HEAVY MUSIC HISTORY: Dark Medieval Times & The Shadowthrone – Satyricon

Throughout 1992 the Norwegian sky was aglow with the flames of sacrilegious arson. As the churches burned, the soundtrack to their ruin was written. Kristian ‘Varg’ Vikernes would put the first three BURZUM albums to tape that year, while the Doom Occulta brothers in IMMORTAL released their first full-length. DARKTHRONE’s seminal Under A Funeral Moon appeared just months later, while MAYHEM prepared their long-awaited masterpiece De Mysteriis Dom Sathanas. The creative fervour at 56 Schweigaards Gate must have been palpable, as Euronymous oversaw the comings-and-goings behind his desk in Helvete. Among the patrons were Sigurd ‘Satyr’ Wongraven and Kjetil-Vidar ‘Frost’ Haraldstad. The young musicians perused the pitch-black shelves, and laid their hands on satanic classics as well as fresh offerings from their peers. It was in the midst of this that SATYRICON would prepare their pair of black metal classics: Dark Medieval Times and The Shadowthrone.

“When I joined SATYRICON, I wasn’t really sure I wanted to play drums at all,” admits Frost. “For me it started with hearing MOTORHEAD for the first time. It opened my ears. When I got my first drum kit, I wanted to feel the raw and physical energy of that music. I thought drums were the right instrument for me. Then I moved to Oslo from Lillehammer to study,” he recalls, “and I decided to end it there. I decided I would be a dedicated fan rather than also try and be a musician because I didn’t feel like a musician, but then I heard that SATYRICON was in need of a drummer. They had asked my friend Faust if he could play drums for them but he had said no, since he had just joined EMPEROR. So, he told them about another guy who played drums who was from the same area as him, and who didn’t have a band – perhaps SATYRICON should speak to him? That was me.”

In mere months, SATYRICON had started work on their first EP The Forest Is My Throne, which laid the musical and thematic foundation for their first full-length. Meanwhile, the black metal scene was making headlines. “It was almost as if things were exploding out from that weird world we were living in,” recalls Frost. “I had the sensation that the ground was constantly moving beneath me. It was strange how all that chaos could result in anything meaningful, but it did.” He muses. “Perhaps we were the right people to feed from that chaos and live on it?” For their part SATYRICON avoided the descent into criminality and sensationalism, and remained focussed  on their craft. “We always thought: what could possibly be more important than the music itself? Black metal is a difficult and demanding discipline, even if it’s barbaric and primitive in other ways.”

Primitive was certainly the order of the day. By 1993, the Norwegian black metal scene had completed an aesthetic shift from anti-musicality to total necrosound. Cut-price guitars were plugged into fuzzboxes, played through overdriven practice amps, and captured with the nastiest microphones they could find – all in the name of committing musical heresy. This complete inversion of production values allowed the young musicians to render dismal atmospheres anew, and SATYRICON were no exception. “We’ve always dared to be unconventional, and we gravitate towards expressions which you may not have heard before. That’s a big part of our identity,” explains Frost. Fantastical, vampyric forest-spirits and the like were all but played out by 1993, so SATYRICON decided turned their focus backwards; Dark Medieval Times was as much an aesthetic objective as it was a title.

“Satyr has always been fond of Norwegian folk music; it’s what he connects to,” Frost explains. “It came down to instinct and intuition. He has always favoured creativity and bold solutions so it was natural for him to bring some folk elements into the band, even if it meant breaking with tradition in black metal, or even metal in general. He wanted it to be a part of SATYRICON’s musical universe.” By blending traditional textures into an otherwise grim and hostile black metal soundscape, Satyr managed to evoke a cold vision of the past. “There was a period when he connected to these medieval sounding themes. It was what was going through his mind. I liked it a lot too, but how could we bring these elements together onto a record? At the time, a synthesiser was the answer,” he laughs. “Nowadays we would try and bring in some old instruments. That was impossible then, but we could get close enough: write arrangements for different instruments and bring in some medieval folk melodies. The fact it was unconventional and bold made it all the more appealing.”

A little under a year later, and SATYRICON were back in the studio preparing their next bold statement. The Shadowthrone reprises a more conventional instrumentation, with Satyr and Frost both focussed on creating a purer expression of the black metal atmosphere. “What inspired me personally and made me want to be part of it was the way Fenriz and Hellhammer played. They both have a clever and intriguing style,” notes Frost. His proficiency as a drummer improves markedly between the first two albums; inflecting Satyr’s compositions with percussive precision, and introducing interesting rhythmic choices into the mix. To this day Frost remains a studious musician, committed to honing his craft, and those early influences clearly still play an important part in SATYRICON’s oeuvre.

“Fenriz is very technical, but he decided to play in a minimalist and straightforward, almost primitive, way on A Blaze In The Northern Sky and the following albums. I just thought his solutions were so elegant. Rather than playing something much more impressive, which he could, he realised it wouldn’t have helped the music. That’s even more impressive,” he declares admiringly. “I instantly realised this was something I should try to understand and grasp myself. Hellhammer meanwhile has a very technical and progressive approach, but he makes it work with a band like MAYHEM. There is something very clever about that, too. Each did something very informative for my approach back then.”

Dark Medieval Times and The Shadowthrone first appeared on Satyr’s own Moonfog Productions, and their limited incarnation on wax has made them highly sought-after relics of the early Norwegian black metal scene.  For years, their exclusivity has befitted the elitist sneering of collectors. However as the records approach their thirtieth anniversary, SATYRICON have elected to reissue these iconic albums available on vinyl: remastered, remixed, and with a fresh lick of paint. “There wasn’t that much he [Satyr] could do with the old master tapes,” admits Frost. “They weren’t intact so he couldn’t do proper remixes, only minor adjustments, but those adjustments he could do he wanted to do.” Revisiting some of his earliest work, Satyr was forced to confront the limitations of his youth; undertaking the remixing and remastering personally. “There’s more tone in those albums now, which makes them sound a bit more analogue and organic, which makes sense for SATYRICON in 2021. I’d say they sound more like themselves,” he concludes.

Addressing the artwork, meanwhile, was a task long overdue. “Satyr was never satisfied with the cover art, even back in the day,” remembers Frost. “He had always wanted the Kittelsen to be on [Dark Medieval Times], but he put it inside the gatefold instead. At the time we wanted something which was exclusive for SATYRICON, which would help to establish our identity. The drawing is fine, but a bit too cartoonish. It didn’t really fit what he had in mind. Satyr has always maintained that the Kittelsen is the true cover in his mind. Same with The Shadowthrone. The original artwork is quite vague, so now we have a cover where the original idea has been expressed properly.” Finally this pair of black metal classics has the sound and imagery which they deserve, and can be reconsidered by fans and newcomers alike in their final form.

Dark Medieval Times & The Shadowthrone (re-release) is out now via Napalm Records.

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