The Next 2000 Years Are Ours | Review By: Noa Kushnir
Snap out of it already!
"Only my hands could provide the rest and suffering"…Uh oh, looks like that very same hand's the one now suffering. Also, that song's like from a month ago. Snap out of it.
So what's up with that thing on your hand? Hospitalized? Mental ward again? How many times have I told you - that music of yours does no good to no one…Well I wasn't hospitalized, but I was very close to missing this gig after a vile stomach/throat virus that made me feel like something straight out of this song rendered me bedridden. But whoever knows me, knows I'd go any length to feed my passion for music and writing. And go I did.
So a few days after the first wave of body aches and sore throat subsided, I found myself carpooling again with some friends, on my way to witness this happen, live and in the flesh, before our gaping eyes, ears and mouths.
Oh, and that hospital bracelet was the ticket. Instead of the usual stamp on your right hand.
A personal acquaintance with a true Hero to be
So I'm sure many of you have seen pictures like this one circulating around local social media. In case you were wondering, they're real. No Photoshop skill can mimic the horrible quality of this picture taken by my phone camera. I truly appreciate Mr. KzR for willing to put up with doing selfies with all the star-struck fanboys, creepy stalkers and wannabe musicians/journalists who dabble in occult that may or may have not pestered him during that evening. Hell, he even manned the well-stocked merch table at the beginning of the evening. And that thing literally made me feel like a kid in a candy store in a world where candy wrappers were designed by Greco-Roman/Indo European occultists.
Being a fan of all their releases, I would have bought all their discography on vinyl right there, were I capable of affording them all. Plus, all their releases are a feast for the eye. In fact, I was originally drawn to listen to their works after falling in love with the cover art of Roman Acupuncture. The arabesque of Meandros-like patterns surrounding the spear on the front cover initially made me mistake them for a Hellenic act. A closer look revealed these "Meandros" patterns were in fact a chain of solar symbols – just like the one inscribed on their frontman's right hand, which caused somewhat of a controversy in this interview by Haaretz.
And the man's fixation with astral bodies didn't end there. During what started out as a brief conversation, I noticed that his fingers were adorned by the different phases of the sun and the moon. Turns out his whole right hand and whole left hand were dedicated to solar and lunar symbols respectively. The left hand being the passive, feminine and lunar hand, the right one being the dominant, male and solar hand – as in a material representation of an active/passive, Chthonic/Solar duality known in the world of tradition, whose representation by gender may, as many may not know, change according to context. It's always great to meet other people who are familiar with this duality known to the traditional world. I would have been glad to have more conversations like that with more people in my life and I would have died to keep up this Occult/Traditionalist conversation with him and enrich my growing knowledge in the field, but Dim Aura were already up on stage, so I reluctantly excused myself. Oh, the sacrifices you make for the sake of full media coverage…
Dim Aur
The Dim bill of fare
So let's start with the good part. These guys' live gig did sound great with eyes closed. The vocals were so powerful, the guitars were cold and clear as ice water, sharp and penetrating as freshly unpackaged razor blades.
But the stage show?
Where were the days where Mr. H would conquer the stage with his thumb flipping and throat cutting gestures, not to speak of that hangman's noose he would flip out from time to time that used to run shivers down my spine? Where have all these gone?
Is that you or me? Maybe I was provincial and naive as fuck back then, but I used to remember their stage shows being better.
Well, there's no other words beside "skinny" and "anemic" to better describe what I saw that night on stage. The rich, powerful aura created by their sound seemed to deflate to nothing like a big bag of hot air once my eyes were open.
The stage seemed so empty and oversized – even for the quartet which they were. The guys did nothing to conquer and fill it up, though each and every one of them looked great on their own. Was it the lack of interaction between band members?
Ferum's amazing stage presence. Maybe I should have stood closer to the stage.
On top of that, H was unfortunately doing a miserable job trying to sell his otherwise great vocal abilities to the audience. The poor guy ended up looking like a kid throwing a fit yelling "I! I! I!" in a poor attempt at making tons of noise that ends up drawing zero attention. Tons of "hot air" again, dispersing everywhere, leaving no residue, nothing to sink my teeth in, devoid of any lasting effect.
Now I remember him being a first class performer - complete with a set of bloodthirsty crazy eyes and all. These eyes of his could render all props and gestures all too redundant – although these never hurt. Maybe it was the bad and unflattering lighting in the Gagarin that hid away all the great details whose presence could have otherwise made it into a much more believable and convincing stage show.
The much anticipated crazy eyes were hidden but apparently still there.
Again, the music itself was great. I virtually have no complaints. The band seemed to do everything right. Vocalist H even pulled out a guitar of his own during one of the songs. I wouldn't have pulled that off on stage.
But did it touch my heart? Why not?
I understood from an old Interview with H that the band's main lyrical themes and sources of inspiration lie within the realm of Nihilism, but the stage show and recent inflation of bands and people in the underground taking the easy way out by following the neutral and by now rather trite path of Nihilism got me seriously questioning the authenticity and originality (more on that later) behind what I've just saw and heard.
