Controversial opinions on metal

[Funerary_Doom]

^ Agreed wholeheartedly with that.

On the topic of NSy bands, I really loved a lot of the folky stuff from bands Temnozor (though not really BM), Velimor and Gontyna Kry. I prefer Eastern BM over Norwegian BM any day.

 

[crimsonfloyd]

Love Gontyna Kry (particularly Welowie) but haven't heard the other two you mentioned. Need to check them out.

I'd say Norway and France are the cream of the crop when it comes to black metal, but Poland certainly deserves to be in the conversation.

 

[J.]

I've never ventured beyond welowie. Is it worth it?

 

[Funerary_Doom]

France has awesome BM too. The Norwegian scene seems overrated to me… at least these days. I really can't think of a new fresh band from Norway… if you can name a few though i'm totally willing to have a change of heart.

J: I really liked Krew Naszych Ojcow also. Here's a track from it:



Edit 2: I found Velimor. This song is called Fog. It gets really folky and pretty towards the middle.


edit: Kroda is also a good one too.

 

[crimsonfloyd]

I've never ventured beyond welowie. Is it worth it?

Nothing is on par with Welowie, but I do enjoy the rest of their discography. Pusty wieczór and Krew Naszych Ojcówis are both really atmospheric with lots of ambient and folk passages. Very dreamy stuff. The other two are more conventional black metal albums and are both solid.

France has awesome BM too. The Norwegian scene seems overrated to me… at least these days. I really can't think of a new fresh band from Norway… if you can name a few though i'm totally willing to have a change of heart.

Oh, the Norwegian scene is just about dead. Enslaved is the only band who still releases anything worthwhile. However, based on what was released in the 90s alone it still ranks #1 all time in my book. If we're talking about contemporary scenes, it wouldn't even be in the conversation.

 

[Avigrus]

IMO, MGLA from Poland are just about one of the best BM bands today...

With Hearts Toward None was amazing!

 

[Manic Ferocity]

I've struggled to find anything as memorable as Thousand Swords in Graveland's discography. Carpathian Wolves and The Celtic Winter are probably second next to the aforementioned album but they still don't quite live up to it. I should probably give the other albums more listens.

 

[Nephilim96]

Oh, the Norwegian scene is just about dead. Enslaved is the only band who still releases anything worthwhile. However, based on what was released in the 90s alone it still ranks #1 all time in my book. If we're talking about contemporary scenes, it wouldn't even be in the conversation.

Considering the fact that Norway has like 9 people, it's not a surprise.

 

[HamburgerBoy]

I'll take Drottnar over most other present-day black metal bands.

 

[Eligos]

Even the skilled rifftcraftsmen like Lake of Blood?

 

[HamburgerBoy]

Never heard of them and apparently they're from the USA. When I saw YouTube uploads had them described as atmoblack I expected that you were just trolling, but they actually seem fairly decent. Actually you might have been trolling and maybe they're a token black metal band to hate on and I'm just unaware.

On a related note, I finally listened to Aeternus' Beyond the Wondering Moon (well, about three songs and assorted parts from other songs) and while I know the whole "It all sounds the same dude" insult is usually a sign of not giving something enough time or attention, I got that feeling really strongly. I mean, full on "Wait, this isn't the exact same song mis-tagged, right?" feelings of repetition. Every day I am dismayed at how low the standards of the average black metal fan are.

 

[romanticism]

"It all sounds the same dude" is a relatively fair (not accurate, but fair) insult for, say, Blasphemy or early Bathory, but an inability to differentiate between songs like "Sentinels Of Darkness" and "Winter Tale" certainly draws into question either 1) your ear or 2) ...what if every black metal album BurgerBoy has ever hated was just a pornogrind or slam death album that some troll mistagged?

 

[The Butt]

That album is great, quit being a knuckle-dragger Burgerboy.

 

[Onder]

Dude HamburgerBoy, you don't like black metal, we get it.

 

[HamburgerBoy]

"It all sounds the same dude" is a relatively fair (not accurate, but fair) insult for, say, Blasphemy or early Bathory, but an inability to differentiate between songs like "Sentinels Of Darkness" and "Winter Tale" certainly draws into question either 1) your ear or 2) ...what if every black metal album BurgerBoy has ever hated was just a pornogrind or slam death album that some troll mistagged?

