
Differences between Heavy Metal, Thrash Metal, Black Metal, and Death Metal - curtis
https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/5n3sfx/eli5_the_differences_between_heavy_metal_thrash/dc8ogpa/
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obombration
> This one's a bit unique as it all began with a small group of teenagers in
> Jessheim in Norway in the late 80s/early 90s. They wanted to be 'evil' and
> 'extreme' but they lacked the musical ability to rival the predominantly (at
> the time) Swedish and American Death Metal scenes. So instead they did what
> anyone would do (not) they started burning down churches, proclaiming
> themselves 'Satanists' and killing each other.

That statement ignores a big part of the black metal aesthetic and does a huge
disservice to the many great musicians in the scene. The raw production values
were in response to the rising popularity and commercialization of death metal
around the late '80s and early '90s and the 'plastic' production that came
with it. Listen to Soulside Journey and then A Blaze in the Northern Sky and
try telling me it wasn't absolutely intentional. Then listen to anything
Emperor released and try telling me "they lacked the musical ability to rival
the predominantly (at the time) Swedish and American Death Metal scenes."

Euronymous spent tons of time perfecting the production of De Mysteriis Dom
Sathanas. Whether it sounds harsh to the average listener or not (it does), he
went out of his way to have 1) audible bass (check it out on headphones
sometime), 2) thunderously huge drums and 3) cacophonous guitars, true to his
playing style. These were all calculated, intentional decisions, meant to
drive the cold, bleak aesthetic.

~~~
careersuicide
I take _extreme_ exception to their characterization of the beginnings of
black metal. Not just because of the unfortunate dismissal of technical
ability. Rather, anything that doesn't start off by mentioning Venom and
Bathory and instead jumps to what is arguably the second wave totally outs
itself as not having actually listened to what the larger names in the genre
have themselves said. If you read interviews with the members of bands who
started in the late 80's and early 90's they all have the same influences in
common (with few exceptions): Kiss, Mercyful Fate, Venom, Bathory, and Celtic
Frost. Skipping ahead a decade kinda misses how the aesthetic was established.
Which as you mentioned was very much intentional.

~~~
ZenoArrow
Slightly off topic, but any recommendations on Mercyful Fate stuff? I don't
know much of their back catalogue, though I did play this at a Halloween party
once, I enjoyed it immensely, other people not so much!

[https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=ObAaVZwULH4](https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=ObAaVZwULH4)

~~~
careersuicide
Personally I'd recommend "Don't Break the Oath"[0] or "Melissa"[1]. But really
their whole LP discography can be listened to in an afternoon. King Diamond as
a solo artist has been a bit more prolific though.

0:
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xpk1wJ62CrQ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xpk1wJ62CrQ)

1:
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J_PjBUcbzqY](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J_PjBUcbzqY)

------
vmasto
Great overall but the omission of "Death" (the band) in death metal is a
mystery to me. Death was a great influence not just in death metal but metal
in general and defined the genre. They were impeccable musicians and brilliant
virtuosos. I think any song from Death's early albums is a much better example
of the music's "sound" than anything else.

~~~
ZenoArrow
I used to enjoy The Sound of Perseverance, haven't heard it properly in a
while, what was that instrumental track on that album with the harmonised
guitars?

~~~
rl1987
"Voice of the Soul"

~~~
ZenoArrow
Yes, that's the one I was thinking of.

Forgot it had a decent cover of Painkiller too:

[https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=quPliK3eAy4](https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=quPliK3eAy4)

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ivl
I find metal is one of the more interestingly diverging genres. The range of
sound that falls under 'metal' is shocking. You can go from slow, with clean
vocals and a (fairly) relaxing sound, to something earshattering.

Also, you can very often tell that the musicians are putting all they can into
it. The music is very emotional in a lot of the subgenres, particularly black
metal, and post-metal.

------
slantyyz
I was sold with the opening sentence "I wrote my dissertation on this very
topic..."

