SepticFleshgod Apocalypse Concert Impressions

I'm sore and I'm tired. I barely got any sleep last night. But I also attended a concert last night, and the internet needs to know what I thought about it. So I will push on and write up a blog post for all you lovely readers out there. I was even right up against the stage for the entire show so I got a view of it all.

As I'm sure you know, Hour of Penance dropped off this tour at the last minute because of visa issues. I was definitely looking forward to seeing them but perhaps there would have been too many blast beats if they showed up. Anyway, they were replaced by the unknown Black Crown Initiate hailing all the way from USA. When I tried to look this band up, I found that the only thing they've released is a single EP. And that's exactly what they played. They started with a song from their upcoming album and then went straight into the entirety of their backlog.

Black Crown Initiate's music was alright to say the least. A little too many breakdowns for my taste. However, both the vocalist and guitarist had amazing vocals. The main vocalist had powerful screams and the guitarist had the best clean vocals of any band that played. Why was he so good?! The music itself didn't do much to hype up the crowd, It was good once it got rolling, with some blast beats thrown here and there, but too often everything would recede to acoustic set pieces. It also didn't help that they were playing to maybe 50 people. The venue filled out a bit as the night went on, but it was barren compared to how it usually is. I also didn't snap a single picture of this band so look them up if you want to see what they look like.

Luckily for Toronto's own Necronomicon, the lineup change meant they got to go on second instead of first. Not sure if this got them a longer set, but at least they were playing for half an audience. All three of them came out and put on a solid show. They didn't move around stage too much but every time the guitarist/vocalist stepped away from the mic, him and the bassist started a coordinated headbang in the center of the stage. The vocals were also very powerful for some reason. Besides some technical hiccups with a guitar cable not working, the majority of their set sounded the same. Every single song had blastbeats and that doesn't always translate the best into a live setting. Even the one song of theirs that I always recognize when I hear it blended into the rest of the noise and became much less recognizable. Everything was good, but it just all sounded the same.

Then came the half hour-long breaks in between bands in order to set everything up. Luckily, Fleshgod Apocalypse brought along a piano and opera singer again to add to their show. Also luckily, their sound was definitely better than the last time I saw them, though it wasn't without its issues. Since there were sounds from so many different places, some things had to get drowned out in the mix. I could clearly hear the drums, vocals and sometimes the guitar, but all the symphonic elements (especially the opera singer) got put into the background. It's unfortunate that not everyone got their time to shine but the only way I can see around this problem is to constantly switch the sound mixing to focus on whatever is prevalent in the song. It's possible, though probably too much work for someone to do every single night of the tour. The band played a wide variety of songs covering all of their albums. The Violation is still undoubtedly their best live song, the crowd just freaked out when it started to play. The vocalist also came out in between songs with some prop, from a book to a glass of wine, to tell some story and introduce the next song. I couldn't hear a word he said, but a guy behind me kept shouting out every song they were about to play without fail. Either he has really good ears or he looked up the setlist beforehand.

I was really looking forward to seeing Septicflesh when it was time for them to come out. Since I was learning against the stage the whole time, I still had tons of energy. And since there weren't too many people there, I wasn't sweating too much and therefore wasn't dehydrated. Septicflesh came out to a roaring audience and oh boy did they deliver! This time, the three sounds I could actually make out were the drums, vocals and orchestrations. It worked out really well because the guitar work isn't usually the main focus in their songs. And it was a nice treat being able to hear the symphonic elements for once. I was also happy to discover that my favourite Septicflesh songs are also everyone else's. In total they played two songs that I didn't recognize; one was Unbeliever and I'm not sure the title of the other. They played everything I could have asked them to play, starting from The Vampire From Nazareth and moving their way around the most recent three albums. The only song they didn't play was Sangreal. Possibly because their normal bald guitarist (who also does the clean vocals) wasn't there and that song has a big focus on cleans. Either way, all the songs sounded great and I headbanged my face off. It always feels good to say that the headliner was the best of the show. The only complaint I have is that the band didn't move around the stage too much. They went behind the stage displays for the start of each song, but that was about it. At least they came out with their costumes. The vocalist's fly was undone though.

All in all this was a good concert. All the bands put on a solid show. The only consistent problem was the sound mixing, but that seems to be a consistent problem at just about every concert. I'm not sure why so few people showed up but they definitely missed out. I wish the bands luck on the rest of the tour and I'll probably see them the next time they come back.

