Ok, so this particular choice for “song of the day” is not the usual metal, rock or even apocalyptic and horror music, but that’s why my taste can range so far and wide. My latest choice is the song “Listen To Your Heart” by the Belgian trance duo D.H.T. who covered it from the original Roxette track.
I enjoyed the original Roxette version which is so 80’s power synth ballad, but for some reason this cover by D.H.T. is my favorite. Maybe it’s because it’s a much slower vocal version of the song which does have a much faster tempo with a lot of 80’s style instrumentation. It also may be due to the fact that I just seem to get lost in the vocal stylings of Edmée Daenen who is the vocal front of the trance duo.
Lastly, it could also be that she has quite the voice in addition to being quite the hot number herself. Or I’m just a sucker for sappy ballads.
Hey, even the dark heart of a metal and horror aficionado will soften somewhat once in awhile.
Listen To Your Heart
I know there’s something in the wake of your smile. I get a notion from the look in your eyes, yea. You’ve built a love but that love falls apart. Your little piece of heaven turns too dark.
Listen to your heart When he’s calling for you. Listen to your heart There’s nothing else you can do. I don’t know where you’re going And I don’t know why, But listen to your heart Before you tell him goodbye.
Sometimes you wonder if this fight is worthwhile. The precious moments are all lost in the tide, yea. They’re swept away and nothing is what it seems, The feeling of belonging to your dreams.
Listen to your heart When he’s calling for you. Listen to your heart There’s nothing else you can do. I don’t know where you’re going And I don’t know why, But listen to your heart Before you tell him goodbye.
And there are voices That want to be heard. So much to mention But you can’t find the words. The scent of magic, The beauty that’s been When love was wilder than the wind.
Listen to your heart When he’s calling for you. Listen to your heart There’s nothing else you can do. I don’t know where you’re going And I don’t know why, But listen to your heart Before you tell him goodbye.
Listen to your heart, mm hmm.
I don’t know where you’re going And I don’t know why, But listen to your heart Before you tell him goodbye.
One of my favorite movies of all time is Joe D’Amato’s haunting 1979 romance Beyond The Darkness. Not only is it one of the best Italian films ever (and the best film ever directed by D’Amato) but I think it’s also one of the best films ever made.
One reason the film is so effective is because of its soundtrack, which was composed and performed by (who else?) Goblin. The music will be familiar to any Italian horror fan, largely because it was reused by about a thousand other movies that came out in the years after Beyond The Darkness. (Director Bruno Mattei, in particular, was fond of it.)
Today is November 9th. I’m 25 years old today and I don’t want to talk about it. Bleh. Instead, let’s just play one of the greatest songs ever written, Gimme Shelter.
Gimme Shelter is one of those songs that seems to turn up in every fourth movie that I watch and it’s easy to tell why. It’s a great song. Despite the apocalyptic subject matter, this is an undeniably exhilirating song. This is a song that makes my heart beat faster every time I hear it. If I ever happen to total my car again, it’ll probably be because I was listening to this song while driving. If I ever make out my list of top ten songs to fuck make love fuck to, Gimme Shelter will be at the top of the list along with Blondie’s Atomic, Siouxsie and the Banshee’s Kiss Them For Me, and every song on Moby’s Play CD.
Is it possible that Gimme Shelter is the greatest song of all time?
Happy Halloween. Hope you enjoy the conclusion to my black metal countdown.
10. Bathory – Bestial Lust
Were I outlining a history of black metal, this song probably wouldn’t make the cut. By mid-80s standards it might be black metal, but by early Bathory standards it’s pretty straight forward thrash. That is, from a stylistic perspective it was already in 1985 a throwback to the genre Bathory had evolved out of. But it’s such an awesome song that, thrash and black metal being so intimately tied in the 80s, I think I can justify it. I considered giving the ten slot to In Conspiracy with Satan instead. Feel free to humor it as the more appropriate choice.
