Metal Reviews

Not true, since the brutal side of death metal forgoes melody in favour of riffage. Personally, I wouldn't say that stuff like early Deicide or Dying Fetus are melodic, since there aren't really any leads. Even the solos in these aren't melodic, especially the solos in None So Vile for example. But they are still fucking awesome.

St. Anger is shit because everything about it (riffs, sound, lyrics, etc) is shit.

Interesting how I seem to have come around to a different viewpoint now. It's odd that we use 'melodic' as a genre identifier. Because, of course many musical terms would be just as applicable to some music, for instance "dissonant polyryhthmic death metal" or whatever.

Solos aren't melody. Melody is basically the foundation that all music is built upon. If something eschews all forms of melody then it just turns into noise. Even Nasum, while basically being an insurmountable wall of brutality, contains melody in the form of infectious riffs that won't leave your head. Napalm Death is the same thing, early Deicide as well.

I actually don't like much in the way of melodic death metal...in fact I typically all out hate it. However, Godgory's Sea of Dreams is a good melodeth album that doesn't get talked about much. Its a pretty mellow album overall, but pretty relaxing to listen to. I definitely recommend it.

Ehm, what? Music is built from the bottom up. Melody is the most recognizable part of music, but it's in no way the foundation.

So what is the foundation? And please don't say THE BASS HURRR.

Melody, harmony & rhythm (& loudness . )

Isn't melody anything with 3 notes or more? Melody is everywhere.

I would say rhythm is the foundation of music. What you do with that pretty much defines what you will sound like. And pretty much all music has it, in some form or another; which cannot be said for melody.

Definition of melody from wiki:



Not all music is based on a "linear succession of musical tones" at all.

An awful lot of what we consider melody in DM; even in melodeath, is really mainly "tone colour", IMO. (Although obv. that is a type of melody)

+1, taking In Flames as an example, I would consider the riffing in Take This Life as being melodic, but there isn't a melody as such. Unlike in Jotun (or Amorphis' Black Winter Day), where the intro lead is a melody as it is a succession of notes which are seen as a single entity.

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Rhythm, chords, and harmony are the foundations of music.

maiden melodies!!!!!!!!!!

I thought so too. Isn't Melodic Death soppose to be the adding of twin guitars and melodies of Iron Maiden into Death Metal, plus a small dose of thrash as well. Swedish Death Metal- pre-1995.
Old School Melodic Death Metal 1995-2002 , Modern Melodeth 2003-present, the adding of clean vocals and keyboards is what gives modern melodeth its sound.

Dark tranquillity are quite possibly the pioneers of this technique, and honestly they are still going strong while Anders and the crew from In flames still play 'identity crisis metal' and with Soilwork a Disturbed cover band.
They are really the only band worth mentioning playing Gothenburg melodeath

Dark tranquillity are quite possibly the pioneers of this technique, and honestly they are still going strong while Anders and the crew from In flames still play 'identity crisis metal' and with Soilwork a Disturbed cover band.
They are really the only band worth mentioning playing Gothenburg melodeath

True. Actually I still have to check out Soilwork, though I made the mistake of listening to the singles of Stabbing the Drama and my enthusiasm waned.

A Predator's Portrait is the way to go.

I love Stabbing The Drama.

Yeah. Once you realise that, in fact, people that call Soilwork Nu-Metal haven't heard any Nu-Metal for years, it gets pretty good. Not that much of a difference between STD and Figure No 5.