I don't read dissertations and I'm not even a huge metal fan, but the idea of
a dissertation on metal subgenres just sounds interesting to me.

~~~
obombration
"Black Metal: Evolution of the Cult" is a great introductory book on early
black metal scenes around the world. Most black metal works focus on the
Norwegian scene (Mayhem/Burzum/Darkthrone primarily), but Evolution of the
Cult has chapters on Rotting Christ from Greece, Sigh from Japan, the Les
Légions Noire bands from France and a whole host of others.

[https://www.amazon.com/Black-Metal-Evolution-Dayal-
Patterson...](https://www.amazon.com/Black-Metal-Evolution-Dayal-
Patterson/dp/1936239752)

~~~
jdc0589
had to double take that book title. I assumed they would have gone with "kvlt"
instead of "cult"

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morley
I consider myself a minor, amateur metalhead (to which I'm sure a real
metalhead would take umbrage), and I have to look up the definitions of black
and death metal every few months to remember the difference. It doesn't help
that their names are so similar, and that I don't particularly like either
genres.

Off-hand, there's also sludge, stoner, prog, doom, folk, nu, and power metal,
and several different slices of each genre.

~~~
mtdewcmu
It would have made sense to divide up Death Metal into subgenres. Doom
metal/stoner metal is the most interesting thing I've come across in recent
years.[1]

[1]
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_pcfW9pP8XQ&t=10m58s](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_pcfW9pP8XQ&t=10m58s)

~~~
RUG3Y
I wouldn't put doom and stoner under death metal, very different aesthetics.
That's just me though.

~~~
mtdewcmu
I agree. The definition of death metal is a real hodgepodge. It's sort of like
classifying animals as

    
    
      1. dog
      2. cat
      3. horse
      4. other

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jdc0589
The depth and breadth of all the sub-genres of metal is really pretty
shocking, even for people that have listened to it all their lives. I have a
slightly loose definition of metal, so in my mind I can go from Blackened
Thrash/Death from someone like Skeletonwitch (an all time personal favorite),
to whatever the hell 3 Inches of Blood is (all I know is it's awesome), to
viking themed Death Metal, to all acoustic stuff from Eluveitie, all the way
to a cello trio like Apocalyptica or maybe even Break of Reality (less so) and
still be "in the genre" so far as I'm concerned.

Its amazing.

------
throwaway26960
Djent - (Periphery - The Walk)
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kfPNEGy5L-w](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kfPNEGy5L-w)

Thrash - (Stone - Get Stoned)
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yWHlr3U_s8Q](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yWHlr3U_s8Q)

Melodic - (Children of Bodom - Towards Dead End)
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j7fbeGWZ5gw](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j7fbeGWZ5gw)
Also (Galaktikon - Dangertits) [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eVB8lM-
oCSk](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eVB8lM-oCSk)

Black - (Dimmu Borgir - Progenies of the Great Apokalypse)
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WuIxl0vip6Q](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WuIxl0vip6Q)

Heavy - (Smashing Pumpkins - Zero)
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NBkjcvNztKQ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NBkjcvNztKQ)

Progressive - (Between the Buried And Me - White Walls)
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FNdRh2un5eg](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FNdRh2un5eg)

Parody - (Austrian Death Machine - Get To The Choppah)
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tPIO86jTrQQ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tPIO86jTrQQ)

~~~
xtracto
Good list of examples. I like to point people to Every Noise at Once (
[http://everynoise.com/engenremap.html](http://everynoise.com/engenremap.html)
) to show the differences between the types of Metal.

BTW, it is really really nice to see a post related to this my favourite type
of music here in Hacker News. For people that do not understand Metal I can
recommend the documentary "Metal, A HeadBanger's journey" (
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metal:_A_Headbanger's_Journey](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metal:_A_Headbanger's_Journey)
) which tries to explain in a "anthropological" way, the background of metal.

------
saticmotion
For those who want a very in depth tour of all metal genres, with example
songs, check this website out:
[http://mapofmetal.com/#/home](http://mapofmetal.com/#/home)

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ZenoArrow
Metal is a fairly broad group of genres, I'd suggest there's something in it
for everyone.

Just for fun, I'd be interested in hearing some recommendations. I'll start
with one, this is The Space For This by Cynic, I'd guess you could call this
melodic tech death metal, but as Zappa said, talking about music is like
fishing about architecture, just see if you like it!

