Deafheaven

I know they've been discussed elsewhere, but I think Deafheaven could use their own thread. I am admittedly a very casual metal listener, but Sunbather has really grabbed me. Not sure "black metal" is the best genre tag for it though, as the music is warm and enveloping and the overall vibe of the thing has nothing to do with coldness and hatred. Actually, the shrill vocals seem very surprising paired with this music. I don't know why it works but it does.

Road to Judah is pretty great as well.

none more false

http://media.npr.org/assets/img/2013/04/30/deafheaven20131-caf771c53e5f8ec296d331fa960c778f8a29a48c-s6-c30.jpg

they look like they work for teach for america

http://media.npr.org/assets/img/2013/04/30/deafheaven20131-caf771c53e5f8ec296d331fa960c778f8a29a48c-s6-c30.jpg rather

hahaha maybe wait until their second record, imagine if we had a liturgy thread

*searches* oh

Both Deafheaven and Liturgy broke through on their second records...

They just look like two guys. Maybe a little more vampiric than average but still. Xpost

http://blog.zap2it.com/frominsidethebox/cast-of-person-of-interest-cbs.jpg

Actually, the shrill vocals seem very surprising paired with this music.

do threadbans exist can I be banned from this thread for my own good

this band reminds me of the owl city guy
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H7HmzwI67ec

its really not necessary to make fun of these guys for looking like normal guys since their dull, labored-over music should rly provide sufficient ammunition.

I am admittedly a very casual metal listener, but Sunbather has really grabbed me.

It's ok bro, this record is for people like you.

Can I just post this picture of Bosse-De-Nage?

http://i58.tinypic.com/1z1bvp1.jpg

ghost of bizarro Pete Seeger to thread

Blackened Flagpole Sitta

as 'this kind of thing' goes, I can't find any photos of Neige Morte that do their look justice, but when I saw them the singer was wearing boat shoes and no socks. I wouldn't have minded but I'd just been to see Immortal

TBH these Sunbather dudes just look like co-presidents of the Death In June fan club, USA division.

Do you guys look "metal" yourselves or do you just demand this of your metal musicians?

I look like Don Knotts in a black commando sweater and a porkpie hat with a Katatonia patch sewed to it.

To be clear, I voted for this album. I just think they look funny, in a funny kinda way.

One of the worst things in the 77 imo, turned off at the first egregious quiet-loud

if anyone wants to listen to an actual good usbm record from last year with some crossover potential try out woe's withdrawal. the main guy in woe also looks like just a guy, if that's a concern at all.

You'd have to be deaf to want to listen to this band! Hahahaha

I think I give up trying to get people to check out metal since metalheads do their damned best to put people off.

treeship if you ever want recommendations feel free to webmail me or if you're on fb gimme those details. Always happy to chat about any music.

If people check out Deafheaven and it leads them to get into Weakling or Ludicra or something, great. But compromise-metal just inherently gets on my nerves.

the singer in this band screams a lot.

Lantlos! That is the best post-rock-black-metal there is, mainly because the post-rock used is of the earlier, Talk Talk-ian kind. Love their album .neon.

I dug this album, Treeship, my man. I'm not sure yet, but it might even be in my top 10.

It's unfortunate the 'black metal' label has stuck. I guess nobody else can do shrieking vocals except black metallers. Yet it can't all be just about the music, right? Or can it? Isn't most metal now just riddled with contradictions and hundreds of little factions with their own thing that all of it essentially means nothing now? I didn't think people still argued over metal.

I remember metal fans tending to be worst than English modernists when it comes to labelling, with their fervent desire to categorise music.

I guess since I like Deafheaven, I'm just driven by the wrong ideology, lack that radical individualism, and am entrenched in a mainstream group identity/herd mentality. Metal just has too many sophisticated subgenres and subcultures, man. I.e., rules. I can't judge it because I'm just a casual listener. I'll leave that to true metal listeners.

But what do I know. I guess I can't tell what I like. Can a true black metaller recommend some basement-studio, genre-crossing metal that still keeps it real...yo? Oh, sorry, that's hip hop. I'm such a dilettante. Hihihi!

Anyway, the theatrics have always put me off. So has the Peter Pan syndrome a lot of these dudes have.

I remember in secondary some guys would get magazines with build-your-own-church-to-set-fire pages and my internal laugh would echo as strongly as blast beats.

Who says those who listen to Deafheaven even want to listen to an 'actual good USBM' album? LOL.

Kthksbye. Gonna work on this http://www.wikihow.com/Do-Black-Metal-Vocals

that's a shame you get put off. The whole reason I run metal poll at eoy time is to introduce everyone on ilx who can be bothered reading it to good metal of all kinds. Hardly anyone contributes on the rollout thread though. Lack of interest or fear of being shot down?

Maybe I'm wasting my time?

who says those who read ilx want to read a nine-paragraph crimsonhexagon post about anything, lol

@۩, Oh, I listen to some recommendations here. I appreciate that. And some I like. But that's as far as I'll go. I can't be bothered to shoot down bands like Deafheaven (or replace this band with whatever equivalent in another music 'genre').

All of us listen to music differently, right?

I've hung out with metalheads since I was a kid. I remember tabbing out Old Man's Child crap for some of them. I've played music with some. Even when I stopped playing music a couple of years ago, I was around some metal musicians. I'll just clarify the obvious, just in case: a lot of them are great people, but they are also much older and have diverse musical tastes.

Young kids have always been very set in their opinions. I am much older now and don't really discuss music the way I used to when I was a kid. I'm into more cultural and historical overviews. Identifying with a musical culture is not something I do or desire now. I'd rather study it on my own time.

I played music for a little more than half of my life. If there is one thing I was always put off by, it was the theatrics of performing. That's just my thing, though.

The people I would talk to when I was a kid were trading Dimmu Borgir tapes, as well as crust punk stuff. I always felt more welcomed by those who preferred the latter. It might've just been the time and place. But again, for me, music is not about being accepted into a group of people. I can listen to one album, then switch to something completely different. I have friends who listen to totally different styles of music. The consequence of this is that your life becomes compartmentalised. I can't have all of them in the same room, because I'm sure some would despise others.

The only metal friends I've tried to get involved in other realms of my life are those who like stuff like Opeth.

Anyway, thanks for your honest reply and, again, I appreciate your recommendations, ۩.

This got to #10 in the metal poll so plenty of metal dudes like it. Think the vocals are a bit weak but it's a good record that obv overlaps with the postrock/ shoegaze crowd. Plenty more music around like that: Alcest, Les Discrets, Drudkh, Lantlos, Nachtvorst, Arsaidh, Bosse de Nage, Westering, Kultura Kureniya, etc.

If people check out Deafheaven and it leads them to get into Weakling or Ludicra or something, great. But compromise-metal just inherently gets on my nerves.

― atom bomb, vietnam, missiles on the moon (GOTT PUNCH II HAWKWINDZ), Saturday, February 1, 2014 4:27 PM (59 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Why? Deafheaven wanted to make an album that sounded like Sunbather not one that was more orthodox black metal, either in sound or spirit. How is this a compromise? If you don't like the way they integrate bm sounds into their music that's fine -- it's a critical judgment -- but your reaction to them just seems territorial.

it def it territorial, and i don't think that's great. but i also don't think it's great when ppl are actively avoiding the context that surrounds and creates something like deafheaven.

worst sin they committed (to metalheads) and also simultaneously most genius PR move is the album art

i think that's actually the only distinctive thing about them tho, afaict

the album art is awesome! and i kinda liked judah. the music on this one just didn't work for me.

ya its cool it just looks like something gr80 would listen to u know

balearic metal

If you don't like the way they integrate bm sounds into their music that's fine -- it's a critical judgment -- but your reaction to them just seems territorial.

I just find this "let's take one or two elements of metal and glom them onto some shitty, dull post rock/shoegaze" thing grating. It's not good metal and it's not good post rock; if the only creative innovation is blending two things together poorly, why bother?

It's very good post-rock!

I'm convinced and rescind all prior arguments.

Also I do actually like the cover.

I bet you can mention more worthy BM than PR from the last few years. Sunbather put some agression and energy into the mix, and it's the best post-rock in eons, with the possible exception of the last GYBE.

i'd like to try with this band again, but the scream-o vocal style is really off-putting for me. is there anything that tones-down the yelling, or is especially accessible and hook-y (maybe that's an alternative way to approach deafheaven, if it's all scream-o vocals).

yes, i know; i'm super-duper old, and should probably be listening to paul anka.

Don't worry, their next album will probably feature some daring experimentation with clean vocals. Album after that you'll never know they were a metal band at all.

oh I'd guess their one-sheets will make liberal use of the word "metal"

I usually love mimsy pseudo-metal usually but these guys take Envy and Wolves in the Throne Room and make it into something of a shitstain. Poor man's Alcest and that's being really fucking generous.

idk if theres a joke behind yr dn i'm not getting, but i enjoy it regardless

ban cad; ki-moon

Such dislike from some itt

I like Sunbather quite a bit. It's a good album.

is it a final fantasy pun? yeah that would be outside my area but thumbs up.

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

i mean, this song is stunning to me. i don't think it sounds like what i've heard of alcest and it definitely doesn't sound like wolves in the throne room.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N-Dyaoq_oSA

I really liked this album. I understand that its very success is galling because that seems to be about the buzz delivery system and its lottery like windfall for some bands at the expense of others. But the drumming on this album is ace, there are great riffs, and it is really well sequenced. Which doesn't mean other albums didn't also come out that have those qualities too.

It was in my list this year so maybe I'm defensive but I just kept going back to it. It's also not a thing where if you dig this you can't also get down with Insquisition and Cultes Des Ghoules and harder/darker/kvlter stuff.

OK I was rather needlessly aggressive, sorry (I just migrated from another forum because of that kind of shit and I'll try to cut it out). I think I dislike DH largely because of "the buzz delivery system and its lottery like windfall for some bands at the expense of others" mentioned above.

