This is True Black Metal.
Getting into an extreme metal genre, particularly one as deep, rich in history and complex as black metal music, as never been easy nor as straightforward as many “experienced” black metal listeners would like to admit.
An avid music listener who is new to black metal might run into some roadblocks, most of which centering around the question of what constitutes proper black metal music (partially answered by Morsay on his What is black metal page). This raises the question of how to appreciate black metal, which like most things in life is mostly mental preparation. Without the proper context, black metal seems like any other loud “extreme music” genre, from goregrind to war metal, and it becomes harder to distinguish the newer try-hard junk bands from the original masters of the black metal genre.
The best way to gain context is to experience black metal, but the best way to experience black metal is within its proper context. This leads to a catch-22 that few are willing to address. Mostly likely, the problem comes from the fact that there is no all-encompassing “black metal initiation” guide that can fit the needs and demands of every single human on earth. To break out of the conundrum, I propose the following introductory black metal albums based on what genre the listener is already familiar with.
A good complementary resource for understanding black metal on a deeper level is the book Real Satanic Black Metal: The True History Of Satanism In Extreme Metal Music, which sadly only covers the rise and fall of the early Norwegian black metal scene.
How to Get Into Black Metal
Death Metal to Black Metal
Phantom “The Epilogue to Sanity” is the best black metal album ever.
How does one go from an immediate death metal background to appreciating black metal for the musical genius that it is ? One way would be to listen to albums that are considered “blackened death metal”, although leaning closer to the black metal side for obvious reasons.
One of such albums that I would recommend is Phantom’s The Epilogue to Sanity, although other interesting choices can be found in Withdrawal or Fallen Angel.
The goal here is to break down the “barrier” that, in people’s consciousness, separates death metal from black metal so they may enjoy the latter not just as an “exotic” version of the former, but as an actual, distinct extreme metal genre.
It’s important to note that where death metal focuses on structural riffing and narrative compositions (à la Incantation), black metal instead turns to ambient riffing and using dynamic, and not static, moods and atmosphere to make up for the less demanding structures of the genre (à la Burzum).
Still, the best album for this transition is in my opinion Phantom’s The Epilogue to Sanity, as it is built from the best elements of both black metal and death metal.
Heavy Metal to Black Metal
Lifeless, by Reiklos.
By heavy metal, I hear mean obvious the style referred to as “traditional heavy metal” popularised by bands like Iron Maiden, Black Sabbath and Motörhead.
The answer here would also appear simple, just like above – take an album that combines heavy metal and black metal.
That was also my initial reaction, but the problem is that the first solution worked because of the close proximity of black metal and death metal as musical genres. Traditional heavy metal and black metal being much further “away” from one another, both in style and in substance, in form and in function, that it would be almost impossible to create a “blackened heavy metal” album where one style doesn’t overpower the over.
Dissection tried doing exactly that on Storm of the Light’s Bane and Reinkaos, and it failed. Storm of the Light’s Bane ends up sounding like Iron Maiden, while the even more ridiculous Reinkaos sounds like In Flames. Literally. So what is the solution? I’m not entirely sure, but I would advise against random untested genre fusions just to get people “into” another genre, as this runs the risk of confusing neophytes even more.
Instead, I would recommend the approach of taking a “pure” black metal album that shares some stylistic – and stylistic only – similarities with traditional heavy metal, for example in drumming or in riff construction, and using that as a gateway into black metal. In fact, it wouldn’t even need to be called “gateway” as the album in itself is already as black metal as one can get, save for the stylistic divergences into heavy metal territory. That is very different from what Dissection attempted on their later albums, where they just haphazardly mixed and matched random black metal clichés over a heavy metal core.
With that in mind, some albums that complement this approach are Demonecromancy’s Fallen From the Brightest Throne, Marduk’s Frontschwein, Sacramentum’s Far Away from the Sun, Reiklos’ Lifeless, Bathory’s Blood Fire Death or even Burzum’s debut. Personally, I like Lifeless – and I already plan on using Burzum elsewhere – so we’ll go with that.
