Post by Barrigard on Aug 14, 2006 19:31:54 GMT -6
After some deliberating and procrastinating about just what this section will be about I figure the best place to start will be the basics.
This is a paper I wrote for English about a year ago, I'll admit it was a bit rushed and really only half of what I wanted but I figure it gets the point accross well enough.
Death metal, the name its self represents harsh extremes. Death; the end of life, the opposite of living. Metal; cold and hard, used in products that require strength such as chains and hammers. Such a name barely begins to describe a culture that primarily revolves around being as extreme as possible. Before any prejudgments about death and black metal can set in, it is important to remember that there is inherently nothing “better or worse”, “Likeable or unlikable” about any genre of music. Because there is such a wide range of people in the world compounded by the very specific idiosyncrasies of artists, a wide range of musical styles and musical personalities exist. Everyone from Back to B.B. King, to Varg Vikernes himself, the most controversial figure in all of black metal, have had devout fans and opposition that has on occasion become violent. How is it then that some music became to dominate the industry and others remain underground, is it their sound, their messages? It is merely a combination of finding even a small cult audience in one city, then being chosen by promoters such as record labels, finding good advertising partners, and radio disc jockeys, all of whom expose the music to a wider audience, that gives a any form of music its leg up into cultural dominance. Black metal was not very rich in such fortune.
From the early 1980’s to early 1990’s heavy metal dominated the mainstream music and youth culture, a culture that was thriving at strength unseen since the Woodstock. Some metal historians look back on this period as a “Golden Age” when such “trad-metal” acts like Judas Priest, Iron Maiden, Metallica, Def Leopard, and Black Sabbath dominated the radio, MTV, and thousands of black t-shirts. Metal was everywhere, guided by big record labels promotion, once K-Mart started carrying Metallica’s Master of Puppets, metal music and culture found its way into the homes of middle America every bluelight special. As high as metal seemed to be commercially, it was ultimately betrayed by the media when attention turned to Kurt Cobain and the Seattle grunge movement. Unknown to the majority of the public however, the golden age of metal had spawned a subgenre still in its adolescence when media and record labels decided it wanted nothing more to do with heavy metal. The name of this subgenre was derived from the first band to be counted among its ranks, an English extreme thrash-metal band known as Venom, the genre was named after the title of their second album Black Metal. The dark, morbid, and satanic themes portrayed in Venom’s earlier work turn out to be mostly for show, regardless of their insincerity Venom set precedents such as referring to band members by mythological or satanic names, such as Venom’s Cronos (Greco-roman mythology) and Abaddon (taken from Anton LaVey’s The Satanic Bible), and using extremely twisted guttural vocals (although nothing in comparison to their descendents).
While most musical writers agree that extreme thrash bands like Venom influenced black metal lyrically, it was accompanied by the progressive metal of Merciful Fate that would set a musical standard to be creatively imitated by the extended genres of black metal the would emerge in the late eighties and into the nineties.
It was in Norway and Sweden that the originally just for show themes of Venom were interpreted very seriously by the youth leading to a rise in more serious and heavier black and death metal bands, thriving in the closed off scene of young Scandinavia, having a very limited audience and budget whilst being scorned and feared by the general population. Because black metal was not lifted to the top of the commercial music industry by MTV publicity and big wealthy record company like their heavy metal forefathers, black metal survived as a mostly closed society limited by both the social geography of Norway and Sweden. It was the ideal place for the growth of the most radical, and controversial forms of music in our modern day: Death and Black Metal.
Because of the important role Venom played in influencing black metal one may be lead to believe that thrash metal its self spawned black and death metal. This is not the case. The most important concept to remember when examining black metal’s early days is that black metal technically stood no better chance of becoming a dominate musical force in the commercial MTV world then thrash did. The fates of these two extreme versions of heavy metal genres were decided by those who had the power and money to promote the artists, namely very big American record triumvirate Electra, Atlantic, and Warner bros records. Thrash, a predominantly American scene where ultimately chosen to be promoted, not necessarily because “people like thrash better”, but because thrash bands were able to collect a wide following in the local scenes of major American cities, such as in Metallica’s case, San Francisco. The sheer size and number of cites in the U.S. delivered to thrash an audience that was not only bigger then black metal, but also closer and more accessible to big American record companies. Conversely, had black metal centralized in the Unites States and thrash metal come to power in Scandinavia, black metal would have become just as big and well known as thrash. Simply replace the names Metallica and Anthrax with Emperor and Burzum.