I just don't find them particularly convincing as either a post-rock or metal band... And in general I prefer black metal bands that look like college professors/scruffy dudes rather than grumpy pandas with a leather fetish.

periodic reminder that melodically these guys are the flaming lips

now got a black metal cover of 'this here giraffe' stuck in my head thanks aeroboot

periodic reminder that melodically these guys are the flaming lips

― joe perry has been dead for years (underrated aerosmith bootlegs I have owned), Sunday, February 2, 2014 11:51 AM (54 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

So?

the term Black metal is getting loose. it doesn't mean what it use to, like the word punks and hardcore. it when the casual fan gets a hold of it it turns into something that is different than the original intent.
This is whats happening with these guys.. A SF BM band, who I believe are a lot vegan, who use a lot of major keys, signed to an east coast hardcore label... Non of that really says Black Metal to me. And i'm not even a big fan of BM..

And in general I prefer black metal bands that look like college professors/scruffy dudes rather than grumpy pandas with a leather fetish.

― ultros ultros-ghali, Sunday, February 2, 2014 9:44 AM

this brought the LULZ!

So?

So if you're into this band you might want to also check out the Flaming Lips, you might also like them

Shall I explain my upthread reference to Pete Seeger?

who I believe are a lot vegan

aero that is a serious accusation you are making

I'm glad my work is not going unappreciated here goon tie but listen for yourself, deafheaven is flaming lips + genuinely spectacular drummer with the vocals traded out for "black metal"

http://www.stereogum.com/1617782/deconstructing-alcests-shelter-and-metal-in-a-post-deafheaven-world/franchises/deconstructing/

Was just thinking, their last album Torn Beyond Reason was just too early for the big wave, but if the Northern Silence label dudes do their job, the new Woods of Desolation album could totally be this years Deafheaven.

Hello. I liked this album actually and my false-metal bullshit receptors are generally quite acute. I think if you try not to get hung up on whether they're supposed to be metal or not, it greatly improves the experience, unlike with Liturgy who sound like someone trying to copy BM tropes based on some distant memory of having heard Nattens Madrigal once.

I think Deafheaven's sound is really satisfying. A kind of drowning, frying sound with some really stunning moments that transcend the typical BM and post-rock stuff people compare them to.

I think both Liturgy and Deafheaven are totally pleasurable listens and I find this TRUE KVLT arguments pretty moronic. Flaming Lips could only be improved by dude from Deafheaven in place of current singer.

periodic reminder that melodically these guys are the flaming lips

― joe perry has been dead for years (underrated aerosmith bootlegs I have owned), Sunday, February 2, 2014 11:51 AM (Yesterday) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

nah man the band these guys i GUARANTEE used to have posters on their bedroom walls of was ...And You Will Know Us By The Trail of Dead

the structures of the songs, chord changes, vocal melodies are total Trail of Dead just inna black metal stylee

I think Sunbather > Aesthetica, but Generation > every song by Deafheaven.

#importantopinion

the pecan tree is my favorite black metal track and despite a handful of my bloody valentine songs it's my favorite shoegaze track too

i love hunter hunt hendrix's manifesto and his role as public enemy no. 1 among metalheads more than i like liturgy's music.

trail of dead is a really good call, ums

Foster's Van by the Boo Radleys is my favourite BM song.

treesh, serious question, do you like any screamo?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D_-gNndrD7c&list=PL9D0487956FC7B9EA

this record owned

Am I missing something or are people actually upset about this not fitting into some particular subgenre or that it combines too many from others or something?

the thing with metal is it's never enough to like metal, you gotta like the right metal and you gotta like the right metal for the rights reasons and also you have to like the right metal for the right reasons at the right time, before the wrong ppl like it

i think what has been happening is that people who are knowledgeable about the genres deafheaven are attempting to fuse are saying that in their opinion it is not a particularly successful fusion.

Am I missing something or are people actually upset about this not fitting into some particular subgenre or that it combines too many from others or something?

no, that's not what people are "upset" (="talking") about, though that is how people who don't just love the shit out of Deafheaven have their arguments characterized. xp cad otm as usual.

i think what has been happening is that people who are knowledgeable about the genres deafheaven are attempting to fuse are saying that in their opinion it is not a particularly successful fusion.

― call all destroyer

^^^Exactly.

As I said elsewhere, it's like chocolate and ketchup. Both are fine things, and many people love them, but together they taste like shit. And for me, Deafheaven is the musical equivalent of chocolate and ketchup.

omg EZ you PURIST

For the first 20 years of my life I kept my foods from touching each other on the plate. That's now in the past, but some things bring it back.

Plus, my best friend made a chocolate ice cream and ketchup shake when we were 10 and it traumatized us both with its heinousness.

i think what has been happening is that people who are knowledgeable about the genres deafheaven are attempting to fuse are saying that in their opinion it is not a particularly successful fusion.

― call all destroyer, Monday, February 3, 2014 8:55 AM (17 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

this is true, but the full range of metal dudes' complaints itt includes mocking that this fusion could even be described as "metal" or "black metal" on the PR sheets. at the very least these metal dudes have questioned the purity of deafheaven's intentions in using these genre descriptors.

you can't complain about straw in your cheeseburger after you've been tossing straw around the kitchen: "none more false", "oh I'd guess their one-sheets will make liberal use of the word "metal"", etc.

i'm not totally sure that's what has been happening but even if so it seems like deafheaven fans want to make it very clear that they aren't actually interested in metal. so never the twain shall meet i guess.

like if deafheaven fans are saying "wow i found the one metal record i like" and metal fans are saying "great but it's barely a metal record" i don't see what the problem is.

I'm a Deafheaven-fan, and I like plenty of metal. From Sunn O))) to um... Om!

"i think what has been happening is that people who are knowledgeable about the genres deafheaven are attempting to fuse are saying that in their opinion it is not a particularly successful fusion."

lol right.

there's nothing wrong with deafhaven that a reincarnated ronnie james dio couldn't fix

it seems like deafheaven fans want to make it very clear that they aren't actually interested in metal. so never the twain shall meet i guess.

orly?

i'm not totally sure that's what has been happening

he gave you quotes from the thread!

Can you guys help remind me which #team I'm supposed to be on?

The facts:
1. I like metal.
2. I like shoegaze.
3. I don't think Deafheaven is really metal or shoegaze.
4. I like Deafheaven though.

#TEAMBREEZY

i was talking abt folks like treesh and crimsonhex obv, cmon you guys

deafheaven is definitely an alloy of some sort. but one party thinks it's something like steel. the other thinks it's mimetic poly alloy sent back in time to destroy humankind.

like if deafheaven fans are saying "wow i found the one metal record i like" and metal fans are saying "great but it's barely a metal record" i don't see what the problem is.

― call all destroyer, Monday, February 3, 2014 Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

i was talking abt folks like treesh and crimsonhex obv, cmon you guys

― call all destroyer, Monday, February 3, 2014 Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

@call all destroyer, I'm trying to understand why you think you need to have an opinion on people who like Deafheaven to begin with.

I'll echo what jon /via/ chi 2.0 said and say:

1. I'm not a genre-fan. I think I stopped being one in my teens. So, you are right, I'm not a metal fan. But I'm also not a 'rock fan' or a 'jazz fan'. I am a 'music' fan. Revolutionary, isn't it?

2. I don't think Deafheaven are purely black metal. They mix a bunch of different styles like thousands of bands do. If I was forced to reduce them to a style or genre I would probably use BM and post-rock or some type of post-metalish thing, but I'd feel uncomfortable doing so, because I don't talk about music in those terms all that much. If and when I do, I think they should be taken with a grain of salt, as a loose point of reference; a simplification of whatever type of art form, and I would hope the person I'm recommending the music to has enough sensibility to not confine whatever music to specific genre rules.

3. LOL @ "i found the ONE METAL record i like". Please go on. I want to hear more on this.

As far the chocolate and ketchup analogy, the problem is, of course, music is intangible, thus, making it difficult if what you hear is actually chocolate or ketchup.

making it difficult to decipher if what you hear is actually chocolate or ketchup.*

basically i think the dynamics of successful crossover metal acts are interesting in terms of how ppl react to them. but if yr gonna be "what can we really know, it's all just music maaaan" then we prob don't have much to talk about.

because I don't talk about music in those terms all that much

ok, I'll bite - can you define the terms in which you do talk about music?

we need to agree on an orthogonal basis of genre words. then we would never fight because genres would be like pizza toppings.

To me the clear touchstones for Sunbather are not shoegaze so much as sentimental Explosions in the Sky style post rock and M83 type stadium-sized 80s romanticism. In light of that, it's not surprising to see it have so much cross-over appeal; in my opinion it mines that stuff and hybridizes it with metal pretty well.

http://noisey.vice.com/blog/why-are-black-metal-fans-such-elitist-assholes

well, that was terrible

the photo man, the photo!

yeah...

I guess I shouldn't be surprised but that just seemed like snarky, tossed-off linkbait barely arguing a point. sounds like a vice article alright.

so what does the record sound like, guys

I could liveblog it, this time not turning it off at the first EITS dickmove...

can a mod merge the alcest/liturgy threads with this one?

that would be like merging chocolate and ketchup

Liturgy were iirc just so much better than this

threadallurgy

rolling neil halstead metal thread

this thread is worse than hitler

you're way closer there than your flaming lips zing, aero!

well that's because they really do sound like the flaming lips! the shoegaze thing is misdirection really

alcest on the other hand lumps in nicely with 90s shoegaze I think

Where do yall stand on other BM 'travesties' like Shining? I ask because their cheesy nujazz technowank metal just came on my MP3 player and filled my ears with creamy shards of noxious joy

I found them really interesting. In the end I wasn't that into them, but it struck me as an earnest try at trying new things

threadallurgy

― the Norwegians are leaving! (Sufjan Grafton), Monday, February 3, 2014 2:52 PM (8 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

lol well done

http://www.metalsucks.net/2014/02/03/prince-harry-loves-big-four/

Metal music was created in England — so it makes sense that there’s finally a fan of the genre in the Royal Family.

Actor Dominic West, who you may know from playing “McNulty” on The Wire, or from his criminally underrated performance as “Jigsaw” in Punisher: War Zone, recently accompanied Prince Harry to the South Pole while working for a charity called Walking with the Wounded. And what did Mr. West learn about His Highness on the trip? He tells The Daily Star:

“Harry has a terrible selection on his iPod. It is the sort of thing soldiers listen to. Hardcore thrash metal.”

