Thurston Moore Joins Black Metal Band Twilight
 

In his post (?) Sonic Youth career, Thurston Moore has taken a bit of an aesthetic turn: he's joined the black metal supergroup Twilight. Nachtmystium guitarist/vocalist Blake Judd, also a member of Twilight, revealed this in an interview with the 1st Five.
For their upcoming album, out this fall on Century Media, the Twilight lineup will consist of Moore, Judd, producer Sanford Parker, Stavros Giannopoulos from the Atlas Moth, Wrest of Leviathan, and Imperial from Krieg. Judd told the 1st Five that he hopes to get Isis' Aaron Turner, Lichens' Rob Lowe, and Malefic of Xasthur to also contribute.
Judd told the 1st Five:

You know Century Media could offer us a hundred thousand dollars to make that Twilight record and say: 'Blake, you get ninety percent of that money but Thurston Moore's not gonna be on the record, or, you can be on it and we'll give you ten grand and that's what you have to make it work.' And I would, I would take the ten grand and work with Thurston. That's like how much I love Sonic Youth.

Judd alluded to Moore's involvement in an interview with Brandon Stosuy for a recent "Show No Mercy" column, and explained how they met:

Pitchfork: It's the same lineup as the last record?
BJ: Pretty much. I know [the Atlas Moth's] Stavros [Giannopoulos] and Sanford will be involved and there's talk of Thurston Moore being involved. He was really interested in doing it and he's a big black metal fan. Sanford knows him because his old studio was run with a guy named Jeremy Lemos who was Sonic Youth's sound man for a long time, so that's our connection to them. Sanford had spoken to him when we were doing the last album about maybe getting involved. Timing wasn't right then, but he said he was super interested in doing something down the line. So if we add anybody else, that's who it will be.

i'm more interested in hearing this than the next chelsea light moving song

Well, musically I can see this taking Thurston a bit away from the usual stuff most have grown to expect him to be doing (I love the Chelsea Light Moving track, but it isn't too far off from what we've heard w/ Sonic Youth/some of his side projects over the past few years).

Exciting. Yes. Always dig when musicians branch out into other genres...especially when they know how to add their own twist to it, which I have full faith Thurston is capable of doing.

In other words, haha, thanks for sharing this.

Agreed, but seeing him sport corpsepaint would be even more important.

he's a brilliant guitar but i think he hasn't speed or an antichrist soul for this.

Woah. Fucking awesome. And I agree with you madcap...I'm just so fucking curious!

I'd be excited if the band wasn't Twilight....

Well, this can´t be worse than Metallica and Lou Reed.

I like Nachtmystium and I like Thurston, I'm cautiously optimistic.

Boy, is Thurston burying himself in work! Would this be to stave off grief over Kim & the (possible) end of SY? (I wonder which will last longest - this or Chelsea Light Moving?) I must admit, tho', I'm looking forward to hearing Thurston shredding, black metal-style. Could be excellent therapy, both for him and us grieving SY fans...

I've been curious to hear some output from him in this vein. We've heard how BM affected T, but we've never actually heard it musically from him. I too am excited to hear this.

hope not.

Why? every song will sounds the same. Black metal is one idea over and over again.

Cheap shot. Shit things are too easy to mock.

I don´t think artists should make something completely new in every album. I think if someone has found some very personal, own style, he can recycle it if he can add new albums something fresh. I think true creativity doesn´t born in obsession to create always something new. I also really enjoy artists who add little something new along their career, develop some kind naturally. I think for example PJ Harvey should forget his obsession to renew all the time.

Anyway I haven´t heard any interesting Black Metal-record. It´s a long time I watched Venom 7 gates of Hell-vid and I quite like it. Maybe I should listen some Venom-album sometime in the future...

I think it´s stupid to say any music style shit, because I think no-one can listen all the albums of some music style specially if he´s the one who doesn´t like that style.

its about damn time

I think artists should do whatever the fuck they want.

Oh yeah, all black metal sounds the same.... I was listening to Proclamation, my friend mistook it for Bathory.....

I just have no use for black metal, it was defined by Venom in the 80's and then codified by a bunch of Scandanavians and everything I've ever heard sounds exactly the same.

I just don't get it. Its a strange type of nostalgia.

