Difference between Blackened Death Metal and War Metal/Bestial Black Metal?

[EverG]

I'm to understand that they're technically 2 different sub genres. But my confusion is that both of them seem to stylistically draw from both Black and Death metal. So what specifically distinguishes the two? And if you can, recommend me your favorite bands from both sub genres .

 

[Phylactery]

I think it's easier to listen to them to see the difference but,

There are different strains of blackened death metal, the more melodic style typically from Sweden with bands such as Dissection, Dawn, Sacramentum (although I consider their first and imo best album, straight up black metal), Unanimated, Necrophobic, etc.
Then there is stuff like Ackercocke, Behemoth, Belphegor, etc, which I'm not really a fan of. Seems to be death metal with some black metal influences.

War/bestial black metal is typically far more aggressive with much rawer production and full of chaotic blasting.
Stuff like:
Blasphemy - Fallen Angel of Doom
Beherit -The Oath of Black Blood
Antichrist - Sacrament of Blood
Teitanblood - Seven Chalices
Proclamation - Advent of Black Omen
Archgoat -The Light-Devouring Darkness

By no means does this cover everything, but it's just to give you an idea. As I said at the start, you should just listen to them to get a feel for the differences.

 

[EspaDa]

The best blackened death metal example are albums like Behemoth's Satanica or Demigod. I'm not a fan of a term War Meral tho.

 

[Krow]

Calling war metal chaotic is probably the best way to explain it, especially versus all the other bands generally accepted as black/death. It generally has pretty shitty production quality too. Tends to be a bit monotonous (not much differentiation track to track) and albums don't generally last over 35 minutes.

@Phylactery is right though, hearing it will make the difference more apparent.

 

[Manic Ferocity]

I think it's easier to listen to them to see the difference but,

There are different strains of blackened death metal, the more melodic style typically from Sweden with bands such as Dissection, Dawn, Sacramentum (although I consider their first and imo best album, straight up black metal), Unanimated, Necrophobic, etc.
Then there is stuff like Ackercocke, Behemoth, Belphegor, etc, which I'm not really a fan of. Seems to be death metal with some black metal influences.

War/bestial black metal is typically far more aggressive with much rawer production and full of chaotic blasting.
Stuff like:
Blasphemy - Fallen Angel of Doom
Beherit -The Oath of Black Blood
Antichrist - Sacrament of Blood
Teitanblood - Seven Chalices
Proclamation - Advent of Black Omen
Archgoat -The Light-Devouring Darkness

By no means does this cover everything, but it's just to give you an idea. As I said at the start, you should just listen to them to get a feel for the differences.

Pretty much, but I find "war" metal to be a silly term and typically have an easier time simply calling them different styles of black/death metal.

 

[Manic Ferocity]

"War" metal is what happened when record labels decided they wanted to market bands playing in the Blasphemy/Beherit vein under the elitist pretense of being the most extreme bands on the planet. I have a hard time believing a lot of those bands actually wrote their music prior to their recording sessions.

 

[Phylactery]

I'm not a big fan of the term either, but I think genre tags are useful when looking for similar music. To call everything I described as black/death metal doesn't help much because of the different styles. Blasphemy/Beherit worship has its own style and so it needed a tag I guess to make it easier to find similar artists.

Is the term "deathened black metal" a thing or is everything that's a hybrid just called blackened death metal or black/death metal? Blackened death metal seems to imply it's death metal with black metal influences. Is it still used to describe black metal with death metal influences?

 

[RedStorm]

Blackened death metal is death metal with very slight inclusions of black metal such as tremolo picking and that bullshit, they also have more "satanic" themes. War/bestial black metal has more of a very blackened thrash feel with a much more violent feel, you can't really get more deep into chaos then Bestial black metal like Morbosidad and arch goat. Really the only thing that tops it are the more vicious strains of american black metal.

Blackened death metal is typically more melodious and listenable, Behemoth is probably a band that a lot of people here have listened to and would be considered blackened death metal

 

[Manic Ferocity]

I always considered Beherit black metal and I felt the same about Blasphemy for a while. I don't know. Black metal is a lot of different things and there's a lot of demographic relevance involved causing a divide in sound based (mostly) around location. It's probably the most arbitrary sub-genre of metal.

 

[Serjeant Grumbles]

I'm not a big fan of the term either, but I think genre tags are useful when looking for similar music.

I accept the term "bestial black metal", but I think "war metal" is a pretty useless term to search for, as you'll find bands like Sabaton tagged as such.