My first exposure to Decapitated came this past Fall. I was making my web rounds and came across a story about an accident the band had been involved in. Being the occasionally morbidly curious guy that I am, I clicked on the story. It told of a tragic car accident that occurred in Russia while the band was on tour.
The accident was bad, claiming the life of drummer Vitek (real name: Witold Kieltyka) and seriously injured vocalist Covan (Adrian Kowanek), who is still recovering. This was a terrible way to stumble across the band, but I am glad I did, as the music is absolutely insane. This, their first DVD release chronicles the earlier years, through 2004 just prior to original vocalist, Sauron, quitting the band. While not directly stating it, this DVD is a nice tribute to the talent that Vitek possessed and was taken from the world too soon.
Decapitated formed in Poland way back in 1996, the band members were teens and pre-teens at the time (Vitek was 12!). It was apparent to those around them that they had the skills that could take them far. They developed their style (which I will guess and call extreme tech death metal, when you hear their music, that will make sense), wrote original songs, and released their first full-length LP, Winds of Creation, in 2000 via Earache Records. They went on to release three more albums before the tragic accident in October of 2007.
The centerpiece of Human's Dust is a 2002 performance in Krakow. The 35-minute set is brutal, heavy, and extreme. Knowing that they were teenagers at the time of this recording is simply mindblowing. I am no judge of this genre, so I cannot say just where in the pantheon of tech death bands they fall, but with the skills on display in this concert footage, they were (are) destined for greatness.
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