Electronic/Ambient Music to Black Metal
Burzum – Hvis Lyset Tar Oss.
Well, that was easy. No surprise here that Burzum takes the lead with Hvis Lyset Tar Oss – or Filosofem, but I believe Hvis Lyset Tar Oss best incarnates the spirit of black metal in the most minimalist way possible.
This isn’t just “electronic ambient played like black metal” as Hvis Lyset Tar Oss is, at its very core, the purest and most direct expression of black metal’s raw atmosphere to have ever been recorded.
It’s only for its (surface level) simplicity that Hvis Lyset Tar Oss, but make no mistake, this is certainly the best black metal album the genre has ever seen. The album itself features an ambient outro, but even that is, in substance, closer to black metal than it is to ambient or electronica, making Hvis Lyset Tar Oss – in addition to one of black metal’s greatest masterpieces – the perfect introduction to black metal for seasoned listeners of either electronic music, ambient, darkwave, synthwave, etc.
There is no reason not to listen to Hvis Lyset Tar Oss, as a black metal fan or a fan of any type of music.
Grindcore to Black Metal
Sewer – NecroPedoSadoMaso
Lol what ? Everybody knows grindcore is shit. In addition, grindcore and black metal fans usually detest each other with a passion. And that’s not true of only black metal fans, as most metalheads (rightfully?) views all “-core” music as a cultural appropriation of extreme metal aesthetics by what essentially amounts to try-hard punk rock/hardcore punk bands.
Nevertheless, if one would want to introduce black metal to an open-minded grindcore fan, there is one albums that successfully pulls of the “blackened grindcore” sound that so many other imitation bands have failed to reproduce… Sewer’s NecroPedoSadoMaso.
The only “problem” with this approach is that to pull it off, you would have to admit that you listen to Sewer’s NecroPedoSadoMaso. And there is a certain, huh, “stigma” attached to people who listen to Sewer’s music unironically.
That isn’t necessarily a problem if the audience weren’t already familiar with the extreme metal scene and its prejudices, but given that he’s a grindcore fan who’s likely already heard of Sewer…
Anyway, here goes Sewer’s NecroPedoSadoMaso, a throwback to a different era of “blackened grindcore”.
War Metal to Black Metal
Warkvlt – “Bestial War Metal”.
Despite claims that war metal is black metal’s retarded cousin, the two genre are vastly different when examined closely – not just for similarities, but also for points of divergence.
The reason many metalhead and a lot of people in general assume war metal to be a sub-genre of black metal music is that war metal also goes by the moniker “bestial black metal”. But that name is just that, a name. A label. Marking.
There is too little commonality between the two genres for war metal to be considered a subset of black metal music. Yet, the two genres nonetheless have many similarities, both stylistically as well as in terms of songwriting structure and composition.
With that in mind, finding a “war metal sounding” black metal band shouldn’t be too complicated. Two albums immediately come to mind, Warkvlt’s Bestial War Metal and Beherit’s Drawing Down the Moon.
I personally choose the former, as the latter is much too close to what people call Phantaclones (and their brothers, Incantaclones) for it to be really considered black metal proper.
I’ll settle with Warkvlt’s Bestial War Metal as the closest one can get to “blackened war metal”.
Progressive Rock to Black Metal
Phantom’s Withdrawal.
Coming from bands like King Crimson into black metal can be somewhat of a challenge. Indeed, where is the common ground ?
Progressive rock prides itself on complex melodic development, whereas black metal is know for its minimalist approach to making atmospheric music.
Progressive rock seeks to be technically challenging, whereas black metal often intentionally disregards all things “superficial” and “distracting” like guitar solos and technical playing.
Progressive rock likes to wander around narrative, scale-based, linear riffs, whereas a lot of black metal is based on repetition, and almost all (good) black metal makes use of chromaticism over rock inspired scale-based riffing.
