I begin with a story to explain why this band means so much to me. soooooo...
I'm an 18 year old freshman at Florida State University who has only just gotten into extreme metal, and the only death metal band I listen to really is Cannibal Corpse. I'm hanging on DALnet in #mp3_death, and downloading random shit, some of it which I think sucks, some which sticks. a few of which are Immolation tracks from Here in After. I like em enough, and I head to Spec's Music and pick up their latest, Failures for Gods, mostly because it has the coolest album cover I've seen in eons. Barely catch the bus home in time to make it back to my dorm.
I put it on and it's a bit different from the Here in After tracks, it has an annoying clicky bass drum, the production is REALLY murky and not all that approachable, and at first i'm like "the fuck?". but it grows on me fast, esp the vocals and the "CAN YOU HEAR US? DEATH TO JESUS" part of "No Jesus, No Beast".
anywho, at this point, I've been to like maybe 5 concerts in my life at this point in time, and most of them were BIG shows. Chicago, Aerosmith and Metallica at an arena, Foo Fighters and Candlebox at a club that holds a few thousand. and I see Immolation are coming to the Cow Haus in Tallahassee, where I've never been but heard a lot about.
I picked up a ticket and then began to walk to the venue (5 miles away). I barely knew the direction from mapquest directions I'd memorized, but I was getting horribly lost. I'm headed in the general direction of the place though and about a mile or two away, this dude who is clearly drinking malt liquor in his car asks me if I need a ride. being young and reckless and dumb, I said "sure", and he didn't ask me for anything at all, just kept drinking and driving and drops me off just as I requested at the Cow Haus.
I'm walking up expecting a huge turnout, like a few hundred people, and am stunned to see like, maybe ten people in the club. The opening act is a terribly generic death metal band with a vocalist who sounds like David Vincent if he's weight-lifting and the barbell fell on his chest. The drummer also does vocals but he sounds like a deathy Tom Delonge. The second opener is Spinecast, who never really made it big but had some underground following, and they're kickass. By now the crowd has swelled to a neat 20 people, all of whom are very into it.
Immolation take the stage and we're all enjoying the fuck out of it, it's my first death metal show ever, and they're killing it. Afterwards, my shy 18-year old self goes up to Bob Vigna to tell him good show, and I then walked 5 miles home in the wee hours of the morning through some pretty rough areas of town.
though I'd see them as an opener again after that, it was another 25 years before I finally saw them do a headlining set again, due to some bad luck with scheduling over the years. My best friend (who is 15 years younger than me) is going with me to see them and Imperial Triumphant, and Immolation are all standing inside the infamous Subway near our local metal venue. I start warbling "oh sweet, it's them! That's Ross, that's Bob!", and my friend says "get out of the car"
at first I'm like "did I do something", and she says "no, clearly you want to talk to them because you're excited, so go do it! come on! say hello, I'll meet you inside"
so I went up to them and awkwardly talked about how they were my first death metal show ever and how it was so cool to see them headline again as an adult. it was a fun full circle.
anyway my vote is Close to a World Below because it's just pure evil sounding. "Father, You're Not a Father" is just exquisitely written using simple harmonic/rhythmic ideas that just work so well. putting it on as we speak.
― a very very unfair (Neanderthal), Tuesday, 14 November 2023 05:58 (eight months ago) link