Black Metal Hall of Fame Special Issue

SPECIAL COLLECTOR’S EDITION

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e xt r e m e ly e xt r e m e

BLACK METAL

SPECIAL ISSUE [featuring]

IMMORTAL ^ BURZUM ^ VENOM DARKTHRONE ^ EMPEROR SATYRICON ^ ENSLAVED ROTTING CHRIST … and the stories behind their greatest records

d ec i b e l m ag a z i n e .c o m

NOTHING’S BLACKER THAN

METALLICA

LIVE AT GRIMEY’S In June 2008, Metallica took the stage at a super-secret show at The Basement below a record store in Nashville, belting out a blistering “Master of Puppets”, “For Whom The Bell Tolls and More.” Now out for the first time ever on CD and double 10” VINYL, exclusively at Metal Club stores.

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just words from the editor

OK, before you ask, “Where in

the name of all that’s unholy are Mayhem and Bathory?” let’s quickly go over the three rules for inducting a record into the Decibel Hall of Fame: The record must be at least five years old. (Check!)

2) The record must be considered an “extreme music classic,” as determined by Decibel’s staff. (Check!)

3) Decibel must interview every band member who played on the recording, and present each of them questions exclusively about the writing, recording, touring and overall impact of said album. (Uh-oh…)

1)

Now, while Decibel recognizes Deathcrush, De Mysteriis Dom Sathanas and, honestly, every Bathory release from “the band’s” self-titled debut through Blood Fire Death as undisputed pinnacles of the black metal genre, without directly speaking with the late Euronymous and Quorthon, articles on said releases would paint incomplete portraits at best.

So, let’s focus on the pages that lie ahead—eight black metal Hall of Fame features, including three brand new, never-before-seen HOFs on Burzum’s Filosfem, Satyricon’s Nemesis Divina and Rotting Christ’s Thy Mighty Contract, plus a story on Darkthrone’s Transilvanian Hunger previously only available in Precious Metal.

It’s just the kind of light reading we know you all enjoy when you’re spending a lazy Saturday afternoon around the house plotting to once again burn Fantoft Stave Church to the ground, or just watering the plants.

—Albert Mudrian, Editor-in-Chief

Alex Mulcahy

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Venom, Welcome to Hell .................................................... 04 Rotting Christ, Thy Mighty Contract .................................. 12 Emperor, In the Nightside Eclipse ..................................... 20 Darkthrone, Transilvanian Hunger .................................... 26 Enslaved, Frost ................................................................. 34 Burzum, Filosofem ............................................................ 42

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Satyricon, Nemesis Divina ................................................. 48

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Immortal, At the Heart of Winter ...................................... 56

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COVER PHOTO BY PETER BESTE

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story by adem tepedelen

Enter Satan the making of Venom’s Welcome to Hell

T

he decision to induct Venom’s debut, Welcome to Hell, rather than the band’s second album, Black Metal, came down to one simple fact: there would be no Black Metal—the album or the genre—were it not for Welcome to Hell. It may seem something of an obvious statement to make, but the success and the metal paradigm-changing impact of the debut really set the stage for a second album that, while excellent in its own right, gave little more than its name to a genre. Certainly, nothing musically on Black Metal is any more influential or, for that matter, particularly different than Welcome to Hell. What cannot be overlooked is the incendiary effect that this blasphemous debut had on an already white-hot metal scene.

While other New Wave of British Heavy Metal bands were generally pursuing a more traditional path, content to draw influences from Sabbath, Purple, UFO, Priest and other ’70s heavies, Venom wanted to make the “devil’s music” truly evil.

In 2010, seeing a goat’s head in a pentagram on the front cover of an album wouldn’t cause most metalheads to take a second look. Satanic/occult imagery has become an integral part of metal, particularly among certain subgenres. Such was not the case in late 1981 when Welcome to Hell was released. Sure, it sported the DBBMHOF exact same front cover image as the band’s debut single, “In League With Satan,” but the full extent of the wickedness in store was to be found on the back, where the Welcome to Hell band—Cronos, “Bulldozer Bass and Growls”; Mantas, NEAT, 1981 “Buzz Saw Guitars”; and Abaddon, “Drums and Nuclear Newcastle trio Warheads”—included this quote: “We are possessed by makes metal black all that is evil / The death of your God we demand / We spit at the virgin you worship / And sit at lord Satan’s left hand.” The evil vibe was furthered by song titles like the title track, “Sons of Satan,” “In League With Satan,” “Witching Hour,” “One Thousand Days in Sodom,” etc. It was, without question, the most blatantly wicked, quasi-Satanic metal album ever released up to that point. While others— Black Sabbath, Pentagram and KISS among others—flirted with these images and topics, Venom shoved them in our faces.

And the Newcastle-based trio accompanied this imagery with an equally menacing racket that, while not exactly precise or tight, was well-suited to the overall vibe. This was an album recorded and mixed in six days, and it showed.

But if we’re to consider some of the bands that drew inspiration from this unholy first effort—Slayer, Hellhammer, Mayhem and countless others—it’s not hard to see how dramatically this album, no matter how sloppily it was played, impacted the entire history of metal that followed. [4]

Venom,

PHOTO BY KEVIN HODAPP, FRANK WHITE PHOTO AGENCY

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VENOM WELCOME TO HELL Cronos in chains You can’t spell Conrad without “rad”

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of Wallsend, which is a very industrial part of Newcastle, called Neat Records had a studio above it called Impulse, and all of these bands were recording there. We were kind of hanging out with these guys and hanging around with them. We weren’t particularly friendly, but were kind of hanging around as peripheral parts of the scene.

CONRAD “CRONOS” LANT: Back in those days, it seemed like everybody was in a band. There was a lot of music stores and whenever you went into the music stores, there was a guy sitting there trying out new guitars. There was a very big interest in all things musical. Everybody just seemed to want to play music. It was all based around the heavy rock music. The punk scene had kind of been and gone. Nobody really took it that seriously; it was a shock thing.

It wasn’t a musicians’ thing, something that people would aspire to. They did it really to piss their parents off.

What was the Newcastle scene like at the time?

Around about that time, the New Wave of British Heavy Metal was just kicking off. Newcastle was pretty much at the center of all that. You had the London connection with Iron Maiden and people like that, but there was a hell of a lot of bands in Newcastle. There was a great, thriving metal scene, and practically all of the bands were on Neat Records—Raven, Fist, Tygers of Pan Tang, White Spirit.

TONY “ABADDON” BRAY: The scene was pretty exciting. We’re an industrial city and I guess a lot of what we grew up believing were kind of punk attitudes. If you could play a sport well, like football, maybe that could get you out of the JEFF “MANTAS” DUNN:

doldrums. If you could play music, that could get you out of the day-to-day existence that you’d seen your parents go through. The country was going through a pretty bad economic time then.

There were a lot of pit closures, there were a lot of steel mills closing down. People were pretty pissed, you know, and that kind of down feeling seeps down to everybody. The music scene was what was kind of helping. [There were] a lot of bands who were kind of before this New Wave of British Heavy Metal, bands like Raven, Tygers of Pan Tang, Fist. We kind of looked up to these guys because they were doing what they wanted to do. They were playing live—pretty shitty places—but they were playing live. They were creating music. A very small place in the middle B M HO F

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LANT: We weren’t, really, because we set our sights high from the word go. We wanted to put two drum kits together. We weren’t happy with one drum kit. We didn’t want just two 4 x 12” [cabinets]; we wanted like 200 4 x 12”s! Because we were so over the top, everybody was wagging their finger, like, Tut tut tut, you don’t do it like that. What you need to do is work hard, play the clubs, pay your dues. We never understood that. We used to look up to bands like KISS and fucking Judas Priest, Led Zeppelin. We didn’t look up to fuckin’ Motörhead, Sham 69 or the Sex Pistols.

We weren’t looking up to some little bar bands who had 50 people in the crowd. We wanted a fuckin’ million people in the crowd.

DUNN: We were pretty much the outcasts at the time. We weren’t liked—let’s put it that way—by the other bands in the area. I think the thing with that was just the fact that we sort of came off the back of the punk scene, and we were trying to do something different and not just be your standard sort of rock act. All the other bands far outweighed us in playing ability and technical skill and all this kind of stuff, but with us it was sort of right place, right time.

BRAY: Initially, we weren’t accepted. We were called punks with long hair. At the time, some of the bands who were kind of pre-New Wave of British Heavy Metal kind of still saw themselves as hangovers from the ’70s. We were kind of outlawed a little bit. I don’t think we were striving to be fantastic musicians. We were striving to be a good band, and I don’t think some of the other bands really understood that and they used to look down their noses at us a little bit.

PHOTO BY KEVIN HODAPP, FRANK WHITE PHOTO AGENCY

How well was Venom accepted into the Newcastle scene initially?

Did you have the idea for the blatantly satanic imagery and lyrics from the beginning?

LANT: Absolutely. Rock ‘n’ roll is the devil’s music.

We’ve always said this. It was one of the cool things when we first met and we realized that we had the same ideas. We were in different bands originally. I was in a band called Dwarfstar originally when I met Mantas, and his band was called Guillotine. We met through girlfriends we were seeing and he told me that Guillotine were looking for a guitarist. I had kind of already gotten to the point with the guys in Dwarfstar where I realized they weren’t really serious about what we were doing. And Mantas sounded a lot more serious. So, I went along and had a practice with the guys and seen what the score was and thought that they were a lot more mentally where I [was] at. They wanted the big drum kits and the big backlines and all this sort of stuff.

DUNN: The Venom logo was drawn by Abaddon. I remember way before Cronos joined the band we had the idea. Like every band, I suppose, at that point, we wanted to go out and shock people.

That was a deliberate thing. We wanted to go out there and be brash and obnoxious and grab attention. We all had an interest. The satanic imagery and the changing of the names and everything, that was all planned. I remember showing up to rehearsals one day and I’m sure it was Abaddon’s mother or his auntie had embroidered or stitched this huge backdrop, and it was the pentagram. And that was our first backdrop. And obviously that became the cover of the first single, “In League With Satan,” and then Welcome to Hell.

BRAY: We had it right from the beginning. We knew we weren’t going to by called by some Christian names. We were going to be known as single-word names. And the imagery was there right from the beginning. Right from early rehearsals. I used to take pyrotechnic powder to rehearsals and we used to rehearse with pyrotechnics. We used to blow shit up in halls and things and just see what it would do, with a view to one day putting it all together.

my system. I was able to ask the engineer, “Could you work for free and I’ll do extra hours in the studio?” So, I kind of had to bum the first demos.

It wasn’t until after we’d recorded them that the record company started picking up their head and saying, “Oh, hold on a minute, this is very different—this could do something.”

DUNN: We just bugged Neat Records constantly about releasing a record. They released “In League With Satan” with “Live Like an Angel,” and all of a sudden the thing exploded. And I’m convinced to this day that Neat Records just pressed up a few of those and put it out there waiting for us to just bomb [so they could] go, “OK, boys, now fuck off. You had your chance, now get the fuck out of here!”

BRAY: We did the single first and that got great reviews. We got invited back to do what would have been our second set of demos. As we were walking upstairs with the equipment—I remember there was about eight flights of stairs, it was a horrible place to record in—and the guy from Neat Records stopped us halfway up the stairs and said, “Instead of just doing these demos that you’re going to do for the couple of days, why don’t you do all the songs you’ve got and we’ll make an album.” We were jumping up and down and thought, Oh yeah, great!

to Hell,” was actually written in the studio. That was essentially how the album came about. It was put out so quick, it was done so quick—you can see by the [“In League With Satan”] single cover, it’s the same as the album cover. It’s the same fucking cover just blown up to 12 inches.

BRAY: Consequently, you’ve got two sides that come out of that [brief recording session]. One is that it’s a very frenetic album, a very hurried album.

All the songs need to be demoed further. So, you’ve kind of got an album which a lot of people say it sounds like it wasn’t ready to be recorded. And you can say that, because it wasn’t. But also, because of that, because of the hurry-up values that came with it, and the excitement that was in it, it was full-on adrenaline.

Knowing that you had such a short time to make your debut, what was the approach to recording the songs?

DUNN: None of us had any technical knowledge of studios, so we just went in—in true Spinal Tap form—and turned everything up to 11 and recorded it. Looking back on it, production has come a long way in 30 years—with the digital age—but I think what you get from Welcome to Hell even now is the sense of a band just going for it and doing it live. And I think the one thing that has stood up and stood the test of time is the songs. It’s as simple as that. Putting the production values aside, at the end of the day it’s all about the songs.

BRAY: From my point of view, most of the drum tracks were all done in one take. We kind of got in and blasted them down and thought, Well, this sounds exciting, this sounds good. The guitars obviously had a little bit longer [time to work]. A lot of these songs had been written before Cronos was in the band, but he changed lyrics and wrote different lyrics, so there was a writing process going on.

LANT: The thing is, the songs had been played for about a year and a half at rehearsals up to that point. The songs were fine; we knew them backwards. We didn’t have anything to learn. The only overdubs were some vocals, some lead guitar overdubs and the secretary who came upstairs to read a psalm over the “Welcome to Hell” bit in the middle with the drum beats. But apart from some effects and things, there wasn’t much overdubs.

[After the album was released] when we were getting letters from fans–Yeah, we’re going to sacrifice the virgins–[the label] were all like, “What the fuck is this shit?!”

How did you get hooked up with Neat Records?

LANT: Because I was actually working as like A&R [for Neat] and bringing all these other bands in, I [was] constantly badgering Neat: “I want my band in, I want my band in.” They’re like, “Shut up, kid.” They thought I wasn’t really serious.

They thought it was just a case of, because I liked heavy music and because I was getting all these other bands in the studio, then I wanted some. So, I still say to this day that the only reason they let [Venom] in the studio was to kind of get it out of

C O N R A D “CRO NO S” LA NT So, what was to be a demo session basically turned into your debut album?

LANT: The whole Welcome to Hell album, we were kind of tricked into that, because it was actually a demo session. When we had went to record the first three songs that we did [for the single], the record company had said, “Look, have you guys got some more songs?” And we said, “Yeah, loads.”

So, they said, “Come in the studio and we’ll give you three days. Just record everything you’ve got and we’ll see if there’s a single or whatever in all that.” So, we spent three days recording Welcome to Hell. To us it was just an idea, it was demos, it wasn’t going to be an album or anything. And then the record company at that point gave us the ultimatum: either we’ll release that as it is, as the album, or we don’t get the deal. At the time, we were absolutely furious because we knew we could do better.

DUNN: We were given three days in the studio and that was it. We had a few unfinished songs that we put together. The title track, “Welcome

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Was part of the instant appeal of this record simply the fact that it had such a raw feel that perfectly suited the material?

DUNN: Absolutely. The evidence of that is, the first time we played Hammersmith Odeon, I remember running onstage and the front row was full of [4]

VENOM WELCOME TO HELL Spinal topped Bootlegs of hell from across the globe

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that. They’d had no inkling of any kinds of sinister goings-on. [After it was released] when we were getting letters from fans—Yeah, we’re going to sacrifice the virgins—[the label] were all like, “What the fuck is this shit?!”

DUNN: We totally just went out there to grab attention. That was the whole thing, that image [goat head in a pentagram] had never been used before on an album. Fucking hell, nowadays you can go into any T-shirt shop and buy a fucking baphomet T-shirt.

BRAY: We could never have done anything that would be too controversial. We didn’t care what we said, we didn’t care what we did. The album cover and album logo was something that I did.

I obviously got it from LaVey or something like that, but it was always going to be what the band was about. That was why we had blasphemous lyrics on the back. It was in plain view.

We thought, We’re not going to mask anything or hide anything. It’s right there on the cover. If you don’t like it, if you don’t want your kids to have it, that’s the parental choice. This is art; this is our art. Nothing is too blasphemous, nothing is too controversial. You can’t tell me what to say and do in this day and age—that was the thinking behind it. As a piece of art, other than something being overtly sexual, I don’t think anything could have been more in your face.

It’s right there on the cover. If you don’t like it, if you don’t want your kids to have it, that’s the parental choice. This is art; this is our art.

Nothing is too blasphemous, nothing is too controversial.

TONY “A BA D D O N ” BRAY punks. There was punks there, there were metal kids there. It was a whole cross-section of people.

A lot of punks were into Venom. We were just coming off the back of the whole punk movement in England, where everything almost seemed homemade. You’d just get in the studio and stick a mic up and go for it. None of this super-polished stuff where everybody was trying to go in and be more and more and more produced and tighter and this that and the other. I think definitely part of the charm of Venom, if you like, was this whole aggressive, put-it-down-live, that’s-what-you-getif-you-don’t-like-it-fuck-off attitude. I think that’s what Welcome to Hell captures. It captures the attitude of the band at the time.

LANT: It was nail-biting because we kind of thought the looseness, the brashness, that worked really well with punk. Rock music was a little more clean, a little more precise. And we didn’t know if the crossover would work. We used to always call ourselves long-haired punks anyways, because we kind of didn’t take ourselves too seriously. We used to always say we’re not in the music business; we’re in the entertainment business. This is one of the reasons why we used to just spend all the money on the stage show and productions and everything. We just wanted to have a good time.

Who came up with the cover art? Was there ever any concerns as to how this would be accepted?

LANT: [Neat] were really broad-minded and I think it was because of the fact that they knew me so well. And me as Conrad is very different than the Cronos character. Cronos is a fucking

How aware of your shortcomings musically were you at the time?

demon, where as Conrad, he has a beer, he as a laugh, he has a joke. So, they didn’t see this cover as anything dangerous or deadly or disturbing or anything. It was just Conrad’s artwork. They had no understanding whatsoever of the black arts. They didn’t know what it meant.

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LANT: The thing is, it worked for Venom. I’ve done plenty of sessions where I’ve worked with other bands and even worked with other individuals, and I’m a competent musician. I have no worries about anyone’s review of a Venom record. When a Venom record goes out, it has to be Venom, and the bench was set with Welcome to Hell. On Resurrection, where we did try to tighten up all the little screws and get the perfection in the drum timing and everything, people said, “Great production, but it’s not really Venom, because Venom’s a lot more loose and brash—not as precise, not as perfect.” If you advertise Mars bars, you’ve gotta sell Mars bars. Venom needs to be Venom, and it isn’t about accuracy and perfection. It’s about feeling, atmosphere and all of the kind of intensity that goes into the recording. I can forgive the odd error in a guitarist’s riff or a drummer’s beat if the intensity is in the playing.

DUNN: It was no different to us going in and recording the first demos. We went in there with exactly the same attitude. We didn’t have any massive expectations of ourselves. We went in there and did the best we possibly could for the time period. The track “Welcome to Hell” itself, if you play the vinyl and put the needle in the first groove of “Welcome to Hell,” you hear the track kick in [sings opening riff]. Now take the

needle out and put it at the end of the song and it’s about three times the fuckin’ speed. [Laughs] We just couldn’t fuckin’ keep time. Abaddon was the worst person in the world for speeding up and slowing down, but even when we replaced Abaddon with Antton [Anthony Lant, Cronos’ brother] in the late ’90s, even Antton said, “That was part of what Venom was about, this whole

loose, rough, raw type of thing that it was.” It was part of what Venom was. There was a lot of criticism for that.

BRAY: I’ve never wanted to take any drum lessons, I’ve never wanted to buy any drum DVDs or anything like that. I’ve never wanted to better myself.

Every time I play a song, every time I play with the guys, I try to play the best I can. I think I’m the

Welcome to Hellhammer TRIPTYKON’S Tom G. Warrior explains how Venom’s debut changed his life

By Adem Tepedelen

Where and when did you buy Welcome to Hell?

TOM G. WARRIOR: I went to England in 1981 as a young teenager and diehard fan of the New Wave of British Heavy Metal. I came across the single “In League With Satan,” the band’s first 7-inch single, before they had an album out.

I hadn’t heard of Venom yet, but I purchased the single on the strength of the picture on the back.

I had never seen anything like that before. When I put the single on when I got home, it was simply the heaviest music I had ever heard. I became an instant convert. I worshipped that single. I had been looking for music that heavy and I had so far only found it in punk when I heard Discharge.

But [after finding Venom] I knew that heavy metal could be played as heavily. Later on I heard that [they] were planning on recording a full album, so, of course, I highly anticipated the release of Welcome to Hell. When it came out, I bought it the day it arrived at the record store.

PHOTO BY PETER BESTE

Do you remember your first impression just upon seeing it?

WARRIOR: Everything fell into place. They did it exactly the right way. You have to realize this was before extreme metal even existed. The biggest metal band at the time was AC/DC and the most extreme metal band was probably Motörhead. I was completely taken by how radical [Venom’s] image was by their posing and the fact that they had knives and axes and black leather and studs and everything. It was heavy metal taken to a new level, a level that was completely unknown at the time.

Nowadays bands cannot imagine the impact that had, because such extreme metal has been popular for 20 or 30 years. Back then there was nothing like it. The word “revelation” sounds extreme, but it was nothing short of a revelation. These photos and this music changed my life forever.

What about when you put the needle in the groove?

WARRIOR: It was fantastic. I had been scared that [Venom] would change or become more polished or more commercial. The single had been recorded in such a primitive demo-like manner, but that was exactly part of the attraction to that sound. The whole attitude was very punk-like even though it was heavy metal. At the time, all the big

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best person in that band at that time, if you know what I mean. I don’t think any of us particularly wanted to become impresarios. I think we wanted to become more aggressive, more outrageous with what we were doing. I’m pretty sure musical prowess was not a priority. As long as I feel vindicated by and feel happy with my performance and what I’ve done, then anybody else can take a flying leap. [4]

bands tried to be more polished. The lead vocals of all the other bands were operatic, multi-octave voices. The production was supposed to be really polished and very professional. Venom took a completely different path. So, when the album came out, I was afraid that they would have yielded to what was coming in the scene. I put the needle in this record and it turns out it was a whole record like that [first] single. Every track was recorded in a very primitive manner. There were playing mistakes on there. The mix was very rough. It was like sub-demo standard. To me, it was perfect.

What possibilities did Venom open up for a young metal musician such as yourself?

WARRIOR: I had a very, very difficult youth, and looking back I think that’s what drove me to extreme metal. I subconsciously was looking for heavier and heavier metal. In 1978, I discovered UFO, which was very radical at the time, then later Motörhead, which was much more radical.

But deep inside, I always longed for more aggression, more heaviness, more darkness. But then I discovered Venom and [they] fulfilled all of that. Of course, I had the dream of becoming a musician, and I think it was the existence of Venom which showed to me that what I felt inside it was actually possible to write and record that. It wasn’t just some kind of feeling just inside of me; I realized that other people had that feeling, were attracted to that same music and actually wrote and recorded it. I think that was the final impulse I needed to become a musician myself and form my own three-piece. That was the very root of Hellhammer.

What is it about Welcome to Hell, rather than Black Metal, that appeals to you?

WARRIOR: I know that Black Metal is probably the more famous album by Venom and most of Norwegian black metal is based on it, but to me it was already too commercial. I loved Welcome to Hell much more because, if you’re going for Satanic underground metal, there’s nothing more Satanic and underground than Welcome to Hell. Black Metal had kind of jokey songs on it, but Welcome to Hell was like a serious album with highly blasphemous lyrics and complete aggression and complete disregard for any conventions of the scene. For me, the impact of Welcome to Hell is a million times more significant than the second album.

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In your estimation, why did this album ultimately have such an impact?

DUNN: Everybody was ready for something different, for something raw and fresh and exciting.

I think that’s how it came about. The success of Venom from the Newcastle scene was pretty much overnight. There was no slogging around all the little rock clubs and stuff like that. We didn’t do any of that. We played a couple of little places in Newcastle, and literally one weekend we were rehearsing in a church hall of all places in the west end of Newcastle, and the following weekend we were at Poperinge in Belgium in front of about 3,000 kids in a sports hall. It was literally that quick. When everything started to go, it happened so fast. The press jumped all over it. There was no gradual build-up there. It kind of swept us off our feet, to be perfectly honest. We were a little bit amused by it all. It just seemed to be the way things happened. For us, I think we thought, Oh, this must happen to everybody. It was total naiveté. It was a case of, form a band, do some recordings, become famous. That seemed to be the handbook for the rock band.

BRAY: Obviously the New Wave of British Heavy Metal thing was starting, so there were a lot of bands. But there were a lot of bands that were still, to me, timid. Bands like Saxon, Iron Maiden did very well, but they just stayed as safe heavy metal bands. [Then] you got Venom bursting that bubble straight away and going, “Hang on, there’s more—a lot more.” You would look at bands that were heavy metal bands and they were all very similar. I think it just needed a band like Venom to say, OK, that’s very good, but we can climb the The seven ladder above that. And I’m not horsemen talking about virtuosity; I’m The best talking about just coming 10 dollars through and saying, “Fuck ever spent that.” If you take a band anywhere, circa 1983 from Norway like Emperor and you take a band like Pantera, you think, How are these two bands even remotely linked? They’re completely different bands. But when you follow the strain back, what you get is Venom. You don’t get to Iron Maiden, you don’t get to Saxon or the Tygers of Pan Tang. What you get to is Venom. And I’m very proud of that.

LANT: I just think it was so radically different.

People just couldn’t believe that a band could create so much intensity with just three members. I think people just couldn’t get the trick of it, as well. They kind of thought like, Fuckin’ hell, listen to those timing errors. Listen to those notes—what are these guys doing? Well, we actually were creating something new. People sometimes are afraid of change. People like normality and they like to be able to predict what’s going to happen tomor-

If you play the vinyl and put the needle in the first groove of “Welcome to Hell,” you hear the track kick in. Now take the needle out and put it at the end of the song and it’s about three times the fuckin’ speed. We just couldn’t fuckin’ keep time.

JE F F “MA NTAS” D UNN row. And when they can’t, I think it’s unnerving for some people. For some people, it’s absolutely exciting. I remember reading reviews where people were saying, “This is going to break your stereo.” Listening to music at the time, there was absolutely nothing like Venom. That’s what made Venom so special. As a guy who worked in a studio and saw different bands coming in every day, I still today scratch my head and wonder why people thought Venom was so amazing and why they didn’t think all these other bands were so amazing. It’s not something you can ask for, or predict or wish for. It either happens or it doesn’t.

band, it was also good to be able to pull it back and have some slow, intense songs. Putting songs like “In League With Satan” together, that’s just like a massive middle finger to all of the kind of Black Sabbaths, who would sing “Please God help me.” To be able to say “I’m in league with Satan” and “I was raised in hell” and “I am the demon,” I just think it’s really exciting and different. For me, the classic track of Welcome to Hell is definitely “Witching Hour.” I remember when we penned the song and Mantas came in with the riff, straight away I just threw the lyrics at it in seconds. It was just one of those songs that came together so quick. Songs like that are rare, where in like five minutes you’ve got a killer track.

What’s your opinion of it today?

What are your favorites or the ones you feel like are Venom classics on this?

DUNN: I always loved “Welcome to Hell.” I loved playing that song live. “One Thousand Days in Sodom,” I loved that song. “Live Like an Angel,” “Schizo.” I’d say these were probably my favorites.

BRAY: To me, “Witching Hour” and “Buried Alive” [which is actually on Black Metal].