9. Mörk Gryning – Tusen år har gått
When I think of quintessential black metal, stylistically speaking, the first album that comes to mind isn’t In the Nightside Eclipse, De Mysteriis Dom Sathanas, or any other obvious staple. It’s Mörk Gryning’s 1995 release, Tusen år har gått. This inexplicably forgotten Swedish band managed to capture every stereotype element of black metal perfectly in their debut release. If I personally ever aspired to start a black metal band, this album is what I would try to emulate.
8. Immortal – The Call of the Wintermoon
But when it comes to influence, to the legends go the glory. Immortal gained much of their fame for later works, with Call of the Wintermoon known best for its ridiculous music video, not the song itself. I avoided showing that video for a reason. 1992’s Diabolical Fullmoon Mysticism is less noisy than a lot of its contemporaries, and its dark character shines through all the more because of it. This album, and this song especially, set a standard for black metal aesthetics. It’s one of the first to be so distinct from thrash that the influence is no longer immediately apparent.
7. Burzum – Key to the Gate
Varg Vikernes’s works being so album-oriented, I could think of very few individual tracks that maintained their greatness apart from their larger vision. But Key to the Gate always, for me at least, stood apart. The intro is absolutely demented, and yet it progresses into a well-structured song. For me it really captures Varg himself, a mind half brilliant and half warped beyond rationality. In explaining his historic past, Varg has been known to change his story frequently. Sometimes the church burnings, the murder, the primitivism all appears to be part of a rational and not altogether disagreeable plan. Sometimes he reveals himself a racist, homophobic, paranoid imbecile. The 2010 release Belus, his first in over a decade, is in striking contrast to Dissection’s Reinkaos. Following Jon Nödtveidt’s jail term for murdering a homosexual African man, his creative genius had left him. His next album was a failure, and he took his life not long after. Varg made some rather bold statements about Euronymous’s sexual orientation in explaining his motivation for murder (not to mention some claims to white supremacy that surpassed mere confusion to the point of complete ridiculousness). Yet after serving more than twice as long as Nödtveidt, his next album was a brilliant continuation of the old Burzum, as though no time had passed at all. There is a sort of unnatural complexity to him, and his music alike.
6. Dissection – Where Dead Angels Lie
But Jon Nödtveidt’s significance in at least this one instance should not be overlooked. Storm of the Light’s Bane, released in 1995, features perhaps the single most memorable black metal song I’ve ever heard. At least for a brief three years, Sweden’s Dissection was rivaling anything Norway had to offer. As so many black metal stories go, Nödtveidt’s suicide was nothing approaching traditional. I read that he blew his brains out sitting in the middle of a pentagram surrounded by candles, with a grimoire open before him.
5. Gorgoroth – Ritual
I wouldn’t go so far as to say Gaahl is overrated, but Hat, their vocalist from 1992 until 1995, suits me best. Their debut Pentagram is just as unforgiving as their later works, but with a lo-fi value that captures an essence of evil more effectively than brute force. The third track, Ritual, struck me the first time I heard it and remains still one of my favorite songs of the genre. (And it shares so much in common with Nattefrost that I almost have to believe it had a direct influence on his solo project.)
4. Darkthrone – Transilvanian Hunger
This one kind of goes without saying. If Kathaarian Life Code initiated the second wave of black metal, Transilvanian Hunger predicted its future. Primitive and raw on a whole new level (it was recorded three years before Ulver’s Nattens Madrigal), the album’s trance-like appeal might have some relation to Varg Vikernes’s lyrical contributions. I imagine it was more a matter though of fewer minds leading to a more consistant focus. It was the first Darkthrone album involving Nocturno Culto and Fenriz exclusively as band members.
3. Emperor – I am the Black Wizards
Emperor’s self-titled 1993 EP briefly pre-dates In the Nightside Eclipse and, along with two other EPs/demos of the era, features many of their first album’s classics in their unrefined, original forms. I wouldn’t go so far as to call the originals better (Emperor’s reunion performance of the song at Wacken 2006 is by far the best version of it out there), but the original appeals best to that rawness with which the second wave of black metal made its mark. All of the refined features that set Ihsahn’s song-writing apart–the heavy synth, the complex movements, the difficult guitar riffs–are present, but in this early form they still took second stage to that demented ethos black metal embraced for a few years in the early 90s.
