Varg Vikernes

Kristian Larsson Vikernes, better known as Varg Vikernes (Norwegian: [ˈʋɑrɡ ˈʋiːkəɳeːs]); (Bergen, February 11, 1973), is a multi-instrumentalist musician, composer, singer and one of the pioneers of the Norwegian black metal music scene. In 2009 he was granted parole after serving 16 years in prison for the murder of Øystein Aarseth "Euronymous", a member of the group Mayhem, in 1993. Also known as Count Grishnackh (Count Grishnackh), the name he used in the early days of black metal in Norway, was the founder and sole member of the band Burzum.

Biography

Varg Vikernes was born on February 11, 1973 in Bergen, Norway. He was called by his parents Kristian , although when he founded Burzum he changed his name because he was horrified by the idea that it meant Christian . He replaced it with "Varg", which in Norwegian means wolf, and has also used the pseudonym "Count Grishnackh".

Varg Vikernes learned to play several instruments in his adolescence, and around 1988 or 1989, when he was fifteen or sixteen years old, he formed a first group called Kalashnikov, a name that was soon changed to Uruk-hai. According to Vikernes, it was not a serious or high-quality group. In 1989 he met the members of the group Old Funeral and collaborated with them for two years. Later he began to compose for his project Burzum, in which he has always composed all the lyrics, performed all the vocal parts, and almost always played all the instruments, also being in charge of mixing the songs.

Burzum's first album was simply called Burzum and was released in March 1992 through Deathlike Silence Productions (DSP), a label owned by Øystein Aarseth, better known as Euronymous. He also owned the store Helvete , where the copies were sold. This is how Burzum joined the Inner Circle, an organization that would join almost all the Norwegian black metal bands led by Mayhem. According to Vikernes, Euronymous did not have enough money for the project, so he lent him the equivalent of $5,100, money that he did not recover after the copies were sold and his album turned a profit, so Vikernes lost favor with him. and the respect. Vikernes attempted to create his own production company, 'Cymophane', under which he appeared in August 1993 Det Som Engang Var. That same year, Vikernes collaborated as bassist with the band Mayhem, of which Euronymous was a member, in the recording of the album De Mysteriis Dom Sathanas.

However, despite the initial friction he had with Aarseth, Vikernes managed to give the Helvete store and the Deathlike Silence label the same attention from fans as before. This is why he decided to give an interview to some reporters claiming to be behind the church fires along with other musicians (which Varg regularly provoked), which is why black metal became known in the media. The interview caused a stir, the media began to consider black metal as a genre of criminal and murderous satanist musicians. Through the press, the Norwegian police began to investigate the events, so Varg was immediately arrested, and then released when no evidence was found.

Incredibly, the great media attention that the interview and Vikernes' arrest produced generated greater attention from black metal fans. However, paradoxically, this coincided with the fact that Euronymous, unable to sustain the Helvete store, decided to close it, causing disappointment among fans (according to Vikernes, Euronymous closed the store because his parents ordered him to). Subsequently, Vikernes began to become progressively disappointed in Euronymous and accused him of being stupid, a fool and a moron who not only did not take advantage of that moment to generate greater support for black metal, but also always wanted to be the center of attention and control everything. the Norwegian black metal scene, so I no longer considered it 'extreme'. This is how Varg decided to completely distance himself from anything that linked him to Euronymous, who in turn began to conspire against Varg.

Murder of Euronymous

In August 1993, the same month that his second album goes on sale, Varg Vikernes travels at night by car from the city of Bergen to Oslo, accompanied by Snorre Ruch, founder of the group Thorns. According to Vikernes, he had learned from a mutual friend that Øystein Aarseth, alias Euronymous, was planning to murder him, or at least that was what he had told several people, that he would like to torture and kill him. At that time, there had been an intrinsic hatred towards each other for a long time and in addition, Vikernes was trying to release his third album through another record label, so that Euronymous would not be in charge of production. In addition to this, Euronymous had recently been arrested for having injured some boys with a glass bottle, so Vikernes took the alleged threat seriously. Not feeling intimidated, and to show Euronymous that he was not afraid of him, he decides to go see him at his own house, to confront him personally.

According to Vikernes, upon arriving in Oslo on August 10, he calls the phone saying who he is and uses the excuse that he wants to talk about a contract; so he goes up to the apartment while Snorre Ruch is left waiting on the street. Once inside his house, when they are both face to face, Aarseth goes to the kitchen to look for a knife and, after returning with said instrument, he tries unsuccessfully to strike Vikernes, but he dodges him and removes the weapon from the kitchen. hand; Subsequently and instantly Aarseth runs through the building, down the stairs. Vikernes catches up with him and kills him with the same knife in the fight. The autopsy revealed a particular cruelty in the attack on the stairs, determining at least 23 wounds in various parts of the victim's body.

