RFI: Les Légions Noires

All the official cd releases from those days are great of course. The VT splits, Mutiilation (Vampires and Remains) and some of the Vlad Tepes demos. From the other stuff I can only really recommend Black Murder, Seviss, Brenoritvrezorkre and Moëvöt.

The whole LLN concept has been very influential on Peste Noire, both imagewise and the total revelling in lofi, well, weirdness. I can't hear much influence on older bands like Blut Aus Nord, Kristallnacht, Seigneur Volant, etc those bands were already around when LLN were big. At the time it was pretty exciting, you got tons of mostly excellent demos coming from a seemingly really big scene but in the end 95% of the LLN 'movement' turned out to be just the two Vlad Tepes guys with their various projects and demos.

If you haven't already heard it, check out the Raven "F.M." minicd on No Colours (from somewhere in the late 90s), although it's Norwegian it's very similar to Vlad Tepes and very very good.

Drastus

i remember being really excited about LLN when i first discovered it, the only ones that have really stuck with me are möevöt and mütiilation. some vlad tepes stuff i still like. there were some ok second-string LLN bands that came out after the fact like vermeth (metal) and amaka hahina (noises). i'll always wonder how much (if any) influence aghast's album was on the weird noisy shit.

oh, and john's repping of drastus here and elsewhere makes me think i need to check them out. i could probably go do that right now, this being the internet and all.

they are awesome. I also really love Peste Noire's "Lorraine Rehearsal," it is great.

I've been really enjoying this Eikenskaden LP I got the other day--"The Last Dance." French BM not explicitly allied with LLN but seems pretty similar stylistically. Basic idea is thing is raw but melodic bm with odd piano breaks. Melancholic guitar shred over grooving riffs, vocals yelled & mixed low--I dig. I guess it's the "solo" project of a fellow from the band Mystic Forest, who I have yet to check out.