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Atheist: Piece of time
17/08/11 || Smalley
It’s hard to believe that any other band was ahead of the mighty Death in influencing tech death, but lo and behold, back in ’89, when Death’s latest release was the rather straightforward “Leprosy”, another group of Floridan death metal-ers released an album that, if not “officially” tech death in the modern sense of the sound, still undoubtedly had an influence on its formation. That album in question is “Piece of time”, the band, Atheist, and while they haven’t recorded anything in past 19 years that really tickles my c0ck, the paths they blazed with their first two albums ensures that they’ll always have a place in my cold metal heart.
I’m sure it would’ve seemed odd back in the 80’s, when the basic characteristics of death metal were still fresh, to consider fusing the frantic instrumentality of something like “Reign in blood” with a jazz-like sense of improvisation, with songwriting that has no real steady “base”, but rather, constant tempo shifts and riff changes that come at you without a moment’s notice. I’m sure the vast majority of DM bands at the time would’ve scoffed at such a proposition, and would’ve preferred to stick with the simpler, safer brutality the genre was known for, but Atheist did take such a risk, and they actually made it work pretty well.
The opening title track starts off in a rather odd (but interesting) way, with ambient ocean wave effects coming in as a light, spacey synth plays. But after that, Atheist really gets down to business, as Roger Patterson’s unexpectedly jazzy, high-energy bass kicks in, followed by equally-frantic drumming, solos, and riffing that changes directions on a fucken dime, basically, being tech death before we knew what tech death was. For the most part, the songwriting on “Piece of time” is a bit too twitchy to be super memorable, but while you’re listening to it, it is uniformly engaging and headbang-worthy, with awesome instrumental performances from all involved. The production’s pretty muffled, but the overall energy makes up for that, and what were you expecting with an 80’s death metal record anyway?
To return to the Death comparison, not only was Atheist ahead of Death when it comes to influencing tech death’s creation, but I also strongly believe that Atheist influenced Chuck Schuldiner himself with this album. Just think about it; Chuck was recording “Spiritual healing” in ’89, before he really would’ve had a chance to absorb significant influence from “Piece”, and then “Spiritual healing” turns out to be an awkward, red-haired bastard record, in purgatory between the brutality of the first two albums, and the more technically-minded nature of the future albums. Cut to a year later, and Chuck’s creating more intricate, sophisticated, and frantic death metal than ever before. Coincidence?
It’s very easy to imagine Chuck hearing the intricate songwriting here, the meta, philosophical lyrics, Kelly Shaefer’s shrieky, raspy growling, Patterson’s jazzy bass work, the spacey intro on the title track (shades of “Cosmic sea”?), and so on, and be inspired to incorporate similar elements on his future works. Not to imply that “Human” isn’t better than “Piece”, as “Piece” lacks the memorable impact of the former’s songwriting, but “Human” could’ve been a very different album if it weren’t for PoT. Hell, would Chuck have ever gone more technical with his sound, and created great albums like ITP if he’d never heard “Piece”? No one can say for sure, but it merits thought. Anyway, ya’ll already know I love me some Death, but every single person still has works that influenced them, so let’s shine a little more of that tech death spotlight on Atheist for a little bit, shall we? You fucken know they’ve earned it…
- Information
- Released: 1989
- Label: Active Records
- Website: www.atheistmusic.com
- Band
- Kelly Shaefer: vocals, lead guitars
- Rand Burkey: lead guitars
- Roger Patterson: bass
- Steve Flynn: drums
- Tracklist
- 01. Piece Of Time
- 02. Unholy War
- 03. Room With A View
- 04. On They Slay
- 05. Beyond
- 06. I Deny
- 07. Why Bother?
- 08. Life
- 09. No Truth
