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All Naked, All The Time….

Holy Unblack Metal, Batman! An examination of modern attitudes towards Black Metal.

Posted on September 29, 2008 in the News, Rants category

The early 90’s was a very odd time for music. While Nirvana took grunge to the masses in the USA and britpop ruled the radio in the UK, certain Norwegian bands were engaging in church burnings, murder, suicide and creating one of the most controversial music genres known to man. Black Metal. It took the speed and snotty attitude of punk, laced the heaviness and technicality of metal, employed screaming vocals as opposed to the guttural wretchings of death metal, and then drenched it in nihilism, anti-Christian/pro satanic themes and lots of fake blood. Bands like Mayhem, Emperor, Darkthrone, Satyricon, Dimmu Borgir, Gorgoroth took the centre stage of this scene and made it infamous in Europe. Not a lot of scenes can be associated with murdering fellow musicians (except maybe hippedy hop), burning down some of the most famous old churches in your country, anti-social lead singers who buried their clothes in the Earth before performances (Dead, from Mayhem, who lived up to his name by blowing his head off with a shotgun), as well as making some very good music along the way. The fact that now a lot of bands in the scene dissasociate themselves with the violence that happened over a decade ago shows that the genre is changing, and evolving. Dimmu Borgir are now a symphonic black metal band and Burzum, aka Varg Vikernes, (incarcerated for his crimes of arson, as well as the murder of Mayhem’s guitarist “Euronymous”) has took his music to the dark ambient style. Another more famous genre survivor is that loveable troll Mortiis, who, after being bass player for black metal band Emperor, left to take his music to an ambient level, before he became famous with the industrial style of his later albums.

But then came along something strange, almost unbeleivable………. Christian Black Metal. Or, in a play on words from the message printed on the back of a famous Darkthrone album, (Under A Funeral Moon), “Unholy Black Metal”; Holy Unblack Metal. What a mouthful. Incorporating the harshness and brutality of the bands in the scene, but wearing less corpse-paint and having their crosses the proper way up. The scene was started properly by bands like Antestor and Horde, the former of which received threats from the “black metal inner circle” when they operated under the name Crush Satan. Their sentiments were the exact opposite of the anti-religious themes and lyrics of the BM world, and understandably had a hard time getting their voices out there. Today, a lot of bands will downplay their involvement with the Satanic element of BM, most saying they only use the name “Satan” simply as an adversary for Christianity in a metaphorical sense, or even simply for shock value, there is no doubt that Black Metal will always be tarred with the stigma of the murders and violent behaviour that governed its inception. While “Christian Rock” bands like POD and Creed continue to sell millions to the mainstream in the USA, this harsher, more brutal style of music will always be the tricky sell, even if using the popular name of Jesus.

We asked a home grown British Black Metal band Ethernal their thoughts on BM, HUBM and their thoughts on if the two can mix.

NM -What attracted you to the sound of Black Metal?

What I think attracted us to Black Metal is the extreme and dark atmosphere it creates. This dark atmosphere is something that communicates from the creator to the listener feelings and ideas about life, existence, death and is relevant especially today more than ever. It is more than just a form of music to us, it is about how you perceive things and express your view on the world.

NM - Why do you think there are so few British black metal bands operating today?

I disagree, in fact I think there are many ..Black Metal bands.. operating in Britain, it just depends whether you consider them Black Metal or how highly you rate them. The problem might actually be that there are so many BM bands operating that fans are flooded with many similar sounding bands and see this as the ideal and anything different as not true. It might also be due to the fact that in Scandinavia people managed to preserve more of their culture, much more than in Britain; the old religions and gods are still alive there. I think this is why so many of the classic bands of BM came from there because these things go hand in hand with Black Metal.

NM - What separates Ethernal from other BM groups?

Ethernal has always strived to create an original British sound within Black Metal and not to repeat what has come before. We feel we pay more homage to the greats of Scandinavia by doing something different to what they began. What made Black Metal extreme when it first appeared was that it was doing something against the current. To hold onto this ideal becomes a trend and follows the current which is not what Black Metal is about for us.

NM - True BM, especially in Norway, used to be seen as anti-Christian/pro satanic yet there are a lot of black metal bands now who incorporate Christian themes into their lyrics, do you think with it’s history BM and religion can mix?

As we all know the true Black Metal of Norway in the early days for most bands was satanic or pagan and for some bands still is. And inevitably today bands have reacted to that by starting Christian Black Metal bands. Our opinion is that there can be no place for Christianity in Black Metal, anyone who thinks different clearly does not grasp the concept of Black Metal; Black Metal is everything that Christianity is not. I think if a band uses Religion and its values compliment those of Black Metal then yes these can mix and this is totally up to the band.

NM- Will BM ever achieve its notoriety back from the days of Church burnings, suicide and murder of the early 90’s, is it still shocking enough?

What can be more shocking than murders, suicides and Church burnings to an apparently civilised Christian society? Black Metal clearly came out with all guns blazing in the early days leaving very little left to shock people. This got the name of Black Metal out to pretty much the whole world and made the content and message of what Black Metal was about clear. It would be good to say Black Metal has become more about the music today but sadly I don..t think this is the case. It is up to the bands left playing Black Metal to keep the message there, but to explore and challenge themselves with new ways, sounds and instruments to express it. This way the fans who understand the point of Black Metal can still appreciate it without the need for shock value. So no, Black Metal will never be as imposing or as shocking as the mid 90..s in a physical direct sense, but the darkness, mysticism and morbid concepts within the music certainly can still exist and even be built on.

[Many thanks to Ethernal for doing this interview, please help re-pay our gratitude by checking them out here]

Not surprisingly, Ethernal aren’t the only Black Metal band that feel that Christianity and BM do not and never will be able to go hand in hand. The actions and voices of many early bands have made this perfectly clear, when a music style and scene are born out of hatred for a particular ideology, then it’s going to be a hard sell to fight back with the opposite message. But then again, that’s the beauty of the music that we all are drawn towards. BM is a rebellion. It rebelled against the Christian invasion of their lands in Scandinavia. When HUBM came out, it rebelled against the themes that everyone said you needed to be in a Black Metal band. Satanism, hatred, nihilism and misanthropy. Satyricon have openly stated that Black Metal “doesn’t necessarily need to be Satanic, as long as it’s dark”, and I think this goes to show how much the genre is wanting to progress away from it’s dark beginnings. Satyricon have gone a more mainstream style with their last album “Now, Diabolical”, and Dimmu Borgir are now just as symphonic as they are Satanic. But this style of music has been around for over 2 decades now, and you will be hard pressed to find a band that doesn’t want to progress after being around a genre this long. You can now get Melodic Black Metal, Viking Black Metal, Symphonic Black Metal, Blackened Death Metal, Industrial Black Metal, Black Ambient, Black Doom and a host of others! But whether you are looking for an enlightened BM band or an evil one, this is the genre you want to stick with. Just make sure it’s brutal.

[OXKING]

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