Celtic Frost's "Into The Pandemonium"

We currently have Celtic Frost's highly experimental third album "Into The Pandemonium" tagged as thrash metal & avant-garde metal but I'd like to question that position. Sure, the thrash metal stance is justified as there's still more than enough of the band's classic sound on offer to warrant its inclusion in The Pit however I have to question the validity of the avant-garde metal tag as I just don't hear anything terribly weird about this album. Sure, it was a very ambitious & unique release for the time but if it was released today I'd suggest that it would be far more likely to be tagged as gothic metal as a good half of the tracklisting treads similar ground to later bands like Tiamat as far as I can see & I'd suggest that there are less thrash metal numbers in comparison. For that reason, I'd like to propose that "Into The Pandemonium" is removed from The Infinite & reassigned to The Fallen while maintaining its position in The Pit.

I think this poses an interesting question that has bothered me for quite a while as the history of music is revised from a modern viewpoint. Do we judge a release purely on how we feel it sounds today with benefit of hindsight or should it be considered in it's correct historical context?

This was an incredibly experimental release for metal at the time. No one sounded like this and it was certainly considered avant-garde back then. So, my question is, does that historical context now count for nothing as releases are to be judged solely from a modern perspective, compared against others which may well never even exist without the ground-breaking work of the former? 

I don't really have strong feelings on it at the moment myself (as I haven't listened to Into the Pandemonium in an age, and don't particularly care to again), but I agree that avant-garde metal in general is tricky. By its very nature, it can be a bit of a catch-all for experimental stuff, with two bands within the genre often not sounding especially alike beyond that approach of experimentation. As what is or isn't considered "experimental" may change over time, the avant-garde tag on older albums may feel odd by modern standards.

I think my inclination in general would be to judge by the current standards of a genre. Death metal and groove metal, for example, both evolved out of thrash metal, so early examples of them might have just been classified as thrash. But later, when those genres came into their own, those early releases might be re-classified in hindsight.

I also feel like we tend not to tag genres based on historical importance. Reign in Blood or Pleasure to Kill were undoubtedly influential in the emergence of death metal, and Iron Maiden were likewise an influence on what would become power metal, but we don't classify those releases/artists that way, even if we might mention it when discussing them or those genres.

Look, by the dictionary definition of the term "avant-garde" this record was certainly a decent fit at the time. But I think it's important to remember what we're trying to achieve with the genre tagging here at Metal Academy & that's to create an environment where it's easy to identify music that's in line with your unique tastes & preferences. For that reason, I think it's important that we use the modern understandings of metal terminology. Also, I've always regarded truly avant-garde music as sounding a bit off-putting & strange. The self-titled debut album from German band Warning is a fine example of that as you never quite feel comfortable with their incredible amalgamation of doom metal with progressive electronic & synth pop sounds even though you really enjoy the experience. I don't get that feeling with "Into The Pandemonium" & I never did. A lot of that has to do with the fact that Celtic Frost are so damn successful with their experimentation here. The vast majority of the material sounds so fluent & fully realised so I never feel that uncomfortable feeling that I associate with truly avant-garde music as opposed to simply ambitious, experimental or progressive music.

Regardless of all of that, if I think that "Into The Pandemonium" often sounds like gothic metal period Tiamat then both acts should be tagged the same regardless of the era they come from. These tags are purely meant as an indication of whether someone will like the music contained on the release or not so it's best for there to be standardization across musical history.

P.s. Yes I'm one of those people that believes Venom & Mercyful Fate are not even close to black metal. Have been since the late 1980's too.

If the purpose of genre tagging is purely to point someone in the direction of music they might enjoy, then sure, I agree that the genre must be assessed from a modern perspective. All I wish to express, rightly or wrongly, is that I feel there has been a lot of re-evaluating of music that doesn't account for historical context. This isn't a phenomenon confined to metal, there are plenty of people who don't believe Bob Dylan, The Beatles or the Sex Pistols are much to write home about and that's fair enough, but I don't think their importance should be undermined because younger fans can't view them in context.

