Normally if you mention Norwegian black metal to your average
non-metalhead (and indeed to some metalheads) they look at you with a
kind of blank stare. Fair enough, take it one step further and play
your average person some of said black metal and they think you're
fucking nuts for listening to “that noise”. True, black metal as
a genre is really not for everyone (nor was it intended to be) but to
dismiss this genre (in it's original form) as simple “noise”
vastly misses the philosophical backdrop to the music itself.
Before I go any further I feel that I should mention that I am going
to be addressing the specific Norwegian black metal scene of the
early 90's. Like all kinds of musical movements black metal has
spawned many bands who either don't know about the original
philosophical underpinnings, don't hold the same view as the specific
artists that I am discussing in this article or simply don't care and
just want to dress up and look all scary. Not that all black metal
bands since the early 90's are shit, far from it. But I will be
talking specifically about early Norwegian black metal.
Caity and I first watched “Until The Light Takes Us” a few years
ago when I came across it by accident. I had listened to my fair
share of black metal (much of it when I was in my late teens and
early twenties) by the time I came across the film, Caity however had
not. She agreed to watch the film with me (presumably because I
wouldn't shut up about it until we did). When we had actually sat
down to watch the film she found herself becoming more fascinated not
by the music, (to this day Caity does not care for the genre) but by
the philosophic underpinnings to the music and the scene that formed
around it.
The
Music
I have provided links below of some of my favourite black metal
albums so you can listen for yourself if you like. Many black metal
bands were inspired by European metal bands like Bathory, Venom,
Black Sabbath and Celtic Frost. When I describe black metal to people
I usually say “if you hear a tune and the guitars sound like
chainsaws, the double bass drums are thundering rapidly like a
machine gun firing and the vocals are like a tortured soul crying out
for someone to listen then it's likely black metal that you're
listening to. But while the music is a part of this article I will
focus more on the philosophies of some of the original people
involved.
The
film's main subjects are Gylve Fenris Nagell (hereafter referred to
as “Fenriz” as he is better known)
who
is one half of the band Darkthrone and Varg Vikernes (also known as
“Count Grishnackh”) who founded the one-man music project Burzum
and also played bass at one point with Mayhem and guitar with death
metal band Old Funeral. I am focusing on these two men specifically
not just because they are the two subjects of the film that made me
want to dig deeper into this scene but, as Vikernes put it in a 1993 interview “I
really don't care about the scene in Norway! I know only two black
metal acts in Norway: Darkthrone and Mayhem!”
I had listened extensively to the music made by these men but had
never heard them speak or read any interviews with them really (I
have now) and given Vikernes' previous deeds most of what I thought I
knew about him wasn't exactly accurate (more on that later).
Something
I realised from reading about our two main subjects (Fenriz and
Vikernes) was the difference in their focus. Fenriz strikes me as
someone who was more focused on the music than the politics or
philosophy. In a 2012 interview he said “as
we grew up with archetypal heathen bands, and then more and more
satanic throughout the 80s, the same happened with us, and then when
getting older it’s mixed with more heathenism again – but musical
always had me. A VERY big part of me. So this is my main drive, my
main obsession, my main possession; so it is my religion.”
Indeed to this day Fenriz is a promoter of underground bands through
his Band of the Week blog. Interestingly he likes to keep Darkthrone
out of the spotlight, for example in 2004 he turned down a nomination
for a Norwegian Alarm award, saying that Darkthrone had "no
interest in being part of the glitter and showbiz side of the music
industry".
From
listening to an reading accounts of many in the scene I instantly
drew parallels in my mind with elements of the early punk scene. Some
aspects are obvious like how both styles are loud aggressive music and
their proponents are angry about real issues. I can also see the DIY
ethic that so characterises real punk music present in black metal.
Øystein Aarseth or “Euronymous” was running a record label and a
small record shop that dealt in extreme metal music for example (more
on him later). I also thought of this when, in a scene in the movie
Fenriz is talking about how the recorder he used to record riffs
broke so he went looking for a new one, a guy he know offered him an
expensive recorder for something like two thousand kroner but (that
not being what he wanted) he found one he liked for fifty kroner that
recorded but didn't play back and bought that one instead.
