We all know of Siege and Napalm Death but I would actually say swedish punkband Asocial demo from 1980... Discharge where around at the time and sounded a bit more brutal, but Asocial was much faster...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uhUCJeUpWlQ

When talking about Asocial they even blastbeated in 1982!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P-ab_zdpLWs

I'm sure what Swans were doing in the early 80s (Filth, Cop...) was among the most extreme, brutal music that was being done at the time. Hell, it still is today, nearly 30 years later.

I checked it out on Youtube and it was quite awesome, and I usually don't like slow music but that was very special! I liked the song Stay Here

early Killing Joke ("What's THIS For...!" 1981, "Revelations" 1982)

It certainly isn't going to be any rock-based band, that's for sure. Probably something from the early musique concrete era of the late 40s-50s.

I have to say that I think early Swans is a bit too brash and noisy for me, but I do like some of their material.

I think magma is a pretty extreme band. I guess many wouldnt' agree with me. Still, I've often imagined some of their pieces coming across pretty well in a death metal format. "Mekanikdestruktiwkommandoh" is certainly far from easy on the ears, especially for the uninitiated.

In 2010, people still hold this opinion. There we have it, folks. I'll also put forward acts like Nurse With Wound. One track on their first album was just Steven Stapleton screaming in a high pitched voice, playing some pretty bad guitar solos with some feedback and drones in the background. That was '79. A lot of their works are really, really out there, even for avant-garde.

I think Terveet Kädet in 1980 beats Asocial in 1980, in fact TK's output between 80-83 (basically their first 3 ep's and first lp) is some of the best and yes, most extreme hardcore... ever. Nothing against Asocial, though, fantastic band, although I don't appreciate their "metal" stuff as much. Also check out United Mutation and Void, as well as Die Kreuzen's first lp for hardcore bands that were ahead of their time.

In the late 70's a lot of the post-punk stuff coming out in the UK and the US still holds up as being pretty extreme, though generally more out of sheer fucked up-ness than for actual brutality, Annie Anxiety or Teenage Jesus and the Jerks, for example.

Earlier still would be a band called Cromagnon, whose album Orgasm came out in 1969 and features tape loops, sampling and a lot of screaming.

In the teens and twenties, Italian futurist composer Luigi Russolo was making music based on noisemaking machines.

Look up Die Kunst Der Geräusche [german for "The Art of Noise", the name of the Italian futurist manifesto]

(download a recording of a 2003 performance of his works here: http://www.mediafire.com/?08y22r06m1t)

I think extremeness in music is very subjective, even more so than heaviness. I'm sure people have been making noisy music with yelling for thousands of years.

If we're talking about metal, the first band that could possibly pass as extreme would be Venom, but personally I think Death/Mantas would be a good place to start, but some thrash like Possessed could also be considered extreme.. If we're talking about music, I'm sure it's lost in time.

I like to think of Death and Sepultura as some of the earliest extreme metal bands outside of thrash. Again, this is just an opinion so don't spaz out on me.

I'm going to have to throw in 'The Velvet Underground', they were very extreme for their time, the first two albums are very good examples of this. Also 'The Monks' they are from around the same time. Both of these bands have a strange mix between proto and post punk in their sounds.

I would have to go for The Birthday Party in terms of extreme. Not as chaotic as hardcore bands mentioned before but sure is dissonant.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KvlS4BwTUQw

Junkyard was released in 1982

^ Did you know Rowland Howard (their guitarist) died a couple of weeks ago? It's really sad, he was getting a second wind a musician before he died and he used to play excellent, cheap gigs in Melbourne a lot.

It's hard to tell though with a lot of 60's and to some extent 70's bands, because the recording norms normally really neutralize any rough sound they have, so live recordings are normally a better indication of how extreme they were. A good example of this are the Butterflied Blues Band, their recordings are fairly smooth, but they had a really rough treblely, screeching sound when they played live.

I'm going to have to throw Bob Dylan in here for this reason too, some of his live performances are really punky or heavy, particularly during the 65/66 virgin electric trinity tours.

Bob Dylan with 'The Band': Like a Rolling Stone (Live from Albert Hall 1966)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_OWYbZzD7lM

Bob Dylan with The Butterflied Blues Band (live 1965 from Newport Folk Festival)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VslTyc1gBbY

Yeah, heard about it. It's such a shame. Man, I wish I had taken the opportunity to see him play live.

