Terminus Interview - Grizzlybutts

In this special bonus episode of Terminus, we speak with Josh, the man behind the webzine Grizzlybutts, who has been kind enough to propagate our gospel of insanity through his site. We talk about his long history of music writing, from his early days writing hypernegative reviews in punk zines, to his current work writing long-form metal criticism that affirms whatever can be affirmed in the music. Over the course of the conversation, we touch on bigger questions like: What is the role of the critic, and the metal critic in particular? What is the point of *writing* about metal, as the big print mags and hegemonic music sites decline? Why should new metal fans bother learning the history of the music? This interview captures a sense of Josh as a man driven by deeply personal conviction: a drive to match the effort of the artist with his own, a compulsion to grapple with the big questions, and a stubborn insistence on the value of the written word itself -- irrespective of what's to gain, regardless of what anyone else thinks.

00:00 - Brief lead-in

02:20 - The genesis of GrizzlyButts: origins, influences, ideals, antipathies

36:07 - Filtration and curation: How does G.B. choose what to cover? How do we do it?

45:15 - You Need To Know This / Why Are You Doing This?: The purpose of metal history; folk art vs. high art, returning to the spirit of black metal.

01:26:47 - Ordinance - "The Kingdom of Nothing," fr. In Purge There Is No Remission (The Sinister Flame, 2020)

Enter the GrizzlyButts domain

Terminus links:

Terminus on Youtube

Terminus on Patreon

Terminus on Subscribestar

Terminus on Instagram

Terminus on Facebook

thetrueterminus@gmail.com