four years pass...
seven years pass...
some nonsense I wrote about Legion. NOt even sure I appreciate about it what everybody else does but hey
Almost 25 years later, it's easy to forget what an impact Deicide's self-titled platter had on the fledgling death metal scene, or mainstream society as a whole. Earlier forays into death metal were largely rooted in the occult and Satanism, but of the cartoonish variety. The camp factor was there to reassure the more squeamish listeners that it was all in fun.
Deicide, on the other hand, had no such interests. Their first album was essentially a death metal treatise against the Nazarene, one of such chilling tunnel-visioned focus that it seemed authentic. One must also remember that this album came about in the waning hours of the "satanic panic" of the 80s, a time where soccer-moms and Baptist dads were actually convinced that legions of Satanic hellspawn were waging war on the nation. So in a sense, the environment was perfect for Glenn Benton and company to annihilate the scene.
Yet, when you actually *listen* to the album, it's easy to forget just how catchy it is. Glenn's inhuman growls, Asheim's annihilating drums, and the Hoffman brothers' netherworldly riffs may be an intense package, but the songs are downright hummable. All of which helped intensify the singularity of Deicide's purpose - a declaration of war on Christianity.
Of course, years later, it became readily evident that Glenn was no more serious about Satanism than Alice Cooper was about detonating schools. For all of his various antics, such as promising suicide at the age of 33, branding an inverted cross into his forehead, even naming his child "Daemon", it was purely theater. Which is not surprising - theistic Satanism isn't very common worldwide. Most self-identified Satanists fall into the Anton Lavey variety: Atheists who reject Judeo-Christian teachings.
Nonetheless, Deicide's message was appealing to listeners not because their followers were dying to join a bloodthirsty cult. In addition to its brutal aural assault, metalheads had grown tired of the conservative Christian values that were so pervasive in every day society. This album was a declaration of war on organized religion. To metalheads, who at the time largely felt like outcasts, it was a rallying cry.
Naturally, the first big hurdle Deicide had to clear is one that all bands go through - how to follow up their debut. The songs on the s/t had a couple of years of circulation prior to the s/t's recording, in the form of two demos (released under the band's original moniker, "Amon"). They had exhausted all of this material so now it was time to begin anew for their follow-up.
One could be forgiven at the time for assuming that Deicide would stay in their lane on album number two, and just expand the subversive sonic palette of the debut. Glenn and company had other plans. They deliberately set out to make things difficult for their fans.
Gone was the immediacy and structured-approach they had previously championed. "Satan Spawn, the Caco-Daemon" begins proceedings on a somewhat muted note. It's a curious opener, a largely dissonant, time-shifting train wreck that is the aural equivalent of bumper to bumper traffic. While not a *bad* song by any means, it lacks the focus and precision that "Lunatic of God's Creation" had, and while there are interesting moments, it ends with a dull thud.
"Dead But Dreaming", however, more than redeems that false start. Bookended with a thunderous, crescendoing power-chord feast, the main thrust of the song feels like tanks advancing on an unsuspecting enemy. Yet even this track contains few, if any, of the memorable riffs and precise flow of their prior effort. Whiplash inducing time changes abound, and the main riff itself seems like an extension of Asheim's percussive assault. And thus, it's on this track that it becomes apparent as to how the album should be experienced - a noisy, Satanic battering ram.
Glenn has previously indicated in interviews that the band sought out to deliberately cast aside any musical idea that was catchy, and this is evident in the finished product. It's also why the band is not so fond of this album in retrospect, and does not play much of this material in a live setting (outside of "Dead But Dreaming", and on some occasions "Trifixion").
It's admittedly difficult to recall these songs when not actively listening to the album - unlike technical death metal bands like Atheist, there's often no rhyme or reason for the detours the band takes on Legion. It's a messy, sprawling affair, one that almost intentionally seeks to obstruct its listeners from comfort. It dares its audience to pay attention, refusing to become background music.
The Hoffman brothers' leads are chilling as ever, often off-key Cerberic siren songs to lure listeners to the Depths of Hell. But the real star of this album is Asheim, whose pummeling drum onslaught guides the apocalyptic sound. The Hoffmans' riffs are an arm of the percussion, partnering to create a cacophony of dread as opposed to memorable songwriting. Glenn's deepening, multitracked vocals only enhance the effect.
As the album progresses, traces of the band's debut start to poke out. "Trifixion", for instance, contains a tremolo picked, chromatic descending riff reminiscent of those found on "Dead by Dawn". But no sooner does this familiarity show its face before the band launches into a jarring series of blasting tempo changes, an amelodic middle finger to anybody whose mind dared to wander.
Yet despite the bands's compositional sloppiness, these deviations work in their favor. The often disorganized and abrupt detours serve almost as their own little vignettes, songs within songs. The dispensing of the rulebook only enhances the terror, as if the band were swarming an enemy with unorthodox rituals to keep them off balance.
Benton's multitracked vocals only grew more powerful, this time not being altered with pitchshifters or harmonizers (contrary to their debut). At times the sounds he creates don't even sound human. These types of vocals are much more familiar in today's metal environment, but it's easy to forget that death metal vocalists had spent most of the 80s shrieking in a witchy, high-pitched rasp, and that the gutteral, bludgeoning style Benton utilizes here was a recent development in the genre. Sadly, Benton's innovative approach sparked several incapable imitators which contributed to some homogeneity in the genre; but in 1992, this was some scary, sick stuff.
Over the remainder of the album, Deicide veers closer and closer to the sound they perfected on their debut, but never let it marinate for long. Once indoctrinated, listeners can almost anticipate the next interruption, the moment the next earworm of a passage is immediately cast aside in favor of a disconnected jumble of ideas. Yet while that sounds disengaging on paper, the result is anything but - the album insists upon itself, demanding its listeners pay attention to it. As such, the album works much better as a whole than the sum of its parts. Although songs like "Dead But Dreaming" and "Trifixion" work well on their own in a live setting, few fans shout out requests for songs from this album because by themselves, they're far less interesting. The songs are best experienced as part of a 28-minute combative Satanic symphony.
Speaking of the length, I can't recall the last time a 28-minute album felt so 'long'. You might remember, this is the length of Reign in Blood. Yet that's not to say it's an exhausting listen, just that it can be transfixing (see what I did there?) in a way that makes one lose track of time.
Nonetheless, this approach would not have served the band well long-term (Glenn still isn't thrilled with the album), and from then on out, the band took a lean approach. The next album, Once Upon the Cross, is streamlined to almost retcon Legion out of existence. While a step down from Legion, it's an extremely strong effort, one that features some of 'Cides best efforts. But it was clear by the opening strains of that album that Deicide's experiment was over - but while that blunted their intimidation a bit, we should all be glad for the momentous slab of anti-Christian venom we were treated to decades ago.
― Hammer Smashed Bagels, Monday, 16 March 2015 19:06 (nine years ago) link
three weeks pass...
five years pass...
three months pass...