In the early 1990s, a group of Scandinavian
teenage misfits birthed a new form of Metal, one that was
atavistic, fantastical and profoundly misanthropic. 20 years later,
we’re still talking about it: there are Black Metal art
installations, Black Metal symposiums, Black Metal films, a Black
Metal ballet company and an ever-growing stack of Black Metal
books, of which Black Metal: Beyond The Darkness, an
anthology of essays and interviews published by Black Dog, is the
latest.
One reason for the enduring fascination with Black Metal is
the movement’s visual identity. From the outset, its practitioners
took great care over the way they presented themselves, wearing
costumes and make-up and obsessing over artwork and gig theatrics.
Black Metal became a ‘look’, as much as it did a sound, one packed
with a complex of allusions to grindhouse movies, occult
literature, pagan folklore and religious iconography.
For this edition of The Wire Salon, the first in a new
season, critic Nick Richardson (The Wire, London
Review Of Books) will give a talk that expands on his essay in
Beyond The Darkness and which will examine the derivation
of the Black Metal imaginary, taking in Quorthon’s leg-bone
mic-stand and Gorgoroth’s Krakow gorefest, via weapons, runes and
the meaning of wolfhood. The talk will be illustrated with audio
and visuals and will be followed by a panel discussion, with
Richardson, Edwin Pouncey and Louise Brown (former editor of
Terrorizer magazine), which will consider Black Metal
imagery in the context of the music's extreme philosophies and
radical praxis, as well as its influence on a swathe of avant garde
musicians and artists, from Sunn 0))) to Banks Violette.
London Cafe Oto, 6 September, 8pm, £4 on the door
only.
