Bathory

Essential Albums

  • Under the Sign of the Black Mark
    Under the Sign of the Black Mark
    Under the Sign of the Black Mark

    Unleashed upon a very discriminating audience in 1987, Bathory’s third album became one of the primary building blocks for the Scandinavian black metal movement of the early ‘90s. Essentially the solo project of then 21-year-old Swedish musician Tomas “Quorthon” Forsberg, the record has an uncompromising attitude, cavernous atmosphere and demonic vocal style that made Bathory one of the most extreme bands in the land. Along with the early works of Celtic Frost and Venom, it inspired the legion of corpse-painted firebrands that followed.

  • Bathory
    Bathory
    Bathory

    Though Venom had named an album Black Metal two years earlier, the 1984 debut by Sweden’s Bathory is what really established the genre’s sound—no human had ever sung with the phlegmy, demonic screech that Quorthon does here. The band’s murky, zero-fidelity mixture of Motörhead’s momentum with Black Sabbath’s pagan pessimism adds up to a battering ram of depravity. The nefarious subject matter of tracks like “Storm of Damnation” and “Raise the Dead” just makes the creep show creepier.

Artist Playlists

Compilations

About Bathory

When Bathory hit the metal underground in the ’80s, the Swedes sounded like wraiths from a shadowy hellscape. Their first three albums, including 1987’s Under the Sign of the Black Mark, defined Scandinavia’s black-metal scene thanks to their blurred guitars, tortured screeches and Satanic menace. It was a remarkable accomplishment considering that guitarist, singer and songwriter Quorthon (born Thomas Börje Forsberg) was a mere teenager when he started the project—named after Hungarian countess and alleged serial killer Elizabeth Báthory—in 1983. For Quorthon, however, black metal was only a first stop. With 1990’s Hammerheart, he once again started a new scene: Viking metal, a deeply heroic, power-metal-informed style rich in Norse folklore. Despite Bathory making detours into retro-thrash on mid-’90s efforts like Requiem, Quorthon’s passion for Viking metal only deepened, culminating in 2002’s Nordland I and 2003’s Nordland II, a two-volume set packed with mythological storytelling and orchestral heft. Sadly, Quorthon’s life was cut far too short when the 38-year-old died from heart failure in 2004. Ranking up there with titans like Venom and Mercyful Fate, Bathory are revered as one of extreme metal’s early pioneers.

ORIGIN
Vällingby, Sweden
FORMED
16 March 1983
GENRE
Metal

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