Metal has never really gotten the love it deserves in my opinion. Be it black metal, speed metal,thrash metal or grindcore, the focus has always ended up on the camp as opposed to the art.
This is no better exemplified than in film. Spinal Tap. Anvil. Heavy Metal Parking Lot, Fubar. It’s always been about the pomp, the circumstance and in many cases the stupid. That is untill now.
Until the Light Takes Us is a feature length documentary about black metal. An ideological movement? Sure. It was also a brand of music that exploded in the 1990′s, showering popular culture with metal musicians, murderers and mayhem. It’s also the most open minded look at metal culture that’s hit the silver screen. Taking to some of Scandanavian metal’s finest, it goes deep, talking to members of bands like Darktrone and Mayhem.
They didn’t burn down churches in Spinal Tap, but Norwegian Black metallers did. . The film takes you deep into the heart of darkness in a manner unlike anything. This has nothing to do with Satan and everything to do with art, activism and terror. What happens when the quest to make the biggest statement yet goes too far?
Metal as art with social and psychological ramifications usually get tucked to the side in North America. Manson gets blamed for Columbine yet not a single North American band member has worn a necklace made from the shards of skull of an ex-bandmate. Now that’s the sort of wrecker of civilization people might want to be worried about.