For the record, I agree with both Tymell and Daniel regarding the bands and albums they mention. Venom were speed metal and MF were heavy metal, but what about Hellhammer and Sodom's very early output? Similarly Reign in Blood and Pleasure to Kill aren't death metal, but what about Seven Churches? If this re-evaluation continues will we reach a time when even Bathory and Morbid Angel are no longer considered extreme metal, because they simply don't conform to redefined parameters?

I only raise the matter to trigger a debate, after all, the forums are a platform for honest, heartfelt discussion and it is something I feel passionately about and I am genuinely interested in what other metalheads think.

I have to take Sonny's stance on this one.

There are plenty of artists over the years whose stars have faded with time because their brand of "avant-garde" or "progressive" music becomes less forward thinking as more and more new bands/artists try to mimic that sound. It's part of the reason why my opinion of Dream Theater has fluctuated drastically over the years. But that does not make them less progressive/avant-garde by definition. I have been a staunch advocate for years now that genre tags are subjective and arbitrary ways of linking similar sounding music together in an attempt to lure in a new audience. I say this under the impression that I get from a band like Slayer. They are clearly a thrash metal band first and foremost, but their tone is so drastically heavier than their contemporaries. And I personally believe that without an album such as Hell Awaits, the genre that we know as Death Metal would not exist. So why does Possessed's Seven Churches have that sole honour? Same year, same style, but only one is viewed as the birthplace of a new genre.

Genre's are always changing and redefining their boundaries. But I also believe that it is important that we maintain historical importance as well. While I was learning about music history in school, I found it ever so important to know the historical background to a piece's conception and how it fared with it's contemporaries. Beethoven; the composer that is widely regarded as the face of classical music, was a rebel when he composed his most daring, romantic works. Jazz and early Rock & Roll were the poor man's music. And heavy metal was heretic. And the tags associated with each were added much later.

I guess what I am saying is that we can call an album "Thrash", but still recognize that, for a time, it was "Avant-Garde", even if those same designations do not hold up the same today. As for Into The Pandemonium, I do not believe that the "Avant-Garde" tag should be removed, because of the albums constant style changing for dramatic effect. 

Hi, younger fan here.

I have to admit it's a bit strange as someone who is "newer" to the genre to hear all the discourse between what is and what isn't when it comes to sub-genres of older, classic bands. I wasn't around during the birth of Thrash or Black Metal, let alone Heavy Metal, so it's a jarring argument when someone like me comes in asking "Where did Death/Black/Thrash/Avant-Garde Metal start?" and the answer is becoming "Well it started with these guys but they're not actually Death/Black/Thrash...". It just gets messy in a way that doesn't really benefit anyone, in my opinion. If the goalposts are constantly shifting then sure it makes for interesting conversation topics, but I'd rather have some concrete tags and distinctions when it comes to writing reviews or having opinions about a certain release. 

It seems like a lot of the arguments follows the pattern of something not having "enough" of whatever thing that genre normally looks for. I'm strawman-ing this really hard but like Sonny said, for the sake of debate, if Into The Pandemonium isn't "Avant-Garde enough" to be Avant-Garde, then isn't it still Avant-Garde in some capacity? I just think it's unhelpful to be constantly re-evaluating, since there will come a point where things will get muddied up to the point of no return. I'd personally rather hear "Celtic Frost is a cornerstone Thrash Metal band that experimented with Avant-Garde and Gothic Metal later in their career" since that properly describes it, rather than "Well the standards of Avant-Garde are constantly changing so it wasn't actually that Avant-Garde", which is so much more confusing for someone who may not be familiar with Celtic Frost's discography. I guess I just like objectivity in these kinds of cases.