I can expand all this to a grand discussion on authenticity and lyrical themes in Black Metal, but I've decided to do that elsewhere, as most of the things I was about to say there might have not (and I hope not!) applied to our favorite Black Metal quartet discussed here…
I've been planning to do an article on the exploitation of Satanism, nihilism and other such topics in Black Metal, so I won't share my full thoughts on the subject of bands/individuals taking the easy way out by being dollar store nihilists right here – and again these words have nothing to do with Dim Aura as I'm still not sure what their story is. I love these guys with all my heart and would like to believe every word of theirs comes from the heart. Plus, I hate judging.
So the first three songs on their set list came from their newer, full length album. The sound of which I've lovingly dubbed "Darkpathian Forest", following a comment from a friend of mine about them sounding like Darkthrone and Carpathian Forest, and in a more general sense, like a fusion between raw BM and Black n roll. And I've got somewhat of a soft spot for Black n roll.
But then the fourth song on the set list started out, and I was sure it was a cover to Horna's Merkuriana. Was it the slow beginning that brought up this association? I was already cheering toward fast paced part and partly tipping my nonexistent hat for H who dared sing in Finnish.
But it wasn't.
So you see what I mean, I love their sound. I love their taste and all their aesthetic and musical choices and that made me fall so miserably for them on the first place. I felt proud that someone on this god forsaken piece of land finally got what Black Metal's all about and knew how to do it right. Not to mention the part of doing that on an international level, as they were one of the first pure BM acts to "make it" in the European underground.
But cheap patriotism aside, we must remember that an understanding of a genre happens when a myriad of influences that are indistinguishably digested into a primal soup spawns something completely different that makes use of these influences to reflect the artist's personality.
Also, that very same unique combination of influences itself can create this reflection of the artist's uniqueness but these guys seem to be afraid of straying too far from what today's scene deems "acceptable" sources of inspiration for the genre they're creating. And that might be the thing somewhat suppressing the growth of their own unique personality as a band.
But then again, maybe they don't have any intentions of becoming nothing more than a homage act to classic Black Metal and its aesthetics. I'm totally fine with that.
Each and every one of them looked great from up close.
Having said all this, I must say I take no pleasure saying these kind of things.
These are the times I hate being a music critic and somewhat of a musician at the same time…There's always that inevitable question, can I do better? Have I done better? Knowing all the difficulties involved in making music - the writer's blocks, the many moments of insecurity and second guessing, all these times I've asked myself "why bother? Why do music?", all these times I berate myself, trying to forcefully and unwillingly convince myself to give up this passion for this seemingly trifle "pastime" of mine, telling myself to "grow up" and "out of it", not to speak of all the self-inflicted criticism and self-doubts that eat you up like an avalanche of caustic water - against which you struggle and gasp for air most of the time while trying to make the most out of the few and sparse moments of calm – hoping one day to reach a terra firma of confident clarity where you can drink freely from the many sources of inspiration around you and keep that white hot creative fire ceaselessly burning.
Being torn between being inauthentic and appearing unappreciative of the efforts made by fellow musicians, I'll have to unwillingly choose telling the truth. After all I hate lying and there's nothing more I despise in this world than being a hypocrite.
So now I'm here to face the music. I might have really gotten on these guys' nerves this time...If that didn't already happen a few years ago in that awkward moment when I accidentally barged backstage at the now defunct Sublime show venue.
Bölzer
Look, even their setlist has some pretty artwork on it... Some of the songs were from Hero, some were from their older releases.
By the time I reentered the venue, it was already filled up. Will the Mardukian nightmare that happened here two years ago repeat itself once more in this now renovated venue? On one hand I was happy to see us keeping up the packed-club momentum that started out last month with Aosoth. It was a good sign of support from the local underground. It could certainly mean a brighter future, but there was another part in me that totally hoped it won't be another Marduk hits the Gagarin looking bummed out on stage kind of ordeal. I just couldn't stand seeing another unhappy artist walk out of this notoriously bad venue.
Well, unlike that case with Marduk, at least the stage was less crowded this time, and the mic was adjusted to match the height of their mammoth of a vocalist.
The word "Hero", which is also the title of their latest effort, was used in the Roman tradition to distinguish between a man who has always been god (Deus) and a man who has become a god through some kind of an act of initiation (Divus or Hero). I have no idea if that was their concept behind this title. But excuse my superficiality, the word "Hero" can be pretty much used to describe how their vocalist/guitarist looks on stage - shirtless. Seriously, this mammoth of a man has the body of a Greco-Roman hero and a natural crown of copper hair. Think Hercules/Heracles – but with a guitar instead of the occasional weapon in hand.
A guitar wielding Hercules
The drummer, an equally good looking other half of the band came in the form o f a black haired Nocturno Culto doppelganger (you can argue but that's the association that jumped up to my mind the moment I saw him), whose truly bombastic, spectacular performance on the set even managed to surpass his great looks.
