Black Metal vs Death Metal

is it okay to burn a church in front of a baby?

teach... your children hell...

i desperately wish to hear a serious BM/Delta Blues synthesis. yes i does.

deth

"I wonder if Abbott and I will be the only ones who vote for avant-garde black metal."

I voted straight Black Metal. A lot of what I like could be wedged into some sort of avant-garde BM category, but I just don't think it's meaningful at all. As far as I can see, BM has always included loads of "avant-garde" experimentation, it's not something that started at some arbitrary point five years ago or whatever. It's right there at the centre of the genre, and always has been.

I get a lot less out of what I hear from sworn exponents of Death Metal, but there's no question that the same arguments against a separate avant-garde category would apply.

Still, AFAICT there is a difference between Spektr and, I dunno, Emperor or something. I just meant that I don't know the genre as a whole really well but do enjoy and listen to what gets classified as 'avant-garde'. Like, I enjoy Mort more than I enjoy the more traditional BAN tracks that I've heard. I wonder if some of the bands I mentioned might possibly be better classified as "post-rock BM" or "psych/prog BM".

"there is a difference between Spektr and, I dunno, Emperor or something" - Yes, but probably no more more than the difference between Emperor and Mayhem, and a certainly a lot less than between Emperor and Abruptum - and I'm not slagging off Emperor BTW. There is truly wild stuff to be found from all eras of BM, trust me.

I'm still not clear on what's being classified as avant-garde.

Stuff hipsters like.

What about stuff weird avant-garde people like?

That's death metal.

Take a handful of bad acid, stick an Abruptum CD on repeat, and call me from jail.

So if I like Deathspell Omega, Absu, and Lair of the Minotaur, am I a weird avant-garde person, a hipster or what? You're kinda giving me an identity crisis here, Alex.

(If we have hipsters in Windsor, I'm pretty sure I'm not one of them.)
xpost

I mean, your points are well-take though, Soukesian. I'll listen to Abruptum.

xxpost it depends on which one you like the most obviously.

If I said I liked Deathspell Omega most, what then?

if you can imagine a kid in a carpathian forest t-shirt hearing about it before it's discussed at a mogwai show, it is not avant-garde.

I don't think I've ever heard carpathian forest or mogwai.

only one of those is a mistake.

xxxp then you are goth

what a relief!

if you can imagine a kid in a minor forest t-shirt hearing about it before it's discussed at a death angel show, it is avant-garde.

Haha, Abruptum was an avant-garde black metal and dark ambient band from Sweden

http://www.heavymetalonline.co.uk/acatalog/GS130.gif

^^^ not avant-garde.

"dark ambient" doesn't really appeal to me ... it reminds me of hippies.

On Deathlike Silence, not on MTV any time soon . .

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0yv_l6aDmRc

"Abruptum was an avant-garde black metal and dark ambient band from Sweden"

If they'd been from Norway they would have been straight Black Metal. It's the Swedish thing that avant-garde's 'em up a bit.

Earlier, as I said on a different thread, I heard Moonsorrow's 'Chapter V' by accident and it was revelatory, a quite gorgeous experience. Not exactly straight BM, but a great example of an original take on the genre, done superbly well. How those songs sustained my interest like that is testament to the thought put into their crafting.

nice to hear some love for that album. i seem to remember it was mocked for being easy listening on the rolling metal thread when it came out, but i've always loved it - even if it isn't very heavy.

multi-xpost - i don't understand what would make Deathspell Omega "avant-garde"... they seem like straight, if not discordant, BM with some pretty strong DM (specifically Morbid Angel/Suffocation) influences to me.

Also the fact that the lead singer was a dwarf.

he was also the opening to the vortex of all evil, don't forget that part.

obscuritatem really does make all "avant-garde" metal sound like it's not trying hard enough.

Abruptum released two albums on Euronymous's Deathlike Silence label. You can't get any more canonical second wave than that.

so without using examples of kids in t-shirts, could someone describe the difference between avant-garde black metal and non-avant-garde black metal?

You are too picky goth-girl.

Kids in t-shirts is perfectly reasonable way of explaining genre differences.

There is no difference. I speak as a goth, and therefore not a hipster.

Alex, I understand if you're not up to the challenge.

I'm liking Abruptum but I'm not sure why "avant-garde black metal" is a poor label for this, given some of the other things that are also classified as "black metal".

xposts

xp unfortunately t-shirts examples are really the limit of my criticism. Unless you'll accept bumper sticker examples? Or band logos drawn on desks?

if a fat kid who hates his parents and wouldn't understand the words "post-rock" would carve the band's name into his fleshy white bicep with an xacto knife in a show of allegiance, it's not avant-garde.

See that's why strongo's a professional and I still has a day job.

isn't "post-rock" rock that is boring?

Depends on who you ask, I think.

can you answer this for me using examples involving kids in t-shirts?

post rock isnt hip anymore so anyone on ilm who hates post rock is clearly a hipster!

my hypothetical fat kid is NOT a hipster.

xpost: Why is avant-garde a bad (sub-genre) label? Firstly, Abruptum predates most black metal. Secondly, part of the appeal of back metal, for me, is that it is all part of a strongly recognizable esthetic whole, even if this band sounds a bit like SPK and that band sounds a bit like Judas Priest. As a long-term fan of both those bands, that's got to work for me. Thirdly, "avant-garde" stinks of "this is the stuff it's OK to like".

xp - because he doesn't understand the words "post-rock" - hipsters have to understand them, because they signify something that isn't hip anymore.

are there any post-hipsters?