The only specific bands West named were all the members of The Big Four, so, alas, Evile don’t get that royal endorsement they’ve been working so hard for all these years.

http://www.metalsucks.net/wp-content/uploads/2014/02/prince-harry-620x319.jpg

Imagine the disquiet if he had liked Deafheaven or Alcest!

http://www.metalsucks.net/wp-content/uploads/2014/02/prince-harry-620x319.jpg

i kind of agree with everyone in this thread

esp the opinions that are at odds with each other

today was the first day i realized these guys were called deafHEAVEN not deafHAVEN so fuck this band now

DEAFHEAVIN'

i liked roads to judah a lot
sunbather is awkward tho
i dont care what they look like
i agree that its cover is the most interesting thing about it
drummer really is great
people who rallied behind the mobs of trve dudes hurling endless homophobic slurs at liturgy are human scum regardless of the fact that the band's drummer was literally inaudible live and dude had dumb ideas
lets not do that again

it does bother me that they seem to use the term "shoegazing" instead of "shoegaze"

hahah it doesn't really make for the best action verb, does it

i kind of agree with everyone in this thread

― 1 P.3. Eternal (roxymuzak), Monday, February 3, 2014 4:55 PM (22 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

esp the opinions that are at odds with each other

― 1 P.3. Eternal (roxymuzak), Monday, February 3, 2014 4:55 PM (22 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

fan of Beefhavin'

lol xp
man that was some fuckin shoegazing black metal, man, i tell you

next thing you know it'll migrate to the past participle and then the real war will begin

shoegoze

When in disgrace with fortune and men's eyes
I all alone beweep my outcast state,
And trouble deaf heaven with my bootless cries,
And look upon myself, and curse my fate,
Wishing me like to one more rich in hope,
Featured like him, like him with friends possessed,
Desiring this man's art, and that man's scope,
With what I most enjoy contented least;
Yet in these thoughts my self almost despising,
Haply I think on thee, and then my state,
Like to the lark at break of day arising
From sullen earth, sings hymns at heaven's gate;
For thy sweet love remembered such wealth brings
That then I scorn to change my state with kings.

people who rallied behind the mobs of trve dudes hurling endless homophobic slurs at liturgy

Stuff I'm Glad I Didn't Even Know About chapter whatever

And trouble deaf heaven with my bootless cries

these guys refuse even to wear boots, how can you be metal and not wear boots

i don't know if i like this album but one thing for sure:

now i know there is a genre called Blackgaze

oh, tune was space, u might be amused 2 hear that the other day my phone corrected ur band's name to Narnia, just a heads-up

some writers (and just people in gen) who i had respect for were sort of celebrating the trve metal crowd's venomous response to liturgy, linking to "hilarious" pages and pages long comments threads of people making rape jokes/insults about sexuality. wish i hadnt seen that either tbh

xp you say these guys refuse to wear boots?

Am listening to Sunbather all the way through right now. It's kinda boring, which is my main problem with it - I don't gaf about whether it's true metal or not - I find the tunes and the production q somnolent

best track so far has been the keeningly-titled 'please remember' which devolved into a f unexpected noise experiment halfway thru. other than this, dirges

is there a genre called voidgaze? or is that just people staring into the void and not music at all?

my bootless cries. my orange croc'd cries.

xp to imago

is there disagreement about whether or not its true metal really? it seems like everyone agrees its not (maybe they/their PR ppl thought they were re: the other album, but about this album theyve mostly said its a departure from metal stuff iirc?), the people who like it and the people who dont alike

the boots thing does bother me, wtf are these guys wearing, vans?

huarache sandals, hopefully

hahaha oh i just now realized its a reference, i thought you for real saw them decrying boots in an interview or something. i was about to launch a campaign against these dudes

http://www.luxecoliving.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/12/mens_birkenstocks_socks_1.jpg

http://www.brooklynvegan.com/img/music/deafheaven/cakeshop/17.jpg

one of them goes barefoot lol

or is that just people staring into the void and not music at all?

― Isaiah "Ice" McAdams (cajunsunday), Monday, February 3, 2014 Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

and while we're talking about things inspired by sonnet 29 there's also this:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kCR48dC4b54

it's clear from their name that they are anti-boots. have you ever seen a picture of them from the ankles down, think abt it

ha lol I umm cannot stand in judgement of bros who wanna perform w/o shoes on tho lol

used to often go barefoot but tbh i now wear very thick soles because i use too many pedals with tiny switches and that shit can hurt

When I played music, I would go barefoot. It was so comfy.

But I also wear Vans slip-ons.

used to often go barefoot but tbh i now wear very thick soles because i use too many pedals with tiny switches and that shit can hurt

― 1 P.3. Eternal (roxymuzak), Monday, February 3, 2014 Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

I'm not even kidding.

Sorry if this grosses people out.

I could make such great swells and crescendos.

tevas black like our hearts. two bright white socks like templars burning at the stake

is there disagreement about whether or not its true metal really? it seems like everyone agrees its not (maybe they/their PR ppl thought they were re: the other album, but about this album theyve mostly said its a departure from metal stuff iirc?), the people who like it and the people who dont alike

― 1 P.3. Eternal (roxymuzak), Monday, February 3, 2014 10:37 PM (10 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

yeah not rly, this is def false metal but some of my favourite music is false metal. the disagreement seems to be whether the false-metalness makes them bad, which I aver it does not - their badness comes from their inability, as i see it, to compose interesting or arresting music

these guys refuse even to wear boots, how can you be metal and not wear boots

never worn shoes or boots in my life. I've worn trainers since I was 11 1/2 and went to secondary school.
(except the boots i wear if its snowing - worn about 3 times in 5 years)

I have short hair too (cut it when I was 23 - I'm 41 now)

I must not be metal. worrashame.

the building midsection of the final track really, really reminds me of a GYBE song. like, really very much so. except GYBE at their best had far more range and far more *hooks*, wd u believe

do you tuck your pants into your tennis shoes y/n xp

AND FUCK RED DOC MARTENS I HATE THOSE MORE THAN ANYTHING

My pants stay under the trousers....

*dramatic pause*

and nothing gets tucked into my socks or trainers

im sorry, but you're indie

btw imago yr pun upthread was magnificent

۩ just went on my favourite IL Xor user list.

roxy i cant be indie i only ever talk about metal here!

i even created a lame sock to do a poll!

I knew it was you!

according to sick mouthy i stomp over threads with big metal boots(lol)

[i was just joshing u]

And trouble deaf heaven with my bootless cries
these guys refuse even to wear boots, how can you be metal and not wear boots

― joe perry has been dead for years (underrated aerosmith bootlegs I have owned), Monday, February 3, 2014 4:29 PM (27 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

!?!?! dude all those florida death metal bands u worship wore nothing but big ass white reebok hi-top basketball shoes!!!

ronnie van zandt performed barefoot!

as a lesson in the vicissitudes of shakespearean reading this thread is coming through like a champ

this thread has been a wild success.

i've changed my mind deafheaven you have a dumb band name but i wish u many more years of prosperity playing fake black metal and looking like interpol

lol sorry treesh, I don't mean to be too hard on yer lads - I don't regret hearing the album but it & I are attuned 2 difft lodestars

morbid angel wore boots
death wore boots

http://www.wallpaperup.com/uploads/wallpapers/2013/08/30/140338/big_thumb_b13ba5f59d3cd17935a03dc72eb2212c.jpg

not a reebok in sight

nick cave songtitle shortlist reaches coinflip stage xp

hahaha xp

im not decrying footwear of any type btw, im just disputing the ludicrous assertion that all florida DM dudes wore hi top reeboks!!

naw roxy yr right tho. I am (90s) indie. I dont deny it. Tho after I got into music via Nirvana I got into metal before Indie rock. A few irl ppl think Nirvana/grunge is metal so i'll always be the metal guy to them. Some see me as the stone roses indie fan. On ILM ppl think im the metal guy except the rolling promo thread see me as an indie guy.
But Im 41 and dont care how people see me. I've never been one of the popular people so if you called me a hipster i'd lol in yer face.

I just happen to like Liturgy,Deafheaven, WITTR as much as I like Weakling,Darkthrone,Burzum,Ulver,Mayhem,Celtic Frost,Bathory, Venom, Hellhammer or Death SS. Ans yes I do like Envy/Mono/GYBE/EITS/Mogwai.

If you dont like these bands fair enough but I really do hate the undercurrent of "oooh non-metal ppl like this but hate real metal" that exists.
I happen to like trying to get people to check out metal , yes i know that annoys the likes of sick mouthy or bb or whoever, but its cuz yknow i love music. I like to be introduced to stuff outta my comfort zone. I wish some knowledgeable person into reggae would send me dvds or spotify playlists of the classic old reggae/dub as i only have a handful of cds. Same goes for classical recordings (I have no idea which recordings are the best).

But why do people want to put off outsiders?

actually gonna post that line or 2 on that dumb poll thread

theres tension between metal and outsiders, because outsiders often sweep into the metal world and, believing most metal fans are dumb or w/e, start acting like instant experts of this new thing they've discovered, trampling on and disrepecting people who have spent more than a summer on it, you know?

like imago?

metal is the ft lauderdale of genres

there is nothing wrong with not being a lifer, and metal doesnt nec. belong to anybody, but there's something wrong with someone getting more attention as a groundbreaking artiste because they look like a reg dude who is just colonizing metal for a minute, or because they have an indie looking album cover, or are actually playing flaming lips music with shrieks over top or w/e

jk with that last phrase

^^^rad post

i want the flaming lips to make a metal album now just to annoy everyone

!?!?! dude all those florida death metal bands u worship wore nothing but big ass white reebok hi-top basketball shoes!!!

roxy is otm, this is true now because they're all v. old and comfy. when you are an og death metal dude reeboks count as boots

I just happen to like...Deafheaven...as much as I like ...Celtic Frost...

ok look no accounting for taste or whatever but come on now man get ahold of yourself here

that didn't quite come out as i intended it

it should have been

I just happen to like Liturgy,Deafheaven, WITTR just as I like Weakling,Darkthrone,Burzum,Ulver,Mayhem,Celtic Frost,Bathory, Venom, Hellhammer or Death SS. Ans yes I do like Envy/Mono/GYBE/EITS/Mogwai.

How did trv kvltists feel abt Botch, Dillinger Escape Plan, Converge, etc? Wasn't that phase 1 of indie colonizatuon?

those were hardcore bands tho

yeah but they were def metal too imo, they got covered in metal mags

like i said phase 1, metalcore was the smallpox blankets that were handed out to metal natives

as far as indie metal crossovers go, cave in's jupiter was prob the year zero. i recall that album was championed as the ok computer of mathcore at the time, or something along those lines.

i think trv kvltists think they were hardcore bands, to answer your question

But why do people want to put off outsiders?

