Black Metal History Month

Black Metal History Month

Looking Back At BLACK METAL HISTORY MONTH

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Well, February is over with and thus concludes another awesome round of Black Metal History Month. If you missed any of the awesomeness, here is a look back at what we posted:

The FiX, our music video show, went ALL BLACK METAL with videos from Taake, Inhein, Keep of Kalessin, Dissection and Immortal. Watch it here.

We posted two other videos: the King of Metal reviewed modern black metal bands and everybody got pissed, and we got our friend Karlynn to give us a black metal corpse paint tutorial.

We posted two lists: 10 bands that shaped the History of Black Metal and the 10 Most Lethal Weapons in Black Metal.

We reviewed essential black metal albums including MERCYFUL FATE's Melissa, DISSECTION's The Somberlain, MASTER'S HAMMER's Ritual, MARDUK's Panzer Division Marduk, EMPEROR's In the Nightside Eclipse & Anthems to the Welkin at Dusk and  HAVOHEJ

Things got a little silly too when we asked you to show us your corpse paint, we ate some Immortal cake after pulling over Abbath and cuddling with black metal kitties.

Fear not, just because February is over, doesn't mean we will forget about the blackest of the metals. More black metal coverage coming soon.

Black Metal History Month Lists

Top 10 Most Lethal Weapons In Black Metal

Black Metal Weapon Dressing Guide

As some of us intelligent people might know, there have got to be a few reasons why black metal weapons look so primitive and are being used as part of many a band's fashionable poses in black metal photo shoots. To cut a long and analytical lecture short, these reasons can be basically broken down into three parts: (1) Culture & Politics (2) Artistic Expression and possibly (3) The Mojo Factor. Without weapons, black metal would be un-black black metal (reminding one of bands like Abigail Williams, Wolves In The Throne Room etc.), because it just wouldn't be the same! It's like taking a dump in the toilet without bringing in the newspaper. (more…)

Black Metal History Month

Sgt. D Lets HAVOHEJ Sodomize The Holy Asshole

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We're big fans of Sergeant D and his blog Stuff You Will Hate, so we asked him to contribute to our Black Metal History Month que of articles. Here is the only black metal band this guy likes:

I'll be honest: when it comes to black metal, I really don't know my asshole from my elbow. Is it racist that it all sounds the same to me?? I mean I consider myself a pretty openminded person (I'll listen to anything from Emmure to The Acacia Strain to Upon A Burning Body), but I just can't get into such formulaic, homogenous music :(

The only BM that I can actually tell from the rest of the pack is an old band from New Jersey called HAVOHEJ that I liked in high school. I honestly have no idea if metal nerds know about these guys are not, so please excuse my ignorance if this is super old news. (more…)

Black Metal History Month

Black Metal Kittehz!!

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It's no secret that kittens and black metal go hand in hand on the internet, after all there is even an internet comic dedicated to the kvlt cuddly creatures. Perhaps it's their natural pizazz for corpse paint design, or because cats + anything = internet sensation (we're certainly not above posting about cute cats as seen here and here), but what I do know is today is leap year day, which means we get an extra day of Black Metal History Month! To close out our month long event I pulled together a handful of black metal related findings of the feline kind (including my own little church burner seen above). (more…)

Black Metal History Month Show Recap

ALCEST Stun London

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Alcest finally played London once more after several years of teasing yearning fans with their absence.  Their appearance in the grimy bowels Camden Town excited the city to the point of selling out the Purple Turtle and cramming the small venue with hungry ears. Unfortunately it seemed more like support band Soror Dolorosa had chosen to play the wrong venue and their artificial attempts at a lackadaisical emulation of The Sisters of Mercy were lost on a disinterested audience who were instead hypnotised by the impossibly thin heroin chic the ageing singer was exhibiting. Badly made leather jackets aside, Soror Dolorosa don’t do a bad job of copying an already copied to death sound but were not particularly suited to the mood of the evening.  (more…)

Black Metal History Month

Show Us Your Corpse Paint

Halloween 2011

During our wonderful corpse paint tutorial, the lovely Karlynn Holland asked you, the Metal Injection junkies to submit photos of yourselves donning corpse paint. As we wind down Black Metal History Month, we have selected the five best submissions. You already see Will and his roommate Steven looking grim as fuck. Let's take a look at some others: (more…)

Around the Interwebs Black Metal History Month

I Want A Slice Of This IMMORTAL Cake

Immortal Cake

OMG, my good friend Jessa Blavatsky has done it again. You may recall she made a delicious Metal Injection cake, and this awesome Death Cake too, and now her latest creation…Abbath cake! It looks pretty delicious, and I can attest, her cakes taste great too. Check out Slaytanicakes, and get yourself a slice. Immortal are one of the featured music videos in our Black History Month special edition of our music video podcast, The Fix. [via MetalSucks]

Black Metal History Month

Essential Black Metal Listening: MERCYFUL FATE Melissa

Mercyful Fate - Melissa

Where would black metal imagery be without the excellent album Melissa? Quite simply not the same place that it currently stands, that much is very true. Melissa was instrumental in the well thought out realm of the occult; and not that front that Venom had originally put up. This was something more legitimate, with a band more than capable of absolutely outplaying just about every heavy metal band of it's era, let alone any era. Kim Petersen's (King Diamond) first full on foray into the world of heavy metal was through this debut album from a few very disturbed, yet very intelligent Danes. It's great to see it mentioned as being one of the seminal "black metal" albums but to pigeonhole it as simply black metal is just wrong. This is much much more than that… (more…)

