Innovative Deathcore Bands

Oh, hey, since my blog still exists I might as well throw down a new entry for my legion of dedicated fans. I know, I know, you can’t thank me enough for these great recommendations of incredible bands and now that you’ve listened to all the albums that I reviewed until your ears bled black…You simply crave another review of some skull-crushingly brilliant artists. The notion that you could be out of new and interesting music to listen to is utterly foreign to me since I consistently listen to new albums as soon as they are available. My greatest worry is that I will pass up some really great music and wind up listening to something mediocre instead. And yet, I find myself returning to older artists and bands that I “missed out” on in their heyday and surprisingly often, I discover some excellent bands. So, my message to people out there today is to check out some older shit if you seek inspiration from another time period. Don’t get me wrong though, I’m not saying you should listen to 80’s music (just puked in my mouth), but if you search for some of the original artists of your favorite (sub)genres you begin to hear and understand musical influences. I don’t think I truly understood hardcore punk until my friend told me to check out some early 90’s Refused albums. Anyways, I’m going to briefly promote a few of my favorite Death Metal/Metalcore albums of the Fall to get the nastiness flowing.

With the demonic presence of Halloween still in the air, what better way to celebrate the darker side of life than with some delectably apocalyptic deathcore albums. The following bands I would certainly consider deathcore in many respects but they also push the boundaries of the subgenre with their respective unique approaches. As I have said in previous posts, deathcore is certainly an acquired taste and the majority of people are too close-eared to even consider listening to it. But like all the finer things in life, when you approach it the right way consistently, it becomes a part of you and you cannot imagine your life without it. Deathcore must be listened to at a very loud level, to the point where you risk damaging your ears. It also sounds best if you are doing an activity that matches its rapid rhythms such as exercising, playing sports or blowing people’s heads off in a video game. Some people forget how your mood not only effects your perception of the music you are listening to, but if you are truly open-eared, the music itself will dictate your own mood. Three bands that always seemed to get me pumped up no matter what my mood are The Black Dahlia Murder, Winds of Plague, and After the Burial. These are perhaps the three most interesting and talented bands in extreme metal and they certainly all push the envelope of the subgenre’s rapidly evolving style.


The Black Dahlia Murder has become one of my favorite bands mainly because of their energy, passion and unique approach to metal. They remain one of the fastest, heaviest and most interesting bands and the energy of their live shows is simply contagious. Their style is mainly rooted in death metal but there are also influences from black metal, thrash metal and even hardcore. Their vocalist, Trevor Strnad, mainly does high shrieks but occasionally adds deeper growls to accent specific parts of their songs. The drumming is extremely fast and tight with enough blast beats to give you a heart attack. Their lyrics are most similar to gore and black metal due to their love of extremely dark and fucked up themes such as zombies and death itself. They recently added Ryan Knight (ex-Arsis) to their lineup and his excellent guitar solos have made their most recent album, Deflorate, their best to date. You have been living under a rock if you haven't heard of this mighty band.


Winds of Plague are a bit newer to the scene than BDM but definitely spun heads when they re-recorded several songs from their debut as well as new material to create the ridiculously epic album, Decimate the Weak, which was released in 2008. They are a band that has the epic black metal power of Dimmu Borgir (both relying on symphonic elements and keyboard) with the breakdown forte of Unearth, and a brutally refreshing yet deathly ugly vocal style. Their latest effort, The Great Stone War, though not as epic as Decimate, certainly continues their brutal yet melodic take on deathcore. Though I have yet to see this band live, I hear that they have quite a presence on stage and really get the mosh moving. If you are really into dark and heavy music that doesn’t sacrifice melody for brutality (they have a great balance), definitely check out this band.


After the Burial is certainly the most progressive of the three bands and is also the closest to Metalcore. I started hearing a buzz about this band several months ago but put off checking them out until mid-summer. When I finally got a hold of their second album, Rareform, it simply blew my mind. My favorite thing about this band is their guitar work, which is very heavy and melodic but more importantly it is surprising and progressive. In other words, they don’t follow the standard metalcore format and are not afraid to experiment with song structure. The drumming and bass guitar also perfectly accentuates the energy and innovation of the guitars. Although I am not very impressed by their vocalist or lyrics (I think he could easily be replaced), his more traditional death growl has begun to grow on me. Listen to their song Berzerker and you will immediately recognize this band’s raw talent.

All three of these bands are innovative, interesting and fucking epic. Each of their albums is certified Nasty! and get a 10/10 for their excellent contributions to deathcore.

Non-Metal Moment: I’ve been listening to Saosin’s latest album In Search of Solid Ground almost every day. This album is essential for fans of pop-punk, post-hardcore and alternative. The drumming and vocals are simply outstanding.

