A cultured human being should pursue a good hobby. It’s somewhat more interesting if said hobby involves a mild vice or foible. The hobby should also develop skill and produce a satisfactory end product. It should make the person somewhat unique amongst a group of peers and allow them to develop camaraderie with their fellow hobbyists. It becomes a Schelling Point so to speak.
9 CommentsTags: alcohol, beer, homebrewing, the good life
Internet startup incubator Y Combinator, which specializes in discovering new and useless dot-coms to give money so that its members can profit off of re-selling the stock after the IPO, banned Gab.ai founder Andrew Torba after he typed “build the wall” on Facebook.
5 CommentsTags: andrew torba, censorship, curtis yarvin, gab.ai, hacker news, paul graham, sam altman, twitter, y combinator
New York University professor Michael Rectenwald was put on paid administrative leave for his controversial Deplorable NYU Prof Twitter account that exposes how the Ivory Tower uses social justice warring and identity politics as methods of social control. His reprimanding proved him right.
4 CommentsTags: censorship, colleges, communism, diversity, free speech, multiculturalism, political correctness, self-censorship, totalitarian, twitter
The leading representative of Swedish industry around the world, Ikea, sells furniture of styles from a dozen nations. It has a housewares section, a full-service cafeteria, a donut shop and a grocery store. You can pick up electric lights, tools, houseplants and home decor there.
But conspicuously absent are the most important items from Sweden in recent memory: Swedish death metal and black metal.
16 CommentsTags: ikea, Sweden, Swedish Black Metal, Swedish Death Metal
Some sorry schmuck has to shovel it into a hole and set it on fire.
32 CommentsTags: Altered Perceptions, Amphisbaena, Anal Blasphemy, Aum, black 'n roll, Black Tomb, Celestial Grave, Chine, crypto-indie, deathcore, Faustian Dripfeed, Gespenst, hammerheart records, Hellbringer, hells headbangers, hipster bullshit, Hoath, Ill Omen, Iron Bonehead Productions, Mare Cognitum, metalcore, Rebaelliun, Rest, Saboter, sadistic metal reviews, Seventh Xul, Shadecrown, Shataan, Shokran, sig ar tyr, Sol Sistere, Soulwound, Summit, The Black Twilight Circle, The Hell's Decrees, The Last Band, Vlad in Tears, War Metal, Warpvomit, Wyruz
Metalheads tend to be wary of punk, recognizing it only for its role as an influence on metal. This attitude obscures the fact that the best of punk is worth exploring on its own terms and merits, starting with perhaps the greatest influence of punk technique and heightened aesthetics in that genre, hardcore punk‘s The Misfits.
49 CommentsTags: Crossover, Earth A.D., glenn danzig, Hardcore, Hardcore Punk, punk, punk rock, the misfits, Thrash
Metal — in any meaningful version of the word — has been dead for twenty years, but the death keeps accelerating, as if trying to achieve absolute zero of interest for people with souls. This has prompted a number of long-standing metal bands to explore hybrid genres, so they can carry on the spirit of metal in another form.
5 Comments
We recently reviewed the 2015 EP from Undead entitled Blood Enemy. This underground metal release combines the best of late 1980s speed metal with the architectural song transitions of Swedish death metal. Fortunately, the band were on hand to answer our questions about their music, approach and the art of death metal.
51 CommentsTags: death metal, Speed Metal, Undead
Renowned death metal cover painter Dan Seagrave has an upcoming exhibit of his Migrators September 17th at Eridanos Tattoo and Gallery in Cambridge, Massachusetts. More information may be found on the Facebook event page:
1 CommentTags: art, cover art, dan seagrave, death metal cover art
Article by Johan P.
This text is a continuation of the previously published article, The Difficulties of Folk Metal. As stated in Part I, the threefold aim of this multi-part article is, in rough terms, to: 1. Give a short introduction to the subject, 2. Point out some of the difficulties connected with integrating folk music into metal and finally, 3. Provide alternative methods of integration. Part II will be dedicated to the second part of this quest.
Naturally, there are limits regarding the scope of my endeavor – the most obvious demarcation being that the article primarily focuses on Swedish folk music. In my view, the critique of folk metal is an ongoing project, and this article should not be seen as an exhaustive treatment of the subject at hand.
So, if someone else out there finds the subject interesting, you are more than welcome to make contributions. It could be in the form of additional material (metal or folk related) and complementary ideas to enhance the project. For example, the depth and applicability of the arguments presented below would surely benefit if the scope could be expanded to include other forms of traditional music.
42 CommentsTags: folk, folk metal, genre, Heavy Metal, Månegarm, music analysis, musical analysis, neofolk, nokturnal mortum, Sweden, The Voice of Steel, Vredens Tid
