Swedish vs Norwegian Metal

[Bruticus]

Oh yeah, this thread.
seeing Finland has come into the conversation.
Never had an interest in that nation's metal. CoBodom was cool when you're young with your mates and discovering leads and neo classical and stuff buuuut... then they have some of those more obscure and eclectic death metal bands, that Lyka sth sth Flame sth band with the very unusual euphoric moments, or Demilich these two were pretty cool... the whole renowned funeral doom scene I thought was uninteresting, I preferred the foon-doom I was getting from other countries...

I dunno. Which good Finnish band am I missing ?

 

[Phylactery]

Demigod - Slumber of Sullen Eyes
Adramelelch - Psychostasia
Purtenance - Member of Immortal Damnation
Amorphis - Privilege of Evil, The Karelian Isthmus
Belial - Wisdom of Darkness
Sentenced - Shadows of the Past, North from Here
Slugathor - Circle of Death, Echoes from Beneath

Lykathea Aflame is from the Czech Republic.

 

[TechnicalBarbarity]

Psychostasia is a masterpiece. Easily one of the best albums from Finland

 

[no country for old wainds]

don't forget rev biz, beherit, cartilage, hail, sarcofagus, impaled nazarene, kyprian's circle, thy serpent, etc. finland are the kings of funeral doom too for anyone who cares: skepticism, thergothon and unholy are all finnish.

some cool recent bands in finland too: angel sword, tyfon's doom, bonehunter, legionnaire, ranger, mausoleum gate, lantern, circle of dawn, hooded menace etc.

obviously not sweden level, but like i said before i think they have a case vs. norway.

 

[Vegard Pompey]

My first metal mentor was a finn and Barathrum was one of the first extreme metal bands I got into. I still love 'em, they're a bit hit and miss but their best tunes are absolutely killer.

 

[Phylactery]

Yeah the Cartilage was an oversight from me, one of the best. But he seems mostly into death metal which is why I didn’t mention the others. Except Thy Serpent which I’m not very familiar with.

You consider Unholy to be funeral doom?

 

[no country for old wainds]

i group those bands together due to their nationality and their seeming to generally have the same fanbase, but i guess not really. great band though.

 

[Phylactery]

i group those bands together due to their nationality and their seeming to generally have the same fanbase, but i guess not really. great band though.

Are you a fan of Dolorian's When All the Laughter has Gone?

 

[no country for old wainds]

haven't heard it but i was under the impression it's their least praised album. the anus guys jerk it over voidwards in particular.

 

[Bruticus]

I mean to me the difference is fkng staggering.
The other day I give Dark Funeral another shot, I think to myself "damn, this is some actually good black metal", check out the wiki page, forgot they were SWE. Kinda like how every hot American actress is really Canadian ? Or every funny American actor you find out is just a Canadian. Every good Norwegian metal band is really Swedish

 

[Manic Ferocity]

Dark Funeral is about as boring as black metal gets. Their first EP is decent but not much to write home about after that.

 

[Bruticus]

Dark Funeral is about as boring as black metal gets. Their first EP is decent but not much to write home about after that.

Think so ? Not me. I've got this on my playlist this week and I'm quite enjoying it, although not my preferred metal style:


FANTASTIC vocals, lots of power and presence. Blasts sound good. I appreciate the general tone, it's classic evil metal but very well executed and the riffs are by no means revolutionary but they're inspired. Overall comes across as hellish and destructive. Good shit Dark Funeral. Swedes, OF course..

Oh and I've heard mucccccccchh more boring than this in black metal, oh my. You exaggerate.

 

[TechnicalBarbarity]

... never gave Dark Funeral a shot but some of that was quite enjoyable.

 

[PrincessHades]

All i know from norway is black metal...i cant remember the last time any good black metal has come out of norway, probably Immortal-Sons of Northern Darkness or something. Everything else is just the bands pretending to be ultra serious individualist Satanists all the while kissing their fans asses. Or in some cases totally selling out and admitting it

At least Swedens metal scene had some longevity and diversity and the musicians arent as pretentious

 

[Sophii]

Swedes have more ferocity and balls in their music. Definitely prefer Swedish metal against Norwegian metal. Though there are a lot of cool bands from Norway... Darkthrone, Extol, Ved Buens Ende, DHG...

 

[CiG]

 

[Bruticus]

All i know from norway is black metal...i cant remember the last time any good black metal has come out of norway, probably Immortal-Sons of Northern Darkness or something. Everything else is just the bands pretending to be ultra serious individualist Satanists all the while kissing their fans asses. Or in some cases totally selling out and admitting it

At least Swedens metal scene had some longevity and diversity and the musicians arent as pretentious

The pretentiousness is one thing, the pseudo philosophical (and deeply pathological) middle-class whim that is the whole satanic bm scene...

but besides that I'm interested in knowing why their music is generally so much more basic than Sweden's, as mentioned before one would think Swedes and Norw are practically indistinguishable culturally/ethnically, why would their performance in metal music bear such different fruit.
Scenes (musical, artistic more broadly) are very different from one area to the next now, so for e.g. Swedes amongst themselves are divided and clanic like there's the Gothernburg area and then there's the capital Stockholm scene and each one has a distinct sound, and I mean there isn't quite a universe between those two cities.

Black metal (vs the quintessential Swe metal sound, i.e. melodeath) comes across as more basic, primal in fact, and rougher. Conversely, Swe metal generally sounds more polished, definitely more sophisticated, and it's heavy and gritty but it doesn't have that sort of primordial essence. Perhaps those attributes reflect the nations' respective character. They must at least on some level.

 

[PrincessHades]

@Bruticus Sweden is more populated and people live closer together so i think it has more of a modern cultural scene. Norway is more rural and barren so naturally the music is more reflective of isolation, and a culture was built around that that pretty much was willfully isolated in that artists didn't want to experiment with styles other than their own.

Sweden on the other hand was free from this so the black metal bands there were way more interesting. Also BM and DM seem a lot closer together in Sweden

 

[Bruticus]

Yeah it defi

@Bruticus Sweden is more populated and people live closer together so i think it has more of a modern cultural scene. Norway is more rural and barren so naturally the music is more reflective of isolation, and a culture was built around that that pretty much was willfully isolated in that artists didn't want to experiment with styles other than their own.

Sweden on the other hand was free from this so the black metal bands there were way more interesting. Also BM and DM seem a lot closer together in Sweden

yeah, definitely appears that way, that Norw is the more isolated and raw culture and metal scene, Sweden the wealthier, poshier and more diverse.

It's quite something to think about, how different those two scenes sound, in spite of (to reiterate) their cultural closeness in general. I mean Sweden and Norway aren't exactly polar opposites are they. They're both close to the North pole, but they're not quite polar opposites (...).

 

[PrincessHades]

@Bruticus well sweden wasnt really more diverse back then...lol