-Zombie Viking

Out of the Ordinary #2: Semargl

What comes to your mind when you think of black metal? It could be church burnings and the grim forests of Norway. Or possibly blasting instruments and low production values. Maybe your image of black metal is entirely based around Immortal. Or perhaps you think of a band covered in pentagrams and corpse paint... playing pop music with growled vocals. If that last one doesn't come to mind, then you haven't been introduced to a little band called Semargl. They're definitely out of the ordinary.

Semargl is made up of (from left to right) Romulus, Anima, Rutarp, Adele Ri, and Shaddar. They make a unique blend of black metal and pop that they call "satanic pop metal". That's also the name of their most recent album, what a coincidence! They started off back in 1997 making pure black metal and somehow gravitated towards this equally amazing amalgam of music.

Of course, any time a band betrays their fanbase and changes to a completely unrelated genre, they're going to have some backlash. In fact, it's sometimes hard to sort through the pile of negative comments on their music videos and various website profiles (ie. Facebook, Last.fm, their official site..), so I'm going to say what needs to be said: Semargl is a great band and makes great music. There, I said it. And I will stick by it. They started off making quality black metal and now they make quality pop metal. I've been looking for something like this since I stumbled upon the genre known as industrial metal. You can try, but you'll never find anything quite like Semargl.



I'm not exactly sure what prompted their change into the band that you see in the video above. They're a Ukrainian band, which is not exactly an area known for its metal. They've also gone through plenty of lineup changes. Rutarp and Shaddar are the only founding members left in the group. I'm sure it had something to do with Rutarp. Just look at that face. Plus, what kind of vocalist would willingly give up their position as frontman to play keyboard? Someone who's busy transforming their band's genre, that's who.

Semargl released their first full-length album in 2005, Attack on God. By all means, this was a good black metal album. It had blast beats for days, symphonic keyboards, and all the devilish screaming you could ask for. It's a very different sound then the band you were introduced to.


The band even had a whole satanic mythology/philosophy that they created and centred their first 4 albums around. They put a lot of effort into their work and fully developed their ideas until it was time to try something new. I'm still not sure what prompted the change into their specific genre, but it can be seen as a new phase of the band. Semargl changed their members, they changed their logo, and they started making a new type of music. Their black metal days are behind them but they keep their costumes and face paint as an homage to their roots. If you strip away everything, Semargl is a band that just wanted to try something different. And different they did.

Rutarp is keeping his own black metal spirit alive with his side project of the same name. You can check out one of his songs here. I also wanted to include this remix of Credo Revolution by Zardonic, since it's how I found out about Semargl in the first place.

You can find Semargl at the following links (copied from their website):
http://www.semargl.com.ua
http://www.myspace.com/semargl
http://www.vkontakte.ru/club744615
http://www.lastfm.ru/music/Semargl
http://www.ilike.com/artist/Semargl
http://www.youtube.com/semarglband
http://www.facebook.com/semargl.band

-Zombie Viking

Metal on the Side Mondays: Rotting Christ

Perhaps the first thing most people notice with Rotting Christ is the name. They must be some crazy Christian hating black metallers! And while they are black metal (some of the time), the band isn't quite what you'd expect.

What are you looking at?

Staying on the topic of the name for a bit though, they have indeed gotten a lot of slack. The name Rotting Christ was chosen with the thought "we'll see what happens" as far as I can tell. The band wasn't really looking to directly offend anyone, but at the same time they kind of were. Dave Mustaine of Megadeth fame refused to play with them purely because of the name. These guys have been doing it for longer than anyone though - 25 years. It makes you wonder how Rotting Christ lasted so long with a name like that. They got picked up by Century Media just 3 years after releasing their first album though, which probably played a big part in keeping the band around. I mean, the only band I can think of with a more offensive name is Anal Cunt, and they only lasted 23 years on and off. But they disbanded because their vocalist died, so I guess it's kind of insensitive of me to bring it up... Anal Cunt was also chosen as the band's name purely because it was the most offensive thing Seth Putnam could think of.

Lyrically, Rotting Christ likes to mix things up with all sorts of themes. They range from the typical anti-Christianity to occultism and even Greek mythology. The lyrics are also sometimes in Greek, the band's native tongue and country, just to be a bit different. Truth be told, there aren't too many metal bands from Greece (Firewind is the only one I can think of off the top of my head), so that already makes Rotting Christ a bit more unique.