1. Mayhem – Funeral Fog
“Please excuse all the blood.” Dead’s suicide note, the artistic photographed rearrangement of his splattered brains for use on a future album cover, clothing buried with dead animals for weeks to reek of decay, Euronymous’s brutal cold-blooded murder with a knife to the skull, Varg Vikernes’s inclusion as the album’s bassist AFTER murdering its lead guitarist, the burning of the Fantoft stave church, the trial that lead to Faust’s confession of murdering a random stranger, Tchort’s imprisonment for grave desecration, Samoth’s imprisonment for arson… Black metal consumed itself in a real life horror story unrivaled in fiction between 1991 and 1993, and it all culminated in the release of De Mysteriis Dom Sathanas. Funeral Fog must be appreciated with an eye towards the literal insanity that surrounded it. “In the middle of Transylvania, all natural life has from a long time ago gone. It’s thin and so beautiful.” We reflect on Elizabeth Bathory and Vlad Tepes as the real life icons of evil from which the cultural genre known as horror, 20th century serial killers not withstanding, was born. But in the early 90s, the middle of Transylvania was southern Norway.
Happy Halloween!
I leave you with a final treat that couldn’t stylistically make the cut.
We’ve now reached the final day of what has been a week-long horror-themed “Song of the Day” feature for the site. It’s quite appropriate that this final day also lands on Halloween and I’m sure many will approve of this final choice to cap off the week.
A week which has seen Italian film composers and prog-rock bands chosen for creating and contributing some of the best and most memorable themes to horror films which will stand the march of time. We’ve seen an epic song from a Montreal band whose music has the apocalyptic sound to it. There’s also two entries from films created by a master of the horror genre in John Carpenter.
The week began with Goblin’s main title theme for George A. Romero’s original Dawn of the Dead. With Halloween night the premiere of the long-awaited and heavily-hyped tv adaptation of Robert Kirkman’s The Walking Dead comic book series (by none other than Frank Darabont himself) I thought what better way to bookend Goblin’s theme for the Romero zombie epic than by picking Johnny Cash’s song “The Man Comes Around”. One of the last songs penned and sang by The Man In Black himself and properly used by filmmaker Zack Snyder to be the intro music for his remake of Dawn of the Dead.
This song with its gospel-like (though not as hopeful as most) sound and it’s apocalyptic and Biblical lyrics just speaks of the apocalypse like no other song from this past week has done. It comes off almost like a prophecy come down and spoken by one of God’s main dudes. This song when paired with the scenes of the zombie apocalypse crashing down on an unsuspecting world in Snyder’s film instantly made it a favorite with all zombie fans everywhere and introduced The Man In Black to a whole new set of fans.
I would like to think that when the zombie apocalypse does arrive it would be to this song as I and those who share my belief in how to survive such an event ready ourselves for whatever may come.
The Man Comes Around
And I heard as it were the noise of thunder One of the four beasts saying come and see and I saw And behold a white horse
There’s a man going around taking names And he decides who to free and who to blame Everybody won’t be treated all the same There’ll be a golden ladder reaching down When the Man comes around
The hairs on your arm will stand up At the terror in each sip and in each sup Will you partake of that last offered cup? Or disappear into the potter’s ground When the Man comes around
Hear the trumpets, hear the pipers One hundred million angels singing Multitudes are marching to the big kettledrum Voices calling, voices crying Some are born and some are dying It’s Alpha and Omega’s kingdom come
And the whirlwind is in the thorn tree The virgins are all trimming their wicks The whirlwind is in the thorn tree It’s hard for thee to kick against the pricks
Till Armageddon no shalam, no shalom Then the father hen will call his chickens home The wise man will bow down before the throne And at His feet they’ll cast their golden crowns When the Man comes around
Whoever is unjust let him be unjust still Whoever is righteous let him be righteous still Whoever is filthy let him be filthy still Listen to the words long written down When the Man comes around
Hear the trumpets, hear the pipers One hundred million angels singing Multitudes are marching to the big kettledrum Voices calling and voices crying Some are born and some are dying It’s Alpha and Omega’s kingdom come
And the whirlwind is in the thorn tree The virgins are all trimming their wicks The whirlwind is in the thorn tree It’s hard for thee to kick against the pricks
In measured hundredweight and penneypound When the Man comes around.
