By: Navjot Kaur Sobti
Going for the kill and satisfying those sick appetites is Relapse Records – having resurrected the already timeless compositions of Chuck Schuldiner – godfather of all things heavy and true in metal. In an official press release, the label announced that they would be partnering up with Perseverance Holdings Ltd. (a name that, fittingly enough, echoes the crushing, final calls of Death’s last release, 'The Sound of Perseverance') to reissue the full catalogue of EvilChuck himself – covering his work with Death, Control Denied, and Mantas.
One of the leading pioneers of and in metal, since its birth, and still revered legend amongst musicians in the metal world as it exists today, Chuck Schuldiner was most notably known the frontman of Death. And to those fans who have hailed the music that rose from and took shape within the ugliest questions of human existence, mortality, and purpose that he therein chose to confront – 'Scream Bloody Gore', 'Leprosy', 'Spiritual Healing', 'Human', 'Individual Thought Patterns', and 'The Sound Of Perseverance”– they will now be able to relive the gifts of precious Schuldiner memories, resurfaced and respun, via the digital release of all of the aforementioned records, which hit the web on May 11th. (Oddly enough, permission was not given to Relapse Records, to reissue the arguably most legendary Death record – 'Symbolic.') Tomorrow will mark what would have been Chuck Schuldiner’s 43rd birthday – in a life cut short by his long, tumultuous battle with brain cancer. Just two years after his initial diagnosis with pontine glioma, a form of cancer known to invade the brain stem, Schuldiner was on his way to recovery, when he relapsed, in 2000. He passed away six-months after his 34th birthday, on December 13, 2001.
In commemoration of all things left in the wake of Chuck Schuldiner’s legendary metal outputs, Relapse has promised to reissue an expanded version of Control Denied’s 'The Fragile Art of Existence,' a group that he conceived in 1996. This collection will also include music from the Death-progenitor project – Mantas – which has, to date, never been officially released.
In terms of more long-term reissues, Relapse has also promised to complete and release the final Control Denied album, 'When Man and Machine Collide,' which was tracked by Schuldiner (over ten years back), and produced by Jim Morris at Morrisound Studios. To some, the latter plan may appear an infringement on the sanctity of Schuldiner’s last and uncompleted work of music (essentially, art) – a work that was a reflection upon his life, past, and his mortality, which, before the face of his impending death, he chose to comment upon, accept, and express to his fans in honest, true metal form. Thus, with a few steps taken aback from any and all politics, gains, or motivations on the reissued material, it is clear that from the early days of 'Scream Bloody Gore,' through to the present day, it is Chuck Schuldiner's music that has and will continue to burn – mercilessly and without repose – keeping his spirit alive and that metal flowing, as long as there is music to be heard, and an existence to be had.
To access the reissued tunes, as released by Relapse Records, click here.