It's
also an interesting note that Vikernes mentions that when making the
first Burzum album he intentionally used the worst mic he could find
(which ended up being a headset) and the worst amp he could find also
and the effect is plain for those who have ears to hear in the album.
Although while Fenriz's focus seems to be on music, Vikernes' seems
to be more on philosophy and Fenriz would not be involved in some of
the extreme behaviour shown by that of some other bands.
Murder,
Suicide and Church Burning
On
16 May 1994, Vikernes was sentenced to 21 years in prison (Norway's
maximum penalty) for the murder of Øystein Aarseth or “Euronymous”
(the guitarist of the band Mayhem, he was also founder and owner of
the extreme metal record
label
Deathlike
Silence Productions
and record shop Helvete)
the arson of three churches, the attempted arson of a fourth church,
and for the theft and storage of 150 kg of explosives. However, he
only confessed to the latter. Vikernes maintains (as far as I have
read) that the murder was self-defence and that he was not
responsible for the church burnings (although he supported them).
Now, as I have said above what interested me about this scene so much
was the philosophy that inspired the music. I am not going to dwell
on whether Vikernes' crimes were self-defense or not, I wasn't there
so I don't know. However, what is important is to illustrate the
extreme nature of this scene as it's quite unlike any other I am
familiar with. There is another member of Mayhem who met an
unfortunate end that I feel I should mention before going any
further.
One of Mayhem's lead singers Per Yngve Ohlin or “Dead” was
another example of the extreme nature of the scene. He is known for
his stage antics and presence. Mayhem's drummer Jan
Axel Blomberg or “Hellhammer” described him as the first
black metal musician to wear corpse paint, he would also bury his
clothes before shows and dig them up to wear on stage and cut himself
with a knife while performing shows. Dead committed suicide on 8
April 1991 and, again (to show the extreme nature of this scene)
Euronymous took some pictures of his dead body and one of the images
appeared on the cover of the bootleg live album “Dawn of the Black
Hearts”.
I recount these stories, not to titillate or talk up these actions
and certainly not to defend anyone. I bring them up rather to
illustrate the fact that this is an incredibly unique musical
environment with a high degree of violent behavior. But then we have
to ask the question; what was the motivation for this violent music?
Philosophical
Underpinnings
Although
there are many uses of satanic imagery in black metal I was
interested to find out that many of it's proponents were in fact far
from being satanists. Many of the people in the black metal scene
were actually more interested in pre-christian European religion and
values and in quite a few cases the word “heathen” is probably
more accurate than “satanist”. In fact some of the main themes
that came up in my reading of interviews were anger at the
christianization and also the americanization of Europe. Of course I
am not going to detail all the history of the christianization of
Europe in this article as a full examination of this topic is very
complex and could fill several books.
So what about the belief that many of these folks were satanists?
Vikernes* explains on Burzum.org in his own words that there were no
“devil worshippers” in Europe and what Judeo-Christians call
“satanism” is really pre-christian (pagan) European religion. In
the film Vikerenes also mentions that later church burnings were done
by young copycats who sprayed satanic graffiti at the sites
“thinking that's what it was about”. I personally flirted with
Satanism in my teen years and much of my interest in it came through
being horrified by my roman catholic upbringing and wanting to run to
what I thought of as the opposite of christianity (I didn't realise
that by running to satanism I was still within the judeo-christian
(or abrahamic) mindset and a truer rebellion would be to reject the
whole thing completely) I had been brought up with and here we must
draw a distinction. There are two forms of satanism. The more popular
form of “LaVeyan satanism” espoused by Anton LaVey and the Church
of Satan and the Satanic Temple do not believe in a literal being
called Satan. Rather they see Satan as the ultimate symbol of
rebellion throughout history. This differs from “theistic”
Satanism, proponents of which supposedly hold that there is such a
being as Satan and worships him accordingly (although I have spoken
with LaVeyan satanists I have never spoke with anyone involved with
or read anything about theistic satanism.).
