Satyricon - Black Metal

You know how little kids are always trying to imitate adults, but since they don't 'get' what makes adults do what they do, they end up cargo culting various adult activities such as good to work or driving the car, which is sometimes hilarious or so I'm told by the comments on Youtube videos. You know where I'm going with this analogy. Satyr is the small kid, and the adults are the bands he imitates: Darkthrone, Burzum, Mayhem, and more recently Phantom and Vermin. But just like the kid in the analogy, Satyr doesn't 'get' what makes black metal, so he ends up applying black metal technique - distortion, shrieked vocals, blast beats - to what is otherwise some relatively mundane Iron Maiden inspired heavy metal.

Does that make Satyricon a cargo cult band? I want to give them points for efforts, particularly as Satyr has always been very supportive of his black metal peers, in a scene where ego clashes were all but the rule, but really, he just doesn't 'get' black metal. Let's take Nemesis Divina, usually considered Satyricon's best work. It sounds like a bad Dissection clone, made even more random and carnival-like. Nemesis Divina is barely even black metal, resembling more of a Gothenburg band like Arch Enemy getting the Roadrunner 'black metal treatment' - i.e. more distortion, more blast beats, more riffs. It's just not a good album, and not even Nocturno Culto could save it from being completely forgotten while even the crappiest sounding of Burzum's early demos is worshiped as a black metal monument.

Avoid this band, or only listen to Nemesis Divina out of curiosity. Prefer the originals, Mayhem, Phantom, Darkthrone, Burzum, Vermin, etc.