I didn't know if i have to make this thread in the recommendation part of the site, but i didn't find anything like that, i wanted to you guys gave me your list for the best BDM bands of all time. Iam getting again to the genre but for your information i have this top five in my mind.

1 - Suffocation
2 - Devourment
3 - Cryptopsy
4 - Analepsy
5 - Disgorge (US)

Anything in similar quality of this bands? I found underground sketchy stuff, but i want the best that the genre can offer, on a sound, creative and production output of the music. I know that Slam and BDM are mostly part of the same genre, you are free to put some slam bands here. I discover that BDM is a lot more hardcorish than the traditional death metal scene to my surprise. A lot of 90's hardcore punk influenced the scene in a lot of ways.

I wanna know about the differente between the 90's scene of BDM and the more modern bands, the different styles, regional scenes, tell me everything you know about this mostly underground metal genre.

Thanks for the help bros.

Man I could write an essay on brutal death haha

Defeated Sanity, Inveracity, Aborted Fetus, Bound and Gagged, Lykathea Aflame, Typhoid, Flesh grind, Alienation Mental, Blunt Force Trauma, Agony Conscious, Goreobscenity, Jenovavirus, Kevlar Skin, Glossectomy, Gorevent, Infernal Revulsion, Terrordrome, Tomb Throat, Carnal, Dripped, Putrescent Seepage etc plenty more but that should keep you busy

"Underground sketchy stuff" and "the best the genre has to offer" aren't really mutually exclusive. The underground sketchy stuff is where a lot of the atmosphere is, once you get past the obvious stuff like Suffo/Cryptopsy.

Many countries have cool regional BDM scenes but they're hard to generalize in clean strokes other than, like, "Colombian bands tend to be really primitive and sloppy," "Germany tends toward a combination of slammy and technical," "NY is groovy," or whatever. But throw a dart at a map and it's safe to assume either/some combination of Suffocation, Disgorge or Devourment will be huge influences. So just look around and listen, look into some labels that were major players like United Guttural, (early) Unique Leader, Unmatched Brutality, Comatose, etc. That's my main advice.

Some 90s stuff you might have missed:

Fleshgrind

Pyrexia - if you like Suffocation a lot and want more like that.

Deeds of Flesh - not a huge fan of this band, but by most people's estimate they should probably be #6 on your list. Sort of the next truly influential longrunning American BDM band after Suffocation.

Mortician - love them or hate them, they left an impact.

Clean Flesh - "predator vocals" started here.

Afterbirth - their 90s stuff is partially to blame/thank for slam, along with Internal Bleeding and Repudilation.

Malignancy - quirky smartypants sorta technical band from the late 90s

...

Millennial stuff I like (not exhaustive):

Inveracity - Greek Suffocation worshippers. They don't play slam, but their incredibly knuckle-dragging, breakdown-focused debut album was probably a bit influential on millennial slam.

Severe Torture - sort of like a more BDM take on Cannibal Corpse. First two albums are good. Worth a shot if you wanna get away from some of the more off-the-wall stuff in the genre.

Mutilated - see above. Lots of CC influence in this obscure and generically named but great band. It's sort of funny being able to talk about Cannibal Corpse influence as if it's something that takes the edge off rather than adding edge, but that's BDM for you.

Condemned - sort of a Disgorge clone. They had Cephalotripsy's vocalist, so they have those BLURP BLURP BLURP OOWEEE vocals you'll either hate or love. First album's about as one-dimensional as music gets, the second album's a little more moody and "artistic."

Pathology - you can kind see this band's discography as a microcosm of how the genre evolved. No frills deathgrind type stuff with medical/gore lyrics at the beginning, but then in the late 2000s there was a slow shift into sci-fi themes (which was the trend at the time), goofy neon album covers, slam influences, etc. You could accuse them of trend-hopping, but they're decent and a useful signpost band if you're just now getting into the genre.

Prostitute Disfigurement - classic lowbrow, trashy BDM with better musicianship than you might expect. I like the darkly melodic Carcass-isms in their second album.

Brodequin - always lo-fi, (mostly) always blasting. Their medieval aesthetic was unique and they had great drumming, but sort of a challenging band to get into imo thanks to consistently dismal guitar sounds and a relative lack of breakdowns/"ear candy."

