Those of you who still might think so, you can lick Mother Mary’s asshole in eternity.”

The band continued by stating it was not political in any way and that none of its albums had “contained any racism/fascism or Nazi slant at all.” When the controversy continued to rage in certain circles, Darkthrone included the following message in their 1995 album Panzerfaust: “Darkthrone is certainly not a Nazi band nor a political band. If something breaks down, if something is stupid, etc… When we wrote ‘Jewish behavior’ in our previous press statement, we could have easily have (sic) written, according to the Norwegian language ‘stupid’ instead.” “In Norway the word ‘Jew’ is used all the time to mean something that is out of order. “Darkthrone can only apologize for this tragic choice of words,” Fenriz and Nocturno Culto wrote in an apology letter that revealed the anti-Semitism in Norwegian society. On the occasion of Hunger‘s twentieth anniversary, Noisey noted that Norway has a long history of deep-seated cultural anti-semitism, and Darkthrone ostensibly blamed this ingrained bigotry for their statement: Their 1994 album, Transilvanian Hunger, features lyrics penned by Vikernes, and was infamously promoted by a press release in which the band claimed that “If any man should attempt to criticize this LP, he should be thoroughly patronized for his obviously Jewish behavior.” It goes without saying that this is an incredibly stupid statement… but to Darkthrone’s credit, they repented.

And, generally speaking, the bands that have avoided the controversy that musicians like Vikernes actively court have done so by being… well… non-controversial. You have to take them on a case-by-case basis. You cannot lump all of these bands in together, regardless of one statement Aarseth made more than twenty years ago.

Euronymous short hair