Interesting stuff. As an old-school metal fan (ronnie james dio, black sabbath, randy rhoades, etc), I’ve never been able to get black metal, but I think I can see a glimmer of what they’re getting at now. The mention at the end of sin-eating was surprising, but made sense on reflection.
I don’t know much about Death Metal, or music in general, but I am familiar with Norway and have seen the reconstruction of the stave church burned by arsonists outside of Bergen. It makes one very angry to stand there in the rain, squinting at the rebuilt wood and tar dragon eaves and contemplate the deliberate destruction of cultural heritage.
I just can’t comprehend what would make a song — a genre of music, a musical subculture — so powerful so as to inspire someone to torch a spectacular, nearly thousand year old building. Is it fanatical self-centrism on par with the Taliban shelling those Buddha statues, or such a deep nihilism that one cannot even appreciate the longevity of something outside one’s own experience?
Crimson05er: I wasn’t familiar with the story of the destruction of the church before seeing the article to which I linked. Your comments on it have me researching it. Thanks.
December 14th, 2009 at 8:42PM
Interesting stuff. As an old-school metal fan (ronnie james dio, black sabbath, randy rhoades, etc), I’ve never been able to get black metal, but I think I can see a glimmer of what they’re getting at now. The mention at the end of sin-eating was surprising, but made sense on reflection.
December 16th, 2009 at 4:51PM
You have Buffy Studies and edited collections published on legal aspects of Harry Potter novels, so why not Norwegian-black-death-Viking-metal?
Professors want to have fun too.
December 17th, 2009 at 11:54AM
I don’t know much about Death Metal, or music in general, but I am familiar with Norway and have seen the reconstruction of the stave church burned by arsonists outside of Bergen. It makes one very angry to stand there in the rain, squinting at the rebuilt wood and tar dragon eaves and contemplate the deliberate destruction of cultural heritage.
I just can’t comprehend what would make a song — a genre of music, a musical subculture — so powerful so as to inspire someone to torch a spectacular, nearly thousand year old building. Is it fanatical self-centrism on par with the Taliban shelling those Buddha statues, or such a deep nihilism that one cannot even appreciate the longevity of something outside one’s own experience?
December 17th, 2009 at 12:57PM
Crimson05er: I wasn’t familiar with the story of the destruction of the church before seeing the article to which I linked. Your comments on it have me researching it. Thanks.