Despite all my humbuggery about Christmas, yesterday was a good day, spent with family, unmarred by even one Christmas song. In what little time I spent listening to metal, I wandered back to a long song I’d discovered only the day before and have been listening to repeatedly. It’s called “Glemselens Elv” and it’s by Burzum. In other words, it’s by Varg Vikernes, from the 2010 comeback album called Belus. It’s an amazing piece of music, and so I decided to add another chapter to the mini-series on long songs that I thought I’d finished weeks ago. (What I thought was the last post in the series is here.)

According to Vikernes, Belus is “the name of the ancient European solar deity of light and innocence”, a more ancient name for Baldur — the “White God”, which was the original name planned for the album until it stirred up such controversy that Vikernes abandoned it. He further explains on the Burzum web site:

Belus is not a religious album or an anti-religious album, nor is it a political one, but an attempt to explore the myths about Belus and unveil the oldest roots of our cultural heritage. The album deals with the death of Belus, his sombre journey through the realm of death and his magnificent return. In essence the album and the story of Belus is meant to be an entertaining story about something that once upon a time played a major role in the forming and shaping of Europe. . . .

Inspiration for the album has come from a variety of sources, and I find my inspiration from fairy tales and myths, from classical music, from memories of what once was, from traditional music, from fantasy, from the wind and weather, from deep forests and running water, from the sky and the sunset, from misty mountains and from yellow leaves falling from age old trees.

Vikernes recorded the song in 2008 in the Tromsø prison, the year before his parole after serving 15 years of a 21-year sentence for burning churches and for the murder of his Mayhem bandmate, Euronymous. (more after the jump, including the song . . .)

When we started this site, we committed to ourselves (and to you) that we would post something new here every day — rain or shine, weekdays and weekends, holidays and mornings-after-binging — no exceptions. Inevitably, something will happen and someday we’ll fail to live up to that commitment. But so far, so good.

Thinking of something new to add every day that meets even our minimalist standards hasn’t been easy. Sure, there’s always new music to hear and then write about, but that takes a fair amount of time, which we don’t always have. So, sometimes we let our minds wander around the interwebz, just to see what might make an impression.

Like yesterday. Two things caught our eye: (1) a recent interview by black metal legend, convicted murderer and arsonist, and recently reinvigorated Norwegian recording artist Varg Vikernes; and (2) more info than we wanted to know about the artificial insemination of an elephant that was perpetrated earlier this week in Seattle, as reported in grotesque detail by the city’s daily newspaper.

Are these two items related to each other? Well, not actually, though pairing them in the title to this post seemed like an eye-catchingly good idea. Do they both relate to extreme metal? Uh, not actually. What the fuck, we fudged a bit. So sue us. Actually, don’t sue us. Read these bits instead, which include our always-incisive commentary (after the jump . . .)