Metal Marathons #001 Part 2: Darkthrone: The Revenge

 part two of two.

Welcome back, ladies and gentlemen, to the marathon retrospective of Darkthrone's career; last time we had travelled from the abyss of rumbling, complex death metal, through the vast, icy forests of classic and much-loved black metal, and out the other side into the primitive, chord driven, and some would say re-hashed landscape of the band's middle years. This time around, we are going to travel through that place, and out the other side into a slow cascade of old-school influences and Manilla Road, wherein the band resides now.

Of course, the majority of this marathon will be aimed at the "punk" albums which started with "The Cult is Alive" - something of a paradigm shift, if you will, in the bands sound; and certainly one of the most fundamental ways to divide the "old" and "new" sound the band had. First, however, there remain three of the much-overlooked middle-era black metal albums to plough through starting with Plaguewielder. In my experience, there tends to be more to these records than meets the eye, and I'll be first to claim that listening to them is utterly worthwhile. I urge you to.

 As I said in part one of this marathon, Ravishing Grimness cannot be dismissed as "more of the same". Plaguewielder, however, might be. The album is another forty-minutes or so of swaggering, relatively simplistic, chord driven black-metal. Not unpleasent, by any stretch; in fact, I enjoy listening to the record, however, it feels less inspired than, say, most of the bands other material. I'll argue vehemently that the band have never had a truly "bad" album, and there are some flavoursome riffs scattered through this record To its credit, it manages to sound cold and grim in a time when a lot of black metal had ceased to.
 

Hate Them is an interesting one - it feels a step up in terms of song-writing and especially energy, with high-speed drumming and higher tempos all over the shop. By the band's own admission, Hate Them is the album in which they really started to delve into punk and other old-school influences more fully, and you can tell; many of the tracks take on a black n' roll edge, with d-beats, metal-punk style riffs, and other barrels of fun added to the recipe. The appeal to outside influences really gives the album a novel edge, and makes it very listenable; particularly tracks such as Divided We Stand, which could easily find a place on the later, less black-metal records.

Sardonic Wrath is, I suppose, the last "black metal" album the band ever did. Certainly, it feels like their final attempt to make an album which was black metal to the core. Ultimately, I really enjoy the record, and find it a fitting end to that part of the band's career; it's very raw; rough as a badger, in fact, and in the same way as Hate Them, combines elements of other genres nicely, but without spoiling the entirely black-metal bend of the record. You could slot Sardonic Wrath somewhere in between Transilvanian Hunger and Panzerfaust and nobody would be the wiser to the fact that it was actually made in 2004, a testimony to the fact that the band can still conjure great black metal, when they want to.

Whenever I go a while without listening to The Cult is Alive, it's always a bit more black-metal influenced than I remember; in fact, it's still quite raw and harsh, more a large-step along from Sardonic Wrath than an utter shift. The crucial difference however, is that from this record onwards, the band feel much more overtly fun. The bouncy riffs, influenced by traditional metal, crust punk, and a vast array of other things manage to be extremely catchy, ballsy and filled to the brim with sheer old-school attitude. This album marks a very profound reinvigoration of the band, as foreshadowed by the leanings towards this sound on the previous two records, on this one they come to power-chord based fruition.

Once again stripping back the black-metal, FOAD is another foray into the old-school world of punk and speed-metal. It's sometimes easy to forget how different the more recent Darkthrone albums are from one another, and the gulf between The Cult is Alive and this record is very illustrative of it - gone is the harsh and scathing guitar tone, replaced with a more rock n' roll, warm sound which suits the less serious, more playful character of this record, and those beyond it. Lyrically too, this album makes forays further and further into more human themes, reducing  the occult and Satan as themes, in lieu of tracks about metal and rock itself - a pronounced manoeuvre towards the world of vicariously recreating 1984.

Dark Thrones and Black Flags marked the beginning of a move towards more traditional old-school metal; it retains something of the punk and black-metal influence, of course, but at the same time, is a more clear, almost epic record in places. Clean vocals appear here and there, for instance in "The Winds They Called the Dungeon Shaker", very much foreshadowing the directions which the band would be going in the next record. The riffs on this record are among the most chunky in the "new Darkthrone" era, with a lot of bite and an enjoyably occult feel; the music is liable to be dark still, but in a more traditional way; often a spooky darkness, not the misanthropy of black-metal.

Circle the Wagons travels even further into the realm of pure heavy-metal, but, as with every other album manages to feel extremely Darkthrone still, which is a point worth raising; despite the bands vast number of changes in style and production, there has never been a Darkthrone album which didn't feel like one. Like it's predecessor, Circle the Wagons is an album filled with very tasty, hefty riff work, albeit frequently even more melodic. For me, at least, Circle the Wagons stands very prominently as a testimony to how radically Darkthrone's sound has changed, miles upon miles away from Soulside Journey or Transilvanian Hunger, and personally, I wouldn't have it any other way.

Ultimately, listening to all of a bands records in a row is a superb way to chart the changes in the bands sound, and it definitely equips you with new tools and ways in which to listen to the music; you become much more aware of the bands evolution and progression between styles and influences. If there's one thing which Darkthrone's discography has screamed at me, it's integrity. I don't think there's a single record by the band in which they weren't trying, and in the majority of them, they succeeded.