LANT: I think “Sons of Satan” was always my favorite because it was the first song that I wrote for Venom and it’s very brash. The fact that we could use it as the first song on the album was very exciting. It kind of set the pace straight away. Even the title track, for me, was great because for all that we were a fast and ferocious B M HO F

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DUNN: Everybody that I’ve spoken to, the fans that I’m in touch with, especially the really hardcore fans, the two albums they mention straight away are Welcome to Hell and Black Metal. I think Black Metal gets the edge over Welcome to Hell purely because of the fact that it is “black metal.” It’s the album that started everything, really. I suppose for sheer fondness and memories, Welcome to Hell does stand up to being the one. At the end of the day, it’s the album that started everything for us. When I look back on it and think, we knew absolutely nothing back in those days. We did what we could, and that was the result. And now 30 years on I’m talking to someone who wants to know all about it. And that, for me, is amazing.

To think that as young guys we just went in there, couldn’t play very well, just made a fuckin’ noise and 30 years down the line it’s [considered] a classic album, it’s influential, it’s all of those things.

You’ve got to have a sense of pride about that.

BRAY: Whenever I see bands in magazines talking about who they used to like and got them into this sort of music and Venom’s mentioned there, I get extremely proud of that. It hasn’t stopped for 30 years.

LANT: I’m quite proud of Welcome to Hell. Yes, it could have been better, but I wouldn’t change a thing. It was that moment in time. We’ll never create it again. It was something special. We were really young, and to create an album when you’re that age that changes so many people is incredible. To hear all the bands that have been influenced by that album and Black Metal and others, it’s just so humbling. A

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story by chris dick

The Grecian Formula: Black L the making of Rotting Christ’s Thy Mighty Contract

et’s rewrite history. Black metal history. While it’s true the Norwegians— namely Euronymous’s contributions—have been and probably always will be considered by the hoi polloi as progenitors of contemporary black metal, the devilish art was just as underground and equally as wicked elsewhere on the European continent. Thus, it’s fair to claim, the Norwegians were heavily influenced by the dark and nefarious sounds emanating out of Eastern and Southern sections of the continent. Hungary had late ’80s chapel haunters Tormentor, who went on to move not just Mayhem and Emperor, but Swedish morning stars Dissection, while then-Czechoslovakia was home to truly foul, if slightly strange, birds like Master’s Hammer and Root. But further south, in the quaint but bustling town of Athens, Greece, the blackest of metal was more than a bespiked, angry dude here and a Welcome to Hell-worshipping longhair there. It was a movement.

Although the trio of Sakis Tolis, Themis Tolis (a.k.a. Sauron), and Jim Patsouris (a.k.a. Mutilator Jim) began as a rudimentary grindcore outfit in 1987, Rotting Christ quickly transformed into something darker and more sinister two years later on the Satanas Tedeum demo. They were a different band (with the same lineup) on a very left hand path. Vocalist/guitarist Sakis had taken on the NecroMayhem pseudonym, songs like “Embryonic Necrocannibalism” and “Physiotherapist” were replaced by “The Hills of the Crucifixion” DBBMHOF and “Restoration of the Infernal Kingdom,” and completely absent were the Scum-like trashcan bursts heard on the Decline’s Return and Leprocy of Death rehearsal demos. Rotting Christ were officially black Thy Mighty metal. After Satanas Tedeum, the Greeks would release two singles, a Contract split with Italian wizards Monumentum, a crucial EP in Passage to OSMOSE, 1993 Arcturo and a demo that’d ultimately get them signed to burgeoning Sign up for the "other" French label Osmose Productions. But the most significant year for Athens scene Rotting Christ and Greek black metal was 1993.

In the same span it took the U.S. government to sign an executive order to allow women to be fighter pilots, the Nobel Foundation to award Nelson Mandela the Nobel Peace Prize for his anti-apartheid/government-building work in South Africa, and the Norwegian police to officially charge Varg Vikernes (a.k.a. Count Grishnackh) with Øystein Aarseth’s (a.k.a. Euronymous) murder, there was a hellacious roar emanating out of central Athens and its suburbs. It was lightless, bellicose and malevolent. The Greek black metal scene had conspired against the intolerant and triumphed in a warrior-like sonic thrust. In short, the Athenians had arrived.

Necromantia’s Crossing the Fiery Path, Thou Art Lord’s Diabolou Archaes Legeones EP, Varathron’s His Majesty at the Swamp and Rotting Christ’s Thy Mighty Contract hit hard [4]

Rotting Christ,

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and often that year. Whereas the Norwegians experimented with Walkman recordings and the Swedes were still keen on infusing black into their death metal, the Greeks sounded, well, Greek. And definitely evil.

Informed by Bathory and Celtic Frost, but also raised on the NWOBHM, Rotting Christ’s debut album, Thy Mighty Contract, was unlike anything from the North. Or anywhere else, really. Opener “The Sign of Evil Existence” had an unbelievably beastly pulse, but it’s the rest of the album, from the crestfallen “Transform All Suffering Into Plagues” to the doomed-out “The 4th Knight of Revelation (Part I, II),” where the Tolis brothers, Patsouris and new hire, keyboardist George Zaharopoulos (a.k.a. Magus Wampyr Daoloth) had room to strategically pound, stretch out melodies, get very atmospheric and, best of all, show they were unrivaled riffmasters. “Exiled Archangels,” “The Coronation of the Serpent” and “Fgmenth, Thy Gift” are fucking majestic tunes.

In fact, we honored a section (2:08 to 2:49) of “Fgmenth, Thy Gift” in our Top 50 Extreme Metal Riffs of All Time feature from Decibel #50.

Ancient Greece had all kinds of noteworthy thinkers, inventors, mathematicians and playwrights, but none of them—not even Sophocles, Plato, Euclid or smarty pants Pythagoras—hold a ritual candle to Rotting Christ’s Thy Mighty Contract.

Do you recall which bands influenced Rotting Christ while writing Thy Mighty Contract?

I know you were fans of Beherit, Impaled Nazarene and Unholy.

Not only those bands. Personally, I was really into first generation of black metal bands like Bathory, Venom, Celtic Frost and Hellhammer, and always wanted to sound somehow like them. They were my idols back then and I was dreaming every night to be like them!

My dreams became a dark reality when a friend of mine gave me Celtic Frost’s Morbid Tales. I still have Mr. Warrior’s voice in my mind. His “Ouugh!” stuck deep inside me. After, I then discovered a new world. The newborn world of black metal really influenced my compositional style for Thy Mighty Contract. Also, the countless brand new bands that were created at the time. Yes, Impaled Nazarene and Beherit influenced me. But I will also mention Darkthrone, Immortal, Burzum and, of course, the true Mayhem, with our brother Euronymous, as influences.

THEMIS TOLIS: Do not forget the many demos that we used to listen to. We were really in touch with so many bands back then. I was even into listening to destroyed tapes. I used to like noise music. Being explorers in our life generally meant we were seeking new musical directions.

Yes, we loved the first generation of black metal bands, as well as many heavy metal bands, but we wanted more. We wanted to expand our musical horizons. So, a friend of mine suggested a fanzine. The old glorious Slayer magazine. I SAKIS TOLIS:

ordered it hiding some bucks in an envelope.

When it arrived, I thought that I was exploring a new world. All the new world was there: Beherit, Impaled Nazarene, Mayhem, Samael, etc. I was personally influenced by all these bands.

GEORGE ZAHAROPOULOS: There were no specific influences. It was natural to get influenced by everything you listened to at the time, but we always tried to find our own way and style. I still love Beherit and Impaled Nazarene!

JIM PATSOURIS: Look, when working on the songs for the album, we had tremendous inspiration.

As for our influences, although we liked these bands—we are also very good friends with Beherit and Impaled Nazarene—we didn’t get [directly] influenced by them. Listening to the album is easy to understand why. For me, Thy Mighty Contract is a reference point for Rotting Christ. And beyond for the whole occult black metal genre.

I remember Norwegian black metallers would name drop Rotting Christ, Necromantia, and Varathron as “true black metal.” Looking back on the explosion of Norwegian black metal (as well as black metal in general), what do you make of being labeled “true black metal?”

S. TOLIS: It was an honor for to them to include us and our Greek horde as “true black metal” back then. They were the leaders. Individuals like Euronymous were a big deal for us and for the scene. When they were calling us “true,” you can understand how we felt. But what was “true”? I still wonder to this day. Maybe “true” is B M HO F

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Contract killer defined by someone’s Tolis has a Christdedication to the idea crushingly good time, of black metal and not live in '93 exactly how brutal your band sounded.

In that case, Rotting Christ will never be called “true.”

T. TOLIS: I also remember that our band was included in the “black metal circle.” Something that had nothing to do with our band. There was a racist/fascist tension in that movement. And, as Rotting Christ, we never had anything to do with the “black metal circle.”

ZAHAROPOULOS: What is “true black metal” after all? We never cared about labels. We always created music straight from our heart and soul. If there was darkness and hatred in our hearts, then it would be channeled through our music!

PATSOURIS: I remember this whole story with “true black metal” and whatnot. Blah, blah, blah. I think Rotting Christ, Varathron— another band created by me—and Necromantia gave fresh ideas to the black metal scene. And these Greek bands influenced a lot of bands worldwide. See the demo of Enslaved. They were influenced by Rotting Christ. Or have a look at the covers of such classic albums like Dissection’s Storm of the Light’s Bane, Immortal’ s Diabolical Fullmoon Mysticism, Vital Remains’ Let Us Pray or Blasphemy’s Fallen Angel of Doom. You will see members wearing Rotting Christ shirts. Also, bands like Darkthrone (from their death metal era), Mayhem and Burzum were really into Rotting Christ’s music.

Thy Mighty Contract was supposed to come out in January of 1993. It was delayed almost a year, if I’m not mistaken. Do you remember why Osmose waited so long?

S. TOLIS: Yes, I think you’re right. I remember there was a delay, but I can’t remember why.

T. TOLIS: You are right, but it was common back then with labels. We weren’t that professional.

The scene was just being born at the time.

ZAHAROPOULOS: To tell you the truth, nope! But I remember that we delayed to complete the recordings a little bit.

PATSOURIS: Really, I do not remember the reason for the delay. But delays like that occurred back then.

I gather signing to Osmose wasn’t too dramatic.

How did you hook up with Osmose? Osmose boss Hervé Herbaut had a good ear for talent.

S. TOLIS: Yes, he had a really good ear. And you can understand this by the fact that almost all of the bands that signed to Osmose had a remarkable career. Now, if you want to know how we hooked up, I can’t say the best words, but I know we caused it.

T. TOLIS: We weren’t too professional back then.

ZAHAROPOULOS: Back in the days, Osmose was the #1 label for black metal. They had all the great bands from around Europe. So, it was natural for Rotting Christ to be there. We were one of the most original and creative newcomers back in the day.

PATSOURIS: Sure. Hervé was totally into our music in those days. Osmose released a large number of great albums. Now, after so many years, we must acknowledge his contribution to extreme music.

Indeed, many bands owe him a lot.

Thy Mighty Contract was a significant jump in quality over Passage to Arcturo. What do you remember about the songwriting process?

S. TOLIS: Yes, it’s true there was a big step. As for the compositional process, as the main composer, I can’t really tell you why. I used everything to expand my musical abilities, though. I wanted to trip deeper into the fantastic world of black metal. I was listening to demos and new stuff all day long. I was really hungry for metal. I was really hungry for dark metal. I remember I was tripping with my guitar more than 12 hours.

It was a fantastic journey and I am really glad that I did manage to create an album that many people consider as cult and influential. Also, stress and deadlines lead us to create an impulsive album. You can feel that. Concerning the jump into quality, I never took music lessons, so I can say that this progression came naturally.

T. TOLIS: There was some holy smoke involved, too. I was never involved with the composing, but what I remember was my brother Sakis smoking the whole day and the glorious rehearsals in various studios around Athens.

You know, Athens has no similarity to the U.S. when it comes to rehearsals. There are no places to rehearse. And it’s hard for musicians to get their own place. So, you are forced to rent some rehearsal space. Every owner didn’t have the best words to say about us. Hey, don’t forget the recording process. Thy Mighty Contract was, for

I still have Mr. Warrior’s voice in my mind. His “Ouugh!” stuck deep inside me.

SA K IS TO LIS me, the most enjoyable recordings in my career.

We owned the studio, so we had countless time to spend and to experiment. That definitely was an experience I will never forget.

ZAHAROPOULOS: I think Thy Mighty Contract captured the true essence of Rotting Christ. It united all the elements together: melody, aggression, originality and darkness!

PATSOURIS: I still consider Passage to Arcturo as a memorable cult album. But you are right: Thy Mighty Contract is miles better! When we were composing Thy Mighty Contract, we were more experienced and more mature musicians, with real studio experience. The jamming was awesome. Imagine some youngsters giving body and soul to a vision, making something very dark and brutal, but still heavy and melodic.

“What you leave behind is not what is engraved in stone monuments, but what is woven into the lives of others.”

— Pericles

Black Sabbath and Judas Priest. Traditional heavy metal had always flowed in our blood. Melody in our music was also part of our culture.

Do you remember which songs were your favorites at the time? Has your opinion changed now that you’ve had 15-plus years to think about it?

S. TOLIS: Being the main composer of the band, I consider each song as something unique for me.

And still to this very day I can’t choose one song.

I am really sorry.

T. TOLIS: “The Sign of Evil Existence” and “Exiled Archangels” rule!

ZAHAROPOULOS: “The Sign of Evil Existence,” “Transform All Suffering Into Plagues” and “Fgmenth, Thy Gift.” They still do the trick!

PATSOURIS: I probably adore all eight tracks of Thy Mighty Contract. And believe it or not, I still listen to it very often. Maybe after Triarchy of the Lost Lovers, it’s the Rotting Christ album I’ve heard the most.

OK, inquiring minds want to know: Who or what is a “Fgmenth?”

S. TOLIS: It’s a name Jim Mutilator came up with.

Influenced by The Lord of the Rings.

PATSOURIS: Curiosity killed the cat. [Laughs] Fgmenth is a mighty force from another dimension. Something like electricity.

Melody also played a part in separating Thy Mighty Contract from its predecessors. At the time, melodic black metal was barely an idea yet, but there are all kinds of killer melodic riffs in “Transform All Suffering Into Plagues,” “Exiled Archangels” and “Fgmenth, Thy Gift.”

The production quality of Thy Mighty Contract was a vast improvement over Passage to Arcturo. Why was it important to push Rotting Christ’s production quality? I ask this because in interviews for the album, it’s one of the key reasons you felt, at the time, why Thy Mighty Contract was superior to any Rotting Christ release before it.

S. TOLIS: Yes, melody was an important part of our music. And still is. That made us sound unique. I do not look like it, but deep inside me I have this character and that comes out with melody. OK, to avoid any misunderstanding, when I refer to melody I’m not referring to smooth, sweet melodies. I am talking about dark atmospheric melodies. Yes, I like noise, but I also like melody. I don’t know. Maybe I’m openminded for a black metaller.

T. TOLIS: OK, there is melody, but it’s not “white” melody. I call it “dark” melody. When it is performed properly, it can touch my soul. I hate cheap, velvet melodies. On the other hand, I am into melodies that have to do with the dark side of life. I have the feeling that Rotting Christ plays “dark” melodies.

ZAHAROPOULOS: That is why I told you before that Rotting Christ—and all the Greek black metal bands of that era—were searching for their own unique sound. We never copied! We established our own thing.

PATSOURIS: It comes normally. We grew up with all these classic heavy metal bands like Iron Maiden,

S. TOLIS: Thy Mighty Contract was recorded in our studio. In the studio that the band had bought.

Back then, many cult bands recorded their albums there. I am referring to the glorious Storm Studios. We did the whole production ourselves.

We had unlimited time. So, we came up with a far better production than Passage to Arcturo.

T. TOLIS: I had unlimited time for the drums. I remember we were all really calm. Maybe this is the reason why it’s superior.

ZAHAROPOULOS: At that time, the production was super! It was the first time that we had a budget to work with. That is why we tried our best.

Don’t forget that the studio technology was not that advanced back then.

PATSOURIS: Passage to Arcturo was our first studio experience. It was produced by a producer who had no idea what black metal was. We thought we’d go for a clearer sound for Thy Mighty Contract. The audience could hear the melody through the brutality. I consider Thy Mighty Contract an album that gave black metal a more melodic orbit. So, a more “commercial” production was really kind of key.

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by G. Osmark, A. Delaportas and Rotting Christ. Do you remember telling Osmark and Delaportas specific sound goals (heavier than this, louder than that), or did you just go into the studio and bang out the record?

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S. TOLIS: Actually, it was recorded by these guys.

We didn’t know what a producer was back then.

So, we called them “producers.” No, we didn’t have any goals. Times were different back then.

No one had a goal. No one knew about technology. No one knew about effects, etc. It was a spontaneous soul expression and that reflects in Thy Mighty Contract. Not only Thy Mighty Contract either. If you listen to all the albums of this era, you can feel it. At least I can. I remember Osmark showed us sampler hardware that had just come out on the market. We were like the primitives looking at fire!

T. TOLIS: That was a mistake. We did the production. They did the sound engineering. We were aware of the sound, however. Despite the fact that they were good sound engineers, they weren’t aware of black metal or the scene.

ZAHAROPOULOS: Indeed, we did a lot of corrections and suggestions. The guys involved knew about heavy metal, but not the extreme metal sound that we wanted to produce. It was more like collaboration.

PATSOURIS: I really miss those guys. They were great! I haven’t seen Delaportas since after the recording [of Thy Mighty Contract]. Osmark left Greece for the States many years ago. I hope both are still alive. We certainly gave them musical direction. But it was really hard to produce this album.

ZAHAROPOULOS: It’s a very small studio. The heat was enormous! It was like Hell itself!

PATSOURIS: Great times! I have to mention that me and Sakis bought Molon Lave Studios, so we were the owners as well.

Was there a lack of experienced drummers in Athens? I know a lot Greek bands at the time used a drum machine. It sounds like there’s both a real drummer (Themis) and a drum machine on Thy Mighty Contract.

S. TOLIS: This is up to Themis to answer, I think.

But remember, Athens is a densely populated city with no free places at all. It is not like the great majority of U.S. cities. There is so much free space in the suburbs in the U.S. So, it was so hard for the musicians to get a rehearsal room to put their drums in, so I think they chose different instruments. We had luck with drummers.

To be honest, we’re still lucky. Athens is still densely populated. I can’t think of any other reason why Athens didn’t have many extreme drummers at the time.

S. TOLIS: This is up to Jim to answer, but I was connected to his lyrics, even if I couldn’t understand what I was singing. Jim had a strange way of thinking, and that was reflected in his lyrics. I remember I was often breaking the recording sessions in order to ask what the lyrics meant. For example, “Fgmenth, Thy Gift.” Everyone in the band was connected to Jim’s lyrics, though. They didn’t have a concept, but they were direct and you could feel the dark atmosphere emanating from them.

T. TOLIS: We were into Apocryphism and Occultism back then. But I have to say Jim was our voice.

ZAHAROPOULOS: I think that he was borrowing concepts and themes from various sources that he was into.

PATSOURIS: Thy Mighty Contract is lyrically based in Occultism. The title says it all.

Did you consider Rotting Christ to be Satanic or Occult? Obviously, with a name like Rotting Christ, the first impressions are that the band is Satanic.

What do you recall about the time you spent at Molon Lave Studios?

S. TOLIS: The power of the team! That was the glorious era of the Hellenic scene. All the bands back then were recording in these studios that we later bought. It was a black metal ghetto.

Everyone was exchanging ideas about our precious black metal music. We were spontaneous teenagers that were seeking and doing their revolution under a different path. Under a different god.

T. TOLIS: The calmness, the fun, the purity and the metal spirit! As I told you, we had just bought the studio from Molon Lave. The whole recording process was the best. Most interesting in my career. Despite the tons of pot we had smoked, we had some adventures with the local authorities. At the time, Greece was vibrating from a scandal involving Satanists that killed some people. Every metalhead was in hiding. So, we did the same when [the police] knocked on our studio door. They were looking for us. They thought Storm Studios was a Satanic shelter.

Lyrically, Rotting Christ mixed mythology, Lovecraftian lore, Crowleyisms and apocalypse theology. Did you have a unified lyrical theme or were you merely borrowing concepts you liked the best from various sources?

T. TOLIS: The drums were performed on an electronic set. Something like triggers. We had the opportunity to choose sounds to correct mistakes. But I repeat: I played the drums on Thy Mighty Contract.

ZAHAROPOULOS: For Thy Mighty Contract, we used triggers on the drums. It was the first time for us. New technology and new ideas. Of course, the triggering was not of the best quality, but it served us well. Drummers were the most rare kind back in the old days. And most couldn’t play fast.

PATSOURIS: Yeah, you are fucking right. In those days there was a lack of good drummers in Greece. Especially in the black metal movement.

“You will never do anything in this world without courage. It is the greatest quality of the mind next to honor.”

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S. TOLIS: We were more Occult than Satanic, I would say. We were never into extreme Satanism. We weren’t really evil people. We were fascinated by black metal ideology, we followed its orders, but we never got so extreme as to call ourselves Satanic. We were more into Satanic ideology and Satanic theory, which was definitely a curse back then. You weren’t Satanic Occult of if you didn’t call your personality lyrics Satanic or talk about Rotting slowing in '93 killing Christians, or tell Christ to go fuck himself. I guess we were part of the “smooth” Satanic movement.

T. TOLIS: We were a combination of Occultism and Satanism. I will agree with Sakis in saying that we were definitely more Occult. We didn’t want to follow trends or Satanic fashion.

Personally, I was not that Satanic. I was not into the ideology of “Fuck Christ! Hail Satan!

Kill Christians!” I like to search and philosophize in my life, so I was more into Occultism.

We were not that extreme as a band, and many times were wrongly categorized because of our name. I still believe that all religions are rotting, but I would never say, “Go kill Christians!”

I belong to the most moderate of black metallers. Maybe.

ZAHAROPOULOS: I would not dare to say that Rotting Christ is a Satanic band. In the narrowest sense. Rotting Christ was—and is—more of a band who deals with the darker, occult side.

Literally and

And since Satan falls into this category then, yes, we were part Satanic in a sense.

PATSOURIS: One hundred percent Occult metal. I don’t think we gave the band the name Rotting Christ because we were Satanic. Rather, we just don’t like Christianity. Of course, everyone is free to consider what they want, but it is worth studying and looking for what you believe.

figuratively Memoirs from the infamous tour

influence on young people.

I also remember hiding in Storm Studios because some journalist was looking for us. They wanted to interview us after a big scandal erupted in Greece. Satanists had killed some people and they thought we might be involved or know something about it. We also had protests at some of our shows, a few death threats, and some shows were cancelled because bands refused to share the same stage with us. Conservative minds always think of ways to limit freedom and the free exchange of ideas.

T. TOLIS: So many troubles, but I was shocked when I saw our faces on national television. We were branded as Satanic. I guess that was the highlight.

ZAHAROPOULOS: I think there were some problems in U.S. and the U.K., if I am not mistaken.

PATSOURIS: Yes, quite often there were a lot of offended Christians. I remember during some tours there were people protesting against us.

Can you draw the distinction between the Satanic and the Occult as they relate to Rotting Christ?

S. TOLIS: Occultism is more apocryphal and dark knowledge that is based on many theories. Satanism is simply Satanism. That’s all. Now, if you really want to get into details, we’ll need the whole magazine to explain.

ZAHAROPOULOS: Satanism is centered around the Judeo-Christian figure of Satan. There is darkness and wisdom in many other cultures and civilizations, too. Rotting Christ always treated darkness in a broader sense.

PATSOURIS: You touched on a sensitive topic.

I could talk for days about this. Satanism and Occultism are quite different things. Satanism was informed by Occultism. Occultism is the root of all the religions, organizations, etc. They were influenced by the Occult and built their own “truths” around it. Occultism is connected to all the mysteries of the world, to all the mysteries of the universe, and is connected to life and death. Satanism is a religion for devil worshippers. And a kind of selfishness, even a simple reaction against Christianity. Hardly any connection to the supernatural or true magic. Occultism has no borders. It’s the way to the outer worlds and for eternity. One way to meet your fate. Its roots go far back to the beginnings of the world.

Back to the ancient initiations. To Pythagoras, to Plato, to Aristotle, to the creation of pyramids, to ancient gods that left Earth. “Impossible is nothing” could be a simple but loyal meaning for Occultism.

Do you remember having any problems— distribution, protests outside your shows, etc.— with the band name? It’s pretty blunt.

S. TOLIS: Too many! We still have problems, but I do not hide that I’m used to it now. I like the name Rotting Christ because I think that it has impact. The name punches conservative ideas worldwide. Metal’s priority, first and foremost, is to challenge conservatism. I remember once when returning from tour and seeing my mother almost crying. I asked her why and she said that she saw me on the TV. On a special show about Satanists and murderers. They were blaming our band for being Satanists. Like we were a bad

What do you remember about the “Fuck Christ” tour with Immortal and Blasphemy?

We were not that extreme as a band, and many times were wrongly categorized because of our name.

I still believe that all religions are rotting, but I would never say, “Go kill Christians!” I belong to the most moderate of black metallers. Maybe.

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S. TOLIS: “Fuck Christ” was the first second generation black metal tour. I can say that the whole tour was a huge experience for us. I don’t really recall specific events, but I do remember it gave us a chance to be face-to-face with the entire European black metal scene. The bands we shared the stage with were great!

T. TOLIS: “Fuck Christ” was the best tour ever.

Simple as that!

ZAHAROPOULOS: Nothing! I wasn’t there.

PATSOURIS: That’s the first black metal tour ever and I am proud to be a part of this historical event. Unforgettable tour.

I’ve read a few crazy stories about the shows.

Self-mutilation, bomb threats, etc.

Any of that stuff true?

S. TOLIS: As I said, the whole experience was huge.

It was the first time a Greek metal band toured Europe. We were innocent boys on that tour. I know it sounds sad, but we were shocked. I mean the tour was called “Fuck Christ.” All the stories are true. I can’t hide the fact that we were scared by the bomb threats, death threats and the fans’ extreme reaction to our music. However, we got used to it. I can proudly say we really enjoyed the “Fuck Christ” tour. It’s definitely in my top three tours of all time. It will be very hard to get a tour like this together again—new experiences, great bands and great shows. I can say I felt truly underground on this tour. I am proud of the feeling.

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Patsouris and the Tolis brothers Greek out

The audience sometimes exceeded the limits. I saw it with my own eyes. But I really can’t forget the young man who cut himself and almost bled to death. All in the name of Satan.

J I M PATS O U R IS I can’t say that all the stories the rest [of the] band members referred to scared me, but they definitely shocked me. It was actually a culture shock, meeting metal fans with a different mentality than mine. Some of them were really extreme. Seeing a room full of blood after someone cut his veins in the name of Satan was not something that you see every day. Performing under a bomb threat wasn’t too usual either. Also, touring in a nightliner was something that we had not even thought about.

Not in our wildest dreams. Almost all the bands shared the same huge bed. First generation nightliners!

