I think we can all agree that Frank Bello from Anthrax is a phenomenal bassplayer, and his ability to make himself present amidst Scott's crushing rhythm guitar and Charlie's drumming onslaught is worth applauding. Plus he can do all kinds of nifty techniques.

Yeah, had people IRL be dismissive of my favourite drummer being Bill Ward but man that sound on the early albums and live performances I've seen is unmatched in that style. There's a thousand stoner bands that wanna be like Sabbath, but forget there was more to them than just than the riffs, can't really think of many where the drummer actually stands out to any great degree.

Some years ago I used to think that Vinny Appice was just an average drummer, but damn... what a fool I was! This guy is as precise as a clock, or better yet, as a robot. I even like his style better than Ward's. No direspect though. Both are absolute monsters at the drums.

He sounds phenomenal on Live Evil.

Honestly as I'm getting more into Death Metal, I gotta say I'm not a huge fan of post Spiritual Healing Death. Human and every album afterwards just sounds weak as hell compared to anything else happening in DM at the time.

This. I made a point in a thread about drummers some time ago that no one was mentioning how crucial Ward was to Sabbath's sound. All of the original line up had a uniqueness to their styles - especially when playing together - that can't be replicated.

Geezer Butler and Bill Ward together = the ultimate rhythm section.

It’s non an unpopular opinion but the fucking Truth…

Yeah, I don't think that's an unpopular opinion at all. It's clear that the Butler-Ward duo are one of the things that made Sabbath unique from the beginning, and I think Bill Ward's jazz-influenced style of drumming is definitely something a lot of Sabbath worship bands don't necessarily pick up on.

John Tardy sounds like the Tasmanian Devil and I hate it.

You're not alone. I feel like on this website, it's 50-50 for those who only like Death's first three albums, and those who like all their albums.

What do you feel like is a better example of 90's death metal than Death's stuff?

Progressive death metal is usually pretty boring, but all Death albums are classics, even the softer ones.

Ronnie James Dio ... meh.

Dio in his solo career is pretty mid, except for one or two classic albums, but with Black Sabbath and Rainbow, he is a rock/metal legend.

Eh, both you and Lee misunderstood me. I wasn't saying that it was an unpopular opinion, I was merely adding my two cents to the Butler/Ward discussion that was going on.

Well, keeping about drummers topic... Appice in these albums with Dio is frankly superb. The line up of the first 3 albums is the best in Dio's career (the solo stuff, I mean)

Now, an unpopular opinion (I guess) I really like "Never Say Die" (the song, the album is pretty mediocre) of Black Sabbath. I think it works great as a very catchy and commercial Hard Rock song.

nice technique if you want to make friends….

Cradle Of Filth

Who in their right mind would diss Bill Ward? His drumming is an integral part of Sabbath's sound, he brought a groove to the band that 99.9% of stoner/doom bands would kill to have.

Dude have you listened to Human? That album is Death Metal to the core. It’s super fast throughout and full of some chunky OSDM riffs. I never understood people who liked the first three but not Human. It’s more technical but that’s it. Now Individual and later are a different thing, especially Symbolic onward.

I'm a pretty big fan of Never Say Die the album, but I just don't understand why the title track is pretty much always singled out as the only good song on the album. The album has so many better songs.

I like Human, but no means is it super fast. Come on!

It’s not Altars of Madness but it’s just as fast as the 1st three.

Actually, I think Dio has one of the strongest body of work as a solo artist, and I'm usually pretty resistant to praise a musician's solo work, even if they're from a band I like (e.g. Rush is my favorite band and I've still yet to listen to Geddy's and Alex's solo albums). I think Dio was able to nourish the influences he got from working with Rainbow and Sabbath into something uniquely him, whereas I feel like most solo acts just sound like lesser versions of the band that they originate from.

Speaking of which, I'll use this as an opportunity to express one of my hot takes, but as an example of a solo act I'm talking about, I find Bruce Dickinson's work outside of Iron Maiden to be disappointing overall. Accident of Birth is a decent album, but The Chemical Wedding is probably one of the most overrated albums I've ever heard. It was built up to me as this great album and an antidote to post-80's Iron Maiden from multiple sources since like 2009, but honestly, while I'm not the huggest fan of Maiden's 90's albums, I think The X Factor and Fear of the Dark are better. I just found The Chemical Wedding to be so vanilla and unmemorable that my main thought when it was over was "Thank God Bruce and Adrian returned to Iron Maiden because they need Steve Harris!"

Human is not any tamer, any slower then the previous three Death albums indeed. For some reason, Human still seems to have this aura, at least to some, of being less death metal. I don't know if it's because the lyrics aren't about eating dead babies, or because it's more prog/tech/jazzy or whatever, but some death metal purists are very boneheaded and conservative about what they think is good or even "real" death metal. And yeah, Human is just too "gay" and pretentious for some, or whatever. But I think it's nothing less then a masterpiece. I'm not saying that anyone in this current discussions said that. Just pointing out that I'm truly fascinated by this perceived big fracture in death metal, where bands like Atheist and Death supposedly destroyed the genre by making it too intellectual or something. These bands were clearly very death metal at their core still, around the time they released Unqestionable Presence and Human.

