OUR LIST OF 2018’S MOST INFECTIOUS EXTREME METAL SONGS (PART 4): BLOODBATH AND BAEST

 

After yesterday’s digression into obscure blackened realms, today I’m returning to death metal with two more additions to our list of Most Infectious Songs. I’m also again indulging in the delights of pairing up songs that seem to belong together, in this instance one from the old guard and one from some relative newcomers who are definitely kindred spirits, sonically speaking.

To check out the previous installments in this evolving list, they’re collected behind this link, and to learn what this series is all about, go here. We’ll have other posts at the site this weekend, but I’m pausing this series until Monday while I try to figure out what to add to the list next week.

BLOODBATH

Surely it will come as no surprise that I’m including “Bloodicide” on this list. If you read my comrade DGR’s review, or the column in which he put The Arrow Of Satan Is Drawn at No. 14 on his year-end list, you know that he loves that album but is “absolutely smitten with the sheer gall it took to name a song ‘Bloodicide'” — in addition to considering it one of the better tracks on the record. And I feel much the same way.

It’s a prime example of how much ridiculous fun Bloodbath must have had in writing and recording the album, and it proved to be (by my lights at least) the most infectious song on the track list, in part because of the joy that comes from yelling out “Bloodicide!” along with Nick Holmes (at least inside my head).

 

 

On top of that, the song includes guest vocal appearances by Jeff Walker (Carcass), Karl Willetts (Bolt Thrower/Memoriam), and John Walker (Cancer), underscoring the old school death worship that inspires so much of the record.

I don’t know that I would go so far as to call this song “legendary”, as Karl Willetts did, but it’s a whole hell of a lot of HM-2-powered fun — a chugging, galloping, skull-pounding mauler accented by freakish leads and an ear-incinerating solo. The vocals are of course great. Red meat for the faithful….

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

BAEST

When my friend Andy reviewed Bæst’s 2018 album Danse Macabre he began with three points:

1. Bæst sound like a younger, hungrier, and arguably more authentic, version of Bloodbath.
2. This is in no way a bad thing.
3. Danse Macabre may very well be the best Death Metal album I’ve heard this year.

And sure enough, about three months later, he included the disc on his list of the year’s Great albums. And it really is hellishly good.

One of the things that makes the album so appealing is how damned infectious so many of the riffs prove to be. Now, I didn’t consult Andy in deciding which of the tracks on the album belonged on this list, and don’t know if he would agree with my pick, but I’m going to introduce the song by quoting him anyway (from that review):

“Opener ‘Crosswhore‘… is one of the most scorching statements of intent you’re likely to hear all year, its boiling blend of gnarly riffs, gut-rumbling vocals, and grim, malevolent grooves delivered with all the inhuman intensity and sadistic swagger of a band who know they’re onto a real winner….”