By Ryan Rupert
Black Metal begins with the worship of the darkness. Musicians such as Venom, Bathory, and Mercyful Fate molded the ways of the dark into notes and lyrics and ultimately forged Black Metal. Subsequent bands have somewhat parted from the satanic leanings of the forefathers of Black Metal, and forged a new Black Metal from Norse legends, myths, and stories from medieval times. Many however remain true to their dark heritage.
Venom are the "godfathers" of Black Metal. Their music was based on the worship of Satan himself, and all that was associated with him. From their very first album, "Welcome to Hell," the metal community knew that Venom meant business. Venom's second release, "Black Metal," coined the name of the genre itself, and reserved Venom a place in metal history. Venom held the Black Metal flag high for about six years and then broke up because members Cronos, Mantas, and Abaddon could no longer get along together. During Venom's reign of terror other bands sprung up in the newborn genre. One of the most well-known of the new bands was Bathory. Bathory were also the first to use the trademark Black Metal "Rasp," a distictive shriek emanating from deep at the back of the throat, and they were also considered more satanic than Venom in their songs. Today Bathory are still together, but they have changed their Satanic ways and have switched to telling Nordic tales. Also, they have made the transition to all "clean" vocals, though they have kept their raw sound.
Bathory wasn't the only great band to emerge in the aftershocks of Venom: While Mercyful Fate probably sounded more like Venom, the vocal style was something all its own. King Diamond, Fate's lead vocalist, used a blood-curdling high-pitched shriek at many points during his songs that heightened the dark, evil feeling of the band's music. Mercyful Fate broke up during their career and King Diamond went on to his own project named after himself. King's solo albums are all theme albums, whereas Fate's are mainly self-reliant songs. Before Mercyful Fate released its first album without King, the two rejoined and now both projects still exist and are still as evil and dark as when they started. That first wave of Black Metal is not the Black Metal most people know today. The first wave had no synth or keyboards and was basically thrash with evil, satanic lyrics.
Today Black Metal is very different; it has become more symphonic and has integrated the use of synth. On the other hand, bands which have not embraced the atmospheric or symphonic sound are even more raw and extreme than their predecessors. The Rasp has become the vocal style of choice. Bands are often straying from the original evil lyrics and developing themes along the lines of the Norse legends and other folk stories, though darkness and evil are still the main centers of focus. Todays hot spot of Black Metal is Europe -- mainly the Scandinavian countries. Unfortunately, this makes it difficult for Americans to find great Black Metal, but some American bands are trying to make a name for themselves, such as December Wolves.
For more information on Black Metal you may want to try http://www.blackmetal.com/ On that page there is a short description of Black Metal and they also have a mail order service. You can search for Black Metal nearly anywhere on the Web. The information is out there, all you need to do is look.
Two issues ago I wrote an article about my sense that Marilyn Manson poses a threat to the metal community -- a sentiment that many fans who sent us mail were not too happy with. It is now to my displeasure that I find myself in a position defending Marilyn Manson and his "carnival of freaks".
Tracks Of Creation is based out of Calgary, Canada, known worldwide as Cowtown (home of the oh-so-wonderful Stampede). To my dismay, some in the community have jumped on the bandwagon with certain American cities and have managed to prevent Marilyn Manson from playing at a local venue.
[Editor's Note: I experience convulsions of disgust at the fact that Larry Rickman, owner of the venue which has cancelled the MM show, has been so successful in his promotion of censorship and violation of his contractual obligation to allow the show to go on. Larry Rickman is well known in the community for his unfair dealings (he's been banned from both the Alberta and Toronto Stock Exchanges) and his mismanagement of the Calgary Stampeders football team, causing the loss of their star quarter-back, Doug Flutie. It amazes me that in light of these facts, Church officials had no qualms about handing him money to help keep the MM show from being held in Calgary. It is truly a perfect example of the perfidy and hypocrisy of the Church that they should have a problem with the MM show, yet seem to experience no misgivings about helping out a clearly immoral and unscrupulous man. One way or the other, Marilyn Manson is here today, gone tomorrow, while Rickman is (unfortunately!) here to stay.]
To give you a better idea of what actually has gone on in Calgary, I've included three related stories from Next Level news for information -- they sum up the situation better than items from the local paper.
Just because MM may have a questionable stage performance, that gives nobody the right to decided whether or not people are allowed to see them in concert.
All in all, I believe everybody should have the opportunity to see for themselves what a substandard act Marilyn Manson really is!