Cerebral Effusion - Spanish band.

Flesh Consumed - I always saw their first album as sort of the final statement on 2000s brutal death metal. It kinda does everything--it's morbid, creepy, technical (without getting TOO technical), and hugely slam influenced without actually being slam. Monolithic guitar sound to top it off.

Saprogenic - unique American band who somehow mushed together Covenant/Formulas/Gateways era Morbid Angel with Devourment, if that makes any sense. They had those broiling, imperialistic melodies that scream mid-career Trey Azagthoth, plus insanely triggered Sandoval-esque double bass very high in the mix, but they also had those BDM sewer vocals and they throw a big dumb stupid slam or two at you in just about every song.

Dyscrasia - one of those early (not 90s, but still relatively early) slam bands who were kind of an evolutionary dead end in that they have very little musical connection to modern slam. Groovy but they incorporated those grooves into some pretty complex/progressive song structures. Proudly refused to use triggers, for what it's worth.

Defeated Sanity - another band I'm not huge on, but they're the heir apparent of post-Cryptopsy technical stuff and hearing them is important to having literacy of the genre.

Despondency - I much prefer this German band over Defeated Sanity. A little more grounded and focused on midpaced nastiness. If Defeated Sanity is slam with an IQ of 180, this band is like slam with an IQ of 120.

Infernal Revulsion - Japanese slam band who (unlike a lot of slam bands) actually had riffs when they weren't slamming. Try the first album. note: their most recent stuff is awful and sounds like some sort of slick death metal-ized modern hardcore nonsense.

Degrade - a rare Swedish BDM band worth hearing. Their one album is about as generic as it gets, but it's very very heavy and lots of fun.

Corpulate - they did one album and I don't even know how to describe it. Mathy progressive slam? Crazy shit.

Down From the Wound - the ultimate filipino slam band... if that means anything. Pretty good songwriting. Their first album has an almost Scott Burns/Morrisound-ish antiseptic production to it that somehow adds to the creepout factor.

Immortal Fate

For me, this answer depends on where we draw the line for brutal death metal. I guess stuff like Cannibal Corpse is borderline not bdm?

I also might want to avoid focusing too much on brutal tech death in my answer. However, the mix can really work wonders when done right, so I'll allow myself some leeway in my answer.

OP already mentionned Cryptopsy and Suffocation. Both are great picks, definitely important in shaping the genre and defining the codes of. Both are amazing bands! I was lucky enough to catch Cryptopsy playing None So Vile in it's entirety in 2017, for the 20th anniversary of the album.

There's some obvious names that need to be mentionned still:

Nile
Origin
Hour of Penance

If you've never visited these guys' discography, do yourself a service in fix that right away.

Some names usually come out a little less in these discussions, but are definitely totally worthy and brutal as fuck. Starting with French brutal death metal band Benighted. Their album Insane Cephalic Production is relentless, and I swear, it messes with the chemicals in your brain.

Another band I can't recommand enough is Fulci, especially their Tropical Sun album. It's based on Lucio Fulci's Zombi 2, and it's amazing! It has everything from massive grooves, brutal pit-inducing riffs, crushing breakdowns, fast pounding riffs, massive drums and deep death growls.

I think that early Fleshgod Apocalypse also deserves a mention. Oracles was one hell of a symphonic brutal tech death album. They have since turned into a boring death metal version of Dimmu Borgir, but still...

Democracyiscringe pretty much covered most of it, but I'd also throw in the dutch band Disavowed and the bands affiliated with them through shared members. Another couple bands that deserve mention are Inveractiy and early to mid era Beheaded.

There is quite a few bands in Indonesia like "Reduced" that are big time Disgorge(CA) clones. When I think of brutal death metal the 3 main bands that come to mind are Suffocation whom is obviously the most important. Then Disgorge(CA) who took it to the next level and left us to soon, and then Defeated Sanity who are the pinnacle of the modern bands.

Suffocation and Cryptopsy are both BDM bands that I hold very dearly. Other BDM bands that are also great and Dying Fetus, Disgorge, Mortician, Brodequin, Defeated Sanity, Cattle Decapitation, and Decrepit Birth.

