Possessed is an immensely influential band in the genre of Death Metal. They’re sometimes called the first Death Metal band and that’s pretty much the truth. Their 1985(!!) Album Seven Church’s is a monster of an album. Not just because of the music, but the year in which it was released; in 1985 there was NOTHING heavier then this album. It predates Death’s Scream Bloody Gore by 2 years making Possessed the first death metal band and this album, the first Death Metal album. I’m not counting demos here, as both Death and Possessed had demos out in the span of 1983-1987 when Deaths debut came out.
Band - Possessed
Album - Seven Churches
Year - 1985
Genre - Death/Thrash Metal
Despite its huge influence to the Death Metal genre by basically kicking the whole thing off, this album is still mainly rooted in good old fashion Thrash! You can hear lots of Venom worship in this album. The album kicks off with the Exorcist, a high speed tune with awesome riffs. Though most of the songs on this record can be described as such. It’s a good example of the rawness of the record during the verse the guitars sound like buzz saws or something due to the massive distortion. During the bridge/solo area the riffs clean up and are more defined, the solo here is a bit of wah abuse mixed with some good old fashioned shredding and that’s true for most solos you’ll hear here. Jeff Becerra sounds beastly here and defines death metal vocals all in one swing. Pentagram starts off with some backmasked vocals then breaks into a nice mid tempo riff. Lots of cool lead bits in this song! It breaks into a really thrashy bridge section that last for more of less the rest of the song. Once again, plenty of cool lead stuff in this song. The Lyrics on this album are mostly Satanic/Anti-Christian and death related in nature. This is the standard for a lot of old school death metal as opposed to lots of the gore lyrics that would later be popularized by Cannibal Corpse. Burning in hell is a fast, thrashy tune with a mid Tempo part about halfway through. The title Track has a lot of cool lead bits in the middle of it as well as some truly bad ass riffage! Satan’s Curse has a nice, long solo I dig! The trem picked riff in the middle of Holy Hell drags on a bit to long for my tastes, but all the other sweet riffs make up for it. Fallen Angel’s intro is epic as fuck! It starts with like bells… then the guitar comes in with the bells. After that’s finished up with it goes into thrashing mayhem mode! Great song! The song Death Metal is probably one of the best, simply because it does great justice to the genre named after it.
Most of the songs on this album are short and sweet with the longest song being 5:10 and the shortest being 3:10. All the tunes on this one are simple yet engaging. Despite its huge influence to the Death Metal genre its still strongly rooted in Thrash, which is fine by my, that’s how I like my Death Metal. It’s a bit of a Riff factory, this album. The riffs are a mix of more traditional thrash riffs and driving, trembelo picked riffs. As a matter of fact this might be another example of a first. Trem picked riffs in Thrash, not sure it it’s a real first though. Vocals are brilliant, they fit the music perfectly. They’re harsh and abrasive and probably the most aggressive vocals of 1985. Every extreme metal vocalist probably owes there style to Jeff from Possessed. The lead work is commendable, not so much for the solos but for all the cool lead bits after verses and whatnot. Not to say the solos are nothing special, they’re awesome! You can definitely hear the influence these solos have on Death Metal bands that came later on. The drums are pretty simple but they do their job. Fast, aggressive and pounding drumming is what you can expect here. No crazy technical shit just all the band needs to sound as aggressive as possible. As for bass, you can barely hear it except for a few places but its fine I suppose, its following the guitars. This album is pretty much essential to anyone who even, kind of like extreme metal. If you dig Death or Thrash Metal then you need this if you don’t already have it. I hope you do ;)
Here are some tunes to give you an idea of the albums sound. Not one sub par song is present on this one!
Edit: For some reason I put the number seven instead of the word in the title... Stupic mistake on my part haha
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