Comments on: Impending Doom – There will be Violence

By: Jordan Itkowitz

Jordan Itkowitz — Mon, 13 Sep 2010 16:08:53 +0000

Orphaned Land and Eternal Gray are from Israel but to my knowledge they are not “Jewish” bands. Keep in mind that there’s a large portion of Israelis that are pretty secular.

By: vugelnox

vugelnox — Mon, 13 Sep 2010 13:49:28 +0000

I dislike christian metal but the primary reason I don’t listen to it is because it rarely is any good. I still rather enjoy A Hill to Die Upon and they espouse christian lyrics but they also churn out some pretty fine tunes. Same with some of the older Believer and Extol material. Yet those three are exceptions to the norm.

By: xbenx

xbenx — Mon, 13 Sep 2010 07:34:16 +0000

Wow, I’m overwhemled and pleased with all the feedback here, thank you all! I can fully understand the backlash against this band, given their hardline stance and “god is coming for us,” lyrics and the music of course, however, I agree with gabaghoul and mike, that there are good, even great Christian bands out there. Extol’s early releases for one were phenomenal, some of the best technical black/death metal of the late 90s, shame they lost their way though when they jumped to Century Media. Two other (incredible in my opinion) Christian bands were Embodyment (early) and Strongarm (all).
Regarding Cacophonic’s point about heathen bands making bad music, it is bang on, how many god awful bedroom black metal and brOOtal one man death metal bands pollute this earth? And what about all the Nu metal crawling back out of the woodwork. I can see that some would equate Impending Doom to being no less evil than Limp Bizkit, and would even consider them the same in terms of their musical abilities and ideological approach, I would disagree but I’d like to know what everyone else thinks.
PS: Desperado, very good argument, it was something I was trying to address but would have ended up writing another 1,000 words if I had done so. I doubt that many people listening to this now will be listening to it in 30 years, but then again, who truly knows…

By: Desperado

Desperado — Mon, 13 Sep 2010 00:49:19 +0000

Eternal Gray(sp?), Orphaned Land and several more Jewish bands exist and kick ass.

By: Desperado

Desperado — Mon, 13 Sep 2010 00:47:21 +0000

I gave these guys a listen after each album drops on their myspace and recently checked out the latest music video. Musically I find these guys stagnated and trite. It seems most bands in the rough and tumble -core field is struggling to survive in my eyes, as opposed to actually broadening their musical horizons. Granted other bands suffer worse with this, constant genre shifts and borrowing labelled as “experimentation” and “progression” as opposed to developing a sound of their own and growing as a band.

I honestly think that’s why these genres suffer so many line-up problems, they churn out a timely release that everyone else has done before and better, then suddenly hit the wall dumbfounded as to what direction they should go next. I actually enjoy watching this diverging series of bands that travel down mixed paths. The kids are moving on to new things during the downtime, bands try to catch up with new trends to keep their market, have to make some tough decisions when it comes to what directions they need to go in order to expand their horizons etc.

My personal views as an atheist are largely irrelevant, but I will say that it does bother me, my life spent in an elitist private christian school and father’s work as a deacon and eventual pastor and missionary has led me to loathe and despise religion in general. Seeing these bands come along and attempt to bring me the message kind of makes it an automatic turnoff, Crimson Armada and Corpus Cristi being huge culprits. I know many guys who “church shred”, and they are all arrogant posers in every sense of the word. Its a business, and business is good.

Thankfully these bands are not true death nor metal so it is very easy to avoid such acts until encountered in some public domain. I apologize in advance for the long-winded soap-box opera, just felt like talking. I’m happy if people out there enjoy this, but I personally see this genre and most acts being culled as the more original acts find a stronger identity and sound. Just thinking about it, do you see these trend hoppers standing around listening to this ten, twenty or more years from now? I sure as hell don’t, only maybe collectively as a generational progression. I compliment hardcore though, that has remained true to itself and has stood the test of time.

By: Cacophonic

Cacophonic — Sun, 12 Sep 2010 23:54:34 +0000

I enjoy bands on both sides of this particular fence, and must disagree, JH DOOM.

I really don’t see how a christian band espousing their faith thru their music is any different from a satanic/pagan/jewish band doing the same.
(ARE there any jewish metal bands?!)

If it’s the musical skill (or lack thereof) you’re referring to, I’m certain there are as many poorly-skilled heathen bands as there are christian ones, if not more.

Just my 2 cents, of course.

By: JH DOOM

JH DOOM — Sun, 12 Sep 2010 14:25:43 +0000

Christians need to GTFO of metal or be fed to the lions.

By: gabaghoul

gabaghoul — Sun, 12 Sep 2010 14:17:17 +0000

yeah, Extol and Zao, both Christian metal too, both awesome. it helps that you can’t understand the lyrics though. I tried listening to Hands, which musically was cool, but the constant screaming of “Praise be his name” and other vocal self-flagellations really turned me off.

By: mike

mike — Sun, 12 Sep 2010 09:04:43 +0000

@tom957

Ever heard of Becoming the Archetype? Who gives a shit what the lyrical themes are. If it’s quality metal, it is fine by me.

By: Reignman35

Reignman35 — Sat, 11 Sep 2010 16:25:14 +0000

Yeah this was a definite step back from The Serpent Servant… the vocals got cleaner which I think ruins the heaviness of their music and is not a good evolution from their first 2 discs.

By: tom957

tom957 — Fri, 10 Sep 2010 23:47:33 +0000

Christianity is bad enough, but christian metal is an abomination. Fuck that noise.

By: faust666

faust666 — Fri, 10 Sep 2010 19:35:45 +0000

This record bored me so much that I haven’t even looked at it since the first spin.

By: Erik Thomas

Erik Thomas — Fri, 10 Sep 2010 18:48:52 +0000

I thought this was a bit of a step back from The Serpent Servant

By: Nick Taxidermy

Nick Taxidermy — Fri, 10 Sep 2010 17:34:26 +0000

I’ve never heard these guys, but I’m tired of the christian chokehold on metal. it was ours, assholes. go…find your own thing!

By: JH DOOM

JH DOOM — Fri, 10 Sep 2010 16:43:37 +0000

This stuff is the very definition of “false metal”. I don’t know how anyone can listen to these bands and not resist the urge to vomit uncontrollably.