I'm still not buying it to be honest. The only reason I said that "Into The Pandemonium" fit the term "avant-garde" at the time of release was because the dictionary definition the word is "new and experimental ideas and methods in art, music, or literature; favouring or introducing new and experimental ideas and methods." But if that was all there was to it then Metallica, Helloween & Napalm Death would also be referred to as avant-garde metal & they're obviously not. That's because for something to be thought of as truly avant-garde in metal music it has to not only tread new ground by combining multiple influences but those influences need to be a challenge to accept. If a sound works too fluently then the term becomes less appropriate. I firmly believe that Celtic Frost just created a new subgenre here (i.e. gothic metal) in the same way that Black Sabbath created one. It doesn't sound as artistically challenging as a genuinely avant-garde release like Bubblegum Octopus' "The Album Formerly Known as 8-Legged Dance Moves" by a long stretch so I'd much rather keep the term for records that truly deserve it. I mean "Mexican Radio" is simply a poppy heavy metal track & "Inner Sanctum", "Babylon Fell" & "Caress Into Oblivion" are essentially very similar to Frost's previous thrash metal works. "One In Their Pride" is a one-off industrial piece influenced by New Order but it was nothing unusual for a band to include a drastic change of direction track as an interlude to break things up a bit. Black Sabbath were doing that back in 1970's after all. The rest of the album all fits in with the modern understanding of gothic metal in my opinion. There is plenty that reminds me very much of Tiamat & Paradise Lost here. So in summary we have a mixed bag of sounds but not much that genuinely challenges my ears for a label which is generally the case with truly avant-garde metal.

And on the topic of historical context, I think that it takes time for a subgenre's sound to develop but once it has it remains fairly stable. I actually don't see us changing our stance on what constitutes death metal, black metal, etc. over time as much as people seem to indicate. We simply saw those sounds developing over a period of five to ten years with a number of bands being hybrids before they settled on an outcome but once the final article was settled upon their definition has stayed the same ever since. Avant-garde metal is admittedly more of a catch-all than a legitimate subgenre so I don't think it can be referred to in as definitive a way but there were releases that came before "Into The Pandemonium" that are still much more appropriately tagged with the avant-garde label (like 1982's self-tiled "Warning" record I referred to earlier) & that's because they sound a lot stranger & challenge our concepts of music in a theoretical sense & I think that's the crucial element here. I just can't get my head around the relevance of labeling a release as "avant-garde metal" when there are other releases that sound the same as it that aren't labeled the same way. The only reason to smack the label on in the first place is to give people an idea of what they're likely to hear & if I said this release is gothic thrash metal it's a far more accurate description than avant-garde thrash metal in my opinion. I've always thought that & my opinion hasn't changed over time.

To be honest, it doesn't matter to me one bit whether Into the Pandemonium is adjudged avant-garde metal or not, that's usually a genre (in all art) that I give a wide berth to as I typically find it to be pretentious and, in the case of music (to me anyway) often unlistenable which Into the Pandemonium definitely isn't. I maintain the point (and I'm not implying that you're guilty of this, Daniel) that people will continue to redefine the parameters of what constitutes a given genre, or even historical context of music from a point looking backwards. As a keen history buff anyway, I believe it's important to maintain a factual and consistent narrative to allow understanding of how the present was shaped.

Maybe this wasn't the best place to instigate this discussion and I certainly respect Daniel's view on this point, ItP certainly was a huge influence on the development of gothic metal (although I try not to hold that against it too much!) and it's experimental aspects don't hold up to modern standards, but I still maintain it was an important release at the time as a well-respected band attempted to expand what metal was capable of. I am unfamiliar with the Warning album you cite, Daniel, but I think you would agree, so we're most metal fans at the time, unlike Celtic Frost who were becoming a leading name in metal mid-80s and deserve their reputation as game-changers, which they themselves then went on to attempt to destroy, but that's a conversation for another day.

This release has been added to the Hall of Judgement.