What new level are you talking about exactly? Help me out here, because everything I hear from this band is entirely derivative of previous BM bands. Is there something i'm missing? The guys in the band talk a good talk and make it sound like what they're doing is smart and innovative in their interviews but the music itself doesn't match the vocabulary.
new 'The Sword ' album
- Thread starter Cheiron
- Start date
I haven't read any interviews with WITTR and don't intend to. Like I said I saw them play live twice and based on that I would say their sound owes just as much to Godspeed You Black Emperor and Sunn0))) as to Burzum.
Helm
Maybe on Luna
Hah, not meaning to start something, but... post-rock and drone influence (which I don't hear in WITTR, personally), true marks of the evolution of black metal? Hvis Lyset Tar Oss has plentiful dynamics and, drawn out hypnotic composition 15 years ago.
*sigh*
But I guess WITTR are condemned already. This is after all LOTFP, where the music itself is only the second most important thing and getting some attention from outside the 'clique' is a deadly sin
Helm
Maybe on Luna
dcowboys311
Member
I'm not sure why you're being so defensive about someone not liking a band you like. I enjoy WITTR but they aren't all that original, and plenty of people dislike them. Like a previous poster mentioned, Weakling and In the Woods... have pretty much already done the whole post-rock/black metal thing. They really aren't taking black metal to a new level like you seem to think.
I hate to revive a thread that nobody cares about but i'm catching up on the dialogue late and what Helm brought up is interesting to me. Now there's vocabulary to easily categorize sounds that otherwise were taken to be part of the band's vision as opposed to a stylistic choice. Lengthy hypnotic music now signifies a post-rock influence even though lengthy hypnosis has been present in black metal before people had a quick little two-syllable catchphrase to describe it. It just surprises me that so many people consider a smattering of another genre within their straight-forward black metal to signify an evolutionary phenomenon that steps up an "old" genre to a new level. Blueberry syrup is certainly delicious but I don't think it's a culinary miracle.
I'd recommend not reading their interviews because the first (and last) one I read seemed like a 500 word essay on what they do not do and why they do not do those things that everyone else on the planet seems to do, and the pretense in their tone is staggering. I find no fault in the music itself (it's not poorly made or anything like that), but the way that this band seems to be continually paraded by everyone else and by themselves as though the very foundation of black metal is being rebuilt in their image is tiresome.
I'd recommend not reading their interviews because the first (and last) one I read seemed like a 500 word essay on what they do not do and why they do not do those things that everyone else on the planet seems to do, and the pretense in their tone is staggering. I find no fault in the music itself (it's not poorly made or anything like that), but the way that this band seems to be continually paraded by everyone else and by themselves as though the very foundation of black metal is being rebuilt in their image is tiresome.
If you want to listen to good black metal that shakes the foundation of black metal listen to this band - http://www.myspace.com/gnawtheirtongues
I was thinking more along the lines of this band than anything else - http://www.myspace.com/wrnlrd - since on songs like "Silent Command" they're working with some elements of black metal and using them without an obvious musical reference instead of merging them with those of an existing genre. Gnaw Their Tongues don't seem to be as pretentious as WITTR but to my ears it's still a case of "unexpected genre meets black metal and everyone thinks the world is getting destroyed as a result." Granted, GTT are drawing from some less accessible genres (power electronics/industrial) than post-rock, but it's still the same thing going on.
Helm
Maybe on Luna
What is tiresome for me is how low the entry is for Black Metal is these days, for reasons I'd otherwise commend, like that anyone can pick up an instrument and start a band. Thats a great concept, HM music is supposed to inspire you to express yourself (and in that it succeeds in this is why it evaded death when the industry abandoned it in the mid 90s) sadly it produces a lot of shitty black metal because as a theater, as a spectacle, as a game black metal is notoriously easy to do a fair aping of. You know, the one riff, the drum machine, some corpse-paint, a few nicknames. It's the best Metal Reenactment Society, better than the retrothrash thing.
Have there ever been more active black metal bands than now? Everybody has to do their drone 20 minute one-riff journey to the stars!
So he have a lot of new bands that start with a 'black metal basis' and then 'go from there' and everyone's so happy about how visionary they are to mix whatever in the form. What about examining that 'basis'? Is it restrictive? Don't Fleurety, In The Woods..., Bathory, Mercyful Fate, Master's Hammer all fall into that 'basis'? The original forms of black metal are not restrictive, yet the derivative form these new bands 'launch from' is very, very restrictive, very closed. It is the droning Transylvanian Hunger riff, nothing else. There is no historical perspective to the whole that this subgenre was by the new people. I posit that new listeners that get so excited about the new black metal that is pushing the same boundaries that were pushed 15 years ago do not really understand the 'basis' of the form, nor do they care to inspect it. Why? Because it's happening all over again right here and now, and it's more interesting to follow what's going on right now, not back in 1991, right? That is the allure of a 'scene', and that is what hipsterism is about: a scene, the workings of the scene, the relevancy of a scene right here and right now. By definition transient, doomed to reinvent the sound and mimic the aesthetic of something once potent. It's no wonder old black metal was so 'fuck trends, fuck scenes, fuck fun'.
