Christian death metal

Christian death metal or life metal is a subgenre that blends death metal music with Christian metal. It is defined by death metal’s musical style combined with Christian-themed lyrics, performed by bands whose members identify as Christians. Musically, it remains indistinguishable from traditional death metal, characterized by heavy guitar riffs, blast beats, and guttural vocals. However, the lyrics set it apart, often focusing on Christian concepts such as demons, sin, self and self-denial, divine judgment, and apocalypse. The imagery in Christian death metal frequently mirrors or contrasts with that found in secular death metal, which often deals with violent, gory, or anti-Christian themes. Because of this, some critics view Christian death metal as an oxymoron or a surprising juxtaposition, and it has faced resistance from both secular death metal fans and some within the Christian community.

Christian death metal proper formed in the late-1980s to the mid-1990s through the outputs of Mortification, Vomitorial Corpulence, and Paramaecium in Australia, Opprobrium, Living Sacrifice, and Crimson Thorn in the United States, Sympathy in Canada, and the early work of Antestor in Norway. In the same period, the Christian thrash metal bands Vengeance Rising, Sacrament, and Believer, all from the United States, also included elements of death metal. In the late 1990s and early 2000s, Norway's Extol, Finland's Immortal Souls and Deuteronomium, Sweden's Pantokrator, Germany's Sacrificium, Ukraine's Holy Blood, the United States' Embodyment, Feast Eternal, Possession, Aletheian, Becoming the Archetype, and Tortured Conscience, and Brazil's Antidemon emerged to further develop the genre. In the 2000s, the metalcore bands Underoath, As I Lay Dying, Norma Jean, and Demon Hunter all received labels of Christian death metal, and were some of the leading bands in the general hard rock market. In the latter half of the 2000s, Impending Doom (from the United States) and Blood Covenant (from India) have joined the forefront of Christian death metal.