The stage lights burnt low - maybe a bit too low. But the sense of sight was, aside from giving a glimpse on musical virtuosity of duo, virtually unnecessary here, as my ears and mind were more than sufficient.
Stage lights burning low
There were only two of them on stage but the sound they've managed to produce up there was equivalent to that of ten average sized extreme metal bands. On our way home, we wondered how that could be even possible. I recalled a conversation I recently had with a bassist, and what he said about the similarity between a bass guitar and a percussion instrument. So that kind of explains where the bass sounds came from, but where could they possibly hide that extra guitar? Am I underestimating the vocalist's multitasking abilities by assuming he hasn't got another pair of hands like some kind of Hindu god?
Speaking of which, this guy's vocal abilities are truly something. For one moment, the man can roar like some kind of angry force of nature and then in the next he'll switch to howling melancholy cleans of lonely desert wolf that seem to rise and reverberate into the material world from great sources which reside beyond what we deem tangible. What are these sources? Only he himself can tell.
The music itself incorporates elements of retro 60's 70's rock into extreme metal while making this unusual combination work like a charm. As a fan of both genres I'm totally digging this.
Some may define the style of their latest effort as a fusion with stoner, I'd rather dub it Desert/Meditation Metal as somewhat of a reference to Jim Morrison's experience at the high desert region of New Mexico, but also because the meditative quality here is crystal clear, calm, yet unmovable and solid as a rock, and feels very different than that blunt, hazy state of mind of a man high on weed.
I must admit I'm not a great fan of the desert, but maybe this music might draw me closer to its barren unforgiving beauty. Maybe this same sense of barren clarity is also what one feels while meditating. Could this be a motivation for me to meditate more? Having replicated what seems to be this state of mind in their music, I can't help but wonder if anyone in the band knows anything useful about this form of mental art I'm trying to master…
I stood among the crowd and closed my eyes. I could see a clear turquoise sky above merging with the golden dunes at an undisrupted horizon. My feet seemed to magically sail where they would have otherwise drowned, my body burned – clad in sand colored flames. Or were these hands of sand rising from the dunes, finally catching up with my will to defy their inevitable grasp? I felt myself surrender without struggle, to be swum by the many undercurrents of sand now flowing beneath and around me like a silver sea. Above, the blinding white hot sun burned in its will to draw every bit of the silver liquid including my now liquefied flesh up to the heavens. Am I finally bound to touch the sun? Am I being given a chance in this lifetime, to thus transcend the ephemeral material world? And why does everything suddenly seem so clear and easy? I attempted to touch one of the many rays of sunlight, protruding like golden spears from a white hot source, only to realize that in the next moment I was being hurled down into a canyon of jagged rocks, a fallen Icarus, prey to his hubris, to die but not to become.
Sorry for getting carried away into so many clichés. Sometimes I just tend to get into really weird trains of thought when listening to really good music, like some kind of trance or weird trip, I guess.
This state which I was in all through their part of the evening made me completely forget about my dry throat and ailing, virus-struck body. And when the gig came to its unexpected end, my hand unconsciously reached to rub my chest in contentment, as if a sweet golden elixir of pure sunlight has just been poured down my throat.
After arriving home at around 4:00 AM my body might have been in the seventh circle of virus hell for the next few days, but my soul was soaring and is still soaring within the heavenly realms of pure light and ecstasy.
I have taken a small piece of this aural sunlight with me, bottled up in a vinyl copy of "Hero", just so I can bask once more in its golden embrace once the black clouds inevitably regather.
Thanks for the inspiration. You may be mortal now, but your souls have been immortalized on this release. Those who wrote and sang the tale of the hero might be on the path to become immortal heroes themselves.
I've heard some complain about their part of the evening being too short. But these complaints sound almost unfair. What can we expect more from these two guys, after they've already put their hearts, souls and guts on table?
Summary
With another successful night behind us, we may have a chance that a great season of musical festivities may just as well happen.
What I saw that night on stage, as well as a few conversations I've had with people who turned out to be quite influential figures in the scene made me realize that even greater events await us in the future. I think we all owe our thanks here to the many unseen efforts made by a few saintly people who still remember the meaning of totally embracing the spirit of the underground.
What started out as a murmur and a whisper whose source I can't even tell, is on its way of catching an unstoppable momentum. Will we live to see a day in which underground extreme metal gigs and clubs march out of Tel Aviv to take over Haifa, my hometown again?
I can't believe I'd ever say this again in my life but it seems like the next 2000 years might certainly be ours. So let's keep up the good work we've already started. Whoever hasn't done this yet, join our forces by attending a gig or two, and show your support by buying music and merch straight from the artists.
Let's make extreme metal great again.
2/4/2017 Noa Kushnir
Photo courtesy: Alon Blau (on Bölzer), Oare Gat (on Dim Aura & Bölzer), my old phone (on all the rest)