One of the many great Tampa, FL area bands. I like their attention to the sludgier doom riffs in the middle of fast songs, that hearken back to their Celtic Frost influence.
Cause of Death should be in every Death metal fans library, as well as Slowly We Rot, & End Complete. It's a perfect trilogy of albums. I like their newer stuff as well. Seen them live a bunch of times. Always great!
Obituary is one of the best death metal bands out there. Their classic albums are just amazing. I agree; everybody should listen to them.
Yup, there was a time when I couldn't get enough of Obituary's crushing, ton-heavy, doomy, groovy death metal. Their uncanny ability to alternate between break-neck speed and decelerate to a crawl at the flip of a switch, always gave me a thrill. Bolt Thrower seemed to do similar stuff on their records. John Tardy remains one helluva unique voice in dm, though plenty of fans seem to dislike it. I still like it. Allen West somehow seemed like a perfect match for the band, though everybody else that lent their guitar genius (not least, James Murphy) delivered some cool riffs along the way.
As with Morbid Angel, my strongest favourites remain the first three. Slowly We Rot, Cause of Death and The End Complete. Those three are outright classics and indispensables for the serious death metal fan, especially those that swear by the 'old-school' variety. I found Back from the Dead to be a much weaker, lesser album than the previous three. The songs, overall, were very uneven in quality, sounded rather insipid and discards from earlier recording sessions. The tacky 'remix' ending did the album no favours. World Demise, though largely overlooked and under-rated is something that I mostly enjoyed, with a handful of superb songs, but again the unnecessary, self-indulgent, ultimately silly closer annoyed me. Their '05 comeback, Frozen in Time, disappointed me hugely. To me, it sounded highly mediocre, uninspired, and flat-out boring. The last one, Xecutioner's Return, was a stronger rebound effort, with much more inventive songwriting and just better overall, though again, Obituary sadly somehow sound to me like they are basically a spent force.
Ralph Santolla is probably sticking around with the band. At any rate, I think he somehow sounds a lot better with Obituary than he does with Deicide (I want him out of that band, actually). Obituary are due to release a new album this year. Despite my waning enthusiasm for a once-mighty act, I'm gonna buy their latest, nevertheless.
Napalm, I tend to agree with a lot of your opinions here. I do like parts of World Demise. It was very hooky and had some winners there. Although it was a bit of a mess toward the end of the album.
And agree that BFTD & Frozen were somewhat lackluster efforts. I thought Frozen was the better of the two. And OI particularly like the albums mix on that one. I saw them last on the Frozen tour though and while their writing may have weakened, their performing abilities are still spot on. I like Xecutioners Return. I've never been a big fan of Allan Wests lead guitar style. So having Ralph there now is an asset I think. Their last EP was good as well, and I think the band are slowly regaining their songwriting chops. I won't make any hasty predictions of the upcoming release. But I do look forward to it nonetheless.
..And, Warlock, on second thoughts I realize how I gotta agree with you about Frozen in Time being somewhat better overall than the very pedestrian BFTD. Also, you're right on the money about how whatever a fan may think of their last few records, including Xecutioner's Return (a cool enough album with a cleverly apt title), I've been told by very many fans---Obituary devotees or not---that the guys still perform with an intensity and impact like they used to. As if they never had a lay-off, never really left the scene, and if anything, have renewed hunger to prove a few points to anybody paying attention. Oh yes, the Left to Die EP was a pretty impressive effot that made sparks fly with me.
Btw, mate, have you had a chance to check out the Tardy brothers' side-project with the latest 'Bloodline' album :cool: ? Unlike say, what the late Dime Darrell Abbott (RIP) and Vinnie Paul made of their, frankly, absolutely awful Damageplan, I'd say John and Donald Tardy have pulled off something extremely exciting, cool and worthwhile outside of Obituary.
<!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://www.candlelightrecords.co.uk/digital/ecard/obituary/Obituary_Ecard.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false">http://www.candlelightrecords.co.uk/dig ... Ecard.html</a><!-- m -->
That's a link to an obituary e-card that shows their new albums Artwork (which is epic as fuck) and 3 previews of tracks from it.
Those samples KILL!
Napalm, the Tardy Brothers album I wanted to like, but it seemed a little bland to me for some reason. I still own it though so maybe I should take another listen.
I do want to mention the excellent Death/Industrial project called Meathook Seed featuring Don Tardy & Trevor Perez. I'm not normally a big fan of the pairing of these styles. But MS did it the way I like. A brilliant album start to finish.
Yup, those sizzling samples are enough make me salivate for the upcoming full-course meal to be dished out by veteran legends like Obituary. I sure hope those of us (myself included) that have been writing premature 'obituaries' of this great band, will have to eat our hearts out, upon hearing the latest album really soon.
Warlock, I think I know what you mean by not particularly digging the Tardy bros' solo-side effort. For one thing, I wish it was wholly different from Obituary, which it isn't. And that's neither a good nor a bad thing. And, more pointedly, I've heard a few guys complain that it sounds a bit 'dated' in style, sound and production, and sort of derivative of their main band and perhaps a bit overly old-schoolish sounding, AND boring. But I honestly enjoyed Bloodline for its diversity with its dollops of groove, doom, thrash, even hardcorish flavours thrown in that makes it an organic, fluid album where John and Don show off and have fun doing it.
I'd high-five you in total agreement about Meathook Seed (CC inspiration a la Meathook Sodomy, right there
) And industrial-death can, and often does, sound pretty darn cool.....when done right....as Tardy and Perez sure do!
Great band, the new album has some epic solos.
Anything from the first 4 albums this band did is killer. I think my favorite out of that set of albums is World Demise, followed by Cause of Death. Stay away from Xecutioner's Return and Back From The Dead unless you're a fanboy like me.