Seriously, how long have you been a human being? Because this is pretty much most of humanity all of the time.

I just happen to like Liturgy,Deafheaven, WITTR as much as I like Weakling,Darkthrone,Burzum,Ulver,Mayhem,Celtic Frost,Bathory, Venom, Hellhammer or Death SS.

I've got to go sputter for an hour or two brb.

theres tension between metal and outsiders, because outsiders often sweep into the metal world and, believing most metal fans are dumb or w/e, start acting like instant experts of this new thing they've discovered, trampling on and disrepecting people who have spent more than a summer on it, you know?

Also yes, this, thank you.

go read what i said after that in reply to smithy

It reads like damage control.

Trv kvlt, schmv kvlt, I just think the Deafheaven album's kinda drab. Maybe I'd like them live, but it doesn't do much for me on the car stereo. Unlike, say, WITTR, who make a massive sound however suspect their credentials.

I actually think WITTR sound kinda drab on record (live though they're pretty great).

Siegbran, thanks for that Stereogum link, I never look at that site, and that was some of the best music writing I've read in a long time. very impressed. cheers.

agreed, that's a smart and knowledgeable account of the current chessboard

All's I'm saying is all the dudes I know who were into DEP, botch etc back then won't stfu abt black metal now so they are the ones that ruined your party

as far as indie metal crossovers go, cave in's jupiter was prob the year zero. i recall that album was championed as the ok computer of mathcore at the time, or something along those lines.

hah, just about every cave in fan I knew at the time was severely bummed out by the lack of breakdowns and slayer riffs (I thought it was aiight myself)

All's I'm saying is all the dudes I know who were into DEP, botch etc back then won't stfu abt black metal now so they are the ones that ruined your party

yah but as I keep saying people actually are down w/cross-pollination, hybrid shit, fuckin every death metal bro loves Atheist who have fuckin fusion sections in their jams. what people hate about Deafheaven is the hybrid is metal + wack bullshit. "oh they just want it PURE!" is the bogus distraction defense brought by deafheaven fans. DEP et al made some slamming records and are/were great live what's not to like

I saw them last year, and they were... OK. Bits of the set were great, bits were sub-Pelican noodly post-rock. And that's the thing for me, they just weren't interesting enough. I want my BM to sound like machine gun fire in a blizzard, or uber-weird stuff like Urfaust. Not liking Deafhaven has nothing to do with trveness, that's just a blind thrown out by people who imo have never grown out of the playground. "I'm cooler than you" is just stupid childish bullshit.

(Also their singer was dressed all in black and had one leather glove on that he kept on doing Alvin Stardust moves with, but he just looked like Paul Dannan auditioning for the role of Herr Flick in Gary Barlow's 'Allo 'Allo The Musical.)

the glove thing makes it sound kind of amazing!

Now they're stealing from Sean Bonniwell?! HACKS!!!

what people hate about Deafheaven is the hybrid is metal + wack bullshit.

having some nazgul barf his lungs out over your tiresome glazed donut guitar schmaltz doesn't make it metal (or interesting or good).

i dunno, i like it.

i mean, i don't even listen to them to get a metal fix. i don't really care.

i tried & was kinda intrigued at first, but after initial spins couldn't get past the 1st couple tracks (which are decent, okay, fine). i just feel like being pissy because i'm working a 10-hr night shift these days.

i mean, i don't super love agalloch, WITTR, explosions in this guy or even MBV really, so i'm probably not the deafheaven guy.

my favorite metal albums from last year wound up being a lot more metally & energetic as a rule: carcass, vohl, skeletonwitch, revocation, kylesa (downer but heavy & catchy), power trip, that kind of thing. good for driving fast and yelling at trees. or retro groovy stuff like windhand, sabbath & blood ceremony.

outsiders often sweep into the metal world and, believing most metal fans are dumb or w/e, start acting like instant experts of this new thing they've discovered, trampling on and disrepecting people who have spent more than a summer on it, you know?

the thing w/ stuff like this is it's so vague as to be almost meaningless

like I always feel that one person's "acting like instant experts" is someone else's "is really excitable about music and wants to share that with others"

obviously I'm not questioning the existence of obnoxious neophytes

I listened to this band and it just reaffirmed that I find most "post-rock" and music that has a significant element of "post-rock" boring. I'm still unclear on what post-rock is, but I'm going off of what gets identified as of that genre.

*Reads through this thread and notices that there are a lot of Deafheaven haters*

*Calls up all the Deafheaven haters*

*Leaves them each a voicemail where I play the entirety of the Deafheaven album through the phone*

*The Deafheaven haters check their voicemail*

Dang... this is grim. These... these kvlt lords play it trve

*The Deafheaven haters check their voicemail*

NOOOOOOOOOOO!

How should new black metal fans pay appropriate tribute to Americans who got into it 10 years after the fact as opposed to 20 years after the fact?

traditionally, a gift of aluminum

alternately they can just share their stories about their first flaming lips concert

you guys are just mean

What level of enthusiasm for BM are people who haven't listened to a huge amount of it allowed to display? If I quite like the Deafhaven record and A Blaze in the Northern Sky but haven't sat down with a great deal of other records do I just not mention BM?

idk who is even being serious anymore but you could listen to some more records, or you could ask for some recommendations?

"You wanna be a black metal fan? You can't just go buy any album...it's scientific. You gotta buy this...Filosofem...it's the departure point. Listen to it every night around dusk for a month."

"But listen...there's a burden that every real black metal fan's gotta live with, that's the fact that Mayhem, the greatest black metal band of all time, is never gonna play again. You can't live in the past, man"

"Here, take this....it's a Hellhammer cassette, one of the last in existence. I want you to steal a car, get it in and drive west. Play the tape full blast, when the tape ends, get out and get into a fight."

"Here, take this....it's a Hellhammer cassette, one of the last in existence. I want you to steal a car, get it in and drive west. Play the tape full blast, when the tape ends, get out and get into a fight."

I owe you dinner for this one

i saw Mayhem live only a couple of years ago...

I've only played a couple of songs but Deafheaven kind of sounds like The Joy Formidable covering Sigur Ros covering The Foo Fighters while the singer runs barefoot across a floor full of tacks

aka, the Flaming Lips.

dog latin my fact checking dept is off today so i couldn't get them to vet my dumb kids in the hall jokes

ahahaha dan/EZ

he don't use wiki

call all destroyer: didn't want to turn this into a BM recommendation thread.

don't worry about it, DY. You should check this one out

like I always feel that one person's "acting like instant experts" is someone else's "is really excitable about music and wants to share that with others"

― wilful brony (DJ Mencap), Tuesday, February 4, 2014 5:33 AM (5 hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

really excited about musician bios and automatically believing that people who know 1000x more than him know way less than him, is my experience of the obnoxious metal neophyte

admittedly my experience is probably colored by my being a woman

i mean, i don't know how that could be "meaningless" unless you just never experience this type of person, which is possible

I honestly can't think of a representative experience I've had that would fit the bill, which I daresay is, accordingly, helped by my being a guy

it may be that I'm really tone-deaf abt this kind of thing idk

iwant to make sure that my important opinions are recorded in this important thread so part 1 i dont give 2 fucks abt genrewhatever in metal or not etc but part 2 this band by the important metric of being any good is total goddamn garbage and i have no idea what people are digging about it.

amazing thread, i hope an npr podcast metal album comes out every six months

I'm still trying to unwrap exactly what we are arguing about at this point, but it's kinda hard to see for all the straw.

all I know is that I wanted to sing "Everlong" over the first song on the album

this thread is hilarious in a "grade-school playground bullshit except perpetrated by so-called adults" sort of way

how much do we gotta pony up to see that on YouTube DJP

and by hilarious i mean sad

alpine static otm

aaanyway, black metal is so over anyhow, 2K14 belongs to DARK JAZZ #darkjazz

otm #darkjazz

just got my deafheaven voicemail. I pitchshifted it down and put some trip-hop beats underneath it and wrote to several online publications demanding I be awarded metal album of the year

all I know is that I wanted to sing "Everlong" over the first song on the album

This is sort of why I like it, though. I think of it as an epic anthemic rock album, sort of like a screamy Siamese Dream. ("Everlong" is one of my favourite radio singles of the 90s so ymmv.)

there was zero judgment to that post btw

OTOH I did turn the song off and start playing Alcest, so make of that what you will

Oh great DJP, just trade in 2013's divise non-metal metal album for 2014's, that'll help us all.

just got my deafheaven voicemail. I pitchshifted it down and put some trip-hop beats underneath it and wrote to several online publications demanding I be awarded metal album of the year

― joe perry has been dead for years (underrated aerosmith bootlegs I have owned), Tuesday, February 4, 2014 5:40 PM (5 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

cant wait for skot to publish his response to this email

now that dan says it, i kinda feel like "the colour & the shape" era foo fighters were sort of more influential on modern active rock bands in the long run than nirvana was

Oh great DJP, just trade in 2013's divise non-metal metal album for 2014's, that'll help us all.

^_^ happy to be of service!

Haha, hoping you picked up the humor intented in that one.

oh man come on, of course I did

Is it okay to casually dip into genres outside your main areas of interest without necessarily wanting to become an expert? Engels said that specialization is one of the great horrors of capitalist society, I think, and I don't think it's bad to be omnivorous in one's interests. This was an issue in the pitchfork thread too regarding a john fahey primer. My opinion on Deafheaven is coming from a different place than aero's or someone's but I don't think it's invalid or that I should prefer Mayhem or Celtic Frost to this or something.

You mean the inverse, surely

loving you for that engels quote treeship

Honestly, i love the ilx metal threads because they helped me discover a bunch of stuff i like such as darkthrone and uncle acid, the latter which led me to revisit sabbath. But I don't want to listen to as much metal as those guys do because I have a limited amount of time on earth.

inverse deafheaven, just imagine the possibilities

wouldn't "inverse Deafheaven" be Godspeed! You Black Emperor?

Hearinghell, more like.

the takeaway i've gotten from this thread beyond 'ok some of these ppl are doing a bit right? otherwise...' is apparently i should check out alcset

Which is, conincidentally, an up and coming Berlin power metal band. (xpost)

YES CHECK OUT ALCEST

also, the new Warpaint album is great for the first half before it runs out of energy

Would say that after it runs out of energy, there are a couple of great songs toward the end. But not the last one, imo.