ZAHAROPOULOS: You have to ask the other guys about that. I only followed Rotting Christ to the Greek and Israeli shows.

PATSOURIS: All of them are true. The stories aren’t fantastic. The audience sometimes exceeded the limits. I saw it with my own eyes.

But I really can’t forget the young man who cut himself and almost bled to death. All in the name of Satan.

T. TOLIS:

the entire community—and everyone who played death metal was fake. It sounded “white.” Sort of tension of the times. I can’t agree with the sentiment today, of course.

ZAHAROPOULOS: Because death metal had started to grow commercially and black metal was still very underground, so people labeled death metal as trendy, which was stupid!

PATSOURIS: [Laughs] I think it was Euronymous (R.I.P.) who had this view.

Some ran to embrace it. I never identified with this view.

Bands go back and re-record old songs for a variety of reasons. Would you change Thy Mighty Contract if given the chance?

Probably because they were reserved for the 7-inch EP. PATSOURIS: Those tracks were officially recorded for the Apokathelosis EP. They shouldn’t have been included on Thy Mighty Contract.

ZAHAROPOULOS:

“No man is free who is not a master of himself.”

— Epictetus Do you recall why the two songs—“Visions of the Dead Lovers” and “The Mystical Meeting”—from the Apokathelosis EP weren’t included on the original pressing of Thy Mighty Contract?

S. TOLIS: I do not really know. That was another label’s trick for bonus material. We weren’t that experienced to know what was going on at the time. We were purely metal fans and never had an idea of how things operated.

T. TOLIS: “Visions of the Dead Lovers” is still one of my favorite Rotting Christ songs.

At the time, death metal was considered trendy metal. If you can remember, why was death metal considered trendy and black metal not?

S. TOLIS: Back then, black metal considered death metal to be false. A game of the times, really. I’ll never know what’s going to be considered trendy tomorrow. I think there weren’t many extreme death metal bands—except Cannibal Corpse; they still have the respect of B M HO F

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S. TOLIS: No! An album, an old album, a cult album is loved now as it was when it was recorded. Even with the bad production, mistakes, etc. It’s pure and spontaneous. If you try to repeat yourself, you will fail. History has been written once, and that’s enough. The problem is you never know when you’re going to write history. It just happens.

T. TOLIS: If we were to re-record Thy Mighty Contract, I’d quit the band.

ZAHAROPOULOS: Personally, I would re-record everything with a killer updated sound, so it would devastate everything else!

PATSOURIS: I would not change a single note from this album, but I would like to hear a more modern sound. A

NACHTMYSTIUM ADDICTS BLACK MEDDLE PART II

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Total Eclipse the making of Emperor’s In the Nightside Eclipse

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n the Norwegian summer of 1993, the second wave of black metal was still in its ultraviolent infancy, and only a handful of bands were actively exploring the parameters of what was then an obscure and distinctly Scandinavian art form. Upon its release in 1995, In the Nightside Eclipse established Emperor as the reigning masters of a more complex, atmospheric style of “symphonic black metal,” but before the album was even mixed, half the band was in prison on charges ranging from arson to murder. The recording sessions at Grieghallen Studios in Bergen were completed in July 1993, just a month before black metal hysteria would seize Scandinavia in the grip of screaming newspaper headlines detailing the vicious murder of Mayhem founder/guitarist Øystein Aarseth (a.k.a. Euronymous) by Burzum mastermind and onetime Mayhem session bassist Varg Vikernes (a.k.a. Count Grishnackh). A Pandora’s Box of criminal activity in the black metal underground had sprung wide open.

Shortly after Vikernes’ apprehension, Emperor guitarist Samoth was arrested for church-burning and Emperor drummer Bård Eithun (a.k.a. Faust) DBBMHOF was arrested for killing a man in the Lillehammer Olympic Park—a deed he had committed almost a year prior to the recording of In the Nightside In the Eclipse. Released from prison in December 2002 Nightside Eclipse after serving nine years and four months’ time, CANDLE LI GHT, 1994 Faust joins fellow ex-Emperors Samoth, Ihsahn Notorious symphonic (guitar/vocals/keys) and Tchort (bass) on the eve black metal classic of a sudden Emperor reunion (featuring Samoth, Ihsahn and longtime Emperor drummer Trym) to recount the making of one of the most historically fascinating and sonically influential albums in the annals of extreme metal. [4]

Emperor,

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What are your most vivid memories of the recording sessions for In the Nightside Eclipse?

FAUST: There

were a lot of practical things we had to organize, because Bergen is like 500 kilometers from Oslo, and we were very young at the time, and we didn’t really know how to organize ourselves. But we managed to get hold of a car and we managed to actually get an apartment in Bergen. The car we used was from Samoth’s father, and I was the only one who had a driving license.

IHSAHN: For me personally, it was kind of a turning point. We had recorded demos before and also the first Emperor EP, but that was in a very cheap studio. This time we went to Bergen and Grieghallen, and recorded in a big studio with an experienced sound engineer and everything. I was only 17 at the time, so I couldn’t get into the pubs, and since I had to do the guitars and the vocals and all the keyboards, I spent a lot of time in that studio. When the other guys finished their parts, they could always go to the local rock pub and hang out. I’d generally been very interested in sound engineering, and because I couldn’t get into the pubs, I’d spend my nights with Pytten [Hundvin], the engineer, learning about recording and studio technology.

TCHORT: I had just turned 19 and was starting to drink coffee for the first time. Grieghallen was huge—the drums were set up in a big hall and that’s where I recorded the bass as well. Before, I had only been inside a small basement studio and this was a hall where big orchestras could be recorded live.

SAMOTH: I had just turned 19 that summer, and I remember Bård and I terrorizing the Bergen neighborhoods in my dad’s old Ford Econovan [laughs]. We had a lot of fun during those weeks, but also a lot of work. We were quite inexperienced as far as being in the studio, and this was really the first big recording for any of us. There were some magic musical moments in the studio for sure, but I don’t remember too many concrete incidents from the actual studio session. I remember more about the time, the atmosphere, and the total rebellious freedom I felt back then.

Were all the songs completely written beforehand, or were parts improvised in the studio?

IHSAHN: Oh, yes, we’ve always had all the material ready before we go into the studio. I would say it was pretty well-rehearsed. We never booked time before we were actually finished writing the songs.

SAMOTH: The song structures were all done, but a lot of the symphonic keyboard parts were actually made in the studio. We didn’t have a keyboard player at the time, so we never rehearsed

with keyboards prior to the recording. Of course, certain parts we already had planned the keyboard lines for, and some riffs were made with keyboard lines in mind to begin with, but the overall symphonic and atmospheric layering on Nightside was pretty much composed by Ihsahn during the recording session.

TCHORT: As far as I remember, most of the material was written beforehand, but the intro for the song “Towards the Pantheon” was made during our stay in the apartment next to the studio.

The album was co-produced by Pytten, who also produced Mayhem’s De Mysteriis Dom Sathanas and the first Burzum albums. What was he like?

IHSAHN: He was the sound engineer at Grieghallen Studios, and still is, as far as I know. He also recorded several Immortal and Enslaved albums. Grieghallen came to be the studio where everybody recorded their first black metal albums. But Pytten wasn’t a metal guy at all—he was just a very good sound engineer. He used to work for Norwegian television, as a host on a youth program. He’s a very nice guy and a very skilled guy, socially. He related very well to all these extreme types—all these young black metallers who were coming in. He took it very seriously.

FAUST: I have only good memories about him.

He was very well-educated in his work, and very relaxed. In the past, Grieghallen wasn’t one of my favorite studios, but I think he put a trademark sound on each recording—a very organic and dynamic sound. I think he was a part of getting the right sound for In the Nightside Eclipse.

At the time, he was already famous in Norway as a musician—in the ‘80s he was in a band called Blind Date. His daughter is one of the most famous handball players in Norway now—she’s a very known icon for sports, and I think she was voted most sexy female in a magazine back B M HO F

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Samoth and Ihsahn, circa 1991 Too evil to be captured by mortal f-stops

in 2002 or something. We met her because she would always drop by the studio when bands were recording there. I think she was maybe a year or two younger than us.

TCHORT: Everyone seemed to “know” Pytten from a TV show he used to be on, but I didn’t recognize him. He was cool to work with, kinda relaxed. I remember he didn’t like the bass I brought, so I borrowed one of his for the recording. I don’t think his bisexual daughter was into handball—or at least not known—back then, as she was probably only 15 or 16 at the time.

Five of the songs on Nightside actually have the word “Emperor” in the lyrics. Did you think of Emperor as a character, or was it purely self-referential?

IHSAHN: [Laughs] I didn’t realize that. You know, I can’t really remember all that was put into the lyrics at that time, because some of them are mixed with stuff that Mortiis wrote before he left the band. He wrote lyrics for “I Am the Black Wizards” and “Cosmic Keys [To My Creations & Times]” and then me and Samoth wrote some lyrics together. I wrote the lyrics to “Inno a Satana” and “The Majesty of the Nightsky” on my own. So, it’s all a big mixture, but I think they were partly drawn out from some of the concepts that Mortiis was working on at the time. The rest was pure imagination. I think there was a lot of running through forests [laughs]—it’s all very epic. I suspect we used the word “landscape” more than once as well.

SAMOTH: I think we saw “Emperor” as a sort of entity. We didn’t really ever use the word “Satan” much in our lyrics. We’ve always used a lot of metaphors and symbolism. Emperor became a metaphor for our own entity, for the dark lord,

for the devil, for the strong and the mighty. There could be several ways to see it, you know.

TCHORT: I don’t think I read the lyrics until I was holding the finished album in my hands. I came from a different part of Norway, so the few times we met were for rehearsals, I didn’t witness the birth of the songs and the lyrics behind them.

There’s an essay in the appendix to the book Lords of Chaos that compared black metal as a Scandinavian youth phenomenon to the Norse legend of the Oskoreien, “the ride of the dead,” which was also reflected in a Norse folk custom that involved groups of young males terrorizing villages on horseback while wearing masks, making noise, etc. Are you referring to Oskoreien in “Into the Infinity of Thoughts” when the lyrics go, “In the name of the almighty Emperor I will ride the Lands in pride, carrying the Blacksword at hand, in warfare”?

IHSAHN: Until you say it now, I’ve never heard that comparison. To be honest, my only connection to Oskoreien is more or less the famous Norwegian painting—I’ve seen the original at the national museum here in Norway. It’s also on the cover of the Bathory album Blood Fire Death, which is my favorite black metal album.

But I never read Lords of Chaos. I know I did an interview with that guy, and I think I’m referenced in the book, but I never bothered to read it. I’ve never had any interest in that side of it—all the hysteria, and what everybody else wanted it to be. Of course, in the beginning, we knew all the people involved, but the whole idea of a unified black metal scene was just very unfamiliar to how I experienced it. I’ve always been detached from that and—how do you say?— kind of self-centered about my own work. I’ve never cared very much for the whole scene and its development.

Was there anything in particular that influenced the lyrics—books, films, etc.?

Emperor expressed many things, both internal and external, during the years. The power of Norwegian nature was always a source of inspiration for us, especially in the earlier years. We found great motivation in the vast forests and mighty mountains, and would actively be a part of it and also use its visual strength in our artistic vision. We also had a strong fascination for anything ancient, such as the Viking era. Ihsahn and I would spend a lot of time brainstorming on concept ideas, and at one point we had this whole concept of a dark fantasy world going. It was all very visual, I think. We drew a lot of influences from artwork related to Tolkien’s The Lord of the Rings. And keep in mind, this was 10 years before you could buy a “Lord of the Rings burger” at Burger King—quite a different vibe, so to say. We also had a period where we had a strong fascination for the whole Dracula myth and everything related to Transylvania,

SAMOTH:

the Carpathian Mountains, the dark corners of Eastern Europe and folklore. For example, a film like Nosferatu—both the 1979 one and the 1922 silent movie—was a big part of our ambiance and visual influences.

IHSAHN: The lyrics represent very much the imaginary world we were occupied with. I never really read The Lord of the Rings or any of the things that everybody in that scene was reading at the time. I steered away from that, but the words we used and the fantasy imagery were still part of the whole way we thought and played. It doesn’t really mean much in particular on this album, but it does capture the essence of the atmosphere of that time.

more symphonic black metal. We knew—or we started to realize—that it would be something different, but I don’t think we felt we were caught by any ideology because we pretty much did what we wanted.

TCHORT: Black metal was still very new to me, and since I hadn’t been in the scene—I came from a death metal band—I didn’t know much about the ideology, so I certainly didn’t feel any restrictions. I understood the passion for atmosphere and even melodies that was put into the music, but besides that, I tried to play my part well and not be concerned about anything else.

IHSAHN: We were so young, and we had no idea what kind of impact this whole thing was going to have. I suppose now black metal has become a world-renowned phenomenon, but at the time, it was so small and so totally underground, we were just occupied with trying to do our best. I mean, I know Pytten used a lot of big reverbs, so it all sounded very majestic, which is maybe how he interpreted it. For In the Nightside Eclipse, we also kind of built further on the use of keyboards to try and give it more of an orchestral feel.

Not many other black metal bands were using keyboards very extensively back then.

There weren’t that many black metal bands in existence at the time you recorded In the Nightside Eclipse. Were you enjoying the freedom of what was essentially a new art form, or did you feel restricted in any way by an ideology you had to adhere to?

I don’t think we felt too restricted.

When we first started Emperor, we stripped everything down from what we were used to with our death metal outfit, Thou Shalt Suffer.

Our aim was to go back to basics and sound like Celtic Frost, Tormentor from Hungary, and Bathory… lots of Bathory! But as we got more serious with Emperor, we started to develop a more personal sound in addition to the obvious black metal influences. It was based a lot around the use of keyboards and the whole atmospheric and symphonic aspects. It became our thing, and we just took that further and further, really. But at the same time, it was very important for us to make sure we still maintained a certain spirit in the sound.

FAUST: Black metal had existed for many years, but this was the second wave, and ours was the SAMOTH:

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IHSAHN: Yeah—I think that came from when me and Samoth played in several bands prior to Emperor. We used keyboards in [Thou Shalt Suffer], so that kind of developed into a more progressive death metal.

Circa Wrath of At the time we did the first the Tyrant demo Emperor EP, we wanted The Great to use some layers of keyNorthern boards, and that kind of Trendkill: evolved on In the Nightside pre-trendkill Eclipse—but even on that record, the keyboards are very simplified compared to later releases. At the time, there were no bands using keyboards in the same fashion.

FAUST: Emperor and Enslaved were the only bands with guys who could actually play the synth and the piano. Up 'til then, all the use of synth in black metal had been made out of very minor knowledge of the instrument—just making the easiest chords and stuff. But Ihsahn and Ivar from Enslaved were able to create good melodies on the synth and use it as an instrument along with the guitar and bass and drums.

I remember people in other bands would see Ihsahn and say, “Shit, this guy really knows how to play the synth.” It wasn’t really that common back then, so I think we realized that we were a lot different from bands like Immortal and Burzum, who played a very primitive kind of black metal back then.

Tchort hadn’t been in the band very long at that point.

FAUST: Tchort

replaced Mortiis, who was kicked out or asked to leave in the beginning of 1993, after the recording of the mini-album. [4]

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TCHORT: I felt comfortable with the band and its other members, especially since we had just spent two weeks together touring in the U.K., but recording the album and being in a professional studio was a new experience for me. I had only recorded a demo before that. I didn’t have more than a handful of rehearsals before we went to the U.K. to play—and then we went straight to the studio.

IHSAHN: [Laughs] When we went to the U.K. to tour with Cradle of Filth, they were our support act!

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The album was recorded in July of 1993, but wasn’t mixed until the following year.

Why the delay?

FAUST: Well,

basically because half of the band ended up in prison. I was arrested one month after the recording, as was Samoth, who was released not long afterwards. My charges were a bit more serious, so I stayed in prison and didn’t take part in the mixing. I wrote down my point of view on a piece of paper for them to take into consideration during the mixing, but it was mostly about the drums and stuff.

SAMOTH: There was a lot of stress that fell with Bård and I being arrested and taken into custody. I was, however, let out again some few weeks later, but Bård didn’t come out until nearly 10 years later. Fucking crazy, eh? There was a lot of turbulence within the scene around this time, and this pushed the whole thing back quite a bit. I believe that Grieghallen was also booked for a while, so we had to wait. Eventually we found the focus and got studio time booked for the mix. It was just Ihsahn and I who went for the mix; I remember us sleeping in a rehearsal room in Oslo, and taking the early morning train to Bergen.

I believe we gave Candlelight all production parts by late fall of ’94. They had it pressed in ’94, but it didn’t really reach most distributors and shops until early ’95, so that’s why many see it as a ’95 release. It was a very frustrating time, as we lost our drummer, the stable lineup, and the whole Norwegian scene was in turmoil and we weren’t really sure what lay ahead for us as band. But in retrospect, I actually think the whole delay of the album made it an even stronger release. We sent out advance tracks to a lot of friends, and the tracks spread around the world and created a great expectation for the release.

I have a classic memory of Varg stopping by the studio in his chainmail and standing in the recording room enjoying a huge ice cream with a smirk on his face.

SA MOTH TCHORT: I also remember Ihsahn was sick during the recording of his vocals and he was spitting blood during the sessions. He did some vocals that were replaced with new vocal recordings later on— when he got better—so I think that contributed to the delay as well. They had to go back to the other side of the country to redo the vocals and do some more keyboards. He probably couldn’t do any clean vocals when he was sick, either.

Bård, were you nervous about getting caught by the police while you were recording the album?

FAUST: Not

really, because a lot of time had passed [since the murder], so I didn’t really think that much about it. I think it was a bit of luck that we were able to finish the recording before both Samoth and I got caught.

Varg Vikernes killed Euronymous shortly after you finished recording In the Nightside Eclipse.

He also lived in Bergen. Did you see him often during the recording sessions?

TCHORT: He came by and we spent some time at his apartment, too. I think I took a shower there and used his bubble bath [laughs]. The killing happened later on, but I can’t recall exactly when Euronymous was murdered.

SAMOTH: It was just weeks after we returned from the studio that all hell broke loose in Norway. It’s weird to think about, really. If all the controversy with the police had happened a little sooner, this album would have never been made and the future of Emperor would probably have taken a whole different turn. We went to see Varg several times during the recording sessions. Even though we knew there was some tension between him and Euronymous, we didn’t really involve ourselves in that and didn’t really think that it would come to such extremes only weeks later. I have a classic memory of Varg stopping by the studio in his chain-mail and standing in the recording room enjoying a huge ice cream with a smirk on his face.

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At what point did you decide to dedicate the album to Euronymous?

Sometime during ’94, I’m sure, when we pieced together the artwork for the album.

It was natural for us to do so, as Euronymous had always been very supportive of what we were doing and he was also a friend of ours, especially to Bård. He wanted to sign us to his label, Deathlike Silence Productions, but we had already done the mini-album with Candlelight and made the decision to stick with them.

IHSAHN: I think it felt very natural at the time, since he was so recently deceased, and we were releasing an album at that time. Bård was working very much with Euronymous at [Euronymous’ infamous record shop] Helvete, so it felt right at the time.

FAUST: Yeah, I reckon that I was the one closest to Euronymous. I worked in his record shop and also at some point lived together with him. I think it was a consensus some time after the murder when things finally started coming down to ground again. No one thought about not dedicating the album to him. It was the most obvious thing in order to commemorate his memory.

SAMOTH:

Where did you pose for the photos on the back cover?

FAUST: Apart from Tchort, I think they were all

taken outside of Samoth’s place—in the woods— but at different times.

TCHORT: My photo was taken at a local cemetery.

I was later arrested because I stole that stone angel with the blood covering it and placed it in my bedroom.

IHSAHN: I remember there was no Photoshop or anything like that at that time. If you look at my photo, there’s this dark background, and that was a very manual cut and paste. I’m cut out with scissors and glued onto a different background. I think it was the same with the goat in Samoth’s picture. We had to be very handy at that point— we didn’t have all the technology that people have today. We took our own photos, too—we didn’t have any contact with photographers or designers, you know? Things are almost too easy these days.

How did you decide on Necrolord’s cover art?

I’d seen some of his work, like Grotesque’s Incantation mini-LP and Dissection’s The Somberlain, and liked his style. This was before he took off as an artist, I guess, and before long, every black metal album had a blue-toned art piece as a front cover. [Laughs] Originally, an ex-girlfriend of mine had tried to draw something for us, and from that we had a sketch of the tower that can be seen on the cover. Later, Ihsahn and I pieced together a bunch of ideas, [including] the tower and incorporating the death rider from the first mini-album, and we sent that to Necrolord. He did an awesome job and totally got our ideas and the vibe we were looking for at the time. I

SAMOTH:

think to this day it stands out as a classic black metal album cover.

FAUST: I thought it was fantastic—the perfect visual for the music—even though today it might seem a bit cheesy. It’s a little bit mysterious, and maybe a bit Lord of the Rings.

Which song holds up the best for you personally?

IHSAHN: I think both “Cosmic Keys” and “I Am the Black Wizards” hold up well still—especially “I Am the Black Wizards,” which was popular from the beginning. But usually my favorites from the albums we’ve made have hardly ever been the same as everybody else’s. I think my favorite from this album is probably “In the Majesty of the Nightsky” because it has some musical elements that I feel were very well thought out for the time.

SAMOTH: Actually, I think the whole album holds up still. Of course, songs like “I Am the Black Wizards” and “Inno a Satana” have both gone down as “classics,” but the whole album has a very real and natural flow, I think.

FAUST: I think “Inno a Satana” is the perfect black metal hymn. That track manifests itself as the personification of symphonic black metal. I think it’s a really, really good track—it’s what constitutes symphonic black metal for me.

TCHORT: I am still to this day overwhelmed by the impact the album seemed to have on the scene. I travel more than ever now, with my bands [Green Carnation and Carpathian Forest] and in the darkest and most uncommon places of the world, I meet with people who approach me and tell me how much that album means to them.

SAMOTH: It wasn’t really until after [1997’s] Anthems [to the Welkin at Dusk] was released that we started getting a lot of front covers and bigger media attention, and then Emperor really started to become larger and taken more seriously in general. Looking at Nightside, I think there was a lot of buzz and hype about the album even before it came out—with advance tracks spreading around the world, there was a lot of anticipation in the underground about the release. When it finally came out, it quickly became an album that led to a lot of influences in the growing black metal scene—or black metal boom, rather.

In the Nightside Eclipse is the record many people would consider the first fully realized symphonic black metal album.

FAUST: Yeah, I think it’s the first album that consciously tried to make black metal symphonic. Ihsahn has always been very good at orchestrating music, and I think that everybody who has a relationship to symphonic black metal always points back to In the Nightside Eclipse as maybe the first album that inspired him or her to start making that kind of music. That’s a huge compliment.

How long after its release did you realize the influence/impact it had?

IHSAHN: I remember the first time we went on a European tour with Bal-Sagoth. They were actually older than us, but they said they started playing more black metal-style music—with keyboards—because of the first Emperor EP. We felt that was a bit strange, but later on we were in England and we met the guys from Cradle of Filth, who claimed that In the Nightside Eclipse was the album that everybody had. But the impact Emperor, as a band, has had on this black metal scene—and to some extent extreme metal—has been most noticeable after we quit the band. But I haven’t given much thought to how influential we were, or how influenced we were by others, or any of the more superficial aspects of it.

FAUST: I

corresponded with Samoth while I was in prison, and I had access to magazines and stuff, so I saw that black metal was growing bigger and bigger. The album sold very well, and I saw that people were inspired by it, but I’m not sure I realized how big Emperor were before I started to see the tours they did and things like that. I was a little bit hidden from all that attention when I was in prison, so I didn’t really see or understand it before I started to come out again on weekends to meet people and go to gigs again. I think it was in 1998 that I had the possibility of actually going out, but it wasn’t very often—maybe six times a year or something for 12 to 24 hours. I was given that opportunity because it’s a part of the Norwegian prison rehabilitation program. I remember going to a Dimmu Borgir gig in Oslo in 1998, and it was packed with a lot of people and young girls who I wouldn’t really imagine going to a black metal show. That’s when I saw how big it had become.

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Do you feel differently about the album now than you did at the time you recorded it?

IHSAHN: At the time we recorded it, I was of course very proud of it. By the time we did a couple more albums, it’s always like you wanna go back and change things you think you could’ve done better. [Laughs] By now I feel like that about all our albums. But I see it as a product of that time, where we were musically, and how old we were. It makes me feel like an old man at times, because it’s such a long time ago, and there are so many kids coming up these days that have the album, but were barely born when we recorded it. But I’ll be 30 in October, so I guess I’m not that old.

TCHORT: For a period of time, I didn’t like it so much, mostly because of the production. But I’ve probably only heard it three or four times since it was recorded. The last time I heard it was earlier this year, after a show I had done with Carpathian Forest. There was an aftershow party and I was lying on a couch when they played the whole album and it struck me that I really got a kick out of the music. And I got that old vibe again…

FAUST: Well, I do realize that if it was released today it would be a very cheesy album, but that’s something you can’t take into consideration, because it was recorded in 1993 and released one and a half years later.

I don’t really listen to the album anymore—it’s been many years since I actually put it on, Emperor but I can appreciate circa 2001 the moods and atmoDoing Neo, spheres in the music, Morpheus and Trinity and I can understand proud that a lot of people like it because it was a very good album at the time. But for me, today, there wouldn’t be any point in trying to recreate that album or to establish a band to continue in that vein.

SAMOTH: The album was something totally fresh for us when we were in the middle of making it, but today I see it almost in a historical sense—as a part of my life that also had great impact on how my life has become today, actually. We didn’t really know that we had made a groundbreaking album. We knew it was a good album that had something personal and unique to it in our genre, but we never really saw it becoming one of the classic black metal albums of all time. Even saying this now is weird, but it makes me really proud of what we managed to put together. We took our music and everything around it very seriously. Those times were very special. We were quite young and very active in a rather obscure underground movement. It almost seems like another life looking back at it now. A

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story by albert mudrian

Hunger Strikes the making of Darkthrone’s Transilvanian Hunger

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t was the fall of 1993 and the Norwegian Then it happened—a postal prophecy and a black metal scene had formally ratified two-week whirlwind of inspiration that saw the mystique that would forever surround Fenriz conceive and record the entire frameit. But, musically, it was now pretty much work of what would become ground zero for fucked. Burzum mastermind Varg “Count isolationist black metal. When it was finally Grishnackh” Vikernes had just been hauled off to released in 1994, however, Transilvanian Hunger the pokey for the fatal stabbing of Mayhem guiwas anything but an instant classic. Instead, it DBBMHOF tarist and scene Svengali Øystein “Euronymous” was derided for its raw, lo-fi, almost nonexistent Aarseth. Within weeks, Emperor’s Tomas production values, and further disparaged for “Samoth” Haugen and Bård “Faust” Eithun the inclusion of the phrase “Norsk Arisk Black Transilvanian would each be arrested for arson and murder, Metal,” which loosely translated to “Norwegian respectively. And although they weren’t involved Aryan Black Metal” on its original back cover.

