The late great Sam Levenson once said, “Don’t watch the clock; do what it does. Keep going.” Had we followed Sam’s advice we might have led a fuller life but most likely would have failed to notice that on this very day 25 years have passed since Bathory released their seminal third album Under the Sign of the Black Mark.

Though we here at Bazillion Points listen to Bathory all the time, no one has loved, talked about, or thought of Bathory more than Swedish Death Metal author Daniel Ekeroth.  When he realized this important date was imminent, he instantly sent over a list of his favorite Bathory albums, wishing for it to be published on this historical day. We gratefully obliged.

TOP FIVE BATHORY ALBUMS, a list by Daniel Ekeroth

Blood Fire Death

In hard competition with Under the Sign of the Black Mark, this takes the biscuit as my favorite Bathory album. It’s their most majestic release in my eyes, with the most powerful sound and best vocals. It also contains the two most epic Bathory songs of all time: “A Fine day to Die” and “Blood Fire Death”. Though I personally prefer the occult lyrical content of the previous albums, I can accept the Viking stuff here since Blood Fire Death just sounds and feels so awesome. The record is just a miracle, shredding the boundaries between black, thrash and death metal. It’s one of a kind, and defies categorization.

Under the Sign of the Black Mark

If you are looking for the pure essence of black metal, your quest ends here. Under the Sign of the Black Mark features some of Bathory’s best songs, a wonderful atmosphere and screams that will give you nightmares. It is also a perfectly structured album, where the songs balance each other into an almost conceptual whole. This is the blueprint of all black metal to follow, and to this day the most accomplished black metal record ever made.

Bathory

“Venom on speed!” I remember thinking when I first heard this album, and I still stand by that. In fact, this is what I wanted Venom to be back then—faster, more intense and more extreme. It still holds up as one of the best albums of its era, with a devilish atmosphere and strong, catchy songs.

The Return

Probably Bathory’s most extreme album—it hit like an atomic bomb on its release day. I don’t think the songs are as strong as on the debut, and the sound and execution are not on par with the two albums that would follow. However, this is as violent and primitive as early black metal ever got and still a unique album in all its unpolished glory. Strangely, this is the only of the classic Bathory albums that was recorded in a professional studio—though by far sounding the worst!

Hammerheart

The last Bathory album that meant anything to me, and a classic in its own right I guess. The vocals and the production kind of screw it up for me although I really like the songs. If this had recorded in the same way as Blood Fire Death it would probably have been a masterpiece.

RIP, QUORTHON! /Daniel Ekeroth

Swedish Death Metal is the ultimate blow-by-blow account of Sweden’s legendary death metal underground, based on exclusive interviews with members of Nihilist/ Entombed, In Flames, At the Gates, Dismember, Grave, Hypocrisy, Opeth, Unleashed, Marduk, Morbid, Mob 47, Deranged, Edge of Sanity, Merciless, Therion, Liers in Wait, Carnage, Carcass, Tiamat/Treblinka, Afflicted, Repugnant, and the Haunted.

Below is a picture of Bazillion Points author Jon “Metalion” Kristiansen—sporting an appropriate SLAYER MAG t-shirt and a Morbid hoodie—posing in the Slayer Mag corner of Neseblod’s black metal exhibition at Popsenteret in Oslo. Kristiansen unfortunately had to return to Sarpsborg but the exhibition will run until April 29th. Dette bør du ikke gå glipp av!

Jon Kristiansen, backed up by trusted metal warriors Nifelheim

Today marks the premiere of the SLAYER MAG portion of Neseblod’s ongoing black metal exhibition at Oslo’s Popsenteret. Jon Kristiansen will personally be on location to present his classic zine as well as photos from his private collection. The exhibition runs until April 29th, but Kristiansen will be there from the 4th through the 7th.

Those of us who won’t be able attend can always read said zines and look at said photos in Kristiansen’s memoir/SLAYER MAG anthology METALION: The Slayer Mag Diaries. You know, the book MSN called “the best metal book of 2011, possibly ever.” That’s right.

There’s also this video. The SLAYER MAG corner shows up at the 2:28 mark:

First off, life is hard for a blog these days. With the Facebook and Twitter quick-fixes available, not just Bazillion Points and me personally, but every single book we’ve published is able to shower the world with quick daily updates. Between the pages of actual publication, that’s a lot of updates. But woe the neglected blog… okay, I’ll try to do better.

Several years ago, a small film crew visited the old downstairs Bazillion Points HQ, and I told them what I thought about Bobby Liebling and Pentagram. That was kind of the low point of Pentagram history, several quiet years past the summer 2001 no-show debacle at the Recher Theatre in Towson, MD. Except for that fiasco, I had never actually seen the band, and didn’t except to. The trajectory of one of America’s earliest, evilest, and most unsung heavy rock bands seemed to be pointing headlong towards ashes and dust.

