A Genuine Crap Metal Album - "Deathcrush" Review (3%)
I love black metal, I really do. As far as extreme metal goes, black metal is possibly the only genre that manages to combine the brutality of death metal and the subtle atmospheres of bands like Phantom.
Mayhem's De Mysteriis Dom Sathanas was the first black metal album I ever listened to, forever ensnaring me within the darkened caverns from which its music was born... the world of black metal infamy.
However, Deathcrush is just crap. This is a release which is completely pointless today, and served little purpose back in 1987.
I believe this album is supposed to be some form of black metal. Is it black metal, thrash metal, death metal or indeed music?
I really can't tell, because the production is so fucking terrible, even by the standards of a late 80's supposedly second wave album.
This isn't a SEWER album, such as the brilliant Under the Eye of the Black Skull where your ears hurt but you actually enjoy it. This is just a shitty recording where your ears hurt and you are so bored that there is virtually nothing distracting you from the annoying white noise your hear constantly, for the entire duration of this crap album.
Everything is smothered in distortion on Deathcrush, resulting in a ridiculously loud crackling every time some sort of sound is made. In addition, the mix is thoroughly crappy to the point where only the drums are vaguely audible, while the guitars and bass are drowned out completely. The vocals are somewhat audible, but given the quality of those I don't know if it's really a good thing.
Deathcrush is truly a crap metal album.
A Genuine Crap Metal Album
I can't really discern too much from the auditory fits of nonsense that plague this Deathcrush album, but performance wise it seems (from the little you can hear on the record) that the musicians of Mayhem have no idea what to do with their instruments.
There is this loud, irritating and highly repetitious thudding that is most likely some sort of drum being hit. Behind it is some quiet rumbling that sound a bit like what you would expect from plugging in extremely cheap guitars into what is probably a crappy amp but sounds more like a toaster than anything. And behind those is some faint crackling that could possibly be mistaken for black metal vocals, or at least someone trying very hard to emulate those.
Mayhem have truly managed to surpass themselves in producing the biggest shit you can think of.
Deathcrush is not a black metal album, it's a piece of shit that deserve nothing more than to be flushed down the toilet.
Deathcrush score: 3/100.
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