Bolt Thrower doesn't over-complicate things, but always delivers well written songs carried by great riffs and grooves, perfect for nodding your head to(as Bryan did). sadly they split up a few years ago, but they've had a solid carreer of consistently quality releases. Also a great pick for today (International Women's Day), as they had a female bassist.
I wouldn't say they split up, sadly the drummer passed away and they decided not to carry on without him. Karl Willets the vocalist has another band now called Memoriam.
Solid career is putting it mildly. They have no bad or even meh albums. Nothing but killers after another. Very very rare feat in music. They stuck to what they do and never sold out. Unlike many other bands (cough Metallica cough). Like you can listen to the whole BT discography start to finish and have a great death metal time.
Keep in mind this was Bolt Thrower’s final song on their FINAL album ever. Which many, myself included, consider to be their magnum opus, Those Once Loyal. Amazing album. Everything BT ever put out was nothing short of great. Perfect band through and through.
IVth Crusade is their magnus opus personally, but Those Once Loyal is amazing too. They have nothing but great albums. A rare feat for a band that was in the biz for so long
they're really good at simple earworm riffs, plus as as guitarist they're fun to just play along and jam not really much else to them, just good ol' bread-and-butter death metal with cool grooves and memorability
I dont know about you but try composing a "simple earworm riff" without copying someone else, its incredibly difficult. And they did it for almost 2 decades. Just constant barrage of great riffs, great groove, fantastic vocals, pure death metal. Top 3 dm bands of all time, no doubt. I dont remember who said but someone said that the hardest thing about composing is composing a great simple melody. The only other death metal band with riffs comparable to theirs is Deströyer 666.
Bolt Thrower, they were really good at making bloody good music from very simple ingredients. Groovy, not complex but somehow also managed to not sound like watered down. Also if you are a guitarist they are a fun band to play along with, the songs are quite easy to learn by ear.
Excellent video as usual. Only thing I would mention is that Bolt Thrower's early on were known as being "grindcore" style, of which they are one of the pioneers from the late 80s, the mixture of extreme metal and a punk style. Although they have always been death metal to me, but I think maybe the style difference you are picking up on, say compared to traditional death metal bands like Mordbid Angel, maybe could be explained by this early roots of Bolt Thrower and their "grindcore" style, i.e relatively simple but groovy riffs, unlike regular death metal being usually more technical.
One of my favorite bands! A cool unique thing with Bolt Thrower: they wrote a song called World Eater for their second album, which was a massive success. Then they often took this song and perturbed it a bit here and there, but left it spiritually the same at its core. Specifically, the songs Cenotaph, Embers and The Killchain are such examples that I can remeber from the top of my head, but there might be more. Each song is a hit and each is different, but still very similar! It is such a cool thing IMO.
Wow I am thrilled to see both thrower on your channel really legendary band - a lot of fun! As far as them not being the most extreme band consider that they put out their first album in 1988. So a lot of the more extreme bands that we now associate with death metal were subsequent to this band and influenced by them. I completely agree with your comments about their riffs finding that middle ground between a melodic aspect and then just kind of the cool part. Also a lot of, or more than would.expected at least, of groove with this band
This is one of Bolt Thrower's better songs. They always have an excellent handle on groove. Personally, I like my death metal to be more about speed; a blend of thrash and death is best. Story to Tell is my favorite of the death metal songs this week, thus far.
Bolt Thrower are definitely one of the more solid, straight-forward DM bands, but I can't help but feel disappointed that they made it on the week given you've reacted to them before and there's so many major DM bands you still haven't heard. I do understand their appeal though, as in a way they were one of the thrashiest of the old-school DM bands. Very solid riff-writers too. Easiest way to think of death metal is as a genre that added growls to thrash. If you listen to Possessed's Seven Churches from '85 (their song Death Metal gave the genre its name) is basically just that and is really THE bridge between the genres. If you then go on to some of the earliest DM albums like Death's Scream Bloody Gore, Pestilence's Consuming Impulse, Morbid Angel's Altars of Madness, and Obituary's Slowly We Rot (all from '89) you can really hear how death metal became more brutal and grinding. After that it quickly started getting fused with other metal genres including prog metal and melodic/classic metal. So there weren't very many years where "pure death metal" was a genre before the various fusions kicked in.
