Insanity. Or as the Oxford Pocket Dictionary tells me "not of sound mind" is possibly the best way to describe the mosh-pit in a black metal concert. The beat is way to fast to be able to jump to, and constant rhythm changes leave most unable to jump at all. This leaves room only for vast (and I do mean vast) amount of hair-flicking and head banging. But this really only happens to those nuts enough to be at the front barrier.
The next section of the pit, lets call it the "frenzied" section are those that actually make an attempt at jumping. Everything is fine for the first few seconds of a song, but then a rhythm change jumps in and they left to their own devices. This normally means surging in any direction as a group or shoving the person next to them and forming an impromptu square-dance of violence and savagery. But these people aren't a majority and so a firm shove in the back will normally get the message across, and they surge/jump in another direction.
Mayhem were the main reason these people had turned up to the Metro dressed as freaks of the night. I don't recall ever seeing so much black. Ever. And everyone was dressed similarly, despite the fact that they were all "alternative" music fans. Most had on boots with varying amounts of straps and spikes with black pants and a shirt displaying their favourite Nordic Metal Heroes. The most common banner worn was that of Emporer; black metal noisemakers from way back.
Other party favourites were Cradle of Filth, Dimmu Borgir, Megadeth, Opeth, and obviously Mayhem, who were selling shirts at the door to the viewing area. Only one poor clown was wearing a Ren & Stimpy shirt, and luckily, I wasn't beaten up as a result. One articulate Emporer fan actually complimented me on the way I had chosen to dress that evening, walking up to me to shake my hand and quoting sesame street "One of these things is not like the others". Then he walked away to blend in with darkness.
The first band on the stage was Abominator. This was the first black metal show I'd been to, and it surprised me when speaking between songs the vocalist continued to growl. Not just in this set, but two other bands did the same. It reminded me of a pirate movie of title long forgotten, especially when accidentally slipping between regular talking and growling.
Most of their songs were pretty "tight". It's going to be difficult to differentiate between all the bands at this point as I'd never heard any of them before that evening, but the differences were obvious at the time.
Hellspawn played second, and I'd been looking forward to seeing them as they're on the same recording label as Acid Bath. But the singer seemed like a dunce and wore a goat's skull on his belt. He too growled between songs and threw a shirt or CD out into the dark pit ever now and then.
The next band to grace the stage were Dungeon, who are a power metal band. This means that the "singer" actually "sings" and doesn't growl or shriek or scream. The vocal stylings are operatic and high pitched and, frankly, it's not my cup of tea. But to their credit, they did it well, and got the audience tremendously excited.
Mayhem took their sweet time getting organised. I can only imagine it was the pig heads on sticks that were causing the delay. They came out and played an amazing set for a bit over an hour including the "encore". It really is a difficult thing to describe their onstage presence.
And I know a lot of you will be thinking "Black metal? That's just screaming and dressing in black".
But it is like any genre of music. to understand it you have to immerse yourselves in it and things will become clear: it's screaming, but with purpose and intent. An upward-cast green light upon the singer during certain parts of the song were suddenly contrast to flooding the stage in an eerie red light; which would be followed by bathing the bass player or guitarist in brilliant white light while they raced frantically to maintain the level of intensity.
I have a lot of respect for black-metal drummers; they seem to work the hardest during these things. You'd be forgiven for thinking it was an electronic beat; and the unfit need not apply. The pig heads on sticks lasted about 8 songs before one was wielded above the singer's head and then thrown into the pit, causing a surge and a scuffle and a security guard to attempt to retrieve it.
About two songs later the guitarist mumbled something (I think in Norwegian) and hit another pig's head with his meaty fist off the stick and sent it flying to regions unseen, as someone bumped past me and slopped a drink down my leg. The remaining pig heads on sticks were left intact as far as I recall, and when the evening came to a close hundreds of freaks went storming into the night.
This proved to be the best part of dressing nothing like the throng; people didn't associate me with the freaks walking up George Street to the windy bus stop shouting and growling.
Reviewed on Saturday, 21 September 2002