Therion - Proving Heavy Metal is an ARTform

What is the purpose of Art? (art with a capital A)

To make you feel.

--me

Not dictating what you feel, just that you feel something powerful, real, new, whatever.

What is the purpose of Art? according to LifeHacker

"The purpose of art is washing the dust of daily life off our souls."

--Pablo Picasso

Therion is a Swedish Metal band, symphonic metal, known as the "most adventurous metal band at present." (Therion biography, MusicMight). 

Originally death metal, started in 1988 (that was ages ago! I had just barely tossed my aerobics leggings by then). They added classic elements one by one till they became what they are today -- full-on symphony for some songs / some performances.

They've gone through a massive metamorphosis.

These three videos don't do justice to Therion, but it is a glimpse of their brilliant abilities.

First video - show to friends when they indicate that they think heavy metal is just guttural grunting. So. Much. More.

Second video - opera is for the sophisticated for a reason. The combination of sounds is incredibly intricate. You'll see in upcoming posts that it's heavy metal that pushes the boundaries of what is possible in music. They mess with the structure of music in ways that other musicians in other genres don't dare try.

Third video - Son of the Staves of Time. I had to research this one. It felt a little like a Heavy Metal Schoolhouse Rock Bio of a Famous Person. Short version: They're singing about

Byrger Tidesson

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Johannes_Bureus
who was an antiquarian (librarian type for ancient books), polymath (someone with a wide range of knowledge, not just mathematics), and mystic.

My favorite part -- Byrger Tidesson wrote the very first ABC book in Swedish. He used the runic alphabet and latin script, but still, how fun to be inside the mind of some person who first conceived of an ABC book, something that had never been created before in his mother tongue.

Therion = Erudite Metal

If you have to look up what erudite means (learned, well educated) then perhaps Alestorm is more your speed. Wink. It's all good at different times, for different purposes.