Fast-forward slowly to 2012, and all kinds of unlikely turns have come to pass. I’ve seen Pentagram indoors and outdoors in three zip codes and sixteen Bobby Liebling costume changes! Don Argott and Demian Fenton have completed their documentary, Last Days Here, and they could not have asked for a brighter bouquet of flowers at the end of a long slog through the smelly dirt. Grab your popcorn and see the parable of death, music, good and bad luck, and the power of several kinds of love.

LAST DAYS HERE in the New York Times

When Mean Deviation was just the germ of an idea, when there was only a “non-fiction book proposal” and maybe three pages of notes to show for it, I had lots of ideas for the book that ultimately never came to fruition. Like:

• A sidebar rant called “Why Symphony X isn’t progressive,” but that didn’t quite happen the way I originally envisioned (well, it kinda sorta did—it evolved into Chapter 13. Deviation or Derivation?).

• A page of ‘70s-era prog rock album cover art images that could easily have graced later metal albums, drawing yet another parallel between early prog and modern metal. Covers from Omega (The Hall of Floaters in the Sky), Gnidrolog (Lady Lake), Neuschwanstein (Battlement), and others were to be featured, but it didn’t happen. Maybe a future blog?

Doomsword or Primordial would have killed for this album cover, no?

• Features on metal artists and fans who were steadfastly “anti-progressive,” giving voice to those averse to mixing prog rock’s peanut butter with metal’s chocolate. I wanted to talk to the most militant metal purists. I thought of Tom Angelripper from Sodom, and of Don of the Dead from the long-running NunSlaughter. I did talk to Don for the book, but the whole idea just didn’t fit in the book after all. Our interview begins after the jump…

Read the rest of this entry »

“Alright, this is another fast one… but aren’t they all?”
Read the rest of this entry »

The printer proofs of the limited Murder in the Front Row dustjackets arrived today. These measure x 27.5″ wide x 11.5″ high, and will be wrapped around copies of the book shipped directly from Bazillion Points. Each side features a photo by one of the book’s authors, Harald Oimoen and Brian Lew, with Harald’s classic Metallica yard FxUx pic facing outward (he had just told them he needed to split to go see Megadeth, true!). Brian Lew’s side offers some Exodus blood-upon-the-stage action, starring one murderous fan lower left with the infamous call to arms written in gaffer tape on the back of his denim: KILL!

This book is amazing collection of inspired moments from probably the most energized local scene heavy metal has ever known. More to come!

Click the photo above to enlarge. And join the Facebook page for regular commentary by Misters Oimoen and Lew…

Main site:

MURDER IN THE FRONT ROW

Here’s a plumb pulled from the written portion of Murder in the Front Row:

In upcoming SF thrash metal photo book MURDER IN THE FRONT ROW: Shots From the Bay Area Thrash Metal Epicenter, by Harald Oimoen and Brian Lew, guitarist Gary Holt of Exodus (and currently Slayer) claims that the bruising scenes seen nightly at metal shows everywhere first came to thrash metal from punk at Ruthie’s Inn in Berkeley, CA.

“From our first show together with Slayer,” Holt writes, “to all the shows with everyone from Death Angel, Possessed, Violence, Legacy, and many others, Ruthie’s Inn lives in infamy because it’s the one and only birthplace of violence becoming part and parcel to an Exodus show. I had never seen a stage dive, a pit, or anything coming close to resembling that before Ruthie’s. It was born there, with the help of Wes Robinson and the Exodus Slay Team, and anyone who says different doesn’t know what they’re talking about or they’re lying to you. While the rest of the metal world would later come around and learn the joys of a little good friendly violent fun, it all started there at Ruthie’s, end of story.”

Holt’s full essay joins over 400 color and black and white live, candid, and studio photos in the large-format hardcover MURDER IN THE FRONT ROW book, an untouchable eyewitness viewpoint into the sometimes violent mid-1980s San Francisco metal scene that launched Metallica, Exodus, Testament, Death Angel, and Possessed, and first supported Megadeth and Slayer. The book will be available December 2011 wherever books are sold, including directly from Bazillion Points with a limited two-sided exclusive poster-size dustjacket.

See this location for page samples and preorder info: http://www.murderinthefrontrow.com

Our charged-up friends at ACDCcollector.com have uploaded a brief preview of Bazillion Points’ forthcoming DIRTY DEEDS: My Life Inside/Outside of AC/DC, by former AC/DC bass player Mark Evans. The short PDF includes a scene which is set in the lovely city of Paris, costarring Bon Scott, and it can be downloaded here [click the teeny "AC/DC News" link on the left].

DIRTY DEEDS is the first insider account of the classic Bon Scott years of AC/DC, a gripping, laugh-out-loud tale of a band that lived fast and played harder than anyone else. For more info about the book and to pre-order (with bonus metal badge), visit the main Bazillion Points page.

Daniel Ekeroth’s beloved Swedish Death Metal book has had some rabid supporters over the years, but voracious reader Alex Sooz from Spain is walking the extra mile with Nicke Andersson’s iconic cover illustration tattooed into her flesh. Needles over several sessions by Jaime Bosch at Inkfierno in Mallorca, Spain.