However this idea does not yet directly take into account marketability, which happens to be one of the biggest factors in major record, radio, and advertising company’s decision to pick up on a particular band, and therefore elevating the entire genre. It is very easy to say that black metal’s lack of commercial endorsement (and therefore its exposure to the world outside its own local scene) was due to directly to the fact that their music was the heavies, vocal’s most distorted, and their satanic themes and lyrics most offending to the western culture. The truth is that thrash metal, acts such as Metallica, Anthrax, Megadeth, and Slayer, or any other form of heavy metal that experienced commercial success, are just as extreme in their sound and in some cases even more potentially offensive lyrically to mainstream society.
Heavy metal’s lyrical themes of sex, alcohol, and rebellion, although have been used as exaggerated stereotypes, were considered to be very offensive to many people at the time, specifically the parents of fans. In response the Parents Music Resource Center was established by Tipper Gore, Susan Baker, and Nancy Thurmond. The PMRC pursued heavy metal legally, claiming that minors should be protected from the “evil influences” of rock music and eventually succeeded in adding parental advisory stickers to albums with “offensive” material. Ironically the sticker only encouraged more people to buy the records due to all the media coverage and a new sense of “bad”. Despite all this opposition it was the already large heavy metal fan base that turned a destructive force into record sales.
On the other hand, black metal’s fan base remained local and their funding with major record companies dismal at best. Thus, for black metal, the fan base became integrated into the production and promotion of the music. A good example of this is the founder of Deathlike Silence records, Øystein Aarseth, more commonly known to followers of black metal as Eurynomus from the band Mayhem. Aasrseth independently contracted such influential black metal acts like Burzum and Sigh, opened his own black metal record shop called “Helvete” where he made most of his money selling Deathlike Silence CDs via mail-order, thus expanding the influence of black metal to listeners on all continents, although Scandinavia remained the definite home of black metal and their record companies.
Because black metal’s existence was a result of their devoted fan base’s support, black metal bands and celebrities needed to appeal to local fans for their support the same way heavy metal initially relied on large record companies for exposure and CD production. Black metal gathered such support by delving into Pagan themes and promoting an ancient patriotism for pre-Christian Europe, building off of the anti-Christian themes that had saturated the genre from day one. The black metal fans and musicians of Norway embraced this idea, finding a new avenue for such Old Norwegian myths and characters like trolls and monsters, for which there was a severe lack of in their 20th century culture. For the entirety of its 70 + years history, Norway has produced only one major horror film, and all import horror films were severely censored or banned. The black metal underground was able to thrive on themes of old religion and horror, ultimately creating for many fans and musicians a religious experience.
The religious nature of black metal blamed Christianity’s historic cultural takeover for the problems (as they viewed them) in Norway. Varg Vikernes, otherwise known as “Count Grishnackh”, the creative force behind the band Burzum, stated that Christianity in Norway was a “Jewish Implant” in the heads of Europeans. These sorts of ideas led to the burnings of over 100 churches and countless grave desecrations, of which Øystein Aarseth and Varg Vikernes, as well as many others collaborated on. The arson and the vandalism was not mindless hate filled destruction, Vikernes stated from prison interviews that the graves and the churches were specifically chosen because of their connection with the founding of the current society in Norway, all of those churches burned by Vikernes had religious importance and were built over torn down Odinistic holy sites in century’s past.
This period of time in black metal was on a crash course, as arrests were made and most importantly the two most influential figures in the black metal underground, Aarseth and Vikernes, were silenced. In 1993, Vikernes was tipped off to Aarseth’s plans to kill him and responded by visiting Øystein’s apartment to face the issue. Theories range from power struggles to self defense as to why it happened, regardless of the reasoning Varg Vikernes killed Aarseth that night. This triggered his arrest and the arrests of many others involved in the church burnings. With two influential voices silenced, black metal entered and age of intellectual expansion as once inverted counter-culture expanded and influenced new bands and new genres.
Today black and death metal is on the rise commercially in the U.S. and Europe with exposure that is at an all time high. Currently bands that are apart of the New Wave Of Swedish Death Metal (Arch Enemy, In Flames, Dark Tranquility), have gained the most commercial exposure, this is due both to the rise in power of such metal only record labels like Century Media and Nuclear Blast, and mainstream audiences newfound interest in metal once again, after riding the waves of 90’s grunge and the late 90’s Nu Metal scene (Godsmack, Disturbed).
None of this would have been possible had it not been for introspective nature of black metal society, eventually promoting religious and political purity with in the scene. By examining black metal we are able to see what can happen to a musical culture, that is inherently extreme, breaks off and remains isolated for 15 years. Such a fate could have befallen any other musical genre had they been in the same social and geographic situation.
