Chuck's treatment. Kid Rock, Corn, the Red Hot Chili Peppers, and even Matt Heafy from Trivium did his own thing at high school.
00:43:25
Speaker
before he was 15 years old. And before he was even in a band, Chuck had influenced him that much that he went and organized a gig for his band in high school so that he could send the money to Chuck Schaldinger's medical treatments. Wow, so he touched so many people. And in the industry, I mean, chili peppers, I'm so surprised. Kid Rock, Corn and Trivium you get, but Kid Rock and the Chili Peppers, it's like, wow.
00:43:52
Speaker
I think that goes to show, you know, all we've done here is talk about the musical influence from a very nerdy point of view. Okay, well, individual thought patterns, you can see how it helped tech death metal came from this and that. But even, even just, even just the way, as you said, the lives he touched and the way he meant things, you know, after when I told you that when I said when we agreed that we were gonna do this. Yeah.
00:44:19
Speaker
And before we got to the first few listens, we watched a live video on YouTube of death performing. And I said to Dash, I said, just read these. And it was the comments from the YouTube video.
00:44:33
Speaker
And you can just tell he's just such a missed person. I think it's also because, I mean, do you remember what he looked like? Just like a jeans and a T-shirt. And he just like looks like a guy that just lives next door. Just played the guitar and he'd grade at it and everything. It's just like the most down to... Yeah, the most normal looking guy. I'll find his long hair. I suppose that was a bit different for the 18s, but well, maybe not. But you just got the most normal looking guy. Imagine living next door to you and you're like, yeah, sorry, that guy in David
00:45:03
Speaker
You see that, yeah. What, Chuck, the neighbour? That's why you brought the paper round yesterday, which you mean? But yeah, that's, that's, we're done now essentially on our analysis of death and their discography. We hope that it's shown, taken you through musically, lyrically, production wise and influence
00:45:25
Speaker
influence-wise, how important death were. And I don't want to overstate this, I don't want to make out like I know everything about death metal and this is the, you know, now there's so much more for me to do and to go and check out. And I said we'll get to after but I'll just give my thoughts on death metal now and I'll ask you after, yeah? No, I have written this so I'm going to read it because I have to make sure that I wanted to get my thoughts down.
00:45:50
Speaker
I've now come away having so much respect and admiration for Chuck. He's like overnight. Over a few months, he's going to become my metal hero. Even though I'd say Deaf aren't my favorite band.
00:46:01
Speaker
I've got bands I prefer more, but in terms of what he has done, I'm in awe of him and what he's done. He has made me understand death metal. Now let me explain why. I didn't get it before. I thought it was messy, convoluted, loud, over the top. I didn't enjoy it.
00:46:22
Speaker
And now I get that it is all about the technicality, the aggression, the darkness you are meant to feel in the lyrics translated through the music, the musicianship. And although I like a bit of melody and death, I can really now enjoy and appreciate death metal. And I can't wait to go and start checking out some other bands in this
00:46:44
Speaker
who are equally responsible because we've got to give, you know, we've got to give credit as well. This wasn't a one-man show, despite everything we just said. Chuck was largely responsible for a lot of stuff and a lot of the progressions and the changing the course of Death Metal had many times. We've got plenty of other bands as well, doing the Necrophagia, we're a big band, Obituary, you know, we already said Possessed, a whole host of other great bands that we want to lord and give plaudits to for their parts in it. But
Live Performances and Changed Perceptions
00:47:14
Speaker
As you can see, if you've watched for the last half a long, this show is about Chuck Shoulderner and Death. Yeah. What are your thoughts on Death Metal now? I'm just so touched. Like, it's weird, okay? It is weird. My whole perspective changed when we watched the live video. Okay, why? Because I actually, so we watched like a live show they did. We watched, if it's Death Fans are watching, they'll know, we watched Live in Einhoven. So that gig, we watched that one. That changed everything for me.
00:47:44
Speaker
because I was just listening to, when I was listening to Screenbladder Go, I was like, oh my goodness. This is so difficult to listen to. I'm actually struggling, but I need to, you know, I need to take my notes. I need to be proficient about my prep. And then I watched a live video and I looked, I just watched him do his thing.
00:48:09
Speaker
And like, wow, there's so much skill behind this. Yeah.
00:48:14
Speaker
It's just that just completely turned it around for me. And I started seeing it from the, from just completely other perspective, from the perspective of just excellent musicianship. And God knows how many hours put into just playing guitar to that level, let alone songwriting to that level. Okay. And I think this is what changed it for me. And now I look at the whole genre differently. And I'm actually really curious about melodic death metal. I love my melodies. Okay. I'm a singer. So.
00:48:43
Speaker
It's something I'd definitely go and check out. I think I agree with you. I think we're
00:48:48
Speaker
being in the western side of the world was so used to the confines of western pop music and western pop music quite clearly involves an intro, a verse, a chorus, a verse, a chorus, a bridge, a chorus, and then an outro. That's like staple, that's every Beatles song, you know, the Beatles, the Stones, the Who, the Kinks, all these bands.
00:49:13
Speaker
And even today, how many of our favorite bands have intro, verse, chorus, verse, chorus? So many. So many. It's a trademark of Western music to structure songs like this. Western popular music, I should say. So it's no surprise that there's a plethora of bands and artists in metal that write like this.
