.In the Pocket

Death-metal pioneers Obituary are content to crush eardrums at medium speed.

The name Obituary means something to even the most casual
metalhead.

Way back before death metal was even called, well, death metal,
teenagers in Tampa, Florida, were down-tuning guitars, stripping away
melodies, and fashioning heavy rhythms to create a new and fetid strain
of extreme rock that had less in common with Black Sabbath and more to
do with the sound of giant prehistoric alligators crashing into a
boiling-hot swamp. Lyrics tended to be violent and blasphemous, while
the guitarmanship retained a musical sensibility (at least during
solos) despite an ever-escalating barrage of evil riffs.

That raw, sulfuric riffage is on full display on Obituary’s latest
album, Darkest Day, released in June by Candlelight Records.
Songs like the surging “Forces Realign” possess a moss-encrusted groove
and a menacing, manatee-carved-by-a-boat-propeller amp tone that only
an old-school Florida death-metal band can produce. Indeed, while
listening to a thunderous track like “Truth Be Told,” you’ll experience
the sonic equivalent of being locked in the punishing grip of a
bloodthirsty skunk ape (Florida’s answer to Bigfoot).

Brothers John and Donald Tardy (vocals and drums, respectively)
formed the band under the name of Xecutioner in 1985 — they
weren’t old enough to vote when they recorded their songs for the
Raging Death compilation, released in 1987. In 1989, the band
released a genre-setting full-length, Slowly We Rot, which
stands among the most important and influential death-metal albums ever
recorded. Together with Death, Deicide, and Morbid Angel, Obituary
founded the “Florida death metal scene,” with Tampa as its
epicenter.

Which leads us to an obvious question: How did a band as dark as
Obituary spring from sunny Tampa Bay?

“It just happened,” says Donald, waiting at Tampa International
Airport for a British Airways flight to London, where he and his band
were slated to connect to their destination, a festival in Portugal.
“Florida was the beginning of death metal. This state just had all the
greatest bands when I was a teenager — Nasty Savage, Savatage.
Growing up, we got to see these bands live. Then Slayer entered the
picture and really turned our gears. We and these other Florida bands
you’re talking about were competitive. So we had to take what we did
seriously, and get as good as each other or better.”

Tardy admits the phrase “death metal” came later, after his band had
already settled on an approach. To him, the music he played was always
just metal, but taken to its logical, inevitable conclusion. “All we
did was take [death metal] to a new level,” he says. “John’s voice got
heavier, and it went from there.”

He has fond memories of Morrisound Recording in Tampa, where
legendary producer Scott Burns documented noises generated by Florida’s
most infamous bands. Tardy recalls laying down tracks in Morrisound for
Obituary’s demo, financed by the Tardys’ parents. As a teen, he didn’t
own a complete drum set and had to borrow drums from Burns.

Still, Obituary’s last two CDs were recorded at his brother’s house
with Pro Tools, which means an engineering board as long as a runway is
no longer necessary. “We spent a lot of money to get the computer and a
lot of time on Pro Tools figuring out the program.”

The results are remarkable. After an eight-year studio hiatus
(1997-2005), Obituary fashioned a well-received comeback album, 2005’s
Frozen in Time. Darkest Day, meanwhile, hasn’t earned any
negative reviews of note. Is metal more accepted, or is Darkest
Day
simply that awesome?

“It’s both,” Tardy admits. “The acceptance is here, sure, as old
Metallica fans open up to bands like Lamb of God. But there’s something
about our album we recognized immediately during the recording. Every
song was natural and classic-sounding.”

Critics have other descriptors, too: “Chugging. Midtempo.
Groove-oriented.”

“We’re a band that’s not afraid to stay in the pocket; it’s where
we’re comfortable,” Tardy says. “Heavy doesn’t mean 100 miles an hour.
We have a tempo our fans love and know to expect.”

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