search
more stories
 

One From The Grave: Luck of the Corpse

print   email   RSS
 May 29 2009 at 03:44:23 AM



Re-up the tombstones.

Five years before heads reading Metal Maniacs thumb-tacked full page ads of Fearless Undead Machines to the wall, Arlington VA’s Deceased unleashed their debut album, one of the earliest releases by Relapse records, and as far away from the sound of their well-regarded opus as Show No Mercy is to Reign in Blood. Yet in much the same way Luck of the Corpse kicked up enough unhallowed earth to make room for greater ideas to come.

Vocalist / drummer Kingsley Fowley, 13 years behind the stroke that would leave him (still performing) with only 1 ½ working lungs, leads the crew on a midnight joyride through the graveyard of mankind. The ardor of youth laid bare - mavericks aching to get their face on an LP cover, name in the liners - and while loudness cost money, playing it faster still meant pussy for days. Having fun havin’ a band . Inexperience indulging in fantasy at that age perhaps not much different from your own; executed far short of the mark of “perfection” as guitars metallic grit and rough harmonic pawing point to kids wantin to be King and Hanneman, sounding closer to that pair dreaming of Shermann and Denner slummin with a mini 12” amp.

Some say mediocre, generic. But it wasn’t straight Thrash or Death metal either. Not Deicide, anyway. Not Morbid Angel or Obituary. Not Possessed. No copycat shit. There was more color too it, not timid, but playful, pushed to extremes in waves of dive bombs, slides, pick scrapes and touch harmonics accenting campy jitters and creeps, those Fabio Frizzi-like arpeggios poked out with the saddest “clean” tone that ever came out of a professional studio. The kind of performance that suggests they only just started playing months, rather than years, before recording. Catchy, imaginative and yes, sloppy. Can you actually listen to it? Why the fuck not?! No matter its technical flaws, Corpse’s economy and abundant energy still sustains listening today.

Opener “Fading Survival” sets the tone for much of what follows, abruptly trudging in and gaining speed with a series of start-stop variations on the hopeless opening riff before giving way to“The Cemetery’s Full,” a simple thrasher with a menacing introduction. With “Experimenting with Failure,” however, Deceased starts running full tilt. King’s kit as fists pounding the shit out of locked chamber doors. When guitarists Mark Adams and Dough Souther start chuffing, the vox sound appropriately as if shouted from the roof of a moving train. Fowley’s manic tales of atomic reanimation and diseased minds are not yet fitted with an actual “concept,” and instead put forth as rabid warnings, ghost stories told while the forests are burning, precariously preaching the end:

All their lives they believed the word
And all their lives they believed in trust
And all their lives they believed in truth
But in death they will see the light

Even barked, the words can’t come fast enough, starting on the beat and then blurring into one unbroken string of URGH, not a breath passing between whole words, peaking with “Decrepit Coma’s” furious quadruple phrasing of NevertoawakeNevertoawakeNevertoawakeNevertoawake AGAIN!

The album’s second half opens up with longer, stranger tracks like the “Shrieks from the Hearse,” a short score in itself, followed by the more melodic “Psychedelic Warriors” and “Birth By Radiation” ending the album properly with OTT explosive speed after a prolonged, lead-footed intro.

Not hard to see how this could have easily become another one-shot record, bashed out live for a spell and then forgotten as the members drifted apart over time. But the core held together even as original guitarist Souther was replaced by Mike Smith before the discs even returned from the plant. The resulting 11 tracks lifting the torch of ferocious riff wizardry left in the dirt by Death just as Thrash slowly petered out at the close of the decade. Amateur, yes - at times achingly flat - but often just plain reckless and wild. And for all the consequences of the cliché one is made to weep over such an antique quality.

[Todd DePalma]

Deceased
Luck of the Corpse
1992
Relapse

*Correction: Mike Smith replaced Doug Souther on guitar before the album went to plant.

Comments (8)

  • 15 comments
    evanz
    4:13 AM on Jun 02, 2009 // reply »
    Great to see this album get some kudos.
  • 36 comments
    ex.person
    7:22 AM on Jun 02, 2009 // reply »
    Great to see other people appreciating it too. I think Deceased is shamefully underrated in general. Much more to them then FUM.
  • 24 comments
    Dennis Dread
    12:14 AM on Jun 09, 2009 // reply »
    I'm a '13 Frightened Souls' fan myself but Deceased rule and it should be noted that the cover art to 'Luck...' was swiped from Mario Bava's stylish horror anthology Black Sabbath! "NUCLEAR EXORCIST!!!!"
  • 1 comment
    king fowley
    12:53 PM on Jun 10, 2009 // reply »
    thanks for the write up. those were the days of teen angst and wild madness. i remember well recording at 4 a.m with headphones literally smoking as i could never get enough volume to feel what i wanted to feel to put down vocals.

    the graveyard shift is al lwe could afford.
    fast, faster, fasterrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr!, all it was about then. it was our foundation and we learned from our mistakes as well as our triumphs.
    still enjoy the songs, wish the l.p wasn't so rushed and doug souther's falling out with the band wasn't upon us while recording it all.