Close (Spoken part) And I heard a voice in the midst of the four beasts And I looked and behold, a pale horse And his name that sat on him was Death And Hell followed with him.
The penultimate choice for this week’s horror-themed “Song of the Day” feature brings one of the best theme songs ever composed and put on film. I am talking about the Main Title theme for John Carpenter’s classic horror film (also one of the best grindhouse films ever made) and one which launched a whole new horror subgenre with Halloween. This theme would become synonymous with the “slasher film” that when the many copies and imitators of the film came out in droves a year later they would try to replicate this keyboard synthesizer-based theme and fail miserably.
It’s actually a pretty simple theme. Carpenter composed the theme as a piano melody played in a 5/4 meter that even the most novice piano player could play with ease. This theme could be heard throughout the film whenever Michael Myers appears and/or in the vicinity. Some have even started calling it the Michael Myers theme and they wouldn’t be far off. It’s become the film’s leitmotif that Carpenter ends up relying on it to set the mood and tension in the film. Other kids of songs could be heard throughout the film but outside of the Blue Oyster Cult’s “Don’t Fear the Reaper” the rest of the score is forgettable until this theme kicks in.
This theme will be the final of the instrumental themes for the week. With one more day left in this special week-long horror-themed week for “Song of the Day” the last one will definitely usher in another awesome Halloween and help kick off the premiere of what will probably be the best thing to ever grace the tv screen past, present and future.
As I mentioned in another post, my sister Erin and I spent Tuesday night watching the Killer Party Marathon on Chiller. One of the movies we saw was the original 1980 Prom Night, starring Jamie Lee Curtis and directed by Paul Lynch. Prom Night, of course, was remade two years ago with cross-eyed dumbfug Brittany Snow as the star. If, like me before Tuesday night, you’re only familiar with the tepid and bland remake than the original Prom Night is a surprise indeed.
The original Prom Night is an old school slasher film, one of the many that came out in the two years immediately after Halloween. It even stars the star of Halloween, Jamie Lee Curtis. Prom Night also stars a lot of Canadians because it was one of the many low-budget B-movies that was made in Canada in the early 80s. Apparently, Canada was offering tax breaks to film companies willing to shoot up north. Several web sites have said that the setting is obviously Canadian but I couldn’t really tell. Of course, I’m from Texas. Anything above Arkansas looks like Canada to me.
Plotwise, the film is pretty much your traditional old school slasher film. There’s a terrible tragedy in the past, an innocent man is blamed for it, and ten years later, teenagers end up getting killed at some communal event. In this case, the tragedy is the death of a young girl who is killed during a truly demonic game of tag. The children responsible for her death lie about what happened and a disfigured drifter is convicted and imprisoned for her murder. As for the communal event, in this case, it’s prom night. The killer stalks the prom, which is what I suggested my classmates call our prom way back when. They disagreed and that’s their loss. The Killer Stalks The Prom would have been a story to remember.
Anyway, here’s a few random thoughts about the original Prom:
1) As with all old school slasher films, it’s interesting to see just how much of the early products of this all-American genre borrowed from the Italian giallo genre. Everything from the elaborate, past tragedy to the black gloves worn by the killer to the attempts to keep audiences guessing who the killer actually is to even the supporting character of the burned out cop simply screams giallo. The main thing that the Americans brought to the giallo format was the idea of having the murders revolve around a previously innocent gathering or holiday.
2) Especially when compared to recent “slasher” films, Prom Night is a relentlessly grim film. Prom Night’s killer doesn’t waste any time with comic relief or one-liners. He’s too busy savagely killing people. And our victims aren’t the usual collection of bimbos and soulless jocks. No, this is the type of movie where even the token virgin ends up getting her throat ripped out with a gigantic shard of glass. There’s not a lot of deaths in Prom Night, just six. But they all hurt.