And it is fucking ugliness.

It'll be cool if he goes a bit racist.

Mid-life crisis?

Seeing the words 'Thurston Moore' and 'Twilight' together makes me cringe.

EVERYTHING is worse than Metallica and Lou Reed

If he doesn't wear any platform heels he'll be fine.

Andropause could be very hard for men...specialy if they wanna play whatever metal

First, let me say that I have never been a fan who automatically likes every side project Thurston has done. I listened to some of Twilight's first record the other night, fully expecting to hate it. I've always liked metal, but what little I had heard of black metal left me unimpressed. But this was surprisingly good, except for the silly vocal style that seems to be prevalent in this kind of music. There was some melody underneath the sheets of noise. I can even see parallels with some of Sonic Youth's stuff. So, what struck me as a case of "strange bedfellows" actually makes a little sense to me now. I wouldn't mind seeing them live.

So you´ve heard all the world´s Black metal-records?

Totally agree, I just descriped what kind of art making I enjoy. If some artist enjoy repeating himself endlessly, it´s ok to me.

Try living below someone who has a wooden floor and wears high heels.

Black Metal is the only genre I've ever heard that manages to make noise and aggression sound boring. Thurston's too nice and too cool and too much of a sonic wizard for such a genre to deserve, but if anyone could make something interesting out of it, it would be him. I'm curious, but neither outraged nor excited. Definitely rings of a mid-life crises, at any rate

I didn't know you lived below Robbie Savage.

Imagine what it was like when the fucker was practicing for Strictly.

Whatever BM's shortcomings, Thurston turning up in his muscle car with his hair in a ponytail hardly sounds like any kind of remedy. Good luck to him though. Living the dream.

Al this talk of mid-life crisis as a motivator really pisses me off as a middle aged person who has ALWAYS BEEN IN BANDS FOR FUCK'S SAKE.

Thurston is a musician. He is a "band person." He likes "music." Like most people with decent taste, he listens to things outside the areas in which he himself has historically played. Jesus. He wants to explore a new avenue in an area of music that he enjoys and is outside his usual stylistic parameters (though I argue that BM has many qualities that appeal to noise/sonic/no wave fans [tremolo chord picking, raw recording quality and dissonance for instance], and those qualities were in fact what got me interested in Burzum in the early/mid 90s and made me a metal fan when I had previously dismissed the entire field out of hand), and I say good for him.

A fucking midlife crisis band is a guy picking up his guitar after "giving up that youthful bullshit" and playing AC/DC covers or Blueshammer shit with his buddies from work at some neighborhood bar.

Thurston is a lifelong musician. He has always made music and will continue to do it. BIG FUCKING SHOCK. No one is levelling the midlife tag at Lee for continuing to make music he enjoys at this point.

I am not super into Twilight (bought the first LP and didn't wind up keeoing it after a few listens), but it's a solid group and has an audience and there are far worse ways Thurston could have scratched his black metal itch.

Zygotes, man. You come back when you're 40+ and we'll see if you're still even remotely cool. If you are, I guess it's a "crisis."


Fuck it.

You were doing so well until this line.

I guess that was unfair, but I have seen a lot of cool young people turn into squares right before my eyes.

(I guess I just get sensitive and annoyed about these things. You stay current and try to remain vital and "in the now" and it looks like a midlife crisis, you stick to your guns and you're "a sad old man living in the past." These things are usually only uttered by people too young to have had to deal with aging and not turning square...)

I think you are totally on point. Mid-life? Uhhh a little late for that hrhrhr. Sorry had to get a bit black there ;).

I am fairly surprised at the lack of BM fans here. I myself am not the biggest fan, however after getting a couple of my good friends into more dissonant music, they had found themselves pretty well obsessed with it and went about buying a good swath of all the better stuff on vinyl. My buddy even looking into running an online record shop for it. It's not my favorite of the boundary pushing/noise/dissonant/whatever genres, however..

I do totally dig some black metal... when done right. My personal tastes are more on the modern side like WITTR, Krallice and a few of the classics (Burzum, et al.). I cannot stand ANY regular metal, hair metal, or Metallica BS. Black fucking Metal or STFU. It just has the aesthetics noise rock fans love... for me anyway.