I'd say that last bit true of any genre, in the end it depends on how far back you want to draw the line, since there's always someone else before that (and this is an endless debate amongst many genres, for sure). Also, artists don't want to keep making the same song over and over again, and at what point do we draw the line on what has too much outside influences (that's then the other debate about genres I guess). Additionally, genre names tend to be groupings of multiple different sounds, because otherwise people should just use the band name. It's like discussing whether salmon or cod are truer fish.
we are once again getting close to what traditional death metal is. I hope next recommendations are from the early days of death metal because bolt thrower while still being death metal, kinda have their own way of writing semi melodic semi groovy mid paced riffs with no blast beats (except the first 2 albums and a couple songs from war master). The music sometimes gets slow, usually mid tempo, the vocals are monotone and the riffs are usually easy to digest compared to what death metal is. Certainly a good way to introduce someone to death metal, but for a channel that has reacted to a full nile album and bands like demilich/aeon/necrophagist to name a few, we can go a step further in terms of heaviness.
I literally came here to literally say the same thing! I literally wrote a thesis in my jazz class about Pierced from Within…. This is definitely the album that best expresses a tech Death game changer
Cool to see that so far 3 out 3 bands (at least, and 1/3 for songs suggested) were picked (I guess by a majority of people suggesting it) by you for a critical reaction...I love Bolt Thrower because I believe they are unique in providing relatively simple Music for sure, but super groovy & very often catchy Metal...I don't consider it standard on my side because of their very efficient sense of groove..(...). For me, it is Death Metal (honestly I'll struggle to explain what is D.M. in English without spending too much time & quote sogns section examples to listen to...), but anchors itself more into a mix of Thrash Metal & post & quite softened Grindcore which was their original style...so a kind of mid-tempo (most of the time) MeloDeath. This is no brainer Metal that one could overlook, I know, but it is very efficient on the little it does. The band did split in 2016 & some of the members still play in other bands, such as Memoriam. Curious now to see which next band/song you'll be picking...PS: Forgot to mention that maybe this long fade out makes more sense if I tell you that this is the last song of the album ?
Signs that you're listening to death metal include typically low or mid growled vocals, lots of tremolo picking, and double kick. It will almost always be in a minor key or composed largely of chromatic riffing, and typically feature lower tones than a genre like black metal. Songs tend not to have the galloping rythymns found in traditional heavy metal and often in thrash. I feel like you're pretty close to 'getting' what makes something death metal. The complexity just comes in the variety of sub/splinter/hybrid genres rooted in death metal. I imagine it's definitely hard to see similarity between 'Brutal Slamming Death Metal' bands like Visceral Disgorge and a melodeath band like At the Gates.
I could never explain with words what's the difference between genres of heavy metal. But when I hear it, I immediately know, what one is and of course, what I like to hear.
Death metal started in the mid/late 80s. It was kind of a natural evolution from thrash metal, just down tuning guitars and trying to be more aggressive, brutal and pummeling. Some real knuckle dragging stuff early on especially. Someone from the band Warbringer explained to difference with black and death metal by saying "Black metal speaks to the forlorn and lonely part of his soul but death metal is just a giant gorilla destroying a room." I'm probably paraphrasing but I think I'm pretty close. If thrash metal took punk's aggression and added that to heavy metal, death metal took that sound added perhaps some hardcore punk and pushed the sound further but kinda in a same direction. Early death metal albums kinda sounded like thrash metal with just guttural harsh vocals, lower tuned guitars and dirty, raw production. Some classics are Scream Bloody Gore by Death, Altars of Madness by Morbid Angel and Severed Survival by Autopsy. Just to recommend some of the really early stuff. Death is arguably the first one, Autopsy has some bouncy fun with a prominent base sound and Morbid Angel had aged very well out of these early albums. In the early 90s we got some prog/tech death and that decade was a time of great experimentation. Melo death kinda became a thing around -94-ish with albums like Heartwork by Carcass and actually bands like Bolt Thrower among others. Looking at death metal at around 2000s kinda gives more palatable examples of the genre but also a more polished sound. Perhaps "polished" is kinda wrong. Let's just say some of the kinks have been ironed out. Some of the late 80s stuff might give a better view of where this music comes from and how it has evolved. Thanks for reading my rambles once again. Cheers and take care buddy.