This is a paper I wrote for English about a year ago, I'll admit it was a bit rushed and really only half of what I wanted but I figure it gets the point accross well enough.
Death metal, the name its self represents harsh extremes. Death; the end of life, the opposite of living. Metal; cold and hard, used in products that require strength such as chains and hammers. Such a name barely begins to describe a culture that primarily revolves around being as extreme as possible. Before any prejudgments about death and black metal can set in, it is important to remember that there is inherently nothing “better or worse”, “Likeable or unlikable” about any genre of music. Because there is such a wide range of people in the world compounded by the very specific idiosyncrasies of artists, a wide range of musical styles and musical personalities exist. Everyone from Back to B.B. King, to Varg Vikernes himself, the most controversial figure in all of black metal, have had devout fans and opposition that has on occasion become violent. How is it then that some music became to dominate the industry and others remain underground, is it their sound, their messages? It is merely a combination of finding even a small cult audience in one city, then being chosen by promoters such as record labels, finding good advertising partners, and radio disc jockeys, all of whom expose the music to a wider audience, that gives a any form of music its leg up into cultural dominance. Black metal was not very rich in such fortune.
From the early 1980’s to early 1990’s heavy metal dominated the mainstream music and youth culture, a culture that was thriving at strength unseen since the Woodstock. Some metal historians look back on this period as a “Golden Age” when such “trad-metal” acts like Judas Priest, Iron Maiden, Metallica, Def Leopard, and Black Sabbath dominated the radio, MTV, and thousands of black t-shirts. Metal was everywhere, guided by big record labels promotion, once K-Mart started carrying Metallica’s Master of Puppets, metal music and culture found its way into the homes of middle America every bluelight special. As high as metal seemed to be commercially, it was ultimately betrayed by the media when attention turned to Kurt Cobain and the Seattle grunge movement. Unknown to the majority of the public however, the golden age of metal had spawned a subgenre still in its adolescence when media and record labels decided it wanted nothing more to do with heavy metal. The name of this subgenre was derived from the first band to be counted among its ranks, an English extreme thrash-metal band known as Venom, the genre was named after the title of their second album Black Metal. The dark, morbid, and satanic themes portrayed in Venom’s earlier work turn out to be mostly for show, regardless of their insincerity Venom set precedents such as referring to band members by mythological or satanic names, such as Venom’s Cronos (Greco-roman mythology) and Abaddon (taken from Anton LaVey’s The Satanic Bible), and using extremely twisted guttural vocals (although nothing in comparison to their descendents).
While most musical writers agree that extreme thrash bands like Venom influenced black metal lyrically, it was accompanied by the progressive metal of Merciful Fate that would set a musical standard to be creatively imitated by the extended genres of black metal the would emerge in the late eighties and into the nineties.
It was in Norway and Sweden that the originally just for show themes of Venom were interpreted very seriously by the youth leading to a rise in more serious and heavier black and death metal bands, thriving in the closed off scene of young Scandinavia, having a very limited audience and budget whilst being scorned and feared by the general population. Because black metal was not lifted to the top of the commercial music industry by MTV publicity and big wealthy record company like their heavy metal forefathers, black metal survived as a mostly closed society limited by both the social geography of Norway and Sweden. It was the ideal place for the growth of the most radical, and controversial forms of music in our modern day: Death and Black Metal.
Because of the important role Venom played in influencing black metal one may be lead to believe that thrash metal its self spawned black and death metal. This is not the case. The most important concept to remember when examining black metal’s early days is that black metal technically stood no better chance of becoming a dominate musical force in the commercial MTV world then thrash did. The fates of these two extreme versions of heavy metal genres were decided by those who had the power and money to promote the artists, namely very big American record triumvirate Electra, Atlantic, and Warner bros records. Thrash, a predominantly American scene where ultimately chosen to be promoted, not necessarily because “people like thrash better”, but because thrash bands were able to collect a wide following in the local scenes of major American cities, such as in Metallica’s case, San Francisco. The sheer size and number of cites in the U.S. delivered to thrash an audience that was not only bigger then black metal, but also closer and more accessible to big American record companies. Conversely, had black metal centralized in the Unites States and thrash metal come to power in Scandinavia, black metal would have become just as big and well known as thrash. Simply replace the names Metallica and Anthrax with Emperor and Burzum.