Vikernes' escape at that time is desperate, so desperate that the police almost stopped the car on one occasion while returning to Bergen. Finally, he was arrested on August 19 (9 days after the event) in Bergen, where he remained hidden. Days before his murder, when Vikernes was accused of burning churches, Aarseth had already declared: & # 34; [...] & # 34; Soon he will be recognized for something bigger.' Unknowingly, he had predicted his own death.

His murder indictment also included charges of arson against several centuries-old Norwegian churches. The image of the burned remains of one of these churches constitutes the cover of the first version of Aske, and there is also a pirated edition of one of the albums whose back cover includes a cutout of a church next to the text "Burn your own church.". However, Vikernes has neither admitted nor denied the facts to date. Thus, with no evidence other than testimonies from individuals who apparently also participated in the burning of churches, he is sentenced to prison.

Burning of Churches

On June 6, 1992, the Fantoft stave church, one of Norway's architectural treasures dating back to the 12th century< /span>, was burned. Before January 1993 fires had occurred in at least seven other Norwegian churches. Vikernes was found guilty in several of these cases: the burning of the Storetveit church in Bergen, the Åsane church in Bergen, the Skjold church in Vindafjord, the Holmenkollen chapel in Oslo and the death of a firefighter. He was also charged with setting fire to the Fantoft church on the outskirts of Bergen, although the jury stopped short of finding him guilty. The judges considered this a jury error, but refused to overturn the entire case. The latest appeals to the case were rejected.

The press demonized the Inner Circle and this group of pioneering Norwegian black metal groups, including Mayhem, Darkthrone and Emperor; made up of young people who knew each other, some of them criminals or suicides. From his cell outside Oslo, Varg stated in an interview that he no longer wanted to be associated with black metal.

Vikernes today

After 16 years in prison, Varg Vikernes was released from prison, under parole, on May 24, 2009 and released his first album after imprisonment, called Belus in 2010, subsequently releasing the albums Fallen in 2011, and Umskiptar in 2012..

He lived for a time on a farm in Telemark (Norway), later moving to France, where he currently resides with his wife Marie Cachet and seven of his children (Tivar, Baldur, Sovili, Eloi, Björn, Maïa and a daughter born in March 2021), taking on the task of building her own house, located in a rural town, in the Limousin region. Vikernes has a daughter from a previous courtship in Norway.

In March 2013, the documentary Forebears directed by Marie Cachet was released, which features unreleased music by Burzum as its soundtrack. Some of the music from this soundtrack, as well as other compositions, were released in 2013 in a concept album, of purely electronic music this time, in the style of the old albums composed while Vikernes was in prison. This album is titled "Sôl austan, Mâni vestan" (east of the sun, west of the moon).

Judgment

At the trial in August 1993, Vikernes stated that he had learned from a mutual friend that Euronymous was planning to kill him. They both meet at Aerseth's (Euronymous) house, the latter looks for a knife in the kitchen and tries to hit Vikernes, but he dodges it and snatches the weapon from him. Aerseth runs through the building, down the stairs. Vikernes catches up with him and kills him in the fight. According to the official report, he was stabbed 23 times: 2 times in the head, 5 times in the neck and 16 times in the back. Vikernes denies this, saying that Aerseth fell on broken glass while he was running, which could explain the considerable number of injuries. His murder charge also included charges of arson against several centuries-old Norwegian churches. Vikernes was sentenced to 21 years in prison for burning churches (some with crafts from the 17th century) and for the murder of Aarseth in 1994.

Arrest in 2013

On July 16, 2013, Vikernes was arrested on suspicion of planning a massacre. According to various media, ^{[which one?]} the origin of the investigation that led to his arrest is that Vikernes was one of the 530 recipients of the manifesto of Anders Breivik, the murderer who planted a bomb in Oslo and killed 77 people in Norway in July 2011, in the act known as the "Utøya massacre". However, Vikernes repudiated what happened on his website and his blog. ^{[ citation needed ]}

Release

Varg Vikernes and his wife Marie Cachet were released on July 18. The police, who under French law can detain anyone suspected of terrorism for 96 hours, made the decision after finding no evidence of terrorist plans or any violent action. Local media and the Norwegian network NRK have confirmed that his release occurred around 7:00 p.m. and after two days of confinement.

Personal beliefs

Vikernes stated that he has high regard for authors J.R.R Tolkien, Julius Evola, Friedrich Nietzsche, Oswald Spengler and Knut Hamsun.