I have yet to listen to Bruce Dickinson solo work, Iam just not very interested in his solo stuff. Also, I don't really listen to post Fear of the Dark works of Iron Maiden, they have some cool song here and there but there is no comparison, the 80s stuff is so much better than their modern stuff.

Human is one of best achievement reached by death metal!!!!

Flattening of emotions,Suicide Machine,Lack of Comprehension,Secret Face all masterpieces…

How these songs aren’t fast?

All Death albums are awesome, they are one of the few bands that don't have a bad album. My favorite of them is the last one, The Sound of Perseverance.

I've never seen anyone call Human "Gay" or Unquestionable Presence a "genre destroyer", I'm not saying that no one ever has, but I've always found them to be quite celebrated and beloved albums. Now... I've seen those kinds of comments with Cynic.

Over time, I've lost a bit of interest in Spiritual Healing, which I find to be less ambitious then Human, but also less iconic and timeless the Leprosy. It's also weaker in the songwriting department compared to both.

The Sound of Perseverance I find to be a bit uneven. It has some bangers, but some much weaker and forgettable cuts. Scavenger of Human Sorrow, Spirit Crusher, Flesh and the Power It Holds, and To Forgive Is to Suffer are all bangers though! And I love the Painkiller cover!

Individual Thought Patterns is another album I find myself visiting less then the two albums it's sandwiched in-between. Human does that whole prog/tech/jazzy death metal thing so well, there is basically no album that can reach that level of quality songwriting and flawless execution. Symbolic is proggier even then ITP, and it was very much a transition album for Death, reducing the death metal elements and focusing more on prog instrumentation. It's far from being my favorite Death record, but it does have a ton of solid riffs and memorable moments, which makes me revisit it more then ITP. However, I know that ITP has amazing cuts, like Overactive Imagination and The Philosopher, so I still try to revisit it from time to time. Again, it's not a bad album by any means, just one I find a bit less interesting then it's predecessor and successor.



They are of course, very much celebrated, and they should be, but I've met some purist osdm fans who consider that any form of prog or jazz elements don't belong in death metal, and that having lyrics about space, spirituality, introspection, the cosmos and science-fiction, was "un-death" or something like that. Hell, I even remember a guy on some forum, years ago saying that the only good Death album was Scream Bloody Gore and that everything else was shit.

It's not the most popular opinion, but I've stumbled across this opinion enough to know that it's not just a few people either.

Regarding Death, I used to love Sounds of Perseverance but in recent years I've found myself listening to it less and less. The first 2 albums are classics all right, but for me the sweet spot is Spiritual Healing and Human, with ITP a couple of notches below. Symbolic, for whatever reason, never clicked with me no matter what.

I don’t agree that Symbolic is more proggier than ITP and isn’t a transitional album it’s the point of arrive of Chuck vision..

narrow, compact, catchy, indeed it seems Human more restrained..

Superb..

We are Enslaved noooooooowwww

For my life, I can't remember any single riff of that album outside of the title track. Maybe I need to hear the album again and again, but my first time was actually very boring, except the title track. "Technical Ecstasy" is a lot better.

Never say die and Technical Ecstasy aren’t bad album the only problem come after a bunch of full that have made the history of heavy metal…

It’s normal that they pale in comparison….

By transitional album, I meant that it showed that Chuck was moving away from death metal into more progressive metal, like we would find later on In The Sound of Perseverance, and on Control Denied's debut. Symbolic has some great moments for sure, but it's not an album I think about when making a list of the best death metal records, as opposed to SBG, Leprosy and Human.

Yeah but The Sound of Perseverance was supposed to come out not under the name Death but Control Denied, for me Symbolic is top three…
Transitional album is Spiritual Healing(a great one)Symbolic have all the elements that make part of Death’sHistory…


1)Leprosy
2Human
3)Symbolic

just to play but as I've said before I love all Chuck's albums…

My favorite bass player of the thrash scene I think. Not always being buried helps too.

I can understand not liking The Chemical Wedding but I’m not sure how it qualifies as vanilla. I don’t think I’ve ever come across any other album with that sort of style setup.

I think people hear the simple riffs on The Chemical Wedding and those other albums around it, and think that must mean it needs more... but I've rarely heard straight up metal like that with that level of evocative, atmospheric qualities and feeling and variety of mood. Love em...

The Chemical Wedding is a good 90s-style heavy metal album, is kind of the same thing that Halford did in Resurrection. Is not vanilla and is heavier than most modern Iron Maiden music.