I'm from Kirkenes, a mining town in the northernmost corner of Norway. During the winter the sun does not rise, there are metres of snow, and cold winds come down from the frozen Arctic sea. It is months of cold, bleak darkness. This Christmas I went back north for a week of reindeer meat and photon deprivation. This brief visit reminded me of how much I actually appreciate daylight, but also made me think about the heritage of gloom in much of the Norwegian music that I enjoy. There seems to be an undercurrent of darkness running through Norwegian musical history that I believe might be where the 'black'-part of True Norwegian Black Metal comes from. This is not related to the sentimental melancholy found in other Northern European traditions (i.e. the wonderful sadness of the Finns). This is the pure matte blackness of frozen fjords and hostile mountains. And isn't it wonderful?

Einar is a designer and researcher working at the Oslo School of Architecture and Design. He is also a part of the design studio Voy that specializes in woodworking and electronics. Einar lives in a forest by the fjord and travels by ferry.

P.S. 'Svartsyn' can be translated to 'black-sight' and describes an extreme pessimism.