Excellent summary, but Possessed's Seven Churches is usually considered the first death metal album and one of their tracks was where the genre got its name from.
@@jonathanhenderson9422 True. For me that album still sounds pretty primitive. Like proto-death metal. Also after Scream Bloody Gore there was a bigger explosion of bands/albums so that to me feels like more of a starting point for a bigger movement. But you are absolutely correct that the starting point or the ingredients were there with Possessed.
I feel kinda vindicated with my 'classic death metal = dark, dissonant thrash with growls' coments all the way back on day one of this week since I knew it would end up like this: Death Metal is a legitimately broad genre but most people use 'Death Metal' as a short hand for either Brutal Death Metal or Technical Death Metal and it's because there's so much diversity in just the label of "Death Metal" is not very useful, to the point that it feels like 'Just plain Metal' as you said: Even Arch Enemy has growls yet is one of the more by-the-numbers modern bands anyone thinks of when we say 'metal' today and 'Melodic Death Metal' if you get a bit more picky about it but even that label was far more useful more than 20 years ago when Arch Enemy and other meldic death metal were not as widespread to the point it like just standard metal today.
should give a listen to something from their first two albums, they came from the late 80's british grind scene (napalm death, carcass, those kinds of bands) and while they've always leaned towards death metal their first two (mainly first) albums had lots of grind elements mixed in
Bolt Thrower got a similar style to early Amon Amarth records. Not sure what it is, maybe the constant chugging and cool riffs? It's not that unique or mind blowing but it's such a classic sound at this point so it's hard to get disappointed by it.
Great band, great album, but not the best song from the album IMO, but near top. haha But, everyone disagree about what is their best work etc. 😅 A great one quite a few has reacted to in the past has been Anti-Tank, from the same album, which has a rather nice music video on youtube too. One thing this album really nails is the more almost modern warfare of second world war feel, it's just not world war 1 anymore that they've done before, and definitely not something like the crusades (which they've also done) etc.
Also, early Bolt Thrower is grindcore, and not death. This album is their last, and will remain so, even if most members still make music, because one member is dead, so this one is not really Grindcore. Grindcore is essentially British, the step after NWOBHM (lol, long acronym, but it means new wave of British heavy metal. Think Iron Maiden, Motörhead, Venom etc) and inspired by early death metal in USA. o.o''
Good choices so far. But, a death metal week without Pestilence (Land of Tears) or Gorefest (anything from Erase would do)... Also, Obituary (anything from The End Complete)
The riffs are quite good and the music in general too. The singing is crap though. Compared to todays screamers those old school vocalist are Little League. Spoils it for me really...
They can make music for the next Doom game. Other than that it sounds generic video game music that something Nine Inch Nails will produce for a video game as a standalone act. It will it increase its value if its in some bad ass games.
Bolt Thrower doesn't over-complicate things, but always delivers well written songs carried by great riffs and grooves, perfect for nodding your head to(as Bryan did). sadly they split up a few years ago, but they've had a solid carreer of consistently quality releases. Also a great pick for today (International Women's Day), as they had a female bassist.
I wouldn't say they split up, sadly the drummer passed away and they decided not to carry on without him. Karl Willets the vocalist has another band now called Memoriam.
Solid career is putting it mildly. They have no bad or even meh albums. Nothing but killers after another. Very very rare feat in music. They stuck to what they do and never sold out. Unlike many other bands (cough Metallica cough). Like you can listen to the whole BT discography start to finish and have a great death metal time.
Keep in mind this was Bolt Thrower’s final song on their FINAL album ever. Which many, myself included, consider to be their magnum opus, Those Once Loyal. Amazing album. Everything BT ever put out was nothing short of great. Perfect band through and through.
IVth Crusade is their magnus opus personally, but Those Once Loyal is amazing too. They have nothing but great albums. A rare feat for a band that was in the biz for so long
Bolt thrower must be one of the most influential and also underrated death metal band in the history...
