Mass Burial: Dodheimsgard -- Supervillain Outcast

 

Supervillain Outcast is the second attempt at experimental Black Metal from Norway’s Dodheimsgard, and is generally shunned. Released in 2007, a whopping eight years after 666 International, much of the scene had moved beyond the band, and a fairly common thought was that Dodheimsgard was now trying to do something different for attention. By 2007, the “acceptable” form of experimental Black Metal was changing once again, and this time, aided by the Internet, the change was soon to be accompanied by a mandate that it was ok for bands to be identical to each other and still classify as unique, so long as they were widely unknown by the general masses. The Cascadian scene was beginning to stir, and Black Metal was growing tamer and more generally acceptable in its tamer form.

And while Supervillain Outcast may be shunned by some, there is an audience for it, and that audience really seems to love it. But that seems to have been the trajectory for this band, or bands like it, where they find a devoted core of followers and then a devoted core of haters, who the followers assert just don’t “get it.” I was not a fan of the album upon release, as I wasn’t really a fan of the band in general, and what I’d heard back then was not anything that I’d thought really counted as being Black Metal enough: I gave them credit for doing their thing, and was into other experimental bands like Soleflad at the time, but Dodheimsgard just wasn’t doing it for me. At that time, I viewed these guys through the same lens as I viewed a band like Ulver or Manes, who followed very much the same career path: they were guys who had been doing Black Metal, and then weren’t any more, but were still trading on the Black Metal credibility card. Stylistically, Manes is a much better comparison to Dodheimsgard, but Ulver seems to garner infinitely more hate, as they were one of the first Norwegian Black Metal bands, and then they went full electronic. Manes and Dodheimsgard and even …In the Woods were at least occasionally reaching back into their Black Metal pasts on newer works.

But Dodheimsgard may have done this reaching back the best of those bands, as Supervillain Outcast is another record in that atmospherically unsettling, futuristically grating fashion, slightly more abrasive than predecessor 666 International, but not moreso than that albums’ contemporaries that were name-dropped a few times in the 666 article. Supervillain also manages to interject some atmosphere in the form of choral interludes that never fail to catch me off guard, even when I know they’re coming. Unlike the predecessor which relies on a split between longer and shorter songs, Supervillain Outcast is a selection of short to mid length (like four minutes) tunes that flow from one to another, resulting in more of a landscape of sound rather than an album of songs. Like that made sense. Individually they don’t mean a whole lot, but the album is more of a full album experience, really. There’s no hit single on here, or even single stand out tracks. Everything is good, but nothing is exceptional. I feel personally that that causes me to lean in a slightly apathetic direction with this album, which I don’t think is fair. 666 International was Dodheimsgard’s first stab at this formula, but Supervillain Outcast is the first time they got it right on the head. Shame then that I can’t type up single song titles and gush over them. I guess it’s an album kind of like an ambient album, where singular pieces aren’t as valuable as the general reception of the whole thing. That sounds a lot less ambivalent, too.

The songs are good and all, but by 2007 it really seems as though the general enthusiasm ship for this kind of Black Metal had already sailed. This kind of album was all the rage in the early 2000’s, maybe in the 2001 to 2003 corridor there; but by the time of its release the scene seemed to be moving on from the Supervillain Outcast kind of thing. That, and this record is really just minor variations on the 666 International formula. Where that album was something different for the band, this one is basically just that one with some minor changes and a much tighter execution.

It has taken me forever to get through this discography, and the writing of this piece made me realize why. Dodheimsgard is band that seems to have written and released albums in pairs. The first two albums are enough alike that it is safe to say they are minor modifications of each other. The next two are similar enough that they are minor modifications of each other as well. Not to say the results aren’t positive ones, because they are: I think the only way one would consider the first four albums bad was if a person just didn’t care for the styles they represent, which, in the cases of 666 International and Supervillain Outcast, I could certainly understand. But none of the works are examples of “bad” or “poor” samplings of their respective styles; although one could argue that the first two, standard Black Metal records were kind of retreads or junior league examples of that style and time in the Norwegian scene in general. I’d think that was unfair, but to each their own.

While the first two records were pretty easy for me to add to my general music rotation to be written on, the next two really struggled to gain any foothold in my listening habits, but not because they are bad or anything. They just don’t stick in my head for long, a general issue I seem to have with this brand of Black Metal. The exceptions to this rule are few and far between: Satyricon’s Rebel Extravaganza has songs that occasionally filter through my mind; the self-titled Thorns album is a total beast of the genre; probably another one or two examples, but I can’t even think of them right now. I’m not real into the later works by aforementioned groups like Manes or In the Woods… either, so I suppose the general fault is my own. While Supervillain Outcast has some very cool moments, and is definitely worth a listen, it is primarily background music, which allows its more interesting moments to stick out. That’s when things like the vocalization tracks and the strangely hypnotic qualities of the actual music take hold, when you’re not really paying attention to them.

There’s one more album in the Dodheimsgard repertoire, and it’s the one that actually got me interested in the band more than any of the previous four. But, to put a stamp on the first four, let me say this: if nothing else, Dodheimsgard is a great example of some guys who started out playing Norwegian Black Metal, and then made it their own thing. What they did may not be for everyone, and that’s fine. Nothing is wrong or poor here, but it may be that other records in this style just plain do the style better, leaving Dodheimsgard as the poor cousin of the bunch.