Goddamn You! White Peasant is my summer jam of '14, out now on Hectic Lore

Penultimate track on Warpaint is beauty and truth

Is it okay to casually dip into genres outside your main areas of interest without necessarily wanting to become an expert?

no and you are a monster for even considering it

Alcestian Gatekeepers

Oh, look. Another discussion on genre that went nowhere.

Colour me shocked.

PS: I never got my Deafheaven voicemail. The BMers say I'm not BM enough, and the Deafheaveners say I'm not DF enough. Why can't I just be accepted by a group? Why can't I fit in? Argh. I'm going to go read more existiential literature and visit a cemetery now. No, no, FUCK FORGET EVERYTHING FASJFKASFSFS. I'll just wear corpsepaint and scream in the washroom and work on my melodrama.

true kvlt dudes dont use washrooms

watain didnt age all this animal blood for you just so you could go and give yourself a good scrub cmon dude

true kvlt dudes dont use washrooms

― Corpsepaint Counterpaint (jjjusten), Tuesday, February 4, 2014 Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

you might try that Shining album from '06 then

"Trve Kvlts Don't Use Washrooms" - are the RHCP doing crossover BS too?

lol

bing a bing a a bing a bong burzum
gig a gig a gig a gong gorguts

bingo bango bongo his name is...wait, wrong thread

I stumbled across this quote from a user review at Metal Archives that struck me as relevant. It's actually about Agalloch, but says:

"One of black metal’s better points was the way it managed to be both artistic in spite of being thoroughly nonacademic -– it was primal as fuck and rather silly but nevertheless articulate -- and managing to blow off or ignore most of what makes radio music sound like it was poured into a mold before release. But it seems to be a continuing theme, especially recently, that the bands in the “metal scene” most frequently praised for their artistry and creativity are the ones who back away from the murkiness of underground metal and move back towards the mainstream’s idea of what artistic music sounds like."

morbid angel wore boots
death wore boots

― 1 P.3. Eternal (roxymuzak), Monday, 3 February 2014 23:06 (Yesterday) Permalink

as did fairies

it's hardly surprising, i think, that the deafheaven album would be widely loved by people who don't otherwise have much use for extreme metal. it's basically a sugary, shoegazey postrock album (albeit one scarred by black metal shrieking). sugary, shoegazey postrock has, as a subgenre, been well received by indie-friendly pop critics in recent years - and indie-friendly pop critics seem rather to dominate the discourse. that's the context in which sunbather seems to have succeeded. "metal" is relevant only in that the genre's current fashionability perhaps graces deafheaven with backstory and a bit of kvlt glamour. nothing wrong with any of that. the people who love it aren't "getting metal wrong"; they're probably getting shoegazey postrock right (i wouldn't know as i'm not an ardent appreciator, don't love alcest either).

this sort of thing is perennial. an album that hybridizes indie with something a bit more insular & cultish is wildly celebrated by indie fans and (consequently) becomes a hate-magnet for those who wish to distance themselves from what they see as a dilettantish circle-jerk. tbh, from where i sit, the backlash is much more tiresome than the hiveminded rush to embrace that precedes it. so what if sigur ros and smashing pumpkins fans love deafheaven? they should love deafheaven. sunbather was made for them.

my mom likes jesu & alcest, fwiw. i don't think she's arrogantly flaunting her ignorance in calling them better than all the other metal i listen to. she's just talking honestly about what she likes.

think i misspelled vhol up there. vohl. vhol. something like that.

^^ yup. (xpost ... and it's vhol)

cmon

it's VHÖL

</mëtäl>

this band sounds like the appleseed cast

except screamy or whatever

yall wanna ride for that be my guest

Part of what puts me off about this record and this band in general is how "I see what you did there" it is.

xps - i know, siggaroos got a accent too, but i won't be fucked outside BÖC & motörhead. they've earned it.

the backlash is much more tiresome than the hiveminded rush to embrace that precedes it

there was no backlash from me until this album placed in the ILM 77 and I gave it a listen, only to find it rly boring, and even then my backlash was only to say 'this is boring and uses what are imo rly worn-out songwriting tropes & thus i find no appeal in it' - this is the sentiment behind about 99% of the deafheaven backlash - there's a kind of anti-strawman strawman in play here of the tiresome trve kvlt metaller, which iirc nobody on ilx actually is

tell that to all the sacrificed goats in my basement

Imago OTM--it's the equivalent of calling someone who doesn't like Doo-Bop by Miles Davis a Wynton-style genre fascist

Doobopheaven

Doo-Bop fans are above your silly notions of jazz purity. You could really learn something from them.

http://image.lyricspond.com/image/m/artist-miles-davis/album-doo-bop/cd-cover.jpg

omg what is he even wearing

Boots

Inverted cheetah pajama pants.

Also trying to open a can of cat food with his trumpet.

...my backlash was only to say 'this is boring and uses what are imo rly worn-out songwriting tropes & thus i find no appeal in it' - this is the sentiment behind about 99% of the deafheaven backlash

this is a bit disingenuous, i think? speaking not about any individual but rather the "public response", there was a clear initial rush to embrace sunbather followed toward year's end by a lot of grumping. doubt that the latter would have been half so audible had not the former been so widespread. speaking as a grump...

I'm going to listen to Doo-Bop and enjoy myself because I'm open-minded like that. Have fun snapping your fingers solemnly to your Art Blakey first pressings played through your fussy tube amps.

imago -- didn't you gush about a gazillion post-rock bands in the first few years you were an ilxor?

http://img819.imageshack.us/img819/6114/31226125528904124505124.jpg

Counterpoint: they were in Florida. It's really not boot weather about six months of the year. You want as much ventilation as possible.

foxy storage

I'm surprised no one's brought up their defiantly un-BM lyrical subject matter yet.

Held my breath and drove through a maze of wealthy homes. I watched how green the trees were. I watched the steep walkways and the white fences. I gripped the wheel. I sweated against the leather. I watched the dogs twist through the wealthy garden. I watched you lay on a towel in grass that exceeded the height of your legs. I gazed into reflective eyes. I cried against an ocean of light

Crippled by the cushion, I sank into sheets frozen by rose pedal toes. My back shivered for your pressed granite nails. Dishonest and ugly through the space in my teeth. Break bones down to yellow and crush gums into blood. The hardest part for the weak was stroking your fingers with rings full of teeth..

It's 5 A.M...and my heart flourishes at each passing moment

Always and forever

The lyric "Break bones down to yellow and crush gums into blood." from "Sunbather" by Deafheaven has not yet been explained. To explain these lyrics, visit ...

Bones are yellow inside like bananas right?

"I'm surprised no one's brought up their defiantly un-BM lyrical subject matter yet."

The mind boggles at the level of bravery required for such defiance.

imago -- didn't you gush about a gazillion post-rock bands in the first few years you were an ilxor?

― sarahell, Tuesday, February 4, 2014 11:50 PM (7 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

this particular fallacy is called ad hominem btw

it's a Star Trek reference, Dr. "Bones" McCoy usually wore a blue shirt, and Captain Kirk's shirt was yellow, but here they are talking about breaking Dr. McCoy's will and making a coward of him.

there's yellow bone marrow, yes

feel like I'm in a bm band called Cannotgoogleheaven right now

this band sounds like the appleseed cast

― adam, Tuesday, February 4, 2014 6:23 PM (1 hour ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

fuck man, do not sully the good name of the appleseed cast like this

this particular fallacy is called ad hominem btw

― imago, Wednesday, February 5, 2014 7:59 AM (49 minutes ago) Bookmark

No this is ad hominem. Your teeth are stupid and your hair smells and when you breathe out it smells like mustard

idgi what's the fallacy?

;-)

Part of what puts me off about this record and this band in general is how "I see what you did there" it is.

― Clarke B., Tuesday, February 4, 2014 6:24 PM (1 hour ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

you are super-otm about this, as soon as the first song hits the first break and it's a warbly mbv-like guitar part i was like "ohhhhh-kay"

http://31.media.tumblr.com/d8174ee1f8b5706d56e54adf9e82a078/tumblr_mxohw07fAh1qa8qcjo1_500.png

true. that one melody sounds a lot like that cat stevens song as well. xpost

xp - hahahah!

That imagine is clever and I like it, but: "I could do that" is a very different sentiment from "You shouldn't have done that"

btw my li'l player thing hit me with Earth's Like Gold And Faceted earlier, and DAMMIT if that isn't the best metal shoegaze experience I've had, like, for a while

also, ad hominem is obv any attempt to defame an argumentalist's character, especially with regards to the field of argument. who the fuck cares if I like Redjetson aged 19

are people talking about neige's involvement with "aryan supremacy" in the wake of alcest blowing up? i know he has attempted to distance himself from that in one interview. just kind of wonder if it's coming up at all or if people just dont GAF

had never heard of it - elaborate!

he played on the peste noire album of that title, but was only ever an ancillary member of that band, if a member at all, and has since said publicly least once that he was never involved/interested in their political/idological crap

also ppl into alcest etc who are looking for recs, try Les Discrets

*ideological

oh! well i have their album 'folkfuck folie' but was never aware of their questionable leanings (whether or not they're aryan supremacists, it's perhaps an unhealthy fascination)

peste noire are not just questionable, they are explicitly racist

oh shit. well my brother gave me the mp3s amongst a shit-ton of other metal, kinda thinking i shd delete it now

kinda

'the burzum argument'

moved to trash

have put Ordo Ad Chao on, just to convince myself I'm still metal, also coz it's amazing and I've had a hankering to hear it all day thanks to this thread

xp to imago

i pretty much worship indria saray who played bass on several of their recordings, so it's hard for me to write off listening to those - it's complex, he's an asian dude that they had in the band for the fucked up reason that he made things smoother for them, like in situations where NS bands would see trouble, at certain border crossings etc. it's hard for me to lump him in with them and say "fuck them." i've never heard him speak on the matter at all tbh.

i should also say that they admit he is the greatest bassist in france, so not JUST for that fucked up reason, though they did always bring that up as a justification for him being in the band

peste noire being nazis really pissed me off, lorraine rehearsal was one of the great rehearsal albums every but they are especially gross racists yeah

i know. hard to take!

hmm. well i don't think any of their music stood out for me particularly but it is possible i may have enjoyed a few of their songs on shuffle mode. it's gone now; there's a lot of other great metal i won't have to listen to with the somewhat jarring thought of 'these lyrics might be militating for a white france'. poststructuralist appreciation grows harder in such explicitly political circumstances. has saray played on anything less uh problematic?

i should also say that they admit he is the greatest bassist in france....though they did always bring that up as a justification for him being in the band

― 1 P.3. Eternal (roxymuzak), Tuesday, February 4, 2014 Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Not that I think anyone should stop listening to music made by racists or people who have immoral or unethical opinions. Personally, I have a complex view on the music I listen to, including BM, precisely because of where Norwegian BM is said to be rooted.

norway?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0JKlQ82BWB8

xp of course i realize that makes it worse

like, reread my sentence, i don't think you understood me

i mean ot that i really GAF considering youre a dude abnout to school us on your "complex" approach to norwegian BM and morality

lol

Comedy hour never stops on IL Xor.

imago: also triste sur, but there's not much out there. i can send u something. he also plays with alcest but not on any albums, just as part of the touring/live band

OTOH I did turn the song off and start playing Alcest, so make of that what you will

Ha, I started listening to Sunbather and switched to Altar of Plagues so...

ty rox, have just dug out headphones. this is already intense and oh shit is that a bass riff

norway?

