New to blast beats, chugs, and gutturals? These new lessons are for you. Today we’re updating the amazing Obsidian seminar with four new lessons designed to make these extreme styles even more approachable.
In the new lessons, extreme metal professor John Taylor breaks down the signature sonic elements of each style. Each bite-sized overview includes numerous stylistic examples delivered with John’s trademark dash of avuncular humor, and of course, his incredible playing.
As an example, check out John’s introduction to what is perhaps the weirdest subgenre in heavy music – black metal:
The Obsidian seminar is over 20 meticulously sequenced lessons to build both your mechanical technique and your musical awarnes. Check it out right here on the Cracking The Code platform.
These are cool! I like that Jon sticks mainly to the basic characteristics of each without going too far down the sub-sub-sub genre wormhole. Death Metal is especially guilty of multiple sub-genres, some of which, like Death n Roll and Melodic Death Metal, the riffing can really deviate from the traditional “vanilla set” of Death Metal riffing styles. Also different geographical “scenes” have very distinct differences in sound (Floridian Death Metal, UK Death Metal, and Swedish Death Metal, for example, all have their own “flavor” of death metal riffing).
For sure. This is probably heretical but in the “In Flames” examples we used in the initial intro video, I had trouble hearing how melodic death was even death at all. It’s got emo choruses. I was editing that and thinking, isn’t this just what mainstream metal sounds like now??
So yes, so many genres!
Trust me, if we wanted cash, I don’t think Black Metal is going to deliver it to us by the truckload! I’m actually kind of amazed there’s enough money in it to keep some of these bands going after all these years. There are huge deathy bands like Gojira, but most seem to be almost mom-and-pop level, playing for the super insiders.
You are right that we’re doing this because it’s a style where the mechanics really are specialized in a way that is perfect for what we study. But I also just think it’s a creative niche populated by dedicated people that keep doing their own thing regardless of what’s considered cool. That alone is worth supporting.
In the “bedroom shredding” scenes we dramatized for the original series, I made sure to include closeups of the HM2 and the Peavey Backstage 30 practice amp, since that’s all I had for years. I understood that pros probably used other gear to get their luscious EVH-like overdrive, but had no idea what it was. All I had was my bees-in-a-can pedal into a clean amp - and not a good clean amp. To find out later that this pedal was responsible for any kind of classic tone is just totally hilarious.
There’s also a huge boutique market for HM2 clones now, some with all sorts of extra EQ and blend controls. I have and have used a few of them, but I tend to eventually keep going back to the BOSS og (I’ve got the waza craft one currently).
I honestly think it’s great that this legendary death metal tone was the result of a teenage kid in Sweden going “look how over the top this thing sounds when I set all the knobs on 10.”