Lords of Chaos

by Michael Moynihan

  ABSURD CASSETTE COVER WITH BEYER TOMBSTONE

  Since my release I have not hurt anyone or destroyed anything. But it has long since had anything more to do with what I did, but rather with what people think about me and do to me. Through the efforts of the leftist opinion cartel, my behavior—which in other countries would be of no consequence—was ultimately depicted as if I had committed the worst crimes against humanity. This process can no longer be halted; it goes beyond my destruction. It was my undoing that I had willingly guided not only my life but that of Andreas and Sebastian—I am a quasi-“missing link” between the two of them.

  DO YOU FEEL BLACK METAL IS STILL AN IMPORTANT FORM OF MUSIC?

  If you’re talking about the Black Metal underground, then I would agree it’s important, but if you’re talking about the fashionable music biz, then I have to point out that we don’t care about it. If “musicians” feel the urge to prostitute themselves to the business, then let them do so. They will perish, along with the Judeo-capitalistic system they are a part of.

  Black Metal from its very core is very important and influential—especially now, at the dawn of the New Aeon, when Christendom will perish and a neo-heathen state will arise. “Herr Wolf ” once declared: “A violently active, dominating, intrepid, brutal youth—that is what I am after. Youth must be all those things. It must be insensitive to pain. There must be nothing weak and tender about it. I want to see once more in its eyes the gleam of pride and independence of the splendid beast of prey. I want my youth strong and handsome. They shall overcome mortal dread in the most difficult trials. That is the stage of heroic youth.” The youth influenced by Black Metal and other ideologically related music corresponds to “Herr Wolf’s” description almost wholly. A youth without false scruples, discarding altruism and morality, the youth of the New Aeon, the new Reich.

  We really appreciate the sinister art of Black Metal, and will never change our style, because we became aware of Black Metal as the sound of the forthcoming Aeon of Horus, and the return of Wotan: still absurd, undreamt of by the narrow-minded, but nevertheless the soon-to-be reality, our reality, beyond all doubt! The sun is rising over Europe—will it destroy us or give us light?!

  ABSURD ASGARDSREI

  The harshness of the rhetoric behind Absurd has intensified immeasurably since their early days among the high school students of Sondershausen, as has their music. Beginning meagerly with hymns to demons discovered in Satanic horror films, the early demo cassettes of the band are low-fi chunks of adolescent noise, soaked with distortion and offering unintentionally humorous spoken introductions to the songs. Their music is more akin to ’60s garage Punk than some of the well-produced Black Metal of their contemporaries—but what they lacked by way of musical execution they were more than willing to make up for with the real-life execution of the sad figure of Sandro Beyer.

  Lyrically they have always sung the praises of revenge against one’s enemies, and a number of their earlier songs appear to refer to—or portend, depending on when they were written—their killing, through a recurring leitmotif of murder in the forest. Pushing the limits of poor taste a step further, one of the Absurd cassettes released since their incarceration employed a photo of Sandro Beyer’s tombstone for its cover art.

  If there is any clear spiritual mentor behind Absurd’s transformation over the years, it is Varg Vikernes. Varg himself seems to be aware of this, and smiles when talking of recent events inspired by what happened in Norway: “In Germany some churches have burned. And there are the Absurd guys, who have also turned neo-Nazi....”14 Judging from the interviews conducted with Hendrik above, Varg’s remark about the ideological transformation of Absurd is correct. The long quotation Hendrik attributes to “Herr Wolf” at the end of the interview is in actuality the words of Adolph Hitler, speaking of the new prototype of hardened, pitiless youth which Nazi Germany would produce.

  Similarly to how Varg once brazenly put a picture of the burnt remains of Fantoft Stave Church on the cover of Burzum’s Aske mini-LP, Absurd’s Facta Loquuntur disc also prominently features a photo of the charred framework of the Frogn church, which was torched in Norway in 1995. The title of the album is Latin for “deeds speak for themselves,” and the liner notes exhort the listener to “Remember your pagan origins and follow always the honorable way of your pagan ancestors!” A few sentences further they state, “This release is dedicated in everlasting worship to our martyrs who died or have to suffer in one way or another in order to set a flaming sign for our movement. Our kingdom will come.”15 Such sentiments would make Varg Vikernes proud. Absurd’s own tiny record label, Burznazg, takes its name from a term Varg once planned to use for his own operations, and the most infamous criminal in Norway was surely proud to know of the “Tribute to Burzum” compilation CD project initiated by Hendrik Möbus and friends.