3) I usually just think of Jamie Lee Curtis as the crazy woman selling Activia on Lifetime but this movie shows that she’s actually a pretty good actress. Even working with a script that isn’t exactly full of brilliant dialogue or multi-faceted characters, Curtis is a sympathetic, likable, and most of all, believable heroine (which is all the more remarkable when you consider that she, like everyone else in this film, appears to be far-too old to still be worrying about the prom). She even manages to make the film’s ending rather touching and even poignant. And how many slasher films can you say that about?
4) Prom Night is as much about tacky — yet insanely catchy — disco music as it is about spilling blood. Seriously, if I owned the soundtrack to this film, I would listen to it 24/7 for two years straight. I’d force all of my friends to listen to it too and eventually we’d all go insane and just spend the rest of our lives wandering around going, “Prom night! Everything is alright!”
5) One last thing — Prom Night showcases what has to be the most believable, cheap, and tasteless prom ever put on film. The theme is Disco Madness and the students are all very chic in that way that even they know will be painfully dated in another two years. Indeed, this is one of the rare films that understands that the perfect prom is nothing less than an unintentional camp spectacular. For someone like me who, as the result of seeing too many episodes of Saved By The Bell: The New Class, grew up with an unrealistic expectation of what the senior prom would be, the original Prom Night remains a refreshing breath of fresh air even 30 years after it was made.
And always remember: “Prom Night! Everything is all right…”
I don’t think I could have possibly stumbled upon a more appropriate image for this penultimate entry in my music column than the goat Heiðrún feeding on Yggdrasil. (Well, technically Læraðr.) I’ll today be concluding my compilation of songs that, while still being “black metal” in some sense, extend well beyond the boundaries of the genre.
10. Hardingrock – Faens Marsj
In 2007, Ihsahn and his wife Ihriel teamed up with Hardinger fiddler Knut Buen to merge Ihsahn’s evolving progressive black metal with Norwegian folk music. If the vocals are the only real trace of black metal remaining in this particular track, I think the appeal is no less apparent.
9. Temnozor – Busov’ Vran’
(Темнозорь – Бусовы Враны)
Temnozor’s 2010 release is easily their best in my opinion, and certainly their most folk-infused. That this Russian band in 2007 released a split with Nokturnal Mortum might be telling. Their ability to harness folk as a sort of primitivism has evolved tremendously, and it herein shows. The gripping dynamics of Russian vocalization are inseparable from the overall sound. It’s no wonder this is a predominantly Eastern European movement.
8. Boris – Luna
Pretty much any obsessive Boris fan will tell you they’re the most innovative band in existence, and I totally buy into the hype. Boris has, over the years, consistently denied all forms of classification, seeming to incorporate a new style of music on practically all of their myriad releases while remaining always recognizably Boris. In 2009 they contributed one track to a split with stoner metal band Torche, and in doing so gave black metal a unique new form. It’s an unfortunate shame that the last two minutes of this song, in which they transition into an Electric Wizard-esque doom metal outro, aren’t available on youtube. But for the purposes of this column, this song’s significance still comes through. Boris eat musical styles and shit roses. This is one of them.
7. Agalloch – Limbs
Where were you the first time you heard Ashes Against the Grain? I think a lot of people can actually answer that. Pale Folklore and The Mantle were brilliant and unique albums, but THIS, this was something innovative on a whole new level. I remember the thought striking me almost immediately: “Woah, post-black metal exists.” Any use I’ve ever made of the term originated from my first listen to Ashes Against the Grain. Isis’s Oceanic was probably my favorite album at the time, and here was everything I liked about it taken to by the best band at creating musical imagery that I’d to that point known. The marriage couldn’t have gone better. Ashes Against the Grain will go down in history as groundbreaking and unique, one of those albums that predicts the future without ever wholly conforming to it. It always was a stretch to associate Agalloch with black metal, but in so far as musical genres are merely generalizations, the most unique bands always seem to fit into all and none simultaneously.
