The Origin Of The Blastbeat
January 18, 2009Alexis Petridis of The Guardian reports that James Hoare, deputy editor of Terrorizer magazine is agitating to have January 29 declared International Blastbeat Celebration Day. The idea started out as a joke on Good Bad Music for Bad, Bad Times, a remarkable blog written by Erich Keller, a European literature student and former frontman of acclaimed Swiss grindcore band FEAR OF GOD.
"A blastbeat is a kind of very, very rapid repeat hitting of the drums, usually in excess of 180bpms, so it sounds kind of like an apocalyptic typing pool," explains Hoare. "Most people associate it with NAPALM DEATH and EXTREME NOISE TERROR, because there was that period when John Peel was playing them a lot in the late '80s and NAPALM DEATH's drummer Mick Harris came up with the name, but blastbeats crop up in some of the strangest places. The BEASTIE BOYS used one on one of their early punk records, 'Pollywog Stew'." He thinks for a moment. "It's difficult to say what its appeal is, really. I think it's just because it's extreme."
Read the entire article from The Guardian.
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