Ten Black Dooms Droning: 2009 (and Beyond) in Metal

I kept taunting Tucker and Marty for being wussy little twee indie rock/electronica/emo fanboys who’d hide behind their Mommy’s skirts if the Cookie Monster spoke to them too loud, or, you know, if the apocalypse occurred. "Oh I love Cut Copy because they’re so much fun."  Yeah, well, let’s see how much you enjoy dancing in hell with your feet torn off and your bloody stumps slipping and sliding in the shredded scraps of Cut Copy’s intestines. Huh?! How would you like that?!

So Marty says, okay, fine then, go ahead and inflict the evil, vile stink of metal upon The Factual Opinion and keep inflicting until there’s nothing left but stench and rubble and maybe a Norwegian bashing a church with his keyboard. And I couldn’t do it, because I’m actually a poseur who’ll be the first against the wall when the pit opens (though since I’m a Semite, that was probably always going to be the case…but I digress.)

Anyway, here’s the best I could do; five from this year, five from the decade, in no particular order of preference. Read them and weep bloody tears, mortal scum.

Gallhammer - Gloomy Lights (2004)

So some people think Japan is all pretty flowers, bathing, intense design skills and crossdressing gameshows. And it is those things. But it’s also three women spitting out shrieking, gutteral imprecations over fearsomely, heavy, feedbacky doom. “Endless Nauseous Days” is perhaps the high point on Gallhammer’s Gloomy Lights, both because it’s called “Endless Nauseous Days” and because it may be the vocal performance of the decade. The “singer” starts out with an eerie impersonation of an actual strangulation and moves on into bellowing that could stun an ungulate.

Drudkh - Microcosmos (2009)

“Drudkh” means “wood” in Sanskrit; these guys are Ukrainian nationalists, which is politically dicey but aesthetically productive. , The sweeping metal buzz is set over traditional rhythms, creating huge, densely textured slabs which resemble, simultaneously, quaint folk dances and large military vehicles decimating your home. Bleak, beautiful music by which to ethnically cleanse your neighbors.

Funeral Mist - Maranatha (2009)

About half of this is top-drawer-but-nothing-odd-about-it old school black metal; lots of screaming, lots of relentless drums, occasional church bells. I like that okay. The other half though, is a lot stranger — and that stuff is great. “White Stone” is a black metal answer to the Melvins; slow, trudging, choral voices in the background, and no irony at all — just the inevitable, agonizing approach of unholy revelation. “Jesus Saves” starts out in screaming mode, then two-thirds of the way through fades seamlessly into a pleasant spacey guitar figure laced with feedback. Funeral Mist doesn’t know whether they want to be Darkthrone or Sonic Youth — or maybe they bartered their soul for the right not to be able to tell the difference.

Rites of Thy Degringolade - An Ode to Sin (2005)

So a big part of the reason I can’t really consider myself a metalhead is that, despite my love of black and doom and drone and prog and thrash, I’m not really all that into the cornerstone of the genre. And yeah, I’m talking about death.

Rites of Thy Degringolade is an exception though. Mostly it’s the drummer, Paulus Kressman, who even by metal’s fearsome standards is an absolute monster, jamming 15 minutes of twisting, proggy time changes into 2 to 4 minute bursts. “Totality’s Reign” sounds like what might have happened if Keith Moon did a barrellful of amphetemines and joined a hardcore band — a maelstrom of bizarre, epileptic fury.

Plus, for God’s sake, they called themselves “Rites of Thy Degringolade.” How cool is that?

Pyha - The Haunted House (2008)

Originally released in South Korea by a 14-year old recording in his bedroom, this was reissued last year on the tUMULt label — and it may be my all time favorite black metal album ever. Without a band, without a studio, Pyha gets sounds like nothing I’ve ever heard even from Xasthur; squealing, squeaking, grating metal-on-metal; vocals distorted till they sound like rusty gates, volumes pushed so high the whole thing cracks around the edges. Explicitly anti-war, the album functions as an aching, extended dirger. Most metal albums revel in anger; “The Haunted House” is one of the few that is genuinely and effectively sad.

Marduk - Wormwood (2009)

There’s nothing especially fancy about Marduk; they just write great, bad-ass, old-school metal songs — with a contemporary extreme black-metal filigree thrown in of course. This is one of those albums where the best track always seems to be the one you’re listening to; “Funeral Dawn,” “Phosphorous Redeemer,” and “To Redirect Perdition” are all built around riffs so crushingly heavy they seem to warp time back thirty or forty years, when Sabbath was sainted and Vitus was black. The uptempo tracks are ferocious as well, channeling a thrash aggression that often gets lost in extreme metal’s artier ambience. If somebody who actually listens to metal, metal, and only metal were to stumble on this list, I sort of imagine them looking at Gallhammer and Pyha and Khanate and pegging me as a pompous art-school Lars-come-lately for the most part. But I think I’d get props for Marduk.

