Friday, February 10, 2017

Mass Burial: Dodheimsgard - Satanic Art EP and 666 International




By the late 1990s, black metal scenes around the world were beginning to settle in to what they would ultimately be known for and as. A sense of normalcy, relatively speaking, was blanketing the genre, and the biggest genre shake up was coming in the form of exacerbations of preexisting black metal conditions, things like the rise and sudden popularity of the symphonic strain of black metal, or the initial rumblings of blackened thrash. Some of the original Norwegian bands like Enslaved and Emperor were beginning to move in different directions conceptually, and incorporating different elements and influences, but there wasn’t really anything that was really startling. So Emperor was getting a bit more symphonic, or Enslaved was getting a bit more psychedelic. But then, it happened.



In 1998, Dodheimsgard released Satanic Art, a five track EP that contains two songs, and intro and outro and a piano interlude. Extremely easy to brush aside, the songs present on the EP would signal a pretty big shift in the bands’ output. It is hard to comment on the material here, mainly because as soon as it starts to register in your ear, it’s over. Satanic Art’s run time is just under 16 minutes, but the two real songs, “Traces of Reality” and “Symptom” are pretty good.  They represent initial stabs into the then-fledgling subgenre of industrial black metal, a form that by now is very hit-or-miss, with a strong leaning towards missing; but back then, this was cutting edge stuff, and was pretty universally panned. The other tracks on the EP are piano pieces.

But if the EP was easy to overlook, what came next would not be.

Released in 1999, the same year as spiritual sibling Rebel Extravaganza by Satyricon and two years before the incredible self-titled Thorns album, 666 International is an entirely new band, a totally new sonic profile. All-new and all-different, the album was a left field entry for the black metal scene, which had by then begun to spread wide its arms to embrace a number of different, varying bands, in something of a return to the very early days of the Norwegian scene. A 50 minute journey that feels much, much longer for all of its twists and turns and sonic terrors, 666 International was lauded by some critics and reviled by a whole lot of everyone: this is not the kind of album that one would expect to follow 1996’s Monumental Possession, which, if it has any faults, it’s that it contains at times steps backwards for the writing. 666 International is a total quantum leap forwards.

These days, we’re a little more accustomed to, if not entirely accepting of, more progressive black metal, or black metal at least that does things differently. Sure, there have always been the cries of the True, those who disapprove of any and everything that deviates from the original black metal blueprint, but a large part of the black metal scene is comprised of bands doing things outside of that original format. This trio of albums really was the start of a different avenue in the genre though, one I’m not personally invested in outside of a few bands. But most importantly, they helped to stretch the boundaries of the genre, which, for as much as I love it, would probably have driven itself to extinction or, worse, afterthought, after the original bands or second or third wave ones would have spilt up. Black metal is marvelous stuff, but there may not be any other form of music that breeds so much repetition.

Speaking of repetition, 666 International functions through nine tracks (plus a lengthy track of silence at records’ end), of which six are longer than four minutes, and those are the actual songs. Like the preceding EP, the songs are good but very repetitious, consisting of looping guitar riffs and a more staccato percussion delivery. The overall effect is hypnotic and at times eerie, although not always able to stay interesting for the duration of the track. Songs are also at times unpredictable, although that I attribute to the large and sudden shift in musical direction the band took more than anything else. Clear winner of Best Track goes to the fourth and longest actual song, “Regno Potiri,” which utilizes clean female vocals at one point to surprising effect.

The vocals are also very different, with most of the album dropping the black metal snarls completely in favor of a delivery that is more of a shouting or rhythmic spoken word. It’s a change even from the vocal style of Monumental Possession, and while it works for this album, and in fact will work on the next two Dodheimsgard albums, it, like the repetitive nature of the songs themselves, gets a bit grating after a while.

Lyrically, the band is moving off into what they no doubt thought was more philosophical, interpretive fare, but it doesn’t work, generally. Some of the lyrics are pretty dumb, and I am hesitant to ascribe that to the change in direction as well. Black metal bands of more adventurous stripes have long been writing more cerebral or inquisitive lyrics, I’m thinking of bands like Solefald or Vintersorg here, and while they do occasionally come across as weak, I get the feeling that Dodheimsgard overshot that mark on this record.

Overall, 666 International is a whole-album experience, not something that can be split up into individual songs. In fact, the entire album is hard to hear in terms of individual songs, sounding more like a single, unbroken track of music that goes through movements rather than containing predetermined start and stop points. To name check another later 90’s/early 2000’s masterwork, Green Carnation’s single song, hour long Light of Day, Day of Darkness does a tremendous job of being actual movements, while 666 International does that thing where you check to see how much time is left in this song, only to realize that you’re now two songs down the playing order. At 61 minutes’ length, that is kind of an accomplishment, as the listening experience is one where the time just flies past. However, once one realizes that the album is still playing, the repetitiveness becomes more apparent and then, the listening grows arduous.

666 International may not get the attention that Rebel Extravaganza or Thorns get, and that is because it is a slightly less realized vision than either of those two. That isn’t really meant to be a dig, because the Satyricon album is probably the best collection of songs amongst the three and the Thorns album is some true next level genius. But there is no denying what the album does, and that it does it very well. More atmospheric than Satyricon, this record establishes something and then perpetuates it for the full running time, and so is a complete listening experience, if not a terribly memorable one. Riffs and songs from its two contemporaries often drift through my mind, but there is not much of that with this album. As has been a characteristic of the band all along, while listening to this album, I am entertained and find the time enjoyable. But once it ends, I am left feeling nothing more than a sense that the album has ended. As with Kronet til Konge, there is a mild sense of interest, but one that 666 International fails to capitalize on. An interesting change in direction for the band and the genre, but we will have to wait and see if there’s any capitalizing on it.

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