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Okay, this isn’t totally about Den Saakaldte, but more about me. I’m an American but don’t hold it against me. I have been exploring the darker, more insane regions of music for as long as I can remember, and it’s taken me down many different and occasionally dangerous paths.
One major ‘highway’ on my musical map has been metal. From Black Sabbath onward (or maybe even a little before that, if you expand your definition of metal), the giant slouching beast of metal has provided me with countless moments of delicious terror and delightful unease. And not a little good old-fashioned headbanging, too, but that’s kind of another theme entirely. The online casino USA thing didn’t come until much later…
For the first few decades of metal, a lot of the actual songs weren’t always as effective as the sounds and imagery that went along with them. Like, Black Sabbath rarely creeped me out; maybe once or twice per album did they do anything that got close to the sound and feeling that I was looking for (the album covers were usually more creepy than most of the songs!). But when they did succeed, it was perfect…like online slots, but then again not like that at all really…
Meanwhile, there was an entire world of other creepy sounds besides metal. Contemporary composers like John Cage and George Crumb were freaky and awesome (how could I say no to a piece entitled Black Angels: Thirteen Images from the Dark Land?). Some progressive rock and art rock got me there, too (some tracks by Pink Floyd or Univers Zero can definitely scare the crap out of you if the mood is right).
And then there was the lovely eerie messes made by modern bands likeThrobbing Gristle, Butthole Surfers, and even some of the more experimental Crass songs (I have a recording of “Reality Asylum” that I wouldn’t dare listen to, in certain moods…). All of these seemed to add wonderful pieces to the jet black, dismal grey, and dripping crimson jigsaw puzzle of my ideal musical picture…