[hardbass]

We could trade examples all day of course, here are some of mine:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j8C3Tez3iAY

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BOa5p0FVhko

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XphUURIAx5g

and for my "cheat" example: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7pAD870Lx-o

I suppose its my bias speaking but at the end of the day there has to be something that distinguishes thrash metal from speed metal or heavy metal of course. Its in our "guts" so to speak but it needs teasing out exactly what the difference is. In the branch of thrash or partition perhaps that I gave the distinction is clear: hardcore of some sort or scene as the influence. For German thrash, I can see clearly there is a difference, as Sodom and Kreator in their early era feels like black/death metal structurally so it isn't just sped up Motorhead. While a lot of Metallica sounds like thrash, there is an element of rock music to Metallica's sound. Your example with that Sodom song is a good one. In my view a band that considered itself thrash when doing the "odd one out" song for an album, would never write something like For whom the bell tolls, they'd do a Discharge cover instead or a east coast hc style short song. Perhaps its my finding rock music grating that biases me to leaning toward some of Metallica's work not being thrash. For German, we can see it by asking what is the difference between Rage or Angel Dust and Kreator/Destruction (here of course even Rage and Angel Dust are already absent of any rock feeling even though they are supposed to be the older so called "speed metal" style). In both my examples and much of German thrash I think for me, if I look back and see, I think its that whatever path they took the rock aspects have completely gone from them by that time.

[YeGoblynQueenne]

Yeah, you catch me out here, I think I know Violence and I obviously know Anthrax but the rest I'll have to listen to a bit to see what you mean.

But I do see what you mean in many places, e.g. the structural similarity of Sodom and Kreator with early Black. Including Bathory again! It isn't just sped up Motorhead, and the Sodom track is indeed a bit out of the ordinary, but they're still a big influence I think.

I don't know if I agree Metallica have a rock element. Hmm. Can you point to a track more specifically where you hear that? I can't think of any. Unless it's in the Black Album or later?

>> I suppose its my bias speaking but at the end of the day there has to be something that distinguishes thrash metal from speed metal or heavy metal of course. Its in our "guts" so to speak but it needs teasing out exactly what the difference is.

Well, yes, and then, maybe it's a bit of an affectation. It's only something you do once you've listened to a bit more metal than the ordinary person (which is not much: AC/DC, Metallica, maybe Slayer, end of). I of course had endless debates with my friends as a teenager and I may or may not have written angry letters to the editors of the only Greek language Metal magazine when I was growing up (and I think the only one still?) to protest the clandestine placing of a band in the absolutely wrong category in this or that article of theirs.

Maybe kids these days will get over that sort of thing. Maybe not. It's all good.

>> and for my "cheat" example: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7pAD870Lx-o

Yeah without even listening to that I can tell it's cheating XD

[hardbass]

I meant for whom the bell tolls itself as an example, while it uses thrash metal chugs, something about how its laid out feels a bit off like its trying to be written like a rock song.

One thing I just realized is that compared to early thrash metal, some speed metal bands had already gotten far more militant, stripped down and free of any remaining rock feelings. Think of Exciter, Rage, early Helloween or Agent Steel.

Again speaking to my bias of course but for me thrash starts getting truly exciting when it started growing toward death metal, its the most "fun" form of metal to me in a way nothing else gets, its in some ways the most spiritually "hardcore punk" like form of metal in the sense of instead of just including this or that hardcore guitar phrase or drum beat in a song, their approach of writing and playing was very pure, heart worn on sleeves and egging each other on fun. The complexity level was increasing rapidly but I feel due to this hardcore sensibility it doesn't just start sounding like prog rock as this hardcore like minimalist thinking keeps the melodies elegant and flowing, its probably one of more legato leaning genres of metal.

But yes, genres are not mathematical structures, trying to find a really hard scientific dividing line would keep leading to moving in circles forever. I have my preferences of course, death thrash and OSDM mainly.

[YeGoblynQueenne]

>> I meant for whom the bell tolls itself as an example, while it uses thrash metal chugs, something about how its laid out feels a bit off like its trying to be written like a rock song.

Hm. OK, maybe. I haven't ever thought of it that way tbh. It does kind of Deep Purple though, in its general rythm so maybe.

I think I agree with your point about Thrash moving away from Rock, very much, despite my feeling that Motorhead was a major influence. I don't know if there's a contradiction there. On the other hand, one of my favourite bands is Entombed (though I can't say I like everything they ever recorded) and I like them exactly because they have this kind of boogie groove in their death-thrash. Then again I think that is one reason some people just don't like them.

I'd say some Thrash bands definitely veered too close to prog. Annihilator? Over Kill? Megadeath... Some Death bands too. I remember reading reviews about this or that Death record and the journo would write about the sudden changes of tempo and the complex riffs and so on and I'd always be like, I don't care about that. I like my Metal simple tbh. Give me one riff that will blow me away and I don't care how technically accomplished you are.

Now, I remember a friend of mine who distinguished Metal from non-Metal based on whether a song had a guitar solo, or not. If it did, it was Metal. If not, it was something else, probably that sus hardcore stuff that our common friends liked. I guess that goes to your point about the similarities and therefore at least cross-pollination, if not outright influence, between thrash and hardcore.

>> But yes, genres are not mathematical structures, trying to find a really hard scientific dividing line would keep leading to moving in circles forever. I have my preferences of course, death thrash and OSDM mainly.

Yeah, mostly classic Metal, Doom, Black, Thrash, and a bit of NWOTHM here. OSDM is cool too, I need to dig more into it.