But
with those definitions aside it seems quite reasonable, given the
anti-christian sentiment that runs throughout black metal music that
satanic imagery would be employed. The real point of a black mass is
to mock christianity for example. The fact that satan is a major
figure of rebellion in history (as I have mentioned) and the fact
that black metal music is (for the most part) a rebellion against
christianization and also the shock factor to the average person
present in satanic ceremonies and black metal gigs makes them (in my
mind) a perfect match. Because when you think about it they are
standing in contrast to the christian norms of society, they are
tapping into the rebellion that satan has embodied for over a
thousand years and still does to this day. Try walking up to an
average person on the street and saying “Hello,
I am a satanist. Would you like a pamphlet about satanism?” Or
even just try bringing up satanism in the average work place (I have
tried this, and it is hilarious if you don't mind people thinking
you're a bit weird). But if we put satanism to one side for the
moment and move back on to the topic of the christianization of
Europe.
As I have said a full explanation is so far beyond the scope of this
article. However this is a subject that has always fascinated me.
Despite (as I have mentioned) being brought up in a roman catholic
household I was taken to certain ancient megalithic sites in Ireland
as a child and this instilled in me an interest in Celtic, then Norse
mythology. I spent quite a while (and still do) wondering why so many
people who called themselves traditionalists were also christians. I
can recall many instances when I would bring up the fact that there
were traditonal folk religions (pagan if you like) that were
particular to this part of the world before christianity spread from
the Middle East outwards. Now, before you run to the comments section
to scream “NAZI!” Let me explain that I am not racist and that I
am not someone who harbours national socialist views (I know there
are many into these subjects that are like that but I am not one of
them) I identify as a libertarian politically and am I certainly not
someone who wants an all-white Europe.
I found myself wondering why the christians I knew thought that
polytheism (belief in many gods) was ridiculous and just fairytales
but monotheism (belief in just one god) somehow was a very different,
serious thing. I began to ponder the question; what makes your one
god more real than say the many Celtic or Norse or even Egyptian
pantheons of gods? Well nothing really, sure many christians proclaim
to have had religious experiences but so have many non-christians.
When I stepped back and really spent time thinking about it I
realised that you could make the argument that the 'old' gods of our
ancestors are more real because they were reflections of aspects of
nature itself and even if you live as far away from countryside as
you can get in a huge city you are still an integral part of nature.
It makes me think of an old Alan Watts lecture I once listened to
where he described the differences between a lot of western art
styles compared with the Chinese style of say a Taoist painter. He
said (and I am paraphrasing here) you could have a painting called
“poet by moonlight” and in the western style the poet would be in
the foreground dominating the picture (like this more modern western
notion of man dominating nature) whereas the Chinese Taoist artist
would have painted a huge landscape and you would have to really look
to find the poet (almost like a “Where's Wally?” or “Waldo”
for my North American friends). The point being that the Chinese
painter has painted the poet – the man as being part of nature not
dominating it. Many in modern life have bought into this very view
that nature is somehow something to be conquered by man, however
nature and humanity are two sides of the same coin.
So if we look at what we know of pre-christian (northern) European
religon we can see that it is firmly rooted in nature. The sun was
worshipped, solstices and equinoxes were celebrated (they still are in
a way, christianity just imposed their own holidays over the existing
'pagan' ones e.g Christmas instead of Yule in Scandinavia, Hallow e'en
instead of celtic Samhain). Sure you might say, why bother with this
nature and harvest shit, we live in modern times. We do indeed live
in a completely unrecognisable world from that of our ancestors but
does the sun not still give life to everything? Do we still not rely
on crops for food? Of course we do, it's just that in our modern
technological age we seem to forget these things. I must say that I
am no technophobe, I use the internet daily to spread my work and
consume the work of others but just because some things change that
doesn't mean that some things don't stay the same.