6. Ulver – Hymn VI: Of Wolf and Passion
The first 18 seconds of this song are about a decade ahead of their time. They’re absolutely beautiful–downright uplifting. I guess I never really thought of unadulterated black metal as something that could be triumphant. Sure, bands put it to positive use by incorporating folk and the like, but here you have nothing but blast beats and tremolo, a basic Norwegian breakfast, speaking of something glorious. Perhaps black metal’s origin naturally associates it with the dark and devilish, but very briefly, in 1996, Ulver showed that the same unbridled intensity could turn itself towards any honest end. Of Wolf and Passion. An apt title.
5. Nokturnal Mortum – In the Fire of Wooden Churches
I said you hadn’t seen the last of them. Another NeChrist masterpiece, In the Fire of Wooden Churches is an eclectic, constantly transitioning song that almost never repeats and ends triumphant. This video extends a few minutes beyond the end of the song. Its proper length is about 7:11.
4. Peste Noire – Ballade Cuntre Les Anemis De La France
Ballade cuntre lo Anemi francor got my 2009 album of the year vote. To quote my brief review of it, “This is brilliant, fascinating, unlike anything I’ve ever heard before. As has been said, the ambiance of hate is gone. What replaces it is something I can’t quite define, but it’s captivating. If Famine hadn’t coined it “Black’n’Roll” I think the term still might have popped up, but it’s a whole lot more than that. The 60s-70s rock and roll styles it incorporates, while similar in construct, conjure nothing of the sort to mind. Instead, it gives this sort of disturbingly lively essence to a dismal, filthy Dark Age. Track three feels like I’m dancing circles around someone in a torture chamber randomly sticking hot pokers into them and really enjoying it.” You are listening to track three.
3. Krallice – Wretched Wisdom
Listening to Wretched Wisdom while driving through a barren pillar-studded wasteland in Arizona was one of the most amazing experiences of my life. This is the gut-wrenching scream of an absolute desolation stumbling hopeless at last into the depths of insanity. And here the term post-black applies more than ever.
2. Nokturnal Mortum – NeChrist: The Dance of Swords
Alright, this is my last Nokturnal Mortum entry. Honest. I’ve very little left to say about this band, but I hope you can see why I chose this as their best song. I said of their first entry “this isn’t just a statement about the past, it is a violent declaration of war on the present.” NeChrist might be the celebratory feast on the night of that declaration.
1. Alcest – Le Secret
In 2005, Neige decided it was time to take a new approach with his black metal project. He wanted to write something beautiful, and that he did. The album Le Secret is 27 minutes long and consists of two songs. Neige himself regarded the work as widely misunderstood, and seems to have concluded since that black metal just isn’t a compatible medium for some things. His next album was more on the order of shoegaze, with little in the way of black metal remaining, and his 2010 release, while significantly heavier, largely distinguished the black metal from the shoegaze elements as a sort of contrast between dark and light.
Souvenirs d’un autre monde and Écailles de Lune are both fabulous albums, make no mistake. But Le Secret is so much more. It’s one of those works that can never be repeated, because beyond musical genius it requires a sort of innocence. Those 18 seconds for which I glorified Ulver… here they stand on their own, independent and beautiful.
I remember being very young and getting the chills and scares whenever I heard the opening notes to the fifth entry to the week-long horror-themed “Song of the Day” feature for the site. Even now into my third decade I still get a bit of the willies whenever this song comes on TV, cable or I happen to click on the video on YouTube. The song I’m speaking of is the opening theme to William Friendkin’s horror masterpiece, The Exorcist.
The theme was composed by English musician Mike Oldfield in 1973. “Tubular Bells” is actually an epic piece of progressive rock music which is actually split into two parts. It’s the first part which was chosen and slightly reworked by Oldfield himself to become the opening theme to The Exorcist. This particular theme has become one of the most iconic film themes in cinema history. I’m not just talking about in the horror genre but in all of film.
A person who has never seen Friedkin’s masterpiece about a young girl possessed by the Devil and the ritual which happens soon after will know the theme once they hear it. The theme is literally played on the same name musical intruments. While the original has a more baroque sound with some synth manipulation added to the overall tone, the one used for the film definitely has a more progressive/synth rock to its tempo and tone.
