Nihilistic Music.

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What is nihilistic music?
Trent Reznor is a nihilist, but is he singing about it? etc. the song Heresy.
Marilyn Mansons music defenatly sounds nihilistic.
The Sex Pistols were nihils, but did they sing about it?

There's a few distinctions to be made here. Firstly there's a) music that is made about nihilism, b) music that is associated with nihilistic groups but doesn't itself have to do with nihilism, and c) music that employs a style associated with nihilism (such as dadaism).

Examples of each:
a) The Fugs
b) thrash metal music and the ANUS crowd
c) Faust (as in the band), Nurse With Wound

The song "Heresy" appears to be a message from a frustrated, possibly diseased man to figures on the religious right trying to contextualise his ailment in a way he finds insulting. Reznor himself saw the song as his own reaction to the right-wing take on the AIDS epidemic in the early 90s, but he did not refer to it specifically in the song. I don't think it necessarily espouses nihilism.

I'm not so sure about Marilyn Manson or the Sex Pistols. At best they may be candidates for category b) along with NIN, but since I'm not a fan of Marilyn Manson or the Sex Pistols I might be missing something.

Joy Division is fairly nihilistic. Late '70's band. With such tracks as "She's Lost Control", "Dead Souls", "Love Will Tear Us Apart" and a personal favourite "Sister Ray"... Bauhaus occationally has it's moments as well. Some of the Cure's darker tracks (such as one hundered years) would probably qualify as well.

Not the sort of stuff I would listen too all the time any more though. O.o

Edit:
I don't think I have the words to describe 'nihilistic music'. I do know few bands pull it off successfully. Some just sound like they're trying to hard to be nihilistic, which is kinda defeating the entire point in the first place.

Death in June.

Agalloch are nihilistic, and quite popular with the teen crowd around here.

Tool definately is.

The majority of Machine Head songs provoke Nihilism.

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Excellent post. From Bauhaus (one of my personal favourites), listen to "All we ever wanted" and "Burning from the inside" and behold.

I would say some Smiths songs may balance on nihilism but I would disagree with them being nihilistic as a band.

In the gothscene, Sopor Aeternus & the Ensemble of Shadows would probably qualify as well, although sometimes the depression element is up front rather than real nihilism which can be heard in some of their songs.

Not heard either of those two(Sopor Aeternus & the Ensemble of Shadows), though to be honest, I prefer the older Goth music myself. Not surprising as it's also the music I heard growing up. The Smiths...Hmmm, yeah some of their tracks nudge nihilisim, but I also think that was kinda part of the times in the late 70's/early 80's what with "THE BOMB!" and all the Apololypse stuff being generated by the Cold War, so alot of groups edged on nihilistic at times, especially in Britian. Sisters of Mercy could have, but they were too energetic. Fields of the Nephilim could count though, though I some times feel they're more 'apocolyptic'.

Though now I think on it, if you are interested, track down music by "The Ledgendary Pink Dots". They're...unique...I don't think I have heard a group like them before. I'd place them in the nihilist range for alot of their tracks.

Sopor Aeternus & the Ensemble of Shadows is one band. It is a one-man project of Anna-Varney who uses a band guiding him but their line-up always rotates. The guiding band is called the Ensemble of Shadows which he says refers to the spirits that inspire him when writing music. The music is medieval gothic or neofolk, like a very dark and gloomy funeral march full of medieval flutes and eerie samples. It is quite spooky and the lyrics, although very abstract and bizarre, are very gloomy. The band is often called the eeriest and saddest band on earth ... But let me tell you I don't believe the whole stuff, the whole story about being in depression for 30 years and never leaving your house and "never performing in front of human audiences" sounds like all rock cliches combined really. But well, the music sounds good, so...



Alas, let me tell you about the beauty of the tomb
The stained glass, all viole(n)t, enhancing the gloom
Dark flowers, all withered, fragile and old
But their perfume still lingers, like a secret untold
Like a dream or a memory that floats in this vault
Waiting for a moment it shall be recalled
By some visitor maybe who is seeking relief?
from a strange kind of sadness, some unknown disease
Its symptoms are madness, caught by the music in his head!
Sung by the endless choirs called "the Voices of the Dead"
...
It's his longing for silence, for the absence of sound
that will lead him to hidden paths below the ground
Where he shall discover, through terror and through fear
Behind the black pine doors, something is sleeping here...
A little dead baby, a young boy lies kept
So fragile and frightened, crippled and sad...

Trent Reznor did a cover of Dead Souls for a motion picture album for The Crow.

Tool sounds nihilistic but i wasn't sure. Parabol and Parabola, sound like a nihilistic description of love.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_z2O289Jemo

Tool is way too diverse for any label. Some songs of them, such as Stinkfist, Aenima and Sober may be bordering nihilism, but you can hardly call songs such Wings for Marie nihilistic? Tool is way too diverse for any tag of some sort.

Wait a minute. Is nihilistic music summat you're supposed to enjoy?
Cos I always thought Born to Run by Bruce Springsteen was probably the most nihilistic and depressing piece of crap I'd ever heard.

I don't know what nihilistic is supposed to mean as a descriptive term for music. Most of the stuff people mention is music with a negative emotion. Negative isn’t necessarily nihilistic in my definition.

I would imagine true nihilistic music would have no emotion at all, just random noise or something. Atonal music comes to mind.

I like nihilistic music cos it's powerful, and at times, meaningful.

I think the previous poster wants a definition of "nihilistic music" and wants to know the difference with just negative/depressing lyrics.

I guess nihilistic is a term that is open for interpretation. Like the lyric from Sopor Aeternus I quoted, is that nihilistic in your books or would you rather say it is just goth or just depressed?