Metal Bands You Need to Know
In tandem with our review of Howl and Coliseum in this week’s Listen Up, and Kenneth Lee’s riff-heavy Best Albums of 2010 So Far, we at College Gentleman give you spring chickens a list of some of history’s best, most important, and somewhat overlooked metal bands. Below find groups who revolutionized heavy music, influenced all of the bands you listen to, and made great records who are, well into their 30’s and 40’s, still kicking ass and taking names.
Melvins. After Sabbath, Iron Maiden, and Metallica, Melvins are the most influential metal band of all time. Throughout their 25-year career, Melvins have created a pioneering body of work in stoner, sludge, doom, drone, and even grunge. By slowing down the epic riffs of Sabbath and Black Flag, the early work of Melvins spawned the careers of countless plodding sonic experimentalists. Drummer Dale Crover and guitarist/vocalist King Buzzo created the template for the pummeling drums and mountainous riffs of a slew of underground metal genres, the echoes of which are everywhere in 2010.
Where to Start: Houdini
See Also: Eyehategod, Boris, Electric Wizard, Sleep
Napalm Death. It’s hard to overestimate the importance of Napalm Death in extreme metal. As the first grindcore band, they introduced extreme metal staples such as blast beats, unintelligible beast-like growling, and incredibly short songs. If you like metal that doesn’t fuck around with solos, melody, complex structures, and clean vocals, you owe your life to Napalm Death. Their debut, 1987’s Scum, is frighteningly brutal, and its unbridled aggression and scathing sociopolitical lyrical content has rarely been equaled. Bow before the altar of a band that will gladly fuck your ear holes until they bleed.
Where to Start: Scum
See Also: Carcass, Dying Fetus, Pig Destroyer
Entombed. In five years, Entombed managed to create the blueprint for one genre and completely invent another. Recorded while the band members were still teenagers, their 1989 debut Left Hand Path laid the foundation for countless death metal acts to follow. Integrating the heaviness of death metal, aggression of grindcore, and musical precision of thrash, Entombed upended extreme metal by adding whiplash tempo changes and crushing grooves. With 1993’s Wolverine Blues, the band invented the Death n Roll genre by blending the heaviness of death metal with the structures, riffs, and (gasp!) melody of rock n roll. The result is one of the great metal albums of all time.
Where to Start: Wolverine Blues
See Also: At the Gates, Kataklysm, Disfear, Hatebreed
Coalesce. Coalesce created severe abrasiveness from silence. By loading their music with sudden changes, stop-start riffs whose jagged cadence owe as much to James Brown as to hardcore, and the dub-esque tendency to bring instruments in and out of the mix unexpectedly, the band created one of the most unique sounds in metalcore. Coalesce managed to so thoroughly blend hardcore, metal, and math rock, it’s hard to call them anything but scary. In their heyday, Coalesce were one of the most harsh and difficult bands in heavy music, whose sound laid the groundwork for a new aesthetic in underground metal.
Where to Start: Functioning on Impatience
See Also: Botch, Burnt by the Sun, Architect
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