― j., Tuesday, February 4, 2014 Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

this is really intensely melodic - I usually prefer my DM fucked-up and atonal - viz, Gorguts - but melodically imaginative stuff like this and Atheist is also totally my jam

get Geir on the case imo

o and if you wanna send me sthng i'd be v grateful - firstname dot secondname at gmail

I almost started talking about that noys scholarly article on peste noire/racism and then I realized that this is still the deathheaven thread and I already said they were terrible so I've done all I can here

you almost started talking about it

also, ad hominem is obv any attempt to defame an argumentalist's character, especially with regards to the field of argument. who the fuck cares if I like Redjetson aged 19

― imago, Tuesday, February 4, 2014 5:51 PM (4 hours ago)

Dude, it wasn't an attack, it was a question. I vaguely remember you rhapsodizing about Mogwai and related acts, but I could be wrong?

i liked mogwai circa that one with vampire on it. and i still like the christmas song. no shame.

This thread could do with some more recommendations for ppl who like deafheaven rather than more reasons why they're not very good.
Woods Of Desolation
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YA-TLekogvk
Austere
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nA07Sm1djdk
The Angelic Process
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LNu9JuURXL8
Thy Light
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hxMd3r0ZzDw
Àrsaidh
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JKz8dqMAu1Q
Les Discrets
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1ej7UkjdHNg
Nachtvorst
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ajyHTBihAKI
Westering
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ctdTK4k-Mxk
Drudkh
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LKfOGcm6QOk
Kultura Kureniya
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DeguKnbyjXY
Bosse-de-Nage

good recs. kind of short on overt racists tho.

dude, drudkh!

Unsurprisingly the only one of those I know is The Angelic Process, but it's fucking incredible

Haha point taken roxy

The Deafheaven reminds me of Katatonia's Brave Murder Day, if the growling were replaced by screaming. My favorite fake-Black-Metal album of last year is Stara Rzeka which is kinda like BM crossed with post-Fahey drone-folk.

Yeah, it's a great album. Lots of German psych-rock in the mix too

So who's gonna be the first to start a ska-black metal fusion band?

Not the idiots in Skathory I'll tell you that

Someone should post that Jogger video here asap - doing the sunbathing BM thing about 10x better and more amusingly than D'ven (I would but am on my phone)

fahey u say?

Yeah, it reminds me of some of his dirgey-er stuff.

skankthrone

skathory

bal-skagoth

oh im sorry i repeated skathory!

hviss ska tar oss

det ska engang var

enskanked

skatain

thread delivers

sklayer

Dying @ enskanked

Forced to skank against our will, we are... Enskanked

Skanking for Vengeance

Reel Dead Flesh

Skagalloch

Sunskanker

Skadom

We are... a blaze... in the northern... PICKITUP PICKITUP PICKITUP

The Mighty Mighty Burztones

Sunskanker
―joe perry has been dead for years (underrated skatosmith bootlegs I have owned)

We are... a blaze... in the northern... PICKITUP PICKITUP PICKITUP

genius

blut skaus nord

blaskahyrkh (mighty skavendark)

anthems to the skankin at dusk

Skarpathian Forest?

skattens skadrigal

The Tenth Sub-Level of Skaicide

Sliturgy

don't be afraid to do swing after the ska well is dry

skatain

― call all destroyer, Wednesday, February 5, 2014 5:37 PM (3 hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

dead

Skasthur

Skagalloch

I just got the album from Amazon. Will now see what all the fuss was about.

that will make a change!

"Ordo Ad Skao"

Skattles in the North

A Blaze in the Northern Ska

Wolves in the Band Room

im impressed by you all knowing how to use metal archives to get names of black metal albums ;)

Calypso of Filth

anaal naskarakh

reel black fish

less than jaykh

madness

In the Shadow of the Horn Section

No results found for "trondheim rude boys".

In the Shadow of the Horn Section

― NO GODS, NO MUSTARD (GOTT PUNCH II HAWKWINDZ), Wednesday, February 5, 2014 5:54 PM (1 minute ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Haha amazing

Black Skabbath

you big tuff black metal fans think you've gazed into the darkness huh?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qXN23pDmSrY

GIVE EM SOME REGGAEEEE

les legions blancs et noires

nattyfrost

lol

Congo Natty's playing round the corner from me later, I want to go. some of the new album sounded aight

― congo nattefrost (DJ Mencap), Friday, May 3, 2013 1:13 PM (9 months ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

lol forgot about my display name there

― congo nattefrost (DJ Mencap), Friday, May 3, 2013 1:13 PM (9 months ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

scooped!

skeltic fraast (does that work? i'm pretending it works)
eyehatejah - dubsick
deathspell skamega - fas – ite, maledicti, in ignem aeternum (feat. elephant man)

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v472/birdnestsoup/burzum.jpg

lawl

yo guys, this is pretty neat

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tMfSKr1cVkY

Ska/crust punk/black metal/reggae band, Leper from Canada

omj

"jah warriors wear boots"

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v472/birdnestsoup/darkthrone.jpg

Excellent work

Typed "Skadness" before realizing that Madness were actually a ska band and NOT a black metal band

The Skapecials

Almost typed "The English Skeet" before I realized that would turn the Beat into more of a crunk band than a ska band, which they already were.

This town is comin' like a grim and frostbitten kingdom

Bathory Live From Studio One

Dub in an elevator / pickitup pickitup while I'm goin down

this thread really is old ilx, from start to finish

kind of wishful to think that it could finish

FOR THE LOVE OF GOD SOMEBODY LOCK THIS THREAD RIGHT NOW DO IT DO IT DO IT I'M BEGGING YOU LOCK THR

hey everybody, i'm not a metal guy at all, but i cued up "under the sign of the black mark" on youtube yesterday because of this thread, and it kicked ass. cool record.

Hey everybody, I'm also not a metal guy at all, but I cued up the new Toni Braxton/Babyface album on Spotify yesterday because of this thread, and it kicked ass. It wasn't metal, though.

lol.

seriously though what is with all the nazi shit. how do you metal fans deal with that? i know mouthed off plenty on the varg thread already but i guess i'm genuinely curious. is it just an artifact of european politics generally?

I did nazi that question coming

i bet yr führerious with yourself now

the thing that's weird to me is that I am pretty confident in my ability to navigate/ignore fascist and racist industrial ppl, but when I approach metal I always feel like I'm going to open a jack-in-the-box full of hatred; part of that is conditioning from childhood but not all of it, and I can't figure out why this is a hurdle I can't navigate here when I can navigate it in other contexts

(the short answer might be as simple as "you like synths and machine clanking so you will put in the extra work to avoid assholes in order to enjoy them")

part of loving any art is figuring out whether the people who made it are awful and what that means (what's up tiger lily?). part of the fan experience of this genre is gingerly checking into whether the band is cool with white supremacy and eliminationism which seems a little more specific and on another order.

the thing that's weird to me is that I am pretty confident in my ability to navigate/ignore fascist and racist industrial ppl, but when I approach metal I always feel like I'm going to open a jack-in-the-box full of hatred; part of that is conditioning from childhood but not all of it, and I can't figure out why this is a hurdle I can't navigate here when I can navigate it in other contexts

^^^^^ otm. but only a certain strain of metal, right? not sure where, precisely, to draw the boundary-lines, but i feel like they can be drawn.

this is a q that has been discussed to death on other metal threads and it's kind of a dour unfun q. OTOH as deafheaven are so clearly Stalinists I can see where it pertains

omg they are stalinists?

this aggression will not stand.

yeah i know it has, i just felt like returning to nu ilm by ruining the thread

xp

you fascist goole

nattyfrost

― 1 P.3. Eternal (roxymuzak), Wednesday, February 5, 2014 11:29 PM (Yesterday) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

my god

p sure I read this one interview with one of the dudes from Deafheaven where the interviewer was like "so what's this title Sunbather mean anyway" and the dude was all "oh we called it that because we love Stalin, nbd" and the interviewer was also a Stalinist so they high fived

sick interview

"Sunbather" = we bathe in the never-setting sun of our never-ending empire

I read that one too

goole this thread may be for you What is the most offputting barrier to you listening to and enjoying certain types of music

this is a thread purely about hipster ska-metal

How do you singer-songwriter fans deal with all that Charles Manson shit?

we deal with Charles Manson shits on a shit by shit basis

I don't want no Commies in my car!

No Christians, either!

I think a lot of (though obv not all) the "fascist" imagery in industrial music has more to do with exploring broader ideas of fanaticism & oppression and the people making the music don't actually consider or proclaim themselves fascists. Whereas extreme metal (again, obv not in its entirety) harbors more people who espouse genuinely racist and reactionary and fascist ideas.

obvious pinkos

(not saying that the use of fascist symbols in industrial music is necessarily defensible or that there aren't tons of industrial fans making extremely poor judgment calls)

where's your stats for that crutis?

i counted

i think at the neo-folk end of industrial culture, a lot of the ambiguity falls away

In my experience, as being a fan of both genres, is that the industrial fans are way more likely to be racist/fascist. And then there's Neo-folk...

hah xp

Don't ruin Skanking Gristle for me please

Skank In June

Yeah, it really depends on what subculture you're talking about.. Your average NON fan is probably more reprehensible than your average Burzum fan. I meant the kind of industrial that DJP is talking about, which I gather is closer to the EBM end of the spectrum.

