Geez, how do I even start with this band? With a story, you say? You got it :D
Early spring, 1999. I'm in Roswell, GA visiting family, using the internet unsupervised for the first time. "Nice, guy, who had the first pair of naked boobs you saw?" you ask. Fair question, but do I go straight for pixelated pubes like most 13 year-old boys would've done? Nope! No time: I straight-away start scouring the web for info on - you guessed it! - black metal, something, anything about this otherworldly, dangerous music that I'd happened on the summer prior. To clarify, we didn't have internet at home until a couple months after this incident, and prior to that it's not like I could just go down to the library and ask for the Satanic, hairy bands section, or get music recs from my cool older brother (only child sort of) or my cool friends (friends not cool). We didn't have it in school either, so this was quite literally the first opportunity that I'd had since hearing Anthems to the Welkin at Dusk for the first time the previous July to do some digging, save for the odd Metal Maniacs I'd picked up, which were only so helpful in getting to the core of this stuff. Emperor was my gateway band, and at that point really the only proper, second-wave black metal I'd ever heard, so that's where I started. Turns out, there was a small handful of respectable fanpages devoted to the band - maybe 4 or 5, max, but 2 or 3 of those were really good, with bios, interviews, (now-vintage) photos, all the mandatory stylings of a late '90s GeoCities band page.
So, I read. Devoured, really, discovering references to fantastical band names I'd never heard of - Darkthrone, Burzum, Immortal, Gorgoroth, Satyricon - dropped with zero context, an electrifying new dialect that I was desperate to learn. My mind boggled at the idea of how they must sound, the names themselves so evocative in their own right that I was able to conjure up in my imagination what other black metal must sound like. There were mentions, too, of early Emperor incarnations like Xerasia, Embryonic, and the brilliantly-monikered Thou Shalt Suffer, the artwork for whose Into the Woods of Belial demo reissue (Nocturnal Art) was the most atmospheric thing I'd ever seen.
Eventually, however, I hit the point in the bio where the author discussed the notorious events of the early Norwegian black metal scene. (If you're here, you likely already know what I mean. If you're new and you don't, then head on over to my little piece on exactly that that isn't finished yet.) Anyway, I read what happened with complete shock and awe and infatuation, though also some confusion - English was not the webmaster's first language, and given my lack of background knowledge, a lot of the details manifested as a lexicon of what had to have been arcane black arts. I was, however, able to glean that Emperor's very own drummer was a murderer, and also encountered the names "Euronymous", "Dead", and "Grishnackh" for the first time, positioned as central players who burned things down, killed people, and recorded timeless BM albums. God, it was so exciting coming across this stuff, these pseudonyms that were utterly alien, that I couldn't even figure out how to pronounce, belonging to real people committing impossible-sounding crimes in the legendary days (but no more nights) of blood and fire. The name "Dead" really got me. "Dead? That's it, just 'Dead'? Is that a typo? How do you just call yourself 'Dead'? And why?" It unnerved me, to say the least. I still had lots to learn.
And that's exactly what I did: through the untamed wildnerness of the '90s internet (wildernet), I navigated my way to yet more info on these dudes, and that's where I finally saw it for the first time, emblazoned as a logo across the top of another fanpage: Mayhem. I was scared. No kidding: even their mere logo was enough to make me feel uneasy. There was something so sinister and unearthly about it, so jagged and confrontational and authentic, and the appearance of inverted crosses as indelible pieces was so extreme to me that I was afraid to even have the page open while in the same house as my family. That's all to say nothing, however, of what awaited when I actually heard Mayhem for the first time. This particular fanpage had a track or two from each album available for download as mp3s, so I started with the title track of what was at that time their only full-length: De Mysteriis dom Sathanas. I queued up the file in my heavily customized Winamp player, turn the speakers on, and hit play. And I saw Hell. And I loved it.
The most diabolical riff I'd ever heard in my entire life, wrapped in the meanest, nastiest guitar tone, shreds the air around my head into ribbons
"Wellllcooooome!," comes the bellow from a demonic, communal rectory
In unison begins a barrage of relentless blastbeats and bulldozer bass beneath the razorblade riffage
"Tooooo the elderrrruinsss ehgainnnnn." An undead priest croaks in incantations and breathes a scene of macabre, Satanic ritual
De Mysteriis Dom Sathanas
I had goosebumps within seconds. And a new favorite band.