Heavy Song of the Week: Obituary Ring in the New Year with Old-School Death Metal Riffage on “My Will to Live”
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The post Heavy Song of the Week: Obituary Ring in the New Year with Old-School Death Metal Riffage on “My Will to Live” appeared first on Consequence.
Heavy Song of the Week is a new feature on Heavy Consequence breaking down the top metal and hard rock tracks you need to hear every Friday. This week the honor goes to death metal veterans Obituary’s “My Will to Live.”
Ah yes, a new year. In the realm of music criticism, it means a clean slate. All those lists and rankings of the top albums and songs reset to zero, and we must discover anew. A perfect time to launch our “Heavy Song of the Week” feature.
The music industry generally shuts down around the holidays, so this first week of January was slim pickings. That said, those who were bold enough to take advantage of the slow week and drop new music garnered the spotlight. Obituary relished in it, serving up a tasty slab of old-school death metal with “My Will to Live” — the latest single from their forthcoming album Dying of Everything.
One of the great aspects of heavy metal is how it tends to evolve year in and year out, as sub-genres shapeshift and combine with one another. That’s why metal remains a timeless and international language, informed by the past but not beholden to it — a delicate balance of nostalgia and progress.
Here, the nostalgia factor is high, as Obituary remind us that sometimes, sick riffs and divebomb solos are all you need. No weird time signatures or experimentations (Mithridatum more than fill that requirement in our honorable mention tracks below). Let it be known, the old-school death metal template — which Obituary helped forge — never expired. It’s the meat and potatoes to prog and tech-death’s leafy greens. A little of both leads to a balanced diet. Frontman John Tardy even has a Tom G. Warrior-like snarl to his delivery on “My Will to Live,” and that’s always gonna win over our hearts.
— Jon Hadusek,
Senior Staff Writer
Honorable Mentions:
Iggy Pop – “All the Way Down”
The Godfather of Punk is back with a new album, Every Loser, and joining Iggy Pop for the ride is an all-star cast of backing musicians including Duff McKagan, Travis Barker, Dave Navarro, Chad Smith, and the late Taylor Hawkins, among others. Like Ozzy Osbourne’s recent albums, the LP was helmed by Consequence‘s 2022 Producer of the Year, Andrew Watt. On the song “All the Way Down,” Iggy conjures up a little raw power, offering up a track that brings to mind his work with The Stooges and his classic solo material.
Katatonia – “Birds”
“Birds” could almost be classified as a straight-up alt-rock song if not for the surging leads and guitar textures that gradually take over as it progresses. Katatonia have long since forgone the extreme metal of their early years, deftly moving in a more melodic and accessible direction. It can be hard to separate an artist from their most admired work, even as they themselves seek new creative endeavors. However, that is the fallacy of the audience. Katatonia again prove that they can do melodic metal as well as they did the more extreme stuff. A graceful maturation.
Mithridatum – “Mournful Glow”
One of the first great technical death metal offerings of 2023 comes from Mithridatum — the new project of former The Faceless members Geoff Ficco (vocals) and Lyle Cooper (drums), and Cooper’s former Abhorrent bandmate Marlon Friday (guitar). “Mournful Glow” veers more toward Cooper and Friday’s work together in Abhorrent, with its dreamy spaced-out prog and death-doom leanings. That shortlived Texas band only recorded one album back in 2015, so the advent of Mithridatum comes as a welcome surprise nearly a decade later.
Heavy Song of the Week: Obituary Ring in the New Year with Old-School Death Metal Riffage on “My Will to Live”
Jon Hadusek
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