Hunger PEACEVILLE, 1994 in any of the aforementioned criminal activi(Darkthrone maintain that they profess no Isolationist black metal ties, Darkthrone were on the verge of falling white power ideologies, and in response to starts here apart, too. Guitarist Ivar “Zephyrous” Enger had the controversy, the band’s next album, 1995’s already begun drifting away from the band folPanzerfaust, bore the legend, “Darkthrone is cerlowing the 1992 recording of their Under a Funeral tainly not a Nazi band, nor a political band.

Moon album. Vocalist/guitarist Ted “Nocturno Culto” Skjellum was Those of you who still might think so, you can lick Mother still residing in a remote area of the country—several hours from Mary’s asshole in eternity.”) the band’s homebase of Oslo—and growing more emotionally Fifteen years and nine more studio albums since its release, distant from Darkthrone drummer/founder Gylve “Fenriz” Nagell Transilvanian Hunger is now the most emulated of Darkthrone’s by the day. With free time on his hands and rehearsal space in his seemingly endless canon. For this Hall of Fame Decibel corralled living room, Fenriz rejoined his old doom metal band Valhall and its architects to find out why a new wave of black metal bellies appeared—for all intents and purposes—dethroned. will never be full.

Darkthrone,

What was the state of Darkthrone after you recorded Under a Funeral Moon in 1992?

So, you didn’t immediately start working on new material as a band for a while?

We weren’t huge on communication then. We didn’t really start rehearsing another album after we went to the studio to record Under a Funeral Moon, which was in the summer of ’92.

When we recorded Soulside Journey in the summer of ’90, we started to make another album pretty soon. And in the summer of ’91, when we recorded A Blaze in the Northern Sky, we quickly went on to make a new album, but we didn’t in ’92. We’d been in the zone for two years, partying hard and being, you know, maniacs like you wouldn’t believe. There wasn’t really an established black metal scene until the mid-’90s, so I guess we were all strange and freakish. We were having day jobs and living ghoulish lives on the side, and I guess it took its toll. After Under a Funeral Moon was recorded, everyone went on to do what they wanted.

NOCTURNO CULTO:

FENRIZ:

I moved from Oslo in late ’91, and I never looked back, actually. What I did was, every week I was driving three hours to get to Oslo and rehearse, and that was during the rehearsals for Under a Funeral Moon. And Zephyrous still [lived] just outside Oslo, so he was like a natural in the band. I was the one that was weird, moving away and everything.

FENRIZ: Yeah, we didn’t start making new material. It was also the fact that Ted moved, so it would become impossible, and it was all a blur, really.

As far as I remember, in summer ’92 we recorded Under a Funeral Moon, and then I guess I was hanging a lot at the Helvete store that Euronymous had. ’Cause that had opened a year before in August ’91 with help from the few left in the scene. My help would just be giving 60 records, so he had something to have on the shelf. This was really low…

Low-budget, barebones?

Yeah, yeah. It wasn’t a fancy store—it was a freakish hangout. I was thinking about it, and I just sat in the store and had a beer after work always. But then, after Under a Funeral Moon, that store, it was open some months after, and then Christmas ’92 it just shut down; that had sort of been a little center-point for all of us, like, in this freakish time from August ’91 ’til Christmas ’92. And then when that sort of fell apart, the store closed and you had sort of all the problems that I didn’t know about that just perfectly led up to a lot of, well, you know, the whole murder incident in ’93. I guess ’93 was extremely confusing for everyone involved here, because we weren’t really that many people, but everyone was really strange and weird, and then when ’93 came, then we just lost the store and it was every man for himself. It was crazy. It was almost, you know, different unions for different bands, [4]

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DARKTHRONE TRANSILVANIAN HUNGER going and trying to EC E AL S P keep contact and stuff like that. But I guess in ’96, three years after, everyone was going their own direction more or less. So, that was sort of the start of the total anarchy after the ’93 thing—when we didn’t have the record store of Euronymous anymore. Then it was like back to normalcy, but everyone was like, “We were all crazy, so we just fend for ourselves.” And then after the murder, then everyone suddenly knew that, yeah, we’re really on our own now, and we did get more popular from that in this neat little country.

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album. I was this dude drifting around in mountains and woods and fishing, and there was the wilderness—I kind of forgot everything else. I had this amazing time.

Zephyrous did come up, and we just continued partying and things like that. And you what?

I don’t think I even thought about Darkthrone that much, except for that Zephyrous and I probably did have some slight plans for new material.

Don't axe

No, actually, Fenriz is not happy to see you

You mentioned in an earlier email correspondence that the music for Transilvanian Hunger came to you in a vision while you were at your day job at the post office.

Did you consider replacing Zephyrous before Transilvanian Hunger?

I guess I wasn’t used to Zephyrous because we were like different guys. I’m this really gesticulating, typical Italian, hyper dude, while he’s really calm and easy. I guess it was hard to handle my escapades. And I never really—it’s not something I want to sit down and talk to any of them [about]. As far as I remember, I was not hanging out with those others a lot, like Zephyrous—we got a bit too close maybe. Just answering this is forcing me to try to remember something I haven’t remembered before. And, of course, at work today I was like, “What the hell happened in ’93?” I know what happened on a personal level. I know that I had quit Valhall—we started Valhall in ’87. And after I got the record deal with Peaceville in ’89/’90, I said, “Valhall, I don’t have time to do both bands now; I have to really concentrate on Darkthrone.” And Valhall said, “OK, that’s a shame.” And then in ’93, I realized that Darkthrone was not active, and I probably didn’t want to make songs, and Zephyrous didn’t want to, and Ted—I don’t know if Ted really wanted to make songs after Under a Funeral Moon either. It felt like we made something really total, and that’s really our most total black metal album, Under a Funeral Moon.

So, in ’93, I just joined Valhall again, and we had been rehearsing with Darkthrone in my living room ever since we got the record deal—it was like ’90 to ’92 we were there—and then when Under a Funeral Moon was recorded, then there was no music being made there anymore in the room, so now that I think about it, it’s not strange that I was twiddling my thumbs there and thinking, “Hmmm… maybe I should ask if Valhall needs a drummer again,” ’cause they’ve always had problems with drummers. So, I was back, and that meant also that they had their portable studio with them, so the portable studio now was a part of my living room. And whenever we were not rehearsing, then I could make everything I wanted with that studio, so it became that I continued the Isengard project— that’s how I got started on that very same studio in the summer of ’89. But… at that point Ted was living far away—we’re talking ’93 now—

FENRIZ:

Yeah, that’s how I remember it, and that’s how I remember it the year after and the year after that, and every time I talked about the album, it’s the same vision that came up at work.

I had this really intense feeling, and with that came the lyrics to the “Transilvanian Hunger” song. And as I told you… I’m just going to put in some mouth tobacco here, one moment… oh yeah. I stopped smoking. The first thing I did was mouth tobacco, then I started smoking, then this. I have this stupid, incredibly rare lung disease, too, so I can’t smoke. Not to worry, though—I can ski well, and hike.

FENRIZ:

There wasn’t really an established black metal scene until the mid-’90s, so I guess we were all strange and freakish. We were having day jobs and living ghoulish lives on the side, and I guess it took its toll.

F E NRIZ and I had gotten married, too, and he… I don’t know what Zephyrous… I think he was still sort of, maybe he moved. I don’t remember when Zephyrous moved away, but it’s clear that at one point he really did move away. They both moved far away. They both just thought that the Helvete scene that I was sort of in sucked because they were really into just being on their own, and I am also a loner, but even the thing with me being there, it was just pissing them off, I guess.

So, it was [that] they’re really die-hard loners.

NOCTURNO CULTO: Zephyrous actually came to the same small village I was living [in], and we would just basically have a good time, you know, usually just partying. Also, when I moved, I was experiencing things that were kind of larger than life, especially after the Under a Funeral Moon B M HO F

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So, how fully formed was the vision for the record at work?

So, I [should] mention now that we had lots of instruments in my living room; it’s a rehearsal space, and it has been for years. And then, suddenly, [the] Valhall guys took with them the whole studio that I knew how to work from before, because I did the first Isengard demo on it in summer ’89, and then I also did a Valhall demo on that studio, so I sort of knew the ropes for that little piece of shit studio called Necrohell studio. So, I was ready to go. I was coming home after work and I started making the music, and the vision I had for the music was to… I can only know this by thinking about the album now, so that’s what I’m talking from, that sort of memory, because I haven’t listened to the entire album in years, and I didn’t do that now before the interview. If I had the album at work today, I would have listened to it, but I didn’t have it; I really should have, I’m sorry about that. I sort of remember four or five of the songs and the main things to talk about it.

FENRIZ:

OK, then what do you remember?

Drums… let’s see, first I had to make song number one on the guitar. And then I would know it in my head, and then I would sit down at the drum kit and go “chick-chickchick-chick” while usually humming the riffs in my head, and that’s what a one-man band is.

It always starts with the drums, but you have to

FENRIZ:

have made the song in advance so you can hum it in your head while you play the drums. So, that’s how it works, OK? I figured out different ways to record the drums, because when I had recorded the demos before in another place, here I had, this is a portable studio—only four channels—so I can only use one mic for the drums, and I had to put it high up, behind my back, in front of the kit, and then do checks afterwards to see that it sounded good. And I ended up having the mic—I was sitting next to the wall, you know, like usually drummers do with their back to the wall—and I had the microphone lowered, sort of like behind my head, and that would work best for the drums.

Then I had to find a guitar sound for the riffs, but I sort of found that when I was making the first song. Let’s say that, in all probability, “Transilvanian Hunger” was the song that I made first for the Transilvanian Hunger album, with the finger moving technique that had been started by Bathory on the Under the Sign of the Black Mark album, and been used on the Blood Fire Death album. This sort of technique was one of the styles that became known as Norwegian black metal, but that particular style that I’m using is not a typical Norwegian [style]; it is more that Quorthon started that style, and what I quickly found out was that guitar sound that I had was working very good with those sorts of riffs. And in retrospect, you can see that it was right; it sort of works because it gives that exact sort of attack on the strings, and it totally worked. Also, it was a strange kind of effect that I used, so when I turned off the effects pedal, the amp would still be going “kkkkkssshhhhh” on a level of five out of 10 decibels. So, it was sort of crazy. It was a special thing.

And then for the bass, I had to create a bass sound that would fit with the other two guitars, so now we have established that Necro studio has

four channels—so number one on the drums, number two on the guitar, number three on the second guitar, and then I had to find a bass sound that would match, to bring out the magic in those finger movements that I use. Because I don’t really use chords like Euronymous and Snorre [Ruch]. Euronymous from Mayhem and Snorre from Thorns were the ones that made the typical Norwegian thing, you see—they made chords, and they would play all the strings, like more than one string in the chord, but would they be clean together? No, they would resound together. That was their style, and that you can hear on Mayhem’s Live in Leipzig, and Mayhem Deathcrush, and on the Thorns demo—and the Thorns demo was really, really important. And I guess also Count Grishnackh or Varg, we all [listened] to the early and new style of Mayhem and Thorns stuff. But I am not a good guitarist, so instead I use the technique that Quorthon already did in ’87 and ’88. OK? The vision that I had was that this is winterish—this will be the “longing” that I already knew from Burzum, and I will have that sort of trance, and [an] entrancing tempo that was monotone. A band that was important for both me and Varg was called Von from the United States.

Von was extremely important for Burzum, but not for Darkthrone—only on the Transilvanian Hunger album was Von important. Yeah, because we have to see the ’80s as a whole now. Would you say the ’80s was a decade when metal was really monotone, or was it really hectic? I mean, everyone knows it was damn hectic. You’d have, like, riffs and riff changes and tempo changes from the NWOBHM, until death metal and even grindcore.

What was the world ready for? More hectic stuff?

I don’t think so! So, when Von started doing their thing, we’re all clicking like, “Holy shit! They’re doing the monotone thing!” That was the freshest thing [we’d] heard since we were born. Suddenly the monotone thing was allowed, and we would be like, “Yep, we will open up to that.” And with all due respect, it was Count Grishnackh who understood this monotone thing first, and he understood it from Von. And I thought, “This lyric I got in my head at work, and what I’m starting to work at now will be this tempo, [these] sort of riffs, and it will be monotone.”

And it turns out I completely entered the sound, and that’s Tr00 blood

A frostbitefriendly gem from yesteryear

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why I made all the songs and made all the takes and laid everything down on tape in two weeks— [it] must have been maximum two weeks. And you can also hear that it’s a very monotone, very concept album, and usually that sort of music is made by one person. Whether it’s electronic or not, when it’s really sounding a bit totalitarian, then you know it’s the work of one guy, one dictator.

Did Fenriz tell you about the vision he had at work, or did Transilvanian Hunger just show up in the mail one day?

The latter. Fenriz just sent a tape in the mail, and said this could be our new Darkthrone album. To me, it was really strange, because I hadn’t really thought about it, but when I heard the album, it was like an echo of the things I was doing in the middle of nowhere.

It was a weird sensation of, “Well, this is exactly the sound—if I could create an atmosphere on tape of what I’ve been doing for the last two years now, this is it.” Even though it sounds strange that he did the album himself… who can blame him, you know? Everybody was moving away, and he was just sitting there with all the equipment saying, “What am I supposed to do now? Well, I have to play it.” It’s probably only natural. And especially after the fact that this was in the day and age where there were no cell phones. There was no email. I didn’t have a phone. I had to travel for half an hour to get a phone box, so it was not easy. It was also difficult when I’d go to the phone; it was not necessarily very easy to get a hold of Fenriz anyways, so the communication wasn’t really top-notch back then. But if all these things that happened today, all the communication and stuff, it would probably have been a different situation. Also, I think Zephyrous felt kind of very left out. But he couldn’t do anything about it, because he was the guitarist, really, you know? Since I do the vocals anyway, I could do the vocals. I remember he was not very pleased about it, but I don’t think this is the entire reason for him leaving the band, actually. He was actually getting sick, and probably, I don’t know why, but suddenly, I mean, he was driving a car one day, and everything went black and then he woke up in the hospital with a lot of things attached. It was kind of dramatic stuff going on. He recovered kind of slowly and moved to another place where his relatives were living. But, yeah, he tried to cope with it—I definitely understood then that he’s not going to play anymore.

NOCTURNO CULTO:

I’ve heard the drums were done in one take.

Well, I couldn’t go in and stop myself or anything like that since this was a very primitive studio. Of course, I made the next song; I don’t know what song I made after that—it’s one of the seven others, I’m sure—but I learned that song. I’d sit down and play it on guitar, and I’d decide for myself, this would go eight times, this will go 12 times, because in the ’80s you

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would never play a riff more than four, KM E AL S P six or eight times.

Burzum and Von were also experimenting with playing stuff 12, 16, even 32 times before changing, and that would mean the change would be of the essence, the change would be really noticeable. And as I said, this was very fresh in the early ’90s. We’d had a decade where this was not done. There was not a single album except the Bathory stuff that was doing this sort of thing in the ’80s. So, yeah, those who hadn’t heard Bathory were really thrilled by the new stuff we were doing. So, of course, I had to do the drums in one take. If I was doing a mistake, I would just go back and start again, and that’s how we always work. I don’t stop in the middle of a song saying, “OK, I finished part one now; I can do part two tomorrow.” That’s not how we roll.

That’s how the big guys roll, I imagine.

So, that’s not really impressive either. Because, as you know, the really special thing with Transilvanian Hunger is that it’s the first metal album that has the same pace on side A, except for Von, of course, again—but that was not an album, it was only demos. So, the first four songs, as far as I know, have the same tempo. And that’s really extreme. That’s really, really extreme. But I have always decided that the riffs I was doing were fitting these kind of riffs, and that’s where I was going. And then the fifth song, finally [makes drumming noises with tempo change], and of course when you listen to four and a half songs with one tempo, then the tempo change is gonna make an impact—it’s the monotone over the monotone. But it was only me, so there was no one there to argue or anything.

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When we interviewed Grutle Kjellson from Enslaved for Decibel’s Darkthrone cover story, he mentioned the idea of making “pure Norwegian music”—not in the Aryan sense, but in the sense that all the lyrics [except the title track] are in your native tongue. Was that something you were trying to accomplish with Transilvanian Hunger?

No, definitely not. But it’s cold, and for us, we have to admit that our country, and the feeling, and the cold weather—the autumn, the bleak and gray light—sometimes, it all inspired us to do a lot of things. I think especially I was inspired by desolate places. Because it’s such [a] more powerful experience than being around where so-called things are happening. But today it’s, of course, different.

FENRIZ: Yeah, it was the coldness and the nature and the winter forest walk that we did a little NOCTURNO CULTO:

of. Both me and Varg were into that—walking into the forest—but now I just laugh at it, because we didn’t really walk long distances or anything like that, like I do now. But sadly, everyone thinks that. All the rich white kids of the world think this is really exotic, and want to do it too and put on a bit of corpsepaint and go back into the yard when it’s winter, but this is not really wildlife. And then you’ve sort of had a distance to it and a little taste for it, and that was enough to spawn that incredible sense for both Varg and me to sort of play an ode to that, I guess. Yeah. Simply enough, it was candles in the snow, man.

Now that you’re an experienced hiker, it’s kind of funny that you guys used to go on some of those forest walks.

Not together, though! That would be really lame.

FENRIZ:

This was the first Darkthrone record to feature a guest lyricist. Why did you share lyric responsibilities with Varg Vikernes on four of the tracks? Moreover, what did Varg contribute, at the time, that you didn’t or couldn’t?

We should go into the whole ordeal about the murder [of Euronymous]. We’d been getting threats from the Scandinavian North, though I assume it was some Swedish person that went totally crazy, because just two weeks, or three weeks, or a month before Euronymous’ murder, I got a letter from Sweden anonymously, like a tombstone that said “Euronymous” across it.

So, it was logical that I would think that. You know, Varg wasn’t arrested for the murder until weeks after, as far as I remember, and those weeks, man, I was nervous as hell. I would arm myself with the Bonded by Blood album by Exodus playing on my walkman, which got me through the battle it was to go to work and to go to my house—even around in the city, you want to watch your back and have your knife at hand and stuff like that. The situation for me, it was nerve-wracking; and then, you know, Varg was

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even visiting me and we were trading. I got some shirts and CDs, and he would get some Darkthrone merch for free from me, even after the murder, and I would say, “Man, I got this letter from Sweden,” and he would just say, “No, don’t show the cops that.” And he’d go off driving back to Bergen, and a couple [of] weeks later he was arrested for the murder, and I was like, “What?!” thinking I don’t know if it’s true or not, I don’t know any of the circumstances. I did the album, or had the album done. I don’t really remember when in ’93 I did this album—maybe it says on the album.

It says it was recorded in November and December of ’93.

OK. I had sent the album to Ted, also along with the lyrics. The thing [was] when Varg was in prison, I was thinking more and more how he now could not speak to the outside world. I Mistruth in thought, this is advertising? a very extreme Hunger's situation— regrettable we’ve never had back cover slogan anything like this in Norway before, or the metal world at all.

So, I was writing [Varg] a letter, and I said, “Do you want to communicate via Darkthrone in any way?”

I offered [for] him to write the lyrics, and then he sent the lyrics, and then that was the lyrics. I don’t even know what the lyrics mean. I’m never a curious person that asks why. I’ve had some people around me always asking why, and it always bothers me. I don’t want to bother anyone. And I never wanted [to] in my entire life. I don’t want to be a bother, so I don’t ask.

Ted got the lyrics and spent a long time listening to the album, and I was also sort of explaining to him to what this album was, and I was sure he would find some great way of singing the stuff. Later, we would take the tape—because now it was full, the four tracks were full—we had to take the tape to the studio, get Ted down from where ever he lived at the time. I think he was definitely in the North somewhere, or in Trysil; he hadn’t moved maybe at that time, which is an important place for us, Trysil.

Up northeast. We record there and [we’ve] rehearse[d] there since ’98. He’s been living there, his wife’s from there; we have a lot of history with that place.

FENRIZ:

Did Peaceville have any objections having Varg contribute to the record?

I don’t remember that at all. I guess [Hammy, Peaceville founder] is a people person—he has to do that, he has to be like

FENRIZ:

I think it’s a good album, by all means, but you know, it’s more like emo-goth kid stuff. So, that album is actually the reason there’s emo kids. Just kidding!

N O CT U R N O C U LTO that, and being from England it’s more like, you don’t have those hermits like we seem to be. They have a lot of interaction and stuff like that. He probably knew we were going through an extremely insane period in our lives, and he saw the shit hit the fan, I guess. In retrospect, I see that happened as well. He didn’t want to tamper with that at all. The album was under contract—see, we had signed a four-record deal. So, the album had to be done; it’s in the contract. Transilvanian Hunger was probably a little bit doomed from the get-go. It was an extreme outing from extreme times.

Why is only the title track written in English?

Oh, it was? Oh shit… I guess I didn’t know what language Varg would use, so that was of course out of my hands. I didn’t know, so that’s a coincidence. When it came to my stuff, we have to go back to a gig we did in ’89, with Darkthrone. It was in the movie theatre where grew up, Kolbotn—a good place for metalheads.

I’m kidding, but there has been a whole lot of bands from there, throughout, and it’s a really small place; it’s strange. But you know, this area is where Mayhem is from, too, just a couple of miles down the road, and we had another cool band in the ’80s that was really, really great called Vomit. I remember the first Mayhem rehearsal I attended was in October ’87, ’cause I’d been in touch with Necrobutcher in ’87. So, that was my first contact with any other Norwegian band. So, I went to see them, and at that time it was only Necrobutcher and Euronymous, and there were two guys from Vomit that were helping Mayhem out. That was before Ted joined [Darkthrone]. It was before, Jan [Axel Blomberg]—Hellhammer—joined [Mayhem].

And Mayhem’s old drummer, Torben [Grue] went on to become an opera singer, a real character at that, too—we were all weird. You had to be to make it though the ’80s metal scene in Norway because there [were] none. We were the ones taking care of any global activity.

So, at a gig in ’89 that we played, Torben—he was laughing, because he’s always been like that—would come up to us and say, “Hey, why don’t you extreme metal acts start singing in Norwegian? Now that would be extreme.” And I was mulling this over in my head for the rest of the ’80s then, and then in ’90 and in ’91.

And then in ’91, when we’d finished A Blaze, I was writing the first lyric for the next album, which was “Inn I De Dype Skogers Favn”—a

FENRIZ:

song from Under a Funeral Moon, obviously. And I felt it was really hard to crack that sort of code, ’cause even growing up with the rock ‘n’ roll and the heavy blues-based stuff from the ’70s, it was always “yeah, yeah, yeah” and “baby, baby.”

Everything was… let’s say that the international language for the postal system is French, but the international language [for] rock ‘n’ roll is English. So, maybe that’s why I went two years after receiving that idea from Torben. I finally thought, “Now is the time, now I will do it, now I got the courage. I’ve been writing lyrics for five years—I’ll do it now.” And I was very pleased with the result. It worked perfectly well with Ted’s vocals, and so I guess that’s why I did three more on the Transilvanian Hunger album.

Where did the title come from? Is it a reference to former Mayhem vocalist Dead and the “I Transylvania” shirt he was wearing when he committed suicide?

That would be very logical. You’d think that would be a really sound way to try to figure out a reason for the title. However, I’m not sure that it was, because I think it would come sooner after Dead’s suicide, like if that would be a song on A Blaze in the Northern Sky or Under a Funeral Moon. I thought of it with the whole concept of the icy and the cold landscape. Probably it must have crossed my mind, obviously, about Dead, too, and his whole take on Transylvania, and the real hunger he had for it. I don’t remember now, but I would actually prefer [if] it was like a tribute to Dead, but I’m not sure that’s all of it. When I make a title—or an album title, at least—there’s never just one meaning behind it. There are several, because I mull it over in my head, and, what I’m good at here in life is quick associations, so when I get a title, I quickly come up with a lot of different ways out of the little box that the title is in. And then I stuff that box full of different meanings—so it’s very potent for me.

I never talk about lyrics much, or not when I have the artistic side to myself anyway. Then it’s better not to explain too much. Lately, I’ve been explaining a little bit about the lyrics ’cause it’s no problem. I’ll just write about my feelings containing some fucking topic or scene politics, but at that time it was all dark and serious, really. You know, the simplest thing in the world is for white kids that are a little bit troubled to go really pompous on it all—like

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you get a splinter in your finger and suddenly you have a whole grindcore album. That’s how it is—adolescence and early 20s. I guess people feel really strongly in their lives at the time.

Most artists, they make their most vital music early and spend the next 20 years sucking.

How did the cover art come together? The illustration is a bit different from A Blaze in the Northern Sky and Under a Funeral Moon.

It was a continuation of it, though, and it was supposed to be a continuation. I was thinking, “Yeah, of course, what photo would be Blaze?”—just having a photo as a cover at that time was also preposterous. No one did that. It had to be some sort of Ed Repka painting or what have you. So I wanted to take it really back to the ’80s when we did A Blaze and all the influences on the album are of the ’80s, and so are the others really, except that when it comes to Transilvanian Hunger, it was more of the same mood that Burzum had, and then a mix of that, and then Von, and both those bands were like ’91, so that’s how far we went into having inspirations; all of the rest of the way we play our instruments, and I play drums, is ’70s.

OK, the cover. We chose the photo of Zephyrous for Blaze—immediate shock value, I guess it had, or reminiscent for people going though vinyls in the store, going like, “What the hell is this in the new section? That’s like from… that’s from the ’80s.” And we continued with that with Under, and we didn’t Photoshop away that little bush in front of Nocturno Culto there. And then finally it was time for one of the shots of me. And this was a photo session that was done, I guess, in ’92, so now it was time to find a photo from that photo session; but I had lost the original photo, like from when you deliver the film, and then you get back the print and the negative, and I couldn’t find this either. But what I had done in ’92, I had photocopied a lot of the photos, so I could send [them] around to magazines and stuff, because we didn’t work on that, this was beyond DIY. So, there were photocopies, and that is all that was left. So, I said, “I got to search longer, I can’t just send a photocopy to England and imagine that they’ll go with that for the cover.” So, I searched and searched— nothing. Well, then I just sent the photocopy, like have the logo up in the corner, please, and put Transilvanian Hunger on there—boom, it’s your cover. I don’t remember if they thought it was strange or if they tried to protest or anything. I think, again, they sort of knew that everything was blown to hell over there in Norway. They just said, “Yeah, whatever.”

So, no, that was it, and it wasn’t a normal thing to do, I know. It was just a photocopy.

No one would think that it would work or anything. Today, when I send photos to magazines and stuff, they’re all like, “Oh, we need

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it better, we can’t C use this seriously, E KM E AL S P it’s too bad,” but they don’t know the whole icon, which is from a photocopy of a paper copy. So, that always freaks me out a little bit.

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The infamous press releases regarding "Jewish Behavior"

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we never did see any of them as competitors, it was cool. It was a great time, actually, because metal bands did have a lot of attitude back then.

There were, of course, a lot less bands back then as well, but it was a great time. It’s a different time today. I don’t know. People are just literally killing everything they have just to have some news headlines. There’s a lot of things going on today that are not misanthropic, to say the least.

I mean, I’m kind of living a misanthropic life, even though we realize that everything today is more difficult—especially when it comes to spreading your music around in a sea of bands.