Awesome response my man, thanks for all the info.

some of the earlier bands of course would be Cannibal Corpse, Broken Hope, Paralysis. Bands who used that Neanderthal blasting style that Bolt Thrower used, rather than the alternate bass/snare blast that Napalm Death and Morbid Angel used.

Then Suffocation basically put the name to it with Roadrunner Records promoting them as “the most brutal band in the world!” or “most brutal band in existence!” or whatever they printed on all of their promotional mailers at the time. Pre internet days Roadrunner was great at sending you promotional posters of the new releases and catalogs with good hype descriptions.

Then you had some great post-Suffo bands like Gorelust (Canadian suffocation clone with killer drummer) as well as Torture Krypt (NJ band with a Suffocation meets Cannibal Corpse type of sound).

I should have put my top 5 like you did

Defeated Sanity - One of the most brutal bands out there, also a bunch of extremely talented musicians.
7.h Target - schizophrenic tech/brutal death from Russia, bonkers brutality
Lykeathea Aflame - the happiest sounding death metal you'll ever hear
Circle of Dead Children - This band's vocalist is incredibly underrated, insane highs and politician moral low gutturals
Cephaloptrisy - slam kings, over the top but so damn good

Someone mentioned Immortal Fate- that's awesome! Redwood City, California's finest! I'm surprised anyone even remembers that band. They used to play small shows in the Bay Area and occasionally a big club show (typically with their little brothers' band Plutocracy) but they were never a very well known band outside of Redwood City. Yeah, they were pretty good, somewhat influenced by Incantation but with an independant and underground style.

I'm partial to the early (VERY early) Goregrind sound, before goregrind got stale and, frankly, rather lame. So, I would put early Carcass up there. Bolt Thrower's third and fourth albums (Warmaster, IV crusade) are epically awesome. To be honest, some of the super complex, super technical stuff doesn't really do it for me, which is why I respect bands like Suffocation, Lykeathea, and Cryptopsy more so than I really enjoy listening to them.

Taking into account the entirety of a band's work:

- Nile
- Suffocation
- Entety (yesss!)
- Sickening Gore
- Deeds of Flesh

In regards to selected outputs:

- Deranged (R-X, P.C.)
- Broken Hope (T.B.O.R.)
- Repudilation (P.O.I.)
- Embalmer (T.W.B.E.)
- Mortician (Z.A.)
- Disgorge (US) (C.T.F.)
- Reinfection (T.D.F.N.)
- Orchidectomy (A.P.A.)
- Foetopsy (Dyspartum)
- Fleshgrind (D.F.D.)
- Brodequin (F.O.D.)
- Origin (U.U., Chaosmos)

Defeated Sanity and Origin

I love Carcass and Bolt Thrower as much as the next guy. They are two of my all time favorite bands actually. But they have nothing to do in a thread about brutal death metal.

Deeds Of Flesh, and Disgorge(Mex) are probably my two favourites.

Re: Deeds of Flesh
I'm absolutely certain that one day there'll be a big box set of all DOF recordings on vinyl. Very much looking forward to that one!

GOREROTTED 'nuf said:

Only Tools & Corpses
Mutilated In Minutes

Maybe not quite BDM but close enough to eclipse what is out there at the moment!

The song titles alone are brutal death metal....go check out "gagged, shagged and body bagged" or "stuff your ass with broken glass" for upbeat cheery tongue in cheek loveliness!!

I'm glad to see Analepsy and Prostitute Disfigurement mentioned. Aside from the newest record, pretty much everything Analepsy has done is top tier.

I'd add Coprocephalic to this list, as I really enjoyed their Gluttonous Chunks album. I don't know if you'd consider Goregasm brutal death metal, but they could fit here too.

Well, as you said yourself... this answer depends on where we draw the line for brutal death metal. Bolt Thrower; I can see your point, they are heavy as shit but maybe not what one would call "Brutal Death Metal." If you define Brutal Death metal as having a lot of technical playing and complex structures, then some of the early Carcass albums would qualify- "Symphonies of Sickness" and "Necrotism" certainly. Even "Reek of Putrefaction" though that might actually fall more under goregrind than "brutal death metal." I understand the need for categorization of music, but so often it's so subjective and a matter of splitting hairs, or one's opinion, that I kind of hate getting into these kinds of arguments.

