Thursday, January 14, 2010
Cream Calendar / Moving Pictures Black Metal Documentary Until the Light Takes Us Coming to The Belcourt Feb. 5
Posted by Steve Haruch on Thu, Jan 14, 2010 at 11:42 AM
The least metal thing to happen to Nashville recently was the news that Slayer and Megadeth canceled their Jan. 31 show at Municipal. Sure, we hear they're going to reschedule, but still. After many long, cruel days of not having anything very metal happen to us, we found out today that Until the Light Takes Us, the documentary on black metal, will be screening at The Belcourt Feb. 5-11. (Nashville's own Harmony Korine briefly appears in the doc, possibly in corpse paint.)
Here's what the filmmakers, who spent a year in Norway to live among the bands, have to say for themselves:
Part music scene and part cultural uprising, black metal rose to worldwide notoriety in the mid-nineties when a rash of suicides, murders, and church burnings accompanied the explosive artistic growth and output of a music scene that would forever redefine what heavy metal is and what it stands for to other musicians, artists and music fans world-wide. The film goes behind the highly sensationalized media reports of "Satanists running amok in Europe" to examine the complex and largely misunderstood principles and beliefs that led to this rebellion against both Christianity and modern culture.To capture this on film, directors Aaron Aites and Audrey Ewell moved to Norway and lived with the musicians for several years, building relationships that allowed them to create a surprisingly intimate portrait of this violent, but ultimately misunderstood, movement. The result is a poignant, moving story that's as much about the idea that reality is composed of whatever the most people believe, regardless of what's actually true, as it is about a music scene that blazed a path of murder and arson across the northern sky.
Fun! Now here's the trailer:
One of the film's subjects is Varg Vikernes, who was convicted and sentenced to 21 years in prison for murdering Øystein Aarseth (aka Euronymous), his bandmate in Mayhem. If that story sounds familiar, it might be because Attila Csihar, who sang for Mayhem on the album De Mysteriis Dom Sathanas, has toured, often in a big old robe, with drone kings Sunn O))), who totally fogged Mercy Lounge last September. (As the Wikipedia page for De Mysteriis astutely points out, that album may be the only one in history to feature both murderer and victim.) Vikernes was released from prison last May. You might think he's a total cock, but that's death metal, not black metal. Catch up.
Now everybody grab an invisible orange and make a face like GRRRAAAHH!!!
Comments (12)
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Hehe, I have been reading about that on Blabbermouth, as well as the German musical that Gaahl from Gorgoroth was recently cast in. That shit cracks me up!
As for Nashville metal news, how about Paul Di'Anno coming to Limelight on February 8th? Crazy!
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Fuck Yeah! Black Dynamite tomorrow, and then this in a couple of weeks? Hells yeah!
I just hope this is better than Metal: A Headbanger's Journey. While that doc does give a reasonable overview of metal as a whole, it wasn't terribly insightful.
There is apparently a new interview with Varg Virkenes (aka Burzum) since he has been released from prison. I am sure that will be good for some Nazi propaganda and nihilism.
@Lance:
I think if this documentary has a flaw, it will be that it is too narrow and one sided than too general.
Speaking of sweet metal movies, check out this trailer for Slow Southern Steel:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3CHY0xOvPbE
It is a documentary about Doom Metal and Stoner Rock in the South shot by Karim from I'm Better Than Everyone Records and CT from Arkansas sludgers Rwake. The documentary includes interviews with metal bands in and around Nashville, and throughout the South (Note Phil Anselmo in the trailer). The film is in the last stages of editing and dates of distribution should be released soon.
Check it out.
i can't tell how afraid i would be of one of these guys in like, a barfight or something. i mean, are they pretty serious or are they like those guys with giant plastic battle axes in that park off of 440 and West End?
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