Black Mass

I consider myself a pretty big fan of Death SS, and all of their releases up to their first studio album I consider to be almost perfect, so what went wrong with Black Mass? Well, to start with, this album seems pretty good, the re-recorded tracks from their early days are pretty great, and most of the other tracks are solid too. In the end, there's just a huge problem I couldn't ignore; two of the tracks on this album are "covers" (and I use that word VERY lightly) of Paul Chain Violet Theatre. Those two songs, "Welcome to my Hell" and "In the Darkness" show me exactly why Steve and Paul used to argue so much, as he absolutely butchered them.

Paul Chain writes dark, doomy, experimental tracks to perfection. Steve on the other hand seems to prefer the stadium shock rock angle, which does not work in any way for those songs, making it feel like less of a tribute to his ex-bandmate and more of a mockery. This is made more evident by the fact the songs don't even sound remotely like the originals, having completely altered them. Steve added his own lyrics and the band changed basically every riff for the worse, making them less chromatic and dissonant, more like typical, fairly boring rock riffs. "In the Darkness" went from one of the most gloomy sounding songs I've ever heard, to a glam-laden power ballad with absolutely cringe-inducing verses you could almost find on a Terry Glaze-era Pantera album.

On a more positive note, even though this isn't the darkest sounding album you can find, it's still full of great songs, as long as you ignore the two covers. This album serves as a sort of transition away from the gothic gloom of the previous material, and a step towards the more rock n' roll future of the band, that would come together fully on "Heavy Demons" a year or two later. In the end, I'd say I like this album, but it's definitely at the bottom of the list when it comes to 80s Death SS for me. It's worth a listen if you like horror-themed Metal in the end... or maybe you should just listen to Paul Chain's album instead, ha!

Black Mass is probably one of those albums you remember just as much for its cover as for the actual musical content. I mean, seriously, that's pretty fucking haunting. Has Jesus ever looked any cooler than this? The eyes, man. The eyes. At any rate, the record is also notable for attempting to incorporate a pretty broad range of elements into a pure heavy metal package. Though Steve Sylvester's primary vehicle Death SS never quite brought him the success of a King Diamond or Lizzy Borden, which had a similar theatrical, horror-rooted flair to their image, he still spun some heads in Europe and has enjoyed over 30 years of cult status among fans in Italy and beyond.

It's not a stretch to discern that Death SS is heavily based in the shock rock aesthetics that were pioneered by KISS and Alice Cooper, even down to Sylvester's sniveling, constipated vocals which recollect Coopers' heavier rock works in the 70s and 80s. At times, I honestly found Steve (aka Stefano Silvestri) to be a bit distracting, since his accent and delivery combine for an atmosphere that feels more like the family cat hunting down crumbs of kibble more than some strapping metal maniac, but even his voices mixes and matches with the tunes, often blending in with the backing vocals or attempting a cleaner, sultry mid-range. There are a few points at which he's even pitch-shifted down to provide a sort of horror narrative in tracks like "Welcome to My Hell", but this feels just about as corny as his scrunched nasal bite in "Kings of Evil" or "Cursed Mama".

As for the music, it's quite solid traditional/speed metal which at times reminds one of Germans like Accept, Rage or even a less blindingly melodic late 80s Helloween. Black Mass is pretty well produced for its time, with clean tones in both the rhythm and lead guitars, the latter of which feel a bit too soaring or bluesy to really capitalize on the dark themes in the lyrics or cover art, but then, this was in an era where cheap horror flicks like "Black Roses" or "Trick or Treat" where just the act of having a heavy metal band in the score was considered 'edgy' or dark. Not that Black Mass is a soundtrack to anything other than what's in the band's minds, but I'd compare them to a band like Detroit's Halloween whose lyrics alone were supposed to channel the creepiness more than the rather major keyed, straightforward musical output. Death SS were a lot more unique though, using acoustic/ballad segments, organs, proggy synthesizers and even saxophones to flesh out their fairly stock array of rhythm guitars.

This is not the best material in the Death SS repertoire, as the following album Heavy Demons upped the ante on the metallic elements, and the preceding Evil Metal EP had better songs than any of these, but it's definitely reaching for a wider appeal than most of their pre-industrial metal era. The lyrics, while not complex, are more thoughtful than one might expect for a horror based record, but I do rather wish there were a more central, consistent concept running through the entirely of its runtime. The music is just good enough to stand on the threshold of the memory, and certainly there were scores of better bands in the genre pouring out of Europe in the late 80s that made this sound like child's play, but if you're into the shock theatrics and not so easily dismissive of Sylvester's pinched vocals, it might be worth a spin.

-autothrall
http://www.fromthedustreturned.com

Death SS were formed in 1977 and they can be considered the very first horror metal band. After the good debut, they reached the top with this great album, Black Mass. The members used to wear monsters dresses with face panting; very original for this period! I think nobody did this before them (except for Kiss, but they had not the same occult meaning), especially in Italy. The frontman Steve Sylvester (the Vampire) and the other members, the Death, the Werewolf, the Zombie and the Mummy, created something new, also musically.

Occult contents, cemetery visions and an horror image created a mystery the surrounded the band.
Their music can be seen as a great mix of classic heavy metal with speed/thrash influences. The face panting and the lyrics content contributed to create a black metal image, along with some instruments and atmospheres typical of the band.
They are the kings of evil, as they proclaim in the album's first track and considering all that I said before, you must believe them…

The occult can be found in each single track, being a future inspiration for lots of group. In that period the Italian pioneers of death and black metal were releasing their first albums or demos (Mortuary Drape, Bulldozer and Necrodeath, ex-Ghostrider) and Death SS contributed to their image and sound.

In this album each group's influence is well balanced and very intense, producing band’s classics like the scary Horrible Eyes or the great Cursed Mama, with a great organ intro to celebrate a true black mass. Gregorian chants and samplers can be found in the long title track. The atmosphere is sick, starting from the front cover where the singer has been shown crucified in the dark, with his scary eyes staring at you. The legends behind the group's history and the moniker Death SS make the listeners' morbid curiosity grow.

The singer has a great voice, scratchy and evil enough for this great piece of metal; songs like Buried Alive, Kings Of Evil, with a great melodic intro and the obscure Welcome to My Hell, are an important history lesson for those who still do not know this band. The title track, with the bells intro and the sax (yes!!) sound is incredibly original and evil.
With this album the band has become a cult in the scene, showing something new and scary for the period. The reviews of this album were great in different countries at the time and I must admit that this album is simply unique.

Welcome to their Hell…