I get that some of it is kind of splitting hair, but these two really are quite cut and dry, in my opinion. I'm saying this because brutal death metal is an established subgenre with some specific elements that define the genre. "Lots of technical playing and complex structures" isn't brutal death, but more like technical death. RYM defines brutal death metal as "a subgenre of Death Metal that emerged in the early 1990s. Brutal death metal typically utilizes triggered blast beats, chunky, fast riffing, and rhythmic "slam" riffs, popularized by Suffocation." and I agree with that definition. I'm thinking of stuff like Dying Fetus, Dehumanized, Defeated Sanity, Regurgitation, etc. Brutal death often overlaps with technical death metal, so what you described before applies more here, with bands like Suffocation, Cryptopsy, Nile, Origin, etc.

Carcass evolved in another scene. They were not following the footsteps of bands like Suffocation. They were more in line with grindcore and goregrind. I get what you mean when you're saying that Carcass were brutal and incorporating death metal elements by the time they released SoS and Necroticism, but they were brutal, as in the adjective brutal, and not brutal the subgenre of death metal. I know it might sound nitpicky, but Carcass didn't share the core elements of the sound of brutal death metal, even if they were making a very aggressive, violent, "brutal" form of death metal.

Top 5 in terms of quality, impact, influence, etc
1. Suffocation
2. Dying Fetus
3. Cryptopsy
4. Deeds of Flesh
5. Disgorge (US)

Personal top 5 favorites...
1. Suffocation
2. Hour of Penance
3. Beheaded
4. Dying Fetus
5. Gorgasm

I could never really get into the "classic" BDM bands like Suffocation, Deeds of Flesh, Dying Fetus or Cryptopsy, but I love several bands that are very directly influenced by them.

Some of my favourites are:
- Defeated Sanity (by a wiiiide margin)
- Iniquity
- Aborted
- Putrid Pile (first three albums)
- Abominable Putridity
- Mortician
- Organectomy



Totally agree, I thought Quiescence was fairly ordinary and lacklustre compared to Atrocities from Beyond

I was surprised no one except you mentioned them; among the new bands, they seem to be one of the most popular ones out there. I like their style; they remind me of Analepsy, they seem to be the forerunners of the new BDM scene that made slam what it is today.

Other two bands that I found and thought were pretty cool are Kraanium and Katalepsy, both with a capital K. They are part of the new school of BDM tho, not classics of the genre.

I love Katalepsy as well, though the last few albums have been pretty dead in the water for me.

I don't wanna sound like a nerd but all those bands you mentioned are slam death, and not BDM

I thought slam death was part of BDM, like a micro sub genre of the already small genre that is BDM.

I think you're right. But I'm guessing that, because some people really hate slam death, but still enjoy BDM, they might tend to draw a line between the two?

Anyway, RYM defines slam death metal as a subgenre of brutal death metal.

https://rateyourmusic.com/genre/slam-death-metal/

Slam is 100% a subgenre of brutal death metal, a sub-subgenre if you will. But it's true all this modern outer space slam with lyrics about weed and 10 bass drops per song is a very different thing than Gorgasm or Disgorge, and there are people into BDM who still don't accept any slam after Devourment's first album. Just like there are oldschool death metal fans who don't accept post-90s brutal DM. Everybody's tolerance ends somewhere.

This is probably one of the best BDM albums that I've ever heard in my search for the best. It's so strange that this is an album that nobody here recommends. It is one of the most hardcore-influenced brutal death metal that I have heard; it has a 90s appeal and a dark, grimy atmosphere. Furthermore, it is not a very popular band, so I recommend it here; they only have one album.

If you like breakdowns, hardcore, and stuff like Pyrexia and early Suffocation, you will love this. It has a lot of bass; that's something that I did not hear in the other records that you guys posted here.

Devourment live - the best.

Defeated Sanity, Malignancy, Artifical Brain(if they count), Afterbirth, Putridity, Cerebral Effusion. Disgorge(Cali), off the top of my head, i dont mind some slam, but i cant stand slam as a genre, so the less slam in my brutal death metal the better.

