6A - Wednesday, September 17, 2014
The Michigan Daily - michigandaily.cam
6A - Wednesday, September17, 2014 The Michigan Daily - michigandailycom 0
A subtle mutiny.
An outsider's guide
to country music
I
METAL BLADE
Long hurr, don't curr.
Cannibal Corpse's new
'Domain' a brutal ride
ByJOSHFRAZIER
DailyArts Writer
I grew up hating country
music for no real reason. I was
raised on a steady diet of clas-
sic rock, and as I grew older, I
began to love the wordplay of
hip hop and the experimental
nature of alternative music.
When I came to the University,
I gained a greater appreciation
for the primal nature of stadi-
um-ready EDM, and my expo-
sure to people from different
backgrounds has led me to love
just about all types of music.
Except for country.
This summer, I moved down
south to Fayetteville, Arkansas,
where loving country music is
as natural as breathing air. My
experience there has led me to
at least begrudgingly tolerate
country music, and to come to
like (and even love) a few songs.
Here is an outsider's guide
to learning to love country
music - based on the music you
already like:
Classic Rock
Essential Song: "Springsteen"
- Eric Church
Fans of guitar-based
rock'n'roll should make a rela-
tively easy transition to a coun-
try radio station. Established
acts like Lynyrd Skynyrd and
Neil Young clearly influence
many current southern musi-
cians. Blues-influenced guitar
licks and tales of Americana
are prevalent throughout pop-
ular acts like Joe Nichols, Eric
Church and George Strait.
Pop
Essential Song: "Play It Again"
- Luke Bryan
Several mainstream country
musicians have crossed-over to
Top 40 chart in recent years.
Taylor Swift and Carrie Under-
wood are two female vocalists
who have become undeniable
superstars. Florida Georgia
Line's "Cruise" featured a half-
sung, half-rapped style and a
Nelly guest verse. The lines
are blurred between these
two seemingly very different
genres due to the feel-good,
party nature of many songs,
and the ensuing fan-base made
up of teenage girls.
Rap
Essential Song: "Praying
Man" - Big K.R.I.T. and B.B.
King
Southern rappers like Lud-
acris, Yelawolf and Big K.R.I.T.
have touted their country roots
for years, priding themselves
on their unique Southern heri-
tage. Seminal rap artists like
UGK, Scarface and Three 6
Mafia have instantly recog-
nizable voices influenced by
Southern drawls. Rap fans may
not find a lot to like in modern
country hits but should enjoy
the thumping basslines of blues
legends. The go-to track is.the
highlight of Big K.R.I.T.'s 2012
debut, Live from the Under-
ground, which marries South-
ern blues rock and lyrical hip
hop on "Praying Man," featur-
ing the legendary B.B. King.
EDM
Essential Song: "Drunk on a
Plane" - Dierks Bentley
Contemporary country radio
hits often feature up-tempo,
danceable beats, but many of
these songs are derided by clas-
sical country fans and objective
listeners alike as shameless
attempts to cash in on a popu-
lar trend. Dance music fans
should embrace the rhythmic
nature of country hits, which
often experiment with uncon-
ventional time schemes. The
stereotypical, party-driven
nature that influences many
popular electronic songs is
prevalent in many country hits.
Beer and women are two of the
most common tropes found
in country music, and there is
no better example of that than
Dierks Bentley's riotous ode to
drinking, "Drunk on a Plane."
And for electronic music pur-
ists who can't tolerate music
made with guitars, banjos and
fiddles, well, at least coun-
try makes for good pre-game
music.
ByKEN SELANDER
DailyArts Writer
Cannibal Corpse's 13th stu-
dio album, A Skeletal Domain,
combines brutality, evil, pure
genius and
more evil.
Upon listen-
ing to the A Skeletal
record for the
first time, I Domain
felt that more Cannibal
work went
into creat- orpse
ing diabolical Metal Blade
titles for each
track than the
lyrics of the songs themselves,
but upon a second listening I
discovered I was dead wrong
and brain-dead.
As I listened to the first few
songs on A Skeletal Domain, I
began to feel there was a dis-
tinct possibility that someone
might barge into my room while
I was lost amidst the music,
not paying attention to my sur-
roundings and brutally murder
me with a chainsaw. Nowhere
on the record did this seem like
more of a reality then on the
third track, "Kill or Become,"
which includes thoughtful lyr-
ics like "Fire up the chainsaw /
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Cut their fucking heads off."
Musically speaking, "Kill or
Become" starts off slowly, but
quickly gains pace. The track
consists of simple riffs that are
made more complex by the ran-
dom notes chosen in between
mute-note strums. A very
metallic-sounding twang on
each note via the low B-string
from the bass guitar drives
the song behind the screams
of their lead vocalist, George
"Corpsegrinder" Fisher.