So, we have to do more stuff—do interviews maybe, do some fielding and do exclusive stuff and everything.

People often describe A Blaze in the Northern Sky, Under a Funeral Moon and Transilvanian Hunger as the “black metal trilogy.” Do you view those albums as linked in any way beyond the fact that they were all released one after another?

No, it’s just because human beings as a species are really visually led. Like, you could put Anthrax and Celine Dion in a box with the same type of album cover, and they’d go, “Yeah, this is a natural progression, sure; I can see how these are linked,” ’cause the cover is clearly almost identical. No, the thing is the three album covers are black and white photos, and that’s why it’s viewed as a trilogy. If the Panzerfaust album also had that kind of cover— like the black and white instead of black and gray—then they would have to say it’s a “four-ology”! It’s so easy to think of it as a trilogy instead of this four thing, so everyone’s going, “Oh yeah, that’s a trilogy.” But the thing is, those albums are really far between, the productions are very different, the music is very, very different on these albums. Ted’s vocals are [mostly] the same, but that’s always, that’s the only thing that ties them together. Also that they were number two and three and four in our chain of albums, but there’s nothing else combining these albums.

Different lineups, different studios—not the first two—but different engineers and sound.

And the thing with the first one, A Blaze in the Northern Sky, in this so-called trilogy, is a mixture of death metal and black metal; and number two of the so-called trilogy, Under a Funeral Moon, is basically pure black metal of the ’80s style; and then I did the Transilvanian Hunger—part three— which was just me, so there again, it has really nothing to do with the vibe of the two other albums. I see it as a very, very different album.

Actually, there are so few things that combine them and so many things that divide them.

NOCTURNO CULTO: Yes, I do, actually. When it comes to being a musician and being in a band, I don’t think those three albums connected to each other in any way, really, but they’re connected in the sense of that time period. I would say there was definitely a new era after Transilvanian Hunger, and we never looked back. To me, [there were] very, very fruitful years between A Blaze in the Northern Sky and Transilvanian Hunger, because lots of things did happen, lots of things in my life changed. Also, it was totally Darkthrone on the darkest day, but that was a really important time also, because I think since Fenriz and me obviously are the only two left in the band since ’93, I think those years are without the rehearsals, especially A Blaze in the Northern Sky and Under FENRIZ:

In the Decibel cover story, you state that 1994 was “a horrible year for black metal.” To your credit, nothing else in the black metal scene that year sounded anything like the Transilvanian Hunger record.

Well, there were other bands on the brink of doing this, probably. I can see that if I didn’t make an album that was so hypnotic, other people would, but then again the other bands were more like bands, and I was alone at that time with that album. But I’ve always said that everyone in the Norwegian scene of ’90, ’91, ’92, ’93, ’94—everyone was doing those kinds of riffs. Gorgoroth was also doing them, Enslaved was doing them. Emperor was doing them.

Immortal was doing them. And I was making some sort of riffs like Mayhem and Burzum and those guys. All of us were listening to the same bands of the ’80s. Of course, this was the early ’90s—there were no other bands to listen to.

There was Master’s Hammer. Master’s Hammer was the first Norwegian black metal album, but they were from Czechoslovakia, and we all listened to Master’s Hammer a lot, the Ritual album. So, I don’t think there is much originality about the riffs on Transilvanian Hunger at all.

The whole originality of it is the production, the die-hard monotony of it, the whole execution, the thing that it was [iconic] was that it was structured that way; it’s the structure and the sound, and, I mean, I’m the executive chief on the album, so I had to make all those choices, but to me they weren’t like choices at all. It was made, it had to be that way—there was no other choice. I realized I had made an album that was entirely in one tempo.

But I didn’t know, I thought maybe more of it like, “OK, I got the inspiration, so I did the album.

I am proud of it, but I am keeping Darkthrone afloat with this album.” I was even considering, when I had done the first Neptune Towers

FENRIZ:

a Funeral Moon; of course, [that] did get a solid platform for us to stand on in the future as well.

Musically, everything worked perfectly. We never really after that encountered any problems playing together, because when you’re the only two left, you have to rely on experiences from the past, and there’s less argument when you’re the only two in the band, and you don’t have to stand in line to record.

Do you view it as a special time period for the entire Norwegian scene as well?

Yeah, I would say so, because you have to remember that people also like to call it the second wave of black metal, which pretty much started off—and we were kind of early on in there—with A Blaze in the Northern Sky. It really did cause a stir. All kinds of reactions came. It was a time where things were actually misanthropic and dark. The bands that did do stuff then had a lot of attitude, and even though

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album, to release that as a Darkthrone album, just to keep Darkthrone afloat as well, or just to confuse people, because I had started to detect in ’94 that it was turning into a trend, and that was the thing that was [most] horrible about ’94—it was the trend. You’d see people from other countries really tuning into what we were doing and trying to do it, but misunderstanding it. And making it with better sound, more synthesizers.

Where before, the riff—and you would sort of hear the riff so many times that you would sort of make the synthesizer sound in your head, but then the other people from other places would take that tone that you would get in your head while listening to a riff long enough—they would put a synthesizer on top, and I was sort of like, “That wasn’t really the intention.” And then the whole sad thing about it became inflated, too.

There’s a sadness in it; I don’t think Transilvanian Hunger is very extreme, but there’s a lot of emotion there, and there’s also a sadness, and that’s why the whole thing started to go a little bit haywire, because there was suddenly an emphasis on the sadness; and that’s why Gezol [of Sabbat/ Metalucifer fame] from Japan started saying [in faux Japanese accent], “What is happening to black metal? It’s too much black and not enough metal!” and this is what I am currently… I’m paying my debts. Every time I make a new song, I’m paying the debts, man. Because I had to do Transilvanian Hunger, but realized I was veering into the “too much black and not enough metal.”

Although, on the third song—I think it’s called “Skald Av Satans Sol”—that was a song with a very metal riff, which is what Merciless would play. Merciless from Sweden had an album called The Awakening, and this was the first album that Euronymous released. And the first album that we released on the label Tyrant Syndicate was also a black-thrash album, but when we released a black-thrash album, we get a whole lot of people going, “Why aren’t you releasing standard ’90s black metal?” But do you think Euronymous got the same reaction when he released Merciless?

Of course not. This again proves that the scene now is completely horrible compared to when we grew up, because we didn’t have this attitude from people that were locked in a trend. The last time I visited Euronymous, what were the bands he was about to release? No, it wasn’t Gorgoroth; it was Sigh, and it was Mysticum, which are both really not trendy bands. We were never locked in a trend, and that’s why it was so horrible for us to see it all become a trend, and that really kicked in in ’94 and ’95, and the last part of the ’90s were horrible for absolutely every metal style on the planet. We’d been through seeing thrash metal die, and then we saw death metal, which was once a part of thrash metal, but branched out.

Death metal would be [at] first really great, and then would start to become [a] trend, too. And then death metal just crumbled before our eyes; I think I maybe had five death metal albums from

1990. It was just not something we listened to in 1990. We had been stuffing our heads with death metal in ’88 and ’89, so it was time to take the old Sodom and Destruction albums again in 1990, and then we started to listen to more Motörhead and Venom, too, of course—also always Bathory and Celtic Frost, and Hellhammer as well. But those two were always the most important bands for us: Bathory and Celtic Frost. Nowadays, there’s not a lot of Bathory left in us; it’s a lot of Celtic Frost and Hellhammer, though. We sort of changed Bathory with Motörhead—the spirit of Quorthon lives on through us as we continuously refuse to play live.

You know, the simplest thing in the world is for white kids that are a little bit troubled to go really pompous on it all–like you get a splinter in your finger and suddenly you have a whole grindcore album.

F E NRIZ How do you think Transilvanian Hunger holds up today?

Well, it’s for those who are really fucked up, ’cause there’s not really any entertainment there. And if you are going to like that album today, you either would have heard it many years ago, or you are a complete misanthrope for liking this stuff. Because it does not have anything to do with “modern sound.” It’s monotone. It’s very misanthropic.

It’s dark, and it’s an album that’s not easy to get into, especially for kids today that are used to that sound and a lot of things just going on, and “Oh, did you hear that? That was really cool.” It’s not like that, so it’s for people that are especially interested in that kind of farout, distant kind of riffing. And even though I know a lot of people have a hang-on to the Transilvanian Hunger stuff, I like to think that it’s—well, not to be harsh, but nowadays I think it’s like… I think it’s a good album, by all means, but you know, it’s more like emo-goth kid stuff. So, that album is actually the reason there’s emo kids. Just kidding!

FENRIZ: Now something finally popped into my mind, like, why so many bands copy that exact album. I’m thinking maybe because it’s damn NOCTURNO CULTO:

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easy. My mother could play that. She couldn’t create it, but she could sure play it. I’ve been a fan of many hundreds of thousands of acts through out the years, and I never really felt like I would copy one of them and send them a tape and say, “What do you think?” That’s not me. I said earlier that I don’t wanna bother people, but it seems like other people are not like me; they are perfectly willing to make me listen to themselves copying me! They sort of think that that’s the thing I need to hear most in the entire world. It’s like, no, I made that, I don’t sit around and listen to that all the time. I prefer to listen to Burzum. I don’t know, that just makes me sort of lose the faith in humanity—not that I had much from the get-go! But it’s really horrible, man.

To make something that sticks out like that—well, I’m sure not everyone can do that. Usually it’s a coincidence that leads to someone making a punk album that stands out or something like that, because it’s really difficult, right? But there’s a time and place for everything. And suddenly I was thinking I was doing what everyone else was doing when I made Transilvanian Hunger, but it turns out now it’s really distinct; but as I told you, that really hurts when people copy it, because then I find it truly loathsome. I’m really much more comfortable with playing a varied style like we did on Blaze or Funeral Moon or later albums, ’cause then [if] you’d have people copy those albums, at least they will be playing three, four or five metal styles instead of just that one type of album! It’s so limited, what can I say? It hurts.

It hurts my ears. I mean, it doesn’t hurt. It’s cool that someone’s listening to what I was making—it was two weeks of my life, man.

I couldn’t have made that two weeks without having gone through my musical life up to that point, or the life in the scene and the creation of—or the continuation of—the ’80s black metal, but it’s still just two weeks of my life… that is haunting me on a daily basis, mind you.

I discovered MySpace through a coincidence two years and three months ago, so I quickly started surfing around, and discovered how easy it was to find new crust bands I never heard about.

I’d find one crust band and then, suddenly, on their “top friends,” there were 12 others, and I’d heard about six of them, and then: “Yes, this is great!” But earlier this year I was thinking, I was asking my girlfriend, maybe I should check into our MySpace page, maybe see what people left—messages and stuff. And then I sort of figured that it was really easy to answer a lot of people on a daily [basis], but [the] result is that I got more and more bands that had played for a couple of months and they choose Transilvanian Hunger style. It’s just more of what I was bored of already in ’95 and ’96. I was bored then and now. Twelve years after that, I still get it on a daily basis. A

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Long Cold Winter I the making of Enslaved’s Frost

f black metal was defined by a single year, it would have to be 1994. Not a single calendar year before or after could possibly compete with—in sound, vision and diversity—De Mysteriis Dom Sathanas, In the Nightside Eclipse, Hvis Lyset Tar Oss, Suomi Finland Perkele, The Shadowthrone, Bergtatt, Transilvanian Hunger and Opus Nocturne. Though the second wave of black metal had crashed a few years before, the biggest wave was in 1994. And with it, the second wave of Viking metal.

The first Viking metal wave was nothing like the second, however. The unifying bonds—cultural history, geographic location, a connected (via post offices worldwide) underground network—just weren’t there. Nevertheless, proto-Viking metal was. As early as the late ’70s, in fact. Faithful Breath could be viewed as the genesis, replete with fur and horned helmet costumes and epic album art (check out Back on My Hill). They weren’t the only ones either. Sweden’s Heavy Load purloined Nordic myths and imagery in the early ’80s. As did Norwegians TNT, for one album.

But the true innovator was Bathory. Over three albums—Blood Fire Death, Hammerheart and Twilight of the Gods—the Quorthon-fronted outfit braved it all to create the first-ever cohesive metallic tribute to the Vikings.

So influential and symbolically important were these records that they inspired three Norwegian teenagers, one as young as 13, to form Enslaved in 1991. Though the trio’s first foray into Viking metal was enough to ink a deal with then-cult label Deathlike Silence Productions, it’d take an EP, Hordanes Land, and a debut album, Vikingligr Veldi, for Enslaved to find a (left hand) path of their own. Enslaved had arguably fara I Viking-ed on Hordanes Land, but internally they—particularly guitarist Ivar Bjørnson and frontman/ bassist Grutle Kjellson—knew that songs about battles, desolate snow-capped mountains and fjords could only go so far. This was stuff for neophytes and surface-dwellers, not a group of intellectually- and culturally-motivated teens.

Enslaved’s fingerprint—Bjørnson’s quirky chords and berserk arrangements, Kjellson’s battle-worn caterwaul and Trym Torson’s deft blasting—remained DBBMHOF intact on second album Frost, but for all intents and purposes, this album marked the beginning of a long sonic and philosophic sojourn. First and foremost, Bjørnson dialed back on Vikingligr Veldi’s theme repetition. Gone were the endless Frost riff cycles of “Midgards Eldar” and “Lifandi Liv Undir Hamri.” And Kjellson OSMOSE, 1994 dove headfirst into Norse myth. He was less concerned about the retelling of Progressive Norse Thor’s fateful encounter with the Midgard Serpent than the root of the conflict. crash course Kjellson knew it was time to reclaim the gods and goddesses of his ancestors, especially if it meant his version of things would inevitably clash with the Christianized fairytales so often associated with Nordic myth. And, finally, Enslaved—out of respect for and to differentiate themselves from a burgeoning black metal scene—had branded the term Viking metal on Frost. Officially.

Decibel is hereby honored to induct our first (and possibly last) Viking metal record, Enslaved’s Frost, into the Hall of Fame. As stated in one translation of a Hávamál passage: “Cattle die / and kinsmen die / And so one dies one’s self / But a noble name / will never die / If good renown one gets.” See you in Valhalla, guys! [4]

Enslaved,

PHOTO BY FRANK WHITE

ENSLAVED FROST The world according to LARP Kjellson, Bjørnson and Torson suit up for action

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1994 was the year of Enslaved. You guys had proverbially landed on the extreme music scene with not one, but two albums.

IVAR BJØRNSON :

Absolutely. It was a year when it all sort of began for us in a bigger context. We started to think of ourselves as a band with a future. We saw it in terms of years and thinking ahead. Before that, we didn’t have any perspective. We did the mini LP [Hordanes Land] and Vikingligr Veldi. The feedback internationally for Frost was really good. People started to talk about touring. We started to see that we were about to achieve exactly what we wanted with the band.

Quicker than we expected, really. We felt the band was going the right way. Every phone call we got was a big leap for the band.

Do you have specific memories around the writing and recording of Frost?

BJØRNSON :

A bunch of good memories. It’s been like something like 15 years ago now. We recorded in Bergen, but at the time we were living in Haugesund, our native hometown, which is like three or four hours south of Bergen.

Bergen was the epicenter for metal in our part of the country. That’s also where Grieghallen

[studios] was. We borrowed an apartment from my dad’s girlfriend’s son. At the time he was studying in Bergen, but this was summer, so he wasn’t there.

Yeah, good times. [Laughs] TRYM TORSON : For us, it was always doing what we wanted to do. Being a part of the black metal scene, even though we weren’t black metal.

We didn’t look at it as a big thing. There were maybe 20 people that were exchanging ideas about music. From the beginning, we didn’t want to have black metal lyrics, but it had to be as Norwegian as possible. We even sang in Old Norwegian and Icelandic. I don’t remember being hassled for going our own way. On the contrary, people were into what we were doing.

Was Enslaved a group effort? I know Ivar wrote most of the music.

BJØRNSON :

We were a little gang. It’s the same now. I write all of the music. Me and Grutle would share lyrical duties. On Frost, I think I wrote two of the lyrics. Socially, we were two small groups within the group. Trym and Grutle never really spent time together. Just the two of them. They would mostly socialize within the context of the group. Trym is my really old friend from the little town B M HO F

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where I grew up. He had relatives there. He was an older guy who was into metal, so I was instantly interested in getting to know him.

There was nobody else around that was into metal. When we split up Phobia and started Enslaved in ’91, I remember Trym as a guy who played drums. By that time, me and Grutle had become friends. So, it was me and Grutle, me and Trym or the three of us together. It was mostly about me and Grutle, putting our heads together to come up with conceptual ideas, by the time Frost came around.

GRUTLE KJELLSON : Frost was one of the first albums I wrote most of lyrics for. It was the first time we went deeper into the mythology. More like trying to find the philosophical background to the myths. Something else than bedtime stories the Christians wanted us to believe for the past 1,000 years. Dig beyond the layers of Christian deception and lies, so to speak. Frost was the first album we tried to do that. To interpret the myths ourselves. To make them our own.

TORSON : Ivar would write the riffs. Then we’d get together and practice the riffs. If I had some ideas, we’d work on changing his riffs. Also, if he had some ideas on drums, we’d work those out. I remember Grutle was working, so we really only had the chance to practice as a group on the weekends. That’s when we shared ideas as a group.

couldn’t even play a beat.

I just pounded on the toms. [Laughs] You were teenagers when Frost came out. How much of Enslaved circa ’94 was the product of the band searching for an identity or a voice?

BJØRNSON :

Did your families support Enslaved?

BJØRNSON :

My dad and Grutle’s mom were really supportive. From the very first days of the band.

They were both teachers, so they had experience in feeling out what is a healthy interest and what is not. Now, when my dad comes backstage after shows, he’ll have a beer and brag about how he was listening to the black metal of the day back in the ’60s. Before anyone else had heard about the Rolling Stones. Stuff like that.

I think he recognized that when you become dedicated to a musical movement, it’s important. My dad and Grutle’s mom were really helpful in talking to other parents, too. Making them realize it’s a genuine art form. We weren’t about opposing parents or anything like that. We didn’t relate Enslaved to opposing anything. Frost was a pro thing. Not an anti.

KJELLSON : My mother paid for the printing of the first 100 Enslaved T-shirts back in ’92. My mother and Ivar’s father were the biggest money sponsors for the band.

TORSON : Oh yeah! My mother bought me my first drum kit. I was around 14 years old. I had always wanted to have a drum kit, but I never knew how to play drums. I was utterly confused. I

I think we had a pretty good idea of what we wanted to do in Enslaved. We came from Phobia, a death metal band. We did that in ’89.

We had a demo. We did gigs outside Bergen. The band was getting a bit of a name in the Norwegian underground. The reason why we split up Phobia is because me and Grutle realized we were playing music that we wanted to play—it was brutal and all that, but it didn’t really mean anything. We got that feeling it was just five guys who got together after school to jam. That wasn’t exactly what we were looking for. Also, at the same time you had Darkthrone, Mayhem and all those guys breaking black metal to the moon and beyond. It was a big inspiration to us.

Not the whole Satanic thing, but the whole other thing: layout, lyrics, image, song titles, even

Veldi sessions were closed off. The timing around Vikingligr Veldi and Frost was a bit weird because of the whole Deathlike Silence thing. Vikingligr Veldi was a year delayed, so that’s why it’s so close to Frost. The recording of Vikingligr Veldi was finished during the summer of ’93, if I remember correctly. We started writing for Frost in the autumn and winter of ’93.

KJELLSON : “Svarte Vidder” was written in early ’92. I’m not too sure why we didn’t include that song on Vikingligr Veldi instead. It would’ve been suitable more for Vikingligr Veldi than Frost. “Isöders Dronning” was the last song we wrote for Frost. We have always had the tendency for the last song we write to be an indicator of how the next album is going to sound. “Isöders Dronning” is the song on Frost that most reminds you most of [1997’s] Eld. It’s always been like that, unfortunately. [Laughs] What did the rest of the guys think of the Frost material the first time you played it for them, Ivar?

BJØRNSON :

Nothing special, if I remember correctly. We were into rehearsing a lot, dedicating our time to the music. Every time I would show up with a new song, the guys would immediately dig their fangs into it and add their own expressions to it. It was different from Vikingligr Veldi.

On that album, it was more about repeat[ing] things. I think 48 is the record on that album.

They’d say, “OK, how many times do we play this riff?” I’d say, “Um, 48.” They’d reply, “Seriously?” [Laughs] I do think Frost was something the guys really liked—the direction we were heading in.

[Pytten Hundvin] just loved Trym’s drumming.

He said, “You’re such an amazing drummer. I can’t believe the energy you have.” Then he looked at me and said, “Those arrangements are beautiful.” He had a worried look on his face because he saw that Grutle was in the room and said, “You make the best coffee.”

IVA R BJØ RN SO N fonts on the album covers. Everything was part of a big whole. That appealed to us. Some of the guys took it to the extreme, which was a reaction to the American and English bands—dudes in Bermuda shorts. Back then, it felt like black metal was serious. Like it was trying to relay something important.

Every song, save “Svarte Vidder” and “Isöders Dronning,” was written in ’94. Were they leftover songs from the Vikingligr Veldi sessions?

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There weren’t too many solos on Frost.

Why is that?

BJØRNSON :

Personality-wise, I’m an Yngwie Malmsteen kind of guy. With the big hairdos. Fast cars.

Stuff like that.

Technically speaking, I had already developed or found my guitar voice. I’m more or less selftaught. I inherited—from my dad—a bunch of guitar lesson books from the ’60s and ’70s. They were about chords, ranging from easy Bob Dylan protest songs to complex Simon & Garfunkel songs.

A lot of kids were fans of the shredders. I guess it was too late for me by the time I was aware of the shredding tradition. I had settled as a rhythm guitarist. I was into guys like David Gilmour, Euronymous from Mayhem, Snorre [Ruch] from Thorns. It wasn’t until Roy [Kronheim, guitars] was in the band that I started to think about leads.

It was a gradual discovery. [4]

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Progressive rock influences started to come through on Frost. That’s how I hear it, at least.

KJELLSON :

Well, you can hear the progressive influences coming through on “Isöders Dronning” and “Fenris.” Those songs were like something is yet to come.

BJØRNSON : Absolutely! All that stuff happened naturally. We were listening to things like Klaus Schulze and Tangerine Dream. Also, Rush and Yes. Stuff everybody’s heard. We were inspired by the way they used the keyboards. The way they wrote songs.

The productions of Vikingligr Veldi and Frost vary drastically. I’ve always felt Frost was a bit on the thin side. I guess it’s not as layered as Vikingligr Veldi.

BJØRNSON :

Yeah, Frost is more personal. I couldn’t tell you how we did the guitars on Vikingligr Veldi. The focus wasn’t on the guitars.

It was more about getting the right amps into the studio and finding a sound. With Frost, we had our own ideas. Like for the guitars. I used the Swedish death metal sound for the guitars.

Half of the sound is from a bass amplifier with a really heavy distortion pedal plugged into it.

The other half is the traditional set-up. My own sound. Frost is more of a band sound, whereas Vikingligr Veldi is more layered. Frost is more direct. It’s the sound of a trio.

KJELLSON : Frost was recorded on a different drum kit and with a different drum production.

It was the first time we used triggers on the bass drums. I still have nightmares about that.

Tick-tock, tick-tock. It was extremely annoying listening to the drums being triggered. I couldn’t believe my ears! So, the drums sound a bit different. It’s more in your face and in the forefront.

What was it like working with Eirik “Pytten” Hundvin on Frost?

BJØRNSON :

It was great. We had already worked with him on Vikingligr Veldi. He had a reputation.

He was an open-minded and cool guy. He was the first guy outside the extreme metal scene to become a major player. The first thing he did was Old Funeral. Immediately when Pytten heard this new direction—he didn’t really care for heavy metal—he thought there might be hope for kids after all. He was enthusiastic. When bands went into record with him, they’d call all their friends and say, “You have to record with this guy!” He would do a lot of hardcore pro bono work. You’d show Pytten your contract, show him the amount of money you had to work with and he’d make it happen. I remember he was always trying to be positive. He’s an old teacher, so he’s always trying to be fair and democratic.

He just loved Trym’s drumming. He said, “You’re

such an amazing drummer. I can’t believe the energy you have.” Then he looked at me and said, “Those arrangements are beautiful.” He had a worried look on his face because he saw that Grutle was in the room and said, “You make the best coffee.” [Laughs] He’s still very active as a concert producer in Bergen.

KJELLSON : We only had a couple of fights. A couple of times I told him to go kill himself.

Apart from that, things went excellently. [Laughs] He wanted me to do the laughter at the end of “Loke” all over again. I was tapping on my belt.

He said he could hear it. “Oh, I can hear it!” he claimed. It was at the end of a really long day.

I said, “I can’t hear it. You can’t hear it. Maybe you can hear it, but you’re just saying that to annoy me!” I remember telling him, “I won’t do

We felt, “Oh, let’s call it Viking metal.” I know now we shouldn’t have done that. It started an avalanche of folk metal bands. Bands that sang about drinking beer and raping.

GR U TLE KJE LLSO N it again. You know that. It’s perfect. You can’t hear the fucking belt tapping.” He just said, “OK, pack your gear and get out of here!” I said, “Fuck you! You’re going to use this! We’re paying you!”

It was a stupid fight. In the end, we kept the recording and laughed about it the next day. The belt tapping is there, I guess.

Your image differed from black metal. Ivar had the executioner’s outfit, Grutle was sporting the Viking helmet and Trym had the Spanish replica sword. Were you trying to figure out your image at the time?

BJØRNSON :

I don’t know where the whole mask thing came from. My idea of the executioner was perhaps inspired by Sodom. I think some people thought I was into S&M. I had an Irish lady calling me for a few years after Frost came out. I’d tell her to fuck off and she’d think that was part of the whole sadist routine. She’d hang up and call me the next day, ready for more abuse. Like, “Stop calling me, you fucking bozo!” [Laughs] KJELLSON : I wish I knew! [Laughs] I was basically dressing up like a Viking warrior king. I had no B M HO F

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idea what the others were trying to do. Not even today. At least we didn’t have any horn helmets.

It’s not heresy as long as there aren’t any horns.

That’s the ultimate cartoon.

TORSON : We wanted to project a Viking image.

We didn’t want to look like a regular Viking.

They were farmers. They were only Vikings when they traveled outside of Norway. I remember us looking at images from movies like Conan.

Ivar found the executioner’s mask at a market.

He thought it looked cool. I had this sword, but it wasn’t a Viking sword. Those were hard to get a hold of. I found it at a market. We used what we had. Sverd from Arcturus made his own chainmail, too. I had him make me a chainmail, so I used that. A lot of us had chainmail. [Laughs] The term “Viking metal” was on the inside sleeve. Was that a declaration as to what style Enslaved played?

KJELLSON :

It was a declaration, or rather a statement, that we weren’t black metal. We didn’t have Satanic lyrics. We felt, “Oh, let’s call it Viking metal.” I know now we shouldn’t have done that. It started an avalanche of folk metal bands. Bands that sang about drinking beer and raping. We still got them today. Loads of them!

Suddenly, Viking metal is a genre. Well, I’m not the only one to regret that now. [Laughs]

Can you tell me where you found the cover photo for Frost? It’s such a striking image.