Well, it isn't necessarily songs on a whole as much as it is a scarcity of ideas, especially when they go into that slower what-I-suppose-is-supposed-to-be-"epic"-or-lofty-or-something sound. With 7+ minute plodfests it's easy to switch up the order in which such ideas appear, but ultimately it doesn't do the job. Dynamics mean shit when you build up and ease out to the same kind of sound every time. Admittedly they just have kind of a boring and unenergetic sound overall. Think newer Iron Maiden; yeah the songs may be long and have multiple bridge sections and shit but the riffs are just kind of there and the melodies are entirely boring. Sitting through Sentinels of Darkness in its near-entirety, then going into Sworn Revenge after the blasty bit at 1:30, then immediately with Vind's intro, they all have basically that same fucking 3/4 distorted strum a-strum-a-strum rhythm. Iron Maiden? No, I take that back, it's basically the college rock approach to riffcraft. Fuck that unmetal noise. Winter Tale does basically the same thing too, btw.

Like I said I didn't listen to it in full and just happened to get those three songs on YouTube in order so maybe I accidentally got the worst possible track-order. Still, usually I can tell when cursory sampling is greatly harming the music vs when there is almost no possible way that I will find something worth appreciating. The black metal parts sounded decent/passable, but the rest is irredeemable.

Dude HamburgerBoy, you don't like black metal, we get it.

I love Mayhem and like some other stuff, even if my preferences generally don't go beyond the very early 90's.

 

[Kara-Shehr]

This really isn't a controversial opinion and I didn't want to post this in the black metal thread because I didn't want to clutter it up but I've noticed over the years that we have quite a few fans of Summoning on this forum.

I'm currently beginning to explore their stuff and I'm just curious as to why so many people are attracted to them besides the obvious Tolkien fan appeal. They seem to be quite popular on last.fm as well. I've owned Oath Bound for awhile but I've never really had a significant interest in the band until now.

I bought Stronghold and Old Morning's Dawn the other day and I'm enjoying Stronghold currently. I'm just looking for some perspectives on their music by fans or even the people who don't like them. Which I'm sure we have plenty of both here. Just interested in discussing them, thanks.

 

[crimsonfloyd]

Their popularity is based on a few things: 1. they're extremely accessible and probably one of the least dark black metal bands to become popular 2. their music is extremely catchy and 3. there is a lot of crossover between fantasy nerds and metalheads.

Summoning is good, but it's pretty surface music. All they ever do is repeat a catchy melody for fucking ever until they've pounded it into the ground and got it stuck in your head. Then you hum it all day and because of that feel the need to go back and listen to again because you can't stop thinking about it. But after a few listens it gets boring and obnoxious because in truth there's no depth to their music. Summoning basically applies the principles of modern pop music to black metal and puts a geeky spin on it.

In sum, they're pretty good at what they do, but what they do is formulaic and not nearly as deep or special as many of their fans make it out to be.

 

[HamburgerBoy]

Yeah, they can't possibly hope to match the level of minimalist brilliance found in all those other black metal bands that repeat a melody a thousand times.

 

[crimsonfloyd]

It's the difference between sacred and profane sounds. For example, someone like Burzum is using repetition in the same way it is used in Indian mantra music and other spiritual chanting. The aim of that kind of music is to bring the listener into touch various primal energies through the repetition of certain sound patterns through which the listeners brain and body is brought into a particular attunement. It's essentially meditation music. Summoning, on the other hand, just use neoclassically tinged pop hooks. That sort of sound has a very finite shelf life.

Now granted, there are a ton of DSBM bands that repeat the same melody for fucking ever and THINK they're doing something deep but are actually just creating a boring 70 minute album containing a grand total of six riffs, but when an artist has the right reason and the right understanding of the purpose of repetition, then it totally works.

 

[dwellerINTHEdark]

Ah Summoning. One of the greatest acts in metal. The music is rich, sweeping, majestic, triumphant and evil at once. The abundance of reverb enhances the experience. Lyrically the music is obviously appealing to fans of fantasy. Musically it is accessible to most extreme metal fans, though track duration may be a problem for some. Each release is pretty similar but so far that hasn't been a detractor. There are two vocalists which keeps things fresh to some degree. I think a big appeal is that it's not your typical black metal so it feels different and refreshing. I find how the vocals are drawn out to be quite relaxing too.