In Norse mythology, Ragnarök is a series of future events, including a great battle foretold to ultimately result in the death of a number of major figures (including the gods Odin, Thor, Týr, Freyr, Heimdallr, and Loki), the occurrence of various natural disasters, and the subsequent submersion of the world in water. Afterward, the world will resurface anew and fertile, the surviving and returning gods will meet, and the world will be repopulated by two human survivors. Ragnarök is an important event in the Norse canon, and has been the subject of scholarly discourse and theory.
The event is attested primarily in the Poetic Edda, compiled in the 13th century from earlier traditional sources, and the Prose Edda, written in the 13th century by Snorri Sturluson. In the Prose Edda, and in a single poem in the Poetic Edda, the event is referred to as Ragnarök or Ragnarøkkr (Old Norse "Fate of the Gods" and "Twilight of the Gods" respectively), a usage popularised by 19th-century composer Richard Wagner with the title of the last of his Der Ring des Nibelungen operas, Götterdämmerung (1876).
Ragnarök is a Swedish prog-rock band, founded in Kalmar in 1972, by Peter Bryngelsson, Henrik Strindberg and Staffan Strindberg. Their first album was released 1976 by Silence Records.
Ragnarök is the fifth album, released in 1995 on Metal Blade Records, by the rock/heavy metal/punk band Gwar. This album contains the most varied vocal stylings of any Gwar album, as the majority of the band lends their lungs to the tracklist (only We Kill Everything features as many different vocalists), as well as guest villain Cardinal Syn.
Ragnarök is essentially a heavy metal album and it is spiced with a story about the end of the world. The story involves Oderus and his alien sister Slymenstra being forcibly mated with the aid of rogue space aliens. Meanwhile, a comet hurtling towards planet earth is inciting the populace to revolt, and anarchy has set in all over the globe. An AIDS-like plague has crippled the masses ("The New Plague" is sung, by Dave Brockie, as a human with AIDS), who await the meteor's arrival and their subsequent death. However, it turns out that the comet is actually Cardinal Syn, a robotic agent of harsh Catholic dogma. Syn is representing the Warrior Pope, who is demanding that all bow down to him and obey his insane whims. But Syn is drawn to Slymenstra's alien baby, for a reason that is left for the listener to uncover...