Burzum - "Belus" (Nor)

For better or worse, the early 90s Norwegian black metal scene came to be the defining force in the second wave of black metal. A lot of arguments can be made for either. Falling into the "better" category is the vast amount of quality produced by the country from 1989 to 1994. Boasting an incredibly high signal to noise ratio that remains unparalleled to the day, the Norwegian scene was operating between a lower bound of "very good" and an upper bound of "genre defining masterpiece". The music produced during this time was instrumental in pushing the genre away from a more traditional rockish riff-based approach and more towards an atmospheric, ambient construction. In contrast, falling into the "worse" camp, the scene shortly fizzed out, became a parody of itself and inspired countless lesser talented bands who would flood the market with lukewarm rehashes. In direct contrast to Norway's response against “trendy” death metal (a bit silly to state, considering most of the Norwegian bands started out as death metal and all conviniently jumped ship at the same time, nevermind all the killer death metal that was being produced in Sweden or Finland, and the surprising lack of killer death metal being produced in Norway), the Norsk black metal sound soon became a trend itself. While bands like Darkthrone developed a sense of humor and grew the ability to laugh at themselves though a series of good and highly enjoyable later albums, Emperor just turned into a joke. The legion of awful synth black metal bands that followed “In the Nightside Eclipse” is amongst the worst music recorded by anyone at any given time, and its truly astounding how much of it there is. Its always unfair to harshly judge a scene based on the merits of the low quality imitators rather than the original classics, but given the gap in quality between the original bands and the clones, its a big turnoff for me to hear a Norse-inspired sound in a present day band.

Burzum is one of the most oft imitated bands to emerge from Norway's black metal scene, and listening to the music, its incredibly easy to see why. Burzum's sound was extremely new and unique, and while initially inspired by the Thorns demos, quickly progressed to a sound on "Hvis Lyset Tar Oss" and "Filosofem" that embodied the Norwegian shift away from the more traditional heavy metal based sound of black metal's first wave. More closely resembling ambient music in structure than heavy metal, Burzum's music is dark, dischordant, tense and brooding. As with ambient music, the songwriting focus is placed almost entirely on the atmosphere; there is barely any energy in the songs, and the song structures are extremely repetitive and long. Working within this kind of framework requires a great deal of talent, and Varg's imitators often possess a fraction of his compositional skills. Most of the Burzum inspired bands I've heard have been tedious and boring, which is something that Burzum was never guilty of ("Daudi Baldrs" doesn't count as that is more in the 'unintentionally hilarious' category). I find this to be a shame, as I consider "Hvis Lyset Tar Oss" and "Filosofem" to be pinnacle of black metal as a whole; very dark and textured music that does not have an equal, past or present.

"Belus" is Varg's first metal album in almost 15 years. "Filosofem" was probably the last of the truly great Norwegian black metal albums to emerge from the 90s explosion, and Varg's incarceration coincided with the time when the scene imploded upon itself. "Daudi Baldrs" was an embarassment, and while I liked "Hlidskjalf" a great deal, it had nothing to do with what was going on in the black metal scene at the time. Given the lapse of time between that (1999) and 2010, combined with the high opinion I have of Burzum's early work, I was a bit skeptical when I heard that he was returning to writing metal music. A lot of the older greats are never able to recapture the magic of their earlier albums in the later stages of their careers, but upon actually hearing the album in its entirety, I couldn't be more pleased at how much it exceeded my expectations.

Stylistically the album very much plays out as the logical successor to "Filosofem". The layered approach to the guitar playing, its tone and the droning role in the music bear a great deal of resemblance to that album; the vocals are also delivered in a distorted rasp similar in “Filosofem”'s tone. A far cry away from the manic shrieks on the first three albums, these vocals are less harsh but work extremely well within the context of this music. The bass is quite prominent in the mix, and works extremely well in contrast to fill out the trebly guitars. Largely used for rhythmic punctuation, the bass was never fully utilized on earlier Burzum records, and its presence here adds a lot to the music.

Synths are used extremely tastefully and subtlely on this album. At no point are they overbearing or appear at inopportune places within the music, nor do they go off in their own direction for half of the album's running length. For the most part, the music is more dominated and driven by the guitars, which guide the listener through one of the best black metal albums from the last 10 years.

I don't know if I like "Belus" more than "Filosofem" or not, as "Filosofem" has the advantage of having 14 years to sink in. "Filosofem" was one of the first 'real' black metal albums I bought, and I've listened to it countless times since. However, after listening to "Belus" almost non-stop for a few weeks after its release, I can't identify a single weak point on the album. Aside from the brief 30 second intro of a hammer majestically hitting an anvil (which sounds so weak that I thought it was footsteps until Dodens Grav told me otherwise), the album is extremely strong throughout its duration. "Sverddans" is a ripping throwback to the first Burzum album that seems to come out of nowhere, and the rest of the album surrounding this track is made up of extremely well constructed songs which rank amongst Burzum's finest. The intro is totally inconsequential, and while it would have been best to have been left off entirely, it doesn't take much effort to move the needle a few millimeters to the right.

Probably the most poignant thing about this album's release is how much it illustrates the gap between Burzum's songwriting and the songwriting of Burzum influenced bands. Before Varg went to prison, the wave of totally generic, Norse inspired black metal was just in its infacy stages. Its fairly safe to say that the black metal scene has been largely stagnant since the Norwegian scene fell apart, and aside from the Canadian war metal scene and random acts here and there, I haven't been impressed by too many of the genre's recent entries. By 2010, thousands of generic Burzum influenced albums have come out, and “Belus” still manages to sound fresh and new in a style that has been largely stale for about a decade. "Belus" is everything that I had thought impossible - a logical followup to "Filosofem" that manages to progress musically without sacrificing quality. When receiving the album I was hoping for simply "just good", and I'm glad I got something that sits amongst the best. While I'm not confident the rest of the old Norwegian black metal scene will follow suit and release excellent albums, it wouldn't be realistic to expect anything anywhere near that. As long as Burzum can continue producing music half this good, I won't really mind too much.