With a Rotting Christ song, you never quite know what to expect. The band has gone through a few styles, from grindcore to black metal to gothic/dark metal and back to black with some folk influences. Songs sometimes include chanting, delicious clean vocals or wonderful growls on behalf of vocalist/guitarist Sakis Tolis. Just as an aside, brothers Sakis and Themis (drums) have been in the band for the entirely of its 25 year existence. That's a pretty big feat in the metal world! Getting back to the music, the riffs are also probably unlike anything you've heard. Rotting Christ just has their own unique sound and I can't think of any band to compare it to. The only thing I could say to give you some idea is that their riffs sound like they have a bit of Middle Eastern influences. But I could be completely mistaking Middle Eastern with something else. Needless to say, the music is good. Some songs are catchy and have you chanting along while other songs just create a sombre atmosphere. It's worth mentioning that you should listen through an entire album before making a judgment. That being said, every album has its own feel (and usually a different genre) and these guys have released 11 albums so I won't mind if you just stick with a couple albums for now. In fact, their most recent album, Kata ton Daimona Eaytoy, is pretty darn good and worth a listen or two.



Even a typical Rotting Christ song doesn't stay with one style. They'll usually start with one riff or chant or slow buildup. Then, just when you're getting sick of it, the song will completely switch pace and never use that riff again. This can be found in both songs above. Rotting Christ does have a tendency to repeat riffs for a bit too long, but this is easy to forgive when it's only used for a part of the song.

If you can find another band like Rotting Christ, I'll eat my own hat. These guys are just so unique and cover so many different styles that unless you're offended by their name, they're definitely worth checking out.

You can find Rotting Christ at:
Metal-Archives 
Facebook
Wikipedia
http://www.rotting-christ.com/

-Zombie Viking

My Musical Journey

For those of you that wonder how I find new music, or are just looking for some new bands, I've decided to do a "live blog" of one of my youtube journeys. This is where I'm watching a music video for a band I like and I just start clicking on the related videos until I get into uncharted territory. Sometimes I find some great bands hidden away behind all the links and other times I fall into metalcore territory or just a bunch of boring bands. Luckily, this time turned out pretty successful.

This journey all started from this link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UnrGCp-N7Bo

I don't remember how I got there, I just had it written down from another day. The only other Taiwanese band I've listened to is Cthonic, and Anthelion has a similar musical style (especially the vocals). This vocal style and the fact that it's in Mandarin just sounds so much different from anything else. It's a breath of fresh air, especially in black metal where too many bands sound too similar. These guys are just a quality, groovy and catchy black metal band. You may also notice in the related videos that Massakren shows up. As you may or may not remember, that's the band that now goes by the name of Starkill and is awesome.

Here's Anthelion's metal-archives page. Turns out there's another band under the same name from Italy, but they've since split up. It's kind of crazy that these guys have put out so little in the band's lifetime. The band is over 10 years old and has only released one album. Though that's the way some bands are I guess. Still, I'll be sure to check out this album a bit more in depth.

Just looking at all the related videos gives a great reminiscent feeling. There's some Powerwolf, Dimmu Borgir, and a band that I haven't listened to in far too long: Anorexia Nervosa. Be sure to check out that song (Sister September), it's a good one. I think I'll check out Satanized next, they have a cool name.

Though it turns out that despite having a cool name, the actual band's music is pretty boring and uninspired. They sound like a poor man's Hate, which is a band that comes up in the related videos for this song anyway. Just check out Hate instead, there's some good Polish blackened death metal (also, RIP Mortifer).

I seem to have gotten into the bands-from-interesting-places part of youtube.. There's bands from Taiwan, Iran, Spain.. Not something I'm used to seeing. I got scared and clicked on a band called Immortal Souls.

Now this is good melodeath. Plus they have corpse paint on. No band wearing corpse paint has ever steered me in the wrong directions, so I will definitely be checking these guys out. They're also Finnish. This band just keeps getting better and better!

From reading the comments, it seems that this band is christian, or at least partially. From what I can tell, they seems to talk a lot about winter and coldness (like one of my favouritest bands ever, Wintersun), but I always enjoy bands that break out of the typical "metal" mould, such as the Christian Unblack Metal band Antestor.

