Graveyard Classics

Six Feet Under's problem was never the instrumentals, it was mainly the vocals and lyrics. Don't worry with this one though because Chris gets rid of one of the problems since this is a cover album, we don't get any of his shitty writing. Of course though, there's never a perfect Six Feet Under record while having those horrible vocals.

I remember this TNT cover being almost my gateway into death metal. I found it in a worst metal covers of all time list and it was one of the reasons I didn't check out death metal for a long time. It's honestly worse than I even remembered. He even lets out one of his famous "eeeeeeeeh's". I can't say much about this cover other than I wasn't a big fan of AC/DC before but even then this is a disservice to the original. Bon Scott did not deserve whatever Chris Barnes had created doing this.

I just want to say that hearing one of my favorite Black Sabbath songs as well as Exodus songs on this album was something I never wanted to go into my ears. Chris again does his magic and runs these songs to the grave and drags them to what feels like an eternity because they’re such horrible covers. That might be why he called this cover album “Graveyard Classics”, because he drags your favorite metal songs to the grave.

His cover of “Piranha” just proves what we all already knew, Chris cannot do thrash metal. I don’t blame him since he never obviously did this genre and was in the death metal/groove metal scene but still. This again is a disservice to Paul Baloff. This completely ruins the original song for me cause the cover will just never exit my mind.

Guess what, Chris Barnes isn’t able to do a punk song either, who’s surprised? The cover of “California Uber Alles” actually makes me want to scream that’s how bad it is. Like I can’t tell if I find it funny or just disrespectful. His screams as well is the worst thing I’ve heard during the whole entire album.

I cannot hear Chris Barnes do another one of his screams or his vocals ever again. He just needs to quit death metal and join a new genre. Honestly just stop making music. The other covers on this album are again a pain to get completely through. During all of the songs I just have the urge to skip them, but the whole album is like this. Every time I get through a Six Feet Under record I feel like I should get a reward for having to sit through the entire thing. All I get is about 40 minutes wasted in my day.

This cover album is complete garbage, the only redeeming quality is that the choice of songs that they covered are great. Apart from that, there's nothing about this record that I enjoy whatsoever. Firstly, the entire album is downtuned to shit, ruining most of the riffs. It almost seems as if Six Feet Under was trying to parody classics such as Holocaust and Son of a Bitch. The purpose of covering songs is to respect them, and solidify their iconic qualities, as well as expressing how the song has had an effect on your music tastes. However, when the performance of the covers are so awkward, lifeless and outright obnoxious, it begins to feel like a parody. Also, Six Feet Under is a death metal band. So naturally, when they try to perform old-school rock n' roll, it comes off as overtly cheesy, to the point of being unlistenable. What's even more difficult to believe is that Metal Blade agreed to distribute this. Brian Slagel surely would have died in his chair while first listening to this. Anyway, enough bashing this album, I'm going to explain why it is so awful in more detail.

Like I said, the guitars are way too downtuned and muddy for these songs. Specifically, the cover of Piranha is completely ruined by the overproduced, muddy guitars, and the death growls are hilariously dysfunctional with the song. One of the few merits of this record is that the playing is tight, however. I guess Chris Barnes told his crew that if the covers are going to sound like shit, they might as well put effort into the performance. I respect that, although they could've utilised the potent musicianship to playing material that is original. Hell, a cover album would be fine if they didn't pick songs that didn't match with a death metal band in the slightest. Even Accept has songs that fit Six Feet Under's sound more than Son of a Bitch, which is way too raw and happy to have a death metal do-over, tracks such as Ahead of the Pack or TV War wouldn't make Barnes' growls sound laughably bad.

I can't really explain how out-of-place Chris Barnes sounds on Graveyard Classics. His cadences just sound so abrupt and forced compared to the original versions of the songs (to be honest, Barnes' vocals have been shit since 1995). The way he growls "California, Uber Alles" is so fucking funny, his voice sounds so strained and he can't even string words together properly, he sounds like he's hurting himself, and the high scream during the same track may be the ultimate low point of the album. Don't even get me started on T.N.T. His hilarious performance completely stagnates any rhythm that the songs otherwise had. I can't believe that Chris and his flunkies decided to make another 3 versions of this utter shite. If I had to summarise Graveyard Classics in two words, they would be dumpster fire. Don't waste your time or money on this.

They had a few covers on previous releases, and on Graveyard Classics decided to go full out and release an album consisting entirely of covers. These covers include some of the classic songs of rock, punk and old school metal. Now I can understand how these accessible death metal covers of classic songs might help fans who already listen to heavy music make the leap into death metal. Still, with quality this low, this is not the best gateway. The covers are not all that different from the originals, besides the harsh vocals. Not only is this release utterly stupid, it is also a huge wad of spit in the face of the bands who created these classic songs.

