22 Jun 2006
Odin Walks the Nine Worlds

Nine Worlds ProductionsThe image at left links to a new, heathen owned and run, production company and booking agency. Which also happens to have a hand in a (so far web only) radio outlet. That's right, Odin Lives Radio, is back, with a new name and a new look: Nine Worlds Radio.

There's a statement up on the old site about the whole morass, reproduced here because it's relevant to many of my readers..

What Happened to Odin Lives?

As the Producer and Webmaster for Odin Lives Radio, we've been deluged with emails over the past month, all of which asked the same questions: what happened to Odin Lives? Where are the archives? Is the show coming back? Are you still on shortwave? And while it's pained us to leave so many of you puzzled, the situation has been very complex and very fluid - and only now do we feel comfortable in answering all the questions.

First off, the good news. Odin Lives Radio is coming back! We've changed our name and, consequently, our main web address, but we're back "on the air". The new name is Nine Worlds Radio, and the new website is at http://www.nineworldsradio.org.

This wasn't exactly done by choice. We were forced to take this action to continue our operations. No, we didn't lose the domain name, and we weren't challenged by some esoteric trademark or copyright law: it was worse. We faced the Jormangandr of the modern Heathen revival: we were tarred with the brush of racism.

We were soon getting requests from musicians and producers to not feature their music, and not book any concerts, as they refused to be associated with racism in any way. At some point since the development of the Odin Lives Radio website, a variety of links were established from our website to others. These links were done without our knowledge and the information contained in the linked websites was not part of our agenda for Odin Lives. As citizens of the United States of America, we certainly embrace the freedoms we enjoy – most especially the freedom of speech and association. Having said that, there are philosophies and opinions which run counter to our thoughts and beliefs, and we have no interest in promoting such ideas.

We were, to put it mildly, shocked and dismayed. Three years of work building the show had seemingly been destroyed virtually overnight. We are heathens, not racists - some of us are folkish heathens, some of us are universalists, but all of us place our trust in our folk and our gods over and above any political debates.

But in the hope that your belief in the Gods and Goddesses of the North is heartfelt, and not just a whim of temporal politics, we can ask you to stop pushing our shows, our concerts and our other services on sites devoted to white supremacist politics. If you care a whit about heathenry you will separate your politics from your religion, and not cause associations to be formed in the minds of the ignorant between them.

It's taken us this long to resolve all the disputes and difficulties arising from this morass, but things are finally straightened out. We will not run from this: but we've changed our name and site address to avoid any confusion on the part of our musical partners. We will be playing the same great music from the same great bands you've come to know and love. The archives are gone, because they reference "Odin Lives" instead of "Nine Worlds", but we're looking for ways to burn them as MP3 CD's and offer them for sale.

There's a ton of other changes coming as well: we're no longer on WBCQ (for the time being) but are exploring other avenues for radio syndication. We've also ramped up our booking agency and are again arranging concerts by notable Nordic Roots (and other genres) artists.

Nine Worlds Radio will go online at noon, United States Eastern Standard Time, on High Midsummer. There'll be at least one show posted, and more to come on a weekly basis. Needless to say, we are cautiously optimistic that the unwanted links, which were placed on Odin LIVES! website, will not be reestablished.

Thanks for your patience, loyalty and support through all this - Odin does indeed still live, and he roams the nine worlds as he has always done.

May the Shining Gods and Goddesses of Our Folk Guide Your Path and Ward Your Stead,

Chris Larsen
Producer

Dave Haxton
Webmaster

16:34 /Asatru | 12 comments | permanent link