After I few more clicks I stumbled upon Torture Squad. These guys are from Brazil, another place without that many metal bands. This is some really good quality thrash. I don't normally like thrash so I always have an eye open for thrash bands that I actually enjoy. It's just my desire to have as much musical diversity in my library as possible. I'm actually really happy I found these guys, this is really good and catchy music.

I blacked out and woke up on this video. The band is Ekho, a folk/black metal band from freakin' Israel! I already like them.

I'll end this escapade with a band I'm not quite sure of yet: Purgatory. They've got a cool name and all, but I'm not too sure about the music. It's some really solid death metal, but it's one of those bands that I'll either really like after a while or just never listen to again. I'll check them out later... much later.

Well that's it for this journey. I also accidentally stumbled upon a few metalcore bands that I didn't mention above, but I quickly navigated to another page when I realized what had happened. They started doing the weird metalcore thing of throwing their whole body up and down during a breakdown. It just looks silly and the opposite of brutal. Oh well, not the topic to get into right now. So I'd say I found a nice bit a of bands to check out. From here, I usually look up some more songs from each artist and decide if I do actually like them or not. This happens anywhere from the next day to the next month, depending on how interested I am in the band and how busy my schedule is. There's so many gems hidden away on youtube, you just have to know where to click.

-Zombie Viking

Good Workout Metal #1 Varg

I thought I'd try this new thing because I've recently started working out and I listen to metal when I work out and stuff. There's undoubtedly some better bands to listen to while pumping iron compared to others. Bands that get you pumped up or are just plain heavy. This of course isn't just for people who work out, you can listen to these great bands any time, it's just that they're also great to listen to in the gym. Let's get this started.

The first band is Varg. These guys have been built from the ground up as good gym metal. Just starting with their name, it's the Norse word for wolf, the animal most associated with ripped Spartans. Or maybe it's just that one scene from 300... Either way, Gerard Butler is a hell of a man.

Wolves!

The actual music is pagan metal - a mix of melodic death and black metal with a touch of folk. I'm not sure what they're actually about since the lyrics are in German, but I think they have something to do with wolves and battles and apocalypses and having a good time, typical pagan and German stuff. By the way, the German lyrics just add to the whole muscley-man strong hard music deal. Listening to German just makes you feel stronger, even if you have no idea what they're saying. Their official website is so metal it doesn't even have an option for English. Nein!

The riffs are strong and the vocals heavy. The faster songs give a good constant beat to work out to. Normally, I'd skip over slower songs, but Varg really knows how to play crushing riffs, especially at a slower tempo. You can tear through an entire album during your workout since every song is just well crafted to what you're doing. I could not think of a better band to start off this series with.

You there, start working out.

If you're going for a workout and don't know what to throw on your iPod, check out Varg. They're heavy, catchy, German and have a good mix of fast and heavy slow songs to keep you going. They've also got sick face-and-body-paint. These guys are so extreme that people bring dumbbells to their concerts and just lift weights in the mosh pits. Trust me.

You can find Varg at:
metal-archives
Facebook
Youtube 
http://www.varg.de/

-Zombie Viking

Dimmu Borgir - Abrahadabra Review

And you thought In Sorte Diaboli was bad.

The Norwegian black metal superstars of Dimmu Borgir return to once again prove to the world that we'll throw money at whatever crap they put out. With ICS Vortex and Mustis gone, the remaining members have struggled to throw something together before their spare reserves of money run out. The result is worse than anyone would have expected. With the symphonic members of their band gone, Dimmu got the first orchestra they could find to make an album for them and said "good enough". They put a couple guitars and drums over the tracks and called it a day. Who are we even giving money to here? Abrahadabra is 90% orchestra and 10% Shagrath trying to sound evil. It seems like he got too old to scream anymore and has been reduced to talking during all the songs. And who the hell is playing drums here? Daray? Come on man, step it up!

This album is bad, there's no doubt about it. In fact, it's so bad that I bought tickets to see Dimmu on their tour supporting it just so I could yell things at them. Things like "I love you" and "Keep up the good work". It's all part of my devilish plan. I also bought a tour shirt just so I could throw up on it.

Screw you, society!

The lyrics on this album are something else. As you may remember, In Sorte Diaboli was supposed to be the start of a six-part series of albums based around Vortex's new book about a priest becoming the antichrist. While there was no way in hell the band (who had released 6 albums previously (The Stormblast reissue doesn't count)) was going to spend another 20 years retelling Vortex's emo poetry, I thought it would go on for at least more than one measly album. But alas, Abrahadabra is intently focused on whining about past band members being dicks. You know your band is a sellout when you can't even be an unrelenting jackass in peace. So Vortex now gets to focus on Arcturus and Mustis... What happened to him again?...

