An analysis of black metal culture...

[black blood]

“No Fun, No Core, No Mosh, No Trends”

 

[Killbot]

Thorns was one of the first black metal bands, not to many people know about the early reputation of Thorns and (Founder)Snorres involvement with the scene. The early rare Thorns demos back in the early 90's are hard to find, but their self titled is a must have it came out in begining of the decade.

The Trondertun and Grymyrk demos are fantastic.

 

[Einherjar86]

If you really want to focus on the culture of Black Metal in Norway you should include some information on the Northern Crusades in your paper. Black Metal and the church burnings were largely in response to the invasion of Christianity into a purely pagan society and culture. Sweden and Denmark actually played a huge role in the conversion of several Scandinavian countries, including Finland, Latvia and Estonia. Soon after Sweden's conversion, the Norwegian kings followed. The first known kings of Norway, Harald Fairhair and his son, Eirik Bloodaxe (yes, that was really his name in Norwegian) were pagans. However, Eirik's brother Hakon the Good (awww, the Christian is always the "good" one) supplanted him and began preaching Christianity to the Norwegians. Harald Greyhide succeeded in seizing the throne from Hakon, but he couldn't hold it. Then Olaf I rose to power, built the first church in Norway and succeeded in basically converting all the vikings to Christianity. The First Wave of Black Metal is mostly a rebellion to this conversion of the ancestral pagans of Norway. This is why the subject matter of the lyrics primarily deals with satanism and atheism. The Second Wave is an attempt to revive the pagan beliefs of old, which is why the subject matter deals more with neo-paganism. There is a great deal of information available on the Northern Crusades, and you can find out more about the conversion of Norway and other parts of Scandinavia in the sagas of Snorri Sturluson. I think it would add a great dimension to your paper!

 

[skeptik]

The only arguably First Wave band that even came out of Norway was Mayhem, actually. And Norwegian Black Metal began as an opposition to Death Metal.

 

[deathonacid]

music?

I'd go for:

Venom
Immortal
Mayhem
Marduk
Behemoth
Emperor
Gorgoroth



that's off the top of my head... am pretty new to this style myself... actually prior to 2007 I hadn;t listened to my metal collection in about 6 years... and it was mostly the popular stuff when I dusted it off... then I dived into Black Metal... definitely has it's moments, as does all metal, and I"m going to my first black metal gig with Immortal in March

to bad I missed Marduk last year... would love for Behemoth to come to Australia...

 

[Stormwatch]

Has black metal ALWAYS been a pretentious middle class thing? Or is this a new development?

 

[MannequinLimbs]

Maybe look into Les Légions Noires.

 

[Cythraul]

Has black metal ALWAYS been a pretentious middle class thing? Or is this a new development?

Metal has always been largely the domain of white middle class males. It's the result of boredom.

 

[skeptik]

I don't really know about Venom's economic standing while they were starting out, but Quorthon was well provided for.

 

[Zephyrus]

By his family or by his government?

 

[skeptik]

His father was a well-off businessman, and was course the infamous "BOSS" mentioned on all Bathory releases and the president of Black Mark.

 

[mutantllama]

Darkthrone interviews:

http://www.geocities.com/funeral_inception/interviews/

 

[Zephyrus]

His father was a well-off businessman, and was course the infamous "BOSS" mentioned on all Bathory releases and the president of Black Mark.

Imagine if Euronymous had parents like that.