Idk. To my ears slam is much more accesible sonically than BDM, so i would just put it as a sub-genre of death metal, not BDM

ROTTING - Crushed

Still imo one of the best BDM bands. Even if they only have 1 album it's still a banger and It is always in heavy rotation for me.

I'm listening to it right now. This album kills; it's a lot more groovy than what I expected, and I would not be surprised if some of the guys in the band are Entombed and Stockholm death metal fans. It's true that some of the best albums of brutal death metal are from mostly underground bands; one of the best albums that I listened to was Drowning in Tragedy by Eternal Suffering.

apart from all the stuff that's already been mentioned (defeated sanity, early suffocation & cryptopsy, etc), this one's one of my fav albums in the genre that i didn't see anyone mention yet:

Aside from the super obvious Suffocation Cryptopsy and Dying Fetus, if I had to do a top 10 it would be something like:

Agony Conscience - Look Into the Silence
Amputated Genitals - Human Meat Gluttony
Brodequin - Festival of Death
Brodequin - Instruments of Torture
Defeated Sanity - Passages Into Deformity
Defeated Sanity - Psalms of the Moribund
Gorgasm - Masticate to Dominate
Incinerated - Lobotomise
Malignancy - Intrauterine Cannibalism
Sintury - Disgorging the Dead

As for Slam, I don't mind slam riffs or some Devourment, but I'm not interested in "pure" Slam who builds their entire songs around them.

This genre to me is kinda frustrating because on paper it's everything I look for and it's even like my personality, completely over the top and deliberately trying to piss you off, but for some reason idk none of it really ever grabs me when I try to explore it.

Idk it's almost like there's just nothing below the surface at all.

I say that because I'm genuinely looking to see if anyone initially had this opinion but grew to develop a taste for it cuz to me it just seems to only be brutal in the literal definition of the word.

If we consider Nile a brutal death metal band, then they are the best. There isn't much competition to be honest.

When listening to brutal death metal, it's important to understand that it's an acquired taste; you first have to listen to the albums and cross the line of thinking things like "this just sounds like noise" and try to listen to the melodies, the rhythms, and the songs that this bands creates. As you can see in this thread, there are multiple styles of brutal death metal, but I would say they can be summarized into three schools.

The first one is the technical one; this style is usually referred to as technical death metal. Not every technical death metal band belongs in the brutal death metal category, but some do, especially bands like Suffocation, Defeated Sanity, Deeds of Flesh, Nile, and Cryptopsy. Because those bands play their instruments in a very technical and progressive way, it could be a little hard to listen to them the first time you discover the genre. It is probably the most respected school of BDM in the metal community; most bands in this genre are pioneers of the scene and very respected musicians in their instrument.

The second one is the slam school of brutal death metal; the kings of this style are Devourment, no question about that. This style focuses more on slam riffs, death metal breakdowns, simple song structures, low-tuned growls with a lot of pig squeals, and trying to sound as scary as possible. This style usually merges with other genres like grindcore, deathgrind or goregrind. It's usually the nastiest form of brutal death metal and also the goriest one; when you think of brutal death metal, you are probably thinking about this style of music. There are pure slam bands nowadays that play a distinctive style of modern bdm; they kind of created a scene of their own, especially in Russia. Most of the bands that the guys recommend here belong to this school of BDM.

The third one and the one i discover in this thread is the hardcore one, specially the New York scene, there is one scene of brutal death metal that for me is different to the ones we mentioned, this are probably the first bands that mixed death metal with hardcore before the creation of deathcore. The band that gave origin to this scene is Suffocation, but most important bands of this style are Pyrexia, Internal Bleeding, Eternal Suffering, Repudilation, Broken Hope, Skinless, etc. They play a very primitive style of BDM; they were arguably the first bands, along with the technical BDM bands, to develop the genre. If you like New York hardcore, you will like this style. It has lots of groove-induced breakdowns and hardcore, bouncy riffs mixed with more street-wise lyrics talking about violence and crime in a NYHC way.

Defeated sanity was actually the last band I tried to listen to, but the constant blasting kinda just bored me after a while, they didn't seem dynamic enough, but perhaps I'll give them another listen cuz I actually like quite a few of the bands you mention especially broken hope, loathing is quite a killer album, I guess I just completely look at it as just straight up death metal rather than give it the brutal tag idk