OH MY GOD NO!

Oh.. different guy? Ok, good, I was scared there for a bit.

As if the album itself wasn't bad enough, Shagrath, Galder and Silenoz decided to add insult to injury in the form of multiple music videos. Since I am a weak man and can only stand watching one at a time, I'll focus on the worse of the two: Dimmu Borgir. The song, not the band (though they're both pretty bad). The entire video focuses on the three musketeers trudging through the song, trying to make it seem like they give a crap. Shagrath is up on some DJ set and the other two are... somewhere else. Plus there's a mysterious drummer because they couldn't get whoever did the drums on the actual album. Cut to some reused footage from Gateways, some stock footage of wolves, and some goddamn promotional pictures, and you've got yourselves a music video. Oh and did I mention the video effects? Well they consist entirely of lens flare and flipping the video upside down for a brief second. I feel insulted just watching this. They spent more money on their stupid costumes than they did on video production. Speaking of costumes, did Shagrath ever tell you how he got those scars? I can sum up everything wrong with this video in one word: everything. Though a picture is worth a thousand words, so I'll include one of those too.

So as you can tell, Abrahadabra is bad. But you already knew that, you went out and bought the album. So Dimmu Borgir wins again, those smug bastards. Now if you'll excuse me, I'm going to go listen to Mourning Palace so I won't feel ashamed anymore of being a Dimmu fan.

-Zombie Viking

Shade Empire - Ruins

Here's a relatively unpopular band that I listen to. Shade Empire plays blackened industrial metal from Finland. Though now it sounds like they've gone a bit more towards the black/dark metal side of things. I didn't know what was happening with this band, as they've been quiet for a few years. The vocalist recorded a couple albums with his other bands Chaosweaver and Deathchain and the rest of the band did.. something else. But now they're back with a new music video and a new album coming out May 6th. Check it out.

-Zombie Viking

Xanthochroid - Land of Snow and Sorrow (cover)

In case anyone hasn't already seen this masterpiece. The video has almost as many views as the original Wintersun one. Pretty impressive for an American black metal band. Perhaps one day I'll do an actual write-up on these guys (because they're awesome), but for now I'll post this video. Enjoy!

-Zombie Viking

Metal Mondays: Eternal Decay

I don't know what's going on here..

Eternal Decay
Genre: Melodic Black Metal
Country: Israel 

Eternal Decay is a small black metal band from Israel. When I say small, I mean both their popularity and actual band size. The band is only three people. Now normally three person bands have two guitarists (one of which also does vocals) and a drummer. But Eternal Decay has a drummer, keyboardist and guitarist/bassist/vocalist. Must be hard to play two guitars live.

I actually found out about this band while mindlessly browsing through Youtube. The following video appeared:


This is probably the most random metal video I've ever seen. There's a few pictures of the band mixed in with "evil" looking things and the most broken English I've ever heard in a song. And I loved it. I immediately ordered the album which was only available through Ebay for some reason. The coolest part is that the band actually shipped me the album straight from Israel. They included a bunch of cool things like a sticker and pamphlet detailing the band. This was also all cheaper than a typical album that hadn't been shipped half way across the world.

I can say that I personally wrote their bio on Last.fm, which is kind of cool if you think about it. I can't say though that I've seen them live. Apparently they did come here recently, but I didn't find out about it until afterwards. Hopefully they come again.

As I said previously, this band is very much lacking in listeners. It's some solid melodic black metal with a good vocalist, interesting drum beats and a symphonic undertone. Be sure to check them out!

-Zombie Viking

Metal is Not to Be Taken Seriously

Metal, like many other niche products, does not take itself seriously. People who bother to find and listen to it obviously already like the product, so there's no need to impress anyone. Musicians can just relax and release what they enjoy making. Since we're such a great community of people, this usually leads to carefree and humorous music.

A good place to start is with Dragonforce. I've had countless people ask me how I can listen to them. They've called Dragonforce garbage, untalented and unoriginal. But they're just taking it too seriously. How can you honestly look at a group of guys with their hair down to their anus and analyze every single note they're playing? Sure, every song sounds the same, they constantly mention fire, ice, and dragons, and they have 5 minute solos, but that's what makes them funny! Dragonforce is literally the epitome of lulz when it comes to metal. They've unfortunately taken a more "we're going to actually play music now" approach with their new album and vocalist though. Despite that, the music they make is still pretty epic and retains the laser-powered guitar solos that they're known for. It's just now backed with real power metal.