There are few bands so consistent and yet diverse in their discography; every album is a little different, but every album is utterly, unapologetically Darkthrone. That's why we like it, and obviously, that's how they like it too. Darkthrone unapologetically do what they will, and they do it well.

Links:
Darkthrone Official Site
Darkthrone on Facebook
Darkthrone on Metal Archives

But wait! you shout. What about the new Darkthrone record; "The Underground Resistance". Don't worry, I haven't forgotten it, I just think on account of being new, it deserves a full-length review, which I'll be doing in the next few days. Stay tuned!

Metal Marathons #001: Part 1 - Darkthrone: The Nineties

 Part one of two

There's always been something greatly enjoyable about listening to a lot of a band's discography, or all of it, at once. Well, not at once, that wouldn't sound very nice; but certainly listening to it in order carries a lot of fun with it. A few months ago I decided I might do features where I reviewed discographies, instead of just lone albums, and for some reason, I decided to start with Darkthrone. A few months later, of realising I really don't quite have enough hours in the day to do the band's whole discography, I've decided to break the marathon into two more digestible sections. Cheating, essentially, but it seemed to be a choice between doing it this way, or not at all.

As a band, Darkthrone really need no introduction; one of the most hard-working and productive pillars of the Norwegian black metal scene, and more recently of the Norwegian metal scene in general, Darkthrone have a discography which is fantastically varied but all utterly Darkthrone. Interestingly, I suppose the marathon begins with the album which sounds the least close to the band's trademark sound; Soulside Journey.

I don't exaggerate when I consider Soulside Journey to be among my favourite death metal records, and merely on the basis that it's not the music which Darkthrone are famous for is never a sufficient reason to dismiss it. Soulside Journey is murky, churning and thoroughly evil old-school death metal; technical, and compositionally quite ingenious. It's the kind of album which can draw you in susprisingly well, and it certainly showcases the penchant for evil-sounding music the band had which would certainly be dominating their music later on. The resultant eerie death metal is well deserving of a listen by anyone who has dreamed up reasons not to have listened already.

I first listened to A Blaze in the Northern Sky on Halloween, in the dark - I wanted to listen to some dark music, and this album provided it excellently. People who really enjoyed Darkthrone on the strength of Soulside Journey must have gotten quite a shock indeed when they heard A Blaze in the Northern Sky - a very, very different monster indeed. Instead of thick but solid production, the album is incredibly rough and fuzzy, with a guitar tone like electric sheep-shears which, instead of sounding amusing, succeeds in sounding fantastically evil, accompanying the scathing vocals. Of all of the bands records, this is the most diabolical, and the long songs certainly help it achieve a sort of satanic majesty.

 By the time that Under a Funeral Moon came out, black metal was very much coming into its own - a fact which is reflected in this album's recipe. While the embryonic take on black metal that A Blaze in the Northern Sky created is still present, on this record the songs are shorter, and altogether feel closer to the emerging "convention" of black metal. Under A Funeral Moon is, of course, not derivative in the slightest, but was instead a setter of this convention. The combination of retaining the previous records dark majesty and scathing guitar tone, and combining it with a more punchy, rapid-fire approach creates what is, quite possibly, one of my favourite "classic" Darkthrone records.

Transilvanian Hunger was the first Darkthrone album not to feature guitarist Zephyrous, and you can sort of tell; the record manages to be atmospheric, and indeed even more intense and evil sounding than a lot of Under a Funeral Moon was, but at the same time, it's not quite the same; not a bad different, but nonetheless different, particularly with regards to the style of lead guitar. As an album, Transilvanian hunger is more aggressive, and is typically very unrelenting; a characteristic in which is outdoes every other Darkthrone release with relative ease. While I prefer the atmosphere and more hook-laden feel of Under A Funeral Moon, this album is generally likewise a great pleasure to listen to.

Panzerfaust is something of a continuation of Transilvanian Hunger, with the subtle difference that the band remembered that they were allowed to play slower bits too. If the previous albums were icy, Panzerfaust feels more akin to snow; velvety, and with the same chill, but much more primitive and primal; songs like Quintessence feel at once hypnotic, wrathful and powerful. The vocals on this record are loud, but lack the scathing, demonic feel they had, particularly on Under A Funeral Moon, perhaps the main cause for the album feeling more enraged than occult. Consequently, the real draw of the album for me, at least, is that the riffs are extremely raw and pronounced, packed with energy and intensity.

I quite like Total Death. It may represent the beginning of the "wilderness" which Darkthrone vanished into during the late nineties, but I still enjoy it as an album. The magic of the first five records isn't quite oozing out of it, but at the same time, it still has a certain feel of cohesiveness and bite. There are snowy melodies in the same vein as Panzerfaust, but also an inclination further towards more simplistic, old-school forms of black-metal, namely the first wave, with riffs in that style making themselves known every now and again, perhaps representative of Fenriz' deep attraction towards the old-school beginning to push aside and transform any concious affiliation for the second-wave black-metal scene.
 

