Steelchaos 2018 Preview: True Black Dawn
November brings not only gloom to Helsinki, but also a weekend of blackest, darkest tunes when the metal hordes invade Nosturi for the indoor festival Steelchaos from November 9 to November 10. True Black Dawn will perform a special MeatHook show. In honor of this occasion, it's time to enjoy a very peculiar interview with True Black Dawn's Wrath.
Steelchaos is one of the winter highlights musically, and also this year, the line-up for the two days is very promising. Besides True Black Dawn also Arcturus will play a special (old-school) show, and the likes of Primordial, Bölzer, Root and The Ruins of The Beverast will take the stage, among others.
Now, to the interview:
True Black Dawn – a contagious disease spreading over the years
Understandably, Wrath wants to keep the mystery for the special MeatHook show intact, but he had a few words to share to set the tone.
The hanging man, the black gallows
The Devil's paladin dangles over the gathering
Hooks through the skin, the crimson nimbus burning
Baleful and faceless, the luminous shadow.
- Wrath
Things did not get less cryptic in the actual interview itself (parts of it were first published in Offense Zine No.3)....
The incubation period, the time for a disease to unfold its ailments in their full sickly glory, varies but after 15 years the one called True Black Dawn is at last descending on this degenerated universe again. Manifesting itself in a range of symptoms carrying the name ‘Come The Colorless Dawn’ True Black Dawn is back with force, last witnessed by an unsuspecting human race between the early 90s and 2001 when the first outbreaks wreaked havoc. Long forgotten and in the vain hope of having defeated this illness, True Black Dawn has returned and to borrow from Dante: “Abandon all hope, ye who are be infected.”
The only chance to gain some insight was to ask Wrath - doctor, patient and one of the creators of the illness itself.
TMP: How would you describe the True Black Dawn?
Wrath: Spectrophobia (fear of mirrors) and Dementophobia (fear of becoming insane) come to mind as fitting mental aberrants. A distorted reflection lurking in the looking glass, a shadow self grinning in the dark recesses of the mind, a soundless laughter echoing inside.
TMP: Where and how was it discovered for the first time? By whom?
W: It began to manifest nearly a quarter of a century ago among a small group of deviants in Ostrobothnia, who broke the pious shackles and shed their blood free. Throughout the years it has constantly changed, resisting all attempts of treatment.
TMP: How does someone become infected? Who gets infected?
W: Insanity is contagious, once it settles in it's hard to brush off. Once tuned in, the frequency stays on. What used to be static is now something else, when the oscillations are aligned.
TMP: What are the symptoms?
W: The murky music bellows, blisters, and burrows beneath. The somber fragments of calm crawl under the skin, and increase the strength of the aggression.
True Black Dawn (Photo by Maija Lahtinen)
TMP: How do the symptoms show in a person or an organism?
W: There's no such thing as fun for the whole family. When the children are lead to the razor-man, they walk away with permanent smiles on their faces. When you brawl with a pig, you walk away with its stink.
TMP: What is the course of the disease?
W: It shines through the charcoal veil, and eventually claws through the mind's fabric. The black light that pours with a deep exhale. The rosaries of red, and the crimson grail. Silent, it's there, not far from here.
TMP: What complications can be expected?
W: It's not uncommon to ejaculate black blood, feel infatuation for sharp objects, and speak uncontrollably in vile tongues.
TMP: How does an infected person or organism experience the course of the disease?
W: The boundaries of reality become paper-thin. Something beneath peers through, grinning, making the strange feeling stronger. Feverous dreams of the pale sun burning like a beacon above, its flames engulfing the dreamer, and igniting him/her with an insatiable passion for the grey.
TMP: What does it feed on?
W: They come in many forms, some of which might be unusual to the casual observer. More undefined and outlandish sources of nourishment seem to be generally preferred. When you're musing on dread, you're bound to end up somewhere sinister.
Wrath | True Black Dawn (Photo by Maija Lahtinen)
TMP: (How) does it spread?
W: From streams of ashes it becomes a river, that spills to the shores like oil. Painting its path grey-black as twilight. Like a faceless mouth it spews cold void mercilessly forward.
TMP: Is there a cure? If yes, what?
W: Innocence once lost can never be regained, psyche once injured can never be unscarred again.
TMP: Any health warnings regarding the future?
W: Nine diseases were unleashed on an unsuspecting populace, yet two still remain, patiently waiting for their turn to gnaw the lambs with their fangs. [Health warning: Visitors of the Maryland Deathfest XVII in May 2019 should be aware that the area will be highly contacious with the True Black Dawn virus on Saturday, May 25, 2019].
TMP: Any last words?
W: "What we achieve inwardly will change outer reality."- Plutarch