Sure, there are many satanic, political and generally antisocial bands out there, but it's just to scare away the mainstream. When a typical person looks at black metal, they see Gorgoroth, Burzum and Taake scowling back at them (my post on crazy black metal musicians is here). A trve metalhead though (see what I did there?) knows that just under the surface lies Immortal in all their panda-faced glory. And who can take Immortal seriously? They don't even take themselves seriously.

I'm being so serious right now!

Anybody who just generalizes metalheads into one big group of no-humour satanists is dead wrong. Metalheads are the nicest people ever (why else would we help people up who fall down in mosh pits?) who don't take their music too seriously. We're just here to have fun. Anyone who gives you the wrong impression is probably either a genre whore, 12 year old, or a scene kid.

-Zombie Viking

Metal Mondays: Graveworm

Their bodies are all connected. The band is actually just one big mass of musician.

Graveworm
Genre: Melodic/Symphonic Black Metal
Country: Italy

Graveworm has been around for quite some time but is still painfully unknown. They may not make the most original music ever, but they seamlessly blend beauty and brutality. Keyboards provide the ambience while the guitars are chugging out fast and heavy riffs. This is all background to the powerful vocals of Stefan Fiori.

Stefan is actually one of the most powerful metal vocalists I've heard. I'm not sure why this alone hasn't gotten the band some more recognition. He goes from deep growls to extremely high pitched screams multiple times each song. Just listen to the first 30 seconds of Bloodwork to see what I mean.

He wears the most unfitting things during performances though.

Graveworm was actually the most played artist in my library for quite some time (according to last.fm at least). It's not that I would choose their songs to play, it's just that I never really skipped any. Ever. I was fine with listening to every song I had by them and the listens just piled up. Currently they are my seventh most listened to band of all time (of alllll timeee), right behind Korpiklaani and Amon Amarth.

I did mention that the band has been around for quite some time (since 1992), and in that time they've changed quite a bit. Graveworm started off as a gothic metal band with some tinges of black metal. Then around Engraved in Black they fully shifted to a melodic black metal sound. Finally, a couple albums later with Collateral Defect they started to shift to a more death metal style. And on Diabolical Figures, the band became fully immersed in death metal while still keeping a bit of their black and gothic heritage. If you listen to an album that you don't particularly like but can hear some potential, just pop in another and you'll get almost a completely different sound.

Graveworm is probably best known for doing metal covers of non-metal songs. Well, it's not that they're known for that per se, it's just what every non-metalhead looks up. Their most popular (according to Youtube) is their cover of Holding Out For a Hero by Bonnie Tyler. Here is Graveworm's I Need a Hero.



Whether you like beautiful or brutal, gothic or death metal, Graveworm has you covered. For such a wide array of music they've put out and such a powerful vocalist, their lack of popularity is questionable at best. The least you can do is go and check them out.

-Zombie Viking

Metal Mondays: Arafel

Told you this week would be a different genre. We're getting our folk on now.

They're in a forest and everything. So folky.

Arafel
Genre: Folk Black Metal
Country: Israel

Coming to us all the way from the Mediterranean is Arafel. A quick search gives us this: "Arafel, a Hebrew word (ערפל), meaning "fog;" generally used in reference to the Apocalypse." which sounds pretty metal. And pretty Israeli. Actually, being a successful metal band, or a metal band at all, in Israel is pretty hard. Bands such as Melechesh have changed countries because of troubles with the infamous religion police.

This band actually caught my attention when it was announced that former Equilibrium vocalist Helge Stang would be joining. I've always had a soft spot for Asian bands in general because they never seem to get any recognition, so I thought I'd check Arafel out. Needless to say, I was impressed. Their latest album, For Battles Once Fought, contains all the folk you'd need mixed with catchy melodic black metal riffs. Combined with Helge's powerful screaming and growling vocals, it leaves quite a mark. Also they have a female violinist, Nasha Nokturna (that can't be her real last name), which is always a nice bonus.

This is all that comes up when you Google the band name.