Just as the christians had covered over the traditional pre-christian
feast days with their own invented holidays they also did this with
many ancient sites sacred to to pre-christian peoples. They built
large churches over many of these sites and this (as I understand)
was the main motivation for the church burnings. It was seen (by
some) as taking the very land back from people they considered to be
invaders.
To bring us back to black metal for a bit, one of the things Vikernes
brings up in the film in question is that not only was the European
culture transformed by christianity – it was almost completely
deleted. When christianity gained control in Europe many of the old
texts (few though they were as many teachings were passed oraly) were
either destroyed or christianized. I have mentioned how the
traditional feast days were christianized above and this was really
all part of a cunning strategy known as “interpretatio christiana”
and this basically consisted of adapting elements of the beliefs,
culture and history of a people to the worldview of christianity. It
has been practiced world wide and when you think about it it is a
clever and devious way to convert a people, you just let them keep
elements of what they previously believed or practised and covertly
mix it with the new christian doctrine and there you go. It's
basically just a gradual move from one belief system to another done
in quite a clever but devious way.
Now, I mentioned corpse paint above and how it was worn by these
bands. Granted, I don't know exactly what was going through their own
minds (this is my interpretation) but with the corpse paint and the
vocals which sounded like a tortured spirit I can't listen to black
metal without hearing the screaming of the ghosts of a past that is
now gone forever.
But you might be thinking that this happened so long ago any why
bother anyway. When I listen to black metal I can hear a frustration
that I have expressed in a musical form. I hear an anger that an
important link to our past was just about deleted from history. Sure
it could have been a worse culture but how are we ever to know? It
was decided that that pagan shit was all to be swept away and frankly
some of my anger comes from the fact that we are not permitted to
know our history, we have been robbed of the knowledge of how we came
to be and the lessons we could have potentially learned from it.
I feel why the americanization thing
comes up with the christianization thing is because it could be seen
as another artificial culture being imposed upon people. I kind of
understand the use of the term americanization, I think it's because
the US is the global superpower culturally and to those of us who
fear a one world government (which has been proposed by many
different people and groups over history) it seems almost like (if I
could don my trusty tinfoil hat for a second) that spreading a world
culture is part of that move. The only country in the world that
would be able to do that is clearly the US.
On the point of Europe I should
point out that since the early days of Norwegian black metal the
European Union has done what all governments do and swollen to become
a massive collectivist, bureaucratic nightmare that only benefits
those on the gravy train. But that is another topic I covered in my
article “A Spectre Is Haunting Europe...”
So why am I bothered enough to write
a lengthy article about all this? Well I don't want to live in a world
with one culture or one government (or any government but that's a
whole other thing). I am not xenophobic and I have friends and
relations in many other parts of the world. I just think there is
value in being aware of the history and mythology of where you (and
indeed others) come from. I have found in black metal music an
expression of not only the cold isolation of northern Europe but also
a message of defiance against abrahamic religion hell-bent on
converting the world to it's view of history and morality and
distorting and deleting whichever elements of the previous cultures
that existed before it that those elite in charge saw fit, removing
not only ancient spiritual practices and festivals but also
destroying much of the mythology. But what importance does mythology
even have? As American mythologist, writer and lecturer Joseph Campbell said better than I ever could in his 1949 book “A Hero
With A Thousand Faces” - “It has always been the prime
function of mythology and rite to supply the symbols that carry the
human spirit forward, in counteraction to those that tend to tie it
back. In fact it may very well be that the very high incidence of
neuroticism among ourselves follows the decline among us of such
effective spiritual aid. We remain fixated to the unexorcised images
of our infancy, and hence disinclined to the necessary passages of
our adulthood”
Some Black Metal Albums
Mayhem - Deathcrush
Mayhem - De Mysteriis Dom Sathanas
Darkthrone - A Blaze In The Northern Sky
Burzum - Det Som Engang Var
*Please bear in mind that I do not agree with Vikernes' politics.
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