While they do include some classic metal songs from bands like Venom, Angel Witch and Exodus, they largely aim their arrows at some very easy targets. The most blatantly obvious song they cover is Deep Purple's "Smoke On The Water". As ridiculously overplayed as it is, it's a good song. The song contains what most likely is the most recognized riff ever, making it just about impossible for Six Feet Under to be more predictable in their selection. This cover is a good example of many of the pitfalls of this album. First off, the vocals are really bad. In the cover, the rock songwriting is not brought to a metal standard and besides a rougher production, instrumentally the cover is not that far off from the original. With the exemption of some melodic shredding, this remains true for the majority of the album. Much of the time it just seems like someone is growling over a rock song, which comes off as more than a bit silly.

Other classics covered include Jimi Hendrix's "Purple Haze" (again, they go with the obvious ones) and AC/DC's "TNT". While a death metal band covering Jimi Hendrix could be pretty cool, it is certainly not the case here. On the Hendrix tune, it just sounds ridiculous. The worst part of the album is the vocals, they sound half-assed and quite silly. These vocals, along their fairly close (but not half as good) instrumental rendition of the original, are a disastrous failure. They should have changed the instrumental to fit the metal style, it just sounds absurd the way they have it. The AC/DC cover serves as foreshadowing for one of the most unfortunate endeavours in the history of death metal - Graveyard Classics 2. With one cover album obviously not being enough for Chris Barnes, he decided a second coming would be in order - this time it being a cover album of an entire album - AC/DC's classic Back In Black. Needless to say, they completely messed everything up. They also cover Black Sabbath's "Sweet Leaf." It is not surprising that they chose this song, knowing Chris's affinity for anything marijuana related. Now I get it, covering a Sabbath tune is almost like a right of passage for many metal bands - a countless number of bands have done it. This is one of the worst Sabbath covers out there. The instrumental sounds almost exactly the same and his vocals sound absolutely absurd.

As much as I hate how they ruined other classics, the one cover that really boils my blood is of Dead Kennedy's "California Über Alles". Dead Kennedy's are one of my favourite bands, and "California Über Alles" is brilliant. The catchy punk guitar, the interesting drum patterns, Jello's razor sharp wit - everything was perfectly in place. The lyrics, satirizing California governor Jerry Brown, are both funny and thought provoking. Six Feet Under are quick to fuck it up. Again, the instrumental is similar to the original and the vocals are a joke. They sound exceptionally horrendous during the chorus. During the song, a loud painful high pitched yelp is emitted, which make the normal vocals sound good in comparison. While brief, it is enough to make any self-respecting metalhead cringe. Unfortunately this pathetic yelp is featured on multiple songs.

While not as pitiful as the rock and punk covers, the metal covers are still exceptionally lame. True, the music is more suited to be covered by a death metal band, which makes them seem less ridiculous, but they still come off as weak and half-hearted. They come off as unnecessary covers with embarrassing vocals. While the selection isn't bad, the performance is. On their third Graveyard Classics album (yes, they just couldn't help themselves), they have many more metal covers, which unsurprisingly aren't all that good.

In the end, this is an unnecessary cover album by a largely unnecessary band. Chris's vocals are absolutely horrendous, and instrumentally this is quite tame - the band sticks largely to the originals, which doesn't seem appropriate given the situation. While every musician knows that covers can be really fun to play, if you're going to release a full album of covers, let alone three, it better be damn interesting. This whole album is just one colossal embarrassment. If you still insist on getting this, be warned - don't get the limited edition version. It contains three bonus tracks, including Thin Lizzy's "Jailbreak". With that cover, Six Feet Under managed to make what is quite likely the lamest cover by an established band of all time. As curious as this release might make some people, don't bother, there is nothing worthwhile to be found here.

Chris Barnes and Six Feet Under had been scattering cover tunes over their past three releases, hitting up some of their most obvious influences, or really the obvious influences for any metal musician over the age of 30. Thin Lizzy, Iron Maiden, Judas Priest, and KISS are not the most unusual choices, nor did this drab death metal rebound do a hell of a lot to improve upon them other than slather them in Barnes blunt incantations. So it's not exactly out of nowhere that the idea was birthed to provide an entire album's worth of fare, presumably for the fans to digest, and noting a few of the selections the band has made here, presumably to inspire the younger lot to seek out a few classics they might not be aware of. This, of course, is assuming that there actually ARE Six Feet Under fans. Are there? I've never met one, but someone must be buying this shit.

To be fair, Barnes and the boys have made some pretty intriguing selections. Most impressive to me are the NWOBHM and classic metal pieces. They've got "Confused" by Angel Witch and "In League With Satan" from Venom, in addition to "Son of a Bitch" by Accept, and the great "Holocaust" from fellow Floridians Savatage, which is likely the most unexpected on the entire disc. Unfortunately, none of these offer more than the basic ingredients, thicker in tone but less effective than the originals, so we're supposed to get by on the novelty of Barnes' vocals alone. I suppose it's funny the first time you hear someone performing Udo Dirkschneider or Jon Oliva lines in gutturals, but really, after about 30 seconds, the humor is lost upon me, after all it's been done a thousand times, even by myself. It also doesn't help that these are all boring as fuck, in particular the Venom tune.