Ithdabquth Qliphoth - Funeral Spirit of Holy, Holy and Holy Trance-formation (2009)

Created by a Russian with the impossible name of AL-LA-ShT-Orr, this is a single 20-minute song-suite of alternating shrieking, throbbing, trudging, and ominous quoting from scripture. The entire edifice is lovingly, carefully crafted, each section shifting into the next with the graceful inevitability of continents shifting.

Xasthur - Nocturnal Poisoning (2002)

If you’ve ever wished for soothing ambient background music that sounds like it has crawled out of Hades with fangs and claws and acidic blood spurting from its hollow eye-sockets, Xasthur is your entity. Nocturnal Poisoning manages to be both restful and unendurable; wave after wave of subtly shifting textured bliss built out of pounding percussion and guitars and keyboards shredding both eardrums and sanity. This is what happened to My Bloody Valentine after it was murdered at the crossroads, and its flesh left for the crows.

Khanate - Clean Hands Go Foul (2009)

Stephen O’Malley is better known for his work with Sun O))), but I generally prefer Khanate. First, with Khanate I don’t have to go to google every time to remember how many stupid parentheses to put in. And second, Khanate’s just more evil. The formula is pretty simple —hideous, unbelievable, throat-shattering shriek; guitar feedback and drums at painful volume; repeat veeeeeeeerrrrrryyyy slooooooowwwwwllllly. For several albums. And, no, it never gets old, damn it.

Harvey Milk - Life…the Best Game in Town (2008)

Metal for ironic indie rockers. Harvey Milk does the Melvins better than the Melvins are doing at this point. First track on this album alternates a twee, hushed vocal chorus with thundering doom metal; the last is called “Good bye Blues” because, you know, it’s last and they’re cute. “Motown” actually swings while still being thoroughly metal. So yeah, they’re ironic and too rock for metal and everybody loves them because they’re ironic and too rock for metal, and this bugs me. But at the end of the day…they write great, weird songs and they are heavy as fuck. I can’t argue with that.

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Not sufficiently filled with rage and the crushing urge to violate persons and statutes? Don’t yet feel like donning Viking garb and scalping some Grizzly Bear (and yeah, I mean the band)? Hie thee hence, then, wench, to Aquarius Records; enter "metal 2009" into the search function…and witness the beauty that is Agoraphobic Nosebleed, Ash Pool, and Atavist, to say nothing of the rest of the alphabet. Ten black dooms droning? Ten? Aquarius laughs at your ten, for their metal is legion.

And, hey if all pistons are firing, you can sample some of these bands through an exciting metal filled download over at my blog.

-Noah Berlatsky, 2009

Comments

[Chris Jones]

My friend really enjoys Marduk, and I've actually really dug what I've heard by them, but man...their name is way too close to Marmaduke for me to take them all that seriously.

Stoner metal hit kind of a renaissance this decade, I think. Fu Manchu, Electric Wizard, Boris, Om, Mastodon...apart from the early '90s there's never been a better time to like metal AND weed.

I need more black metal; the only black metal album I have is "Prometheus: The Discipline of Fire and Demise" by Emperor and I actually like it quite a bit. What else would you recommend for someone starting off?

[NoahB]

Get that Pyha album. Holy shit is it good. Really, like one of my favorite albums ever. I can't believe how he makes those sounds.

The other black metal up there is recommended too (that'd be Drudkh, Xasthur, Funeral Mist.) Nachtmystium is great, and kind of more rock friendly. If you're into ambient, Striborg is good through.

Or go to the Aquarius record site, enter Black Metal in the search, and then listen to some samples.

[Mike]

This is a solid list, and I'm happy to see someone trying to turn people on to Aquarius Records, but, uh, where the hell is Velvet Cacoon?? I know all the crap surrounding the band's image can get in the way of enjoying the music but this list looks incomplete without "Genevieve".

And speaking of the A's of metal, you ever give Akitsa a listen? A Gallhammer fan would love them.

[NoahB]

Hey Mike. As I said, I'm kind of a poseur; the reason Velvet Cacoon isn't on here is that I've never heard them (or even heard of them.) I'll try to give them a listen though.

Akitsa sounds vaguely familiar...but again, I'm not familiar with them. I will try to check them out....

[Brian T.]

This was really fun to read.

Who are you and what did you do with the real Noah Berlatsky?

[NoahB]

Maybe you should just read my music pieces, Brian?

Here's a longer review of that Marduk album.

[Brian T.]

I've read your music pieces before. Usually, I like them even less than the Wonder Woman essays.

Still... This one was fun.

[NoahB]

Ah well. Can't please all the people ever I guess.