Black Metal.

Hardly. While there's no denying that Inquisition owes a great deal of their sound to Pure Holocaust, they've continually been refining their unique take on black metal (particularly with Dagon's infatuation with layering dissonant broken chords, which are utilized with a degree of finesse that few BM bands can compete with) and progressing, conceptually, with each album. I almost feel like Ominous Doctrines... helped codify their entire back catalog, as every album before it seems to be anticipating what they achieved on that release. Say what you will about the vocals, but don't discredit Inquisition for calling upon the established classics to inform their distinct approach to making black metal instead of just tossing out the playbook, so to speak, and starting from scratch (which results in HIV+ failure 99% of the time).

I went back and listened to "Ominous..." and you're right, there is some pretty cool use of dissonant riffs on the album. I was a little too hasty to call it regurgitation. Still, I do find the album too formulaic and predictable.

I have no problem drawing from the classics and I would point out WiitTR obviously are heavily inspired by In the Woods, early Opeth and Burzum. Liturgy obviously have a lot of Emperor in their sound with all the neo-Romantic riffs. Everyone is drawing from someone else, the question is can you create something that is your own.
 
An article in the New Yorker is going to have a cap on the word count. There may very well have been a draft of the article that went into more detail on the history of BM and noteworthy bands, but the article has to get to the point sooner or later, which is that WITTR and Liturgy are examples of black metal emerging as a more significant underground genre in America. Spending 200 words on the 2nd wave really doesn't have anything to do with that. And being the New Yorker, it's going to have New York bands mentioned, and it's going to have varying degrees of pretentiousness in the tone. It's the New Yorker. This is about as good an article as you're going to get in a mainstream publication.

I get people saying they don't like Krallice or Liturgy, but they're both doing something a lot more original than the previous wave of USBM bands circa 2000 that were not particularly unique. I think Krallice is better at writing melodies (but they sort of lost it on their last album) while Liturgy is doing things rhythmically that are completely new to black metal. I think they've got a ways to go in terms or writing memorable riffs that retain the technicality they seem to be going for. This song is a bit simpler and more effective. [ame]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lx3aMrp9A08&feature=related[/ame]

Other times they do not sound particularly like black metal at all: [ame]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5ZTWWS3k5sc&feature=related[/ame]
 
I don't think that article was anything to particularly get your knickers in a knot over. The focus was on USBM. There's no law that says when discussing music, art, film or literature that you have to go back to the absolute genesis of a genre and then discuss everything chronologically before you get to whatever artist you want to talk about.

I'm not advocating WITTR style black metal over anything the predates it, because I really don't like it, but there's no sense in getting upset over an article like this. Given where it was published and the subject matter, was it ever going to be anything else?

I will say this though, here's how to approach black metal. Don't be a fucking faggot.
 
The point is not that the author didn't go through all of the developments leading up to the USBM that the article was about or that he didn't spend enough time on second-wave bm. The point is that the little bit that was written on second-wave bm was lazy and sub-wikipedian. It's not how much he said, it's what he said. Yeah, I guess I'm expecting too much out of a writer for The New Yorker. Doesn't mean I can't still have my nerd rage.
 
I think it would help to clarify that (in my opinion) Liturgy truly are not black metal. Wolves in the Throne Room and Krallice are closer, but Liturgy should not be classified under the black metal umbrella, and if they insist that they should be, I think that's a serious oversight on their part.

The truth is that over the past several years, a new genre has rapidly been emerging that has its roots in black metal, but is something different. Liturgy is the new face of this genre simply because of their identifiable differences from black metal. Other bands that I would deign to classify in this new category, but that still fall somewhat close to black metal, are: Fen, Altar of Plagues, Deafheaven, Castevet, Cobalt, to name a few.
 
I think the fact that they have a release called "Aesthetica" should have given it away that their relationship with black metal is superficial at its most charitable.
 
Has anyone ever heard of a band called Inherit? They released an EP called Imortell back in '95. According to metal-archives, they're from Norway and play black/doom. Only recently were they added to Metal-archives.

I like obscure 90s black metal and it was cheap so I ordered it. However, it's not too often that I make a completely blind purchase like this. However, I can't wait for this to arrive to hear what it sounds like! I was just wondering if anyone knows anything about this band at all, or this release.
 
I don't understand why USBM and European BM have to be diametrically opposed. I consider Leviathan, DsO, Negura Bunget, Farsot and Krallice to be cut from the same grain. They're all progressing the genre splendidly.

So some flashbang journalist wrote an article about USBM and compared apple to oranges. Who gives a shit.
 
Exactly.

Good Black Metal is good Black Metal regardless of where it comes from.
 
I don't understand why USBM and European BM have to be diametrically opposed. I consider Leviathan, DsO, Negura Bunget, Farsot and Krallice to be cut from the same grain. They're all progressing the genre splendidly.

So some flashbang journalist wrote an article about USBM and compared apple to oranges. Who gives a shit.

Cool, so I'm still awesome for liking those bands. It's been near two years since I've kept up on any metal so I was SOOOO concerned about being an outdated, pathetic trendster.
 
I don't understand why USBM and European BM have to be diametrically opposed. I consider Leviathan, DsO, Negura Bunget, Farsot and Krallice to be cut from the same grain. They're all progressing the genre splendidly.

So some flashbang journalist wrote an article about USBM and compared apple to oranges. Who gives a shit.

uh

lol