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He and his brother John were inspired by bands with names like "Nasty Savage" and ""Savatage,” where some members of “Trans-Siberian Orchestra” got their start. You can expect to leave a show soaked with beer - or someone else's sweat.īefore the show, Obituary's drummer, Donald Tardy, reflected on death metal's start in Tampa. Look above the stage, and you'll see exposed metal beams that reveal lighting rigs. There are no seats and the wood floors are scuffed by years of heavy combat boots. Like the music being played that night, the Orpheum is gritty. They just released their tenth studio album and celebrated in Tampa's historic Ybor City earlier this year with a performance at the Orpheum, one of many venues that regularly hosts metal musicians. “It's the adrenaline rush of ‘oh my God, that just either scares me or shocks me or makes me laugh.’"
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"It's the same thing I think that attracts people to watch the most horrifying movie they can watch,” Morris said.
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The brothers say they were aiming for the musical equivalent of a Halloween haunted house attraction: equal parts alarming and disgusting. The Morrises helped Obituary record their first album. Three decades ago, the members of that band were just kids messing around in a garage. The band is just a few years old, but they draw a lot of inspiration from bands like Obituary, one of the Tampa bands responsible for starting death metal. "This is what sets death metal apart from every other genre,” Morira said. After Grave Ascension's performance at New World Brewery, I stood behind the brick building talking to the band.Ī group of their drunk friends ran up beside us, shouting obscenities and dropping their pants, causing Guitarist Emilio Morira and his band members to laugh hysterically. That extremity and playfulness is reflected back on the fans. "I think the original idea they had was let's do something so crazy extreme that everybody hates it,” Jim Morris said. So what sets death metal apart? It regurgitates anger and frustration with the world, and it doesn't take itself too seriously.īrothers Jim and Tom Morris helped incubate death metal in Tampa about 30 years ago at Morrisound Recording in Temple Terrace. “They want to hear really heavy stuff with so much emotion put into it." "It's just very dark and I feel like it fits most people's personalities in this scene,” Lewis said. She doesn't want to see the scene die out. Grave Ascension's members say they are drawn to the frantic, hostile beats, and to lyrics that often evoke images of death, religious blasphemy and anarchy.ĭeath metal enthusiast Courtney Lewis is at New World Brewery to support local music. The crowd is loving it.Īfter the show, Shaw sums up why he and his band mates do this night after night: "Life's tough and sucks, so play music that reflects that."ĭeath metal, one of many subgenres of heavy metal music, emerged in the mid-1980s, starting in Tampa, and has made a bit of a resurgence locally in many of the same venues that played host to the founding bands originally. The members of the death metal band that calls themselves "Grave Ascension" throw themselves into the frenzied beats during a performance at New World Brewery in Tampa.
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He growls into the microphone as a swarm of fans, clad in black, bounce on their feet around them, screaming back at the band. Adam Shaw, bass in hand, peels a sweat-soaked strip of blonde hair away from his face and steps up to the mic.
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