Most of Arafel's songs are a bit long, breaking the 5 minute mark. They usually go by quite fast though due to the speedy guitars and great interludes. Death of Archaic World is one of the more unique songs on the disc, starting off with an electronic-ish intro and having a banjo solo. A banjo solo! The only other band I've heard do a banjo solo is Ensiferum in Stone Cold Metal. This one is just as good though, and the song is better. Then it transitions into a violin solo, bridge, and back into the song. Yes, this is my favourite song on the album. Check it out:


-Zombie Viking

Heavy Metal Naming Conventions

Knowing what genre a band is solely based on their name is a virtue. It allows you to preemptively judge them without hearing a single note. It saves time.With that being said, it becomes a lot easier to know a band's genre if you know the naming conventions.

Heavy Metal: Names are either manly or have some form of metal in them. Examples: Metallica, Iron Maiden, Led Zeppelin, Manowar

Death Metal: Band names refer to stuff dying. Not too creative here. Examples: Death, Cannibal Corpse, Decapitated, Dying Fetus, Morbid Angel

Thrash Metal: Also refer to stuff dying, but faster. What is it with American-created genres? Examples: Slayer, Megadeth, Sepultura (Portuguese for grave), Warbringer

Power Metal: Names are epic-sounding. Examples: Dragonforce, Rhapsody, Kamelot, Iced Earth, Firewind

Black Metal: Names are dark and/or powerful. Examples: Darkthrone, Immortal, Emperor, Dimmu Borgir (Icelandic for dark fortress), Behemoth, Burzum (part of the inscription on the One Ring meaning darkness)

Folk Metal: Bands choose names in their native language. That's the only criteria. Examples: Too many to list

Troll Metal: They have troll in their name. Examples: Finntroll, Trollfest, Trollheim's Grott, Trollband, Trollkotze, Litvintroll, Troll-Myr, Trollhorn, Trollward, Troll (I promise these are all real bands)

Also here's a handy naming pentagram I found.

-Zombie Viking

Symphonic Metal

The internet often says that metal is the closest current genre to classical music. While I don't fully support that statement, symphonic metal definitely makes it easier to see where it comes from.

Lured in with promises of pretty women and symphonic metal.

Having roots in power and gothic metal, symphonic metal is metal that incorporates symphonic elements (obviously). These include everything from a strong keyboardist to an entire orchestra playing the backing of tracks. Operatic and female vocals are also a staple. It has become a hugely successful genre, even reaching mainstream success in some parts of Europe.

The Swedish band Therion is credited with creating, popularizing and influencing the symphonic metal genre. They started out as a death metal band, but since the mid 90s they've incorporated choirs and other classical elements into their music. Nightwish is another symphonic band you might have heard of that's been around since the origins of the genre.



Symphonic metal as itself isn't really the biggest genre though. As opposed to bands adopting the symphonic style, they've brought elements into their own genres. Symphonic power metal and symphonic black metal are two huge subgenres with arguably just as many bands as plain old symphonic metal. Symphonic!

Symphonic power metal includes bands like Rhapsody and Pathfinder. They play their instruments fast and create an atmosphere with keyboards and backing vocals. But you can read more about that in yesterday's post.

Symphonic black metal includes bands like Dimmu Borgir, Emperor and Carach Angren. They play a slightly slower melodic black metal and add in the typical keyboards and orchestras. Personally, I particularly enjoy this subgenre due to the clash of harsh black metal and beautiful symphonic.



Also be sure to check out Epica, the band in the picture atop this post. They are sort of like Nightwish but have a bit more of an edge to them. Plus the bassist uses growls instead of clean vocals.

-Zombie Viking

Holiday Metal

Metal is often regarded by the mainstream media as a bunch of fun-hating Satanists. While this may be true for majority of bands (screw you, fun!), there are some that just want to have a good time. There are certain bands out there that sacrifice every hope of ever being popular in order to release a holiday metal album. While this may work for pop artists making Christmas specials, who in their right mind wakes up in the morning wanting to listen to Manowar playing Silent Night? Oh wait...


Now that we've gotten that out of the way, I'd like to focus on two specific bands. One Christian (sorta) and one Jewish (not really) for the sake of diversity. Erlosung and Gods of Fire.

Erlosung is a band that hasn't actually released an album yet. Through some witchcraft though, they have an entire two Christmas albums available for listening to on their YouTube channel. Oh, and did I mention they play black metal? Well, they do.