In the end, this chosen theme for the day will be continue to scare and terrify old and new audiences of The Exorcist. Just looking at the video above with just the fog-shrouded Georgetown brownstone in the foreground and Father Merrin just standing there looking up at the home then having the theme playing would make even the most God-less person want to start praying for their eternal soul.
Before proceeding to the two concluding posts of this column, I thought I’d turn off the distortion for a day and present an assortment of haunting little tunes that really serve the season well.
I actually encountered a lot of trouble finding what I was looking for on youtube and had to settle for a few secondary options, but a few dismal video accompaniments aside, I think this turned out rather nicely.
Tenhi – Kielo
This Finnish track is a case in point. The only Tenhi album I’ve heard is their 1998 release, Kauan. Someone sent it to me a good ten years ago, and I’d have all but forgotten them save for this song. Unfortunately the album version, which features a much more morbid arrangement, was not available, but this piano rendition certainly has its merits.
Kiss the Anus of a Black Cat – Sevenfold
I love Kiss the Anus of a Black Cat for so many more reasons than their name alone. One of the few bands I know hailing from Belgium, Kiss the Anus released their first album, If The Sky Falls, We Shall Catch Larks, in 2005. It’s impressively dark. They’ve managed four more releases since, incorporating a variety of styles, but none of them struck me so much as their first. I had hoped to showcase the song Sevenfold, but at least my second favorite on the album was available. Enjoy, and check them out. They just put out a new album earlier this month.
And please excuse the video image. Neither I nor the band had any part in it. >_>
Death in June – Runes and Men
“Apocalyptic folk” has such a nice ring to it, though “neofolk” might be a bit more practical. Douglas Pearce met David Tibet in 1983. Both artists had formed their associated projects, Death in June and Current 93, by then, but it was when their complementary ideas mingled that the style really came into its own. Their mutual fascination in the arcane left a grand mark on music for decades.
Current 93 – Whilst the Night Rejoices Profound and Still
And on that note, here is a sample from the album that really got me into David Tibet’s music, 1998’s Soft Black Stars. This video replaces the last instrumental 30 seconds or so with a minute of silence, but it’s what I could find.
Current 93 – Anti-Christ and Barcodes
Though I may be deemed a bit uncreative for posting two consecutive songs by the same artist, off the same album no less, I think this intensely bleak, desperate number should serve as a fitting end to the first half of my list. From here I’ll be shifting focus a bit. Again, this song ends about 1 minute before the actual video does.
Steve Von Till – The Spider Song
Steve Von Till, better known as a member of Neurosis, has written some absolutely brilliant solo material, but not this song. The credit goes to Townes Van Zandt, a country/folk tragedy who died of a drug overdose in 1997. Where Van Zandt’s song was peculiarly upbeat for its moving lyrics, I think Steve Von Till really captured its true essence. He brings American folk alive in a way that just wouldn’t quite fit in anywhere else.
Of the Wand & the Moon – Raven Chant
This Danish band debuted in 1999 with Nighttime Nightrhymes and, after an impressive eleven releases over the next six years, stopped recording rather abruptly in 2005 and haven’t released anything since. I think Raven Chant, off their first album, is the highlight of their short history.
Matt Uelmen – Tristram
If I measured by last.fm play counts alone, this would be my all-time favorite song by a landslide. I never even played Diablo, but whatever spark of genius brought this to Matt Uelmen’s head is equally appreciable out of context. There’s not much I can say about it, but I’ve been known to leave it on repeat for hours and not get bored.
Burzum – Han Som Reiste
I read once that Varg Vikernes intended each of his albums to be a sort of spell, attempting to first invoke a trance-like state and then communicate to the listener subconsciously through music over the remainder of the album. I also read once that Varg Vikernes thinks Hitler is part of an enlightened alien race hiding out beneath Antarctica. But whatever you might say of the guy, Han Som Reiste, appearing in the middle of Det Som Engang Var, certainly left its mark on me, the first time I heard it and every time since.
And lastly: Summoning – Menegroth
I think this song best captures what I had in mind today, if it breaks thoroughly with the criteria I started from.
Enjoy your Halloween week; I’ve still got two more posts to follow.
