Taiwan Today

Chthonic unleashes shrieking vocals, raging guitars and thunderous drums that combine as a powerful voice for .

Limited vision, limited union;

Unlimited division, unlimited illusion;

Limited freedom, limited right;

Unlimited island, unlimited fight.

Our hearts are pounding with a heavy beat.

The rights of millions lay at your feet.

A society marching needs true justice.

A world like this needs true union.

We have the land, the strength, the power.

Rise up, overcome, take it over.

Ignored too long, we became stronger.

Tear down the walls and let us run over.

--"UNlimited ," Chthonic, 2007

In September last year, Chang Tieh-chih, a Taiwanese music critic and doctoral candidate in political science in the , went to a concert at the Highline Ballroom in . He was looking forward to catching a performance by Taiwanese black metal band Chthonic, which had received extensive coverage in major newspapers, including the Washington Post, International Herald Tribune, New York Times and Los Angeles Times. "My friends in said the band had received a lot of domestic coverage and asked me if the local media made too much fuss over it," Chang says. "I told them the media fervor was even more pronounced in the ."

Chthonic was the first Asian band to play in the Ozzfest tour, a leading heavy metal festival. This was a significant achievement, but the main reason for all the media attention is the band's role in 's quest for international recognition. Chthonic's concerts last year coincided with the opening of the United Nations General Assembly and 's first attempt to join the world body under the name "" instead of "Republic of China." has sought to join the UN since 1993, but has failed due to opposition by , which holds a permanent UN Security Council seat and claims that is part of its territory.

Freddy Lim, Chthonic's 32-year-old lead singer and chief songwriter, played on the name of the world body when he wrote "UNlimited Taiwan," which became the title of the band's tour. "Tear down the walls and let us run over," Lim roars amid raging, overdriven guitars and thunderous drums.

Chthonic, taking its name from an ancient Greek word pertaining to the gods of the underworld, did not organize its tour as a political campaign. It was first and foremost a musical tour. "Media are interested in the political dimension, but fans are attracted to Chthonic's music on a very visceral level," says David Frazier, a freelance contributor to the International Herald Tribune and music critic based in . "Still, it can and does happen that a fan will start out liking the band because they rock hard, but then gets more interested in their personalities and political message."

The band did not hesitate to take on a mission Lim and the other band members see as crucial for the future of their country. "It's quite abnormal that Taiwanese artists or performers have said so little on the issue of Taiwan's quest for international recognition, whether they choose not to or dare not to," Lim says. "I'm a musician, but I also have every right to speak about my own views as a Taiwanese citizen."

The tour was funded in part by the Government Information Office (GIO) to promote 's efforts to increase its international status. "We're just hitching a ride on Chthonic's musical journey," GIO Minister Shieh Jhy-wey said at a press conference before the start of the band's UNlimited tour.

Heavy Mettle

The band has more than proven its public relations mettle. On the day before Chthonic's performance in , the city's Taiwan-affiliated associations attempted to draw attention to the country's UN bid with a march, the latest in a series of such events stretching back over the last decade. However, compared to the amount of press coverage Chthonic's concerts received, the march went virtually unnoticed. "Such events and the government's other promotional efforts have attracted little attention from the foreign media, but a rock band can create a strong international presence for the same issue," music critic Chang says. "It's a powerful example of music's ability to make a statement in the political arena."

Chang says Chthonic's integration of musical and political expression can be viewed as a continuation of the New Taiwanese Songs movement of the early 1990s, which used pop songs to explore and comment on social issues and, more indirectly, politics. With songs written mostly in Holo, the language of 's largest ethnic group, the movement developed a more energetic approach than the traditional Holo genre's typically slow, sad style. Formerly dominated by Mandarin songs, the New Taiwanese Songs movement came to be viewed as a landmark in 's mainstream music scene. "In the past, Holo and Mandarin songs existed in two separate worlds," Chang says. "Writing songs in Holo was already quite a subversive act."

Together with old Holo songs, the energetic new style was a major inspiration for Lim, who established Chthonic in 1995. "Holo songs are the normal background music for my everyday life," says Lim, who also composes lyrics in Holo. A classical piano student as a child, Lim gradually developed interest in hard rock from his teenage experience of listening to and imitating the styles of foreign bands such as Guns N' Roses and Bon Jovi. Lim then became fascinated by more aggressive forms of heavy metal and eventually settled on black metal, which is characterized by shrieking vocals, distorted guitars, fast, pounding tempos and performers with demonic face painting.