00:49:40
Speaker
But to have someone just turn that formula on his head and be like, you want to start this solo? Fuck it, let's do it. And I'm not going to, you know, prog rock came in the early 70s and they messed around with structures and everything. So I'm not saying that Chuck Sheldon is responsible for changing the course of all music, but just having the
00:50:05
Speaker
balls to grab a genre or a sub genre that you've essentially invented and say yeah it was good for that album but now I'm going to do this and I'm going to mess up the structures and do this and now I'm going to do it but I'm going to put time signature changes in and tempo changes and use other instruments and now I'm going to do it and I'm going to use a fretless bass. I just I got so much admiration for this guy
00:50:29
Speaker
so much so I mean what was your do
Favorite Albums and Community Engagement
00:50:31
Speaker
you have a favorite album symbolic symbolic me too what like any other job like a list no no I think symbolic is my favorite yeah um and I just I really enjoyed that album I just had everything for me it really did it did have everything which I really enjoyed it was so good um but yeah do you have a favorite like a album
00:50:55
Speaker
Ooh, yeah, that's a good one because they've got some very interesting ones. I do. Yeah, I think I did the top three. Yeah, so number three for me was Sound of Perseverance. I thought it was really scary. Like, what is that thing? Is it a mouth? Is it a cave entrance? And the people crawling up and that red, the redness, the dark red that litters the album. It's scary. You look at anything, that's a death metal album. Yeah. Spiritual healing, I thought it's cool because it's kind of almost a bit tongue in cheek just with the
00:51:25
Speaker
uh the who was it it's a tv evangelist uh a priest um trying to heal someone who's obviously like mentally disturbed or mentally ill or maybe even physically ill um and this is always a bit comedic you know a bit satire that was number two for me but number one leprosy leprosy oh i found leprosy so disturbing that's the point for me you've got the most unmetalled color pink dominating the album cover
00:51:52
Speaker
with what we call a leper, a man or woman who has leprosy. Yeah, and leprosy is a, I don't want to say anything wrong, but it's a disease which I know can eat away at flesh and skin and everything. Yeah, how is that disturbing? But that's metal as fuck. Exactly, and this is what they were going for. And I like that if you want to scare someone, you know, you want to say, yeah, do you want to see death metal? Oh, look at this. And you put the leprosy album cover in their face, they'll be like, oh, fuck. Please don't do that to me.
00:52:21
Speaker
No, no, we do it to our family members. But yeah, I think that's it. As far as we're concerned, you know, we've been through the whole discography four times now with the four different sections. And those are our thoughts. Yeah. Do we have anything to answer or to address? I think so. People are just saying greetings from Mexico City Hall.
00:52:40
Speaker
Hi guys, if you've missed anything go back and check it out because we've gone through the whole of death's discography explaining why Chuck death and the rise of death metal was so crucial done by them. We're gonna save everything as per usual you can check it out on any platform of your choosing really we've got the live stream is going to be up on YouTube on Facebook and if you're watching on YouTube and you're not yet following us on Facebook please follow us on Facebook. Yeah why not?
00:53:07
Speaker
why not please support us it means the world to us and you can watch us on instagram as well yeah all three of you instagram please go to facebook and hit a like is that right that's facebook facebook go to youtube and hit subscribe youtube hit instagram of facebook and give them likes and subscribes please guys we want to build this male community we've said it before we want to build a little male community as we've said we're in our mid-20s we don't i'm happy to say live mid-20s they don't need to know that
00:53:36
Speaker
I'm happy to say live on this, I do not know everything about heavy metal.
00:53:41
Speaker
Not me either. But we love it. It's a learning curve. I told you I listened to nu metal, tech metal. I listened to traditional metal, industrial metal, prog metal. I listened so much. Death metal is not something I checked out before. I'm learning and having learned in the best way possible, just find the best fucking death metal band and get involved in their discography. And it's changed my world around. Like already, I bought t-shirts. I loved it so much. Like the album really hit me in a special way.
00:54:10
Speaker
And again, massive thank you, I suppose, in the afterlife to Chuck Scholden, that's all he did. If, at the very least, I only end up enjoying seven Death Metal albums and they are all Death's albums, I'll be happy. At the best, I'm going to have a whole new world of Death Metal opened up to me.
00:54:29
Speaker
But anyway, we're a community. We're trying to build a community of like-minded people who love metal, whether you like new metal or death metal, black metal or industrial metal. We shouldn't be part of it. We're just going to share our thoughts on things, do album reviews, all the stuff you see here. So please get involved and join us. Yeah, we'll see you very soon. This has been really enjoyable and I've really enjoyed the research we've done for us. And the listening. And the listening and...
00:54:53
Speaker
I love it. I do, I do. It's music that has hit me. No, I did not think I'd come away two months ago saying I now love a couple of Death Metal albums. There you go, there you go. This is what happens and actually this is all because of you guys as well. Yes, thanks to you guys. Thanks to you for recommending, thanks to you, you and you for recommending it to us. So yeah, we'll see you again very soon. Thank you very much for tuning in. Have a nice day. Have a lovely day. We'll see you very soon.