9.5
(8 votes)
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I used to hate Burzum. Recently, I started getting into real black metal, but still didn’t give Burzum’s music a fair chance – labeling it “lower rung” black metal. However, after careful listens I have come to realize that not only are the first 5 Burzum (Varg Vikerenes/Count Grishnack’s one man black metal project, from Norway) releases very influential, but are also essential listening for any black metal fan. Varg’s minimalist approach to music and his genius created some of the best black metal ever recorded (though, I am not a fan of Hvis Las Tar Oss). Filosofem, in my opinion, is the pinnacle of Burzum’s career and the perfect outpour of Varg’s views and philosophy (www.burzum.com). You may not, and probably won’t agree with his views, but he certainly is an interesting person. Filosofem is the most minimalist of Burzum’s works; it has a very lonely, depraved, funereal and depressing sound to it, with suchlike production to back it up. Varg uses repetition and recurrence to bring his point across, and does a grand job of it. This album is, unfortunately, the last worthy Burzum album, for since this release Varg has been in jail for murdering Euronymous of Mayhem. In jail, he has released two albums, which are mainly ambient works and do not interest me even remotely.
The album kicks in with “Dunkelheit” which, as the title suggests is an extremely dark, dismal song. Slow drumming and a wonderfully simple riff, plus the minimal use of keys for the purpose of atmosphere create a brooding, yet classy black metal song. More than the riff, I love the keyboard line, which comes across as trance-like… and works! This album also carries Varg’s best vocal approach, which is not as piercing as on his earlier work. Instead, it is rather muddled and distant, perfectly suiting the mood he creates. “Jesus' Tod” is the fastest song on the album, and yet succeeds in putting me into a trance. The song starts off with a trill-like riff, repeats itself, and then kicks in with speedy drumming and forlorn shrieks. The music hardly changes throughout this 8 and a half minute song, and The Count’s repetitions are not only spell-inducing and hypnotic but are also a good introduction to the rest of this 6-track album.
“Erblicket die Tochter des Firmaments” is easily the best song on this masterpiece, and possibly the greatest black metal song ever written. This one finds Varg going back to the slower, brooding style and the main riff here is the loneliest one I have ever heard, and I find myself going back to it over again as it works like magic. It is immaterial that that song has negligible changes – Varg still manages to produce a depressive yet majestic, lonesome yet powerful, classic. His vocals are at their absolute best, and the overall song does well to bring out the pagan nihilism that lies deep within the man. Brilliant.
“Gebrechlichkeit .i.” and “Gebrechlichket .ii.” are as minimalist as metal music can get. Both songs are very similar and carry the same simplistic keyboard line. The guitar on both songs can be safely described as “guitar noise” – there is no riff present as such, just simple strumming using loads of painful distortion. The former contains droning, severe vocals; the latter being an instrumental. This extremely minimalist approach has also been used by Judas Iscariot, in the last song of the classic “Distant In Solitary Night” album, except the vocals are spoken word propaganda. In between these two works of monotonous art lies a 25 minute long ambient piece called “Rungang um die transzendentale Saule der Singularitat”. This took me some time to appreciate, and many others still cannot find any use in it, and simply skip it. However, even though this keyboard piece is “singular” (as the title suggests) and really never gets anywhere, it lends chunks of atmosphere to Filosofem and suits the despondent mood perfectly, pushing it a few steps further. Maximum effect is achieved at night, in complete darkness. I wouldn’t play this song randomly, but in my opinion, without it this classic would be incomplete. Oh yeah, and try playing this during the darker parts of a PC game like Doom – perfect!
On the whole, this album is a classic and I can find nothing wrong in it. Dull, sullen, minimalist, weird, sad, pagan, nihilistic – this is Burzum at its most impeccable. The Count has come a long way from “Burzum/Aske” with this, and it is entirely too bad he has to be in jail and stop playing black metal. Another album in this vein would have been killer! Filosofem is essential; if you are a black metal listener and don’t have this, shame on you. (5/5)
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Ignorance isn't bliss; Ignorance is ignorance, just that.
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