Death, I'm kind of 50/50. I like some Death bands a lot, like I played the first two Death albums to er death. It's a bit hit and miss for me though. I like Grind bands more consistently, Cannibal Corpse and Last Days of Humanity.

When I was a kid, adults told me Metal was a passing fad, it would go away in a few years, and I'd grow out of it.

Any moment now...!

[hardbass]

>Now, I remember a friend of mine who distinguished Metal from non-Metal based on whether a song had a guitar solo, or not. If it did, it was Metal. If not, it was something else, probably that sus hardcore stuff that our common friends liked. I guess that goes to your point about the similarities and therefore at least cross-pollination, if not outright influence, between thrash and hardcore.

Have you ever asked what he thinks of black metal?

[YeGoblynQueenne]

Yeah, it wasn't his cup of tea. He listened to some of the bands we did with us but at home I don't reckon he had any Black albums.

[hardbass]

I would like to clarify if you meant Entombed as in the Left Hand Path era or Entombed as in Wolverine Blues. I believe boogie has a very specific meaning and the LHP era pages crustpunk and hardcore rhythms which to me is precisely one of the main antiboogie elements that metal learned from hardcore. Its a continuous flowing "square" beat that enables the guitar to center stage rather than a swinging beat that needs the drum to make room for guitars like in a lot of rock.

By prog I meant just classic prog. Complexity in metal is a bit orthogonal to being prog, I think simply "normal" death metal like Morbid Angel is far more "prog" that prog due to death metal's own native sensibilities which in part as I said tie in to the hardcore lineage. I haven't yet given it proper thought, but it's my theory that the hardcore beat and the different way punk/hardcore uses power chords from general rock music is what enabled thrash and ultimately death metal. I love Sadus and Atheist, and you will see people call them "technical" death metal not "prog" death metal, it may hint that subconsciously or consciously people are aware that death metal achieves "prog" goals without actually necessarily using classic prog techniques.

From what prog I have heard, I think its amazing, and an admirable development for the time. It's a big part of why metal is metal, early metal sensibility in my view is very strongly derived from prog. The prog bands were already using less "swingy" beats and more guitar centric writing. It's just that hardcore had to finally put the final piece of the puzzle that enabled these tendencies to achieve their full fruition. Direct prog had a tendency to sometimes wander too much. Hardcore firstly checked this by being hyper minimalist, and secondly that undeveloped theory of mine regarding hardcore having innovated a very different way of playing guitar and the drumming technique letting guitars room to breathe achieving a much more naturalistic and flowing method of creating hallways of riffs.

>When I was a kid, adults told me Metal was a passing fad, it would go away in a few years, and I'd grow out of it.

Partly imo this again ties in to the influence of hardcore culture on metal. Punk groups I think were doing xeroxed art and fliers and garage recorded and dubbed tapes quite early. A punk musician named Paul Halmshaw was irritated at the lack of infra for punk and hardcore music due to mainstream infra not deeming it worth it, so he fielded his own infra. Most people know of Peaceville as a famous metal record label today.

edit: >Cannibal Corpse

I am not aware they had any grindcore/deathgrind albums. I haven't listened to their entire discography so I could be wrong.

[hardbass]

Oh and yes I'd say Entombed and a lot of that branch of swedish death metal comes mostly from crust and hardcore rather than thrash. For thrashy swedish death, you could try this for example https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dNTJ7n5LeCI

[YeGoblynQueenne]

Cheers! I'll have a listen.

[YeGoblynQueenne]

>> I would like to clarify if you meant Entombed as in the Left Hand Path era or Entombed as in Wolverine Blues. I believe boogie has a very specific meaning and the LHP era pages crustpunk and hardcore rhythms which to me is precisely one of the main antiboogie elements that metal learned from hardcore. Its a continuous flowing "square" beat that enables the guitar to center stage rather than a swinging beat that needs the drum to make room for guitars like in a lot of rock.

Wolverine Blues and even more To Ride, Shoot Straight and Speak The Truth. They've gone back a bit since then I find.

>> By prog I meant just classic prog.

Oh, right. I actually haven't heard a lot of the. Blue Öyster Cult and Rush etc? I of course acknowledge the immense influence of those bands on Metal, but that's the part of Metal I don't like that much. I think the influence was the focus on guitar technique and general musical quality which is something that's not really there in crusty punk and hardcore bands, I guess it's even anathema to some. You could even argue that a lot of Metal bands play the same music as hardcore bands but take the craft of music-making more seriously. This of course goes against my argument that thrash/death/black aren't descendants of hardcore/punk.

>> I am not aware they had any grindcore/deathgrind albums. I haven't listened to their entire discography so I could be wrong.

Oh, I see. Wikipedia calls them straight Death Metal. For me and my friends they were always either splatter/gore or grind. Different definitions I guess.

[hardbass]

What I was saying is that it's both. Before thrash, and especially for early nwobhm there is a lot of prog to it. Prog was actually trying to remove the rock/blues earlier than nwobhm, and even if such and such nwobhm band said they hated prog, their structure is much more like prog than hard rock. No swing, square beats, linear and through composed songwriting, etc.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LHHHePJtK40

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KpL5htneI-c

NWOBHM tried to streamline it of course and they succeeded to an extent but as I theorized before, it took hardcore to actually invent the tools to finally achieve that goal completely and result in chromatic labyrinths. Ie its not hardcore alone, nor prog alone, both had to be part of metal's dna to result in death metal in my view personally.