Gripped by the Soul of Spiritual Awakening – a presentation about black metal from the Low Countries

How do divergent uses of black metal aesthetics and cultural narratives differ between Norwegian and Dutch-speaking Low Countries bands, and in what ways do these uses have different outcomes and meanings? Norwegian black metal will always be Norwegian black metal. And Swedish death metal will always stay Swedish death metal. Yet, in the Dutch-speaking Low Countries, there is a vast variation of black metal bands that are more inclined toward their local area or province. Why is that and what can explain those differences? Christopher Thompson (University of Malmö) and Didier Goossens (CEMPER, Erasmus University Rotterdam) have bundled forces to answer these questions and will present their work at our conference. Mod: Frank Kimenai (Hive Mind, NL).