Book Review: Choosing Death: The Improbable History of Death Metal and Grindcore

By Albert Mudrian

Thanks to having jury duty last week (which provided 8 hours of uninterrupted reading time), I finally finished this book which I purchased some time ago. Overall it was an interesting read, although a lot of it was along the lines of "this guy and this guy had a band that never played a show but recorded a tape that this other guy got in the mail and then two of those guys formed another band that played one show with this other guy who was later in yet another band." And everyone was named Mark or Mike or Danny or something (except for Chuck from Death and Trey from Morbid Angel). And there were no females involved, with the recent exception of Angela from Arch Enemy (Jo from Bolt Thrower got a one-line quote, though I guess Bolt Thrower is neither death metal nor grindcore).
By the standards of the book, I would not really consider myself a death metal fan (although I'm largely unfamiliar with Death; Morbid Angel, Cannibal Corpse, Nile and the like don't really "do it" for me). Near the end of the book, the author says something like despite the fact that there have been literally thousands of death metal bands, none have really changed the formula or raised the profile of the scene because all those bands sound the same.
On the other hand, I looove grindcore, which is probably because I have a very short attention span and also identify with the political elements present in the lyrics. But since there are so many fewer grindcore bands, the focus of the book is really Napalm Death and death metal.
One thing that did strike me after finishing the book is that metal - especially so called "extreme metal" - is really a small, insular scene. Although thanks to this book, it's one I now know more about so I can act all superior when discussing such things in the future. Sweet.