WTF is Deathcore?

I’ve been hearing people who know about music and people who don’t dropping this relatively new term in reference to a lot of metal bands. It has certainly become a trendy way to describe Metalcore bands that are heavier and more extreme in their approach. I think it is pretty cool that these types of bands have achieved a firm degree of popularity in the metal scene, especially at a time when post-hardcore and so-called screamo bands are taking over. Today, I decided to comment on three bands that perfectly exemplify this style, Suicide Silence, Carnifex, and Whitechapel. Beware that these bands are not for the weak stomached and you may experience symptoms such as bleeding ears, bulging eyes or uncontrollable defecation. I will create another blog post of three bands that are on the experimental side of Deathcore in the future.

Deathcore is, as its name implies, a mixture between death metal and hardcore punk but it is far more extreme than this simple definition. These bands breakdown their breakdowns while utilizing very heavy (and dark in tone) death metal and even black metal guitar riffs. The emphasis on the breakdown, which is specifically created for brutal mosh pits and highly energetic atmospheres during live shows, is very classic in the subgenre. Most bands avoid clean vocals all together and stray from melodic elements (as this would place them closer to the Metalcore subgenre). These bands are the essence of what “extreme” music has come to mean in contemporary times. The drumbeats are very very fast and riddled with typical death metal blast beats that can make anyone want to shake their fist at the sky. Suicide Silence, Carnifex, and Whitechapel have a lot in common, namely they are heavier than uranium and will blow your face off with their intensity.

Suicide Silence has built up quite a following in the last few years by constantly touring with more popular Metalcore bands and securing spots on festivals such as Mayhem. They have explosive performances and truly rock out and their mosh pits are borderline dangerous, its like being in a battle scene from Braveheart. When I first began listening to them a couple years ago, I didn’t really like the vocals and found them a bit monotonous. Seeing them live quickly changed my mind and their breakthrough album The Cleansing is ridiculously intense. Their latest album, No Time to Bleed is even better and features a richer depth of style, more interesting song structures as well as cleaner production. For a lot of people it is difficult to get used to their mainly shrieking vocals, but they utilize deeper growls also and their vocalist is ridiculously passionate. My favorite tracks right now are Wake Up, Suffer and Lifted and I like the increased presence of keyboard and sound effects; it is certainly more interesting than their last album.

Carnifex has also been causing many people to soil their pants for the last few years that they have been in the extreme metal scene. I actually dig their vocalist, Scott Lewis, more than Suicide Silence’s Mitch Lucker because he does more deep growls in the vein of death metal (I find this more soothing). Some people have argued that this band is more of a death metal band but the prevalence of breakdowns as well as their popularity in the hardcore scene places them in the ranks of quintessential Deathcore bands. They are much less popular than Suicide Silence (who debuted at #32 on the billboard chart) but I think their death metal riffs are catchier. I have yet to see them live but I think we can all assume that the mosh pit would churn with the thickness of molasses. Check them out if you are into Deathcore, they are a very solid band despite some early on line-up changes. Their latest album, which was released last year, The Diseased and The Poisoned will probably cause your ears to bleed profusely.

Of these three bands, Whitechapel is my current favorite and I have been listening to them a lot more the past few weeks. They actually come from Tennessee, instead of Southern California like the other two, and they have a very intriguing sound, yet they are heavier than Michael Moore. Their name is actually not religious at all and references the district in London where Jack the Ripper carried out his gruesome murders (if that isn’t metal, I don’t know what is). I think their vocalist has the greatest range of the three bands and he does a great job balancing deep growls with higher screams. Unfortunately, I missed their performance at the Mayhem Festival because they were one of the first bands and I arrived about an hour late. I noticed that tons of people were wearing their shirts so they are creating quite a stir in the scene. They have brutal breakdowns, delicious death metal riffs and tremendous drumbeats that are not for the faint of heart. Their album is titled This Is Exile and deals with typical death metal themes lyrically and is very dark in tone. All of these bands seem to have anti-religious messages embedded in their lyrics but I don’t listen to them for the lyrics, since you can barely understand them even after a dozen listens. My favorite tracks are Father of Lies, Possession and This is Exile.

All three of the bands are certified Nasty! Whitechapel’s album gets a 9/10 since it is the most interesting in my humble opinion, while Suicide Silence receives an 8.5/10 since it is better than their last album and Carnifex gets an 8/10 because I said so. My non-metal moment today is about electronic group Pendulum who utilize mainly drum and bass style to create some catchy and very fast dance tunes. They hail from Australia, check out their albums In Silico and Hold Your Colour.