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This is a letter I wrote to a very good friend. The french bands have now done what I was hoping TesseracT would do back in 2007. Continue the work alongside with Meshuggah. TesseracT play polyrythmic like Meshuggah and they were earlier than Meshuggah with extremely polished metallic sound so I wrote to them suggesting that they even inspired Meshuggah, who made the record of the year of 2008. They laughed back and revealed some of the secrets with their extreme sound that they had - and told me that they did not influence Meshuggah. Well - whether they did it or not* - the thing is that they COULD have done the next step in the Meshuggah carreer there. It might sound strange for an outsider but for me this song changed it all. It's written and recorded solely by the guy in green t-shirt, as far as I know in his bedroom, before he formed the band around himself. For me it took music from "wooow" to "holy shit", I could not stop listening to it. It was autumn 2006, I had just written the first riffs for "Blood" and later, when having recorded the Blood guitar+growl demo, I put it on repeat. So, this song explains why I've uploaded my tracks on repeating players.
So - they did not continue just that math-metal. Instead comes the french along. They do not play polyrythmic - it's like one rhythm is ok if it's just good enough - and it is! Hence they take it on at an even earlier point - they take it on where jazz/tech/death metal ended, jazz-deathmetal was what Chuck Schuldiner played along with the other superior musicians of the 1991 lineup of Death. And it is what I intend to start making in time as it is the most advanced form of brutality there is. Well the french has a scene now that is absolutely unprecedented. They have no death metal city so Stockholm still goes under the flag "Death metal capitol of the world". Most of the french metal bands are touring their own country only so far - but they are definitely going to spread the coming few years which is good for the rest of the world but bad for the french fans. Most important maybe - unlike the very large wave of american modern-metal bands those french are GOOD - LOTS of them are good enough for me. In contrast I've turned down hundreds of requests from american nu/metalcore bands. Of course it's intriguing me. Last time I was in touch with a music scene blooming I was not making music myself - I was too young and had not started - now that I do it is of course exciting to know that there are plenty of people that would suit "my band". As in - not having a band... Also interesting is that they are absolutely rock-hard, no joking people. Not one of those french bands has requested me. Unlike the american scene where the bands see Myspace (the whole western world and more) as their market. I think there are around 30 good french metal bands now - and I'm pretty sure this never happened before anywhere in the world - not in any genre at all. They are the cradle of modern man (cro-magnon) and they claim it with grace.
France not only has a metal scene now - they have the metal scene. Back in the days there was (almost) a scene like that in Sweden. Before Entombed became big they toured Sweden (along with a lot of other bands) and gigged on little clubs and there were many death metal gigs (also big ones) with foreign bands organised. The death metal scene worldwide has now taken form pretty much. It's the american concept of a death metal militia/society as in NYDM - New York Death Metal - that has now spread over the world. The french death/modern metal scene has coherence. GREAT artwork. Good production - and most important = good riffs and a pounding seriousness. Example. Clothes, design - it's all death metal.
They even use black/white Youtube logo etc. Interesting that most of the bands doesn't have any chicks (or not so many) on their pages. It's pure serious fucking violence. Like one of the bands states themselfes:
 Underground music movement with bands touring together without making a big thing of it. What they are singing about is evolution - a kind of deep DEEP pain that is supposed to be in us all - and I agree about it. One of the bands (sounding like Rammstein, not your teacup I guess) even have a song called Evolution up on their page. But hardest of what I've seen so far is Hacride. That is - not counting Whourkr because they are another league (of computer processed music - kind of a no-no in the rest of the death metal world). Hacride has a concept that copies the one and only record that is the death metal masterpiece:
In a way Hacride is even worse. Death (Chuck) told us that death sucks, that diseases and genes suck, that we all suck, that society sucks. Take into account that - out of the 3 musicians that really inspired me - 2 have died young from physical failure - that is Quorthon and Chuck. Hacride goes deeper, takes it further along with the whole new cro-magnon breed:
 The last one is Lazarus, and that one is different, it's about psychological pain. That there is deep psychological pain within. You know what I mean. It's an antithesis upon western society's first outspoken reaction upon long-time ignored eastern wisdom. Modern french metal is the antithesis upon new-age. New age spiritualism incorporates alot of eastern wisdom, embraces it and says: it's correct. But they added something: (We lived before and) "It's wonderful". Like a former friend of mine said "Everything is healing". They tend to misuse words so much that it becomes better to shut up. New wave of french death metal added something themselfes: (We lived before and) "it SUCKS". Now I simply assume they really MEAN that we're actively taking part in evolution. The new Hacride album is about coming back to life after a near-death experience - the Lazarus phenomenon. Their statement "I think it can relate to everyone cause we all had this feeling at least once in a lifetime." - I think it might suggest that we all bear stuff like that inside us. Not an airtight conclusion maybe. My own idea is that we're all psychologically/evolutionary/karma-wise fragmented. This might be why so many people get afraid of the current worldwide wake-up - because they know there's a chance of breaking up for the one's who aren't stable enough for the new era. For we are all composed of many different bits. Tracking our genes and psyche back to the origin they do what the americans can not.
I wrote a little poem as a reaction on listening to Hacride.
Or - like they state on the Whourkr Myspace - Worse Than Death Metal. This looks like a job for me. The name is not as one might think a play on the word worker (they say..) but instead something of a primal scream spelled out. One of their albums is titled Naät which is a play on the word nature - they go even further back. One of their songs is called Plantea which of course is the same kind of alliteration.
 Hardest ever - so far - ain't the french though. It's the swedes in this hardcore smasher Cursed by the Thought. Psychological pain - right?
Chaan, 2009
*Note - As of autumn 2009 - this can be read on Tesseract's Myspace: |
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