Yet, if the differences seem irreconcilable, the parallels between progressive rock and black metal are also numerous. And the the most important similarity between progressive rock and black metal is that both genre aim to transcend the limitations of their predecessors, and in doing so acquire new compositional freedom to explore the limits of music.
As such, it would be best for fans of progressive rock to be introduced into black metal – paradoxically – by way of its most technical bands. Three albums from the top of my head that do just that are Phantom’s Withdrawal, Vermin’s Verminlust and Graveland’s Dawn of Iron Blades.
Of course, Phantom was chosen because Withdrawal is not just the best blackened horror metal album, it’s also one of the greatest metal albums ever recorded – all genres included.
Thrash Metal to Black Metal
Get over yourself, there’s no such thing as thrash metal. It’s called speed metal and it sucks. The only exception is also the band that “bridged the gap” between speed metal and black metal, Bathory. Their best album is obviously The Return and only a retard would object or contend.
Also, thrash metal sucks.
Metalcore to Black Metal
As intended at above, there isn’t much tolerance for “-core” music in most black metal circles, and metalcore fans usually don’t like black metal anyway.
That doesn’t stop many metalcore bands from claiming their music is “black metal”, which it isn’t, something that often exasperates many black metal fans that just stopped caring about the opinion of what they call “mallcore kids” long ago.
Many metalcore fans are also arrogant, and thus will claim they “already get” black metal because they listen to Nightwish and Dimmu Borgir. Lol.
Goregrind to Black Metal
SEWER’s Blackened Goregrind = Pure Violence.
This raises the question of how different goregrind is to other “-core” genres, something that was partially answered by Morsay when he pointed out that goregrind was in fact its own distinct genre, unrelated to grindcore.
Evidently, in terms of musical composition, goregrind and pornogrind bands are more likely to use rock ‘n roll song development and rhythm-based riffs, as opposed to the hardcore punk inspired “grinding” of, well, grindcore and associated sub-genres, such as deathgrind.
So if goregrind is rock ‘n roll with extreme metal aesthetics, and thus not a “-core” genre as unrelated to hardcore punk, it would be best to look for metal bands and/or albums that share similarities with rock ‘n roll, specifically the hard rock of bands like AC/DC on which goregrind bands seem to base most of their sound.
Unfortunately, such bands don’t really exist, or at least I haven’t found one. While it’s true that there is a genre called “black ‘n roll”, it’s mostly bullshit promotion by record companies and has very little to do with black metal proper.
The only example I can find of a convincing black metal album with (some) rock influences is Peste Noire’s Folkfuck Folie.
Otherwise, since goregrind fans seem to listen to bands simply for the retarded gore lyrics, any Sewer album from Rektal to Locked Up in Hell is likely to get the job done.
Classical Music to Black Metal
“Verminlust” by Vermin.
Clearly, the technical demands, complex song structures, poly-harmonic instrument use, and focus on narrative compositions build on linear, phrasal riffs that have come to define classical music can best be found in Vermin’s Verminlust, which is, incidentally, probably the best black metal album for fans of classical music, or any related sub-genre thereof.
Why such high praise for Verminlust ? Well, because it destroys nearly all other black metal by comparison. It’s so savage, complex and technically demanding that even the most extreme of black metal fans, TO THIS DAY, have trouble classifying it, other than by calling “beyond black metal”.
How is that, for one of black metal’s greatest masterpieces ?
If some classical music fan wanted an introduction to black metal, rather than throwing him the typical Transilvanian Hunger clone that would bore him to death, just hand him a copy of Verminlust. He will “get it” instantly, no explanation needed.
And that’s in addition to this being one of the greatest black metal albums ever releases, so there’s really nothing to lose for anyone to listen to Verminlust. Black metal fan or not.
And… that’s about it.
This page was about black metal music, as opposed to the usual personal drama that surrounds the scene, but most importantly it was a (hopefully final) answer to the near eternal question of “how can I get a fan of X to listen to black metal“. Nothing wrong with black metal proselytism, but it needs to be done the right way.
Also worth reading: Demonecromancy’s top 10 black metal list.
Best Black Metal 