KJELLSON :

We had the title Frost. We wanted the best frost imagery we could possibly find. We were in a bookstore in Bergen. It’s from a tourist book, actually. Something like Discover Norway.

One of those books. It’s from an area called Jotunheimen in the middle of Norway. It’s a fresh water mountain lake. When we saw it, we were like, “Ah-ha! This is absolutely perfect! This is our cover.” I think it’s better than Twilight of the Gods, to be honest.

Apart from Bathory’s Viking period, would you consider Enslaved the first of its kind?

BJØRNSON :

Yeah, when we started Enslaved we had to have a concept. Black metal wasn’t fitting for us. That’s out of respect for the black metal bands, too. Those early black metal bands had a strong feeling for what they were doing.

They put a lot of meaning into it. Coming from families of teachers, both me and Grutle had a lot of books at home about the Vikings. At the same time, Bathory is a band I got into with the Hammerheart album. Hammerheart and Twilight of the Gods being my favorite Bathory albums, it just fit perfectly with Enslaved. We wanted a strong concept around the band, something that could fit both the aggressive and violent side and the mystical and beautiful side. The whole Northern theme.

Pillaging the friendly skies

Enjoying the most luxurious ride they'll have on their first U.S. tour, circa '95

Describe the Frost tours of Europe, the U.S. and Mexico.

BJØRNSON :

The first thing we did was the “Winter War” Tour in ’95 with Marduk coheadlining. It was the second time a Norwegian extreme metal band went out on tour. We had heard the stories from the Immortal guys who went out on tour with Rotting Christ the year before on the subtly named “Fuck Christ” Tour.

Ours was the “Winter War” Tour. Not exactly Einstein material either. It wasn’t “Fuck Christ,” at least. [Laughs] It was crazy. At the same time, it was our first time outside Norway, so we were equally fascinated by the fact that we never ran out of beer and we didn’t have to pay for it.

Which was quite an experience. The U.S. tour was great. We got in touch with John McEntee from Incantation. He made it all happen. It was us, Incantation, Absu and Kataklysm. I still feel bad for John. He had so much bad luck on that tour. It was insane. It’s unreal how much how many bad things happened to him during that tour.

KJELLSON : The first European tour with Marduk was wellorganized. We had a tour man-

ager, equipment, a tour bus, a nice band to tour with, good venues, food and sleep. When we went over to the States, we were like, “Oh, man! This is going to be so cool!” In many ways it was cool, but we played a lot of real shitholes. The cars broke down. The AC wasn’t working. One of the cars broke down in Central Bronx. That was exciting. I remember that was John McEntee’s idea. “I wanna drive you around to the worst neighborhoods in New York.” It’s like, “OK, let’s go.” The car breaks down. He said, “Ah, I guess we’re a bit unlucky now. The car’s fucked.” So, yeah, thanks, John! When the tour started going badly, he would always try to change the morale of the band. He’s like, “Hello, Grutle. Do you feel like rockin’?” “No, I don’t, John!” He then said, “Well, you look like a rocker to me!” [Laughs] That was pretty funny.

After the U.S. and Canada, we went on to Mexico for 14 days. We got stopped a couple of times at checkpoints. We never had American money to give to the police, so we’d give them merch. Things took a hell of a long time. The last show of the tour was in Torreón.

When we came to the venue, it was too late for the gig. They set up an emergency gig two days later with all the equipment they could get. I did the vocals and bass through a ghetto blaster. They managed to get two bass drums, but one of them was from a children’s drum kit. [Laughs] The guitar amplifier was a 20-watt Peavey. We sounded ridiculous.

The backstage was inside a whorehouse. It was kind of special, to say the least.

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TORSON : The U.S. tour was a no-budget tour. We were traveling in a van without AC. It didn’t even have back seats. There was just a small two-seat couch in the back. We took turns sleeping on the couch. I remember being tired all the time on that tour. We didn’t really sleep. Even though there were bad conditions throughout the tour, we learned a lot. That tour, especially the Mexican part, changed us. The Mexican part was the worst. It was a real nightmare. I love Mexican food, but we ate from the street.

Mexican hot dogs. I mean, when they say hot dogs, it was fuckin’ really a hot dog. Or maybe rat. I don’t know what those sausages were made of. Everybody got sick. I remember being pulled over by the police. It was in the middle of fucking nowhere. The road was gravel, no lights, nothing. They had machine guns; they took our passports and made us stand in a ditch. At that time, I was sure they were going to take the few dollars that we had, steal our stuff and shoot us while we stood in the ditch. I was like, “Oh, shit!

I’m gonna die in Mexico.” I was so sure of it.

Trym left in ’95. What were the circumstances around his departure?

TORSON : Me and Grutle were arguing a lot. Ivar’s the main guy. He writes all the music. Grutle’s the lyric guy. So, I think they thought it was easier to get rid of me than to get rid of one of them. Even though me and Ivar had more similar musical interests, it was easier for those two continue with a new drummer. I left and eventually joined Emperor. You can say I was pretty happy with the change. I remember getting the call from Samoth. He learned that I had left Enslaved. He was still in jail at the time. I was going to school and living in Stavanger, with the Gehenna guys. I was rehearsing with them a bit.

Samoth asked if I wanted to try out. They had tried out a lot of drummers, like Hellhammer, Frost and Erik [Brødreskift]. I think the drummer from Ulver tried out, too. I had one practice and the rest is history.

BJØRNSON : It was after we came home from the ’95 tours. It was really un-dramatic. We had done the European tour, which was really easygoing. It was like a party. We had our first experience with reality on the U.S. tour. There were some pretty low times on that tour. Like when we got dumped in Mexico by the promoter. He dumped us on the street, so we had to go 24 hours by bus—with a bunch of Mexicans and their chickens—to the border. We had to find our way back. There were some weird things going on with merch sales and money getting stolen. When we encountered those things and when we realized the social fabric wasn’t totally solid—I was the guy binding Trym and Grutle together in the band—is when we

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I remember being pulled over by the police.

They had machine guns; they took our passports and made us stand in a ditch. I was sure they were going to take the few dollars that we had, steal our stuff and shoot us while we stood in the ditch. I was like, “Oh, shit! I’m gonna die in Mexico.”

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TRYM TO R SO N Stare inquisitively

figured out it wasn’t going to be the three of us forever. Also, me and Grutle, during that tour, we started planning ahead. We were discussing musical influences. We discovered that we were talking a lot about progressive music and slowing down a little. Adding more melody.

The gap widened when we realized Trym didn’t want to go in the same musical direction.

Emperor was a perfect match for him. at us, Cleveland!

Bjørnson and Kjellson shred in black and red

Do you guys have a favorite song on Frost?

BJØRNSON :

It changes a lot. I’m fond of “Gylfaginning.” We really tried something with that song. It sounds very intense on the album.

It’s a little above what we were capable of at the time. We almost pulled it off in a way that makes it sound on edge. I like “Fenris” a lot. It’s got a really strange song structure, if you can call it structure at all. [Laughs] It has a little funky middle section with the synths. That part was inspired by “Escape From the Island” by KISS off The Elder.

KJELLSON : I like “Loke” a lot. I also like “Fenris.” The most suitable song for our new lineup is “Jotunblod.” I like the ideas—not the performance—on “Isöders Dronning” and “Gylfaginning.” The ideas are pretty cool. But I’d have to say “Jotunblod” is my favorite.

TORSON : When you listen to songs and when you play songs they’re totally different. I like “Loke.”

It has all the elements I like. But, to be honest, I don’t even remember all the songs on the album.

Vikingligr Veldi was a tribute to Øystein Aarseth.

By the time you were writing Frost, were you still dealing with physical and psychological impacts of Aarseth’s death?

BJØRNSON :

Yeah, I guess so. It took a really long time for everybody that was close to it. When the trial was done, it put a really big lid on everything.

I think it was regarded as a supernatural battle

between good and evil. But it wasn’t, I think. The way things were portrayed by the media, it left a bad taste in our mouths. We also fell into the trap of leaving it [alone] for a long time.

KJELLSON : No, I wouldn’t say that. I don’t think it affected my writing at all. We were split in two—those that followed Count Grishnackh and those that followed Euronymous. It actually happened twice. Things were starting to crystallize half a year before he died. Something bad was starting to happen. Everybody could basically feel it. Something wasn’t right. I remember Euronymous told me he visited an old psychic woman who had foreseen Count Grishnackh was going to kill someone.

Euronymous said, “It will be really interesting to see how that turns out.” It turned out to be him. So, yeah, that was pretty crazy.

TORSON : Yeah! The first album was supposed to be released on Deathlike Silence Productions.

I remember I was at home watching the news.

There was a murder in Oslo—black metallers. I was like, “What the fuck is this?!” When they said Øystein Aarseth, also known as Euronymous, had been killed, I couldn’t believe it. I was like, “No. No. This is impossible!” I called Ivar immediately. He was like, “What?!” We freaked out. I remember Grishnackh saying it was probably the Swedish guys, as there was a problem between the Swedish and Norwegian black metallers. We felt it was payback time for the Swedes. Then we learned it was Grishnackh who did it. It was like, “What the hell?! Why?!” They were supposed to have been friends. I was friends with both of them! I couldn’t believe what had happened. My brain didn’t cope with it. It felt all wrong. After, we didn’t know who we could trust. We could only trust ourselves. The scene changed after Euronymous’ murder.

Do you remember how Frost was received when it came out?

BJØRNSON :

I remember everyone was enthusiastic. We have to take into consideration it was easier to have overwhelming feedback back then.

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The people that were reviewing the album had a reason to check it out. It wasn’t imposed on everyone writing music like it is today.

KJELLSON : It was received very well in the underground. There weren’t that many labels or bands around. Very few bands toured outside their communities. I remember Terrorizer and Ablaze in Germany liked it. We didn’t get much interest from the tabloid press here in Norway.

That happened many years later. The press was only interested in writing about killing and church burnings. They didn’t care at all about the music. You have to remember, people hated us in Norway. They thought everybody with long hair was an arsonist or a biker. We had a biker war between the Bandidos and the Hells Angels going on around the same time. If they didn’t think you were a Satanist, usually by shouting, “Count Grishnackh worshipper!” you were a biker. You couldn’t walk alone after dark.

You could easily get into trouble. People would scream, “Fucking Satanist!” or “You fucking killers!” It was crazy. You can imagine people weren’t too concerned what we were doing musically. That didn’t matter at all.

Would you change anything about Frost?

BJØRNSON :

No. Remaking things like that is impossible to begin with. The spirit of the times.

How we recorded it. On a micro-level, we are very different people now than we were back then. I think a lot of ’94-’95 seeped into the music as well. For me, I would draw the line at remastering.

KJELLSON : No, I wouldn’t change anything.

I don’t like re-recording albums because they didn’t sound good. You did your best back then.

That represents what you were back then. I’m proud of what I did back then. So, yeah, I think things like that should be left alone.

TORSON : Yeah, of course. You always want to change things. At the time, I wanted to prove myself as a good drummer, but today I want to play what’s right for the music. I think I would play a bit simpler. The song is the most important thing. A

LONG LIVE THE FOURTH STUDIO ALBUM OUT NOW FROM GOOD FIGHT MUSIC

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Enter Sandman the making of Burzum’s Filosofem

“We can talk about an overarching Burzum-theme, to be found on all the albums, including Filosofem, and I think this can be summed up with one word: despair.”

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n 1993, Burzum mastermind and sole member Varg “Count Grishnackh” Vikernes both embodied Norwegian black metal’s violent strain of pagan nihilism and sought to defy the genre’s increasingly stultifying conventions. In March of that year, he recorded Filosofem, one of the most captivating and influential black metal albums ever committed to tape. Unlike much of the black metal that was being created at the time, Burzum’s fourth full-length and fifth overall release wasn’t so much a feral outcropping of youthful rebellion as it was an ultra-hypnotic meditation on what Vikernes says was his own inner despair. How this despair played out may or may not have been a factor in Vikernes’ subsequent murder of his former friend, Mayhem bandmate and label boss Øystein “Euronymous” Aarseth, but that’s exactly what happened less than five months after Filosofem’s completion.

As a result, the album wasn’t released until early 1996, when Vikernes had already been incarcerated for nearly two years. For fans on the outside, it was certainly worth the wait.

Opener “Burzum,” generally known by its German title, “Dunkelheit” (“Darkness” in English), follows in an excellent tradition of eponymous metal songs—Black Sabbath’s “Black Sabbath,” Angel Witch’s “Angel Witch,” Iron Maiden’s “Iron Maiden”—in that it has become emblematic of the respective band’s sound, an unintentional mission statement of sorts. But while DBBMHOF both Sabbath and Maiden have certainly produced more popular songs and better albums than the self-titled debuts on which their eponymous tracks appear, “Burzum”/ “Dunkelheit” is arguably the definitive Burzum track, and Filosofem Filosofem is the ultimate Burzum album. Filosofem also came to define black MISANTHROPY, 1996 metal while sounding almost nothing like the work of fellow Norwegian proOne provocateur genitors Mayhem, Darkthrone, Emperor and Immortal. to rule them all Purposely recorded with some of the shittiest equipment available, the album’s six songs exude a deeply narcotic effect. Hypnotic, mesmerizing, trance-inducing—all such adjectives apply to Filosofem’s pinging synth, humming bass and buzzing guitar tones. Even Vikernes’ otherworldly vocals seem to emanate from the thick barbiturate ether of a primordial Scandinavian landscape. While “Dunkelheit,” “Jesus' Tod” (“Jesus’ Death”) and “Beholding the Daughters of the Firmament” inculcated hordes of corpsepaint commandos and laid much of the foundation for the isolationist black metal movement that followed (Leviathan, Xasthur, etc.), songs like “Rundtgåing av den Transcendentale Egenhetensstøtte” and “Decrepitude II” invoked the electronic astral-traveling of Tangerine Dream or Vangelis, and even foreshadowed some of the more minimalist work of Scottish electronic duo Boards of Canada.

Conducted during a lengthy series of email exchanges with Vikernes that partly resulted in our May 2010 Burzum cover story, what follows is the latest induction into Decibel’s Hall of Fame. [4]

Burzum,

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One of the overarching themes of Filosofem seems to be death and rebirth as viewed through the change of seasons and the cycles of night and day. Is this fair to say? If so, why do you think these things were on your mind at the time you wrote the lyrics?

How do you view Filosofem in the context of Burzum’s musical and artistic trajectory?

From my point of view, Filosofem was a step back from Hvis Lyset tar Oss. It was more an experiment than the other albums, and was as such a good experience, but I think only the first few tracks on Filosofem really work well.

You’ve said that Burzum was originally conceived as a spell. How does this apply to Filosofem?

Same as the other old albums—starts slow, speeds up and then slows down again. The point was to calm you down, or get your attention, wear you out and then finally make you relax and fall into sleep, dreaming. It was a sleep spell, enabling your mind to escape in a certain mood and live in a dreamworld for some time.

To what extent do you think of the music on Filosofem as a vehicle for the lyrics/stories within? Is one more important than the other, or are they all “of a piece”?

The music was supposed to be a vehicle for the lyrics, but I don’t know if that was successful or not. Unlike Hvis Lyset tar Oss, the Filosofem album was not a concept album. It was more like a “leftovers” album, made up from all the tracks that

were left over after recording the other three metal albums (and Aske). So, I don’t see them as “of a piece.” I think the “Burzum” [“Dunkelheit”] track is the most important track on Filosofem, because it best captured the essence of Burzum, but also because it probably is the best track on that album.

Why did you choose to record some lyrics in English and others in Norwegian?

The Burzum tracks on the first four albums weren’t always recorded in a chronological order. Some of the tracks on Filosofem are old and others are new. Initially, I wrote lyrics in English, but then—in 1992—I decided to write lyrics in Norwegian instead. Being a “leftovers” album, Filosofem had both old and new tracks.

I don’t think we can talk about an overarching theme of Filosofem. We can however talk about an overarching Burzumtheme, to be found on all the albums, including Filosofem, and I think this can be summed up with one word: despair. The death and rebirth theme is present, though, very much indeed, under the arch of despair. The attraction to death and rebirth naturally derives from despair, and I think it is safe to say that despair was on my mind when I wrote these lyrics— and the other Burzum lyrics, too, for that sake.

The seasonal changes and the cycles of night and day represent hope, because it means that nothing lasts forever. Even despair has to meet its end. Death is a purification; the only thing that will purify your mind and free you from the despair, and the rebirth is the new beginning you need to live without despair. You are reborn; innocent and pure. It’s a new chance to do what is right. You cannot purify your mind in any other way; you cannot forget what you know any other way, and you need ignorance— innocence—to live without despair. There are, of course, alternatives—less attractive ones— like you can choose life and learn how to live with despair.

I don’t even see Burzum as regular black metal, let alone NSBM. From my point of view, Burzum has nothing (but metal) in common with what we today understand as black metal.

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The lyrics to the songs “Burzum” (a.k.a.

“Dunkelheit”) and “Beholding the Daughters of the Firmament” are preoccupied with cold and darkness, two environmental realities commonly associated with Norway. To what extent would you consider these songs products of your environment?

The cold and darkness described in Burzum is at least mostly metaphorical, and I don’t think my environment mattered in this context. I grew up here, so I am used to it. To me, Norway is neither cold nor dark. Instead, the south is (too) warm and (too) bright… Norway is my norm.

The “lyrics” to “Rundtgåing av den Transcendentale Egenhetensstøtte” / “Tour Around the Transcendental Columns of Singularity” are quoted from the Norwegian poet Johan Sebastian Welhaven. What is the name of the piece you quoted from, and it what is its significance to you?

I call “darkness,” and that’s what “Jesus’ Death” is all about—as is “Hvis Lyset tar Oss” (“If the Light Takes Us”).

Why did you decide to include “stories” alongside the lyrics in the album booklet?

It was not a concept album, so I wasn’t really happy with it, but these stories improved the album and made it more like a concept album. I saw it as an opportunity to elaborate.

Is it true that Filosofem’s opening track was the first Burzum song ever written? Can you trace its musical development from inception to its eventual appearance on Filosofem?

It was the first Burzum track, or the last UrukHai track really, because I first named the track “Burzum” and then decided to change band name from Uruk-Hai to Burzum. It was not included on the debut album because it did not “fit in” well with the other songs. The same was

Not sure if I remember this. The poem itself is not very significant to me, other than I like it. I like Johan Sebastian Welhaven, and his poetry is often very romantic. He was in opposition to the horrible and treacherous Henrik Wergeland (another Norwegian poet), but unfortunately the Wergeland-clan prevailed, and this was a great loss to Norwegian culture. Norway would have been a better place had the Welhaven-clan prevailed.

The correct English translation is “Walking Around the Transcendental Pillar of Singularity.” I haven’t corrected it, but please do. I have, however, removed some capitalizations in the Burzum track titles here and elsewhere in the interview, where appropriate.

Example: “Beholding The Daughters Of The Firmament” should be “Beholding the Daughters of the Firmament.” I know the Misanthropy guys didn’t get it right, but it’s never too late for me to try and correct this…

Not sure if I remember correctly, but I know being anti-trend was very important when I recorded the debut, and then as time passed by, the focus on revolt withered and eventually died.

It was not really a revolt against proper/trendy recording techniques, but rather (initially) a revolt against trendy death metal bands doing their best to sound just like Morbid Angel and Death, and then (secondly, and with Filosofem) a revolt against the trendy black metal bands doing their best to sound just like Darkthrone/ Burzum.

I also wanted the album to sound pretty much like it eventually did, and when looking for alternative Something techniques, I obviwicked this ously used the ones way comes that I liked. It was The interior not a complete sucand exterior of Filosofem's cess, because I was rare digibook looking for an even “poorer” guitar sound and even more out-of-this-world vocals. The first three tracks worked, but not the other guitar track(s).

The next time I will not revolt against anything, but rather just do exactly what I want. I am myself, and not just the opposite of those I dislike. If what I like is or becomes a trend or not matters no whit to me. Not today.

You also mentioned that with the exception of one bass track, all of Filosofem was recorded in one take, which leads one to believe that you were exceptionally wellrehearsed. What was your practice routine like at this point in time?

Why did you want to write a song about Jesus’ death (“Jesus’ Tod”)?

It was a continuation of the Hvis Lyset tar Oss concept, where the so-called light was presented not as the “Savior” in any way, enlightening us and warming us, but rather as a source of deprivation, decay, darkness and degeneration. The Judeo-Christian “light” does not enlighten or warm us; instead it dazzles and burns us. It is a source of ignorance (just like Islam, by the way). When Jesus died, the Jewish faith (disguised as Christianity) was forced upon the European masses, and our colorful, enlightened, philosophical, deep, scientific, pure, innocent and magnificent continent was covered in spiritual darkness. This Judeo-Christian “light”

recorded the vocals through a headset mic. You say you did this to rebel against “proper” and/ or “trendy” recording techniques, but some part of you must have found the result aesthetically pleasing on some level as well. Which was more important to you—the rebellion or the aesthetic—and why?

the case for Det som engang var. I tried to include it on Hvis Lyset tar Oss, but the recording was really a failure, so I never used that version. Finally, when I recorded Filosofem, I included it, along with the other tracks left over after the other recordings.

It seems that Filosofem was recorded in a purposefully unorthodox fashion. In an article on your website, you say that you plugged your guitar into your brother’s stereo amplifier and DECIBE L

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Well, it can also mean that I wasn’t really doing a good job, and ignored minor mistakes that I could have and probably should have corrected. But I did not want the album to sound “artificial” and instead I believed that some mistakes just added to the charm and authenticity of the album. This was my mentality at the time, and I did it like this when I recorded all the metal albums. On Det som engang var, there is even a drumbeat missing on the second track. It would have been so easy to correct that, to simply add that one drumbeat, but I didn’t, because that would be like cheating.

Or so I believed, anyhow. I played “live” when I recorded the albums, so to speak, with all that entails. Only (most of) the major mistakes were corrected (and in fact I don’t think

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BURZUM FILOSOFEM EC E AL S P there are any mistakes, even minor, on the Filosofem album. Well, maybe one on the ambient track…).

Not sure what to say about my practice routine. I was a full-time musician, so I did spend a lot of time rehearsing, but I don’t think the music on Filosofem is very difficult to play.

There’s one complex riff on “Jesus' Tod,” but the rest is pretty straightforward.

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One-man wolfpack

Assorted vintage adverts for Burzum's "leftovers" masterpiece

Do you think of Filosofem differently today than you did when you first recorded it? If so, how?

Now, that’s a long time ago. Not sure if I even remember what I thought about it back then… in fact, I am not even sure what I think of it today, and I am not sure if there is any disagreement between then and now. I liked the first few tracks very well, and I guess I still do…

Did you have a recording engineer assisting you at Breidablik Studio when you recorded Filosofem? If so, what is his/her name and why is he/she un-credited on the album?

At what point did you start seeing or hearing about Filosofem’s impact on black metal and its influence on other bands?

Well, there is actually no such thing as a Breidablik Studio, and I just used that name to protect the technician in the studio I was using from harassment and threats. Norway is not a free country, and our freedom of speech is real only for those who propagate the views of the authorities. There is no room for real dissent in “Soviet-Norway.” Because of this, the technician asked not to be credited on the album.

In fact I didn’t know it had such an impact. I never paid much attention to the so-called black metal scene after 1993, or rather I paid less and less attention to it from 1992 onwards, until I had nothing to do with it or anyone in it from 1996 onwards. I am happy if it was well-received by at least some.

How did you decide upon the Theodor Kittelsen artwork you used on Filosofem? How does it relate to the music within?

Filosofem was recorded just a few months before you killed Euronymous. What was your relationship with him like at the time?

The first two albums (the debut and Det som engang var) had artwork by the same artist, so I figured that I could do that for the next two albums as well (Hvis Lyset tar Oss and Filosofem).

And the next two (Dauði Baldrs and Hliðskjalf). And the next two (Belus and ????). I wanted to use the Kittelsen art because of the first track and the “halfway-concept” of the album, i. e. the partial continuation of Hvis Lyset tar Oss.

Nonexistent. We had no contact. He lived in Oslo. I lived in Bergen. It’s an eight-hour drive from Oslo to Bergen, over snowy mountains and on narrow roads, so you don’t just “drop by” for visits unless you have a very good reason to do so. He had closed his record shop down, did no work with his record company, Deathlike Silence Productions, and was jealous because I got “all” the attention from the media at the time, so there was no reason for me to have anything to do with him anymore.

The lyrics on Filosofem seem decidedly apolitical, unlike many of the views you have espoused since then. Do you resent the fact that your music is occasionally classified as “National Socialist Black Metal”—and embraced by creators and fans of actual NSBM—despite the fact that albums like Filosofem make no reference to any of your political leanings, regardless of what they might be? Do you have any hope that these misconceptions might eventually change?

Living in “Soviet-Norway,” I am used to political repression, so I naturally resent it, and I think it is fine if real dissidents embrace my music, no matter what they believe in. If someone thinks of Burzum as “Nazi” and because of that calls my music NSBM, that’s their problem. Not mine. If anyone has a problem with Burzum because of this NSBM classification by some, I think listening to classical music—any classical music—would be a major problem to them as well; not even one of all the famous composers would have been seen as “house-

Filosofem was the last album you recorded before going to prison. Does it have any special significance for you because of that?

trained” in the world we have today. If we are to fight or ignore art created by all those we disagree with, there will not be much art left in our world.

Perhaps I should add that I don’t even see Burzum as regular black metal, let alone NSBM. From my point of view, Burzum has nothing (but metal) in common with what we today understand as black metal.

It seems the most commonly available pressings of Filosofem list the song titles in German. Why is that?

Maybe the demand for the German edition was higher. I don’t know. You should ask the old record company, Misanthropy, and their distributors about that. They were the ones printing and selling the albums.

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Not really. It was not a perfect album, so to me it first and foremost represents another failure. It was a step in the right direction, alright, because it made me learn something, and perhaps because of that it was a necessary failure. It was not a mistake, but still a failure.

In retrospect, is there anything you would change about the album?

Yeah, I would have included only tracks that I was truly happy with. I’d include at least one fast track, and drop the experimental drum-less stuff. I’d also make sure to make all the lyrics in the same language, and make them follow the same thread. And out of spite, I’d call the music “elf metal” or something, just to make everyone understand how I felt about the development [of] the black metal scene. A

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story by chris dick

Black Arts Procession the making of Satyricon’s Nemesis Divina

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sk why, as of this writing, there are only six black metal albums— Welcome to Hell, A Blaze in the Northern Sky, Transilvanian Hunger (from Precious Metal), In the Nightside Eclipse, Frost and At the Heart of Winter—in the Decibel Hall of Fame and we’re likely to provide six times as many answers why there aren’t more. Bands refuse, dudes hate one another, money is owed, lawsuits are pending, key members have vanished, or, in the most extreme case, someone has passed (Euronymous and Erik Brødreskift, for example). But ask why nearly every black metal album, as of this induction, is of Norwegian origin and the answers become less clear and immediate. Why Norway? Indeed.