    but it is what it is! we did it and keep on doing it. new lp out soon. cheers and saleutes to all!

    thanks a million for the words

    king
  • 374 comments
    VOEGTLIN
    12:55 PM on Jun 10, 2009 // reply »
    !
  • 35 comments
    Miskatonic
    10:48 AM on Sep 02, 2009 // reply »
    Among my 1st death metal records was Nuclear Blast's Death is Just the Beginning Vol. 2. It had spectacular songs from Dismember, Pungent Stench, Amorphis, Defecation, Benediction, Master and many more. But one of my favorite songs on it was The Thirteen Frightened Souls. Great song! Luck of the Corpse and The Thirteen Frightened Souls EP were always on my to buy list, but by the time I thought I could afford it, FUM was out. So I got that one. Love that album! But it lacked the raw quality found on Thirteen. I dunno why I never went back and got that early stuff. Too damn much metal out there. Anyway, I finally got Luck... Great stuff!!

    King? If that's really you... I love your voice. If that's not really you, I love his voice...
  • 6 comments
    heresy is progress
    10:29 PM on Mar 11, 2010 // reply »
    I don't think a Reign in Blood/F.U.M. comparison is really apt here. It would be more accurate to say Fearless is a more morbid Seventh Son of a Seventh Son or Operation: Mindcrime in scope.

    (probably not the hippest records to namedrop on LHP, but fuck it. falses' leave the hall...)
  • 36 comments
    Moonchild
    1:32 AM on Mar 12, 2010 // reply »
    (probably not the hippest records to namedrop on LHP)

    False assumption for the first record, but that's why I worded it that way. Seventh Son is the one that gets tossed into "most underrated Maiden" polls while every other Deceased record gets far too little love/press etc.
 

Leave Feedback


Name


Email
Email will not be displayed. Gravatars? The LeftHandPath.com uses Gravatars which are the pictures that you see next to each comment. If you haven't already, register your email address and picture with Gravatar.com

Website
( Optional )

Feedback

Post your feedback, HTML will not be rendered, only plain text.


Subscribe
Receive emails when others submit comments

 

Leave this field empty

 
TWITTER RSS FEEDS
categories
138 1970s 33 ac/dc ajna ambient amon another bad idea apocalypse art asia ass cheeks atl atlanta is burning away azagthoth baby warrior drama bazillion points beer ben vierling black metal black metal sublet black sabbath blasphemy blood blue cheer bon scott bone sickness bones books booze boredom brooklyn bros bukkake bullet belts canada canadian mexican food cargo chains chips & beer chips n beer chuck schuldiner cliches codpiece comics conan cooking corpse paint cowbell cross-chatter crust cry babies cycles d&d d.c. danzig david vincent death death metal deceased dei carnifex demo demos denim desecrate devil devilock dffd metal dicks dio dirty south disgruntled dodgy doom dragons dread drinkin drone drugs drunk again dvd ec comics elvis emotions eschatology euronymous's dildo fake fangoria farts feelings fetish film films filth fire florida death metal folk foodster free publicity fulci georgia german germans germans glen benton goats gore grind groupies gygax halloween hard rock hardcore headbanging heat heathen metal heavy heavy metal hell awaits hollywood homeless looking dudes make good music horror horror punk hotlanta ink interview jazz jerseys judas priest kali kenneth anger kill posers king cobra king diamond label profile latin leather lemmy lhp001 lhp002 lhp003 lhp005 lhp006 lhp007 lhp008 lhp009 lhp010 lhp011 lhp012 lhp013 lhp014 lhp015 lhp016 lhp017 lhp018 lhp019 lhp020 lhp021 lhp022 lhp023 lhp024 lhp025 lhp026 lhp027 lhp028 lhp029 lhp030 lhp031 lhp032 lhp033 lhp034 lhp035 lhp036 lhp037 lhp038 lhp039 lhp040 lhp041 lhp042 lhp043 lhp044 lhp046 lhp047 lhp048 lost lucifer lulz magick manilla road marcus garvey master mephistopheles mercyful fate metal metal chef meth mgd misfits morbus chron motorhead mutilation nature nazi gaga necronomicon new york no shit noise norway not black metal not good nwobhm nyc oakleys obama 08 oh death one from the grave pain pentagram philthy pony girl power metal power trio primer problematic production pulp punk pussy putrid real men listen to thin lizzy rednecks repka reunion riffs motherfucker riot ritual robert e howard rock rush salad days samhain satan savage sword scorpions seagrave shit show report sin nanna skanks slayer sleaze sleeveless slim pickens sludge sluts soulless space cadet speed speed metal spikes spooky fingers steel stranger in a strange land studs summer summoning swamp sweatpants sweden swords tanya roberts teethofskull texas thirsty and miserable thrash thrash metal tits tldr tna tombstones tour dates tremelo tuesday you tube vanguard vans varg vhs vinyl vomit weird woods year end blah year-end list you tube tuesday youth zines zinka zombies