A bouncy, growling bass riff
also guides the chorus on the
album's first song, "High Veloc-
ity Impact Spatter." The track
sets a tone of despair and evil
for the rest of the record, with
an eerie 40-second intro that
forces the listener to imagine
moving at a high velocity, soon
to become impact spatter. The
initial noise is then cut off by
blast beats from the beast that is
their drummer, Paul Mazurkie-
wicz, and hard chuggingby lead
guitarist Patrick O'Brien.
"Vector of Cruelty" is a fan-
tastic example of Cannibal
Corpse's overall approach to
music. While some metal bands
decide to use more intricate,
complex guitar solos and riffs
to match grueling blast beats,
Cannibal Corpse decides to
go for a purely angry sound
with mute-note strumming for
almost the entirety of the song,
with a 10 to 30 second burst of
fast notes to compose "Vector of
Cruelty's" solo. This way, they
can much more easily focus on
being angry and evil without
having to worry about trying to
make their music too difficult
to play.
"Vector of Cruelty" might
be the most typical Canni-
bal Corpse song on A Skeletal
Domain, but "Funeral Crema-
tion" is the record's best track.
Mazurkiewicz flaunts his stam-
ina by holding a constant blast
beat on the bass drum for nearly
the entire song, with slower
beats on the crash and snare to
offset the rapidity of the bass
drum beats.
"Funeral Cremation's" main
falter lies in the fact that its solo
is no longer than 30 seconds.
Overall, Cannibal Corpse's
sound would be significantly
improved if the brief guitar solo
was extended. This would fur-
ther prove O'Brien's skills and
thoughtfulness in his ability
to play something other than
chugging, and simultaneously
give the listener a longer break
to recover from Corpsegrind-
er's mind-melting grunts.
Many writers criticize death
metal for lacking variety. To
some extent, I agree: Corpseg-
rinder's screams on A Skeletal
Domain are highly monotonous.
Consistencyin screaming might
please some listeners, but it also
makes the songs less interest-
ing. Instead of constant soul-
crushing, low pitch grunts,
Corpsegrinder could expand
his screaming range to higher
screams so as to provide more
emotional ties for listeners.
Aside from the monotone
screams,A SkeletalDomain eas-
ily separates itself from other
death-metal albums. "A Skel-
etal Domain" and "Headlong
into Carnage," for example, are
the fourth and fifth tracks of
the record, but pose a beauti-
ful juxtaposition. The vocals in
"Headlong into Carnage" are
more distained and hateful, and
express concern for the mas-
sive amounts of blood and guts
spurting out everywhere. Con-
versely, the screams in "Skel-
etal Domain" are more evil and
sinful, providing imagery of
people dying rather than what
their remains might look like.
If you haven't already
impaled yourself with the larg-
est knife in your kitchen before
the final song of the album,
then "Hollowed Bodies" is
sure to be the final nail in your
forehead. The song begs the
listener for an answer to the
question "will the truth ever
be told," to which most prob-
ably answer "I have no idea;
that's the only vaguely audible
line in the song." While this
may be true, I think "Hollowed
Bodies" offers far more insight
than merely lyrics about dead
bodies: it offers a window into
the expression of a tortured
being's soul. The song paints
a portrait of the human condi-
tion, making it so much more
than the surface screams about
blood and guts.
At the conclusion of A Skel-
etal Domain, the record still
leaves many questions unan-
swered for listeners; "Who
were the parents who allowed
'Cannibal Corpse' to practice
in their garage and/or base-
ment?," "Who would pay money
for this CD?" and many more.
Despite the unanswered
questions, this masterpiece of
an album surely will go down
in history as one of the more
memorable death metal albums
... of this month. I'm sure the
many lasting cover bands of
Cannibal Corpse in the future
will be inclined to add at least
a few tracks from this album to
their set.
Los Angel
Edi
ACROSS
1 Expensive
5 GUM rival
10 Conference with
UVAsandtUNC
13 Guthrie at
Woodstock
14" Unchained":
2212 Tarantino
film
15 Arctic explorer
John
16 *Butcher's
appliance
18 Not just some
19 Square peg,
socially speaking
20 Sharp-eyed
hunter
22 Timeforfools?
24 *Prankster's
ballson
28 Ridethe wind
29 Lip applications
30 Perons
31 Ready tobe
driven
33 "Cagney and_":
'80scop show
35 Newspaperfiller
36 Fruit thatcan be
the sore of the
starts ofthe
answers to
starred clues
38"No more details,
please!"
41 "Right?!"
42 Ruined, as
hopes
44 Picture on a
screen
47 Fastfood
package deal
49 Sock part
50 *Allowance for
the caetedia
52 "A Change Is
Gonna Come"
singer/songwriter
Sam
53 Catch on the
range
54 Timeto attack
56 Bass brew
57 *Monet work
63 Pewter
component
64 Sings like Rudy
Vallee
65 Biblical reformer
66 Hazardous curve
67 More than
anpopular
998 Stadta hand
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