is norway still producing the best black metal bands? if not which country is leading the way. i ask this because satyricon's last cd was by far their worst offering, darkthrone's last wasn't their worst but by no means their best, emperors done, immortals done and dimmu borgir are an album or 2 from taking their sound to a mainstream audience (but i hope not) in sorte diaboli is an awesome album but somewhat softer in comparison to death cult and puritanical.

You shouldn't care about this.

Immortal arent done

id say France is prolly the leading BM country atm

There is a black metal help thread:

http://www.metal-archives.com/board/vie ... hp?t=36166

There are also numerous other black metal threads in which this question can surely be answered.



Please use the search function.

i threw up several times when i read the first post.

Norwegian black metal is not dead, but I also don't think they're "producing the best bands" or "leading the way," as you put it. There are many great bands that come from Norway, such as Beastcraft, Tsjuder, Vulture Lord, etc.

I still enjoy Immortal's newer efforts somewhat, but there used to be so many great bands of several different styles from Norway. Mayhem, Darkthrone, Emperor, Ancient, Arcturus, Dodheimsgard, Theatre of Tragedy, Dimmu Borgir, Satyricon, Enslaved, etc... All of these bands have almost totally strayed from the styles that made them great. Some remained good to me, such as Darkthrone and Arcturus, but as a whole, Norway is nothing compared to what it used to be.

While I think it's interesting to know where certain bands come from, I could honestly care less. As long as they play good music, it's pointless to care whether they come from Mexico, Norway, China, or whatever.

Norway never was producing the best black metal bands.

When you say Norwegian black metal, do you mean bands like Cradle of Filth...?

Because of the internet globalization styles have meshed a lot between countries so it isn't as much about where is the best black metal coming from.

Besides that Finland, Sweden, France etc seem to be producing good bands.

FWIW COF is English BM. Or gothmetal. Or whatever.

In my opinion Italy lately got some good bands, Spite Extreme Wing and Melencolia Estatica above others.

You're not very smart.

1. For not realizing that he was joking.
2. For even thinking for a split second that COF is black metal.

Oh wonderful another person who doesn't think Cradle is BM. The age old fucking argument.

Atleast they USED to be. In my mind they still are... even with the largely "not-so-blackmetal" sound. Sure it's no old Marduk or Markhor or Xasthur but they are still pretty close to maintaining a more poliushed BM feel... though I would say they are more goth metal than anything.

And I did realize he was joking, there... buddy. I'm sure no one is that stupid. I've been on forums enough to know how to tell a joke. Thanks for the useless point out.

Cradle of Filth does not play black metal. I honestly don't think they ever played black metal. I think their old material had many elements of black metal, but I don't consider it strictly black metal. Listen to old Immortal, old Burzum, old Mayhem, old Darkthrone.....old Cradle of Filth just has a different sound than that. I know not everyone is going to agree with me, but that's just how I see it. I enjoy very little Cradle of Filth after their third demo anyway.

Oh yeah they are nothing like Burzum and all. I have the bands you name... and some other old stuff that doesn't sound like them... but I think they (COF) played a very unique blend of symphonic blackmetal.

Even one of their old guitar players (Paul I think. Not too sure) even denied that they played black metal in the earlier days. Dusk and Her Embrace is their closest thing to black metal in my opinion, and I agree that it was unique.

Dusk was definately one of the best from them... if not the best. I enjoy Vempire a lot as well. And when I first picked them up I was already familiar with older Emperor and Darkthrone so I know Cradle wasn't full-on fuck-your-mom-with-satan's-fist BM, but I still found their uniqueness very appealing.

1349? Some good new Norwegian black metal.

Check out the Niderosian bands for the new wave of BM from Norway, most notably One Tail One Head, Celestial Bloodshed, Kaosritual, Min Kniv, Mare, Morkenkunst etc...

The arguement at to Cradle's genre stance is so redundant. I can't count how many threads have just dissolved into a shit fit over whether or not ANY of their material is considered black metal.

In my opinion, I'd say that up until Cruelty and the Beast they were VERY heavily black metal influenced, but still do not retain full black metal standards. If anything they are closer to the symphonic side (ie Emperor) but are still much to goth based to be fully black metal.

As for the actual topic question, there is no way of saying that Norwegian black metal is either dead or alive based on the releases of its mainstream bands. Emperor, Immortal, Satyricon, Darkthrone, and Dimmu Borgir are certainly not the only black metal bands doing things in the Norwegian scene, nor are they an accurate representation of where the scene is heading for that matter. For better or for worse, the original black metal scene in Norway is never going to fully resound what it used to be. I wouldn't keep expecting that.

A lot of the bands have honestly just matured. When many of these bands started the members were in their late teens to early 20's at best. People change, the bands change, the music changes, the scene changes.

Hell yeah, revisionism is the new way to go!!