Viking Metal - Characteristics

Characteristics

Viking metal is "noisy, chaotic, and often augmented by sorrowful keyboard melodies." Described by writer Johannes Jonsson as "slow black metal with influences from Nordic folk music", it has been considered a category of folk metal. Like folk metal bands, Viking metal acts "generally utilize some acoustic and other unusual instruments in addition to the traditional metal instruments", but, unlike folk metal, Viking metal "typically avoids non-standard instruments". Vocal techniques often incorporate clean singing in addition to the typical black metal screams and growls.

Thematically, Viking metal draws extensively on elements of black metal, but uses pagan and Norse lyrics and imagery instead of those of an anti-Christian or Satanic nature. Viking metal combines the symbolism common in black and death metal, especially the exultation of violence and virility through weapons and battlefields, with a common interest in ancestral roots, especially a pre-Christian heritage, expressed through Viking mythology and imagery of northern landscapes. However, some bands such as Sorhin keep the Satanic elements of black metal but are influenced musically by more recent folk tunes. Visual media such as album art, band photos, Web site design, and merchandise all highlight the dark and violent outlook of Viking metal lyrics and themes. In his thesis paper "Reawakening Pride Once Lost": Indigeneity and European Folk Metal, Aaron Patrick Mulvany says that while much of the thematic history of heavy metal uses parodies of the occult in an incongruous fashion, Viking metal bands use "a very specific mythology which controls not only textual choices, but also the imagery used on albums and frequently the kind of music composed."