Dark Economic Truths of Underground Metal

Recently many of the other “metal” websites, blogs, publications et cetera have been doing articles about the business side of music industry. Unsurprisingly none of these articles had the testicular fortitude to address the ugly reality of the underground metal economy as they are written by either slaves to the machine itself or losers who genuinely believe that they have “careers” in music which heavily depend on acceptance by the community. Since the Death Metal Underground staff bow to no masters social or corporate, we are in the rare position give you the truth in its rawest form. So with absolute disregard for the powers that be in metal, let’s take an honest look inside this machine to see how it really works.

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Tom Warrior Censored on Upcoming Celtic Frost Reissues

In a recent blog post, Celtic Frost vocalist/guitarist Tom G. Warrior has publicly disowned BMG’s upcoming double CD reissues of his band’s best output, Morbid Tales and To Mega Therion, and the more pandering and spotty Into the Pandemonium and Vanity / Nemesis. The embarrassing Cold Lake was omitted at Warrior’s request. While initially on board with the reissues and involved with the creative process, Tom Warrior has abandoned ship because the commercial mega-label BMG refused to print his linear notes as he intended. This blatant censorship was a means of preserving the integrity of the Noise Records liquid assets purchased by the label but had inadvertently overwhelmed the Cold Laker with a plethora of painful flashbacks of the corporate influence that plagued Celtic Frost throughout its existence.

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Nokturnal Mortum – Verity (2017)

With Verity, Nokturnal Mortum continue down the more commercial path they started embarking on The Voice of Steel and their half of last year’s The Spirit Never Dies split with Graveland: commercialized rock-constructed music with Ukrainian folk and power metal aesthetics.  On the inferior half of the The Spirit Never Dies, Nokturnal Mortum abandoned the use of the progressive rock techniques with speed, power, and Gothenburg metal riffs to craft compositions similar to the extended, droning flowing black metal compositions of past greats. Verity continues the slide down into Wacken fare.

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The Lurking Fear Preview “Winged Death”

The Lurking Fear, a side project of At the Gates members including Tomas Lindberg, preview a new track, “Winged Death” from their upcoming self-titled EP that is coming out soon. The band also has an album, Out Of The Voiceless Grave, coming out August 11th on Century Media. Death Metal Underground’s staff are not giddy with anticipation but rather unsurprisingly disappointed.
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Crackhead Bobby Liebling Assaults Elderly Mother

Former and probably current crack smoker Bobby Liebling of long running stoner rock, pseudo-metal band Pentagram was arrested for apparently assaulting his elderly mother, causing him to be dropped from Pentagram’s upcoming European tour. Liebling famously was filmed smoking crack in his elderly parents’ basement in suburban Maryland for the Pentagram documentary Last Days Here. Liebling’s drug problems and abhorrent personal behavior have long sabotaged any chance Pentagram may have had at creative of commercial success.

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USA Deports Evil Invaders

Funderground Belgian speed metal band Evil Invaders were deported from the United States according to their Funbook page for not having the appropriate work visas to play a metal festival in Milwaukee. Evil Invaders were not being paid to play the festival. The festival organizers were only covering Evil Invaders plane tickets and transportation cost for the band and their equipment. Since the festival organizers were still charging for tickets and making money, Evil Invaders needed an appropriate work visa, which they did not have, thus they were deported.

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Bill Steer Admits Making Arena Rock

Bill Steer, the guitarist of sell-out grindcore legends turned butt rock turkey Carcass, did an interview with hipster social justice warrior rock website Vice Noisey last week where he ranked Carcass’s albums in order of his favorites. Bill Steer admitted that Necroticism: Descanting the Insalubrious was pretentious death ‘n’ roll instrumental wank and that continuing in that style would not have provided any future for the band so they started writing heavy metal for arena rock fans on Heartwork as only about three hundred people at every big show Carcass played actually liked death metal at all. Bill Steer finally dropped all pretense of Carcass’s later material being traditional heavy metal and admitted it is actually written as arena rock in order to please the most people.
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Sadistic Metal Reviews: Inquisition of the Unworthy

Burn them all!

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Dawning – Mount Um + 1997 Demo (2016)


Another previously unreviewed record judged some of The Best Underground Metal of 2016.

Mount Um + 1997 Demo is a digital anthology collecting what Steve Cefala judged to be Dawning‘s strongest material. Half the run-time (“Side A”) is one new, extended track entitled Mount Um in three parts: “Pilgrimage to Umunhum”, “The Albino Bridge Sacrement”, and a melodic bass outro. Mount Um sounds like Summoning worshiping Emperor‘s In the Nightside Eclipse in a lengthy composition reminiscent of Celtic Frost‘s album work. Ambient fantasy keyboards are perverted into pandemonium as if on an arduous journey of great hardship and loss culminating in a bittersweet victory over the uncaring, vicious forces of nature. Mount Um‘s composition is progressive and profound.

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Judas Priest – Unleashed in the East (1979)

Article contributed to Death Metal Underground by George Psalmanazer.

Judas Priest started life as just another Led Zeppelin influenced band in the early 1970s. Quickly they became massively influenced by Black Sabbath and especially Thin Lizzy. Priest adapting the counterpointed riffing and harmonzied melodic guitar leads of Thin Lizzy into a mixture of progressive rock and the then new heavy metal of Black Sabbath but with operatic vocals instead of Ozzy “singing” the riff through his nose kicked off the New Wave of British Heavy Metal in the late 1970s.

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