This much is known: Though black metal from the Kingdom was initially informed

by Venom, Bathory and Hellhammer, inventive teenagers and twentysomethings in Oslo, Bergen and various towns all over the country quickly transformed it into something else. Inspired as much by Norway’s natural, almost prehistoric beauty and pre-Christian belief systems as they were angered by state-controlled Christian agendas, bands like Mayhem, Darkthrone, Emperor, Immortal, Burzum and Satyricon rebelled sonically (and, as documented elsewhere, violently). What they created wasn’t just black metal. It was Norwegian black metal.

Although the aforementioned bands—and many more—were unified under a flag of hate, there were key and often subtle philosophical and spiritual differences separating the Satanists from the Paganists. For example, even if the members of Satyricon—Sigurd Wongraven (a.k.a. Satyr) and Kjetil-Vidar Haraldstad (a.k.a. Frost)—sported anti-Christian symbols, their origins were more Paganistic. This distinction was absolutely important when debut album Dark Medieval Times saw the light of day in 1993, but by the time Nemesis Divina roared like Fenrir at Ragnarök three years later, Satyricon’s path was well-established and it was painfully obvious that if the DBBMHOF wolfpack was running in one direction, Satyr and Frost weren’t necessarily following. Conformation was never a comfortable concept for Satyricon.

Nemesis Divina First impressions are everything. The Halvor Bodin and Stein MOONFOG, 1996 Løken-designed cover for Nemesis Divina resembled more a piece out Another supreme of Dave McKean’s workshop than art Xeroxed at dad’s office. Rich Norwegian nightmare with color and symbolism, the high-end design (color theory, font choices, etc.) broke seriously sacred ground. Musically, from The Shadowthrone to Nemesis Divina, the Norwegians experienced a near-magical improvement. Songs like leadoff monster “The Dawn of a New Age,” centerpiece “Mother North” and the title track were stronger than any song in Satyricon’s past. Satyr’s everimpressive riff-making/songwriting skills displayed a maturity not found outside, [4]

Satyricon,

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say, fellow sophisticates Emperor, while Frost’s incessant volleys and ultra-fast double bass rumble helped propel songs like “Forhekset” and “Immortality Passion” into the proverbial stratosphere. The surprise addition of Darkthrone’s Nocturno Culto (a.k.a.

Kveldulv) on second guitar not only looked aesthetically right, but it also seemed at the time that Satyr had assembled a constellation of stars—Fenriz contributed lyrically to “Du Som Hater Gud” and Nebelhexë had a spoken word bit in “The Dawn of a New Age”—willing and able to transcend black metal’s self-imposed limitations.

Nemesis Divina was Satyricon’s finest hour and from the moment Satyr snarled This is Armageddon! at the opening of “The Dawn of a New Age,” black metallers—from cromags to the intelligentsia—collectively recognized that one of Norway’s coldest and darkest stones had proverbially traveled an impressively long mile. From the fjords, forests and mountains of Norway to the hallowed hallways at Decibel, we are hereby humbled to unlock the Hall’s huge creaky oak doors for Nemesis Divina.

Nemesis Divina marked a significant artistic milestone for Satyricon. Now that you have the benefit of hindsight, why didn’t Satyricon settle for the comforts of convention?

SATYR: ’Cause it was never in the nature of the band’s songwriter. [Laughs] I used to follow racing legend Michael Schumacher’s career. He’s a Formula One driver. He’s the most winning driver of all Formula One drivers. He was interviewed on television, and the guy is known for being fiercely competitive in the world of sports. He would go to extreme lengths. The interviewer said, “You seem to be competitive.” An ironic understatement. Michael Schumacher casually said, “That’s my nature, yeah.” I kind of feel the same way. As I’ve grown up and matured as a professional, the decisions I’ve made can be traced back to when I was a kid. At school, where today Christianity is a subject you can choose, Christianity wasn’t a choice. I was so deeply uncomfortable and miserable attending those classes that I refused to do it.

My parents had to write letters and have meetings

with the local and regional school board so I could be dismissed from Christianity class. Throughout the following years, I sat in the school library just reading books that I had picked myself. I wasn’t the only one in the school, but in my part of the country that had the luxury. I completely refused. I wasn’t having any of it. [Laughs] That is my nature. For as long as I’ve been a musician, I’ve always followed my instincts. I’ve had record company people tell me to try different things stylistically and I’ve had all sorts of advice. If it doesn’t feel right to me, no matter how hard the pressure is—and it might’ve hurt Satyricon in some cases—I won’t do it.

FROST: Basically, the founding drives of this band are creativity and innovation. We wanted to create something that was uniquely our expression. Not their expression. We also grew as musicians, so we developed in a unique direction. It’s more the question of the quality of it than the originality of it. We would never accept something that didn’t sound uniquely ours.

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Would you call Nemesis Divina Satyricon’s coming of age album?

Skull, fucked

(l-r: Frost, Satyr, Nocturno Culto)

SATYR: I remember Daniel Janecka from the Australian company Modern Invasion, which was one of the few labels in the early ’90s dedicated to black metal, came over—he’s an older guy; in his early 40s; we were teenagers— and heard Nemesis Divina for the first time. He said it was the Sgt. Pepper’s of black metal. That was a bold statement. I was flattered. What was different about the record was the music.

Satyricon didn’t have to be necro or primitive.

For us, it was about how to do things right and to get the best experience. I was overflowing with creativity at the time, so I was able to dive right into the Nemesis Divina project. When we did that, we had a little more experience and insight. We created something that took it to the next level.

We had to write history right there and then.

NOCTURNO CULTO: I think the album really had an impact at the time. You can actually appreciate the production.

You described Nemesis Divina as a fist in the face of god. Can you elaborate?

SATYR: Some records have a bite to them that make them come off as potential milestones.

There can be certain things you do while you write the music or while you’re in the studio that allow you to see where things are heading.

Seeing how people react, you can see it’s going to be more than just a new record. It’s going to create a place for itself in history. When I was recording the part where I’m singing “This is Armageddon!” at the beginning of “The Dawn of

a New Age,” it actually felt historical. Working on “Mother North” and finishing “Mother North” in the studio felt like we were doing something special. I felt as if we were writing history. If you don’t feel that way while you’re working on a record, you’re probably not creating a milestone. You might be working on an awesome record, but not a milestone. The fact that we felt that we were doing a milestone, that’s what made it a fist in the face of god. We knew we were doing something that would have great impact. Greater than anything we had done before.

NOCTURNO CULTO: It’s probably taken from a Darkthrone lyric. Actually, it’s from the Under a Funeral Moon album. [Laughs] Nemesis Divina was written over a two-year period. Describe the songwriting sessions.

SATYR: I was writing an awful lot of music. For the first three or four years, I wrote music all the time. We didn’t have a career mapped out. We didn’t start playing shows until Nemesis Divina.

We didn’t have any goals other than making great music. It was a goal of mine to record and release an album. Once that was achieved, then I moved on to the next thing—the second and third albums. Playing live was more the result of public demand. We were getting offers for festivals, one-off shows and tours around Europe. For me, it was all about writing music. I remember part of the reason Nemesis Divina sounded the way it does is because I was really into the guitar. I was into classical guitar in my early teens, but it wasn’t until my late teens that I got into the electric guitar. It was more than a songwriting tool. I was interested in the guitar. I was never a better technical player than when I worked on Nemesis Divina. I was writing interesting and challenging things on the guitar. I remember Fenriz was listening to “The Dawn of a New Age” for the first time and said, “It’s very creative.” I remember that really well, actually. I think I was doing a lot of unconventional things guitar-wise. I was experimenting a lot, finding out what the guitar could do for me.

I also remember Jon [Nödtveidt] from Dissection was over at my place. He stayed with me for like two weeks. We’d just play guitar together—black metal things on guitar that had no purpose. We’d play Satyricon parts together.

Dissection parts together. Add things that never made it on our records. Playing around like that helped develop me as a guitar player and songwriter. I also remember getting more detailed with Frost for the first time. I’m very particular about everything about the drums now, but starting on Nemesis Divina I started to get detailed.

Some records have a bite to them that make them come off as potential milestones. When I was recording the part where I’m singing “This is Armageddon!” at the beginning of “The Dawn of a New Age,” it actually felt historical.

SATYR

I also remember things were different with Nocturno Culto present at many of our rehearsals. When we were rehearsing for Dark Medieval Times, it was me and Frost. When were rehearsing The Shadowthrone, it was me, Frost and, sometimes, Samoth. We’d also have a keyboard player there. We did a similar thing on Nemesis Divina.

Even though Nocturno Culto never wrote anything, it was perhaps better for the atmosphere, for me, to have him around the rehearsal room, as opposed to Samoth. When Samoth played with us on The Shadowthrone, he had a prominent role in Emperor. Obviously, Nocturno Culto had that with Darkthrone, but he was more humble than Samoth. He was on a higher level, too. It was easier for me to say, “Can you just play that? And then I’ll play this?” He would never counter me.

He would just play what I wanted him to play.

For me, it was more like a musical canvas that was standing still instead of a canvas that was moving around as I was painting.

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able to contribute myself. I also remember we stepped it up seriously at that point. I was out at the rehearsal place almost every day. We’d have band rehearsal several times a week. We never really tired of it. It was inspiring. We enjoyed playing music and seeing how it developed. Having Nocturno Culto meant a lot to us.

He has a very deep and mutual respect for what we do. He was a really passionate Satyricon fan before he joined. And Satyr and me were avid Darkthrone fans. It was a great feeling that he wanted to cooperate with us.

Do you recall any particular challenges?

SATYR: Yes. That’s actually when I found out that Frost could barely see. I had no idea. [Laughs] I remember when we were in the rehearsal room and I said, “Let’s try that cymbal instead.” He said, “OK.” We’d play the part again and he’d hit the wrong cymbal. I thought, “OK, let’s try this again.” I eventually said, “What the hell is wrong with you? Can’t you see I’m pointing at that cymbal?! You’re playing this cymbal!” He said, “No, I’m not.” I was really frustrated. I was pointing at the middle cymbal.

I said, “I just want you to play the right cymbal. How hard can it be?!”

Eventually, he tells me he couldn’t tell which one I was pointing at. I said, “What’s the matter with you?

Are you blind?!” He said, “Almost, yeah!” [Laughs] We had been playing together for a few years and I didn’t know anything about it. He was completely serious. His eyesight was terrible. He could barely see anything!

[Laughs] I said, “Dude, don’t you want to use contact lenses?” He said, “No, I’ve never given it much thought.” He’s that kind of guy. A year later, I picked him up in my car and he tells me he got contact lenses. It wasn’t until that point he knew what I really looked like. [Laughs] He said it was really stressful walking around downtown Oslo. Everything was suddenly so clear. He had been walking around in this fog for years and now all of a sudden he could read all the signs. There was too much information for him to process. [Laughs] FROST: Well, I’ve had lousy sight for as long as I can remember. I guess I thought I could cope with not seeing very well. Gradually, I got used to not seeing too well. I felt I could manage in everyday life and my drums were big enough to hit, so it didn’t really matter. When I finally got contact lenses, I could finally see people. It’s funny. I could finally see what people looked like. People I’d been around for several years.

Like Satyr. [Laughs] NOCTURNO CULTO: I didn’t know that. Uh, this is news to me. [Laughs] I’m the kind of person who is usually not too aware of things happening around me. But anyway, it was usu-

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How did Nocturno Culto end up in Satyricon?

SATYR: I don’t think anyone ever believed he’d stay as a permanent member. We saw it as a possibility. If it did happen, it would’ve been nice. In his head, it could’ve been a possibility.

Basically, Frost and I were independent at the time. As much as we admired his work and his position as Nocturno Culto from the sacred band Darkthrone, in Satyricon— although he was somebody we enjoyed playing with and respected—he was very much the fifth wheel on the wagon.

NOCTURNO CULTO: I think it was early ’95. I was living in the north of Norway. Living a very strange life on my own. [Laughs] It was like an excuse to go to Oslo. My girlfriend was living in Oslo back then. I thought, “Why not?” I missed playing guitar and having the “band” feeling. I liked the two previous Satyricon albums. They had something different going on—clever riffing and everything. It all made sense to me to join them. When I joined Satyricon, the three of us were thinking it would work.

there was an opportunity to go out and tour, we would tour. I remember we were offered to go to Australia. It was exotic. Even today it’s exotic.

I just wanted to go there in support of Nemesis Divina and our guy there, Daniel Janecka, had offered. Nocturno Culto was more like, “I have a life at home. It’s kind of far. I have things to do.” I was like, “Come on, man. It’s Australia!” He wasn’t quite up for it. It was at that point, we figured, that he should go back to doing his thing in Darkthrone.

NOCTURNO CULTO: It was my plan to stay with them. I don’t know what’s wrong with me— maybe I’m a complex person—but after a while I started to think I couldn’t live in Oslo again.

I like to be in desolate places. Oslo was getting on my nerves in ’91. I was running away from a sinking ship. It wasn’t any better in ’95. I told

At the time, black metal didn’t really use singles as a promotional tool. Yet you had “Mother North.” Do you recall the decision-making process where a) you realized you wanted a single, and b) which song was going to be the single?

What were the circumstances of his departure?

What happened was that we did the In like a lion record and we did a Moonfog's Nemesis European tour. After that montage tour, Frost and I wanted to work hard. We didn’t really enjoy the tour, but we started thinking in a different way. This wasn’t just a little thing on the side. Never was. But we wanted to continue stepping it up in every department. We weren’t really looking back. In Nocturno Culto’s case, he was really honest about it. He loved being a part of Satyricon. He wasn’t against us stepping it up. I think in the end, it didn’t really suit him. As much as music is important to him, but he was never a guy who was going to do this full-time. The guys in Darkthrone had regular day jobs. That doesn’t mean the music means anything less to them. The music is something they do in their spare time. Fenriz has always claimed the reason why they’ve had day jobs is ’cause they don’t want Darkthrone to do what people tell them to do. I think the turning point for Nocturno Culto was when we decided that if

Add more aggression. I said, “Why would you add more aggression?” I don’t think he understood the question. The song was supposed to be atmospheric and majestic. I felt it was one of our best songs ever and that Frost was ruining it. So, we threw everything away and started over. We didn’t change much, though. We just put it back to the way it was at rehearsal. Back then, he was completely unhappy. He disagreed with the decision. He felt it was a big mistake, and I said to him, “Trust me. It’s not a mistake.” To this day, I don’t think he remembers how incredibly fast the first recording was.

FROST: I do. I remember when I recorded that take I was quite satisfied how it turned out. It was probably quite a bit faster than what we had rehearsed. It sounded like a good and energetic take. Satyr complained, “It’s too fast.” I said, “What do you mean it’s too fast? It sounds aggressive and forceful. That’s what I care about.” At that point, it was about me and how far I’d come in my musical evolution.

Satyr said, “It’s too fast. There’s no room for added riffs. I will have to sing faster, too.” So, he told me to do it over again. I was really frustrated and had to settle for a take I didn’t really like at all. He wanted to keep it. Still today I’m extremely dissatisfied with my drumming on that song. It’s an amateurish performance. I think it was slower than the version we had rehearsed.

SATYR:

Satyr quite early that I might have to move away. This was in ’96. Before we went on the first Satyricon European tour. I told him I couldn’t stay in the band. He understood, I think.

“Mother North” had a different drum track originally. Why didn’t you use Frost’s favored studio take?

SATYR: Frost was quite nervous. When he’s nervous, he plays fast and then faster. I had to restrain him in order to maintain quality. On “Mother North,” I felt I had a real gem on my hands. He was playing so fast, trying to add stuff on top of it. I was listening to it with the engineer and Nocturno Culto. I said, “This is not the same song. This is not what we were playing at rehearsal.” Frost wanted to fire it up a little bit.

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SATYR: Obviously, it wasn’t really considered a single, ’cause there weren’t too many outlets for black metal singles. It was more for the music video. The format interested me. It’s the standout track, but we certainly didn’t have any visions of it being a single. We would never expect “Mother North” to go on the radio. It was more for the fans. When you choose a song to represent the record, it’s not really about what you find to be your personal favorite song. I would’ve chosen “The Dawn of a New Age” if that were the case. “Mother North” represented everything that Satyricon was about. The song was a great candidate for a video. It was also a song that people can pick up on without an indepth analysis.

FROST: I remember that we decided that we wanted to make a video. As far as we knew, there were no other black metal videos being made.

Eventually, Immortal made a video for a song from the Battles in the North album. Even before the release of the Immortal video, Satyr had started to look for people to cooperate with us.

This was way before the album was finished.

When I finally got contact lenses…

I could finally see what people looked like. People I’d been around for several years. Like Satyr.

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At one point during the rehearsals for “Mother North,” it started to speak to us. We felt it was probably the song best for making a video. It’s very visual. The song almost chose itself. It was video material.

NOCTURNO CULTO: I remember he said, “It’d be cool if you could turn up.” I thought, “Yeah, why not?” [Laughs] I was dedicated to the band for over a year.

What were you communicating in the “Mother North” video?

more in-depth idea than that. To have a girl in there wasn’t necessarily a key factor.

When it was suggested to me, I knew I wanted a very Norwegian girl. She had to have a typical Norse look that would represent Norwegian beauty. There’s always darkness in Norwegian black metal, but with Satyricon there’s a beauty aspect as well, whether it’s musically, lyrically or as part of the visuals.

Of the seven songs on Nemesis Divina, which one is your favorite? I believe Satyr has repeatedly stated “The Dawn of a New Age” is his favorite song.

SATYR: Well, we hadn’t done a video before. We were having a lot of fun with the format as a whole. We had an idea of what we were, what we represented and where we came from, so it was immensely important for us to have Norwegian nature as a part of our video. Likewise, to have transitional Norwegian black metal aesthetics with the corpsepaint, the chains, the fire and the weapons. We also wanted to include medieval elements. There was an old military fortress we used. It was hundreds of years old. It was all shot on location in Norway, of course. It was peoples’ first opportunity to see—not just hear—Norwegian black metal. There weren’t any other black metal videos at the time [Emperor’s “The Loss and Curse of Reverence” video was also released in ’96—ed]. The closest thing to it was a retarded documentary by Norwegian TV 2 on Norwegian black metal. They needed illustration footage to fill out the interview and analysis parts. So, they had the Immortal guys run around in circles and look like morons in the woods. They just added the music to “Call of the Wintermoon” to it. It was embarrassing back then and it’s embarrassing today. But I think “Mother North” was representative of Norwegian black metal at the time. We would never do a video like that now.

Though we did sell a ridiculous amount of VHS cassettes. Far more than many of Moonfog’s recorded albums.

SATYR: It hasn’t changed. “The Dawn of a New Age” gives me the same feeling as songs I grew up listening to. Thinking back when I was a 10-yearold kid and waiting for the intro to “Fight Fire With Fire.” All hell is about to break loose.

Listening to the build-up to “Hell Awaits.” The rain and thunder to “Black Sabbath.” The opening to “The Dawn of a New Age” is a bold one.

It’s eerie. Then all hell breaks loose. It’s chaotic.

I love the guitar playing on it. My vocal performance is one of my best. To this day. It sounds very apocalyptic. It’s also perhaps the reason why we rarely play it live. It’s hard to recreate the same atmosphere.

FROST: Same as Satyr. It’s the strongest song.

Basically, I feel the same now as when the album was released.

NOCTURNO CULTO: The album is one big package of music. I like all the tracks. I like Side B on the vinyl most. I remember working so hard on the songs. They were so technical on guitars. I wasn’t used to that kind of thing. Back in ’96, it was long time since we—Darkthrone—had done the Goatlord rehearsals. Goatlord was also very technical. I felt out of touch. I had to play a lot of catch-up.

Was Monica Bråten’s role in the video a metaphor for Mother Earth? She was nude for most of the uncensored version of the video.

SATYR: Our pride in our heritage and cultural background was an important factor to many of us. It wasn’t important to all of us ’cause some of us were more preoccupied with Satanism.

That came down to bands like Darkthrone

SATYR: She was a metaphor for Norway. The North. The beauty in nature. There was no

Norse symbolism in both art (Thor’s Hammer) and lyrics (“Mother North”) was part of Nemesis Divina. What role did Norse symbolism play in Satyricon?

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and Mayhem. Other bands, like Satyricon and Enslaved, didn’t have a Satanic foundation.

We didn’t worship the devil. Our ancestry, nature, culture and the beliefs—paganism—of our forefathers were very fascinating things. I saw it as compatible with our music. Not only was it compatible with our music, but it could actually shape our music. Most importantly, it felt close to my heart. The spectacular nature of a country that I live in, and the way nature affects the way our country looks and the mood of Norwegians as individuals and people, is pretty amazing. We still have intact buildings from the Viking age. It’s so accessible to us, this spiritual connection to our forefathers. If we want to look for it, it’s right there outside our doorstep. It was all very real. It was part of my musical inspiration and artistic identity. I still think it is.

You minimized the folk and medieval music themes on Nemesis Divina. Those were very prominent themes on Dark Medieval Times and The Shadowthrone.

SATYR: I don’t know what you mean by minimized. There were fewer of them on The Shadowthrone. The flute was gone on The Shadowthrone and there were fewer acoustic guitar passages. If anything there was less medieval and more folk. On Nemesis Divina, there were still folk music note progressions and medieval music pieces—like the end part of “Du Som Hater Gud” and many of the parts in “Immortality Passion”—but they started to move in a darker, more progressive direction.

The keyboards on Nemesis Divina were implemented differently from most bands.

They’re at once subtle, in the case of “The Dawn of a New Age” and the title track, and conspicuous, as in the mid- and end-sections to “Forhekset” and “Du Som Hater Gud.” SATYR: “Du Som Hater Gud” is actually grand piano. We started off thinking this is going to make it sound bigger and that is going to make it sound more atmospheric or majestic. It seems like an obvious thing to do for someone who doesn’t have that much experience. As we gathered more experience, it didn’t make sense to suffocate the guitar parts with keyboards.

You can hear on The Shadowthrone we started to pull back from the keyboards. We just

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it’d be cool a part with a woman’s voice. If there would’ve been another woman accessible to us, we would’ve used her. With Nocturno Culto, it’s different. He wasn’t playing guitar on the whole record. He played guitar on some of the songs. Certain parts I played for him. He played the majority, I guess. He’s a lot better of a guitar player today than I am, but I was probably a lot better than he was at the time. I’ve always had a good relationship with him. He’s a very solid guy. He has a real understanding of what it’s all about. For me, just to have him there spiritually contributed to the overall quality. In that case, he was definitely important.

NOCTURNO CULTO: I don’t think they were too important. The result would’ve been the same.

But people here like to collaborate. The scene is small here. Even though there are a lot of bands, there aren’t many people living in Norway. Less than 4.5 million people. So, people know each other.

“Transcendental Requiem of Slaves” has a melancholic guitar line, but the rhythm tracks and effects have a bit of an industrial touch to them. At least after the fade in. The track was a sort of preview for Rebel Extravaganza.

What do you remember about your two months in Waterfall Studios?

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continued from there. Actually, KM E AL S P “Transcendental Requiem of Slaves” was the first time we figured we could do more interesting things with the keyboards. They didn’t have to be brass, string or choir samples. We used the keyboards as rhythm patterns and noise textures. This became part of Satyricon’s sound later on.

FROST: On Nemesis Divina, we knew we wanted to use the synthesizer, but we wanted to use it in an untraditional way. More layers of sound. On Nemesis Divina, we started to experiment with analog effects. You can hear those on “The Dawn of a New Age.” What we wanted the synthesizer to do was to add something to our music that we couldn’t make with two guitars, bass, drums and vocals. If the synthesizer couldn’t fulfill that, we tried to leave it out. We heard it in other bands.

They were using keyboards all the fucking time.

That, somehow, felt very counterproductive.

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SATYR: No, certainly it wasn’t our intent at the time. We didn’t know what we weren’t going to do musically after Nemesis Divina. In hindsight, it was the first, looking back, documented piece of music that was heading in that direction. It was the first time we did something like that.

More from a historical point of view, this was when industrial-like music was introduced into Satyricon. It wasn’t on Rebel Extravaganza. I mean, the first few songs I wrote for Rebel Extravaganza sounded more like Nemesis Divina than anything that ended up on Rebel Extravaganza. I wrote a considerable amount of music that we never used for anything. It sounded like Nemesis Divina Part II. And that’s what stopped me from releasing the music. I had already done it. It didn’t have the magic of Nemesis Divina.

FROST: I remember when I first heard it. I liked it a lot. It was different. Exciting. But it still had a Satyricon feel to it. It pointed forward where Satyricon was heading. I think it signaled that Satyricon was going in an unfriendly direction.

We didn’t know it at the time, ’cause we didn’t have material for Rebel Extravaganza.

Was collaborating with certain people—Fenriz, Nebelhexë, Nocturno Culto—in the Norwegian scene important?

SATYR: I think it was important. All these different people contributed to the benefit of Nemesis Divina. Other times, there are other reasons. I can’t play keyboards. So, you’ll need someone who can technically achieve your vision. Fenriz’s contribution had no important factor. His lyric was more me asking him as a friend to do a lyric for Satyricon. Nebelhexë’s thing was more like

SATYR: One of Norway’s finest recording engineers—he normally didn’t work with this kind of music, but wasn’t a wimp by any means— taught me one very important lesson. When we were mixing the title track, I was sitting listening to something we had done and I was unsure whether I wanted it to be balanced like that. It sounded too clean. A little bit too perfect.

We didn’t set out to be necro or deliberately awful, but some of the stuff he was doing made it sound slightly boring. The music was too nice.

It sounds nice and everything is so clear, but compared to the rough mix we had done for the track, it lacked the ferociousness of the rough mix. He said, “OK, you’re not too sure?” I said, “Technically, it’s perfect, but feeling-wise I’m not sure.” He replied, “Then we should do it again and do it the way you want to do it.” I wanted him to lean more towards the rough mix. We worked a little bit on that and undoubtedly it sounded rougher and not as high-end. He said, “When it comes to my mix, forget it. If you’re not sure about it now and you’re not getting the right feeling, you won’t be getting that feeling tomorrow. Always trust your instincts. I tell this to every band.” It made sense to me and it’s a piece of advice that sticks in the back of my mind. It was an important lesson for me.

FROST: When the album was finished, hearing it for the first time was tremendously exciting.

I put my heart into the recording of the drums.

I remember I struggled a lot. I really wanted it to be on a higher level. The whole band was on a higher level. Nemesis Divina was going to be the real deal. The band was going to shine.

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totally satisfied. I couldn’t appreciate enough the other elements in the music. The strongest qualities of the album. In a certain way, I feel I didn’t understand the music well enough and didn’t appreciate the music the way I should’ve. It took many years for me to realize the limitations I was forcing on myself. Better late than never. [Laughs] NOCTURNO CULTO: It was right in the middle of Oslo. An above-average studio. Very professional people working there. It was all lined up for us.

It took a while, but I eventually got things right.

Darkthrone, even today, records the drums and one of the guitars simultaneously. We do everything in one take. That wasn’t the case with Satyricon. I wasn’t really used to playing things over and over.

At what point did the final track order for Nemesis Divina come together? Looking back on it, does it flow logically to you?