Rowland S. Howard was awesome, I like his stuff with These Immortal Souls and his solo stuff too (but better with a full band than just him alone with his guitar), but it never really got that extreme, maybe as hard as hard gothic:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=orH3GBNY ... re=related

Anyways, back to the topic, I have heard late '70s/ early 80s Finnish metal and it is cool, but not really that extreme, punk stuff like Kaaos was more extreme:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TnSdZXp8t8Q

I'd just like to make a quick mention that Siege is better than you and any bands you like.

CONFORM.

Dropdead is such a gem, something whenever i put on i can't not listen to the whole thing, I love that release.

Can't have a thread like this without throwing in early DRI (Dirtiest, Rottonest...). For my money though, Discharge's "hear nothing..." is what broke the mold of "normal" music, even if it isn't particularly fast.

For metal, Vulcano is a good one to add.

This was what I was going to say.


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rPiO_G-DEHs (black/folk metal elements way back in 1969)



Anything more extreme than that from that time period or earlier would have to be something way outside the blues/country/rock mold of 50's/60's pop music. Something like this, for example, from 1960:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FfBVYhyXU8o

I remember listening to that Cromagnon album, and there was a track consisting of only something like the sound of someone screaming or being tortured.

Negative Approach offcourse. Siege. The Neos. Dorsal Atlantica. There was another band like Siege... can't find it now...

Probably Bad Brains

Wasn't serialism even earlier? Don't know if that works as extreme, but it sure as hell qualifies as "extremely unpleasant".

Agreed. I rate the debut very highly. It's one of my favourite 60's releases. Need to give White Light, White Heat another spin though.

Sister Ray sticks out to me particularly, I guess in one way it's fairly standard psychedelia, but in another most of it from that time is very nice, airy and smooth sounding where as Sister Ray is very harsh.

Plus Lou Reed took some pretty big steps as far as bringing the smut and sleaze to rock n' roll too. Jagger did it a lot as well, but he don't get no transvestite prostitutes and sailors dressed in pink and leather.

I'm surprised no one mentioned the Stooges

Cyanamid from New Jersey. They were using blast beats in 1982.

Univers Zero's album, Heresie, had some pretty brutal death growls.

Their music is also the foundation for Demilich. Check them out.

Yeah, I don't think there had been anything like Raw Power before it. A huge step for both hard rock and punk in my opinion.

I think as far as post-rock n' roll goes early proto punk bands would have to take the cake in this thread as far as over all sound goes.

There was a LOT happening in Finland and Sweden in the early eighties with punk and hardcore. Shitlickers, Tampere SS, Kaaos, The Varukers, Anti Cimex, Mob47 and such.


Siege rules. Clearly

Stravinsky.

Yeah Varukers, Subhumans , Crucifix, Youth Brigade, Dead kennedys, The Exploited and Bad Religion are my earliest songs

Siege, Negative Approach are heavier though. The Neos faster

You really hear the hardcore in the Asocial demo but I do think Exploited are a bit heavier in 1980:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aroTwW-suPA

Varukers '81:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AtRztuzgqsc

Youth Brigade in '82:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=td9j3UWthHo

Negative Approach in '82:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SwBm0FsCJOM

And here's a link of the Neos - End All Discrimination 1982:
http://www.mediafire.com/?nig10tdo1a1

It's THE FASTEST BAND!

And we're forgetting the Boston scene: Negative FX, SS Decontrol, Outpatients, Deep Wound, DYS along with Siege.

Great bands well worth checking out!

Aw man this topic made me pick up some demo's and early singles I didn't get before. Take The Subhumans - 1982 - Reason for Existence for example, awesome!!! Also Crass - The Feeding of the 5000 (1978).

I am amazed noone mentioned them yet, but Angel Witch had a release as early as 78, and were extreme for their time. Also (obviously) Venom, and Mercyful Fate. Enough said.

Wow, no mentions of Throbbing Gristle yet? From their earliest incarnation as COUM Transmissions in the mid-late 60's, I'd say they probably have a tenuous grasp on the earliest extreme band. Granted, they were mostly sound/performance/transgressive art and not really noisy until the 70's, but taking the shock & directness from dada and stripping it of most of its flippancy and replacing with much more morbid sensitivities, they're probably the earliest example of what fits the current definition of extreme (and how much more so with the definition then).

Can't go wrong with Crass & their trademark noise-drone rhythm guitars. If you like Feeding, Stations of the Crass is also fucking fantastic, but for their more 'out there' extreme stuff, Yes Sir I Will is incredibly heavy in a non-musical way, as well as their final release 10 Notes On A Summerday.

I love Swans. Easily the most intense band I know of.

I have to mention the Novas: there an old rockabilly group that essentially invented the death growl.

Hasil Adkins is amazingly rough and energetic. I know some who claim he invented punk.