The worst - and perhaps most hilarious - thing about this is how 'Norway' has responded to all this hipster black metal. They have a very solid scene of their own that is all about the ass-pattery of having been there in 1991. The absolute worse retro-black metal is that one 30 year old Norwegians are making now, all GRIM UNT EVIL and meant to 'show the youngsters how it's done'. Jesus, if the premise is dead, let it rest, make something else.
And now we have Nachtmystium selling a record Ephel Duath made what, 5 years ago?
Have there ever been more active black metal bands than now? Everybody has to do their drone 20 minute one-riff journey to the stars!
So he have a lot of new bands that start with a 'black metal basis' and then 'go from there' and everyone's so happy about how visionary they are to mix whatever in the form. What about examining that 'basis'? Is it restrictive? Don't Fleurety, In The Woods..., Bathory, Mercyful Fate, Master's Hammer all fall into that 'basis'? The original forms of black metal are not restrictive, yet the derivative form these new bands 'launch from' is very, very restrictive, very closed. It is the droning Transylvanian Hunger riff, nothing else. There is no historical perspective to the whole that this subgenre was by the new people. I posit that new listeners that get so excited about the new black metal that is pushing the same boundaries that were pushed 15 years ago do not really understand the 'basis' of the form, nor do they care to inspect it. Why? Because it's happening all over again right here and now, and it's more interesting to follow what's going on right now, not back in 1991, right? That is the allure of a 'scene', and that is what hipsterism is about: a scene, the workings of the scene, the relevancy of a scene right here and right now. By definition transient, doomed to reinvent the sound and mimic the aesthetic of something once potent. It's no wonder old black metal was so 'fuck trends, fuck scenes, fuck fun'.
The worst - and perhaps most hilarious - thing about this is how 'Norway' has responded to all this hipster black metal. They have a very solid scene of their own that is all about the ass-pattery of having been there in 1991. The absolute worse retro-black metal is that one 30 year old Norwegians are making now, all GRIM UNT EVIL and meant to 'show the youngsters how it's done'. Jesus, if the premise is dead, let it rest, make something else.
And now we have Nachtmystium selling a record Ephel Duath made what, 5 years ago?
Well cycles happen anyhow. Younger generations start listening to 'new' black metal (doesn't matter the genre, just using black metal since that's what we've been discussing) and then explore the roots and come to the conclusion that 'new' black metal is too polished, boring, and isn't edgy, and so they start their little black metal band and try to 'play the good stuff.' Except they feel that they have to add some element into the music that either has a modern feel, or that shows that they realize the silliness of waht they are playing, but are playing it anyhow and that makes them awesome.
And for those that have been around the whole time, or even people who haven't but have done their history lessons won't find it to be any good or original. The only ones who will love it are those that think its hip. Except for the rare band that 'gets it'. Gates of Slumber could easily be a hipster band like The Sword, except they get it, and aren't trying to play the old trad metal/doom while still being 'hip.'
You are right about the basis of black metal being easy to write and perform. So few bands ever did it any good. But there are some newer black metal bands that continue the ground that Immortal, Arcturus, ...In the Woods, and others have laid out. And some of them are very good! Others are finding ways of incorporating non-black metal influences into black metal (or just taking black metal influences and adding them to their cauldron) and the genre is morphing and becoming less like black metal. Which is fine.
And for those that have been around the whole time, or even people who haven't but have done their history lessons won't find it to be any good or original. The only ones who will love it are those that think its hip. Except for the rare band that 'gets it'. Gates of Slumber could easily be a hipster band like The Sword, except they get it, and aren't trying to play the old trad metal/doom while still being 'hip.'
You are right about the basis of black metal being easy to write and perform. So few bands ever did it any good. But there are some newer black metal bands that continue the ground that Immortal, Arcturus, ...In the Woods, and others have laid out. And some of them are very good! Others are finding ways of incorporating non-black metal influences into black metal (or just taking black metal influences and adding them to their cauldron) and the genre is morphing and becoming less like black metal. Which is fine.
Helm
Maybe on Luna
Yeah of course some newer music in this vein is amazing (even the worst hipster-infested 'scene' will breed some bands with honest aspirations, this is how it always was), I just find it interesting that the ones that are doing a good job of it do not seem to be actively *trying* to cross-breed their black metal, the evolution of the form comes naturally to them.
WitTR are definitely not all that original (or that good, I'd argue). The guy who mentioned the marketing strategy is dead on though - they've been very heavily promoted in indie-rock leaning periodicals and websites, chiefly on the basis of their 'socially conscious' political stances rather than, you know, their music. I suppose that seems groundbreaking...
...if you've been living under a rock for the last 15 years and have never heard of Ildjarn.
...if you've been living under a rock for the last 15 years and have never heard of Ildjarn.
Most people like product far more than they like art. Art is hard. It demands thought. It requires that we re-examine our assumptions. Sometimes, it doesn't even make sense on first glance.
So what most people really want from the world are new versions of the already known (Craft) or (these are the 'adventurous' ones) superficial recombinations of several different types of the already known at once (Blut aus Nord). There's not much room for artists of real quality (e.g. Profanatica or Averse Sefira) who build upon what is already known to say something new, but don't genuflect in the direction of obvious novelty. 'Tis a shame, really.
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