Political affiliation

Vikernes says that he has never been part of any Nazi organization and that the only one he has participated in is Riksmålsforbundet. In a July 2005 statement on his website, titled "The Nazi Ghost" ("The Nazi Ghost"), Vikernes states that although he "occasionally used the term 'Nazism' to describe [his] ideological basis of his', he no longer calls himself a 'Nazi'.

The reason I have been attracted to and occasionally expressed support for "nazism" is mostly because many of the Norwegians (and Germans) "nazis" embraced our pagan religion as our blood-religion, and rejected Judeo-Christianism as a Jewish heresy.

Vikernes expressed his desire not to be associated with anti-Slavic sentiments. He identifies three things that differentiate him from the "Nazis": "unlike them I am not a socialist (not even at a national level), I am not a materialist and I believe in democracy (the old Scandinavian!)".

In the late 1990s, "to avoid confusion" and "find a more suitable and precise term", Vikernes coined the term "odalism" based on the Odal rune. "From the Norse óðal (homeland, allode, allodial law, nobility, noble, inherited property, motherland, land ownership, distinguished family, distinguished, splendid, kinship and nation).&# 34; He explains: "It positions itself on paganism, traditional nationalism, racialism and environmentalism." Vikernes contrasts it with "'civilization' modern" which he equates with "capitalism, materialism, Judeo-Christianity, pollution, urbanization, miscegenation, Americanization, socialism, globalization, etc." He gives importance to the fact that odalism "is not a concept corrupted by history"; In contrast to Nazism:

The 'Nazi Ghost' has frightened millions of Europeans to worry about their blood and their homeland for sixty years to this day, and it is time to banish this ghost and start again to think and worry about the things that (what we want or not) are important to us.

In other texts on his website, Vikernes embraces Nordicism, racism, and eugenics ("racial hygiene"). However, he points out that following one's own culture is an equally valid choice and beneficial for all people. Vikernes declares that although he is a racist, he does not hate anyone and that "hatred is irrational. He has also expressed rejection of homosexuality.

In response to a question from a fan, Vikernes expressed his disdain for the European Union, describing it as 'totally corrupt, extremely bureaucratic, predominantly Catholic and completely chaotic.'

Religion

Varg considers himself a pagan, and promotes the return of Europeans to carrying out a properly European religiosity. Although it has been closely associated with Satanism, he rejects the label stating that there were no members of the early Norwegian black metal scene with that ideology, and that they were only using the concept to draw as much distance as possible from Satanism. the Judeo-Christian world.

In a 2010 interview with "Vampiria" from Spain, Vikernes was asked about the important role that Odinism plays in his life, to which he responded: "Well, I am not religious in any way, but I have a pagan ideology and values." I believe in blood, soil and honor; in the family, the homeland and in hamingja; in strength, traditions and courage. And I believe in a Europe waking up."

Drug use

Vikernes is against the use of drugs and declares that he has never ingested them, not even alcohol, aspirin, Coca-Cola or sweets, and the only use he condones is prescription use. Even on his blog he considers people who consume drugs as “weak-minded.” In this way he has disdained the metal subculture, calling it “black music.”

It is a primitive subculture, without intelligence and without meaning, as are all subcultures of the rock and roll. I also listened to music. metalBut I never behaved like a nigger for that. Smoking marijuana or getting drunk, sleeping anywhere and getting infected with the other venereal diseases, partying all the time, going to concerts to meet other hollow heads, etc. What sense does it make? [...] The real attraction that people have in this particular subculture must be another, such as contempt for the modern world, fascination for death, Gothic, romanticism or even pagan values, but everything becomes very negative mixed with the traditional culture of the heavy metal.

The Lord of the Rings

From an early age, Vikernes has been fascinated with the fictional kingdom of Middle-earth created by British writer J. R. R. Tolkien. His stage name Grishnackh is taken from an orc from The Two Towers. The name Burzum, meaning darkness, was taken from the black tongue inscribed on the single ring of the Lord of the Rings. The inscription reads "Ash nazg durbatulûk, ash nazg gimbatul, ash nazg thrakatulûk agh burzum-ishi krimpatul" or in Spanish "One Ring to rule them all. A Ring to find them, a Ring to attract them all and bind them in the darkness [darkness]." Additionally, before joining Old Funeral, he was in a band called Uruk-Hai, also derived from the Lord of the Rings text.

Vikernes interpreted The Lord of the Rings on his website, noting the connections to paganism in the books, but also acknowledging the Christian context of Tolkien's Catholic beliefs.

Discography

Burzum

Mayhem

• 1994: From Mysteriis Dom Sathanas

Old Funeral

• 1991: Devoured Carcass (EP) -

Darkthrone

• 1994: Transilvanian Hunger (all four songs)
• 1995: Panzerfaust (read of a song)