Lyrical Subject Matter

well varg does have lyrics that fit the music very well. for instance, erlibcket die tochter des firmaments:

I wonder how winter will be
with a spring that I shall never see
I wonder how night will be
with a day that I shall never see
I wonder how life will be
with a light I shall never see
I wonder how life will be
with a pain that lasts eternally

In every night there's a different black
in every night I wish that I was back
to the time when I rode
through the forests of old

In every winter there's a different cold
in every winter I feel so old
so very old as the night
so very old as the dreadful cold

I wonder how life will be
with a death that I shall never see
I wonder why life must be
a life that lasts eternally
I wonder how life will be
with a death that I shall never see
I wonder why life must be
a life that lasts eternally

if you read these lyrics by themselves, they don't really do much for you. familiar themes of running through the forsest of olde and so on can also be laughable after a while of being exposed to this stuff. but along with the music they help portray a feeling that dani filth's lyrics can't. indeed, other lyrics really would not fit the music at all, and one really appreciates their significance in that context.
dani's lyrics basically consist of one image thrown on top of another (and usually variations on the same theme) and there is little one can really accomplish with that technique. some of varg's lyrics definitely are much more genuine. so are some of the lyrics by anathema on alternative 4, for instance.

of course, when i read poetry, i'm definitely not going for anything penned by a metal lyricist.
 
There are some brutal metal bands who have intellegent lyrics,

Meshuggah are a very brutal band, nevertheless they have some very intellegible and intellegent lyrics:

Dehumanization -

"A new level reached, where the absence of air lets me breathe
I'm inverted electrical impulses. A malfunctioning death-code incomplete
All things before me, at first unliving glimpse undeciphered
Its semantics rid of logic. Nothing is all. All is contradiction

Grinding, churning - the sweetest ever noises
Decode me into their non-communication
A soundtrack to my failure, one syllable, one vowel

A stagnant flow of endings. Un-time unbound. Merging to form the multi-none
A sickly dance of matter, malignantly benign. Greeting the chasm - unbearable, sublime"


where is NFU with his usual sarcastic posts :lol:
 
sure!


Heimdallr

Heimdall is the name of an Old Norse God;
he is called the Old White Norse God;
he is great and holy;
his teeth are made of gold;
his horse is named Goldtop.
He lives where it's called the mountain in the sky besides
Bifrost.
He needs less sleep than a bird;
he sees night as clear as day
one thousand miles away from where he is;
he also hear the grass grow from the soil,
or the wool on the sheep and everything that can be heard.
He possess the horn that is called the Gjallarhorn,
and they can hear him blowing the horn in all the homes.

Because, after all, the true measure of any literary work is the way it reads when badly translated into another language by a non-native speaker. :rolleyes:
 
It's not in Norwegian, it's in 9th century Norse. It's a little like slamming an American for writing awkwardly in Old English in any event.
 
He posted lyrics to a song written when Varg was 17 in his fourth language. That proves what, exactly?
derbeder posted erlibcket die tochter des firmaments, which was written in 1993, surely he was not 17, lol. The lyrics on the later albums don't show substantial improvent. From the translations, the lyrical themes aren't especially interesting either. Like always, Varg is jack of all trades, master of none.
Because, after all, the true measure of any literary work is the way it reads when badly translated into another language by a non-native speaker. :rolleyes:
So what's the literary value of crudely translated norse mythology? Personally, I prefer having a more credible and articulate source than a metal band with a foreign language dictionary.

It's pretty hard to deny Enslaved's later albums have less cringe worthy lyrics because their mastery of english improved.
 
derbeder posted erlibcket die tochter des firmaments, which was written in 1993, surely he was not 17

And the lyrics, as he pointed out, are actually quite good. Please try again, moron.

The lyrics on the later albums don't show substantial improvent.

Horseshit, they're among the best and most conceptually challenging song lyrics ever written. Are they clever and socially conscious? Of course not, but they're emotionally evocative and philosophically intriguing to a degree that has not been matched before or since.

So what's the literary value of crudely translated norse mythology?

It's very possibly the lyrically weakest song on any of their artistically significant albums. Granted, it isn't as painfully stupid as, say, "RUUN," but it's certainly not of the caliber of the other tracks on the album (which, admittedly benefit from their liturgical rather than original nature).