Here is their biography from their Facebook page:

Erlösung is a Black Metal band started by Sebastian in the fall of 2008 just for the sake of creating metal. The project was well received and Sebastian took that as a sign to continue working with the project. In 2009 Marcellianus and John Quinn joined the band and for a short time they played together. However Quinn decided to take a different path in music and started a his own project Streetlight Sonata. At this point the band was joined by Stephanie who was to preform clean female vocals, but due to distance issues, it was too hard for her too keep up with the band. Marcellianus and Sebastian continued to play, but didn’t get much material recorded. To add to the problem, Sebastian was starting college in Statesboro but before he left, he and Marcellianus recorded the music video ‘Wall of Glass” before parting. Then in the cold winter of 2009, Marcellianus and Sebastian put together their first album, "Christmas ist Krieg." during the summer of 2010 Erlosung broke up, and Sebastian has now taken on the band as a solo project and is now working on the next Erlosung Full Length album.

I'm confused too. Their official website doesn't really help either. Here's a jolly Christmas song by them though.



The next band is Gods of Fire. They are another American band (Erlosung is American, right? I never really understood their bio.) who has actually officially released two albums. Their first album, Wrath of the Gods, is a Greek-themed standard power metal fare. For their second album though, they decided to do something a little different... and released Hanukkah Gone Metal.

The album features such classic Jewish stories as taking back the temple from dragons and escaping the evil Zeus-worshipping Egyptians. Wait a sec, has anyone told them that that's not exactly what happens? Oh well, the music they make is still pretty epic and awesome. Check it out for yourself.



Maybe holiday-themed metal isn't all that bad. Merry Christmas and happy holidays!

-Zombie Viking

P.S. Thank you Mike for showing me Gods of Fire.

Black Metal Musicians Are Crazy

Black metal musicians are crazy. That is a time-tested proven fact.The entire scene was founded on craziness and in the blackest reaches of Scandinavia, it continues.

Yep

The most iconic feature of black metal is of course the corpse paint. This of course was started by a man known by his stage name as Dead. Dead was the vocalist for Mayhem. That was before he blew his brains out of course. The suicide letter read "Sorry for making such a mess". Dead's stage name wasn't entirely for show. He was very close with the land of the deceased. By close I mean he buried his clothes before concerts so they'd have the smell of rotting and regularly had severed pig heads as part of Mayhem's stage decoration. The corpse paint was just another way he brought himself closer to the dead. Nowadays it's hard to find a black metal band without corpse paint (as I mentioned yesterday). This is either out of respect or just plain tradition, I'm not sure.

Dead, looking lively.

The entirety of founding black metal members were crazy too, not just Dead. They all used to gather in a record shop named Helvete where I'm sure they did very evil things. Not to mention all the church burnings, murder and unwanted attention this group of guys were getting. You read that right, none of this black metal stuff was ever meant to become big. In fact, it was originally made as a genre of music people wouldn't want to listen to.

Over time, the scene has become a bit more tame and less insane. The biggest black metal group is quite a bit less satanic and quite a bit more into having hissy fits that some band members left. However, there are still some less popular people hiding in Norway. Taake is one band that comes to mind. Their only member, U. Hoest, has every bit of black metal spirit as the founding members of the genre. In March 2007, Hoest appeared on stage with a swastika painted on his chest. During the concert he also spat and threw beer bottles at the audience. There was a big controversy about it, and the band released the following statement:

...we truly apologize to all of our collaborators who might get problems because of the Essen swastika scandal (except for the Untermensch owner of that club; you can go suck a Muslim)!

In April 2007, Hoest made a further statement:

My previous statement clearly states that I apologize only to our collaborators who might get problems because of the scandal. This means that I take full responsibility and should receive all "problems" myself. But what problems did I get? We raped Essen on one of the first days of the tour and the word spread within minutes. For the rest of the tour I was such an easy target for verbal or physical abuse on stage, walking around the venues, in the streets, etc. But I didn't receive any confrontation. So keep your pathetic internet debate going, but don't think for one second that I take any of you seriously. Furthermore, I never did anything to make Taake a "big" band. I was hoping to lose some fans with the Nekro EP, so now I certainly expect to get rid of some more.

U. Hoest, what more is there to say?

Thank you Wikipedia.

I think I've made my point. Musicians in the black metal scene are crazy. I didn't even mention all the Varg Vikernes/Euronymous stuff. Nor did I mention the near-hundreds of documentaries on the subject. Just give it a quick google if you want to know more.

-Zombie Viking