  GERMAN HEADLINE: “CHAPEL WAS IN FLAMES”

  The band still continues despite their jail sentences, although they have encountered numerous obstacles. Originally incarcerated together in the Erfurt prison, after a period of time the media made a scandal of the fact that the three killers had regular contact with one another inside the prison walls and were being treated much too nicely in light of their crime. Hendrik explains:

  In March of ’95 the self-declared “Grand Inquisitor,” an evangelical parson named Jürgen Hauskeller, together with a member of German parliament, Vera Wollenberger, visited the jail in Erfurt. Although the warden of the jail refused to let them inside, Wollenberger enforced the right for this visit with the help of the Thuringian ministry of justice, and thus they came to look at what was going on with us. Certainly they expected to see us suffering with only bread and water, and were badly surprised to find the opposite was true—we lived together on the same floor, made music together, and so forth. After this visit, they managed to start a hostile campaign against us via the yellow press, by telling how “good” we had it behind bars. The mother of our victim then declared her son had died all over again, and she demanded they stop our alleged “holiday” and start the punishment. The consequences were that each of us has been moved to a different jail, and the warden at Erfurt lost his job, due to the alleged “privileges” he gave us.16

  GERMAN HEADLINE:

  “ENORMOUS BLAZE DESTROYS BELFRY”

  The trademark Black Metal pseudonyms of Absurd’s personnel have changed since their first recordings, and by ’94 they had adopted titles from dark aspects of Germanic mythology, recasting themselves as “Surt,” the fire giant who ignites the earth at Ragnarök; Nidhögg (literally “the one striking full of hatred” in Old Norse), the dragon who gnaws at the roots of the world-tree and drinks the blood of corpses; while Sebastian, formerly known as “Werwolf Dark Mark Doom,” has now shortened his appellation to simply “Doom.”

  Like Vikernes, Hendrik is of considerable intelligence, and has spent his time behind bars delving deep into the legends and romanticism not only of heathen Germany, but the history and esoterica of the Third Reich as well. While the status of Absurd is certainly limited to the far reaches of the underground, their records have continued to appear and find an audience. The band demonstrated they could engage in the acts they sang about, thereby endowing themselves with a unique aura of “authenticity.” The fact they were willing to spend nearly a decade in jail for the experience of committing murder gives them a perverse form of credibility over the bands who merely sing and dream of empty morbid fantasies. By their actions they also set a grim example—as Bård Eithun and Varg Vikernes did before them—which others may feel compelled to live up to.

  Möbus also reveals the existence of a Germanic “Black Circle” which he claims the members of Absurd are also connected to, called Die Teutsche Brüderschaft (Teutonic Brotherhood). The Brüderschaft is mentioned prominently in the dedication list on Absurd’s debut CD. Still, Hendrik wonders, “Considering the effects Black Metal is causing, I’d expect something to spread like a wild fire across Europ
e. It’s difficult to say why this has yet failed to appear.”17 It may be that the contemporary German environment is somehow lacking the ingredients that allowed Black Metal to take the extreme turn it did in Norway, but there is evidence that the potential exists.

  As an aside during an interview we conducted with Dani, the driving force behind British gothic Black Metal band Cradle of Filth, he mentioned a fleeting encounter they had during one of their early tours with a knife-wielding German youth who claimed to be part of a “Satanic Gestapo.” Whether this is the same as the “Teutonic Brotherhood” spoken of by Hendrik is unknown.

  DANI—SINGER OF ENGLISH BAND CRADLE OF FILTH

  HAVE YOU HAD ANY PROBLEMS WHILE ON TOUR?

  We have abroad. Some German guy from the “Satanic Gestapo,” I think they were called, who jumped on stage with a carving knife. This was on the Anathema/At the Gates/Cradle of Filth tour, and I was looking the other way when the bouncers grabbed him, and basically beat the crap out of him and threw him on the floor. But he came up afterwards and apologized, and just said, “Oh, sorry,” really innocently. I think he just said the knife was a prop, but we were getting threats from people all over Germany. There was a band called Pyogenesis, and these kids who were the mouthpiece of the lower rank of this supposed “Gestapo” were telling people that the girlfriend of a guy in Pyogenesis had been stolen from him and abducted, and they’d been repeatedly raping her.

  CRADLE OF FILTH

  THEY ACTUALLY DID THIS?

  No, they didn’t do it at all. It was bullshit. We saw the guy in Pyogenesis and he said it was absolute rubbish. But we’d heard it from people at a concert saying, “Beware, they mean it,” and it was frightening if you put it in context, that people would make threats like that.

  In other communications, Hendrik reported that in Germany a number of churches and chapels have burned, or were attempted to be torched, under suspicious circumstances. He elaborates:

  From late ’93 until early ’97 there have been around around a dozen church arsons (including attempted ones and/or desecrations inside the church) throughout Germany. Almost all of them have a proven link to Satanism or Black Metal, due to unequivocal symbolism at the scene of the crime. Most of the important events (countless small and large cemetery desecrations, a couple of damaged or burned churches and chapels) took place in Thuringia and Saxony. Some examples: a church desecration in the town of Greiz during the spring of ’94, a series of cemetery desecrations along with a burned chapel around Leipzig during ’95–’96 (those “criminals” have been caught already), and a church burned to the ground in Riethnordhausen during the spring of ’97. The most recent church fires happened in Lübeck, Hamburg, and Husum (all in north Gemany) during four weeks in April and May ’97, but the police, who once again caught all the “criminals,” said almost nothing about their background except for that of a link to the right-wing scene.18

  Churches have also been set alight in nearby Poland—or “Eastern Germany” as Hendrik terms it, recalling Hitler’s “Großdeutsches Reich.” About the church attacks he elaborates, “Many more were damaged and profaned, and even countless cemeteries desecrated likewise—but all this I can sum up as ‘after-pains’ of the Norwegian events.”19 Overall in Europe as of 2002, Hendrik claims to now be aware of more than 100 acts of anti-Christian arson, although it impossible to know on what he bases this figure—presumably rumors circulating in the underground he is a part of.