They may be simple but no one does groove better then Bolt Thrower in Death Metal.
Legendary band \m/
Last song on their last album. When cannons fade. Never has there been a more fitting title for a song.
Cannons truly faded when they quit. Top 3 death metal band of all time
they're really good at simple earworm riffs, plus as as guitarist they're fun to just play along and jam
not really much else to them, just good ol' bread-and-butter death metal with cool grooves and memorability
I dont know about you but try composing a "simple earworm riff" without copying someone else, its incredibly difficult. And they did it for almost 2 decades. Just constant barrage of great riffs, great groove, fantastic vocals, pure death metal. Top 3 dm bands of all time, no doubt. I dont remember who said but someone said that the hardest thing about composing is composing a great simple melody. The only other death metal band with riffs comparable to theirs is Deströyer 666.
Last song of their very last album. Majestic farewell!
Your face when the groove kicks in. Priceless, and also every Bolt Thrower fan.
Bolt Thrower, they were really good at making bloody good music from very simple ingredients. Groovy, not complex but somehow also managed to not sound like watered down. Also if you are a guitarist they are a fun band to play along with, the songs are quite easy to learn by ear.
"What would the soundtrack for Warhammer 40k sound like?" Bolt Thrower: Hold my beer. 🤘🤘
Lol exactly
Они были фанаты этой вселенной, и даже выпустили альбом Realm of chaos.
Still havent played any 40k games without playing atleast one bolt thrower song in the background since the early 90's \o/
@@marcusornestahl6378 Playing Dawn of War 1 with Bolt Thrower blaring is awesome ^^
Their name is a reference to the iconic 'bolter' weapon from 40k
Excellent video as usual. Only thing I would mention is that Bolt Thrower's early on were known as being "grindcore" style, of which they are one of the pioneers from the late 80s, the mixture of extreme metal and a punk style. Although they have always been death metal to me, but I think maybe the style difference you are picking up on, say compared to traditional death metal bands like Mordbid Angel, maybe could be explained by this early roots of Bolt Thrower and their "grindcore" style, i.e relatively simple but groovy riffs, unlike regular death metal being usually more technical.
One of my favorite bands!
A cool unique thing with Bolt Thrower: they wrote a song called World Eater for their second album, which was a massive success. Then they often took this song and perturbed it a bit here and there, but left it spiritually the same at its core. Specifically, the songs Cenotaph, Embers and The Killchain are such examples that I can remeber from the top of my head, but there might be more.
Each song is a hit and each is different, but still very similar! It is such a cool thing IMO.
Cenotaph, Embers, Spearhead, Powder Burns, The Killchain fricking great songs.
Bolt Thrower doesn’t just dig a groove, it’s a deep trench with piles of bodies laying inside killed by blunt instruments…a sledge hammer.
Wow I am thrilled to see both thrower on your channel really legendary band - a lot of fun! As far as them not being the most extreme band consider that they put out their first album in 1988. So a lot of the more extreme bands that we now associate with death metal were subsequent to this band and influenced by them.
I completely agree with your comments about their riffs finding that middle ground between a melodic aspect and then just kind of the cool part. Also a lot of, or more than would.expected at least, of groove with this band
This is one of Bolt Thrower's better songs. They always have an excellent handle on groove. Personally, I like my death metal to be more about speed; a blend of thrash and death is best. Story to Tell is my favorite of the death metal songs this week, thus far.
Bolt Thrower are definitely one of the more solid, straight-forward DM bands, but I can't help but feel disappointed that they made it on the week given you've reacted to them before and there's so many major DM bands you still haven't heard. I do understand their appeal though, as in a way they were one of the thrashiest of the old-school DM bands. Very solid riff-writers too.
Easiest way to think of death metal is as a genre that added growls to thrash. If you listen to Possessed's Seven Churches from '85 (their song Death Metal gave the genre its name) is basically just that and is really THE bridge between the genres. If you then go on to some of the earliest DM albums like Death's Scream Bloody Gore, Pestilence's Consuming Impulse, Morbid Angel's Altars of Madness, and Obituary's Slowly We Rot (all from '89) you can really hear how death metal became more brutal and grinding. After that it quickly started getting fused with other metal genres including prog metal and melodic/classic metal. So there weren't very many years where "pure death metal" was a genre before the various fusions kicked in.