However this idea does not yet directly take into account marketability, which happens to be one of the biggest factors in major record, radio, and advertising company’s decision to pick up on a particular band, and therefore elevating the entire genre. It is very easy to say that black metal’s lack of commercial endorsement (and therefore its exposure to the world outside its own local scene) was due to directly to the fact that their music was the heavies, vocal’s most distorted, and their satanic themes and lyrics most offending to the western culture. The truth is that thrash metal, acts such as Metallica, Anthrax, Megadeth, and Slayer, or any other form of heavy metal that experienced commercial success, are just as extreme in their sound and in some cases even more potentially offensive lyrically to mainstream society.
Heavy metal’s lyrical themes of sex, alcohol, and rebellion, although have been used as exaggerated stereotypes, were considered to be very offensive to many people at the time, specifically the parents of fans. In response the Parents Music Resource Center was established by Tipper Gore, Susan Baker, and Nancy Thurmond. The PMRC pursued heavy metal legally, claiming that minors should be protected from the “evil influences” of rock music and eventually succeeded in adding parental advisory stickers to albums with “offensive” material. Ironically the sticker only encouraged more people to buy the records due to all the media coverage and a new sense of “bad”. Despite all this opposition it was the already large heavy metal fan base that turned a destructive force into record sales.
On the other hand, black metal’s fan base remained local and their funding with major record companies dismal at best. Thus, for black metal, the fan base became integrated into the production and promotion of the music. A good example of this is the founder of Deathlike Silence records, Øystein Aarseth, more commonly known to followers of black metal as Eurynomus from the band Mayhem. Aasrseth independently contracted such influential black metal acts like Burzum and Sigh, opened his own black metal record shop called “Helvete” where he made most of his money selling Deathlike Silence CDs via mail-order, thus expanding the influence of black metal to listeners on all continents, although Scandinavia remained the definite home of black metal and their record companies.
Because black metal’s existence was a result of their devoted fan base’s support, black metal bands and celebrities needed to appeal to local fans for their support the same way heavy metal initially relied on large record companies for exposure and CD production. Black metal gathered such support by delving into Pagan themes and promoting an ancient patriotism for pre-Christian Europe, building off of the anti-Christian themes that had saturated the genre from day one. The black metal fans and musicians of Norway embraced this idea, finding a new avenue for such Old Norwegian myths and characters like trolls and monsters, for which there was a severe lack of in their 20th century culture. For the entirety of its 70 + years history, Norway has produced only one major horror film, and all import horror films were severely censored or banned. The black metal underground was able to thrive on themes of old religion and horror, ultimately creating for many fans and musicians a religious experience.
The religious nature of black metal blamed Christianity’s historic cultural takeover for the problems (as they viewed them) in Norway. Varg Vikernes, otherwise known as “Count Grishnackh”, the creative force behind the band Burzum, stated that Christianity in Norway was a “Jewish Implant” in the heads of Europeans. These sorts of ideas led to the burnings of over 100 churches and countless grave desecrations, of which Øystein Aarseth and Varg Vikernes, as well as many others collaborated on. The arson and the vandalism was not mindless hate filled destruction, Vikernes stated from prison interviews that the graves and the churches were specifically chosen because of their connection with the founding of the current society in Norway, all of those churches burned by Vikernes had religious importance and were built over torn down Odinistic holy sites in century’s past.
This period of time in black metal was on a crash course, as arrests were made and most importantly the two most influential figures in the black metal underground, Aarseth and Vikernes, were silenced. In 1993, Vikernes was tipped off to Aarseth’s plans to kill him and responded by visiting Øystein’s apartment to face the issue. Theories range from power struggles to self defense as to why it happened, regardless of the reasoning Varg Vikernes killed Aarseth that night. This triggered his arrest and the arrests of many others involved in the church burnings. With two influential voices silenced, black metal entered and age of intellectual expansion as once inverted counter-culture expanded and influenced new bands and new genres.
Today black and death metal is on the rise commercially in the U.S. and Europe with exposure that is at an all time high. Currently bands that are apart of the New Wave Of Swedish Death Metal (Arch Enemy, In Flames, Dark Tranquility), have gained the most commercial exposure, this is due both to the rise in power of such metal only record labels like Century Media and Nuclear Blast, and mainstream audiences newfound interest in metal once again, after riding the waves of 90’s grunge and the late 90’s Nu Metal scene (Godsmack, Disturbed).
None of this would have been possible had it not been for introspective nature of black metal society, eventually promoting religious and political purity with in the scene. By examining black metal we are able to see what can happen to a musical culture, that is inherently extreme, breaks off and remains isolated for 15 years. Such a fate could have befallen any other musical genre had they been in the same social and geographic situation.