Text written by WikiBrother Halison Xavier for the column Scream For Me, WikiBrother
I've wanted to write about rock/metal for a long time, and at this point in my life, I couldn't start with any other band than Celtic Frost.
At the end of the year, Spotify released its year-end retrospective, and there they were all over the list, led by Thomas Gabriel , also known as Tom G. Warrior.
But what did I find so fascinating about this band, which is rarely remembered today, that makes me listen to them so much in 2021?
The usurper's tears guide my sword
At a time when I was particularly interested in black metal, a playlist of songs that were essential to the development of the style, curated by the famous drummer Fenriz from Darkthrone, came to my attention.
The first thing that caught my attention wasn't Frost, but rather the fact that the playlist was headlined by none other than my fellow countrymen from Sarcófago , with the song "Satanic Lust".
At that moment, I was overcome with genuine Minas Gerais pride, knowing that what was being done here in Belo Horizonte in the 80s crossed the ocean and reached Scandinavia, but not only that, it was very influential on what would be done in extreme metal in the following decades.
However, upon listening further to the playlist, still among the first songs, there was the somber "Dawn of Megiddo," from the album To Mega Therion , which translates from Greek as "the great beast."
The great beast
When I heard that, it was a mixture of ecstasy with a hint of strangeness.
I was already familiar with Frost, through "Procreation (Of The Wicked)", but "Dawn of Meggido" was on another level. It featured a raw and direct sound like the band's early songs, but this time with impeccable production.
All that ambiance and symphonic elements, which in other bands and styles I used to turn my nose up at and still do, made perfect sense there.
The drumbeats and string sounds, orchestrated in the style of Wagner, brought to mind a dark and gloomy abyss above the River Styx, through which I was to navigate to meet her: The great beast from the cover of To Mega Therion.
The disturbing artwork on that cover is probably the biggest blasphemy I've ever seen in my life. It brings a certain discomfort even to me, who has been away from God for quite some time now. I needed to listen to the whole album.
Innocence and Wrath
It's the name of the first track on the album: "Innocence and Wrath". A completely instrumental track, just over a minute long, that serves as an introduction to the album. In the first few seconds, symphonic elements appear and, combined with the heavy and dry tone of Tom Warrior's guitars, create an atmosphere of tension and suspense for the listener.
It's as if I can see the sound, and I see again the grotesque figure of the beast, accompanied by its malevolent, humanoid serpents, which move in a frenetic and mesmerizing way.
And so the album continues, heavy and raw while also being sophisticated and well-produced, offering allegories about man's desire for power and the nature of death. It's a bible of extreme metal.
Perpetual Shadows
Unfortunately, Celtic Frost is rarely mentioned today, even though they are the authors of such an influential masterpiece as To Mega Therion.
The avant-garde nature of artists like them paves the way for others to follow. They had the audacity to explore the unknown before everyone else and are influential to other bands for that reason, even if they are little remembered in the mainstream. These are the perpetual shadows of the work of Thomas Gabriel Fisher , a man ahead of his time.
What CF and Hellhammer did, as well as what Black Sabbath did decades before, is what I believe metal should be: Paradigm-breaking, disrupting the status quo and reinventing itself cyclically. This ignites my passion for metal and inspires me to write here.
“After the battle is over
And the sands drunken the blood
All what there remains
Is the bitterness of delusion…”
*This text was written by a Wikimate and does not necessarily represent the opinions of the site's authors.
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