History
Led Zeppelin and Manowar had already explored pagan themes in the 1970s and 1980s though pagan metal bands share few if any similarities, preferring instead to credit the influence of bands such as Bathory, Enslaved, Amorphis, and Skyclad. Bathory and Enslaved are also known as Viking metal bands while Amorphis and Skyclad are also known as folk metal bands.
Jarkko Aaltonen notes that Black Sabbath "was quite pagan" as well but of "the current metal scene", he credits Skyclad as starting "the mix of traditional folk-rock music with mythology-concentrated lyrics". Chrigel Glanzmann of Eluveitie similarly credits Skyclad as the first pagan metal band, remarking that the band had mixed heavy metal music with Celtic folk music "in a way that was really inspiring". The author Ian Christe has also identify Skyclad as the pioneers of pagan metal. In contrast, Heri Joensen credits Bathory as the first pagan metal act instead, noting that Bathory had gotten "tired of the childishness of satanic lyrics, so they added some cultural weight by going to Nordic mythology". Alan A. Nemtheanga of Primordial remarks that one "can see the formation of pagan metal" in Bathory's 1988 album Blood Fire Death. He also contends that Bathory "were copying Manowar, which most people don't like to admit". Mathias Nygård of Turisas identified Amorphis as the first pagan metal band for playing "a huge role in guiding us in the direction we are now".
In April 2008, performers on the folk and pagan metal festival Paganfest were subject to accusations of being neo-Nazis and fascists from the Berliner Institut für Faschismus Forschung. Ville Sorvali of Moonsorrow and Heri Joensen of Týr issued a joint video statement to refute these accusations, noting that "one of the biggest issues seems to be that we use ancient Scandinavian symbols in our imagery like the S in the Moonsorrow logo and the T in the Týr logo that is how the S and the T runes have been written for thousands of years". Moonsorrow has also issued a written statement in response to the controversy while Týr notes on their official website that they "got the idea for the rune logo" from the Black Sabbath album of the same name. Other pagan metal bands such as Skyforger have also disassociated themselves from Nazism, fascism or racism. Skyforger went as far as to add the words 'No Nazi Stuff Here!' on the back of their album covers.
As of 2009, the genre has become something of a phenomenon. Mikael Karlbom of Finntroll feels that pagan metal has become something of a trend. Jarkko Aaltonen of Korpiklaani expresses a similar opinion and laments the number of people "jumping on a bandwagon". Johan Hegg of Amon Amarth has distanced his band from the trend, stating that "We don’t really see ourselves as one of those bands doing pagan folklore music."
Read more about this topic: Pagan Metal
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