6FU stretches back a little farther to further cultivate their dope habits with Black Sabbath's "Sweet Leaf" and Deep Purple's "Smoke on the Water", and we're treading on all too obvious territory with these and the rest of the album's selections. Again, there is is no impetus to ever dive into these versions, as they're incredibly bare bones rendering could be achieved my just about any band jamming in their practice space on a Friday night. The most aggressive cover they've chosen is "Piranha" by Exodus, a pretty exciting song that would seem a natural for a death metal act, but yet again comes off wholly uninspired. A couple of generic punk pieces like the Sex Pistols' "Stepping Stone" (a cover of a cover) and the Dead Kennedys' "California Uber Alles" don't exactly quicken the pace, and the rest are all rock staples: Jimi Hendrix' "Purple Haze", the Scorpions' "Blackout" and AC/DC's "TNT", the last of which is arguably the most potent fun on the entire disc, even if it's as retarded as the rest.

Graveyard Classics must have been some sort of a hit, because Metal Blade and 6FU would go on to release two more volumes later (the third of which is admittedly the least annoying). But in all truth, this is even more petulant and loathesome than the band's original albums like Haunted and Maximum Violence. Chris Barnes does not have bad taste in music, but he's also not very good at performing that written by others', much less himself. Thus, it's hard to view a taste numbing tribute disc like this as anything more than a cash in on Barnes' post-Cannibal Corpse 'celebrity', milking this sluggish, sorry parade of failure for all its worth, scoring pocket change for a gram of forget. Meanwhile, his alma mater was releasing a record so good that this is even more laughably by comparison...

-autothrall
http://www.fromthedustreturned.com

You know something? I've never understood the reasoning of why people hold this band in such high regard. I think they are one of the worst bands to grace my ears. All their albums are pretty much a snooze fest. But given the fact that people like things so simplistic and one dimensional, I can see the reasoning into liking Six Feet Under. Especially the 13 year olds who don't know any better.

So, why am I reviewing this disc you ask? Well, frankly I have no idea either. But I think it's to warn you of the lameness that this piece of plastic possesses. I found myself laughing so hard because I could not believe how Six Feet Under could take a bunch of great songs and turn them into the lame-ass borefest they typically play on their worthless albums.

Every song here has been favorites of mine for so many years, so hearing SFU doing them made me want to rip my hair out. This was done to show respect for the bands that influenced them. I guess they didn't have enough respect as one might have thought.

So this also begs the question as to why I bought it. Well, I did not buy it, a friend gave it to me, because he said it sucked, and he knew I disliked them anyway so he thought I'd get a big laugh out of it. Which I did.

The album opens up with a rendition of the Savatage classic, "Holocaust." I'm sure Criss Oliva is turning in his grave, because SFU do not do the song justice at all. It only gets worse after this. Their rendition of Black Sabbath's "Sweet Leaf" is so utterly boring that you'll want to skip it a minute into the song. The song, "Piranha", which is one of the best songs Exodus ever did, is totally desecrated on this crap-fest of an album. While there is a glimmer of hope when they do Angel Witch's "Confused," it still lacks any serious punch that the song truly has. I wish Jimi Hendrix would rise from the grave, and severely punish SFU for ruining one of his all time classic tunes, "Purple Haze."

Are we finished? Nope, not yet. There is also another glimmer of hope when the Deep Purple classic, "Smoke On The Water" comes on. But, it is totally ruined once the song gets going, and renders it useless. John Bush and his shitty flat vocals make an appearance on this album on the Scorpion's classic, "Blackout." I guess when they asked him, they knew this album would be lame, so what the hell, right?

So by the end you're so tired that you need some shut eye, and to settle down from the laugh fest. It boggles my mind how a band can take 12 of the best songs ever recorded and turn them into a heaping pile of feces. Six Feet Under succeeded in doing that.

A pointless album from a pointless band. Six Feet Under will never convert me into a fan. I have given them all kinds of chances since their inception. But, this release further proves that this band is just an unwanted disease that graces our fine genre.

I'm convinced Chris Barnes wants to be in a cover band. SFU pump out cover songs ALL the time. It was only a matter of time before they had a cd of all covers. Well here it is and well basically, its Six Feet Under changing classic rock/metal songs in, well, SFU style. There lies the problem, in that sometimes it works, other times it doesn't.

I don't know if there are that many people out there who have ever had the urge to turn Smoke on the Water or TNT death metal, but here it is done for you. This is the part of the cd that doesn't work. There really is no need to be hearing Purple Haze or the songs above with cookie monster vocals and a buzzsaw guitar sound. Some of the covers work well, like Piranha, which with Chris Barnes singing, is somewhat an improvement over Paul Baloff from Exodus. I love Exodus just as much as everyone else, but Paul isn't the greatest singer, plus Bonded By Blood didn't have the best production. So its cool to hear a song like that redone. Also props to SFU for covering Exodus, which is awesome, since they deserve more credit.

Basically this cd is pretty good, but a few songs are bad. Plus, keep in mind its Six Feet Under doing all cover songs. So this might wear a little thin after a few tracks. Best tracks: Piranha, Son of a Bitch, Blackout.