[http://youtu.be/gw-6IIBXNSQ](http://youtu.be/gw-6IIBXNSQ)

~~~
pgm8705
My typical music tastes lean mostly toward classic rock and indie. Never was a
huge metal guy. Then I stumbled on the doom metal band 'Pallbearer.' Their
album 'Foundations of Burden' blew my mind. Epically melodic, complex, and
moving all while fully living up to the 'doom' sound of the genre. Highly
recommended.

~~~
ZenoArrow
Just started listening, sounds great! Thanks for the recommendation.

[https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=N99KPZ2RsoM](https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=N99KPZ2RsoM)

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pavel_lishin
I wish there were some representative samples linked from this. Based on the
description, I don't think I'd be able to distinguish Black Metal from Death
Metal.

Also, metal is an incredibly varied genre. If you think you don't like metal,
I'd be happy to recommend a couple of different sample songs and see if any of
them catch your fancy and change your mind.

~~~
mtdewcmu
My interpretation: Death Metal sounds really hard; Black Metal sounds like
crap

~~~
mtdewcmu
It's not my opinion... the description of Black Metal made it sound like crap.

~~~
Floegipoky
Give it a chance, I'm not a fan of the "we're like srs evil" aesthetic but the
genre has produced a lot of high-quality art. A lot of bands sidestep Satanism
and focus on paganism's affinity with nature, letting the atmospheric quality
of the music lull the listener into a trance-like mindset of connection and
oneness. Here's Agalloch, perfect for a snowshoed stroll through the forest:
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3cXz69kk9YU](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3cXz69kk9YU)

------
glup
As with any other classification, start with Borges' Celestial Emporium of
Benevolent Knowledge.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Celestial_Emporium_of_Benevole...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Celestial_Emporium_of_Benevolent_Knowledge)

------
blubb-fish
Whaaaaaaat?

Nobody posted Harald Schmidt talking about Metal, yet?

[http://www.sat1.de/tv/die-harald-schmidt-show/video/heavy-
me...](http://www.sat1.de/tv/die-harald-schmidt-show/video/heavy-metal-clip)

It's a classic!

------
camus2
Thrash Metal is basically "L.A style" high pitched voice , Death metal is more
like "Tampa style" growly voice, Black Metal is more about the look than
anything else and Heavy Metal, well any rock band can play heavy.

------
squozzer
I won't call the author right or wrong on their categorizations, but metal -
and maybe all genres of music - break down in the following ways:

1) Subject matter, which for long-running bands tends to have a fad-like
flavor (e.g. AC/DC's Highway to Hell and Back In Black have more satanic
subject matter than DDDDC or Fly On The Wall.)

2) Presentation / aesthetics / "Dress code" \-- For instance, Van Halen vs.
Mötley Crüe. Both wore spandex; MC also wore obvious makeup, dyed / teased
hair, and sort of shambling / fishnet clothing, VH did not. Black Sabbath
tended a little more towards leather and black, while their equally-loud peers
Led Zeppelin looked a little more hippy.

3) Band composition / Musical direction -- For instance, it is nearly
impossible to call your band metal if it has a keyboard player (Sorry Styx and
Deep Purple.) How about guitars? Some bands - GnR and Aerosmith had dedicated
lead and rhythm guitarists, who harmonized a little; Other bands, such as
Priest and Iron Maiden, had more-or-less two lead guitarists who would split
leads and/or harmonize multiple times per song.

Just a forinstance, KISS would be metal based on 2, but not so much 1 (their
subject matter was mostly sex and drugs, very little death and hell.), and
their approach to 3 was pretty much Rick Derringer territory.

~~~
Floegipoky
Please stop perpetuating the myths that metal has to concentrate on "death and
hell" and that keyboards somehow aren't metal.

------
notahacker
But let's not forget all the other subgenres, as beautifully illustrated at
www.mapofmetal.com

~~~
67726e
There's also the Metal Evolution tree[0]

[0] - [https://s-media-cache-
ak0.pinimg.com/originals/18/3b/19/183b...](https://s-media-cache-
ak0.pinimg.com/originals/18/3b/19/183b19cafe1e9d15e0c500fa396e0747.jpg)

~~~
notahacker
that's very nice too, although I can't quite work out why someone's labelled
grunge as "goth metal"

~~~
67726e
Good catch, I never noticed that one.