SATYR: I’ll say it like this: Daron Malakian from System of a Down said in a conversation we had four or five years ago that track sequencing is very underestimated by artists. I totally agree with him. That comes down to not just albums, but live performances as well. With Nemesis Divina, there were some extremely obvious things. It was extremely obvious that “The Dawn of a New Age” would be the opening track and that “Transcendental Requiem of Slaves” would be the closing track. They stand out in that respect. With all the other songs, it’s the same with all the other records. Sequencing the tracks so they make sense. Tempo-wise, atmospherically, dynamically and stylistically. It’s always like that. There are always a few songs that naturally find their place. Then you go from there.

That’s where the real job starts.

FROST: I would say that it does. It begins at the right place and ends at the right place. The opening is so powerful. No other song on Nemesis Divina could’ve opened the album. When I think of other songs on the album opening Nemesis Divina, it just messes with my head. I can’t even conceive it. [Laughs]

You guys went all-out for the photo sessions.

Frost has one of the biggest spiked armbands I’ve ever seen. You really went to extremes to project an image.

SATYR: With Frost, that was his idea. He wanted to go overboard. Frost always wants to go overboard. If he could find a way, he would wrap a tank around himself. [Laughs] For me, the main thing with the photo shoot was to get the photographer onboard. We had a makeup artist for the “Mother North” video, so we used the same makeup artist for the photo shoot. Corpsepaint is homemade. I wanted to move away from that.

I think Frost wasn’t mentally ready for that.

If you do look at the makeup of Frost on the “Mother North” video and inside the booklet,

My immediate feeling when you talk about re-recording and rearranging is only sadness. What’s been done has been done. You have to stand for it.

Even though the public demands it.

It’s all bullshit.

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compare it to Nocturno Culto’s and mine, you can see his is more homemade. ’Cause it was homemade. [Laughs] That kind of look was still appealing to me, but I felt it could be done better by someone with special effects skills.

FROST: That’s how we wanted to be at that point. I didn’t use a makeup artist for my corpsepaint on the individual photos. I’ve always felt corpsepaint’s a very personal expression. I still feel that way. We don’t really apply corpsepaint in Satyricon anymore. I still apply makeup before I go onstage. It’s a ritual. It channels my focus and my energy. It helps a lot to get me in the right mood and the right mindset. When it comes to corpsepaint, in addition to it being a ritual, where you change your persona, it’s also a way to express by using your face as a canvas. You paint a certain expression on it. That’s why it’s always been very personal to me. I have very conservative views on how it should be applied. I didn’t want some makeup artist to do mine. It conflicts with using the makeup to me. I do remember we didn’t want black and white corpsepaint. We wanted to look like we were hit by some kind of bad disease.

A plague. So, it was important to hire a professional to do that. My own make-up looked quite different. I had this vision when Satyr and I were out in the woods. We were way out there and came across an old abandoned house. We didn’t expect to find a house out there. All of a sudden, there it was. I pictured in my inner

eye that there was a face appearing in one of the windows. I wanted to recreate that face with my corpsepaint.

NOCTURNO CULTO: You mean the stuffed eagle?

[Laughs] Again, I wasn’t familiar with so-called professional photo sessions. It was a photo studio with one of Norway’s famous photographers. At that time, Darkthrone had stopped using corpsepaint.

Actually, it was ’92. A lot of people don’t know that. Anyway, there was the makeup and feeling slightly ridiculous. [Laughs] I didn’t have any opinions on how it should look. I just had to look mean. [Laughs] Tell me about your fascination with birds of prey. There’s a crucified hawk on the cover and one perched on back of the throne inside the album sleeve.

SATYR: On the inside cover, it’s a stuffed Golden Eagle, actually. The Golden Eagle is the second biggest eagle species in Norway. The hawk was newly found dead by the artist—Stein Løken—we collaborated with. It had crashed into an electricity pole. Birds of prey are a big thing to me. The term “eagle” has been used to describe me. I think it was Joey Jordison who started calling me “black metal eagle.” I’ve always seen birds of prey as powerful creatures that carry a lot of symbolism. Snakes and birds of prey are very impressive creatures. They have a mythological touch to them. I look upon birds of prey as beings higher than us. They’re superior to man. I don’t know why I feel that way.

I think they carry some kind of wisdom that’s unavailable to me. I think they’re beautiful.

Beauty is impressive to me.

The letter to losers and shit talkers in the liners of Nemesis Divina was written for what reason?

SATYR:

In hindsight, it’s something I regret.

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Little did I know black metal would become as big as it is now. It was really aimed at the unfortunate predecessor to the Internet. Zines, people writing letters, tape traders and stuff like that. I was trying to say to if you’re sitting there doing nothing, don’t envy us. Go out and do something for yourselves. Or you can just fuck off.

Nemesis Divina was reissued in 2006. If you were to re-record the album again—like what Dimmu Borgir did on Stormblåst—would you rearrange the songs or add anything to the originals?

SATYR: Re-recording is not an option. We could remaster it. Satyricon fans don’t have to be afraid. When you read in interviews that a band is going to remaster a record, as a fan, you should be afraid. What that means, in most cases, is some guy at a mastering studio is going to make the audio sound more up-to-date.

With no consideration to what’s going on musically. There’s only so much you can do during mastering. Remastering can be a gift, but also a dangerous tool if not given the proper attention. It’s a horrible misunderstanding by many artists that you send your record away to some guy who will make your record sound better.

He won’t.

FROST: It’s a difficult question to answer. There are so many ifs and hows. I find it a bit hard to even conceive changing it. I guess, we would radically rearrange the songs. The idea of rerecording the album sounds a bit absurd. It’s the spirit of the time. To do it over again today would be ignoring that fact. Also, why should we do it? Why not make new songs instead? We’re still hungry. We have the inspiration. We’re not empty. When we’re empty, we’ll call it quits.

NOCTURNO CULTO: No. My immediate feeling when you talk about re-recording and rearranging is only sadness. What’s been done has been done. You have to stand for it. Even though the public demands it. It’s all bullshit. I’m most familiar with the lo-fi version of metal. I’m comfortable with it. The soul of the music has to do with the sound. If Satyricon ever does it, I wouldn’t do it. They probably wouldn’t ask me anyway. [Laughs] A

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story by j. bennett

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Timeless Frost

the making of Immortal’s At the Heart of Winter

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n 1995, Norwegian corpsepaint legends Immortal were on top of the world: With Mayhem’s Hellhammer sitting in on drums, vocalist/bassist Abbath and guitarist/lyricist Demonaz were high on the icy grimness of their own Battles in the North and opening for Morbid Angel on the European leg of the Domination tour. A year later, things couldn’t have been worse: Shortly after recording their lightning-paced black metal misfire Blizzard Beasts with new drummer Horgh, Demonaz began suffering from severe tendonitis in his arms. Unable to play for more than half an hour at a time, the guitarist was forced to the sidelines while Abbath traded four strings for six on the band’s subsequent tour. In November of 1998, still anticipating (or at least hoping for) Demonaz’s full recovery, Abbath and Horgh traveled from their hometown in Bergen to Hypocrisy mastermind Peter Tägtgren’s Abyss Studios in Sweden to record their fifth full-length, At the Heart of Winter. With Horgh on blast beats, Abbath handled the guitar, bass, keyboards and vocals (a true one-man band, DBBMHOF he had even played drums on Battles in the North and 1993’s Pure Holocaust) while Demonaz faxed lyrics in from Bergen.

A month later, Immortal’s magnum opus was complete—a At the Heart six-song, 46-minute frost epic that also happened to feaof Winter ture some of the most vicious black metal riffs ever laid OSMOSE, 1999 to tape (not to mention some of the most ridiculous band Epic BM study photos in the history of ridiculous band photos). Released in isolation in 1999, At the Heart of Winter was instantly hailed as a masterpiece by many—including Decibel contributor and thenTerrorizer editor Nick Terry, who gave the album a 9 out of 10 rating (along with Album of the Month status) and wrote, “If the Norwegians’ reputation was sealed and cemented by 1995’s Battles in the North, then this fifth go-round will plant the full fucking monument on top of that rep.” Which is just one of many reasons that At the Heart of Winter is the latest inductee into our Hall of Fame… [4]

Immortal,

PHOTO BY CAROLE EPINETTE

IMMORTAL AT THE HEART OF WINTER The Grim, the Black, the... well, you know Abbath and Horgh patiently await the arrival of the Avon lady

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Peter called Osmose before we did Blizzard Beasts and said he wanted to produce us because he was a fan of Pure Holocaust.

Osmose told us about this guy from Sweden who had a studio called Abyss and we were like, “Who the hell is this guy?” We thought it was some kid sitting in his room who wanted to record an Immortal album, so we just kind of laughed.

We thought we were real champions and that we’d do everything on our own. Then we heard about this band called Dimmu Borgir that everyone was talking about, so Demonaz went to buy the Enthrone Darkness Triumphant album. He played it for me and we were like, “What the fuck? Where was this recorded?” Then we looked at the credits: Abyss. Peter Tägtgren. So, we knew we had to do the next album at his place.

ABBATH:

What were the circumstances surrounding Demonaz’s tendonitis, and how did it initially affect the band?

Straight after we did Blizzard Beasts, I got tendonitis in my arms. There was the most pain and the most problems in my left arm. I had done too much playing, too much rehearsing. I got this amplifier that was harder to play on, but I improved my technique and I was playing really fast. [Laughs] But it was too much. It was overkill for my arm. We were stressing about how we were going to deal with it. It was very difficult—it was a really big fist in the face.

ABBATH: We were practicing for the Blizzard Beasts tour when Demonaz fucked up his arms and suddenly got tendonitis because of the work he had at the time. He was doing construction, building houses and stuff. It was winter and it was cold.

On top of that, he got some new [musical] equipment and he kind of changed his playing style a bit. The whole thing was an accident. He worked outside and never warmed up or stretched out— none of us did—we didn’t know about stuff like that at the time. It could’ve happened to me, but it happened to Demonaz. You can’t control everything. We were so ready to get out there and kick ass, but when we did the rehearsals for the Blizzard Beasts tour, this thing just suddenly happened. It was a disaster. Immortal was about to split totally at that point.

DEMONAZ:

How did you make the decision for Abbath to take over on guitar?

At that time, I had a strong belief that I would be back. We tried to work with it, but my arm was too hurt. It was easy for Abbath to do because he always made most of the riffs anyway. He is the riff master in Immortal.

ABBATH: While we were waiting for Demonaz to recover, me and Horgh continued jamming on stuff and took things pretty slow. We didn’t rush anything like we did on Blizzard Beasts. We took a step back, slowed down a little bit and thought more about the atmosphere instead of intensity and blast beats. As we got further along and Demonaz didn’t recover, we had these great songs and arrangements, and after a while, Demonaz started working on the lyrics. He said, “OK, you guys continue, but Abbath—you play guitar. I don’t want anyone else to replace me.”

And I felt great about playing guitar at that point. I didn’t feel so comfortable about it on the Blizzard Beasts tour, because Demonaz was standing in the audience and I was playing guitar.

But later I felt more confident, and we decided to carry on. Immortal was our baby, and we didn’t want to kill our baby.

DEMONAZ:

At the Heart of Winter was the first of three Immortal albums produced by Peter Tägtgren.

How did you first hook up with him?

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What were the recording sessions like?

Working with Peter really blew us away.

What he did with us on all three albums was unlike anything he did with Dimmu Borgir or anyone else. But, you know, Peter gets phone calls all the fucking time and you have to wait while he talks. Then you’d get a little work done and his phone rings again. Peter is great—he’s the best—but everyone wants to talk to him all the time and he has to take the phone. We worked from morning ’til 6 o’clock every day and at the time, Peter didn’t have the house he has now for the bands to stay in, so we stayed in this hostel with all these kids running around. We couldn’t relax and it was driving us nuts. But we woke up really early every morning because we were so excited to get to the studio. With At the Heart of Winter we wanted to be in the studio all the time. It was like magic or something.

HORGH: At the Heart of Winter was a very important album for us and we had to make sure that everything was going to be exactly the way we wanted. Peter Tägtgren had a great understandABBATH:

ing [of] how we wanted it, and when we had found the sound for the drums and guitars and started the first recordings, I knew that this was going to become a killer album. I wish we would have used Abyss Studios on the Blizzard Beasts album as well—it was like being in paradise compared to Sigma Studios in Bergen, where we recorded Blizzard Beasts. Peter is a metal producer and he knew what bands like us wanted. The people working at Sigma didn’t have that experience in metal music, so it was a fucking nightmare recording there. Just knowing everything is going in the right direction makes being in the studio so much easier. [But] when the day was over and we were back at the hotel, it was really boring.

You didn’t have any Swedish adventures in your downtime?

Me and Abbath lived in a hotel called the Saxenborg and it was placed in the middle of nowhere. We didn’t have a car, so Peter had to come and pick us up every morning and deliver us to the hotel again every evening when we were finished in the studio.

Sometimes we took a taxi to the closest town, which was a small town called Ludvika. When we were there, we visited the local pubs and went to restaurants before we took a taxi back to the hotel again. The taxis were expensive and we didn’t have much money, so mainly we were stuck at the hotel watching movies, listening to music, reading magazines and books, and just looking forward to getting the hell back into the studio again the next day.

ABBATH: Abyss is great, but I wouldn’t want to be there for a whole month again. There was nothing to do there—we drank a lot of coffee. At night, we watched TV and tried to sleep, but we couldn’t because we had drank so much coffee.

So me and Horgh created this absurd kind of humor between us, and that’s how we survived.

With Sons of Northern Darkness, it was a little better—we actually took a trip to Stockholm to see Depeche Mode.

HORGH:

What was Abyss Studios like at the time?

When we recorded At the Heart of Winter, the walls were all white with gold and silver award-albums with KISS all over it. When I walk into the engineering room nowadays, it makes me feel like I’m inside a spaceship or something—it looks really cool. There is heating in the floors, there are lights with dimmers in the roof and the equipment is really up to date. Even though the studio is better nowadays, I must say it was great being there back in ’98 as well.

ABBATH: Peter has this Star Wars pinball machine, and sometimes we’d play it for too long, like, “Abbath—come in and do some guitars!” “Wait a minute—I have to score a few more points!” I was never into pinball machines before I went to Abyss, but now I know how people end up HORGH:

with gambling problems. Lars Szöke, the old Hypocrisy drummer, actually holds the record on that machine.

At the Heart of Winter is considerably more epic and melodic than its predecessor, Blizzard Beasts. Besides not having Demonaz on guitar, to what do you attribute the differences between the two albums?

At the Heart of Winter was the start of a new epoch for Immortal. On Blizzard Beasts, we tried to play too fast. We totally misunderstood our own songs. For example, when we play “Mountains of Might” now, we play it much slower than it is on the album. Immortal is a learning process, and we have our own school, you know? So, we decided to go in a different direction because Blizzard Beasts wasn’t working.

Me and Horgh worked out this groove, if you know what I mean—I put in more of my oldschool influences, from before I started listening to extreme metal. For example, one of the

ABBATH:

[Abyss Studios] has this Star Wars pinball machine, and sometimes we’d play it for too long, like, “Abbath–come in and do some guitars!”

“Wait a minute–I have to score a few more points!”

A B BAT H riffs on “At the Heart of Winter” is inspired by “Hells Bells” by AC/DC. It wasn’t on purpose, but sometimes things just happen. And the whole album is just six songs because we didn’t feel like making another one. There’s no rule that says there has to be eight or 10—you know when you have enough for the album. If the songs you have say it all, what do you need more for?

HORGH: We definitely would have liked Demonaz to [play guitar] in the first place, but that was not an option since the tendonitis in his arms was such a serious matter. Abbath was well prepared and ready to record the guitars when we finally went to the Abyss Studios. It was a very frustrating period for all of us, but we kept the brotherhood and spirit up and Demonaz is and always will be a very important member of Immortal.

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Demonaz wrote the lyrics, but this was a very difficult time for him. His spirit wasn’t totally there because he was depressed about his situation. Some of the lyrics came in the nick of time on the fax machine. At the Heart of Winter is more me and Horgh’s album than Demonaz’s album in many ways. But we couldn’t have done it without him, and no one else could’ve done it better than him. Immortal is the three of us—me, Horgh and Demonaz—but that album is a little more me and Horgh. We developed a new sound together with Peter, and Demonaz wasn’t involved in that part of the process.

ABBATH:

Many Scandinavian black metal bands pay tribute to their frozen surroundings either lyrically or visually, but Immortal seems nearly synonymous with the aesthetics of a Norwegian winter. It’s almost impossible to think of the band without also thinking of some whitewashed, frostbitten landscape.

I would never try to write lyrics inspired by something or somewhere else.

Lyrically and musically, we’ve found our own thing, and to have those signatures might be the most important thing for us. It really takes time to write these kinds of lyrics—there can be no wrong lines. They all have to fit the song.

But the songs on At the Heart of Winter are very much related to the Battles in the North album.

I took inspiration from “Blashyrkh (Mighty Ravendark)” to write “At the Heart of Winter”— you could almost put the lyrics to those two songs together, because they’re the same way of speaking. And “Solarfall” is a line from “Throned

by Blackstorms.”

DEMONAZ:

What about some of the other songs on the album?

Let’s see... “Where Dark and Light Don’t Differ” was inspired by one time when I was walking in the woods and I came to this place where there were really high trees. If you looked up, you could see where the light comes through, but where you’re standing, it’s dark. Sometimes small things like that can inspire you. “Withstand the Fall of Time” was the fastest track on the album.

In one of the opening lines, I write about a “giant grimfaced realm,” and if you look at the album cover, you see the face. I tried to describe this landscape, this realm that is the ultimate for us— it’s like a power. “Tragedies Blows at Horizons” is about not thinking so much about what’s happening and just letting it flow. We battle on, we go on—it’s a struggle. The whole album is a struggle—it’s about bringing the storming.

DEMONAZ:

Do you have a favorite song on the album?

I don’t know—it’s a fucking great album. I like all of them. I really like to play “Withstand the Fall of Time” live and “Solarfall” also. It’s difficult to say. [4]

ABBATH:

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too, but they’ve sold almost a hundred million albums.

HORGH: We did the photo shoot here in Bergen. A friend of [ours] took the pictures and for us it was a photo session like any other. I can add that those pictures were not meant to be inside the booklet in the first place. We had chosen two pictures that were supposed to be inside the booklet, but when the record label sent us the booklet in return they had used the pictures that you find in there today. I remember they were in a rush to get the album out and they told us the album would be delayed if we didn’t accept this proposal [so] we [said], “OK, what the hell—use the pictures and get the album out there.”

DEMONAZ: Osmose fucked it up. There were only supposed to be two pictures on that album—the one on the back and one other—but they put a picture on every fucking page. It was too much. We agreed on one thing, and they printed something else. People started to make parodies of Immortal when those photos came out. OK, they maybe started a little before that, but those photos gave a spark to the fire, you know? People really thought those photos were hilarious. We thought the photos were great—we thought, you know, fuck everybody. But they weren’t supposed to be like that in the album. There was nothing we could do about it, though.

I called Osmose and they got to hear it, you know? But I don’t mind the parodies—every great band gets parodies. If you don’t get them, you have to work even harder.

I really enjoy listening to the whole album, but “Solarfall” will get my vote. It has all these different elements in it that stand in great contrast to each other, and I like that. “Solarfall” has a great structure that makes the song interesting all the way—and it’s one of those songs that I really enjoy playing live.

DEMONAZ: If I had to choose between “At the Heart of Winter” and “Solarfall,” it’s difficult, but I think “At the Heart of Winter” might be the one. It’s a big song, with a lot of motion.

It’s the first time we mentioned Blashyrkh again, this kind of epic atmosphere.

It’s an epic song, but the lyrics are very easy. It’s only like 12 lines—12 long lines. [Laughs] It’s an Immortal lyric, you know? And At the Heart of Winter is more of an Immortal record than Blizzard Beasts, in a way.

HORGH:

As of 2007, At the Heart of Winter is the only Immortal album that doesn’t have a photo of the band on the cover. Why is that?

We didn’t want to have another Battles in the North cover with just two of us in the photo.

So, the people from Osmose told us about this artist from France, Jean-Pascal Fournier, who was totally into our music. He did a sketch for us, and when we saw it we were like, “Yeah, man—go for it.” I think it’s great, just like Battles in the North, because I remember going to HMV in London and among all these albums with black covers, all you can see is Battles in the North and At the Heart of Winter because they have white backgrounds. But there shouldn’t have been a picture of us at all on that album. Actually, it was just supposed to be our faces on the inner sleeve on the vinyl—that’s the picture that ended up on the back of the CD. The CD booklet came out totally wrong.

ABBATH:

People started to make parodies of Immortal when those photos came out. OK, they maybe started a little before that, but those photos gave a spark to the fire, you know? People really thought those photos were hilarious.

Yeah, the band photos in the booklet are pretty entertaining—especially the “Heisman pose.”

What were you guys doing?

ABBATH:

We were experimenting with photos,

D E MO NA Z and through some stupid mistake, the pictures ended up at Osmose. They weren’t supposed to be on the album at all—we were shocked when we saw them in the booklet. At the time, people started making fun of us because of those pictures, but now, they’re just classic. Horgh was a little bit fat at the time, too. People can laugh as much as they want, but we do our thing and we’re not embarrassed. People laughed at KISS, B M HO F

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How soon after At the Heart of Winter was completed did you realize that Demonaz wouldn’t be able to rejoin the band as a guitar player?

We didn’t know so much about it because we didn’t know how long it would take the arm to heal or how bad the damage was. But it’s chronic. I still play guitar and make music, but I can’t play on that level anymore. I can’t rehearse everyday on an extreme level or play a full show. I’d have to rest my arm for a month. But I still play—I played today and yesterday. It’s no problem—I just have to control it. If I play like half an hour or something, I won’t do damage. You know, over the last 10 years the question I’ve gotten the DEMONAZ:

PHOTO BY AARON PEPLIS

most is, “How’s your arm, man?” People ask me that more than they ask my name. Everybody asks me if I still play. If I was just a guitar player—if I didn’t write or compose—it would be fucking bad. I would be destroyed, I think.

But I’m a musician, you know? I compose, I write lyrics, so it’s not a problem. It was in the beginning, because it was hard for me to understand that I wouldn’t be able to rehearse with the band or play live with them all the time. At the time, it was really fucking bad. I was really darkened by that thought. But it didn’t take so much time before I accepted it. I knew that we couldn’t stop, though—Immortal is everything to us. And it was good that Abbath took over on the guitar, because it would be much worse if he continued playing the bass and there was another guitar player.

Looking back, is there anything you would change about At the Heart of Winter?

No. At the Heart of Winter kicks ass, so [the] mission is completed.

DEMONAZ: That is a really bad question to ask.

[Laughs] Not that the question is bad, but you’re really bad to ask it, you know? Looking back, you can always change things, but I wouldn’t change a thing on that one. I think it came out really well. We made this album when we were on the edge of surviving. It was HORGH:

Back in Blashyrkh A vintage Winter one-sheet, circa 1999

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Personally, Abbath perfers extra black Then again, he’s a night person

our purgatory, you know what I mean? We had a lot of things against us. We were at a crossroads after Blizzard Beasts, because of the blast beats and technical stuff on that album—what could people expect after that? I don’t think anyone expected an album like At the Heart of Winter. So, I think it was a really important album for us. In one way, I think that At the Heart of Winter, Damned in Black and Sons of Northern Darkness are a trilogy—all produced by Peter at Abyss. It was the first album we did outside Bergen, the first album we did with another producer. It showed that we could continue to do great things with Immortal even if we had a lot of problems.

ABBATH: I actually wouldn’t change anything we’ve done, but At the Heart of Winter and Diabolical [Fullmoon Mysticism] are probably the Immortal albums I love the most. They are so pure and clear somehow. With both of those albums, we felt like we were opening up a new world, and with At the Heart of Winter, we kind of set a new standard for ourselves. It was the start of a new era, and it saved us somehow.

We proved that nothing could kill the spirit of Immortal. A

THE MOST EXTREME

RECORD STORE DAY IS COMING APRIL 16, 2011

IN LIVE CONCERT AT THE ROYAL ALBERT HALL

IN STORES 9.21.10 Available in three very special configurations: Limited Edition DVD/Vinyl Box Set, 5-Disc Set with Accompanying Live Audio and a 2-DVD Set. ©2010 Roadrunner Records

Thanks,

everybody. Before we get started, I was just wondering: Do we have anybody here from out of town tonight? [scattered applause] All right!

Ma’am, where are you from? [woman at bar: “Schenectady.”] Schenectady, great. Well, being from out of town myself, I know it can be kinda cold to find yourself far from where you’re home. Even if you’re havin’ fun, it can get real, real cold. So I’d like to dedicate this first number to Schenectady, and to anybody else who finds themselves... “Frozen by Icewinds.”

Hey, awesome. People, if I can just speak from the heart here—if I can just speak for a minute not as “Demonaz from Immortal,” but as Demonaz the human being: It means a lot to me to be able to sit here at this keyboard and play you my songs. For a while I felt like I might never play again, and it was a hard time for me.

This is a song that speaks to that time in my life, and I hope if there’s anybody here who’s been down like I was, they’ll be able to find some strength in it. This one’s called “Descent Into Eminent Silence.”

[plays “Frozen by Icewinds”]

[plays “Descent Into Eminent Silence”]

All right, thanks. Is it just me or is it getting cooler in here? Listen, I have to tell you, it is great to be here. Before this tour, as many of you know, I hadn’t really been onstage in a long time. But one day in the middle of my cross-training workout, Max—that’s my life coach—says to me: “D, how long are you going to let tendonitis tell you how to live your life?”

And for me, that was a turning point. I know it sounds crazy, but I hadn’t really even thought about playing the piano before. And now... well, here we are, December in New York... you might say we’re in the... well, you know the words.

Thank you. Thank you so much. So, a lot of people have been asking me on this tour: “D-man, are you just playing the old songs because you know it’s what people want to hear?” And I wanted to say something about that. I don’t just play for the money, or for the acclaim. Believe me, if it was just about money, I wouldn’t be sitting at this piano right now, pouring my heart into these tunes. [man at bar claps] Thank you. But I’m here because I hope I still have something to share with the people who love my music, wherever they may be. And so when I play something from way back when, it’s

[plays “Cursed Realm of the Winterdemons”]

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because those feelings are still real for me. And that’s the name of that tune.

[plays “Unholy Forces of Evil”] Wow, thanks. Something special in here, folks.

I—

[five-minute pause; arguing heard off-mic] OK, wow. I’m real sorry, but management says I can only play one more song and then I have to leave. I was pretty sure this show had actually been confirmed and I’m real sorry to have to cut the set short like this, but I guess they weren’t really expecting me here tonight. [uncomfortable pause] OK. Well, I want to apologize both to you all for not being able to finish out the set, and to the management for tickling the ivories without letting them know who I was. My bad! Anyway, they’ve said I can play one last number. So, cool.

I’m at Grossinger’s in the Catskills tomorrow; I hope some of you can make it out—I understand that their piano is an 1864 Steinway and it sounds like butter. Looking forward to that.

Until we meet again, then—well, I’m Demonaz, the pleasure’s been mine, and now I’m ridin’ on!

[plays “A Sign for the Norse Hordes to Ride”; leaves building] A

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