“A crucial aspect of my death metal enjoyment comes from the mood it invokes. I feel plain cold with OSDM stuff, but the oft-maligned dissonant death offers a spectrum of atmospheres and environs: Portal‘s gates of madness, Ulcerate‘s apocalyptic meditativeness, and Ad Nauseam‘s croaking caverns, for example. Sinister intent and apathies to our suffering are a given in the dissonant stylings, but what if we could make it fun?” Devil-may-care and discord.
“Although divisive, Portal‘s influence in the death metal world is undeniable. Featuring riffs that seem to crawl with murk and dissonance aplenty with an eldritch monstrosity roaring from the pulpit, there are few who can accurately channel this particular breed of otherworldly alienation. Many have tried and failed, but getting that squirming aesthetic just right is nearly impossible. Basque duo Pestilength is the latest to try their hand at the next Vexovoid.” Cake? No cake!
“Each year we aggregate the voluminous listery that occurs in these hallowed pages in order to delineate the favorite (or rather, lowest common denominator) records from a given year across the various writers and tastes that we now characterize.” This is what it sounds like when mobs rules.
The list has landed. I repeat, the list has landed!
Kronos and Grymm deliver artisan Top Ten(ish) lists for 2021. Just look at that craftsmanship!
GardensTale and Ferrous Beuller unleash their Top Ten(ish) lists in a reckless manner without regard for the safety of others. Wear your safety goggles!
TheKenWord and Carcharodon assembled these Top Ten(ish) lists and apparently they stand by them. You can judge if that is the right decision.
“Lovable Norwegian oddballs Diskord make their long awaited return with Degenerations, their third LP and first recorded output since 2014’s mind-bending Oscillations EP. Easily one of my most anticipated albums of 2021, long ago I fell hard for Diskord‘s strange amalgam of old school death metal, experimental flair, and ability to crank out killer death tunes, chopped up with psychedelic and prog experiments. My first exposure was on their monumental 2012 LP Dystopics, an incredible album I consider a modern classic. However, as the years passed I began to wonder whether we would hear more from the band. Well the moment has arrived, Diskord fittingly popping up on the Transcending Obscurity roster to land another mindboggling clusterfuck of weird arse death.” Degenerate to evolve.
“Cathexis is a death metal band from Texas. How to further classify them is up to the listener, but to me their sound is that of a TXDM band playing a mix of Obscura, Negativa, and Hate Eternal. Untethered Abyss is ambitious in that it tries to find the sweet spot between TXDM brutality, the creative dissonance of Obscura and Negativa, and the propulsive and aggressive death metal of Hate Eternal.” Texas knows brisket and abysskit.
“If I’m being truly honest, I have a difficult time with death metal. It feels unfair, as these acts rear their guttural heads on my AOTY’s yearly, but they’re often adjacent strains: black/death, dissonant tech-death, Lovecraftian, or other pretentiously experimental concoctions. But old school and Swedeath? Gimme somethin’ else, because I overthink the hell out of it: at the risk of sounding like my parents, it all sounds the same to me. However, a new weird death metal release from the label behind groups like Prometheus and Thecodontion? Acausal Intrusion, sign me the fuck up.” Ruptured Nulitas.
