Ah, but any man can give a song a pretentious title. The reason Bal-Sagoth wins for sheer pretension is because of the actual lyrics of the songs themselves. Every album is basically a fantasy novel, formed into two trilogies, and we are confronted from the lyrics booklet with things like this (only half of this is sung. Worse, there are a good few bits sung that aren't mentioned here):
Starfire Burning Upon The Ice-Veiled Throne Of Ultima Thule
Spears agleam in the dying sun,
The blood is spilled, the battle's won,
From the icy throne of God-King shall rule,
When nine stars kiss the moon o'er Ultima Thule.
[Old Northlander war-song, found in the ancient scrolls of Volmyr]
The Final Part of Voryn Helmsmiter's Journey to the Ice Realm: Blood
drips from my frost-encased sword, forming a crimson blossom upon the ice...
My limbs cold, becoming as one with the massing snows... my eyes nearly frozen
closed. For how long had we travelled? The memory grows dim, lost in the
cruel, searing storm-winds. And now, at last... our quest is at an end. With
the blessings of the elders we began our journey beyond the great veil of
shadowed glaciers... They spoke of a prophecy foretold, an ancient and
glorious legacy, A quest for the realm of legendry lost to man since before
even the Star-Lords descended... Now, only I survive, my blood spilling to the
ice, turning to crimson crystal upon the deeply frozen earth. Elder sorcery
crackles and hums all about me, coursing through the sky, the snow... As grim
destiny approaches with the freezing boreal gales and this ancient prophecy
unfolds...
[Predication of the Elders:]
Go, follow the witch-lights in the northern night sky, beyond the great
silvern mountains... Let the sacred moon-crystal be your guide, beware the
sentinels at the Caverns of Eternal Mist...
Spears agleam in the dying sun,
The blood is spilled, the battle's won,
From the icy throne of God-King shall rule,
When nine stars kiss the moon o'er Ultima Thule.
Swathed in moon-frosts, in icy winds our blazon flying,
Iron gleaming 'neath the stars, black skies ablaze with astral fire,
White wolves (like silent spirits) haunt us, ever northwards, the ice-gem
leads us, glimmering,
Powerful spells entwine the shrine of legendry, mighty gates of frozen
splendour looming,
When the moon and stars shine as one upon the snows, the ancient ice-gate
opens, the prophecy is fulfilled!
Towering, ice-encrusted forms lumber forth from the freezing mist,
(Their eyes shimmering with a fiendish, eldritch malevolance...)
Our steel is raised against their weapons of gleaming crystal,
And the virgin snow is rendered crimson by bloodshed in a searing storm of
slaughter.
(Wounded, dying, my flesh rent by weapons no human ever forged or wielded, I
am beckoned forward by a strange, alluring force from beyond the veil of
swirling mists...)
Shadows, images form in the glittering rune-carved walls of this glacial
chamber,
Secrets frozen within the timeless vaults of eternity...
The throne of the time-lost ice realm, entwined in the mantle of such searing
star-born power...
This frozen, aeon-cloaked seat of immortal majesty... (of an empire forged
long before the vast seas rose in devouring fury!)
What shimmering swords raised in combat once sang with the glorious clamour
of steel on steel?
What splendid banners, billowing in the icy gales, once heralded the march
of these invincible silverclad legions to the blood-swathed embrace of epic
battle?
The glory of untold thousands of years past... this ethereal legacy of
mighty Ultima Thule.
The frozen eyes of immortal kings watch me... such a dark splendour!
The Guardian of Ice and Shadow:
The grim Ice-Gods sleep in these frost-bound tombs, illumined by the caress
of lunar fire,
And the kiss of star-gleam from the stygian void...
All is now as was foretold in prophecy, written in the very ether of empyreal
eternity...
The celestial alignment is night... the conjunction is at hand!
And nine stars illumine the northern heavens, a vast cosmic sigil with the
silvern moon at its centre...
Blazing argent light fills the chamber, engulfing the hewn walls of elder ice,
These ancient carvings in a time-veiled tongue, (etched into the primeval ice
countless aeons ago, now bathed in diaphonous incandescence by this storm of
lucent stellar power, their mindsearing meaning at last becomes known to me...)
their cosmic secrets unfold...
The ice-throne is encased by a shimmering wall of writhing cerulean flame,
A lambent flame far colder than the frozen surface upon which it dances...
And then, enlightenment comes, gleaming down upon my consciousness as the
bright moon gazes down upon this auroral vista... From my mind is lifted an
obscuring veil, a veil induced by sorcerous arts, and I realize I have been
merely a vassal of another's twisted will, a pawn in a game which is entwined
in treachery and malign aspirations to thresholds of great power. Such a
traitorous web has been spun! The elders of my kingdom bow in obeisance to the
vile priests of Xothan'kur, and it is their diseased machinations which have
urged me here, to the very heart of the far-fabled ice realm... for they seek
to usurp the power of the Conjunction, stealing the vast energies of the
Ice-Veiled throne and absorbing them into their own leprous, undead bodies, pe
rpetuating the adoration of their abhorrent liege for countless ages,
liberating his vile will and enslaving the realms of the world... Aye, for
generations they have plotted their actions, and I was the key to this plot,
chosen from birth for this fated journey... for the blood of the ancient kings
of Ultima Thule runs strong in my veins, and only once in every aeon may one
such as I stand before the throne during the great cosmic alignment, when the
sorceries of the ancient Ice-Gods are at their peak, and rightfully wield this
power unleashed... And yet I vow that the vile minions of Xothan'kur shall not
prevail... Liberating the fettered power of the moon-crystal, I sever the
tendrils of their dark conjurings, and their aspirations are at an end, th
eir spells broken by the very power which they sought to usurp! The final
vestiges of mortal life flee my body in crimson gouts, and at last I realize
what the fates have spun for me, and what is carved in the very ice all about
me... My destiny is at ha nd...
[The Herald of Enlightenment:]
And so, enrob'd by tendrils of starfire and the raiments of lunar mist,
The immortal liege whose sceptred empire is eternity,
Sits enthroned and brooding over his dark realm once more.
The last of my life's blood spills to the ice, (as star-wrought destiny is at
last fulfilled.)
Swathed in freezing flame...
The mystic wolves of the frost-moon (slowly, silently) encircle me,
Their eyes are blazing azure, and their fur is whiter than the sublime snows.
Such power! I am the Chosen... the secrets of the earth and the stars are
unlocked before me...
I am destined to reign forever... to reign from the Ice-Veiled Throne of
Ultima Thule!
They are by far the least sensible band in the world. I also might mention here that they take themselves pretty seriously, are sponsored by a company that makes re-enactment weapons, and perform wearing chainmail, leather hoods and other such costumes. And that their front mans stage name is Lord Byron. Bless 'em.
