SATYRICON Frontman: 'Americans Have A Different Understanding Of Extreme-Metal Music'

June 2, 2006

Sigurd "Satyr" Wongraven, the snarling frontman for Norwegian black-metallers SATYRICON, told MTV.com that he has no idea what sort of response the band's new album, "Now, Diabolical", is going to receive when it lands in U.S. record stores on June 13. SATYRICON's previous outing, "Volcano", has sold a mere 15,000 copies since its release back in 2003. Six weeks ago, "Now, Diabolical" was released in Europe and is one of the fastest-selling records in their homeland.

But Europe isn't America, and according to Satyr, "Americans have a different understanding of extreme-metal music.

"It's kind of weird," he continued, "because death metal is a part of what I call extreme-metal music, and death metal has more to do with America than Europe, that's for sure. It seems like there is a lot of confusion as to who's, where it concerns black metal and death metal. Europeans pinpointed a long time ago who's black metal and what bands are important. The American kids don't seem to have the slightest clue about that, so you find yourself in a situation where a band that is not popular in Europe at all ... can do really well in America, while other bands that have very solid standings in Europe are not doing very well in America. It's hard to predict.

"If I was to go by the reception and the overall status of a band like SATYRICON in Europe, I would say that [the record] is going to do extremely well in America. But given what I just explained, you never know."

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