Black Metal History Month

An All BLACK METAL Edition Of The FiX is now posted

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We are knee-deep in Black Metal History Month, and to celebrate, we have unleashed an all-black metal edition of our music video podcast, The FiX. Frank hosts a slew of awesome videos from the likes of Taake, Inhein, Keep of Kalessin, Dissection and Immortal. Watch it now or subscribe to the podcast on iTunes

Black Metal History Month Reviews

Essential Black Metal Listening: DISSECTION The Somberlain

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By 1993, the Norwegian black metal scene was engaged in an all-out, lo-fi war with mainstream death metal and the society that condoned it. Dissection, forming in Sweden, didn't have much choice but to fraternize with death metal's royalty (they shared a practice space with At the Gates). Like many of the second wave's constituents, Dissection drew deeply from Bathory's legacy. Unlike their peers, however, Dissection looked beyond the atonal seethings of Under The Sign of the Black Mark, taking direction from Quorthon's later, more epic leanings. On their debut album, Dissection would channel the ineffable Blood, Fire, Death, transcending its glory with malignant melody, preternatural songwriting skill and some of the finest riffs ever penned. The Somberlain is a life-altering invocation of rage. (more…)

Black Metal History Month

Black Metal Corpse Paint Tutorial

Black Metal Corpse Paint Tutorial

In continuation of Black Metal History Month, we asked our friend, artist Karlynn Holland to give us some tips on how to properly apply corpse paint, the iconic face paint used by many black metal bands. In a new Metal Injection exclusive video, Karlynn goes through the process, also giving some history on the art form . It's a fun viewing. Check it out.

Black Metal History Month Lists

10 Bands That Shaped The History Of Black Metal

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BLACK METAL: to some it's the purest embodiment of uncompromising musical nonconformity, while to others it's the meme that keeps on giving (I predict knit corpsepaint ski masks will be all the rage before February wraps up).

These are not necessarily irreconcilable opinions on the subject… we here at Metal Injection do our fair share of taking the piss out of the genre – anything that takes itself as seriously as black metal needs a good kick in the ass now and then – but Black Metal History Month is when we do our part to honor the heritage of the bands that have pushed things forward over the last 20+ years.

In 2011 we inaugurated Black Metal History Month with a bevy of articles, one of which included the Top 10 New Black Metal Bands You Should Know.  This time around we're going to flip the script and focus on the early progenitors that kicked this shit off in the first place.

A couple house rules:

  • This isn't a pissing contest to determine who are the most "kvlt" acts out there; this is about influence, pure and simple.
  • That said, BM is in a great period of flux right now, with a lot of experimentation going on that is pushing more and more bands beyond the scope of BM proper… in the interests of acknowledging the built in limitations of a top 10 list I'm not going to be dabbling in a lot of far flung sub-sub-genres; there will undoubtedly be a handful of orthodox elitists who quibble with some of these picks, but most readers will acknowledge all of the following as fitting within the loose confines of black metal, at least during the period of influence cited.

And with that here we go, in roughly chronological order:  (more…)

Black Metal History Month

Essential Black Metal Listening: MASTER'S HAMMER Ritual

Master's Hammer - Ritual

The first wave of Black Metal is almost always associated with the Scandinavian peninsula, but there were so many things going on in the crazy and small world that several bands tended to have similar ideas at the same time. Master's Hammer are a Czech band with plenty of great black metal sound; theirs is one rich in the tradition which Quorthon started in 1984. While Venom are forefathers in name Bathory gave the genre more legs than had been previously available and the sound spread much more quickly than either Cronos, Quorthon, or the Norwegian scene could have ever imagined. (more…)

Around the Interwebs Black Metal History Month

'Scuse Me Sir, Can You Please Step Out Of The Car?

Abbath signing for Norwegian soldiers

And gimme your autograph!!! Oh, please, please, please, please, pretty pleeeeeeeeeeease?

Black Metal History Month

Essential Black Metal Listening: MARDUK's Panzer Division Marduk

Marduk_old lineup

Both black and death metal embody the most misanthropic, morbid, depressing, sickening, and rebellious traits of mankind—yet they are quite different from each other. While death metal is often cartoonish and easy to separate from reality, black metal is often grotesquely grim and starkly realistic. In particular, the war-obsessed brand of black metal popularized by Swedish black metal fireteam, Marduk’s iconic 1999 release, Panzer Division Marduk, fits the above description perfectly.

Although not a black metal band, Germany’s long-lived Destruction was probably the first underground metal band to utilize modern war-like imagery (such as their donning of bullet belts in their early days) and war-themed lyrics (although it was always about the pure pwnage of mankind and holy forces by unholy forces, and military jargon like “panzer” was never used). Panzerchrist from Denmark may be a younger band than Marduk, but they started peddling war-themed blackened death metal since their first full-length album, Six Seconds Kill, which was released in 1996—a good 3 years before Marduk’s first war-themed album, Panzer Division Marduk. Could these two bands have inspired Marduk to write this record?

Here’s the funny thing: Whether Destruction and Panzerchrist had inspired Marduk to write this album or not, both of them are not remembered by most extreme metallers for modern war-themed extreme metal music and imagery. Marduk is. (more…)

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