Coil-y weed

Front Line Ska-diddly

Jah Thirlwell

Front 420

Jahnesis P-Orridge

Einsturzende Spliffpuffen

Slayer & Pantera have way more racist fans than Burzum tbh (ie theres millions more fans of those bands whilst every person I know who likes Burzum is not racist or right wing.)

Killing Toke

if ilx is anything to go by even actual nsbm (a tiny small amount of bands with an even smaller amount of fans) have more non-fascist fans. Whether thats because no-one cares about lyrics and its all about the music maaaaaaaaaaan, or not I dunno.

Skankaway Voltaire

Meatlight Manifesto

woah

have you guys seen http://metalalbumswithgooglyeyes.tumblr.com

no and I still haven't

well, you would probably need to know the originals to find it funny I suppose

I group my music by political persuasion, so I have refiled this album alongside Robert Wyatt's.

burn xp

Do you reject Wayne Coyne, and all his works, and all his empty promises?

idk who is even being serious anymore but you could listen to some more records, or you could ask for some recommendations?

― call all destroyer, Tuesday, February 4, 2014 7:28 AM (2 days ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

still catching up with this thread but ^^^^board description

So I'm finally listening to this album all the way through, and it's more varied and engaging that I thought it would be from the one track I sampled before. Huh. I might like this after all.

yeah, and ums' trail of dead comment was pretty otm

feel a little offended on trail of dead's behalf here, they could write a song

Still can!

yeah. I guess this deafheaven album is 4 variations of "It Was There That I Saw You" with shriekier vocals and some slower jangle songs in between.

it was there that i saw you has a bass riff to die for & deafheaven do not know what bass is

i like trail of dead, they were fun live they jumped all over the place and wrecked their drums and stood on stuff
i saw them open for queens of the stone age

i like source tags and codes a lot

true. deafheaven guitar sounds like The Walkmen guitar or something. riffs would be nice. xpost

if they had riffs, we'd probably just say they sound like nickelback, though.

I don't think Sunbather really needs bass. The multi-tracked guitar fills up the space pretty well.

feel like bass would limit the drum fills. don't think i'm prepared to give those up.

hmm, well see roxy's link upthread for how to fit pompousmetaldrumming and bass together i guess. i find d'ven's midrange guitarmash to be deeply mundane & uninspiring, like a sandwich filled with seven varieties of coleslaw

the only thing i'd call trail of dead out on is that 'will you smile again' great as it is should have been the absolute last time the did a song that played the 'frantic start, slow plodding middle bit, reprise frantic bit to finish' card, but it was very far from being their last such song

a great many bands have had a lot of drum fills while having bass

sXe & the banweeds?

ignore me

what?

and a great many bands had pianists playing with the saxophonist, but ornette coleman and deafheaven said enough already

hey jude (deafheaven's first album is called roads to judah!)
don't make it bad (deafheaven are bad!)
take a decent DN, and make it cornyyyyy (deafheaven are corny!)

has anyone used "The Shape of Metal To Come" as a Deafheaven headline? I bet that would make aerosmith so madd

thank you so much for my own new dn, sufjan grafton

always happy to help

https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/1484956/the%20flaming%20lips.png

<3

lollll

lmaaaao

also man i was really into trail of dead back in the day! kind of want to revisit it. i remember a prior revisiting in 2005 going well.

feeling old rn

Ornette and left Deafheaven dude are kinda sweater bros.

it's funny cos when SoJtC was released it was to universal acclaim

"It Was There That I Saw You"

I don't think I've ever listened to Trail of Dead before, but I just played this track. I hear a slight resemblance to Deafheaven, but man... those vocals. Give me shrieking over that any day.

i dont get the comparison to deafheaven at all tbh

I think it's the the loud-soft middle-loud structure that imago described that reminded me. The vox are def oceans apart.

And Oceans

lol I really like a lot of ToD but even I think the vocals (and lyrics) are pretty terrible.

i read lords of chaos on my iphone last summer.

At least we can rely on them for a good thread, though

I stumbled across this quote from a user review at Metal Archives that struck me as relevant. It's actually about Agalloch, but says:

"One of black metal’s better points was the way it managed to be both artistic in spite of being thoroughly nonacademic -– it was primal as fuck and rather silly but nevertheless articulate -- and managing to blow off or ignore most of what makes radio music sound like it was poured into a mold before release. But it seems to be a continuing theme, especially recently, that the bands in the “metal scene” most frequently praised for their artistry and creativity are the ones who back away from the murkiness of underground metal and move back towards the mainstream’s idea of what artistic music sounds like."

What do you think of this quote, Dominique? (It seems very obviously problematic to me.)

Depends on who's doing the praising. You could record the best and most innovative Death Metal album ever, but it won't get you reviewed on Pitchfork or get you a high Metacritic score. Write a competent metal album that crosses over with shoegaze, indie folk, post-punk or stadium rock, and you will.

The whole review is actually more problematic.

Tension between staying pure to a genre and looking outward for ideas is terribly old (see Dylan/Miles/James Brown/etc). The more problematic thing to me is the automatic conveyance of musical "progress" because a record references acceptable canon or some conventional musicality, but I don't think that applies really to Deafheaven (let alone Agalloch).

I'll only get worried when metal bands start talking about making their sgt pepper.

The quote, especially the last sentence, seems to invite some basic questions. What does "mainstream" mean here? Sales among the general public? Reviews in the music press? Academic esteem? Industry awards? These are all different things. What is "the mainstream's idea of what artistic music sounds like"? Beethoven? Miles Davis? Dark Side of the Moon? Bob Dylan? James Brown? The Clash? Tupac Shakur? Nirvana? Robert Johnson? Adele? Brian Eno? All of these have received canonization as great artists in one way or another. Is epic progressive metal or post-rock really "the mainstream's idea of what artistic music sounds like"?

(Ha, I'd typed this out before I saw your post that referenced some of the same artists.)

xpost

I'll only get worried when metal bands start talking about making their sgt pepper.

oh you will not be worried mister, you'll make a poll of metal sgt pepperses and be stoked. (sc. smiley-face here)

Seems like a lot of black metal was/is just as formulaic as "radio music"

Well, yeah, I really don't think Agalloch or even Deafheaven are guilty of applying 2010s 'radio music' formulae to metal.

It's just a preference of formulae when you get right down to it.

i hate sgt pepper so i wont

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tMfSKr1cVkY

Ska/crust punk/black metal/reggae band, Leper from Canada. Wild and Free off the End Progress album.
download album at
http://moshpittragedy.com/info-leper.php

http://i.imgur.com/prrCn9r.jpg

The quote, especially the last sentence, seems to invite some basic questions. What does "mainstream" mean here? Sales among the general public? Reviews in the music press? Academic esteem? Industry awards? These are all different things. What is "the mainstream's idea of what artistic music sounds like"? Beethoven? Miles Davis? Dark Side of the Moon? Bob Dylan? James Brown? The Clash? Tupac Shakur? Nirvana? Robert Johnson? Adele? Brian Eno? All of these have received canonization as great artists in one way or another. Is epic progressive metal or post-rock really "the mainstream's idea of what artistic music sounds like"?

i think i get where the quote is coming from, though you have to see through the phrasing. early 90's norge blackness typically issued from a position of aggressive outsider-dom. fuck you. you think music should sound good? you think it should be played and recorded well? fuck you. you want it to be available in stores? to be morally defensible? to have "artistic quality"? fuck you. the extremity of that positioning gave it strength and character, helped cement its enduring artistic legacy. almost anything else becomes "mainstream" relative to that kind of self-imposed alienation, including all points on the beethoven to eno continuum. there's a reason black metal was early adopted by noise peoples, those listening to whitehouse & merzbow.

http://i.imgur.com/ErB5lUW.jpg

In 7th grade (1998 or so?) we heard that song "Saddam A-Go-Go" by Gwar. It had horns so I was like "it's death ska." My friend Adam went quiet, got seriously mad at me, and eventually barked "it's like you're making fun of ska!" We're not friends these days.

Depends on who's doing the praising. You could record the best and most innovative Death Metal album ever, but it won't get you reviewed on Pitchfork

To be fair, this isn't really true anymore, to P-fork's credit.

Honest question bc I don't know the answer: would a 10 from pfork help or hurt the most innovative death metal album ever among the metal crowd

Obviously, the metal crowd here is open minded and would not backlash

hard to say. sunbather got an 8.9, bnm this year, while gorguts' colored sands got an 8.2. the moderate praise doesn't seem to have hurt the latter's metal cred. so far as i can tell, i'm the only one around here backlashing, and i'm doing that by trying as hard as i can to understand it.

۩ is 41??

Welcome to ILX Deafheaven

yeah I gotta say Pitchfork reviews an assload of metal these days of all kinds, so I don't see that there's a repressive tolerance vibe about picking the approachable thing and celebrating it to the exclusion of stuff that is more centrally within-genre, over all. But full disclosure: I contributed to the Show No Mercy roundup of metal for this year and had Deafheaven in there, along with Noisem and Locrian and Cultes Des Ghoules and un-metal outliers like Brainbombs

to have "artistic quality"? fuck you.

Is this true though? I was just reading this book Precious Metals a comp of Decibel columns where bands discuss the making of extend metal classic. Obv lots of classic black metal. They all sounded like they had artistic goals and ways they approached writing music very deliberately. Feels like ppl project a lot of noble savage bullshit on to them

Also there were also mentioned in some entries the bands being excited to have the budget to go to a "real" studio

yeah it's obvious to me that the posturing of a lot of early black metal came from not having the resources/exposure to do more. of course you're gonna defend your horrible-sounding recordings if you don't have the capability record anything that sounds better.