In 1996, Chthonic won its first major prize at a pop music contest organized by in . "I was very much impressed by their confidence, how distinct they were from the other bands and with their forceful, well-defined performance," Sandee Chan, a judge at that contest, is quoted as saying in a book by and about Chthonic, ChthoniC Dynasty (2006). A leading producer and singer/songwriter in the Chinese music world, Chan was invited to sing on the band's fourth album, which was released in 2006.

Critical Acclaim

In 1997, Chthonic won another major award for independent bands at a national pop music competition. The following year, the band recorded and released its first single, "Deep Rising," an epic piece about early settlers from migrating to and their difficult struggle for survival in a new, savage land. This song was included in the band's first full-length studio album, the critically acclaimed Where the Ancestors' Souls Gathered (1999). In 2000, Chthonic became the first Taiwanese band to be invited to perform at Fuji Rock, 's largest international music festival.

In 2005, erhu player Su-nung joined the band. The introduction of this traditional Chinese--or "Eastern," as Lim calls it--stringed instrument, which produces a sad, keening sound, is a part of the band's effort to build a distinctly Eastern version of black metal music. Other elements adopted from local musical traditions include the chanting of religious texts and the powerful drumming that accompanies lion dances at religious festivals. Chthonic also incorporates the traditional five-tone format found in old Holo songs, which were in turn based on the Japanese enka genre, a form of melodramatic singing. "I didn't purposefully reproduce these local elements," Lim says. "Their incorporation into my songs is just a natural result of the influences of the unique features and aura of the Taiwanese cultural environment."

Chthonic has sometimes been labeled a symphonic black metal band because it employs a more recognizable song structure and more orchestral elements than other bands in the genre. Chthonic went as far as to invite a student orchestra from to play its Underworld Birthday concert in 2002, which resulted in an interesting combination of Western and Eastern musical styles. Su-nung was the leader of the student orchestra.

Echoing the northern European originators of black metal music, Chthonic explores local history and folk tales in its songs. "Nordic epics and cultures are the most common themes found in black metal music," Chang says. Chthonic's presentation of Taiwanese ethnic history and legends carries on this tradition. Ninth Empyrean (2000), the band's second album, depicts aboriginal gods going into battle against invading Chinese Han deities, a motif that echoes Nordic divinities' resistance to Christianity in northern European black metal music. English versions of Ninth Empyrean and subsequent albums have been distributed in the and European markets.

Ghost Story

Chthonic's third album, Relentless Recurrence (2002), elaborates on perhaps the most famous ghost story in , in which a Taiwanese woman, upon her suicide, wreaks fierce revenge on a man who cheated and abandoned her and then returned to . Lim believes that this type of folklore represents a desperate cry for justice by a marginalized people in a marginalized land. Relentless Recurrence helped Chthonic win the Best Band award at 's prestigious Golden Melody Awards in 2003, with judges praising the album's central motif, musical quality and creativity.

Chthonic's latest album, Seediq Bale (2005), depicts a major aboriginal uprising against Japanese colonial rule in . At the start of "Indigenous Laceration," Lim encapsulates the plight of 's indigenous people, singing, "Winter, years, four centuries; Ceaseless foreign invasion." Lim says that there are still many other topics to explore in 's history--such as Hakkas protecting their turf and the ethnic conflict between descendants of early Taiwanese immigrants and mainlanders who arrived after World War II--and in folk traditions, such as temple rituals and a mythological Taiwanese aboriginal empire.

Lim and his band mates have worked hard to build a sustainable independent music industry in . Among other things, Lim organizes the Formoz Festival, which has grown from several student bands singing in front of the main entrance of in 1995 into a major international music event in recent years. In 1999, Chthonic band members helped to open a live music venue in , which grew into the larger The Wall club in 2003.

Members of Chthonic and other bands have also worked in concert to change the government's policies governing the operation of live music venues. "A major result of our efforts is that performing music has become officially recognized as a cultural business," Lim says. Chang points out that while cynics could view Lim's efforts as an attempt to further his own personal commercial interests and those of his band, the work he has done with the government has in fact helped all of 's independent bands. Now, with the burgeoning of music festivals and the growth of regular, profitable venues for live performances around the country, the future prospects for the development of independent music and the pop music industry in general appear to be bright in .

The spirit of independence permeates nearly everything Chthonic does. Lim says that if his band were offered a chance to perform in --a virtual impossibility given Chthonic's outspoken pro-Taiwan independence stance--it would only do so after receiving guarantees that its themes of independent identity and nationality would not be censored. "Taiwanese people must learn to develop and articulate their own identity," Lim says, "and we musicians are no exception."

Write to Pat Gao at kotsijin@gmail.com