A friend of mine and I were having an argument earlier about who the best vocalist Mayhem has had is. I say it is hands down Dead, but my friend said it was Maniac. While I like Maniac well enough, Dead had an amazing voice for what he sang, and he was only, what, 21?
Discuss.

.Dead is over-rated, but I'd say the best FRONTMAN they've had.
.I'll say Maniac, just because Attilla's voice can be downright disgusting sometimes.

But really, there wasn't a need for another thread like this.

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lol @ the vocals on deathcrush

actually lol @ that whole ep. what a pile of shit. hilarious drum machine intro then worst riffe ver

then moron yelling

SUCKS

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Yeah Mayhem are kindof Crappy i got a song by them where some guy raps.

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You sure that isn't Methods of Mayhem? Iv'e heard every Mayhem song and there isn't any rap.Tell what the name of it is though....

Anyway Mayhem have got to be one of the most overrated metal bands ever.Seriously the most boring riffs outside of Mortician.

Over here, if you say mayhem sucks, some blackmetal dude will kick your ass. But fact is, I don't see why people think they're so great.

I'll try and find out it was all random downloaded stuff but it was black metal with rapping

And i like Mortician more than Mayhem alot more.

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its not that theyre good, its that they were one of the first.
its like possessed, musical wise its really nothing to gawk at but they have 'kvlt' status if you will because they were one of the first DM bands (if not the first one imo)

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Deathcrush and De Mysteriis Dom Sathanas are their only worthwhile albums, i love Dead's vocals they creep me out

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Dead only sang on Live in Leipzig.
In Deathcrush, Maniac sang..and in De Mysteriis Dom Sathanas, Attila sang.

ah! yea what i meant was i love the vocals on mysteriis, i thought that was dead singing though

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I guess I do not see what everyone is getting at here, as you see, the only singer that Mayhem had that had any talent back in the day was Dead. His vocals on Live in Leipzig are quite chilling. Atilla's vocals sound like crap as he could not hold his breathing properly on the album De Mysteriis Dom Sathanas which created a lot of excess air with his vocal chords. This was because he did not compress them properly. If he had it should have been a straight smooth sound or rough depending on how you like it. But there should have been no wispy weird shit in his voice that ruined the vocals pretty much for me. Maniac's vocals are ok but his talent is not very amazing in singing, at least nothing comparable to Dead's.

See, this guy knows what the fuck he is talking about.

Obviously, but that doesn't mean anything.

I think their best vocalist was Attila then Maniac.I
saw them live with Attila and he is a very good frontman also.
Maybe the song with the rapping is A Bloodsword And A Colder Sun?

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Rapping?? it can't be, real BM masters can't stand the hippidy-hop.

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my view on everything discussed....

Mayhem are over-rated, but to be fair their importance isnt really in the quality of their music, it lies in defining the 2nd wave of BM, through having a tremendously fucked up story almost moreso than any musical attributes.

Mortician are one of the worst excuses for a metal band i have heard.

That Mayhem rapping thing is probably just a hideous remix blending black metal and rap
*shudder*

And Valicks reason for Atillas' vocals sounding crap cant be taken as valid; if you say someones vocals are crap because they weren't compressed properly, that has no reflection on his actual voice, it's all down to the recording/mixing of the record.

I'm not a massive Mayhem fan, but if I was forced to choose a favourite, I'd go for Dead. but thats just me.

I think I may be the only one that likes Mortician (somewhat).

I like Atilla the best.

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I dont like them, in fact I really cant stand listening to them for more than a track, Burzum is the epitamy of shit though. I think alot of poeple say they are their favorite band simply because its black metal and they really made a story behind that band.

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nah, for myself, burzum is all about atmosphere and mood. thats why i think hlidskjalf is as good as hvis lyset tar oss, even though its vastly instrumentally different

i legitimately like burzum and will defend that i like the music and not the story

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Eh, Mortician is okay. It's the lame music they play is why I think everyone hates them but for some reason I like. But this thread isn't about them so I'll stop right here.

Dead was good not great, probably one of the best Mayhem has had over the years. Atilla,on the other hand, is the cheesiest vocalist I've heard in any black metal band. Sounds like he's trying way to hard to be "grim" to me. Yet I enjoy the way Maniac sings on Chimera, even then I think he's trying to be grim or he was eating a chicken bone during recording. For some reason I like the whole choking-while-screaming thing. Mayhem is one of the very few black metal bands I enjoy.

I have no idea where I was going with that.

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I just don't know what it is. I like a fair share of grim frostbitten blakc mettle, it's just that the most praised stuff is usualy so...boring..

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I love Attila. But choosing between Dead and Maniac, I go for Dead.

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Atilla! I have never heard a vocalist like him before, he's fucking crazy. Dead may have been a more passionate vocalist, but as far as originality goes I'd have to go with Atilla. Black metal is about being minimalistic and expressing deep emotion within subtlety. It isn't about who has the coolest melody or breakdown. It's hard for people to understand this style because it is the complete antithesis of modern day music.

It's spelled Attila, and I too feel that he was the best. Hell, it'll be interesting to see what happens with him back in the band. I feel Maniac did a great job with the way Mayhem's sound had changed after "De Myteriis...", but there's just no denying Attila's contribution to that album. It had such a cold, evil feel to it and his vocals just added to that affect. And he wasn't so one-dimensional, going from rasping, snearing, to chanting and everthing in between. That was just how he best felt to express what he was hearing musically with his voice. Check out some of his other works, he does a lot of different things vocally and otherwise. As Vomitor said, originality. And it's not to take away from any of them particularly as they all were distinctive for what Mayhem was doing during each of those phases.

picky bastard.

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Hmmm... I guess they are indeed over-rated. There are loads of black metal bands that are much better than Mayhem. The most depressing thing when thinking of black metal is the very low quality of mostly everything earlier than 2000...

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