Darkthrone

"One can only imagine the look on the faces of Peaceville Records’ staff as they hit ‘play’ on Darkthrone’s A Blaze In The Northern Sky album for the first time and the razorblade riff that opens Kathaarian Life Code bled out. They had signed the Norwegian band as a death metal outfit, and their Soulside Journey debut had seen them doing decent numbers and gathering a good level of respect for their technical heaviness. And then, drummer Fenriz recalled later, “They called me up and said, ‘What the fuck is this?’ And I said, ‘That’s fuckin’ black metal, man.’” Harsh, dark, cold and primitive, it was unexpected. More to the point, it was unlike anything else you could hear at the time. Fenriz will split hairs that there’s still death metal riffs in there, but it’s like saying there’s chicken in a nugget – it’s there somewhere, but only nominally. It has the distinction of being the first ‘true’ Norwegian black metal album from the country’s notorious ‘Black Circle'."