I recently read an article in the on-line magazine ‘The Believer’ entitled ‘A Blaze In The Northern Sky’ by Brandon Stosey. This piece is extremely informative offering fresh insight into Norwegian black metal and its offshoot in America, known as US Black Metal or USMB. (http://www.believermag.com/issues/200807/?read=article_stosuy) The article also mentions a coffee table photo book about Black Metal that turns out to be published by Vice, the folks behind “Heavy Metal In Baghdad,” (see previous blogs ) This book shares the title of the Vice TV series: “True Norwegian Black Metal” http://www.vbs.tv/shows.php?show=1072.
The author and photographer behind the project, Peter Beste, has created a work that is broad in scope, full of depth and tastefully done, (http://www.peterbeste.com/bm.html). As both the Believer article and the Vice book and TV special compare the different periods, key figures and defining moments of black metal, I’m suddenly made aware of the unique history behind this music.
A few days after reading ‘A Blaze In The Northern Sky,’ “True Norwegian Black Metal,” the book somehow finds its way to our tour bus. It turns out someone has brought it to on of my band members as a gift. Black metal, a genre I admittedly haven’t always understood, seems to be finding its way into my life and causing me to pay attention.
Another black metal moment happened to me last year when NY based Egyptian visual artist, Nader Sadek, hired me to do a guitar solo for his art exhibition in a Chelsea gallery in NYC. The exhibition compared black metal with the plight of oppressed Muslim women and combined visions of black veils and metal imagery to make a powerful statement. Nader’s exhibit inspired me to look at my own Judaic heritage and draw parallels between black metal and orthodox Judaism, both of which represent the more intense levels of belief within the broad scope of their fields. Like black metal, certain sects of religion, specifically Islam and Judaism, are shrouded in a black tint of mystique. (http://www.roadrunnerrecords.com/blabbermouth.net/news.aspx?mode=Article&newsitemID=77438)
Yet another black metal moment happened a short time later, when I was on tour and stopped in a book store/cafe in Washington DC. There I saw a magazine for art insiders, called ‘Art Papers (http://artpapers.org). This issue had a multi page article and pictorial on the black metal logo, its evolution, its significance and comparisons to other art movements. I was fascinated to see the art world was granting black metal recognition as a valid art form, something that I’d never seen happen with traditional metal.
When I came back to Testament a couple years ago, founding Testament guitarist Eric Peterson (the recipient of the copy of ‘True Norwegian Black Metal’ mentioned above), had started his own black metal project, Dragonlord. When we set out to do a new Testament album, I wasn’t sure how his black metal influence would blend with my jazz influence, but now that we’ve completed our new album, I’m pleasantly surprised. There are a couple fast single string riffs and bass drum onslaughts on our title track, “The Formation Of Damnation” that are rooted in black metal. But when my solo comes up, over a slow, march-like beat, I play a multi octave four note pattern which I first heard in the playing of jazz pianist McCoy Tyner. Clearly, our respective, seemingly drastically different influences can co – exist in Testament.
I ask Eric what he feels sets black metal apart from more traditional heavy metal. ‘Black Metal usually has a lot of these kinds of chords” He says. He begins strumming very fast and then moving a shape in various small intervals on the neck. These are standard minor chords, but the way they are used is interesting, playing all six strings, including the ‘third’ of the chord. This is something that we tend to avoid in more traditional metal, opting for the ‘power chord’ which has no third and is more defined by its movement to other power chords. “It’s like soundtrack metal” he says citing horror movie music, as well as some classical. He plays me various tracks from different bands, including a Dragonlord track which goes from all out noise and gutteral screaming to a complete break with nothing but a pretty synthesizer string patch. He goes on to explain that none of the bands he knows are into church burnings or any of the more notorious, aspects of black metal. It’s about very intense, theatrical metal with most groups leaving the evil to the confines of the lyrics.
Which gets me thinking , that in a way black metal’s reputation can be compared to hip hop. Just as most hip hop artists are not involved in shootings and gang warfare, most black metal artists are not involved in the burning of Norwegian churches and murders of their own bandmates. Imagine if metal had no color at all because society had long given up on its own issues with race as well.
Has that element existed? Sure, but it is the extremists within the movement that created the infamy surrounding it, not the majority of participants. And despite the severe nonconformity of these musical styles and the culture surrounding them, they are a type of showbiz, like any other. Both have their supporters and detractors, both have generated attention from scandals which cast a shadow over the true essence of the movements, and both maintain a mystique which generates the commerce necessary to keep them alive and economically functional.
While you won’t see me painting my face, naming myself after a JRR Tolkien character or wearing nails, bullets and spikes anytime soon, black metal is something that has got my attention. I don’t support violence in any way, but I’ve never been oppressed by the European religious control which Norwegian black metal became an enemy of, just as growing up in upper middle class surroundings, I’ve never felt the inner city poverty which has been the catalyst for much of hip hop. For these reasons, I’m not too quick to cast judgement about these things without a closer look at the circumstances.
There are millions of fans who love the theatrics, the sound and the messages of their favorite music, and this music gives them an outlet for which to vent their frustration in a constructive way. ‘A Blaze In The Northern Sky,’ along with “True Norwegian Black Metal,” the book and the series, all effectively make the case that black metal is a valid art form and a movement which gives a collective voice to individuals whose own voices aren’t being heard.