  The atavistic element of Black Metal can be seen in the evolving efforts of Absurd, who are beginning to employ more recent and incendiary paradigms from the tumultuous Germanic legacy in their worldview. How many others may be awakened to follow in their halting footsteps? In their song “The Gates of Heaven,” written some months before they dispatched Sandro Beyer from earthly existence, Absurd demand in slightly broken English: “Straight on through the gates of heaven, Evil will destroy the souls—Where’s your saviour, where hides Jesus? Why isn’t he at war against us?”20 Unhindered even by temporary confinement to prison, their question is a mocking one.

  “HEATHEN HORROR”

  It is difficult to document how many of the church arsons and attacks in Germany that occurred in the late 1990s actually emanated from the Black Metal scene, but there is no doubt that in many instances a connection exists. As evidence of one minor such incident we can quote from an anonymous communication that was received by the authors in the Autumn of 2000. A two-page letter accompanied by two blurry photos, the missive was entitled “Heathen Horror” and related various accounts of church desecration before signing off with the exhortation “Kill for Wotan!” We are unable to verify any details of this account (including whether or not the “Surt” mentioned here is also the member of Absurd who uses this stage name), but the photographs, despite their poor quality, would lend a degree of veracity to the story. We offer a section of it here in translation to provide a glimpse into the moonlight activities—in all their earnest incompetence—of a militant segment of the German Black Metal scene.

  On a cold November night in 1999 “Surt” and “Tyrann” traveled through towns in the countryside in order to find a remote church that could be set on fire. After some hours of searching we found a secluded House of God in a small village, situated far enough from the town that we would not be heard. We had prepared for our project with torches, kerosene, a crowbar, and a sledgehammer. We parked the car about a half-kilometer away, so that possibly no one might connect it to the action. Were someone to in fact notice us at the church and call the police, we would hear it immediately over a police scanner, and still have time enough to disappear undetected since the closest police station was in the next town many kilometers away. Besides, nothing usually goes on in little towns. After a long trek we reached our goal. We made it over a low fence to the cemetery where the church was also located. It was quite a sight—the church lit by moonlight and the red glow of the graveside candle lamps. After trying unsuccessfully to get the main door open with the crowbar, we crept around the church to find another way in. At the vestry, we finally managed it. We were very nervous and just wanted to hurry. Without looking around us much, we stormed into the main part of the church—by the light of our torches—to lay waste to it and spread the flames. Surt took the kerosene out of his backpack and poured it over the pews as Tyrann held his torch to it and… nothing happened! Shit! It can’t be true! All that energy for nothing? We tried to get the fire going with the kerosene; this looked especially good by night inside the church. Again we poured kerosene on the pews, now more than before. Again Tyrann held his torch to the wet pews, and again nothing happened! In a hurry and mad rush we lay candles, seat pillows and whatever else we could find on the pews and lit it. Smashing the window panes, we took off at that moment since we were too nervous and just wanted to get out as quickly as we could. So, okay—the church wasn’t burnt down. But it was still a decent desecration, since all the church pews were ruined with fire damage, so that no church services would be taking place there anytime soon.

  RADICAL RIGHT-WING ASYLUM SEEKERS?

  After serving the court-ordained portion of their jail sentences, the youths convicted in the slaying of Sandro Beyer were all released on parole. As Hendrik mentions in the previous interview, only he and Sebastian carried forth with the musical endeavors of Absurd. The band’s reconfigured record label, now called Darker Than Black, also began to develop a higher profile. Hendrik renewed his contacts in the music scene and appeared in a few Black Metal fanzines. In July of 1999 announcements circulated about the release of Absurd’s new 4-song CD entitled Asgardsrei. The CD featured a more aesthetic presentation and an evolved sound, although with much of Absurd’s garage-band ambience still intact. Guests on the release included Graveland’s Rob Darken and well as an “ex-member of the German mainstream band Weissglut.” The end of the advertisement advised interested customers to “ORDER IT NOW before ZOG21 take YOUR copy.”

  This warning about the confiscation
of CDs by governmental authorities was not overly paranoid, however, as just a few months later on October 6, 1999, the German police raided a number of homes across the country, in particular the residences of the Darker Than Black and No Colours record labels. The initial charges consisted of “distribution of National Socialistic, anti-Semitic, racist, and violent releases.” Hendrik commented at the time, “This is the first time that the Black Metal scene has experienced the same kind of charges as the White Power scene.” He later noted that the government’s actions failed to result in any legal proceedings against those who were subject to the raids, meaning that the items found in the raids—with Absurd records prominent among them—were not sufficiently in violation of the law to make for a strong court case.