I don't think the band's opinions about artistic quality are necessarily the same as trve metal fans in this case.

i meant "artistic quality" as defined externally, conventionally, by anyone else's standards. within their fuck-you isolation, they had their own artistic goals, of course. but i'd say many/most of the 2nd wave worked hard to project the noble savage bullshit onto themselves, and that's still an essential component of the genre. corpsepaint dude or dudes in leather & spikes pictured out nowhere inna gloom-bound forest - snowy, foggy, at night, w/e.

and sure, the ubiquity of a common approach - thin budget recordings, harsh blankets of obscuring noise, noble savage rawness, punk simplicity - breaks down as times change & bands progress.

i think i get where the quote is coming from, though you have to see through the phrasing. early 90's norge blackness typically issued from a position of aggressive outsider-dom. fuck you. you think music should sound good? you think it should be played and recorded well? fuck you. you want it to be available in stores? to be morally defensible? to have "artistic quality"? fuck you. the extremity of that positioning gave it strength and character, helped cement its enduring artistic legacy. almost anything else becomes "mainstream" relative to that kind of self-imposed alienation, including all points on the beethoven to eno continuum. there's a reason black metal was early adopted by noise peoples, those listening to whitehouse & merzbow.

"The only metal bands that get praised for creativity are ones that break out of an extremely exclusionary box from 20 years ago."

or: most listeners praise that which is most listener-friendly

When it comes to metal hipsters, I always toss Lars Gotrich in there. Not because of anything bad against him - I don't know him personally nor in social media and I love the stuff he exposes to NPR audiences - but that specific role as kinda the NPR Metal Guy makes him a good starting (or ending) point for what some might deem hipster metal or, since that is considered a pejorative these days, metal stuff that non-metal types with beards seem to gravitate to.

I was mildly surprised to not see the album make his best metal album list of 2013 but he did like the Deafheaven:

While thinking about Sunbather a couple weeks ago — and especially its nine-minute opener, "Dream House" — an Instagram from one of Deafheaven's members popped up in my feed; it was a shot of U2's Best of 1980-1990 taken from one of those airplane music stations. Suddenly, the sonic space of Sunbather clicked. The distant echoes of "Where the Streets Have No Name" don't appear until the last minute here, but I can't shake them.

Since then, it's been hard to disassociate my not-so-accidental voyeurism. I keep hearing The Edge's chiming guitar ringing in my ears, now set against Clarke screaming his aching prose. For the first half of the track, the momentum is exhilarating and relentless, buoyed by a melodic punk bounce not heard since Deafheaven's 2010 demo. But the second half delivers on the ideas stemming from the band's stellar Mogwai cover last year: It doesn't just consider the grandiose pace of post-rock — well-trod territory in metal by now — but also understands what caustic relief resides in it. Sunbather is the sound of a band expanding within its reach, with an open ear dedicated not to what always comes next, but what will remain.

Honestly I don't see Liturgy as being more listener friendly than Burzum

i don't think either one would be a very decisive winner in a mom test

burzum is really listenable. the guitar texture on filosofem is smooth and unabrasive.

people often overlook this but burzum spelled backwards is muzrub

it's the lighthearted sense of play that people really respond to with burzum

people often overlook this but burzum spelled backwards is muzrub

― joe perry has been dead for years (underrated aerosmith bootlegs I have owned), Sunday, February 9, 2014 8:01 PM (16 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

yeah I remember muzrub had a verse on an early people under the stairs 12 inch

muzbather

burzum sounds like Jesus and Mary chain but more accessible

Though I've heard it before
Still I need you more and more
But I just can't get away
Grishny kills me every day

the coun's on record saying that he's happy when it rains. one of his many chilling pronouncements.

To me the "not metal enough" criticisms of Deafheaven are misleading. The bay area has always been quite catholic about it's "heavy music" influences probably going back at least to Blue Cheer and Jefferson Airplane, if not the Count Five. Primus was an offshoot of the band that coined the term "death metal" (The Possessed) but was also influenced by the Residents.

Deafheaven are (to me, anyway) the product of a time in late 90's bay area college radio where Burzum, Noothgrush, Gasp, Fushitsusha, and Ebullition style emocore were being played in the same sets. I think they are much more clearly an offshoot of the northern california powerviolence scene (as are Weakling, etc) than any European black metal band. The following is the French emocore band Jasemine, from 1995. If you substitute the Dischargey rhythms for the plodding blast beats of black metal you get something very close to the kind of metal this thread is about:

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

totally agreed and I dig most of that stuff as well, but imo, deafheaven's songs are way too drawn out for the style. I lose interest pretty quickly when these bands stray too far from quick grindy blasts. this stuff is made for 7" splits.

Oooh, good point about bay area college radio (I was a KALX radio Dj during the era in question and I can definitely speak to the way that KALX and KUSF shows were all about connecting the dots). KALX had a policy in which you had to vary your genre at least three times during a three hour set and you were not allowed to be "the metal girl" or "the noise guy" or "the hip hop lady" or what have you- diversity of genre was *mandatory* and shows as a result would encourage people to see what was similar about, say, doom metal and 90s indie slowcore (tempo) or power electronics/noise and black metal (texture) etc. So metal was always getting lumped in or cross-faded with hardcore or goth or industrial or folk or post-rock etc. It certainly influenced how I thought about music and I would guess that it would have impacted the history of bay area metal anyway (Lord Slough Feg, Hammers of Misfortune, Ludicra, or see Amber Asylum's intersection with Neurosis on a social level and otherwise ...) as well as the obvious overlap of the Aquarius records posse as a social scene with, say, the Lucifer's Hammer club, which was booking important early shows by Enslaved and Mayhem that were attended by lots of indie kids alongside lifer metal bros.

I am totally listening to Sane Asylum right now because of this thread

diversity of genre was *mandatory* and shows as a result would encourage people to see what was similar about, say, doom metal and 90s indie slowcore (tempo) or power electronics/noise and black metal (texture) etc.

how DARE you sir?? *turns on heel and leaves room for somewhere more kvlt*

listened to "sunbather" (the song) on repeat yesterday. when i first listened to this band i was put off by the vocals but now i think those vocals give the music a bit of nihilistic rancour. its a phenomenal track, an epic slice of Cure-gone-metal. count me in the deafheaven camp f'sure.

yeah it's obvious to me that the posturing of a lot of early black metal came from not having the resources/exposure to do more. of course you're gonna defend your horrible-sounding recordings if you don't have the capability record anything that sounds better.

― call all destroyer, Sunday, February 9, 2014 1:27 PM (2 days ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

it was definitely a deliberate choice for most of the 2nd wavers! some of them had the tech capabilities to do better but chose worse as a deliberate stance against what they saw as florid death metal & overproduction becoming the standard

Fun fact: Alcest's Souvenirs placed higher on the main 2007 ILX albums poll (#26) than Sunbather did on this year's (#31)

in "the pecan tree", the vocals almost seem to be struggling against the music, especially at the end, and they don't stand a chance. i keep thinking of an orc writhing in agony -- possibly dying -- as he is exposed to sunlight for the first time ever.

darkthrone had pretty legitimate production quality when they were a DM band, so it stands to reason they went lo-fi deliberately

an orc, gtfo

um the orcs have a vague psychological (not a physical) response to sunlight so go to hell

just meant that the tension between the black metal aspects of the record and the post rock aspects of the record really come to a head at the album's climax.

i quite like the idea of vocal ork dying by guitar light fuiiid

actually fuogp either way

Okay, it took me listening to it several times, but I really finally get this album. The hardest thing for me to get past was the screamo vibe, and it's still a detriment, but the fact that I also hear shimmering shoegaze, black metal undertones and psyche-era Pink Floyd mood changes makes up for that.

Chalk me up as another person who kept seeing this thread at the top of New Answers and went to listen out of curiosity, really dug it, then bought the album and now love it

Yes, I know just what you mean. In a similar way I am now enjoying burritos made with two small tortillas.

what if this is all just a dream and deafheaven is the reality? really makes you think

lol

It was all a dream
I used to read Terrorizer magazine
Fenriz, Count G up in the limousine

lol

A+

this is not to suggest that it's a likely influence but rather just a coincidence of production quirks, but one thing that kind of reminds me of trv old school black metal that i've heard is the fast Bob song on Husker Du's Metal Circus. that same insectoid, distorted whine of guitars and frantic cardboard box snare

What other black metal bands should I check out if I deeply love both this album and (though I wish it wasn't so) Filosofem? Like, black metal with atmospheric guitar fuzz and an ongoing dialectic between melancholy and transcendence?

Personally I'd recommend Explosions In The Sky

yeah good point they are better than most black metal

lol

I'd recommend actually exploding in the sky

black metal with atmospheric guitar fuzz and an ongoing dialectic between melancholy and transcendence?

― Treeship, Tuesday, February 18, 2014 3:01 PM (41 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

i guess people think they're boring now or whatever but Wolves in the Throne Room scratches this itch for me

i would recommend eits to anyone regardless of whether they like black metal or not

but especially if they like ongoing dialectics with their guitars

svperstvtvres of transylvania

Treeship: check out the new Woods of Desolation, "As the Stars" for sure.

Who amongst us will confess to having Sunbather as their best album of the year, then?

I never liked EITS, by the way.

Okay, it took me listening to it several times, but I really finally get this album. The hardest thing for me to get past was the screamo vibe, and it's still a detriment, but the fact that I also hear shimmering shoegaze, black metal undertones and psyche-era Pink Floyd mood changes makes up for that.

based on this description, i wish they'd reissue this album, without any vocals, so i can really hear it.

i primarily enjoy this album as an imaginary lost sunny day real estate record tbh

(xp) Deafheaven: The Karaoke Album

KIDZ BOP 666: DEAFHEAVEN

Sunbather is in my top 4 or 5 for sure xp

I had deafheaven #3 I think in the metal albums poll

Treeship I feel you would really benefit from Moonsorrow, specifically V: Hävitetty - absolutely incredible blackened melodic folk-metal

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D5-_4VbzF_A

ok, moonsorrow kicks ass. i already knew wolves in the throne room were good, but thanks hoos anyway for spurring me to re-listen to them. i'm especially fond of their first album. still don't know if i am getting the shoegaze element in these groups though that i love so much in deafheaven and burzum.

i think listening to metal over these past few weeks have snapped me out of a saddish period. if it weren't for deafheaven i think i would have just been stewing in my melancholy indie playlists, so thank you deafheaven. black metal seems to be about cathartically purging ugly feelings rather than aestheticizing them in a way that makes them seem not ugly, which is what sad love songs do for feelings of romantic disappointment. goes without saying that there is a place for both kinds of music. maybe this is just the old distinction between the beautiful and the sublime.

oh yea and this is relevant to black metal

http://www.freep.com/article/20140222/FEATURES01/302220057/Viking-calendar-predicts-the-world-will-end-today