I'd probably never listen to Goatlord other than to find out what it sounded like, or whilst I'm doing a Darkthrone marathon... The whole premise doesn't appeal to me; It's a rehearsal tape from before A Blaze in the Northern Sky with a few finishing touches placed upon it. All in all, while you get the feeling that the music could have been great, the recording quality doesn't do it any good, and the finishing touches too, can at times feel a little clunky, like the "female" vocals which probably aren't. Goatlord always felt to me like a line in the sand of Darkthrone's discography; the "old" Darkthrone before it, and the "new" after. All in all, it's a diamond in the rough, but most of the time, the rough feels just too rough.

Albums like Ravishing Grimness can't really be written off as "more of the same", quite simply because that's not quite what they are. Like much of the "middle era" material, Ravishing Grimness is a swaggering, extremely course and primitive work; in this case, it manifests itself sounding like a slightly concussed version of Panzerfaust, where each chord in many of the riffs and rhythms are  emphasised to give it an enormity. Like Panzerfaust, it manages to dynamically flit through various tempos, and certainly maintains a very true black-metal sound, albeit injected with a bit of piss and vinegar, especially tracks like "The Beast" which really foreshadow the direction the band would soon take.

And so, the band's course through the nineties was examined. But what happened after that? Well, It's taken quite a while to write this, and there are many, many more albums to look at, so I'm going to take a break, come back in a few days to tell you about those. 

I hope you've enjoyed this so far. 

Links:
Darkthrone Official Site
Darkthrone on Facebook
Darkthrone on Metal Archives

#277 Diamond Head - Lightning to The Nations

I'm really knackered. That's not really relevant to this review, but if you espy any sentences which end in smiley faces or suddenly veer into entirely different avenues of context, you'll know why. Anyways, on to the main topic of the day; Diamond Head, and more specifically their début album,  "Lightning to the Nations", an undisputed classic of the NWOBHM, and an album which can be said, with only a little bit of hyperbole, to have influenced more or less every metal band conceivable. 

What you get in Lightning to the Nations is essentially solid-as-a-rock NWOBHM with a penchant for sex-noises during the solos, or at least, enough for me to decide to mention them. More important, however, is the former description; Solid as a rock. Lightning to the Nations really is one of those albums where either the filler is so good that we don't notice it's filler, or it's non-existent. You can't be sure, and either way the result is the same -  there isn't a single track on the album which I'd consider sub-par, through its whole length. Even the less famous tracks - for instance "Sweet and Innocent" are solid. A second observation about the record is that it's damn heavy. The chunky guitar tone really combines with the intense playing and rough, clattering production-values to create something which, while not quite "Welcome to Hell" by any stretch, really shows off a rough and raw edge which a lot of NWOBHM bands were more content to polish and shine their material. I can safely say I prefer the way Diamond Head did things - initially self-releasing the record, and evidently recording it on a lowish budget. The resultant record just has a genuine and very energetic feel which is extremely well preserved by the attitude with which the band created it; the same energy and enthusiasm seeps from it that you often pick up on similarly exciting records by artists who were really pushing the envelope; Kill 'Em All, Show No Mercy, even Burzum's self-titled shares a sort of exuberant and novel feel in the music - there's a certain sound which accompanies a record being utterly non-derivative, and Lightning to the Nations certainly has it.

Of all of the NWOHBM records I've lent my ear to, I think Lightning to the Nations is one of the most thrashy; certainly, the riffs and general style of the band was hugely influential to Metallica, and when you listen to them, you can see exactly where the influence lies. Songs like Am I Evil? are very, very proto-thrash indeed, in fact, as far as I'm concerned, when the first fast riff of the song kicks in, that's the sound that thrash being invented makes. The band certainly weren't afraid of a little breakneck speed, especially in tracks like "The Prince", which hurtle along quite fast even by today's standards. Certainly, the causal grindcore enthusiast might look at the riffs and tempo in the way someone designing a train today looks at Stevenson's Rocket, but at the same time, perhaps there's more than a little possibility that Diamond Head's speed was as influential as their playing, to the rest of the NWOBHM and well beyond. When you consider that, to my knowledge, Metallica have covered five of the seven songs on the record, you really get the scent of how influential Diamond Head were. Perhaps engaging a lot of hyperbole indeed, a journalist, I'm told, stated that "There are more good riffs in a single Diamond Head song than there are in the first four Black Sabbath albums". Maybe not quite, but there's certainly a degree of truth to the overall proclamation; Diamond Head's riffs are really good. I wouldn't go as far as he did - good lord no - but you just need to listen to a track or two to really soak up the monumental prowess of the riff work.

It's a bit of a sad story how rapidly Diamond Head declined after the first couple of records; sinking not so much into obscurity, but by all accounts mediocrity. It's much better to dwell on just how good this album is, however, than lamenting the fact that they didn't make many more like it. Lightning to the Nations is utterly deserving of a classic status, which, for the most part, it has rightfully claimed.

This is 10/10.

Links:
Diamond Head Official Site
Diamond Head on Facebook
Diamond Head on Metal Archives