I'd say that last bit true of any genre, in the end it depends on how far back you want to draw the line, since there's always someone else before that (and this is an endless debate amongst many genres, for sure). Also, artists don't want to keep making the same song over and over again, and at what point do we draw the line on what has too much outside influences (that's then the other debate about genres I guess).
Additionally, genre names tend to be groupings of multiple different sounds, because otherwise people should just use the band name. It's like discussing whether salmon or cod are truer fish.
we are once again getting close to what traditional death metal is. I hope next recommendations are from the early days of death metal because bolt thrower while still being death metal, kinda have their own way of writing semi melodic semi groovy mid paced riffs with no blast beats (except the first 2 albums and a couple songs from war master). The music sometimes gets slow, usually mid tempo, the vocals are monotone and the riffs are usually easy to digest compared to what death metal is. Certainly a good way to introduce someone to death metal, but for a channel that has reacted to a full nile album and bands like demilich/aeon/necrophagist to name a few, we can go a step further in terms of heaviness.
Suffocation- "Pierced From Within" might be a more true version of Death Metal you'd find palatable.
I literally came here to literally say the same thing! I literally wrote a thesis in my jazz class about Pierced from Within…. This is definitely the album that best expresses a tech Death game changer
BT are the absolute kings of guitar riffs..
Cool to see that so far 3 out 3 bands (at least, and 1/3 for songs suggested) were picked (I guess by a majority of people suggesting it) by you for a critical reaction...I love Bolt Thrower because I believe they are unique in providing relatively simple Music for sure, but super groovy & very often catchy Metal...I don't consider it standard on my side because of their very efficient sense of groove..(...). For me, it is Death Metal (honestly I'll struggle to explain what is D.M. in English without spending too much time & quote sogns section examples to listen to...), but anchors itself more into a mix of Thrash Metal & post & quite softened Grindcore which was their original style...so a kind of mid-tempo (most of the time) MeloDeath. This is no brainer Metal that one could overlook, I know, but it is very efficient on the little it does. The band did split in 2016 & some of the members still play in other bands, such as Memoriam. Curious now to see which next band/song you'll be picking...PS: Forgot to mention that maybe this long fade out makes more sense if I tell you that this is the last song of the album ?
super killer melodic death metal band from Japan called Intestine Baalism would be a great vid for death metal week
Damn good band. 👍
Got them coming up tomorrow!
Signs that you're listening to death metal include typically low or mid growled vocals, lots of tremolo picking, and double kick. It will almost always be in a minor key or composed largely of chromatic riffing, and typically feature lower tones than a genre like black metal. Songs tend not to have the galloping rythymns found in traditional heavy metal and often in thrash.
I feel like you're pretty close to 'getting' what makes something death metal. The complexity just comes in the variety of sub/splinter/hybrid genres rooted in death metal. I imagine it's definitely hard to see similarity between 'Brutal Slamming Death Metal' bands like Visceral Disgorge and a melodeath band like At the Gates.
Violence is what makes it death metal for me, hence the name
I would love to see some reactions to funeral doom like Thergothon or Evoken or Esoteric!
I could never explain with words what's the difference between genres of heavy metal. But when I hear it, I immediately know, what one is and of course, what I like to hear.
This album is masterpiece 🤘
Death metal started in the mid/late 80s. It was kind of a natural evolution from thrash metal, just down tuning guitars and trying to be more aggressive, brutal and pummeling. Some real knuckle dragging stuff early on especially. Someone from the band Warbringer explained to difference with black and death metal by saying "Black metal speaks to the forlorn and lonely part of his soul but death metal is just a giant gorilla destroying a room." I'm probably paraphrasing but I think I'm pretty close.
