Difficult Music

The other night I listened to The Shadowthrone, the second album by Norwegian Grammy winners Satyricon. It’s really primitive, but it hasn’t aged that badly. It manages to take black metal’s penchant for “grimness of sound” and make it very listenable. The drums ring out naturally (though Frost’s playing has improved immeasurably since then) and the guitars have a nice buzz to them. A lot of the material sounds like the Storm album, a Satyricon side project where they added powerchords to a bunch of old Norse folk tunes. I think both albums were recorded around the same time, so it figures.

Where are they now? Like I said, they won a Norwegian Grammy for their last album and they’ve made a fancy video co-starring a naked booby lady and a snake—available for download on the Web site. I always thought Satyricon was a two-man project—just Satyr Wongraven and Frost—so I don’t know who all those other guys are (oh, the site says they’re Steinar Gundersen - Lead Guitar, Lars Norberg – Bass, and A.O Gronbech - Rhythm Guitar). The song, "Fuel For Hatred," is catchy as hell, so watch out. For black metal, it’s quite a toe tapper.