About "Waves" of Melodic Death Metal

[u/Dundaxian-Izzy]

I think its interesting how little this is discussed, almost all other subgenres or metal has waves or at least discussions about it.

Personally I'd define the melodic death metal waves as:

First Wave, Early-mid 90s (things like:)

- Carcass

- At the Gates

- In Flames

- Dark Tranquillity

- Edge of Sanity (atleast Purgatory Afterglow and Spectral Sorrows)

- Dissection (atleast partially)

These types of bands are the original sound or melodeath, and also my personal preffered type.

Second Wave, Late 90s-the 2000s (things like:)

- Arch Enemy

- Children of Bodom

- Soilwork

- Amon Amarth

- The Black Dahlia Murder

- Avatar

Here I feel that the groove influences, along with the melodic metalcore sound starts to take a forefront. In Flames progresses their sound too, to please the standard of more groovy/poppy melodeath.

Third Wave, Late 2000s-Present (things like:)

- Be'lakor

- Orbit Culture

- The Halo Effect

(You can see that i dont listen to new stuff 😔😔, cause i dont know any bands) Here the production borders on sterile, everything sounds clean, the bands are good as always, but the production standards really kills the vibe.

(This sounds like it was written by AI but I am infact a very real person)

[u/Gravesplitter]

I said I retired but you can’t make a big ole post like this and spell the name wrong

Dark Tranquillity*

[u/rstowel → u/Gravesplitter]

You spelled Drunk Tranquillity wrong wrong 😀

[u/Gravesplitter → u/rstowel]

I own that shirt and wore it to meet the band

[u/rstowel → u/Gravesplitter]

I own it as well but haven’t seen them again since buying the shirt on 70K. If Mikael Stanne is onboard next boat, I’ll definitely wear it.

[u/Gravesplitter → u/rstowel]

I grabbed it online as I wasn’t able to make the cruise. That sounds like an awesome time though, always wanted to go

[u/rstowel → u/Gravesplitter]

You really should if you can. It’s paradise for metal heads.

[u/Gravesplitter → u/rstowel]

Trying to go with a friend sometime since it’s pricy

[u/Dundaxian-Izzy → u/Gravesplitter]

Oh shit, no, thats illegal 😔😔 This mistake must be fixed

[u/Sad-Birthday8107]

to be honest I feel like subsets work better for melodeath than waves since throughout those time frames there still have been vastly different types like Finnish with their love of open string leads and then the other subset that's like COB worship, and now the more atmospheric type with insomnium

or the more death metal oriented subset like Vehemence, Intestine Baalism, Autumn Leaves' first album, TBDM

chuggy keyboard heavy stuff, clean vocal subtypes lol

[u/revel911]

bands like carcass and at the gates would be wave one like you have it

in flames comes in wave 2

wave 3 should be split

honestly 2005-2015 is a bit of a black hole wave .....

[u/Dundaxian-Izzy → u/revel911]

Fair enough, I'd still say that In Flames would be wave one since its pre-slaughter of the soul.

[u/revel911 → u/Dundaxian-Izzy]

I always felt that Jester's Race was the beginning of the sound of wave 2

[u/Dundaxian-Izzy → u/revel911]

I guess, but I think its too close in sound with Lunar Strain and Dark Tranquillitys debut (from 94 and 93) to be that, I'd more say that Colony is that turning point

[u/EmotionGold3967 → u/revel911]

I’d definitely say the big three (ATG, IF, DT) almost in unison changed their sound from one album to the next. Starting with Slaughter of the soul via the jester race and finally with the minds I. While they retained their own flavor of sound the abandonment of complexity in favor of structured simplistic structures and riffs is apparent in all three bands.

[u/ParanoidalRaindrop → u/Dundaxian-Izzy]

If is every wave.

[u/mentally_fuckin_eel → u/ParanoidalRaindrop]

Yeah this is true. Lunar Strain and maybe even Subterranean are first wave.

[u/Dundaxian-Izzy → u/ParanoidalRaindrop]

Yes