OPINION: Black on Black (part 1 of, who knows how many...) Some initial thoughts...

As a metal fan, while not required to listen to every genre, one typically gives every one a chance.

Black metal, that rather petulant and rambunctious bastard child of a three-way between Wagner, punk and metal, comes across every metal fan's plate at some point in time and reactions certainly vary...Some feel it to be pretentious and cartoonish, others find it the only tr00 metal genre around... Whatever your opinion, it probably has dozens of forum posts from dozens of sites agreeing with it or disagreeing with it. I am still working my opinion on it out...

Now, my first exposure to the form was scant proto-black metal artists like Bathory and Venom. I had a little bit of curiosity in college in 1988 after my friend Sam turned me on to metal, so, I figured I check stuff out. Outside of Anthrax, Motley Crue and Priest, my experience with metal was minimal. I eventually would get into all genres, strangely enough, in order of their appearance in the history of the music scene. In college towns, (mine was Ft. Collins, Colorado) there are plenty of good record stores. There was a local shop named Finest Records that I would go to and pick up vinyl (!) and cassettes (!!) for my Walkman (!!!).

I was a new wave/punk/industrial/alternative kid, but I would look at the metal and found the Venom covers just friggin' intimidating. At the time, the Norwegian Black Metal kids scarcely could play instruments much less play with fire...I also remember seeing Black Sabbath's "Born Again" cover and just wrote off ALL metal as satanic conformity. See, I was given a ton of $#@! for liking the music I liked in my black Baptist family. College, being the time of questioning, would eventually lead me to shed the anti-life, anti-truth, anti-reality aspects of Christianity in favor of the non-theistic, non-religious, philosophical and scientific Buddhism and actually break down and buy some metal records. (Some?! I probably have over 300...)

Off and on, it was the sheer audacity of black metal I was intrigued by. Death metal was intimidating with its overtly satanic lyrics and technical proficiency but it was its kid brother (that sometimes was thought to be the older brother)that seemed to grab the headlines... Burning churches for goodness sakes?! Really?! WTF!

Now, outsider art and pop surrealism has always been interesting to be; Joe Coleman, Robert Williams and Robert Crumb were necessary extensions from my love of comic books...These artists and others were always interesting to me. John Waters, John Woo, George Romero, Gus Van Zandt and Russ Meyer were outsider directors that I loved. As an 'alternative' kid in the 80s (we really didn't have a name outside of 'new waver' or 'weirdo' or 'fag'), I wasn't threatened by the odd... but this was... WHOA!

The corpsepaint, inverted crosses and, did I mention burning CHURCHES?!?

But still, there was something there...There was some primal need for expression, a proto-civilization vibe that was just... enticing...

Now, hearing that first Mayhem record or Emperor or Immortal... That felt like what it felt like to listen to Zepplin's "Houses of the Holy" for the first time; kinda scary in that wow-this-is-cool-but-am-I-going-to-hell-for-this??? kind of way.

I DON'T want this blog to be about race but the National Socialist vibe of some of the Norwegian Black Metal bands makes listening to the records daunting. (Satanists AND Racists?!? What the hell?!)

I can't help but enjoy the genre but investigation has been difficult. I know the stories about Euronymous, Dead, Varg and Faust. I am not bothered by them (Easy E and Suge Knight would eat those kids for breakfast). However, this strain of fascism that has been hinted at in the lyrics and band imagery in metal for a long time now, is metaphor, not as something actually to embrace. Not with some of the Norwegian Black metal guys though...

This side of black metal seems to be a de-evolution to a naturalistic nationalism and suffers from the Pre/Trans fallacy; the notion that going back to some sort of way of experiencing reality of the past is a transcendent state rather than just going backwards... Nationalism and a desire for a simpler time of warriors and the like is not an advancement either spiritually or psychologically and is doomed to find itself clashing with modernity.

Plus, is anyone really more intimidated by a group of folks from the place on earth with just about the lowest crime, poverty, unemployment, homelessness and the highest standard of living? It sometimes makes me think the whole Norwegian Black Metal thing is a product of Seasonal Affective Disorder and a good dose of vitamin D and Zoloft would have saved a bunch of folks a great deal of heartache...

...Still, the music is raw, creative and primal...And mostly good.... I still have thoughts about it rumbling around my cranium, so, I'll have to continue this in part 2 of, who knows how many.