If thrash metal took punk's aggression and added that to heavy metal, death metal took that sound added perhaps some hardcore punk and pushed the sound further but kinda in a same direction. Early death metal albums kinda sounded like thrash metal with just guttural harsh vocals, lower tuned guitars and dirty, raw production. Some classics are Scream Bloody Gore by Death, Altars of Madness by Morbid Angel and Severed Survival by Autopsy. Just to recommend some of the really early stuff. Death is arguably the first one, Autopsy has some bouncy fun with a prominent base sound and Morbid Angel had aged very well out of these early albums.
In the early 90s we got some prog/tech death and that decade was a time of great experimentation. Melo death kinda became a thing around -94-ish with albums like Heartwork by Carcass and actually bands like Bolt Thrower among others.
Looking at death metal at around 2000s kinda gives more palatable examples of the genre but also a more polished sound. Perhaps "polished" is kinda wrong. Let's just say some of the kinks have been ironed out. Some of the late 80s stuff might give a better view of where this music comes from and how it has evolved. Thanks for reading my rambles once again. Cheers and take care buddy.
This is a great summary/analysis!
Excellent summary, but Possessed's Seven Churches is usually considered the first death metal album and one of their tracks was where the genre got its name from.
@@jonathanhenderson9422 True. For me that album still sounds pretty primitive. Like proto-death metal. Also after Scream Bloody Gore there was a bigger explosion of bands/albums so that to me feels like more of a starting point for a bigger movement. But you are absolutely correct that the starting point or the ingredients were there with Possessed.
I feel kinda vindicated with my 'classic death metal = dark, dissonant thrash with growls' coments all the way back on day one of this week since I knew it would end up like this: Death Metal is a legitimately broad genre but most people use 'Death Metal' as a short hand for either Brutal Death Metal or Technical Death Metal and it's because there's so much diversity in just the label of "Death Metal" is not very useful, to the point that it feels like 'Just plain Metal' as you said: Even Arch Enemy has growls yet is one of the more by-the-numbers modern bands anyone thinks of when we say 'metal' today and 'Melodic Death Metal' if you get a bit more picky about it but even that label was far more useful more than 20 years ago when Arch Enemy and other meldic death metal were not as widespread to the point it like just standard metal today.
should give a listen to something from their first two albums, they came from the late 80's british grind scene (napalm death, carcass, those kinds of bands) and while they've always leaned towards death metal their first two (mainly first) albums had lots of grind elements mixed in
Bolt Thrower got a similar style to early Amon Amarth records. Not sure what it is, maybe the constant chugging and cool riffs? It's not that unique or mind blowing but it's such a classic sound at this point so it's hard to get disappointed by it.
13:44 Ben Stein Metal
That's the dude's name!
should do embers by bolt thrower it goes ham
Bolt Thrower... The AC/DC of Death Metal. Formulaic, but if it wasn't broke they didn't fix it.
Great band, great album, but not the best song from the album IMO, but near top. haha But, everyone disagree about what is their best work etc. 😅 A great one quite a few has reacted to in the past has been Anti-Tank, from the same album, which has a rather nice music video on youtube too.
One thing this album really nails is the more almost modern warfare of second world war feel, it's just not world war 1 anymore that they've done before, and definitely not something like the crusades (which they've also done) etc.
Also, early Bolt Thrower is grindcore, and not death. This album is their last, and will remain so, even if most members still make music, because one member is dead, so this one is not really Grindcore. Grindcore is essentially British, the step after NWOBHM (lol, long acronym, but it means new wave of British heavy metal. Think Iron Maiden, Motörhead, Venom etc) and inspired by early death metal in USA. o.o''
Meat and potatoes
Good choices so far. But, a death metal week without Pestilence (Land of Tears) or Gorefest (anything from Erase would do)... Also, Obituary (anything from The End Complete)
There must be about a billion good death metal bands, could say it's a death metal week without them. I wouldn't like to have to only pick 4!
The riffs are quite good and the music in general too. The singing is crap though. Compared to todays screamers those old school vocalist are Little League. Spoils it for me really...
The growls of today mostly sound the same, the old school has more grit and variety among different vocalists. Also you're a gaylord.
They can make music for the next Doom game. Other than that it sounds generic video game music that something Nine Inch Nails will produce for a video game as a standalone act. It will it increase its value if its in some bad ass games.